The Snorricam...

A Snorricam is a camera device used in films that is rigged to the body of the actor, facing the actor directly, so when he moves, the camera moves swiftly with him:


It looks really good when done properly and we discussed building one together as a class. There are online tutorials that may be of help although it does look quite complex.

Questionnaire research

To gain an understanding of current trends in films today, we have been told to produce a questionnaire and carry out a survey. An ideal questionnaire is shown below. I will alter this one, ask people to fill it out and then display the results in a graph or pie chart of some sort. I will post my results on my blog when I have them. Hopefully, this will give us an idea of what factors people enjoy most about films at the moment.

Se7en

As a class, we watched the film Se7en from start to finish. Directed by David Fincher, starring Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman, this film is a psychological masterpiece. The imagery used throughout is mind-blowing and even though I had seen it before, I didn't remember it to be that fantastic and it's extremely hard to find fault within it.

Filming in Southend

Two members of our group, Tasha and Lucy, travelled to Southend-on-sea to start filming scenes for our opening:

Unfortunately, looking at the footage, we have decided that our idea just isn't working. We have started again completely from scratch, and have brainstormed a new idea. It couldn't be more different to our original plan, but I think our project could be outstanding if we manage to pull it off. We plan to create an opening from a film set in 1916. We are currently working on the script for the female voice-over, and arranging permission to shoot in the location we want.

Experimenting with our equipment:

Our group's Prelim:

Lesson 8th October

During Friday's lesson, we pitched our ideas to the rest of the class. We drew up a storyboard of ideas that we had for each scene. The class and our teacher liked our project idea so we were given our film equipment. I really enjoyed presenting our project and also hearing other group's ideas. I was quite surprised at how varied each of our ideas were.

Presentation questions

1. Is your idea PRACTICALLY possible to film? (no speeding trains, sea battles etc)
Yes. Our idea is quite simple, there is nothing too complex about it.

2. Will it show off the strengths of EVERY member of your group?
We will all contribute to the production of our opening, but each member will use their talents to help in one specific area of the project.

3. Can it be storyboarded okay?
Yes. We have drawn up a storyboard to present to our class.

4. Is it something you can reasonably shoot and edit in the time available?
We plan to shoot all our scenes in one day, for the sake of continuity. The editing process will probably be the most difficult, but with hard work we should be able to do it within the time limit.

5. Can you get access/permission to shoot in the chosen location at the chosen times?
We will need to go and ask for permission to shoot on the Southend pier, as that is where most of our scenes is set.


6. Would lighting/sound be an issue on location?
We may need to edit out a bit of background noise (crashing waves, seagulls, people etc.), but some of it may actually add the effect of our plot.

7. Are you going to include dialogue? If so, can you do it on location or will you need to add it later?
There won't be any dialogue within our opening. We feel it would subtract a lot of the tension.

8. Who will be cast as your characters on screen? Are they reliable? Will continuity be an issue?
We had planned on using our friend Heather as our main character, but have now decided to use Natasha who is in our own group. This way, we are sure to be able to rely on her.


9. Have you thought about style of credits and soundtrack?
We are going to create our music on Garageband. This might be difficult and take a lot of time to get it the way we want, but it is do-able.