I Know I'm Not The Only One

As we continue to hear news updates on the coronavirus, we are practicing social distancing. Many places are closing down and the most recent one has been in the movie industry. AMC, the largest cinema chain, closed its theaters up. This following the Regal Cinema. These companies were trying to follow the CDC regulations of limiting gatherings to ten people or less. However, due to theaters closing, some of the biggest movie releases have been delayed. An example would be "Antebellum" the horror movie starring Janelle Monae which was set to be released on April 24th has now been pulled with no new release date. Another example would be the anticipated release "Mulan" which is supposed to release on March 27th. The point that I am trying to make is everyone is being affected by the situation even the filmmaking industry. I was actually excited to see the Mulan movie.
With the movie not being released when it's supposed to, it can cause damages in terms of finances. It will take more money to release the movies at a later date. However, some studios are trying to be innovative. They are testing out an early jump on video- on demand so that movies will still be able to be seen by the public. I think that it is a good idea to try to get movies out faster.  But I think it will end up costing more money to try and let the movie out now instead of holding off on the release.

How Did We Get Here!

Well, a lot has happened from the last time since I have blogged. As seen in my previous blogs I have been scheduling my reshoots and editing, but never actually getting to do it. I figured that with this spring break coming up I would have plenty of time to work. However, another external factor has me not filming. By now you surely know about the coronavirus formally known as " CODIV-19". It has had a major impact on our lives. It has affected me personally by causing a disruption in my education. The superintendent originally closed school a week early so we had two weeks off, then he moved the date we go back to school on April the 13th. Now we have to adjust our schedule because we still have to study for our end of the year exams. In terms of filming. Because a lot of places are closing it makes it harder for me to actually refilm some of my scenes. Not only has it affected my education but it has affected my senior life in general. My senior activities like prom or our senior brunch have been canceled.  However, that is not my main concern. They have not said it yet, but there are other schools who are canceling their graduation. I will be really bummed if my graduation gets canceled because it has been all I have been looking forward to since I came to high school. Regardless life must go on. In times like these, we must keep hope that things will get better. In the midst of bad news, there are a couple good things. Many people have been able to recover from the virus, as well as some bodies of water have been cleared from pollution.

There's still time

So from the schedule that I had from Monday, I filmed nothing on the days I was supposed to. But there is a good reason. I recently found out that our movie was due on April 9th. And before you start thinking I'm going to wait till the last minute, I made a promise to myself that I would not. I just moved up when I was going to do my filming. I plan on filming my movie over spring break. However, there is one little problem. I have to return the schools' camera and tripod by Monday, March 16th. But I have a solution to the problem. I plan on filming on an iPhone this time. And I know what your thinking once again, "I thought that didn't work the last time?" Well, the reason it did not work is that I was using an iPhone while trying to edit on my windows computer. So things were not transferring over easily. I plan to solve this problem by using an apple computer this time. My sister is kind of enough to give me her mac book air, over spring break so by the time I finish filming again I can finally edit.
In the meantime, I also have to think about my CCR which is also due on April 9th. I have my idea though I just need to film it. What I plan on doing is doing an interview like how the late-night show host does it.  I want it to be very comical while also getting the points I need to across. So I will set up a table and two chairs and have my friends interview on the process while also inserting some footage of my experience.

Starting from the bottom

I have been pretty busy since the last time that I turned a blog in. School is now coming up to an end and I have to think of things such as college and my graduation. In the midst of all of it, I make time because I actually like this class. Pertaining to this class, I have some work to do. When we were doing peer reviews, I enjoyed watching another person's film, but it made me realize that my film needs a lot of work. One of the things that I noticed is I need more camera angles, I have about 3 different ones. This means that this week I need to reshoot and get the camera at different angles of some scenes. Another thing I need to do is add dialogue. Most of my film is music covering dialogue and I have to lower the music and let the dialogue be heard. The only reason I did that is that there is background noise that I did not know how to get rid of. So I also have to redo my voiceovers and dialogue.
After reflecting on my own film I decided to create some new filming days. I am hoping that if all goes planned, I can film tomorrow. I plan on doing my voice-overs and dialogue on Wednesday, Thursday we continue reshoots, then I plan to start editing on Thursday and Friday. I just have to be wary because I work on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. However, if I feel as though I am being overwhelmed I will have to call out so I can get this film down.  In the last couple of my blogs, I have been talking about how hard it is to juggle everything that I am doing. So to help myself with the load, I take a break, take a few deep breaths and remind myself that there is a reason for me doing all of this. I am saying this because this is the positive attitude I am going into this week with.

I got my tassel for graduation and that is what motivates me to keep pushing 

Peer review

I got to peer review a scary movie and I have to say, it was pretty interesting. I liked the plot of the story that they had. It definitely grabs the viewer's attention. Another thing that I liked was the camera angles and movements that they used. They were able to incorporate many angles and movements which added to the effect of how the movie should feel. They had good lighting all throughout the film so we were able to see them. My favorite part would have to be the props and makeup that they had. They had a scene where the killer wrote words in blood. They also had a scene where they showed a girl in a bathtub with blood all over her. They way they placed the note and the blood fit perfectly. However, there are a couple things that they could improve on. To start off the video was very choppy, it felt like I was watching different takes with no transitions. You could definitely see when one take was done and another started. A suggestion I would make is to add more transitions into the film so that it flows better. Another thing that I noticed was the sound. Some scenes the non-diegetic sounds would not match up with the diegetic sounds. To help with that I would suggest to level out the sounds, it was really the background noise that was mixing with the music so maybe turn down the background noise or turn up the music.

Filming Blog: Just when I thought things couldn't get worse

So Monday was a good filming day because I filmed a lot of footage. However, when I went to transfer my files to a flash drive, I was running into all sorts of problems. The videos were too large to send on an email, or I would have to save the videos to my files on my phone then transfer them on to the drive. Then my next problem would be that I run out of storage and the couple videos I got on the drive wouldn't play so there was no way for me to edit.  Basically, all the footage I filmed couldn't be used. Our next filming day was on Wednesday. We filmed the scene of him being in the back of the ambulance and that worked out great. We got all the shots we needed in record time too. Moving the equipment was definitely difficult but we got it done. The next time we were supposed to film was today. But of course, the universe was against me.
So we were set to film after school today and we're on a timed schedule, to begin with, because I had an award ceremony to attend. This meant that I had to be back at the school by 6 p.m. So we first had to run errands, such as getting some props and waiting for one of our actors to reach our first location, the hospital. Then once we finished running our errands, we were on our way to the hospital when a car in front of us swerved into our lane and ran into the side of our car. None of us were injured but the back of the car was pulled off when the person kept driving on the side of the car, so we had to wait till the police showed up. Once they showed up we had to call the insurance company and discuss who was gonna pay for the damages. Once that was figured out it was time for me to leave, which meant the car we were going to use is now totaled and I got no filming done today. I would film over the weekend but I will be out of town. So my plan to edit my film a bit more in terms of the plot.

This is the state of the car.

Filming blog: The pressure is on

From my last blog, things got a little hectic. So while talking to Jeffrey he explained that with his schedule he would not be able to help me with the project, this meant that I was stuck stranded. I had to find a new lead actor and actress, change up a couple things in the movie, and change up my schedule. The biggest issue was the schedule. Once I found new people to play my parts, we had to come up with a schedule together. The lead male actor has practice and work, while the female lead had work. I also realized how jam-packed my schedule was, I had work during the week, an awards ceremony, and I will be going to Orlando, Florida for my State competition for Debate. We all got together to discuss our schedule and we said we would film Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday. I won't lie at the moment I am feeling a bit overwhelmed because of how much I have to do in such little time, but I have faith.
The good thing is, we are sticking to the schedule so far. After we got out of school, I shot the last couple of scenes in my film after we got out of school. Since my storyboard was not up to date on the new changes made, it was a little difficult to film. However, we got it done. It was super fun to film though. Since all of us are friends, the atmosphere was really light and fun. We definitely laughed a lot and had to take many shots, but I think we got some good footage. I remember the lead female actresses, messing up the scene and then saying "How to real actors do this without laughing so much"  We shot the movie on a phone, and the quality was better. Because we didn't use the actual camera, I put the footage on a flash drive, and I have to dump it on the computer I am going to edit on. As of right now, I am on track with my new schedule and I hope this works out for the rest of the week.

My lead male and female actor/actress smiling at finishing the first day of shooting