Music found for our film

After spending almost an hour on Jamendo, we finally found a piece of music which fit perfectly with our song. Since this Jamendo, we have the copyright to use it and we feel that it fits our song perfectly. Here is the song;

Since, the actual shot that we needed music was only about 30 seconds this means that we will not be using the entire song but will be using the chorus of this particular song. The part that we will be using starts at around 1:11 on the youtube video and fade it out at about 1:42. This song is great as the lyrics in the song are 'and the tears in your eye' and this is the point where we cut to a shot of Lewis crying over his missing his brother, so it fits in perfectly. It also fits in at the end of the cut we are using, as the lyrics are 'remember where we've been' and this is where we fade it out to which Lewis' line in the script it, 'and where have you been?' so again it fits in perfectly.

Also, for the end of our film we also have some music that is played while the credits are rolling. This music is supplied by Bert Jerred, which we also found on Jamendo, however there isn't a youtube video displaying the music that we used since it was only a 30 second clip to start with, however the music is not as important as the 'Fade away' song by Jamie Rumley.

Music, Sound and Effects

Music is one of the hardest things to get right in our movie. Our film, doesn't really have a tone that is present throughout so it is proving difficult to find a piece of music. We need music pieces in the following parts of the film;

• As Lewis is walking down the side of the house, at the very start of the film.
• As Lewis is crying at the photo, near the very end of the scene.
• For the end credits.

This may not seem that much, yet I would like to find a piece of music that can cover all 3 different parts of the film, where we require music. The criteria that we are looking for music is something that is slow and possibly acoustic, although something played on the piano could also work. After, looking through the free music that are teacher provided with on discs, we found one piece of music that could work but we were not completely satisfied with the tone of it, so decided to use this if we could not find anything else. From the recommendation of a friend, I have been searching www.Jamendo.com for a suitable piece of music, yet due to the amount of music that is actually on the website, it is proving to be quite difficult. On top of the site frequently going down for maintenance, however, I will keep searching for a suitable piece of music which I believe IS out there, it's just going to take some finding.

When it comes to sound effects, our film needs one important one, which is the disappearance of Ryan. We found a suitable effect on our editing software (Final Cut Express) called "Too Much Too Soon" which caused a flash to appear on screen. Without a video it is hard to explain, however this is used 3 times in our film so we thought it would be better if we found a suitable sound effect which could be added to the Video transition. This is where the discs came in handy, after searching through a few discs we found one with the right sort of sound that we wanted (which was a sort of mysterious sound, but also loud with a deep tone). After placing this into the final film, we decided that we all liked it and that it was exactly what we were looking for.

There are 3 points in the film, where the Video transition of "Too Much Too Soon" is used. These are;

• When Ryan initially disappears after touching the pocket-watch.
• When Ryan appears in the mirror, as Lewis is reading the note from Jayne.
• When Ryan eventually returns, after Lewis shows his emotion.

After adding the sound effect to all 3 points during the film, we decided at the point where Ryan appears in the mirror didn't really fit the sound effect. Hence, the reasoning for leaving it silent. The shot was meant to be a spooky part of the film where Ryan appears for just a split second, so it was best not to use the sound effect. However, we still did use the video transition as Ryan disappears when Lewis catches him out of the corner of his eye.

Re-filming :(

Due to our film being outrageously long when it comes to editing, we had to re-jig our film about a little, meaning we have to re-film. In this post, we will highlight what needs to be re-filmed and why. Here we will explain what the problem is with the shots and what we are planning to when we re-film then.

Shot 1;

Here we have a standard shot of Connor walking into the kitchen.

Problem; the problem with this shot is that we had originally had Connor walking to get a glass of water, to which the kettle turns itself on. This was eventually decided to be cut from the actual film due to us being seriously over 5 minutes. This created a problem as we had Connor walking into a different shot when there was no evidence of him turning. So this will be re-shot.


Shot 2;

Here, Connor is startled by the appliances starting themselves in the kitchen.

Problem; A problem with this shot is that this shot appears on the screen for too long and it is not clear that the microwave turns itself on. The shot itself will be kept, but we will film a close-up of both the radio and the microwave.

Shot 3;

Here, we have a shot of Connor sleeping on his bed.

Problem; Again, due to us being 3 minutes over the allowed time we had to re-jig the film. We originally had Connor playing on the xbox, to which he put his head down and went to sleep. We have now decided to have an alarm go off and blend this in the sound of the microwave being turned off. This shot needs to be re-filmed as Connor can look startled when the alarm goes off.



Shot 4;

Here, we have a close-up of Connor crying at the photo of Lewis and Ryan.

Problem; This shot caused a lot of problems when actually filming as since Connor can't cry on cue which meant we had to have a glass of water to provide the tears, meaning Connor had to dip his fingers in the water and then put them on his face for us to try and catch the tears. However, this shot is really out of focus and focuses on the fan at the back of the shot, meaning a need for a reshoot. Damn :(

Shot 5;

Here, as Ryan reappears, a conversation ensues between the two brothers.

Problem; This shot was not originally written in the script and was completely improvised on the spot. The problem? this shot is way too long in the film and we plan to, when we film again, have close-ups of Connor when he is talking. Breaking up this shot.

Other things that need to be filmed is the part of Laura's conversation at the very end of the film, for more information on this look at the post that i posted previously.

5 minutes! (and maybe possibly 20 seconds)

When it comes to filming, we always seem to have a problem of fitting a storyline into 5 minutes. Last year, both me and Connor ended up doing 2 minutes and 11 seconds for our 2 minute film. Not the worst thing that could have happened but it was pretty hard trying to fit it down to that 2 minutes and 11 seconds.

This year, with the extended project of a film being 5 minutes we are able to fit an entire story into it, complete with beginning, middle and end. However, even though we have yet to finish the last scene in terms of editing we have already noticed that we are advancing over the 5 minute marker, with the possibility of us exceeding 6 minutes. Of course, this is unacceptable and we need to get it down to 5 minutes 20 seconds at the bare minimum, yet still we have to add the titles to our film. So, we are going to have a mountain to climb in terms of getting the film to 5 minutes. However, it has to be done and will be done.

More filming to be done?

Due to our actress in Laura Bentley being bogged down due to January exams and coursework we were unable to use her in the last scene of the film. Of course, this wouldn't be a problem if it wasn't for the mass snow that hit us at the end of last year which of course prevented most people from even leaving their house, never mind filming.

So, after having a re-think it was decided that we needed to get filming done so we completely re-wrote the script keeping main plot points. When in comes to including the character of Jayne again we are thinking about the option of having Laura answering her phone in a completely different setting and linking both of the films again.

One way in which we could do this would be in this example;

In this shot we see that 2 completely different shots are placed next to each other as the two girls have a conversation. This is one possibility of how we could do this particular shot.

Another way to do this sort of shot is by switching back and forth between conversations,

As shown here by a young youtube poster, the shots are just easily cut from and can quite easily show a phone conversation as long as you show both characters to be on the phone at the time and that the dialogue is actually compatible.

Due to the easiness of it, we will probably film Laura's half of the conversation asif she is out looking for Ryan and then put the selected clips next to each other. Asif a conversation is actually taking place.

The Loss of a Character

Due to unforseen circumstances, unfortunately we were unable to film with Laura, meaning that we had to completely revamp the script and write the character of Jayne Bentley out of the last scene. Not the easiest of tasks, but nothing phases our group and we managed to do so whereas we didn't change the storyline too much, still used the parts of the plot that we felt were the strong points to our film and then added a storyline around it, that didn't include the character of Jayne Fogg.

One major feature of having the character of Jayne in the final scene was to build suspense. Our original script was to have Ryan appear and Jayne halfway through making the phone call to which Ryan would run downstairs and snatch the phone off Jayne just before she were to tell them that Ryan was missing. However, due to the absence of Jayne, this was not possible without the use of either some incredibly good CGI or a pretty good double of Laura. We worked around the situation by simply saying that Jayne had gone out looking for Ryan and that she might have phoned Mum and Dad while she were out meaning that both Lewis and Ryan had to rush to the phone to ring Jayne to make sure that she hadn't actually phoned Mum and Dad while she was out.

When our video is actually completed it may be an idea to make comparisons of the original script to what we ended up doing eventually.

It is also worth nothing, that we had to find a way to extract the story from one side of the conversation, but we may decide to film Jayne's half of the conversation at another time just so you can hear what she says, but we will have to see what it looks like when we edit it together. A decision will be made at a later date.