Fernando Mesa's AICE Media Studies Final Project

 When I was filming the scene of D.L and his partner in the car, this clip was recorded a few times. Since this clip was filmed multiple times, some of the clips did not make it to the final cut of my opening scene. The reason for why I had to record this clip a few times was because some of the clips had errors that I did not want to be included within my project. Most of these errors within these clips were mistakes within the dialogue of both of these characters. The first clip contained a few dialogue errors that made the clip unusable. The first mistake was that when D.L said the line "Look what we got" there was too long of a pause of no dialogue after this line was said. The second mistake was that when D.L's partner was saying a line, he stuttered in between the sentence he was saying. I thought that filming the clip again without the stutter would make it more appealing to the audience. The third mistake was that the lines that were stated were too long. These li...

 After D.L calls his partner to come back to the house his partner comes back and D.L gets back into the car with his newly acquired briefcase. In this conversation, D.L shows his partner the briefcase that he robbed from James house and his partner says the line "Oh do we stash it at our place then?". D.L responds to this stating "Yeah, we'll continue tomorrow" to show the audience that D.L is planning to rob more houses the next day in order to find more items that will be of some sort of value to him and his partner. Below is the scene of the conversation in the car. For this clip, the filming techniques are very similar to the first clip of D.L in the car with his partner. This is mainly due to the fact that both clips contain the vehicle and D.L and his partner in the front seats. This clip contains the usage of a two shot in order to show both D.L and his partner having a conversation. This two shot, just like the two shot used for the first clip also show...

For my clips containing James I decided to add score in order to make the scene more suspenseful to the audience. I wanted this scene to be more suspenseful because the suspenseful score could show the audience that James's reaction to his missing briefcase will be impactful. To find an appropriate score for my film I went back on YouTube and searched for scores that were compatible with crime genre films, similar what to I searched in order to find the first score for my project that was used earlier in the opening scene. After searching on YouTube I found a score that proved to be very effective in creating suspense for a suspenseful environment. Below is the video I used in order to find this score (The score I used starts at the time mark of 1:26 in the video). After finalizing my decision to use this as the second score element of my film I needed to decide where to add it. After considering some placement options for this score I decided to use this score for the whole scene ...

Some clips for the scene of James waking up were filmed multiple times in order to perfect the scene. Mistakes were in some of these clips which caused me to need to reshoot these clips in order to perfect this scene. There were also some issues within time efficiency of these clips. The first clip of James running to the kitchen had a few mistakes. One of the mistakes was that James ran to fast in the clip and I think the clip would look better if James was running a little bit slower. In this clip, the briefcase was also shown on the ground in the living room and the briefcase is not supposed to be there so that was another mistake that contributed to this clip being discarded. While running in this clip, James turned around and started laughing which was another reason for this clip not being used for the final cut of my project. The second clip of James running to the kitchen was a little bit better than the first one but it still contained errors. These errors were that the camera...

While in bed, James starts to get anxious over the sound he heard earlier. He continues to worry about this sound which causes him to get out of bed and check his briefcase because he is worried someone broke into his house. After he travels to the kitchen he opens the drawer where his briefcase originally was. Once he does this he realizes his briefcase has been stolen and someone broke into his house. James, annoyed and angered by the situation says the line "Where is it?" in a tone that expresses his emotions of anger and annoyance. He then realizes his door has been left open and quickly dashes to his door to see if he can find the criminals anywhere. Below is the scene of James waking up and discovering a robbery has occurred within his home. The scene starts with a wide shot showing James in the bed. This wide shot is used in order to show the position of James while in bed to show the audience that James was in a very vulnerable state while he was getting robbed. A til...

 When someone is watching a film, they may notice background music that can emphasize on screen visuals, intensify scenes or even add suspense to certain scenes. This type of background music is known as score. Without using score a film could be less attention grabbing to the audience. After thinking about this, I decided I needed to add some score into my film in order to add suspense to my shots and make them more attention grabbing to the audience. To find an intriguing score element, I used YouTube and started searching score that is related to crime genre films in order to add more suspense to the scene that this score will be used on. After listening to multiple examples of score, I made a choice in deciding which score to use for my film. The choice of the first score element that I used is below this paragraph (Starts at 2:50 inside of the video). My reason for this choice of score is because it adds suspense and makes the scene that it will be used with more attention gra...

 While filming the phone call between D.L and his partner, there were many failed attempts at perfecting this scene. Some of the main errors during the filming for this clip were dialogue errors and errors within the setting of the film that would not work well with the rest of the clips. This first clip of the shot had a couple of major errors. The first error was dialogue usage. When it was time for D.L to say his lines he forgot his lines which messed up this clip and contributed to this clip being unusable for my project. The second error was the door being closed. The reason this is an error in this clip is because when D.L entered the house he never closed the door, so this would not make chronological sense within my film. The second clip had some similar errors to my first clip but some differences also. Like the first clip, the door was still closed in my second clip. The dialogue used in this clip was also not very time efficient. What I mean by this is that there were ma...

 After D.L successfully finds valuables within James's house he decides that it is time to leave the house and go back to the place where him and his partner stay. D.L leaves the dinner table and goes back to the front door of James's house. Once he successfully gets to the front door of the house he pulls out his phone from his pocket in order to tell his partner that he is ready for him to come back to the house in order to pick him up. This is shown by D.L saying the line "Ima call him, tell him I'm ready" while he is pulling out his phone. Below is the clip of D.L preparing himself to leave James's house. In this scene, handheld camera techniques are used behind D.L to make the audience feel like they are at the crime scene with D.L and these techniques were also used in order to make the movements of D.L look more realistic to the audience. A side shot and a mid shot are also used in this clip. The side shot is used in order to show D.L on the phone with ...

 When the clip of D.L entering the kitchen was being filmed, some mistakes occurred during the filming process. Because of these mistakes, the clip had to get re filmed a couple of times in order to perfect the clip for my opening scene. If these clips weren't re-filmed, it would lower the quality of my opening scene for my project. This first clip is a clip of D.L opening the briefcase and discovering all the money contained inside of James's briefcase. I was not satisfied with this clip because of a few reasons. The first reason was that there was a lack of emphasis in the tone of D.L. I felt this clip could be re filmed with D.L having more emphasis in his tone. D.L also stated a line from my script incorrectly in this clip which is another reason why I wanted to re-film this certain part of my film. There was also a mistake with the placement of the prop money. All the prop money was compact in a corner of the briefcase. This was not the placement that I wanted for my film,...

 After walking to the kitchen, D.L starts to open a drawer in the kitchen in order to try to find some valuables. When doing this, D.L finds a briefcase in the drawer. He picks up the briefcase and walks over to the dinner table and then opens the briefcase. When he opens this briefcase he discovers an astonishing amount of cash in the briefcase. Once he discovers what is in the briefcase he says the line "Oh we got all this money, this is money for days we're gonna be stacked". This line is used in order to emphasize the fact that there is a very large amount of money inside of the briefcase. D.L then closes the briefcase and grabs it and once he does this he gets off the chair in the dining room and starts to walk towards the front door again because he is ready to leave after acquiring the valuables that were inside of James's house. Below is the clip of D.L walking into the kitchen and discovering the briefcase. This clip of my opening scene has a fair amount of o...

 When footage is filmed, sometimes too much film is recorded which makes the director need to shorten the clip in order to make the film more attention grabbing and to make all the clips fit into the film. I had to do this with my clip of D.L entering James's house because of the strict 2 minute limit of my opening scene. I did this in order to be able to fit all my clips into the 2 minute requirement of the opening scene to my film. Below this is the original footage of this scene. The first thing that I did was cut out a part of D.L slightly moving his head near the door handle to show the audience that he was looking at the door handle. I removed this from the clip because I felt that this was unnecessary to include in my film. The next thing that I did was use an editing technique called a time skip. What I did with this technique was that I removed some of the footage of D.L walking to the kitchen and replaced it with D.L starting to walk to the kitchen, and then when a transi...

 In practically every film of any genre, there is usually a sequence called the opening credits. These opening credits usually show the audience who is starring in the film. This can appeal to the audience because some audiences want to know what actors are in a certain film. This can help grab an audiences attention because the audience might be more interested in the film if it stars an actor that they are already familiar with. After considering where to insert the opening credits in my film, I decided to add them to my film after the title sequence. I chose this placement because I believe it works well with the title sequence because this shows the audience the title of the film and the names of the actors all in a short period of time that is more appealing to the audience. Below is a clip showing my placement of the opening credits and how long they are on screen for. The opening credits in my film has the word "Starring" at the start of the opening credits in order to...

 Once D.L successfully opens the door to James's house he enters the house with his flashlight on and starts to look around. Since he entered the house through the front door, the first place that he looked around at was the living room. After looking around the living room he decides to look at the entertainment system that was open. When he looks at the entertainment system he knocks down some boxes that were near the entertainment system, causing a noise to be made within the house hold. D.L then says the sentence "Oh shoot, I hope no one heard that." because he doesn't want to wake up the owner of the house. D.L then walks to the kitchen to explore the house more. D.L finds a drawer in the kitchen which he will open to see if there are any valuables inside that drawer. Below is the clip of D.L entering James's house. The filming techniques used for this clip are very similar to the techniques used during the clip of D.L opening the front door. By this, I mean ...

 Whenever a film is being produced, multiple takes of the same scene usually need to be filmed in order to perfect the scene. This is because of the difficulty of filming a perfect scene that is exactly how one intended it to be. While I filmed the clip of D.L conversing with his partner in the car I needed to film this clip more than once in order to produce this clip exactly how I intended it to be. This first clip I decided not to implement into my film because D.L's partner forgot to say a line. The line that he forgot to say was "lets hope this house doesn't disappoint". This scene could of been left in the film but I felt that this line would make the clip better and having this extra line could also make the film grab the audiences attention better. This second clip was not inserted into my opening scene because I felt that D.L and D.L's partner's voices in this clip weren't enthusiastic enough. In this clip, D.L and D.L's partners were also loo...

 Every film has a designated area where the scenes to the film are filmed. Some places where films are recorded are places like banks, stores, cities, schools, farmlands and houses. As mentioned before in a previous blog discussing my setting, my film will be recorded throughout the inside of my house and the road outside of my house. Down below I have provided a video showing the areas where my scenes will be filmed. This video also includes subtle descriptions of some of the events that happen at these areas.

 Before I started filming, I needed to make a decision on what to use for filming. There are many varieties of film cameras that I could of used to film my project but instead of using a film camera I decided to use something that is more simple. I decided to use an iPhone 14 because of a few reasons. An image of an iPhone 14, from  https://www.wired.com/review/apple-iphone-14/ The first reason for the choice of an iPhone 14 is because of its convenience. When I record scenes on a phone it is way easier to edit and transfer clips because of the clips already being on an electronic device that provides opportunities to do both of these things. Editing features on iPhones (including the iPhone 14), from  https://www.gizchina.com/2023/06/23/enhance-your-photography-experience-get-ready-for-these-8-amazing-iphone-photo-features-in-ios-17/ The second reason for this choice is because of the phones filming capabilities. The phone that I picked to use for filming has 2 cameras t...

After D.L exits his vehicle he then goes to the front of James's house in order to enter the house from the front door. In my opening scene the door to James's house will already be opened before James has to do anything that would be useful to open a locked door. In my film D.L will be very surprised and shocked by this, which is shown by D.L saying the line "What kind of idiot leaves their door open?" While D.L is at the front door he turns his flashlight on because he is aware of the fact that the house will most likely not have any lights on when he successfully enters James's house. As mentioned before in a previous post discussing the value of the flashlight to D.L, the flashlight will help D.L be able to see where he is going in the dark house. A screenshot of the clip where D.L is shining the flashlight at the door. In this clip of the film, handheld camera techniques are used. My reasoning for using these camera techniques are to make the audience feel li...

After successfully creating a title sequence that suits my film I decided to add it to the amount of film that I already have recorded. I wanted to insert the title sequence somewhere where it would fit really well and excite the audience for the film. I decided not to put it at the exact start of the film because I think some film should be shown before introducing the title sequence to my film. I did not want to add my title sequence to the end of my film because most films usually don't include their title sequence at the end, they include it closer to the start of the film.  A screenshot from the clip of D.L closing the door to his vehicle. At first I thought about putting the title sequence after D.L starts to exit the car (before the low angle shot of him exiting). The idea of this placement was not bad but I felt there was a better place to insert my title sequence. After reviewing more of my footage I found a part in the clip where I could insert the title sequence. The par...

 After the first scene of my film, the next shot that was filmed was D.L exiting the car. This shot was used in order to show the audience that D.L wants to rob this house and to let the audience know that he is going to start walking towards the house in order to enter into the house. This scene also shows the audience D.L's partner leaving the house. This is shown in the scene in order to show the audience that D.L's partner will come back into the film at a later time and it is also used in order to show the audience that D.L's partner would have to leave the house until he needs D.L to pick him up so the neighbors wouldn't be aware of the crime that D.L is committing. D.L's partner leaving also makes D.L's path to James's house more sneakier because there isn't a suspicious car outside that usually wouldn't be where it is. A screenshot from the clip of D.L watching his partner leave the house. Above is the clip of the shot of D.L exiting the vehi...

 After researching title sequences from films I decided to create my own title sequence for my opening scene. The first thing that I considered is what font to use for my title sequence. After testing many fonts I decided to choose a font called "ENGRY" because I thought that it would fit well with the genre of my film. The next thing that I thought about was deciding a color for the title sequence. The colors that I was considering was red and grey. I decided to use grey for my title sequence because grey seems like a better color option to use for a crime film than using red. A title in red seems like it would be better used in a film whose genre is the horror genre because of the association between blood and the color red. The next thing that I felt my title sequence needed was score. After searching for score that could work well for my project I finally found one on www.youtube.com   that I felt worked very well with my project and could build suspense within the audien...

Whenever you are watching a film, you may notice at a certain point the title of the film is shown. A title sequence is when the title is shown in the film, usually in a creative way that grabs the audiences attention towards the film. A title sequence usually includes some sort of score sound element that helps in getting the audience excited for the film and this can also sometimes be used to build more suspense within the audience. An example of a title sequence is the title sequence from Avengers Endgame. In this title sequence the audience is shown The Avengers logo in black and gold outline and the word Avengers written in gold which then transitions to the word Endgame written in silver to show the full name of the title of the film. While this title sequence is being shown, The Avengers theme is also playing. Using this theme helps the film producers create familiarity with the film within the audience. Having the title in gold and silver letters helps the film producers grab t...

 After researching many useful resources and planning out my film, my production for my film has started. So far a few of my scenes have been filmed and I hope to complete my filming by the end of next week. After I film all of the scenes of my project I will start editing the scenes and cut out unnecessary parts of scenes. The first scene that I have filmed is the scene of D.L and his partner in their vehicle looking for a house to rob. An example of a film setup, from  https://www.thefilmfund.co/film-lighting-tips-tricks/ Above is the first scene to my project. This scene starts with a two shot between D.L and his partner. This two shot is used to show both characters and show how they are reacting to each other while they are having a conversation. After this, D.L says the statement "Wait, look at that one" during the conversation in order to show his partner a house that he might rob. When he says this, both him and his partner look over at the house and then there is a c...

A storyboard is a great way for being able to better visualize scenes in a film that you are going to create. Since a storyboard is beneficial to the process of creating a film I decided to create one in order to have a better idea of what my scenes will look like in my opening scene. The storyboard for my project The first scene shows D.L and his partner in their vehicle. In that scene they will be looking around for houses to rob and will then find a house to rob. The second scene shows D.L getting out of the vehicle that his partner is currently driving. After D.L does this he goes to the house in order to enter and go inside the house. The third scene shows D.L in the living room of the house looking for valuables. While he is looking for valuables he knocks down a few boxes on accident. The fourth scene shows James moving in bed because he woke up after hearing a noise. He does not get out of bed because he thinks the noise is not unusual. The fifth scene shows D.L opening a drawe...

 Since this film has a limit of 2 minutes I realized that my script may have to be revised. Based on this limit I decided to shorten my script in order for my opening scene to meet the requirement of 2 minutes. Most of the revisions to my script were removing unnecessary words from sentences and removing unnecessary sentences of dialogue. Doing this brought the word count of my script from 656 words down to 569 words. In the conversation between D.L and his partner at the start of my film, I removed some sentences from the dialogue and removed some words that I felt were unnecessary for my film. One example of a sentence that I removed when making my updated script was the sentence of D.L saying "Nah not yet we gotta find a good house that will leave us set for a bit." This sentence seemed very unnecessary because instead of including that sentence and the sentence where D.L finds a house I realized that I could just include the sentence of D.L being interested in a house tha...

In my film all the lights are going to be off in James's house because in my film when D.L is robbing James's house he is still asleep. Since all of the lights are going to be off, D.L will need a tool in order to be able to see where he is going while inside James's house. So for this reason I decided that D.L will be using a flashlight throughout the film in order to have a light source. The reasoning that I had behind my choice was that a flashlight usually produces enough light in order for someone to see in dark areas. Another reason for my choice is that a flashlight is handheld and easier to carry around then other light sources. Flashlights are also a stereotypical light source that criminals use. The flashlight that I will use in my film In my film, D.L will have the flash light on while he is robbing James's house. Without having this flashlight, it would make it very hard for D.L to see where he's going while in James's house because of there being no...

 In my opening scene, one of the themes that will be expressed is the theme that being over confident can lead to mistakes. In my film D.L is very over confident with his criminal skills given the fact that he is a professional criminal. This over confidence leads to him knocking down a few boxes of Funko pops that was near an opened entertainment system. The impact of these boxes falling is that the owner of the house will wakeup in the film because of the noise that the boxes falling caused. D.L will think that the owner of the house didn't hear the boxes falling when in reality that small detail will be what causes James to know that he has been robbed. The placement of the boxes of Funko pops The reasoning for Funko pop boxes being knocked over is because the boxes make a diegetic and synchronous sound that I think will be efficient in fulfilling the purpose of items being knocked over in my film. The boxes will be placed near the open entertainment system in order to show that...

 Most criminals usually have some sort of getaway vehicle in order to flee the scene after they have successfully committed their crime. And with their getaway vehicle they also usually have a getaway driver in order to drive them away from the scene instead of the criminal driving the vehicle. In my case, D.L's partner will be the getaway driver for D.L after he has successfully robbed James's house. In my project I have decided to use a black jeep for the vehicle that the criminals use. My reasoning for this is very similar to my reasons for my choices of costuming. What I mean by this is that I chose this vehicle because it fits with the stereotype of criminals wearing mostly dark attire during the night in order to blend in better with the darkness of the night and having a black vehicle would blend in better at night than a car that has a more vibrant color. The vehicle that will be used throughout my film The criminal vehicle will be shown during the start and end of my p...

 Stereotypically, a criminal will wear some sort of face covering in order to not reveal their identity to anyone in order to improve their chances of not getting punished for their actions. In most films, the face covering that criminals choose to wear is a ski mask. This is one of the reasons for my choice of using the ski mask in my project as I previously decided in a past blog post discussing costuming for the villains of my film. If a criminal was to not use a face covering then this would make it way easier for the police and bystanders of a crime to identify the identity of the criminal. The ski masks that I have purchased and will be used throughout my project, from Amazon My film requires 2 ski masks for D.L and his partner in crime. Both villains of my film will be wearing their ski masks for the whole film so their identity cant be figured out by just looking at them. Another reason for this usage of ski masks is that the house D.L robs will have cameras. This means tha...

 While considering what props were needed for my film, I realized that I needed something in order to represent the valuables in James's house. I immediately thought of prop money because it represents money and one of the main reasons that criminals rob houses is to gain money. Prop money is usually used in films in order to represent a currency that is used in the setting of where the film takes place. Prop money is also more usable to use in films. What I mean by this is that in films sometimes money may be burned like in "The Dark Knight". The scene that contains this money being burnt wouldn't be possible to create with real money because it is illegal to burn real money. Since it is illegal to burn real money, filmmakers can use prop money in order to create scenes of money being burnt because it is not illegal to burn prop money. The prop money that I will be using, from Amazon In my film, the prop money that I will use will be stored in a briefcase inside of J...

 Whenever a film is being produced, one of the things that is needed in order to make the film is a script that shows all the actors what they are required to say in the film. Every film has a script if it has any sort of dialogue! I created a script for my film in order for the actors to know what their lines will be in my film. My script for my film will play a big role in teaching the actors all their lines in order to be able to successfully act out their roles in my film. In my script there was usage of question marks in some sentences. These question marks were used to show the tone of questioning something in that sentence. The exclamation points used in my script were to show the dialogue increasing in volume in the sentences where these exclamation points were used. the multiple dots were used in my script in order to show a pause in a sentence that a character is saying. While D.L and his partner are in James's neighborhood, D.L's partner says "Alright yeah D.L w...

As mentioned before in a previous blog post, prop money is widely used in a lot of crime films and just like other crime films my film will also be using prop money. But where will this prop money be stored? This prop money will be stored in a briefcase that will be used in my project in order to show what object James stores his valuables in. When picking a briefcase to use for my project I had two options: to either use an aluminum briefcase or use a darker leather briefcase. Both briefcases When making a decision for a briefcase I thought about which one would fit my project better. Since my project will be fully filmed at night I think that the darker briefcase would fit better with the time of day. The leather briefcase also seems more casual than the aluminum one. What I mean by casual is that owning a leather briefcase seems more realistic for a normal guy to own than owning an aluminum one. After considering these benefits of the leather briefcase, I finalized my decision of pi...

 When producing a movie it needs to have a title. This gives your film a name that can tell the audience what the topic of the film will be. Since my film needs a title I decided to consider some titles that I could possibly name my film. The title for a film about a heist that did not work out for 2 partners that have to work together to not get caught by the police, from  https://www.imdb.com/title/tt24169886/ My first possible title that I considered was "D.L's Crime Adventure". I did not choose this option for the title because this title seems to remove some of the seriousness from the crime genre and makes the film seem less serious and more childish. My second possible title choice was "D.L's Downfall". I also did not choose this because in my opinion this title seemed like it would make the film less appealing and I feel like there could be a different title that can have the same meaning of this title and sound better. My third choice was "D.L ...

One thing that can add suspense to a film is an unknown identity. An unknown identity can make people question who exactly is under the mask. When a character reveals their hidden identity there could be many emotions released within the audience. Some emotions that could be expressed within the audience are being surprised, confused, or sometimes the audience could be mad. The reasoning for the audience being surprised could be because the identity of a certain character could be a character that the audience would of never thought would be that persons real identity. This emotion of surprise could also contribute to the audience being confused because they could question things like "how is this character actually another character in disguise?" or things like "is this character a good guy or a bad guy?". The front man from Squid Game, from  https://squid-game.fandom.com/wiki/Hwang_In-ho An example of this is in squid game season 1 The front man takes off his mask...

after finalizing my decisions for all the costuming for my characters I decided to create sketches of each of my characters in order to provide a better idea of what all my characters will look like in my films. This sketch of the antagonist of my film (D.L) will give me a better idea of what exactly to look for to perfect the costuming of my character. Down below are my sketches for D.L. The sketch on the left is D.L with a full black outfit and a black ski mask while the sketch on the right is similar showing D.L in a full black outfit but instead of a ski mask is only wearing a normal mask. The sketch that will be most accurate to D.L's costuming in my film will be the one on the left because in my film D.L will be wearing a ski mask instead of a normal mask. The reasoning behind this is that a ski mask protects D.L's identity better than a normal mask would. This is because the ski mask covers more of D.L's face than a normal mask would. 

 When I was considering the costuming for my characters I had a couple of options. One option that I thought of doing was to make James have some sort of police officer outfit in order to show that he was a police officer that had authority to arrest D.L for his crimes. After further consideration I decided to not use this idea and to instead have James wear casual clothing that a normal person would wear. My reasoning for this is because in my film James will be shown getting out of bed and someone wouldn't usually go to bed in their police officer uniform. Another reason for the change in outfits is because instead of making James a police officer I instead decided to make James a normal person with a normal job who will want to catch D.L and after catching him will give him to the police in order for the police to arrest him for all of the crimes that D.L has committed.  An example of a casual outfit, from  https://perkclothing.com/blogs/the-perks/seven-easy-and-cool-c...