Music!

In Romantic Comedies the songs are usually very catchy and reveal a little bit of the storyline. I have researched different Romantic Comedies and the songs used in them, here are a few:
(Click on the links to listen to songs)

Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging
She's So Lovely - Scouting For Girls 

Maid in Manhattan
Me and Julio Down by The School Yard - Paul Simon

Friends With Benefits
Runaway Baby - Bruno Mars
L.O.V. - Fits And The Tantrums

Made Of Honour
Walkin' On The Sun - Smash Mouth 
Love Song - Sara Bareilles

Me and my group have looked at various different songs to use in our opening sequence and found four which we think would suit our movie very well. These are the songs:

Jason Mraz -I'm Yours
Taylor Swift - You Belong With Me
Michael Buble - Haven't Met You Yet
Justin Timberlake - That Girl

Our opening sequence is about two people who will fall in love but haven't met yet. Therefore we have decided to use the song by Michael Buble as it will give a little hint to the audience of what will happen in the movie.

Script

This is the script for our opening sequence. The script was changed various times because since we started filming, a lot of our ideas changed. There is no dialogue however we still decided to do a script for all the actions happening. 

Changes!

Me and my group have created a rough opening sequence to practise with props, find best camera angles and face some problems we might have while filming our final opening video. We went out to Greenford area to film clips with our male character and a few days later we went out to Central London to film clips with our female character. After putting all the clips together and editing the video, we decided to get some audience feedback and ask some people from our class what they thought about it.The feedback we got from people and our teacher was that there was too much footage of the characters walking and that seemed a little bit boring therefore we've decided to add something new to our idea and have both characters getting ready to go out. This idea might seem a little bit cliché but if we do it well, it will work will the idea we already have. To make our film opening more interesting rather than just two characters walking, we are going to film everything again  using the tripod, plan every shot we are going to use and add extra scenes we didn't plan on doing before. We will add scenes of the characters getting ready to go out and leave their house, we will be able to see the female character doing her makeup, hair, eating breakfast and picking her outfit whereas the male character will do all the same thing but in a opposite way as our aim is to show two different life styles. To achieve the full effect we are going to need to use quite a lot of props and some costume changes. For example Nina is going to have proper, healthy breakfast whereas Andre is just going to grab something unhealthy out of the cupboard/fridge and run out of his house.

Props and costumes

These are the props and costumes of Nina and Andre. 

Nina's jacket is quite sophisticated and smart with bright colours. Her brown bag matches with her outfit very well and this is why we decided to use this. She has a black iPhone smartphone which is also a very sophisticaed and 'smart' looking phone. 

 Throughout most of the video Andre is just wearing his underwear however when he lives his house, he is wearing tracksuit bottoms and this black jacket. To add to the casual effect he is also wearing a black bag and red headphones.

Our audience feedback on the props and costumes was very positive and people said that they really help the audience to know the characters better. The costumes suited the characters and genre of the film.

Rough Cut Screening

This is the link to the rough cut video we showed to our audience.
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1k48j9_rough-cut_webcam

We have filmed some clips for our opening sequence however we didn't use a tripod and the footage was very shaky. We still decided to put the clips together to see how the final product could look like and also to get some feedback from the audience.
These are some of the questions we asked them:

What genre i sour opening and how do you know?
What do you think our film is about, and are there any enigmas created?
What parts of the film do you think were good?
Do you think anything should be discarded and new parts added?
Would you watch the film?






















Audience research - Kate
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1k3t5k_kate-feedback_webcam

Audience Research

One of the task we had to do was to create a survey about movies that people watch and other information about the films. I have created a film questionnaire with 12 questions about films people watch and these are some of the results.

Questions:

1. What was the last film you have watched?

2. Where did you watch it?

3. Who did you watch it with?

4. What genre is it?

5. Which country is it from?

6. Why did you decide to watch this particular movie?

7. Do you watch film because of the actors starring in it? 

8. What was the last film you have watched in the cinema?

9. What is your favourite genre?

10. Where do you watch most of your films?

11. Who do you watch most of your films with?

12. Last 3 films you have watched?

Conclusion:

The most popular answer for the first question was '12 years of slave'. 4 out of 20 people had the same answer for question one. I think this is because it is one of the most recent films that came out in the past few weeks. 

16 of out 20 people who took part in my questionnaire watched their most recent movie at home, on their laptop online using Netflix or any other website. This could be because it's easier and most of the time free. 

Most people watched their last movie on their own (11 people), 6 people out of 20 watched it with their family and only 3 with their friends. 

13 out of 20 people who took part in my survey watched the movie which was produced in America. The rest come from UK or UK and US.

People watched these movies because of different reasons, some watched it because of recommendations from friends, they watched the trailer, it was based on a book,  because of its special effects or the director.

10 people said that they watch some movies because of the actors starring in it, 5 said they sometimes do and the other 5 answered no.

Majority of people (17/20) watch movies at home, online illegally or on Netflix. I think this could be because it's faster, easier and cheaper than going to a cinema.

Locations

In our opening sequence we want to show the live's of two different people therefore we have decided to film in two totally different locations. Central London is seem as quite posh, exclusive and expensive whereas Greenford is the complete opposite. We will use clips from Central London to show Nina's surroundings and clips from Greenford to show Andre's surroundings.


To show the contrast we decided to film a clip of a local shoe shop. The shops in the area where Nina lives are going to be less prestige and the compete opposite of any local shops in Greenford.

More clips from the area of Greenford.











This is a typical kebab show in west London and the area of Greenford where our male character lives. This a very different to what we are going to show for Nina's surroundings.

Oxford street sign shows where exactly we are filming. Oxford street is a very popular place in London where posh and expensive shops can be found.

A huge contrast can already be seen between the two shops in Central London and Greenford. Swarovski is a very posh and expensive jewellery shop, something that cannot be found in the area of Greenford.

Bond Street station is a station from which our male character will be coming out.

Shot List

Close up Shot
A close-up shot is standard which frames a person or an object. This kind of shot emphasises a certain feature or object so the audience can just  focus on it. Close-ups are very good for showing detail and can also be used as a cut away. A close-up shot of the actors face emphasises their emotions therefore it usually makes the audience fell more sympathy for the character. Inout opening sequence we are going to use close-up shots to show the character's emotions and different actions like Nina putting on makeup and both characters washing their face.












Long Shot
A long shot shows the full size of the object or the person. It has been suggested that the long shot ranges usually correspond to approximate what would be the distance between the front row of the audience and the stage. In our opening sequence we are going to use long shots to show the journey of our two characters. The long shots are going to show well the props and costumes of both actors.

Mid Shot
The mid shot shows some parts of the subject in more detail , whilst still showing enough for the audience to fell as if they were looking at the whole subject. This is approximately how you would see a person if you were having a casual conversation. A mid shot allows more room for hand gestures and a bit of movement.