My Pitch

Today I pitched my idea to the group, and got some good feedback. My pitch and the way I presented was complimented, and this has given me a real confidence boost on my ability to pull together my work and communicate it to the class, or potential clients, in a successful and clear way. Especially considering I used to feel sick just standing up in front of the class.

In my pitch I introduced the class to the phrases "diagetic" and "non-diagetic" which I learnt when I studied Creative Media. They are the film terms for sound from within or implied to be from within the scene (diagetic) (can be from the original recording or added in later, e.g. an alarm clock sound in a bedroom scene), and sound that is not within or not implied to be within (e.g. mood music, a narrator).

At the end of my pitch, I asked the group a question. I've been unsure on what direction I'd like my short film to go;

1. The room gets tidied with no problems
2. The room does not get tidied in time
3. The room is tidied, only to be ruined at the end
4. Consistently failing at tidying the room (e.g. constantly dropping things, tripping over etc)

The general consensus was a mixture of 1 & 4. I agree, and I think I'll be going in this direction. Now that I've thought about it, number 1 seems too boring, and number 3 seems too cliche & expected and wouldn't be as funny.

In my pitch I shared a quick 4 second video containing a few of my practise shots as I try to explore with my camera work.

Idea Development: What direction should I take?

The idea that I am now leaning towards using is the 'tidying a bedroom' idea, but there are a variety of directions I can take it.

The general idea
Girl sees note on the fridge, reminding her to tidy her bedroom by 10am as someone is coming over. She looks to the clock, sees it's 5 to 10, and she only has 5 minutes to tidy her room. She bolts upstairs, and starts to tidy her room.

This is where I'm stuck, I have a number directions I can take the story;

• She manages to tidy the room on time, everything is perfect, happy ending etc.
• This would be the easiest to do. The shots would consist of her successfully completing different tasks in the room and we would at the end see her succeeding - clean carpet, bed made, smiling faces etc.
• She is halfway through tidying, but doesn't manage to get it tidy in time.
• A half tidied room, would result in a build up of tension in the film on false hope, that is released through failure. Reasonably amusing. 
• She manages to tidy the room but it's ruined at the last second. My main vision for this is a dog bolting upstairs with muddy paws and ruining the whole thing.
• Visually is quite amusing, unsure whether it's too cliche/expected though.
• Her attempts to tidy the room are useless, it ends up looking exactly the same at the end than it did at the start - a pointless attempt.
• Quite funny. Would turn the whole film towards the comedy direction. I could show her failure throughout the film or leave it till the end as a 'reveal'.

I have already storyboarded the film as her simply cleaning the room, so I will now experiment further with these ideas, do some more storyboarding and when it comes to the pitch next week I will present this question to the class to find out their opinions.

My Idea

I've come up with a short, one line synopsis that explains my idea for my 15-20 second film.

A film following the rush of tidying a bedroom when you’ve only a few minutes to spare.

The film will show the panic of trying to rush to tidy your bedroom within the shortest amount of time possible. This film will be filmed within the confinement of a bedroom, which allows me to focus on shooting shots that have a sense of continuation between them. By restricting the story to one room I am hoping it will allow me to explore with as many camera angles and shots within that room and then strengthen the story and the feeling of panic with the actor being surrounded by mess.

I have made note of the sorts of sounds that I would like to use in my film.

• Spray can sound
• "squeaky clean" 
• Feet running on wooden floor
• Running from carpet to wooden floor
• Sweeping - wooden floor
• Hoover
• A fall onto wooden floor
• Panicked breathing
• Plug being plugged into wall
• Creaking
• Scrape against wall
• Clock, tick tock etc
• Cloth rubbing together

A quick Google brought up a list of royalty free sound effect websites, but I am yet to explore these further and look into their usage licenses; freesound.org, soungle.com, freesfx.co.uk, soundbible.com.

Advertisements

There are tons of advertisements on television that play between each show and during the breaks, but they do not last for too long. On each advert break for a show each lasts for an average of 30 seconds. There's currently a maximum amount of minutes per hour that adverts are allowed to be shown on a channel - 12, with an average of 9 minutes.  This generally means that the channel will obviously want to try and squeeze as many adverts into that time frame as possible, so generally none are over the 1 minute mark and most are around 30 seconds long, with a lot being around the 15 - 20 second mark. So, I decided to look into them.

Advertisement lengths by Ofcom

http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/broadcasting/reviews-investigations/rada/

I saw an advert by KitKat on the TV and noticed the fast cuts, so I looked it up.

The car chase happens for about 25 seconds, and in that time features around 25-30 cuts (it's hard to count them!) What I really like about it is the use of sound. There's a slightly different tone to the car engine on each shot. Part of this is to show the difference from a shot from inside a car, and from outside (as that will sound different anyways), but a lot of the changes happen simply when a different angle of the car (from outside) is shown. I like this, as it seems to increase the pace of the film, provide a sense of continuation and create a tense feeling that goes along with the car chase. This has lead me to think about maybe using sound in my movie to create a beat/soundtrack. Each shift in tone of the engine put together builds up a rhythm/beat, and I like the idea of creating this in  my film.

From looking at other car chases I have noticed that the quick cuts/fast pace is pretty much standard, especially in more recent films (e.g. Fast & Furious, Drive etc).

This advert by Lurpak users a narrator, and a slight soundtrack but uses the diagetic sound from within the shots, and timely editing to create a beat.

This advert by Weetabix uses quick cuts to contrast with the slower, longer shots to create humour. There are 4 members of the family, who each have a short, quick cut sequence. One of the moments I noticed immediately was the sound effects at 35 seconds in, when the mother is picking up clothes from stairs. Instead of using the standing "clothes being picked up" sound (which isn't exactly loud, dramatic or exciting...) they have chosen to use a slightly "woosh" sound, which I think is really successful. It helps to strengthen her point of her constantly and quickly picking up the clothes her kids leave around and makes the advert a bit more engaging and humorous. The sound enhances the jump cut shot which shows her picking up clothing after clothing.

The Paper Kites - Quick Cut Video

The Paper Kites - Young
Whilst this video is not 15-20 seconds long, and is a music video, I still found it interesting. It's a quick cut video containing over 4000 images.

The Paper Kites: Young from Oh Yeah Wow on Vimeo.

This video got me further interested in transitions, and how I can use them with quick, fast cuts to create links from one shot to the next and in turn display a journey.

In this video, each shot is shown for less than a quarter of a second, but it builds the basis for the next one and in turn there is (whilst not seamless) a transition from one to the next that we can make sense of. It's almost like stop-motion. Below shows how each shot shows how someone lifts up their head. 

From watching this, I am interested in doing this in the larger scale. It's inevitable my film will have quick cuts - it has to have 30 fit within a maximum of 20 seconds - but I don't want that to mean that will have a detrimental effect on the storyline. I want to use the quick cuts to my advantage by linking each shot to one another in some way. I could do this through the location, the content, linking sounds, camera techniques (e.g. whip pan) etc.

Developing Understanding & Initial Ideas

In order for me to come up with more ideas and understand the task further, I broke down the brief some more;
- 30 edits - (30 cuts), must be dynamic, will be fast paced
- 15-20 seconds - an intro and end screen is optional, but is in addition to the 20 seconds.
- A 'journey' - travelling, accomplishing a task, emotionally
- Storyboarding - need a variety of shots to build 30 edits
- Sound - sound effects, no soundtrack, royalty free

I then started to think about the types of journey that I could have, under the category of an "everyday action". These included Food (ordering food, baking, being at a restaurant), actual physical journeys (to college, work, going on a run, going home), Cleaning (tidying, against the clock, getting it perfect) and Getting Ready (e.g. doing hair/makeup).
When I thought about how I could produce these ideas, I started to see a problem with some of them. I felt that the ideas that involved ordering food, baking, making tea, applying make up etc would confine me to the one spot. For example, the ordering of food would literally involve someone on the phone talking, and applying make up would restrict my variety of shots to of someones face and close ups of each piece of make up. I didn't like how this would restrict me, and felt it would probably result in a film that wasn't very interesting because the subject wasn't in the first place.

Then, when I looked further into shooting an actual, physical journey, I realised it would do the opposite of restricting me. There are so many important "checkpoints" to cover on say, a journey to work or college, that I'd end up having just a few shots for each. I felt it would spread the story and shots out too thin, and wouldn't allow room for me to experiment with more interesting shots - they'd just be the standard, basic shots required to just portray a sense of the story.

This is what is now drawing towards the "cleaning" category, because it will allow me to work within one room and explore that room with a variety of shots. I may think of another type of story that I could contain within a room, but I'm now going to start storyboarding/doodling a few ideas for shots and brainstorming some shots I could use in each of these categories to see if I could make any of them work.

Beat You - Existing 15 Second Film

Beat You

 

Beat You from 15SecFilms on YouTube

This is another example of a 15 Second Film. It's titled 'Beat You' and follows 2 men - one of which that has an obsession with winning and being the best at aspects of everyday life. Until he finds something he's not the best at - fighting. 

The film does not follow a journey in the logical sense. Like my previous example ("Sounds of New York") we do not see the transitions between shot to the next literally (e.g. someone is at work, they get in a car, they get home) but we feel a journey through the feeling we get from the film. The repetitive use of the sound "Beat you!" builds irritation, leading to a climax at the end of the film - he loses and gets punched in the face. 

15 seconds is all that it takes to explain this story. It's a montage of different, but very similar events happening at different times in different places. The time constraint has strengthened the film, as it squeezes a repetition into a short amount of time, which makes it more irritating but also funnier. I find it interesting how in just 15 seconds the creator has managed to get me on the side of the guy that keeps on losing and to sympathise with him. 

This film is less focused on intriguing and interesting cinematography, but still looks good. The shots are more kinetic - they are off-tripod mostly and focused on the movements and actions of the actors more than the location they are in. A lot of the shots are wide, with quick pans that incorporate 2 shots into one take, rather than cutting from one to the next. There's a lot of shift in focus, from one actor to the next, which you can see below. 

The initial focus on the actor slowly sipping his drink quickly allows us to then acknowledge the contrast to the guy next to him who's practically inhaling his drink. Within under a second we understand what's going on, so this amount of time is all we need.

Movements by the camera allow for longer shots that are not boring. They are paired off with some shorter, quicker shots, and this allows for some short pauses and breaks in the pace of the film. At 7 seconds in, the 2 men are at urinals, and the camera pans to enhance what's supposed to be a funny moment. 

This has led me to think about transitions, and how they can be used to suggest time passing or links from one shot to the next. Whilst I am unsure about using longer shots and pairing them off with much shorter shots to make up my 30 cuts, I am interested in using techniques like 'whip-pans' to create a tense, fast paced feeling for my film. If I can secure a clear understanding on each shot, the use of a whip pan may enhance my film and allow me to fit a lot of meaning into my 15-20 seconds.

Sound effects are used in this film alongside dialogue (which is mainly the repetitive use of the phrase "Beat you!"). Mainly, the sounds are diegetic.

Diegetic sound: Sound who's source is visible on screen. E.g. the sound of television show when there is a television that is on, the sound of an alarm clock going off if an alarm clock is in the shot/scene. 

Non-diegetic sound: Sound that's not actually there or has not been implied to be there. This could be mood music, a narrators voice or added sound effects (particularly those that don't really make sense -  e.g. a children's TV show, someone jumps and there is a "boing" sound).

There is an example of non-diegetic sound at approx. 14 seconds. It is only heard for the duration of the shot - so less than a second - but it is not implied and is rather obvious that it's not coming from "within that scene". It's a type of mood sound-effect - it suggests annoyance and anger, where the feeling may not have been so clear if it were not there (e.g. how much understanding can we get from someone turning their head?).

From this 15 second film I have begun to think about camera work and how I can use it to create transitions which then have an effect on the pace of my film. I've also started to further think about sound and how it can be used not only to build a sense of environment and iterate what is on screen but also to portray a feeling or meaning that is either not clear enough on screen or would work well if it was enhanced further (e.g. comedic effect). 

Sounds of New York - Existing 15 Second Film

The very first point of call for my research was to look at existing 15 second films. Part of this was to reassure myself that it was possible to create a film that worked and only needed 15-20 seconds to tell a story or convey a message or feeling. I went to the website Vimeo, and searched for "15 second films".

Sounds of New York

Sounds of New York from Kofa on Vimeo.

This film is 15 seconds long, and follows a persons journey through New York. It focuses on the sounds that they come across along the way, and uses them as the soundtrack for the film.

In the 15 seconds that this film lasts, there are 19 cuts - there are 19 different shots. So, a little less than what I am aiming for, but then I do have an extra 5 more seconds (up to 20 second) to play with. Through these 19 shots the creator has managed do two things - document a journey and make the sounds an equal part of the story as the image. This is exactly what I want to aim to do.

It also does not feel like 15 seconds. When you first think of 15 seconds, you acknowledge that it's not a very long time. We're used to going to the cinema and watching a 90 minute film, perhaps even films over 2 hours long, so we learn to assume that we need that amount of time to even begin to tell a story. A 90 minute film has got the time to play with long, extended scenes, but a 15 second film doesn't. Despite this, each cut in this film feels natural. It doesn't seem as if any shot is on screen for too long - or too short - and the sounds that we hear help to edge the viewer towards an understanding for what's on screen much quicker, which allows for faster cuts.

Even though each shot is on screen for less than a second, each is framed and shot beautifully and their is no loss in focus on cinematography.

This film highlights the importance of good cinematography, in fact. The "rule of thirds" is prominent, and helps to give the viewer an immediate understanding of what their seeing as well as making it pleasing to look at. The use of focus and depth of field again enhances our understanding of what we're looking at. In the shot above on the left, it is clear to us immediately we should acknowledge the musician, not the passers-by, because of the focus on him. On the left, the girl takes up most of the shot, so she is immediately obvious, but we are forced to look at her expression because of the use of focus by the cameraman. As the film is so short, it's important that each shot means something and is very easy to process, because it's not going to be on screen for long. 

The use of sound in this film is very important, as that's what it's about. When watching, it doesn't feel like there are any added sound effects - nothing is too dramatic, no sound is really out of place or not synchronised and each sound flows nicely from one another. A reason for this is how each sound is from the same environment - New York. The sounds that were recorded during the filming of each shot seem to be the same sounds we are hearing, so the movement from one shot to the other helps build up a feeling of the environment we are seeing. It's an organic, natural progression from one to the other.

What I've learnt from this 15 second film is the importance of good cinematography, and how, despite the short length of the film, it's vital to ensure a clear understanding of each shot for your viewer. Without this clear understanding, you lose the basis and point of having such a short, fast paced film as there is no meaning to it - it's just a bunch of fast cuts. I've also learnt how sounds and the types of sounds you use can have a large effect on the meaning of your film too. This film is quite calming and low key, despite the slightly industrial and city-vibes it has, because of the images that they have been paired with. Each sound follows from the other and tells a story within itself.

AF105: Time Based Media

Short Sharp Shock
New Brief - my understanding

Plan, shoot and edit a 15 - 20 second film that depicts a journey of some sort. This could be as simple as making breakfast or travelling to college.

This film must contain at least 30 edits - 30 cuts.

This film can have a 3 second title and end screen, but this does not count towards the 15-20 seconds.

Sound effects can be used in the film to add effect and dynamism, but a soundtrack must not. (e.g. do not create a music video). All sound effects that are used must be noted down and an asset register must be created that documents their source and any usage licenses that apply to them. Any sounds that are used must be Royalty free.

In order to produce this film, you must analyse a variety of different films and create a number of storyboards that experiment with different ideas. You must submit one, full developed storyboard in a .PDF format.

Continue to update this blog alongside the project, and use it to document progress on the project and present any research.

Crit

I displayed my work to the class and got some feedback. The overall response was very positive. 

I received the most amount of feedback on my book cover, the majority of which was very positive. They felt that my design was very well executed, with really good use of Illustrator. The general consensus was that the cover is a successful one.

The main critique I received was the combination of colours between the skyline and the fencing - they felt that the fencing slightly merged into the skyline. I understand what they mean, although when I look at my design on any computer screen it does not do this, and this may have been down to the colours the projector portrays, which are not quite rich enough. I will take this on board though as I must be careful not to choose colours that are borderline clashing, as when it is viewed on different screens the design looks a lot different. Considering my design is so reliant on it's colour scheme, in places on my cover (e.g the fencing and the skyline) I am risking it having a detrimental effect on the overall design. 

Another concern was the legibility of the authors name on the spine.  I agree with this and understand their concern, but am going to stick with how I have it. If I change the colour to white or cream, it will clash with the sky behind. If I change it to Red, it will ruin my design style of having only 1 element in the blood red on each side of the cover. I've specifically stuck this to drawn attention to certain elements  on each page. I cannot move the authors name down as the penguin logo will obstruct it. So, I'm going to keep it where it is.

When I displayed my poster on the screen, I made the mistake of not installing the font that I had used onto the presentation computer. This meant the fonts that appeared on the screen were not the ones that I had chosen. The crit still went well though, and the class actually liked the font that it changed to.

I asked if they felt the poster was too text heavy, and they said no. This is useful as I was worried I had written too much, especially in the very bold, heavy font I have chosen. The class were impressed with how I featured the cover on an actual book, and said this strengthened it and defined it as an actual poster rather than just a copy of a book cover thats been enlarged. 

The only slight concern from one person was the dark blue patch in the top left corner. They felt as it was the only element that was the colour, it was slightly detracting. The class disagreed, and said they felt it added to the realism of the sky, so I decided to leave it as it was. I like how it highlights the border  that I have placed around the poster. 

Further look into Branding Guidelines

I decided I wanted to make my branding guideline as one poster, that explains the rules of my designs. I found the following example, and this has inspired me to do mine in this style.

http://studio-ly.co.uk/Brand-Guideline-poster

My branding guidelines need to be straight forward to look at understand, and I like the way there is a design featured centrally and then the rules of the design are floating around it. 

Branding Guidelines: What are they?

As part of the Visual Communication Brief, I need to create a Branding Guideline to submit with my book cover design.

We went through the basics of a "Branding Guideline" in class and then I went home and researched further into existing Branding Guidelines, as well as seeking out some advice on what to include in a Brand Guideline.

This website was extremely helpful, and provided me with links to example Branding Guidelines from a number of well known companies:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/07/21/designing-style-guidelines-for-brands-and-websites/

I've chosen to reference the Channel 4 "Style Guide" to explain my research on Branding Guidelines.

Colour

Channel 4's colour guidelines

http://www.channel4.com/about_c4/styleguide/downloads/C4StyleGuide1.1.pdf

The above is taken from Channel 4's publicly available "style guide", and defines the colours that should be used on their material. This applies across the board, on their website, adverts and any other promotional material.

They've included the CYMK, RGB, Hexadecimal and Pantone details of each colour, as well as featuring the colour itself. This not only gives a visual representation of each colour, but ensures each colour can be applied to any format - screen or print - across platforms.  

This has been presented in an aesthetically pleasing way using a rainbow-effect style gradually moving through each shade. This can easily be printed off and used as a simple reference guide for someone needing to use it to create material for Channel 4. 

Font

Channel 4 has it's own font, and it has referenced to this font in their Branding Guideline. Then they have provided examples of each style that can be applied to the font to create different variations and defined when and where these variations should be used.

The example above shows the 'C4 Headline' style. Channel 4 has defined where the font should be used (large titles, extensively on posters) the size the font should be (14pt and above) any specific design elements that apply to the font (e.g. when used in print, the only type face that should be in a box) and any other rules to follow (Always use correct upper and lower case lettering). 

The entire alphabet and varying symbols have been used to show what each letter/symbol looks like when the typeface is applied to it, which like the Colours section provides a visual reference for the user. 

Also defined is the minimum type size, suitability for each type style, "leading" (distance between lines of type) for both Headlines and Body text and how to calculate that. 

Text colour is also defined, and any allowances that can be made are mentioned too. Otherwise, you should follow the rules defined in the "colour" section of the guideline.

Writing Copy

Even though it may not apply to my Branding Guideline, another common thing is to define any "writing copy" that should be followed when designing things for a brand.
Specifics Include:

• When to use upper or lower case
• Variations of writing the company/title name
• How are numbers written? E.g. numbers 1 - 10 to be written out ("one", "seven") and anything further to be written in figures ("19"). Specifics within this - e.g. as above "All numbers at the beginning of sentences should be written out".
• How are dates written?
• Punctuation specifics.

Logo

Defined is an explanation of the logo, a minimum size it should be displayed for print (10mm) and web (30 pixels deep) and a maximum size (none). 

The position of the logo is explained, and an example is shown. An explanation of that decision is also provided.

Rules on the display of the logo are explained - can it be edited in any way? can the user add an outline? can the user incorporate text into the logo? Answers any questions about the manipulation of the logo.

My Proposed Poster

• I decided to feature the "physical book"to clarify it was an advertisement for book, rather than a TV show or film.
• Hierarchy - the logo is the biggest and at the top, featuring the sparingly used Red because I wanted that to be the very first thing seen, using the knife to draw peoples attention. The knife then points down to the book, and the text can then be read.
• The feature of the tagline (provided by Penguin) at the very bottom. I felt it summed up the book well and in a short amount of words, so was useful to use, and despite it's bottom position still stands well against the background with the contrasting red.
• I went for a border as it framed the poster well and allowed me to have the book "sit" on something that contrasted it well. The brown of the cityscape was clashing with the brown on the actual book. 
• Steered away from featuring the fencing. If I featured the fencing, I'd have to use the same technique of the newspaper hanging, and then the poster would be a complete copy of the book cover. 

The A2 Poster

The next piece I need to design is the A2 poster. Before I do this, I decided to have a quick look at existing book promotion posters to get an idea of what sort of content that have and how they are designed.

What I noted about book promotion posters:

• Majority feature the book being promoted - e.g. a picture of the physical book.
• Text along the lines of "on sale here", "available to buy now"
• Like all posters, features imagery relevant to the book, following the chosen design style.
• Mention of the author - are the well known? emphasis on that
• Same features as majority of promo posters, just for a book. 

When in Waterstones, I took some pictures of the posters they have up in there. 

• Not all feature a picture of the physical book - but there is mention of the words "novel", "book" etc. 
• Being featured in a book store, these will automatically be taken as adverts for books.
• Recommendations: "read it, and you'll never be quite the same again" - gives someone a reason to read the book.

My Proposed Book Cover

This is my proposed book cover for "The Outsiders". Personally, I think it's very successful.

My aim for this cover was to communicate the idea of Gang Culture and it's prominence in a big city (In the book, it's Tulsa), and how it divides a community like it has the one in The Outsiders.

• The fence represents separation and division.
• The logo represents a gang sign, how it's stamped onto a newspaper with disregard for what was already there.
• The knife represents violence and suggests the cause of the division in community. 
• Red can be taken as a violent and brutal colour, due to its immediate relation to Blood. It is sparingly used to colour aspects I would like to drawn attention to. For this reason, it is used on just one place on the front cover - on the knife.
• The rips inside the paper can be taken as both wear-and-tear of the paper, or as bullet holes. 
• The battered newspaper represents destruction and provides insights into the happenings of the book through the various headlines spread amongst the page.
• The newspaper strip and how it runs around the page is also hinting towards the classic layout of Penguin/Puffin books.