Re-edit blog

Re-editing our film has been a top priority for the past few classes. It has been quite a struggle since sometimes the computers will decide to take a long time to load Pinnacle Studios. In the worst scenario Pinnacle Studios would just never load and we did try multiple different computers. When we were lucky and it worked that’s when we were able to edit. We switched between Pinnacle studios and Lesly's computer programmed video editor. This is because we wanted to start at home and continue because the computers at school would sometimes be slow. So, Lesly imported all the scenes and put them in order of the storyboard. Therefore, we’d only have to split each scene in order to add specific details. For instance the titles design, transitions, and special effects. Since the titles in Lesly’s editing software did not have anything that would go with our theme, we used Pinnacle Studios to edit the design of each title. This process was grueling because we had to decide which fonts and styles we wanted to use. Many fonts were very similar and were only different in tiny aspects.

First, we wanted to find a scary font for the title of the movie, but at first we couldn’t so there was a basic one. We also wanted to fix the rest of the fonts, so it would match well with the title font. Anyeska and I found a scary dripping font which we changed to red and a green background. It looked as though blood was dripping, which helped create spookiness. The other titles were changed also, and the color is now red. After this, Britania began looking for transitions to add between each scene. It would be more entertaining and create suspense, and overall improve the smoothness of the film. So we thought about adding them at the beginning, when the girls are playing frisbee as their title appears, to transitioning to the next person. Another detail we did was special effects. Lesly added a scream in the scene where Britania is separated from the group and sees the entity again before she gets possessed. Lesly also added a screeching effect when an eyeline match was created between the monster and Claire. 

Reediting Blog

Re-editing our film has been a top priority for the past few classes. It has been quite a struggle since sometimes the computers will decide to take a long time to load Pinnacle Studios. In the worst scenario Pinnacle Studios would just never load and we did try multiple different computers. When we were lucky and it worked that’s when we were able to edit. We switched between Pinnacle studios and Lesly's computer programmed video editor. This is because we wanted to start at home and continue because the computers at school would sometimes be slow. So, Lesly imported all the scenes and put them in order of the storyboard. Therefore, we’d only have to split each scene in order to add specific details. For instance the titles design, transitions, and special effects. Since the titles in Lesly’s editing software did not have anything that would go with our theme, we used Pinnacle Studios to edit the design of each title. This process was grueling because we had to decide which fonts and styles we wanted to use. Many fonts were very similar and were only different in tiny aspects.

First, we wanted to find a scary font for the title of the movie, but at first we couldn’t so there was a basic one. We also wanted to fix the rest of the fonts, so it would match well with the title font. Anyeska and I found a scary dripping font which we changed to red and a green background. It looked as though blood was dripping, which helped create spookiness. The other titles were changed also, and the color is now red. After this, Britania began looking for transitions to add between each scene. It would be more entertaining and create suspense, and overall improve the smoothness of the film. So we thought about adding them at the beginning, when the girls are playing frisbee as their title appears, to transitioning to the next person. Another detail we did was special effects. Lesly added a scream in the scene where Britania is separated from the group and sees the entity again before she gets possessed. Lesly also added a screeching effect when an eyeline match was created between the monster and Claire. 

Reshoot blog

      After getting back my peer review, I did not reshoot over the weekend. The reason being that my group mates and I were quite busy this weekend. However, we received our peer review on Thursday (3/5). For our peer review, my team mates and I ended up reviewing ourselves. To eliminate personal bias, we watched our own film as if we were not the ones who made it. We then made a list of things to fix about our film in order to match the peer edit rubric. We came to the conclusion that it is necessary to reshoot. We plan to reshoot Anyeska and Jazmin’s title because they were a bit choppy.

Peer Editing the Opening Sequence

      On Tuesday (3/3), I peer edited one of my classmate’s opening sequence. The film was about a girl (main character) who came across a poster which sparked her interest. The poster was advertising a room for rent. The main character then goes to check out the room, and in no time she accepted the offer. Upon the first night of moving in, the audience soon find out that her roommate is a psychopath who tries to kill her. Evidently, the movie falls under the genre of horror. I absolutely enjoyed the story behind the film; However, there are a few adjustments to be made.
      For one, I suggest that my classmate work on sound in her reshoot— the dialogue scenes were low in volume. Moreover, our teacher gave us a list which advise  that we use 14 specific shots, angles, sounds and movements. For the most part, my classmate incorporated majority of the suggested angles, movements, shots, and sounds in her opening sequence. However, in the reshoot I recommend that she try to add the ones she missed, that is: establishing shot, low angle, eye line match, and an action match. For instance, she should add an establishing shot of the apartment.
      2 questions— One thing I really liked about the film is the use of transitions. In the very beginning, she used a color transition where she zoomed in one of the actors wearing a red shirt and the next scene was zooming out from a red cup. A suggestion I would make to the film is to incorporate the use of makeup on the antagonist. In other words, the roommate who attempts to kill the main character looked like a regular person. I suggest that in the reshoot, she should look a bit creepier— even a creepy smile would make a difference.
    Overall, peer editing was fun and useful. Peer editing opened my eyes to new ideas to incorporate in my opening sequence. I enjoyed giving my constructive criticism and I hope that the group who peer edit my project would effectively do the same.

Filming the Opening Sequence

      On Sunday (2/27), Jazmin, Anyeska, and Lesly all went to Dollar Tree to gather props and makeup so that we could film our opening sequence. They bought makeup which is shown down below, worn by Lesly along with the props bought. Afterwards, Anyeska drove to my house to pick me up. Once I arrived at Anyeska’s, Jazmin and I went into the kitchen to make fake blood, using cornstarch, corn syrup, and red food coloring. It took us roughly 10 minutes to get the perfect mixture. Afterwards, I went over the storyboard to better understand the movie. Simultaneously,  Jazmin was doing Lesly’s makeup with clay, foundation, lipstick and our very own homemade fake blood. When Jazmin was finished, we gathered our props and drove over to the abandoned house where we planned to film. When we got to the abandoned house, we started decorating it with fake snakes, a creepy doll, fake blood hand prints, and the broken mirror.
      In front of the abandoned house, Anyeska, Jazmin and I played frisbee as Hangeno recorded us. The next scene we filmed was the scene where I went off to get the frisbee I came across the unknown entity. We filmed all of our outside scenes on Sunday. It took us around three hours to film all of our outside scenes. Of course, we had to reshoot our scenes a few times before finally getting it right.

Gathering Props + Filming Blog

      On Saturday (2/22), my group mates and I got together to commence the filming process for our opening sequence. We (Lesly, Jazmin, Anyeska and our volunteer, Nick) all planned to meet up at Anyeska’s house around 4PM. Side note: Nick is not apart of our group, however he was nice enough to help us out with our preparations. We all individually arrived at Anyeska’s house, so therefore we were all there by 4:30PM which delayed us a bit. Shortly after we all arrived at Anyeska’s house, we got into Lesly’s car and headed over to Party City to gather our props. We were looking for fake blood, a soccer ball and wax to act as scars and bruises. The way in which we utilized the fake blood and wax will be further discussed in a later blog. When we got to Party City, we looked carefully through each isle for the supplies we needed. When we were unable to find the supplies, we reached out to one of the workers for help. The worker told us that fake blood was out of stock since it is nowhere near Halloween time. Below is a picture of my group mate Lesly and I playing with a few props we saw at Party City. Therefore, we left Party City and drove 11 minutes to Walmart. Surely enough, Walmart also did not have fake blood being that it is out of season. However, we bought a frisbee at Walmart which is a substitute for the soccer ball we initially planned to use. Neither of us had a soccer ball and we were unable to buy one, therefore we found it best to use a frisbee.
     On our way back to Anyeska’s house, we stopped at Pizza Hut to pick up pizza for our house scene. When we got back to the house, we all washed our hands and Jazmin, Anyeska and I gathered around the dining table to film the scene where I realized that I left my phone at the Haunted House. We were only able to film two scenes on Saturday being that we failed to acquire all of our necessary props. Filming took around an hour being that we had a lot of bloopers. All in all, Saturday was a day of hunting for props and doing a few practice runs for the actual film which we planned to seriously initiate the very next day, Sunday (2/23).

Final Task Filming Blog

      Today, February 20th, my AICE Media teachers gave our class the chance to take home our filming equipments. Lesly went to the camera room and signed off on a camera, SD card and tripod for our group to utilize. A picture of our filming equipment is shown below. My group mates and I are going to film our opening sequence this weekend. We plan to film on both Saturday (2/22) and Sunday (2/23). Lesly, Jazmin and I will all go to Anyeska’s house to film. On Saturday we hope to finish filming majority of our movie scenes; however, on Sunday we plan to go back to Anyeska’a house to clean up the film, redoing scenes if necessary. If by chance filming this weekend does not go well, we also have next weekend to film— Saturday (2/29) and Sunday (3/1). Our rough draft film is due on 3/3, therefore we hope to get everything completed in due time.