CCR

My Creative Critical Reflection

Here is the link to my CCR: Stephanie's CCR
Back Up Link: CCR Backup 

Goodbye for now blog! :)

Film Opening

I Present... the Long Awaited Dead End

Who would have thought we would have made it to this point. Our film is finally here. After long hours editing, stressful searches for music, being jailed to our homes, and restless nights planning, I present Dead End. Enjoy :)

Link to Our Film Opening: Dead End (2020)

Backup Link: Dead End Backup

Project Reflection

A Bittersweet Finale

This project has been such a learning experience
about myself and films. It's so satisfying how this simple idea of a homeless man living in his car has developed over time. So many small details go into creating even just a short 2-minute opener.

Deciding to work with my partner Leandro was risky but helpful. Although we didn't know each other very well when picking partners, we decided to take a chance and work together. Working in a group can be scary, however, it went a lot simpler than I had imagined. It was very easy to bounce ideas off of one another, we never seemed to get stuck. If one of us had a bad idea the other one would let us know. He had strengths in editing while I had a notch for coming up with ideas, the team dynamic worked well. I even found that I was more likely to get the work done fast because someone else was relying on me. In addition to that, I saw that if I put my mind to things I could reach some goals I wouldn't have deemed possible. Even if it required hours of searching for just a 30-second background song to the title slide, it can be done.

This film opener was probably the most naturally flowing out of all of the projects I have completed in this class. Throughout my work in the year, I found that I constantly had issues with the theme; my projects always lost their focus. This time around we decided to create a film based on a simpler idea. We had a slight urge to go towards a complex idea but instead, we stuck with making are simple idea intricate and detailed. I also learned how planning plays such a key role in projects. All the planning and research that went into this project prepared me for the execution.

Throughout this project, I learned that I enjoy films. I have always loved art, however, I have gained a newfound respect for film and any type of media. I learned that a lot goes into a piece of work. We often consume media without even thinking but if you take a step back and think about what you're watching it's truly amazing how much thought and detail go into films. I did not expect to like this subject as much as I did and it is maybe something I would want to continue even after this year.

This is a bittersweet feeling. I am happy with the outcome of the project and that the stress if over, however, being creative is a lot of fun and it's sad it has to end. I am also going to miss my blog, which was surprisingly very fun for me to do.

CCR Planning

I Swear I can see the Finish Line

So now that I basically have the editing done, it is time to move on to competing the CCR. Honestly, the CCR has been something that has kinda stressed me out this whole project. It just feels surreal that this moment has finally come and we're at the finish line of the project. I am slightly nervous because i'm not sure how i'm going to go about filming the CCR but right now i'm planning on doing a voice over while showing visuals.

Questions

There are the four main questions that need to be answered in the CCR. My plan of attack is to make an outline for the points I want to make then develop a full script. I also cannot forget to include some data but luckily I can just refer back to my blog posts for that.

Outline (click to make larger)

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Editing Part 3

Reaching Home Stretch

We're getting so much closer to finishing the editing. We may be falling slightly behind the editing but I think we're still on track to finish. We have most of the beginning done, however, we have to fix up the end of the opener. I am hoping to be done with editing by Wednesday/ Thursday so I have enough time to edit/ film my CCR. Here are some newer updates/ obstacles we overcame.   :)

Title

I am so happy to announce that I overcame my issue! I realized I could just make the title on Power Point. To make the title look real, I took an individual photo of each letter from a mix of different Florida license plates (I took a pic of an "E" on one license plate and edited it on this fake one.) I also edited the colors a bit to look dull. I am super excited with the outcome and can't wait to see how it looks at the end of the film opening. We are going to match cut this title license plate with the car license plate. (Hopefully it goes smoothly.)

Sound

When we were filming we did capture some sounds of the road/ ambiance in the background, however, in order to bring these sounds out more we're just going to edit in our own. For the ambiance sound I searched up "highway sounds" into a copyright free sound browser and found one I thought best fit. We also want to place our own sounds for some actions to be emphasized or sound more realistic. The sound of the trunk closing we thought could be louder to add drama. Instead of looking this up we decided to incorporate a technique we learned in class. We used volley sound making by dropping a textbook on a marble ground. We think this will fit well for the sound.

Distribution

DIS  TRIB  U  TION

As we get closer to the due date, I am realizing I need to prepare my CCR video. I have viewed the questions in the past and made blog posts researching some of the topics. I have already covered target audience, representation, and even mentioned some technologies that aided in the creation of the project. The one thing that I haven't touched on is........ DISTRIBUTION.

I may have slightly avoided this blog post because I honestly don't know too much about film distribution. Additionally without school, Leandro and I haven't really discussed where/ how we would distribute the film. My teacher did briefly talk about distribution when discussing the CCR questions and I have researched distribution with other medias but it differs with smaller films. All I remember is that Leandro and I were leaning towards distribution the "film" into a festival because that is what most interested us during the lesson. To avoid the confusion, I need to research:

Distribution Research

So when it come to indie films, distribution may not come as simple. Large companies like Disney can easily distribute their media to the movie theaters and even advertise through their various platforms.

Festivals

This is a form of distribution that Leandro and I are very interested in. Film festivals either have theme or just be open to all and is where one can submit their film in hopes that it wins a prize orgains attention. With digital distribution increasing, festivals are not as popular but still serve as a good tool. There are large, renown festivals such as the Sundance Film Festival and the Cannes Film Festival. Smaller, local festivals such as the Miami International Film Festival also exist. A negative would be that not many people attend festivals. The majority tend to be people already interested in film or the industry.

Streaming Platforms

Recently streaming platforms such as Netflix and Hulu have gained a large popularity. People like the ability to steam movies whenever and wherever they choose. However, gaining a deal with a brand like Netlifx is not always easy. Luckily, there are also smaller streaming services where one can attempt to make a deal with. Having one's film on a streaming service can allow for a large group of people to see it. Additionally, many streaming services cater the movie selections per viewer which would allow for the film to be easily distributed to its target audience. The negatives are that it can be difficult/ detrimental to sign a film away to a larger company.

Streaming Web Sites

Although some may consider something like "Youtube" to be a streaming platform, I put it in its own category because it functions differently. Often times for sites such as YouTube, Vevo, or even smaller streaming sites like Film Hub, no account or subscription is necessary. It is usually very easy to distribute your own content on these sites and it can be viewed by a large amount of people. The negatives are that there are often a lot of competition of sites like these and it may be difficult for one's film to gain popularity. However, some sites such as Film Hub specialize in distributing Indie films.

These 3 forms of distribution seem to be most popular in the indie film industry. However, after doing some research and analysis we believe it would be best to distribute our film in smaller local festivals and both large/ specialized streaming sites. We think it would be strategically best to disregard streaming platforms.

Final Music

Music At Last

So after many days (maybe even weeks) of looking for the right music, we found a song! Like I mentioned in a previous posting, we already found one of the songs we needed (the rock song). We now had to find a sad, slower song for the end of the film opening. It was difficult because we were relying on getting Brent Faiyaz's permission to use his song "Natural Release." Unfortunately, he never got back to us.

Finding this song took much longer than expecting. It was difficult to find a song as good as "Natural Release." Some sad songs we heard were too fast paced and upbeat, while some were too depressing. It seemed as if nothing could fit into the opener. Luckily, I got the idea to look up what instruments Brent Faiyaz used in his song in hopes that I could find a somewhat similar song. After doing a quick google search, I found out that he used a bass guitar and that his song was sort of mimicking the blues genre. So with this new information, I continued my search.

Finally, I discovered a website called freemusicarchive.org, which had a pretty good variety of songs. I found this royalty free song that was labeled "Psychedelic Blues." Although it may not be as good as "Natural Release" it still gave off a sad and perplexed vibe. This is the song we are deciding to stick with for the end of the opener. The official song is called "Psychedelic Blues"- Lobo Loco.

Listen Below :)

Sound

On the Search for Sounds

Sound is something that my partner and I knew would be essential to our opener. Since we are showing a man driving, we need to incorporate all of the sounds one would hear while driving. This will allow for our opener to feel real and accurate. Throughout the film we want to play around with sound and the lack of sound. We believe this will help us with emphasizing some actions/ emotions.

Our first step with sound in making a list of all of the necessary sounds we need to make or find on a copyright free website.

Primary Sound List

• Car engine + car driving
• Radio + Radio Music
• Car keys
• Hands hitting steering wheel in frustration
• Trunk Closing
• Phone Call Conversation
• Heavy Breathing 

Secondary Sound List

• Background road
• Birds chirping 
• Air Conditioner
• Moving around in car
• Placing Car in park

We already have some sounds such as the phone calls and hands hitting the steering wheel recorded. The rest of the sounds we will have to find online or create through foley. We would love to incorporate some foley sounds for possibly the trunk closing and keys dangling. For the trunk my idea is to record a textbook hitting the ground. The key sound can be created by shaking up some change.

One of my favorite websites to find copyright free sound effects: https://freesound.org

Editing Part 2

Editing Dilemmas 

So Im not going to lie... I have a confession to make. The reason I am not blogging much about editing are because to two reasons. 1) My partner Leandro is going to be the main editor for the project (Of course I will still contribute) 2) We have been procrastinating.

Although we got the filming done pretty fast, we have not been so productive with the editing. I have already uploaded all of the film and we have started the editing beginning of the opener, however, we are working slow. To be fair, we do have this upcoming week in our schedule to finish editing. Leandro and I are in the process of overcoming this procrastination but we are reaching some dilemmas. The challenges that I have been assigned to overcome are the title and whether or not we should include some credits.

Title

We had no trouble choosing our film title "Dead End." We even figured out how we want to display the title very quickly. Like mentioned in a previous blog post, we wanted the title to mimic a license plate. The issue is that we haven't found the best service to edit this on. First, I tried editing the title on Mac Pages. I looked up a template of a plain Florida license plate which was pretty simple. However when tt came to placing our title, it was coming out slightly wonky looking. We also tried looking online to see if there was a "license plate maker" online. Unfortunately, most of the "makers" looked unprofessional or blurry. I think we are going to stick to editing our own title. This time around I may use Microsoft Word or download some new editing service I find.

Credits

Obviously a large portion of the opener consists of the credits. We have already established the fact that the credits will appear on objects placed around the car. A dilemma we're facing is whether or not we should place our "production company" logo at the beginning of the film as well. We placed the logo on an object in the car but we think it may look more professional if we also place the logo clearly in the beginning. We are also unsure if we should give credit to the copyright free music we are now incorporating. If we did so we would have to type it on the screen which wouldn't align with the rest of the credits aesthetic. As of now, we are leaning towards placing the "production company" logo twice and not giving credit to the song artists.

Music Update

*Queue the Sad Music*

So these last couple of days/ weeks have been kinda depressing. Well that might be an overreaction but its just crazy that for the first time ever I want there to be school. Its my senior year and as corny as it may sound I want to experience all my senior activities like Prom Graduation and so on (I know first world problems). However, the good news is that I have a TON of time to work on this project.

Ok but the real reason I'm kinda sad is that Brent Faiyaz never responded to Leandro and I's messages. We were really hoping to use his song "Natural Release" for the second half of the opener. However, we are going to take this lack of response as a sign to use another song. Luckily there are tons of copyright free music out there for our choosing.

Music Decisions 

So my teammate and I have decided to place music in two parts of the opener. This is something we finally decided after a couple of weeks of contemplation.

First Song

So the first song we want to place in the opener is going to be an instrumental rock song. We want the music to capture the characters aggressive and overwhelmed feelings. The song is going to be a diegetic sound that comes from the radio while he is driving. Fortunately, rock songs are sort of easy to find. When I was editing I put a rock song that came along with the WeVideo editing service and it honestly fit. Its strange that I found the song so fast but it honestly fits. If I do not find a better song I will just keep this one.

Song: Hard Day- BaltaZzar

Second Song

The second music will play for less time than the first. This song will fade in towards the end of the opener when things shift from an angry to sad tone. This will be a non-diegetic sound. The song needs to be slower and give off a mood of sadness and reflection. It can have lyrics or just be instrumental (whatever works). I have not found the right song for this yet but I will continue to search. This song has definitely been a harder one to find. Since we were planning on using "natural Release" for most of the projects duration, it has been hard to find another song that will fit the vibe as well as that one did.

Editing + Updates

The Corona Virus 

So this week keeps becoming more and more hectic. I continue to reach obstacles that I didn't expect to come across. The biggest obstacle being the Corona Virus or COVID-19. This illness has caused schools in my area to shut down for at least up to April 15. This is an issue because the project was due on on April 5. This would mean that Leandro and I wouldn't be able to meet up like we had hoped. "Can we just meet up outside of school?" one may ask. Well we could but it is extremely difficult considering every place is closed and we are supposed to be practicing "social distancing" and staying home.

However, at the end of the day health comes first. It is important that we follow our given instructions to stay safe. The only down fall is that Leandro and I are no longer going to have time to edit in class together, which is something we had hope for.

Solutions

Now enough of all the negatives. Luckily we are good at solving problems and we now have a set plan. A couple of days back my teacher Mrs. Stoklosa informed us that the due date for this project would be moved back to April 12. This is actually a relief for Leandro and I. We thankfully filmed before the Corona Virus got worse. Which means we really only have to edit and complete the CCR in these upcoming weeks. I honestly believe this is more than enough time to do everything.

Now for the editing problem. We had originally planned for Leandro to be the main editor for the opener. However, we also planned to do most of the editing together in class so that we could both contribute. Our solution to this is going to be to use WeVideo. This editing service (provided by our teacher) allows us both to edit the film. This is not exactly what we had envisioned but its as close as we will get to "editing together." Additionally, we may have to FaceTime or Skype to figure out some last minute concerns with the project.

At the end of the day I'm grateful that we were able to adapt to the situation. I have heard many other of my fellow peers be in situations much worse where they had to change the entire topic. Hopefully all goes well for them and Leandro and I.

Updated schedule

03/23-03/29 blog + edit

03/30-04/06 blog + finish editing 

04/06-04-12 blog+ CCR + figure out distribution 

Deciding Our Target Audience

Who's Our Target?

Now that we have done target audience research, representation research (a lot of it may I add), and even finished filming, it is time to decide our target audience. We must decide if we want to stick with the typical drama target audience or take a different approach. Luckily Leandro and I were both able to agree on something fairly easily.

Figuring out who and what we were representing was necessary in deciding our target audience. Through research, I have found that representation plays a big role in deciding the target audience. A film representing women as powerful will attract mostly females. While a film representing the struggles a person of color may face, will attract many African Americans. That being said we don't want our target audience to be homeless people (that would be extremely unrealistic), instead we want to target people of the same age and background as the actor.

Age

Image Link

Our opener portrays a 'young adult' male living in his car. We thought it would be best for people around his age to hear this story and become informed about the situations people their age are living in. The target audience of most dramas are usually between 17-50. This means we would like our target audience to be slightly more focused on the younger end of the spectrum. Of course the "film" could be enjoyed by someone older, however, we want to make an impact on this age group specifically (17-30).

Ethnicity

Image Link

This year films portraying different races/ ethnicities are finally gaining popularity. It is so empowering that some non represented groups are finally being shown in film. We wanted our film to have that same energy. Like mentioned in a previous blog post, latinos are rarely shown in the film industry. We want our film to go against this and have our lead actor be Puerto Rican. By doing this, we know our film is much more likely to attract latinos. This caused us to make the decision to target to latinos as a whole (not just Puerto Ricans). We believe this is also smart considering a large majority of  U.S. citizens have some latino in them.

Gender

As for gender, we want to target both male and females equally. We know that mainly women go to see dramas, however, the fact that there is a male lead and a more "masculine" theme, we believe men would enjoy the film as well. We want our target audience to not be limited on gender.

Image Link

Economic Status

Image Link

Like I mentioned earlier in this blog post, we don't want to target to homeless people because many would not go to see a movie. However, in terms of economic status we would want to target middle to high class since people in these categories are often the ones who go see movies anyways. By doing this we would hope that the middle to high class people are able to become less ignorant of the situation homeless people endure. We want the stereotype that "all homeless people are bad people" to break.

Further Representation Research

Representation Returns

Representation is such a wide scope category that it needed a second posting. However, this time I want to investigate representation in a more specific way. Instead of looking at the film's industry representation as a whole, I want to delve into how this would apply to my project. That being said, I want to research who makes up homeless people. Leandro and my goals are to know the group we are representing well. We want to see how our film challenges or represents the group.

Luckily we did some minor research during one of our brain storming sessions (aka a couple of google searches). We looked up the race/ ethnicity that makes up most of homeless people. We saw that white males were most popular. This is when Leandro and I got the idea to add some Hispanic elements into the film. Of course our actor Leandro is a white male, however, we know that the film industry is already crowded with white male actors. So we decided to have the character speak some spanglish in the film opening and we also incorporate some Spanish snacks and even a Puerto Rican Flag (luckily Leandro is also Puerto Rican). We think this was a smart idea because it allows us to stay true to the group we are represented but also stepping out a little.

Additionally, we want our film opening to take place in South Florida. This place (also where we live) is made up of many latinos. So having the actor be of Spanish origin just made sense.

Common Puerto Rican Snack we
featured in the car.

Phone accessory that has the Puerto Rican
flag on it. (Placed on back of phone
while making phone calls.

When coming up with the idea for our film we also considered having a family live in a car instead of just one person. Although this may have been a unique concept, we thought it would be difficult to find another committed actor. Luckily the majority of homeless people are on their own. According to  The 2018 Point in Time Count , individual men make up 67% of the homeless population. This means that our film opener would represent the majority in this category.

From rampages.us. Shows demographics of homeless people.

Obviously, we did decide to have a male actor. This was more because Leandro is a better actor than me, however, again is true to most homeless people. The majority of homeless people are males. So call it coincidence or planned but it works.

Overall I would say that Leandro and I don't mind going against some of the film's industry stereotypes. We want to take a different approach and show homeless people in a different light. However, we also want to ensure that our film is representative of homeless people as a whole. We don't want to further our film too much from the norm. By creating a hispanic white male, we believe we are reaching this happy medium.

Sources:

“Demographic Data Project: Gender and Individual Homelessness.” National Alliance to End Homelessness, endhomelessness.org/demographic-data-project-gender-and-individual-homelessness/.

Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on Health Care for Homeless People. “Who Are the Homeless?” Homelessness, Health, and Human Needs., U.S. National Library of Medicine, 1 Jan. 1988, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK218239/.

stephanieps21. Univ 112 Stephanie Saavedra, 29 Aug. 2015, rampages.us/stephanieps21/2015/08/29/why-the-homeless-need-stories/.

Filming Day

The Big Day

Today was finally the day that Leandro and I meet up to film our opener. The good news is that filming went pretty smoothly. The bad news is that besides this project, a lot has been going on. School has be temporarily cancelled due to the corona virus becoming a larger issue. This is somewhat stressful because that means we have less time to meet up and edit the project together. However, we are going to try and stay optimistic.

How the day went?

Well Leandro and I kept our decision to film today. We did not let the virus or school cancellation alter our plan. However, we did decide to push our filming time earlier and also switched locations. Originally we had wanted to film around 1 pm. However a couple of days ago, we decided to start around 10 (a little ambitious looking back at it) because we wanted to make sure we got a lot of sun and had enough time to film. We actually ended up starting at 11 because we had to gather some last minute props. In terms of location, we were debating going to film at a church, however, it is Sunday and we were unsure how crowded it may be. Instead we filmed at the Home Depot parking lot which was perfect. Not many people were out due to the virus and the Chick-Fil-A next door was empty because it was a Sunday (a blessing because that Chick-Fil-A is always crowded).

Filming Obstacles

Overall, I would say Leandro and I did not face many obstacles while filming. We were able to film it all relatively quickly. Setting up the set design took slightly longer than expected. We had to ensure the car looked lived-in so we spent extra time debating where to put everything. In the end, we were satisfied with the look.

Leandro and I setting up the car.

Probably the main issue we faced was trying to film in the car. My car is pretty small so it was difficult to get Leandro in the frame at times (especially when I had to film him driving). Additionally, it was hard to get a variety of shots in the small car. We are hoping that we filmed enough for the 2 minutes and that the shots don't look redundant.

We even had to push the seats forward to even get some of the shots.

Our last issue was trying to get the final shot. We want to incorporate a shot of the homeless man closing the trunk. The only issue with this is that my reflection kept showing up on the side. We know that if the "cinematographer" is visible in the film it will seem unprofessional. We are pretty sure we got a good shot without me in it, however, sometimes we don't notice mistakes until editing.

Filming in One Day?

Yes I know it sounds crazy but Leandro and I were able to film in one day. In just a couple hours we were able to get every shot we needed. We thought this was a smart idea because it ensured the set design was consistent throughout. We also found that it was simple to film all in one day. We did not have to change location or costume so it was simple to do it all.

Now onto editing...

Representation Research

Representation within Dramas and The Filming Industry...

One strength the drama genre has is that it is one of the best genre in terms of representation. Dramas tend to be about hard hitting or "dramatic topics." Due to this, many stories of unrepresented people, groups, or ideas have been able to come to light. Everything from disability, older age, minority groups, and poverty can be shown through dramas. The wide variety of representation that can be shown is what attracted me to this genre in the first place. I wanted a film that could represent a taboo idea/ group in a different light.

Moonlight (2016)
Represents an individual dealing with his sexuality
 within the black community.

Popular Themes Represented in Dramas

• Mental Illness 
• Social Issues
• Teen issues
• Black Lives Matter
• Different Industries
• Different Jobs
• Sexuality
• Poverty

What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993)
Represents a mentally impaired child.

Popular Groups Represented in Dramas

• Different Ethnicities/ Races
• Communities
• Countries
• Workers
• Families
• Disabled people
• Different Age Groups
• LGBTQ+ community

What is Lacking?

Despite the large variety of themes/ groups that are represented in Dramas, we cannot ignore that the representation in the film industry is weak. It is obvious that most featured actors/ film workers are the white males. 

Click to enlarge. From Statistica.com.

In recent years we have been seeing more women actresses. In this chart from Statistica.com, the amount of lead roles is shown from 2011-2019 by gender. There is a rise in female leads, however, males still continue to dominate. According to Jamie Doward from The Guardian, male stars earn more than $1 Million more per film than women. Even if a women manages to get a lead role there is great likelihood that she is getting paid less than her male costars. 

Additionally, we see that white people are the most features on the big screen. Unlike gender representation, this ethnicity/ race gap is not to lessening. We often see Hispanics as the least represented group in Film, despite making up a large part of the American population.

Click to enlarge. From thoughtco.com.

Even the lack of diversity is evident behind the scenes with the majority of directors and writers being males. Again the number of women in this field is beginning to rise, however, they face yet another challenge with being respected in the industry. Women are constantly being walked over and losing awards to their male counterparts. Whether infant or behind the screen, women are poorly represented.

Lastly, drama is a genre with more diversity/ representation than the average film. However, it is still clear that some groups continue to be underrepresented in film. Along with Hispanics, groups such as the disabled, mentally ill, LGBTQ+, and so on continue to be poorly represented. Not enough films are being made about these groups/ ideas. The drama genre does contribute to overcome this lack of representation, however, this cannot be said for the film industry as a whole.

Sources:

Cole, Nicki Lisa. “Just How Bad Is Hollywood's Diversity Problem?” ThoughtCo, ThoughtCo, 28 Sept. 2019, www.thoughtco.com/diversity-in-hollywood-3026690.

The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/15/hollywoods-gender-pay-gap-revealed-male-stars-earn-1m-more-per-film-than-women.

MasterClass. “10 Classic Movie Themes With Examples - 2020.” MasterClass, MasterClass, 22 Oct. 2019, www.masterclass.com/articles/10-classic-movie-themes-with-examples#10-classic-movie-themes-and-why-they-matter.

Watson, Amy. “Gender Distribution of Lead Actors in Movies in the U.S. 2019.” Statista, 17 Feb. 2020, www.statista.com/statistics/692465/distribution-lead-actors-gender/.

Target Audience Research

The Typical Target Audience

Before deciding exactly who we want to target for this movie, Leandro and I thought it would be beneficial to research who typical dramas are targeted to. Although drama subgenera can impact the target audience, this is what I found to be most typical.

Male or Female?

Dramas are usually targeted to women. It seems that within the filming industry, women enjoy to consume more drama and romantic movies while men lean towards action. That being said, the ratio of men to women audience can alter for every movie. Some dramas such as the Titanic (1997) has a more female audience when a drama like Ford V. Ferrari (2019) has a large male audience. Since drama is so broad, the theme/ topic of the movie is really what impacts the audience's "gender."

Click picture to enlarge. Survey from Statista.com. Conducted in
December 2018 with more than 2,000 participants all 18+.

As shown by the online survey from Statistica.com, more women state Dramas as their favorite movie genre than men. It seems as if men prefer Action, Adventure, and Comedy before Drama. While for women, Drama is tied for first as their preferred movie genre.

Old or Young?

Unlike gender, Dramas are very diverse when it comes to age. Usually the target audience will vary depending on what the film is rated or the film's theme. However, we found that the age range for dramas are typically 17-50. This makes sense considering that many dramas cover sensitive or mature topics. A drama like the Joker (2019) may be geared more for the younger side while Roma (2018) leans to the older side of the target audience.

Click picture to enlarge. Graph from Stephenfollows.com.

Overall we can define the target audience as adults (young to older adults). Just as the chart shows, adults seem to consume and be targeted by dramas. However, there it is evident that dramas are enjoyed more by older adults.

Race/ Ethnicity?

Dramas are targeted and consumed by a wide variety of races/ ethnicities. Typically the target audience's race/ ethnicity is impacted by the films representation/ theme. A film such as The Hate U Give (2018) focuses around the theme of police brutality and black lives matter. Therefore causing the target audience to mainly consist of African Americans. While the film Little Women (2019) is about a white women and therefore has a more "white" audience.

Sources:

“How Do Movie Genre Tastes Change with Age?” Stephen Follows, 16 July 2018, stephenfollows.com/changes-in-movie-genre-tastes-with-age/.

Levin, Gary. “Who's Watching What: TV Shows Ranked by Racial and Ethnic Groups.” USA Today,  Gannett Satellite Information Network, 28 June 2017, www.usatoday.com/story/life/tv/2017/06/27/whos-watching-what-tv-shows-ranked-racial-and-ethnic-groups/103199848/.

Watson, Amy. “Favorite Movie Genres in the U.S. by Gender 2018.” Statista, 12 Dec. 2019,
www.statista.com/statistics/254115/favorite-movie-genres-in-the-us/.

Props

Preparing the Props

Since filming day is just 5 days away, Leandro and I had to finalize our props. More specifically, we had to finish making some of the props. Like mentioned before, we wanted to have the credits appear on objects around the car. Leandro made about half of the objects while I did the others.

Our first step to making the props was to do a sketch so I drew out some ideas of objects we could put the credits on. This allowed us to divide the props easily and have a game plan going into it. Although we didn't completely stick to these sketches, it really helped to envision and create our props.

This is probably my least favorite of the group.
Leandro and I may cut this out of the film
opener, however, we are still deciding.

Again this is one of my favorites. It looks pretty
realistic in person.

Instead of putting the credits on a chip bag,
 we decided to put it on a cracker box. This
was much larger/ easier to read.
Probably my favorite credit prop.

We kept this idea true to the sketch.

Now that we have all of our more specific props made, we can just focus on collecting the rest of the set design. We still need to collect toiletries, blankets, bags, snacks, and so on.

Set Design Research

One Week Until Filming

As we get closer to the filming date we need to finalize our set and gather our props. On top of that we need to gather the props that we wanted to write the credits on. Before finalizing any set designs, we wanted to compile some research. We specifically researched movies that had to showcase poverty/ low class families through set design.

Examples of Low Class through Set Design

Joker (2019)

This film showcases the Joker as someone who is poor and struggling. In order to showcase that his living conditions are not the best, he is shown in an old styled apartment. Many dull colors such as beige, orange, and yellow are used throughout. Additionally 70s florals and worn out furniture give the impression that the family cannot afford new things.

The Hunger Games (2012)

This film portrays a whole district that is poor. One of the tactics used to have this idea come across is by playing with the set design. Again very dull colors are used throughout such as whites, beiges, and browns. This time we see a lack of items to show that they cannot afford many things. The furniture and walls also appear to be dirty which can be associated with poverty.

The Blind Side (2009)

This film is about a homeless teen who gets taken in by a rich family and eventually becomes an NFL player. In the scenes where the audience sees his home town, it is evident that he is/ was in a low income family. His mother's house appears to be filled with trash and is very cluttered. This gives the appearance that she is distressed or has no time to clean which many poor people deal with. Again dull colors and low lighting are used to give the place a gloomy and poor look.

Overall we see that poverty/ low income status can be shown in various ways. To portray that our homeless man is living in his car, we will take some of these well-produced movies into consideration. We want to incorporate dull colors as well as having a cluttered/ dirty space. However, we also need to remember that poor/ homeless people cannot afford much so we don't want to overdo it.

Music

Last Minute Music

Although Leandro and I have not even filmed/ edited our film yet, we were already thinking of what songs we wanted to incorporate. We know we want to use a more upbeat and aggressive song to play on the radio as he is driving in the first couple of seconds. This will serve as a diegetic sound that may or may not become non-diegetic (we are still playing around with this idea). We also want a non- diegetic song to play at the end of the opening and when the title is shown. Leandro and I want this song to be more somber and slow.

While we were brainstorming a little bit about music, I came up with a song that would fit well for the sad music. The song "Natural Release- Brent Faiyaz" would fit perfectly the only issue is that we would have to ask for his permission to use it. This wouldn't have been too much of an issue if we had asked during week one, but of course we waited until week four. Despite this we still wanted to ask. Maybe some miracle would occur and he would answer. We had trouble trying to figure out how to ask for permission, however, we asked Mrs. Stoklosa (our teacher) and she advised us to contact him on email or social media. The song was produced by him, not a label, so we needed to go to him directly.

I emailed him and texted him on Instagram's direct message while Leandro used Twitter to message him. So far we haven't heard any responses, however, we are still hopeful. We are going to wait for a response up until we have to edit. If Brent Faiyaz does not grant his permission by then we will have to find another song that is free of copyright.

Originally Leandro and I wanted to stick with only using copyright free music to make things easier on us, and we still plan to do so for the other song. The only issue with copyright free music is that is can be hard to find. My teammate and I researched some websites that have royalty free music that we plan on looking through once we reach that stage.

Some Websites with Royalty Free Music

• Royalty free music from Bensoundwww.bensound.com › royalty-free-music
• Free Music For Creators | The Right Music - Rights Free‎Ad·www.evokemusic.ai‎
• Royalty Free Music | 100% Copyright Clear | PremiumBeat.com‎Ad·www.premiumbeat.com‎
• Free Music Archivefreemusicarchive.org
• Royalty Free Music - Find Your Perfect Track - PremiumBeatwww.premiumbeat.com › royalty-free-music

Schedule + Labels

Half Way Point

So now that we are half way through our project, we thought it was necessary to make a schedule. With only 4 weeks left and so much to do, we don't want to fall behind. With a busy schedule, spring break, and school going on at the same time, we need to have a set plan. So we currently have finally set a film date/ time (FINALLY!) and estimated schedule for the editing.

The Schedule

03/04 to 03/14: Finalize the props and costume design. Finish making the props and placing everything in the car. Making sure the costume looks accurate and buy/ borrow anything if necessary.

3/15: Day of filming. Start around 1pm until filming is done. Hopefully only one filming day so that the costume and set design looks the same throughout the film opening.

03/16 to 03/29: Start and finish editing. Here we will need to find some music, titles, sounds, and so on. We also need to sort through all the footage and edit.

03/30 to 04/05: Complete the CCR and do the last touches. We hope to be done with editing as well.

Production Label

Although having a production label was not necessary, my teammate and I wanted to create our own to add into the opener. We believe this will make the credits look more authentic while also giving credit to both my teammate and I. We may decide to add more onto the the logo, however, we have already finalized our "production company name." We want to name the "company" BS productions playing on the fact that my last name is Boyarsky  while my teammate's is Schenquerman. Ironically it also sound like a curse word one uses to call something out for being fake.

Our Production Company Logo

Group Meeting

The Group Meeting + Advice

This week my teacher had us get into groups and talk about our projects. This was meant for us to get advice and feedback by our peers. I enjoyed getting to help others with this tedious project, especially the ones who are working alone and have no one to bounce ideas off of. I am happy to say that a couple of my group members were able to overcome big dilemmas in terms of plot and even film titles. Personally, I would say my experience went very well. My group members really listened and gave me some good pointers on how to tackle some of my problems.

Location

One of the biggest issues my teammate and I were facing was where to film the scene. We obviously knew we wanted to film in a car, however, we were still unsure where to park the car. We needed a parking lot that is empty during the day which can be difficult to find in our home town. Additionally, we didn't want to go anywhere too far because that may waste too much time and be a hassle. My group advised me to check out this Church that is always empty during the day. It is located just 5 minutes away from my house and is always empty during the day. Without the help of the group, I would have probably still been stressing about where to film.

Film Location

Title Name

In terms of our film title, we had some ideas but never finalized any names. My teammate and I really liked the name "Dead End," however, we were unsure if it was too cheesy. After asking for my peers opinion, I can confidently say that "Dead End" will be our film title. My peers thought the name captured the theme of the film without being too cliche. This made my teammate and I feel much more assured with the direction of the film opening.

Makeup

Lastly for costume design, or more specifically make up, my peers gave me some tips on what it should look like. They want our actor to truly look homeless so they advised me to possible put some dark eye shadow under his eyes to make him look tired. They also thought it would look realistic for our actor to grow out some stubble or even put make up on him to give the allusion of a beard. The only issue with this is that our actor (who is also my teammate) doesn't want to have that much makeup on him. So we might not play around with make up too much. I don't want to have the actor/ my teammate feel uncomfortable while acting.

Storyboard

I Present... the Long-dreaded Storyboard

Click Picture to View Larger

Now for one of the steps my teammate and I have been dreading the most... the storyboard. Both Leandro and I are not the best at drawing, so creating a storyboard is never that much fun. We find it simple to brainstorm the shots and camera movements we want to do but we have difficulty replicating the shot onto paper. Despite this, we still know that creating the storyboard is at our best interest for the long run.

Click Picture to View Larger

The storyboard is very essential when working with another brain. This allowed Leandro and I to make sure we have the same vision. Often times it can be difficult to express an idea through conversation, however, a visual helps overcome this. Additionally, creating the storyboard is a time saver. Both Leandro and I have busy schedules and finding the time to film is going to be a challenge. However, having a plan and the order of the shots we want to create is going to save a lot of time while filming. Of course we may have some on-the-spot-changes, but this is more-or-less our plan.

If my Drawings don't Translate too Well, we also have the Wordy Version

(List of Shots)

1) Music/ car sounds fade in as car  gets close
2) Back seat looking at road ahead; shaky shots
3) Side view window; shaky shots; trees/ background shown moving fast
4) Shot of side view mirror; POV shot; Person is shown through mirror; shaky
5) Shot of front view; mid-shot of man looking stressed: shaky
6) Shot of side view; pans slowly right; mid-shot; side profile; shaky
7) POV of rear view mirror while turning; shaky close-up
8) Shot from back side as he parks; mid shot; last shaky shot
9) Close-up facing him as he is parked
10) Series of close-up and mid shots of person on phone; some zoom-ins
11) Close-up shots of trash/ items + credits
12) Series of sweep shots of car; left + right pans
13) Close-up shot of feet; zoom in slowly; shows him stepping out of car
14) Left pan inside of car; follows person through window; follows until reaches trunk
15) Slight Tilt up; high angle shot; camera sees person looking back at the camera
16) POV shot of person looking in trunk; low angle shot
17) Series of shots that zoom out; from close up of face to parking lot; man yells out; shows he parked outside of lines
18) Camera tilts down as trunk closes; match-cut of the license plate to the title (Deadend???)