Schedule

So I had a surprise visit form my grandma we spent the day together, and now it’s too late for me to shoot. Now I suppose I might as well set myself a schedule for this week that I’ll hopefully stick to.

Monday- Edit in class and shoot as much as possible at home

Tuesday- Go to dog park for the outside shots, get the music

Wednesday- Finish shooting / get editing

Thursday- Edit in class, finish at home

Friday- Reflect

Weekend- Edit and post critical reflection, post link to project

Is three days not enough to shoot everything else I need? It’s possible, but I have to try, I guess. I’ve been efficient with editing in the past so hopefully I can grt through that quick as well. Oh, and the music but that shouldn’t be too time consuming. Now that I think about it, I recall having to record and post how I do it if it’s a cover of someone else’s music or something. Guess I’ll be able to show off my chops in that area here.

Did I procrastinate too much? Absolutely. Will it happen again this week? I sure hope not. I’ll try my best to stay on the ball but old habits die hard. I’ll just have to keep reminding myself that this is the big final project and I need to keep myself motivated. What a fun way to start the quarter. We teenagers really like making it hard on ourselves, huh?

Filming finally

Right then... I procrastinated a little morethan I should've and now the break's almost over. Whoops. But some filming is better than none, right?

This is my favorite shot so far. It feels like a great transition-y shot and it looks super professional. Well, at least the action does. The quality itself is surprisingly poor for my iPhone 6. Maybe I'll reshoot later with more focus or something but if not, I like this one, despite its potato cam quality.

Here's a runner up for best shot [in my humble opinion]. I could probably edit it to speed up a little later on. I like how well the tilt up matches with her looking up and it really helps show something above has gotten her attention.

And finally, this one. Sne's all chilling out here. Really relaxed and stuff. I like how she kinda just smacks her lips there, or whatever dogs do, it shows how she's just chilling. I probably could've held this shot a little steadier, huh?

Anyway those were today's highlights. I'm definitely filming some more tomorrow so stay tuned.

Filming, almost

It’s spring break and I might as well start trying to get some shots of my dogs. One positive is that they’re good to go, for the medical issue has come and gone. However, now I’m uncertain as to whether or not I should give them a bath. It could be too obvious if I cut between shots of them being fresh and less fresh, perhaps. But wouldn’t being snow-white contribute to the overall cuteness appeal?

I can’t decide but I’m not going to go and do a whole other pros and cons list. It is just about time for them to get a washing right about now anyway. If it’s too noticable then I’ll reshoot afterwards with the less clean dogs or just try and cover up the discrepancies with editing. Either way, they’re bound to end up looking the same as they are now. Excellent!

Anyway, it’s getting pretty late actually so I’ll get to work tomorrow. Oh, and I spoke with my mom and she’s fine with letting the dogs roam freely for the project, she’ll take care of the baby. Although, it’s up to me to clean up all the toys and everythinng said baby has left strewn around, but I can just get around to that tomorrow as well... I wonder if the URL I chose for this blog is influencing me or if I just know myself that well.

Oh, and apparently it’s national puppy day or something. Celebratory puppies inbound

Film Title

Why the heck haven't I thought of a title yet? After all, it's like the first thing everyone sees/hears about a movie so it's pretty important, and people often really like to judge a book by its cover, unfortunately.

Titles of dog movies are usually something like the names of the dogs (Old Yeller, Mamaduke, Hachi, etc), something describing the dogs (Air Buddies, 101 Dalmatians, Show Dogs, etc), or something descrbing what the dogs do (All Dogs Go to Heaven, A Dog's Way Home, A Dog's Journey, etc). For mine I'm leaning towards the latter two since just having the protagonists' names feels rather bland.

Now, if I do one describing the dogs, how could I describe them?  Looking at them the first adjectives that come to mine are cute, and furry, and white, but none of those feel like good movie titles. I guess I'd end up calling it "Lost Dogs" or "Spirited" or "Puppers" or something. That last one is modern slang so yay for appealing to the young hip crowd, I guess.

On the other hand, for a title describing the dogs' actions, I could be a little more vague. A semi-cryptic title would probably incite curiosity in a potential viewer, right? For that, I could go with "Running Free" or "Life Unchained" or "Pursuit". Going with a more light-hearted theme, I would think that last one might fit better. After the whole setup of the intro it could fit in well, popping up as the humans chase the dogs, too. Now that I think about it, since I already determined the title would come up there in the kinda-storyboard I did, that last one would probably be the best choice of the bunch.

In the end I believe "Pursuit" would be the best title. I briefly considered throwing "fur" in there for a pun, but "Fur-suit" brings with it some... undesirable connotations, especially in today's society. Anyway, I could probably design it as a colorful little pop-up to appear in the opening once I'm editing the final product. I think I'll have some little muddy dog prints on it for extra light-heartedness. That's all for now.

Complications

Well, I was hoping to start filming around now, but it looks like I'll have to put it off for a little. For one, my little dog's got to wear something for medical reasons and I was hoping it would be off by now but apparently it'll take a bit longer. Such is life, I suppose. Perhaps I'll be able to get some footage of my other dog in the meantime...

Anyway, another issue is that tmy carpeting just got removed, and now I got a hard floor like everyone else. My dogs used to love running around, chasing each other left and right on the carpet. This is something I really wanted to capture to emphasize how the characters just like having fun and all, but I presume ithat now they'll slide everywhere and run into things with that momentum and no rug to slow down on. Or maybe they'll get used to it quickly, time will tell.

One other problem I have now is my sister started walking and my overprotective mother insists on keeping the dogs restrained for the baby's safety because she's afraid they'll play rough and she'll get involved. Mothers, am I right? I hope she'll loosen up if I tell her I need to let the dogs be themselves for this project when it's time to film, but knowing her, it's a bit of a risk.

In case things come to the worst case scenario and all these issues persist, I suppose I can bring over my older dog to a friend's house where she can play with his dog and I could just film that instead. The only issue there is that if I need tons of footage I'd have to be over there a LOT, but desparate times call for desparate measures, right?

Pros and Cons: Dialogue

Now, for actual dialogue between my characters, I could bring in some friends to do the voice acting, or it could just be me, but since my dogs are both girls in real life I guess it would be kind of weird for me to do it, so I'd rather stick with bringing in outside help if I end up going this route.

Pros:

• Better characterization
• Helps tell the similar dogs apart
• Could be used for some humor
• Helps viewer connect with characters more
• Follows the example set by Snow Buddies

Cons:

• I'd have to go out and bring people in, depend on their availability
• Requires better writing than just narrating
• No matching mouth movement like in the Buddies flicks
• Probably not as quick and easy as doing it myself
• Have to come up with some way to exposition through dialogue and not make it cheesy
• Have to script dogs playing and talking and it'll proably be cheesy
  

Well, with less pros and more cons thsn the first option, it looks like I'm gonna go ahead and have a narration accompany my film opening.

Pros and Cons: Narration

So after some more discussion in class I've come to the conclusion that I need to do some narration or some sort of voiceover with the dogs dialogue. I gotta start filming soon so to help narrow it down, as Jim Halpert would say, it's time for a list of pros and cons

Pros:

• Faceless, anonymous speaker, needs no introduction
• Aids the telling of the narrative
• Quick recording process in post production
• I can do it myself
• Just need microphone and quiet
• No need to write dialogue, just spout exposition
• Follows the example set by Air Buddies

Cons:

• I don't sound like Morgan Freeman
• I won't be structuring the filming around the narration
• I'll be biased towards the quality of the audio because it's me
• Kind of a cheap story telling element

That's what I've thought of so far... Now for the other option.

Storyboard, kinda (Part 2)

For the second half of the opening, the plot picks up. 

The music comes to a stop and both of them suddenly look away as the jangling of leashes is heard. They already recognize the sound and react like that when they hear it so getting this shot shouldn't be too difficult. From a low angle this shot emphasizes that they are called by something above them.

Outside for the first time, they walk out and the tracking shot pans to the side with them. I don't think it would be too hard if it's a wide shot and I can sort of squart down and follow along at a distance, I think. Anyway, this is followed up by another little montage-like sequence following them along as they walk, with the production credits flashing around them. After pulling on their leashes a few times thanks to seeing other dogs or people or vehicles, they'll be snapping free and running off, which I'm not entirely sure in what manner to film but I know I can film it at a dog park and with their collars slightly loosened. 
Running off after the collars snap, the title pops up after they pass and covers up the humans running after them, keeping with the whole faceless humans theme. That's where it ends! I could probably come up with some more music on my own or just find some royalty free form killertrax, but that part comes later. The title too.

Storyboard, kinda (Part 1)

So I'd like to start off with a closeup of my younger dog (Zora) on the ground and wagging her tail, looking ahead. Getting down like that is an easy trick she knows and she usually wags her tail when she's gonna get a treat so this shot should be easy. Alternatively, I could start with a closeup of her face from a side and then cut to a closeup of her wagging tail, since actors shouldn't look into the camera. 

The second dog (Mia) is revealed with a two-shot of them together, This might be a little harder to do but the concept can be played with when I'm filming. They're both down on the ground and alert of each other, tense and ready to play.

 Cur ro one of them suddenly sprinting forward, breaking the tension and playfully jumping on the other one. This shot doesn't need to have both of them so it could just be done with just one of them laying down when suddenly I bring out some food or something.

A similar shot but with the other dog, from the other side, than can be done in a similar manner. (and yes I did flip the same drawing)

From then on I was thinking to show them play-fighting and then cut away to a sort of montage of shots that show how they live their live, general dog stuff like running around, barking, eating, and sleeping, edited in sync with a cover I'm making of this song. 

Dude, where's my plot?

Hey, I was out of commission for a bit thanks to the surprise emergence of wisdom teeth and complications thereof, but now it's time to get back to work. In class I met up with some others and we determined it would be best for me to watch some Air Buddies movies because of the fact that my dogs are small and cute like those in those movies and we decided that it would be cool to follow some of their examples, such as giving the dogs funny voices. Thankfully, I had the original one on DVD and there's some more on Netflix.

The original Air Buddies starts with narration expositing the backstory and stereotype- I mean, personality of each of the dogs. They have one thing in common and that's that they get in trouble a lot. From there this shared trait of mischief separates them from their owners and they spend the movie struggling to get back to them. The opening keeps focus on the dogs and their actions but also includes humans, establishing them as actual characters as they deal with the rebellious puppies causing trouble.

Snow Buddies opens up with a dog harrassing some cats. Thre's cheesy dialogue between them and then the dog goes to meet up with the other dogs. After more cheesy dialogue, they start playing a game, but one of them sees an ice cream truck and jumps on, the rest of the dogs following his example. The truck somehow takes them all the way to Alaska for the snow gimmick and they spend the rest of the movie trying to get back home from there.

...Aaand the rest just go off the rails while recycling the "buddies are separated form owners and have to get back" formula with a gimmick. The rest of the movies I watched (Space Buddies, Santa Buddies, Treasure Buddies, and there's one more on Netflix but I didn't bother because there's only so much of these things that I can stomach) they all start with this week's guest star giving exposition and setting up the plot that will inevitably take the dogs from their owners. "

See that? My dogs are way cuter than Disney's. Anyway, in conclusion, I'm gonna keep my opening more like the first two and just set up the characters and plot without sending my dogs to space or the north pole or anything like that. Just have dogs going out and having to get back home. I'll have the storyboard up soon.