Project Management - Week 1

11/02/2020

I will be graded on doing my part and how I work with others

Nominate people for roles

ShotGun - a project management site we will be going over
It doesn't have to be, it's really up to us as a team

Our strengths? 
Hard-working diligence
Editing video
Good at being analytical


We spent the morning introducing yourselves to the class and listing out the roles in a film production, organised in different departments; production, camera, editing / vfx, sound, art, and distribution / marketing. 
We also learned that making a film has four stages; development, pre-production, production, and post-production.

We decided formed a committee for the group short film project in a small version of like what we did to organise Think & Create last year. We won't worry about a treasurer for now, but we did vote on who is to be the chairperson, secretary, and the person in charge of communications (later Discord manager).

Each of us in the class are expected to chip in $200 from our course-related costs. Since there are 17 of us in the class, it would add up to $3,400 and that would go towards making our group film project.

By Thursday

• Choose top 5 roles (personal; priority and your interest in the role)
• Vote
• Pitch ideas
• Assign screenwriter
• Bring a piece of work I'm proud of and enjoyed making
• Something important to your culture
• Something about your hometown and things people may not know
• Logo designs

Discord manager: Phoenix

My choices for a company name

• Crow's Nest (1 vote)
• Taniwha (1 vote)
• Bomb Palace (1 vote)
• DigiSouth (4 votes)
• Cheese House (3 votes)
• Nuclear Fridge (6 votes)
• Pan Galactic (2 votes)

Jetpack Kakapo - (10 votes; winner)

Bamboo Stick - (3 votes; bronze 3rd place)

Nuclear Fridge - (5 votes; silver 2nd place)

Jetpack Kakapo - winner

Who is Kurt Lewin?

Bruce Tuckman

What is Crawford's slip method

Empathy is the main moral point of working as a group

Don't put all your eggs in one basket when you communicate with people in your group. Facebook message, email, Discord message, speaking up etc.

With invoicing, film people are paid on a day rate. 20-25 percent tax and GST to IRD for taxing your own filming work, but it's done for you when you are contracted by a employer.


Timaru

Miskell, B. (n.d.). [Photograph of a wide view of the piaza and the green land covering over to Caroline Bay with the coastline in the horizon]. Boffa Miskell. https://www.boffamiskell.co.nz/project.php?v=caroline-bay-redevelopment

Aoraki Tourism. (n.d.). Caroline bay [Photograph]. Aoraki Tourism.

https://www.aorakitourism.co.nz/visit/our-stories/caroline-bay-the-jewel-in-the-crown

Richard Pearse

MOTAT. (n.d.). Richard pearse portrait [Photograph]. Walsh Memorial Library, The Museum of Transport and Technology. https://collection.motat.org.nz/objects/10412

South Canterbury Herald. (2011). End of an era: Richard pearse's great-nephew, also called richard pearse, right, died in timaru last month. He is pictured with pearse advocate jack mehlhopt and the 2003 centenary replica of the pearse monoplane [Photograph]. Stuff. http://www.stuff.co.nz/timaru-herald/news/communities/5460457/Pearse-link-lost

Top 5 roles

• Editor
• Assistant Editor
• BTS
• D.I.T.
• Sound Mixer

Careers New Zealand. (n.d.). Film and video editor. New Zealand Government. https://www.careers.govt.nz/jobs-database/arts-and-media/entertainment/film-and-video-editor/about-the-job

Editor

It's all about arranging video files together to create a story and matching sound files and video files together. Additional duties to this role included, but not limited colour correcting, adding title graphics, music and sound effects, supervise the final mix, and ultimately communicate with your client or director on the finished product.

Skills are dependable on this role include being able adapt and be in the know with up-to-date and new editing technologies, knowledge of how filmmaking works and elements of that can improve the story, possess a creative vision, have the determination and will to be able to meet deadlines, have a meticulous eye for detail, and communication skills.

In the real world, you have to travel around the country or overseas with a film crew, your work hour is often done in shifts, but may also find yourself with long days. 

As an editor, you do your own edit before a director comes in with his or her vision applied into a director's cut

Hardy, R. (2015, June 26). What exactly does an assistant editor do? This hilarious song will tell you. No Film School. https://nofilmschool.com/2015/06/what-exactly-does-assistant-editor-do-hilarious-song-will-tell-you

Adams, M. (2015, June 24). Mark adams - the assistant editor song [Video file]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xSoPGcTpyw


Funny and a crack up about not only being an assistant editor, but pretty much any entry level position in general on a film production. It's quite self-depreciating.

Riser, D. (2018, January 30). How to become an assistant editor. CareersInFilm.com. https://www.careersinfilm.com/assistant-editor/

Assistant Editor

This role involves organizing the video, graphics, sound, and other media for editing and to ensure it has the right codecs. You label the video files on the editing project in order to be line with the slates, you set up the project file, export the completed edit, produce proxy files for the footage, and do an assembly cut for the editor.

The role of an AE makes the process of film editing faster and things easier for the Editor.
If I was to take on this role, I would need to research and found out how to produce proxy files.

Top choices for HODs

Production - Caleb

Camera - Luqman

Editing / VFX - Oisin

Sound - Jay

Art - Fabriana

Distribution / Marketing - Jerry

Story ideas to pitch

Two adventurers met somewhere isolated

The sun vanishes, causing never ending night. Dreams of sun coming back but fears of the sun vanishing again

Two polar opposites meet. One has great balance and coordination, the other doesn't. 

A woman and her 13 year old son survive the elements in a post apocalyptic world 

Work to show on Thursday

Tech Royale

https://vimeo.com/382731330

The Kinetic Files

https://vimeo.com/112145657

Need to tell James

• Work from high school to show in class?
• Did I get this right about what you said about invoicing?
• Do I do a presentation to pitch my idea(s) tomorrow like I would for Patrick?

12/02/2020

Parasite is a surprise to be a best picture winner because it's an international film that won in the Oscars, a film awards that usually 'local' as described by Bong Joon-ho, the director of the Oscar-winning film, Parasite and critically acclaimed film, Snowpiercer.


Newton, S., Reed, C., Steward II, D., Toliver, K. R., & Young, M.A (Producers), Cherry, M. A., Downing Jr, E., & Smith, B.W. (Directors). (2019). Hair love [Motion picture]. Sony Pictures Animation; Matthew A. Cherry Entertainment.

Hair Love is a good feel-good animated short that proves that animation tends to express human emotion much more clearly than live-action. Like how the 1994 Lion King was better at that than the 2019 motion capture reboot.


Blanco, N.G. (Producers), & Bagnall, L. (Director). (2017). Late afternoon [Motion picture]. The Irish Film Board; Cartoon Saloon.

Late Afternoon is a stylistic, sentimental, and abstract expression of being at a very mature age and reminiscing innocence and the good old days. It could be a depiction of dementia or Alzheimer's from the perspective of the protagonist and the animation is sometimes like the protagonist has a floating head. It almost like a vibrant and optimistic exploration of the human condition, spirit, and mind.

Themes - love, the human condition, innocence



Mr Yellow. (2019, March 16). Animal behaviour 2018 1080p web nfb [Video file]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97vyLRr5Kgs

Animal Behavior is a funny short with mature and dark content and humor (mental health, discussions of sexual stuff, attempted murder, and cannibalism). I would not expect an adult short film would get nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animation Short Film because it's commonly child-friendly, G-rated short films. This short film has elements that reminds me of Creature Comforts, in the way it anthropomorphize animals into human society and situations and this in this case, it's in the form of a group therapy session.

It's dark and mature humour reminds me of Bojack Horseman.


Rim, G. (Producers), & Keane, G. (Director). (2017). Dear basketball [Motion picture]. Go90; Beileve Entertainment Group.

Dear Basketball is a touching love letter to the sport he loved and what it has meant to him from his childhood right then. A moving auto-biography in the form of a film by a man that will be sorely missed by the world and a story that will see itself as the stuff of legend for years to come. The pencil animation give this short great value, respect, and faithfulness to how Kobe expressed his love for the sport.

13/02/2020

We presented our best work, our hometown, culture, and childhood on the projector. Re-watching Caleb's film, Elpis made me realise for the first time that he managed to draw emotion from the audience. He even did his own original score on Garage Band.

One of the postgraduate animation students showed us a 3D animated Asian short film, Shim Chang. It had flawless 3D animation and a great deal of drama

TheCGBros. (2020, January 4). CGI 3D Animated short: "shim chung" - by kepler studio | thecgbros [Video file]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OVAn6CgS5M

I presented photos of the Timaru, Caroline Bay, and Richard Pearse to the class. I even talked about how my great-great granddad was one of the eyewitnesses of the actual Richard Pearse flight in 1903. At the last minute, I also presented a photo of me on my first day of primary school in 2001.

I had to send those files and a link to The Kinetic Files (my best short film) to James, so it could be shown to the class on a projector. Accessing them on my temp drive didn't work, so I had to email them.

The class was impressed by The Kinetic Files, especially the 'inventive' cinematography, editing, and its moody and psychological style.



We brainstormed ideas for the group project. Caleb and Luqman, and Oisin shown presentations on their ideas. Both of them were great and solid concepts.
I was excited the most by Oisin's idea, a Cold War comedy called Silo B-59, but Caleb and Luqman's idea also had potential, which is a live-action / animation hybrid, coming-of-age fantasy about a kid and his teddy bear that protects the kid at night. 
It reminded me of the premise for the video game, Among the Sleep. Oisin's idea reminded me of Dr Strangelove.

Playstation. (2015, October 16). Among the sleep - launch trailer | PS4 [Video file]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UN4rRMcZK4M

We went through a list full of ideas for the group project. I contributed the most number of ideas (four ideas). 
When we came down to the top three ideas, we were going to vote it down to one idea, but it was then decided that we brainstorm further into these top three ideas before we do so.
I couldn't take part because I had to leave class early to catch my bus home, plus I didn't mind which idea went ahead for the group project.

However, I did hope that Oisin's idea would win the vote, but it didn't and Caleb and Luqman's idea won the vote.

The last bus leaves at 6pm and so I will have to leave early on Thursday classes, so that I have a way home.

17/02/2020

Encyclopedia Britannica. (n.d.). In memoriam. Retrieved February 17, 2020, from
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Kurt-Lewin

Who is Kurt Lewin?
He was a German-American psychologist that specialist in social behavior. He spent his later life on the concept of group dynamics, especially how the well-being of an overall group can the affect the behavior of an individual in the group.



The Ohio State University. (n.d.). In memoriam. Retrieved February 17, 2020, from 
https://inspire.ehe.osu.edu/2016/05/12/in-memoriam/

Bruce Tuckman
He was an American psychologist that specialized in group dynamics and student behavior. He did a study on procrastinating students and developed a model of group dynamics in the 1960's that is still relevant today as it was then.


Lewin and Tuckman are generally two generation of psychology that developed the foundations and elements of group dynamics.


iCreate. (n.d.). What is crawford slip writing?. Retrieved February 17, 2020, from http://www.icreate-project.eu/index.php?t=336

Changing Minds. (n.d.). Crawford slip method. Retrieved February 17, 2020, from
http://creatingminds.org/tools/crawford.htm

What is Crawford's slip method
Crawford's slip method is a easy and very inclusive brainstorming method, no matter big or small the idea and it efficiently categorizes them. 
It can be a method useful in creative situations like forming an idea for a creative project in a group, analyzing information, and filing a report on results and/or data.

One way to ultise this method is by each person in a group to write their idea down on a slip of paper or on a post-it note, in which each one would be gathered all together. This will also be easy for everyone in the group if they run out of ideas