LaMusica

The music option is the only part I am struggling with in my film opening. As of right now I have a royalty free song called Up! by Zenith Productions, its not upbeat very relaxing introducing more of a meaningful story. The pros of this pick is that it matches the song my actor is playing on the piano and as he is playing if I incorporate the music faintly in the back it lines up. However, the only thing is.. will the people watching think its boring.. will my audience like the said "meaningful" or "sentimental" vibe it gives in its film opening or stray away from it

In addition, when I showed my parents the very beginning they of my film opening that I already edited they said the music might be mistaken for what you think the boy is suppose to be playing on the piano. So! I think i’m going to lower the sound as I put the piano sound over it 

Filming And Its Recap part II

HOLAAAAA GOMERS 

The shots I shot today with my wonderful actor (brother) were exactly what I wanted. I shot every piano scene today and tomorrow I will be shooting the sport area of my film opening. The main character is playing lacrosse and my brother has practice tomorrow night and before I leave after dropping him off I will use him as well as a couple of his friends to shoot the small shots at the Tequesta Trace Field.

Just to the right is a little peak of my wonderful editing skills with the credits in the second shot of my film opening. 

Once school starts again I will be finishing the last shots in Ms. Wolfs room. I want to film a school scene where the main character is taking notes in class and then proceeds to fall asleep giving us an easy transition to him dreaming about playing the piano as it brings him joy and color, the boy will then wake up from his daydream to the sound of the belle ringing. After I get those shots (preferably Tuesday) I will edit every detail out of this film opening <3 

Here are some lovely pictures my sister took as we filmed today, enjoy!

<Me standing above Alexander for that perfect shot

 

^In the back of the shots is Alexanders room (obviously). We cleaned it up a bit because it was...messy...however, as you can see we have his desk and to the right a little metaphor that will be seen as the film opening goes on. The lacrosse stick next to the guitar gives us a little chance to see how our character is interested in both sports and music.

Thats it for this blog post, there will be more specific doings happening next time so stay tuned on this wonderful journey.

BYE GOMERS 

Costuming!

HI GOMERS! it’s time to talk about the costuming of my project because I really haven’t discussed the idea behind that :)

As you can see from the picture above my actors costume was a mix of a teenage boys everyday outfit combined with a hat that I wanted the character to wear to show a sense of hiddenness to the characters face.. In some cases that could be looked at as a negative thing however, the way I look at it is this is a film opening so if you want to see the character more you have to keep watching!!

The black shirt and jeans don't really symbolize anything except a basic teenage boy fit. In the other shots my character is wearing a lacrosse uniform with his team number on it as well as a school outfit that is similar to what he is wearing in the shot above just without the hat and a different shirt.

Bro.

Hi Gomer's hope everyones having an awesome day I have been through so much with this project we really do have a love hate relationship. I filmed my film opening last week like I said before I went on my trip to Disney. In Disney! I then started editing and trying to pull together some parts of the project however, I started noticing how long it was.. and how some shots were just simply not needed. 

I then had a whole confrontation with myself and started to think more about how I wanted this film opening to look overall because with the shots I had achieved there were some lighting issues, it looked too grainy for my liking, as well as some shots as stated being unnecessary. 

SO, Instead of deleted or editing some of my blogs I am really taking you guys along this journey. I have decided to pluck out some of the story line and shorten it to my liking.. I have now taken out the whole idea of color blindness because I find it creating to much of a film not a film opening and the editing would have taken me so long, including additional stress I do not need. I drew up a slightly new storyboard and decided to re-film some shots but still include some of the ones I liked from before. My main actor is my brother of course and I do live with him so its pretty easy to just say lets go film again!

Below is the slightly altered storyboard and here's a summery of what's going on :

- A coming of age film opening about a teenage boy in love with music who longs to be playing his lovely piano. He yearns to always be playing instead of whatever else he is doing.. 

Something I am still deciding on 

- The shots in color are the shots of him playing piano representing how the music brings him life and the shots that are in a more black and white represent how much he longs for the color and how nothing else brings him that.

Some of me really wants Ms. Stoklosa not to read this because I feel like she will be angry that I decided to flip my project a tiny bit.... HOWEVER I have gone through so much with this project that I am finally not rethinking or second guessing my thoughts on this and have full faith that this will be done editing by Friday night.

This has been a whole essay but thank you for following the Gom Blog and her crazy decisions she decides to make, I'll see you guys tomorrow after I start filming again with my brother <3

Filming and its Recap

HI GOMERS WE ARE BACK!

Its Sunday March 20th and we have finished filming every shot needed for my film opening. I finished filming on Friday and fixed a couple shots on Saturday morning. Everything went smoothly and I cant wait to start editing, which will be done mostly on my long car ride to Disney tomorrow morning

LETS GOO MARIO MIC DROP.

Recapping :

Friday I started filming around 2:30 in the afternoon I was struggling with the lighting at some points as well because the way my kitchen is set the light kept going in and out....so i kept waiting for the lighting to come back and thats the ONLY set back I had which was kind of fun. The pictures shown on the right and below are a little sneak peak of the vibe shown in my film opening...The music book with music sheets creates a sort of chaotic look as the character is just living his life making an egg :)

Right to the left is my filming set up🤩 Isn’t it beautiful my ring light broke so I had to level it out with my dogs food bin it was great. It ended up working really well however it was getting annoying moving the bin everywhere I went so I then just used a stabilizers for the rest of the filming day.

The next thing I wanted to talk about to all of you was the lighting effects I am having once I finish editing. I have been editing here and there on my trip however haven’t gotten to the part where the lighting will come on the screen then disappear. Below is the difference between those colors, in the first high angled shot that will be the full color seen when my character plays music and the second high angled shot will be his basic everyday life vision. He is color blind so I tried to edit and research how abs what color blind people really see, there is still a little bit of seen color but to other people it’s not the full thing obviously and I really wanted to portray that well.

That’s it for this blog guys! however, the next ones will be more of my editing process and ideas that come to me along the way

Thanks for tuning in with Gom! 

Finalizing

HI GOMERS

Below is my final story board. From the last time I spoke to you all we just had a group discussion about our projects in class and my fellow classmates told me I was missing some parts of my story..It seemed sort of plain to them and it did to me as well however, I didn't know how to fix it. Last night I stayed up laying in bed imagining different scenarios and outcomes and I concluded I was missing a chunk of "why is the color changing in my film opening", which I then came up with the idea of what if the main character was color blind.

Its a big step from what I was going from however, the main character now is color blind and that is why everything is black and white, when the character plays music he then can see color and figures that out towards the end of the film opening leaving viewers with the urge to find out what will happen next and how the small musician playing any type of music lets him see. The idea that he is color blind is shown more through his emotion as he looks at a flower in the first couple of shots and  later in the film opening as he's walking outside. I finally am set on this story and will be filming in about an hour. so YAY PROGRESS 

Now talking about my main actor. My friend Cristian who I wanted to use is currently in Tampa for a drama competition and I was going to film when he got back however, with everything i'm going through with the changes I really just want to film so I can have more time later to fix any boo boo's I don't like. In conclusion there will be another actor I am bringing in who was the runner up to Cristian WHO I know would love to help me and star in my Aice media portfolio project <3 and that one person is Alexander Gomez my brother yayyyyyyyyy. He said he would love to help and with my mind finally being made up with the story line and my brother also being able to play piano really helps solidify my perspective on my idea.

THE MUSIC

The music aspect is a big part of this project and making it look as real as possible. My brother can play the piano as I said so I think Im going to have him play something and record it and edit it back into the project to make the sound better however, my brother cannot play the guitar so! I will be putting a sound I found on bensound.com for royalty free music! The composer is Evert Zeevalkink and I love how it sounds especially with the aspect that the main character will figure out he can see when he plays music so it gives that emotional side to it.

After I film I will update you Gomer's on how it went as well as what still needs to be done! 

Thank you all for following along ill see you in a bit :)

Group Discussions (3/14)

Hi Gomers! Today in class we had our first group discussion for our film openings. They went very well, we gave each other feedback and critics. I started to talk about my project my group members listened and told me they love my idea especially the lighting aspect of it however, they do think I should change the storyline, sebastian said the story might be a little dull for my film opening like no point to the story! So going off of that i’m going to rethink some parts of the project mostly just WHY the main character loves music and WHY it causes the “light”.

My buddies and I <3

Filming Schedule

Hi Gomers! Lovely to speak to you guys again

Today I will be mapping out my schedule for filming as well as incorporating a very detailed and specific storyboard, just to put my mind at ease. I really want to be organized for the filming part of this project so this blog will be a layout of everything in my brain.

FILMING DATE : March 19th 2022

* My plan is to film my whole film opening next Saturday! I discussed with my fellow actor Cristian and he is free then as well which is perfect

EDITING : March 20th-25th

* Editing my film opening will begin directly after I film...However a lot of work will get done over the course of spring break which is the 21-15, a whole week I can dedicate just to this project 💚 In addition, I am going on a little trip to DISNEY LAND!! so the car ride up I will put in my headphones and just edit.

Very detailed layout of each shot 

1. High angled shot of pan PANING left - right 
2. Still high angle shot egg being cracked in (SIZZLE)(creating sounds as "music")
3. High angled shot of egg being put onto a plate 
4. Cristian sitting at a table Medium shot shows him eating breakfast (tapping a beat)
5. Over the shoulder shot of Cristian looking in mirror combing hair
6. Grabs keys, bag and phone THEN music book under other music sheets + guitar then runs out the door with a long shot/tracking shot
7. long shot of Cristian getting in car 
8. Shot of him driving 
9. Shot of car physically moving
10. Cristian parking 
11. Long shot (still) of Cristian walking to Starbucks WITH journal in his hand + guitar 
12. Goes in Starbucks - gets drink
13. Medium shot of Cristian sitting and drinking coffee<3 
14. Starts writing but scribbles trying to play guitar 
15. Looks left to right then gets up close up
16. Walks to "park" 
17. Sits at a tree
18. Long shot of Cristian writing/playing 
19. Having a hard time he gives up and PUTS IN EARPHONES 
20. Music starts to play WHAT MUSIC?????
21. Then Cristian is seen starting to write as if the music gave him L I F E
22. GETS EXCITED looks up from his journal
23. Tosses it to the side 
24. Close up shot of journal the wind flips the pages 
25. and title is shown 

MUSIC CHOICE :

*Once Cristian puts in his headphones.. Music will start playing.... But what? Im thinking of using the song AMAZING by Rex Orange County however the acoustic karaoke version. This version is more guitar where I would have the music start playing and once Cristian finally starts writing he can join in with said music on his "guitar". Below is the song I will be using I really like the part at 2:42-2:54 

https://youtu.be/Ky02Iwbhwxk

- Cristian will keep writing at 2:42-2:52 then will proceed to grab his guitar and play along with the music at 2:54

Thats it for now, love the progress we have made and I'll see you next time on the Gom Blog!

The Candidate

So here's the thing I am rethinking the gender of this character. I am trying to find an actor(one of my friends) who I know can give me the facial expressions I want as well as portraying the emotional part of the character very well. At the start I was thinking of a girl as the main character right? because why not? However, listing the people I thought would be good for this wasn't really putting my at ease. Concluding me in switching the character over to MALE. 

I spoke to one of my close friends Cristian Velasquez <3 and he said he would love to be a part of this journey of mine and I cant wait.

Having a male character brings a new light to my film opening. The main character is more quiet and to himself with a love for music.

Location

Hola Gomers! Now that we finally have our filming sequence, I can get started on the little aspects of this film opening and we can start really moving along with this piece. 

Alright so location. A lot is happening in my film opening, the character does not stay in one place she moves around and goes all around her neighborhood town just living her day.

 

Location sequence

- House 

- Car 

- Starbucks

- Park

Above is my locations throughout the film opening. First its a house (I will film in my house) Then in the car (my car) Next a coffee shop - Town center is right next to my house I will be utilizing the Starbucks there for more of my convenience - Lastly the park, at first I was thinking of using the park area by Town Center however I don't think the lighting and environment is what I'm looking for SO! I will be using my community park right down the street from Town Center.

______________________________________________________________

Figuring out the location and specifically where I want to film is important to me for a smooth filming experience. I don't want to be making big decisions as I'm filming which is why I'm planning everything thoroughly and strategically.

Stay tuned until next time on the Gom Blog!

Telling The Story

THE STORYBOARD 

GOMMMMERRRRS ITS STORYBOARD TIME 

First were going to map out the course of our film to get a basic idea of each specific shot I would like to incorporate THEN we will draw up a storyboard. 

Film opening sequence 

1. Scene opens with a crack of an egg on a pan
2. Slides a plate and puts egg on it
3. Eats 
4. Seen getting read (puts shirt on)
   
5. Grabs car keys and bag 
6. Grabs music journal underneath a bunch of sheet music 
7. Then runs out the door
8. Driving 
9. Parks 
10. Walks to a coffee shop 
11. Gets coffee and sits watching as people walk bye
12. Pulls out music journal tries to write but cant
13. Walks away 
14. Drives to a park
15. Walks to a tree and sits 
16. Pulls out her journal again tries to write..cant
17. Puts headphones on
18. Suddenly is writing 
19. Looks up then proceeds to get up and run away
20. The music book falls from her side 
21. Close up shot of book- the wind flips through the pages until one specific page
22. Title of film is shown

Now that we have laid out our storyboard sequence I drew up THE STORYBOARD, one that has each shot I want to incorporate based off of my thoughts for the sequence. Below you can take a look at this beauty, I worked hard on her. 

Im so happy were finally making progress!! I'll see you all next time on the Gom Blog. <3

Lighting 🌞

Hey Gomers it’s Gom back once again! Today we’re going to be talking about the lighting aspect of my film opening.

As you read in the last blog one main thing that happens in my film opening is that over the course of the story the lighting will drastically change, the main character goes through a development with music. Where without the music playing in her ear, her days are gloomy which will be portrayed by each shot being a sort of black and white such as the picture shown to the right. 

This picture shows more of a darker tone then I would like but it gives you an idea.. The character will be seen getting ready in the mirror just like this with a shoulder shot as well as putting clothes on in a single medium shot.

In the first picture on the right we have a Telephone box and it is brighter with color than everything else around it that is black and white. In the picture down below we have a dark shot with a brighter lighting coming in as a persons walking.

Both these shots are examples of how I want my characters emotional side to come across in the audiences eyes. I want it to show very clearly that the music switches the mood of the character to bright and difference in facial expressions. To add on, Im thinking of wanting to incorporate a sense of fantasy into this.. When viewers watch this film opening knowing how the music turns everything brighter as well as ending the opening with a said "page turner" it will also give them the sense of "what's gonna happen next" and  "is music more of a magical thing in this film?" things such as that, which i think will help intrigue viewers to continue watching.

In addition, my character will be feeling a lot in these clips showing the audience specifically how she feels through the lighting. She will put her headphones in as music starts to play the shots will continuously get brighter...the two pictures below will give you a good example on what I am looking to portray.

                     

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Take it back to the start

No one said it was going to be easy... 
I FINALLY figured out my idea..I talked with Ms. Stoklosa last class and we FINALLY FIGURED IT OUT GOMERS YAYYYY. This wasn't easy and I went back and forth with many ideas but I am indeed proud of this

A Girl who’s days are gloomy but then transformed by her love of music 

the scene opens with the girl cracking an egg on a pan you can hear the sizzle of the egg. She eats, gets ready one shot of clothes going over her head is seen then is blatantly seen grabbing her journal underneath a bunch of other music sheets of paper showing the viewers she likes music……she then gets in her car and drives to a coffee shop with all of this being gloomy colored grey and sad. She watches as multiple people walk by as she drinks her plain coffee — then proceeds to take her coffee and walk to a tree on top of a hill, she sits down and proceeds to put earphones in her ears as music starts playing the shots get brighter and less gloomy showing how the music is helping her. She then proceeds to write and its seen that she’s zipping through it. The screen is now in full color and now the character is seen getting up leaving her journal behind…The journal on the ground is then blown by the wind…the pages whip to a specific page that shows the title of the film. 

The end 

Struggling

I am having a hard time with my project idea, its not good enough for what I want to produce.. my idea doesnt flow well and is more of a story not a film opening. I am going to discuss with Ms. Stoklosa today about it to see what she thinks and ill get back to you guys....