That's a wrap

     And just like that, it's over. Okay, guys here is my final portion of this project, my ccr. This is kind of sad but at the same time, I am so happy to finally be giving you guys every piece of this assignment. Thank you for sticking with me for these past 8 weeks and I will talk to you soon <3

Here it is :')

Hey guys, it is extremely bittersweet to be typing this up but after weeks and weeks of work, our film opening is done. I am so happy to announce that the name of our film opening is 'By Your Side' and you can watch it here. This experience was one I will truly never forget and I am super grateful for everything I learned. Thank you guys for being on this journey with me since the beginning.

Time to reflect

     Hey guys, as you all know my team and I have wrapped filming so I just wanted to come in here and talk a little bit about everything. This project has really been an experience I am so grateful for; Grateful to have made new friends, to have learned so much, and to have grown in the process. An example of something I learned was actually how to use Adobe Premiere as one of the actors from my opening was nice enough to give me a crash course and show me the basics.Honestly writing this blog was such a blessing as although at times it stressed me out, I am now able to see every little change that my opening went through. This project really tested my communication skills as weeks where I was struggling creatively I did not reach out to my teammates but rather let myself get into a deep slump where I was extremely unmotivated. I now realize the mistakes I made during this entire process and am able to confidently say I can learn from them and change my thought process for future projects. Alright guys, this is technically my final blog post as my next two posts will just be links and a few quick words. I am super grateful for everything this project has provided and am excited to see what the future holds!

The car scene (and others)

     Hey guys, this blog will be similar to my last one as I will be explaining the process behind the other scenes in our opening. We started by shooting the scene of Betty getting ready as we were using my sister's room and were unsure of when she would come back home. Everything for this scene went pretty smoothly honestly, that is until we had to film Gaby leaving the room. My sister's door is broken so unless slammed it will not close but when we had Gaby slam the door it looked very strange as Betty goes from this tranquil figure who is getting ready to slamming doors. We did a few takes where Gaby just closes the door with normal force but it was very obvious that the door was not closed correctly so we also scrapped those shots. We were honestly not sure what to do at this point until I had an idea, I would stand behind the door and when she pushes it in order to close it, I would continue to push it until it closed. We tried this method and it honestly looks perfect on camera. Next was the car scene, this one was a bit nerve-wracking as I have no experience with acting but the second Gaby, Dani, and I started practicing our lines everything came super naturally and we all made our little tweaks to the script and I honestly think only a line or two from the script remained as is. We filmed this by having Larissa outside of the car with the driver's side window being down and Lorena was in the trunk of the car, we did this in order to have two different angles each focusing on different characters. I believe that we ended up doing three takes of the car scene just so when we are editing we can see whichever looks best.  Heres a picture of Gaby, Dani, and I after we wrapped the car scene! 

After filming this scene we all just stayed talking for a little bit and even took a little snack break and then everybody went home. Guys, it is crazy to me to be talking about having filmed everything as it seems that just yesterday I was writing the treatment for this film. Anyways, I will hop back on here soon and talk about some other elements of this project.

The shower scene

    Hey guys, I am super happy to announce that the shower scene for our opening has been completely filmed! This experience was extremely fun as I was able to finally meet Larissa and Lorena in person, as we have been getting to know each other virtually for a long time now our interactions were very natural. We started the day by making fake blood, we blended a lot of powdered sugar together with cocoa powder and red acrylic paint (Thank u Sara for the recipe I love you :,) ) This recipe was absolutely perfect as it looked extremely realistic and washed right out with water. Here's an extremely flattering picture of me covered in blood.

I picked my three vinyl, each record having been pressed on the color I needed for the scene; A yellow one, a red one, and a blue one. Gaby was the first to film her scenes so she got in her bathing suit and I began spraying her with our blood mixture, we got our main shots such as when she has to yell but we also filmed short clips to insert in between the cuts during the shower scene. We repeated this with Dani and then with me, this process was not super tedious as everything washed out super easily and we already had everything planned out so we knew exactly what we wanted to shoot. After each person wrapped their scenes they would wash out the blood and change back into their clothes as they prepared to leave. While filming my scenes Lorena had to leave but as Gaby and Dani already filmed they were able to take over for her in case Larissa and I needed any extra help. That is all the insight I wanted to give you guys about the filming process of this scene, my next posting will touch on every other scene so I will talk to you guys then!!

Some roadblocks

     Hey guys, just wanted to update you about some issues that my team and I have run into. The first thing that happened was one that may throw everything off track which is Dani who is portraying August made some not-so-smart choices which led her to get grounded for a few months, here's how that happened. Dani was bored one night and decided to leave her house, through her window, without telling anyone. About an hour later her grandmother decided to check in on her and to her surprise, she was gone. This led to Dani being grounded until probably our graduation and her car being sold which led her to having no ride to my house and no rights to do anything. Finding a way to get her to my house is the least of my worries as she only lives around 20 minutes from me and I can pick her up but as she was just grounded her mother is not loving the idea of her going to a friends house, even if it is for a school project. Hopefully, her mother realizes that the best choice is to let Dani come to film and help me with this project. The final is less of a roadblock and more of a last-minute change to one of the character descriptions, I may have forgotten that I am cast as the character of James and my hair is very purple currently as shown below. 

So this is an official announcement that the character of James has purple hair! Gaby has also been going through some things as her dad was recently injured but I do have hope that he will be recovered soon and Gaby will be able to join us for filming. Worst case scenario we have to recast Betty and August, but I really do think everything will ultimately work out the way it is supposed to. Alright, that is everything I needed to update you guys on but again I am hopeful that everything will solve itself!

The script (no, not the band)

     Hey everyone, today I am going to discuss the script for our film opening. At first, I did not want a script at all as I thought it would just make everything seem too unnatural but then I realized that no script would just make the final product extremely messy. It took me a little bit to think of what conversation being had could really show the personalities of all the characters until I decided on the one below. 

This script is not one that the actors have to stick to, it just lets them know the conversation that is happening and how their characters feel about the subject matter. There are specific elements in the script that are extremely important to me which are; Betty saying sorry and really wanting August to have a good day,  James being a really private person and August being a sad person. As I have touched on before Betty has very religious parents who are extremely hard on her so she says sorry to every little thing such as being ready a few minutes after she said she would be, the second part is just to show how much she truly cares about August. James being a very closed off person showcases his youth and how he has not found comfort in himself yet therefore he does not open up about experiences and/or his feelings. Finally Augusts lines do not show her being a sad person but moreso how she delivers them and how they are extremely short, this is due to loneliness as she is somewhat new to town and her only friends are her cousin and his best friend. That is all for today guys, everything is really taking shape and I am super excited to have the final result!

Second Group Meeting

    Hi everyone, as you may remember a few weeks back I mentioned how I was a part of a group meeting where we all just talked about each others film openings and gave feedback. This meeting consisted of five members and was a bit different than the first one as every participant sent their blog so while they were telling us a little bit about their work we could read about the entire process; This was super helpful as everyone could see specific challenges that others faced and how they overcame them. It was honestly super refreshing to see what others were creating and how different everyone's work was from one another. As talked about last week, I was having some trouble finding the excitement within me but when I talked about my opening I went on effortlessly for a good amount of time and realized that my passion for this project never left. I truly love what my group and I are creating and am very ready to begin filming any day now. When I was talking about the opening the other members kept pitching ideas on techniques to use but I had already discarded all of the ideas they gave as they ultimately would not have matched the mood;This was until one member gave me an idea that I am honestly super excited to incorporate. As you know the shower scene will have colored lighting and each character will have a specific color assigned to them and someone pitched the idea that the characters should be wearing those colors for the rest of the opening and I loved the idea. I think doing this will add an elaborate element that only some will catch but will impact those who do; This is also a way to tell the audience more about our characters as they only get to see two minutes of them. Alright guys, that was all for today but I will be coming back on here again this week to give you some updates!

Just wanted to talk

    Hey guys, this week has been extremely stressful for me and I just wanted to come on here and talk. I know that this blog has been dedicated to only my film opening but my personal life is also a big part of this project as it affects my work ethic and I do not want to come on here and say "Everything is going just fine and I am not nervous at all!!" as that would be a blatant lie. For the past few months, my family and I have been working on opening up an accessory store at the mall and we finally opened last weekend so I have been working like crazy with everyone just trying to get things in order. The communication my group and I had earlier this month was also beginning to fade which was caused by all of us being extremely busy and honestly burnt out. We have been working on this project for over a month and I had a stable balance at the beginning but recently everything just overtook me. I have always been one that doesn't look to healthy coping mechanisms and instead keeps stressing myself out until I am so overwhelmed I drop everything I am doing. These episodes always last for different periods of time and I am so thankful that this one is already going away as I am slowly gaining motivation to get back on track with everything. With a project like this one, there will undoubtedly be slow periods when not a lot is happening and I have to find a way to not let unmotivate me. This week my group and I should begin filming which I am so excited for; I shared all of this as this project is a part of me and if I am not doing well neither is this film opening. Anyways, thank you for just listening and I hope you see where I am coming from. I do not want to just come on here and share all the highs that occur. Once again, thank you for listening. Click here for an article that really helped me that touches on coping mechanisms, and just how to face different types of emotions. 

Final cast !!

    Hey guys, I am super excited to announce that we have officially cast all of our characters. Before I reveal all the actors I wanted to let you know that there has been a minor change made to the characters which are their ages. Instead of having the two-year age gap between characters we have decided to make Betty and James 16, almost 17, while August just turned 17. This minimal change was made as these ages fit the characters and what they are going through better and the dynamic between them would be less tainted. You guys already know that Gaby is playing Betty which I am super excited about but now it is time for me to let you know who else is starring in our opening. August will be portrayed by my amazing friend Daniela Valerio. I have known Dani for at least six years now and when I asked her about being in the opening she was immediately super enthusiastic about it which is exactly what I wanted from the actors. Here is a picture of Dani :)

Finally is James. At first, I was getting frustrated as I have barely any male friends so thinking about who could star as him and do it right was a process. I was really trying to think about who to ask until I had an aha moment, I know the person who is passionate about these characters and this opening and will pour their heart into this project; Myself. Since the beginning of this project, I have been saying that I was not going to be in the opening but then I realized that nobody will care as much as I do when it comes to portraying James. Another reason I cast myself was due to the fact that I did not want my dialogue to seem too forced. Gaby, Dani, and I have been really good friends for many years and now we will be playing three best friends so there were no better castings in my opinion. I am going to close this blog out with a picture of myself now! I am honestly super nervous to introduce these characters to you all and now the entirety of James is in my hands, no pressure though. 

Gathering materials

    Hey guys, today I wanted to let you guys know all of the equipment and props my team and I are gathering before we begin filming. First of all, I wanted to talk about how I am planning to produce colored lighting. Before I begin I want to give some minimal background info which is that I own two studio lights which I use for my photography and I collect vinyl. A few weeks back I was doing a shoot in my room and playing a record when I realized that I own many different colored vinyl and if I hold one up to the light it will produce colored light. Records should never be exposed to too much heat as they will warp so it was a trial and error process of trying to find the perfect angle that would produce the perfect lighting while not damaging my vinyl and below is the result.

My group and I still need to find the best fake blood to use. We have been researching for a while now but we need to find a brand that will not stain our actors' skin or my bathroom. We are at a point right now where we may just make our own, if we find multiple recipes and keep altering them until we get the perfect mix of realism and cleanliness we would be good to go. Alright, y'all that is all for today!