Inspiration

  

    My main line of inspiration for my piece is the 2022 Aronofsky film The Whale, and, in more ways than one, I plan to incorporate elements from the film into my piece. The protagonist of the whale is a 600 pound male, and the movie has many disturbing scenes of him practicing his gluttonous addiction, but that is not the main line of inspiration I plan to take away from this film. 

   

    The setting of the movie is one element id like to incorporate into mine. The film takes place in one house for the entire runtime, and in doing this it allows for the few characters featured in the film to be shown at their most human state through dialogue. I aim to play to that same benefit in having the setting not be a main focus of the feature so I can also focus directly on my characters. 

    Further, there are scenes where theprotagonist casually hammers food into his mouth during conversation and we can tell what he is thinking based on the way he looks while he does it(hesitance, regret, relief.) I plan to mimic this during the conversation my characters would have with the character representing the main form of gluttony. 

   The short film I make will not be as hopeful and heartfelt as The Whale, but there are specific elements of the movie I will adapt into mine. I plan to rewatch The Whale (i've only watched it in theaters a few months ago) to better my understanding of theway the cinematographers develop such a tragic and sympathetic character. 

    

It's Decided.

 

    I decided on a narrative idea for my short film, and it just so happens to be something outside of the two ideas I listed in my last post. I'm still running with the concept of "gluttony" from the first of my two ideas, just in a different way. 

    The original idea was supposed to be a very experimental and offsetting flick. Though the concept was wacky enough to make for an enticing watch, it most likely would have looked tacky and not had the justice it deserved without an INSANE acting performance. It was hard for me to accept this fact, as I badly wanted to play with the idea of gluttony in a context other than food, but luckily I was able to restructure my idea to make it not only easier for myself but also more effective and straightforward in its message. 

    My new film would have 3 characters having a conversation in a single room for the duration of the picture, each demonstrating a different level of gluttony. The most overt form of gluttony would be characterized by one of the characters hammering food into their mouth the entire time, the second form of gluttony would be characterized by a character who is addicted to attention or themselves(a glutton to their own ego,) and lastly, the deepest most commonly accepted form of gluttony these days, gluttony of media, would be characterized through a character who would never look up from their computer once during the conversation. The second and third levels of gluttony would be bombarding the first with insults, showing how society dismisses their own gluttonous behavior and only ever responds to the main one they interpret.

Group Meeting

     

    Today I met with some of my classmates to discuss our personal progress on each of our short films, and in it, I was blessed with reassurance that I wasn't too behind everyone else. If you are up to date in the MannySpace lore, you would know that I am still deciding between two potential narratives for my short film. In this group meeting, my friends helped me gauge between the two choices and I am closer to electing one now.

    I was happy to hear that both of my ideas were ones they liked. They said that the burglar narrative had a Coen brothers type of feel to it and it could be pretty funny, and they also liked the darkness and mind-bending nature of the "gluttony" narrative. They relayed the same type of concerns I had for both, including lighting, location, and acting performances being the crux of both projects(they would both be kind of hard to film) but they stressed that it didn't matter because they both looked fun. Of the two, however, they were impressed more by the ending and aesthetic of the Gluttony narrative, and it sparked something in me that is now pushing me closer toward choosing it over the burglary. 

    I didn't exactly receive an answer or make any big decisions in this group meeting- I didn't come to class specifically hoping for one. What I got was a lot of reassurance that my ideas were good, and no matter what I inevitably chose it would be fun to watch.

Choices, Choices

     I finally have some ideas for narratives I would like to make. I do not have fully fledged stories to pair with the ideas I have, but I am going to detail them and offer the potential pros and cons of running with these stories. 

(By the way, the tonality post I made last week has not aged well with my ideas.)

I. Gluttony

Genre: Psychological Horror(?)

    This film would be told from two perspectives and would be more of a symbolic representation of a greater concept of being addicted to consuming media. The film would open with a man who is cleaning his empty living room with a very depressed or stale look on his face. After a few shots of him doing this, he would sit down with a bag o chips and start watching tv. Then, the shot of the man on the couch pulls out to reveal that his life was playing on a video entitled "24 HOUR DOING NOTHING LIVESTREAM" and we also see that another young person is watching. The viewer's room is drab and dank, giving the impression that this is all the person does. After a few shots developing this idea, the person's sibling would walk in(assumedly from a family gathering in the house outside the door) and have a dialogue with them, and through this dialogue, the idea that the viewer watches what she does to feel less lonely. The sibling would reply with something along the lines of "how could you be so lonely in such a crowded home?" and the viewer would reply with something like "This is the only thing I can define as real." I imagine whatever followed this line would be some Lynchian-type imagery of the sibling vanishing and the viewer walking out of the room to reveal the same couch and empty living room as the man from the beginning, and it ends with them sitting down on the couch in the same way as the man from the beginning(maybe another pull to reveal the same live-stream?) The point of this idea would be to be a symbolic representation of this normalized gluttony in absorbing media common of today's kids. 

Pros

• Very little actors
• Can be filmed at my house or a friend's house
• Would not need a big crew
• The living room i visualized was mine, and the spacious layout alloys for many shot types behind and around the subject.

Cons

• The message could be much dumber and less deep than I expected
• May not be scary whatsoever
• Commentary is either too straightforward or not straightforward enough

II. House Invasion

Genre: Dark Comedy

Much less deep than the last idea, but possibly a bit more fun to film. The story would begin as a standard yet sloppy house break-in, and the house owner would the upper hand when he has the burglar at gunpoint. After either shooting the burglar or recognizing the voice of the burglar after confronting him, the house owner would come to realize that the burglar was an old friend of his and the two would immediately act like there was never any immediate danger or threat in what they were going to do to each other. The two would have a fun dialogue by the kitchen counter, possibly showing the burglar congratulating the house owner on his gunmanship and the house owner accepting the compliment and telling the burglar that he learned his skills from a class he took his wife and kids to(a throwaway line meant to pay off later.) When things seem great and all seems to be good for the two of them, blood would suddenly splatter all over the burglar's face in slow motion to reveal that his partner who was waiting outside came in and shot the house owner. The main burglar would freak out and feel bad, but suddenly be reminded that the whole point of the visit was to rob the house. As they are about to walk out the door, they would suddenly be stopped by a little girl with a nerf gun. The two would think it was cute and the main burglar would greet the girl kindly (implying that he knows her already from knowing her dad) and before he could finish the two would be shot by the little girl(real gun.)

Pros

• Funny, possibly more fun to watch than the first idea
• Can also be filmed in one area
• Minimal props needed

Cons

• Hefty reliance on the script
• Lighting could be awkward
• Are guns allowed??

    I have other ideas, but I think these are the two that show the most promise. I'm leaning a bit more toward the first idea because I would rather work with cinematography than work my writing chops, but I will make a decision by the end of the week. 

Advice on Writing a Story

    Today, I watched a video that did end up helping me understand what the planning process of brainstorming a story consisted of. Though it seems kind of corny or unintelligent to derive information from such a quick video, I really only wanted to hear what he said about how to target the starting point of creating a short film. 

    This video gave me a great tip on the importance of creating value and meaning through a specific audience one would like to target. The creator had this to say about it:

    "This may sound a little counter-intuitive, but rather than originality when you're writing your short film, I want you to focus on entertaining yourself or a really close friend of yours. Make your audience specific so that you can make your film more specific."

    While I still cannot say I have fully formed ideas as a result of this video, this quote really resonated with me for the rest of the day enough that I felt the need to comment on it. Where I initially tried to take a concept and reverse engineer a film from whatever concept could come to my head, I have now adopted the strategy of taking stories and conversations I can remember having with my friends in the past to formulate some sort of story behind it. I don't plan to adapt a story a friend has shared with me or anything like that, I had many interesting 3AM conversations with friends that I know I can base entire stories around.

    Additionally, the video stressed the importance of writing the entire story before jumping into pre-production. Before thinking about cinematography and stylistics, I need to detail a definite beginning, middle, and end to my story. For an effective product as a whole, it's important to have the entire story defined before I begin thinking about how it will be filmed(for foreshadowing in the beginning and making the story that comes full circle.)

    I didn't finish the entire video because the only real part I was looking for in my research was advice on brainstorming, but I do plan to turn to this video for advice once I get to the pre-production and production stages of my short film. 

36 Dramatic Situations

 

    In pursuit of a possible narrative, my research brought me across a very interesting concept in the realm of storytelling- George Polti's 36 Dramatic Situations. George Polti was a 19th-century writer primarily known for writing a book detailing the concept, that every narrative follows one of 36 archetypes with variants based on the physical content of the story. As hard as it may seem to accept that "all stories are the same," researching this topic blew my mind once I started looking into it. 

    While the list of dramatic situations is too long to list, I forced myself to do research and read every single one of the archetypes, and it ended up showing me primarily what I didn't want in a story before showing me what I might want. For example, I knew that I didn't want to make a story about adultery, love, or the crimes of a loved one, as I feel I'm too young to understand love enough to make an entire narrative based around it. Also, I feel like making any adventure-type story about supplication or deliverance is not something that could be fit in a mere five minutes. I could be wrong on that, but it seems like a hassle to think about fitting it into such a small amount of time.

    Despite the post I made last week about tonality, I am slightly being pulled once again toward darker subject matters. Reading specific situations like abduction, madness, and ambition. I have ideas I will update you guys on later, and this concept of 36 dramatic situations helped me begin fine tuning my ideas. Thanks George. 

Tonality

    

    Even though I lack a direction in terms of a narrative yet, I have given thought to the kind of tone I hope to convey in my production. No matter what genre this short film becomes, I would rather it be a bit more lighthearted than something darker. It can be dark with some cheerier elements to contrast the dark, but I would instead not make something dark and gloomy. 

    Coming off of a psychological thriller route for my last big project in the film opening, I would find it to be redundant if I went ahead and made some dark and mysterious production again. As much as I enjoy the kind of media that haunts me or has a darker tone to it, I feel like trying to make something of the sort again will honestly turn me into a darker and less cheery person. 

    This all could be a dumb little itch I have and not end up being how I feel once I get an idea for my narrative, but this is just how I feel at this stage of my brainstorming. 

Project Schedule

    I have developed a timeline for the short film I plan to create. The process began this week, and the full project is to be completed in the middle of April. Here it is:

Week one

• Choose project genre(short film)
• Brainstorm narrative of said short film
• Research genre
• blog(2)

Week two

• Cont. Brainstorm narrative(finalize?)
• Cont. researching genre
• blog(4)

Week three

• IF NOT DONE: Finalize narrative this week
• Begin developing a script
• Think about technical elements of piece(look into microphones, editing, etc.)
• Think location, time, actors, wardrobe
• blog(4)

Week four

• Begin storyboarding
• Find actors 
• Buy necessary tech for production(based on week 3)
• IF actors found, develop a filming schedule
• blog(4)

Week five

• if not complete, finalize storyboarding and script
• Film
• blog(4)

Week six

• IF NOT DONE: continue filming(reshoots?)
• Begin editing
• blog(4)

Week seven

• Continue editing
• blog(3)

Week eight

• IF NOT DONE: finish editing
• Research ccr
• Begin ccr
• blog(3)

Week nine

• Finalize ccr
• Make sure all elements are exported and prepared BEFORE Week 10
• blog(3)

Week ten

• Post final drafts of everything to blog/youtube
• Reflection post

    In my roadmap, I believe I have given myself a sufficient amount of time to brainstorm and flesh out my ideas to their greatest heights. I feel like the initial creative process usually ends up being slightly harder than the actual execution for me, so giving myself three weeks to really sit on ideas for a narrative will work well in my favor. I usually binge edit for projects I need to edit and end up finishing them in roughly two or three very painful days, but given that this project is much more important and is foreseeably a video with a longer duration, I am going to give myself 2-3 weeks for it. The time I allowed myself for my CCR is pretty limited as a result, but I predict it will be the easiest component of my entire project so I am in no way worried about time. In general, I doubt that there is too much that will change in my schedule while it's working itself out; I feel I have much more time to flesh out certain aspects of my project this time around. 

I'm Baaaaaaaaaack

 

    It's official: yours truly is back for some more media production updates. I'm starting work on a new project for the second level of my media class, this time a FULL SHORT FILM as opposed to a film opening like last time. I am not sure what I will end up doing just yet, but based on my experience with my last big project, I'm already eager to jump straight into this. My head may be empty, but my heart is full. This is gonna be a fun next ten weeks. 

Back Like I Never Left

 

Hello.

     I have not interacted with my blog for a few months now, even though I assumed I would based on how much I enjoyed creating posts during my film opening production earlier this year. I haven't stopped creating my own projects since then, I actually have a few projects I could have documented my process on, and I'd like to detail how the most recent of the few came to be. 

    Last month, I planned out a documentary about how people tend to attach such unexplainable yet profound meanings to small trinkets that come into their possession. It was the first time I had ever tried my hand at creating a documentary, and I had the help of two friends in my media class. We planned out four interviews with people who had different stories about their collecting of trinkets and baubles, whether it was someone who collected a ton or could connect a specific feeling/memory to one object.

    The documentary did not end up being on the topic we initially planned out, though. During the second interview in our series of scheduled interviews, we interviewed a friend and aspiring filmmaker named Alex who wanted to talk about a corrupted SD card that he claimed was the reason he pursued film. While we were shooting B-roll, we had the idea of shooting a clip of him scrolling through all of the corrupted footage, and while we did it, we were both dumbfounded when we saw the lost footage magically reappear before our eyes. The meaning Alex found in his useless broken SD card that he had so thoroughly explained in the interview was no longer real to him, and finding the moment and the shift in meaning as a result of a new context so riveting, we decided to change our documentary topic to just this moment. 

    With the pre-recovery interview as well as another extensive interview post-SD recovery(together with an interview of Alex's Mom,) the total footage we had filmed came around to a whole hour. The cutting process for this hour's work was tough and unlike any editing job I had ever done. This being my first documentary ever, I was surprised to realize that most of the time I would spend working on it would be editing and structuring the interviews. The process was very grindy and resulted in a 3-day long headache, but I eventually managed to create something I was moderately proud of. The final doc ended up being 7 minutes and 42 seconds long, and it had a discernible narrative structure with a beginning, middle, and end. I named teh documentary Recovery and you can watch it right here. 

Critical Reflection

    

In our documentary Recovery, we aimed to deliver a story about a shift in one’s perception of an object that held so much meaning to one person as the object lost the meaning it had before. While spotty in some regards in terms of editing and cinematography, the narrative structure of the piece created was able to deliver what it needed to in a cohesive manner, one that proved effective in demonstrating a clear takeaway for the subject of the doc after events played out the way they did.

Going into the documentary, we had a broader focus on our topic. Instead of focusing on one person’s experience with their object, we initially hoped to interview a variety of individuals and their different outlooks on the meaning of their trinkets. The sudden change in focus was the result of an interesting turn of events during the second interview in our schedule; the corrupted SD card that our interviewee had grieved over after years of it not working magically fixed itself during the filming of the interview. This revelation seemed like a much more interesting avenue to take the documentary, and as such, we decided to ditch the trinket idea and wholly focus on how the broken SD card shaped Alex’s life. In retrospect, I believe we could have done a better job in delivering the gravity of the moment, specifically by using the footage from the first interview we filmed and subverting the narrative within the documentary. Similar to the odd and everchanging narrative structure of Exit Through the Gift Shop, we could and should have made the audience think the documentary was just going to be about trinkets and then hit them with Alex’s reaction to the SD card fixing itself on-screen and shifting to his story. 

The target audience of the work is 16-30-year-old media creators, ones who understand the basics of how cameras work and who are old enough to relate to the theme of having a deep-rooted connection with an object that has no real purpose. Certain stylistic choices, like the lingo used in taking viewers through Alex’s story as well as the language allowed/used in the doc, define the appropriate demographic of the work. The music and editing of the piece(or the lack thereof in certain moments) work well in allowing the project to breathe a bit after major interviewee dumps on the viewer. Also, moments where the music takes a backseat to the visual storytelling on screen, most specifically the moment Alex realizes his once corrupted files are no longer corrupted, artfully allow the onscreen emotion to navigate the way the viewer engaged with the documentary.

The documentary filming and editing process was uncharted territory for me coming into this production, and as such, I did not know what to expect. The result of this inexperience was a lot of stress during post-production while I tried to find exactly what bits of the interview footage were deserving of a place in the piece. In addition, the structuring/ ordering of the clips from each of the interviews was even harder to do, considering I needed to bind interviews from two individuals together. The product came out as very amateurish and not too exciting visually since my goal first and foremost was to create something cohesive in nature, but I am not exactly disappointed in what I was able to accomplish with this project. The production process for a documentary is fairly different and arguably much more difficult than anything I had ever experienced in my past productions, but I am glad I was able to have experienced it. Now with the knowledge that the editing portion of documentary-based filmmaking is the most crucial part, I can place greater importance on allowing myself more time to play around with clips I’ve collected in post if I were to create another documentary.