Group meetings pt.2

Today in class we did we had another group meeting. My group was Brooke, Jack, Sebastian, Vanessa, and myself, of course. The group meetings are always good because it is a great way to get feedback on your work, give advice to others, get ideas from others, and see your progress compared to others (which sometimes makes you stress less about how much you have done lol)

Brooke talked first about her project, which she is doing a documentary on dance. She explained how she wants to show the more technical side to dance, like the movements, story, and emotions. This was a little similar to my project which I thought was interesting. I liked this idea and think it can end up looking really cool. We suggested that she uses not just the dancers, but also an instructor or professional, which could add more range and variety to the interviews. We also suggested that she adds more to her blog, like a different font and more pictures. This will make it more appealing. She had not started filming, the magazine article, or posting on social media, but she said she created the account. We also suggested that she gets started doing all of those things because the due date is coming up. As mentioned before, hearing this made me realize the progress my group has made. Haha.

Jack went next and explained that he was doing a music video for the same band that he did his documentary project on. This was a great idea and I think that it will turn out awesome. He said that he had already filmed most of it and just has a little bit more to film. He told us that he filmed part of it at this like abandoned location that has a lot of tires and had to convince a guy to let them film there, but he said the guy was chill and was cool about it. This sounded really sus to me, but this just makes so much sense for Jack. He said the next part he was filming in his garage and the band was just going to have a bunch of rubber ducks thrown at them. Again, so Jack. He said the music video has no story, but I think that this makes sense with the band and style. On his blog we saw his digipak, this had rubber ducks on it, which he was putting in his video, too. It looked really cool, and I thought he did a good job creating it. He asked what we thought he could include in it, and we suggested a pop out like origami rubber duck, he liked this idea. His blog also appealing; it popped out at you with black and purple, it really matched a band vibe. I am excited to see this music video and final digipak.

It was now my turn to go, which everyone liked some of the ideas that we had for editing our video. They thought it was a great idea to transition through the ages and change the filter or coloration to darker as she gets older. Jack suggested that on our postcard that the back be black and white. I liked this because it is a picture of our character towards the end of the short film, which would be in black and white. They also suggested changing the color on our postcard to make it more visible; switch the red title to black and the information from black to red. They thought my group has been making good progress and that our social media is consistent.

Sebastian is doing the two movie trailers and is going for like a thriller comedy. He had a similar idea to my group, by changing the coloration to like a greenish. I thought this would work well for his idea. He had not started to film; however, he had a complete shot list and script for both trailers. He was planning on filming this weekend, and having both of those things complete will make it super easy to do. I believe he said he was using Twitter for social media, which I think that he should just make sure to include some pictures. We also suggested that he include some more pictures on his blog, but I think he will include more once he films.

Vane was the last person to go, and her project looked really great from what we saw on her blog. She had already filmed and took pictures for her key art. She used a professional camera and the quality looked amazing. She is doing the trailers and making her film about a false reality. The key art reflected this perfectly. She had three options on her blog and was not sure which to use. Two were in a bathtub and the third was in front of those circle things that look like they are moving but actually are not, this was really trippy. We liked them all, but she thinks she is going to use the one of the bathtub ones. I have a feeling that her project is going to look really professional, and I am excited to see it. I do not remember if she had started on her social media, but I am not worried about her doing so.

Of course, we forgot to take a group picture, so I do not have that to include. Sorry, this is just a lot of writing. This was group meeting was insightful and collaborative.

(Pretend this is us)

and WERE BACK

Now that Spring Break is over, it is the final few weeks of our project. The first thing that we immediately discussed was when we would finish filming and whose postcard we would use. We decided that we are going to continue filming tomorrow (03/29) and see if we are able to finish. I think that we are at a great place with filming, and we have already started to edit. We are making good progress and are working efficiently.

We also discussed our postcard. Both Eugenia and I worked on this over break and had nice visuals and ideas. I continued to mess around with this in class and Eugenia and Ana liked what I had made. We will probably end up using mine for the FINAL piece, but we had an idea to post it to our Instagram to try and get some feedback on our ideas. 

It was really awesome to hear and get conformation that our work is coming along well and our "fans" are excited to see how it turns out. I am too! I think that this topic is very visually appealing and that we have a lot of cool shots. Despite the deep purpose, it is visually appealing. 

Here is the progress on the postcard that I made in class today.

Here I added dates, a film festival, and director names. For the film festival, it is for the most part local (Chicago), and is for short films. I put the categories that we could be entered for that would be the most achievable.

I have not added anything here yet, but we plan to have our social media here and maybe a quote. I made it a little transparent to change the tone.

This is still a work in progress, and I will continue to work on it!

Postcard

As we are at the end of break, we really want and need to get started on our postcard. I know that Eugenia has started to come up with some ideas and outlines for our postcard which is great! I also wanted to start putting together some ideas, which are for the most part the same.

I had screenshotted these two pictures from filming that I think could work well for the postcard, one of which is similar to our current Instagram profile picture.

The reason that I think using these two pictures our work well is because of the juxtaposition that they include. The top picture is the action that everyone sees, however the bottom shows the struggle behind the sport.

Here are some ways to incorporate them...

or...

These are just rough ideas and we still need to discuss as a group. When we meet in class, we will start to discuss our ideas and see what we think work best. We also need to determine what information we will include on our postcard. This includes film festivals, dates of release, where we are releasing, and other information.

See you after spring break!

Marketing

As mentioned previously, over break we wanted to focus on posting on our Instagram. We have recently added new posts, which included some background and fun facts of our main character, as well as little teasers that we made from some footage.

We want to grow our Instagram by gaining more followers and posting more frequently.

These videos were posted as an Instagram reel. According to Instagram, reels include creating, watching, and sharing short, entertaining videos. You can create multi-clip videos up to 90 seconds, and get creative with easy-to-use text, AR filters and audio. The most important part as to why we are using reels as opposed to regular videos is because of the explore tab on Instagram. The new Reels tab-a space to encounter shareable moments as they happen-or find reels in someone's profile. You can send reels you like to friends in Messenger or share them to Stories. This is a great way to expand our audience by using hashtags to get on users explore tab.

Here we did a little intro for our main character. We just included some fun facts about the actress to show possible engagement with the fans.

Spring Break Plans

SOOO... this week is Spring Break and we do not have school. Because of this it is going to be a little bit more difficult to communicate and find time to work on our project, however, we plan to still find the time to get stuff done.

We plan to continue posting on our Instagram with photos and more behind the scenes! We are working on creating little edits of some of our filming to post on the Instagram as mini teasers. We plan to post a few of these, pictures of our cast, and BTS of filming. This is our Instagram currently, and I will do another blog about our recent posts!

We want to start brainstorming some ideas for our postcard and possibly an outline for our plans. We are most likely going to use Canva, which has a variety of options for us to use and be creative with our print component. When we go back to school and are all together in class, we will be shifting more our focus to this.

We want to film a little bit more over break. This of course may not happen because of what I explained earlier. However, if possible, we plan to get what we can. After break, we will get the remaining footage and filming complete.

Finally, we want to start editing what we have, so that when we do conclude filming, we already have a foundation and outline for the rest of the footage. We have not discussed who will be editing the entirety, however, we can all contribute in some way towards the editing. I think it is better for one person to do most of it, therefore it is consistent and the "vision" of the final product is not altered.

BEHIND THE SCENES

I do not want to share too much, but here are some behind of the scenes!

Here is a picture of filming a scene with our main character. We took this on our first day of filming.

(this video will not be included vertically)

Here are some videos that will be most likely be included in our film. These will be included in the parts with our character at her youngest age. 

We still have a lot more filming to do, but we are at a comfortable place where we know we are on track to not be stressed. We are going to start editing what we have and start on our print component. Next week is spring break and will be difficult to communicate without class time and do our usual work, however, when we have the time, we will be working on our project!

Meet the cast!!

Here are some pictures of our cast! This is not everyone, but some of the important roles that you may want to keep in mind! We took these pictures on our first day of filming. I will be sure to include some behind the scenes and some clips from filming in the future! 

These three girls are playing our main character. Each are playing the same role, just as a different age in our main characters life. They will be in most of the film so get used to seeing them!

 

These girls are playing another one of our characters. She will be playing one of the teammates? (idrk gymnastics terms) and friends of our main character.

I will post some more behind the scenes in future days!