Unlike a storyboard, a script primarily plans the narrative sequence of a film/video. Scripts tend to follow a certain format or sequence of events. In his series of videos “How to Write a Movie Script“, Ron Becks describes the process for developing a movie script and the structure of the story of a script. Here’s the introductory video:

The next 6 videos that you should watch are:

• How to Get Started
• 3 Act Structure
• Characters
• Movie Script Length
• Conflict
• Protagonist

The Assignment

Before you start the main part of this project, be sure that you watch the first 7 videos in the “How to write a movie script” series. Once you have watched the videos, write a 15 to 20 page script based on the story of the three little pigs. I recommend that you use the Celtx application (you can use a regular word processor, but Celtx takes care of all the formatting. It’s also free to use so you can download it onto a home computer if you are going to work at home).

The script should have the following elements.

• The story should follow the three act structure described in the “How to Write a Script” videos.
• Scene headings, action and dialog should be properly formatted. (Celtx does this automatically)
• The script should have numbered pages and a title page. (Celtx does this automatically)
• The characters don’t need to be pigs or a wolf, but should have the characteristics and conflict as in the original story.

Deliverable

One script, 15 to 20 pages long, written according to the above criteria. You can submit a pdf file of the script or print out a hard copy of the script. Due no later than December 15. There won’t be any class time especially allocated for this, but you’ll be able to work on it whenever you have down time while working on other projects.

There are a number of phases to producing a video or film. The American Film Institute describes the process in five steps:

1. Script development
2. Screenwriting & Storyboarding
3. Production & Filming
4. Editing
5. Exhibiting, Reflecting and Reviewing

In this model, steps 1 and 2 are the pre-production stages, step 3 is the production stage and steps 4 and 5 are post-production stages. The first part of the A Day in the Life of NBCHS project is step 1 – script development. The goal of the script development step is to get permission to proceed (sometimes referred to as getting the green light) to go to the screenwriting and storyboarding step. Within the script development process, there are 3 basic steps – pre-writing, outlining & treatment, and the pitch. These videos explain these three steps:

Pre-writing

Outlining and Treatment

The Pitch

The Assignment

Form work groups of 2 or 3. You may choose who you work with for this project. Each group will work through the script development process, delivering their pitch on Friday, March 23. In addition to the pitch, you will also need to submit a written copy of your story treatment (for this project the treatment should be one or two paragraphs).

For the first part of the assignment, you will make some jot notes (hand written) that describes the following kinds of film techniques as well as reasons that they might be used. For example, a close-up shot is a shot that shows a close up view of the subject, often someone’s complete face but none of their body. It used to show a character’s emotions or reactions to an event or something another character says.

There, I’ve done the first one for you. Now please make some notes on the following ways of framing shots, different kinds of cuts (transitions between shots) and different camera angles:

• Extreme long shot
• Medium long shot
• Long shot
• Medium shot
• Close up
• Extreme closeup
• Two shot
• Reaction shot
• Inserts
• Cutaways
• Selective focus
• Soft focus
• Low angle
• Eye level
• High angle
• Tilted

Due March 9, 2012

• use a variety of sound effects from freesound.org and music from ccmixter.org (but using 1 or 2 effects or music clips from Garageband is OK).
• try to use more than one music piece
• use a variety of audio production techniques such as varying sound levels, fading sounds in and out, panning sounds from one side to another
• be 1 to 2 minutes in length

Make sure you are saving all your work in a folder called “soundscape” in your folder within the “Documents” folder on the iMac.

Before you start putting the sounds together, I’d like to see that you have a plan and you’ve done some amount of pre-production. I’d like to see a list of sounds and types of music that you want to use. If you want to do a little exploring on freesound or ccmixter to start out, that’s fine, but you should get an idea of what you’re going to do before you start collecting audio clips.

• A description of each project that you worked on (including help on other people’s projects).
• A description of your contributions to the project.
• An evaluation of the best parts of the project. What were the best things you did during production of the project? Why do you think they were well done?
• An evaluation of the parts of the project that you think you could have done better. If you could go back and change things in your project, what would you do differently and why?
• A list of what you learned during the creation of the project. What skills – technical, organizational, personal, etc. – did you use and develop during the project?

  The Regina Film and Video Student’s Society at the University of
Regina is preparing for our annual film festival: Living Skies Student
Film Festival, and we are actively and enthusiastically seeking
submissions from both high school and post-secondary students across
North America.  Submissions must be under 15minutes in length and the
deadline is January 10th 2012.  Submission forms can be found on our
website www.livingskiesstudentfilmfestival.com
This is a three day Film Festival, running from February 10th to
12th 2012, that showcases student films from across the country and
northern United States. It is an important opportunity for up and
coming filmmakers to get acquainted with the work of their colleagues
from other film schools across the country.
This event will be taking place on campus and combines screenings
of student films with seminars presented by highly respected and
renowned filmmakers, such as NFB filmmaker Donald McWilliams, Filmpool
artist in residence Chrystene Ells, and local special effects artist
Emersen Ziffle.  Friday night is a meet and mingle in the 5th parallel
gallery on campus, where you can let loose and mingle with upcoming
and successful filmmakers.  We will be having a red carpet awards gala
on the Saturday night to celebrate the winning entries and all who
participated in this year’s festival. This student organized festival
is a cultural event as well as a learning opportunity for students.

For more information, please visit the website at
http://livingskiesstudentfilmfestival.wordpress.com/about/
Also check out our promotion video at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQtb1Ac0Hek

If you check out the website, you’ll know just as much about the festival as I do. If you are interested in entering, let me know and I’ll get you a copy of the submission form. If you have any more questions about the film festival, I’d be happy to pass those along to the festival organizer (who is a graduate of NBCHS, by the way).

Requirements

The video should be 1 – 2 minutes in length. The story is to be told entirely through video – no dialog allowed, although you can use music and sound effects. Before shooting any video, you will need to complete a storyboard and get it approved by me. When you are shooting, you will need to get the consent of anyone who appears in the video if they are recognizable. See me for permission forms.

The video itself must meet the following critera:

• no dialog
• 1 to 2 minutes in length
• school appropriate
• use 3 different shot distances
• use 2 different angles
• include title at the beginning and a credit roll at the end
• be interesting

Deliverables

• storyboard
• final edited video with music and sound effects; should be exported in HD 1080p format (make sure you edit in full HD)

Due Date

December 2, 2011. If you finish before that you can use class time to work on your Three Little Pigs script.

Partners – you will work with a partner once again for this assignment. You may choose your partner but it must be someone you haven’t worked with before.

Deliverables – a script; a list of all elements you used to produce the radio ad with proper attribution; a 30 second radio ad. Show me the script and the list of all the audio elements you’ll be using before you start recording the commercial!

Due date: October 28 (You’ll need to work quickly to get this done).