Our Protagonist

 Meet The Main Character!!

HIIII BLOGG!! In this blog, I will be introducing the main character of our film's opening. As a part of most successful films, you need a character or have characters. As part of our opening, we chose to have a main character, a woman who is in her early 20s, maybe even late teens. Her name is Claire. We chose Claire because it felt like a cute name that would suit someone vulnerable, in our case, vulnerable to our mysterious figure. 

We want to build an image of Claire as a super sweet, naive, innocent girl. We don't want her to portray a mean girl personality, and that is something my partner Jake and I have wanted from the start. We don't really have a reason why; it's something that just felt right for both of us, so we agreed to make Claire have this sweet girl personality. We also would like our character to be an average woman's height, which is around 5 feet 2 inches, because to help convey that super, cute, sweet, innocent persona, we would like her to be shorter in height. In the next blog, I will be talking about the rise-en-scene elements used to further build Claire's character!!

Next Step!!

 Storyboarding!!!

As part of our next step in the project, after we have planned out the plot, is to create a storyboard! A storyboard is intended to be a basic visual representation of how the shots are laid out and explained, creating a template to aid during the filming process. A storyboard isn't meant to be perfect or exactly how the film is going to look. Think of it like a sketch of a drawing; it isn't the final product, but it's almost an outline or just an idea of what the final product is going to be. 

These are our storyboard drawings, and as you can see, they aren't very detailed; however, they build a general idea of what is going to happen or just a general structure of how we would like to film our opening. I do not have the greatest artistic abilities; however, I use this as an opportunity to do more in the descriptive part underneath the drawing itself. And that portion, I talked about what shot was used in what the character will be doing during that shot. Something I did not mention in the storyboard is that in the shots where the woman is looking up from her phone and during the extreme longshot of the figure, we are going to utilize panning to allow the audience to feel as if they are watching the scene happen in real time. Meaning, we will not be cutting in between her looking up from her phone and then a shot of the figure itself. It will be all one fluid shot. This also allows for the Thai back to the active audience theory because the audience will feel as if they are a part of the shot, as it will feel as if it is happening in real time. 

I said in the final few shots, the characters of the woman and the park ranger will be conversing; however, we have yet to come up with the final script for what they will be saying to each other. We do have a general idea that the Ranger will startle her by placing his hand on her shoulder and will ask her what she's been doing here so late all by herself, especially with this mysterious figure that has been seen within the park. Another thing we would like to do is have the Ranger offer to walk her out. This could help build that suspense because at this point, the figure would be gone, and now it's just the woman in the Ranger.

Our Final Idea!!!

 Thought, after Thought

After being able to talk with Mrs. Stoklosa after many nights of brainstorming and butting heads with Jake about different ideas, we finally have a concrete idea. We agreed that we were leaning towards the genre of horror, and in our opening, it consists of paranoia. However, this is a film OPENING, not a full film, so we have chosen to cut/end the opening at a part during the scene that keeps the audience thinking, but they will never know. 

To open our scene, we are going to have a woman coming out of the forest, where it then cuts to a close-up of her phone as she receives a bunch of messages implying that she just got out of a hike within the forest and now has service. These messages will consist of her friends and family asking her if she is okay because there has been sight of a mysterious person or figure within the park she was hiking in. She responds, saying she is okay, but she is asking questions about who this person is or what this person is doing in the park. As she is waiting for a response, the camera will pan to a mysterious figure underneath the street light to create that backlit effect to make the figure's face unknown. The camera will continue panning between the woman and the figure to demonstrate that this is all happening within real time. As the woman calls out to the figure and gets no response, she gives up and believes it's just in her head when, all of a sudden, a park ranger approaches her. The park Ranger asked who she was calling out to, but when she went to tell him about the figure, the figure was gone. The park Ranger begins to tell her how it is late, and they're having sightings of a mysterious person within the park, and he believes she should head home. The woman agrees and begins to leave. However, my partner and I are stuck on where to end the opening. Option one is to end the opening right there after talking to the park Ranger and she was on her way out, or option two, where we show the figure still there, but it's a very quick shot of the figure and then cuts. I am leaning towards option two because I feel as if ending it with the short shot of the figure rebuild that builds suspense and paranoia. My partner is leaning towards option one so once we figure out which ending we choose to do, or if we come up with a completely different ending, it will be documented in one of my later blogs!!

Media Theory!

 Theories of Media 

HI BLOG!! As part of our media context essay, we are instructed to incorporate Media Theories in relation to our case studies.  We were given a paper listing various Media Theories and theorists. When developing our film case study, as part of the sections to research, we were asked to research a Media Theory that relates to the film and explain how it relates. For our film opening, we are tasked with selecting a media theory we'd like to incorporate and explaining why we have chosen it for our intended purpose. 

After further thought and research, my partner Jake and I agreed that the best Media Theory to include is the Active Audience Theory. The Active Audience Theory by Stuart Hall claims audiences are not passive recipients of media content but actively engage with, interpret, and create meaning from it. This theory emphasizes the role of audience members in shaping their media experiences, highlighting their ability to select, negotiate, and resist messages based on their own backgrounds and contexts. In other words, audiences are more likely to want to consume media where they feel as if they can interpret what comes next or feel engaged. We are going incorporate this with our plot idea with the idea of this mysterious figure. You may be asking yourself how a mysterious figure is going to make the audience feel as if they can interpret the scene, well heres how! During this part of the scene, a woman is going to see a figure in the distance of the parking lot, but it will be backlit, so you will not be able to see the face, only the silhouette. This builds that eerie suspense, with the woman being all by herself in an empty parking lot with a creepy figure under the street light, which will allow the audience to start thinking about what could possibly happen next. Will the figure attack her? Will it start creeping closer? Is it someone she knows playing a prank? This is an example of Active Audience Theory, which is getting the reader to feel engaged in the film, well, in our case, the opening. 

Here are some images of what we are trying to acheieve of this figure that is meant to get the audience engaged. 

Group Meeting

 1st Group Meeting 

Hello blog!! To start off the 3rd week of working on our portfolio project, in class, we did our first Group Meeting. First off, I want to tell you about the group I was in. It was me and 7 other classmates: Trisha, Samuel, Christian, Avery, Ethan, Meliyah, and Sonakshi. They were probably one of the best groups I could've had to start off my first group meeting of working on this project. Everyone was so kind, helpful, and attentive. 

To begin the group meeting, we all went around telling eachother their genre they are trying to demonstrate and what their initial ideas are. Samuel is working with a group of 2 other peers, where he stated they are trying to demonstrate a hospital operation while a robbery is taking place. We all agreed his idea could work really well if filmed correctly and made well, where we also suggested to him some shots and angles he could utilize for this plot. Christian went next, where he talked about his group and his film idea of beginning the scene with a group of friends in a car when they spot a mysterious bag in the road, and when they open the bag, they get sent into a trance. Because Christian had more of his plot already thought out, it was much easier to provide him with more feedback and help. I gave christian and idea for when to cut off the opening to make it cliffhanging. I suggested he cut it off while the camera is at a low angle of the group of teens looking into the bag, so it builds a sense of wonder in the audience of "what is in the bag", and then that's where it cuts. He was very appreciative of all our suggestions to further improve his opening, and that's another thing I loved about my group, we were all very open to people's opinions, honest criticum and help! 

However, of course everyones plot and ideas were great, but one person's plot that really stood out to me was Trisha's. Trisha's plot is that she wants to base her plot on a more modern or futuristic technological paranormal story about a woman or girl who has many different types of technology within her house. This includes her TV, her iPhone, an Alexa, and anything else technology-wise that she can program to do what she needs to build her plot. Her main idea is for everything to start malfunctioning against her; however, it is settle and makes her second-guess whether her technology is really trying to ruin her. I told her I think her idea is very smart and creative because of the world we are living in currently, with everyone being digital natives and the world being centered around Artificial Intelligence (AI) and technology. Her idea reminded me of an episode of the show 9-1-1, during which a woman is spying on her ex-boyfriend through all of his surveillance cameras and AI devices all throughout his entire house. However, while he goes to shower, she begins messing with the temperature through the app that's connected to that device in his house. However, because she keeps messing with it, it begins to malfunction, and the temperature keeps rising, and he begins to burn in the shower, meaning it kinda worked against him, like what Trisha is trying to portray in her opening. I recommended she watch that scene of the episode to allow her to kinda see a different perspective on a plot she is similarly trying to create. Overall, we all praised her for her super creative idea for her opening and provided her with loads of feedback. 

Now, for my ideas, as my turn came around during our circle. I told my group that my partner and I don't entirely have a concrete idea of what we are going to do, but we do have a small idea. I told my circle group all about how we want to utilize the Tree Tops to create a thriller or horror opening. I admit that we were leaning a little bit more towards horror because that is something Jake and I both love and have seen many films in that genre, making it easier for us to have an understanding of what we can do to pull this off, even though our teacher stated to kinda stay away from horror because it is very commonly used. I also told them some of the idea of a girl running through the woods and trying to figure out whether to start it off as she is running from something or she is just running because she likes to run, but there is something there she doesn't know about. They thought our idea of using the Tree Tops is smart espically because of how it looks at night, and would be a great way to portray that darkness in relation to horror. Ethan also suggested we research more horror openings and see if we can find more inspiration because he believed that the idea of running from something may be commonly used, but the idea of using the setting of the forest was a great idea. So I am very open to researching a little more, but tomorrow when I am in class discussing with my partner, we then hope to have a concrete idea so we can get up to pace and make sure we don't fall behind espicallt when the time for filmimg come, we need to be ready. 

In The Trees

 The Tree Tops 

Initial Ideas:

After my partner Jake and I had been doing our research on openings with the genres we are interested in portraying, we began brainstorming, but we agreed lets come up with a setting for the opening and then try to build a story or plot with that setting. Jake has been pretty stuck on the idea of a dark forest, which I think is good due to the fact that we are going for a horror or thriller opening. Now the part we struggled with is living in Weston, Florida, where are we going to find a forest? So we had to think outside the box, which really meant outside of Weston. That's when I remembered a while back I went to a friend's house who lives in Davie, Florida, and she took me to this big forest area by her house, which is really a park with a big tree house, a lake, and trails everywhere hidden by the trees. It is known as Tree Tops Park. 

 This is an image of one of the many trails that The Tree Tops has to offer for us. These trails, especially at night, can be used to build that eerie feeling or sense of thrill if utilized correctly. 

                    This is a picture of the tree house that The Tree Tops has available. The tree house is relatively old, but still sturdy and well-maintained. The tree house provides Jake and I many more potential plot ideas bc not only is it all, but it also has that old run-down look to it, which can build off of that scary or thrilling feeling. 

Last but not least, The Tree Tops also has a lake that includes a wooden boardwalk, also known as a footbridge. The boardwalk leads to the middle of the lake and can be used as a fishing spot. This is another aspect of the park that can be well used to develop a horror or thriller plot. 

Overall, The Tree Tops has so much to offer for filming, and is a great place to let creativity run wild in terms of the number of different plots or stories we can develop. My initial thoughts before really brainstorming a plot or discussing our idea with our teacher, Mrs. Stoklosa, I am thinking about opening the scene with someone running, however, it would be running away from something or even going on a peaceful run abloivous of everything outside of their headphones. I feel this is a great way to build curiosity or chaos from the start, which is something I stated I wanted to do in my previous post. Adding on to the idea of someone running, they could run to the boardwalk, where there would be something watching from the water or even someone following them, making them trapped since they are in the middle of a lake. As you may be able to see, there are so many ideas for stories to develop within this plot, and I hope my partner and I take the most advantage of this to make a very good film opening. 

Credit Sequencing

 Credits! Credits! Credits!

In this blog, I will be discussing credits with you. In your head, you may be thinking "pttf credits are the boring part of the opening that just tell you who's in the movie, BORING". But no credits are actually more than just the characters/actors, and they can actually help develop the film. The credits also include key cast and crew members, typically highlighting the production companies, major stars, director, writers, and producers. See! Credits are more than just a list; they are HONORABLE MENTIONS. Now I'm going to talk to you about my research on credits and the different techniques that filmmakers use to include their credits in their films.

Napoleon Dynamite (2004) 

Napoleon Dynamite is a very funny comedy coming-of-age film that was released in 2004. It is about a teenage boy named Napoleon who is just a nerdy teen trying to live life and deal with all the bullies at school while living with his grandmother and having a technology addicted bother. This film has a very interesting yet one of the most creative ways of integrating its credits into its opening.

As you can see, the producer used food plates, highschool ID's, and library book slips as a way to include their credits, which is such a fun and smart way to do it, as the objects help to build that nerdy, funny tone of the movie itself. As I stated in my previous blog, including the credits on a blank screen wastes seconds, although this doesn't quite introduce the characters on provide dialouge it is useful bc it sets a comedic tone. This may not be exactly how I would integrate my credits into the opening; however, I still feel this is an honorable mention of the creativity of the producers. 

MAMA (2013)

Mama is a supernatural horror movie that is about two young sisters found feral in a cabin after being abandoned for five years. The girls are adopted by their uncle and his girlfriend, but they bring with them a vengeful, protective spirit they call "Mama". Within the opening scene, the credits are displayed in a way that provides some context for the movie itself. 

As you can see from the opening, the credits are displayed over what looks to be children's drawings; they are not happy drawings. These drawings of what seem to be little girls provide context for what these little sisters may have encountered. This is used to provide context while also including credits in a way that doesn't seem wasteful of the 2 minutes my partner and I have to make our own film opening. This is a great example of a way that I may include in my film opening if our idea aligns and it goes well with the plot or theme of my opening.