Project Diary 4

This is an 'on set' project diary where we document our search for suitable Locations/settings.

Project Diary 3

This Diary is a further update to our previous one, going over our plans for carrying out the production of our trailer. 

Action Plan

Ross and I decided that to efficiently complete our task, we must create an audit and an action plan for the remaining tasks leading up to and including the filming and editing of the production. Below is the plan, detailing the steps we have to complete and the priority of each task. 

Click to visit the Action Plan

Poll

As a quick update regarding the poll we ran on this blog a little while ago, I would just like to justify our decision after that small piece of audience research. 

The result of the poll was that:

Four wished us to make a Psychological Thriller

One wished us to make a Horror Thriller

One wished us to make an Action Thriller

None wished us to make a Detective Thriller

At first glance it may seem that we have gone against Audience research by choosing the form of Thriller that was not chosen by any, though our final idea actually encompasses the best of all that were chosen including our own choice of Detective. Though predominantly Detective, the inclusion of an unexplained twist as a Dead man is ID'd as the killer introduces the Psychological elements. Horror is conveyed as the overarching story is of Death and Mystery; aspects that hold connotations of Horror. Action isn't involved as much, though as it is a Police vs. Criminal style film, it will include scenes of Action.

Locations

Once we knew what the beginning of our film entailed, we decided that the best opening would be to have the killer at a distance under a lit lamp post to back light them. To hunt locations, we traveled to a local Village called Little Oakley to find a suitable setting, as we knew there were lamp posts like the ones we needed. Below are the pictures we took:

We decided that the first two images were the better looking ones as they depict exactly what we were thinking and are, themselves, distant from anything else enforcing the desolate and lonely ideology. Below is a mock frame I created using the image to convey my ideas for the opening shot of the trailer:

The figure below the lamp post is the murderer and the two approaching
lights are the headlamps of the soon to be hijacked car.

Actors

For our film trailer, we require a number of Actors to fulfill roles, some bigger roles than others. As my Dad used to participate in Amateur Theatrics, we chose him to play the main roles. It also helps that one of our Parents is the Actor we need most as he will be the most available. The other role we needed to fill was a Historian who will be speaking the majority of the Trailer. We chose to ask a History teacher at our school to fill the role as he is exactly what we envisaged when designing his scenes. He happily obliged which was a great leap forward for our Pre-Production. Below is a link to a tick list of all of the actors we need that will be updated:

Click to visit the Ticklist

Production - Storyboard Draft

After our Preliminary task, it became time to design a Storyboard for our end Production. As previously stated, we decided to go against the majority demographic and aim our film at a niche audience with an adaptation. This is because our previous films for GCSE etc. were not detailed enough and that we could create a much better trailer for an adaptation or, as we have now chosen, a factually based story. 

The story of the A6 Murders, which we have chosen to base our film on, begins on the 22nd August 1961 where Michael Gregsten and his Mistress Valerie Storie were hijacked on the A6 and ordered to drive for the entire night before Gregsten was shot and mudered, and Storie was raped then shot. The next morning, Gregsten was found dead with Storie seriously injured next to him. James Hanratty was suspected right up until he was hanged for the crime, though no resounding evidence was ever found. It was only in 2002 that DNA testing proved his guilt, though some believe he was framed just to conclude the case which is the main point we are basing our story on; the copy cat muderer at the end of the trailer will be revealed to be James Hanratty - impossible as he was hanged fifty years ago, making a poignant point about DNA and how it can be tampered with. 

We plan to play on this DNA point and, respectively, name the film 'DEADMAN'. This is a play on words as 'DEADMAN' clearly conveys the DNA result though it also reflects the original setting which was 'Deadman's Hill'.

The original idea storyboard is below:

After the initial storyboard were put down on paper, we drafted the full storyboard indicating main scenes: