Filming obstacle

     My team had planned to begin filming this weekend and focus on capturing the first couple of shoots for our film opening. These shots include establishing shots, context, setting, and time-period, shots of our main character's bedroom. We had agreed to film at Daniela's house as her room fit the early 2000s vibe and can easily be utilized as a set base. With our incorporation of time and character-appropriate props and set design elements like clothes, flip phones, and a lava lamp it would be perfect to film in. Unfortunately, this weekend we will not be able to begin filming for the portfolio project. 

    Daniela has been feeling sick lately and although she has tested negative for covid, she still has a fever. We decided as a group that it would be best to postpone filming as Daniela woke up this morning feeling under the weather and her family is also sick which can be risky since other team members are in close contact with older family members. Subsequently, we have agreed to reschedule our filming date to next week after school as by time Daniela will hopefully be feeling better and this time works well with everyone's personal schedules. 

Why this tittle

    Tittles, they encapsulate a film and guide our perception of the peace but they are also a form of art in respects to how they are displayed on screen. After developing the overview of the plot, setting, and main character, my team decided we needed to focus our attention on the tittle which is often forgotten about. We landed on the tittle 'Birthday Blues' which is a phycological phenomena where feelings of sadness or disinterest manifest themselves in regards to ones birthday. This tittle is very fitting considering a life changing pandemic is set to occur on our main character's milestone sixteenth birthday, poor her.

    After deciding on the tittle, my team turned to how we wanted to convey said tittle. We agreed we wanted its display to represent the destruction of childhood which aligns with the genre, coming-of-age, of our film. To achieve this, we thought of incorporating a birthday candle on the 'i' of 'Birthday' to represent the joy that is meant to surround birthdays. The font of all the other surrounding letters is purposefully chosen to look dull and, depressing like the sixteenth birthday our main character is about to experience. Using a joint Canva document, my team created two designs, a plain version and a second version that resembles tears falling due to experiencing 'Birthday Blues'. We are also considering animating the letters to melt of screen to mirror that of candle wax on birthday cakes.

Target Audience

     Our film opening falls under the coming-of-age genre and therefore has a target audience of young teens, more specifically within the ages of twelve and eighteen. Granted that our plot follows a sixteen-year-old female protagonist, the target audience can be turned into girls in this age range in particular. With our target audience in mind, my team has planned out certain aspects in our opening that purposefully appeal to our target audience and demographic.

    The mannerisms, language, vocabulary, state of mind, basically the way our character acts will mirror that of teenagers to create a sense of relatability and realism in the target audience. The way our character expresses herself through her physical appearance and the way she chooses to decorate her room are also indicative of her youthful nature. The bright pink colors planned to be littered throughout her bedroom, band posters, pictures of her friends, and youthful accessories such as a lava lamp and a diary will all show that our character is living the life of an average teenager...until of course the pandemic hits. 

Snippet of our research

Set Design

     My group has decided to film the beginning portion of our film opening, which consists of establishing, context, and, setting shots of our main character's bedroom. This will allow her personality and the setting, being the early 2000s, to be portrayed. My teammate Daniela's bedroom fits this aesthetic and time period however, she is going to redo her room soon so we need to plan out our shots and film prior to this in order to have a quality base for our film opening. We plan to film said shots this weekend and enhance them by incorporating props and set design as well.

    Our list of props and set design items all play a vital role in our main character's daily life. We plan to have pink nail polish, bright jewelry, sports medals, and trophies, as well as fashion and makeup magazines pictured in the background as such things are hobbies and interests of our character. Her room will also include CDs, a CD player, an i-pod, a disposable camera, and a landline phone to aid in establishing the time period of our film opening. For context, we will also bring in a birthday necklace, birthday banner, calendar, and diary where she writes about her birthday and plans for the day to indirectly show that the date is special to her. My team as a whole already owns most of these props so purchases intended from this project will conveniently be minimal. 

Music Blessing

     At the start of our project, my team knew we wanted to utilize sound to set the mood for our film opening as well as tie into the plot itself. We did not love the idea of using noncopyrighted music since it is often difficult to work with. Many websites require users to create an account and make downloading their music files tedious. Oftentimes one repeats this process over several websites in search of a specific sound. To overcome this monotonous task, my team found a song created by an already established artist that fit the vibe of our film opening plot which we hoped to use.

    Of course, we can not incorporate a copyrighted song into our project without permission which is rarely granted and can be very time-consuming. With this in mind, on day one of our portfolio project the team agreed on a song that we all liked and on that same day, asked for permission to use it in our project by direct messaging the artist over Instagram. The group choose "What If I Loved You" by Gatlin an artist that is not too mainstream with only about 417,000 monthly listeners on Spotify which increases our chance of a response. We were incredibly lucky to have Gatlin respond back AND grant us permission to use her song within a couple of days! 

    The song's vibe and the vibe we hope to achieve in our film opening align as they are both youthful and fun. The song is about a once-in-a-lifetime love that leads up to a breakup much like our main character's happy life being turned upside down by a pandemic. We plan to incorporate Gatlin's song at the beginning of our film opening as our charter is getting ready as a way of setting the cheerful mood and the context of youthfulness. 

Thank you, Gatlin!

Plot

     To create a quality film opening, it is important to consider the plot of the film as a whole; doing so will aid in giving the opening direction and allow us to better establish context as well as setting. The overarching plot of our project follows a teenage girl in a sudden pandemic and will fall under the coming-of-age genre. The storyline will revolve around her reaction and subsequent response to such a shocking and life-changing event. In our film opening, we plan to focus on portraying her personality and pre-pandemic life followed by her immediate response to news of said pandemic.

    Our film opening will start off with the main character getting ready for an event, maybe school or a party. We plan to incorporate an establishing shot of her room to hint at her personality as well as a calendar prop revealing that it is her birthday. Shots we utilize to establish the context and setting of the character's room will be layered with credits. The calendar prop date, as well as the pink set design littered with early 2000s technology, will allude to the time period being roughly the year 2005. 

    Her flip phone, which is appropriate for the time period, will buzz in the background as the character is visibly excited to take on the day. All the while, music will be playing in the background, this will likely be diegetic sound played through a speaker of some sort. Once she is finished getting ready, she will check her phone and realize that there is a pandemic that will spread uncontrollably. As reality hits the character in a dramatic form, we were thinking she drops her phone, the music will cut and the title of the film will be shown.

    On canva, my team has created and shared this mood board for our intended plot.

  

Research

    After deciding on the genre for our film opening, being coming-of-age, my team was excited to key into the specifics of our intended teenager in a pandemic plot; however, we knew that we needed to take a step back and conduct research before getting into the technicalities. To organize ourselves, my team created a google folder for the project and began working on a research chart document within it that consists of two case studies, Clueless and Ferris Bullers Day Off, as well as an overall genre and time period research sections. Although we have already incorporated a hefty amount of research into this document, with the progression of the project we still plan to add on research to further advance our knowledge and a subsequent blend of potential new ideas. 

Research chart as of now

    From the cases studies, we learned that coming-of-age films share a similar aesthetic that gravitates towards a youthful, bold, and, bright vibe. This can be seen in the title and credits of our Cluess case study as well as the overall vivid color scheme of the movie. We plan to mirror this type of decorative in our film opening as bold and bright aspects, potentially fonts, costume, and set design align with the target teen audience of the coming-of-age genre. This ties in perfectly with our plan of having the film opening set in the early 2000s as we researched that bright and bold fashion and make-up were popular during this time. We plan to design our plot and set it in such a way that the time period aids in conveying the bright and youthful vibe seen in coming-of-age films; this also extends to incorporating time-appropriate technology like flip phones revealed through our research. 

 

What Genre?

     With the official commencement of the portfolio project, my team and I are not yet sure exactly what plot, characters, or technological elements we want to incorporate. At the moment, the possibilities are truly endless due to the openness of the project which can be a little intimidating since this amount of creative freedom within school projects is truly rare. To combat this my team has agreed that settling on a more broad topic like genre would be a tactical way of narrowing down on our film opening.

    After texting in the group chat we created and throwing around plot ideas we noticed a common theme among them. Our perspective on life as a group of young teens in a chaotic world, especially amongst a global pandemic, is something that unites us. The experiences we have at being at crossroads and slowly entering young adulthood are so raw and can be richly manifested. We decided the genre of coming of age would be fitting for our project and are considering incorporating a Covid-19 pandemic-like idea or event that reflects our feeling of having our teen years stolen. 

    This genre is not only something we can connect to but is also very practical given our limited resources. Our location in a suburban community gives us access to a setting that is plausible for the genre and plot idea. Our own homes and rooms can provide the basis for establishing context, setting, and characters especially if we add props. Moreover, we do not necessarily need to rely on others as actors given that the team members already fit the general character plan.

(Said group chat)

Transition into the portfolio project

     When approaching the Cambridge portfolio project, I knew that I wanted to take advantage of working in a group, especially after the team work accomplished during my music marketing project. I decided to work with my friend Daniela Garcia as we had already done multiple media projects together and due to our friendship, felt comfortable around one another. We will also be working with our classmate Berkley Morris who has worked with Daniela in a previous project. Berkley and I used to have a class together, which makes the group dynamic ideal. We plan to approach the project fully next class by sharing our ideas, combining them, and making a group schedule.

Full process of the music marketing project

     Before tackling the music marketing project itself, my group decided that research and planning were vital in assuring our project reflected modern marketing techniques and that our distribution practices would subsequently be effective in the real world. We heavily relied on Google Drive by creating a folder that was accessible by all four members. As a group, we completed a research chart that included two record companies, their history, similar artists, and four cases studies. This became the base of our marketing project as it gave us insight and background on the topic at hand; it was accessible through the google folder. The folder also contained a schedule that the group collectively planned out which set deadlines and ensured we did not fall behind. 

    After researching, my group listened to the song assigned to us and each devised our own storyboards for the music video. We then shared our thoughts and devised a storyboard that incorporated all of our ideas. However, this toke some time as the team was still getting accustomed to each other. After we worked past this, we talked about when, where, and how we were going to make our storyboard come to life. We then created the decided on the vibe and image of the band as well as their logo to represent them; this was also found in the google folder. We then began a canva PowerPoint that was shared with the entire group which had a theme that we felt represented our band properly.

     For the marketing and distribution portion of the project, the team brainstormed with our research chart in mind. Collectively, we worked on the canva PowerPoint starting off by implementing our research within it. We then meticulously planned out the marketing campaign which also included a logical and chronological implementation plan; his also applied to the distribution plan. The concepts were discussed collectively during class but were manifested at home in order to maximize the efficiency of the time the group was physically together. Additionally, we created the social media accounts on Twitter, Instagram, etc., as well as our band's website. 

    For the music video itself, its was largely animated but was in part filmed with the group members as actors. Theses shots were filmed at our school underneath the stairs. All the group members had a say in the directing of these shots and props were incorporated as well. Not all of the scenes filmed make it to the final cut of the finished music video; this was intentional as we over filmed in order to assure we did not lack footage for the video. The editing of the music video was directed by Branden and all of the group's members opinions and voices were heard in this part of the music marketing project.

    

    The group then wrapped up the canva PowerPoint by dividing up the slides and each adding a designated topic that had already been discussed in class. We also added informational images and more to further elaborate our project and to add visual appeal. We then practiced our assigned slides, some members even decided to create personal flashcards to aid in the quality of their presentation. This assured we were well prepared for our presentation. The group had a collective call the day before our presentation to tie up loose ends, make sure we had all practiced our presentation, and assigned a group member to be the designated technology slide clicker person.

    The music marketing project as a whole was a learning experience and taught me the importance of teamwork and planning. Taking the time to make a group schedule was extremely helpful in producing our project in a timely manner. This is an aspect from this project that I plan to incorporate in my Cambridge portfolio project as well. Good communication and equal effort within a group allows for a more diverse set of ideas to be considered and overall leads to a more efficient means of tacking the project at hand. Working in a group, likely a smaller one of two or three people, is something I will consider for the Cambridge portfolio project.