Treatment

In the first scene of the movie, the protagonist (Ali) is shown drawing a picture of his brothers looking at him with hostile expressions. Then he is shown vacating his bedroom and going to explore his house like small kids usually do. He fearfully tries to pass his brother (John) without drawing attention, and when he approaches the second brother( Ouni), the brother gives him a steely look and shows that Ali's presence is unwanted. Ali, then goes to the balcony and looks up at the sky, trying to figure out why his brother hate him so much.

Storyboard for film

The soundtracks have been taken from a local musician named Danish with his permission.

This is the storyboard:

* I've changed the order of the first two shots and show the paper one after a distant shot of Ali (the main protagonist)

After the meeting, we were transported to a studio Interflow relied on for the animation and editing of particular media products. It is called Pyramid Studios and had high graphic computers with the latest graphic, sound and editing softwares installed in them along with recording equipment.

Internship in Pyramid Studios

As AS level Media students, we still hadn’t gained experience sufficient enough to be called ‘Media literate’. We had just begun applying the filming techniques we had learnt theoretically in class on our final projects and were supposed to start working on their opening titles. We were fully aware of the fact that the titles were to be animated as done in films, but had been having quite difficulty in grasping the concepts of such a practical task.

Sir Zaman, our school’s A-level media teacher perhaps realized this and arranged an internship program for us to understand as to how a Media industry operates and the work involved in production of significant media products like television ads, promo material for singers and yet to be released dramas. It was to start from the 22^nd of December, 2010 and we had to attend a meeting with the chair of Interflow-a dominant Media Industry of Pakistan mainly working on the management and airing of such products.

The meeting with the chair proved to be quite interesting and significant as we were explained how a particular Media industry functions, given the liberty to have our queries solved by the experienced people themselves.  

Interflow has had 27 years of success as a Media industry with 204 employ strength and five departments including strategic planning, accounting for 30% of industry billing. It handles advertising, media planning and buying, production, activation and a media house responsible for electronic and outdoor media products. The media department is held responsible for airing and then buying of a product (e.g. ads) after making careful and appropriate decisions.  The creative department is responsible for art-designing of the particular products.

Ufone, Mountain Dew, Lays, Pepsi and 7Up are some of the industrial companies which rely on Intergroup for having their particular product aired on television and promoted. Other domestic companies like BAA-Contact plus, Habib Masala, Olpers, Tarang and Manapasand also rely on Intergroup for the same objective.

Abstract Opening Title

This is an abstract opening title I am going to create for my movie-Brothers. I made this short animated opening using a 2D and 3D graphic software called Adobe AfterEffect. By using the Transformation option, I was able to control the Opacity of the text layer. Also, I then animated my text to give it an effect. Later, I added sound to it by first exporting from Adobe AfterEffect as a movie, and then put soundtracks by importing it to Premiere where I added it. Then I saved it as a final product:

I have decided to select the institution MiraMax for the production of my short film entitled Sweeping Tides. This is chiefly because my film is supposed to have a psychological impact on the viewers; since the story revolves around a victim and bullies. It is known through extensive research that when a person enters inside the walls of a school, his personality and cognitive processes tend to change for that particular environment because the laws of other environments fail to apply in a school in which many social groups of students are mainly formed.
  Miramax has made several movies which have administered psychological impacts on viewers. One such is "ShawShank Redemption" which sets in a typical prison, and because of that environment the prisoners' personality and cognitive skills change.

Prelim Analysis

This is the first preliminary video ever produced by  my group. The amateur production tends to highlight a very obvious theme which is bullying like I mentioned earlier. There is continuity in the shots of the first scene (for e.g, the subject walking down the path shown from a long shot and then that shot followed by a slightly closer sideways shot to provide more detail to the viewer from the main protagonist and generate expectations from them. It should be noted that the lighting during the first shot when showing the pathway is poor, chiefly because of shadows being cast by the buildings above and dimming the natural light on the sun on which that entire scene was dependent upon.  

One can simply criticize that when showing the main scene of contact of the subject with the bullies, the camera movement was chiefly stationary, rendering the scene incapable of explaining the situation more clearly as intended. However, the audio of the scene is comparatively better as the mocking noises of the bullies is clearly heard, making their roles obvious and thus signifying their role to the viewer. Also, the sound of hands beating the back of the subject is also efficient in making the roles of the primary character and the secondary (stereotypes) characters  obvious to the viewer/viewers. Continuity in the shots is further emphasized upon when the subject is shown falling down from a specific cut scene to another cut scene, but with a varying camera angle. Also, the thud heard enables the viewer to embrace the magnitude of the situation which is that the victimized subject has been tortured and brutally thrown down on the sun-lit ground. It should be noted that after the "bullying" scene, continuity is quite efficiently showed between the cut scenes. For example, after the subject is shown in the falling momentum, his collapse is shown in another cut-scene and again with a varying angle( the camera is in front of the subject and it is a long shot). As suggested by the practical teacher, minor alterations in the way these scenes were shot. Instead of just showing the victim falling down from various camera angles in different scenes, a first[person scene with the camera falling down from the victim's motion of view could have added more insight in the viewer about this character in question.