Location - Mood and Tone

The tone and mood of the trailer will be paramount to its overall feel and success, so here I have used images found online, screen grabs from trailers, and our own pictures, to try and demonstrate some of the key ideas of our mood and tone.

As in many of our key influences for the trailer, the tone we would like to capture is invariably dark and thrilling - as comes with the crime thriller genre - with vibrant colours to capture the metropolitan setting and mark the film out as almost neo-noir in it's bold imagery and use of lighting. The use of location and setting will allow us, in part, to achieve these tonal ideas and images. The idea of the city is a central one to our trailer, specifically the city at night; an image that can be presented in a few different ways.

The light and dark contrast that comes with the city at night is a great thing to try and capture, and this is especially dramatic and vibrant in the Leicester Square, Chinatown, and Piccadilly Circus locations that are available to us. Influences on this thrilling and bright, yet subtly ominous mood  are primarily Welcome To The Punch and Only God Forgives. Vibrancy of colour abounds in London, and it would be great to capture this.

For more dramatic and darker/gritty scenes, London is awash in alleyways and street corners that can provide us with lower key lighting in soft yellows and whites. Hummingbird demonstrates that this can work well with the high key and multi-coloured lighting from other scenes and Drive depicts the city at night in a similar manner.

Inevitably given the genre, we will be inputting a chase scene of some description, and this can be given pace and drama by setting it on either the banks of the Thames, likely the south bank, or along the A4 between Piccadilly and Leicester Square. Similarly fast paced scenes from other trailers also include gunfights, however to attempt one of these would be unfeasible for us.

The mood we would like to create in our film is one typical of our genre; fast pacing and thrills, but with a serious and dramatic edge. The way in which our tone would be set apart however, is through the use of London locations and the scenery, lighting, and mood, that they can provide us with. We are not the high-octane City of London glamour of Welcome To The Punch, but neither are we the gritty, seedy feel of Hummingbird. However these films are great influences on us and hopefully we will be able to capture some of both of their moods to produce a trailer that showcases excitement and thrill as well as the seedier, grittier side of the criminal world.

CM

Location - Central London Recce

The above is a voice over explains how lighting, setting, shot type and tone will be used/utilised in our media trailer - The Recce was done by myself and my partners with the voice over my own input.

JL

Location - Bar Recce

 This was our Recce for the bar location. I talk a lot about the different lighting in the bar and how we have used different gels/filters to create different atmospheres and tones in the location itself. Below are a few pictures of my partner and I playing with the different angles behind the bar itself:

This was our first time using Gel's (as shown below) so getting to know how to use them, especially before the house recce (Where we plan to use them on the outside of the house) was a lot of help. 

Location - Sound on Location

Location - Most Influential Images

Location - Album

Camera Practice

We have now had a chance to refresh our camerawork and sound skills following the summer holidays. This post is in order to look at and evaluate the composition and effectiveness of some of the shots we took.

This first shot uses perspective well, and used the correct angle for filming the hallway, keeping the foregrounded figure (Max) central to the shot and the action just to his right. I would say that this shot is one of the more well composed we took.

This shot is less effective in my opinion. The idea was to get a low angle shot making Max look more formidable and dominant. We were unable to get the camera low enough and as such the shot suffered, becoming fairly ineffective in its aim.The intended symmetry of the shot is also off, adding to its general air of failure.

This shot has strengths and weaknesses. It is well lit and shot interestingly, keeping the figures central and the background chairs as a feature. However the shot appears to be slightly off kilter, distracting from the better areas of the shot, something that ought to be rectified in any shot that goes into the actual trailer.

CM

JL