Film opening - Zombieland

This is the opening to Zombieland:

The Hook: Everything in the scene is destroyed, cars crashed, upside down and on fire. All of this destruction draws in the audience and makes them want to see more. The shot used to shot the destruction are mostly long shots, but their are some close up shots that focus ob zombies attacking and eating people.

Set the scene ( time? Setting?): The time of year is not clear from the opening however the setting is a destroyed and zombie invaded America. Everywhere you look in the scene there is chaos and destruction, such as blood, fire and destroyed buildings and houses.

Introduce the characters: The characters are only introduced by written codes, showing the names of people in the film.

Introduce the genre: The setting gives the audience the impression that the film is going be a thriller/horror. However from the way the narrator is talking it sounds as though it could have a hint of comedy to it,

Credits: The credits are a written code,they appear on the screen in large red text to make it stand out, they slowly fade on and off of the screen. They also have a song in the background to get peoples attention and make the opening more interesting, this would be a technical code.

Narrative: The story is presented as a thriller/horror, this is shown though destruction, the blood and zombies.

Film opening - Juno

This is the opening to the film Juno:

The technical codes in this opening are the lighting, the lighting is very bright and happy which gives off the impression that this is going to be a positive film that a lot of people can enjoy. The opening is mainly made up of medium shots which show the main character (Juno) and some of the background.

The symbolic codes in this opening are that the colours are bright and friendly, which again is giving off the impression that the film is going to be a happy and positive one. The main character seems quite easy going, the clothing she is wearing is very casual, showing this is not a formal film. The main characters body language is very relaxed, which yet again shows her easy going nature and how the film is going to be a positive film  rather than giving the impression that this film is going to be a horror or an action film.

Codes and conventions

What is a code?
A code is a communication system which contains elements which have an agreed meaning.

There are three different types of codes that may be used to convey meanings in media messages, these codes are:

• Technical codes: These include camera techniques, framing, depth of field, mise en scene, editing, lighting and sound.

• Symbolic codes: These refer to objects, setting, body language, clothing and colour.

• Written codes: These are in the form of headlines, captions,speech bubbles and language style.

What is a convention?
Conventions are generally accepted patterns of code that communicate a particular message.

The purpose of a film opening is to begin to grab the interest of the audience so they get hooked into the film. The film opening also clearly show the audience what the genre of the film is and show either the protagonist or antagonist.

Timing conventions: the length of most film openings are around 2 minutes long, however some major blockbusters can take up to 5 minutes.

Set the scene: This means showing the audience the year, the location, what is going on and so on.

Introduce the key characters: The key characters are the protagonist, the antagonist, the sidekick.

Introduce pre plot or beginning narrative: This establishes the platform/scene

Key Credits: Such as the production company. the director, the actors, the logo.

The opening usually starts with a Equilibrium where a key event occurs.

Main exercise

The titles and opening of a new fiction film, to last a maximum of 2 minutes.

continuity

Continuity is the continuation of a scene with numerous shots mixing in together, there are no breaks in the scene. Continuity is also lots of small scenes that keep the moving flowing without spending to much time focusing on one scene.

An example of continuity could be a guy flying to New York, what would be shown is:

• Him arriving at the airport
• Him boarding his flight
• Him on the plane
• Him getting off the plane in New York.

The video above explains the reason why video's and films need continuity, and why things are a problem without them.

Preliminary exercise video

This is my group video for our preliminary exercise, for the first time filming and editing I think we did okay. We had a few bloopers where we couldn't open the door, someone forgot what they were meant to say, people carried on talking without the person with the camera going round to film the shot reverse shot. We managed to get everything we needed while filming such as Match on action, Shot reverse shot and we kept to the 180 degree rule.

When we came to editing we had a bit of trouble as the program Adobe Premium Pro kept crashing and we were just starting to learn how to use it, but we managed to get it sorted in the end and edit all our footage. Overall I think our preliminary exercise went well however if I was to do it again I would film more footage so we have more to work with when it comes to editing.

Camera shots.

Camera shots

• Extreme long shot: A extreme long shot is usually taken from quite far away and is used to set the scene. It will more often than not be showing an exterior such as a landscape or outside of a building, these scenes do not really show to much detail as they are more about given a general impression rather than showing specific information.   

• Long shot: A long shot shows the audience the character from head to toe. Even though the main focus of this shot is on the character there is still usually a fair amount of background detail.     

• Medium shot: A medium shot shows a character from then waist up and is normally used during dialogue scenes. There are two variations of this shot, these are a two shot and a three shot containing two or three people anymore than this then it is usually known as a long shot. There is not a lot of detail in this shot as the location has probably already be established in another scene.

• Close up: A close up shot shows very little if any background and usually focusing on a face or a specific object, anything other than the main focus of the scene is blurred. This shot shows the focus of things for example the expression on a characters face or important information on a document.

• Extreme close up: This shot magnifies beyond what the human eye can see. An extreme close up may be of a characters face and would only show their eyes or mouth and has no background what so ever. This shot is used for dramatic effect.

180 degree rule

The 180 degree rule is a filming guideline that says that characters in a scene should have the same left right relationship with each other. When the two characters are facing each other an imaginary line must be draw, the line usually runs straight down the middle of these two characters as shown in the image below.

Once this imaginary has been set and the filming has begun the camera must stay on the same side of the line. If the camera is switching between faces and suddenly crosses to the other side of the line, the characters will appear as though they are facing the same direction and it will not look as though they are talking to each other.

Shot/reverse shot

Shot reverse shot is a film technique where one character is shown looking at another character and then it switches and the other character is shown looking back at the first character. Due to the fact the characters are shown facing in opposite directions it gives the impression to the viewer that the characters are looking at each other.

A good example of shot reverse shot is shown is the video above.

Match on action

Match on action is when an action is started in one shot and continued on into another shot for example if you where filming someone opening a door you would have a shot of them from behind walking up to the door, then a close up of them pulling the handle and then a shot of them walking into the door where they are walking towards the camera. The video below shows another example of match on action.

A good example of match on action in the video above is between 2-3 seconds because the perspective of the camera changes while the scene carries on uninterrupted.

Preliminary exercise

Produce a continuity exercise which involves a character opening a door, crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom they exchange a couple of lines of dialogue. The task should demonstrate:

• Match on action
• Shot/reverse shot
• 180 degree rule