Mood Boards

Mood boards to give a general understanding of the concept of each individual character and locations for filming.

T-shirt designs

Finalised Posters

slider

sliders

Video Editing

24/10/11 -
Attendance: Rhys Jones, Marc Hemsley, Ainsley Evans.
Time: 12 o'clock

Spent a good four hours getting together the video footage and editing it to make a trailer.

Kieran Hall showed up for the last ten minutes to drop off photos mentioning he was ill.

25/10/11 -
Attendance: Rhys Jones, Marc Hemsley, Ainsley Evans

Rhys carried on making with poster designs.

Marc editied the trailer we made and started work on the rest of teh footage we have left over.

Ainsley got started with the presentation by lookign at how to use Prezsi and what things we needed to include as well as assist Marc with the video editing.

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Stuff for the website

What you think?

Poster and Introduction Ideas

I was brainstorming some ideas for an introduction and came up with a film/stop motion style, the camera panning around each of the groups bedrooms, passing any sci fi/ geeky things that may be there to get a feel of the type of people the show is about, drawing to an end a desk sketch presenting the title of the show.

I've mocked up a few poster Ideas, some were photoshopped straight away others have been hand drawn. I'll be adding the drawn ones once they have themselves been edited.

The idea for these came whilst looking at marketing posters throughout the years. These two in particular derive from the British goverment in 1939. The term 'Keep calm and carry on' has been widely used throughout tv as well as other markets. The same font and logo have been used as both marketing for tv and general fan art for Tv shows such as 'Made in Chelsea' and 'The IT Crowd' shown below. 

It's my idea that using a familiar and noticeable marketing icon such as the symbolic crown and phrase, that it would be effective and draw an audience toward it. Maybe not even the audience you would expect from a sci fi TV Show.

A bit of everything.

This post consists of a back story for my Character Al, a mood board for general concept of the character and research that I've done toward marketing the TV show; its competition, ideas for humor and quirks and a little look into the music.

Character Synopsis 

My character is named Al, this character is widely known amongst the other characters as the 'arsehole' of the production company. He's new to this line of work, straight out of university with his bachelors degree and as can be expected thinks he is gods gift to the industry and work at hand. With this 'attitude' he finds it hard to socialise with the others, trying to make everything his own way it causes unnecessary drama and awkward situations with Steve 'the stoner'. Coming from a highly educated family, he feels the pressure and must have everything perfect. This character is quite different to my actual personality, I am quite a quiet, socially awkward person, so describing and playing a character with these qualities is relatively easy as its an 'outside looking in' type character. I feel this character will give the show a darker side of comedy; causing commotion and rivalry within the group.

Competition for the show


With the way we are presenting the TV show; Like 'How I met your mother' telling the story of previous events I found that there was quite a bit of similarities with other shows.


30 Rock (2006 - present)

Synopsis - Liz Lemon, head writer of the sketch comedy show 'TGS with Tracey Jordon', must deal with an arrogant new boss (similar to the character Al) and a crazy new star, all while trying to run a successful TV show without losing her mind.

Tagline - 'Enjoy the ride'

Genre - 'Comedy'


The office (2001 - 2003) (UK)

Synopsis - The story of an office that faces closure when the company decides to downsize its branches. A documentary film crew follow staff and the manager Brent as they continue their daily lives.

Genre - 'Comedy' & 'Drama'

Film similarities

Fan boys - (2008)

synopsis - Star wars fans travel to Skywalker ranch to steal an early copy of 'Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace'

Tagline - ' To theaters, it will come'

Genre - 'Adventure' 'Comedy' & 'Drama'

Zack and Miri make a porno ( 2008)

synopsis - Zack and Miri are two lifelong platonic friends who make an adult film to pay the rent of their apartment. With the help of their friends the couple set out for auditionees for their porn film.

Tagline - 'A poster for everyone who finds our movie title hard to swallow'

Genre - 'Comedy' 'Drama' & 'Romance'

Ideas

I've noticed that within all of this competition the use of a female counter part is used, this causes a new level of comedy, one of which might not be noticed in an all group cast. So the idea for a female character to be implemented into the script and production company may be a good road to take into consideration. The settings for each of them are more or less the same, with the exception to film. Within an office space, computer labs and work stations. Having the characters embark on an adventure like setting will bring the characters out of their comfort zone, the stereotypical 'nerd' or 'geek' is often a a shut in, scared of the outside world which is always humorous, this is seen countless times in 'The IT crowd'. Whilst shooting in Swansea I feel there are a few places ideal for shooting; within our homes 'out of work lives' and how the group socialise then. Out drinking in the pubs of Swansea mentioned earlier by Marc, having the group indulge in normal society.

Marketing

I found a few helpful links relevant to television marketing.

• www.thinkbox.tv - This link offers information on most things such as 'TV effectiveness', 'Getting started on TV' etc. Thinkbox is the marketing body for commercial TV in the UK, in all its forms. Its shareholders are Channel 4, ITV, Sky Media, Turner Media Innovations and UKTV, who together represent over 90% of the commercial TV market in the UK. 

• www.audiencelabs.com - They offer articles and publications of their work in to their own research.

• www.beyond30.org - Becoming a member will allow us to see into the research they are working on right now. They are currently looking at trying to understand the future of advertising in television, particually from the standpoint of the audience.

Poster

This was just a quick mock up of what a poster could look like, I noticed with The IT Crowd, 8bit images are used as part of there introduction to the episode. I figured a similar simplicity might also be effective.

A catch up necessary...

Sine I haven't posted to the blog in a few days then I think it's time it was brought back up to speed.
I will be including a few things in this entry: The first thing is my character and his personality.

Jeff.
This is the name of my character who is the sterotypical nervous nerd - he doesn't like confrontation, drinks only milk and as previously stated doesn't know where the World of Warcraft ends and the real World begins.
This character is based on an exaggeration of myself, given that I am generally a quiet and reserved person we played it to it's strengths so the character may come across more naturally instead of being forced to be something I'm not.

______________________________

Earlier Marc and myself met up to book out video cameras ready to film for Thursday.
Being that there were only two of us about it was a bit of a struggle with what exactly we could do.
We then decided we could write up possible interview questions as well as a check list of things we could think of that still needs to be sorted and for when we need said things sorted for.

Interview Questions.

> What's your job here?
>Do you enjoy the working enviroment of this place?
>What do you think of your work colleagues?
>Who's the worst to with?
>Who do you enjoy working with?
>How did you get the job?
>Do you take the job seriously?
>How do you feel the production is coming along?
>How are you after last night's work doo?
>Do you think your boss is too strict on Steve and the rest of you?
>What would you say the most important keyskil is for this working enviroment?
>What are your long term goals of working here?
>How are you finding the hours?

(more to come as we think of them/Improv whilst filming

__________________________________________

To Do

Website - Marc - Monday

Theme Tune - Rhys? - Monday

Interview - All

Pub - All

Office - All

Market research - Marc/Ainsley/Kieran - Over time

Ask Dave about where to find TV viewing figures - Marc/Ainsley - Done (asked Phil)

Editing - All - Monday/Tuesday - 9-5

Research - Marc/Ainsley/Kieran - Over time

Posters - Rhys/Kieran - ASAP

Presentation practice - All - Next week 9-5 everyday

That concludes all that I can currently think of.

Posted by Ainsley Evans

Story ideas and my character

My Character

My character is called Dave and he is an alcoholic. I have loosely based this person on myself as I like to drink but going to over play it. There have been a few alcoholic comics like All Murray the Pub landlord and Father Jack in Father Ted. These sort of characters are never the lead roles as they would become boring a repetitive after a while that’s why they make good sidekicks or funny back ground stories. But Men behaving badly show both roles as drunks and always drinking heavily and getting up to stupid things. Although this doesn’t sound good on paper but when put on video its funny to see. So my character would be based on Martin Clunes who plays Gary in Men behaving badly. He works in a small office and has an uneventful life and lives with Tony who both drink and well behave badly. This is what I do to in my time when I go out as I usually get in stupid situations.

Story

The story is based around 4 people working in a Production company working on a Sci-Fi series. 4 guys with totally different back grounds, one is a Stoner (Steve) who never seems with but really good at modelling but doesn’t know he isn’t getting paid. Al is the boss and is arrogant, condescending and basically a arse hole and he knows he isn’t paying Steve as he feels doesn’t deserve it. Jeff is the nervous Nerd, not too sure about where the World of war craft finishes and the real world starts. He hates shouting and confrontations and goes mad when these things happen and when he goes out only drinks milk. The last one is Dave the alcoholic who gets drunk where ever he is and keeps getting into stupid situations at work and well everywhere he goes. Every episode sees the team get up to stupid things and tries to get the work done. As they are all geeks in their own sense they are not welcomed by the outside world and constantly arguing.  

The filming will look like the office but with all the humour as the IT crowd, the channel we would see this on would be channel 4 as they have a lot of dark and rude humour on there like the Inbetweeners and MisFits. After watching the IT crowd I think the target audience is 15+ as this would cover a larger audience plus giving us the range of prime time TV. Al of the comedy series are about 20 minutes long as any longer would get boring and having it this long would keep it fresh and would enable us to cover a few weeks. Most of the scenes will be impraved as this would better than written down script as it would give the characters freedom to bounce off each other. There wil be a direction and the characters are given situations to get through and its then left to the actors to play around and be themselves.

Story Ideas

Episode 1. F’ing Stoners

This would be the first episode where we would meet the crowd for the first time. The first scene would be Steve coming through the fronts doors of the office in a cloud of smoke wearing a black hoodie and the imperial march song playing in the back ground on the stereo. As the camera pans up we see Steve pull back the hoodie to reveal himself and then cut to the boss Al who comes out with the catch phrase “Fucking Stoners!!”. This episode sees Steve and the gang trying a work night out but as some of them have curfews set by their mothers they have to have it during the day.

Episode 2 Dave sobers up

In this episode Dave wakes up in an alley with is phone telling him its 1985 as he received a txt with this date on. After spending half the day thinking he had gone back in time he decides to try and sober up.

Episode 3 Steve gets paid

Steve goes to his dealer to get his usual but realises that he has no money and after a near mental breakdown due to lack of weed Steve sees the world for real for the time. After doing his job right for the first time Al has no choice but to pay him which leads Steve a hard choice on how to spend the money.

Episode 4 World of Moo Craft

Jeff wakes up to go to work to find that his mum has gone on holiday for a week and leaves him in charge of getting the groceries. Not entirely sure where of where to get his milk fix outside of his house and way from his computer he unwittingly takes Steve with him. They both think that the best way to get milk is at the source!!

Meeting

Who was present: Marc Hemsley, Ainsley Evans and Rhys Jones

Today we discussed what we need to do to start filming. After getting the characters done yesterday we decided that we need to build on the and the situations.

Things that need to be done, Research into characters, write up oour own charaters and come up with a design.
Rhys is going to do more posters, Me and Ainsley are going to continue on the characters and research into how pilots come about in series like the office and the IT crowd.

We are going to meet up tomorrow at 10 in the morning out side the fade buildig to get cameras nd start filmimng some mock ups and solo interviews.

Characters - Write up

Characters

1.       (Rhys) Steve the Stoner – Pushes things off till later, stereotypical, always looks tired

2.       (Marc) Dave The alcoholic – Lazy and always has a drink in his hand no matter where he is.

3.       (Ainsley) Jeff – Nervous Nerd- Objecting to everything, nerd is the way forward with comics

4.       (Kieran) Al The Arsehole- Always having ago if things don’t go his own way and always talking down on Steve the Stoner.

Setting

1.       Bar – 4 guys sitting on their own, Steve with a Mountin Dew, Dave with Martini Stirred not shaken, Jeff with a glass of milk and Al with a Beer with Whiskey chaser. 

2.       Interviews

a.       Solo interviews talking about the other people and whats going on

3.       Office – Computer room

4.       Design Room – Presentations (Steve Sleeping).

Situations

1.       Bar – Day time but the 4 of the on their own drinking and discussing why they are drinking during the day and the work they are doing. Really stupid ideas and saying where they got it from like quoting stuff.

2.       Interviews – everybody has an interview about other people and what’s happening at the time. Like discussing jobs and situations that’s been going on.

3.       Office Computer room – Where the work is going on, Steve ignoring the instructions by Al and Jeff trying to help. Dave with a drink of “Coffee” setting trying to stay vertical.

4.       Design Room- Where people are trying to show what needs to be done with Steve asleep in the back ground snoring, Jeff giving the presentation and Al undermining everything he says.

Work that needs to be done

Script – We need to discuss this all together as the characters are based on our selfs. To do research on how we interact together we need to meet somewhere where we feel comfortable.

Research so far

• Bulletpointed a list of what needs to be researched and began research on these topics:
  
  Story Arc
  Characters
  Setting
  Mood of humour - light/dark
  Promotional Ideas - marketing - media formats
  Target Audience
  Post-production
  Pre-production
  Theme song - Intro/End
  Credit screen
  Sci fi genre - What's worked or hasn't worked.
  Writers/Producers of Sci fi programmes
  Writing technique
  Pilot episodes - What makes for a successful pilot
  Script writing
  Trailer
  Pitch
  
  Following yesterday's meeting we also came up with what kind of direction we would like to take the programme.
  
  It was decided we would give it a How I Met Your Mother sort of feel with the narrative voice at the beginning and throughout the duration of the programme.
  
  We also decided on the genreal story idea that 4 nerds would meet on a forum and have this idea to make the best sci fi programme ever but in turn becomes the worst.
  
  The programmes name: FAQ or Frequently Asked Questions.
  
  Another post will be put up shortly with information of  research gathered.

Posted by Ainsley Evans

Project Plan

This is only a rough plan for our group to follow as a realistic guideline for what stage we should be at any given time, written up by Kieran Hall.
Monday 10th - Sunday 16th October

(Monday - Wednesday)

• Breaking down the research and getting everything together including all the refferences for the report, making a collective group archive.

• Deciding on the general story, breaking down each character; having their own concept art, mood boards and synopsis.

• Storyboarding the pilot episode.

• Writing the script.

• Marketing ideas.

( Thursday - Sunday)

• Collecting refference imagery for location shooting.

Monday 17th - Sunday 23rd October

(Monday - Sunday)

• Booking out equipment, possible character auditioning.

• Film shooting for pilot - estimate 2-3 days.

• Film editing, collection and incorporating music and sound effects.

• At this point we should be a post production

Monday 24th - Thursday 27th October

(Monday - Thursday)

• Putting together the presentation

• Practice makes perfect

Group Meeting

Group Meeting
Tuesday 11th october 2011

Attendance:
Kieran Hall, Rhys Jones, Ainsley Evans & Marc Hemsley

Absent:
Luke Lewis

Agenda:
The group came together to set the gears in motion, last week we discussed ideas that each of us had about the brief. From there we went away on the weekend to brainstorm our own ideas for this meeting. Today we have decided on:

• Story, story arc
• Marketing Ideas
• Script ideas
• Presentation Ideas

We have also messaged tv companies such as FOX, Channel 4 and BBC as part of our research gathering and a project plan has also been written up.

Tasks for next meeting:
This applies for everyone in the group;

• Research relevant tv shows, films
• Marketing for the above
• Write up rough script ideas
• Music themes