t-minus four weeks…

Four weeks left until this project must be turned it. God damn, the deadline is creeping up fast. Ok, I know I said I would start filming this weekend in my last blog posts, but I have a little set back. My sister is staying for her spring break :0000. It’s great and all, but now we’re actually doing stuff on the weekend, like today we spent the whole day out doing stuff and then tomorrow we’re going of to the city to hang out and go to the beach. Which leave’s basically no time to actually start filming. So, not saying I blame my sister…but I blame my sister. 

BUT…. I did get everything else on my list of “things to do before filming” even though I will not be filming this weekend (well besides the title, which will be a problem for future Ayami). So here’s all of that (they’re small things, so I figured I’d just put them all into one LONG blog post instead of a bunch of baby ones).

PROPS

Ok, so for props, I started to think about everything I could possible need for each scene and wrote them all into my planner:

The first thing on there is obviously the action figure, which is basically the one thing I have to go out and buy. I have everything else that I need at home, so I’m basically all good on props. Oh, but one thing I do need to actually make is the poster board, cause it’s gotta be somewhat completed to make it look like Iris is working on it. I also have to write the names of each box onto a cardboard box, which won’t be difficult, but I gotta make sure I don’t forget about it. 

MISE-EN-SCENE

For mise-en-scene, I first thought about what I want Iris to wear, cause she’s the only one who will actually be shown on screen for the opening. This wasn’t that difficult cause the person I casted for her (no spoilers!! I’ll get to that…) dresses how I want her to dress. She’s going to be in very casual clothes, cause she’s just chilling at home and not going anywhere. 

Then after figuring that out, I thought about how I want the lighting and everything to look like on camera. I started to experiment with different colors on my LED lights and how it looked like on camera, and here’s a cool picture I got:

I look dumb, but that’s beside the point. I like how the blue contrasts the glowing whiteness that’s coming out of the box, which is exactly how I want the scene where she’s opening Patrick’s box up to look like. The blue adds to the mystery of it all, and also creates a sense of curiosity, which is perfect. I think it could use a little work, but so far, it’s pretty decent. 

While Iris is working on the project, I don’t want the lighting to be blue, instead I want it to look normal, and slightly darker, so that the contrast between that scene and the opening box scene is apparent, highlighting the tone shift. 

ACTORS

Ok, so I kinda hinted toward this, and I think it’s kinda obvious, but I’m going to be playing Iris for the opening. I don’t really want to go through the pain of having to cast someone and then figuring out schedules and whatnot, so having me be the main character is just way more efficient and just makes a lot more sense. But, that does mean I’m going to have to film majority of my shots with a tripod, and maybe forcing my little brother to help me out if anything. It won’t be bad though, plus I can work at my own pace, so it’ll be great.

SETTING

For setting, since the entire opening is set in Iris’ room, I figured I’d just use a room in my house to do it in. My room is a little too crazy for her, plus it’s incredibly messy and just does not fit the vide of Iris at all. So, instead I’m going to be using my sister’s room. Since she moved out for college, her room has basically nothing in it besides a bed and a desk and a couple of stuffed animals and posters. Since all we will be seeing is the floor and her bed, this is perfect, plus her room is a lot bigger than mine (she’s older, so she got first pick ugh). Which is also another reason why it’ll be easier to film once she’s gone back to college so I can steal her room (heh).

 

[here’s the room and my sister sleeping in her bed]

Boom, so that’s everything that was on the list that I needed to get done before starting to film, which is kinda funny cause I actually will not be filming yet. BUT, it’s fine cause I did put in time in my calendar just in case something like this did happen, so I’m still sort of on track. I got this…hopefully as least.