Movie Opening Blog Post #31

Post with links to CCR’s and film opening-

CCR 1 -

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ChVI_7qJnrumi5qwo8pQWAUS3BF2V-1X/view?usp=share_link

CCR 2 -https://drive.google.com/file/d/1C0IxkrujeCbBP_rEVsaQOI00eNtiCKTP/view?usp=sharing

Horror Movie Opening -https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jl5fbZnsVodktpbwtxe70SXgUF3t0arV/view?usp=share_link

Movie Opening Blog Post #30

 Post with final reflection on project

Now that my horror movie opening is finally done I can say that it was defenitley a lot more work than I expected but also something I’m kinda proud of. At the start I didn’t fully know what I was doing and I had ideas in my head but turning them into an actual video was harder than I thought cause a lot of things werent working out. I changed my plan quite a bit of times because things didn’t look the way I wanted but each time I redid what I messed up I learned something new and I made sure that I didn't make the same mistake. I started to understand how camera angles, lighting, and editing can actually tell a story without needing a ton of words. The part that I’m most proud of is the mirror scene with the doppelganger, that was probably the hardest part to do but also the coolest in my opinion. I had to learn how to use the masking tool in Premiere Pro and film everything really carefully so it lined up. It took a while but it made the project feel like a decently real horror film. This project taught me how important planning is but it also taught me what to do when things go wrong. I also got better at editing and just being patient with the process, I feel like I’ve gotten way better as a creator and I actually enjoyed figuring things out on my own instead of relying on other group members to do things that sometimes wouldnt be to my liking. Even though it was stressful sometimes I’m DEFENITELY happy with how it turned out.

Movie Opening Blog Post #29

Post about post-production of CCRs

After I filmed everything I had to edit both of my CCRs and this part took quite a bit but it was defenitley worth it.

For the podcast CCR I simply just recorded the audio using my phone and the app "Voice Memos" and then cut out any long pauses or anything else that I didn't like. I made sure that the podcast CCr that I made flowed like a real podcast, I didn’t add any music or sound effects because I wanted to keep it simple and I didnt really want to have to much happening at the same time.

For the doppelganger news talk show editing was a little harder but nothing to crazy since I made my whole movie opening using the double person effect. I had to split the screen to show both versions of me talking at the same time, I filmed both parts separately and then lined them up in Premiere Pro so it looked like "both of myself" were having a real convo going on. It took a couple tries to get the timing right but it didn't take long to figure everything out, I think that it ended up looking pretty cool and in some way funny since it was myself interviewing myself.

I used Premiere Pro to edit both videos, the audio podcast was pretty easy since it was just putting voice recordings next to each other and the news talk show wasn't hard either since It's the same type of editing that I used in the opening, I already used Premiere Pro for my movie opening so I knew how to cut clips, adjust volume, and add titles, I also made sure the video quality looked good and the sound wasn’t too loud or too quiet.

In the end I’m actually really happy with how both of my CCRs turned out, I thought that they were pretty fun to make.

This is a little screenshot of me editing my news talk show.

 

Movie Opening Blog Post #28

Post About Production Of CCRs

When it was time to make my CCRs I started by writing scripts for both of them, I didn’t want to just talk with no plan, obviously, and mess up a bunch so I made sure to write exactly what I was going to say, for the podcast I read off of my script and for the News Talk Show had to memorize everything before I made it to make sure that I wouldnt have to look at a paper to talk cause If that was the case then it would look so bad.

For the first CCR which was just audio, I recorded it like a podcast, I found a quiet spot then I used my phone and just read my script out loud using the "Voice Memos" app. I made it sound like a real convo between a host and a guest by having my friend be the host and me be the guest. I had to redo a LOT of lines when I messed up or sounded weird but overall the process of recording the podcast wasn't.

The second CCR wasn't as easy as the first CCR because it was a video where I interviewed myself. I filmed one version of me asking questions first then I filmed the second version of me answering, I had to make sure that I looked in the right direction each time so it looked like I was actually talking to myself but the hardest part was that as the host I had to pause and stop talking for the exact amount of time that I needed to while the other me, the guest, was answering the questions because I couldnt just cut some pause time off of the hosts part or add some pause time off of the hosts part so all I did is I recording voice recordings of myself answering the questions as the host and I checked how long it would take to answer each question and I would pause for that amount of time after each thing I said as the host, I also had to keep the camera in the exact same spot both times or it would’ve looked off, I used a tripod so it didn’t move at all between takes.
Both CCRs took a good amount of tries to get right but once I had all the clips and recordings done I was ready to start editing them.

This is a screenshot of the app I used to create my voice recordings of me and the host in order for me to put them into Premiere Pro.

Movie Opening Blog Post #27

Post About Selecting CCRs

For my CCRs I wanted to choose styles that I enjoyed but also went well my project. 

For the first CCR I chose to create a type of podcast style audio interview, I enjoyed the thought of having a host interview me as if it were an actual interview it kinda let me to describe my thoughts throughout the movie opening and decisions in a way that was natural and easy to understand. It also allowed me to keep it relaxed while still being able to go into detail about my decisions.

For the second CCR I had so many ideas at first but they all turned out to be bad when in the process of production until I came up with the perfect CCR that goes extremely well with my movie opening. Since my movie opening is LITTERALLY doppleganger me I thought I'd do a news talk show where Im the host as well as the guest, so basically im interviewing myself. One of me is asking the questions, and the other one is answering. I really do think that this idea goes well with my movie opening sicne both have dopplegangers.

I also made sure both of these CCRs were done in a way that does not sound boring or forced, I wanted the audience to feel like they're sitting back and listening to someone talk about what they do in a casual but creative way also. I picked these two modes because they fit the mood of my intro to my film and still let me explain everything the way that i want to explain them.

This is a little example of how its going to look for my news talk show except im going to be both the host and the guest.

Movie Opening Blog Post #26

CCR Question #4 - How did you integrate technologies – software, hardware and online – in this project?

In this blog post Im going to give my answer to this question based off of my movie opening, this IS NOT my script for the CCR question but a lot of what I say in this blog post will defenitley be incooroperated in my CCR video for this question.

I used a mix of multiple technologies to make my movie opening. For software I used Adobe Premiere Pro to edit the scenes, to create the mirror doppelganger effect that I have in my movie opening, and to play with the lighting and colors in order to darken the scenes and made everything a little more scary. The masking tool was really important in making the mirror effect look realistic and if the masking tool didnt exist Im sure that making the effect would have been way harder, and I also sort of experimented with different contrast and brightness levels to make the movie feel like a real horror film.

Hardware wise I used a tripod and camera in order to make my shots stable and "professional looking." The tripod came in handy (Thank god I bought it before I started filming) as I needed to film myself twice for the mirror doppleganger effect and if the camera moved when filming to create the doppleganger effect even just the smallest amount then the effect would be completely messed up and I would have to start all over again, this was something that I had learned from trial and error.

Finally I also used online platforms to document my process and structure everything that I did. I did blog posts on how I was progressing, the blogs actually really came in handy throughout my process because sometimes I forgot something that I wanted to do or include in my movie opening and I would just look back into my blog posts because I blogged besically everything related to my movie opening. Another thing that Im thankful for is google drive because everything that I filmed on my camera I would simply just transfer it to my google drive and then download it onto my computer to edit it, which saved me a lot of time by the way. By using all these technologies I was able to achieve the creepy and suspenseful horror movie opening that I wanted even though I was working by myself. 

This image is just to show how many clips were transfered to my google drive so that I could download them onto my computer. By the way this is not even close to all the clips I transfered to my google drive, If I wanted to show how many clips were transfered it would take multiple screenshots.

Movie Opening Blog Post #25

CCR Question #3-How were my production abilities developed throughout this project?

I've decided that I want to do the same thing for all my blog posts about my CCR questions so in this blog post Im going to give my answer to this question based off of my movie opening, this IS NOT my script for the CCR question but a lot of what I say in this blog post will defenitley be incooroperated in my CCR video for this question.

At first I wasn't AT ALL familiar with how to do a full movie opening at the start of the project but as I kept going, my storytelling, editing, and filming got better in my opinion, (Considering the fact that I revised my movie opening plan and changed up how Im going to make my movie opening throught the process of making my movie opening at least 15 times). I used to care only about what angles were used all the time for most horror films but after a while I started thinking about what angles I need in MY film and how they match with MY film, I also started taking lighting into consideration for my movie opening and how the lighting can make my scenes seem different. For example, I learned that applying high angles makes a character look weaker so I did that on purpose to make the main character look scared and vulnerable.

Getting better at editing was another thing that I somewhat got better at, I already knew how to edit and use premire pro before so the extra things that I learned were very minor. I didn't know at first how to make the mirror doppelganger effect work but after a couple searches on youtube I was able to find out how to use the masking feature of premiere pro in order to create the illusion of the doppelganger acting differently than the character itself. I was also able to learn how to use color grading and lighting in order to make the scenes look darker and creepier. Overall I became better at using different techniques with editing to tell a story visually.

These 2 picture are an example of how I improved overtime, one picture shows when I was practicing making my scenes and my doppleganger effect and in that same image the lighting was horrible for a horror film, and the other picture shows a screenshot from the opening where the lighting is more "horror appropriate."

Movie Opening Blog Post #24

CCR Question #2- How does my product engage with audiences and how would it be distributed as a real media text?

In this blog post I want to give my answer to this question based off of my movie opening, this IS NOT my script for the ccr question but a lot of what I say in this blog post will defenitley be incooroperated in my CCR video.

So, first my opening scene of the film captures the audience by making them feel scared. I used different camera angles, lighting, and cuts to make my eerie scenes, the idea of a doppelganger in the mirror makes a lot if people scared mainly because it kinda "distorts" reality by first, making two replicas of one person, and second, in reality the mirror is supposed to do the same thing that you do, not something different. I also used high angles and closeups to make the main character look weak and scared so that the audience see him and feel his fear. The repetition of the knocking noise and the fact that the main characters mom does litteraly the EXACT same thing 2 times also creates suspense and because of that that the audience can't help but think about what is happening.

If this were really a movie it would be a short horror movie that i would post on YouTube, I did some research and there are places where you can post short films for a more targeted audience and I found Vimeo and thats someting that I would post my short horror film on, this is some info that I found online that shows why Vimeo would be a good place to post, "Vimeo has a strong community of creative professionals who engage in thoughtful discussions ans critiques". It would also be posted on TikTok and Instagram Reels so that more can view it faster and the reason I chose those 2 platforms is because based off of my experience on both instagram and tiktok, horror film clips or short horror films are always viral and have a lot of views. The creepiness of the film would makes it perfect for social media where people like watching scary videos and commenting on them. If I wanted to take it further I could submit it to film festivals that would play short horror movies in order to be seen by more people.

                     These are just a couple of film festivals in my area that would be an option.

Movie Opening Blog Post #23

Group Meeting Summary-

In this blog pot I will be talking about the group meeting that I had today in class. In todays group meeting everyone discussed all about our projects, we showed each other a little bit of our projects, and we discussed about our ccr videos and what we plan to do for the ccr. Participating in this group meeting was so relieving because I managed to get a lot of info from people from other groups, and now I have good ideas of how other people think about their projects and what their process is/was for creating these projects. Listening to everyone talk in the group meetings was actually really intriguing because everyone just has all these different ideas and it made me think from many different perspectives. The main thing that I liked about this group meeting is that I got a ton of info and ideas for the ccr video, to be honest, I was stressing out like CRAZY about those ccr videos just because making a 5-6 minute script for four different videos sounds so hard, however, because of this meeting I managed to hear what everyone was doing for their ccr which gave me some idea on how I want to make it, and where I want to make it, all that is left for me to do now is to make my scripts for all 4 ccr's and everything else will just go by quickly since I know how I want to make my ccr's. I definitely wouldn't be able to come up with these ideas within one class period if it wasn't for this group meeting.

This is a picture of my group and I after we discussed everything that we had to discuss. (My teacher took this photo for us. Also, I'm the one in the red hoodie in the bottom left corner.)

Movie Opening Blog Post #22

Research and/or script for #1 question of CCR post:

Question-How does your product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues?

I might have used the pictures that im going to add to this blog post in one of my other blog posts but the pictures that I add correlate to what im saying.

My movie opening uses a lot of common horror movie ideas but it also shows some new things. The mirrors and the doppelganger are used in most horror films because they get people feelin uneasy. I used different angles like the high and low shots to make my character look weaker and more scared. The lighting is also gloomy and that adds to a creepy environment, which is DEFENITLEY needed in horror films.

One of the things that makes my movie opening different is the way in which i build suspense. Instead of using jump scares I build up the fear slowly by making the mirror "behave" in a way that's for sure not normal, like my reflection disappearing or moving on its own, this makes the viewers more tense as they are just not sure about whats going to happen next. The fear comes from not knowing whats going to happen next which I think is scarier that loud noises or jumpscares.

My movie is also connected to real life concerns like identity and mental illness. The main character, luke, doesn't feel like himself and the doppelganger could be an example of what's going on inside of him. Hes scared and upset and then even goes off on his "mom" which kind of shows how fear makes people push away those around them.

My movie uses horror ideas that people are used to but I add a little twist of my own by using more suspense and mystery rather than trying to scare people with loud noises or jump scare scenes. Im currently taking psychology as one of my classes and we learn a lot about emotions, facial expression, etc, so I feel like the way the mirror changes and the way luke reacts make the story feel more psychological and that adds a little depth to the horror instead of the movie opening being only about quick scares.

Movie Opening Blog Post #21

Different Angles Used Within My Movie Opening-

Within this blog post I want to talk about the different angles that I used within my movie opening in order to make it more interesting and more captivating to the viewers eye. Im not going to be showing a lot of clips from my movie opening but I definitely am going to be showing an amount that will be able to show how my movie opening is going.

First I wanted to show this example of these 3 screenshots of my clips. The same exact thing is happening in all three of these clips except they all have different angles in order to make the scenes more suspenseful by continuously switching the angles for the exact same scene which makes people think that something scary is going to be happening really soon, (I'm not sure exactly how to show it but suspenseful music is being played during this scene which really adds to the fact that the angles keep switching and it hints that something eerie is going to happen soon.) 

This angle is a little mix of a high angle and a wide shot which is showing the character as well as the environment, the high angle making the character seem weak and vulnerable.

These two shots also correlate as its showing the same thing just at different angles so that different emotions can be shown, for example, the close up on the characters face is made to show the emotions of the character and it clearly shows extreme fear and makes the character literally look traumatized by something which scares the viewers as well as makes the viewer think about why the character looks extremely scared and traumatized and that reason is shown in the next angle which shows what the character was looking at, the character was looking at the mirror just to see no reflection of himself, which then makes the viewers think "Where did his reflection go? Why is there no reflection?" and that keeps the viewers both scared and captivated as they want to know the answers for their questions.

Movie Opening Blog Post #20

Credits Scene-

This blog post won't be that long as I don't have much to talk about this blog post other than my credits scene and how I made some changes to my original idea of the credits scene that I was planning on doing.

First, Im simply going to talk about how I switched my credits scene from being it's own thing for the first 30 seconds of the movie opening to me deciding on actually just adding the credits scene within the beginning of my movie.

So, originally when I first started mapping out my movie opening Ideas I decided that I wanted to make the credits scene a rolling credits scene and Its own thing for the first 30 seconds but then while I was making my movie opening I just thought about how boring that would be and how 30 seconds Is a little to long for my liking as I want to make sure that I can fit everything that I have planned into the 2 minute max timeframe that I've been given. What is my improvisation you ask? It's plain and simple, I just added my credits during the first little "introductory" part of my movie opening when no action is happening and the movie opening is just getting started.

This is a little example of what I mean, I added the credits to the "boring," starting part of my movie opening. Since this is a solo project all of the credits will be in my name, one of the credits will be a fake girls name as my moms voice is going to be heard one or two times within the movie opening and I just dont want to use my moms real name so that's why I will be using a fake name for her.

In the last blog post I showed my lighting/color settings and that just gave me the idea to show my text settings for my movie openings credit scenes. In these settings I'm showing the Font of my text, which is "Papyrus," I'm showing the Font size, which is 228, and Im showing the Font color as well as the outline of the text. 

 

Movie Opening Blog Post #19

Movie Opening Blog Post #19

Coloring Of My Movie Opening- 

For this blog post I will be talking about the coloring of the clips/scenes in my movie opening, what my settings are, why I chose this coloring, and how it fits with my movie opening.

Im pretty sure that I mentioned the fact that my lighting in my movie opening is going to be dark in order for the scenes to look more eerie as my movie openings genre is a horror movie and within horror movies lighting is a MAJOR factor as it really makes up the horror within the horror movie because what would a horror movie be if it was made solely in a light environment and nothing else; It would be a horrible "horror movie." 

                        

The image that I have presented below won't be incorporated within my movie opening because its only an image that I've created. The reason that I created this image of multiple replicas of me and my movie openings name is because I want to publish my movie opening on YouTube for when I have completed my movie opening and I just had the idea of creating a thumbnail with it as well. The reason that I incorporated this picture in my blog post is because of the lighting, this picture gives a really good idea of what the lighting for my whole movie opening is going to be like since I used the same color setting for this image that Im going to use for the whole movie opening.

 

These 2 images that I've added are the EXACT color setting that I have been using for the development of my movie opening and I didn't watch any tutorial on how to get a specific lighting for horror movie using premier pro, all I did was use the strategy of trial and error. The "trial and error strategy" isn't really a "strategy," I just call it one because It took me at least 40-60 minutes to find the perfect lighting that I wanted for my movie opening and I had to go through a lot of trial and error with my lighting to get, in my opinion, the perfect lighting. These coloring settings perfectly fit my horror genre by creating a dark, scary setting which creeps the viewers out even more that they would be if I were to just incorporate my cameras normal lighting.

Usually I wouldn't use Curves to change the colors of my clips or scene but while I was playing with the color settings I thought, "why don't I check out the curves and see if they are any good," which they are. The only curve that I changed was the white curve because If I moved the white curve upwards It created a darker setting, which I liked, so I just kept it. However If I were to try and play with any of the RGB curves then it would make my movie opening look horrible because I DO NOT want my scenes to look more red, green, or blue, so that's why I only used the white curve.

The main things that I changed with the lighting section was the contrast, highlights, and whites, because these were the only things that created the lighting that I wanted, unlike exposure, shadows, and blacks, which made my movie opening clips incredibly dark to the point where not a lot was visible in my scenes.

Movie Opening Blog Post #18

Shooting Process-

This blog post is going to be about my shooting process and me showing what I'm able to do. The things that I show within this blog post isn't my actual movie opening but rather me practicing for the development of my actual movie opening.

First I want to show the basics of how the "Mirror Doppleganger" is going to work within my movie opening. What I will be showing is a video of my mirror self doing something completely different than my actual self. Keep in mind, this IS NOT the clip that is going into my actual movie opening.

With this little example clip of that's going to be in my movie opening I wanted to show that I can do what I've said that I will do during the planning process of my blogs, I also just wanted to show a little example of how my scenes are going to look. (of course not with the lighting or the acting that I have in this clip) Just wanted to show the development of my shooting process as well.

I've told my mom to "secretly" take pictures of me while I was working on my shooting process and she did so im going to be showing 2 picture of me setting up my tripod with my camera to shoot some PRACTICE scenes, which mean the scenes that I've written in my script but I want to make practice shots first so I can see what I should improve for my ACTUAL scenes.

Finally I'm going to be showing the lighting that will be incorporated during my movie opening.

This is the best picture that I could get of the lighting that I will have. This lighting may look to dark but it's only because of the phone picture camera, It makes everything look either lighter or darker than It actually is. For some reason when I click on the video mode it doesn't have the same effect on the lighting that the picture mode has, so when I will be filming the lighting will look lighter than it is in the picture.

Movie Opening Blog Post #17

Editing Process-

In this blog post I will be talking about me practicing my editing with the "mirror doppleganger" and I will also be kind of showing how it looks to create this effect in premier pro.

What I did is I made 2 recordings of myself in front of the mirror but with the first recording I was doing whatever in front of the mirror and in the second recording I decided that I want to look at the camera for the fun of it and the fact that I just needed to do something different that the first recording is I could capture that "mirror doppleganger" effect that I want to incorporate into my movie opening.

This is what I've done with my first recording, I've made a mask using the draw tool so that I could cut out the part of the clip where it's not showing my mirror self because what I do after cutting out the mirror part in the clip where I want my normal self is I drag the recording of my mirrored doppleganger right over the recording that I used the draw tool on. What happens is both of the clips end up overlaping, however, because of the fact that I removed the mirrored part in the first recording, once I overlap the two, only the mirrored doppleganger clip gets shown alongside the normal clip giving it that effect.

The highlighted pen is the draw tool that Im using to create the effect.

This is what happens with the draw tool and when you connect all the dots with the draw tool, the area within the connected dots remains and the area outside disappears 

If you look closely at this picture you will realize that the me that is not in the mirror isn't doing the same thing as the me inside the mirror, which is the effect that I wanted to get and this is the effect that Im going to use for the majority of the movie opening. Well..... That is until the mirror doppleganger escapes the mirror and ends up "in the same world" that I'm in.....

PS: I WILL BE SHOWING THE FULL EXAMPLE CLIP IN THE NEXT BLOG WITH WILL BE MY PRODUCTION PROCESS.