Extract essay, Game of Thrones

For this component I got to play with an extract from the series Game of Thrones. After viewing the extract, I concluded that the theme the director wanted viewers to convey was the use of power and authority. How when you demand a better title, it is not simply given to you, you must earn it and justify your right to it. And once you have it, to try not to abuse it. 

The Theme starts off in the first scene by using a bird view shot and wide shots, to introduce the  location and scenery in which the actors are going into. For example this was on a boat in the middle of the ocean entering into a kingdom which was evidently not their own. During the scene the lighting is very low and dim, the scenery is kind of muddy looking, this gives the impression that the men are going on a long journey or coming home from something that may have been harsh. A crane shot of the statue also allows the viewers to know that they are definitely entering into someone else's territory. Several camera shots and angles are used, those of which once they get inside the bank, there is a long shot of the hall to demonstrate the static in the hall.  Lastly, closeups were being used to catch the reactions of the actors' faces in their very heated conversation. For example when the guy from the bank questions the lord of the 7 kingdoms ability to handle the valuable gold. 

While there wasn’t much music, mostly dialogue, which was vital in setting tone to the theme also gave the viewers what the main purpose of the extract was. The use of echoes in the bank is a good example. The uses of these in the first scene contribute to the theme of asserting your title for example some ambient sound of the seagulls as well as the men on the boat. This contributed to the facts that both of the men on the boat were in charge. 

The editing aspect also contributed greatly, for example the shot reverse shot of all the men talking showed us the quarrel between them was real. Also again the use of close ups highlighting emotion. The establishing shot of the opening scene when the men were entering under the statue shows they have reached their destination and are now entering into somewhere they seem as if they do not want to be. Moving along into costumes, contributed to the time era and maybe even location of the story line. The way the men were dressed versus the men on the boat shows the power difference in them. 

All in all these different shots and editing techniques allow us to draw the conclusion theme of power and who in the end will be the ultimate victor of it.

Creative Critical Reflection

                                         

                                         


The next three videos above are my CCR questions that I have answered based on this particular experience during the movie making process. The videos discuss the 4 questions at hand and I go into much depth on what it was like to film and the progress not only from just the movie film but as far back as our commercial. I hope these visuals really portray to you the big shift that I have faced/endured as an AICE MEdia student. including all of the things I have learned throughout the way. The experience in AICE Media for sure, kept me busy especially outside of school. At time it did become a lot but it was just one more thing that tested and pushed me to be a better film student.

Pool Day the Movie

    Above is our movie in which we were fortunate enough to shoot before the Coronavirus pandemic. While we did not get to shoot any re-shoots we were able to have good enough footage to put together and make a movie out of it. The whole experience has kind of been bitter sweet because we wanted to get some better shots and make our video about 15 seconds longer, but this is the final product. Pool day starting myself and Amelia. The challenge with this was, we were on edge on how to conclude our final genre since it no longer was a science fiction. We didn't know which genre it belonged too. We concluded that because it followed some conventions of a thriller that, thriller was the best suited genre category to allow our movie to fall under. On the plus side, we did not save anything to the school computers; so that did make it a plus on our behalf to be able to have our footage on our person. This allowed for us to edit a whole lot easier and actually have footage to present to you guys. The one thing I have learned from AICE Media through this worldwide crisis is to appreciate those in the film making industry because all of the things consumers don't see is what is make it or break it for a film. Also to learn how to be able to think on my feet a little more due to everything not going according to plan.

What About Your Friends Music Video

   Our music video was our next big project. With this film we saw so much more improvement with our film making and production skills for sure. We were more comfortable with using our shots and knowing what we wanted to go where. So basically backing up to the beginning of our process, our story-boarding, is hat helped us improve they way we filmed. A lot of setbacks were faced during this music video, I guess considering it wasn't filmed on campus, trying to get everyone together was super hard. I remember Amelia and I actually being there and Amina didn't show so we left and tried again the following week. We faced issues with the skate park we filmed at and it was just a lot going on. But in the end editing became so much easier although we did have trouble figuring out the sound situation. Our music video was inspired by our favorite girl group coming out of the 90's, TLC, so we had a lot of fun maybe too much fun filming this. All of the props were not accounted for came filming day so we did have to think quick on our feet if we wanted to film everything in that one day. We were also racing against the clock to finish shooting before the park closed.

Fright Night Event

  This was the very first video our group and I were assigned to film. We came up with the idea of filming at school during Fort Lauderdale High’s first ever fright night event. It was an event hosted by the class of 2021 that displayed haunted houses and lots of festivities during the week of Halloween for everyone. This was Amina's, Amelia's, Josh's, as well as my first time even picking up a camera to film something of that nature. We pretty much all had no idea what we were doing! I remember the day we filmed, none of us knew how to open up the tripod stance or how to even hook the camera up to it. Once filming was done, we then had to figure out how to work pinnacle studios to edit. But then we ran into several issues with that particular software so we did eventually move on to using IMovie. A software for any apple products. Everything was so much easier and convenient. 

Movie Postponements

 Again due to the spread of the corona virus, movie companies have began to postpone the release of movies. For example Disney, is delaying 3 of their movies due to the pandemic. As well as the Netflix show Riverdale has delayed their filming due to someone testing positive, on set, for the virus. This is very similar to our situation right now as our production has come to what feels like, a complete end. We are also not ale to go back to school so, our chances of meeting with each other to discuss these things are little to none. Netflix has actually set aside 100 million dollars to pay people in the entertainment industry who are being effected right now. I hope that means we qualify! Aside from movie production, entertainment almost seems as a necessity to the way we live. So having to hold off on it slows us down economically for sure, but as well as bringing pure entertainment to us and our families. Kind of weird saying we'll be working on this project over spring break. But considering almost everything is closed we have no other choice. This is good for me because we have more time, I feel, to work, on the film as well as or CCR questions. Plus we have been preparing for this since January so it's not like we are really short on time. Because we have basically completed the project it makes this pandemic a little easier. Of course knowing that AICE Media is handled.

https://www.seventeen.com/celebrity/movies-tv/a31469986/disney-delaying-movies-coronavirus/

A Worldwide Pandemic

                                                                                                                                                                         The whole entire world has been faced with a huge adversity and disadvantage. We have been forced to practice this thing called social distancing which the CDC proclaims works best if we stay 6 feet away. Due to the spread of the Corona virus it has been hard trying to get together and conduct our re-shoot phase of the project. The entire film industry as well as big corporations are taking a major hit as well. By having to shut down in order to quarantine and create a safer space. And with filming coming to a halt we can relate in so many ways. With production stopping it has effected our schedule to film and get together to re-edit our film. The conclusion that we came to is to just have me re-film any opening shots since we did use my house to film. Then in about a week Josh and Amelia will come over to film a few scenes. I am not sure how we want to tackle the editing process, we do need a different way of going about it. 
     What I would like for us to do is come together and edit together as a group. That way all of our ideas are said and implemented. Furthermore, we do plan on re-filming in  about a week, giving us time to each work on our critical reflection questions as well. We do not plan on filming over a lot of scenes just maybe 3 or 4 and we need to ass scenes as well. Our film came up a little short on time, about 30 seconds. So we can definitely add in a few scenes to make up our time of 2 minutes. Our group member Josh actually hasn't been responding to our texts, so we are worries because he has all of the clips and edited version on his laptop.  And right now that is where we seem to fail, is communication. Aside from that everything should go as planned.