A New Schedule

 

   I figured out how to have text and a photo next to each other (thank you to the system of trial and error)! This is a small but mighty feat because I was honestly struggling to achieve this…

    So! To the left, is my new schedule for the project. I wanted to make a new one because I started to see that I was on a different track than how I had initially planned so I rewrote it to be more aligned with my current pace. I think this will actually be more beneficial because I have moved up the time to when I am supposed to begin filming for the film opening, which will ultimately be the most time consuming area of the project as the timing also depends around location availability and the actors involved. Reflecting back on my music video project, I have learned that it’s better to overshoot material and plan out a long period of time to get things right. This way, I’ll also be able to return to filming in case I catch anything inconsistent or wrong with shots during the editing process.

    Now that my affairs are all in order, I have started to structure the scenes of my opening scene. As I've mentioned, I plan for the film to open in a slow-paced montage of items around the main character's bedroom. I want it to open with the focus on a particular item, maybe a window or stack of books, and the main character can be seen through a shallow focus moving around the room. It'll then cut to more important contextual scenes like a picture frame of a young boy and two parents, soccer trophies, a youthful poster on a wall, 12th grade textbooks, a graduation gown, and photographs that show the main character growing up. 

    Throughout these scenes, the credits will be shown in the bare wall beside the centered item. I think after about 10 seconds of natural asynchronous sounds, a voicemail of the mother speaking will play and after it ends the first time, the scene will focus on the main character tapping on his phone. Then, the voicemail will play again while the main character moves out from the frame and the title will appear saying... I still need to work on the title actually. Then a knock will be heard at the door and the main character will stumble to grab his phone and turn off the voicemail. His father will open the door and urge him to get ready, and after a brief exchange of sentences, the main character will look at the graduation gown and look down at his hands and sigh. That's the general idea of the scenes for now, but I'm going to create a storyboard to better plan out the sequence and appearance of things. I'm also interested in adding some nondiegetic music, but I'm unsure if it'll make the opening too noisy or distract from the voicemail. I'll have to experiment different methods when I get to that point.

It's Been Decided!

     I'm very excited to say that I have decided on a storyline and idea for the film opening!!! I know it feels like I pretty much had an idea already, but it was vague. My idea is for the film to be about a main character, most likely a boy, who is finishing his senior year of high school, but is facing all these challenges like dealing with the absence of his late mother, where to go for college, and what to pursue in life. The film will open with the main character getting ready for his graduation. Most (well, probably all) of the scenes for the opening will take place in his bedroom and there will be a lot of still shots of his room while either music or voicemails play in the background. The props shown in the scenes will reveal a lot about the character like college pamphlets, sport equipment, trophies, photographs, and the cap and gown for his graduation. I'm thinking to show photographs throughout his room that show a happy little boy with two parents and then a contrast of the boy, older and alone with his dad. I haven't yet figured out if this is the best method to allude to the mother's death in the opening, but I'll keep thinking about it.

Link: https://youtu.be/MBt8RVLNo4w?si=QRRKXiedeywC_AFs

    After watching a few more examples from movies that better align with the integration of dark themes and a coming-of-age story, I think it’s best to incorporate music or dialogue behind the scenes or even show glimpses of the main character moving around his bedroom in order to add some movement to the seemingly still shots. Seeing the opening scene to Beautiful Boy, Steve Carrell’s character is the only focus of the shot and delivers a minute-long monologue, but what makes the scene interesting is the dialogue. With the scarcity of elaborate mise-en-scene elements, the audience is able to focus on the actual words and hear the story of his son’s struggle with drug abuse. Contrastingly, another movie from the same genre, CODA, uses extreme dynamic movement to grab attention in its opening scene. Having an inkling that I want my approach to be establishing background in the character’s life, I think the best method would be to have a slower-paced opening, more like that of Beautiful Boy. I’d also be better equipped to recreate a scene like that of Beautiful Boy’s because of my smaller budget and desire to emphasize allusions to the conflicts in the main character’s life. At the pace that I’m on, I think I should reevaluate my schedule since I already have a good grasp on what approach and idea I want to commit to. I’ll have to work on that next before moving on with any other aspects of the project.

Link: https://youtu.be/b_D7tDaKTzE?si=3ziToXvGF53TNm4u

Scheduling & Research

    Now that I have a clearer idea of my film's plot and what I'm trying to aim for with my opening scene, I created a schedule to better complete this project. I want to ensure that I'll have enough time for everything, and I've found it's easier to organize my ideas and keep myself on schedule through the use of a checklist. As you can see from the photo below (if it's not too blurry), the checklist is organized by the three blog posts I have to write each week. I thought it was best to have it laid out this way to be able to know not only what I have to blog about, but to also know what step I should be at at that time of the week. The highlighted lines are to remind me to create a separate checklist for items like props, costumes, and locations, which I'll create closer to that time of my process.

So, if I want to make it a good habit to stick to my schedule, I better start now...

    A coming-of-age drama is a mix between two essentially popular genres. The coming-of-age part is one that I know well, especially as I'm approaching the time to move away to college. A coming-of-age film focuses on personal struggles of the characters and how the movie's plot helps them grow. One of the most important aspects of showing this growth and complex emotions is through the use of dialogue. At first, I hadn't thought to include any dialogue in my opening scene, and just use a compilation of moments of stillness, another aspect of coming-of-age films, but now I'm getting an idea to incorporate a voicemail from the main character's late parent (if I choose to go that route). 

    After the popularity that director John Hughes brought to the genre, many coming-of-age films primarily followed characters in high school and featured a fast-paced, youthful opening (see example of Hughes' Sixteen Candles). I'd like for my character to also be in high school, but I'm more interested in the dramatic aspect which would have to feature a slower opening with more melancholic tones. A film opening that comes to mind that I'd, currently, like to embody the feel of is that of Call Me by Your Name. These opening credits give off more of a sense of being frozen-in-time. The color tone as well as the overall mise-en-scene elements of the photographs also contribute to a sad and a "detached from youth tone," which is more pertaining to the genre of drama. Coming-of-age films can go many routes from comedy to romance, but I want to specifically focus on drama in order to incorporate elements like softer lighting and to be able to focus on the inner struggles of the main character's agony. As dark as it seems to sound, I'm actually extremely excited to get started on the film opening. I'm going to have to find a few more examples of exactly how I can embody tone in my opening, but I'm starting to get a clearer image of the story I want to portray.

Coming-of-age movies: What is the coming-of-age genre? - 2024. MasterClass. (n.d.). https://www.masterclass.com/articles/coming-of-age-movies 

What is drama?. The Drama Genre. (n.d.-b). https://dramagenre.weebly.com/what-is-drama.html 

Picking a Genre…

    Choosing a genre and a way to approach my film opening has been harder than I thought. My mind feels like it has thousands of ideas constantly running on treadmills, so how could I possibly decide on a single storyline and genre? A way to tackle this stump, I thought, would be to watch as many film openings as I possibly could. So that’s what I tried to do. I watched a video by the creator StudioBinder about different film openings with the hope that I would be able to hone down which approach appealed to me most. After watching different examples from different genres, I believe that pursuing a film opening in the drama genre would be most interesting. What caught my attention was the example of the opening of the 2019 film Marriage Story. The opening focuses on establishing the relationship between the two main characters in a form where nothing seems to be wrong until the opening finishes to reveal that they are at a therapy session and their marriage is failing. I'm very interested in following the same steps by introducing a character who seems to be normal, but then the conflict is revealed and the peace is disrupted.

    Knowing that I wanted to start off with a serene opening that contracts the conflicts occurring in the plot, I have decided that my film should follow the drama genre, or more specifically, a coming-of-age drama. The next step required me to brainstorm possible plot ideas and how establishing the main character would help contribute to the plot that will be shown in the film. I jotted down a few ideas that all follow a similar storyline that I'm interested in doing. To best fit the common narrative of a coming-of-age drama, my main character will be a teenager (most likely around 17 or 18 years old, mainly because it's easier to cast my friends as the role and that's what age they are) and they'll be dealing with a large conflict that forces them to deal with many emotions and evolve as a person. My ideas range from the main character wanting to go on hunt to find their missing relative to a main character having to deal with abandonment or a parental loss. The idea I'm most leaning towards, for now, is having the main character live the day of an important milestone while dealing with the loss of a parent.

    Having a general idea of the story I want to portray with my film opening, I have to begin planning my process and experimenting with different ideas on how to proceed. At this time, many questions come to mind:

What should the first scenes consist of?

How will the audience know the the parent has died?

How much should be revealed from the film opening alone?

What pacing and sounds should be used?

    A lot of these questions can be answered easier through research of the conventional techniques of a coming-of-age drama film. I have a lot of research ahead of me to be able to know how to best fit my ideas together. Learning from the processes of my past projects, I should also develop a schedule for my work in order to make sure I stay on track. After conducting further research, first focusing on commonalities of the genre, I can begin crafting how to actually bring my idea to life with the resources that are available to me.

The Beginning of the End

    Today in class, we began discussing the steps and processes of the Cambridge Portfolio Project. I'm, admittedly, a bit freaked out. So far in all four years of my high school experience, I have never dedicated so much time on the same project. I'm worried to see how I'll be able to juggle weekly blog posts along with my other schoolwork and activities, but my mind is also racing with different ideas for a film opening. It's also scary to think about how close we are to the end of the school year and how close my time in high school is coming to an end. Within this reflection, I began to recall different projects I have completed over the past few years, and with it, the different media I have consumed. Going over the instructions, I immediately thought back to every movie I have ever watched, both old and new. This made the process suddenly seem exciting a I will be able to express my ideas and knowledge of film in a physical form. Am I going to go for a dystopian genre? I'm not sure my suburban town nor the rest of South Florida would be the best setting for that. Should I tackle sci-fi? I don't think I have the funds.

    Before I get ahead of myself, I need to first examine the different approaches my film opening could utilize. The first idea that I'm inclined to pursue is developing character. I think I will be able to brainstorm many ideas about a complex character and use mise-en-scene elements as well as interactions to develop them. One of the first things that came to mind was a film about a character with schizophrenia. How'd I get here? Well, I recently watched Daniel Kwan's and Daniel Scheinert's Everything Everywhere All At Once, and I remembered how one of the characters would place googly eyes on inanimate objects. The first time it had come up in the movie, I couldn't stop laughing. I started to wonder if I could implement an element of bringing things to life, and a method of doing so could possibly be someone who lives with schizophrenia and how their life is reimagined through different lenses. However, I'm scared of misrepresenting the disease and I would be required to do extensive scientific research in order to get it all right. I'll keep working on that idea.

A24

    Another approach that appeals to me is using my film opening to establish background. Two of my favorite media genres are drama and dystopian, and I was interested in creating something within either genre. Going with either genre would require a detailed background on the situation of both the characters and the world in which they live in. I could possibly make use of my film opening to portray a background for one of these stories. I would have to closely consider all the aspects of my plot and which elements will be helpful to introduce at the beginning of said story. I have a lot of work and brainstorming to do. Once I do come up with an idea, if I choose to establish background, then I'd also have to find the best location for the context of the story. Establishing background also involves the incorporation of scene elements, which requires me to also explore different props I can include.

    I'm excited to start upon this journey and let my mind wander on different ideas and storylines. This blog will also be a mean of gathering my thoughts and reflecting upon my process. Thinking about what lies ahead, I’m excited to use the knowledge and practice I have gained from my past projects, especially when crafting the music video. Though the title of the post seems dismal, it’s actually a start to a thrilling experience of putting everything I’ve learned together into this final project.

Music Marketing Project: The Full Process

    The first step to the Music Marketing Project was to pick out a song from the assigned genre and begin to build a band and concept around that song. After being given three Rock songs, my group chose "So Caught Up" by an Australian group, the Teskey Brothers. The way we chose to approach the crafting of the band was to start with a number of people and genders. We juggled through ideas of having a two-person band or an all-girl band, but we eventually settled on having a coed band of five members. The motivation behind this choice was that we wanted the band to have a friendly and relatable energy, stemmed from friendship and kept together with the music. Sticking to a commonality within the Rock genre, we also wanted our band to have some drama like dating rumors between the two lead vocalists. Doing so, everything else was able to fall into place as we agreed that our main inspiration for the project was the band Fleetwood Mac.

    Inspired by the 70s style and drama of Fleetwood Mac, my group also had to recognize trends of the 21st century and how we could use the resources today to promote a band. Like most musicians, we gave our band "Lemon Drops" social media accounts across many platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook. This allowed us to give a story to our band, which is that the members have been friends for a while and have been posting original music on their social media accounts for a couple of months already, garnering a small fanbase. In creating a background for the band, we were then able to decide that we wanted the band to emit a vintage feel while also being relatable and grounded. 

    The next step was to research current musicians to figure out how they market and distribute their music. Studying the original makers of the song themselves, the Teskey Brothers, and a younger Rock band called the Inhalers, we were able to figure out the best method for the Lemon Drops to be introduced into the official music industry. We selected a date for their music to be released and planned to have it available to stream on most popular streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music. We also thought it would embody the Rock image more if the band released physical music such as CDs and vinyls. Releasing CDs and vinyls also connects us to our target audience of people 15-30 who are passionate about music. My research showed that there is a revival in physical music among adolescents and young adults, and vinyl sales are up by 22% as a result (The Foothill Dragon Press). Popular artists like Taylor Swift have even released multiple color options of the same album on vinyl because of their popularity. So, having CDs and vinyls available to purchase for the Lemon Drops is beneficial to both their brand and music sales.

    Afterwards, we decided on the live performances, which mainly consisted of rock or blues festivals, where the band could perform and market their song. Based off the fact that the band has a lot of anticipated songs, we also thought it was fitting for the band to release an album and join as the opening act to famous Irish musician Hozier. Hozier performs mainly soul and blues music, and we plan for the Lemon Drops to gain a lot of attention from performing at his concerts where his fans are primarily teenagers and young adults. Once we had our information, we began to compile it all together and create marketing practices such as posters and social media posts. Gathering friends who would be able to help us with our goal, we set up days to meet and took pictures that would serve the image of the band.

    Creating a story board for our band's music video, we brainstormed storylines and shots that would be both visually captivating and portray the band well. Putting it into practice, however, stirred us away from our original plans. We ended up brainstorming new ideas to accurately embody the band's concept and came up with a new idea for a promotional video. The reason we shifted from a story to a promo is because we wanted the video to emphasize that the members of the band are what are being marketed through means of social media and fan interaction, so it was important that the band's first music video also displays the members as themselves to accomplish that.

    Completing this project has taught me many things about my planning and execution processes. I've learned to constantly look back at my work in order to make sure everything is being translated the way I planned for it to be. It's also ideal to have a clear idea of the task at hand and work in a timely manner for everything to be completed on time. At first, I wasn't managing my time wisely and I could feel the consequences of that when it came time to put everything together. When developing my Cambridge portfolio, I now know to split the work up evenly and how to best assemble my efforts. I also have learned many things of the media sphere and how to better portray real-world situations in my project. In the future when forming a similar project, I can look forward to correctly achieving what is being asked and enjoying the creative aspect of the task.

Planning the Music Marketing Project

     Planning the music marketing project has been both creatively stimulating and challenging. It's fun to brainstorm ideas with my group members and bring our band to life, but it's also difficult to make sure our ideas are being translated well and accurately represent the real world and marketing practices. We first began our planning process by agreeing on a debut single and creating the concept of our band's energy and background to go with the song. After choosing "So Caught Up," by the Teskey Brothers, we decided to follow route and have our band be an Australian blues rock band called Lemon Drops. We created all the personas involved in the band, which led to more creative ideas following. After making the band members be young, we decided it would make sense for them to also be active on social media accounts like TikTok and Instagram. This made it easier for a story to go along the band's origin like how our two main vocalists have a budding romance.

    After having a clear example of our ideas, we had to research real musicians and companies to understand how singles are typically crafted and promoted. This allowed us to create a website much like famous celebrities like Harry Styles (https://www.hstyles.co.uk/) and Taylor Swift (https://www.taylorswift.com/), in order to make the Lemon Drops as realistic as possible. In our research, we also had to discover the means of technological media convergence that exist in music marketing such as physical posters and products that can be found and purchased online. After seeing common practices, we recreated marketing methods like merchandise and a website in order for our band to have the most exposure possible.

    My group then began to assemble all our work into a presentation to portray the timeline and features involved with the band. Doing so resulted in our band having a persona of a young independent band, and we aimed for our music video to depict that. We shared ideas and started working on a storyboard to organize our thoughts. However, there's only so much to prepare on paper so we had to schedule a date to begin our filming and see how our ideas can play out and be put into practice. Before meeting, we also had to make sure all the actors and group members were on the same page and ready to create the image we had in mind. Now, the next steps are to film all the scenes and piece our footage together, as well as finalize our presentation with original photos of the actors as the band.