Today Bailey and I decided on what font we would use for our film opening. We first narrowed the options that we would choose from by going onto Microsoft Word, writing the title of the film, and scrolling through every font option, writing down the ones we felt were possible options. After scrolling through, we narrowed the options down to the following fonts: Chiller, Gloucester MT, Eras Demi ITC, Maiandra GD, Mistral, Niagara Engraved, Viner Hand ITC. In order to see the fonts best, we put them side by side, along with the Maroon like color that will likely be used in the final product. An image of the comparison can be seen below.
All of the options depicted have been chosen for their visually assertive and thriller-like qualities which best match our intended film-opening with a suspense/thriller genre. We are still deciding on the fonts chosen as they are all special in their own way, each with their own reasons to choose them. For example, the Chiller and Mistral fonts are appealing as they have a creepy aesthetic which fits the murderous intent of Homer. The fonts Gloucester MT and Maiandra GD both offer an off-balance (an idea presented by Bailey), yet creepy style which presents the off-balance mental state Homer is in.
In order to create the Bar that makes up a good portion of the intended shots, we plan to use either my or Bailey's garage and create a fake bar table. We could either build a quick table with wooden planks that we could purchase at Home Depot, or if we could acquire or move a desk into the garage to act as a bar table, that would be optimal. The only problem with the second option is that both Bailey and I don't have spare desks so we will likely go with the first option, even though it is more costly than the second option. Additionally, we will be using low and warm lighting in order to both capture a more realistic bar scene, as well as provide less visuals of the surroundings to make it easier to capture a bar on camera.
In addition to the bar, we plan to use one of our cars' trunks to film a small amount of shots. My car's trunk has much more room than Bailey's car's trunk, so we will likely use his car to capture a more claustrophobic feel. If we would use my car, it would be much more open and not create a sense of being captured and held against one's will when compared to Bailey's car's trunk. We will have a few shots of Peter being placed in the trunk and the a few shots from within the trunk in order to give the illusion that someone is in the trunk while the car is in motion, when we will not actually film from within the trunk during the car's movement. We have even thought about filming some shots within the trunk and then adding muffled car sounds to really capture from within the trunk and provide an illusion to the audience.
One of the shooting locations that Bailey and I discussed was a lamppost that I know of. The only problem with this lamppost is that it is slightly near a neighborhood and we may cause a disturbance considering we will have to shoot at night time. Thus, Bailey and I will have to put forth an effort to film in a quiet manner as to not disturb residents. I don't believe it will be too big of an issue since it is not directly adjacent to any houses, but if we are loud, we may be a nuisance to some people. Another issue with the lamppost is that it has a large road in front of it that may be hard to film in since cars will be coming every so often, leading us to mess up our shot. However, if we go late enough in the night, there will be an extremely small amount of cars that would pass by, allowing us to get the shot that we need. This detail is important as we plan to dolly backwards from a close-up on Homer's face. If cars are at a minimum, we can go slightly into the street to capture the shot that we need. In order to better understand the layout of this lamppost where a lot of the film will be taking place, I attached a Google Maps photo of the location below.
Google maps' photos are slightly outdated so at this point in time, there are more houses along the path depicted here.
Bailey and I were talking about the plot for the story and how we will tie it to the beginning and ensure that everything makes sense, even if we are not producing a fully fledged film. We encountered an issue with the intro of the story being the climax as it is not providing enough room for more interesting story to develop. The intro is revealing a major plot point and so we had to decide between reworking the intro, or changing the main plot. So we tried both, thinking of what to change of the intro first. We both felt satisfied with our intro thus far and didn't want to change it, so we went to thinking about possible plot elements to help make the intro much less important than it seems.
After the revisions, our plan is as follows: We are going to have a man with mental instability (due to causes that we will determine later) named Homer who is approached by a man named Peter, who is his friend or some sort of acquaintance to Homer. Peter begins talking to Homer to the point where Homer becomes aggravated, so he manages to forcefully put Peter in his trunk and drive away until Peter manages to escape the trunk. Once out, Peter begins to limp away at a slow speed, allowing Homer to catch up to him and beat him to a point near death. That would conclude the introduction that Bailey and I would film.
Peter is then planned to be extremely immobile and unable to speak, but his family and friends will try to bring justice to Homer, even though what occured is a result of mental issues. Bailey and I feel this will be a strong plot and provides a lot of flexibility in case of future revisions.
We also brainstormed a couple of different titles for the film, settling on the title "Aberration". The notes paper that we used can be seen below.
Bailey and I last class worked on the first page of the storyboard and decided to stray away from using "Breakfast in America". We were slightly hooked on the idea, but Bailey and I both thought it best to just pick a different idea so we are not wasting time waiting for the Universal Music Group to contact us back with the rights (of which we may not even obtain). So we decided to do a different plot for the intro. I offered Bailey the idea of shooting near a ominous lamppost that I know of, in which the idea spurred to create a mysterious, vague, and ominous opening. We aim to create a sense of confusion for the viewer by providing a part of the climax of the film, as well as scenes intended to be from the past.
We started the planning by "spitballing" different overall plots for the film, thinking about how we will make a larger story out of an intro to ensure that we don't create a short film as opposed to a movie opening. We started with a man that does not have his life sorted out for one reason or another (we plan to create a more in depth personality for him later) in a bar (we plan to make a set to look like a bar) being talked to by his friend, Peter, and the main gloomy character is not in the mood to talk. Peter, on the other hand, is energetic and trying to get conversation out of the main character. During the entire sequence, there will be cuts from current time and the bar scene (intended to be in the past). In the scenes meant to be in the present tense, there will be a constant zooming out at the lamppost mentioned earlier. Eventually, the body of Peter will be revealed with bloody hands of the main character.
We hope to make confusion and ambiguity of the plot with this idea in order to best present a movie introduction, providing viewers more of a reason to watch the remainder of the film.
The storyboard's first page that we created is posted below.
Yesterday, I had gotten into a group of four with my classmates that are not within my group. I gave then feedback on their project ideas, while they also gave me feedback on mine. Their critiques of Bailey and my idea was, first and foremost, the reliance of the song use. They asked about what we would do if we could not get the rights to the song, to which I replied, as stated in past blog entries, that we would either get different royalty free music that would suffice, or we would scrap the idea and create a new one. They seemed to be on board with that plan and so I think we will stay with it, still thinking about new ideas just in case.
Additionally, they stated that it would be good to establish some more tension. So with that suggestion, I made reference to the film Scream and the part of the film with the popcorn about to burst. The scene is below and the part I am referring to can be found within.
Since the theme of our film opening will pertain to breakfast, I proposed an idea of having an egg that begins to bubble after being cooked for too long, building tension similar to the Scream film opening. We would constantly cut to the eggs during moments of high intensity and keep the tension very high. We could accomplish a similar goal with a tea kettle or other breakfast foods or utilities if the egg idea does not suffice. My group seemed to really enjoy that idea. I will ask Bailey of his opinion and see if we can implement it into our film opening.
My group's critiques mostly ended there as I did not have too much to elaborate on due to the early stages of the project. I will likely get back into groups when there is much more material to divulge into, leading to more detailed and helpful criticism.
Bailey and I were discussing on what days we would be filming our project considering we have conflicting schedules. I work Friday-Sunday whilst he has his Saturday open and cannot work Sunday mornings, the time in which I would be available. Additionally, another possible actor for our film would only be available on Saturday, so I had to agree to open some of my Saturdays to satisfy their schedules. Since I also have activities to tend to on Saturday nights, it was decided that on Saturday mornings we would all meet. We plan to do this every weekend possible until the end of the project's shooting and possibly on more days during our upcoming Spring Break. This also worked best for Bailey as he already has his Saturdays open and has no issues with working during the morning. Now that we have a plan in place, I just have to inform my work of the temporary schedule change, one that may not go in effect, however, for another two weeks.
