Peaslake boarding house, which belongs to the school, is near a very secluded area of woodland close by to the main village. Popular with cyclists, Surrey hills is the most wooded county in Britain, so when looking for forested scenery we have lots of choice. The reason that our group choose Peaslake woods, is because were are close to Peaslake House, if something goes wrong, or we need something quickly, then most likely it is at the house.
Like i said, our location choice is very generic, as we are in Surrey choosing the exact spot were we film is less of a problem, however we have to take into consideration, the logistics and practicality of the location, which is narrowed down to peaslake woods.
Update : The Track on Main School Campus
On the day of the shoot, our supervising teacher told us that driving all the way to Peaslake to shoot would be a waste of time, and we had the problem of transporting the bike too and from school. He told us that there was a cycle track on school campus, past our main house at the top of the school, it was secluded, and close by to school, which made things much easier than going to peaslake.
Why this is the perfect institution to Produce and Shoot our Film
An independent film making company based in Los Angles USA, Rocket jump originates from the Youtube channels, ‘Freddiew', 'BrandonJla' and ‘Corridor Digital’. Specialising in VFX and comedic action sequences which were regarded as being the best on the Internet, the channels also offer tutorials in their behind the scenes videos. There most popular video to date counts at more than 29 million views, and currently have just under 7 Million subscribers.
Having independently made shorts once a week, and the low budget film ‘Bear’(2010), the Co-creator of Freddiew, Freddie Wong, set out to do ( at the time) what his 5 million strong fan base had been asking him to do for years, make a TV style internet series. Freddie and his Co-creator Brandon Laatsch (BrandonJLA) spent 7 months in secret writing the internet series, titled Video Game High School, being he first independently made internet series it was viewed over 10 million times, and encouraged the two writers to make a further 2 seasons, and ended the story in late 2014.
Having been independent, low budget and dedicated film maker in the past, Freddie Wong has a very good understanding of how to finance effectively, with little money, and how to achieve amazing results in short spaces of time, sometimes overnight. When still on their own, they may write something Saturday afternoon, shoot Saturday night, edit through to Sunday morning and release the video onto Youtube as soon as they were done, the videos targeting the hip young teens and twenties audiences (although he himself is now coming into his 30s).
Freddie Wong, in one of his earlier YouTube shorts 'Beach Justice'
Having been fans of the Channel from an early stage, i understand that Rocket Jump is a small and very professional company, which now is moving into the big leagues along side Lions Gate, but at its current state, they would be able to work very closely with our group in order to make our film work, they way we would imagine it, whilst at the same time effectively advising us on how to make it better. Due to having a strong presence on Social media and through comments on Youtube, they are able to understand week in and week out what media Text their audience want to see, so every new Text is as up to date as it needs to be.
Also, having many dedicated financial backers, Rocket Jump are able to achieve more, in the past they had creativity yet very limited resources and time to make the visions happen. Now with more money and time, their sky is the limit.
One factor to be taken into account is that Rocket Jump Operate on the Online Platform, and though transferring to TV and the Big screen is a possibility, it isn't necessary, F. Wong is a very strong believer in the online platform for Media Texts, Netflix, Amazon Prime and Youtube, will eventually over take TV and the Big Screen, due to the on demand exesibility they offer. And being amateur film makers this is the easiest platform to access and is a good platform to reach our audience for feedback on the media text we finally produce. Due to contracts with bigger companies such as LionsGate, there is possibility that our film could be handed onto them for a transformation into a bigger production. But we would be taking things realistically by starting out with a smaller company, and working towards the big leagues, and Rocket Jump is the perfect platform for this tactic.
One of the steps on the way to completing our course work was doing what is called a 'Recki shoot'. This is were we film the entire opening sequence to see what does and doesn't work in terms of camera angles, actions, movement of characters or if certain ideas just don't work.
Close up, after the Biker falls off, she lands and we have
a POV shot of the Killer walking towards her, then we went up to the
highest point in school so that we could film an establishing shot
over the Surrey South Downs, to show the gun going off and for how far
it is Heard
As this was an observation of wether or no the angles and filming style would work, Mise-En-Scene and props wasn't of concern, so Ellie, playing our cyclist, insisted that she sat on a frisbee. When shooting her i simply used my fingers to represent a gun. and the 'Exorcist' poster at the end was meant to represent a picture of the cyclist.
We wanted to see what would and wouldn't work well in terms of length of shots and actions, as a group we decided that having a 30 second long segment of cycling was incredibly irrelevant and boring. So we decided to write in something that would take up better time.
This process told the group that our idea really needed re-thinking, although camera angles and connotations will stay with us throughout the rest of pre-production and will be used later on. Location was as expected, but during the actual shoot we hope to go to a much less built up and secluded area.
A selection of images that our group put to together, in order to explain the plot and to give us some helpful reference.
These images represent all of the connotations that we currently expect to put in our opening sequence, the bike in the forest which is one of the key images, and famous actors screaming and covered in blood which references past thriller and horrors which share connotations of our opening sequence. The pain and suffering of our cyclist victim is another strong image, that we wish to portay in the sequence.
The Killer, in our film is a woman, with red fingernails and red lipstick to emphasise her characters femininity, one of our planned shots shows the red fingernails and lips up close, so you know that its a woman.
Revenge and death are all apart of of the killers motives so we added in the key terms of what she feels, her motions and her inside voice.
Bear traps and other animal catching devices shows what the killer uses to pray on her victims, and a picture of her shotgun, along side other forms of murder and weapons, including a hunter and a figure pointing a handgun straight at the camera.
Update : The Track on Main School Campus
