Location Scouting

I have emails a few places that i thought would be suitable for our shoot but one in particular seemed perfect...

Locations

To Marcus Pope,

I am a student at Nottingham University and we have been assigned a brief that instructs us to make a film thats location is the roof of a car park. Fletcher Gate car park would be perfect for our film therefore i am inquiring about the use of the roof. We would be filming at night from 17:00 - 21:00. We don't need to take up the whole roof and we are happy to work around the public use of the car park. We will have a car in the car park and of course, we would pay the usual fee of parking for that. We will have a camera crew, lighting crew, directors and props with us. There will be 8 of us in total and our actors will be mimicking a security guard and a drunken chav. We have no need to film any signs stating the premises. The props we will have will be a golf club, walkie talkies and cones. This is only a short film but if we can take any footage in this place, it would be a massive help.

Thanks,

Marcus Howard

Morning Marcus,

I have no objection in principle, however we need to ensure this doesn’t take place when there is an event on at the Arena, as the car park will be full.  Are you able to secure any certificate of liability insurance from Uni?

Marcus Pope | Parking Operations Manager

Nottingham City Council

Loxley House | Station St | Nottingham | NG2 3NG

M: 07534 603 056

T: 0115 876 3148

E: marcus.pope@nottinghamcity.gov.uk

Character Profiles

Andy:

An ex police man that has been relieved of his duties due to police brutality. He is at his happiest on the golf course by himself where he lets out his anger on the golf balls. He sees himself as a bit of a pro. He has never been married, but used to have a girlfriend that left his once he lost his job. He has no interest in finding anyone else. He had been unemployed for 2 years going to regular anger management therapy sessions and stopped going by his own choice once he found work as security guard in a car park. He has been working there for 3 months and has already had warnings from his superiors for being rude to customers and bringing a golf club to work every now and then. One particular night lights his fuse when he is at work on the roof when a car pulls up in a coned off area and refuses to move. Andy takes out his frustration on the man’s car and later on, the man himself.

Vinnie:

Vinnie considers himself a bit of a lad that can do pretty much what he wants and get away with it. In his early twenties, he hasn’t quite grown up to the society he should be conforming to. He works part time in his local corner shop but uses his parent’s house and funds for drinking and trying to impress women. He has secluded himself from his friends by getting drunk and being abusive towards them. He drink drives almost every time he goes out and picks up a different girl each time and tends to lose them by the end of the night. When he drinks, he becomes provocative towards anyone that approaches him. Little does he know that he is soon to meet his maker (Andy).

Andy’s colleague:

Takes his job a lot more seriously than Andy. He thinks Andy is a bit of a muppet and likes to take the mickey out of him from time to time. Despite this, he does respect him and check up on him to make sure he’s not causing any trouble.

Girl with Vinnie:

She is someone who likes to drink as much as Vinnie. She has only just met Vinnie before getting into his car alone to join him with drinking and joy riding only to find herself in the middle of an argument between her new found friend and a security guard.

Treatment

Driver

Our film is a dark thriller that builds tension through suspense and anticipation. We establish this with our camera work indulging in over dramatic shots including ECUs, CUs, LAs and tracking shots. Most of our movie will be filmed in this way so the concentration is on the characters and their movements whether it’s a raised eyebrow or slight hand movement to insinuate something.

Our film will have a slow pace to begin with and a disturbance of equilibrium early on to engross the viewer right away. The film plays around this disruption and makes the audience feel uncomfortable as they anticipate what is likely to happen. The tension then builds slowly to reach the climax only to leave the audience in suspense as they wait to find out what has happened.

Andy is a displeased, nightshift car park attendant who takes out his dissatisfaction through playing golf with pedestrians on the street below. The only thing is they don’t know they’re playing. One night in particular sets off Andy’s fuse as he meets Vinnie during work. They say opposites attract but is it always a good thing? Driver is a psychological thriller that puts you on both sides of the gun leaving you feeling empathetic for the character of your moral preference.

Driver look

This is a shot from american psycho. My idea of having the main character as someone that isn't all there in the head and actually enjoys what he is going to do. High definition in the smile and generally facial expressions will be key in establishing a character.

From the same film again, i really like this shot as the fiction has no idea that he is there yet it is so blatant to the viewer which gives a sense of uneasiness. 

This is a shot from Se7en which says to me that "no-one can help you". As our film will be shot on the top of a car park, i thought this would be relevant to the kind of shot we want to portray

Different types of shots make the film more interesting and especially in shots like this where it makes that audience feel threatened.

This is From The Machurian Candidate. I like that you are so close to the person threatening you and he's not trying to hide his face but the way it has been shot makes you question who it is. It also gives a sense of mystery to the character and even if he isn't important, it adds that little bit to the film.

Driver

I have decided to be the producer for our new brief in moving image. I want to give this a try as i want to know what what it feels like to be responsible for a group of workers and see if i am capable. I see my role as someone who keeps everyone in line and makes sure everyone is putting out the work they need to be to create a finished product. In terms of the film itself, i hold myself responsible for where it is going to go in terms of advertising, presenting the film (competitions, cinema?) or whether it will just be used for a portfolio if i decide to continue my studies in moving image.

Rendering problems

A massive problem to the timing of my work is the rendering of ym project. Without anticipation, my project is going to take at least 6 hours to render the frames alone. This isn't taking into consideration how long it will take to render through premier. This doesn't help me with things such as analysing my work after it is complete. Other problems i had with rendering were some of the animations such as the doors. Once i had looked through my animation, for some reason the doors wouldn't open even though the key frames were in the right place. I reset the morpher and repeated the sequence but still there was no animation. Due to my time frame i was forced to leave it how it is. This may hinder the full finish of my animation.

Visual and Conceptual Influences

Initially my superhero was always going to be a simple man who had a vengeance. I noticed that there isn’t any mystery about the character if he is going to be like that. I then gave him the power of telekinesis. The primary weapon still exists as blades but he can therefore use his telekinesis to throw objects and his knives. I liked the idea of a superhero not hiding his identity like “the Punisher”. This gives the audience a question of how is he a superhero and therefore makes him more mysterious. To show the telekinesis I tried to give him a sense of aura that he was controlling. Costume was vital in making him the character that he is. Sketching in a pad is limiting to variable colours and textures so I made the decision to draw a standard image, scan it into Illustrator and draw over the lines. This gave me freedom to play about with different colours as much as I wanted until I found something that suited. I really liked the way it looked on the computer as it gave it a more comic feel and really brought out the lines. Personality wise I had the idea in my head that he would be a vigilante that works alone. This let the weapons follow and his facial expressions easier to draw out.

All of this links to my building. As he looks like a man, I wanted to put across that he likes to live as a man with strange aspects. The building as a structure is very standard looking. For example the brick walls, marble floor, tables, chairs and televisions. The other aspect in the scene is the obscurity of it. This includes the dome glass roof, weapons wall, big open spaces and tall galleries. To directly link my building with my character, I used the animation to show his telekinesis with the doors and stairs. This also played on the environment. I made it look like the building was in space. Every superhero has a vehicle so I created a car that he could use to make fly down to earth from space. The character is meant to be a “bad ass” but he does care about what is going on in the world, therefore I thought it was appropriate for him to have multiple large TV screens with the news on and multiple computer screens in the office. The overall look of the place was established after seeing the lairs of “Smallville” and “Thor” which indicate large open spaces and rich materials. I tried to get this across with the trophies, pillars and large glass tables. Linking with the mystery on the character, I set the lighting so is had a very narrow distance but strong shadows to give highlight certain objects.

Overall I thought my project went well and linked nicely between my concepts drawings and building.