Group photos

Here are the group photos we took during all stages of making our film opening.

Group pictures from Charlotte Revell

Because of them Facebook page

We have created a Facebook page to help with the marketing of our film and to make it more accessible to our target audience.

The link to our Facebook page is here: https://www.facebook.com/becauseofthemfilm/

On our Facebook page we have included our film poster and a link to the opening of our film on YouTube.

Production Diary

Monday 7th November

Today we were told who was going to be in our groups and were briefed on what our task was going to be. Our group included - Leah Harte, Lorna George, Jess Burdon and Charlotte Revell. 

Tuesday 8th November

Today we exchanged ideas on our genre and plot. We came up with several ideas and then developed our favourites. 
One idea was a woman in the 1900s, who is a suffragette, and a woman in 2016. The girl in 2016 is the great great granddaughter of the woman in the 1900s. The woman in 2016 does not appreciate the rights that she has today until she comes across a photograph of her great great grandparent and has a visions/flashbacks of what her ancestor went through in order to get her the rights that she has today.

Another idea was a family film about a teenager that goes to an arcade and ends up getting 'sucked' into an arcade game. They then have to try to get out of the machine during the rest of the film. 

We also thought of doing a crime drama where a woman finds a dead body down an alleyway and telephones the police. The film then follows the police investigation. 

Our final idea was another period drama where a teenage girl gets pregnant and is thrown out by her parents. She and her friends must travel far away to a place where they are not known by anyone to raise the baby. 

Wednesday 9th November

We decided to use the suffragette idea because it was the one that we though was the most doable and interesting. It is also the idea that we had developed the most at this point. 
We then began to get our ideas together and build a presentation on Microsoft PowerPoint that would become our film pitch to the rest of the class so that we can get their feedback on our ideas. 
We began to think of the practicalities of our idea first- where the best location would be for us to shoot the scenes and what would need to be organised in order to get everything done. Most of our time was spent working on our presentation.

Thursday 10th November

Today we worked on our presentation. We finished writing all of the slides and then proofread the slides to ensure that there were no spelling or grammatical errors. We then decided to upload our presentation from Microsoft PowerPoint onto Emaze to make it more interesting. 

Friday 11th November

We proofread our presentation again to double check that we had not previously missed any errors that were made. We then presented our film pitch to the class and received written feedback on various aspects of our film idea.

Monday 14th November

Today we uploaded our film pitch to our blog and sorted through the feedback that we received from our peers, uploading this onto our blogs also. We then discussed what we thought of the feedback we received and made changes to our ideas accordingly. We also took some time to develop our ideas further where some people said that things were not clear. 

Tuesday 15th November

Today Lorna called Chelmsford Museum to try to arrange a date for us to film in their museum. We also began to make our shot list which includes all of the different shots that we are planning to include in our film opening.

Wednesday 16th November

Today we continued to make our shot list. We also began to transfer information from our shot list onto our storyboard. We decided to make our storyboard out of post-it notes so that we can rearrange the order of our shots or remove them if we change our mind about something or have a better idea. 
We also began to make a prop and costume list so that we can begin to gather the items that we will need for our opening. We realised that this would need to be done soon because we would need to ensure that we are able to get hold of all of the props we will need so that we still have time to purchase them if we need to.

Thursday 17th November

In this lesson we finished the storyboard and shot list. This meant that we transferred our ideas from post notes to our story board. Leah then recorded a voice over to explain what happened in our storyboard. For the shot list Charlotte went through the storyboard and wrote out the shots needed at each location. This meant we had shots for Oakland Museum, Train station and Charlotte's House.

Monday 21st November

We started the risk assessment and did the character representation. This meant that we looked at the different characters and what sort of personality each character should portray. 

Tuesday 22nd November

Today we did Institution. This means that we looked into different companies that would produced our sort of film and that weren't too big. As a group we came  Film 4 as they help with a lot of smaller films however did produce films like 12 years a slave and Suffragettes. 

Wednesday 23rd November

Today we started the marketing campaign and finished it all apart from our poster. This meant that we looked at how we would advertise our film . This meant that we looked at social media and how we could use that to showcase our film. We then also looked at more traditional methods of advertising our film like buses and newspapers/ magazines. 

Thursday 24th November

 Today we went to Charlotte's house and filmed some of the 2016 women. We went in Charlotte's House and went into her attic. Lorna filmed in the attic and Leah filmed Charlotte coming down the stairs. We then went into her room and filmed Charlotte in her chair at multiple different angles to make sure we had a choice when we edited the scenes in.

Friday 25th November

Today we looked at film titles and decided font and the title because of them. To decide what film title we looked at films like Jane Eyre and the Suffragette. We decided on  Andalus we chose this because it looked like the font of old fashion film which is what we wanted.

Saturday 26th November

Today we filmed at Chelmsford train station and Oakland museum. Today Leah and Charlotte filmed at Chelmsford train station the one shot they needed. Leah's Mum then drove Leah and Charlotte to Oakland's museum where Lorna joined them. They first filmed Charlotte outside shot first. Leah then filmed the inside shots for Charlotte then Lorna. We then went back outside and Charlotte filmed Leah and Lorna outside the museum.

Monday 28th November

Today we started editing and found are film logos off you tube. Charlotte and Lorna started to decide which clips to use in the film open. Leah looked on you tube for a film 4 logo and got it off you tube and gave us the clip it import into the beginning of film opening. Lorna also gave us our film opening the solar production.

Tuesday 29th November

Today we continued to edited and added film logos and music. Today we started to look at the timings for and what order the film clips would go in and what transitions would work with our film genre.

Wednesday 30th November 

Leah and Charlotte carried on trying to order the film clips and decided film transition. Lorna worked on the production diary by adding detail to the first part of our production diary.Thursday 1st December
We continued to edited and discussed key ideas in the group to make sure it had all our influence in it.

Friday 2nd December

Today Leah and Charlotte filmed the office shot in a classroom in Great Baddow High School. We also researched what music we could use in are film opening. We had the problem of trying to find non-copied righted music.

Monday 5th December

Lorna and Charlotte added non-diagetic music. Leah researched different film posters so we could make our film posters as good and close to our film genre as possible.

Tuesday 6th December

Today we watched the first drafts of the classes film openings and wrote down feedback.

Wednesday 7th December

Today Charlotte wrote up are the classes feedback about the film opening. Lorna worked on our film posters.

Thursday 8th December

We edited are titles by changing the colour to black. We also changed the size of our titles. We then also created all the titles and added whole of the crew to the film opening. Lorna continued to work on the 2 film posters.

Friday 9th December

Charlotte continued to edit. Today she looked at the sound and how that could be improved. Leah also look for sounds of protesting for votes for women. This mean that she went onto you tube Lorna finished film posters

Monday 12th December

We added our sound of the women protesting for rights we also changed are titles to make them clearer.

Tuesday 13th December

In this lesson we updated are blogs. Leah also wrote the blog post about what age rating will be and she started our website. Lorna continued to edit. Charlotte updated the production diary and recorded a voice over.

Wednesday 14th December

Today Lorna and Charlotte continued to edited we move are film title from the end to into the film opening more. Leah worked on the location shots and continued to work on the website.

Thursday 15th December

Today Lorna worked on charging the titles so they are easier to see Leah continued to work on the website. Charlotte worked on the production diary so that the detail so each day was there.

Monday 19th December

Today Leah finished our website. Lorna finished editing our film opening and put it on you tube.
Charlotte  finished the production diary and spell checked her blog.

Because of them website

This is the website that we designed for marketing our film. It includes lots of information about the film and also includes connections to our film opening and social media sites.

Our Web Address -  http://hartounnoushiansl1.wixsite.com/becauseofthem

Institution

Here is are research about institutions

Because of them- Age Certificate

Here we have discussed why we have given our film the Age Certificate of 12.


Our film will include discrimination against women however it will be clear that this is wrong and the main character will be fighting against this discrimination. We will also include some mild violence but most of it will be implied only. There will be no gory details in regards to violence. There will  be some moderately disturbing scenes but the film as a whole will not have this tone. There will be no use of drugs or strong language; there will be moderate language only. There will be no sex scenes and sexual acts will be implied only.

Our film would not be able to have the certificate: Parental Guidance (PG) because it includes discriminatory behaviour towards women and there will be some intense threatening scenes for the characters which could be difficult for children to watch. There will also be moderate language which will not be suitable for children.

Our film would not be a 15 certificate because it does not include the use of drugs, strong sex scenes or strong language. Dangerous scenes will not be in  a great amount of detail and very frightening and intense scenes will not be long or frequent. The violence in our film will also be moderate only and not strong.

Film poster research

Here is our film poster research.

Film Poster Research from Leah Harte

Our first draft of our film opening

In this blog we uploaded our first draft of our film opening.

Final film titles

Production company-
Film4 
Solar Productions 

Charlotte Revell

Lorna George 

Because of them

Leah Harte

Jude Pettyfer

Casting by

John Ranch

 

Produced by

Ben Home

Music by

Gavin Luke

Edited by

Roger Brown

Produced by

Emily Hall

Director of photography

John Deadwood

Written by

William Field

Directed by

Todd Haynes

Film posters

These are the film posters for 'Because of them' these will be used to promote the film.

Location Shots

Chelmsford Museum Interior (Downstairs Interior)

 We used the museum as our main location because we thought that we could use aspects of it in a modern way but also emphasise the more historical features for the scenes set in the past.

Chelmsford Museum (Exterior of House)

The exterior of the museum gave us a paved road to walk on and some green fields. This was perfect for all of the shots that we needed to film outside.

Student's House (Attic, Hallway and Charlotte's Bedroom)

We needed to use someone's house so that we could sit on a chair in a bedroom and use a loft. We wanted the bedroom to be more modern because we believed that a person in their twenties in the present day would not want a very old fashioned bedroom, even if their house is very old.

Classroom (Office)

We decided to use a classroom for the office because we needed a computer for Charlotte to type on and the classroom provided a desktop computer. The desk was also very plain and wooden, like you would see in an office and the room provided good lighting to film in.

What we are going to do going forward to improve our film.

On this post we looking at how we are going to go forward to improve our film opening.

• Sort the volume of the sound.
• Add speech.
• Sort the titles out.
• Maybe add a suffragette voice over in the black and white scenes make the genre more known.

Timeline of Film Opening

This is the timeline of our opening. It includes the times in which everything happens, what is happening in the shot and which titles are shown on the screen at the time.

Timing In Opening	What’s Happening in the Shot	Titles
0-8 seconds	Film 4 Logo	-
8-13 seconds	Solar Productions Logo	-
13-20 seconds	Worm’s eye view shot of ceiling and window	-
20-29 seconds	Charlotte walking down stairs	Charlotte Revell
29-42 seconds	Lorna walking down the stairs	Lorna George
42-46 seconds	Freeze on stairs	Because of Them
46-54 seconds	Charlotte putting on coat	Leah Harte, Jude Pettyfer
54 seconds-1.00 minutes	Leah and Lorna walking along front of house	Casting by John Ranch
1.00-1.07 minutes	Charlotte walking along on the phone	Producer Ben Home
1.07-1.16 minutes	Charlotte using computer and writing ‘To Do’ List	Music by Gavin Luke Edited by Rodger Brown
1.16- 1.24 minutes	Lorna holding baby	-
1.24-1.30 minutes	Lorna cleaning in the house	Produced by Emily Hall
1.30-1.38 minutes	Charlotte getting box out of the loft	Director of Photography John Deadwood
1.38-1.52 minutes	Charlotte looking through box and at photograph	Written by William Field
1.52-1.59 minutes	Shot over Charlotte’s shoulder looking at photograph	Directed by Todd Haynes
1.59-2.04 minutes	Black screen – Sounds of suffragettes shouting

My assement of another group's film opening.

In this blog post I will review the film opening "Outlaw"
The genre is action.
First I commenting on what I believe is good.

• The first comment I made was that the locations were good.
• I also stated that the film opening created a good cliff-hanger which made me want to watch the whole film.

I then stated what made the opening sequence confusing or missing.

• The first idea I wrote was about where the titles where.
• I also stated that the music could be more interesting. This is because they only had one song playing though the film opening and changing it up a bit might make it sound better.

Then I said what could be improved.

• I said that the music was a bit loud. 

Group self assessment on 1st draft

What we believed went well as a group.

•  The footage mostly flowed well.
• All the footage was in the right order.

What we believed should be improved.

• The volume of the sound.
• Check the spelling of all the names in the titles.
• Need more titles as we don't have everyone.
• Script should be added.
• It could be longer.  

Feedback on 1st draft

In this blog post we are writing up the feedback on our first draft of "Because of them".

Firstly we learned about what people thought what was good about are film opening. Here are what some people thought.

• They was a good range of shots.
• A lot of transitions where good.
• Good shots from the bottom of the stairs.
• A lot of people thought the locations where good.
• Another good aspect was the different editing effects.
• They was also good costumes.

Then we learnt about what people found confusing.

• Some people said the scenes jumped .
• One person didn't understand the storyline.
• Someone said it was boring.
• A lot commented on how loud the sound was.
• One person said there was too much enigma.
• Some people mentioned that the titles where in the wrong place.

Then we got told how we could improve our film opening.

• The titles needed to be a different colour.
• The sound needs to be louder
• Maybe some speech to make the storyline clearer.
• The titles need to be re-ordered.
• Maybe a suffergate voiceover to make the genre clearer.
• lighting and colouring could have been adjusted.

Titles

PRODUCTION COMPANY-
Film4

OTHER PRODUCTION COMPANIES
SOLAR PRODUCTIONS

CAST:
JUDE LAW
ALEX PETTYFYER

EXTRAS:
LEAH HARTE

WITH
LORNA GEORGE
AND CHARLOTTE REVELL

MUSIC BY
GAVIN LUKE

EDITORS
ROGER BROWN
ELENOR BROOKES

PRODUCER
EMILY POOL
MATHEW SMITH

WRITTEN BY
WILLIAM FIELD
JESSICA BURDON

DIRECTED BY
TODD HAYNES

Representation

In this post I we will look at how the characters are represented.

Institution

In this blog post we looked at what company may produce our film.

Marketing campaign

In this post we looked at how we were going to market our film and where.

Music Research

In this post we looked at different music ideas we could use in our film opening.

Music research from Charlotte Revell

Character Representation

In this post we looked at how the characters are represented.

Risk Assessment

In this post I was looking at the risk at the settings for are film opening and how we are going to minimise this risk. here is the list of risks and how we are going to minimise the likelihood of them happening.

Risk assessment from Charlotte Revell

Here is a picture of are proper risk assessment. we choose the 4 biggest hazard to write about.

Prop list

Here is a list of props we are using in our film opening.

• Cardboard box.
• A photo album
• A2 paper to be used for the signs
• Glass jars.
• Paint (black)
• paint brushes
• Doll
• Blanket
• Briefcase
• Bluetooth ear piece that's connected to a phone. 

Script

This is the script for our film opening. We decided that we didn't want much dialogue so we kept our script very brief.

Walking to Protest

Alice (Lorna): I hope were not late. I don't want to miss the march.
Mary (Leah) don't worry we have plenty of time.

Charlotte on her way to work

Charlotte (charlotte):  [Gets phone call] Mark I told you to move my meeting... well find a way to occupy them... I'm going to be half an hour. [hangs up]

Storyboard evaluation

Our storyboard works well because we include details of what we want to happen in each shot and the angles. However, the timings on the storyboard mean that the video will overrun past our time limit.

The first page of our storyboard works well because we include details of what we want to include and we have also included the transitions that we want to use. However, we have not included all of the information that we could have as we have not included all of the camera angles we used. We decided to remove the part where the letter was posted through the letter box and then Charlotte put the letter in the bin. We felt that this was not a crucial part to the story and since we needed to remove some shots we decided to remove this one.

This page of our storyboard is better because it includes much more detail and some of the various shots that we are hoping to include. We have also included the transitions that we hoped to use so that it would make the editing process easier. But, we did not have on box for each individual shot/camera angle and so some of them are grouped together. This makes the storyboard a little bit confusing. We also removed the shot where we see the suffragette painting the poster as we felt that it was not vital to the story. We therefore also did not include the transition where the camera tracks into the poster and then tracks out in the next shot. We tried to incorporate this in a separate part of the opening but found that this was too difficult to do without a tripod with wheels. We also decided to have the suffragette sit on a chair with the baby instead of walk through the house. We did this because we thought of a creative way to film this and felt that it would make the opening more interesting. 



The final page of our storyboard is good because it includes detailed descriptions of what we will have in each shot as well as various camera angles we will include. However, like before, we did not put each camera angle/shot in a box on its own which made the storyboard more difficult to read. We also did not include the shot where the suffragette was doing the washing up. We thought it would be better to include a more historical looking object and so had her cleaning a clock instead. We also showed the woman from 2016 looking in boxes in the loft rather than climbing the ladder.

Audience

Audience Primary and Secondary from Leah Harte

Shooting schedules

In this post we look at the shooting schedules for different locations.

Storyboard

In this post there is a video talking about our storyboard.

Costume list

On this post I will write about our costumes.
Lorna
A maxi skirt
Grey blaster
Long coat
Votes for women sash
Leah 
Long coat
Skirt
Votes for women sash
Charlotte
Black trousers
Shirt
High heels
Make up

Everything we had in our houses. The only thing we had to buy where the sashes. Leah brought the sashes of eBay.

Film pitch evaulation

The feedback to our film pitch.

Clear Genre, Themes, Message?

People decently know the genre of a period drams and most knew that one of are main themes was women rights to vote. However most commented that period drams were hard to get right. There also understood are main idea that they was a  women fighting to get the vote for women and then they was a modern women who did not see the point in voting. However a couple of people did question are influence of back to the future as we did not have anyone time travelling. However that influence was mostly for an earlier idea. A lot of people also commented that the idea was quite a unique idea as lot as we did not make it too similar to the suffragettes movie that was realised last year. Then one person did say that are film seemed to carry a powerful message.

What is the narrative?

Everyone knew that are narrative was about a women fighting for the women's right to vote and a 2016 women  who did not see the point in voting. they were comments about the film being interesting if we pulled it off and did it well. they was also the comments about the film being too prediticatle.  A lot of people also picked up that there was going to be comparisons between two women however some believe this will be to difficult to do and will not make sense.

Interesting Characters?

In our film pitch we only told people about two characters the women in the 1900s and the women in 2016 however some believed we don't tell them enough about the characters to make the lot interesting and some said this would make the storyline more interesting. However some did say the characters seemed good however need to be developed. then  we did have that the character seemed different and unique but did  comment on the fact we only had two characters which didn't seem like enough.

 

Does it match the target audience?

Everyone apart from a couple of people knew that are film was aiming to get a 12 rating. Some people believe this was good however some believed that the plot line would be to boring for someone of that age. However what we believe in are group however may not have explained properly is that we know most young teenagers wouldn't watch the film however they would not be any scenes or language that means however we know that re target audience would be older teenagers and adults. They also believed that the audience would need to be educated or have a interest in history to understand which I agree with.

Institution.

Everyone apart from a couple knew that are film was being produced by Film 4 and distributed by Path. Then some people did also pick up that one of are production companies as well. The people that commented believed that the choices we made for these companies were good as we looked at other film they have their name too and hey have ones of similar genes which they believe is a good idea.

Any comments about the film, would you watch it, is it doable and interesting?

Some people in are media class said they would watch the film as it sounds interesting. and seem quite unique. However some people had some doubts whether we might be able to pull it of. They also had some doubt wherever we could get the right costume or if the location could be correct or good enough. They was also one or two people that questioned whether if our plot was interesting .However as a group we knew this might happen as are film idea would not sound interesting to everyone however I believe enough people would be interested enough to watch it.   

My view on the feedback

I believe that all the comments where very useful and really are going to help us when we plan the storyboard and script. One thing I have picked up on is that are characters really need work to make the more interesting and they need more depth as we didn't give much information about them. another thing  I picked up on was that a o of people believe that the film is going to be very hard to made the film good enough to show what we want it to.

Shot ideas/mood board

In this blog post we looked at how we where going to shot our film.

Film Pitch

Genre research

In this post we looked at the sufferagete film opening to get inspiration for our own film.

It starts with a close shot of machinery working into a dark and dirty factory where they are women washing clothes.The lighting means it is hard to show any proper detail. However all the women are in gray. Then non- digetic sound changes from very quite calm music to my women shouldn't have the vote. The camera then looks up at the factory owners who are both men. They clothes have more colour than the womens and there room is well lit. However over all the scene is calm.

The scene then changes to when one of the main characters seems to be on her way home. This scene also starts calmly however the music has changed again to slightly quicker music. The lighting is also brighter so we are able to see more details, This is creating the feeling that something big is about to happen. The camera angle then changes to look at the rest of the scene where more and more women are coming into shot. Then the camera starts to get closer to one women with a pram. She sames the first piece of speech. She screams "Votes for women". This turns the scene from calm to chaotic. Women start to throw things trough windows. This means that the camera changes to smooth shoots to quick sharp shots that emphasis the fact the scene is no longer calm.

Student film openings and construction mark scheme

In this lesson we looked at the mark scheme that is used to mark our film openings. We used it today to look at other student film openings.

 Here is the mark scheme.

The Edge

This is the first film we looked at once we had watched it we found out it got 57 out of 60 marks. I believed it got this as the way they produced and displayed there titles were vey interesting and professional. Also the quality of the editing was excellent. another good point was how the music worked in time with the action happening in the opening. However it was too long.

Roses are Red

This was the second title we looked at. This is believe to get about a level 3. The good things about this opening was how creatively the tittles were shown however some where unclear. The only other good thing was that it had a clear genre of a teenage drama. However the camera work had shake moments. Also nothing really happened and the editing could have been better.



Blitz

This film opening got 59 marks. There was a lot good about this film opening. The first thing was the scene was amazing and very realists. Another good thing was the camera work as it was a very crisp and clear. Also the mature of the plot made it stand out as it was more grown up than the other film openings I had looked at. Also the radio in the background was really good at setting the scene. The only bad part about this film opening was at the end when it had the cliché 60 years later story idea.

Titles

In this lesson we looked at what order the titles in a film opening.
the first lesson I looked at was Deadpool. It went in this order marvel. then Twentieth Century fox. Then marvel entertainment. then it had actors however there where comical names like "moody teen". They then mentioned who made cameos. Then we had who it was produced by then written by. then finally who it was directed by.
I then looked at Guardians of the Galaxy in more detail including times.
It started with the time setting. This happened in 4 seconds.

It then showed the company that produced the film this was at 14 seconds.

It then also had who also made the film. This happened at 17seconds.

Then it had the actors. The times were from  22 seconds to until 1:38.

The title of the film did not appear until 2:26.

Then at 2:30 who did the casting.

Then at 2:33 for the music supervior.

 The person who wrote the music was shown at 2:38.

The visual effects producer was shown at 2:43

 Then the visual effects supervisor was shown at 2:46

Then they was a costume designer at 2:49

It then shown who did the editing by. This was shown at 2:53.

 It then who did the production design. This was shown at 2:58.

 Then it was the director of photography. This was then shown at 3:02.

  Then it had the co- producers at 3:06.

 Then from 3:10 until 3:30 it showed the executive producers.

 It then showed who produced by. This was shown at 3:33.

At 3:40 we saw who wrote it.

 Then finally at 3:47 we saw who directed the film.