Creative Critical Reflection (CCR)

Final Project

Here it is! Our film opening BREACH!

Reveal day is near!

So we finished filming last night and also finished editing which is rather quite easier than I thought it would be. As mentioned at the start of the blog Blake has Final Cut Pro X so that is what we used to edit. First, we had to download all the content from the SD card to the MacBook Pro so we could sort through all the footage which we had a lot of due to the many challenges we had to overcome. Once we separated the bad footage from the good footage we began to upload them to the editing program. We put each scene in it's respective order and added some transitions and sound of course. We seriously can't believe what we were able to accomplish and can't wait to show it to you guys in a couple of days!

"FBI! OPEN UP!" + BTS

Since we decided to scratch our previous plans for our film opening today we began to film our film opening...again. We decided that our setting will be a house, more specifically, Blake's house. We chose to use Blake's house due to the fact that we had more space and rooms to work with. Also, Blake had the perfect computer setup for our first scene which was a close-up of the hacker typing away. I didn't believe my teacher, Mrs. Marchetti, when she told the class lighting will be our biggest enemy and man was she right. We had to take multiple shots for every scene we filmed to get the lighting right. Next, Blake and a friend filmed a scene involving a hard drive being lit on fire. Well this is what we originally wanted to do but things happen. So as I stated before lighting was our biggest enemy so for the hard drive on fire scene we needed a dark place to film. When we started filming it was during the day so Blake thought of doing it in the garage since it was empty and it would be dark. We had an extinguisher on hand if anything went wrong. Something did go wrong but it wasn't that anything caught on fire, it was actually the opposite. The hard drive would not catch on fire so we needed to think of a resolution fast. Blake went into his kitchen and grabbed alcohol and he was spotted by his mom. His mom did not like the idea of lighting something on fire with alcohol in the garage. So Blake had to compromise and we all decided that the next just as good thing we could light on fire was a cd as we can light the paper that is on the cd without the need for a flammable substance. This turned out great and I have included a video down below that shows the making of this scene to share with you guys.

Next, Darrah and I started working on making a fake official letter from the FBI to show the criminality of the hacking. Lastly, we decided to film the front door as someone is banging on the door while shouting "FBI! OPEN UP!". 

New idea this late into the project?!?!

So today me and Darrah arrived to class only to realize that Blake wasn't here yet. We wanted to work on the project but not without all of the group members. A few minutes later Blake arrived but he didn't just bring himself, he brought a new idea along with him. He came to us and said "I have a new idea" and we immediately panicked as the film opening is due next week. So we heard him out and it was a brilliant idea.

Two weeks ago, Darrah went to Blake's house to film her part of the breaking news scene. Believe it or not, this was a very time consuming process as we all had to have different accents to portray a worldwide event. While Blake was looking over the footage from that day he realized that this time consuming process wouldn't be worth it in the end as it wouldn't be long enough to meet the required time by Cambridge. Blake suggested to us that we should cut that whole scene out from our storyboard and focus more on the hacker and the consequences of hacking. 

So here's the plan!
Our film opening will start off with a unique introduction to display the credits and title. Then, a closeup of the hacker will show him typing away at 3 computer monitors which would of been later in our film opening if we stood with our old plan. As the hacker is doing these malicious acts he is stunned as the sound of someone banging on the door and the words "FBI! OPEN UP!" enter his ear. 

That's all I'm telling you guys for now!

Title?!?!

So while we have been thinking of our plot and filming parts of our film opening none of us realized we still haven't decided on a title for our film. We want to use a title that relates to computers or hacking but we also want it to be creative. Since our main character's codename is IP we thought about naming our film after that but that wouldn't be very creative. So then we thought about naming our film with an actual IP address. But many people would't understand what our title means so in order for our film to appeal to a larger audience we have decided on the title name "Breached". According to Merriam-Webster, a breach can be defined as an infraction or violation of a law, obligation, tie, or standard. So you can see how this title goes perfectly with our film opening!

Characters...

Another important component of a film opening is to include and establish the character/s.
IP:
In our film opening we have decided to include one main character that the film revolves around. After all, the hacker, who goes by the name IP, has access to every little bit of information which basically makes the world revolve around him/her. We want to depict this character as a tech-savvy individual who does not want to hurt people but only wants to inform them of the information that is hidden from them.

Then we will also include three other characters that are in the film opening for a good 25 seconds. These characters will be news station anchors that will be broadcasting on the global event. We want the anchors to resemble real-life anchors. To do this the anchors will wear formal attire, as seen in the following photo, to properly represent anchors that the viewers see on a regular basis. 

Let's talk about setting!

I haven't talked much about setting and considering it's one of the most important things to establish in a film opening why not talk about it.

So my first thought was to research about common places where hackers conduct their attacks and films that show their environment as the hacking occurs. In doing this research, I came upon this film.

In Blackhat, there is a scene of three people behind a computer screen conducting a cyber attack as seen in the photo below.

Although this photo shows what we are trying to accomplish in our setting we will be making changes to this photo as our plot is different from Blackhat. Since our film opening only includes one hacker and not multiple hackers we will only have one hacker on screen. We would also like to show the hacker accompanied by multiple computer screens to show the size of this global event. One thing  we will keep the same from this photo is keeping the hacker anonymous by filming his/her back until we reveal them in a creative way at the end of our film opening.

More editing research! This time on sound!

So Today we continued our research on editing, more specifically on sound, plus on the tools that are integrated within Final Cut Pro X. We found that while Final Cut Pro X offers a variety of sounds that could be used to make an extraordinary film opening we must continue to explore our resources such as the internet to find a variety of sounds that we could use in our film opening. In doing this  sound research we were surprised by the number of websites that charged for copyright free sounds. Let's just say that none of us were willing to pay for sounds so we continued the search. We eventually came upon smartcloud which gave us a breaking news sound effect that we could potentially use for our news report portion of the film opening. While copyright free sounds from the internet will get the job done just right we still plan on incorporating sounds on the Foley Stage. For example, one of the scenes will include a person typing away on the computer. We can then come up with a way to mimic the sound of the keyboard with a variety of objects.  

Editing research!

Since we are filming next week we decided to just think of elements that would enhance our film opening. For the portion of the film opening that features news reports from around the world we want to make sure it looks realistic to the viewer. Blake mentioned that he currently has Final Cut Pro X, an editing software, on his laptop. Through this software program our capabilities for effects for our film opening are endless. For example, as seen in the video below we can create a realistic news setting that would appeal to the viewer. This video does feature a green screen made out of cloth, however, we can virtually use anything that is green to get similar results that wouldn't break the bank. Until next time!

Things don't always go as planned...

Today me, Blake, and Darrah had planned to meet again at Blake's house to film the remaining news report that me and Blake need to finish. While I had no plans but to go the gym Blake had other things to do such as homework. Today was also the start of the last week of the 3rd quarter which meant that a lot of students were going to be busy studying for cummulatives and completing late work to give their grade an extra boost. So we all agreed that we would meet next week to finish all of our filming and meanwhile this week we would brainstorm on how to improve our film opening.

The first day of recording has arrived?!?!

So Friday night, through WhatsApp, we planned to meet Saturday afternoon to film the news portion of our film opening. While Darrah and Blake were both free to film that afternoon, I wasn't due to my job. So we decided that I will film my part Monday after school. 

From what Blake told me, filming went great and that they only had two problems. 

The first being that we had two options for how we could present our code introduction. We could display the code onscreen or have a person typing the code with the information. They decided to go with the typing option as it would give us the opportunity to incorporate different camera shots and angles. I'm totally onboard with their decision to go with the typing option and would of done the same. 

The second wasn't really a problem, it was more of an inconvenience. We learned that the first take wouldn't be the best and we would have to do multiple takes (which took almost 3 hours) to get a perfect clip. The most inconvenient thing was that with multiple takes would come with a lot of storage being used up on the SD card. Blake found his self having to save the clips onto his computer  and then having deleting them from the SD card. This took away time that was supposed to be for filming which was an annoyance. 

I can't wait to see how my part turns out on Monday and I know I can expect to be filming for a while!

Planning

So today me and my group decided to meet up at Darrah's house after school to plan our film opening. As stated in my last post, we decided to base our film opening off a massive hacking event that takes the world by surprise. So with the help of Google Docs we began to plan. We wanted to have a introduction that would catch the viewers attention and Blake knew just how to do that. We all decided that a sequence of codes with the production company name and as well as the actor's names would be great. 

The introduction will be similar to this picture:

https://talesofalostandfoundman.wordpress.com/2012/09/09/the-source-of-the-code/

After, we decided as a group that what better way to let our viewers know that this is worldwide event by cutting to news reports from around the world. Of course we would have to be the news anchors. Except we had one problem, how would we portray different people from around the world. There would be only one way and that would be to practice and learn an accent. So with that, Darrah would have an American accent, Blake would have an Indian accent, and I would have a British accent. 

Here are some sketches that I created with the help of an app called SketchBook to provide a visual of how our news reports will look:

 Below is some of what we wrote in the Google Doc:

"Beginning

Code

Cut to news

Photobooth blake

Joel: Breaking news

Darrah: An unknown hacker

Blake: know as “iP”

Joel: has leaked crucial government information

Darrah: pertaining to the United States of America.

Blake: This information contains classified weapons blueprints,

Joel: Nuclear launch codes

Darrah: along with citizen’s personal data

Blake: This is the largest leak of information

Joel: Since edward snowden in 2013

Darrah: This concludes our special broadcast"

After the news reports concluded, we thought about what we could put that could follow this bold part. We decided to cut to the person in charge of the massive hacks but only to show his back while on multiple computers. We would then have a creative way of revealing his identity. 

Finally! An idea!

So since my whole class has been given time in class to begin working on this big project, we (mostly Blake and Darrah) decided to begin throwing ideas out in the open right away. We know we want our viewers to be on the edge of their seats even in just the two minutes we have. We each threw random ideas at each other, some worst than others, but each one we thought wouldn't be successful so we kept on thinking. Then, eventually Blake came up with a brilliant idea for a film opening. A film opening having to do with a huge hacking event that shakes the world. We each agreed this will be the focus of our film opening and will begin planning in a bit. 

Trouble...

Me and my group have decided on suspense as our genre. Fine. That's not the problem though, the problem is thinking of ideas that fit the genre of suspense. It's much more hard than we anticipated but we will keep on thinking until something comes up. To help with this process of thinking of a plot, I've included a video that I think might be useful to us.

The journey begins

Before any production can begin, a genre must be chosen. At first, we thought of doing a drama film opening. We later felt that others would do the same genre so we chose to go a different path and choose suspense instead.

One of the most important steps to creating a successful film opening comes from what you do before filming. Research is a key role to laying the foundation for a successful film opening. We researched the genre of suspense and have included two case studies which are down below which will offer us important information about different routes we can take in our film opening.

                            

Jason Bourne: Once again the CIA is after Jason Bourne and they will do everything in their power to accomplish their goal. The hunt begins with Heather Lee, a CIA agent, discovering a hack in the system. The hack was found out to be carried out by former CIA agent Nicky Parsons. Nicky previously helped Bourne but was now helping a man expose the CIA's Black Ops. Heather then hands the information to CIA Director Dewey. Dewey then orders the capture of Parsons in hope of finding Jason Bourne.

The Girl on the Train: Rachel, devastated by her recent divorce, spends her daily commute fantasizing about the seemingly perfect couple who live in a house that her train passes every day, until one morning she sees something shocking happen there. Later on while Rachel is watching TV, a news report comes on and Megan is missing. Rachel becomes invested in the case because of what she saw that day. 

While these films offer different plots it also offers us a view of all the possibilities for a successful suspense film opening.

Here we go...

This week is the start of our foundation portfolio project and I'm not going to lie, it's pretty stressful just thinking about. Me and my group, which consists of Darrah Schaffer and Blake Repp, have began thinking of ideas for our film opening. 

First, it is to our understanding that we need to find a genre for our film opening. Once we find and stick with a genre, we can then begin researching about it. Until we decide on a genre, we can"t go further into this project so when we pick one and stick with it, I will update you guys!