Representation: Setting

To dress the setting according to representation of the genre and mood of the scene we must take props and lighting into account.

Firstly, we wanted to dress the room to show that it belongs to a teenage boy. This was made quite easy for us because the room we are filming in is already a teenage boy's room.

Conventions of the teenage boy's room which were already fulfilled:

• Band posters
• Instruments: Electric guitar, drum kit, amps
• Boy's clothes thrown around the room
• Unmade bed
• Laptop
• Desk with school books and stationary for work

Therefore, we did not have much dressing of the set to do inside, apart from moving iconic props, like band posters, into shot when they are not. We got inspiration from Kick-
Ass for this aspect of our representation.

Opening of Shaun of the Dead

Secondly, we tried to fulfil regional identity by showing that it is set in Britain. In our first set of inside the bedroom, we showed the nationality through English band posters and through the British accents of the actors. In our second location, we film in the street outside the house, showcasing the traditionally British terraced and semi-detached housing which is typical of London houses. Our film reference for this representation of setting is Shaun of the Dead.

How our test shoot will be different to our main shoot

Storyboard

We have decided to alter the storyboard.
Instead of having the long conversation between the three friends in the last minute of the sequence, we are going to have the montage for the last minute and in the first minute we will show Michael being broken up with by his girlfriend Lara, while walking home from school.

Location

The first location will still be Gavin's house, for the teenage boy's room
The second location will be the street outside Gavin's house, where Michael will get dumped by Lara, as they walk home together. This will also be a chance to showcase the British terraced housing and represent our regional identity.

Style

We have decided to differ the style as well.
As opposed to the style of Edgar Wright (Director of Scott Pilgrim VS The World and The 3 Flavours Cornetto Trilogy), we have decided to make it look more natural and not include the editing techniques such as fast action-style editing, whip pans, crash zooms and the fast-paced upbeat mood.
We felt that it did not connote our genre as well as we wanted.

Actors

We will still be using Gavin as our male protagonist but we have decided to use a girl from outside our media group (Yssy) as the girlfriend who will dump Michael at the beginning of the film opening.
We chose Yssy mainly because she is comfortable around the camera and she has the image of a stereotypical girl, also because she lives fairly close to the location, so we could count on her to be there.

Gavin, who will play Michael

Yssy, who will play Lara

Rough Edit From Test Shoot - Video and Reflections

Good Points

• The montage in the first minute is quite interesting and introduces the story and character well
• The song used in the montage creates a suitable atmosphere and isn't copyrighted (because we recorded it)
• While it needs simplifying, the story is clear and fairly interesting
• The continuity was (mostly) very good and the shots flow nicely together
• We have a variety of shot types and lots of camera movement, making the sequence interesting technically

Problems

• We did not record atmos (background sound) so there are some points where the background sound changes
• We took longer than expected to get all of the shots that we needed
• We did not include many titles
• We didn't have any institutional logos at the start of the film
• The acting is not very convincing
• The dialogue is unnatural and the conversation doesn't flow that well
• We tried to cram too much into the two minutes
• We never included the film's title at the end as we couldn't figure out a good way to put it in
• We did not grade it at all so it doesn't look as good as it can
• We never decided on a font so the one used for titles is not what we will be using in the final edit
• The conversation was not very funny
• The sequence was longer than two minutes
• The editing was only rough to avoid wasting time, meaning it doesn't look very professional

Solutions

• Record and use atmos in the final edit
• Organise the shot list better and prepare the set for the shoot in advance
• Include more titles and include the logos for institutions at the start
• Make the script more natural so that the acting doesn't seem forced or awkward
• Simplify the sequence so that it doesn't last longer than two minutes
• Edit the sequence well (i.e. grade it and make the editing in the montage more clean)

What We Have Learnt and Will Change

From this, we decided to keep the main idea of our chosen genre and audience, but potentially make a completely different film opening sequence, because we feel that this one does not reflect what we want.
To do this, we will have to make a new storyboard and devise a new script.
From this we will have to think about the style, camerawork and new actors we will be bringing in because of it.