Jeremy's AS Media Coursework 2013

Tuesday, 4 March 2014

Opening Title Sequence

This is the final version of our opening title sequence, It was filmed on a Cannon EOS 700D and edited using the editing software Adobe After Effects.

My Contribution to Pre-Production and Construction

When planning our opening title sequence we assigned different roles to each member of the group in order to split up the work load and hopefully improve the quality of our final work. I was set the task of securing props and costumes. I believe that I fulfilled the task well as I managed to get costumes that suited the needed characters and genre of the film and the only props needed where guns which I could easily get hold of from friends.

I was an actor in our OTS playing the part of the agent who is killed at the end, however I also believe that I took the role of director as I came up with the main bulk of the script and plot, my ideas and interpretations of each scene are most dominant. Working as a team we always discussed our separate ideas before shooting a scene which occasionally lead to tensions and I believe that I took control of situation like these and made us decide on how we would film a scene or take multiple takes using everyone idea to see which is best and giving us a wider variety to choose from when editing, this is another one of the reasons I was listed as Director in the credits of our opening title sequence.

The OTS was also filmed at my house, after I offered as it was a secluded area where we would not need to get permission to carry the gun props around. Finding a location was meant to be one persons responsibility but ended up being a group effort with all of us looking at locations that could be possible filming spots and we eventually agreed that filming at my house would be easier after I discovered that we would have to provide the police with exact times and dates which we would be filming at if we did it in a public place (which we where unsure of).

I also contributed to the editing process of our work creating most of the final opening title sequence you see using Adobe After Effects. I defiantly cannot take all the credit though as the entire first draft which acted as a base for the final product was made by Fateh Khaled two days after we filmed and a lot of the lip syncing with our foley was done by Harry Denn.

This our Final AS Media Opening Title Sequence 'Vindicate'-

Pre-production: Treatment

'A police officer seeks revenge for the death of his partner, who was murdered by an infamous as

At the start of the film, two agents are sent to investigate a local abandoned house, after being told that there is the possibility that a major criminal could be using it as a headquarters to hold their captured colleague. The captured agent is thought to of been captured because he was investigating the groups previous crimes, and was on a close lead to arresting the group. However the group logged on to the fact that he was doing this, and has kept him hostage for the last month previous to the 2 agents being sent to investigate the house. The criminal believed to being holding their colleague hostage is known to be part of a gang that has had many wrong doings such as money laundering, drug dealing and assassination attempts, which they have carried out in the past. The group have been previously convicted of ruthless crimes like these, but have managed to evade the police every time, and thereby naming themselves the ‘Get Away Group’. The group is composed of 4 members, each of which are highly trained and have crucial links to other major criminals located around the city. On the other hand the two agents are at a complete contrast with one another. The lead agent has spent many years in the job, and is highly advanced in knowing what to expect when, approaching dangerous scenarios such as these. His colleague on the other hand is in his first year, and has been assigned to be the apprentice of his far more experienced colleague.

Just as the two agents arrive and reach the entrance to the building, they feel at risk that someone is watching them, little do they know, that someone is indeed watching them at a high vantage point at the top of scaffolding. The lead agent then tells his young counterpart that he should 'not do anything stupid' stay behind him at all times, regardless of the situation. Just as the lead agent enters the house, he barges in, announcing his presence in the house. A few moments later, they reach the house, and start to investigate around the actual inside of the house. Later on, the two agents meet again in the kitchen and discuss where their colleague could be. The young counterpart fatally decides to suggest the his boss 'should check outside'.

It is at this point in which the assassin on the scaffolding is able to get a sight on the lead officer, and after tracking the officer walking into a shed outside, the assassin begins to put his finger on the trigger and get a clearer line of sight on the agent. A few minutes later the assassin sees the agent discover a vital piece of evidence that he had hidden from everyone to see. In an act of controlled desperation, he decides to assassinate the officer at the exact moment that the officer looks up and sees him up in his vantage location.

After hearing the his boss fall to the floor with a bullet hole in his chest, he called for more units to arrive and take down the assassin from his unknown location. When the police officers arrive, they instantly receive information that the house is home to the assassin of the 'Get Away Group', and thereby proceed with caution. The police bring 8 units to the scene, vastly out numbering the mysterious assassin in an unknwown location to them. They proceed into the building from every entrance, surrounding the criminals. Each police officer is armed with a normal pistol and bullet proof vest in case things get out of hand. The assassin realizes what is happening long before they arrive, he tries to make a desperate lunge for freedom, by climbing down the scaffolding, and jumping to the ground. It came to no avail however, as when he landed on the ground, he attracted attention to himself and was followed by police helicopter all the way back to his gangs headquarters.

A few hours later, the police surround the headquarters, in a abandoned, run down room in the top floor of building in the heart of a local village a few miles away. They then set up four snipers looking directly at the four gang members, and on demand, they shot all four members with bullets that knocked them out, allowing the agents to break in and arrest the criminals. This therefore gave the officers an easy task of simply carrying the criminals into the police van when they left their location, where they were taken to the station, where they were arrested, and put on trial, and found guilty, thereby facing life behind bars.

As for the family of the young agent who was assassinated, he was flown back home to his family in his home town, where the entire town turned up for the funeral, for what they described as a ‘heroic, agent, who put his life at risk to save everyone else. The film then ends with a scene of everyone sowing their respects to the agent, and then cutting to a final scene of the criminal gang being put behind bars. - written by Harry Denn

Pre-Production: Storyboard

This storyboard gave us a rough guide to follow when creating our final opening title sequence, it shows the main scenes that we will film and sequences the order in which they will be filmed in-
Created by Jacob Osman

Pre-Production: Risk Assessment

This is my groups risk assessment, the purpose of the risk assessment is to outline all the possible potential risks and how to solve them if we do ever come across them. Within our risk assessment one of the main outlined risk was the fact that as our project consists of the use of weaponry, this was a huge concern especially to the neighbourhood because if we were spotted with weapons (even though they were model guns) the neighbours wouldn't be able to distinguish the difference between the two, furthermore this could have resulted into police matters; which is why we informed the neighbours in advance prior to the production day in the next couple of weeks. When creating the risk assessment, I thought of all possible hazardous risks and put them together with a solution, so when it comes to filming we make minimal mistakes and are extra precautious. -Fateh Khaled

Pre-production: Location

This is the research that was done into finding the location for filming:

Pre Production - Location - Fateh Khaled from Fateh Khaled

This is an example of a place that we considered filming at until we learned of the legal difficulties of using realistic gun props in public. (filmed by Harry Denn)

These are images of the set that we used before we changed certain aspects and move things around in order to get the right effete for the filming-

Monday, 3 March 2014

Preproduction: Costume

I was tasked with deciding and acquiring costumes which we would need in our opening title sequence.

To do this I looked at other police themed film/tv shows to get inspiration, such as Hawaii 5-0, NCIS and Hot Fuzz. I found that I took the most inspiration from the costumes of Hawaii 5-0, as I thought that the shirt and tie with a protective vest over the top suited the 'detective' characters I had to create. However as our film would be set in England I decided to look at an British biased police film, I looked at the character on the left as his costumed fitted the profile extremely well but the fact that hot fuzz is a comedy and the fact that this character seems overloaded with weapons seem too over the top and adds a comical effect to the scene (something that I did not want to recreate in my own work).

From this picture you can see the costumes that we used in our final OTS, I decided that the superior agent (right) should be the one with the gear like a hip holster and tactical vest was it reflects his increased experience. But mainly this was down to lack of resources and only being able to secure one vest for when we where shooting, however I added dialogue to the script where the superior agent asks his partner why he is not wearing his vest in order to avoid any confusion for the audience. The other agent wore a black suit showing that he was official and black is an excellent colour for urban camouflage, black also connotes death and provides a subtle foreshadow to the fate of his partner.

Tactical vest worn by superior agent (borrowed from a friend)

Over all I think that the costumes worked very well as they where realistic enough to make the film believable and not ruin the atmosphere and people where easily able to identify that they where some form of law enforcement by looking at their clothing.

Hip holster (bought from army surplus shop)

Hip holster worn by superior agent