REVIEW: Drafting layout

When we began to design our review we decide to follow a similar layout to that of Company magazine.
However we did have to adjust the layout to fit the pictures and the text.

Some of the stages we went through are shown below.



We choose this layout due to its emphasis on the pictures rather then the text. Also the magazine is aimed towards a female audience and so is our film.
The final product is below.


As you can see we changed the font used on the FYI and we added a collection of pictures along to bottom to coincide with the film. We tried to fill up the white space on the page therefore making it look more professional.

REVIEW: Choosing most appropriate images from film

Along the bottom of the review there is a selection of photos from the film. We wanted to choose pictures from within the film that looked good together without them giving away the plot too much.
The pictures include scenes from the middle but miss out the beginning and the end of the film so you don't know how it is set up or how it finishes.


The main picture is of the photo frame including the picture of Joe and Scarlet. This emphasises the relationship between the two characters and lets the audience know instantly the genre and theme of the film without having to even read the article. We had to retake the main picture due to the fact the quality was not of a very good standard and this took the edge away from the review.

REVIEW: Drafting text

We started to plan the way in which we would write our review by reading some Company articles. The articles focused on the people and their sense of style, we wanted ours to be similar. In our article we discussed the clothes they wear and the looks of the characters to make it seem more genuine to the magazine. We did also try to not only incorporate the style of the style of Company but stick to the regular format of a review. We made sure to tell the audience what is enjoyable about film and also what has room for improvement.

REVIEW: Researching different film magazine audiences

We looked at a few film reviews from different magazines such as Empire, FHM and Sight and Sound. FHM isn't solely for film reviews so the written information in the page was minimal. As its show below.

The pictures take up the majority of the page and they are the main focus.
Whereas if we look to Sight and Sound, the magazine that is all about film reviews, we see an increase on the focus of the written word.

FHM and Sight and Sound have very different audiences. FHM is a man's magazine for men between the age of 18-35, whereas Sight and Sound is for a much more niche market. Although it is a magazine for both male and female 18+, it is only for people who have a very strong interest in film. Our film is more of a lighthearted girly film who i feel people of Sight and Sound and FHM would have little interest for, so that is why we decided to create our review for Company magazine.
The Company magazine target audience is females 18-30 of the B-D demographic, exactly the target audience for our film. So naturally we decided to feature in this magazine as this would attract the perfect audience.

POSTER: Drafting/ Editing

We went through many stages to get to our final product. They all started with the basic structure shown below but in editing we saw certain things couldn't be created or we saw that by playing around we could find new ideas that looked good with the poster.
Publisher is a programme we have used many times before so the software was easy to get used to and we already had a general knowledge of what was manageable before we started and this meant that little changes had to be done.
Our first draft looked like this

POSTER: Choosing most appropriate images

We took many different pictures to for our poster. They all had a similar look but the items were placed in slightly different ways and many times we have to adjust our lighting. As we had a black background the flash on the camera reflected on the side. However when we tried lighting the area from a distance you was able to see the photographers shadow. Some of the pictures we rejected to use are below.

POSTER: Exploring fonts

We decided that the main font we would use would be Brushscript MT, for the functional information we used Agency FB and all other information is Proletarsk.

We wanted our main font to be written in a handwriting style to reflect the action in the film, Joe writing the gift tag to Scarlet. We looked at other fonts such as Forte and Palace Script MT but we found they were either too thick or the writing was too unclear to read. Brushscript MT had just the right thickness and clarity we wanted.

The functional information has a conventional way of looking on all film posters. It will be tall and thin and again we looked into many fonts finally deciding Agency FB was the best. We firstly look at using Gill Sans MT Ext Condensed Bold, but it was too small to read on the large poster. Also Bodoni MT Poster Compressed was considered however we thought was too spaced apart and we had a lot of information to fit on the small space.

For the other information on the poster such as the release date and the actors we used the font Proletarsk. This font was chose as it was not distracting from the other elements on the page. This is not a main feature so we didn't want it to divert attention from what we wanted the audience to look at. The font is simplistic and clear to read and worked well with the others used.

POSTER: Setting up mise en scène

We used props from within the film to keep a continuity and coherence with the poster. Again there is a black and white theme throughout and we have used some red font so that the theme of love is apparent.
The lighting causes a lot of problems when we were taking the picture. Originally we was going to have the photo in colour, but instead we settled on black and white. When we wanted the picture in colour lighting the scene was very difficult as we only had limited equipment. I tried lighting the room with my bedroom ceiling light but as you can see below this gave the pictures an unwanted orange tint.


So we again tried lighting the room with natural light from my window. The black surface we used is unmoveable and on the opposite side of the room so we had to wait for a very bright day to light the whole room. But as I would stand over the surface my shadow would cast in the scene, as you can see below.



Finally we decided it would be best to use the flash on the camera so that we could get a white light and you would not see a shadow. This did leave a bright spot on the scene but as a group we grew to like this. This is the photo before it was edited.



And this is it after.

POSTER: Sketching possible images/fonts

Below are scans of other idea for our poster, including the pictures and the fonts we would ideally use.




We settled on this one.

POSTER: Pitching ideas for posters

As a group we all designed our own poster and then decided upon which was the best and the most suitable to coincide with the film and it's review. We decided that this one was the best.

We liked the way that all the main elements of the film where featured in the pictures and how all the functional information fit on the page nicely.

POSTER: Analysing conventions of film posters

To accompany our short film we would be making a film poster along with it. Before we began thinking about our film poster we wanted to search other film posters and see what conventions reoccurred and what made a good film poster. We discovered how the film poster can give away many clues into that genre or subject of the film. For example the film poster for The Silence Of The Lambs.


The use of colour on this poster reflects the themes in the film. The black and white suggest that death is present. The moth is also a creature not associated with being sweet and pleasant, rather horrible and scary, also a clue to the film and its genre. When producing our own film poster we will know to focus upon colour used to help the audience presume what our film will be based on. The technical pieces of information are also present on the poster such as the functional information at the bottom, the film title and the film's actors. These are all elements that we have to consider when making our poster and we should remember to include these in ours to help the reader to see the basic information on the film.

FILM: Researching other short films

In preparation for creating my short film I researched many short films available on youtube. I researched on youtube as this allows many short films makers to post their films online and it makes them freely and easily available to view by audiences. Researching the films allowed me to recognise the difference between short films and feature films including differences in the story, the characters and the settings. A short film will follow the scheme of having one storyline, minimal amount of characters and a minimal amount of settings. Many short films I researched emphasised this point. I also found a short film has the ability to put a meaningful message with very little dialogue.

- Strangers
This film shows the message of 2 strangers bonding together when you have a mutual enemy. As a film maker I found this educational as this shows how the use of props can say so much. The use of the man’s necklace and the other man’s paper to express their religious beliefs without saying anything is something I found very interesting. I thought this useful when creating my film as I understood that I don’t need heaps of dialogue and yet still allow for the audience to engage with the plot.

– Picnic
This film emphasises how only one setting could be used and yet the film is still entertaining. It showed me that many locations wasn’t need to keep the audience amused.

FILM: Shooting schedule

A shooting schedual allows everyone to know where people should be at what time. We can then plan which time of the day we need to use for each scene and when locations will be avaible. For example our outside scenes need to be shot outside during the day with moderate sunlight, we need to plan when everyone would be availble to do this.
When organising our shooting schedule we had to work out the length of time we had to do film, which dates we couldn't do and which dates we could. We then set dates that we could film and locations that we could use, but these were all open to change due to weather issues and possible last minute arrangements. By creating a shooting schedule we could then begin to set structure and planning for our film.

FILM: Organising locations actors etc

The setting of our film was fairly simple as we only really needed 4 locations, a bedroom, a living room, a staircase and a street, but we still needed to make sure everyone was at the right location on the right day. The shooting schedule helped with this and communication was also vital. Making sure our actors were on location was fairly simple as we decided to star in our film ourselves, so as long as we were there, so would our actors be. When shooting our outside scenes we had many problems with trying to keep the weather on our side and we went many days where we could film outside due to heavy rain. In the frames for our film we had to make sure everything in the camera screen is something we wanted it to be, we wanted to get the mis-en-scene just right.

We created our male lead role with this image in mind.

The female lead role was created with this style.


We choose the actors to wear black and white clothing to show how the two people are linked to each other and they have a strong connection.

FILM: Storyboard

Storyboards are important when creating a film as it allows anyone viewing it to see a visual interpretation of what the film will look like, something that a script cannot do. Storyboards will allow you to show what you want to be in the frame of each scene and a basic idea of the mise-en-scene. It helps with setting up cameras and it tells you about what sounds can be heard in the scenes. This helps create direction and planning into the film, in return making it easier to film in the long run.

When creating our storyboard we worked together discussing what we wanted each scene to be and how we wanted it to look. We discussed different camera angles to use and make sure we had covered a wide range. Working with the script we made a visual plan of our film and helped when shooting the film as we didn't need to spend time deciding upon which way we should shoot the scene saving us valuable time and effort.

FILM: Scripting

A script is one of the most important things used when creating the film. A script allows everyone to see a detailed written draft of what will be appearing on the screen and it allows the director's vision of the film and the way the characters will be portrayed to begin to take shape.

When writing our script we decided that we wanted to keep dialogue to a minimum and that we wanted to focus more upon actions and camera shots to tell the story. This can been seen from our script which focuses mainly around stage directions and editing.

We wrote out a basic script which we began to build upon adding in more stage directions to make it more detailed and spefic to how we wanted the scenes to play out.

When deciding upon what music we wanted to use as diegetic background sound in the film. We originally thought that Chasing Cars - Snow Patrol would be a good idea as it will link into the romance and we knew there was a build up in the song that will link into the increased pace.

After further thought we saw that the song was too slow and didn't emphasis the increase suspense and pace of the action. We started to think again about which band and song we could use.

We thought we could use Juicebox - The Strokes as we knew there was an increased pace and excitement in the song.

We then thought this song was too heavy and didn't emphasis any of the romance in the film. Then we settled on our final song Old Habits Die Hard - Ten Second Epic

We thought it had just the right level of speed and created just enough tension to work with our film.

For our opening credits we wanted to have another song running through it. This song we wanted to be fast paced but still enjoyable to begin to set the scene of what kind of film this will be. We found the song Friday I'm In Love - The Cure and found it fit our ideas perfectly

This song is happy and the lyrics suggest that the film will be one about romance. It gives the auidence a general idea into what the film is about.

FILM: Developing a pitch

The main aim for a pitch is to help gain funding from different art councils. This would mean to be actually able to make their films and create their vision with the money they donate. A pitch will be when a film-maker picks out the unique and best points about their film to show what will attract an audience and make what will make it enjoyable and worthwhile. The pitch will also allow directors to begin to decide if they would like to be involved without having to read through the whole script.
We choose the best points about our film and looked for its unique selling point. Our pitch included that it was a drama about teenage relationships and that gifts between lovers mean a lot. Our film would include little dialogue and would focus mainly upon music and sounds used. This will attract our audience as the relations are between people they can relate to such as themselves. We want to make a old style film but still with a modern focus. So our colour scheme would be black and white like the old movies but we would film it in colour.

FILM: Research into target audience

Deciding upon a target audience will help us to give our film some direction and allow us to focus on where we can broadcast it. The short film market is a lot smaller then the one for a feature film due to smaller broadcasting space and less interest. We decided to aim our film towards females in the age range 13 - 25 with the demographic of B-C. We thought that females would enjoy a romance more then males would, and as it is a romance between teenagers this would appeal to a younger audience rather then an older one. People of the demographic B - C would be more interested in watching short films compared to those people of a different class.