Sound - Ferris Bueller's Day Off

Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)

Key Features:

• Diegetic Sound 
• Non- Diegetic Sound
• How it fits the genre

Diegetic Sound examples - 

1. Radio Announcer's Dialogue - 0.02
2. Dialogue 0.14
3. Dog Barking and Footsteps - 0.21

The diegetic sound helps to create a realistic sound and setting for the opening. They also in this scenario help to identify the time of day and what is going on. The use of diegetic sound before seeing the characters us effective as it builds up to the character being seen by the audience for the first time. 

Non Diegetic Sound examples - 

•  Music (down beat, relaxing music) 1.58-2.50 

The music is calm and relaxing which is a contrast to the idea of the film it is also ironic as the audience is aware that Ferris is not actually ill. The music makes out that the day will be calm and dull where as it will actually be the complete opposite.

How it fits the genre

The sound conforms to given genre as

• Tone - Irony in which would be recognizable to teenagers and adults alike

The Incredibles - Example of Opening Credits

This particular title sequence does not seem to follow the given order  of opening credits, the title is seen to come first which although seems unusual is used in many films. The sequence is also specially animated for the film.

This is the title of the film. Unusually used first instead of the name of the studio it was made in.  This is probably due to it being an animation.

The writer/director instead of production company. The production company doesn't seem to appear at all with in the opening credits.

Producer instead of a film by (insert name here). This could be due to a lack of famous director or due to the producer being more important in this select film.

Executive Producer instead of Starring. Usually in animation the names of actors are crucial in the opening credits but aren't seen in this sequence.

Music by instead of the title of the film. 

The story supervisor instead of featuring - in this shot you can also see how cleverly the credits are worked into the animation of the title sequence.

Film editor instead of casting.

Supervising technical director instead of music/composer, this is unusual to see in many films but due to it being an animation it is more commonly seen. 

Production designer is in the correct positioning in the title sequence.

Character design instead of editor, character design is an important factor that is seen in an animated film.

Supervising animators instead of director of photography, this is another important factor of an animated film. 

Directors of Photography instead of producer.

Art Directors instead of story. This is seen only in animation films.

Character supervisor instead of writer.

Hair and Cloth simulation supervisor instead of director. This is only seen in animation films.

Sets sequences supervisor is an addition to the opening credits.

Effects supervisor is an addition to the opening credits.

Rending supervisor is an addition to the opening credits.

Production manager is an addition to the opening credits.

Sound Designer is an addition to the opening credits.

Many of the additional opening credits are due to the film being an animation, there are far more technical elements that need to be credited therefore many of them take a spot in the title sequence that you would usually expect to see a different credit in. This is the key difference between animations and other films. Animations require more technical help and so they credited in the opening sequence where as usually technical help is credited in the closing credits.

What are credits?

There are two types of credits:

• Opening credits
• Closing credits

The main focus for our coursework will be the opening credits since we are creating a title sequence. 

Opening credits are seen at the beginning of a film. They are crucial to showing the key member of production (Actors/Directors/Producers) They can be highly differing in the way they are presented. Many films have a specially animated title sequence, in which the credits appear in other films the credits are shown 

on top of the action.

Opening credits are essentially what a title sequence is, but some films have chosen to scrap opening titles. For example Avatar, Inception and Silver Linings Playbook. 

 Common order of Opening credits:

1. Name of the studio
2. Name of production company 
3. (Insert name here) Productions/ A film by (Name of Director)
4. Starring
5. Title of the film
6. Featuring
7. Casting/Casting by 
8. Music/Composer 
9. Production design/designer
10. Editor
11. Director of photography 
12. Producer/Produced by 
13. If applicable - Based on the book/play etc
14. If applicable - Based on characters by 
15. Story/Story by 
16. Writer/Written by 
17. Director/Directed by

There can be many variations of this list, for example there can also be added visual effects, set design, make up artists. 

Closing credits are at end of a film, they list all of the production crew. (Foley artists/Costume designers) 

Sound in our opening sequence

Title sequence - Credits

Since we were close to finishing we had started looking into what we wanted out credits to look like. The most similar to what we wanted was that of the Legally blonde credits. We wanted very a girly and handwritten style of credits that matched and complimented the sequence. This is the ideas we have so far. At the moment we are leaning towards the third set of credits although we need to find the right movement

Sound - Legally Blonde

When analyzing the soundtrack on the legally blonde opening sequence, it was key to look at

• Diegetic sound

• Non Diegetic sound

•  How it fits the genre

Diegetic sound examples

•  Fountain (Water) - 0.49
• Bicycle bell – 1.18     
•  Rambling boys – 1.05    
•  Girls cheering – 2.05
• Dialogue - 3.06

These are just some examples there is more use of diegetic sound in the sequence. These are key examples because they are used to not only help contextualize the background of the opening sequence but they also make it more realistic. The dialogue used give a clue into the type of character she is aswell as informing the audience quite quickly what is going on in terms of the the good luck card.

 Non diegetic sound examples

• Music - "Perfect Day" 3.32 (Length of song) 

The type of music used is very upbeat and exciting, it is also a female vocalist which fits the image they are trying to create. The femininity used in this piece is aided by the music as during the intercutting of the sequence, the main character is seen to get ready and this music is seen as what a girl would typically listen to whilst getting ready. The music is also seen to originate from the main character's room. The use of mixing the non diegetic sound and diegetic sound also helps to create the feel of a certain genre in this case it creates a girly chic flick feel.

How it fits the genre

The sound fits the given genre as it conforms to:

1. Style - Its upbeat and it fits the style of the genre (Girly)
2. Tone - Sets the tone of the film as fun not serious contrasting to the soundtrack in The Notebook

Block in Progress.

Unfortunately after having the Mac's stolen we are temporarily stopped from doing any editing of our footage. Therefore we have start editing again, we still have all our footage and a plan for once we are able to edit again.

Plan
Footage - Since we had finished our sequence it is disappointing to lose it but, we know what our sequence should look like therefore it shouldnt take to long to put it back together.
Credits - We have made a start on our credits so then when we have remake our sequence we should have them completed to just put on.
Sound - This is still causing an issue but we should be able in this time find something we feel fits the sequence. 

Credits and Distribution Logo

Now that we have finished putting our sequence together as a whole we have moved on to thinking about our the other things we need to include. We are beginning to have a lot more of a delegation process during the time we spend working on our sequence. As a group we have decided its best to split off and get things done individually, by this I mean some of us will edit while others are looking at sound, credit fonts etc. We also created our distribution logo this week, its very different to the original idea we had for our logo but we felt it need to be somewhat interactive like the logos of the distribution companies of the same genre and style  as ours.

Editing update

Genre Change

Through out the process we have been very doubtful on whether our opening sequence would actually fit the romantic genre. The actors used couldn't convey deep emotions or make the emotions really realistic to the audience. We decided that our opening sequence was a mixture of two different genres.

Romantic

AND

Coming of age

Re filming

Tomorrow we will be re filming some of the shots of the female that we don't feel we can use due to poor lighting, continuity issues etc. We also plan on re filming on Wednesday to get some more pieces of film for the male part of our opening sequence as we don't have enough.

The Notebook Analysis

The opening to the notebook, is very different to a lot of other films. Films usually aim to engage there audience therefore they are:

1. Fast paced 
2. Exciting 
3. Contains a lot of enigma

The notebook is the exactly the opposite of this, it is recreates a romantic setting that will be the background for most of the film. It is:

1. Slow paced/Slow moving images
2. Romantic, slow music to set the tone 
3. Use of dark and some what dull colours

Key features 

• Setting -Sunset with establishing shot of the lake and surrounding area. The use of colour is also done to create subliminal connotations, the uses of the dark red sunset for love, passion and romance.
• Location - Lake, the background for most of the movie the audience can sense the significance of the location within the opening sequence. 
• Character - Not being introduced to any characters creates enigma, the only character we see is shadowed.
• Genre - The genre is romantic, you can tell by the use of colour, sound and setting.
• Sound - The slow paced music is not only setting the mood for film but it also creates certain emotions within the audience. 

Editing