Silver Linings Playbook

Last night I watched the film “Silver Linings Playbook”. 

Congratulations to Jennifer Lawrence won the best actress for the Oscar. 

This film was Jools recommended to me. It’s have something the same about my script. Believe what you believe. 

During I watched this film, I was thinking about one question. What is normal? Behave like everyone else? Talk in a way that makes sense to the person you're talking to? What if the other party is too normal to make sense with? Everybody has their own way to live, if it is not a common way, others will think of a way to solve it, make it normal. Who are we that define what is normal or what is not? And how do we do that, by quantity? Like 10 of us here, if one behaves differently from the rest 9, that makes him/her abnormal? Have you ever wondered if there's something wrong with yourself that makes you impossible to fit in a certain group or circumstance? If yes, that scene might be your scenario, but do believe there's someone in there or elsewhere hanging as well.

Reference:Silver Linings Playbook, 2012. [Film]. USA: Weinstein Company. [Directed by David O. Russell.]

The third lighting session

The third lighting session has been hold in Roger's house. He want us to practice lighting skills in a practical environment, in the real actual room. 
In that room the sofa, television, desk lamp, adornment, fireplaces, and other environmental features are more obvious, but the light source is more complicated. The daylight from the window, desk lamp lighting, decoration glass reflective, television projection light, the fireplace orange flame, they all come out different light source. The size of the room is also very limit than the studio, we don't have enough space setting light source, so the situation is more limited. we need to solve these problems and use light to create an atmosphere.

Group work on directing class

On directing class, Deborah ask us to do a directing practice. Me, Sophia, D, Billy was a group to directing and shooting a short script.

We used iphone and spend one hour to shoot it. Here is the sample.

Timetable for PGD and MA phase

PDG phase

Week 27-28: Continue to read some books, journals and articles that mentioned in bibliography. Continue to watch some director’s film and undertake a comparative study of this director’s film in different period and different movie style. That is including: a Japanese director Iwai Shunji and a Chinese director Yimou Zhang.

Week 29-30: Consider about how to use colour to create one type of atmosphere through post-production phase. Write a script for a short film (about 3-5 minutes). Make a plan for the second short film.

Week 31: Start to learn After Effects, watch tutorials on the internet.

Week 32-33: Draw storyboard for my short film

Week 34: Shoot for the short film

Week 35: Make one part of my short film, and then adjust the colour through after effect to make the images have different effects (about 5-10 types)

Week 36: Show these short part to the audience who are selected members of the cinema going public, get some feedback from them.

Week 37: Interview effect artist in Broadway in order to know what visual effects they usually use in post-production phase. How can they change the final pictures of the film?

Week 38-39: Edit the film and finish it. Start to test the final film.

Week 40: Second phase Assessment

Week 41: Show the short film to some audience, to test what different feeling bring to them. Get some comments from them.

Week 42-43: Continue to learn After Effects, watch tutorials on the internet.

MA phase

Week 44-45: Continue to read some books, journals and articles relate to my project. Search for Tim burton’s work to learn how he creates a scene. See scene design pictures for he’s movies, learn how he design and prepare setting.

Week 46-47: Write a script for the third phase (about 5 minutes). Talk about my script with tutors and staff in school and Broadway to get some comments, and then rewrite or change some details about it.

Week 48: Draw some scenes which were need through the script. Make a plan for shooting my third short film.

Week 49-50: Expo tutorials. Shoot for the film

Week 53-3: Summer break. Editing my short film and finish it.

Week 4: Prepare for the Expo

Week 5-6: Expo

Week 7: MA assessment

Changed some detail about my script

Jools suggests me to add one scene， so that it can builds up a convincing contextual picture through the script.

The 5 key words is colourful, children's world, generation gap, believe, imagine.

The idea is about a little girl told her mother that she can see another colourful world through the pore that made by her hands.

In that world, sometimes, everything get bigger like through the magnifier. Sometimes, everything become multiple like through a kaleidoscope. This girl was very excited. She wanted to shared this vivid word to her mother. But her mother only can see the real word.

This is a story about believe and not believe things. I want to express that children and adults see the world is not the same, believe what you can see. Don't use your thoughts to destroy others world.

Here is my final script 《Your world, my world》

          EXT. ON THE ROAD. DAY

          A LITTLE GIRL is hopping,jumping and walking on the road

          with a big smile on her face. she use her hands form a hole

          and looking out through it. sometime, she look at the trees

          beside the road, sometimes she look at the blue sky and

          white clouds.

          INT. LIVING ROOM. DAY

          The Little Girl runs into the room.

                              LITTLE GIRL

                    Mom!!! Mom!!! Come and see! I can

                    see a colorful world through my

                    hands!

          The Little Girl's MOTHER comes out from the kitchen. The

          little girl pull her mother to sit down on sofa and shows

          the hole which is made by her hands to her mother.

                              LITTLE GIRL

                    Can you see it! the window become

                    bigger! look at this side, the

                    white wall become colorful.

          The little girl's mother looking through the hole that made

          by her daughter's hands.

                              MOM

                    What? What did you say? There is

                    nothing, just the white wall.

                              LITTLE GIRL

                    You can't see it? It's impossible.

          The little girl put her hands back and narrow her eyes, put

          the hole towards the white wall again. She look through the

          hole carefully.

                              LITTLE GIRL

                    Yeah, it is real, I can see the

                    white wall become red, er, now it

                    become pink. now it is yellow! It's

                    amazing, why you can't see it?

          The little girl shows the hole in front of her mother's eyes

          again.

                              LITTLE GIRL

                    Look, look carefully...Does the

                    white wall changed?

          The little girl's mother push the little girl's hands

          gently. Smile at her daughter,then she stand and walk to the

          table. she take the camera on the table and then she take a

          picture in front of the white wall, turn to look at the

          little girl. Show the picture to her daughter.

                              MOM

                    My dear, camera will not lie to us,

                    isn't it? See? The white wall

                    haven't change.There is no colorful

                    wall.

          The little girl twitched her mouth, frowned, nod her head

          gently. she did not seem pleased.

                              LITTLE GIRL

                    No, I believe I can see it. I'm

                    sure I saw it! I'll go outside to

                    see my world!

          The little girl run out of the room.

          EXT. IN THE PARK. DAY

          The little girl run to the park. She is looking through the

          hole that made by her hands. sometimes she is looking at the

          leaves on the tree, sometimes she is looking at the flowers

          beside the road. Her smile has turn back to her face

          gradually.

          She open her arms, take a deep breath and feel this world.

          She circled and smiled happily. The world around her begin

          to become vivid and colorful.

          EXT. IN THE PARK. DAY

          This scene takes place in a studio with a computer-generated

          background.

          The little girl is hopping,jumping and laughing in this

          world. Suddenly a bell ring come out. The little girl was

          shocked, she is looking back to the distance, but can't see

          anything. The bell continue to ringing. She looking at all

          directions nervously. The colorful world begin to lose

          color, become true appearance. The bell rang again.

          INT. BEDROOM. DAY

          The little girl open her eyes and she see the white ceiling.

          And then she turn off alarm clock. It was a dream, she seems

          a little disappoint. After a while, she turned around her

          eyes and sit up. She use her hands form a hole and looking

          out through it. The room become colorful again. She was

          shocked and get out of the bed immediately. Run to the

          living room.

          INT. LIVING ROOM. DAY

          The little girl come to the living room and take the camera

          on the desk. Then, she put the camera to the white wall and

          take a picture through the hole which is make by her hand.

          She find the white wall on the picture become colorful as well.

          

          

 

The second lighting session

We have done another lighting session last few days. 

On the session we use different light to create one scene looks like in a room. We also used yellow and blue gels to make it looks like in the day time and night time. It’s really useful when you want to create a scene at any time (if you have enough equipment). So that we can shoot daytime scene at night or night scene at daytime, no matter what the weather changes, it can save much time. When we look the pictures through the camera, it looks happened at that time. Use lighting equipment can create atmosphere as well.

Reflective: How to color grade DSLR footage

Colour grading is main tool to support the mood of the scene by changing or adding colours and contrast. After effects can help us do this, it’s very easy to play around. If you want to change or add contrast or highlights change it with the RGB curves.

After I watched this tutorial, I tried one clip which I recorded before. It’s very easy to get the nice mood images what we want. 

Lighting workshop

Last Tuesday we have a lighting workshop in Broadway. In that workshop I learned 6 types of lighting pattern.

1.       Split Lighting

Split lighting is exactly as the name implies – it splits the face exactly into equal halves with one side being in the light, and the other in shadow. It is often used to create dramatic images for things such as a portrait of a musician or an artist. Split lighting tends to be a more masculine pattern and as such is usually more appropriate or applicable on men than it is for women.

2.       Loop Lighting

Loop lighting is made by creating a small shadow of the subjects noses on their cheeks. To create loop lighting, the light source must be slightly higher than eye level and about 30-45 degrees from the camera.

3.       Rembrandt Lighting

Rembrandt lighting is so named because the Rembrandt the painter often used this pattern of light in his paintings. Rembrandt lighting is identified by the triangle of light on the cheek. Unlike loop lighting where the shadow of the nose and cheek do not touch, in Rembrandt lighting they do meet which, creates that trapped little triangle of light in the middle.

4.       Butterfly Lighting

Butterfly lighting is aptly named for the butterfly shaped shadow that is created under the nose by placing the main light source above and directly behind the camera. The photographer is basically shooting underneath the light source for this pattern. It is most often used for glamour style shots and to create shadows under the cheeks and chin.

5.       Broad Lighting

Broad lighting is when the subject’s face is slightly turned away from center, and the side of the face which is toward the camera (is broader) is in the light. This produces a larger area of light on the face, and a shadow side which appears smaller.

6.       Short Lighting

In short lighting, the face is turned towards the light source this time. Notice how the part of the face that is turned away from the camera has the most light on it and the shadows are falling on the near side of the face, closet to the camera. Simply put short lighting has shadows on the largest part of the face showing.

In the workshop, we also tried to make different types of lighting.

The script draft for my short film

Five key words:
1.Colorful  2.Children's world  3.Generation gap  4.Believe  5.Imagine

Aim for my piece:
Children and adults can see the world is not the same. Do not use your thought to destroy their world.

Your world,  my world.

          EXT. ON THE ROAD. DAY

          A LITTLE GIRL is hopping,jumping and walking on the road
          with a big smile on her face. she use her hands form a hole
          and looking out through it. sometime, she look at the trees
          beside the road, sometimes she look at the blue sky and
          white clouds.

          INT. LIVING ROOM. DAY

          She runs into the room.

                              LITTLE GIRL
                    Mom!!! Mom!!! Come and see! I can
                    see a colorful world through my
                    hands!

          THE LITTLE GIRL'S MOTHER comes out from the kitchen. The
          little girl pull her mother to sit down on sofa and shows
          the hole which is made by her hands to her mother.

                              LITTLE GIRL
                    Can you see it! the window become
                    bigger! look at this side, the
                    white wall become colorful.

          The little girl's mother looking through the hole that made
          by her daughter's hands.

                              MOM
                    What? What did you say? There is
                    nothing, just the white wall.

                              LITTLE GIRL
                    You can't see it? It's impossible.

          The little girl put her hands back and narrow her eyes, put
          the hole towards the white wall again. She look through the
          hole carefully.

                              LITTLE GIRL
                    Yeah, it is real, I can see the
                    white wall become red, en, now it
                    become pink. now it is yellow! It's
                    amazing, why you can't see it?

          The little girl shows the hole in front of her mother's eyes
          again.

                              LITTLE GIRL
                    Look, look carefully...Does the
                    white wall changed?

          The little girl's mother push the little girl's hands
          gently. Smile at her daughter

                              MOM
                    My dear, camera will not lie to us,
                    isn't it? Let's use camera to see
                    if it can see or not.

          The little girl frowned, nod her head gently. Her mother
          stand up and walk to the table and take the camera, and then
          she take a picture in front of the white wall, and turn to
          look at the little girl. Show the picture to her daughter.

                              MOM
                    See? The white wall haven't
                    change.There is no colorful wall.

          The little girl twitched her mouth, she did not seem
          pleased.

                              LITTLE GIRL
                    No, I believe I can see it. I'm
                    sure I saw it! I'll go outside to
                    see my world!

          The little girl run out of the room.

          EXT. IN THE PARK. DAY

          The little girl run to the park. She is looking through the
          hole that made by her hands. sometimes she is looking at the
          leaves on the tree, sometimes she is looking at the flowers
          beside the road. Her smile has turn back to her face
          gradually.

          She open her arms, take a deep breath and feel this world.
          She circled and smiled happily. The world around her begin
          to become vivid and colorful.

          INT. COMPUTER RENDERING SCENE. DAY

          The little girl is hopping,jumping and laughing in this
          world. Suddenly a bell ring come out. The little girl was
          shocked, she is looking back to the distance, but can't see
          anything. The bell continue to ringing. She looking at all
          directions nervously. The colorful world begin to lose
          color, become true appearance. The bell rang again.

          INT. BEDROOM. DAY

          The little girl open her eyes and she see the white ceiling.
          And then she turn off alarm clock. It was a dream, she seems
          a little disappoint. After a while, she turned around her
          eyes and sit up. She use her hands form a hole and looking
          out through it. The room become colorful again.

Art of the digital age

Artists who use time-based media in the 21st century have technologies at their disposal that could hardly have been dreamed of only a few decades ago. Professional production tools are now available for the desktop computer, and the it can be used every. It is very convenient in this contemporary society.

To realize a film work in the pre-digital age was difficult. Film runs through a projector at 24 frames per second, or 1440 images per minute. It is time-consuming and cost much more money. Through the digital machine, the film maker can change the final look for what they want. It is much easier to adjust the images when they shooting for film.

Reference: Bruce Wands, 2006. Art of the digital age. London: Thames&Hudson