It is officially week 3 of working on my Cambridge Portfolio Project where I create my very own film opening. Today in class, my teacher assigned us to work with a couple of our peers to discuss and review our plans to get some more feedback and ideas. I worked with 6 other students as I shared my idea and received some help, as well as giving my own constructive criticism to help them out.
My group included my classmates Santi, Jake, Katarina, Ella, Camilla, and Marat. Marat went first to share his idea for his mystery/adventure film about 2 detectives who are plotting on finding a major thief that steals important artifacts and relics from museums around the world. His biggest obstacle was the filming location, they originally had the idea to film in a house and just use different rooms as different locations. The issue with this idea though is that the locations may look like they're in the same house, which may make the film look unprofessional entirely. The group provided a lot of feedback to help Marat, like using mise-en-scene elements to help implement the idea that various locations are being used. He will use a office area with props like empty coffee mugs, empty ramen cups, scattered papers, etc. This will help show the emotions that the detective is going through and make the office differentiate from the other rooms.
An idea Marat had for the mise-en-scene was to create fake news articles headlining this antagonist, and having this prop scattered around the room
Then Santi shared his idea, they want to start the opening as an interrogation. The interrogation is going to be about a doctor getting interviewed after a patient had unfortunately died from a laced medication. They said they weren't fully set on their idea, but knew they wanted to do something about a doctor and where something went wrong. Their biggest issue was location as well, since it would be very different to film in a hospital or interrogation room. Santi said one of the people in the group's mom worked at a hospital so they could possibly get permission from there, I also brought up an idea our teacher had mentioned where they could ask to use the HOSA room for a realistic hospital set, and another girl in our group meeting said she is in the club and could help out! Another issue was the lighting, they didn't want it to seem still dark but at the same time make it look like an interrogation room. We suggested to use a dark backdrop with a bright flashlight on the subject, or even the location idea of a police station backrooms type of look.
Jake then went on to express to us his idea. His idea was very interesting and unique, he was going to film his mainly through the use of POV shots and through a older more digital looking camera. His idea is that these people are looking for a missing person in the woods, and are slowly finding clues. The clues would then be shown through the use of the POV shot, almost as if it was live video footage or as if it was being streamed which is a cool concept to make the audience feel like they're involved. Again, Jake and his partner's group was location. They couldn't find a public park/forest that would be creepy looking, but safe enough to film in at night time. We suggested a nearby park that's open at those hours, but has park rangers to monitor everything going on there.
Next was Ella, her idea was for a drama film opening that opens at a birthday party. The concept of this film is to be about neglection and upbringing teenage issues in general. The concept was very cool but not throughly thought out. She wanted to show the teenage girl setting up for the party by herself, and when it would show her asking her parents for help (whose faces wouldn't be shown to represent how out of her life they are) they would ignore her. She wanted to keep a duller color scheme with muffled audio. We wanted to make sure she had time to roll her credit sequence and that the story was fully thought through and wasn't a basic storyline that wouldn't keep viewers engaged.
Katarina then shared her idea, it was about a girl who was in her room listening to voicemails from her mom who was out at a party. The girl gets so fed up that she wants to leave home, but when she goes downstairs there is a man passed out on the floor surrounded by empty alcohol bottles. While Katarina idea was good and eventful, the group expressed it may be too much information and detail to fit into a 2 minute opening. The story seemed very rushed and we questioned her what the rest of the plot would be. We told her to slow it down a bit and make it more questionable to the viewers as to what was going to happen.
Then I shared my idea. The group seemed to love my idea and agreed that my partner and I should definietly settle on it. The only critiques they had was to make sure the location made sense with the costuming. That if it was casual, make them wear casual clothes. If they were at practice, make them wear uniforms to help better establish the relationships.
Lastly was Camilla, who had such a cool and unique concept where she is animating her entire project. She will be hand drawing the cartoons and frames using specific softwares. Her idea is to keep it a fantasy, and about a dragon that is attacking a town. Color scheme will be very important for her in this film opening. What we recommend for her, was to make the shots purposeful to the plot to help showcase the story better since there will be no audio. We proposed ideas for ways to present the title, along with ideas to help better the storyline.
In conclusion, I really enjoyed the opportunity to speak to my peers that I may not have been able to have spoken to outside of this exercise. It was interesting seeing the different places everyone was at while we are all doing the same project. I also really appreciated hearing clear and honest feedback to better help my project.
.png)
