PRE PRODUCTION - 2.1

CLIENT BRIEF CONVERSATION


The client is my friend and we were communicating through a social networking site and through text so the  conversation is in colloquial language. A summary of the brief is; my friend Anne is a special effects make up artist and i knew that she was looking for someone to do a photo shoot for her so I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to use Anne as my client as we will both benefit from it. Anne agreed to be my client and we begun to talk about ideas for the shoot. She was sure to tell me that her target audience is international SPX and production companies. The type of SFX make up that Anne specialises in is blood and gore so it was very easy to decide on the zombie theme. Choosing our actors/models was simple as we had mutual friends that we knew would do a fantastic job as some had drama experience. I threw in a few ideas to Anne but we mainly stuck to her initial ideas which was to have an innocent looking girl visit a grave and 2 zombies are hidden in the cemetery who notice the girl and chase her only to catch her and feast on her body. Anne also stated a possible twist we could have used which was the girl turned round and killed them.. again but we chose not to carry out this twist. We then spoke about a second location that we could use being a tattoo studio but we did not use this idea either. We also discussed what type of editing Anne wanted on the photos, mentioning white goul eyes and a blue/purple atmosphere. 

            Jemma: Hay Anne (: Ummm do you still need photos taken for your bloody, manky, maggot infested make up? If you do I can do a shoot for you because for my diploma I need to do a photography project where I need a client and I was thinking you could be my client and the photos I take you can use to promote and show your work. Tell what you think (: x

Anne: Ooh sounds cool but I don't photo great so we could use Tony haha when do you need this to happen deary, and any idea of location etc? xx

              Jemma: Woo great thank you! We could use tony and Joe and maybe my friend so we have a girl too. Everything is totally up to you, you're the client so say what you want it to look like and basically I have to make it happen lol. It needs to be a really good location, not just a plain background.. Possibly graveyard? Just somewhere dark and where you wouldn't like to go at night lol. And maybe to be taken on a weekend in the next 3 weeks? x

Anne: Great stuff, OK so let me ponder it, chat with Tony and get this wknd in Devon out of the way and I'll contact you next week with a couple of options, all the makeup can be done at my sisters house just downstairs from Joe’s and then we can bundle in the car and venture to our locations! Should have a few cool props too seeing as tis Halloween season x

            Jemma: Yeaa sounds good >< x

Jemma: Haay, did you and Tony have a little think about location ideas and shizzle? We need to create a brief, like you need to write what you want, i.e. our agreement and terms (not too sure what that means but its on my list to have) you need to specify the target audience, conventions used equipment, resources etc. Also we'll need to think and state legal and ethical issues and limitations and we'll need to plan a schedule of when we are doing the pics. Let me know what ideas you got then we can start making concrete plans (:

Aaaaand you need to say how you want some of the pics to look, like what positions or what you want going on, e.g. someone biting someone’s face off or feasting on another person (:

Sorry you may get a few messages throughout the day as I think of stuff >< I'm liking the idea of somehow using mirror(s) in the shoot. Like the dead people being fascinated by their reflection kinda thing. Are they going to be zombies or just injured people?

I'm also liking the idea of possibly having a clinical looking setting for some of the pics. So having a whitey room or just a light colour so the guys make up will really stand out

Ooo you know where I think we could use, you know bow cemetery that's right next to Orrie’s! I don't think that ever has a keeper and it scares the shit out of me so I think it would look really good!

I'm going to get some bones and meat and try to get a goat’s head!

                  Jemma: Hay Anne, I don't want to be a pain but I kinda need to know you're ideas before Monday. If you just list it all I am happy to write the brief. I just need to start getting the pre production side going. Tarr (:

Anne:  Yo sorry for taking so long. Been a busy busy bee.
Ok so I'll chuck some ideas at you n I'll let you put some ideas etc in too ?!

I like the idea of the graveyard setting with an innocent visitor sitting at a grave with a bunch of flowers in (preferably her) hands, and 1 or 2 zombies walking towards her in the background, but she's completely unaware of them. I'd quite like this to be in a prettier, forestry part of the graveyard where there'll hopefully be a bit of colour. Not sure if we could pull this shot off in the dark, and Tony doesn't finish work until the evenings on Saturday's so it might be one for an early Sunday afternoon? I think there's something more unsettling about zombies in the daylight myself?!

Ok then we could maybe have some shots of them chomping down on her. I have some fake hearts and eyeballs so we could make this pretty cool, although doing her makeup in the cemetery could prove tricky.. Failing that, maybe an unexpected twist could be some shots of her going all psycho and killing them..? Ooh and maybe after the killing shots we could have a single snap of her looking down at a big bite mark on her arm... And we all know what that means... Uh oh!

Are you able to Photoshop these images at all? The zombies would look much more effective if you could pale out there eyes, kinda like a corpse that's been dead for a couple months. Contacts are soo expensive!

Haha or a zombie with a bunch of flowers visiting a grave.. A little spin off. Also Jem, just to let your know I will obviously be using the photos for my SFX portfolio so they will be seen by international sfx artist companies and theatre/tv production companies. Not to put pressure on you but just so you know who my target audience is.

                  Jemma:   Oo no worries (: That's really good that you will be showing the photos to them, I will make sure they look as prioffesional as I can make them.

I'm liking the innocent girl and flowers, that would look really good because i could make them quite bright and obvious and the zombies obvious but subtle in the background. yea we could do a Sunday afternoon, that’s cool, depending how long we're at the location we could try is at the sun is going down too because I think if the sky is a bit mild bluey/purple it will have a good impact, but we can see when we're there.
I think we should just do a range of some in the day and night because I'm planning on taking a couple hundred photos.

Yea I was going to buy some hearts as well and either use fake blood or red food dye to make it redder - really works in previous experience. Oooo I like the twist of her turning on them!! If we use the graveyard next to Orrie I'm sure he would let you do the make up up there, also I don't know if there is a pretty area of that cemetery

Yea I have a new version of photo shop (: For the eye's i am signed up to Picnik and they have an eye colour changing tool and the eyes can be literately any colour you want and it also has a Halloween section where they have like vampire/goul eyes (:

Can you think of anywhere that would look clinical? I'm really stuck on the idea of the zombies feasting on someone in a whitety room! I can't think of anywhere though. I think we should use a minimum of two locations (:

PRE-PRODUCTION - 1.2

One way of using software to produce pre production software would to be to create an effective, animated presentation using an online program called Prezi. I have used this to evaluate my A level media studies exam work (to view click the link http://snipurl.com/2bqk9g ) but it can also be used in the same way, and be as successful when creating pre-production documents. The program is very easy to use and incredibly fun. There are so many interesting, imaginative ways to make a simple presentation into an exciting one. It shares all the same basic features like a selection of fonts and sizes that can be used, bolds, italics and colours that for example Microsoft PowerPoint have. But what PowerPoint doesn’t allow you to do is to transform the presentation into a channel. By channel I am referring to how when using prezi, each bit of data that you put on adds to the path so they do not have to be viewed in a linear form.

For example the first image shows you an overview of one section in the presentation, the presentation then zooms to where ever you have put as the next part of the path. In this case it is a close up of the diagram. After that the presentation has been made to zoom to another area of the workspace which by the creators choice shows the title and then zooms in again so the text is visible to read.

The way you get the presentation to run very much the same as on PowerPoint. You select a ‘play’ button and have to click the mouse button or arrow keys to move onto the next slide/area of page.

PRE-PRODUCTION - 1.1

Mood boards, spider diagrams, storyboards, any visual method of recording information is going to be very helpful when you have keep referring back and reminding yourself of the original ideas and possible paths you could take. I have personally used mood boards and spider diagrams a lot in my photography and media studies.  Here is a mood board I created when I was creating a music video for my A level media studies coursework.

I found using a mood board particularly useful because it allowed be to collect all the ideas, colours, shapes and settings I had in my mind, put them down on a sheet in front of me and let my mind wander. By being able to see everything I imagine together it forces me to experiment with combining each element and producing a whole new impression. The same applies to spider diagrams, however instead of looking at an image you can encourage the expansion of one idea by creating the diagram using colour. For example, the main idea could be in blue, then an element branching off that could be in orange and so on until you have a page of every colour in the rainbow. Colours are always useful for remembering things and influencing new ideas as they aid the memory and help with recall significant points of that project. However one disadvantage of using paper-based research is that you could easily lose it and there isn’t a way to back it up. (Unless you create more than one, which is very time consuming) Another is that with storyboards you can draw and create the frame and put everything you want, how you want. But, you cannot accurately judge the real location when putting it down on paper. Therefore when it comes to carrying out the task or project you may come across a few implications because not all of you props or actors will fit in the shot.