US AGAINST THE WORLD

US AGAINST THE WORLD - Darren Styles
US AGAINST THE WORLD Music Video Remix
This music video was filmed at 'The Memorial Park'. It is an urban park in upper Downtown, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago. The Memorial Park is a public city park in commemoration of the Trinidadian veterans that served in World War I and World War II. It is one of the most visited urban parks in the city. Also, the opening video footage is at the National Academy for Performing Arts. Located opposite Memorial Park and the Queens Park Savannah, NAPA is one of the most attractive destinations in Port of Spain especially at night when the musical fountains come alive with a burst of colourful lights.
The National Academy of the Performing Arts University. Trinidad, West Indies.
Introduction to Media Arts - MUSIC VIDEO PRODUCERS

GROUP MEMBERS
Lemuel Yatali - ACTOR, AUDIO/VIDEO EDITOR, DIRECTOR / PLAYWRIGHT
Kyle Jack - STORY BOARD
Selik Leacock - CAMERA PERSON
Ricki Manmohan - AUDIO/VIDEO EDITOR

Assignments 1 and 2 – Short Video Production (50% total, 25% each)

DEADLINES: Plot Outline, Storyboard with Script

Team Formation (4-5 people, Shooting/Capture, Director Editor, etc)

Final Video presentations

INTRODUCTION
You are now entering the preproduction stage of your video production! The output of this milestone is mostly the video idea and an annotated storyboard. Please read the whole assignment text carefully. Only parts of the tasks will be required to be handed in.

ABOUT THE MOVIE

To guide your ideation in coming up with the topic for your video, we would like you to produce a video that functions as a message or interpersonal communication in the broadest sense.Here are a few examples:

“A day in the life of...” to send home to one’s parents
Public Service Announcement
Video Greeting Cards: (e.g., Birthday or Valentine’s Day greetings)
Video Resume
Personal Ad
Your final video should have a length between 1:00 and 2:00 minutes. The length must not exceed 2:00 minutes. We don’t require you to have dialogue or actors in your video, although the video must have a soundtrack with music and/or sound effects. Please suplly a Cue SheetPreview the document with details of all audio elements used. Be aware that the more you shoot in the production phase, the more work it will be in the editing stage. Therefore careful planning in the preproduction phase will save you considerable time both in production and postproduction.

BRAINSTORMING / IDEATION PHASE Brainstorm in your group about ideas for a possible 2-minute video. You can use any of the ideas presented above or come up with new ones as long as they function as a message or interpersonal communication in the broadest sense. Keep in mind possible location and time constraints for the production.
PLOT OUTLINE AND MOTIVATION Write up a paragraph with your plot outline. Below and the following link is an example from the IMDB plot outline for Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid: http://us.imdb.com/Plot?0083798
Plot Outline: Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982) Juliet Forrest is convinced that the reported death of her father in a mountain car crash was no accident. Her father was a prominent cheese scientist working on a secret recipe. To prove it was murder, she enlists the services of private eye Rigby Reardon. He finds a slip of paper containing a list of people who are "The Friends and Enemies of Carlotta." Searching for answers, Rigby encounters assorted low-lifes: dangerous men and women who were the hallmarks of the classic detective movies of the 40's and 50's. Filming in black and white allows scenes from old movies to be cut into this film. It is through this process that Rigby's assistant is none other than Philip Marlowe himself.
Additionally, write a paragraph about what motivated your choice of the topic and possible formal techniques that you plan to use in your video (e.g., we chose to make a video that communicates to a job applicant specifically about how they did in a job interview because we wanted to experiment with the 180 degree rule and shot / reverse shot techniques). Your motivation should include who your intended audience is and who the speaker is.
SHOT PLAN
In movie production, you would create a screenplay and then a script in order to describe action and dialogue in great detail. The script is then used to draw a storyboard that is used for directing camera movement and actor activities during production. Note: you can write the script on the storyboard. This means that you should have quite an extensive notion of how the video will play out already in your mind.

To prepare your storyboard, it is a good idea to think up a shot plan. Creating a shot plan means describing for each shot the mise-en-scene (location, time of day, the set and props, the lighting, the staging of the action and actors, dialogue, and the narrative function of the shot), and its cinematographic properties (distance, height, angle, level, and possibly motion).

Here are cinematographic and narrative questions that you might want to think about in designing your shots:

Where is the camera stationed?
What is the size of the shot?
What is our angle of view?
Are we cutting or moving the camera?
Whose point of view is being expressed? What information are we revealing or concealing? What is our relationship to the subject? How are we managing transitions (space and time)?

Once you have now completed shooting you should prepare edits in stages, starting with a first “rough” edit. This last milestone requires you to finish editing your video and then give a short presentation about your experience including a showing of your video to the class.

FINAL EDITING
Use your rough cut to work on your final edit. You will need to add:

A title (the title of your movie)
Trimming any rough edits
Final soundtrack
Credits
You may choose to add transitions between shots (make sure they are clearly motivated if you use them).

6. PRESENTING YOUR WORK

Your presentation must include:

Short Plot Outline
Storyboard
Roles for each team
- 10mins maximum Your presentation must include:

Showing of your video
Lessons Learned
Time for Questions
You can include excerpts from your storyboard or any other materials to underline your points. Each group member needs to talk in the presentation. It is very helpful to practice the presentation beforehand and to help each other in staying within the time limit, making sure slides can be read from the back of the room, and speaking clearly and loudly enough to be heard.

HANDING IN THE ASSIGNMENT
Plot Outline, Script, Storyboard

At the beginning of class on Presentation Format: MS PowerPoint or html

Final Video, Presentation

At the beginning of class. Video Format: MPEG or Windows Media Format: MS PowerPoint or html and posted to private YouTube or Vimeo link.