Film Poster

For my film poster, I used two images. one of which I took myself and the other from sxc.hu - a website offering free royalty free images on the condition that you adhere to their terms and conditions, which I have done.

Original images:

 This is the image from the royalty free image site. I really loved the colours from the image and the concert set up - it was perfect for my poster.

This is my original image. I knew that I wanted a simple hand making the 'rock and roll' hand gesture on my poster and so I took a few photos. Then I came up with the idea of having a hospital wrist band around the wrist to show the main character's medical struggle - or at least, to give some indication of it. A friend of my brothers had one which he let me borrow and so this was the image I used for my poster.

I used Adobe Photoshop CS5 to create the final poster, changing all the details on the hospital wristband, putting the images together, adding contrast and text and finally, a vignette. Here is the finished product:

Film Review

After finishing my shot film I set about creating my review. I took into consideration all of my research and thought about the conventions of published film reviews: large title, big main image, screenshots, small fact file about the film, text in columns and a rating and came up with the following:

Short Film FINISHED!

So, the many weeks of research, filming and editing have come down to this, the final cut of my short film. I have made a LOT of changes since my rough cut. Firstly, I changed the title from "Keep Smiling" to "Final Chord" as I didn't like the original and I feel like "Final Chord" both sounds better and is more appropriate. Also, I've put the film into black and white as a lot of rock music videos are in black and white and so this is also appropriate considering the genre of my short. Also, the black and white looked better and covered up the fact that the shots of Harry Cadden had a strong yellow hue which i couldn't get rid of. I've also added shots of the main character playing instruments and added a vignette to these shots to enhance the aesthetic of the shots. The music has been added also and I think that it's come out rather well. Granted, if I had more time, I would probably change a few things. But we'll save that for the evaluation, so, here is "Final Chord".

Editing #2

Production Update

New idea for the ending

Creating Music for my Documentary

Just a quick video explaining how the production of my music for my documentary is going. I gave my brother a brief, he recorded some bits and then we put it all together on Garageband and decided what worked and what didn't . One of the songs that has been finished is below:

I also needed some sadder music to convey the melancholic atmosphere and the effect that the protagonist's tumour has on his loved ones. I found a royalty free track on capoproductionsmusic.com that captured the attitude of my short perfectly and so this is the music that I will be incorporating into my short:

Rough Cut Feedback

This week, we screened the rough cuts of our short films to our peered and received feedback on small sheets. Here is my review of this feedback. Apologies for the horrific quality of the video and my sick-sounding voice.

VERY Rough Cut

This is the rough cut for my short documentary 'Keep Smiling'. This is the bare bones of the documentary so there is no foley sound, no background music, not everything is colour corrected etc. This should just hopefully give you an idea of what I am trying to create for my final A2 Media Studies Project. I'm not even sure about the title of the documentary at this stage but at least it's starting to come together...

Filming is finished!

One Disaster After Another

Filming #2

Editing #1

After filming quite a bit of footage with Harrison, I decided to edit together what I had got so far so I wouldn't have to do a huge amount of editing all in one go. Before editing however, I decided to watch loads of videos and do lots of experiments on colour correcting footage in Adobe Premiere Pro and so I taught myself quite a few techniques. Below are some shots of my colour correction. To show the difference my colour correction has made, I cut the shot in half. The bottom half is before I colour corrected and the top half is after I experimented with colour correction.

After experimenting with colour correction I edited all the footage together from my first day of shooting. However, it is likely that a lot of this footage will be replaced with other elements such as archive footage and shots of Harrison playing instruments or recording.

Filming: Day 1

New film, new script

FADE IN – Footage of a baby smiling and laughing. Sound of a voice over a speaker system with faint cheering in the background.

HARRY (VO):

This next song is for you guys. Thanks for making it number one.

Audio fades into a rock song remnant of rock songs from the early 70s. At the same time, footage changes to the baby in a paddling pool in the summer, he is giggling.

JANE (VO):

He was always a happy little boy.

As JANE talks, an array of footage from when HARRY was a baby is played.

JANE (VO):

He only really cried if he fell over.

Transition to see JANE sitting and facing the camera.

JANE:

Harry always loved music. We used to put the Star Wars soundtrack on for him and he used to sing us little songs so we were never surprised about how much music influenced him growing up.

FADE IN – footage of HARRY singing as a child.

Transition to HARRY.

HARRY:

I started learning guitar four years ago, drums nearly two years ago.

Transition to HARRY playing drums or guitar in his studio.

HARRY (VO):

I just like how I can escape with music. Just kinda, forget everything else for a while and go and have a jam or whatever.

Transition back to HARRY.

HARRY:

I managed to write and record an album last year. I managed to get it put on iTunes and then things just went mental.

Transition to HARRY doing some editing on his computer. Audio of a radio show.

DJ (VO):

And it’s time to reveal this week’s number one single! So, from the self-titled debut album, here’s Paradox by 16 year old sensation, Harry.C!

Audio of the song ‘Paradox’.

HARRY (VO):

I don’t want any special treatment or anything though. I still go to that same school and carry on like normal except I get a little more attention now…

Cross-fade with shot of JANE.

JANE:

I was so proud of him when his single reached number one – I always knew he’d do well. But not long after that, doctors discovered a tumour in his brain that they couldn’t remove and… because of the growth rate, they don’t think that Harry’s got long left.

Cut to shot of HARRY.

HARRY:

I’m not scared of dying. I’m not really scared about the tumour; I try not to think about it really. I just focus on music really.

Cut to shot of HARRY playing an instrument.

HARRY (VO):

If it gets too much I just pick up a guitar or my drumsticks and play something. You know, sometimes you’ve just gotta get on with things.

Cut to shot of HARRY.

HARRY:

I know I’ve not got long left but I don’t want to spend my time moping around, I want to do what makes me happy.