MORE preparation for CCR!!

In this blog post similar to last week I will be conducting research for the ccr questions. Specifically, question number one:
how does your product use or challenge conventions and how does it represent social groups or issues? 

 After researching conventions, I found my genre being a sports drama is very specific, therefore I will have to take information from both sports and drama film and then meld it together. This genre is one that is not too popular and as stated before is a hybrid of sports and drama films.

Sports films

Our film challenges some of the conventions of sports drama because they are usually on a real person. They are commonly biographies of famous sports stars. The sports that they are mostly on are football, baseball, and wrestling. In addition, most famous sports films star an older male lead.

Instead, our film is on track, an uncommon sport in these types of films. We also star a female lead who is in her teens. Our film is not based on any person in particular and is completely fiction.  But, like most sports films the opening of our film establishes the sport the film will be on. Also, they are usually focused on one person instead of a team and our main character is, of course, Elena. Here are some famous ones:
    

Drama films

Drama films usually contain a character that can relate to the audience. In our case, the age range we chose, 14-25, covers those we believe will best relate to our film. Conflicts in drama films are realistic struggles. Running out is about a low-class female that struggles to get into college and to find the means to get into it as well. These films also rely on conflict to make it more dramatic. Running out's conflict is a lack of funds she has to get into college. Of course, she relies on track to get a sports scholarship, but in the opening, it is not guaranteed she will do well at her meet. It is that sense of wanting to know what will happen next that we will get the audience interested in watching the rest of our film. 

Here are some famous ones: 

    

Filming day 2!!

GUYSS!!!
We finally were able to meet up to film the rest of the scenes!!! After two weeks of waiting, updates on the aice exams, and the U.S. surpassing all countries in the number of corona cases, we are here.

We realized it may be a long time before it gets better, but we have to make with what we have. Again, after some strong convincing we were able to film. Today it was finally the whole group not only 2/3 like last. It was a very productive afternoon as we got all the shots we needed and even more in case we can't meet up later.

First, we went to a trailer park mentioned in a previous blog, but near Saint Bonaventure church. We wanted the neighborhood to be decent where the low class does live, but still, have nice surroundings where Elena had space to run. Don't worry, we still practiced social distancing, six feet at all times.

But we also changed the original idea we had of filming her jogging in the morning, instead, we decided to shoot at multiple locations to show the frequency of her jogs, one near sunset and the other after sunset. Honestly, we chose a good day to film as the day was nice and dry. The sun was bright and helped us to get our desired lighting.

Here I will insert some clips along with some photos of us and the locations:

CCR preparation

Beginning the CCR...

Although we have not finished our project due to the setbacks, I have decided to begin one of the major parts of what our project will consist of... the ccr. One of the most obvious aspects of our film is Latin representation, as Elena is a Latin-American teenager. This will be demonstrated through shots of a Colombian shirt she treasures and hangs up in her room. Another shot that will show this will be the note on the fridge in Spanish Elena's mom left for her. Her low class will be demonstrated through the setting we plan to film at. Also, the FAFSA form she has incomplete on her desk and the conversation with her coach as well. 

This graph above shows how underrepresented the Hispanic community is in film.

We chose to represent a group that is not highly represented, a low-class Hispanic. When a Hispanic, especially Colombian is seen on TV or in a movie, they usually tend to be rich drug dealers. Here, we chose to represent a hard-working Hispanic-American female in high school. After we are able to film again and acquire all the shots we needed for the film opening then I will update on editing. For now, I wanted to focus on the representation portion as it is fully established in our film. 


This graph specifically is towards females and also shows the lack of  Hispanic representation as well

Music selection

How we selected our music

Hey, guys, we are currently still in quarantine. But, thanks to technology, my group and I have still been communicating via text and facetime.  Throughout the last week and part of this week, we have been looking for the perfect sound/music that would match with our film opening well.  We have been looking at a few websites to find non-copyright music. We chose to take this route because of course, it is the simplest way to obtain music for our opening. 

Before, we had decided to ask an artist, Bad Bunny for permission for a song we thought would fit perfectly. Sadly, the message we sent via Instagram resulted in no response. We decided to ask early but just wanted to wait it out in case we got a response. After reading the blog it will be obvious there was no response. 

That's why then we decided to go with copyright-free music. As, after all this waiting there was no response and we needed to select the song as soon as possible. After this decision, we went on a few websites to look for music. Looking through these websites we seemed to find no music that really suited what we wanted. Instead, we decided to go on youtube. Here we found what we were looking for, a Spanish trap, but with no lyrics. We believe this will go with the aesthetic we wanted to match with, a traditional Hispanic, but with some American customs. 

FILMING: PART ONE

Filming

Finally!!! Guys after the long wait we finally were able to get started on our filming. This was not easy to pan either as none of our parents want us to leave our houses, especially with social distancing!! One group member and I convinced our mom after being in quarantine for almost a week to film. 

HOW 

We decided we wanted to film in chronological order of the opening. The filming will also be divided into parts as some parts are at different times than others in the film opening. For example, the morning run versus the shots of her room has to look different in terms of lighting and timing. 

CHANGES

When filming we changed our original idea slightly to add more depth, movement, and texture to the shots. At first we were planning on having still shots of the props in her room to establish what is her track career. 

The clips will also make the transitions smoother with clips than it is would've been with still shots. Sometimes photos in a film tend to look poorly edited, so we chose to include a clip of the props. The video shows us placing the medals in position to make them seem plentiful, displaying her dedication to track. 

Authentic

FUN FACT: 

All the track props included in the film opening are authentic to really illustrate her career in track! Other props were created by us using what we had available. 

Medals

Above is the clip of the shot of the medals mostly shown to emphasize the quantity and range of medals Elena has. The unique thing about these medals is that they really are track medals that a member of the group has collected. The medals also have some positive sayings that can just be glimpsed, also another aspect of Elena's personality. Her personality also comes with her positivity that she embraces to get through hard competitions. The video is made to seem as in slow motion so the audience is really able to capture some of the individual medals. 

FAFSA Form 

The FAFSA form is a component of the film opening that works to establish the low-class (socioeconomic) Elena is in. Of course, this means that to pay for college she will have to rely on financial aid and scholarships. Since FAFSA is very widely known in the U.S. for helping students we decide that will be the best option to include. In the photo, the background shows the second page of the form, but as incomplete. This was done to emphasize the stress and heavy thinking Elena has to fill out the form. This is also because FAFSA is only given to some students that apply and not all, therefore she is nervous about the fate of the aid. 

Participant number 

These signs are what participants put on in a race for advertising and to just show their participation in the race. We put them in this way to show the variety of races she's been and the numbers she has been in those races. This is just an overview of the signs, but the videos are closer to show the depth and movement that is needed is a good opening. Again, like the medals, they are authentic which also adds to the authenticity that is Elena's hard work for track. Of course, since Elena is a character (not real) we blacked out the old names on the signs. 

Bills 

We are not fans of wasting paper so we knew if we just printed out bills they just go to waste!! Instead, we improvised we grabbed so old letters we had and just wrote PAST DUE on them to emphasize that the situation Elena is in is not very stable in terms of moneywise. This prop overlaps with the FAFSA form as one leads to another. Because Elena comes from a low-income household she seeks assistance because she has no other way to pay for college. 

SETBACKS

COVID-19

HEY GUYS :((( 

Recently, my group and I have experienced some major setbacks, especially in terms of scheduling. 
As of March 13, the school has been closed due to a global issue, corona. Of course, during this time, it is best to stay safe and inside. Due to this, it has been really hard for us to adhere to the original schedule. We had been planning on filming quite a long time ago but this has set us back. 

We hope the free time we have due to the closure of school can make up for the lost filming time for things such as editing, blog posts, etc. Before, it was hard to film because we all have busy schedules outside of school, but now the virus impedes us from filming.

This week we really have to figure out when we will be able to film and more importantly, convince our parents to let us go out to film at each other's houses. 

In the next few blog posts, I'll update you guys on our filming situation!!