To Kill a Mockingbird - Opening Remake

Making of To Kill A Mockingbird - REFLECTIONS

For when I come to making my film, I know now that I need to prepare properly for it and try my best to get it filmed as quick as possible.

What I did wrong this time is that I didn't prepare as well as I thought I did, which slowed me down at the end and I didn't have a lot of motivation at the end to get it finished. I should of got all the props ready the first day of filming and bought a whistle, which none of us had. When filming we got slightly distracted by people walking into and out of the room. When I shoot my film, I will need to find a room that will be quite and no one walks into, if the shot is indoors. If its outside then I will try and film when everyone has lessons, just so I don't get distracted.

What went well when filming the opening sequence is that we didn't just do one shot and move on to the next. We looked at it and made sure there was no shaking and the timing was right. For every shot we took, we shot an extra two of the same scene, just so we can choose at the end the best quality and timing.

Making of To Kill A Mockingbird - POST PRODUCTION

We filmed the last scene on the third day. The scene with the whistle.

When we came to editing the whole thing together, we first got all the clips into Final Cut Pro and then choose which clips looked the best and which clips we couldn't use, because they were too shaky or the clips filmed was too short.

After we chose the clips, we put them together and then changed the timings and cropped the clips to the right length. We added the music and made the clips in black and white. We looked through our made opening title sequence and compared it to the real thing and it was pretty much on point, apart from the little details like really steady camera angles and spot on movements. Also it was quite hard to make the marble roll where you want it to roll, because the table we filmed on seemed like it was on a slope.

Talk with Clive Owen about 'The Knick'

When we were talking with Clive Owen, he was honest and explained everything in detail. We watched a six minute introduction to "The Knick" the new series. Then asked him questions about it. 

Clive Owen also mentioned that working with Soderbergh, brought good features from the company Cinemax. Cinemax is an American premium cable and satellite television network that is owned by the Home Box Office Inc. 

With TV drama it is better to get more into the story because there are episodes. They aren't so overwhelming by time consumption and they are spread throughout a longer period of time (e.g. a year), where as in a movie lots of information is crammed into a short amount of time (e.g. 2 hours). 

Clive Owen also mentioned that in the US "The Knick" went really well because there is a large viewing audience and Cinemax spent a lot of money to publicising the series. Also Cinemax spent more money than Sky Atlantic did on the series. But the UK isn't as big as the US so there is no need to spend a lot on posters, adverts, etc. 

I found out that the funding to publicise the series is the same amount as the funding for the series. ($ 6-7million).

Making of To Kill A Mockingbird - PRODUCTION

First day of filming:

Our first day of filming went really well, we had everything we needed and got most of our shots that day. We had all our props and motivated to get started and finish filming as soon as possible. We filmed each shot three times, just to make sure they could be the best they can, plus when we edit, we would have a selection of shots to choose from.

Second day of filming:

The second day didn't go as well as we planned...
We had a couple shots left to do but one of the shots included a metal whistle. We had a whistle on the first day but we had to give it back to the PE teacher. We asked if we could borrow it again but we couldn't as he was using it at the time and we couldn't find another whistle that looked the same, we found one that had a ball at the end of it that you squeeze to make it whistle. We went all over the school to find another one but there wasn't any that looked the same.

Making of To Kill A Mockingbird - PRE PRODUCTION

We looked at the opening of To Kill A Mockingbird. We firstly watched the opening a few times just to get a good view and a clear image of what we would have to do. Then I wrote a time line from 00.00.00 - 00.03.00.

We as a group got the props list together and then decided that each of us was going to get some props from home or order them online if none of us had them.

After we got our props list sorted, we then worked out the camera angles, time of the footage in one shot and how we would have to set out the room, to make it look as close as possible to the real thing.

What is a Thriller.

Thriller is a genre of film and TV programmes that use suspense, excitement and tension as its main elements of the film or programme. Thrillers stimulate the viewers mood, giving them anticipation, expectation, anxiety, terror, surprise, and uncertainty. Films of this genre tend to be adrenaline-rushing.
It is also a film with an exciting plot, typically involving crime or espionage. 

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD opening title sequence time line

We created a time line for the opening To Kill A Mockingbird, which we had to analyse every single detail of the beginning. We looked at the titles, times, music, camera angles, frames, props and colour of the film.

Remaking the Opening of ...

Yesterday we were looking at:

Heathers
This is England
Toy story
Withnail and I
Good Fellas
To Kill A Mockingbird

'Toy Story' was a good suggestion but it wasn't good to go forward with it because it didn't have the credits at the beginning and it would be really hard to recreate as we would have to be the toys, this is the same with 'Good Fellas', and also none of us have a car or license, plus it would be tricky to get the shots at night.
'Withnail and I' was also a great suggestion because the camera angles and the editing would be good to learn and create, but the down side was that the man was smoking and we can't have smoking or drugs in our film recreate.

I suggested 'This is England' because I thought it could work, but in the opening sequence there was a lot going on and it would be really hard to film plus it would take a very long time.

'Heathers' is a good choice that can be recreated, because it isn't too complicated and also shouldn't take a long time to film.
'To Kill a Mockingbird' is a good choice as there are a lot of close ups and great different ways to show how good we are at editing, also there are quite a lot of props involved but they are simple and not hard to get a hold of.