Final Opening - Spy School

This is the finished product for the opening of 'Spy School'. Within this opening the film introduces the three main characters. These include our Hero, 'Ajax Thompson' walking to his lesson at the Spy School, the nerd who shows the hero his new gadgets, and the bad guy who plans to destroy the spy school and the students within. The final copy includes everything including the music, sound effects, and titles.

Spy School logo - Main Film Title

We chose to feature an emblem typically seen on school crests. The castle represents how the Spy School started, as a medieval school. This is the logo that will appear at the end of our film opening as the main film title.



The font was chosen because it looks technical just like the gadgets featured in our film. We used Photoshop to create this logo and simply made three layers, consisting of the blue background, the castle and then the text with a red highlight. Jack and Elliot made the logo and then Brad and Alex imported the image to Final Cut and added a motion tracking effect as shown below in the example video.

The video below is the final logo that will appear in our children's film opening credits as the main film title. The music will get louder as this title appears, creating a sense of something starting. The second video shows the layers used to create the logo.

Post Production - Music Composing

While Brad and alex did the editing, we (Jack and Elliot) prepared the background music and sound effects for the Film opening. We did this by listening to the beats on garage band and started to select appropriate loops to use. When we got the footage onto garage band we decided that the constant looping of the track got boring so we added more beats to make it interesting all the way through and we changed the music for the comedy dressing scene to something that will hopefully be more entertaining. In that scene we made the music before contrast the music during the scene to really make it different to the rest of the film and this should add to the sense of silliness. We also added a completely new piece of music for the scenes with the Bad Guy. Below is our finished music track.

Post Production - Sound Effects

During the post production of our film opening, we researched and gathered a collection of sound effects that would be useful for us to use. We weren't happy with the audio recorded with the in camera microphone for most of the exterior shots. This was because a lot of wind had ruined the audio. Luckily we had not recorded any dialogue in the exterior shots, so we where able to delete all of the audio from the video files. We added in a wind sound effect and used that over all of the exterior shots. This gave the video a more professional sound. We found some sound effects for footsteps, however we decided editing the steps to sync up with the video would have taken too long, so we didn't use these sounds. There is also a typing on the keyboard sound effect, however the audio that was recorded with the in camera microphone when we filmed the typing was better than the sound effect. All of the other sounds where for the card scanning shot, the various bleeps and beeps showed that the card was being scanned. Another sound effect that was used in our opening was thunder and lightning to add to the effect of our bad guy and his evil laugh.

 

Production Day 3 - The Bad Guy

On the third day of shooting we did all the Bad guy shots, because that required the most props so we did all of those shots in one day to be practical, these involved close ups and medium shots of the Bad guy laughing and the trying on of outfits

Problems
The trying on of clothes shots took very long to prepare for as the actor would have to keep changing his clothes before every shot. however to save time we decided to place all the clothes onto the actor and do a continuos shot of him he would then take the layers off revealing a new outfit.
We had problems trying to add a lightning effects onto the shot and this was difficult to do in the room with the equipment we had. We would have to switch the light on and on again and again and then add the sounds onto the film later on.

What went well
We did complete all the shots ahead of schedule and upload them unto the mac. part of this is down to our time saving ideas and the fact we were well prepared for the shots we needed to do that day,
Even thought one of our group was not there that day we still managed to do well without him being there and it did not affect our production.

Roles
Camera - Brad, Elliot
Lighting - Brad, Elliot
Acting - Jack

Production Day 2 - Interior Conversation Shots

On the second day of filming we shot our interior shots, theses were mainly shots between the Hero and the Nerd. We shot all the shots from where the Hero walks in to when the Hero leaves and the conversation ends. We did match on action shots to show the Hero moving into the room, some reaction shots for the conversation we also did allot of close up shots of items being handed from one character to another.

Problems

The dialogue was not well rehearsed so we had a lot of out-takes and mistakes in the performance. To solve this one of the group members would read out the lines before each shot to make sure that the performers knew what to say and could deliver it well. 

The positioning of the camera was a very difficult and time consuming thing to do and we spent a lot of time trying to make sure everything was in shot and focused well. To help on the floor we would place items (out of shot) to tell the preformers where to stand. 

The location we needed had to have a computer and that meant we had to go to a computer room. We had to ask Dave to find us a room but he had the wrong key so it took awhile to get into the room we needed.

What went well

We did however complete all the shots we wanted on time and we got to upload all our videos onto the mac and start to look through our shots so we would know if we needed to redo a shot the next day or not.

We had a lot of good ideas for shots that really improved the work we did that day and we realised we needed a reaction shot in our movie and this should improve the look of our completed piece.

Roles

Camera- alex, Jack, Brad. Elliot

Acting- Brad and Elliot 

Lighting- Alex and Jack 

Production Day 1 - Exterior Establishing Shots

We started off our first filming day by filming all of our exterior establishing shots. These shots included the sign which will be edited to say ‘Spy School’, the building shots, the low angle tracking shot of the feet moving, the CCTV shots high and low angle of the hero walking to his lesson and the extreme close-up of the ID card which we will use as the practical title. We also filmed some extra shots of the hero walking so we can edit in some extra footage in case our opening isn’t long enough, and a mid-shot tracking shot of the heroes head as he is walking. Other establishing shots that we filmed included students walking around college which will act as students walking around ‘Spy School’ and an establishing panning shot in the wooded area of the school which we will use as a background to some more opening titles for our children’s film opening.

Problems  –

The first problem that we came across was that our original balcony location for the high angle CCTV shot was out of bounds, so we had to hunt for a different location to get the high angle shots needed. Another problem that occurred when filming which was waiting for students in our school to walk out of our shots, there was nothing we could do to stop this from happening, only to just wait or to use them as extras in our ‘Spy School’. Another problem was with the equipment that we were using, this was because the DSLR cameras that we were using where to heavy for the tripods that we were using. The tripod bolt was also too small for the cameras, so this made the cameras shake about quite a lot during filming.

What went well  -

Some things that we feel went well on the first day of filming included the low angle tracking shot. The final shot was better than we had imagined when story-boarding because it was smooth and almost looked professional. Also we managed to complete all the storyboarded shots, and film some extra shots as backups in case we needed them when editing, all before the hour and a half lesson time was up. We then had time to watch through what we had filmed, delete what we didn’t need, and import everything to our group folder on the computer. 

Roles on set - Day 1 -


Cinematography / DOP - Alex, Brad and Jack
Acting - Elliot
Extras - Alex and Jack

Characters - Bad Guy

In most films there is a challenge or a fight against a force, person or more abstract idea. In our 'film' the plot involves an attempt to destroy the spy school by the 'bad guy. The 'Bad Guy' in this film will be a strong stereotype of how we expect the villain in a movie to look, behave and how he is shown. We decided this would be the best option because in many children’s films there is a very clear divide between good and bad and this is shown by having very strong evil characters. To get across to the audience how this character is the villain of the film we are using strong 'Bad Guy' stereotypes e.g. the mise-en scene of this character will involve a Scar on his face, like Dr evil of Austin powers, because this is a strong symbol that this is a evil character and this will help the audience associate this character as the villain. In one of the shots the character will do an evil laugh this will help build on the idea of him being the villain. We are going to make the set darker around the 'Bad Guy' in comparison to our heroes and this will make the audience instantly recognize him as the evil character in the film. However because it is a children’s film we want to add a comedy element to it this will help make it entertaining and suitable for children, as it will provide a much more positive feel to the movie than if it was all serious, and this character will be the main focus for the humour with funny events happening to him e.g. one of the scenes will involve trying on of silly outfits which will provide a funnier side to the film.

Camera's and Equipment

To create the opening sequence we have decided to use our own cameras to film. This is because the quality will be better and we will be able to achieve good depth of field shots. Also by using two high quality cameras we can film one scene once, with two different angles, so continuity will be much better than re-filming a scene for a different angle. The option of placing accessories such as microphones, and video lights is also available because both our cameras have hot shoe mounts. We will be using a simple lighting set-up using LED video lights, and we will use a light stand to support one of them so we can achieve even lighting. As we are filming a children's spy film, the shots will need to be quite fast and action packed. We will need to do a lot of tracking shots, and to eliminate any camera shake we will be using the 'Opteka X-grip' which will allow us to capture low shots smoothly whilst moving.

Cameras - Canon DSLR and Nikon DSLR
Lenses - Zoom lenses and a macro lens for close up shots

The second image shows an example of a multi-cam set-up, it shows four cameras instead of the two we will be using, however it explains the point of having two cameras rolling at once to capture different angles we will need to shoot if we only had one camera rolling.

Props

Bad guy - Jack

• Eye patch- brad
• Scar make-up - brad
• Cat-Alex
• Office chair
• TV/Monitor
• Smart clothes- everyone
• Women's item of clothing- jack
• Black clothing- jack

Nerd - Brad

• Glasses- jack
• Gadgetry- everyone
• Buttoned up shirt
• pens
• Calculator-jack
• Head-set 

Hero- Elliot

• Normal clothes
• ID Card
• Shoes

Shot List and Story board

1a.) Mid shot of a sign that says 'Spy School' - "Directed by...."
1b.) Establishing Shot of school building
1c.) Long Shot of students on bench
1d.) High angle of students walking around school
1e.) Mid shot of hero with wipe transition
1f.) Tracking shot of hero's shoes amongst other pupils

2a.) Mid shot of ID scanner and scans his school ID card
2b.) Close up of ID card
2c.) Shot of hero running through the door, down the corridor
2d.) Extreme close up of door handleas he opens door
2e.) Hero walks in and high fives the nerd, wipes past the camera and camera pans to nerd typing cerdits
2f.) Over the shoulder shot of the nerd typing the credits
2g.) Bad guy is watching hero and nerd on CCTV then turns off screen

3a.) Bad guy trying on different outfits to blend into school

4a) In classroom with hero and the nerd. There talking about the new teacher, a mid shot of the hero talking
4b) a mid shot of the nerd replying to the hero
4c) a mid shot of the hero talking again
4d) a reaction shot of the nerd, the teacher then walks into the room 

Music Research - Action & Spy Film Soundtracks

The collection of film soundtracks below are soundtracks that will inspire us to find a soundtrack for our children's spy/ action film opening. We have included classic spy film soundtracks such as James Bond, Pink Panther, Italian Job etc.. Also I have included a remix of the James Bond theme song, as an example of how we could remix a popular theme song for our opening sequence. By listening to the music that we have gathered below from youtube videos, it is clear what the style is for spy film soundtracks. Most of them have a fast pace beat for tension and to add to the action of what's going on in the film.

Below are some 'Sound Cloud' play-lists that contain Spy film songs that have been made by various musical composers. We will also listen to these for inspiration towards the composing in our film opening.

 

Test Footage - Typing the Titles

This is our test video to see if our camera could record the text on the computer screen...it did. We used Alex's Nikon DSLR for this test footage, and recorded using the macro lens so we could get the close-up shots of the typing and the words entering the Google search bar clearly. This test was also done so we could practice our second use of practical title in our opening sequence, the nerd in our film types out on the computer, 'Bradley Stearn as the nerd', this is a practical title, as it has been made with every day items such as a computer screen. Practical titles are more entertaining than just basic text that has been made in Photoshop or Final Cut. The test was also done to see if the file format that the camera recorded to was compatible with Apples Final Cut video editing software, it was compatible and the outcome is shown below. We edited using Final Cut, and simply put three different camera angles into a fast cutting sequence.

Update - 21/10/2011 -

As well as testing Alex's camera, today we tested to see if Brad's camera was compatible with Apples Final Cut. The outcome was a relief, because we had filmed almost everything on the camera and if it wasn't compatible, we would of had to re-film everything in one lesson, or edit using our own 'Windows' laptops.

Planning of childrens spy movie

 We first talked about what characters we wanted in our spy film. We decided on a bad guy, a nerd and a hero. We then discussed the costumes of the characters. We decided the bad guy should have an eye patch, a scar etc. We then decided that the nerd should have glasses, use a lot of gadgets and should have his shirt buttoned up all the way to the top. The final character in out opening is the hero, which should have nice clothes, be popular, and should always be lit with bright lights to emphasize the fact he is the main character.

We then discussed the narrative for the film. We decided it should be a spy school for young and upcoming spies, with a bad guy who plots to destroy the school, and that he has killed the hero's parents.

We next discussed the music we would use. We decided that the bad guy should have a dark and gloomy sound track, the nerd should have a techno/synth soundtrack, and the hero should have patriotic and up beat music.

After music we discussed the possible themes of the movie. Friendship between the nerd and the hero was one of our decided themes, another theme was a vengeance between the hero and the bad guy.

The locations for the our film include; classrooms, staircases and hallways busy with students and a dark office for the bad guy.

Last of all we discussed special fx, these included lighting and practical titles.

Opening Titles

This video is about opening titles in films. The first type of title shown in this video is the use of practical elements to create a title. This is a simple way of using every day items such as food spelling out words or words on a credit card to show who is starring in the film. Using this practical way of titles also helps to introduce the characters lifestyle.

The second type of title is basically using text and making it fade in and out of the video footage. With this method you can use a font that is relevant to the film. You can also introduce the era and add extra information for the viewers using this method.

The third title method is the use of motion graphics with titles. We can gather motion graphics from stock websites such as DigitalJuice or ArtBeats. This makes the titles look professional and more interesting.

We are hoping to use a practical title within our spy film opening. We will include words being typed onto a computer screen as a practical way to display actors and producers names in our opening sequence. We will probably use basic text and fade in and fade outs to display the actual films name.

This is the trailer for stormbreaker it has two different types of titles that we are hoping to use within our opening sequence. The first one is computer screen with the characters ID details. We could use this method and have an ID card with the actors name on it. It would also fit in with the spy school theme we are hoping to achieve. The second title method used in this trailer is the effect of words being typed up onto a computer screen.

Brainstorm-Childrens Film

This is our first brainstorming session we talked about how a children's film has to be light hearted and have a some humor in it. We decided our production could not be too serous and that was one of the ways we would make sure it was appropriate for children. We were considering using stop motion for our credit sequence because it would allow us to use bright colour and keep it childish but with the idea we agreed on we decided it would not be in keeping with the genre. The title of whatever we made would have to be catchy. We did consider briefly doing a comedy about real life funny situations like a more child friendly inbetweeners but decided that would not be hard to make entertaining to a younger audience. We also considered a fantasy adventure where a ordinary person finds they have special powers and there life is turned upside down as they have to save their parents but we decided not to in the end as it was not something we were interested in and it would be to hard to film considering the limited time and resources we had. We chose in the end to do a spy film as it is a genre we are all very familiar with and have grown up watching. The music we chose will be in the Mission Impossible style because it is a well known spy movie theme music and it will link well with the genre.

To see our first thoughts on Spy films click here  and to see our research on a famous Spy movie (Johnny English)

Children's Spy Films - Comedy

One of our ideas for the children's film opening is a comedy spy film. A range of comedy spy films that we came up with in our group was Johnny English one and two, Alex Rider Storm-breaker, Inspector Gadget and the Spy Kid films. Within a spy film there is usually a typical bad guy, maybe wearing an eye patch over one eye, or a scar down his face. As we are making a children's film, if we had a bad guy and if he got hurt or injured, we would have to do it in a light or comical way. There is also usually a hero in a spy film, or a character that the viewer likes. Heroes in other comedy spy films include Alex Rider, Inspector Gadget or Rowan Atkinson as Johnny English.

 

We studied the opening credits to the popular spy film, Johnny English. It starts with a quick montage of him getting ready for work. Clips in the montage include him running on a treadmill and then falling off it, reading a book called 'Serious Spying' and then shows him trying on various clothes including the classic Sherlock Holmes hat as an over-exaggeration of a spy look. The next part of the credits are various long and mid shots of Johnny walking through what seems to be a government building and picking up a gun. He set's everything up on the gun, and then realises he didn't add a trigger. The sequence also includes various tracking shots of walking feet which we could include in our opening by using a tripod track dolly or a grip stabiliser.Without any dialogue, this opening sequence still has great humour and is very fun to watch along with a great title song performed by Robbie Williams. Throughout the whole opening sequence there are low opacity overlays of red and blue rectangles which keep flying in and out, these act as transitions.

To see the opening credits for the first Johnny English film, click here.
We got more information about the whole film on wikipedia.

What is a children's film?

A children film is not a specific category of film. It can be anything from a fantasy to a comedy it is defined by the fact that it is entertaining and suitable for a younger audience, this doesn't necessarily mean that older people will not find it entertaining normally there is a subtle adult humour specific designed to keep adults entertained, it can be refereed to as a family film. a children's film is classified partly by its bbfc rating which a guideline on what age a person should be before being shown a certain movie. Children's films are more and more animated or done on computers which allows film makers to push the boundaries more because it is detached from reality. Watership down is the most dramatic example of this. A children's film is more defined by how the bbfc classifies it. For example a U film is usually a children's film as adults like more violence and peril, so the target audience which is families will see the U classification and know its appropriate for their child and most likely will be made for children.

It is rated as a U film.
Shrek is a classic children's film is has comedy, action and romance but its all done in a child friendly way with a happy ending and jokes that younger and older people can understand and enjoy.

Age ratings

U rating

a U rating means Universal which means that it should not upset most people aged over 4. it should have a positive feel to the film and any violence, horror or anything upsetting should have a positive counterbalance to make the child happy.

a U film should not:

•  have any discriminatory language or behavior unless it is shown to be bad
•  have drug taking and any references should be subtle unless it is shown to be bad
•  have any dangerous behavior a child may then copy

a U film should:

•  if there is any horror it should be mild and not last long
•  only have natural nudity
•  only have mild bad language
•  mild sexual behavior
•  mild violence

UP is a example of a U movie.

PG

A PG film means children of any age can watch unaccompanied however a PG should not disturb a child of over 8. A PG film is a parental guidance film where a parent may decide to watch the film with their children to make sure its contents do not upset their child.

a PG film normally will not include:

• discriminatory language unless it is in a historical content or shown to be bad
• have long frightening scenes
• no dangerous behavior that a child may want to then copy

a PG film can include

• references to drugs use as long as it is either subtle or have a anti-drug message
• mild bad language
• natural nudity
• sex should only be implied but in a subtle way that younger audiences wont understand
• moderate violence is allowed as long as it has no detail e.g. blood

Harry Potter is a example of a PG film

Art of the Title - Captain America - The First Avenger

The opening title sequence shows lots of propaganda from WW2, and it sets the tone for the film as being an American friendly film. It shows the film is going to be biased on the USA side of the war with images of the classic Uncle Sam of USA and iconic flying eagles. Within the opening sequence there are no actual pieces of video footage. There is a lot of 2D and 3D motion tracking of the classic American war posters. The opening title credits are also motion tracked to move with the different images. The background soundtrack is a very patriotic American sounding track which is provided by a very dramatic and cinematic orchestra. Within the opening sequence there are a lot of images including guns, airplanes and American flags, all of these are the Mise-en-scene which make us feel a certain way about what we are watching. We found out that the director of this film Joe Johnston got the original idea to do the title sequence in this certain way from one of his previous films 'The Rocketeer'. This was becuase it had an 'art deco' feel to the film and he wanted to to mix that with the WW2 theme of Captain America, this was the starting point to producing the opening sequence used in the film.

Overall this opening sequence is a very bold and set's out to tell the story of WW2 within its two and a half minute running time by showing how strong USA was within the war.

Shown to the left are four of the WW2 propaganda posters used within this opening sequence, they are all well known and are iconic to look at, which is why Joe Johnston chose to use them.

Click here to watch the full opening sequence

Prelim - Action Sequence

This is our prelim video. We had to make a short film including 180 degree rule, match on match action, shot reverse shot and a reaction shot. The 180 degree rule is seen within the talking sequence, match on match shot is seen when the actor is running up the stairs as it cuts from the bottom of the stairs to the top whilst the action is happening, and also when he opens the door the action is matched within the close-up shot. We also added a simple beat using garage band to blend in the audio from each shot and to add tension to the sequence. We used a hoody to add to the mystery of the action sequence, we thought about mise en scene for this. We didn't use any special effects but we used final cut to edit it and added simple fade in from black and out to black transitions.

Cinematography - Alex
Editing - Brad
Music - Jack
Acting - Elliot, Brad and Jack

Below is our final preliminary video -




Problems -

Watching this video back we have noticed a few issues. The first being a editing error within the dialogue sequence, this is because we added a reaction shot, however this didn't fit in with the previous shot as the actor was smiling. Another problem is that our music is not loud enough to be heard, also it is such a simple beat it does not flow with the action on the video. The final error within this video is a continuity error when the first actor opens the door. This is because in the close-up shot he stops opening the door, and then in the reverse shot from within the office the door is slammed open.