Pre-Production Planning for "Blank Shell"

 Pre-Production Planning for "Blank Shell":

    As for the materials I'll be needing for the production of my film opening, I'll be using my phone camera for all shots taken. I've made this choice due to my camera's ability to shoot in 4K and 60FPS. Another appealing aspect of my phone's camera is its ability for easy editing of footage, and high performance in the low-light conditions I'll be shooting in. In terms of costuming, there will be minimal need for anything special, I'll be wearing what I wear on a typical school-day, only slightly tweaked to be more formal. That formality is supposed to convey the prowess of the private investigator character I'll be acting as. Props are also minimal, the two main props I'll be using to do most of the heavy-lifting in terms of storytelling is my car and computer. I will be drafting a fake missing persons poster as well as writing emails to myself in order to fulfill the illusion that I'm being updated on valuable case information. Overall, the materials I will need are designed to be efficient for the scale at which I am making this film opening. These materials needed to be things that are easily accessible and have a low-bar of entry as to how to use them effectively in a film setting. My phone camera, car, and everyday clothes perfectly fulfill these requirements. The ease of access these resources possess aid greatly due to the fact that I am shooting this film opening by myself. One additional piece of camera equipment I will be using is a budget tripod. 

My 2014 Ford Focus SE

    As for the locations I'm planning to shoot at, I will be almost exclusively shooting this film opening at home. Aside from my room with the lights turned off, I will also be filming very brief outside night shots of me driving and getting in my car. I'm deliberately choosing exclusively dark and nightfall settings in order to take advantage of the moody tone that this lighting can set. These are all easily-accessible settings to film at, and it goes without saying that I have full legal access to them. There are some strange intricacies that comes with filming myself driving however. Using my tripod makes these shots possible, but also makes it so that I'll have to trim a lot of the footage I record. The part of the film opening where I'm recording myself driving will be severely limited in its ability to be reshot, which for such an easy scene to act, will hopefully be no issue. I'm taking advantage of my car's resources for the close-up shot of the navigation system. The resourcefulness that this project takes advantage of is something that I highly enjoy, and find to be an intriguing limitation. 

    When looking at the manpower this project will require, it's limited to just me. I find this to be less of a limitation and more of a convenience. Whilst I'm limited in the complexity of the scenes I can create, I'm also at the liberty of being completely in control of the project's creative direction. Additionally, I'm looking forward to doing a voiceover for the narrative parts of the film's opening. I will need to be responsible for all parts of the production and as such am functioning as the director, cinematographer, and scriptwriter. This factor of the project also means that I'm extremely open in my schedule. I can shoot purely when I want, and am not dependent on another's schedule. This idea is very appealing to me and I believe it will make the process go much smoother.