HERE IT IS GUYS (the film opening)

 ATARAXIA FILM OPENING

CCR 1 - WHIZ

ASSISTED BY ANEESA BAJAJ

CCR 2 - VLOG

ASSISTED BY ANEESA BAJAJ

Postpartum Depression

 Wow guys, its finally over, id like to thank Cambridge... ok but seriously this was like my baby and its now been born and now I'm sad so I think that makes the title accurate.

In Reflection

It's actually insane to think about how far our film has progressed. We started with this idea of a 2000s film like Legally Blonde, and somehow created a sci-fi drama that's completely new.

As the DP I was losing my mind on a daily basis. Managing every shot so that it became meaningful for Halley's character and then later in the edit making sure every shot was perfectly done with color correction and color grading.The editing was also fascinating. We ended up over-shooting quite a bit, so we had plenty of buffer to play with. Even the tiniest things that didn't make it through helped us get familiar with and develop our storytelling.

We definitely had a fat stack of issues. The competition we were preparing for threw our original schedule off, and getting permission to film at the gas station was its own adventure. It took three weeks to track down the manager and get approval to film, but we made it happen somehow.

The Creative Critical Reflections (CCRs) were a nice challenge. Im glad that they allowed me to be so creative with the approach that I could take it and do something more fun as a little video rather than solely an essay. And even as crazy as it got during the edit, I actually learned something from the process.

In retrospect, this project has been such a learning curve. From the lessons in our first classes to the major research works in our blogs, to actually implementing everything in practice during production and post-production, each step led to our final product.

Editing (soundation i will get you)

 Okay everyone so I've just finished filming my vlog and now I've gotten to editing my first CCR.  As I previously mentioned I decided to go with an arcade-esque theme for my Whiz interview (a decision I now regret). So I boot up after Effects and to my dismay, my laptop has gone bat s-word crazy and decided to run out of memory somehow. After fighting it for some time my computer finally decided to draw its last breaths upon this cruel world and freeze and then shut down. Sadly this was not the end, I yanked my dad away from his adult person job and he found a way to fix it, but not without scolding me for somehow ruining my relatively new laptop (My storage was full that was literally it). Now you may ask, "Samuel, how does full storage take up memory?" and my answer to that would be "idk." ANYWAY, I booted the ol' 'puter back up and began working on the 8-bit effect I would have on the interviewer,  Aneesa.

The actual visual effect was quite simple but the real challenge awaited me in the sound design. A few weeks ago I saw a video on social media about an effect called bitcrusher, which basically lowers the bit-rate your audio plays at to make it sound extremely low quality.

@harkeofficial Replying to @quill ♬ Backrooms - Harke

;This effect seemed perfect for the style I was going for but I was yet to discover the horrors of trying to achieve it without the one thing no student has, money. So when I typed "bitcrusher" into the google search bar the first 20 or so results are plugins for various music production programs, NOT an option since 1. they cost money, and 2. they take storage which we have established I do NOT have. Soon my scrolling eyes gazed upon what seemed to be a glimmering beacon of hope in this money hungered landscape. Soundation: a music production program native to your browser with a built in bitcrusher effect. Clicking on the link shows me:

 FREE?? how is this possible? I think to myself, but nary the time to ponder on such things. I rushedly sign up and import my audio, and apply the effect. I go to export and here is where my beef with this program begins:

WHAT THE HECK DO YOU MEAN UPGRADE TO UNLOCK?? I personally feel that exporting is the ONE feature that should never be locked behind a paywall if you are going to advertise your service as FREE, but that doesn't stop them does it. Well after much fighting with myself i decided to cave and just grab a plugin for adobe audition and pray to god that it doesn't murder my computer, which it didn't!!

Anyway with that out of the way the rest of my editing journey went fairly smoothly, I'm glad the format i chose wasn't very edit intense after the fun effects. now that I've finished editing the Whiz interview i can slap together all the clips from my vlog and hopefully close out my CCR work.

That's all from me for today stay tuned for my next post where ill reflect on the project as a whole.

CCR Filming

 Hey everyone!! It is officially the weekend which means I started as any media production student would, FILMING!! I got with my group member Aneesa and we began the day by picking up some equipment, and then picking up a Green Screen from my group member Oriana. Since one of my CCRs is a daily vlog, I thought I would document the experience while talking about my film opening. 

Once we got back to my house, we set up all the equipment, and the fairly large greenscreen and began filming. We started with Aneesa's CCR before filming my first CCR. The Whiz interview CCR went great, and I stumbled upon the fabulous idea of having it be sort of 8-bit arcade-themed. As you can imagine its been a pretty hectic day since I've been filming practically both of my CCRs at once but with one fully filmed I'm sure ill be able to finish the vlog quite easily.

Thats all for now!! I really need to go edit and continue filming my vlog so stay tuned for my next post on that!! :))

CCR Production Plans

 Hey everyone today I thought i would go over how I plan on filming my CCRs.

For my first CCR I plan on creating a film interview show called "Whiz" which is loosely based off of Genius Lyric breakdowns. For this I plan on using a green screen in our school's production studio in order to create a bright blue background for me to be against while I sit in a stool and go over each question in detail. I would check out a camera from the school's TV club and film in there one day after school. As far as editing I think ill get a basic edit done on After effects with all the motion graphic effects I want to do before sending the video to my iPad for some fun Hand-Drawn animations.

For my second CCR I plan on doing a day in the life vlog where I will take my audience through a day in production, showing both filming and editing while answering the questions. For this one I will most likely film it on my IPhone and then later edit it together in premiere. I'll also have to create some screenshots of fake comments that ask the questions of the CCR for me to answer. Overall the video will be sort of styled as a vlog with sporadic Q&A throughout the vlog.

CCR 4 (THE LAST ONE!!)

 Okay so as I mentioned before, my second CCR is going to be a day in the life video. This format is perfect for this next question being

• How did you integrate technologies – software, hardware and online – in this project?

The short answer to this question would be, YES. Our use of technology was unreal, relentless per se. In terms of software, we used Google Docs to organize everyone in the group as well as a program called Writersolo to write the finalized script. We also made use of Premiere Pro as our primary editing suite where we created the line edit, sound design, and color grading. My groupmate Santi also used his subscription to a plugin called Red Giant to add some fun effects that took our video to the next level. 

We also used Adobe After Effects to create the title graphic, as well as the credits and a fun-free plugin called VC Orb to create the planet - probably the highlight of our opening.

In terms of hardware, we went all out for the opening, we used a Canon 5D Mark IV to film in digital format as well as a Magnus VT-4000 tripod to stabilize our shots. We also sparingly used my teammate Santi's DJI Osmo Pocket to film some stable tracking shots.

That's all from me for now!! stay tuned for my next post about my production plans for each CCR

CCR #3 (A day in the life vlog)

 SO for my second CCR I thought it would be fun to create a day in the life vlog. The video would basically take you through my production process in one day (from filming to editing). I would tour the audience through different aspects of my production while answering "questions from viewers." I think this structure is a great way of answering each question in an effective and creative manner.

The third question of my CCR asks 

• How did your production skills develop throughout this project?

I would answer this by saying that this project really gave me an opportunity to grow in ways I hadn't expected! Before AICE Media, I had some background from film and TV production classes, but this course has taught me the WHY behind creative decisions - like why shoot wide instead of close, or why make a cut at a specific moment. I'm usually quick with most of my productions, creating them within a week or even within 6 hours, but that meant I didn't always stop to think about my editing choices. This project forced me to slow down and be more intentional with every decision, which has
made me a better filmmaker overall.

My technical skills have definitely improved too. As one of the producers, I had to pay attention to all the small details during shooting to avoid having to reshoot scenes, as well as keeping the production on the track of a schedule. I also pushed myself to expand on pre-existing technical skills like color grading, which I would say I was already pretty good at, but by going online and watching tutorials geared specificallty at films within my genre, which has which has helped me expand my previous niche of bright vibrant warm scenes,  to some cool dramatic scenes. There's also a VISIBLE change in my work from the beginning of the year to now with our film opening. I'm much more careful about framing, lighting consistency, and making sure all our shots serve the story in some way. Overall, this project has helped my expand my skillset and even try my hand at new techniques I hadnt had the opportunity to try yet.

Thats all for today! ill see you in my next blog closing out the CCR Questions!!! ;)

CCR Part 2

 Hey everyone!! Today i thought i would talk about the second part of my first creative critical reflection. As I said before I thought it would be fun to take inspiration from Genius's lyric breakdown videos, but I thought I would ad a few key differences to make it fresh. I want to do this mainly by incorporating fun animations within the video. I hope to use arrows and highlight effects to create annotations over elements (like a highlight animations or arrows to go over a specific part of the video for emphasis). That being said I also created a fun logo and title for the video

In this video I also need to address the second question of the CCR:

• How does your product engage with audiences and how would it be distributed as a real media text?

Since our main character is a teen experiencing depression, our target audience is gonna be teens and young adults who might relate to her struggles. The sci-fi elements with the planet are cool and all, but what really matters is the drama at the heart of our story. Halley is completely detached from reality after losing her friend. We've actually looked into teen depression stats during our research and the numbers are much higher than most people realize. We wanted our film to connect on two levels, helping teens who feel similar to Halley see themselves represented, and also showing others how to recognize when someone might be struggling.

For the distribution part, we'd obviously go digital first with platforms like Amazon Prime since its much easier to upload independent works onto their platform. But the exciting part is that we're submitting to film festivals specifically for student work! The Lightning Film Festival at our school is accepting submissions right now and we're also looking at Shortcuts, which is a Broward County program for student filmmakers. Getting featured through Shortcuts would be cool because they promote selected films across their social platforms, and even air them on a local tv channel as a part of a larger show, which could help our work reach many more people.

Thats all from me for now, stay tuned for my next post about my plans for the next question of the CCR

Getting creative (with my critical reflections)

 Hey everyone!! I've been thinking about different creative approaches for my CCR (Creative Critical Reflection) and I think I've found the perfect format. I'm going to structure it like those Genius lyric explanation videos. You know the ones where artists break down their own lyrics with those yellow highlight annotations? I feel like this would be a really cool way to analyze our film opening!!

For question #1 of the CCR (How does your product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues?), I can really dive into how our film opening uses sci-fi drama conventions while representing teenage depression. The planet isn't just a world ending threat, it's a metaphor for how Halley feels like her world is falling apart. In the Genius video format, I could highlight specific shots of the opening and explain how they represent her emotional state. Since we're blending sci-fi elements with this personal struggle, I'm challenging conventions by approaching depression in a visually engaging way rather than just through dialogue or traditional drama techniques. This approach would make the analysis way more engaging than just talking to the camera for 5 minutes, and it gives me a chance to really get into the symbolism of certain elements (such as the significance of each item she gets from the store).

Thats all from me for now, stay tuned for my next post about how I plan on responding to the second question in my CCR.

Coloring is fun (and the line edit too ig)

Hey everyone!! We're now officially in the post-production stage of our film opening and it's been such a journey getting everything to come together. For our opening, we're using Adobe Premiere Pro for the main edit (fun fact: I'm Adobe Premiere certified!!), while some of our VFX work for the planet is being done in After Effects and Blender. We decided to start editing the outdoor footage and working on those effects first. This way, once we FINALLY get to film the indoor portion, we can just add it in without having wasted any time. Two of my team members are handling the line edit and vfx, while I'm focusing on the color grading.

Speaking of color grading, it's been SUCH an important part of our project because we shot in both indoor and outdoor settings, plus our shoot ran later than expected, so some shots are darker than others. Here's what some of the clips looked like before and after

Color grading has involved A LOT of back and forth between contrast and exposure settings to find the perfect brightness. I also fiddled with white balancing tools to fix footage that came out either too blue or with that weird purple tint that happens sometimes. We've also been playing with tint and saturation in Premiere's basic correction tools - for some clips we had to increase the warmth and greens, while others needed different adjustments.

It's amazing to see the transformation! The color grade really makes everything feel more cohesive and film-like. Thats all from me for now, stay tuned for my next post about the CCR planning :)

Organization Central (too much footage)

Hey everyone!! We just got back from our weekend competition trip, which means we can now officially start the editing stage of our film opening, and it feels great to finally be putting everything together. Thankfully, our editing process is pretty organized (I think) - My teammate Oriana started by sorting footage into specific folders by scene type. This time, we created separate folders for car scenes, planet scenes, funky, messed up shots (because you never know when you might need them), and extra footage.

For our opening, we're using Adobe Premiere Pro for the main edit, while some of our VFX work for the planet is being done in After Effects and Blender. We originally planned to shoot all our scenes in one day, but then, as mentioned before, we ran into a devastating setback (location permission issues). We got all our outdoor shots done, but couldn't film inside the store because the manager wasn't there. So we're starting the edit with what we have while my groupmate, Santi, works to track down whoever "Katty" is, who can hopefully give us permission to film indoors.

That's all from me for now, stay tuned for my next post about the line edit  & color grading =)

Changing the script on set?? should be fine

During our shoot day, we decided to change one of our scenes on the spot! Originally, we had planned for Halley to simply connect her phone to the car after hearing just 1 radio channel mention the planet, but we had a better idea while filming. Instead, we now have her flipping through several radio channels, all of them covering the rogue planet and its upcoming impact, which makes her increasingly annoyed until she finally clicks the radio off completely.

This new version is much longer than what we initially planned but it works a lot better for showing her character's frustration with the whole situation. We even got some extra takes of her reacting to static and different voices, so we have plenty of options for the edit. Sometimes the best ideas happen right on set! The only downside was that we spent so much time on this scene that we ended up rushing through the outdoor shots and filming later than planned (making our shots appear to be during the nightime), but I think the trade-off was worth it. 

Thats all from me for now, Im very glad that we were struck with this divine inspiration, stay tuned for my next post about the line edit :)

its go time ( film fr now )

 Hey everyone!! I'm super excited to share how our first day of filming went! As I mentioned in my last post, we had to split our shoot into two days because of the gas station permission issue, but OOOHHMAHHGAADDDDD the footage we got looks amazing

We managed to get a ton of shots and we actually ended up with way more footage than we originally planned, which is definitely a good thing since it gives us more options to play with during editing. Overshooting is always better than undershooting when it comes to filmmaking!

Anyway, remember how I talked about our lighting plans in my previous post? We specifically wanted to film during dusk to get the vibrant pink and violet tones in the sky to contrast with Halley's neutral outfit. Well, it turns out dusk doesn't stick around very long! By the time we finished getting all our shots, it was completely dark outside.

This means we'll need to do some heavy color grading to make it look like everything happened within the actual timing of the scene. We'll have to adjust the darker shots to match the earlier dusk footage so the lighting feels consistent throughout the opening sequence.

Since my team and I will be at a competition this week, we won't be able to film the interior gas station scenes just yet. To accommodate for this, we're going to start working on a line edit of what we have so far and begin working on the VFX for the planet. 

That's all from me for now! Stay tuned for my next post on (checks schedule) uhh I'm not quite sure yet... See ya :)))