AS G321: Preliminary Task - STORYBOARD

AS G321: Preliminary Task - SCRIPT

IT'S MY HOUSE!

SCENE 1

EXT. EMILY’S HOUSE. DAY.

Establishing shot of house. The front door is open. EMILY walks up to the  door and stops as she sees it is open. Mid shot of EMILY looking at the open door, confused. Close up of the door as she pushes it the rest of the way open and steps inside. 

INT. EMILY’S HOUSE. DAY.

She looks around and sees movement out of the corner of her eye. She walks cautiously into the kitchen, where the thief is trying to hide. 

EMILY

Who are you?

THIEF

Who are you?

EMILY

The owner of this house! What are you doing in here?

THIEF

Oh… I… The door was open, I thought it was for sale, I was just having a look…

EMILY

Well this is my house and it’s not for sale.

THIEF

Sorry… I’d better be going now then…

EMILY

You better or I’ll call the police.

The THIEF looks around nervously, looking for an escape.

EMILY

Wait… are you robbing me?

THIEF

Umm… no?

Over the shoulder shot pans down to show the valuables the THIEF is holding behind her back. 

EMILY

I’m calling the police.

EMILY turns around, looking for the phone. The THIEF quickly goes out the kitchen door and hides in the living room. EMILY turns back around, holding the phone.

EMILY

Wait where…?

The THIEF leans back round the kitchen door.

THIEF

Have a good evening!

The THIEF punches EMILY, who falls to the ground. POV shot from EMILY lying on the ground and the THIEF’S feet. Tracking shot starting with EMILY lying on the ground and pulling back through the hallway and out the front door as the THIEF leaves the house and runs down the road. 

AS G321: Preliminary Task - TREATMENT

Working Title

It’s My House!

Synopsis

Emily comes home to find her front door wide open. She rushes inside and there is a stranger in her kitchen. She asks who they are and threatens to call the police. The stranger denies being a robber but a pan shot reveals to the viewers the stolen goods hidden behind their back. Emily is suspicious and turn to find the phone to call the police, but when she is looking away the stranger slowly leaves the room. Emily turns and is shocked but then the stranger sticks their head back around the door and wishes Emily good day before leaving again. The scene ends with a long shot of the stranger sprinting away down the road as a police siren blares.

Characters

Emily -  A teenage female, who who owns the house.

Thief - A thief who tried to steal the house and does everything she can not to get caught.

Film Techniques

We will film on a Canon EOS 700D and use three-point lighting to light the scene. The techniques we will use are:

• Match on action

• Shot/reverse shot

• 180 degree rule

• Tilt

• Pan

• 360 degree tracking shot

• Over the shoulder shot

Product Considerations

We intend to film in a house and the surrounding streets. 

DSLR Guide

DSLR stands for Digital Single Lens Reflex. It is a camera with one lens and a mirror which reflects the light, where pictures are recorded on a digital card instead of film.

Exposure

• the amount of light a digital camera’s sensor captures when a photo is taken.

• too much light results in a washed out photo (overexposed).

• too little light results in a too dark photo (underexposed).

• a camera’s aperture, shutter speed and ISO settings directly affect exposure and allow you to control how the photo will look.

Overexposed:

Underexposed:

Aperture

• size of the lens opening.

• a low f-stop number allows in more light, which gives a shallow depth of field and an out of focus background and foreground.

• a high f-stop number allows in less light, so has a wider depth of field, giving a sharp foreground, mid ground and background.

Large Aperture (f22):

Small Aperture (f2.8):

Shutter Speed

• controls how long the shutter opens to expose the image sensor to light.

• a short shutter speed means the shutter is open for a very short amount of time. This allows less light to get to the image sensor and means a photo can capture a fast-moving object.

• a long shutter speed means the shutter is open for longer. Therefore more light can reach the image sensor and photos taken of a moving object will be blurred.

Long Shutter Speed (1sec):

Short Shutter Speed (1/6000)

ISO

• how sensitive the image sensor is to light.

• the higher the ISO, the more sensitive the sensor, and the brighter the image will be.

• the lower the ISO, the less light will come in and the darker the image will be.

• using a high ISO in low light will produce a grainy image, so it is best to use the lowest ISO possible, and adjust the brightness of the photo using other elements such as Aperture and Shutter Speed.

High ISO (6400):

Low ISO (100):

Media Language

Media Language refers to the ways in which meaning is created in media texts.

Establishing Shot: The opening shot in a dramatic scene that establishes the disposition of people and objects in the mise en scene. As such it is usually a wide shot, and is likely to be followed by a succession of closer shots.

 Two Shot: A shot in which two figures appear in the frame.

Point of View Shot: A camera angle in which the viewer seems to see with the eyes of the character in the scene.

Over the Shoulder Shot: A camera shot in which the subject of the shot is filmed from behind a person's head and shoulders, which are framed to one side in the foreground.

High-Angle Shot: A camera shot taken from a higher level than the subject, and angled down towards them. This shot can have the effect of diminishing the authority of the subject, making them look weak.

Low-Angle Shot: A camera shot taken from a lower level than the subject, and angled up at them. This shot can have the effect of enhancing the authority of the subject, making them look powerful.

Canted Angle: A cinematic device where the camera is physically placed at and angle so that vertical and horizontal surfaces appear diagonal.

Pan: A horizontal camera movement left-to-right or right-to-left on a fixed axis. The word is short for 'panoramic movement'. A pan following a moving object suggests we are viewing it from the point of view of an observer.

Tilt: A camera movement up or down a horizontal axis.

Tracking Shot: A camera movement achieved by mounting the camera on a dolly and moving it along a track. Typically, tracking shots are used to follow characters or other objects in motion.

Diagetic Sound: Sound that can be heard by the characters in the world of the film.

Non-diagetic Sound: Sound that cannot be heard by the characters in the world of the film.

Synchronous Sound: Sound that is directly matched with what is being viewed.

Sound Bridge: Editing technique in which visual cuts are deliberately not matched with audio cuts. For example, the editor may cut to a completely new scene, but allow sound from the preceding scene to run on for a short time. Alternatively, we may hear the sound of the next scene before we can see it.

Dialogue: The conversation that happens between characters in a work of fiction, or the lines spoken by actors.

Voiceover: A type of non-diagetic, asynchronous sound in which the audience hear a voice that does not have a source either within the frame or within hearing distance and which is not heard by people on screen.

Incidental Music: Music used in a film as a background to create or enhance a particular atmosphere.

Stings: A short musical phrase primarily used as a form of punctuation.

Ambient Sound: Sound which is natural to a setting.
Mise-en-scene: The look of a film, derived from its use of sets and settings, lighting, colour, costumes, hair and makeup, props, actor movement, and the overall placement and visual composition of these elements by the director.

Location: A 'real' place, as opposed to a studio, in which something is filmed or otherwise recorded. A location might be a New York City street or a desert.

Set: An interior that has been constructed to look like a real place when filmed; the set helps to identify the time and place in which a narrative will unfold.

Costume: The clothes worn by characters in a fictional text. The costumes are part of the mise en scene and as such are an important part of signification (for example, as a generic or period identifier).

Make-up: Cosmetics used to change the appearance of a performer.

Prop: Short for 'property'. A small item used in a film or TV production to add realism, assist with the narrativve or act as a motif.

High-key lighting: Lighting which eliminates most of the shadows.

Low-key lighting: Lighting which emphasises shadows.

Cut: The commonest form of edit in moving image texts, this is the instantaneous change from one shot to another in an edit.

Shot/reverse shot: A convention for showing a dialogue sequence. We cut between two speakers, showing each person's point of view.

180 Degree Rule: All camera angles must stay on one side of an imaginary line down the middle of a scene, to avoid confusion of proxemics for the viewers.

Eye-line match: A visual code used to make it clear what the subject is looking at.

Graphic match: A compositional device onscreen, whereby objects of common characteristics of shape or colour are used in successive shots.

Match on action: Two shots in which an action begun in the first is completed in the second, thus disguising the fact that there has been a cut.

Dissolve: In editing, a cross-fade between two shots; one fades out as the other fades in.

Wipe: A shot transition in which the new image wipes over the previous one.

Superimposition: To place one image over another on the screen.

Long take: Not to be confused with a long shot, a long take is a shot of comparatively long duration.

Montage: The production of a rapid sucession of shots and images in a motion picture, usually accompanied by music, to illustrate association of ideas or passing of time.

Post-production: The various processed that take place after filming in order to create the final cut of a film.

AS G321: Foundation Portfolio in Media - Overview

My name is Amy Green and I am studying Media Studies at Newlands Girl's School.

I will be using this blog to document my AS Media Studies coursework. For AS G321: Foundation Portfolio in Media, I have been given the following briefs:

Preliminary Exercise

Continuity task involving filming and editing a character opening a door, crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom she/he then exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue. This task should demonstrate match on action, shot/reverse shot and the 180-degree rule. 

Main Task

The titles and opening of a new fiction film, to last a maximum of two minutes.

This blog will serve as a record of my progress. It will include the documenting of research and planning, production, post-production, and evaluations.