We produced our film opening over a series of shoots in two locations: Greenwich, and the bedroom of my suburban house. We shot both the beginning and ending bedroom scenes in the same room, but altered lighting and mise en scene to make them look like they took place in two separate homes. The middle section of the sequence was shot in Greenwich in the evening so that we could produce an eerie atmosphere whilst maintaining an image quality that would be lost by filming any later in the day.
Shoot 1:
For the first shoot we wanted to get the hardest bulk of the filming completed - this was any outdoor shooting, as we needed the right weather conditions: dark and wet but not raining, and needed to film as early into the process as possible, before it started getting dark later in the evening. However on this shoot we were only able to shoot the outdoor scenes that didn't involve a car as we didn't have access to one at this point. Consequentially we focussed this shoot on the shots of the Temptress commuting to her meeting point with her victim. This was initially going to be out introduction to the Temptress but we later decided to add in some shots of her getting ready.
This shoot was mostly unsuccessful as a lot of the material produced was too grainy or not essential to the plotline and ended up being cut. However a few setting shots were used to establish location and a shot of the Temptress' lower body was used in order to show her coming to a halt at her meeting point. These shots were merged with the material from shoot 4 to present the Tempress' journey from her home to the home of her victim.
Shoot 2:
This shoot was a lot more successful than our initial one, Our group decided to focus on the final aspects of the sequence - leaving any outdoor re-filming and car scenes to another day - which included the implication of a lead up to sexual activity as well as the killing itself.
The first shot we decided to tackle was the undressing. We used a blue/purple sequin bag to cast different lighting from that of shoot 3 onto the walls so as to establish a different location to the Temptress' house and to heighten the atmosphere. The undressing itself was shot through a POV shot capturing the victim's upper body and the Temptress' hands helping to undo his shirt buttons.
We then moved on to SFX, which went rather smoothly as we had previously experimented with the 'SLUT' carving on our male actor and had decided exactly how we wanted it laid out and also how we wanted to shoot it. Our initial attempt had turned out rather small, so we ensured that the word was spread out across the entire chest and looked shocking enough for a climatic ending to our film opening. We captured this SFX using a Steadicam shot, moving towards the carving in order to see the detail. In retrospect this could've been filmed better as the SFX doesn't quite come into focus until the end of the shot.
Shoot 3:
We decided to shoot some extra content for the start of our film opening after realising how little of shoot 1's content we could use. Furthermore, we thought that introducing the Temptress in her home environment getting into character would better inform the audience of her character; so we produced some daytime shots of the temptress in her nightwear (a satin nightgown and a floral robe) putting on her makeup and getting dressed - capturing her transition into her seductress character. These shots - being shot in daylight - were of a high quality and a lot of them were useable, including the opening shots used to establish location and reveal some of the Temptress' character, in which polaroid images and postcards can be seen picturing the Tempress herself, models, and a handwritten note. The colour scheme here is mostly black and white with hints of pink and red connoting with both danger and beauty.
Shoot 4:
This shoot allowed us to tie any ends together; we captured the car shots, enabling us to link the establishing shots in Greenwich to the bedroom shots with the victim. This was mostly done using POV shots from the victim's view. We also captured some transition shots in order to improve the overall aesthetic and flow of our opening. An example would be the smoke shot. In shoot 3 we captured the Temptress blowing out a candle before the screen cut to black - however in order to make this flow better we shot candle smoke rising on a black background so that, when edited, the smoke would continue to rise after the screen cut to black. These candle and smoke shots also came in handy for our final shot displaying the film's title where the candle and title flickered out before smoke was left to rise.
For the first shoot we wanted to get the hardest bulk of the filming completed - this was any outdoor shooting, as we needed the right weather conditions: dark and wet but not raining, and needed to film as early into the process as possible, before it started getting dark later in the evening. However on this shoot we were only able to shoot the outdoor scenes that didn't involve a car as we didn't have access to one at this point. Consequentially we focussed this shoot on the shots of the Temptress commuting to her meeting point with her victim. This was initially going to be out introduction to the Temptress but we later decided to add in some shots of her getting ready.
This shoot was mostly unsuccessful as a lot of the material produced was too grainy or not essential to the plotline and ended up being cut. However a few setting shots were used to establish location and a shot of the Temptress' lower body was used in order to show her coming to a halt at her meeting point. These shots were merged with the material from shoot 4 to present the Tempress' journey from her home to the home of her victim.
Shoot 2:
This shoot was a lot more successful than our initial one, Our group decided to focus on the final aspects of the sequence - leaving any outdoor re-filming and car scenes to another day - which included the implication of a lead up to sexual activity as well as the killing itself.
The first shot we decided to tackle was the undressing. We used a blue/purple sequin bag to cast different lighting from that of shoot 3 onto the walls so as to establish a different location to the Temptress' house and to heighten the atmosphere. The undressing itself was shot through a POV shot capturing the victim's upper body and the Temptress' hands helping to undo his shirt buttons.
We then moved on to SFX, which went rather smoothly as we had previously experimented with the 'SLUT' carving on our male actor and had decided exactly how we wanted it laid out and also how we wanted to shoot it. Our initial attempt had turned out rather small, so we ensured that the word was spread out across the entire chest and looked shocking enough for a climatic ending to our film opening. We captured this SFX using a Steadicam shot, moving towards the carving in order to see the detail. In retrospect this could've been filmed better as the SFX doesn't quite come into focus until the end of the shot.
Shoot 3:
We decided to shoot some extra content for the start of our film opening after realising how little of shoot 1's content we could use. Furthermore, we thought that introducing the Temptress in her home environment getting into character would better inform the audience of her character; so we produced some daytime shots of the temptress in her nightwear (a satin nightgown and a floral robe) putting on her makeup and getting dressed - capturing her transition into her seductress character. These shots - being shot in daylight - were of a high quality and a lot of them were useable, including the opening shots used to establish location and reveal some of the Temptress' character, in which polaroid images and postcards can be seen picturing the Tempress herself, models, and a handwritten note. The colour scheme here is mostly black and white with hints of pink and red connoting with both danger and beauty.
Shoot 4:
This shoot allowed us to tie any ends together; we captured the car shots, enabling us to link the establishing shots in Greenwich to the bedroom shots with the victim. This was mostly done using POV shots from the victim's view. We also captured some transition shots in order to improve the overall aesthetic and flow of our opening. An example would be the smoke shot. In shoot 3 we captured the Temptress blowing out a candle before the screen cut to black - however in order to make this flow better we shot candle smoke rising on a black background so that, when edited, the smoke would continue to rise after the screen cut to black. These candle and smoke shots also came in handy for our final shot displaying the film's title where the candle and title flickered out before smoke was left to rise.
In spite of the difficulties faced when filming, I feel as though all members of the Elsare group have gained a great deal of skills since the start of this project. Even judging by the amount of useable content that came out of our 3rd and 4th shoots compared to the 1st and 2nd it is evident that we learnt when is best to shoot and what angles work well etc. I also feel that our acquired skills are clearly utilised and presented in our final piece.
- R
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