Transitioning into the Cambridge portfolio project

Hello Cambridge!!

From now on, my blog posts will focus on the progress and process of my Cambridge final project, which is creating a film opening of two minutes that I will create by myself. I learned many different and new things about film in my AICE media studies class, such as the different types of shots, angles and representations that you need to use to create a good production that will engage people. Since I learned many cool things about media as a whole and film productions, this project will be a great opportunity to put everything I learned in practice and I will try my best to do so. 

To start the transition, my class learned about film openings as I mentioned before and why they are so important when introducing the story to the audience, since it will be the first impression of your film and make people choose if they want to watch the movie or not. The opening needs to be catchy and unique, using specific elements like sound or color representations depending on the kind of tone you want to approach to grab the audience’s attention. 

One of the approaches I’m thinking about doing for this project, is developing character and using scenes like “a day in the life” to show the protagonist and create an idea about their personality right in the first view of the film. This would work really well in a coming of age genre for example, which is one of the genres that I’m thinking about doing for this project. By developing character, I can use many elements such as costumes, makeup and representations of how the protagonist interact with other characters and even the environment itself, to help shaping their identity and create and idea of how they are dealing with the situation of growing up, which is a major theme in the coming of age genre. 

The second approach I might consider is developing the environment of my film. One of the genres I thought about doing for this project was suspense, so I really think that this approach might look very good in that type of production. I can mix many different elements like low-key lighting, dramatic sound effects or extreme close-ups to build up tension and force the audience to focus on the fear of the unknown and influence them to watch the movie in order to answer their questions that the opening left unanswered.

I am really excited to begin this project and put my ideas in practice in order to create a good film opening!