Project: Post production/editing part 1

 I am now beginning the editing process for my film. but note that in one of my previous posts that my backdrop did not come in time, so I am going to have to reshoot some scenes if its necessary, since the black paper replacement backdrop I used is a bit reflective in the light.

Hopefully this won't be a major setback for my film.

I am using Adobe Express for my film, but some scenes like the opening production title I might need to do it on a separate platform since I am not sure how to do the transitions and animations I want. 

My planning is to simply just lay out all the resources I have and follow my storyboards, and the empty scenes in between will be the scenes I would like to reshoot. I just want to get the main frame of my project in so I can have a good grasp on what I am working with. 

The biggest obstacle I am coming across is the limited range of movement and animations that Express provides. There are specific camera movements and transitions that I want but Express doesn't have. I am not sure if I have to input specific file or code to "my stuff" category, but I am 55% sure I am going to have to create the transitions and movements in another film program. 

For the title card of my film, I am going to go with Baskervald ADF Std. I thought about using other futuristic looking fonts like IMBF Nanomaton or Anders. But I felt like those fonts were kinda pushing it, too upfront that my film is sci-fi. So I went with a simpler font. I was mainly inspired by the movie Emma (2020)

I really like the title card for Emma, showing the main character in the middle as the title surrounds her from both sides.

I plan on doing a similar title with my film except it is going to be a full rocket ship in the great distance in a extreme wide shot rather than a person. 

As for the images of the planet, I simply used free stock images from online.

Project: 2nd group meeting

The people in my group are selena, santi, camila, Isa, Macie, and Andre. 

Andre: A bit into the group meetings, I was put into another group to further balance out the room since some people were gone. So I missed much about Andre's idea, but I know she is working with Trisha who is making the horror robot idea from the last meeting. She also discussed using text messages as the credits, which I think is a very creative idea. 

Selena: For me, Selena has one of the more unique ideas. She has not started filming yet but she does have a pretty vivid idea of what she wants. She is making a horror opening of a creepy thin man under a spotlight in a dark parking lot. Kinda like slenderman. The thin man will be acted by Selena's brother, who is 5'11". But the other people in my group suggest she try to make the figure look even taller using camera angles. 

Although I do think she should try to forgo the texting idea, where the main female lead gets a bunch of text messages. I feel like text messages is a bit cliche. 

Selena said she would try to get a park ranger to accompany her and her group so they can film in a parking lot past late. Although I would have suggested she try to research into more parking lot locations to film at, like a closed publix or walmart. 

Santi: Santi's idea is pretty complicated and kind of all over the place. His idea is about a doctor who releases a deadly medicine that gives people 48 hours to live once ingested, and a random guy named Maverick goes out to save everybody. He would show Maverick typing on his computer in a over the shoulder shot. 

Filming started on Friday, and it is impressive the set up Santi has since his dad is a sports anchor, so he has his own little studio to use. It is a really good place for shooting and even making a podcast for the CCR. 

My one bug though is that I heard before from one of Santi's group mates that he was not really on board with the idea. It appears that Santi is mainly the visionary or director, but his groupmate did seem very unsure about the film idea. I hope Santi and his group resolved this problem, and are all on the same page.

Camila: Camila is working with a another group member who explained the idea much better. Camila appears to just be an assistant. The idea is of a girl who tries to overcome her grief over her dead sister. 

Because I discussed this idea in my previous meeting post, I am not going to discuss this idea much, but I do really like the simple yet effective idea since so far, I have not heard anyone else do this type of idea. 

I also really like the idea of the film opening beginning with just the title, and only accompanied by the sound of waves. And sound appears to play an important role since Camila and her group mate were very specific with the sound. They are using Imovie, which I am a bit worried about since Imovie, at least from phone, makes some really low quality videos. But Camila and her groupmate are using a very high quality camera so hopefully it'll work out. 

Isa: Isa appears to have the biggest problem of scheduling since she said how it is hard to get the cheerleader and football actors together since the football guy is always playing his games. The idea is about a cheerleader and jock smuggling drugs. 

Addressing the main problem of the actors being together to film, I wonder if Isa should have gotten a different actor. I get the respect of authenticity to use an actual football player, but if the guy is not available most of the time then maybe it would be better to just have a tall broad actor than an actual football player.

I really like Isa's idea of making one of those sticker board interviews where the people being interviewed peel off stickers on a board to reveal the questions. Honestly I don't see anyone else who thought of this idea.

Macie: Macie has the most thought put into production. Her story is basically about a janitor finding someone frozen while cleaning. I was very impressed with Macie's production of a magazine showing the advertisement for the cryo-freeze sleep. I like Macie's simple yet interesting premise, relying less on a complicated plot and instead on interesting concepts and world building. 

I don't have much to say about Macie except maybe expand more on her simply plot, but then again the plot for my film is very simple too so...

Production: Shooting

Ok. I kinda have a problem.

Before shooting, I ordered a backdrop frame and curtain, both were ordered separately. The frame and curtain was supposed to be the main background of my space scenes.

The frame came but the curtain didn't. And stupidly, I didn't notice I was missing the curtain until I began building the frame. Apparently my curtain got lost or was sent to the wrong address. Whether or not I get a refund, it is not going to come in time for shooting. 

I do have a solution. I have a backdrop made from black painted cardboard, and I also have a roll of black paper to use. But I have no idea if these will look as good as the curtain. So this might mean that I am going to have to reshoot some scenes in post production (Sounds very bad I know). Hopefully the darkness will conceal the cardboard background. 

But I can't do anything else except just go with the flow, so that is what I'm going to do. 

I tried using the cardboard backdrop but it was too heavy and was not clinging onto the frame well. Afterall it is two years old and barely being held together with duct tape. So I went with the other option of using the black wrapping paper roll I had, which came out surprisingly well. My only concern is that the paper is a bit reflective, so I hope that it does not interfere with the light that much. 

Timelapses

Because I was shooting mainly in pitch darkness, most of the timelapses I shot were too dark to see anything happening, even when I cranked the brightness all the way up. So only two timelapses that one can see something happening is me animating the cockpit scenes. 

Shaking scene from inside the cockpit

Wide shot of the windows and control panel

Production: Building the sets

Production begins and I am now building the sets. I'll have three sets: Main space ship, capsule, and cockpit. I never built a spaceship before so hopefully this turns out well!

I will be using soda cans and aluminum bottles as my main base for my space ships, since they are light and round. (Yes, I fetched these out of the trash. Don't worry I cleaned them)

I will also being using watercolor paper to wrap around the cans to make it easier to paint and color and give it the sleek designs of actual space ships. Water color is a bit thicker than ordinary paper, so it should not easily crumple or leave any dents.

For the main space ship, I taped electrical tape around it since electrical tape looks cleaner than just using black paint. 

For the rocket caps at the bottom, I used black bottle caps and glued them to a piece of cardboard before gluing them under the main shaft of the rocket. 

Then I painted two bottle caps grey and glued it onto the top of the rocket. This'll be the scaled down version of the capsule. 

For the capsule, I taped two soda cans together before gluing it onto a bowl. I used more cardboard to make it thicker and give it a proper shape. 

I used blue paper tape since paint will better attach to it than ordinary office or duct tape. I then used electrical tape to cover any crevices which might make it harder to paint (Leaving any holes while taping will lead to the area under it unpainted, and lead to further careful painting afterwards).

Then comes the most fun part: painting.

I used a metallic gunmetal grey paint, similar to the color of stainless steel. And for the names Pioneer and Hammer, I simply used red and orange paint. 

I originally was not going to put the name of the ship on the capsule, but I was inspired by the Japanese robot Mechagodzilla. I thought it was cool how it had its title imprinted in bright color on its arm. 

(Reference)

For the cockpit, I simply took apart a box, cut out two trapezoids for the windows, painted it grey, then added a small piece of cardboard as the main control panel. For the windows I simply taped transparent plastic in them. To cover the cardboard holes in the windows, I used paper tape to cover it up before painting over them (Still pretty visible but in low lighting it should be unnoticeable).

And for the joysticks, I simply painted two popsicle sticks glued with cardboard. 

All sets are now completed. Now it is time for shooting. 

Doggy approved

TIME LAPSES

Rocket ship

Capsule

Cockpit

Planning: Sound list

 Here is a list of sounds that I will be needing for my project. I will explain again that the story for my project is simply an astronaut blasting off into space on a rocket ship.

I will mainly be using sound effects from Pixabay and Elevenlabs

Diegetic Audio

-Water droplet (For first scene)(Underwater sound)

-Rockets engines blasting/rocket launch (065110_Seamless Rocket Booster Roar & Crackle)(Huge rocket motor startup)(Rocket Launch sfx)

-Cockpit shaking (Napkin dispenser spring)(Rattling bolts)

-Sound of rocket blasting from inside the cockpit (Car on a highway)

-Rocket sections detaching (Explosion)(Nuclear)

-Buttons getting pressed (Keyboard)

-Switches switching up and down (Light switches)

-Thrusters (Air)

Non-Diegetic audio/music

Ephemera by Scott Buckley

Logo production

 My project is required to have a logo of a made-up studio to make my film look like a real movie production. The first thing I can think of whenever a production logo is mentioned is the famous Leo the Lion from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. (MGM).  

This will definitely be my main inspiration for my logo. Of course, I am not aiming for something gold and grand like this logo, but I do really like the inclusion of an animal as the main centerpiece. 

I am reminded of my dog, who although looks more like a big goofy white bear, still looks majestic in some photos as long as I get the right angle and mess with the photo settings a bit. 

I want to aim for something more minimalistic. Leo the Lion is very grand with lots of gold and oranges, and complex in its design. But for mine I think I want to do the opposite, aiming for something simpler and less bombastic, something colder and less warm. Maybe even make the logo and picture have a fade of silver to further emphasize its opposite nature to the MGM logo. 

I will be naming my production company "Juniper Productions", named after my dog Juni.

This is Juni. It was pretty hard to find a good picture of her since she is very goofy all the time, but I was able to find this picture: super elegant and majestic. Although not quite what I'm exactly looking for. Again, I want something colder and more serious. And the photo here is definitely warm and bright, like a sunny day. I want a more winter aesthetic 

I messed with the settings: mainly tweaking the shadowing,, filters, temperature, and brightness in order to get a colder look. Surprisingly not as hard as I thought.

This is the final edited picture. What I really like about this photo is that it looks less like a picture and more like a painting, combining the low quality of the original picture and the tweaking of the settings.

This will just be a still image, not a video like Leo the Lion where he opens his mouth and roars. I think that the beauty of my dog is enough as a logo; no need for any performances since her look alone is beautiful enough.

The editing software I'll be using is Adobe Express. 

Here is the full logo. The font I used is Bravo SCT Regular. I wanted my logo title to be a more mechanical, more industrial. Like I said, I want to do sort of an opposite logo of MGM. I also took inspiration from the studio logo of Tippet Studios since Phil Tippet is one of my favorite people in the animation industry, and his company is known for its amazing work on digital and practical effects. 

Some other fonts I could possibly use in the future:

Anders

Baskervald ADF Std

Equinox Typeface

IMBF Nanomaton

Bonus photo (My dog being goofy):

Project: Mise-en-scene: Planning for lighting

 I mentioned in my previous posts that lighting is very important, an essential element for a film. Without it, then a film might not be as effective it can be with proper lights. Even if a film has choppy animation, it can still look good as long as everything else in it catches the viewers eyes more than the animation. 

I said in one of my previous posts that lighting was the aspect I was most worried about, since although I have made stop motion animations in the past, they are a still bit choppy since I am a huge amateur. 

Right now all I have is an ordinary lamp and little finger led lights. The led finger lights are very good for lighting, and gives me better control of the lighting of a scene. But there is one main problem: they don't last long. In previous films I made, there is noticeable changes in lighting because the finger leds I was using would flicker and don't last long and overtime dim down. Afterall they are designed for party use, not film or photography. 

So I need to find alternative lights that are small, but also last long and do not dim overtime. 

The reason why I like using these little lights is because they not only make the atmosphere of my animations look more lively and cool, they also give much more freedom of how I want my scenes to be lit. 

I am considering these two choices. The first are these mini round button lights, meant for trucks and vehicles. They do not have any setting on them other than turning on and off. I don't mind this, after all lights are surprisingly expensive and I need to work with I can afford. And I also don't mind this not having a broader range of colored lights available (I can just cover the white lights with colored paper or plastic).

What I really like about these is that have sort of a flashlight shape to them, like the finger lights I liked to use.

However the main, possible, issue I am using is that these lights are not chargeable and need an adapter to power it. Which is fine since I already have plenty of AC adapters I could use, but I am not sure how using a wired light would effect the shooting of my project (I never shot a project with a small light that is wired). 

My second option are these small leds, again originally meant for vehicles, mainly motorcycles. The benefits with these is they are wireless, meaning they can be charged and can give me better freedom of where to place them on my set. And they are remote controlled to which I can control what color they are. 

This sounds good but again, the main problem I am seeing is that they are wireless, meaning they have a battery which could possibly make the light dim and maybe flicker overtime. 

I looked at the reviews of this product and they are fairly good until there is one really honest bad review of the same object. To which I am not sure if I should heed it or not. But the reviews are fairly good, so I am more leaning towards the probability that this is a good product.

These two lights look good, but I am wondering which one should I buy? Or should I just buy both? The button lights have better reviews and stars than the motorcycle lights, but the motorcycle lights have a better range of color and does not need a wire connected. I think I'll try to buy both of these, if my parents allow it, but I am also leaning towards the idea of just buying the button lights since they have better reviews.

And about my lamp. The main problem I have with my lamp is that it has a very reflective design; having shiny steel metal as the main hold and a white cone around the bulb. This means if I am going to use this lamp, then it'll be visible, even in darkness. Not to mention that it could possibly interfere with the light since it is white and metal. But I might just cover it up with black clothe or paper. 

I originally thought about using these, small light bulb holders. They are small, black (which will not interfere with lighting), and easier to move around than a lamp. 

Although, I am questioning whether these lights are necessary or not? Yes, I already have a lamp, but it is pretty imbalanced and pretty reflective. I'll definitely be thinking about it. 

Project: Sound design

I am a huge fan and sucker for good sound design, especially for media like 9 and Dead Space. But as much as I love sound design, I am more relying on music for my film than audio. My two main inspirations is Interstellar and 2001, which uses a lot of music but also has a lot of silent periods in between where no music is present. But I will still be using basic sounds from either copyright free websites or making my own foley sounds. 

For music I am using Ephemera by Scott Buckley. I first found Buckley's music through the animations by Alan Becker on Youtube. Alan Becker is one of my greatest inspirations since he does not use any dialogue nor talking for most of his animations, relying more on the actions done by his characters and the music. Buckley's music stood out to me for its dramatism and inspiration from other composers like Hanz Zimmer, whose works are known for Batman and Interstellar. 

Originally I wanted to use the music Buckley made for Alan Becker's Youtube video "Animation vs. Physics". But looking at the description I found that the music is not owned by Creative Commons, organization that distributes Buckley's music for free. Meaning that I have to get permission from Buckley himself to use the piece, which I heard would take a while. So I searched for Buckley's other music and I decided on his piece Ephemera, which I honestly like better since it has a very mysterious aura and feels like going into an unknown galaxy. 

As for diegetic sounds, I am mainly going to be pulling them from copyright free sound effects websites, like Pixabay and Elevenlabs. 

For foley sounds though is a bit more tricky. The main two sound effects I am worried about is the sound of the rocket going through space from inside the cockpit, and the rattling shaking sound that comes with it. 

But when I thought about it, I realized I could possibly use the sound of my car driving down a highway, and maybe layer it with other similar highway sounds I recorded. And as for the shaking sound from inside the cockpit, I have a restaurant napkin dispenser that my parents don't use anymore. It has a spring and a small metal lid on top, and when I push the lid down and release it quickly, it makes a rattling sound from the impact. I am not sure if these are going to work, but I definitely give it a try and see how it fits into my film. 

Project: Mise-en-scene: Concept designs for space ships and sets

 These are my concept designs that will help with giving me an idea of how I should approach making the spaceships for my project. I am mainly considering the cockpit design to be the main set while the rocket ship and capsule designs will be props since they are just used to interact with space, while the cockpit is fully interacted with by the astronaut. 

Although I am making three different props/sets, really only the cockpit will be needed to be up to scale with the figure, a Stikbot, I am using as the astronaut. The astronaut will only be seen in the cockpit, so I do not need to make the main rocket and capsule up to scale.

This design is the main rocket ship. It will have two separate models: One normal scale (Cut in half for a specific shot), and one medium scale. But this might change since I have no idea if I can make a normal scale model look bigger than it actually is. But I think might be able to since the camera I am using for this project, a Logitech c920 HD, is small so I think I will be able to pull this illusion off. 

 

I am mainly basing this design off of the Gemini 8 mission rocket. I like the design since it is pretty simplistic and has colors and textures on it that I can easily recreate back at home; like the black I can recreate using electrical tape, and the engines I could simply paint some bottle caps. 

This is the design of the capsule (the head of the rocket and where the astronaut is housed). The reason why the capsule design looks different from capsule designs from other space ships is because the original narrative I had, if a full film of my project were to be made, would be about an astronaut going through a wormhole. So for my capsule design, I sort of elongated it and gave it some mass to look like a spacecraft that could withstand the forces of a wormhole. 

The name "Hammer" on the bottom of the capsule is the name of the engine the ship is using. Although not shown at all in my project, I envisioned this capsule to be propelled by nuclear pulse propulsion, or in other words, nuclear explosions. This was an old idea back in the 70s when people and scientists alike dreamed about the uses of nuclear power. Of course the idea of using nuclear explosions to propel a spacecraft has been long abandoned years ago, and looks ridiculous today, but I thought it was a very interesting idea. 

Although I said in my previous posts that I like for my film to have a sense of realism to it, I also want there to be a strand of fantasy too. Because a space ship using nuclear explosions as propulsion is an awesome idea. And I don't want to ground my film too much in realism, or else it'll get hard to be accurate to real science and physics, and it could possibly get pretty boring. 

This is the design for the cockpit. The left lever is for controlling the nuclear propulsion engine while the other lever controls the steering of the capsule.

Although as much as I like this design, I am going to have to change it because of one flaw: the distance between the two main controls are too far apart. It wouldn't make any sense for an astronaut needing to stretch their arms out just to pilot their ship. 

The set will be inside a large box, with the inside painted black to further control the lighting. But I might not do this since my room will already be incredibly dark, so I don't there's a need for me to put the set inside a box to control the lighting in a already dark room. 

I am mainly basing this design off of the interior design of the EVA Pods from 2001: A Space Odyssey. My design will be less colorful though and be more clunky and broad. 

Of course I am not aiming for the complexity of a bunch of buttons and lights for my set, but I really like the octagonal control panel, and the screens besides the main keyboard.

Project: Character development

Because I am mainly focusing on visuals, my character is only going to be an instrument for the viewers to follow through space with. Not to mention the fact that the main character of my film will be doing nothing but sit in a space ship, and they do not talk at all. My character does not have a deep arc, with the meaning of my film not flowing within the character but with the audience. 

The best example I can give is the Assassin from Phil Tippet's "Mad God". In this movie the Assassin is just that, a character that has no character depth except being a tool for the audience to follow to explore the desolate world of the movie. There is no plot, but it is driven by its fantastic yet terrifying use of animation and visuals to lead the audience through and through. In an interview by The Illusion Almanac with Phil Tippet, he said himself said that Mad God does not have a traditional narrative like most other movies do, like having plot or character development, but more looking at the world around the characters than the characters themselves. "I wanted to do something without the trappings of story and plot. There’s a narrative, but it’s not a story per se". The narrative is linked by themes, not plot. 

My film does have a very simple plot; Astronaut leaves his planet on a rocket ship. I am not totally going to go into my project without a storyboard like how Tippet did with Mad God, but I do want to have my character be a vessel for the audience to use to interpret their own ideas and opinions.

Other examples of characters who are displayed through themes, not plot. 

Prince Ashitaka (Princess mononoke) 

The Stalker, Writer, and Professor (Stalker)

Henry Spencer (Eraserhead)

Project: Storyboard

 Since my film is not going to have talking, it is better for me to make a storyboard than a script. Afterall I am fully relying on visuals rather than dialogue. Having a storyboard will definitely help with planning and helping me with shooting the scenes. 

Project: Media theory integration

 For this post I need to research one media theory to integrate into my film. And I already have a good theory that fits my project.

I forgot to mention it before but my film will have no dialogue: there will still be sound but no talking from any characters nor narration. I prefer the classic technique of "show don't tell", especially because I think that nowadays movies just... talk too much, which ruins a perfect scene if the characters did not talk at all. I do not like to spoon feed information for the entirety of my film: I feel as though a movie needs to have a perfect balance of dialogue and silence: and unless a film needs dialogue, like a murder mystery, then that's when I think talking can be used more extensively. But generally if I had to pick from the two, I would prefer more silence than more talking. 

I feel like putting a film's message into words really limits the meaning and beauty of a film. If a movie tells the audience what to think, it makes the viewers think of a complex idea only in one way, when in actuality that idea the message is talking about is very complex and ravishing. There is just things in life that cannot be explained in just a few words: it cannot be simplistic, and there is not one "right" way for an idea to be thought of and displayed to others. I feel as though dialogue is merely just an aid to a film, and that visuals are the true factors that tells a story. 

Stephen King, one of the greatest authors, perfectly encapsulate what I think about words and how it diminishes meaning. In King's "Different Seasons", a collection of four novellas, one of the stories called "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption" perfectly quotes how I think words diminishes complexity. Saying "The most important things are the hardest things to say. They are the things you get ashamed of, because words diminish them — words shrink things that seemed limitless when they were in your head to no more than living size when they're brought out."

And the theory that generally encapsulates my view is the Active Audience Theory by Stuart Hall. Hall states that audiences interpret media through their own experiences and social contexts, with the intended message by the creator may not be understood because everyone has their own opinions and beliefs.

For my films, I like to keep the message or meaning open minded, meaning that viewers can interpret my film in any way they want. It is not like I am just creating a film just because; I still have a general, usually simplistic, idea of what the message is. But if I'm asked what the meaning of my film is? Then I won't answer because I prefer to hear from other people what they think about my project.

Project idea summary

 After a lot of thinking and deliberation after my last post with the group meeting, I decided to go with my original idea of having a rocket ship blast off into space. Most of the people from the meeting recommended I go with my first idea after I told them whether I should go with this idea or an idea of two astronauts on a space station. I decided on my original idea since it may seem harder, at least to me, but it does look a lot more fun to produce and shoot than my second idea. 

So here is the general plot I have for my project. It will be a Sci-fi space genre film about an astronaut on a rocket ship, blasting off into space as, like a real space rocket, segments of the ship begin to separate until there is nothing left but the capsule where the astronaut is housed. This is just the plot of the first two minutes of my film, but I did have a general idea for a possible full film that: the astronaut leaves his planet, goes through a wormhole, and lands on another better planet. I know I do not need a big general idea for my film if it was an actual 5-10 minute short film, but having a broader idea like this better helps me look into what I want for the first two minutes. And it helps me scale down what is good to make the film look better, and cutting down on any potential ideas that either seemed unnecessary or doesn't fit the flow of the film. 

Although I mentioned 2001: A Space Odyssey a lot for my project; the first two minutes of my film is more inspired by Interstellar and First Man. This is because my two minutes mainly showcase a rocket ship flying into space, shots and scenes that Interstellar and First Man have while 2001 does not. But between the two movies, Interstellar is my biggest inspiration since I like how it uses object mounted POVs when the rocket separates: and while First Man's rocket scenes are pretty good, I am mainly taking inspiration from First Man's rocket scenes when it shows just the interior of the ship and not the outside. The object mounted POVs that Interstellar uses makes it feel as though the audience is on the ship with the other astronauts. Showing a full wide shot of the rocket soaring through the sky, at least for me, breaks that engagement with the characters, and make it feel like audience is only here to witness the characters journey than actually be with them. 

I have a really clear cut picture of what I want for my film. Now I just have to figure out the knicks and obstacles in mainly pre and post production. I did mention that I was mainly worried about lighting, but now I am more worried about how to edit a planet in the background of the space launch scenes, along with creating and building the small rocket for the scene too. 

Project Group Meeting #1

A group meeting is when random students from the class are put into separate groups to discuss ideas, thoughts, and questions about each others projects. I was grouped with six other student: Sonakshi, Meliyah, Selina, Avery, Christian, and Trisha.

They all had good ideas, and it was great that we all had different opinions and knowledge on how to help each other out. 

Sonakshi had an idea of making a slice of life, beginning off with overlapping sounds inside a library. I wished I'd heard more about how she wanted to introduce her characters or setting more since a library is known for being a very quiet set, so I'd be very interested in seeing how she wanted to present a place like this. 

Meliyah is doing a psychological horror, thriller, and drama. It appears her idea involves a ghost like entity following the protagonist after the death of her sister. I like this horror idea since it is more focused on trauma and sadness than the usual slasher or stalker that most people would think of when thinking about horror. Other people in the group recommended maybe a classic mirror shot, of the character looking at the mirror only to see a ghost in the reflection. Personally I don't like this mirror shot since it has been done too many times, and I heard Cambridge is getting tired of the horror genre since too many people are doing it. In my opinion, I don't think that Cambridge is getting tired of the horror genre, but they are getting tired of people making the same stuff over and over again. I would something similar to Selina later in the meeting, to which I'll explain later. Meliyah also said how she wanted a simple black screen with white credits fading in and out, but having sounds in the background to fill out for the lacking imagery. I am not sure about how effective this idea would be since numerous movies before have used the classic black screen with white credits. If Meliyah would want do something really unique then I think she would have to make a very good background audio for the opening credits. 

Selina had a similar idea to Meliyah who wanted to make a horror thriller. I have to say her plan for her project sounded the most well detailed and planned out, clearly having more coherent plan than me. But again, she is doing horror, something that Cambridge is not a huge fan of. And this is especially amplified since Selina mentioned wanting to shoot in a forest with a supernatural entity as the antagonist. I did not say to her that her idea is bad, but I did recommend her to branch out and explore more horror movies and do more research since her movie sounds pretty cliche to most other already existing ghost movies. But I genuinely think that she can make a better idea if she researched more into the horror genre. 

Avery had the idea of a thriller mystery about a cheerleader and basketball player in a scandalous relationship involving drugs. I really like this idea, and I wished I asked how Avery is going to plan on giving the two characters a lot of relationship building in just two minutes. I also would have asked how the cheerleader's and jock's relationship would be, like if the two are a couple or are they just business partners? If Avery gets the characterization right, then I think her idea would make for a very good film opening. 

I'll be honest, I did not hear much from Christian since I was busy talking to Samuel (I did not know we were not allowed to have two pairs of people talking at the same time). I did hear that he was doing some sort of hospital setting, I think, so I would have been curious to see how he would have pulled this off. My teacher did mention how a student was able to get a small hospital set by asking one of the people in charge of Hosuh. 

Trisha to me had the most unique idea out of the entire group. She still was doing a horror paranormal thriller but the main antagonist is a robot Ai, which to me does not scream paranormal. Trisha even said that the robot Hal from 2001: A Space Odyssey is an inspiration. The Ai villain is some sort of Alexa or Siri, along with the noises of the notifications on a phone making for some eerie diegetic audio. And another really creative idea recommended by one of the other people in the group is to make the opening credits text messages. I really love this idea since it is not a ghost but a robot tormenting the protagonist (Again, ghosts are kind of cliche unless done very uniquely). I do wish that Trisha would make it so that the Ai is not a sentient being or whatever, but simply a robot who malfunctioned: again, like Hal from 2001. If not a malfunction then I hope Trisha gives the robot a unique intent on why they are acting the way they are. 

Samuel is working with two other people on his project. He mainly talked about shooting a hospital scene with the doctor poisoning someone. There is not a full grasp on the story since Samuel does not have a clear intent on what the story is going to be either. Samuel also mentioned how one of his group mates have a lot of stuff for mise en scene in their garage, which would help a ton with the project. But the biggest concern I noticed was that Samuel did not look very on board with the story, appearing to not know much of what is going on for the project nor what to do. At least his group was able to settle on a genre, but I can tell he is not very optimistic or passionate about the progress so far. I can't tell if he simply does not like working on this project, or if the other people in his group is giving him a hard time. Nevertheless, I think he should have a good talk with his group. 

For my project, I am doing a sci-fi, specifically space, stop motion film. I was divided between two ideas.

First idea: A rocket with an astronaut inside blasts off into space, each section coming apart from the spacecraft until it leaves just the capsule in space

Second idea: Two astronauts are on a space station who comes across a problem, so they the ship to take care of the exterior problem with the station

I am completely ok with doing both of these ideas, I am just wondering which one is better to do? Before this group meeting, I met with my teacher with these ideas. And she thought that the second idea would be harder to do since the characters are moving around both inside and outside the space station, meaning that I have to make multiple sets to not ruin the continuation of scenes. But I am completely fine with making multiple sets, after all I do have experience with doing stop motion before. 

But the main problem I am most worried about is lighting, because the first idea involves a rocket that is always moving, meaning that the lighting would have to be changing a lot. While the second idea the lighting is mostly stationary, since it just takes place on a still space station. Lighting is a very controlled aspect in a film, especially stop motion animation since one shake of the light source can make the light flicker in the animation. Which to me, ruins the illusion of a movie and snaps the audience out of their focus. And for me, lighting is a very precious and incredibly important to a movie. 

 When I brought this up to my group though, they recommended I do the first idea since it sounds a lot more fun. And most of all, they told me to not worry much about the lighting. So maybe I should prioritize other aspects of my project than lighting, after all I have to make an entire rocket ship with different parts that can separate from the ship. Not to mention I still have to make a astronaut costume for the little figure I am using for my film. I have to give massive thanks to my group since they made me realize that I cannot focus just on lighting and that I should focus on other important aspects as well. 

Further research: Lighting

 Most spaces movies have very similar ways of making their scenes look like actual space. And the most common way I have seen used in movies like 2001, Interstellar, and First Man, is that those movies use miniature versions of their designed space ships and place it in either a black or digital background.

(Credit: "Corridor Crew" from Youtube)

In the original 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kubrick redefined how space ships are shown. Although Kubrick was not the first director to use scaled down models of a ship, seen in Frau im Mond and Forbidden Planet, he has been the first director to use much bigger and more detailed models than other movies that came before it. 

This leads to the biggest question: How did Kubrick film the space ships without the rigs holding them up be seen? In a video done by Corridor Crew on Youtube, featuring Adam Savage, a incredibly well known special effects designer and fabricator, actor, educator, television personality, and producer; he explained that the ships were still being held by rigs on camera, its just that it was so dark that the rigs couldn't be seen.

Savage further explains that the camera moves, not the space ship itself. If the model did move, it would have shown and revealed the rigs holding the ship up through lighting. This also meant that it would have taken longer to shoot those shots because the dollies had to be smooth and clean. So Kubrick had to film the dolly shots of the ships moving over and over again until there is not a single shake visible on camera. 

And this technique has been done for movies like Interstellar and First Man, except that instead of hiding the rigs or hiding the exposed portions of the background, they just crop it out in post production. First Man takes it a bit more different by using a soundstage, a large round tv background mounted on gimbals. As seen here in a behind the scenes video of First Mans VFX. 

Newer movies like Interstellar and First Man use motion control movement base underneath their models to get cleaner movements of their ships, a far cry from when cameras needed to be manually dollied in 2001. With even Christopher Nolan, the director of Interstellar, having a sort of steering wheel configuration where he can control the 50 ft model in real time. 

Speaking of models, another film necessity born from Kubrick's 2001 is the need for multiple models of the same ship. This is so that the different shots of the same ship can be achieved. For example a wide shot of a spacecraft can achieved by using a smaller model of the ship. But a close up shot of the same ship needs a more bigger and detailed model, such as in Interstellar where the Endurance, the name of the spacecraft, is 15th the scale of the actual designed concept for the model. As explained here in a behind the scenes video of Interstellar by the VFX supervisor of Interstellar, Paul Franklin.

I don't have big fancy sets or soundstage, all I am working with is a small black backdrop, but I feel like that Kubrick's trick alone of making the background dark enough to hide the rigs is enough to make my film look realistic enough.