Research for #1 question of CCR post

How does your product use or challenge conventions, and how does it represent social groups or issues? 

Our film Static uses the traditional conventions of mystery and psychological horror. Within our establishing shot developed the mysterious and eerie elements within the introduction to our production. From using old research on horror, mystery, and psychological horror films, set up the exact framework towards sticking to the necessary conventions of these genres. Our goal was never to challenge or go beyond the standard conventions of this framework. To instead use certain pieces that highlight this genre the best and incorporate them within our framework within our story. For example, I will discuss the Film Vertigo by Hitchcock. Notable for its uncomfortable shots and tension, it is displayed in the opening credit scene within the film. As a reference, we used the techniques and tone within the piece and incorporated similar and the same techniques within our footage for our own production. Without copying the techniques and display of Hitchcock's work, we kept it as inspiration towards our storyboard and shooting process of how within technique and visually stay and display these conventions. 

 When it comes to the representation within our film, we challenge the normal social groups of teenage representation. Typically, within media, teenagers are perceived as misfits, rebellious, and misunderstood. Static challenges the stereotypical conventions of social representation of teenagers through our main character, Avery. Avery is reserved and seen as an introverted teen girl who isn't into makeup, fashion, or social media. She spends most of her free time at home and with her best friend raven. 

Typically, today's media portrays most teens socially revolving around alcohol, drugs, parties, and illegal/daredevil-like activities. Static challenges this in a non-stereotypical way of introducing an introverted teen girl who is tied to this unexpected and graphic murder of her best friend. Avery is our highlight not only as an introverted teen but also as a female, and challenges the gender norms in media.  

        Postproduction Process (Editing) #2

The tools Emma used within editing include many tutorials. Tutorials on fonts, placement of texts, and visual tactics to enhance a film. All sourced from the lovely platform YouTube! Using these tutorials helped Emma see from even professional levels, tips and references on how to correctly edit and place effects and fonts while still keeping the vision clean and crisp. It's key that she took time and space to reflect and learn rather than jumping straight into her editing process. Emma chooses to do the opposite and really focus on how she would get the look she wanted to achieve without feeling rushed and making careless errors. 

Within the timeline of her editing, she also aligned music with the footage. With in mind to not making the music predictable within the footage. As well as extending where the music itself doesn't correlate with the piece. Many mistakes within past projects of our music or sound do not align with the footage or scene itself. From learning these past mistakes, Emma has taken note not to repeat them. With this in mind, while our editing is short of the end product, our editor has taken the key steps to make sure that the results are of value. Disable page. Disability is heavily tie in with visit.

    Post-Production (Editing) Process #1 Post

 Our editor, Emma Gonzalez, and how my group and I worked, and our thoughts impact our editing decisions.

The main takeaway from our last group discussion was to address any imperfections and add contrast, layering, and color during the editing of our film. For our flashbacks to Avery's memories, wanted to show them very distinctly within our production. The sound of static from a television would be the main sound implemented within our production. There are many difficulties with adding this specific effect, as it is used in films, for example, the film Se7en. Where the scenes are faster paced compared to our film, which has a slower pace.

I am not the editor because I have a hard time with editing, I can explain through our editor's eyes the process and thoughts within her editing the production. Luckily, our editor having verification in Adobe Premiere gave us a huge advantage with having the right tools for editing. Bonus to this has her personal MacBook with a drive hooked up with all footage from her camera to make transitioning our footage smoother and easier.  

As far as progress within editing isn't completed but is working on what is discussed in the objective, as far as coloring. Using Lumetric color to enhance the colors as well as fix discoloration. While our shooting was filmed in proper lighting and coloring, it still needs many edits and changes needed to give off the effect needed to create that mysterious feel within our opening. She really focused on these elements to tie our editing as well into our title, Static. Within our last group meeting, we each separately received suggestions on incorporating elements such as sound or effects within our editing process.

 Emma has a certificate in Adobe.

The problem that Emma went through

Emma ran into a few problems while Emma was editing on my first day, as the app Premiere Pro takes and drains a lot of battery life. Emma literally went from 50 to 5 percent in a span of 10 minutes, trying to finish up a section, running for my life to save the project every 5 seconds. Since Emma was at school at the time, Emma didn't bring my charger to school, so immediately when Emma got back home, Emma charged my computer, sat my butt on the chair, and started to edit again. 

Emma also ran into a few snags with Lumetri Color. Yet it wasn't because Emma didn't know how it works; my team and I just didn't clarify how we wanted our flashbacks to look. Now, since it is a flashback, it means it is a memory from the past, in which it would make sense to have the scene be set in black and white. As Emma lowered the saturation, one of our first flashbacks is where Avery is over the body covered in bloodied hands, so the fact that it was in black and white, we couldn't see the color of the blood.

                          Obstacle/Issues

Before talking about the obstacle of filming, I want to talk about some highlights of our Project. First, making our mise en scene elements was the best part of our production process. There were initial obstacles when setting up and the process of creating our set design. We still thought collectively innovative way to effectively set up our main set of the prison cell. We used props such as a dog cage and a table that are relatively household items. Also, our design and setup process, our makeup and costume design aligned everything with the exact looks my group and I were aiming to achieve for Avery's main look in the film. The main highlights were making memories, doing makeup, and using fake blood. It was very hard to take the fake blood off my hands. We should have made our own fake blood. 

Obstacles faced were, of course, initially setting all of the sets with the backdrops and lighting. As well as difficulties with lines, all actors face natural struggles. I struggled a lot with my lines and face when filming. Of course, discussed our success portion and resolved our set issues. Even with a script, our actors messed up lines very frequently. (I was the person to mess it up the most.)  We need many reshoots and uncontrollable laughter.  Sorry Emma. While this made for good bloopers, it took much time away from prioritizing and filming other scenes. Which made us need another day for filming. My group and I did overcome this obstacle. 

                        Group meeting #2 

In one of the classes this week, my teacher put us into group meetings to talk about the Portfolio project. In the meeting, I was put into a group with 5 other students, and the main thing that we had to work on was to share our story ideas for the two-minute film opening with each other and learn from one another's feedback and ideas. My group included my classmates Juan, Andreas, Jp, Sebastian, and Mia.

Juan- thelearningblog12.blogspot.com - This 18-year-old girl, who is very smart and makes glass to see the future and her death, doesn’t know what he is going to do for his CCR. Mia gave him an idea about doing an exam, and the mad scientists wrote on the whiteboard. Jaun filmed some of his film but didn't finish. 

Andreas- andreasmstudiesblog.blogspot.com- The flash in a train place, with a suitcase, she is looking for home, she finds a jewel, she throws it on the ground, there is a flashback to her eating with her family, then it goes to a family eating, and there is a police officer who offers a man. One of the family members closed the blinds.  CCR We advise doing it on the train where she films her scene. Andreas filmed some of his film, but didn't finish. 

Jp- mediajean.blogspot.com - boy getting bullied by him, he is doing a project, the bully leaves, the kid kills the bully, CCR- We advise him to build a fake human body, or a science fair. Jp and his group filmed their film this weekend.

Sebastian- 10ktrophies.blogspot.com - thriller- teen kid in a car with blood on shirt, hand, knife - he is home, and he gets a call from someone telling him to do everything he tells him, he will kill his parents. CCR –We advise him to get a question in the mail, ask her police to use a car. Hasn't started filming.

Mia—Wh0isgossipgirl.blogspot.com- coming of age- two best friends and they play in a park, one of the girls dies, the other girl comes back wearing black, the girl hears her friend's voice- CRR – flies' bag or playing playground. She tried to start filming yesterday, but the weather didn't allow it to happen.

 I finished filming about 3 or 2 weeks before this group meeting. They advise me to make my CCR- Police officer questioning the girl and asking her the CCR questions. 

                      Set Design Creation

My group and I thought of ways to stay good without breaking the bank. For equipment to film, we were in luck, as our team member Emma had a camera already available for filming and a tripod.  Our own phones gave us access to film behind the scenes and photography. The Mise en Scene elements are where the money was allocated. Jade, along with Emma, combined their finances to order a mental asylum gown, two backdrops, and props for the officers' costumes. Totaling up to around $100.00. I put in $15.00 for the police officer's walkie-talkie.  While staying within our budget, our goal was to use as many resources as possible available in our location and think outside of the box to think create our set into life. 

We took one day to plan and set up our location. Emma and I were the ones to build and unbuild the set.  Our initial plan was to use Emma's garage since it had the ideal space and lighting we needed. But, since backdrops are not able to stay up, we chose to set up our main scene in Emma's studio. We chose this location, which worked in our favor as we were able to still add the same effect with lightning and a prison scene. So now, with a steady wall for our background and lightning, we needed to create the bars element for our prison cell. We used a dog cage (Emma's dog) and elevated it with a plain table to capture within filming behind the table that our character, Avery, being captured "behind bars" or in a cell. 

 We added an extra detail, such as a bed, which we used as a small daybed. The following scenes did not require the same changes. For example, our integration scene require table recycled from the prison scene and two bar stool tables. For our Officer Garcia's office scene, we kept the same furniture and details in Emma's Dad's office space. We also used the same table and bars for a special effect of Avery looking within Officer Garcia's office. The teamwork definitely paid off, and for our film and was a fun and money-saving process we used to create our scenes. 

This all happened on the first day of our production process, and we decided to start with our Set design. We initially had planned to use Emma's garage, as it was spacious and the perfect place for lighting, and also big enough to hold our backdrops in place as well. After a good 30 minutes of trying to set up in the garage, we realized that we couldn't place the backdrops the way we wanted them to be seen. We had no way of placing them on the walls since there were many objects in the way. So, we decided to use my studio instead since the walls were plain and the exact size of the backdrops as well. Now, for placing them on the walls, Emma's dad had an idea of just stapling the backdrops onto the wall. It worked. As for the lighting, Emma just dimmed her studio lights and closed the curtains to make it look darker and eerier. 

Scene Development and filming.

                         Scene Development

Our initial planning when creating our scenes was to incorporate foreshadowing of some sort and subtle hints and clues to the overall plot of the story. Our group, as well, wanted to add something visually eye-catching to the background or setting. It led to the ultimate plan and execution of creating doodles and the repetition of a name on the wall of our backdrop. It began with having our credit sequence leading into the introduction or development of our character. The following scenes would develop the storyline and details into the mysterious elements of our storyline. 

Emma, Jade, and I added the first stages of our story board since to reference the first constructive planning my group and I initiated, within planning the details and events in each scene. You can reference our entire storyboard in my blog CarolRabaCrepa200928: Script and Storyboard (Script and Storyboard). Our group had many group calls via WhatsApp where we were able discuss and show our location and space to work with before any shooting took place.

Our scenes are developed into a credit sequence, a flashback scene, final recollection moments of Avery. Our first scene, our credit entails the development of our character, Avery, while she is in jail. Showing the detailed area of her surroundings and adding some mystery. We developed our credit scene to still incorporate our film, but not in a boring way. This scene, while still displaying our credits, develops background and insight into what will happen in our story. For the flashback scenes, these past memories were to give clues and further detail on how Avery got to where she is. 

The rest of our story and scenes reflect the background and evidence toward the audience on the reasoning behind the film, as well as perfectly capture our representation elements discussed in my blog, Media Theory. Static will reflect the genre of mystery and psychological horror. The overall purpose and goal are to capture our target audience into coherently understanding the purpose, vision, and theme of this project.

Film

On the second day, Jade, Emma, and I started by filming one of our flashback scenes since it had to be shot in the daytime.  We were also quite thankful that the weather was on our side, and it wasn't rainy at all, but the complete opposite! We included one of our props: the bloodied marker, which we used fake blood to decorate, it with as well as giving. So, we filmed all of the flashback scenes; it took about 4 hours or 3 hours of filming. Emma wants to take a lot of videos from different angles.

On the last day, it was only Emma and me filming the film. Before we started filming the scenes, we obviously had to get her makeup and costume ready for the shoot. So, my mom helped us with the makeup since neither Emma, nor I is too talented for makeup. We went with her tired, baggy-eyed look. As for my hair, we added some water and some spray that kept my hair from being greasy and frizzy. After I put on my hospital gown, we went on to start our filming process. In the prison cell scenes.  We have a few problems along the way filming, like one of them being the fact that we only had 2 backdrops, one of the walls was just white, which was the wall behind me as I sat on my bed looking across to another backdrop. So, we moved the bed in front of one backdrop to film a few shots. Another problem was that to zoom out Emma's camera was very stiff, so to zoom out, the lens would sort of stick to itself and cause Emma to have a non-smooth zoom out shot for some of the shots.

                        Company Logo

How did we get the name?

For our name search, we first decided to look for some inspiration from other film production companies that could spark an idea for our own. Even though we came across many fun names like "ghost whisper productions", this name didn't really stand out to us, as they never fully felt like "us".  After a few other minutes of continuing our search, Emma had a thought about our own names: Jade, Emma, and Carolina. Emma told them that what if we combine our names to make something for our logo name. It would feel more like "us" because our names are part of the logo. After a few minutes trying to decode a name out of all of our names combined, I suggested, what if we combine the first letter of our names? And so, we did, and in the result, we came up with J.E.C. Productions!

The creation of the logo:

The ideas and thoughts of creating this logo were quite straightforward. My team and I looked at many fonts, so many of them looked cool when first looking, but when typed, they weren't the vision everyone saw. We chose the Blanka font; it was something new and spunky that we had never seen before.  We need to find the right font, color choices, and elements/design to incorporate. Emma suggested that since we used yellow for the last design, purple is the complementary color for yellow. For our J.E.C we colored a lavender purple, yet we kept running into trouble with yellow. We debated whether in the productions at the bottom of our design, the text should be purple, yellow, or plain black.  For elements, my original idea was to incorporate film in some sort of way.  

 With color, font, and design chosen, all that was left was to add some details and animation. With another suggestion from Emma and Carolina of adding a light sort of reflection of the words of our logo, J.E.C, to look as if the camera was displaying them. With some change of coloring, saturation, and angling, it was perfect. Then, carefully aligning the text to pop up when we see the light beaming from the camera, which would reflect J.E.C. Productions altogether. 

Title- Fonts

                                  Title- Fonts

What makes Title-Font Unique?

A title is the very first thing that visually captivates viewers when discovering or learning about a film. In this way, what is displayed is what adds the detailing and effect that the marketing/production team wants to convey. A wide range of fonts makes any title stick out and seem appealing, whether it's a smaller font, bold letters, Sharp, or just a plain font that makes the text stand out. Our goal within our production is to incorporate a font that correlates with our already chosen title static.   

Titles hold an important place within our film, as they are the first introduction to any sort of film or even TV show. When looking at a poster of a film, it helps the audience associate and connect with the film as they watch it. Titles utilize a large range of fonts that can make any title stand out to a specific target audience. We want to incorporate a font within our production that connects with our chosen title: Static. Yet not just our title holds the fonts, but also the credit sequence, as we want to incorporate a glitchy-looking font to make it appear more eerie. Fonts help establish the atmosphere that will be passed throughout the film. Not just the tone but the genre, emotion, and storytelling as well. Using different colors and layouts also helps with the context of the theme placed within the specific font in the title or credits. 

My group and I don't have an initial concrete plan for the exact font to use for our production. But, after examining other mystery and horror productions as a reference, our goal is to create mockup designs in Canva for our production company logo, as well as experimenting with Adobe Express using some of our footage. To have a better visual analysis of watercolors or fonts that stick out when it is viewed in the final product. In the making of the movie poster, Jade used bright yellow and very closely spaced text.

Audio

Audio 

 Audio would be very important, as within our film and other films, we choose the appropriate sounds needed to create our story and give it life. Many films incorporate diegetic or non-diegetic sound. An example of it, a film involving a scene of cooking could include diegetic sound of pans clattering, or the oil sizzling in the pan. There are many other examples out there.  

Our goal is to use Foley sounds, non-diegetic sound, dialogue, and diegetic sound. With foley we plan to record all the heavy breathing, screaming, and clanking of objects. Within our recording, many of these sounds become lost or overlaid with other sounds, so we still want to recreate and make sounds ourselves of these missing sounds. A resource we would use is PixaBay since it gives non-copyrighted sound and music. Our dialogue would be filmed in separate recordings since it would be lost within the original sound of the video. Looking at our script when we are recording the dialogue will help our actors (me and Emma's dad) with their lines, and the director and editor when laying over the sounds when it comes to the final product. Our diegetic sound would be any footsteps, heavy breathing, opening, nature soundscape, and the squeaking of the white chalk marker written on the wall.  So, our sound will be different types.

References

The Los Angeles Film School. (2017, June 9). The Importance of Sound. The Los Angeles Film School. https://www.lafilm.edu/blog/the-importance-of-sound/

Part Two Mise-en-scene

                                                               COSTUME DESIGN-

 For the costume design of our film, we decided to organize the scenes to create a better visual for our characters' costumes, just as we did for our set. Within the three different scenes, we split up the three sections to see what type of costume design we would use. 

For our first part, the prison-cell scene, we wanted Avery to be in a hospital gown, yet we wanted it to be rusty and not too clean, to make it seem as if she had been in the cell for a long time. The costume is a long, white hospital gown with small patterns on the design of the hospital gown; she will also be wearing white socks. Like a mental patient would wear.  Since the hospital gown came in clean with no dirtiness.  Jade, Emma, and I went outside to Emma's backyard to find some dirt, and we blended it into the gown. We need to show that she had been there for a while. 

For the next scene, we decided we wanted our actor (Me) to be in normal teenager clothes, which include jeans, a simple long-sleeve shirt, and shoes. These cloths need to show her as person and who she was before everything. Our scene was the interrogation room. As Avery is held in a seat with her handcuffs on, Emma's dad, Ricardo Gonzalez, who is also in his current costume, acts as Officer Garcia (police officer). He will be wearing blue jeans and a blue shirt that goes up his collar to have a formal sense since he is a sheriff. He will have on his props, which include his belt with his gun (that is a toy) and his notepad for notes during the interrogation. He will also have on black shielding glasses. 

Makeup is a crucial factor within our film, when Avery is being held captive during her prison-cell scenes. We wanted her to seem very tired and not sleeping, as if she had been stuck and trapped there for a long time. To make it happen, we had Emm's mom help us with the makeup design, since she is really good at it. We gave her a look to signify "eye bags" and "tiredness." We didn't know how to do the makeup. We also wet her hair, to make it look greasy and as if she's in a frenzy. 

           

Lighting is highly important within our film and other films, since we want to give out an ominous, eerie feeling during the first scenes. We used dim lighting to represent the mood and atmosphere together. Many different mystery films include low-key lighting to create a darker contrast than other films. It gives them the stability of keeping the audience on edge. We chose to use these techniques within our film, using a light bar to add more of a filler light for when our character needs to be highlighted, and also to space out other characters.