Screening of 'Dark Summer'

We had our screening, which went really well. Quite a lot of people came to the screening and they seemed impressed with our work. We managed to get over thirty questionnaires filled in, all very positive. Here are some pictures from the screening:

                                              

Signed Off!!!

We have been signed off!!! Mrs Blackborow really liked our final cut and overall I am pleased with our piece. Our screening has been arranged for Tuesday 23rd March and I look forward to getting feedback from our audience.

Editing Week

It is now the editing week and we are getting nearer to the production deadline, I have been editing during my free periods and have also been doing editing sessions at lunch with my group. We have arranged to edit after school one day this week. So far, I have been finding the editing enjoyable and have been getting much better at it.

Re-shoot (26th and 28th February)

Our Friday shoot went okay, however, we did not get as much done as we hoped as we had to get used to the changes made to our idea. Also, unfortunately our actress Mel was ill and couldn't make the Sunday shoot so we could not film. However, we can work around this and have arranged an additional shoot to make up for this.

Adjustments to Final Idea

We have now changed the ending of our final idea to make it more effective and appealing to the audience.  Now, once Zoe removes the bed covers to reveal an empty bed, she will look frantically around the room and will then check all of the rooms in the house. We will have a shot in the hallway as she checks the room and once the realisation that Summer has disappeared hits her, she will sit on the stairs panicking until the phone rings. She runs down stairs and pick up the phone shouting 'What have you done with her', there will then be a fade to the titles.

Shoot

We had our shoot on the weekend. We filmed Friday and Sunday, and overall I feel that it went really well and we managed to get all our shots back. We are hoping to get some feedback soon and will see what shots might need re-shooting.

Presentation

Once we had our idea, we had to do a group presentation in front of the class. In this presentation, we explained our plot, talked about our choice of actor and then went on to mention our key signifiers and location. We made handouts to give out as an information sheet:

Overall, the meeting went really well and I think we explained the main parts of our ideas and got across the points that we wanted to make. Our proposal got signed off allowing us to get started on the major planning for the up and coming shoot. The main feedback which we received in regards to the presentation were:


Positives:

• As an audience, we get to have greater overall power than Zoe as we see the masked and she does not. There are questions that begin to be asked such as who is this mystery person? and what role will he play in the film?
• Great visual references with the signifiers e.g the red objects. Strong audience appeal with technology of the phone and familiarity of the location- family home.
• Location is very practical and the explanation of this was positive. Will not be affected by weather, can control lighting and there is a wide possibility for different angles.

What to think about:

• Make sure the group use media terms more often e.g connotations.
• Mention key themes and how this links to the film genre.
• Refer to other film examples on the handout to re-iterate the points that we are making.
• Think about the possibility of ending the opening sequence at an earlier point incase we are doing too much.