*Tutorial with Neil

Neil Tom and I discussed where we were currently at with the pre production work for the semester one brief. I had also previously sent Neil the Shot List and Script that we had, then we talked about the Major Project as Neil hadn't seen the pitch and only had the treatment to go off as a starting point.
After we had talked it through he gave us some pointers that would help with character and story development as well as topics we could look at for research...

Look at characters that occupy space with face, such as Mads Mikkelson who plays the titular character on Hannibal (2013)

Location for theatre space in Sheffield
-Lantern Theatre and Merlin Theatre (No pictures available)

I like the look of the Lantern Theatre because it look Moulin Rouge theatrical and it is small enough that we could fill seats with a small audience without it looking forced, also a smaller space feels more claustrophobic and daunting. It's just a matter of whether we can use the space and going on a recee up there.


Lastly Neil suggested looking at actors who embody their characters.... how they get into the role and their methods.
Jack Nicholson for example switches his charcter on and off with the camera whereas

Daniel Day Lewis will be charcter from the moment he signs on to the point the director yells That's a rap. 

By then exploring these methods it will help us paint a better picture of how Ridley may behave.

Malcom McDowell on A Clockwork Orange is also an interesting character to explore as there is something about his face before you even know that he is a bad guy that puts you off.

Group Meeting (29/10/13)

We went over the script and discussed specific elements with each role.

Producer: When is the actor/all of us free? Is there a space booked?

Camera: What camera would you be using and is it available? What types of lighting do we need?

Sound: What equipment that he would need on the day and anything additional that he would need to create.
Editor: Days that she was free to edit (As she is working on two projects) and in turn the days that I would want to see progress by.

Art Direction: As we do not have one we talked about the props taht we would need and who could bring in what to make the space look more realistic
Unfortunately we then later found out that the camera that the cinematographer wanted to use wasn't available so we postponed filmming to the second week prescribed.

Tutorial With Annie

The tutorial took place during the last week of the pre production stage.

I had left my Directors Notebook at home but I had explained the concept to Annie
-A list of props (As we didn't have an art director)
-A time frame and the aim of how much I wanted shot
-A clear lunch break and restarting time
-A page for things that may have needed to change in comparison to what the shot list/storyboard says.

I didn't have a chance to catch up with Chris for him to hand over the Storyboard but they had been completed.

What I did have to show was the marked up script and the shotlist.

The Making Of Ridley Marked Up Script.docx
Web Link: [http://www.scribd.com/doc/183377772/The-Making-Of-Ridley-Marked-Up-Script-docx]

Shot List for The Making Of Ridley.docx

Web Link: [http://www.scribd.com/doc/183377764/Shot-List-for-The-Making-Of-Ridley-docx]

So far everything was on track for filming next week.

Stylistic Development

I found it hard to search for films that used video blogging aside from the ones that I had personally watched (Avatar and Easy A ), and so I turned to the best resource hub, YouTube. I looked at a range of video blogs on YouTube, from fiction to non fiction some of which I have heard about and some of which I used to watch; The Lizzie Bennet Diaries and LonelyGirl15 to JacksGap and AlexDay as 











Visual Style
I wanted the shots to be really tight, only having a few scenes of looking at the space as a whole through an establishing shot, as you can see from the vlog clips above they a much wider framing than what I have in mind.

Post Production Visual Style

The biggest difference between the blogs that I have researched on YouTube and the one that I want to create is that the character isn't 'Editing' his entries, it is as it is. I chose to use this method because although I could have had a lot more flexibility in being able to play with the characters deteriorating sense of reality I felt that it would have seem to 'Staged' if the audience was then led to this analysis through the cutting.

Audio Style
This was hard to define as the piece is so simple and as it is essentially a conversation between character and audience, albeit a one sided conversation I felt that adding to much non dietetic sound would take away from the realistic I wanted to portray. As well as that from what I have seen from a range of the video blogs that I have watched music isn't really a key element, it's used as an intro or outro, if anything sound effects are used to emphasise points or as a form of humour.


Throughout this process I had this one image in my head to sort of help me keep focus...

For me this picture says that the character is both suspicious and paranoid, he holds these feeling in but he is very close to breaking point. He almost has a nervous calm about him which makes you feel uneasy. This is some of the characteristics I feel needs to be embodied by the character and what I am going to try and push for during the filming process

Group Meeting (24/10/13)

Today was our first group meeting, we had been communication for a while on the facebook group that Tom had set up for the project but today was an opportunity to discuss how we would be moving forward with the project as well as what everyones free days were for when it came to filmming and editing.

Also as I had yet to write the script I spitballed a few of my ideas to the group and listed to their suggestions. The one that I responded to the most was the idea of using an Online Diary, this would be a  way to portray the character and allow the audince to be engaged with them.

Development Process

Ideas and development for the semester one brief.

-A man acting to camera reading a script. This is unknown to the audience. In his monologue he talks about how when he was a young child he was bullied and how he allowed the rage he felt to build up inside himself until one day he does something drastic.
The character is seeing parallels with his own life and the character changes words in the monologue which is scrolling across the screen next to him.

-A day in the life sort. Actor has a "Regular" day and we see them trying to inhibit their character

-Done as a set of four vlogs as he gets ito the head of his character as he is doing a character study, changing from talking in the third person of "Ridley" to the first person "I" it can be spread over a period of time "Rehearsal" phase of the play
[Consider: Is it a new character vlogging about playing Ridley or is it about Ridley playing his character in the play for the major project]
Location could be a black space like a "Big Brother" type style of room, making the audience feel claustrophobic or use a normal room, either bedroom or living room.

Challenges faced.
-Righting this in the way that I originally wanted it to be written became incredibly difficult as it started to feel like I was writing the script for the major project
- As there is only one character it will be difficult to try and keep the audience engaged

Working With Actors.....On Low Budget

Today we used Her Big Chance (pg.103) of Alan Bennet's Talking Heads for an exercise, an actress named Rachel played the lead role of Lesley.
The exercise was Rachel acting as an actress reading the lines of Lesely in Her Big Chance. We started by having her do her bit and having Chris play the role of a director. The aim was to watch Chris and say "stop" if we though that that he was doing something wrong, or had forgotten too mention something to the "actress".
A few of us then took the position of director using the same premise.
The exercise was beneficial as it allowed us to make mistakes and ask questions and understand things from the actors perspective.
Some things that came up included over telling the actions to the actor, which is what Mamet had mentioned previously. The less you tell the better, but at the same time be direct.

Chris also gave us a few pointers to consider during the exercise.
-The final performance doesn't take place on set. It happens in the edit.
What he meant by this is that we have time and there's no need to rush, as long as we feel that we have everything that need.

Rachel also let us know a few things
-Make the actor feel important
-After being used to acting in a "safe space" with a lot of encouragement and praise, they will feel odd not to have that anymore, so let them know taht the work that they are doing is good.
-Give the actors a space of their own on set to have fun//let loose and practice.
-Don't tell them to "improvise" they need some kind of guidance, or direction/starting point.
-Don't tell them "Read it like this" and proceed to read it like you want it to be heard, because this will never work and you'll never hear what you want to hear and it feels as though you're telling them how to do their job.