Technical Difficulties

Originally we had a plan to create a dissolve effect on The Henchman's mask in order to show his mask disappearing. We planned to do this by taking a shot with the Henchman with his mask on then taking another one without the mask in exactly the same position. This worked once as you can see below.

However, the second time we did this, the camera moved so the Henchman was in a different position. To overcome this we decided to cut him out and put him on an empty backdrop, then create the effect on top of this.

However, on the day of the project deadline, the file corrupted and we were unable to recover it. We did not have much so had to think of a short term solution. We inserted another shot of Leora running between the mask being off and then appearing on his face, and since the audience have already seen this before, this maintains continuity.

Adding An Image To The Device

 We made the image we wanted to appear on the screen in Photoshop, making it a gif to make sure the screen had movement so it looked more realistic.

We then added the gif to After Effects, where we tracked the corners of the device to ensure the image stayed with the screen of the device.

We had the image say 75, to inform the audience that the device was loading, yet was not yet complete. This will ensure that the beep indicates to the audience that the device is done loading later on in the opening.

Sound Effects - Beep

For the shot where Leora's time device has recharged, we needed a sound effect to indicate this to the audience, and the characters. We wanted a beep as this is commonly associated with technology completing something, for example when a microwave beeps.


We researched some royalty free SFX to find the beep we wanted, and thought fit.


The second half of this clip fit our needs, as we thought it sounded believable in terms of an electronic device. We also thought that the sound wouldn't be too jarring, but still noticeable.


This clip also fits our needs, as the sound is noticeable and clearly electronic. The only issue we have with it is that it is a bit too distracting and intense for the scene it is used for. To get around this we think it should be cut down to about two or three beeps as to make it less intrusive for the audience.



In the final edit we decided to use the second clip, as it was loud enough to be heard over the music, yet still quiet enough to not be too intense. The first clip, although we liked it better, was too quiet for the scene.

The Time Travel Shot

In order to achieve the effect of the the time travel, we had to cut out Leora frame by frame, then layer the cut out shot on top of the shot of the Henchman running after Leora and reacting to her disappearing.

Later on we will add a lens flare after grading the two shots in order to make it more obvious that Leora is time travelling. Originally we were going to use special effects such as those shown here, but due to the time constraint on the project we settled for using more simplistic methods.

Future Skyline

For the future skyline, we added in more, taller buildings, so there is a difference between the skyline in the future, and 2014. We also decided that to make it a more noticeable difference there should be 'spaceships' in the sky.

We drew inspiration for this from:

Doctor Who - frequently has alien spaceships over big cities, such as London, which connotes the sci-fi genre.

Star Trek - set in the future, with starships, that also connote the sci-fi genre, and are associated with the future

For our opening, we were thinking of having ships like these in the sky, which will further anchor the fact that it is the future. We will also have them move across the sky in order make the scene more believable:

On Set

Harry using the tripod as a counter balance for camera movement shots

Harry using a tree for filming high angle shots

Harry positioning the camera for low angle running shots

Harry framing the over the shoulder shot of Juliette

Harry framing the over the shoulder shot of Juliette, using the tripod to keep the camera stable

Whilst Molly and Harry filmed on the shoot, we only have those photos, as Juliette and Josh were in almost every shot so we couldn't film and Molly took the photos, meaning she isn't shown to be filming.

Grading

For our footage, we have decided to also make it more blue and cold so as to conform to the sci-fi genre. We also made the shots more contrasting and darker to connote the tense mood, and to conform to the general aesthetic of action and sci-fi films.

As shown, the original footage is more green and brown, and not as contrasting, whereas the graded footage has a colder look.

We drew inspiration for our grading from action and sci-fi films, such as:

Star Trek

Alien

Blade Runner

Titles In After Effects

For our titles to be integrated into the action as we had planned, we needed to use After Effects to achieve the look that we wanted.
After planning which shots would have titles and where, we opened the clip in After Effects, added the title where we wanted, and used masks to make the title appear as though it was in the action, for example with this shot, where Leora's boot covers the title as it goes past.

An Example Of Our Shoot-Board

For our shoots, we created a shoot-board to follow to ensure we got all the shots we needed. For the re-shoot, we have remade the shoot-board with just the shots we need to get.

Pre-production - Title Inspiration

We plan to have interactive titles, as these were a convention of the action genre. We have drawn inspiration from the Zombieland opening credits, where characters destroy titles as they run past. Due to time constraints, and lack of experience, we decided to have our characters merely run past or over our titles.

UPDATE (after we have finished our final edit)

Shown above are the Zombieland opening titles, and below are our titles.

There are however differences between ours and those of Zombieland. In Zombieland the titles are more implemented into the background and scenes within the opening sequence, for example they appear as though they are part of the ground or a building. However we were unable to add this effect so our titles appear to be floating in the air but still, by passing behind trees, for example, appear as though they are built in as an integral part of the scene.

Treatment - Soundtrack - Darkness Falls

For our opening, we decided to use this soundtrack, as it fits the genre - action and sci-fi. The beginning of the audio clip is tense, building suspense, before the drums begins, which quickens the pace of our running shots. The metallic noises connote sci-fi, as they are associated with technology. With the audio, we tried to time certain actions with the claps, and the time jump at the end with the noise at 0:58.
Due to practicality issues and the fact that the clip is only 01:09 minutes long we would have to edit the audio clip in order to fit with our opening sequence which is over 30 seconds longer than our sound clip. This would make our editing process more difficult, since this sound clip was most suited to our opening sequence we thought it was worth the extra effort.

Below we have posted some clips of chase sequences in action/sci-fi films that have soundtracks that have inspired our own chase sequence.

The music in this scene of Inception starts off very quietly whilst the two characters are talking and then as the action begins and the chase commences, the music becomes a lot louder and the beat comes in. The difference between this scene and our own was that this scene includes much more fighting and dialogue than our own. The music in our opening sequence has a much more of a sci-fi feel to it, and creates a much tenser ambience.



This clip is a chase scene from The Bourne Identity; the music in this clip didn't heavily influence the ambience and mood of our music but there are some points of this soundtrack which we really tried to capture in our own music. The heavy, fast beats in this scene are something that we really wanted to include in our scene.