Cathy's Section 11/20 - film3 checkpoint

My group is ryan, chris, david, ben, me, naomi, and karissa. we decided to do a film centered on the life of a man stranded on an unknown island. Pulled out to sea from a day of surfing gone awry, the protagonist finds himself on the beach of an unknown place. His initial reaction to call out for help does little to his favor, as he begins to lose hope and his sense of self. While making many failed attempts to find a way back home, he tries to adjust to live living on the island, struggling to survive in an environment not at all suited for living. He finds himself being lead further into distress. Faced with a growing sense of depression and loneliness, the protagonist struggles with hallucinations and beings to show signs of lunacy and irrationality. In his sadness, the protagonist takes his life on the opening scene’s initial beach cliff – plummeting off the side to his inevitable death with a sense of peace and relief in the fact that his long journey has finally come to a rest. While it would be ideal for the filming to occur on a real island, our lack of equipment and knowledge of such a place left us with the option of filming on the beaches near by. As there are no outlets, we decided to make use of the Ryan’s camera once again (though alternating at times to create variety in shot angles) and aren’t likely to use artificial lighting equipment. Since the beaches are rather crowded on the weekends as well, filming will likely take place throughout the week, perhaps are earlier hours to avoid the overflow of people in creating the “deserted island” feel. To emphasize the protagonist’s growing sense of insanity, we plan to use editing to create more jittery, flash screen shots to create the illusion of illusion. The scene of his death as well will be done as a trick of the camera, using a smaller drop and a mattress to give the impression of suicide. As the protagonist is alone, the film will be shot almost entirely in silence, using soundtrack and editing to better create a sense of emotion and insight into the mind and feelings of the protagonist. Our search for an actor to fulfill the part is still underway, thought we are working to complete as much with what we have as possible to lighten the load. The script is well on its way we well as the storyboarding – the most difficult thing at this point being the search for an actor able to memorize lines in a matter of days and perform within the next week or perhaps only half. With a group of eight people, we anticipate a little difficulty in equal contribution as well as finding effective meeting times as with all the conflicting schedules, but are all excited to see how it will all come together in the end.

Filming for this project was pretty difficult because now you have to think about the actors and make sure they remember and are comfortable with the lines. We spent awhile trying to find the actors and overall, I think we picked some really good ones. Kelly is adorable as the female lead, and she made me laugh with her "Uh, maybe because you're NOT REAL" line. Thomas is really charismatic, so that worked out really well because that was the kind of guy that the script called for. Initially, I didn't like the script because I thought it was cheesy and cliche, so I had written another one and sent it to Nina. It was about a man who wakes up to the radio talking about how his girlfriend tragically dumped him, then hails a cab in which the cabdriver already knows his destination, then goes to a coffeeshop in which the barista already knows his order, and then ends with his job interview in which the boss already knows about his personal life and other embarrassing tidbits. In the end, the boss reveals that the internet is a beautiful yet dangerous thing. It was meant to bring to surface the lack of privacy regarding the internet and suggest that perhaps it is not such a good idea to have personal information out there for everyone to see. However, because of time constraints, we decided to stick with "The Man of Your Dreams" and I think it turned out okay. The script grew on me, and it really helped to have Kelly and Thomas on set because they, as corny as it sounds, brought the script to life. Unfortunately, we had trouble with the fog machine and thus had trouble editing because some scenes we filmed had more fog than others, resulting in weird cuts in which the fog would disappear immediately in the next scene. Consequently, our choices for editing were a bit limited, but we did the best we could. I wish we could have filmed more angles, but we didn't want to keep Kelly and Thomas up late. I know the film is not exactly artistic and deep, but hopefully it comes off as charming and amusing. We had fun with it and had some good laughs in the process. Personally, my favorite part in the film is when Kelly begins to hear the ringing and follows it; she then turns around to say "Thomas? Thomas?" and the next shot is of the dreambox and Thomas has disappeared. It cracks me up everytime.

Also in the group with Ryan, Naomi, Stephen...and all those other guys. We're doing the 'surfer stranded on an island' film...and yeah. The other group members have the overview covered.

Group: Vivien (group lead), Jennifer, Susanne ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Where we are so far: We wrote up a script, got a couple of people in on Saturday to shoot the film and we have finished filming. All we have left to do is the editing. Unfortunately because we have about over 1 hour of footage, it’s going to be a lot of editing. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Story: Originally we wanted to do a story involving an antique chair that two people were having a fight over because neither realized its original value and claim ownership to the chair. However, this story –despite its simplicity- proved to be too big of a project to take on and finish in less than 2 weeks time. It involved needing too many adult actors and too many setting that were difficult to find or fake. So in the end we went with an even simpler story about a guy, Joey, who is looking for his uncle, who is supposed to have disappeared a while ago. Joey and this two friends Mo and Kelly go along for the ride and for their own personal reason, mainly they just want to have a vacation and they humor Joey by initially helping look for his uncle. The trip basically involves the random and inane conversations of the three friends until they reach their destination and Joey begins to ask around to see if anyone had seen Joey’s uncle. In the end, it turns out that due to the lack of communication in the family, Joey’s uncle was fine and home safely a long time ago, but apparently no one decided to apprise him of the situation. So he actually flew down to San Diego for nothing... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ What we did: The script actually wasn’t very long because getting actors to remember long scripts in such a short amount of time is difficult. We played a lot of tricks where someone off camera was holding the script up and the actors would reference the script as they tried to do the scene as naturally as they could. Another thing we did was give the actors their background and which conversations they had to touch on and let them have creative license with the rest. So really, it was just my friends staying in character (with only a few occasional slip) for 3 hours and we would continue to shoot whenever an interesting conversation came up. It also helps that all three of the actors are very eccentric, so there was actually a lot of the random singing, rhyming, banter, and sniping which were part of their usual conversation. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Problems?: I think I’ll have a bit of a problem with editing because it’ll definitely have a different feeling to it when it’s cut down to 8 minutes compared to the entire 1+ hours trip where you can get a feel for their eccentricities. So perhaps –if I have enough time- I’ll do two options for the whole movie, the short version and the long version.

My group consists of Ben, Ryan, Danny, Naomi, Steven, Chris and myself. Steven and I are working with students from the earlier Thursday section. Our project is about a young boy who goes out into the ocean to surf and gets taken away by the ocean and ends up stranded on a deserted islands. The project with show the different struggles he goes through and the tasks that he has to accomplish. Last night we went to the beach and got some amazing shots. I am looking forward to editing the project. It should turn out very well. _____________________________ For our group’s fictional film assignment, we decided to do a film centered on the life of a man stranded on an unknown island. Pulled out to sea from a day of surfing gone awry, the protagonist finds himself on the beach of an unknown place. His initial reaction to call out for help does little to his favor, as he begins to lose hope and his sense of self. While making many failed attempts to find a way back home, he tries to adjust to live living on the island, struggling to survive in an environment not at all suited for living. He finds himself being lead further into distress. Faced with a growing sense of depression and loneliness, the protagonist struggles with hallucinations and beings to show signs of lunacy and irrationality. In his sadness, the protagonist takes his life on the opening scene’s initial beach cliff – plummeting off the side to his inevitable death with a sense of peace and relief in the fact that his long journey has finally come to a rest. While it would be ideal for the filming to occur on a real island, our lack of equipment and knowledge of such a place left us with the option of filming on the beaches near by. As there are no outlets, we decided to make use of the Ryan’s camera once again (though alternating at times to create variety in shot angles) and aren’t likely to use artificial lighting equipment. Since the beaches are rather crowded on the weekends as well, filming will likely take place throughout the week, perhaps are earlier hours to avoid the overflow of people in creating the “deserted island” feel. To emphasize the protagonist’s growing sense of insanity, we plan to use editing to create more jittery, flash screen shots to create the illusion of illusion. The scene of his death as well will be done as a trick of the camera, using a smaller drop and a mattress to give the impression of suicide. As the protagonist is alone, the film will be shot almost entirely in silence, using soundtrack and editing to better create a sense of emotion and insight into the mind and feelings of the protagonist. Our search for an actor to fulfill the part is still underway, thought we are working to complete as much with what we have as possible to lighten the load. The script is well on its way we well as the storyboarding – the most difficult thing at this point being the search for an actor able to memorize lines in a matter of days and perform within the next week or perhaps only half. With a group of eight people, we anticipate a little difficulty in equal contribution as well as finding effective meeting times as with all the conflicting schedules, but are all excited to see how it will all come together in the end.

I’m in a group with Jeff, David, Azin and Julie. The story is like what they have already written. Basically there are two worlds: the real world and protagonist’s mind. Most part of the film will be in the protagonist’s mind, making decision of what he is going to order at the restaurant. It exaggeratedly illustrates the dilemma of choosing menus we often encounter when we go to a restaurant. The film has a comedy feeling driven by intense dialogues. If the actor can successfully act different ‘identities’ of the protagonist, I think it would be an interesting and funny short video. Project members have specific roles to complete the project. Azin and Julie will prepare anything needed to shoot the film; i.e. locations, props, etc. David will direct the film and manage everyone’s schedule. Jeff’s role is to write the script and shoot. (I may be forgetting some, but I hope others had filled it out for me) My role in this project is to capture the sound, edit the video and sound and compose original soundtrack(s). I will basically take care of the audio aspect of the film and also edit the video because of the convenience. To record the dialogues, I will use my laptop with an outboard audio interface. The sound quality recorded this way is better than on a camera. After all the footages are shot, I will synchronize the audio and edit them. I will add synchronous and asynchronous sounds where needed and also compose original soundtracks if time allows. If do not have the time, I will use other soundtracks I have. Overall, the project may sounds a bit ambitious for the time we have, but I hope we will successfully finish it.

The people in my group are Brendan Dreaper (the group leader), Alda Tenorio, and I believe Eugene Lee. It has been kind of hard to get everyone together and talk about our project. However, we are getting there and we will probably start shooting after Thanksgiving weekend because I believe everyone has plans. A few of us have discussed ideas for the project and the idea I hope we choose is about a guy who gets some kind of object (football, backpack, shoe/sandal, etc. not sure what yet) stuck in a tree. The guy tries everything to get the object he desires in the tree, for example one thing he tries is he throws other objects at the object in the tree, trying to knock it down. Then at some point in the film, there is a flashback showing how the object got stuck in the tree in the first place. This story can and will be developed more thoroughly if we continue with this idea. In my opinion this idea is quite simple and hopefully won’t take that long to shoot/edit since we are limited on time. For the actors in this film, I believe we have it covered or it won’t be that big of a problem. This idea would be fun to film and could be carried out successfully in the amount of time we have.

My group plans to create a serious like type of short story. It is a story that is suppose to show how the world can be cruel. It will stop at nothing to harm even the most innocent. The story starts out in an ally way where there is a boy lying on the floor. He seems terribly sad and melancholy. He is strumming a guitar. It then fades to a scene of a room. There sits a boy trying to make up a new song to play on his guitar. He seems very determined and focused on his work. He cares mostly of himself and isn’t affect by how other people see him. As he writes and plays, he is being watched by an individual. It turns out to be a girl. She seems to admire his music and listens to him. As time passes they get closer and closer. They eventually like each other and get into a relationship. As their relationship progresses, the main character plays the guitar less and less and eventually doesn’t play at all. They date all the time and he has to work extra shifts to pay for the dinners and places they go to. But as this happens, the girl starts looking interest of him. Because of the protagonist’s life before dating was very conservative and inexperienced, she is irritated by his stubbornness to change and conservative personality. He is “boring” because he isn’t out going enough. She then starts seeing other guys behind his back. She is afraid to break his heart and so she doesn’t tell him. The protagonist eventually grows suspicious and figures it out. He is heart broken and confused. He yells in rage and sorrow. He keeps thinking to himself why how the world can be so cruel. After all the time they’ve spend together and all the time he’s put into her, how can he betray her. He then runs into an ally all depress and in sorrow (possibly crying). He then runs away as far as he can, not looking back. With all the past thoughts streaming through his mind, he finally stops at an ally way (the one that u see in the beginning) and stops. He then screams. He looks to his right and sees the guitar. He picks up the guitar and plays a very sad and slow song. The story fade and it ends.

Our narrative is basically a coming-of-age story, about a naive girl that comes to realize the harsh realities of the world. She is a musician, a guitarist, and something triggers her movement into a depressed state of mind. The first scene depicts the girl stumbling into an alleyway, drunk and depressed. She is smoking madly, and the scene gives off an aura of compression, like the world she thought she understood is now caving in upon her. The scene also includes still shots of the surrounding area. In the following scenes she meets a guy who introduces her to drugs and parties, the world of the socially able. She will be writing/playing music in a beautiful, serene place. The mood is peaceful, and the world is still whole to the character. But they soon go to parties together and he introduces a new world to her. She then leaves behind her passion for music as she falls in love with him. But he does not reciprocate her love, and this crushes her, emotionally speaking. She becomes very depressed, and possibly bitter. The last scene returns to the alleyway, where the girl rediscovers her guitar and passion for music, but this time it’s different. No longer is she the naive, carefree girl; she is a jaded, possibly disillusioned girl, who expresses these emotions through her music. The film will also include flashbacks to better times, so there will be a contrast between dark somber scenes, and happier scenes from the past. The film will have very little dialogue, instead the expressions of the actors, and possible narration will set the tone and provide context and emotion. There will be a strong focus on sound and music.

As Kari already mentioned, we (Kari, Trami, Christina, Maggie, and Nina) initially wanted to shoot a film about a regular guy who loses his job and decides to go on a trip to the desert. The idea was that the guy loves western movies and wants to experience how it feels to live like a real cowboy. Then, while being in the desert, pretty much everything goes wrong and he realizes that he does not like the cowboy lifestyle at all. We contacted one of the actors that Wolfgang recommended, however, he was not able to act for us on the day we were planning to shoot. Thursday night, though, I met somebody, Jeff, who was willing to act in our film and so we began to prepare for our shoot. We worked out a script and reserved a car to drive to the desert on Sunday morning. On Friday, I tried to get a hold of Jeff, but he did not answer his pone. He did not call back either. On Saturday, Trami and I tried to find another actor, but without success. So on Saturday night then, we had to cancel our shoot in the desert. And, since the only day we could shoot this film was this Sunday (Kari, Trami, Christina, and Maggie are out of town next week), we had to rearrange our plans and think about a different story for this project. Thus, our group met today and came up with another idea. The new story is called “The Man of Your Dreams” and was written by Trami. It is about a woman, who “meets” a man in her sleep. This man is working for Dream Central and has the order to repair the woman’s dreamscape, which has been infected by dream fog. We already have a script and would like to shoot in one of the rooms in the theatre & dance building (Galbraith Hall). We visited this location today and made a list of things that we will need for the shoot. Tomorrow, I will meet with Christina and Kari and try to reserve this room for Monday, November 27. As Kari mentioned, since usually only theater majors/minors can reserve this room, it would be nice if any theatre students out there or maybe Cathy (?) could help us in this case. Regarding the cast, Trami and I have some people in mind that we will contact on Monday and on Tuesday. Even though I was, at first, disappointed that we could not realize our first idea, I really like the new script. I also think that our initial plans were a little bit too complex and difficult to implement. I am therefore looking forward to work on this new project.

Group leader: David C. Our script centers around a man who is faced with a dilemma: what to eat. He is out on a date with a girl and our film will be a look inside his mind to see the decision making process. While he is maybe not so talkative outside, his mind is filled with a million different voices with their own opinions and personalities. Our film features a never ending stream of dialogue to show just how much goes into one simple decision. I have several jobs for this project. The first tone was to find a location for filming the inside of the character’s mind. For this, I am contacting the theater department to see if any of their theaters are available for use – we are open to working odd hours. Also, I am in charge of getting costumes. To show the different personas in his mind, we are using different colored ties. The character is going to be dressed up for dinner in a white shirt, tie and jacket. When he is in the theater he will have his jacket on. The personas will all be dressed in the same white shirt, yet the ties will be changed to show their personalities. For example, craving will be a bright, firey orange to show his qualities of recklessness.

these are some ideas we may use. our movie is about an unusual couple that must either stay together or separate due to a job offering for the boyfriend. it takes place in the middle east. it will be shot near lake hodges in the chaparral. The girlfriend is a free spirit nature angel and the boyfriend is a conservative indoor metronome. They feed on the tension between themselves. They enjoy the excitement of being opposites and the conflicts and drama that result. Each character will be forced into the others preferred world. the girlfriend must decide whether to stay or follow her boyfriend. there is pressure from the boyfriends parents to get married. abandonment, independence, solitude, depression, cuddles, frustration, outside pressures, death, old age. starts with girl looking at a ring outside on a rock its with 2pm lighting. cut to the boy in a suit staring at a computer screen frowning on the internet searching for something. he looks at the clock and a picture of his girlfriend and starts thinking. girl standing on lake shore camera running backwards away from her some man picks her up and starts running away with her to the left. close up of bf(boyfriend) face. close up of the gf(girlfriend) laughing at him. he gets a pie thrown at his face. bf is chasing gf on the ocean shore upset. she jumps in the ocean and never comes back up. he waits and watches. bf driving to gf place after work. gf in a kitchen drinking carrot juice and stretching. bf enters the frame and hands her a letter from the foreign job offer. she reads it ,looks at him, and puts the paper down. she comes out of the ocean and hugs him and combs his hair with her fingers. close up of them embracing excitedly. the gf is torn between staying in her beautiful surroundings or following her bf to the foreign city for a year while he works. they worry that if they separate their relationship will fizzle out. a shot of them on two hills staring at eachother and yelling. close ups of their faces trying to get the others attention though they are several hundred feet away. boyfriend starts stomping in the dirt and demanding that she make up her mind. shots of the gf banging on doors in an office building, looking annoyed then screaming at fluorescent lighting, choking on exhaust fumes, shaking her fist at stop lights. running down a street looking back waving goodbye.

Group: Ingrid (leader) and Russ This is a story of a couple that have to decide between staying together, or changing their present life for a challenging opportunity. The script is almost ready, I am sending it to you by email. We will shoot on Saturday 25th; the editing room is already reserved for the following three days.

As I think Emily stated clearly below, the three of us are working on the script at the moment. Devin came up with a working skeleton, which we are now trying to improve on. The main idea is that the story will revolve around two girls. One is telling the story. The second will only be seen in flashbacks. The girl telling the story is dealing with her guilt over her friend's jumping. Throughout the film, it will deal with how the friend jumped, trying to make sense of it, and seeing if that is even possible. As far as actors go, it is straight forward: we need to high school aged girls. Emily was able to secure that for us. Filming is proving to be a problem, because of lack of time. Unfortunately, the script was not finished this weekend, and Devin was not here anyway. I am leaving for northern California on Tuesday, and will not be back till Sunday, so there will be really no way to start filming until the Monday after break. Luckly, we don't think that the filming itself will take that long. What might take longer is editing, but that can be done more easily, and obviously involves less people (the actors do not need to be present).

I am in a team with David, Jeff, Toshiro, and Julie. We already know our story and the script is written. We need to locations for our film. I took the responsibility to find the locations. I thought that a Greek Restaurant located in Encinitas would work because it is family owned and once the owner gives me permission I am done and I do not need to deal with anything else and it is a nice restaurant. On Friday I drove down to Encinitas where there is a family owned Greek Restaurant. I talked to daughter of the owner and explained to her our project and where we are coming from. She gave me the permission and said that we could basically go Monday through Thursday from 3:00pm to 5:00pm. I also took some pictures to email it to my team to see what everyone thinks. They all like the place so we have our first location set. For the second location we need a little theater. There is a class room at Miracosta that is just like a little theater. I talked to one of the professors at Miracosta College. Although she is not in charge she said that she thinks that we could use the room. I would say that 99% we are set for our second location too but I am going to talk to more people about it at Miracosta College. The good thing is that the restaurant and Miracosta (San Elijo campus) are located close to each other. So far I have already taken care of the locations we need. During the shot I will take care of lightings and I will also bring a camera to shoot the film in different angles. I have actually read the script a few times and I wrote down some notes so that I share with my team members on Tuesday. I think that my team members are working well with each other trying to do the best that we can. I only wish that we had more than two weeks to work on this project. To me the first challenge is getting every thing done on time. Hopefully with everyone’s cooperation we will get every thing done in best of our ability.

So I just noticed that my group member Kari (sn: kckarebear) has already posted. I luckily just remembered that I had to do this. I don't want to reiterate what Kari said, so it would be great if you would scroll down to read it. I will, however, elaborate on our new idea, but seeing as Kari doesn't want to give it away, I won't say too much. Our narrative is about a girl in her dream and her interaction with a man in this dream. Actually, I just realized that that's about all I can say.. so scratch the elaboration. Like Kari said, we are having trouble finding an actor/actress so if you guys know any 20-something year-old actors willing to be in our film, please let me or any of my group members (Kari, Nina, Trami, Maggie) know. Also, does anybody know where we can buy dry ice?

I don't know if this comment will be a reply to a previous post (it's not supposed to be), but I wasn't sure if "add a new comment" would comment on the last post, or be a new comment. So yeah, here is what we had to post: My group consists of Devin Bernhardt, Sara Gevurtz, and myself (Emily Grant), and I am the “group leader”. So we’ve been kind of struggling with the script, but I think it’s going to be pretty good when it’s done (we’re in the middle of editing it right now). For the actors, we needed two young, teenage-looking girls, and I went back to my old high school (in La Jolla..) and found two girls from the drama department who are more than willing to be in it. Our story/plot/movie-scene sequence goes something like this (the details of everything hasn’t been sorted yet, so this might not be final): we start off with one of the girls sitting in a slightly dark room looking at the camera, and then looking away. She’s begins talking about one of her friends, but it’s not really clear what she’s trying to explain, because she’s an emotional mess and the audience isn’t sure of what she’s going to describe, for a while. While this girl is talking, we show the two girls (the girl talking, and the girl she’s talking about) having a good time together, laughing and joking around, and showing memories of them being together. The girl begins describing a particular incident that, upon remembering it, makes her happy. She laughs uncomfortably, and then resumes telling her story. For a little over the first half, the girl doesn’t say exactly what happened, and then she starts saying that she didn’t know how “it” happened, because she can’t remember that night too well. The scene then goes to a rooftop (this location for filming is yet to be discovered, but I think that maybe we can film it at my building, which is twelve stories high), and the two girls are standing on top of it, yelling at each other and crying. All the audience hears is the girl’s narrative voice, telling this story—and the images that are shown function as a blur of a memory that is in this girl’s mind. What is shown is what the girl remembers of that night, or what she has allowed herself to keep from forgetting. When she talks about that night, she becomes more and more emotional. The whole story she’s trying to tell is that her friend was very upset about something (not sure if we’re going to make this problem clear or not; we might just leave it ambiguous, but are trying to decide if it’s better or worse that way) and they were in an argument, and the story is supposed to end with her friend being dead (from jumping off the roof, obviously—which we won’t film…for reasons I don’t need to explain?), but the cause of her death being a bit unclear: did she commit suicide, or did the story-telling girl push her off? The end won’t feel unsatisfactory, we hope, but we also don’t want it to be too conclusive, which we feel will make the story more interesting, and the girl telling the story be both the protagonist and antagonist at the same time.

The person who was supposed to be my main character fell through so now I'm looking for another lead. I have several people who will be asking their friends, but nothing is exact yet. However, the locations and script are fairly done so all that is needed is the filming and editing. Hopefully it won't be that complex as soon as I find a replacement actor, and the editing should not take that long either. I'm flying to San Francisco thanksgiving weekend so I plan to get some footage of that too for my film. I've also limited my locations to places that are easily accessible just to simplify things. Overall, as long as the actor situation is handled, it should all work out.

(I've posted my late forum on the place for last week's.) --------------- For our group’s fictional film assignment, we decided to do a film centered on the life of a man stranded on an unknown island. Pulled out to sea from a day of surfing gone awry, the protagonist finds himself on the beach of an unknown place. His initial reaction to call out for help does little to his favor, as he begins to lose hope and his sense of self. While making many failed attempts to find a way back home, he tries to adjust to live living on the island, struggling to survive in an environment not at all suited for living. He finds himself being lead further into distress. Faced with a growing sense of depression and loneliness, the protagonist struggles with hallucinations and beings to show signs of lunacy and irrationality. In his sadness, the protagonist takes his life on the opening scene’s initial beach cliff – plummeting off the side to his inevitable death with a sense of peace and relief in the fact that his long journey has finally come to a rest. While it would be ideal for the filming to occur on a real island, our lack of equipment and knowledge of such a place left us with the option of filming on the beaches near by. As there are no outlets, we decided to make use of the Ryan’s camera once again (though alternating at times to create variety in shot angles) and aren’t likely to use artificial lighting equipment. Since the beaches are rather crowded on the weekends as well, filming will likely take place throughout the week, perhaps are earlier hours to avoid the overflow of people in creating the “deserted island” feel. To emphasize the protagonist’s growing sense of insanity, we plan to use editing to create more jittery, flash screen shots to create the illusion of illusion. The scene of his death as well will be done as a trick of the camera, using a smaller drop and a mattress to give the impression of suicide. As the protagonist is alone, the film will be shot almost entirely in silence, using soundtrack and editing to better create a sense of emotion and insight into the mind and feelings of the protagonist. Our search for an actor to fulfill the part is still underway, thought we are working to complete as much with what we have as possible to lighten the load. The script is well on its way we well as the storyboarding – the most difficult thing at this point being the search for an actor able to memorize lines in a matter of days and perform within the next week or perhaps only half. With a group of eight people, we anticipate a little difficulty in equal contribution as well as finding effective meeting times as with all the conflicting schedules, but are all excited to see how it will all come together in the end.

I’m really surprised that so many people haven’t posted at this point in the day. I was hoping some of my group members had already posted because I’m not sure how much of our story we wanted to “give away.” [Group: Christina (leader), Nina, Trami, Maggie, and Kari] ----- Initially, we really wanted to do a single character narrative about an everyday man who loses his job and, with nothing else left to do with his life, decides to drive out to the desert alone to become a cowboy. We had so many great ideas and our group collaborated really well in developing the story. After we had it set what we were going to shoot, we all looked at our schedules and realized that this Sunday (today) was the only day we could film. However, it was extremely hard to find an actor in such short notice. We called a few people but in the end they all fell through. So instead, this Sunday we got together to rethink our idea and come up with a different narrative piece that would be easier to film—especially dealing with conflicts in scheduling, not having any outlets for lighting, or finding actors. (Something about trying to find one male actor who was willing to drive out to the middle of the desert for an entire day with five girl strangers to film a VIS project in such short notice?) ----- So today we came up with a new direction for our piece. Trami had developed a concept for a play in one of her playwriting classes about a man and a woman who interact with each other in a dream-like state or dimension. We all liked the piece, and due to our lack of time, we kept all of the dialogue the same except for the ending, which we slightly tweaked. We spent most of our meeting time trying to figure out what kinds of props and locations we are going to use for our piece. We eventually found a perfect place in a rehearsal room in the Galathea Hall/Theater & Dance building in Revelle, but in order to reserve it, we have to be theater majors/minors. (If anyone in VIS70N is a theater major/minor, do you think you could help us out?) We are also currently actor/actress-less, but we do have a fully developed plot and script and are hoping to start filming next Monday after Thanksgiving.

Our group decided to do this story; we began shooting the beginning scene and last scene in downtown San Diego. The story is as follows The protagonist, consumed by the cruelty and malice of society, abandoned to her faith in an obscure dark alleyway finds herself in an inner mental struggle. Unconscious she feels how her life drastically collapsed and the sorrows that eventually led to the lost of all she held dear; the pureness, joy, and freedom only found in ones most profound moments of solitude. The story develops in flashback form in order to have a clearer picture of the main protagonist. The protagonist is a lonely mentally challenged girl, who is very talented playing the guitar. She is anti social and tends to ignore the world around her. Later in another flashback while at the beach in her own little place of mental solitude she begins to play a song with her guitar. While most of the people around her ignored or criticize her for being different, she keeps playing. Another girl, smoking several feet away from her, listens to her song and approaches her. “Hey, I like how play” she introduces. “Umm ehhhh, thank you” the protagonist responds in a stuttering, shy voice. This begins a chain of events where the protagonist becomes constricted by the malice, hatred, and even sadist elements found in society. Another flashback, the protagonist in a sense becomes fond, almost to a point to feeling in love with the other girl. She doesn’t understand these feelings but she knows she feels something, besides this is the only person she ever talk to and to say the least being friendly. This girl introduces the protagonist to a whole new world she never could have imagined, or in other words to society as we know it. She stops playing the guitar and gets rid of it in the dark alley. The protagonist struggles to fit in and as a result she begins smoking. Next flashback, the other girl the one that introduces the protagonist to society learns that the protagonist has fallen in love with her. She feels nothing towards the protagonist in fact she was just having fun, didn’t really mind for the protagonist. Eventually she leaves the protagonist. The protagonist now finds herself wrecked; the world/society she was induced in becomes a burden for her, adding to the fact that her love one has abandoned her. She smokes, drinks, and enters a state of melancholy and depression. Finally, in a frantic attempt to do something about her situation she drinks and smokes to find the answer. Last scene, returning from the flashbacks the protagonist is walking lacking many of her senses, falls into that particular alleyway and collapses unconscious. She has a dream, an abstract dream. The dream includes images, objects, and places but most importantly it reminds the protagonist of her former life and how happy she used to be. She wakes up, confused, tries to smoke but decides to stop the addiction. Amazingly she finds her guitar right where she left it. She tunes and struggles to play it, after several attempts she is able to regain her “talent” and starts playing a song that hopefully makes her regain what she held dear and what she lost.-Diego Ley

Upon discussing the possible film concepts, my group finished by choosing to do the story of a surfer who gets washed up on island after being pulled out to sea in a riptide. The surfer has to find a way to survive and glean nutrients from the harsh environment. Eventually, the surfer, seeing no other way, attempts to escape, forsaking his island prison for the open ocean thereby having a better chance of rescue. Unfortunately, the attempt ends in failure as the current and weather only seek to drive him back to the island. Once again, washed back up on the island, the surfer’s hope is all but lost. Pondering, reflecting, he subsists for a little longer before he realizes that he just can’t continue to live like this. As the sun sets on the ocean, rather than let fate catch him, the surfer faces his destiny head on. Unafraid, with no hope of rescue, he climbs to the peak of one of the many cliff faces that border the coast. Stepping closer and closer to the edge, he has no fear; he only sees freedom, his freedom. Ready to give himself to the abyss that lies before him, he catches a glint of some mysterious object on the horizon. Hope remains. This film will be much less focused on dialogue and moved more by the action and the music. The male surfer lead should be approximately 20 years of age and athletic. Ryan, our group leader, has a surfboard that we will be utilizing for the movie. Nearly all of the footage will be shot in one place—at the beach—which is one of the reasons this idea was chosen. Specifically, scenes will be shot near more populated beach spots for the parts in which he gets dragged out and near less populated beaches for the deserted island scenes. Most likely, the deserted island portions of the film will be shot at one of 3 locations: the shoreline, the cliffs, and/or the forest (wooded areas around campus). The film will consist of long sweeping cinematic shots, punctuated by close-ups to emphasize the action-taking place. In fact, we may have access to a camera track, allowing for sideways pans across the scene. Additionally, we plan on getting large broad shots of the beach from the cliffs near campus, thereby, creating a dramatic feel. Hopefully, in the editing process, the shots will be able to be properly aligned and set to the music. Subsequently, the music will be reflective in feeling but also broad and sweeping. As group, we plan to make use of the program garage band to create a separate and unique score for the short film, making the piece much more our own. With regards to the editing, we will be using pinnacle on Ryan’s computer and I-movie on my computer in conjunction to try and speed up the editing process. Consequently, we hope to create a piece that exposes what can happen to a person’s emotional state under such dramatic and taxing circumstances.