UNFOLLOWED - SHORT FILM PRODUCTION DIARY
5th March -
For our final major project (FMP) we have been given the task of creating a short film, as a class we all individually had to think of an idea for a short film. We had to plan this idea and create a pitch for it to be able to sell it to an audience for it to be picked to be made. We all had to present these pitches in front of the other members of the course and Kelly. Kelly decided who's short films were going to go ahead and be made.
I spent time thinking of an idea, this took longer than expected as I couldn't think of an idea. Knowing that I wanted my idea to involve an aspect of social media, I eventually came up with the idea of 'UNFOLLOWED' this was going to be a short film about a young girl in college who is an Instagram star on the rise, she balances the everyday life of being a teenager in college, studying, work, friendships and posting to her thousands of followers. Every day she is gaining more and more followers and is obsessed with showing what she is doing with her day live online. She is constantly going live to her followers showing them what she is up too and more importantly where she is. Little does she know that in that list of thousands of followers there is a stalker that has been watching her every move and is about to strike.
I then went ahead and made a PowerPoint to pitch to the audience, it explained key points to the audience so that they understood what the storyline was and what it would take to make the short film.
I pitched my idea to the audience and Kelly and they liked it, they thought it was a very unique idea and something that hadn't been done much before. I believe I pitched the idea well and spoke through the points clearly so that the audience could picture my idea in their heads.
After we had all pitched our ideas and powerpoints to the audience which included Kelly, we were then told that instead of just a couple of the ideas being picked, we should all go away and make our ideas into short films. This was good news as everyone gets to make their own idea a reality but also getting the chance to work on other peoples ideas too if they want. This meant that all 8 ideas were going to be made into short films.
Because all short film ideas were going to be made, we all had to pick our crew of who we wanted working on our short films, for 'UNFOLLOWED' I decided on the following people for the following roles.
Matthew Hooton (me) - Director
Anya Lillie - 1st Assistant Director
Eden Hall & Laura Hailes - Camera Ops and Lighting Team
Production Managers - Anya Lillie & Matthew Hooton
Editor - Matthew Hooton
Location Manager - Laura Hailes
Art Director - Laura Hailes
Casting Director - Anya Lillie & Matthew Hooton
Sound Manager - Laura Hailes
8th March -
As my crew now knew their roles on my production it was now time to get actors to play the parts of the characters, I had scripted three characters into my film so I needed three actors to play them.
I put out a casting call on our production planning facebook group so that the actors could comment if they were interested and I could let them know details about auditioning for the parts.
The post got a much better response than I was expecting, as 7 people said that they would be interested in auditioning for the parts. I contacted them all and told them the details of the auditions that me and my casting director Anya Lillie were holding in the green room.
I told them all the times of when they should come and audition.
18th March -
This was the day that me and Anya held our auditions for our short films, we both decided to have a joint casting session as were both casting directors for each other's films which meant we got to see the actors audition for not only our own films but also each other's films so that we could decide together who would be good for each role of each film.
We had a time slot in the green room of 2pm - 3pm, in this time we had to get all of our actors in one by one and make them run through an audition which consisted of a performance of a page from our scripts and also acting out a fake live stream on their phones.
Me and Anya both took notes of what we thought of the actor's auditions while they performed so that we could look back later and make our decisions. We also noted down important details about each actor such as their availability and travel arrangements to set.
19th March -
Today was the first day of starting the pre-production paper work for my production folder.
Before I did that me and Anya sat and had a meeting about the cast for each others films, we reviewed the footage from the auditions and put it together in premiere pro. We then decided on who we wanted to play the roles for our films. For unfollowed this was:-
Jade Todd - Chloe
Bethany Wynne - Amy
Shanie Mcclune - Eve
I picked these actors as they performed the best in the auditions and I believe they fit the roles the best. They also had good availability and transport plans. This turned out to be a great choice as the actors were great and worked extremely well with me and the team. They came to every planned shoot and location, were always on time and always made sure to learn their lines the night before the shoot. This was great as it made production much easier.
Now that I had a cast and crew ready I could get on with the pre-production paperwork and start to schedule shooting days.
Today was another day of production planning and scheduling, on this day I also decided to hold a production meeting with my team and the makeup artists that were going to be working on 'unfollowed'. We went through important topics like what makeup I wanted doing on the characters for each scene and what days we were thinking about filming on.
We started with talking about the work we had done so far, this was things like casting and production paperwork. We then moved onto different topics such as the script and when it was going to be ready to give to the cast and crew so they can go through it and learn which scenes they are involved in and what makeup needed doing for them.
While the makeup artists were there I discussed what I wanted the main character, Chloe, to look like when she gets attacked. I described how I wanted her to have blood on her head and bruising around it. They said that this would be possible which was great. I also told them how I wanted the other girls to have 'Instagram' glam makeup with bright colours on their eyes.
This meeting went well and we discussed many things in order to get ready for filming.
21st March -
On this day I started to schedule shooting times for the cast and crew of unfollowed. This was difficult as I had to try and fit filming times in with peoples schedules and the times that actors and crew were free, I used my skills from previous projects such as sit-com production when I had to schedule shooting times for a much larger crew. This helped me on this project as I knew I had to watch out for things such as lessons that crew may have to go too such as maths and english. And I also took into consideration times of traveling to the locations.
This was important because on this project we were going to locations that were further than we had even taken a cast too before. For example, I had to plan to set off for the bus at 9:20AM on the day we were going to Newcastle as I knew it would take about 45 minutes to get there which took time out of the amount of time we had free to film while we were there.
Below is the first draft of the schedule for unfollowed (grey cards).
27th March -
Today was the first day of filming for my short film 'unfollowed'.
On this day we had scheduled to shoot scene 1, this is the scene where the main character Chloe wakes up in her bed and starts to get ready to go to college. While doing her makeup Chloe goes on twitter on her laptop and tweets about what she is going to do with her day.
I decided that I was going to film this scene at my house as I needed a bedroom that looked like it belonged to a teenager, for this I used my sister's bedroom. I brought the crew to my house and they set up to film in the room.
We did a few takes of the scene to make sure that it was right and how I wanted it to look like, so every take we moved the camera a little and made Jade do it differently so that it was perfect.
We managed to film this scene quite quickly and got finished in around an hour and a half.
Once we packed up all the equipment it was a wrap on the first day of filming for my film.
28th March -
Today I filmed for the first time with Laura for Anya's short film called 'Names to Numbers',
her film is about getting stuck in a system where you feel like you can't do the job you want because all your life you've been told its too 'hard' or you'll never make it. Her film shows that you can break free from the system and do whatever you want to do in life and that you don't have to be stuck with a job that you hate.
My role is 1st assistant director and camera op on 'Names to Numbers'.
Anya asked me and Laura to get one of the first shots from the bridge above the LRC in college, We used a tripod to get the camera to face down to capture the two actors reading in the LRC, we very slowly zoomed into the actors to create a nice zooming shot. We also got some shots of the actors sat at the table reading by sitting opposite them on the table and using a mid-shot.
Me and Laura then got approached by a member of staff from the LRC who asked us if we could stop filming because we hadn't given the LRC any notice of us filming days before. They said that people in the LRC may not want to be seen in the film even though that the shot we had only included our actors. They said it was okay this time but if we ever want to film there again a notice would be required a few days before so they can put signs up saying that filming would be in progress throughout the LRC. So we quickly got the last shots that we needed and moved out the LRC.
We had now got the shots that Anya's wanted for the beginning of her film, so we decided to move on to filming my short film. I had planned to shoot 3 scenes on this day, making it our longest shooting day yet.
We then headed outside of college near the river so that we could film scene 2 of 'unfollowed', Eden was supposed to be on camera to film this scene but didn't come as she had a driving lesson, because of this I asked Laura if she could help out by being on camera for this scene. This turned out really well as Laura's shots turned out looking really nice and not shakey.
As Laura was now on camera I didn't have anyone to do the boom mic, I had to go back into college and ask if anyone was free to help me out, Tom and Ollie kindly offered to help for a bit. As I now had people to film the scene we got on with shooting it, shooting went smoothly and we only had to do a few takes. We got two different angles using multi-camera to make the scene more interesting. The scene only took around 30 minutes to film, once we finished we headed inside college to shoot the next scene.
The next scene was scene 3, this is when the three girls are in class and are having a lesson on the dangers of social media. I had Josh from the second year be the teacher for this scene. For this scene, I needed an empty classroom for the actors to sit and be in their 'lesson', I needed a room big enough for the equipment and the crew to fit in. This was a struggle and took a while as all the rooms we tried to use were either in use by other people or were locked. We eventually found a room that was free and big enough for us to film in.
Next time I need to pick a room and make sure it's free before we go out to film. Eden was still not back yet so I had Laura be on camera again. I had my other crew member Anya be an extra in the scene so that it wasn't just the three actors sat around the table. This was the first scene where I had planned to use a screen recording of Jade's phone in the scene to show that she's on her phone in class. I did this and it turned out looking good in the edit.
We did around 5-6 takes of this scene to make sure the actors were saying the right lines and leaving enough time between them for the camera angles to change. The shoot went well and we completed the scene in around an hour.
After this scene, we all had a break and went to get some food as we had been filming all day. We had one last scheduled scene to film which was scene 4, this scene is in the cafeteria at college where Eve is asking why Chloe is doing what she is doing on Instagram.
After we had all got food, Anya & Laura had to leave. This left just me and Eden to film the last scene over in SRC 2. We decided that we would just use a camera each and shoot the scene together with Jade and Shanie. We then realized that we needed someone to do the boom mic so Hashim kindly offered to help us as he wasn't busy. After we framed the camera to how we wanted them and the actors went through their lines we noticed that Laura had the SD cards on her from the last scene. Laura was on her way to the bus stop when I called her and asked if she had the SD cards, she said she did and was sorry for taking them without realizing, me and Eden then had to quickly run all the way to near the bus stop to get the cards. Laura had put them on the side of the street where no one could find them and so she could get to her bus stop in time to catch her bus. Me and Eden eventually found the SD cards in the grass and took them back to college to get on with filming the last scene of the day.
The last scene took a lot longer than we thought it was going to as Shanie kept forgetting her lines, the area in SRC 2 where we were filming was also quite busy so we had to wait until it got a little more quiet to film so that we didn't have people talking and walking around in the background.
1st April -
Today me and the crew shot the final scene of 'unfollowed'. This is the scene where Chloe's stalker finally strikes and attacks her, she is left alone dead as the camera pans further and further away.
We had to shoot this scene in two parts, the first part was up until the part in the scene where Chloe lifts her phone back up from looking around after hearing footsteps behind her, and then the second part where she is laid on the floor dead after being attacked by the stalker. The reason for splitting the scene up into different shooting times was because of the makeup requirements for this scene. For the second part we needed the SFX makeup on Chloe, so we had to film the first part of the scene first and then go back to college for Jade to get the SFX makeup put on as it wouldn't of looked right if she already had a wound on her head before she gets attacked.
One thing that was different in this scene was the use of the drone, when first planning this scene back when writing the script I had the idea of using the drone to create a shot of Chloe layed on the ground while the drone slowly goes further and further up into the sky.
As I haven't been taught how to use the drone yet I asked Olivia from the second year if she would help me out and fly the drone for me to get the shot, Olivia was great and said, of course she would. She did a few takes to make sure I liked what she shot and to make sure the footage wasn't too shaky from the slight wind.
This shot ended up looking amazing and is one of my favorite shots in the short film.
4th April -
Today was the day we shot in Newcastle for 'Unfollowed', this was the furthest place we had ever gone to film something yet. Because of this, we had to plan it properly as it wouldn't be easy to go all the way back to get shots. I started by planning dates that all the cast and crew would be free to go up there to film, I then had to think about transport for the crew to get there. I originally planned on getting the train there as it would only take about half an hour and only cost around £13 for tickets there and back, I was about to tell everyone to order their tickets until Laura suggested that we should get the X10 bus there as she had done it before and it was much cheaper at only £2 a ticket. I asked if she could check out times of when it came to our bus stop and how long it takes. She kindly did this for me and found out that the bus came every hour and takes around 50 minutes to get to Newcastle, as the price was much better we decided as a team that we would just get the bus there.
I then had to plan what places in Newcastle we wanted to film in, Kelly gave me a list of places that she thought would look great on camera so we checked a few of them out while we were there. One of these places was the stacks in Newcastle which is where we ended up filming the scene where Chloe goes live before arriving late to meeting her friends.
On this day Me, Laura, Anya & Eden and my actors arrived at college early so that we could get the equipment packed and ready to take on the bus. We then waited outside college at the bus stop for the bus to arrive. We caught the bus and were now on our way to Newcastle, the bus only took about an hour to get there which wasn't bad at all.
We arrived at Eldon Square shopping centre and we thought that the outside of the building was a good place to shoot as it looked like a really nice background on camera. Unfortunately, it started to rain quite heavily so we were getting wet and we didn't want the camera equipment to get damaged. So we made the decision to get a bus to the metrocentre where we would be able to film inside the stores and get the montage shots of the girls shopping.
We went back to the bus station and found a bus that went there, we ended up getting there in about 20 mins. As soon as we got there we started to get shots inside the stores to use for the montage. We thought that the security in the stores may not be happy if we went around filming on a big camera so we decided that we would only use the proper camera for shots outside the stores and instead use an iPhone to record in the stores as it is not noticeable. These shots turned out looking great! When shooting in the stores I got Jade to pretend she was vlogging her shopping day with her friends on her phone, I got her to use my phone while it was screen recording on snapchat so that I could use the footage to make it look like she is going 'live' to her followers. This made for a great effect in the edit.
It took around two hours to get the montage shots done and after that, we went for some food as we were all hungry. After this, we got on with filming the scenes with dialogue.
We then headed outside of the metrocentre to shoot the scene where Amy & Eve are waiting for Chloe, this scene was tricky to shoot as people kept walking past the camera when we were filming and a lot of people were outside talking which meant that the audio wasn't great as you couldn't hear what the actors were saying. After a few attemps, we eventually got the shot without anyone walking past the camera or talking near the mic.
We got the last few shots filmed around the streets of Newcastle and then we headed back to college to take the equipment back, it was now around 5pm and we could finally call it a day.
I would say this was a very productive and fun day filming for unfollowed. We got all the scenes filmed that we wanted and filming went overall smoothly.
I could now say it was officially a wrap on the set of 'Unfollowed'.
24th April -
On this day I started the post production editing of 'Unfollowed', I imported all the footage from all our shoots into one folder and then imported it all into adobe premiere pro.
I started by editing scene one with the footage I had, each scene I went through the footage and cut it together with audio and music and also colour graded it so that it looked nicer.
I tired using techniques that I had never used before in order to challenge myself, these were things such as a montage sequence which went with the beat of the music and also using the masters and coverage technique to get a multi cam style in my film. This is where you film the whole scene three times and then cut in and out of the different angles in the edit.
29th April -
Today I finished editing all the footage together and exported a 1st draft of my film. I was very happy with how the first draft turned out as it looked how I wanted it to look and the shots and music went well together.
I did notice some things that I did want to change and improve in the next draft which I noted down and changed. These were things like shots being on screen for just a tad too long or audio not syncing up with the mouths of actors.
I showed the first draft to my tutors Kelly and Danniella and they both loved it but made a list of a few little things that I should change to make it better.
8th May -
I looked over these notes and made the changes to my edit to improve.
Kelly told me that one of the scenes in my short film wasn't as good quality as all the others. She said that the best option would be to reshoot the scene with the actors and use the new footage in place of the scene, only if I was happy with that and wanted to do it. I agreed with this and noticed when watching it back that the footage isn't in focus and the audio is out of sync a little bit. I didn't like that the quality of this scene wasn't as good as the others and I thought it stood out and let the film down. I have contacted my actors Jade and Shanie who were in this scene and asked them if they would be free to reshoot this scene, they were fine with this and said that Thursday 16th May would be best to redo it.
AUDIENCE FEEDBACK -
This day was also the day that we did our first screening of our films to the group, we all took turns to show a first draft of our films on the big screen. While screening each film two people per film were asked to fill out audience viewing report and feedback sheets which have feedback questions that they can answer and then give back to the person who made the film so they can see what the audience like and don't like and see where to improve for their next edit or film. I screened my finished film to the class and had two people fill out the feedback sheets. This was Eden & Ollie.
As you can see from the image above, I got some great feedback from my audience. They commented on many different parts of the short film from cinematography to the directing.
General evaluation of production:
My viewers responded to this question with responses such as, 'Great tempo and direction of characters' and 'Music suits the film really well', this is nice to hear as I know that they think that the film runs well and has a clear story line.
Cinematography:
The audience said that some 'great and creative shots' were used, which is good to hear as I know that they like how the film looks to the audience. Ollie also mentioned that some shots were a little bit over exposed at times in the film. I agree with this comment and hope to fix and improve this when I re shoot one of my scenes on the 16th.
Directing:
As this was my role on set of 'Unfollowed' I was interested in seeing what the audience thought of the directing through the film as they were not there with me on set. The audience said that the directing of the film was 'well done' and that you could tell that the actors were being told how to to act when saying certain lines of the script.
Editing:
As I made some very unique editing styles in my film It was nice to see that the audience liked the edit. Ollie's feedback reports say that the edit was 'Amazing' while Eden's says that edit was also great but small things could be done to make it even better.
Both feedback reports said that films pace moved 'just right' which is good as I thought that it maybe moved to quickly bit i'm happy to see that the audience think that it moves at just the right pace to make it dramatic without it being rushed.
I will take all this feedback into consideration when doing the next edit of my short film in order to improve it and make it better.
9th May -
As a very last minute request, Tom Rymer has asked me to be on his crew for his short film as he has been asked to make one with only around 2 weeks to complete it. I said I would be happy to be apart of the crew as I knew Tom needed people to help him out.
