Unit 4 : Christmas Film
Task 1 : Research
1 - How to create guide for the 3 genres of Christmas films :
Is it a Christmas Film ? :
The is it a Christmas Film consist of a regular film with hints of Christmas in like Die Hard. This section is really unspecific it's just a normal film that is set at Christmas time but has nothing to do with it like a 007 movie but set in log cabins at Christmas and then he comes back to London to do more missions, nothing really Christmassy about that apart from the decorations and visuals.
Overall :
These three styles of Christmas films are always difficult to make especially the Hallmark becuase you have to watch everything you do to make sure it fits in with the documents made and provided, because you dont want to have mistakes or wrong scenes in the film if it is rated for a U or PG audience. This is really important with Hallmark as it will probabbly be seen by a lot of people same with the classical family films, they too have a really specific audience and this cannot be changed unless you are clever and make something new and unique then you might have a chance to be viewed by the mass of people who watch all the different Christmas films at Christmas through Netflix or various streaming services, this would then make your film really successful. The is it a Christmas Film genre is always fun because there is no clear cut yes or no its very faded and unclear, as long as their is snow or trees or Christmas things then i guess it can be labeled as a Christmas film even if it's not. But this can be really difficult to get a film classed as a Can it be a Christmas Film ?, as there isnt many other examples like a Die Hard Style of Christmas film because this is the only one that comes to mind for me as i dont really know a lot about the various Christmas Films out there so i'm going off conversations and knowlage i've learent recently but there isnt a clear cut difference like Hallmark and Family.
3 - Detailed analysis on two different Christmas films :
Home alone & The sound of music
Home alone is a dedicated Christmas Film, The sound of music however is a musical and not really a Christmas film but it is however associated with Christmas due to the fact it is aired around Christmas time and in the film they sing and they have links to Christmas with people mainly singing at Christmas time. Home alone is the ultimate Christmas film it has everything a Christmas film should offer from it, The whole layout of the film is top notch and unbeatable. Home alone is set at Christmas and is a part of Christmas for many people so its a very special film for most people. However The sound of music is not Christmassy so it is different to Home alone but has the elements that could make it a Christmas film still. While studying the Christmas film genre to help further improve my skills i made sure i was as involved as possible to help gain some extra knowlage so i can build up skills that i can use within the industry futher down the line. During the Christmas genre i learned a lot about making a film that was targeted more towards a younger audience so that was fun to learn what to include and not what to include as my group were doing hallmark which is very interesting as its romantic and all about love so we had to brainstorm over ideas to make sure everything that was going to happen in the film was PG or U rated as well as the language and terminology used, just to ensure people of all ages could watch it and understand it to the best of their ability. The Christmas genre is a difficult genre to master but if you crack the code you can be really good at it and get the right response from your audience through the advert or fim you might be masking that's to do with the Christmas genre choice of task. Most people dont fully understand or appreciate the amount of work and effort that goes into a 30 second advert on the tv or YouTube because they dont have to work on something like that but the projects are amazing to work on but very intensive and you have to hit the nail on the head otherwise it just doesnt fit right. The best way to work on Christmas genre style films or ads is to make a few little plans before hand covering the different styles ( Hallmark, Classical, Is it a chistmas film ? ) these will help you gain a more specific idea as to what your production will be about, this narrows down the selection of choice in the vision boards. By doing this you will be able to figure out exactly what you need to do and how to organise a set and production documents then you can crack on with the work in hand. That's why when picking between Home alone and The sound of music i knew that one is more Christmassy than the other so their would be a debate about which one is actually a Christmas film. Overall Christmas films are subjective unless it is a clear cut YES THIS IS A CHRISTMAS FILM but otherwise anything can be a "Christmas film" if it has trees lights or snow in so it's not so clear cut as all the big mainstream films. In the end, making a Christmas film is difficult as it has so many different things going on within it and the style can be really hard to master so once you know how to do it it's intuitive for you, that's like filmmaking in a whole, once you've done it for a while everything is just go go go, no time for thinking as you just get planning and creating whereas the Christmas films were a bit more of a chilled thinking and planning as a group to really work our brains to find something great, and we did for our film.
Task 2 : Pre-production & Production
1 - Christmas film with my own idea :
Christmas Classic - Home alone
My idea for my own seasonal film would be something similar to Home Alone or 007 mixed into it with an older person playing as Kevin in the original Home Alone, this would make it more of a 16 or 18 rated Christmas film which isn't really a Christmas film but it is, because it is set in Christmas and it'll look like Home Alone but just an older man 20's <--> 30's and he will protect his land against armed forces who are out to get him during a world fallout as he is the last one standing after all the blasts, but he decides to side with the British secret service so he can defend the United Kingdom against the enemy ( USA or Russia ) he is somehow one of the best agents despite the lack of experience he has had in the field but he is able to defend the UK and take down the enemy ( USA or Russia ) over the course of Christmas and then on Christmas day he goes back to his home and finishes cooking the roast dinner as if nothing happened, he then eats and enjoys his day at Christmas.
2 - Planning Process :
Our planning process was attempting to be as organised as possible to ensure we made the most of our time but over the course of pre-production and filming people weren't in and I had Covid so I couldn't attend for a week due to it but we still tried to do things even when we didn't have a whole team in place. All pre production could have been completed quicker and more efficiently but there was a few snags here and there with communication and people not understanding the whole ins and outs of the situation even though I had provided a time schedule with job roles for pre-production and filming and post-production. Trying to get everyone on the same page can be difficult in teams but sometimes it cant be helped and things are misread or not understood correctly, so for next time i think having a better group and people who want to participate within the whole production from start to finish would be really good and beneficial to everyone. However some things cant be changed or helped so you just have to make do and this was what we tried to do as best we could to ensure there was as little time wasted as possible. I was creating the time schedule for everything and giving out roles so i was able to keep on top of all the work, i was trying to include everyone with task managers and calendar apps etc but some people weren't as up for that as i was so i just put screenshots in teams group chats to allow the others to view the schedule and roles. During the week and a bit we had to plan i gave my documents to everyone else in the team chat and allowed everyone to be updated accordingly as best i could, some people weren't checking teams but they did see the messages eventually
Rough overview of our film before creating :
Production Research :
Script :
Shot lists :
Storyboard :
Risk Assessments :
3 - Production Diary :
We met together on the first day to discuss our ideas and come up with potential films we could produce together.
We then gave our ideas in the form of a group power point me and Alex produced the only ideas in this case but we had good ideas so it wasn't too problematic.
After we had gave a short presentation to Kane about the film ideas he picked mine.
We then did another presentation / talk to Kelly and the rest of the group just to pitch our idea.
I made a document showing our roles and tasks as well as a schedule so everyone knew what they needed to do and for when, this was to ensure the workload was split accordingly and evenly.
After this we made pre-production documents and additional files we may need.
All pre-production documents and scripts etc were completed with little time to spare and they were still continuing after our estimated deadline due to some people not uploading documents.
We all worked out what we needed to do and got sorting equipment and building a set for our film to make sure it looked perfect for our production.
The set was built in the green screen room - we built an office space where the millionaire / billionaire works.
We went to film on location in the collage café after hours, we put extras in the background so it wasn't an empty space.
Task 3 :Distribution & Evaluation
YouTube LINK : Christmas Film pt 1
2 - Detailed Evaluation :
At the start of Pre-Production we had started off by making a document with everyones job roles and tasks for the Pre-Production documents. Later on this was edited and adjusted to accompany everyone elses workflow types, some worked at home while others did the work at collage in the group. The Pre-Production work got completed as best as it could, i put my all into my documents and provided them with as much detail as possible, it is a shame that some documents were missing due to people not being able to complete it, however this did not stop us from trying to put together a short film even though we had a lot of problems.
During the actual Production of the short Christmas Film we encountered a few issues like our director walking out on us while shooting but we as the crew continued despite the sudden event, so we attempted to put together some sort of scene that we could have been able to use in the final film but i have no idea if they did or didnt get used as the communication between everyone via teams was limited and no one took time to read or respond to messages, i belive we tried our best to make things work but it was really unfortunate that it didnt work out so i dont think working in this group again is a good idea unless there is some individuals who start pulling their weight for the team, i had high hopes and pure determination to invision our film fully done and completed before 2023 and its unfortunately not completed as the last i heard it was being edited which was a few weeks back (it is currently the 02.01.2023) so hopefully sometime soon the film is completed.
Post-Production was limited, no communication between the editor and crew or how much progress has been made if at all any, so i'd like to see what has been done so far. This project wasnt the best but i'm trying to look past that and not allow this to hinder the team in any way, i just want to make sure everyone is happy with the final product and making sure that we even have a final product to show to people as it would be a shame if we didnt have one.
3 - My Goals For The Next Project :
I would really like to have a production group like i had for the suspense piece as there was top quality communication compared to this project and everyone was involved, no sitting back was taking place either, everyone had a great work ethic and support buddy, people helped others and in little duos within the bigger group for the suspense piece, so if anything for next time make sure i have a really good co-operative group that usues teams and is willing to put in the effort so allow us to create work at a really high standard. I have also learnt if someone hasnt done the work just do it yourself as you may never get the document you intend to have so just do it yourself and dont depend on others. My target for the next project is to make sure team work and communication is KEY it is my TOP PRIORITY otherwise it'll end up like this project and i just want to have a good standard and level of quality to these productions, i run the production as if it was a paying client so i run the time schedule tight and precise, so this will be the ultimate test for next time to see if i can ensure communication even if the people dont want too, i'd like to see if i can get something out of them so i can say at least they have contributed.
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