Similar film ideas

This Top 10 Scariest Movie Aliens has helped me see 10 different bits of the alien movies that have been produced. This has help visualize what the aliens features look like and how the human beings react to it. The idea of aliens is very foreign to us,therefore this typically is more than likely to scare us. We want the audience to feel and believe that there is an alien abduction that is going to happen, therefore as the make up artist it would be better not to show the aliens real face however create an illusion that the alien is there. We could do this by creating a shadow of the alien.

 The film Invasion of the body snatchers is a film that our film can relate to. It is about  am alien race that come to the earth with the goal of abducting the human race and turning them to dust.




Invasion of the Body Snatchers (aka The Body Snatchers) is a 1956 American black-and-white science fiction film produced by Walter Wanger, directed by Don Siegel, and starring Kevin McCarthy and Dana Wynter. The film was released through Allied Artists Picture Corporation. Daniel Mainwaring adapted the screenplay from Jack Finney's 1954 science fiction novel The Body Snatchers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_the_Body_Snatchers

Production Research - Lighting 1

Before our group begins the production process we need to prepare and research. Since I am the director I need to research into filming, lighting, sound, production design and editing so I can work with everyone else in the group and their roles.

Lighting
For the lighting aspect I looked at several webpages and videos for tips, tricks and techniques on lighting for film.

I stayed on the WITNESS webpage since they had other articles on many aspects of filming such as lighting. The article on how to get good lighting also had many videos that demonstrate each way of lighting a character with different lighting setups as well as information on exposure and white balance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTZoBDPCcsU

For our film we are shooting in a dark environment but we will use our lighting effectively to keep the environment looking dark but bright enough to capture the details on our characters without the audience knowing so they will think it's natural lighting.

The for the reveal of our alien silhouette will will use a powerful light source to back like the person in the alien costume to create our silhouette on a white shower curtain that we covered the window with to diffuse the light source to spread its surface area of light.

We will use a torch as a prop for brandon's character as the power for the bungalow has gone out in our film. This will be a great use of mise-en-scene and lighting as the torch serves multiple purposes.

Production Research - Filming 1

Before our group begins the production process we need to prepare and research. Since I am the director I need to research into filming, lighting, sound, production design and editing so I can work with everyone else in the group and their roles.

Filming
For the filming aspect I looked at several webpages and videos for tips, tricks and techniques on filming.

The first web page I reviewed was a video training guide - http://witnesstraining.wordpress.com/3-film/tips-for-filming/

This guide has videos demonstrating every little detail of what to do and what not to do.

The first video on the guide is WITNESS: Filming, Audio & Using Cellphones.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7BFnhYX2vs#t=165

The video starts out by making it's first point saying that filming is telling a story. It shows where you are, what is happening and who is involved.

Build a meaningful sequence with your shots. By this it means why are you using each shot, the impact of zooms, tilts, pans, and different shot sizes you would use in your sequence.Wide shots and zooms to show the context of where you are and what is happening,and to make linkages in complicated settings. Medium shots used to show what is happening and who is involved and CU's to show the powerful details that may give drama to your video sequence. 

Getting "telling" details in your sequence like someones face in a moment of surprise or fear, shoes from a group of protesters who ran in panic or the moment of silence when someone says something powerful.

Move closer to capture the action. If possible get in close, the image will be better and the audio will definitely improve and the viewer will feel like they are in the mix of the action.

Shoot stable 10 second shots and make purposeful camera movements. Stable still shots are good shots. Never "Hosepipe", be patient and purposeful don't move camera around to get all the points of interest. Instead pick a shot and hold it so the viewer can see what is happening, if you need to change emphasis quickly use a swish pan from one point of interest to the next.

Get good sound. Plug in headphones to camera since camera microphone picks up sounds differently to our ears. Sound is as important as the image, try to eliminate background noise (particularly buzzing electrical noise. Lighting matters. don't film people with light behind them.

The video makes some excellent points on filming from telling the story, capturing actions, the details and tips on sound and lighting.

Equipment List Update

During the holiday we should try and get all the equipment we need ready to start filming asap once the holidays are over.
Everything I don't have is in bold writing.
[Edit if you can get a hold of items on list]

Item	Do we have it ready?	Where Can we get it from?
Camera	Yes	College
Tripod	Yes	College/Dom
Office Chair	Yes	Dom
Thin White Shower Curtain	Yes	Dom
Ladder	Yes	At Location/Dom
Director Clapboard	Yes	Dom
White Bounce Board	Yes	Dom
1000 watt Worklights	Yes	Dom
LED Lantern	Yes	Dom
Multi-Color LED Light Bulb with Remote Control and Adapters	No	Online
PJ’s	Yes	Brandon and Niloo
Alien Mask	Yes	Dom
Suit	Yes	Dom/Dylan/Brandon
Photo Frame	Yes	Dom
Lamp	Yes	At Location
Alarm Clock	Yes	Dylan

Links to items I don't have (for reference):

Multi-Color LED Light Bulb with Remote Control and Adapters (£5.83) - http://www.amazon.co.uk/GU10-Multi-Color-Light-Remote-Control/dp/B00ENFAHM4/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1419773894&sr=8-10&keywords=blue+light+bulbs 

The Alien Silhouette

Our main goal for our media project is to show the audience that our film is a sci-fi film. To do this we need to make the silhouette convey to the audience that something supernatural is going on and that the silhouette supports the sci-fi genre in our film.

I looked at different alien silhouettes to find which one would be easy to replicate but strongly convey the sci-fi alien element.

These 3 images that contain multiple silhouettes  easily portray an alien. The two I like that I think we should replicate one of them is:

These two image mixed together would be our best choice as the head of the left image would be good but the arms are too long and thin for us to replicate so the stature of the right image would work well with the head of the left image.

About aliens history

over the years the belief that aliens exist has increased this means more research has been done about them. This is an advantage that me and my group has; as it allows us to research in depth about specific things that aliens do, this helps us to portray the alien character better.


history 

After all these years of research we have compiled these major facts about Aliens on Earth.

• Alien crafts from other worlds have crashed on Earth.
• Alien crafts are from both Ultra-Dimensional sources and sources within this Dimension.
• Early U.S. Government efforts at acquiring technologies were successful.
• The U.S. Government has had live Alien hostages at some point in time.
• The U.S. Government has conducted autopsies on Alien cadavers.
• U.S. Intelligence Agencies and Security Agencies are involved in the cover-up of facts pertaining to the situation.
• People have been and are currently being abducted, mutilated, murdered and kidnapped as a result of the UFO situation.
• There is a current Alien presence on this planet among us that controls different elements of our society.
• Alien forces maintain bases on Earth and on the Moon.
• The U.S. Government has had a working relationship with Alien Forces for some time, with the express purpose of gaining technology in gravitational propulsion, beam weaponry and mind control.
• Millions of cattle have been killed in the process of acquiring biological materials. Both Aliens and the U.S. Government are responsible for mutilations, but for different reasons.
• We live in a multi-dimensional world that is overlapped and visited by Aliens/Entities from other dimensions. Many of those entities are hostile, and many are not hostile.
• The basis for our genetic development and religions lies in intervention by non-terrestrial and terrestrial forces.
• The truth about our actual technology far exceeds that perceived by the Public.
• The United States Space program of today is a cover operation that exists for public relations purposes.
• People are being actively killed in order to suppress the facts about the situation. The CIA and the NSA are involved so deeply that exposure would cause collapse of their overt structure.
• Facts indicate Alien presence with in 5 to 10 thousand years.
• Our civilization is one of many that have existed in the last billion years, "Milky Way time period"
• Alien Psychology (see information in the following pages)
• The Metagene factor (see information in the following pages)

 It is essential that we get to know more about aliens so we can portray them in our film better.

My Production Name and Logo Idea

For my idea I suggest Nerdy Bird Productions.

The reasons why I have chosen Nerdy Bird Productions as my production company idea is:

• Easy to remember since 'nerd' and 'bird' rhymes.
• The logo was pretty simple to make
• It's difficult thinking of a good name that hasn't been taken. The closest thing to this was Nerd Bird Creative which is a Web Design and Graphic Design company.

For the logo I wanted to visually show it was a production company so a made the 'Nerdy Bird' perch on a Director's Clapboard. The only thing I don't like at the moment are the eyes on the bird but it's the best I could do for now. When I have more time I will update the image.


UPDATE

I have changed the logo a tiny bit to make it look more symmetrical by changing the birds right to be identical with it's left. I also changed the colours to lighter blues and remove the black outline of the eyes. I then change the font of the clapboard and added a title at the top to make the image look better.

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