Establishing Tone

These past few days, I have begun storyboarding and brainstorming the timeline, types of shots, and dialogue I want for the opening. What I am still missing, however, is something that helps establish the cautionary tone that's very distinctive to sci-fi dystopias. My issue is that I want to do it right, and I don't think I have enough background yet to help me develop that tone in the beginning.

Infographic showing how color affects mood

Action FX defines tone as:

"a dynamic, intangible undercurrent that propels the audience's immersion in a world of illusion, sweeping them away into an ocean of movie magic."

One of the main factors in creating a mood or tone of a film is lighting and color. Here, Studio Binder created a "cheat sheet" showing what each major color means, or how it affects the shot. For my opening scene, according to this infographic, I would want to focus on cooler tones, like green and blue, to establish a melancholy, isolationist, and dangerous tone. No Film School corroborates that idea by explaining that muted and washed-out colors would portray feelings of depression, another aspect I would want to take advantage of. Lighting also comes into play with this aspect, when it comes to shadows and highlights that correspond with the colors. High contrast lighting is more typical for horror and drama films, adding dynamic to the setting and characters. Even though this film does not fall into horror or drama specifically, aspects like this high contrast lighting can be incorporated to give similar effects of suspense, caution, or extreme emotion.

Another major factor is music. In an interview with David Gordon Green, Fast Company highlights the importance of music, that can intensify or contrast with the scene, when creating a specific tone. Incorporating aspects that contradict the overall scene, like upbeat music in a depressing scene, can add to the intrigue of the scene, especially in suspenseful scenes leading up to a major turning point, but it is not always the right choice. For my film opening, I think using music that will amplify the tone rather than contradict it will help the theme be more clear and will work well with all of the other aspects. However, this may change depending on what I see most fit during editing or filming. 

Meet Alice

Naming

At first, choosing a name for my main character was difficult. I searched through different parent blogs, statistics lists of the most popular names, and just thought of the names of people I know. Then, I came across a list on a blog and saw the name "Alice".I immediately thought of Alice from Alice in Wonderland and thought that her story of going down the rabbit hole was fitting for my main character's descent through the storyline. It was the first name that really stuck with me, so once I came across it, I didn't bother to search further. I did the same process for Jacob, Alice's boyfriend. However, with Jacob's name, I did not think too deep into the meaning of it as he is not an important main character, at least not as important as Alice.

Creating Alice

As I've begun storyboarding, I know that I want to incorporate some props, like pictures and letters, that have to do with Jacob to establish their relationship and connection. Because of that, I think part of Alice's personality would be very "hopeless romantic" in the sense that she enjoyed the romantic letters and handmade presents from Jacob so much that she displayed them. Alice would also be the type of person to live with rose-colored glasses, while in her relationship. Without Jacob, she feels incomplete and broken and does not know how to properly grieve. She's taking his death more like them breaking up, rather than him being gone. The app perpetuates that feeling as "talking" to Jacob, to her, is like them getting back together.

I created a playlist that uses songs to explain Alice's shift in moods from before Jacob's death, to after his death. 

Grief and Addiction

To main characteristics of my main character, Alice, are her grief about her late boyfriend and phone addiction to the app. To better develop her character, I have to understand both the signs and behaviors associated with both grief and addiction.

Grief

Psychology Today notes that the symptoms of grief are similar to that of depression: sadness, loss of capacity for pleasure, insomnia, loss of interest in eating or taking care of oneself. However, the symptoms of grief lessen over time, unlike depression.

"The acute pain that accompanies loss"

While there is no formula for how grief goes, experiences usually go through the traditional five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. In Alice's case, she experiences prolonged grief, specifically prolonged in the denial and anger stages. Prolonged grief, in general, often leads to isolation and chronic loneliness, another aspect of her grief. She goes through bargaining when she begs her parents for her phone back, and depression when she decides to kill herself. She never reaches acceptance.

Addiction

In general, addiction can be applied to gambling, alcohol, drugs, sometimes even sex, and more recently, to smartphones. The American Psychiatric Association defines addiction in general as:

"a complex condition, a brain disease that is manifested by compulsive substance use despite harmful consequence."

Addiction is the severe substance use disorder in which people have an intense focus on using a certain substance, or more than one substance, to the point that it takes over their life. The symptoms are divided into four categories: impaired control (desire to use and/or failure to cut down usage), social problems (failure to complete major tasks and/or giving up activities for substance abuse), risky abuse (substance use in risky settings), and drug effects (higher tolerances and withdrawal symptoms).

Recently, MIT conducted a study in which students of two professors were required to give up their phones for a day as part of the course. Most students experienced some sort of anxiety, and another study using a similar method found withdrawal symptoms in those without their phones. The second study reported increased heart rate and blood pressure, and a sense of loss of their extended self, being their phones. Another study put teens through cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) for their addiction, and found that their brain chemistry changed and resembled the brains of those without addiction. While these studies are still recent, as is the idea of phone addiction, studies prove that phone addiction resembles characteristics of substance addiction, and that it is on the rise in recent generations.

As the film takes place in the near future, a teenager developing phone addiction, when combined with the predisposition of grief, is not improbable. Aside from her grief symptoms, her addiction symptoms will be introduced in the opening, but elaborated mostly during the falling action when Alice runs away and tries to replicate her "Jacob" on another phone.

Citations:

Walton, Alice G. “Phone Addiction Is Real -- And So Are Its Mental Health Risks.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 27 Jan. 2018, www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2017/12/11/phone-addiction-is-real-and-so-are-its-mental-health-risks/#119e49a113df.

General Outline

Before beginning my screenplay and storyboard, I need a definitive outline of the plot and series of events.

Plot Diagram

I am going to be using the classic plot diagram to separate the parts of the story, rather than different acts. The opening, or exposition, will be the focus of my film opening and will end with the introduction of the conflict, just before the rising action.

Opening:

It begins with the main character, Alice, losing her high school sweetheart, Jacob, suddenly to a car crash. Alice is still in high school, a junior, struggling with typical high school problems like homework and tests, but the recent tragedy moves her to seek outside help. She begins by talking to her friends and family, until she decides to search the internet for advice.

Conflict:

During her search, she comes across an advertisement for a new app that allows her to "talk" to her late boyfriend. The app asks her to upload videos of him speaking, screenshots of their conversations, and to fill out a survey on his likes and dislikes. The app takes all of the information to create a computer-generated voice, meant to sound like those from the videos, down to the way he speaks. Alice is immediately relieved when she receives her first "phone call" from Jacob.

Rising Action:

Surprised by how realistic her "phone calls" with Jacob are, she becomes fascinated. The app's texting feature allows her to "speak" to him during school and at home discreetly. She begins to talk to him more and more, claiming it is like she is falling in love with him all over again. Stuck in the denial stage of grief too long, her family and friends begin to worry as time passes and confronts her. Alice takes it as they are not supportive, and falls deeper into the hole she made for herself.

Climax:

The turning point that precipitates Alice's downfall is when one night, she tells her pseudo-Jacob that she wants to see him and misses him. The app, working off the information from their previous messages, tells her to come to him. Alice's parents, the next morning, confront her once more and take her phone away, deleting the app from her phone. Alice begins to spiral out of control.

Falling Action:

After getting her phone taken away, Alice runs away and buys a cheaper smartphone and tries to replicate the Jacob she spoke to without the messages and videos she had on her previous phone. Alice's new Jacob is not the same, and she notices very quickly. She becomes very angry with the app and breaks her "new" phone. Alice returns home, begging for her old phone back; her parents refuse to return it.

Resolution:

After her parents resist giving her phone back, Alice threatens to kill herself and quickly takes a knife from the kitchen, putting it to her throat. Her parents try to calm her down, from a distance, standing their ground on not returning her phone. Alice, frustrated and hopeless, takes her own life to "be with" Jacob in the end.

I know the ending is very grim, but the impact of dystopian fiction is always exaggerated with an unhappy ending. With this story, I wanted to address phone addiction in my generation, as well as the dangers of certain artificial intelligence technology. To develop my main character, Alice, even further, I will research grief and addiction, specifically phone addiction. 

Welcome to my Journal

Since before this project, I have kept a journal that serves as my planner, sketchbook, and diary. I had begun with adding tasks dedicated to this project in my regular planner, but I realized that I needed separate pages to plan this extensive project.

I began with an overview of the next few weeks regarding this project for me. I included when I would like to begin filming, editing, some research ideas, and main tasks I would like to achieve within these weeks. I don't know if I will strictly keep to this schedule, but it was a good exercise in visualizing what I have left to do and how much time I have left to do it. I also decided to "overload" these coming two weeks to give myself more leeway towards the last few weeks to tweak and perfect the film opening when it comes to filming and editing. Then, I decided to create a page that goes into each week in detail. I have started only with this upcoming week, week one, and have planned what tasks I want to get done and begin.

A method I use within the rest of my journal, and have decided to incorporate here, is the bullet system I have created for myself. Seen in the general overview, open bullets are more general tasks and events. Stars, or asterisks, are notes to the side. They mainly represent a sort of inner dialogue with myself, noting just ideas I am not set on. In the detailed week, the small, closed bullets are specific tasks that I want to get done. Not pictured are other aspects of the "key". For a completed task, I cross the bullet out. For example, "• begin storyboard" would become "• begin storyboard". If I decided to move a task to a different day, I would cover the bullet with an arrow and rewrite the task in the day that I move it to.

I will be posting more pictures of my journal throughout this process, as it is essentially my brain on paper, but this is all I have set for this project as of right now.

Brainstorming the Plot

As mentioned in my last post, I have been keeping a page empty in my journal to write all of my brainstorming regarding the general plot of my film.

Originally, I focused on my favorite episodes from the British anthology series Black Mirror. I then created a table of sorts to narrow down my own original ideas. I knew that most storylines of this genre use what they know, as do storylines of every genre, and create an exaggerative society from a possible "solution". Even though I did rule out technological control as an aspect of my story, after writing the issues I saw the most, I realized most had to do with technology. An idea I gravitated towards in the beginning was the idea of literal control over someone's life through apps and features of a smartphone, coming from the concept of the Life360 app many parents today use. To those being forced to use the app, it may be seen as am extreme invasion of privacy as the app notes your speed, location, driving history, when you were on your phone while in the car, abrupt stops, and more features meant for "safety". I became really passionate about the idea, noting details I wanted to add and possible mise-en-scene and sound elements until I came across this article.

Images from MBC

Here, VRScout tells of a new use for virtual reality (VR) technology being developed in South Korea, which reunited a mother with her seven-year-old daughter who passed away back in 2016. The VR experience allowed the mom to have a final birthday party, take pictures with the 3D model made of her daughter, hear her child's voice call for her, etc. What connected this new revelation in technology to this project was a comment the author made in the article: "Though the technology used in this project is still in its relative infancy, it’s abundantly clear just how powerful VR can be when used by the right team for the right cause." I began to think about how the technology could be wrong, by the wrong team, and maybe even for the wrong cause.

I immediately connected my previous ideas stemming from smartphone applications that exist to the bullet point I had boxed at the bottom, summarizing my last and final concept.

Instead of virtual reality, there would be an app that allows people to "talk" to their deceased loved ones, originally developed to help people grieve with their loss. My storyline will follow a teenage girl who had recently lost her high school sweetheart in a car crash, and downloads the app to help herself. As she continues to use the app, she starts to "meet" and "fall in love" with her late boyfriend again, prohibiting her from completely grieving.

Creating a Story

Now that I have narrowed down the genre I want to work with, it is time for me to fully develop my story idea to be able to create a successful introduction. First, of course, I wanted to research the dystopian genre, less specifically in films, and more generally in storytelling and it's elements to give me a starting point.

Research

In dystopian fiction, there are a few typical features:

• A background story of a climactic event that shook the world to point of drastic change. These are typically backgrounds of overpopulation, war, or a revolution of sorts.

• The governing body or regime of the society uses one of four types of control: corporate, bureaucratic, technological, or philosophical/religious control. I explain examples of each of these types briefly in my previous post. 

• Lower and middle classes suffer a lower standard of living than in our contemporary society. If it not in material items, it is a loss of individuality, free thought, or emotion.

• As mentioned before, the quietly rebellious turned hero protagonist who deeply believes there is a fundamental ill in their society. Sometimes, the protagonist is a part of a group who is not under complete control of the governing body, with people who share similar ideas.
• And, if destruction of the status quo is not an option, escape is the next best thing for the protagonist in the end.

When it comes to the characters, there is the anti-hero protagonist who is often joined and supported by a trusted individual or group. The side characters often fall into one of these categories:

• A specialist in their field who is asked out of retirement or vacation to help support the protagonist's cause.

• Someone who is painted as a criminal in their society because of the working regime; this person is usually framed for the "crime" they have committed.

• And, someone who makes an unbelievable discovery, and goes through extreme lengths to prove it.

Reflection

One of the main issues I have been facing with creating a concrete story and concept is the idea that dystopian fiction revolves around the exaggeration of a current event. For George Orwell's 1984 book written in 1949, which later inspired the film, the story is an exaggeration of a future society that resulted in poor government, war, and authoritarian/totalitarian regimes; since the book talks about a future Great Britain, and was written shortly after World War II, Orwell probably wrote about his own fears that surrounded his contemporary society. For my story, I want to exaggerate a rising unknown but can not decide on how my "future" will pan out, and what specific conflicts my story revolves around. Therefore, the "background" aspect of my story is yet to be determined. 

However, researching conventions of dystopian fiction have helped me narrow down some aspects of my story:

• When it comes to the society the protagonist lives in, I don't want any images of extreme poverty or loss. I would like to focus more on the loss of freedom of individuality, expression, speech, and thought.

• I want a lone protagonist who often feels like an outcast from their society. I want this character to not have any support system, like a group of friends or secret organization, at least not for the beginning, to further the idea of their chosen and involuntary isolationism.

• I have also decided to eliminate bureaucratic and technological types of control used in the story, and want to focus on corporate or ideological control. This allows me to focus more on the loss of free thought and individuality and leaves my protagonist for no way out other than destruction. 

I would like to develop my concept as soon as possible to be able to focus on production and post-production to perfect my technical skills, so for my own personal homework, I will be keeping a page blank in my notebook to write every single idea I come up with, even the ones I may think to be stupid, until I land on my final concept. 

Dystopian Fiction Musts

Lord of the Flies - William Golding

Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury

The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood

Sources:

“Dystopian Fiction.” Dystopian Fiction - DDAT, www.jochenenglish.de/misc/dystopian_fiction_ddat.htm.

Dystopia In Films

Previously, I talked about Science Fiction and it's conventions, considering the genre for my own film. Upon further research, I realized I had to narrow down what subgenre of sci-fi I wanted to focus on, to better develop a narrative and maintain genre conventions. There were many subcategories to choose from, ranging from alternate horror and mystery to alien invasion and apocalypse. Out of all of them, the one that drew me the most was the dystopian science fiction genre.

As defined by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, a dystopia is:

an imagined world or society in which people lead wretched, dehumanized, fearful lives

To me, dystopian stories often reflect some ill in our current society. They don't try to offer a solution, they merely exaggerate an aspect of the status quo to enlighten the public, similar to how the main character does in most of these films.

The Light in the Dark

The protagonist in dystopian films is typically a rebellious one. At first, they are docile, and simply feel trapped and alone with their disagreement with the current state of their society. Through small rebellions, they challenge the current societal or political systems in place that they believe is the ultimate ill of their world. Because of this, the protagonist is the director's tool to portray the negative aspects of this alternate universe through his or her perspective. As Vanity Fair describes, this is the character that will eventually break the shackles and come out triumphantly.

The Black Hole

On the other side of society, there is the collective antagonist, typically the government that created the society depicted. These types of films tend to focus on the head of the political system as the main villain. Typically a person high on the influential pyramid of this world, the antagonist uses their power to sic an army of loyalists against the main hero. All of their actions are justified to themselves and their peers by claiming it is all for the greater good of the systems in place, and for the people.

Intended Utopia

The antagonist of these stories is devoted to their cause mainly because the systems in place were originally meant to fix a former ill (human error, overpopulation, poverty, etc.) However, the ways they incite their power often become too much like an authoritarian dictatorship, creating the illusion of a utopia, rather than a true one. In these films, society is controlled through corporations (advertising, products, media), technology (computers, robots, futuristic technologies), bureaucracy (mindless bureaucracy through regulations and red tape), or philosophically (an ideology enforced by a dictatorship). In general, society is controlled through relentless propaganda, restriction of freedoms, and the worship of a figurehead or concept. 

Through these methods, a society in fear of the current system is created. Many of the citizens believe them under constant surveillance, by a figure like Big Brother, and refrain from expressing individuality in fear of consequence. As a whole, society experiences the extremes of a spectrum. They are either severely overpopulated or underpopulated, extremely sterile or dirty, etc.

Reflection

For my own film opening, I want to incorporate current trends, establish a quietly rebellious protagonist, and enforce the idea of a society in distress. I will have to think of the type of control I want my government to use (I'm leaning more towards corporate or philosophical control) and create micro-rebellions to incorporate into my opening to allude to greater control.

Dystopia Watchlist:

1984 (1984)

Matrix (1999)

V for Vendetta (2006)

Brazil (1985)

Music Marketing Project

For the past few weeks, two friends and I have been working on a lengthy music marketing campaign project, in which we had to create a new band, knowing only the song and genre of their initial release, and create a marketing campaign for the band

First, we focused on the genre. Our genre was Alternative Rock, to the likes of the Killers, Cage the Elephant, and others. We researched two main case studies - The 1975, and The Killers - to learn more about the genre's target audience, typical marketing techniques, and distribution.

Album Cover Art for The 1975

By studying them, we noticed common themes of a simple color palette, societal rebellion, and the marketing technique of "going dark" before the release of a single, EP, or album. Despite the young target audience, distribution methods within this genre were not limited to famous streaming services like Spotify and Apple Music; the genre with the most record vinyls sold is the alternative rock genre, following the fad of using "vintage" ways to listen to music.

Cover Art for The Man by BLKHONEYMOON

After our initial research, we began to develop our band: BLKHONEYMOON. Similar to The 1975, we kept with a color palette of black and neon pink, incorporating those colors into our logo, merchandise, and marketing products. As with the colors, another consistent decision we decided to make was to follow a theme of eyes being covered with the iconic pink paint splatter, hoping that it would become iconography for the band with marketing. The "icon" of the band would also appear through posts on the band's social media - specifically Twitter and Instagram - and website.

We decided to use the website as a hub that links to all other marketing techniques, taking advantage of technological convergence of all services being accessible through smart devices and laptops. The website links to each social media page, as well as displays an email for audience interaction - a feature that many bands of this genre utilize to engage fans and maintain a loyal fanbase. The website also includes a page that acts as a merchandise shop:

Merchandise includes stickers, vinyl records, pins, shirts, shoe collaborations, and more. 

On the homepage, we decided to start off with promotional pictures of the band members, which were shot in the same style as the music video to maintain continuity and brand.  Then, we decided to make the website have a simple layout, with easy accessibility to all other distribution and marketing tools; for example, as the audience scrolls through the homepage, sections are previewing upcoming show dates, merchandise, and ended with a contact form.

With the genre, we found that constant communication between artists and the audience was important to growing a fanbase. Our forms of audience interaction mainly revolved around posting teasers on social media, specifically utilizing Instagram's story feature, as well as giving fans frequent opportunities to communicate one-on-one with band members. Shows in local areas contribute to creating and then maintaining a loyal fan base, as frequent shows in iconic local venues establish a band presence.

When it came to the music video specifically, we decided to stick with a common alternative theme of teenage rebellion, also appealing to our target audience of teenagers and younger Millenials. The storylike video relied on a variety of shots and editing that matched the fast-pace of the song to engage audiences and secure their interest. The main obstacle my group faced while shooting the video was working around our schedules, and the schedules of the people who volunteered to act. However, we were able to overcome the obstacle, giving all of us valuable skills in group communication, accommodation, and compromise.

Stills from the Music Video