CCR

My long awaited CCR! Thanks for coming along on my journey!

The Big Reveal!

     Here it is, in all its glory!! Enjoy my film opening, Harker v. Westwood.

Reflecting

     As my work on my film opening and CCR finally come to a close, I thought I'd take a moment to reflect on my experience.

     I've switched around clips of my opening more times than I can even process, and I think I'm going to have the over dramatic sounds of my parents reciting their lines engraved in my brain forever.  That being said, I really did enjoy completing this project and going through the film making process.

     One thing this project taught me is how nice it is to not procrastinate.  While I'm certainly not the worst procrastinator I know, I do tend to put things off, so the fact that I was able to stay organized and on track for this project was a good step for me.  I ended up preparing everything I needed for filming very early on, and filmed a lot earlier than most people.  This eventually had a much bigger pay off than I could've imagined, thanks to COVID-19.  Although quarantine kept me from being able to reshoot anything for my film, a lot of people had to rethink their entire film ideas, which I didn't have to deal with.  Being that I filmed early, I had ample think to rework my clips in a way that worked for me, and was able to work around the fact that I couldn't reshoot without restarting.

     As for putting my video together, editing helped me to learn a lot.  I'd done a little bit of editing in the past, but this project really improved my skills; it also showed me how much of a perfectionist I am.  Since I transformed my video several times to follow a different flow, I spent an extremely long time altering my opening.  At this point I for sure have a love-hate relationship with editing; every time I'd sit down for a few minutes to work on editing, I'd end up sitting there forever trying to make different changes and improvements.  Even when I wasn't in the mood to keep editing, I couldn't stop myself from sitting there and making alterations.  The positive of this is that I learned a lot about editing and especially about using Premiere.  I had very little prior experience with Premiere, so my journey included a lot of YouTube tutorials and article explanations.  This definitely paid off in the end, since now I have a much better grasp of the program and how to use all of the different functions.

     Overall, although it was frustrating and stressful at times, this project was enjoyable and taught me a lot.  I've always been pretty artsy and even though I'm not looking for a career in the film industry, this project did appeal to my interests and was really fun to do.  I definitely still have a lot of room for improvement, but this process allowed me to greatly improve upon my production and editing skills.  Thanks for coming along on this journey with me, and enjoy my opening!

More CCR Development

     I've been continuing to work on my CCR, so I thought I'd share a bit of behind the scenes for that.
     I decided for my CCR that I'll be doing a voice over on top of clips and stills of my opening, photos to go with my research, and other interesting videos.  I figured it would be most intriguing to mix up stills and videos of my own along with outside clips.  I'll be starting off the CCR with a brief description of my opening and film, which I will be talking about as evidence of my process are shown.  I figured I could show some behind the scenes photos, as well as material from the actual opening.  I only took a few photos on the day of me filming, but I do have a couple, including these:

Beyond behind the scenes photos, I'll also include some fun footage from the actual opening.  I was thinking that I could have some unused clips playing that never made it in the actual opening, just so that the viewer isn't seeing the same clips they're about to see/ just saw in my opening.  This way the clips don't feel as repetitive, but still make sense as they're in the same setting and everything.  That being said, here a few stills I might include from my footage:

     Beyond footage coming from myself,  I'll also be including photos, clips, and graphs from online.  I have a couple statistics that go along with my genre and distribution research, one such being a graph on movie theater attendance. I'll also be putting in clips from other dramas, specifically court room or business dramas, as they share similar characteristics to my film.  This could include movies such as The Verdict, To Kill a Mockingbird, or The Wolf of Wall Street.  While I'm discussing genre conventions and comparisons, this would be beneficial.  Including photos and clips about my equipment and software will also be included in my CCR, to emphasis these steps of my process and to match a vision to my words.  I'm working hard to put my CCR together, and I'll be sharing it with you guys soon!

Putting my CCR Together

  As I prepare for my CCR, I just wrote up an outline for my script, which I will be writing in the very near future.  In the process of writing out my thoughts I gathered a couple statistics, which I've included the sources for below.  These facts are currently embedded in my outline and will most likely be mentioned in my video.  In the meantime, I'm sharing a link to my CCR outline, so you guys can see where I'm at right now! I'll be back to you guys soon with an update.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SaJGFg10K0nHHv0_VZoPp8unKjeiRDsN12xASd6QcYs/edit?usp=sharing

Sources:
https://livestream.com/blog/62-must-know-stats-live-video-streaming
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/adambvary/streaming-services-you-probably-didnt-know-existed
https://www.allmovie.com/subgenre/courtroom-drama-d545

Giving Credit and Moving On

     I kept playing around with ending clips, and I think I'm at an end point that I'm happy with!  It's 2:03 minutes, the end is as smooth as I could make it, and I'm finally satisfied with it.  I'm currently moving on to do the CCR, but first I thought I should include a couple of sources for audio I used.
    I bought and downloaded the main music the overlays a lot of my opening, which was from audiojungle.net.
 MAIN MUSIC SOURCE: https://audiojungle.net/item/serious-science-logo/25852940

     The other audio I used was the door of a door opening, which I used as Jackie enters the room.  Even though you could hear the door opening in my clip, it was too soft so I used this sound as reinforcement.  This, I downloaded for free off of https://www.fesliyanstudios.com/.
DOOR OPENING SOURCE: https://www.fesliyanstudios.com/royalty-free-sound-effects-download/opening-closing-door-54

    I got pretty lucky with the rest of my audio, and was able to use and reuse all of the audio from clips I'd collected myself.  In doing this, I think all of the important sounds in my opening are heard well, and I worked hard to balance all of the sounds and am happy with the final product.
     Now, I'm starting to work on my CCR.  I have all of my research on audiences, genre conventions, and distribution from earlier on in my process, but now I need to get everything together so I can write out what I'm going to include.  I haven't decide yet how I'm going to do my video, but I have a few options.  Basically, I could either talk in front of the camera, having photos and videos to play along with me, or I could stay behind the camera, talking over a PowerPoint or similar presentation.  I'll be developing my CCR more over the next couple days, and will get back to you guys in my next post with an update on my progress. 

My Concerns

     After messing around with a few small things, and deciding on my fonts (font #4 for the title, #1 for everything else), my opening is essentially done.  That being said, I'm not sure I'm 100% happy with it, and here's why.
     First of all, no matter which parts of the conversation I use and what clip I use last, the ending looks a little bit abrupt.  It was really hard to piece together a mini conversation from the clips I had, and one that actually flowed.  Overall the conversation isn't that choppy, it's just that I'm not completely satisfied with the end of it.  I played around with a lot of different options, and I think the only way I'd be completely happy with it would be to reshoot a few clips, which thanks to COVID-19 isn't much of an option. That being said, I still think the conversation works, I just thought I should explain how I'm feeling.

     I also made a minor filming error.  Since the office was so backlit, I had a little lamp that we were shining on my dad's face for some of his shots, and you can see the lamp in a couple of the shots.  I purposefully left it in the shot for his establishing clip, since we needed it where it was, but the lamp magically disappears and is never seen again. The lamp is dark blue and skinny so it's actually not even that noticeable, but I felt obligated to mention it since it was something that was bothering me.

Fonts!

In order to complete my opening, I need a good font for my movie title.  Since I'm using Adobe Premiere, I have access to their big font libraries, so I've been looking through what they have.  Since the title of my movie is a court case, I could either go with a kind of typewriter font, or I also liked the look of a handwriting font.  I looked through a bunch of fonts, and picked out my few favorites.  Here's what my top five looks like:

The top two are both variations of a typewriter font, which gives a nice businessman feel, and along with the third one, looks clean and professional.  That being said, I also like the look of the handwriting fonts, as I feel like they give the case more of a personal feel.  After looking at them against the clip they appear on, I think I like font number two and font number 4.  Both give slightly different tones to the title, and I can't decide which I like more yet, so I'm going to hold off for a couple days before I put my final decision in.  That being said, I can definitely rule out the other fonts.  With all of the text being on to my opening, it's really coming together!!

Adding the Little Things

     Mechanically, my opening is set, so I've moved on to fixing the little things.  Thankfully, since I cut out a big chunk of the conversation in the office, I had a lot less color correction to do, since there's only a couple back-lit shots now.  That being said, there was one or two super back-lit clips, so I had to do my research and figure out how to do the color correction for those.  The problem isn't exactly that they're dark, it's more than that they're super blue tinted, when all of the other office shots have more of a yellow/orange tone to them.  This is kind of hard to fix without making the clip look exaggeratedly colored, but I did my best and even though it doesn't look perfect, the clip at least matches the others a bit better.  Here's a before and after and what that looked like:

      I also have been editing the sound, making sure my music fades in and out correctly, and also that it's at an okay volume.  While I want the music to be heard, I also want the sounds of Jackie walking and the sounds of the street activity heard as well.   I actually got pretty lucky with how the city audio sounded, as the car noises, walking, and chatter sounds super nice and almost like I added it in myself.  That being said, sounds of the city noises from clip to clip were a little choppy, so I overlapped and faded a bunch of the audio clips so that the noise sounded more cohesive. I also added in a door opening sound effect as Jackie enters the room, and adjusted the audio levels of their conversation to try and have all of their lines match in volume. 
     Before I finish, I'll probably play with color correction a bit more and try to make everything perfect, but for now I'm making good progress on finishing my opening up!

Music

     As I get closer and closer to finishing the basic editing, I figured it's time to look at music options again.  Revisiting my previous options, I didn't feel like any of them really captured the tone I was looking for.
     I began browsing for more options, and ended up on audiojungle.com.  Even though you have to pay for these sounds, I really liked what I was hearing so I added a few options to my cart.  Narrowing it down, I was then left with two options.  I felt like both of them would work well with my opening, but each would give slightly different effects to my scene.  The first sound is super powerful, which would emphasize Jackie's frustration and assert her as a dominant force.  The other sound was less powerful, but has more of a tense feel to it, instead emphasizing the strain being put on Jackie.  Both sounded pretty good over the shots of Jackie walking through Miami, but I realized that the second sound could be reintroduced at the end of the opening for a few seconds for a smooth and cohesive ending.  Because of this, I decided to go ahead and purchase the second sound option. It sets the tense tone that I originally wanted, and also will help tie in all of my clips by allowing me to use it during the beginning and the end.  Here's a glimpse of what the ending shot of my opening would look like with my audio:

My Editing Options

     As I've continued to edit my opening, it's getting hard to try and cut down my opening to 2 minutes.  25 seconds cut out of a conversation is a lot, so at this point I'm considering different options.  I could stay with strictly the conversation, and just choose a different start/end point to the conversation, maybe ending it a lot sooner in.  Another option is to put back in all of the shots of Jackie walking through Miami, and then have her walk into the office and her and David have a mini conversation.  I feel like this might be more interesting, since it has all of the outdoor shots and the conversation, instead of only office shots.  If I do this I would again just have to decide at what point to stop the conversation.  This may make for a more abrupt ending to the opening, so that could be tricky. 
     The thing is, all of my shots were filmed in Miami and in my dad's office, which is now closed because of COVID-19.  So, I basically have to find a way to work with what I have right now, unless I want to reshoot the whole thing.  I'm leaning towards trying to have shots of Jackie outside and then a shortened version of her conversation with David, but I'm just worried that it won't flow well this way. I'm playing around with different versions of the opening now, and trying to see what I like. 
     Also, I showed my parents what the 2:25 minute conversation looked like earlier, and they were very proud of their acting skills and how it worked out, even though neither of their acting skills were actually good (shh don't tell them).
     UPDATE: This is me coming back to you guys a bit later in the day; I played around with editing a bit and I think I have my solution.  I put back in most of the Jackie walking clips, and then used just some of the clips from her conversation with David to make a 2 minute scene.  I think the conversation still sounds cohesive, and even though the end isn't as dramatic as it would've been originally, I think it still works well!! I'm going to keep on editing to make everything cleaner of course, but I definitely like how it's coming together; at this point its 1:53 minutes long, so I should be good on time.

My Overestimate

     So, I laid down all of the office clips in Premiere, and it turns out I'm insanely bad at estimating.  The office clips alone are over 2 minutes long.  So my fears from filming day of the office conversation running too short were definitely wrong, and I don't think I'm going to be using any of the clips of Jackie walking up to the office.  This isn't that big of an issue, since my original plan was to only have the conversation anyways, it just means I wasted a lot of time filming and starting to edit those clips.  I think it would've been cool to have her walking up to the office and then have her character revealed once David's office is shown, but not having it isn't going to affect my over all tone or anything. 

     Even with the conversation alone, I'm over time by a solid 20-25 seconds, so I have to see where I can cut time and maybe snip out a couple lines.  Turns out 2 minutes is a really short period of time, but I think I'll be able to cut everything down enough.  I'm hoping I can still make it flow well and avoid it turning out choppy.  My thinking is that I can cut a couple lines off of the end and still have the same affect, and cut out a few words in other lines.  It also helps to overlap the clips a little, having the audio of one clip start over the end of the one before in.  25 seconds is a pretty long time, so cutting that many corners off is going to be difficult but I think I'll be able to figure it out. 
     In other news, I figured out how to change the fonts! For some reason it was just wasn't letting me before.  I'm getting better and better at navigating through Premiere, which is good and makes editing easier and easier.  One bad thing about Premiere is that it's really easy to cut and trim clips, but almost too easy.  Even while you're just trying to move clips around it'll accidentally cut edges of clips off, which is kind of annoying and makes it where you have to pay really close attention to how you're moving things around.  That being said I've just learned to watch really closely to what I'm doing and try to be careful. 

Editing Struggles

     I've been editing my video for a while now, but I'm definitely moving pretty slow.  I'm editing on Premiere Pro because I realized I have it as a part of the Adobe package I already have, and figured it would be a pretty big step up from something like WeVideo.  The only thing is, I've only used Premiere a tiny bit, so trying to figure out how everything works is really time consuming.  I have to keep looking up videos and articles to figure out how to do things like change the font and zoom in.  It gets really frustrating because sometimes I'll watch a video or two and still not be able to do what I need to.  For example, my program won't let me change the font like all of the videos are telling me to.  I decided that I don't really need to mess with the text until the end of editing anyways, so I'm going to come back to this issue a little later. 
     This being said, I'm really happy with how my opening is turning out so far.  I edited a lot of the first half, which has shots of Miami and of Jackie walking up to David's office.  I'll most likely go back and tweak this first part after the office clips are all in, but I wanted to lay them all out first.  After I know how long the office conversation is, I can edit the first half to be longer or shorter depending on what I need.  Once I start putting in all of the office clips, I'm probably going to do be doing a lot of color correction since the lighting varied a lot throughout the clips.  All of the shots of David are slightly back-lit, but some are a little more than others, so I'm going to have to try and make them all match each other.  I haven't quite gotten there yet, so I'll update you guys when I do!

Filming Bloopers

     I’ve started to edit my film opening a little bit, and I’m coming across a ton of blooper clips. Since I haven’t gotten that far yet in my editing process, I decided to share an example of the type of footage I have for each separate clip.  Even for some of the two second clips, we had to do redo them a bunch of times to get the right tone and positioning.  Because of that, it took a long time to go through all of the footage and weed out the usable clips from the bloopers.  While looking through it all I thought it could be interesting to show you guys the type of clips I have and how many tries it took me.  So, here's a short little example of some of my footage.

Music Research

     During the beginning of my opening, and potentially at the end as well, I want dramatic music playing over the scene.  For this, I need to find the right song to match the mood that I'm aiming for.  I want music over the shots of Jackie walking through Miami and up to David's office, and for that I need sort of a moody song that's a little bit dramatic at the same time.  Right after the music, Jackie walks in and slams down a paper on David's desk, so I can't have anything too slow or calm. I’ve been looking at different song options for a while now and I can’t decide which one I like, so I’m going to link to the different options I have so far! It's really hard to try and find a beat that matches the exact tone that I have in my head. Once I get more in depth to editing, I'll make my final music choice.

A FEW MUSIC OPTIONS:
https://www.melodyloops.com/tracks/melodyloops-preview-the-assault-2m30s/
https://www.melodyloops.com/tracks/melodyloops-preview-infinite-skies-2m30s/
https://www.melodyloops.com/tracks/set-high-goals/
https://www.melodyloops.com/tracks/digital-futurock/

Target Audience and Distribution

     I've already done a little bit of research on target audiences, but I wanted to review a bit before I continue on.  Because dramas typically contain emotional themes and mature content, a majority of dramas are rated PG13 or R.  Although family dramas are geared towards a youth audience, most other genres choose a young adult to adult audience.  Since a lot of dramas focus on topical issues and events, adult audiences work well as they are the ones most involved in societal issues and the most informed.  My film involves very relevant social issues, but also has high school age students in it in addition to the adults. Because of this, my film fits in with the average audience of young and middle aged adults. 
     As for distribution, I started researching small independent film companies.   I found a few companies, such as Filmrise, Gravitas, and Kino Lorber, which all do digital releases.  Companies like these would be perfect for my film release, since they are small companies that don't release that many films annually, and work primarily in the US.  I want a company that prioritizes digital release over theatrical, because even though adults do still visit movie theaters, young and middle aged adults also make large use of streaming and digital services.  To keep up with changing times, digital releases ensure that my film is a part of the evolving digital age.  A lot of these small companies are also involved in film festivals, giving me opportunity to eventually have my film viewed in a festival such as Sundance.  I'll officially pick a company later on, but for now I have a pretty good idea of what I'm looking for.
 

Sources:
https://www.sundance.org/blogs/creative-distribution-initiative/2019-what-distributors-want-in-a-film
https://www.slideshare.net/ebonypeart/target-audience-16706479

Filming Day!

     I finally went out and filmed the bulk of my opening!  I picked out my parents outfits and they got ready, then we packed all of our props into the car and made our way down to Miami.  Since I hadn't seen the office yet, once we got there my dad showed us around and showed me a few different filming options.  I'd already decided I wanted to use the boardroom, but my dad ended up showing me a second boardroom option, which I actually ended up liking the layout of better.  We then set up the props on the table to try and make the end of the table look like a desk.  I took a time lapse of us setting up the table, which actually turned out out of focus, but I'll insert it anyways.
     Next we all got out our scripts and storyboards, and we began filming.  Since the opening is primarily the conversation in David's office, all of our shots were in the same place.  Given the fact that neither of my parents can act very well, it still took a while to film as we were trying to get all of the emotions right.  The conversation ending up being a lot shorter then I had planned on it being, just because it went by a lot quicker than it did in my head.  This made me super nervous that my opening was going to end up way too short, so after brainstorming for a bit I decided to get some shots of Jackie walking to the office.  I got a bunch of different shots of her walking through the Miami streets, into the building, and up to David's office, all of which only show her feet and lower half.  My idea is for the beginning of the opening to show her walking around, and then cut to David's office.  After showing his office for a little, he gets a knock on the door, revealing Jackie walking in and connecting the two characters.  Even though this was a spur of the moment decision, I think it will serve my opening well, and hopefully all of my shots work out well together.
     I'm nervous to start editing, because I'm scared of how well my clips and angles will work together, but I'm hoping it will work out how I'm picturing.  Worst comes to worst, I can force my parents back to Miami to get some more shots.

Storyboard and Starting to Prep for Filming

      Because I’m heading down to Miami in a couple days with my parents to film, I needed to make sure my storyboard and script were set. I created my storyboard and will include pictures below, and I’m pretty satisfied with how it turned out. I want my filming session to be efficient and productive, so I wanted to have a pretty set idea of shot angles and composition before we go in. Obviously, I’m sure I’ll want to change a few things once we get to the location and start filming, but I’m confident in my plans thus far. In setting up my storyboard, I added a few stage directions and altered a few words of my script, but overall it’s pretty much the same as the script from my last post.
     To stay organized and make sure I have everything for filming, I wrote down a list of all of the props I need, as well as extra things to bring such as a big light and the scripts. Since we’re going to Miami, it’s important that I remember everything I need to film, since it’ll be difficult to turn around and get it. I’m a little nervous to film, since I haven’t seen the location yet, but I’m looking forward to it! I’ll update you guys once that process starts.

Script and New Prop

      I finally finished the draft of my script.  I'm planning on filming this Saturday, since both of my parents are available to film and I want to film sooner rather than later.  Over the next couple days I may tweak a few lines, but overall my script is pretty set.  I included my script below!
     I also created one of my set props. As a part of my script, Jackie comes in and puts a paper on David's desk.  The paper explains that Aiden has been expelled.  I decided to create this paper myself, and looked up expelled papers to get an idea of what to write in the letter.  I then found a school emblem for the header, added a school address and principal, and wrote my paper.  I left room for a principal signature, so when I print the paper to bring, I can put a big signature on it.

Sources:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DtvXCrLW4AAvEOT.jpg

https://gainako.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Expulsion.jpeg

Plot Change/ Title

     I decided to alter the plot of my film.  I still want the opening to be the mom going to the dad’s office to talk about their son, but instead of them choosing to send the son to boarding school, I decided to have the son be charged with crime.  Because of the increasing issue with school shootings and threats, the boy’s punishments would realistically be outside of school hands. We know this from experience, since in December a student at our own school was charged for making false threats and ended up in court cases on two different charges.  

     I felt like following the son through his court case would be more interesting than seeing his life in boarding school, as well as more realistic and topical.  This also means that the parents would be more actively involved, so it can focus on how the case is affecting the son, the parents, and also their overall family relationship.  

     For my opening, this doesn’t change much.  Instead of having the scene end with the mom saying they need to send Aiden to boarding school, it ends with her saying that David can’t pay off the school this time, and that the boy is already down at the station.  

     I also took the time to develop a title for my film.  I thought it would be cool to have the court case name be the title of the film, which would end up being “Harker v. Westwood”.  I looked up private schools in Miami, since that is where the family lives, and Westwood Christian School was ranked super high. Since Aiden makes threats to the school, the case would essentially be between him and the school.  I think having the court name as the title is cool because by just reading it, it sounds like someone’s name and the viewer might not realize what the title means, but as the film progresses, the title will become clear. 

     I’m developing the script for the opening now, so my next post will be the script!

Sources:

https://www.privateschoolreview.com/westwood-christian-school-profile/33183

Character Names

The main characters of my film are the married couple, and I need names for them that fit their personalities.  For the man, he is an established business man, so I looked up a list of business-like names, and found a list of the most "successful" names.  I scrolled through and the top names were ones like John, Micheal, and Joseph;  I liked the name David from the list and felt that it was a tiny notch less basic than the other names.  I wanted a classic businessman name, and I thought David would work well for this purpose.  I then looked up a list of last names, and after looking through the long list, I settled on "Harker", because I felt it sounded good with David, and sounded good alone.  As a white couple, I want David and his wife to have very American names, and Harker sounds very American. I also think it sounds powerful, and I could imagine male coworkers in the office casually calling him Harker, but also people lower than him referring to him professionally as Mr.Harker.
     For the mother, I looked up popular female names from 1980, because even if she’s older than that, it still sets the names in the right age range.  I want her to also have a pretty basic name, to make her and David fit in with average American couples.  I settled on Jackie for the mother, because I like the name and it gives her a casual feel.  I want her character to be well liked by all of David’s coworkers and the other adults in the film, and I felt like Jackie was a very friendly and inviting name.  Jackie Harker also flows, so the name works. 
     I also need a name for the son, because even though he isn’t in the opening scene, the scene discusses his future.  I got a list of the current popular male names, since if the parents have a basic name, then their son’s name should match with that.  I scrolled through a list of 100 names, and decided I liked the name Aiden.  It’s basic without being completely overused, and also sounds good with Harker. 
   

Sources:
https://www.business2community.com/social-buzz/25-baby-names-that-spell-career-success-01375026
https://hobbylark.com/writing/cool-last-names
https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/life/parenting/a29351513/popular-baby-boy-names-2020/
https://www.momswhothink.com/top-100-baby-names-for-the-1980s/

Set Props

     Since the setting of my opening is in an office, and I’m planning on using an empty boardroom, I need to gather some props for my set.  Most of the props I want are things I already own, like a desk lamp, and a notepad and pen.  I have a blue desk lamp, and also a little globe that’s navy and maroon, which would both go well with the blue and brown tones of the room. A lot of desks I saw had little knick knacks and sculptures on them, which adds to the personalized feel of the set.  This is the purpose of the globe.  I know my dad has little bobbleheads and other small items like that at his desk at home, so I can also bring a couple of those.  I have a landline phone at my house that I can bring to put on the desk as well, since every businessman’s desk has a telephone on it.  I might incorporate a phone call into my scene, so the phone would be essential for those shots.  A lot of photos I found of desks also had a stack of tan files on it, which I know my dad has so that works out well.  Another important “boss” prop is a name plaque, which I thought my dad might have, so I texted him about it and he let me know that he is in fact too cool to own one.  So, I just ordered one off of Amazon that will arrive next week.  The one I found is under ten dollars and personalizable, which will be perfect for the set.  A lot of desks have computers on them, and I might have an old monitor at home to bring.  If I don't have it anymore, I just won't utilize a computer, since a bunch of movie desks didn't have one either.  Lastly, I’m going to bring a plain coffee mug, since most of the images I looked at included a mug on the desk.  By doing this, it brings a casual element to the set.

Sources:
https://www.theraffon.net/~spookcentral/journal/gb2016_location09-01_lg.jpg
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn%3AANd9GcSQJlGX9A1AHa1Lvf72u5ErjwDiyA6rdVS87sCMfgvwNo1peQEH
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/f9OT0HTauKU/hqdefault.jpg

Set Design

     For my opening, I plan on it being set in the husband’s office.  I’m planning on using my dad’s office space, but he works in a big office with a lot of communal space, with no big “boss” like office.  This being said, I’m hoping to be able to either transform part of the office or to frame it in such a way that it looks like an important person’s desk.  My dad was down at his office today, and sent me a couple options.  I could either use his real office space, which is a nice space that I could definitely add a few props to in order to up the professional aspects.  My other option is to use the boardroom, which could look really cool because it has an impressive skyline behind it.  With this, I think I could be able to move the chairs around, add some desk props, and frame the shots to make it look like it's a boss's office.  As long as I can get the windows in the background correctly, I think I can use the edge of the table as the desk.  I don't like the yellow tones of my dad's personal space, and I think the windows in the boardroom look really neat, so I'll most likely end up trying to utilize the boardroom.  A lot of dramas (like American Psycho, Birdman, and Django Unchained) stick to a cool toned color palette, and I like the idea of keeping with cool blues and grays for my opening.  Because of that, the boardroom would work nicely. Since I haven't seen the office in person, I won't know for sure which will work best until I'm able to check out the space myself.

Color Tones Source:
https://digitalsynopsis.com/design/cinema-palettes-famous-movie-colors/

Costume Design

     For my opening, I want to make sure that the outfits of the actors fit the image that I want them to represent.  My parents are going to be playing the part of the parents in the film.  For my dad, I want him in a suit, to portray him as an important business man who is high up in his profession.  For my mom, I want her to be dressed like a stereotypical mom, but in a way that still makes her look respected and nice.
     Businessmen in movies typically wear navy or dark gray suits, appearing very put together and professional.  This can be seen in basically any movie with a boss or corporate worker in it, such as Wall Street and Margin Call.  Their ties also seem to stay in muted color tones, staying away from any bright colors.
      For the woman, most wives to working men are shown wearing nice and conservative outfits.  Typically they wear blouses, with either jeans or slacks, and also don’t wear very bright colors.  Staying away from bright tones keeps the movie on a serious note, and the outfits work to establish the women as people to be respected, but also as people who place their kids at a higher importance than their work.  My mom has a lot of blouses and nice clothes, so this outfit will also be easy to coordinate.

SOURCES:
https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/810EYBOXFWL._SY445_.jpg
https://m.media-
amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMTU5MDEzMzYwMF5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwNTcwMjUxMw@@._V1_.jpg
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjg1hkrF5svr7X4etEQ0A2Mh9s5og9LHQOi_YXTB0ZDMGqEdaGxNdwacE2MBhlIM9KA-WygFPZsXxkC8rFHFMtIbMRQkk9PRy3sPCOVfB2mKEbmpK-eYQgv3r-80K3afpFUud4wSA0IKow/s1600/pic+1.jpg
https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2017/11/09/wonder_custom-17b3e3feb5cef1f485b86848e4e78e762d920f5d-s800-c85.jpg

Film Openings

     To get a better grasp on how to formulate my opening, I decided to watch a few film openings for dramas that focus on family life.

The Blind Side
     This movie, a widely popular sports drama, begins with a clip from a football game.  A woman, who will be one of the main characters of the film, begins a voice over walking through what is going on in the play.  She then goes on to explain the importance of one position, and one player (Lawrence Taylor), as pictures show his body parts.  Right after, a clip is shown of Lawrence walking in slow motion towards the camera.  This opening serves to establish the sports element, and also introduce the main character.  By the way she speaks about the boy and about herself, it is clear that she is a traditional motherly figure who holds a lot of love for the boy.  The opening very clearly shows that the film will be about football, and the narrator's relationship to the boy spoken about.


Wonder
     Wonder starts with a cute shot of an astronaut floating, before moving to show that it is a child wearing a helmet.  A narration then begins of the boy talking about himself, explaining what he's good at, what he isn't, and what he likes.  At the same time, clips are showing examples, but the face of the boy is not shown.  He then goes in to explain how his birth was a roller coaster, and then it cuts to a clip of his parents arguing about the kid attending school.  After, it goes back to narration, as the kid says he is going to start attending school, and his face is shown.  Through this opening, the man character was shown and his backstory was developed.  At the same time, we get a glimpse at the side story, which is how his parents are affected by the boy's life.  It foreshadows the issues that the parents are going to have, and that all of their relationships are about to drastically change.


Waves
     The opening for this film starts with all diegetic sound, as heavy breathing is heard and a girl is shown slowly biking through a street.  It then fades into a loud car of two teenagers singing and driving on the highway.  Close ups show the characters acting careless and light.  It then transitions to a teenage sports practice, with a coach yelling, before showing a school campus and the same boy from the car in different parts of the school.  As the clips continue, differing adult figures are heard, all of which are giving some sort of inspiration to a younger audience. This opening serves to show the setting that the main character is in, showing that they are a high school student and also an athlete.  It shows the many moods of the film, by transitioning from a dramatic tone, to a lighthearted one, to a hardworking and demanding setting.  Through this, it communicated the different themes of the movie, as well as lightly introduced the main character.

                                     A Quiet Place
    A Quiet Place starts with a clip of a father taking away a toy that made noise from his son because it was too loud.  The rest of the family is silent, and the dad is speaking sign language.  The family walks out, and a little girl secretly hands the boy back his toy.  Then, the family is shown walking through a forest silently, all barefoot with no sounds heard.  All of a sudden, the boy's toy starts making noises, the parents and girl all freeze, looking terrified, and the dad then sprints to the boy, as a creature swipes him away.  This opening set the tone for the movie, through the dramatic music and intensity of the characters.  The family is introduced, as well as the main conflict of the film- not being able to make noise.  Through this opening, the audience feels the overall emotion of the film.


OPENINGS:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMLSd6NSuqs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YH1C6yH_nFM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYia52U6lyg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_FdjXqSZlc