Costumes/Props- Barry Crane

Barry- This is the original drawing I did of Barry. He has short hair. (Preferably dark) He wears a white shirt and preferably a black tie because he's on his way home from work. The white shows his good will, the black shows the darkness behind his life. He wears a black coat to show the weather conditions and the time of year. Black smart trousers and shiny black shoes to show that he is a smart, well presented man who takes pride in himself.

The props that involve him are: the house key, the tv remote, a black work bag, a smart watch and a sainsbury's bag. He has a Sainsbury's bag to show that he is a normal individual, also that he goes to work and does the food shopping whilst Gregg does pretty much nothing.

All props and costumes will be kept either at Harry's or my media bag

Locations

In our preliminary film, we shot it in and around Harry's house. This worked well so we agreed to use it again. It is a very versatile place to film as it could be seen as a quiet village, or the outskirts of a town. We also have very good access as it is literally one minute away from school so we can film at lunch times and in study periods etc. His parents both work 9-5 jobs so there is no problem rearranging a few things or setting up lights and other bits. Also there would be no interruption.

We agreed in words that the film would start outside, then end inside. As we looked further into it we noted down what cars were where at what time outside his house to plan continuity and framing for shots. Our character walks down the path and into the house- it was agreed.

The character would enter through the front door for easy access to the living room. The living room was a really good place to set our film because it has lots of antique clocks which could link to our film with the whole concept of time running out.

These were the two locations we planned to use.

Others were debated, such as the alley way used in the preliminary, but the two we had chosen were the best to suit our film.

Character Proflies

Main Character/Protagonist- Barry Crane

Barry Crane is a young adult who is your average bloke/white collar worker. He lives on the outskirts of London (in one of the quieter parts because he doesn't like the noise of the traffic on the main roads) in a small house which he has only recently moved into. He works in paper manufacturing and is highly bored by his job so he often nips out during work hours to get a tuna and lettuce sandwich. He can not afford the rent for his house own, so he allows his old friend Gregg to live there. However, Barry is often short tempered with Gregg because he feels as though he has held him back for his whole life. (They met at school at the age of 8.) Lately the two have been having more and more arguments but will have to start working together as they face the end of the world. Barry has no family left. He was the youngest of two siblings, a brother and a sister. His brother perished in a plane crash at the age of 22 and his sister was murdered by a man who was never again seen on the face of the earth. His parents both owned a butchers after not keeping to the family tradition of traveling entertainers. For generations before his parents (on his mother's side) his family warred against another family of traveling entertainers. This family practiced the art of black magic and Barry's family did not approve of the torment they put humans through night after night. Barry's mother was kicked out of the family union after refusing to keep to the legacy of becoming an entertainer after meeting Barry's future father. They opened a butchers and had two children. (Barry's brother and sister.) On a dark thundery night, Barry was born upstairs at the butchers, at which point a group of the old family enemy broke into the house and performed a ritual on Barry after killing his parents. Barry was left with a tattoo on his chest saying "what you want to see isn't always what you want to see." Barry always thought this related to his parents murder, but as he grows up he starts to have visions that he doesnt understand. It is only as he gets older that he sees what is going on. (It actually turns out in the end that Barry's family was the evil family, and the so called enemy actually have given Barry the gift of visions so he can stop the end of the world.) In relation to thriller conventions, Barry, as a result of being brought up by his brother on a rough neighborhood works well in danger although a quiet sophisticated individual. A typical type of character used in such films as the James Bond collection and The Transporter (Corey Yuen 2002.)

Shots will start high angle showing his general confidence and power, but as he starts to have a vision, they will become more low angle to show that he cannot deal with his visions. This is where Gregg helps him out.

The music in the opening will be based on what I believe to be in Barry's mind at that moment in time. Getting the audience even closer to his feelings and emotions.

Barry will be played by an average, maybe slightly smaller actor. This is because we want his build and body shape to hide his inner power so it is a shock when it comes out.

Second Character- Gregg

Gregg is less important in the opening of the film, but if the film had been completed, he would be the unsung hero of the film. He was generally a slacker at school and still is. He has always been in the shadow of Barry, although they are both respectful to each other. He is allowed to live in Barry's house providing he pays his rent. There is not a lot to say on this character that is actually needed, because he is only in the opening for ten seconds or so. His role in the story is basically to help Barry through his visions, however as it goes on and on he becomes more important.

Gregg will be played by a fairly big guy, based on the fact that he is lazy.

Perhaps none of this seems needed. But, to fully write a story for even just the opening of a film, there has to be a huge story behind the characters. If you go into extreme depths i believe that you can use this to your advantage and be more creative when it comes to constructing the shots and music. It was part of our planning, so it is on here.

List of Shots- first thoughts

First draft in note form of shots that could be used:

An establishing/ master shot to set scene

Hand held low angle mid close up (used in Memento, 2000, Christopher Nolan)

A close up of feet to show some but not all of character

Mid/Long shot of character from behind walking. (however this could create the wrong effect and may not be used)

Long rotating shot from inside house on character to create a being watched feeling. could be used for tension, for when gregg is introduced to the film. so you know someone is watching but arent sure who, then someone taps the character on the shoulder, but its just his flatmate

Some form of shot filmed from on a chair, just for something different

Zooms when fear occurs

Canted angle shot of wall as darkness comes to show that all is not well

Close ups when characters' expressions are needed to be shown

Over the shoulder shot when character watches tv to show from his perspective

Shot reverse shot in dialogue with flatmate

Fade in and out at start and end.

This is open to changes, just a first thoughts list of shots that we could use.

Our Comments

A few of our comments on the film that we felt were needed

The Film

Creating The Sound Track

Creating our soundtrack took about three days work. It was both fun and challenging. Over the course of filming our film, Harry and I came up with a few ideas for the sound of the finished piece. We only vaguely thought about it as we went along, we did not go into much detail. For example, we would be filming a shot and one of us would come up with an idea and say "this would work well," or "we should do this here." We didn't make any notes as such, rather mental notes. This did help however, because once it came to uploading the footage and editing, we had a basic idea of what we wanted.

Once the final parts of the footage were uploaded and edited, I brought my synthesizer into school to do some work on the soundtrack. This is a type of keyboard that produces abnormal sounds... Perfect for our film. We agreed that there would be lots of incidental music to fit the genre. Lots of small parts to fit the character's emotions at that point. We also wanted to leave in quite alot of the sound picked up by the camera, aka diegetic sound, to add realism. However we would have to be careful that the sound picked up was not of a poor quality. This was key with the first sequence in picking up the sound of the wind/basic outside noises. Mainly we wanted the sound to be fairly surreal yet realistic as if it was in the character's own mind. I will go on to explain this later.

The first thing we added to the film was our sound motif, the tune of the film. This was something I came up with earlier on, but felt it fitted in well with the film so we decided to use it.

Next up was a haunting sound on my synthesizer. One that filled the space lightly but still gave a good mysterious, chilling effect. This was to set the tone of the film as a spine tingling thriller, and to create a cold opposite outside, to the hot red lights of inside the house. Diegetic sound at this point is his footsteps and the wind, which works really well with the synth to create a cold chilling effect. During this part, Barry looks up to the sky and hears the noise that triggers his visions. It's also done on the synth and is based on a fog horn. After 4 bars of the solo synthesizer, some strings come in that play an incidental piece that is adapted later in the opening. A flute comes in at this part giving a warm, homely effect as Barry reaches his home. However, as the door is slammed shut, so is the music. This works well, it is sort of in your face, and acts as a good barrier between the two settings.

As he gets into the house there is a deafly silence. This 10 extract was inspired by The Godfather (1972, Francis Ford Coppola.) The silence is so strong that it gets the audience to listen so hard meaning that they stop moving etc to listen harder. This technique creates lots of suspense and works well in our film. After the silence, during the rotating shot around Barry, comes a complex process. On my synthesizer is a touch pad. If you touch this pad and move your hand around it whilst playing a note, the frequency and resonance of the note is changed, creating a 'wah' effect. This part relates back to the sentence in the introduction I said I would explain. Basically, most of the music is based on what I imagine the character to be thinking/hearing in his mind. My inspiration for this idea, was the sound you (or maybe just I) get when you have a dream and you die and you (or I) get the sudden sound in your mind of sheer horror that you are dying. I wanted to recreate a similar concept with this, but slightly less extreme. I think it helps you relate to the character and get inside his mind, and get to grips with the way he is feeling.

As he sits down, it returns to a vague silence. One of the diegetic sound features the camera picked up was the sound of the big clock in the room. This provided a challenge to get each tick in time with each cut, i think it came out fairly well in the end. We put a touch of emphasis on it to give the film a bit of rhythm and to act as some form of a count down.

As Barry sits down and turns the TV on, you can hear the diegetic sound of the news. This also shows conventions of a thriller, however I won't go onto that in this section. As he watches, i use the pad on my synth again. I play a bass synth and start with low frequency getting to high frequency quickly. This is the exact same sound as I explained earlier in the dreams. It also represents the build up, and calm before a storm. The frequency builds up and then once at its peak, it cuts for a second or two. (Inspired by Lord Of The Rings, 2003, Peter Jackson.)

After this the red lights come on and with regards to the sound, there is loads going on. I think there are about 4 different synth parts at this point, all combined to show the power of the vision. During the next shot of the shadow on the wall, I went back to the incidental music from earlier, but moved it up a few octaves to create a scary feel, inspired by Drag Me To Hell (2009, Sam Raimi.) However I was not keen on this part, as I thought it rather cringy and stereotypical, but the audience feedback we received encouraged us to keep it. This overlaps all four synths (which were turned down slightly for clarity.)

The next shot is introduced with a bell ringing twice. This bell indicates the start of the vision, but was not powerful enough just as a normal bell. So to counter this, I added distortion and amp simulation to the bell. This gave it a really powerful timbre which worked extremely well as it is so sudden.

After this comes the sound of the end of the world. This is what we had envisioned it to sound like. And it came out really well. Over the top of this is also the same foghorn effect to show that the sound is linked to the visions. As he walks up to the TV the same confusing synth comes in to show is feelings and that he is in some form of a trance.

The original slap on the shoulder was taken out of the film due to the light switch being heard. We rerecorded it and put it in place, but it turned out to sound like a light switch anyway, but there you go.

The first and only piece of dialogue in the film was fully picked up by the camera. We just had to turn it up full blast to make it coherent. As Barry turns to the TV, he can hear it, therefore its diegetic, then one of my favourite parts of sound is the screaming noise as the peephole effect is used. This is used to show power of the vision and also to make the audience jump when they think all the trouble is over. As he turns back to Gregg, another synth is used to create a creepy noise and feeling, as if to say... "What the?"

Finally, the original sound motif is used on the last title. It is adapted by putting in a few strings and creating a more grand, vast feel, as the end of the world is quite a vast deal.

(All sounds were made using my synthesizer on GarageBand, and some, from straight through the camera.)

I used a synthesizer to give it a modern, futuristic feel and strings to give it a grand more meaningful feel. I think this combination works well with the genre of 'Visionary' because it is a timeless film. It could be remade into a medieval film, but could also be remade into a film set in the year 3000, so it gives it that anonymous feel.

I could not be more pleased with the way the soundtrack came out and could well look into it as a career.