CCR Notes and planning (help)

    So with Daniela's computer decimated and Mariano being the busiest man on the planet, I would like to curl up into a ball and cry! But what I CAN do is be somewhat productive (gaslighting myself here) and make sure I absolutely COOK on my critical reflections this year... unlike last year!! (haha... sorry to whoever graded those). I'm currently at the airport waiting for my connection flight from Atlanta, but it got delayed until midnight, so I'm studying my notes!!

    We did have an attempt earlier on this year of course with the documentary, and I also still have my notes from then, but there's certain things I think I can definitely improve on especially with this being a much bigger production as well!

    These are my notes from earlier this year:

    I'm planning on separating each of the questions and breaking them down into three parts, answering with topic sentences and then elaborating on each part when I sit down and fully write it! I think I can really nail this CCR if I sit down and plan, so that is exactly what I'm going to do!!

(UPDATE: waited in airport until 1 am, flight got cancelled so we rented a car at 1 am and drove 9 hours to home !!! but i DID get a lot of brainstorming done at least!)

Social media bloops

So after throwing a line edit together, I figured I might as well also get a jump start on editing some social media posts, and I made a cute little bloopers reel! You can watch it here or below in the embedded video.

I really wanted to a make a look-a-like low budget YouTube fan page blooper reel because I feel like it embodies our production the most especially with our target audience. I got all my sound effects from Pixabay and for the glitch shots I just made a really fast drawing similar to the other ones on my iPad, its actually SO easy! You basically create a grid that is unproportionally stable, like a glitch screen, and then color it in whatever neon colors look best, then you make one or two smears with the smear brush, then finally add a glitch effect! I wasn't sure if we had to make one or could just take one but I made it anyways, it only took a few minutes regardless!

Here's a few YouTube vids I was inspired from for the bloopers...

Not all of these videos ARE bloopers but the comments, the cuts, and the way they're edited is what I was aiming for!

Definitely exposing myself with these videos... but I lived off of them in COVID and for some reason watched it all religiously everyday!

I do actually really enjoy making the social media posts and I think I might look into the marketing side of that in future which is super cool! Overall, I need to step on it making all of these things, especially with Daniela's computer being MIA (r.i.p)

Editing... (kinda)

 SPRING BREAKKK!!

My family took a trip to the Westcoast of the U.S., and we're hitting Vegas (in Nevada), and then driving through Utah and Arizona! Its is GORGEOUS so far! We originally booked it as a hiking trip but because I crippled myself in January, I get to edit on the balcony (joy) and ice my knee! (acl and mensicus tears SUCK) Honestly, I'm not complaining THAT much because LOOK at this view...

 

  

Some insane flicks so far...

Anyways, we only have the clips from all the dialogue scenes, but I put them all together and we have about 4:45 TRT... which is actually really good! We should only need to get 1-2 minutes of filler clips which we HOPE to film Monday (I know it's getting cut WAY to close I am so sorry), we got an all clear for the camera but now we're waiting to see if Mariano is doing anything. But I cut down a lot of white noise in it and sent it over to Daniela, who watched on her phone. She said she was feeling upset she couldn't do much so she was going to make a list of all the cuts we should insert and notes on what to color grade and more! I think if we have that, editing will be an absolute breeze (plsplspls) and it should run pretty smoothly. I'm happy that we thought that out but I am feeling stressed about the due dates of course. Part of me wishes I was at home so I could really work on this, but I live to travel, so I'm definitely soaking in as much of the West as I can! Also, here's a pic of the line edit...

Filming day one

FILMING DAYY!!

So... this day was something out of hell unfortunately, but we got a lot done!!

I picked up Daniela at 6:55 AM.... (i know)

Me with the body mirror we never used at 6:55 AM!!!

Then I went to pickup Mariano at his house, and he brought a couple outfits out for us to look at. Then we took a little field trip to Publix as we had to get the plant for the film (as well as sustenance for the morning, aka a whole box of croissants + redbull)

We then got to work setting up, I was doing Mariano's makeup and costume while Dani was setting up lighting and cameras. 

One main issue we ran into was how to connect the technical device onto him, and uhm....

this was our solution 

I'm so sorry Mariano 

(he gave consent we promise)

...so we eventually got it on!! And we only had to reapply like 3 times throughout the 12 hours which is a win in my books. Also, he got a free waxing at the end!!!

Next we tried filming the opening and only got so far before Mia came around and we had to start on filming the engineer portions. This took a pretty long time as we had to learn ALL the lines and do a million thousand reshoot whenever something went wrong (which happened a lot)

Mia and Mariano

Mariano learning final monologue

Finally, we finished the engineer parts and Mia left around 5pm... so I started on Mariano's makeup for the end scene where he dies. Honestly... I COOKED. I use some facial putty and my bruise kit from last year with fake blood, it came out pretty good!

Finally, here's just a few of the behind the camera pictures that we took to show the quality!

 

Despite the absolute chaos and trauma endured throughout this production time, we did get quite a chunk of work done and I'm really happy about that! We're going to finish filming as soon as I get back from my travels and in the meantime, I'm going to edit a bunch of the clips together as a mini line edit!!

BTW- We literally finished filming around 7:15... 12 HOURS FOR LIKE 4 MINUTES??? goodbye...

 

Second group meeting!

 Today we had a second group meeting and it was really helpful with finalizing things before we film! I got some feedback on how to create more diverse shots and keep the audience engaged, but mainly everybody liked the plot and our idea. 

Here’s some of my notes: 

-Watch THE WHALE 

-Play with the colors 

-Maybe create seasons throughout the production

    -Winter = death?

    -Calendar establishes time?

-Camera shots

    -Handheld

    -Close ups

I really like the idea of the camera shots becoming increasingly more close and shaky as it goes on, but I wasn't sure about the season's idea as we'd have to refilm the whole thing...

Also, Dani came over to check out the filming location and we set up the lighting to see how everything could look on camera! 

Here is some BTS...

Equipment + scouting

 So we finally get out equipment tomorrow! We are renting from BEACON TV (thank god for being a cbtv kid) and here's a list of everything we're panned out to get! 

- Sony ZV-10 with a 30 mm lens

- RGB lightkit

- Boom Mic

- Tripod

I'm super happy we got our hands on this equipment because the quality produced from this camera is pretty nice, and mixed with the lighting I think it's gonna look SO good. 

Again, the light kit is pretty essential to our production because the lighting in my guest room is pretty sucky at times, also if we want to convey the colors this is the best way to do that for sure. 

But I think getting this equipment is going to elevate everything within our production as in audio and visual quality. Also if we want to submit this to film festivals and enter it in competitions this is pretty much a necessity for that as well! 

Anyways I'm super excited to film and cannot WAIT to see how things look!!

Social media + drawing update

 So... this is really just an overall update post on everything!!!

1. NOBODY sent in an audition :D (im at my last straw)

2. Mariano (our classmate) offered to act in our film!! (bless his soul)

3. I restarted half of my drawing

    Everything kept looking really wrong and I didn't like how the hand was layed out. Mrs. Stoklosa and a few other friends agreed that something was off, and I finally decided it was the positioning of the hand. I'm to lazy to change details so I restarted the right hand fully. It looks a LOT better but I now have to decide which parts to make mechanic. I also did a little more shading on the left hand and restarted the mechanic part because it wasn't shading as realistic as I wanted it to. I really like most of the detailing on the left hand, but I haven't gotten to the finger nails as you can tell in the picture. Here is the work so far.. 

4. We made some social media posts to go out later tonight

    We decided on some meet the director posts, and eventually we're going to come out with a meet the actor one once we have our shit together a little more. But here is the layout, I think they look super cute! We're going with a navy hue to most of the posts, especially on the color grading for the BTS and sneak peak posts. Here's our layout for the director posts! (I'll put in photos of each of us later before post)

5. I made a planning sheet! (kinda)

This helped me pan out what needs to get done and the weeks I have to do it all as well!

I also realized I NEED to step up on social media soon or we may be in trouble...

Here it is:

1. Filming 

-Shot list planning 

-Finish script 

-Film 

-Organize costume 

-Organize makeup/props 

-Make drawings of body anatomy  

2. Print 

-Create layout 

-Plan photos 

3. Social Media 

-Week 5 

-Two Meet the Director posts 

-Week 6 

-Meet the Actor 

-BTS 

-Title graphic 

-Week 7  

-Hopefully have drawing done 

-Sneak peaks 

-BTS 

-Week 8  

-Cast/Director funny vids 

-Bloopers 

-Teaser 

 

 Honestly I really accomplished a lot with all of this planning and I feel a lot more relaxed about how everything is going now! Even though there's still a lot to do, I'm more organized with my thoughts and I can think clearly about what to do.