Our final year piece was much different than what we initially intended - not just visually and stylistically, but also in terms of character development. In fact, the development of our characters was a constant throughout the year.
At the very beginning, our intention was to create a story about two characters who were related, possibly a mother and a daughter, and to explore the family’s dynamics and relationship. Our idea shifted quite promptly as we changed the characters to two young adults who are soulmates. The meaning behind this shift is because our idea was that there might be more room for the audience’s imagination, meaning we would keep their relationship undefined throughout the film to allow viewers to ask themselves more questions about the pair. Also, we would not have been capable of explaining a family situation in six minutes of footage. It would have meant focusing less on the events and on the present moment in the film, and more on past moments and explanations.
Secondly, we explored locations that would support our visual idea of the short film. Our main focus at the time was to contact the Reading Prison and attempt to receive permission to film in the prison’s corridors, prison rooms and telephone booths. Unfortunately, it took us a long time to get a response, and we were later informed that we are only allowed to film on the outside of the prison, where we can see the Banksy mural.
At first, filming inside the prison seemed like the only option, but we managed to find a room in the University of Reading’s Art Department that was small, white and eerie.
“A magical property of light is its flexibility - the ease with which it can be controlled. You can totally transform a situation in an instant at the touch of a switch. Or you can alter it gradually and imperceptibly, without your audience realising how subtly it is changing. Simply by adjusting the relative intensities of the same group of lamps you can transform a scene's appearance or the prevailing atmosphere”. (Millerson 2013:6) In our visual treatment note, I added: “The key collective thought for the film was the overall aesthetic. We wanted to play with different coloured lighting to represent the mood of the scenes. For example, in the main prison scenes, the lighting will have a yellowish tone with undertones of blue to symbolise the sadness and entrapment of the characters. The yellow tones also add to the artificial light that is in prisons expressing the lack of natural light the prisoners see or feel”.
Our idea shifted completely when we were standing in the centre of the white room. We almost felt a feeling of unease, almost like the absence of colour was blinding. I read about the phenomenon of “white torture” which explained the emotions we were feeling. “The prisoner is locked in a completely white, soundproof room. The color white is used to hit all the senses […] this torture leads quickly to hallucinations and has long-term adverse effects. The prisoners can be kept in this state for months or even years, and once outside the room the psychological consequences will be permanent” (Lilith 2016)
The room’s feeling was not exactly what we were looking for at first, but after doing some research about films set in prisons or with a strong, hard-hitting storyline, we found that the white of the room could work well and create an unsettling feeling for the viewer as the absence of colour creates deep contrast with the orange of the prison suit.
The room was in fact the perfect stylistic choice for us and we were sure that adding the brightly coloured orange suit (as opposed to the previously discussed grey prisoner suit) would make it stand out remarkably.
To create the desired look we also added throughout the entire film a Teal & Orange effect that subtly enhanced Maddy’s character’s orange prison suit and Elijah's cool, blue tones.
At first, we imagined the overall aesthetic of the short fiction film to have yellow/artificial tones, mixed with green/blue. Whilst we wanted the blue tones to remain, we switched our perspective from the yellow tones to colder ones to reflect both of their emotions. We came to the conclusion that bright, white lights and completing an extra White Balancing check in post-production created a better effect with more tension, uncertainty and a general feeling of unease.
My three learning goals were to learn more about directing specifically in short films, learning how to work in a group for filmmaking and learning about editing in film.
For the first part (Directing in short-films) I followed a couple of courses on LinkedIn Learning which helped me gain a lot of insight and to reflect on the director’s role when it comes to creating short-films.
I completed the following courses:
Working with actors & non-actors in Video Production
Speaking Confidently and Effectively
Making Quick Decisions
Creative Video Editing Techniques
Building Resilience These courses helped me gain a better understanding of all the aspects of the Director’s role. There were many things I did not realise such as the differences between working with actors and non-actors in the industry, and it helped me understand some of the key techniques to make everything flow well on set.
The courses such as Speaking Confidently and Effectively and Making Quick Decisions also appeared to be fundamental for the Director’s role. Firstly, because the Director is in charge of how the film will turn out, so they have to make confident and quick decisions, and always be ready to face any type of challenge on set.
Secondly, they allowed me to explore these themes and concepts in my real life to then apply them to filmmaking.
When it came to structuring our film and implementing our creative approach we worked as a team to discuss the visual and audible subjects that would be the main focus of the short film. The key collective thought for the film was the overall aesthetic. We wanted to play with different coloured lighting to represent the mood of the scenes. For example, in the main prison scenes, the lighting has a yellowish tone with undertones of blue to symbolise the sadness and entrapment of the characters. The yellow tones also add to the artificial light that is in prisons expressing the lack of natural light the prisoners see or feel.
Moreover, in terms of audio for the film we thought of having a slight echo sound effect to recreate the idea of a memory in the flashback scenes . We also used overlapping sounds like waves crashing whilst the shot is of a prison wall.
Other than these sounds, we added some echoed voices of children laughing and playing and, later on, when the event happens, some worried crying voices in the background. This was all in the man’s head as he is walking in the prison, so we will look at effects (such as echo and muffled) to make sure this idea comes across. This is to engage the audience but also pull focus on the main attributes and significance of flashbacks.
We also had a very quiet but emotional soundtrack that goes from the introduction, gets louder during the conversation and then comes back as the man leaves the prison.
The entire film has bluish tones visually to evoke a melancholic atmosphere which can be seen in examples such as Moonlight by Barry Jenkins and Melancholia by Lars Von Trier. In terms of visuals we wanted the film to have a gloomy and dark aesthetic to emphasise the drama. The film has flashbacks to a beach intertwined within the prison narrative to add depth to the plotline and help the audience understand the history of the characters.
Bibliography: Millerson, Gerald. 2013. Lighting for TV and Film (CRC Press, 2013), p.16 [accessed 16 May 2022] Lilith. 2016. ‘White Torture: The Damage It Can Cause - Emadion’, <https://emadion.it/en/tortures/white-torture-the-damage-it-can-cause/> [accessed 16 May 2022]
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