New Music

Here is the new music we decided to use because we thought it suited our film more:

 

 

New Font

New Font

One of the main changes we had to make was the handwriting and font of the baubles. The original writing was quite messy and did not look very festive, so we re-did the handwriting so that it matched what we were hoping for. These were the type of fonts we were hoping to create:

For our first film, the name labels were written on pieces of paper which was then stuck onto the baubles. This time we decided to write on the actual baubles instead, which looked a lot better, although they were harder to write on so we could not be as creative, like with the cards.

This was the handwriting we used for the card name labels:

Re-Filming

We found a lot of things we could improve on for our first draft of Saving Santa. We decided to re-film our opening sequence to make it better. We went back to our filming location after school and made our opening sequence better. We used a wider variety of names for the title sequence and added in a fight scene to make it appeal to our target audience more. We used a bigger tree so that it looked much more like a realistic Christmas scene and made sure that when we filmed it, it was less shaky. The labels looked a looked a lot better when we re-filmed it and the lighting was more cosy for the film, with less shadows.

Instead of just dragging Santa out, we thought the Robber could carry him over his shoulder as it would make the scene more exciting. The Elf and tree were shown in a different place and the layout of the background meant the camera angle was a lot better.

 

 

First Draft

This is our first draft of our opening sequence (it starts at the time13:42):

 

 

New Titles

We used titles with a wider variety of names for our final film. In our draft we repeated the names of everyone in our group which is not realistic because the names would not be repeated in a real film.

Main actors- Sam James, Tom Lee, Katie Jones, Oli Wong, Olivia Frain, Lucy Fitch, Delilah Tulips, Lee Hart
Costume Designer- Lucy Harding
Production Designer- Issy Payne
Casting by- Dan Amato
Written by- Tom Richardson
Special effects- Bonnie Johns
Music by- Phil Carp
Produced by- Bessie Hawkins
Director of photography- Chay Pollinger

Draft Evaluation

We had a lot of good feedback for our first draft of our opening sequence. Most people liked the way it was laid out and thought we were very creative with how we incorporated the titles into everyday objects or things you would see at Christmas time. We got quite high scores from many people because of the way we filmed everything as one clip. Although we also got useful feedback on the improvements we could make for when we re-film our titles.

The main feedback on improvements we could make, were to make sure there were less shadows and use a bigger tree because ours was too small. Many people also thought that our labels did not look very professional, especially the ones we used for the baubles on the tree.

 

Here is an example of the feedback sheet people had to fill in and give back to us:

 

Here is a photo of our group evaluating everyone's work:

 

Changes made along the way

Final changes

After we had shot our film the first time around, we realised a few things that could be improved. Because most of our film is one continuous shot this meant that we had to re-film the whole sequence. We had repeated our own names quite a few times in the opening titles so we thought we would vary the names and include each name just once. We made the name tags look more professional, for example, by writing on the baubles and not sticking the name tags on with paper. We also used fancier writing that was more creative and readable. 

There were quite a few shadows in our initial opening sequence and the lighting was not very homely. We were able to adapt this and improve it.

I have learnt a lot from these changes about how much of a difference the finer details make to the film. The final film really shows up the tiny imperfections of the first one and looks a lot better.

Title Sequence

Title Sequence

Distribution Company Logo
Production Company Logo (My Logo)
Main Actors
Casting By- Tom Richardson
Costume Designer- Lucy Harding
Music By- Tom Richardson and Chay Pollinger
Edited By- Bonnie Fitch, Lucy Harding, Chay Pollinger and Tom Richardson
Production Designer- Bonnie Fitch and Lucy Harding
Director of Photography- Chay Pollinger
Executive Producer- Bessie Hawkins
Written By- Tom Richardson
Produced By- Bonnie Fitch
Directed By- Chay Pollinger

Characters

Jack Frost- Sam Bellman
Santa- Tom Richardson
Robber- Chay Pollinger
Elf- Bonnie Fitch

Changes made along the way

Initial changes
The main change that we made along the way was the order of our storyboard. After we had taken the recce shots, we realised that the book shot would be better going in between the tree and the stockings. We also changed a few of the names around on different objects to put them in a better order to make sure they flowed better.

It was useful taking the recce shots because it allowed us to see the layout of the room and what background we would be having for our film. We had to take these first so that we could then see how the storyboard would work best and in what order each of the titles should appear.

Marketing Campaign

We have made a film poster to market our campaign which will be displayed on various public transports and in cinemas to widen the audience for our film. Our film will be emphasized around Christmas which is when we plan to market it the most. The trailer will be shown at the cinema at the beginning of other similar films.

For example, many films are displayed on London Transport like the buses:

 

Audience Research

Our film is a certificate of PG because it is suitable for most people apart from really young children  because of the comic fighting scenes. Christmas films are really good family films because there is no real violence or swearing. Our film has comic violence, like when the Robber is kidnapping Santa, but nothing that is not suitable for young children.
We wanted to keep our film as a suitable family film and because it is a comedy but we have made the comic parts suitable for all age groups. Specifically, our target audience is teenage boys and older children because we think the comedy, fight scenes and storyline will appeal to them the most
I have learnt a lot about what is good content for each certificate rating and have researched other similar films to find out what certificates most other Christmas films are. Santa Clause and Miracle on 34th Street both have a certificate of U, whilst Elf has a certificate of PG. We chose PG because of the comic violence in our film.

 

Representations

Many things have to be in our film because of what genre it is. In a Christmas film the atmosphere has to warm and homely because that it what a traditional Christmas setting is like. If it also had an exterior shot, snow would be seen but because our film is only made up of interior shots, we need to show a lot of Christmas decorations in the room.

In a Christmas film, you would expect to see things like Santa, elves, presents and a Christmas tree. We have included these things in our opening sequence so that our film fully represents Christmas and people know what type of film it is.
 We are portraying the religion of Christianity because our film is about Christmas. Christianity is shown as being cosy and warm. Our film is set in a homely middle-class house which shows how the setting of Christmas looks for most families.
Santa is portrayed as being quite old and funny, whilst the robber is shown as being young. This shows the difference in age and how young people are portrayed as being stronger in many films when this may not be the case. The elf
 in our film is female whilst Santa is obviously a man, which shows gender differences and how women are traditionally seen as inferior to men.

The characters in our opening sequence are Santa, an elf and a robber to show that these character feature heavily in the film. A robber is not usually seen in a Christmas film which demonstrates how unique our film is. Another character in our film is Jack Frost who appears later in the film. We didn't want to give all the main characters away in the opening sequence because that would spoil the film. Jack Frost also is an unusual character to appear in a Christmas film which makes our film stand out from others.

Music

Music

For the music in our opening scene, we chose to use music that is festive and suits the genre of Christmas but is quite original as well. We decided that a dubstep version of a traditional Christmas film is original and suits the different type of film we are creating.

Institutions

We had a choice of many distribution companies to use for our film. We wanted to use the one which best suits out film genre of Christmas and action.

Our chosen distribution company

Warner Bros

We decided to use Warner Bros. Entertainment because it has made other Christmas films, like The Polar Express and National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. Warner Bros is the sister company of Time Warner- the world's third largest film distribution company. In 2008, New Line Cinema merged with Warner Bros. Elf was produced by New Line Cinema before they merged but is now a Warner Bros film as well, due to the joining of the companies.

Universal Pictures

Another film distribution company that we could have used was Universal Pictures because they have made other well-known films, like Transformers, Jurassic Park and Oblivion. They have made quite a lot of action films, although they have not made any Christmas films so we thought they would not be the best choice of company.

20th Century Fox

They are one of the biggest distribution companies in the world and have made many major films. 20th Century Fox have have made films like Home Alone, Avatar and Ice Age, as well as the well-known Christmas film Miracle on 34th Street. However we decided not to use this company because they have not made as many Christmas films and we thought Warner Bros would be better suited to the film we are making.

Columbia Pictures

They are not as big as Warner Bros which is why we decided not to choose them because we wanted one of the biggest companies to distribute our film. However Columbia Pictures have produced many big films, like 21 Jump Street, Peter Pan and the Christmas film Bad Santa.

Production Diary

Production Diary

Monday 10th November

On the 10th we began our planning for our film opening task. Before this lesson we had to come up with our own film pitch idea to show the others in our group, we did this so we could agree on one of our ideas which we would then plan, film and edit. In this lesson both Tom and Chay were absent so it just left Bonnie and Lucy to show each other their ideas. We had to discuss good and bad things about the ideas and thought about which one would work best.

Tuesday 11th November

On the second day, Tom and Chay were here again which meant we could show each other our ideas and agree on a final film opening. We told each other our film pitch but couldn't decide between a couple of them so we presented them to the class to see what they preferred. After this we had decided to go with Tom's idea which was a Christmas themed film but with a different audience to the normal genre, teenagers rather then young children.

Wednesday 12th November

On the Wednesday we got together and started thinking up some narrative ideas, looking for music to use in the film opening, possible locations and unique title ideas. These titles included Christmas decorations which told us we need a lot of props but this was good because at this time of year they can be easily found. Later, Tom and Chay thought a lot about the storyboard, characters and narrative whilst Bonnie and Lucy discussed locations, costumes and props needed.

Thursday 13th November

Today we thought about timelines for other films. We went on the computer to do some individual research to look up other films with a similar genre to ours and saw what order they put their titles in. Our opening scene focuses on the titles so this was an important task for our group. We all watched different films so we didn't all do the same. We wrote down the time at every title that came up and who was mentioned. For example the films title was shown early on but was not the first name that came up. We learnt which order these names usually appear in which will be a big help for us.

Friday 14th November

On Friday we looked at the 'art of the title' website which had lots of successful title sequences from well-known films. We chose a title sequence that related to our films genre and created a timeline for the film. We spent the whole hour taking screenshots from the title sequence, cropping them and putting them in order on one photo to add to our blog. We had to screenshot every time a name appeared, wrote down the time and took a photo of it. This took time as it was a long process but it was needed to help us.

Monday 17th November

In this lesson we were given a list of over 20 planning tasks to do which we organised between the four of us by giving each person a number of the tasks to do. These tasks were to help us plan, they included the storyboard, music, prop list, recce shots, planning photos, a mood board and a risk assessment. We all took on the jobs we thought were best for us so we all had something to plan for the week.

Tuesday 18th November

Today we started planning our own individual tasks, Lucy looked at text fonts and sixes for the titles, Bonnie made a prop list and Tom and Chay began creating the storyboard together. To communicate we have made a chat on whatsapp so we can share thoughts easily and share photos for our task.

Wednesday 19th November 

Lucy was absent on the Wednesday so Chay, Bonnie and Tom wrote a title list of who was what role in the production of our film. The logo was chosen which was Bonnie's because it was the best as it looked professional and had a good name.

Thursday 20th November

(No media lesson)

Friday 21st November 

We carried on with our individual jobs and peer assessed our blog so we got a second opinion for our work. This was good as we gathered new ideas for our blog and we found what we still need to do.

Monday 24th November

Chay started the risk assessment for our filming and Tom carried on drawing the storyboard and added some text to it. We also told our media teacher our final ideas and discussed when we will film. We worked out when we could all film which was going to be the following Friday (28th) as we all have a free period last lesson.

Tuesday 25th November 

Today Lucy brought in the Santa costume for Tom and Chay to try on to make sure it fit them, we needed to make sure it fitted so we knew if we needed to get anything before filming. We also continued to work on our individual tasks. Chay worked on the risk assessment, Tom worked on the storyboard, Bonnie made a title list on her blog and Lucy did the production diary.

Wednesday 26th November 

Today Tom finished the storyboard and Chay begun writing the script, Tom has also added timings to the storyboard so it is completely finished. Bonnie worked on her blog writing up prop lists and uploading photos and Lucy added more days onto the production diary.

Thursday 27th November

Today Tom started writing up representations, Chay started the script, Bonnie wrote up about the music we will use in the film and Lucy also looked at music, production diary and worked out what props people needed to bring as our filming day is tomorrow (Friday 28th). 

Friday 28th November 

Today is filming today, before this Tom and Chay filmed the storyboards and made a voiceover, Bonnie added more to her blog and Lucy added the risk assessment to the blog which included all the possible risks that could occur when filming. 

Filming:

When it came to filming, we left school at 1.30pm to go to film. We left at this time so we had plenty of time to film as we had the whole afternoon/evening. We got to our location around 2'o'clock which meant we had about three hours to film. First, we looked at the room we were using and figured out where we were going to place all the props. We used the fireplace, two tables and the mantle piece on top of the fireplace. Bonnie and Lucy decorated the mantle piece with props we had bought and Chay and Tom decorated the tree and picked out tinsel and baubles.

 After this we did some practise filming which got us used to the camera and how we were going to film. We didn't actually film this but we looked through the camera to check it looked good. We then checked the lighting, our film is supposed to be dark as it is set in the evening/night so as it was daytime we shut the curtains and dimed the lights. This lighting was good because it created the scene we wanted. We then stared filming the first shots of our film. We practised many times and got many videos so we had enough to edit and eventually created a long duration shot for the title sequence which lasts about 2 minutes which is what we hoped for.

Once we had filmed the first bit, we started to plan the second part which was when Santa gets 'kidnapped' by the robber. This took time as we had to get all the acting and filming just right. Whilst Tom (Santa) and Chay (robber) acted their small fight scene, Bonnie used the elf costume to be in the foreground who was oblivious to what was happening behind her, Lucy was filming at this point using the tripod in the corner of the room. 

Once we had filmed the second part, we then filmed another shot which will appear before the 'fight'. We filmed the 'fight' before because it was going to take longer. The third thing we filmed was when Santa (Tom) is emerging from the fireplace. Chay used the camera to film this from the side of the fireplace so it looked as though Tom (Santa) had travelled down the chimney. Santa then stood in the room ready for the following shot (which we filmed before this- the 'fight scene'. 

All our filming took about four hours in total which included setting up which took about half an hour. We managed to film everything which was great because we only have to film again if we missed anything or if something isn't right. This means we have even more time to edit which we will need as it is especially important for our film. 

Monday 1st December 

Today in lesson all we did was watched our shots we had filmed on Friday, we looked at what went well and what could maybe be improved if we have time. Lucy looked at lighting on premiere as the camera had made the footage look dark, we should have made lighting more bright in the room but we thought it was okay as it needed to be set at night, however we could easily adjust lighting on premiere to make it look less dull. Chay and Tom also put the footage onto a computer to see what could be done with editing.  

Tuesday 2nd December

Today Tom wasn't in so we continued to work on our blogs instead of editing. Lucy uploaded storyboard photos to the blog and wrote up about them. Bonnie finished the shooting schedule and Chay added some more to his blog.

Wednesday 3rd December 

Today Lucy and Tom were not in school but Chay and Bonnie started to edit the draft of our film. They managed to arrange shots in the correct order and add the music. They also added some more to their blogs, but mainly used the lesson to add and edit on premiere. 

Thursday 4th December 

 (No media lesson)

Friday 5th December 

Today Lucy added more to the production diary, Tom spent the whole lesson editing the filming and Bonnie and Chay added more to their blogs such as the risk assessment and the shooting schedule. Tom had watched the editing Chay had done the lesson before and then added to it eventually making our draft copy to show to the class, this will allow us to receive feedback for our film and see what we need to do to improve it. 

Monday 8th December 
Today we watched all the film drafts and gave feedback, we commented on what went well and what needed to be improved. This was good for our group as not only did we get to see all the other film opening ideas, we got to see what people liked about our film. 
Tuesday 9th December
Today we received our feedback sheets and Lucy and Bonnie looked through them to see what people had said. Tom and Chay were both absent for the lesson so Bonnie and Lucy sorted out the good and bad comments we got from the class.
Wednesday 10th December 
Today we carried on looking at the feedback sheets and looked at what had gone well and saw what we needed to improve. We discussed re-filming as some people had commented on the titles being unreadable. We decided we needed to re-film or do a lot of editing, we then made the decision of re-filming which would then happen the next day (Thursday).
Thursday 11th December 
Today in lesson Lucy wrote on the baubles with tipex to show some names for the titles, Bonnie helped with names and what titles to use and Tom and Chay thought about new shots to use for a slight change in the film opening as the props will have to be moved when we re-film.
Filming:
When it came to filming for the second time, we went after school to the house we were using and got there at about 4.00pm, we took about 2 and a half hours to get all the footage we needed. Lucy re-wrote the labels for titles whilst Tom and Bonnie got changed into their outfits. Chay worked out where everything needed to be filmed and worked out what props we could use. 

When we were ready to film, Chay filmed the part where Santa (Tom) comes out of the chimney, at this point the elf (Bonnie) was in the background. 

We then filmed the fight scene (when Santa is captured) and carries him out the room which will lead to the final part where the wreath is shown. 

After this we filmed the title sequence, when doing this Chay filmed the whole shot and to avoid shadows, Lucy shone a torch above to improve the lighting. 

We then filmed the final scene where Santa is taken and they leave the house, the door then shuts behind them which reveals the title of the film on a wreath on the door. 

This time filming went a lot better than the first time as the props and tree were improved, the lighting was much better/brighter and the titles were different. 

Friday 12th December 
Today we looked at the footage we had filmed the day before and made a folder of what we liked and what we didn't (good and bad footage) we then put the best filming onto premiere and started to edit. Tom did most of the editing and got a lot of it done. We need to add music to make it better and edit some of the shots. Bonnie, Lucy and Chay added more to the blogs.
Monday 13th December 
Lucy was absent from the lesson so Bonnie took in the outfits so that Bonnie Chay and Tom could make the film poster. Using the drama rooms and a tripod, they produced a few images for the film poster.
Tuesday 14th December 
Today Bonnie and Lucy added to their blogs whilst Tom and Chay looked for a classroom to film another shot. Lucy added to the production diary and Bonnie added the shooting schedule to her posts. 
Wednesday 15th December 
Today we added to our blogs, Tom wasn't is school. Lucy added to the production diary, Chay added to his blog and so did Bonnie. 

Thursday 16th December 
(No media lesson) 

After school, Lucy and Bonnie stayed for a couple of hours completing final editing for the filming. We changed music and adjusted some timings to make finishing touches. We then uploaded I to Lucy's YouTube to then put on our blogs, this took a very long time as it had a lot to process. Whilst we waited we added some posts to our blogs, Lucy added more to the production diary and Bonnie added more to her blog. Our film is now ready and up on YouTube. 

Shot List

Audience Research

Our film is a certificate of 12A because it is suitable for many people but may not be the best film for people below that age because of the fight scenes and there may be a bit of swearing. Most Christmas films out there are aimed at families with younger children and there are not many Christmas films that families with older children will enjoy. Our film is aimed at families with older children because of this.

Health and Safety Information

Location and Recce Shots

Shooting Schedule

Script

Props Research

For our Christmas film, we used props that suited the genre and created a Christmassy atmosphere for the setting.

Props

• Baubles
• Present tags
• Wrapping paper
• Card
• Stocking
• Book on shelf
• Santa costume
• 2x Elf costumes
• Christmas tree
• Holly wreath
• Cookies
• Milk
• Tinsel

Location

• Living room of house