Still Scriptin'

     As Jack and I continue to develop all sides of this project, we are constantly nailing away at our script. It has some really nice progress to it- we have almost finished the heist scene entirely. 

Here is the first bit of the scene:

    There are little details within this snippet that are very important to me. For example, Ember and Ben are the first to speak in the scene. This works to continue portraying them as a pair when in reality, they aren't.

We hope to finalize the script this upcoming week. Updates to come :)

Meet The Cast

I think it's about time I introduce you to me and Jack's best friends and very talented actors who will be joining us in the production of our short film.

Meet Skyler. He is playing the role of Humphrey, the backup in the Heist. He only knows Christian, so he's pretty cold to everyone else, especially Joshua. He's a bit too selfish about needing money, so he will do whatever it takes. 

Next up, meet Adrian. He is playing the role of Joshua, Ben's best friend who wants a cut of the money. He brings Ember along to the plan. He's pretty nervous about the whole ordeal and is very easy to pick on. 

This is Connor. He is playing the role of Christian, who is the brawn of the operation. He’s doing all the dirty work in the heist. He is tough and ready for anything. He brings along Humphrey as backup. Doesn't seem like he has much to lose, he just needs some cash. 

Now for Gianna. Gianna is playing the role of Nicole, who is the 'in" for the heist. She is currently employed at the diner and is past coworkers with Jack, so she got strung along. She's in on the idea as she doesn't get paid much now. She's calm and logical and backs up Ember a few times. 

This is my project partner, Jack, who is playing the role of Ben. Ben is the leader of the plan. The diner fired him, so he gets the group together to rob it. He's pretty cold and unlikable, he simply means business. He gets in a scuffle with Ember for being useless and constantly shooting down his vision.

Lastly, this is me! I'm Keira and i'm going to be playing the role of Ember, who is strung along by Joshua to the planning. She isn't into it at all and interjects that the plan is unrealistic. She is deemed useless by Jack for shooting ideas down and eventually gets angry enough to show him up and become the lead distractor.

Title battle + Social media!

Hey, blog!

Happy week #3.

First things first, Jack and I have decided two titles to choose between.

Option #1: TILT- It's short. It's clean. It's cool. To "go on tilt" means to gamble recklessly and aggressively after a bad or improbable beat. This parallels to the utter recklessness of planning a heist after the bad beat of getting let go from a job, like our main character. 

Option #2: TAKE OUT- Also clean and short. Different meaning. Takeout could reference food from the restaurant that you see originally and also play as a double meaning to be taking-out funds from it (stealing).

* We decided we are going to finalize a title a bit later on after our script is finished in order to capture the complete essence the best.  

. . .

In the mean time, we have created a social media account for our short film! The username is obviously tentative due to our title battle, but the point is that the account is in existence! 

It's not done-up or anything yet, but we will start posting on it week by week as soon as we start production. We are going to post things like:

• Trailers and teasers
• Consumer surveys
• Behind-the-scenes
• In-the-making-of shorts
• Where to find the film
• Pretty promotion pictures (consistent fonts & colors, of course)

    This social media account will be a key factor for our film to connect to our target audience: young adults. Instagram is a popular platform for promotion and happens to be the perfect platform for our TA as opposed to Facebook which has an older target audience, and TikTok which leans more towards an informal posting style. 

    We will also follow similar accounts such as other short films or film companies such as A24, a popular independent company that has a similar target audience, and Smokehouse Pictures, the company behind Oceans 8, a popular heist-style movie that I previously studied. Also, we followed similar student-produced short films.

Some accounts we follow:

Group Meeting

 Hey Blog!!

    In today's Media class, we had a productive group meeting about our portfolio projects. We got paired into random groups and discussed some important developments in everyone's pieces. I specifically made progress on creating ideas for key art and publicity for the piece. The group helped me find a balance between portraying aspects of the romance aspects while keeping the heist genre prominent. 

• I could keep any art character centered: portraying possible romance or implying drama between two subjects.
• I could not focus on the characters entirely: possibly location, or discussion table to show active participation with a group planning to lean more towards heist.

    Members of the group also emphasized to me that the dominant genre doesn't always NEED to be identifiable from the key art alone, which was helpful.

    I also contributed some ideas to other group members like my classmate Leventhal, who I suggested a fun music video idea that he is going to use! 

    Overall, the meeting was both fun and insightful. It was great to see everyone bouncing ideas off each other and contributing to our projects. It's refreshing to collaborate with such a creative group of people who are all passionate about media. I'm excited to see how our individual ideas develop and come to life as we continue to work separately.

Sadly, we didn't snap a picture together. Just imagine 6 smiling faces sitting in a unsymmetrical desk clump. 

Polished Opening Scene

Through the program Fade In, Jack and I created a proper layout of the opening scene we had completed a first draft for.

Some things to note:

• I messaged all our friends that will join Jack and I in filming this piece and asked them what they were almost named by their parents. That is now their character name. Official cast reveal coming soon :)
• Jack really helped with the understanding of intention told through Embers character- to tell a compelling narrative whilst also being slightly unrealistic with the pursuit to entertain. 

The actual PDF of just the opening scene is pretty long so here's a snippet of about 1/5 of the scene, the climax:

Note a specific detail Jack and I decided to include is a small clip of of our later revealed crime committer. During the first watch, the viewer won't really note him, but he's detectable from the second watch.

We thought this was a cool thing to create- something that could have new aspects after more than 1 watch.

Script writing is going pretty well I'd say. 

:)

First Rough Draft: Opening scene

When working with a partner and dealing with the creation of something as visual as a literal film scene, sometimes the best way to get ideas out is to just write. Messy, ugly, unorganized, improper... Just write.

So, Jack and I did exactly that. 

Heres an improper, extremely dense, tasteless version of how Jack and I want the scene to go down:

First VERY rough draft of our opening scene: 

Film opens with an establishing shot of a diner. We see a girl there (Keira’s character) on the phone. She is pacing, not nervously, more waiting for something. We hear a phone answer as she stops walking. 

Keira: Hey. Ok. What song do you want me to play?

On phone voice: Such an insignificant detail. Think of the bigger picture here… 

(Hangs up the phone)

The scene shifts to a long shot of the inside of a diner. We see a hand reach and select a song. The rest of the audio goes silent, and we only hear the song being played. 

The shot shifts as we see a boy from the back sitting in a booth, alone (Jack’s character). There is a tracking shot moving towards the back of Jack as he looks up. The camera is moving at the speed that Keira would be walking towards him at. We see close ups and tracking shots of Keira walking as well.  The camera slows and we see Keira walk and sit down across from him. 

The camera is set on a close up of Keira, now staring at Jack. Shot reverse shot- Jack is confused. This happens a few times. 

*The song is playing- the first break in audio we hear is-

Jack: Keira why are yo-

Keira: (seemingly sarcastic) Sh. Don't talk! Just listen. 

Jack: What? I don't even know what you're-

Keira: You think I don't know? Come on Jack we both know why I asked you to talk. 

Shots start here of onlookers in the restaurant, briefly. 

Jack: Keira, I genuinely dont understand. Please just calm down-

Keira: You did not just tell me to calm down. 3 Years. Down the drain

Jack: What are you-

Keira: Do I not mean anything to you? Does this song not mean anything to you? What about this booth huh? Dont you remember? Anything we ever did together? Did it ever mean anything to you?

Jack: I didn't mean to it seriously was just a stupid mistak-

Keira: Save it. Some one else can here it. Everyone here knows what a damn cheater you are 

**Water is splashed in Jack’s face,

Chatter and Ooos are heard, Keira storms out… 

A little update on me : )

As it is crucial to document project growth on this blog, I think it's just as important to check up on personal growth as a creator from time to time...

Last year, I worked solo on my portfolio project. I did this out of desire for most creative control and straight-forward execution of my vision.

This year, I once again had a pretty clear vision of what I wanted my project to look like- but I felt like I needed to work with someone. Not for the reasoning of my idea was too much to handle alone, but I needed to force myself out of my comfort zone. 

Jack and I decided to work together because we are friends outside of class so it would be easy to meet up and communicate about project details. 

Im not gonna lie, I was super skeptical at first if I had made the right decision. It had nothing to do with Jack as a person, rather me. I'm super passionate about media, and I often feel the need to be in control. I wasn't sure if working with someone would be right for me. But, as Jack and I were doing the character breakdown, I was proved wrong instantly.

I started typing away describing the characters in detail. I was describing their characteristics and possible quotes they would say, encapsulating their personalities. Jack suggested I was getting ahead of myself and started strategizing why and how the characters were all gathered there together instead of just what kind of people they were. He came up with some brilliant explanations that then led the motive of our heist to fall into place.

This was such a simple moment in our project development that has already taught me something new about how to tackle such a large project.

It seems cliche but I am learning everyday, even through the little things.

So, thank you Jack for unintentionally teaching me how to be a more open-minded collaborator. :)