Plot Summary

While an unknown object falls from the sky, a wanderer attempts to go and seek out this mystery. She travels many miles through the harsh desert to only find a strange object with a mystical vibe to it. As she goes to investigate the object more, a weird aura appears around her body and arms and with this she feels unstoppable. A mysterious man has followed her to this location and demands that she gives the object to him. Only if she knew how to control her powers, and she lets out a powerful blast and with that there is a cliff hanger.

- Jacob Gay

Prop List

We only used one prop in our film opening, the piece of metal. This prop is going to be the cause of the main character getting her superpowers. The film opening is based in the desert, and having as little as possible props is essential to show the emptiness of the scene

Lighting Analysis

Throughout all of the pictures there is a clear difference in the warmth of the colours in the shot. The lighting is slightly softer creating lighter shadows revealing more detail about the characters face or object in focus. This is very clear at 45 degrees.

Filming Timings

Casting Choice

Amber Pollard - Actress and Costume Designer

Amber is an art student so was perfect for costume designing. And also since we wanted a girl to be the main character to go against the gender stereotypes to show gender equality. Amber is a good actress.

Adam Jones - Actor
Adam is a photographer, he contributed heavily in the development of the storyline and incorporated a character with similar traits as himself. This is why he is perfect for the character he's playing.

Jacob Gay - Editor and Videographer
Jacob is a highly skilled and experienced editor and videographer, making him essential for the filming process and has a great influence on the discussions made on set.

Nasri Iskandar - Director and Videographer
Nasri is great director as he has vision when it comes to film making, he creates and holds a scene with ease and dictates how the scene should flow, we chose him as our director as he is the most mature and his personality shows that he can lead our group.

BBFC Rating

According to my audience profile, this is the perfect age restriction for our movie. The logo above means that it is suitable for 15 years and older. This is because the movie will have violence, this will filter out all the younger viewers from our target market. For example, these movie below are rated 15 and above, these are some of the example we are working towards.

Story Board

Production logo design

Movie Logo

The logo had to be futuristic and sci-fi based. This is why we chose a gold colour with a large font like most other superhero movies. We made sure the name was short and rememberable.

Film Title analysis

These are some examples of superhero film titles :-

As you can you can clearly see, when it comes to super hero films, the font colour and the dimensions  of the text all show power. The text is usually bold and 3D. The colours are usually, silver/grey, red or another bold colour, like green. This is to show power or to hint at colour scheme of the superheroes iconic colours, for example, Ant-Mans suite is red and so is the title. Red is a popular colour when it comes to superheroes, this is because when it comes to colour psychology, red shows danger or power.

Questionnaire

Focus Group

For our focus group we decided to choose a super hero film opening, The Avengers Age Of Ultron, to question the viewers on, because it displays a variety of different powers and genders. The questions were:-

- In three words, describe the scene you've just watched?

- What genre would you say that the movie is from?

- Have you seen clips like this before?, If so, where have you seen them and are they shown frequently in movies?

- Do you see any elements of different genres in this clip and what are they?

- Knowing that they're all super heroes, which one is your favourite and why?

- Which characters fit the stereotype of a hero the most?

Conclusion

From this, we learnt the positives and negatives with using focus groups. The positives are :-

• they are useful to obtain detailed information about personal and group feelings, perceptions and opinions
• they can save time and money compared to individual interviews
• they can provide a broader range of information
• they offer the opportunity to seek clarification
• they provide useful material eg quotes for public relations publication and presentations

....the negatives are :-

• there can be disagreements and irrelevant discussion which distract from the main focus 
• they can be hard to control and manage
• they can to tricky to analyse
• they can be difficult to encourage a range of people to participate
• some participants may find a focus group situation intimidating or off-putting; participants may feel under pressure to agree with the dominant view
• as they are self-selecting, they may not be representative of non-users.

Audience Profile

My name is Jacob Smith, I'm 16 years old and I'm a huge DC comics fan. My favourite movies are,  Batman VS Superman, Man of steel, and The Avengers. Every since I was a kid I would collect action figures of superhero and read DC comics.

 I don't enjoy reading but when it comes to comics i just can't stop. I'm a huge fan of the DC TV series, like The Flash, Arrow and Legends of tomorrow. I love how all their universes and intertwined, this it what keeps me addicted and wanting more and more episodes.

I love playing video games, especially games like No Mans Sky, where you can explore and conquer planets. I love Sci-Fi films and video games, I find them more interesting than other genres, because it gets my mind thinking about the possibilities with all this different powers. For example i never expected The Flash to travel through time, but as it turns out he can run so fast he breaks the time capsule. I find that very interesting, much more interesting than other genres and kinds of movies.

In my free time i enjoy gaming games like Overwatch and other Sci-Fi based games. They are more interesting and fun to then the generic, "shooting game" or "sports game".

Mood Board

Male Gender Representation

In a super hero movie the characteristics that most male characters share are as follows :-

- Dominant over female characters

- Usually main character

- Really Muscular (with some exceptions)

- Heros tend to be good looking whereas the enemies aren't good looking

In super hero films the male characters tend to be really rich and have advanced technology

As you can see from the image above, there are 5 main male characters and only 1 main female character, this shows that the inequality between males and females are still present in movies nowhere days. Personally i feel that this is the case because of the typical male figure compared to the female figure. Males stereotypically have larger muscles, broader shoulders and look all round far more powerful and superior than a female character. This could explain why most victims in films are stereotypically female.

Female Gender Representation

In a super hero movie the characteristics that most female characters share are as follows :-
- Victim
- Intelligent but not physically powerful
- Not muscular
- Both heros and villains are good looking
The female characters are usually a male's side kick. In 2015, 52 were male main actors and only 24 were female.



In this example I've used you can see that the victim is the female, but usually that is the case to give the main character motivation to go after the villain, to seek revenge or vengeance. The use of a females death is much more powerful than a males, mainly because the audience generally feel more sympathetic towards a females death than a males.

In my opinion, I think the main character should be a woman to contradict with the stereotype in films nowhere days. A good example I've looked at is, The Hunger Games, where Jennifer Lawrence, plays Catness Everdeen, a strong, female main character. I changed my story because of its complexity and with that I made the main character a girl and the villain a boy. I think this is the best use of gender because the viewer will be sympathetic towards the main character and not towards the villain.

Editing Analysis

For my editing analysis I'm going to using Age of Ultron as my example to show the different techniques used in editing.

Long Take
Whats very unique about this opening scene, and the main reason i chose to use is as my editing analysis video is that its a mainly one long take. This is extremely difficult and is very impressive, even to a hollywood standard. In filmmaking, a long take is a shot lasting much longer than the conventional editing pace either of the film itself or of films in general. Significant camera movement and elaborate blocking are often elements in long takes, but not necessarily so.

Quick Cuts
Quick cutting refers to several consecutive shots of a brief duration (e.g. 3 seconds or less). It can be used to convey a lot of information very quickly, or to imply either energy or chaos. In Age of Ultron, it is at the end of the long take, moments after Iron man gets a close up shot. Within 6 seconds, 5 different shots were shown.

Continuity Editing

Continuity editing is the process of combining more-or-less related shots, or different components cut from a single shot, into a sequence that is unnoticeable to the viewers and tells a story. In Age of ultron it is from the 1:10m onwards, showing Tron fighting the enemies and and the enemies marching at different angles.

Superhero Convention

                      

Narrative Analysis

Todorov's Equilibrium Theory

 ...is a theory based on a equilibrium, a recognition and then a new equilibrium. This means a balance at the start, and event or new character is introduced to disrupt the balance, making the balance in the story change. This theory is based on mainstream storyline in the film industry.

.

Equilibrium

 This is the introduction of the characters and the story line, when the the movie's details are  established to the viewer.

Disruption

The arch nemesis or disaster that changes the balance of the between the characters is introduced to the viewer.

Recognition

This is when the disruption in the movie becomes known and the characters lives and the events are combined and all the consequences are in full effect. Todorov states in his theorem that this is where tensions constantly builds and this is results in the longest section of the movie.

Repair

This is where the characters try to fix the problems that have happened. This is usually the most tense part of the movie, as stated in Todorv's theorem, as the characters usually put it all on the line to fix the imbalance.

New Equilibrium

This is where the balance is restored but has changed adapting to the new changes, never the less all the problems are all solved and sometimes a new disruption or cliff hanger happens so the viewer gets attached to the series or movie, and is wanting a new movie.

My Movie Opening

For my movie opening, we will be showing the equilibrium and the disruption in the end, and then back to the equilibrium, just before the title screen. The idea is that in my opening movie i create a little confusion between the viewer and the storyline. To create this confusion i will start the movie opening with a fight scene where it isn't clear who the hero and the villain is. This will set the scene and create a tense atmosphere for what is about to happen next. After the fight scene, it will jump to a cut scene where the movie goes back to the start, as the fight scene was a scene from midway through the movie, and i were to continue and create the movie i would repeat the scene making it iconic to the viewer, making it the scene the viewer will remember after watching it. That was the original plan, but later along as our ideas have developed, i believe that simplicity is sometimes so powerful. So the idea is to just show the main character get her powers for 1:40 of our 2:00 the in the last 20s, leave the viewers on a cliff hanger just before the film title comes up.

Sound Track Analysis

Sound Track Analysis
The Arrow

Opening Credits Analysis

The Flash

   Effect on viewers
The font, colour, size and placement of the opening credits are all designed to be subtle but effective. The font that is used is to display the credits are based on the text and style of the DC comic books, as this TV show is based on the comics. The colour of the text are outlined with black and coloured white, this means they will stand out no matter what the background is. This is really good because no credit will be illegible. The size of the font is not too large and not to small. This makes it easy to read. The roles of the people are smaller than the name, this is to put emphasis on the name and not the role. All the credits are placed in the bottom right of the scene making it not take attention away from the acting. They are up on screen for an average of 4s to give time for the viewer to read them.

Super Hero Opening Scene 3

Daredevil

Video Reference



In the opening scene of Daredevil, it shows how Daredevil lost his vision at a very young age with gasoline. In the first scene the audience feels very sympathetic towards the hero as he lost his vision saving an old man. This hints at the viewer that the boy will be a hero. This also grabs the views attention as it is a very sad scene making the viewer want to watch the series and become dragged into the series.


In this opening scene the child, who is soon to be the Daredevil, loses his eyesight saving an old mans life.This later, gives him the advantage when fighting crime. Not being able to see went from an disadvantage to the upper hand the Daredevil had on his enemies. Throughout the series, like The Flash, none of that would've happened without the opening scene.This shows the significance of opening scenes not only in Sci-Fi films but in all films.


.This is done to summarise and set the starting scene for the audience, just like a trailer. In this opening scene in particular, POV is used when the child loses his vision to add an even more dramatic effect.

Super Hero Opening Scene 2

Arrow

Video Reference

In the opening scene of Arrow, the main character Arrow, is running in what seems to be an island showing the audience his powers, his powers being, nothing more than intelligence and being sly. In this scene it showcases Arrows speed and physical ability. Just before the scene ends the arrow fires arrows at an insane distance with great precision.

                                         

In this opening scene The Arrow fires an arrow to get himself rescued, this is ironic as he becomes the Arrow. With a science fiction film, the villain usually has powers too, but seemings though The Arrow doesn't have powers the viewers expect the villain not to have powers, but thats not the case in Arrow. Throughout the series, like The Flash, most details go back to this scene as the first scene is an important scene to the plot. In Sci-Fi films and most films of other genres, this is usually the case.


 shots.This is done to summarise and set the starting scene for the audience, just like a trailer.



The shot used when Arrow fires his arrow is an over the shoulder shot.The Arrow is a very iconic object in the series. In most Sci-Fi based movies either a power or object is most significtant to the story. The shot showing the location normally comes first which is the establishment shot. Most movies do this. Normally these are long shots with a pan or also known as an establishing shot.

Super Hero Opening Scene 1

The Flash

Video Reference

In the opening scene of The Flash, the main character Barry Allen/The Flash, is speaking to the audience introducing himself and his powers. In this scene it showcases The Flash's powers and also shows the most significant scene in the entire series, the murder of his mother, Nora Allen. Through the first scene the audience can tell thats its sci-fi/superhero movie as they show The Flash running through the city at supernatural speeds.

In this opening scene The Flash is seen to have a rough childhood. Ironically, as a kid he wasn't fast enough to run away from the bullies, which ties into his powers, super speed. With a science fiction film, the villain usually has powers too, in this case we get a glimpse of the villain in the murder of Berry Allen's, (The Flash), mother, which in this case has the same powers as The Flash except he uses yellow lighting and goes by the name Reverse Flash. Throughout the series, the reasons behind the death of Nora Allen were explained near then end of the season. Reason being The Reverse Flash went back in time to kill Berry as a child but got stuck in the past. Meaning The Reverse Flash needed to wait till The Flash grew up and gained his powers to send him back to his old timeline. In Sci-Fi films, this is usually the case, The Villain wants or needs something from the Main Character.                                      

The legnth of each shot are very similar of that of a trailer or action scene, starting quite slow then speeding up towards the end. This is done to summarise and set the starting scene for the audience, just like a trailer.

                                         
The types of shots used in the first 20 seconds are used to emphasise the speed of The Flash, this is achieved by making very shaky POVs and long shots. The shot used before the murder of Nora Allen, is an establishment shot of the house. This house later on becomes iconic in the series and plays a big role in the storyline. This is mostly the case in most science fiction films. The shot showing the location normally comes first. Most movies do this. Normally these are long shots with a pan or also known as an establishing shot, this is the case with the Flash in the first scene and before a main scene.

Arrow

Video Reference

In the opening scene of Arrow, the main character Arrow, is running in what seems to be an island showing the audience his powers, his powers being, nothing more than intelligence and being sly. In this scene it showcases Arrows speed and physical ability. Just before the scene ends the arrow fires arrows at an insane distance with great precision.

                                         

In this opening scene The Arrow fires an arrow to get himself rescued, this is ironic as he becomes the Arrow. With a science fiction film, the villain usually has powers too, but seemings though The Arrow doesn't have powers the viewers expect the villain not to have powers, but thats not the case in Arrow. Throughout the series, like The Flash, most details go back to this scene as the first scene is an important scene to the plot. In Sci-Fi films and most films of other genres, this is usually the case.


The legnth of each shot are very similar of that of a trailer or action scene, with some very fast shots one after the other and some more lengthy shots.This is done to summarise and set the starting scene for the audience, just like a trailer.



The shot used when Arrow fires his arrow is an over the shoulder shot.The Arrow is a very iconic object in the series. In most Sci-Fi based movies either a power or object is most significtant to the story. The shot showing the location normally comes first which is the establishment shot. Most movies do this. Normally these are long shots with a pan or also known as an establishing shot.

Daredevil

Video Reference



In the opening scene of Daredevil, it shows how Daredevil lost his vision at a very young age with gasoline. In the first scene the audience feels very sympathetic towards the hero as he lost his vision saving an old man. This hints at the viewer that the boy will be a hero. This also grabs the views attention as it is a very sad scene making the viewer want to watch the series and become dragged into the series.


In this opening scene the child, who is soon to be the Daredevil, loses his eyesight saving an old mans life.This later, gives him the advantage when fighting crime. Not being able to see went from an disadvantage to the upper hand the Daredevil had on his enemies. Throughout the series, like The Flash, none of that would've happened without the opening scene.This shows the significance of opening scenes not only in Sci-Fi films but in all films.


The legnth of each shot are very similar of that of a trailer or action scene, with some very fast shots one after the other and some more lengthy shots for dramatic effect.This is done to summarise and set the starting scene for the audience, just like a trailer. In this opening scene in particular, POV is used when the child loses his vision to add an even more dramatic effect.