Final Product

This is it! My group and I put a lot of time and effort into this film opening and I made an overview of the what we went through to be able to reach the final product. I posted a link to the film down below. Thank you for following me on this journey. I hope you guys enjoy the film and the review please leave some feedback of what you think.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx0SmjusJds&feature=youtu.be

Reflection

This is it! My group and I put a lot of time and effort into this film opening and I made an overview of the what we went through to be able to reach the final product. I will post the film later today, stay tuned. Thank you for following me on this journey. I hope you guys enjoy the film and the review please leave some feedback of what you think.

  CCR Typed

Hi guys my name is artur diniz santos and i was i a group that worked together to create the film opening: Footsteps. I worked alongside Diogenes Mezzadra and Alejandro Caranque, to create a thrilling film. We began 7 weeks ago when our group first met up to decide what our film opening was going to be about. We had a vague idea that we wanted to do something that related to a war veteran who suffers from a severe case of PTSD. After deciding on our idea we did a lot of research on not only PTSD but veterans who suffered from it after a war. After countless of hours of research we finally got a better idea of how to portray the symptoms of PTSD. When we had made our decision final on what we wanted to create we had to come up with ways to portray all of our research into this film. We met up again a week later and created some scenarios that we thought we good, we had decided on doing a flashback of the veteran at the war from the very moment where it now triggers his PTSD, however our teacher gave us some time in class to have a peer review session and the group i was in gave us some more ideas which we thought were good and we had changed to one of their ideas but we went back to our original idea as we believed that we had a better idea on how to create a more powerful scene.

A typical genre convention of a thriller is the sense of anxiety. In our film we tried to create some stress on the audience by leaving them on the edge of their seats trying to figure out what is going to happen next. In the beginning of the film opening our main character, lieutenant Harvey, was disengaged with the audience. He showed very few signs of life based off of the way he was looking around the place and how he had his head down a majority of the time. With this “dead look” the audience begins to feel sorry for him and therefore creates a connection with him. One way that we challenged the conventions of a thriller is that we decided to use natural colors rather than using the typical dark colors and shades. We believed that one way that we would be able to stand out was if we were able to challenge the typical ideas, therefore we used the natural colors. We thought that the film would be better if we used as much light as possible and use the natural sunlight. Our film opening represents a lot of issues that the world faces today in the sense of PTSD. Thousands of people across the world suffer from PTSD not only from wars but also from everyday things. We hope that our film not only entertains the audience but also raise awareness to the issue of PTSD and what people have to go through.

Many people can relate to this film opening as they could have family and/or friends who suffer from PTSD. We believe that this film engages with our audience as PTSD is a common disorder within families. The film can relate to these people who know of someone who suffers from PTSD as they will know some of the symptoms as well as be able to know what he is going through. We created this film to be a serious topic and hope that it would be shared across multiple media platforms such as social media and local theaters. The issue of PTSD is very common and we hope that since it is common it entices people to want to watch it and learn a little bit more about it while entertaining themselves. We hope that the audience become attached to Lieutenant Harvey and are able to sympathize for him and see how serious and real this issue is.

I feel as if not only my production skills improved but my entire group as well. Throughout the entire project we used the different angles and camera shots and did some extra research on camera shots to be able to use them properly in our film. In the beginning of our film we started out with me being the main actor and Diogenes was going to film however it did not work out so well, so Alejandro thought it was a better idea if we switched roles. We believe that this improved our film a lot. I believe that the more you practice something the better you get so by just being able to use what we researched into practice improved our abilities. We went through multiple takes and drafts which each time improved our skills a little more than the last.

The use of technology played a pivotal role in our film opening. As I mentioned in one of my blog posts we used a camera that my dad allowed me to borrow which i feel helped improve the quality of the film. Alejandro was the editor of our film and he decided to use the website Wevideo.com to be able to edit it.The technology played a crucial role on the quality of production.

CCR

This is it, my group and I put a lot of time and effort into this film opening and I made an overview of the what we went through to be able to reach the final product. I put a link to the overview down below and I will post the film later today, stay tuned. Thank you for following me on this journey. I hope you guys enjoy the film and the review please leave some feedback of what you think.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJJH3MwtCSo

Production 2

As we are concluding our production process we are only left with editing in which we are gonna take the class time available to be able to edit the film and make it a smooth and flowing story. We took the time in class before we went on spring break to be able to plan the days that we were going to record as I had to travel for a soccer tournament and we had concluded that from the 28th to the 31st would be the days that we would all be here to record. During these days we recorded more shots than we needed to be able to have options when it came to the editing phase. I will put more of what we recorded on these days at the end of the post.

In the scenes we recored we used some of the symptoms of PTSD to convey what the veteran is going through without mentioning that he has PTSD. We hope that this film helps bring some attention to the people who suffer from PTSD while entertaining you guys.

Production

I'm happy to announce that my group was finally able to being and nearly finish our production as we have all had this spring break time to be able to record our scenes. Over the past week our group meet up and recorded a majority of our outdoor scenes and we will meet up later today to finish the recording indoors. We made some slight modifications to be able to better tell the story as well as due to a lack of resources. For example we changed up the scene that led to the flashback, we had originally planned to have the veteran hanging out with his family but while we were recording we had a better idea which was to have the veteran be going to a therapist to improve his case of PTSD.We also recorded some of our folly audio this weekend after we were done recording our actual film. I will put a clip of what we recorded this week at the end, please feel free to leave some feedback on ways we can improve these shots.

The scene above is how we plan on transitioning from the therapy session (the indoor part) to the flashback of the veteran back at the war scene (outdoor). The quick movement at the end of the clip is when the transition occurs and leads straight to the veteran in a forrest area.

Editing 2

As I mentioned in a previous post we need to buy some extra items to make this film seem more realistic. Luckily Alejandro found a soldier costume in his house which we will be able to use but is still a couple more items that we would have to buy such as fake blood and potentially a better microphone as I am not sure if they microphone from the camera is the best.

For the editing in our scene we were given a tip to record each scene multiple times so we can choose which shot looks the best and make our editing lives a lot easier. There are many different websites and apps for us to be able to edit but we are all more accustomed to iMovie as it is one of the easiest to understand how to use. I will include a picture of the editing screen and a video explaining how to use iMovie

Peer Review 2

Last Wednesday our teacher gave us another opportunity to do a peer review however we had to be in different groups that we were in last time. This peer review session benefited us a lot as it gave us a better idea of what people thought about our idea as well as of what we had so far. They give us some good comment as well as some constructive criticism.

I explained our project and what we had in mind for this film and after this they liked the idea and said it was something that not many people think about going into, however they did not think we had a theme to our film but i explained that this film is to bring more awareness to veterans in particular who suffer from PTSD after coming back from war. As PTSD is a known issue in our communities however not many people talk about it.

They really liked the idea that it brings more awareness to this topic as it is a serious and relevant topic however they did say that I did not mention enough about what we plan to do after the flashback so this week I decided to go more in depth with what we are more than likely going to do. Also they mentioned that we should starts shooting as soon as possible as it sometimes takes longer than you plan and potentially forget about an important shot and have to go redo the shot.

Shooting

We had originally planned to record this weekend due to one of us not being able to make it we had to postpone it. Luckily we are all going to be here during spring break and will be able to record it during the week. We will begin our shooting process this week and I will put some of the clips in future blog posts for you guys to leave your comments.

We changed the plan a little but nothing that will affect the film drastically. We had originally planned to have the veteran be around his family, however we did not take into account the fact the all of our parents will be at work while we are recording so instead we choose to make it so the veteran is with his brother and his friend who are both younger than him. He doesn't have a wife as he went to war pretty young and due to the PTSD he prefers to be alone.

In this scene we will use a lot of medium shots and shot-reverse-shot to show that both characters are having a conversation which is when the brother is consoling the veteran to try to help him back to feeling somewhat normal.

Ending scene

As my group and I are finishing our preparation and begin shooting soon I wanted to clarify what we plan on doing during the ending scene (right after the flashback). We will have the flashback and after this scene we will have the veteran coming back to reality and he will be in fear and not remember much of what was happening before the PTSD occurred. A majority of the ending scene would show the symptoms of PTSD such as fear, anxiety, and mistrust. We will use a majority of what we learned in our research and in our case studies to try to perfect what it would look like after having a PTSD "attack".

One of the symptoms of PTSD is loneliness

We plan to cut back to where he was before suffering from the "attack" however he will be covered in sweat and yelling. To show the emotion we will us a lot of close ups and low-key lighting, these two will be able to show what not only veterans but people who suffer from PTSD have to go through.

Editing

In the scene our main focus is going to be when someone says "can you hold this" however we don't want to focus on anyone else rather than the main character. When he says can you hold this it will flashback to him during war when someone said the same exact words but he was asking him to hold a gun instead.Throughout this entire scene there will be sounds that someone would normally hear during war, such as gun fire, explosion, and yelling. As we don't want there to be any copyrighted things in our film we will either create our own sounds or we will us royalty free sounds.

We thought about a way that we could transition from the flashback to regular time, one of the ideas was that he could be running to safety and he accidentally trips over something and as soon as he falls it goes back to regular time but instead of being sitting down or standing he would be on the floor gasping for air as if he had just woken up from a nightmare. This is only our initial ideas but we will see how this turns out on Friday when we begin shooting.

Location

To give you guys a better understanding of where we are gonna record we decided to go to one of the locations. I will put some of the pictures of the indoor and outdoor locations below. We will begin the recording indoors which is where the flashback scene will occur and then we will transition to the outdoors after the flashback. We decided on the Isles at Weston clubhouse as our indoor location. This clubhouse fits perfectly because it has all of the things we need and also it has a lot of the things that a regular house would have such as a kitchen, a living room, as well as a game room. It is also really good as both Dio and I live in this neighborhood and can ask Alejandro to meet us there to record.

Kitchen if needed

Lounging area

Game room

We will also need an outdoor location for our war scenes so for this case we chose to to record at Markham Park as it has many of the aspects that would fit a war zone. I will put pictures of some of the locations below. There are many areas around Markham that would fit but these pictures were to get a general idea.

Potential Changes

For the casting in our film we originally planned on having Dio's brother be the main character as he offered to help us and also fits the criteria that we have. Dio's brother offered to help us however he also has a busy work schedule so just in case he is not able to record we had to do some other back up castings. He told us that he would more than likely be able to record with us but we needed another option.We believe we found some other people that fits the criteria that we are looking for.

Alejandro has an older brother as well who offered to help us in case Dio's was not able to; however our only concern is that he may look a little younger than we would like. If we are not able to record with Dio's brother who looks much older and fits the part better we would be able to record with Alejandro's brother and we would have to make some minor changes. For example we would change the war he comes back from. If we use Dio's brother he would be casted as a veteran from the Iraq war but if it is Alejandro's brother we would cast him as a veteran from the ongoing issue in Syria. If this is the case we would make the soldier from Syria come home due to injury.

Production 2

We were struggling to find a day to begin our production due to all of our busy schedules however we have now officially agreed to begin the filming process on March 22, 2019. However we had extra class time to be able to work on our project so we decided to record a little draft scene for the flashback scene so we could get a better picture of how its gonna look. We decided to go with our original idea of using a flashback from the beginning of the opening scene because we feel it gives the audience a better understanding and more background knowledge of what is happening throughout the film itself.

During the weekend Alejandro was able to find a costume of a solider which fits our character perfectly. This costume helped us out a lot as we have a small budget for this film, and it allowed us to invest more money in other areas of our production. For our draft scene I was recording and suggested that instead of focusing on the characters talking that we should just focus on the main character and give him  a majority of the attention. I added our draft scene below for you guys to see and leave some feedback on what you think of our idea, but keep in mind it is only draft and not the final take.