A Separate Post that Goes Much More in Depth about Props, Costume, Makeup, and Hair Design

So here we are, just like I said, making a post about props, costume, makeup and hair.


PROPS
Let’s start with props. The props we will be incorporating into our film opening are
super crucial to developing Alice’s character, the objects she interacts with will really
help the audience get a feel of what her personality is like.
Number 1 on our list of props is the basket. I feel like this wicker basket gives Alice
a little red riding hood kind of vibe which plays into that innocence we want to create in her.


Number 2 is the stuffed animals. Alice’s best friends and constant companions. Rachel
and I aren’t completely decided on which stuffed animals we will be using but here are
some contenders.


Third we have the mirror and the strawberries. In our film opening we want Alice to
use the mirror to apply the strawberry on her lips like lip gloss, to imitate how kids will
play as if they are grown ups by copying actions they have seen adults do, in this case
putting on makeup. In doing this we want to further establish her childish nature.



Next is the fluffy pen and checklist/to-do list. At this point adding these two props is to better
depict Alice’s personality. She extremely punctual as well as organized and she likes to fill
her days with many activities to keep herself occupied. The activities she has written in her
to-do list will give the audience some perspective as to what Alice enjoys doing without
actually showing her doing it.



Finally we have the book. We really want to have Alice read an adventure book, right now
we’d like to get Moby Dick so we’re going to check if our local library has it in stock. By
giving depicting this book we are going to present Alice’s curiosity and sense of adventure
that will come in handy when she is met with a talking tree.



COSTUME, MAKEUP, & HAIR
The costume we want to keep quite simple. I already own this simple white dress that I think
will look very nice and also convey the idea of purity and virtue. Also part of the costume
will be a small watch to exhibit Alice’s obsessive punctuality. Finally the shoes of the costume,
as much as I’d want her to be barefoot to perpetuate that earthy vibe we want, it seems a little
unsafe and unsanitary so we will probably end up using a pair of white sneakers that Eva
already owns so they match with the dress and will also allow her to easily climb the tree
when needed.



For makeup we will be keeping it very simple, focusing on a nice and dewey base, blush,
a few faux freckles, light mascara, and probably some eyebrow gel, definitely no eyeshadow,
eyeliner, or contour.



As for hair I have a few ideas that I’ll have to wait to actually try out on Eva’s hair, but we want
to keep it out of her face since she is quite an active child and we also want it to look, for lack
of better words, cute and girly.



Script Rough Draft

I was planning on posting the completed first draft of the storyboard but
unfortunately that will not be going up today because I’m currently in
competition mode for dance so I’ve been  little busy. But, I will be sharing
the first draft of our script, which doesn't exactly have too much dialogue
since it’s mostly stage direction, but it will be a nice tool to help us during
filming so everyone on “set” can follow along and know exactly where we
are. Everyone involved on filming days will receive their own personal
copy that they can write reminders on and take notes.
I know there are plenty of websites where you can write your script into
and it formats it for you, but I just searched up which font (Courier)  to use
and some examples of other scripts. This also isn’t the first script I’ve written
so I already had an idea of how formatting works but I’m attaching some
websites that I used to explain it in better detail and also a website of pdf
versions of screenwriter, John August's scripts, plus the one I used as reference.


Here's a link to pdf for the first draft of our script and a picture of one of the pages.

Meet Alice ! and Eva too I guess

I’d like to introduce you to Alice, our protagonist ! From the beginning I thought
the name was very fitting for our character , but, we went through a few other
names- Amity, Acacia, Iris, Peony, Posy, Rosie- before eventually settling back
to our first idea; We chose the name Alice because we felt it encapsulated the
whimsical tone we want to set, like Alice in Wonderland. With soft rosy cheeks,
freckles, and curly hair, our hope for Alice is that she comes off as the epitome of
innocence and wholesomeness. She is a strange and quirky little girl, always
punctual and never without her stuffed animal friends; she loves tea parties and picnics
and playing in the field and picking flowers. Later I’ll be making a separate post that
will go much more in depth about props, costume, makeup, and hair design but for now
let's get into who will be tasked with playing such a role.
Eva Daskos is a sophomore at Sagemont Upper School, she is very involved in her school's
theater department, most recently she played Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. I met Eva
back in November of 2018 when I went to see her school production of Be More Chill, she
played Rich and immediately caught my attention, I thought to myself how could such a little
person have such big stage presence. Since then I have seen her play a few other characters
each one completely unique and different to the previous one (she's honestly like a chameleon
I swear). When Rachel and I were creating Alice’s character Eva immediately came to mind,
physically I think she will perfectly capture the essence of a young girl and I already know
she’s an incredibly talented and reliable actress who will have no problem embodying Alice
and what she stands for.

Slight Change in Art Direction … also Storyboarding !



On Monday my partner and I were able to discuss with our teacher
the premise of our project. She lead us to some advice that we have since
taken into consideration and are now using it to better carry out our project.
We came to the conclusion that depicting the tree speaking to the girl would
get repetitive, boring, and overall just confusing, since we can’t exactly show
their conversations through a shot/counter shot or even really a two shot in
the same manner that you would show two human or even animal characters
we had to find a different way. Instead of focusing so much on introducing the
relationship between the tree and the girl we will be developing the character
of the girl. In depicting all the different quirks the girl possesses we hope it will
make her ability to hear a tree talking more believable to the audience. We have
also decided to scratch the narrator as it may make things confusing.
Now that we have a slightly clearer path, I’ve started drawing the storyboard.
It’s not quite finished because I want to confer with Rachel before drawing
anything else, but here is what we have so far. I'm also going to attach a link
to the pdf of the storyboard template I used:
http://srjcstaff.santarosa.edu/~kthornle/apgr66/storyboard.PDF

There Will be a Talking Tree

So uhm, Rachel and I have decided to completely change the premise of our film opening.
We have totally scratched any previous ideas we had rolling and are now taking a brand
new direction.


We thought it would be interesting if in our film opening we personified something in nature.
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, Animism is defined as “attribution of conscious
life to objects in and phenomena of nature or to inanimate objects,” It is a religious belief that
really intrigued us. Anthropomorphizing is another approach  that is similar to this idea but
less spiritual and it is when humans give human characteristics to non-humans, like forming
a bond with your Roomba. We felt that by giving a tree a voice we could create a wise and
sapient being that is immovable and acts as a guide to our protagonist.


Our opening will begin with an establishing shot of a field with the tree in the background.
The title will come at the beginning and then a spritely young girl will be seen running
through the field and through the title. Then we want to show her climbing the tree and the
tree speaking to her telling her to be gentle on the old tree’s branches. From there we will
show the two characters meeting each other for the first time. And then depending on how
long all of that is we may also depict the girl leaving the tree to return home. I would really
like to incorporate narration into our film and I thought that the narrator and the tree should
be the same person, kind of like the 2014 version of “Into the Woods” where the baker is
also the narrator. Having a narrator would also add to the whimsical tone we want to set.


We want our film to rely on shots that are visually and aesthetically appealing through
colors and landscape. Which we hope to establish through costume and set location.

I’m glad Rachel and I were finally able to establish what we want our film opening to
be. Overall we want whatever we create to be unique and different and I think a sapient
tree will be a way to achieve that goal. In summary, the rest of this process should be …
interesting.

A Project Schedule Rough Draft

The next few weeks for me are going to be some of the busiest I have ever seen,
between dance competitions, Florida state thespian competition, SATs, schoolwork,
this project, and even just spring break I seem to have quite a lot of my plate right
now, so I thought it would be a wise decision to try and plan out as best as I can
a rough draft of a production schedule, unfortunately I don’t know exactly what
Rachel’s day to day schedule looks like for the few weeks so I will just be basing this
on what works for me and then in the future we will tweak it to make sure we can both
commit our time and attention equally.


3/3
  • Decide the plot and direction we will be taking for our film opening


3/4-3/10
  • Decide casting
  • Start storyboarding
  • Begin writing a script
  • Deciding costumes, makeup, and hair


3/11-3/17
  • Finalize storyboard
  • Finalize script
  • Decide filming locations
  • Begin filming


3/18-3/24  
  • Get as much filming done in the first half of the week since I will be in Tampa for the second half
  • Begin editing any usable footage
  • Figure out what we are missing/what need to change/reshoot


3/25-3/31
  • Spring break ! perfect time to reshoot any footage we need
  • Getting together with Rachel to edit together
  • Final last minute changes


4/1-4/7
  • The final week
  • Fully finalize the project
  • CCR !!
  • Post the final project to my blog :)

The next few weeks will be hectic to say the least but I know that if Rachel and
I manage our time well and put our all into it we can achieve our ultimate goal.
-andrea :)

Group Meeting #1 : who even is editing

Last class we were given the opportunity to meet with our peers in groups of about five
to discuss our ideas and give any tips and advice we had to offer. And let me tell you I
learned a lot ! Obviously we all come from different background and possess different
strengths so it was nice to hear from my classmates all the different things they would be
using or had knowledge in all of this allowed me to figuring out what I was missing or
where I fell short in my project. I realized how little I knew about editing software… and
editing in general. My fellow group members recommended me two editing softwares that
they enjoy using, Final Cut Pro and Premiere Pro. In addition I know that my partner has
iMovie, so we have a few options to research until we find a good fit for the purposes of
our project.

Final Cut Pro
To be honest I don’t really see my partner and I using this software since it is more on the
expensive side and purchasing it just wouldn’t the wisest financial decision. However, I am still
going to attach this video I found of how to use Final Cut Pro as I found it very informative. The
program itself seems very straightforward and easy to use and I’d actually really love to use it some day.
Premiere Pro
I think the most attractive part of Premiere Pro is the fact that I could get a good deal on a student
discount, during our group meeting one of my group members actually showed me on the adobe
website, https://www.adobe.com, how to access this (you click the tab that says “creativity and design”
at the top of the website and then click on “students and teachers” and when you scroll down you can
see the different plans and discounts they offer) as someone with a very small budget this is extremely
appealing to my project. Premiere Pro does not seem very different from other editing programs it isn’t
too confusing as far as I’ve seen in my research so this is definitely a viable option for our film
opening. Also some really cool films such as “Deadpool” and “Gone Girl” were edited on Premiere
Pro which is absolutely insane. For consistency I’m going to attach a link to a Premiere Pro beginner
tutorial video that I found helpful.  






iMovie
iMovie is great because we already have access to it since Rachel has it on her computer. It may
not be the fanciest editing software but it will surely get the work we need done. Our film opening
probably won’t rely very heavily on fancy and expensive editing so if we are unable to get one
of the other two editing programs we will definitely be looking to trusty iMovie to edit on. It also
doesn’t hurt that both my partner and I have experience editing on iMovie so it will be easier than
having to learn an entirely new software.

-andrea :)

adieu

TDDUP has officially come to a close! How bittersweet; this project means so much to me and I am happy that this is how I will be closing ou...