Showcase preparation

The media department are hosting a showcase evening which is opened up to anybody who wants to attend on the 20th March. All the AS groups and A2 groups are going to show their film openings/ music videos. Our group are going to give a brief description to introduce our film opening before we play it to the audience. We will include a brief synopsis and future plot developments, should it be turned into a full length film. We are going to mention how the characters mental health appears to be deteriorating as this is one of the main themes of our opening.

Naming our film opening

We decided on the name "Trapped" for our film opening as it links to her current physical situation as she is currently in a mental asylum and it also links to her mental health as she is now feeling trapped following the incident and how she is being treated and portrayed.
We have decided that we are going to do a reverse shot for the title by incorporating tablets. We are going to lay the tablets out to spell "Trapped" then throw more on top, then reverse it in order to make it seem as though the tablets were thrown down and spelled out "Trapped" themselves.
We are using tablets as our main character would be on medication hence the hospital setting, due to her mental health.

Actors

In our film opening Mehreen is our main character, Nimra acts in one shot and Jana acts briefly in one shot however you can only see her arm. Mehreen is a comfortable and experienced actor as she took a GCSE in drama. Therefore we approached her and asked if she would act in our film opening and she was more then happy to be involved.
As our opening is based in one location, we didn't need to incorporate many characters as the plot is focused around one, with Nimra added as an extra character in a flashback. 

Mehreen

Nima

Location

We have decided that our location is going to be in the medical room in our school. This because it fits the theme that our opening is going to have. This is because it is based in a hospital/mental institution, and the medical room is the closest we can get to this. There are some props that we need which are in the room such as the curtains, the sink, the bed etc. The bed is important in our opening as she will obviously be staying in the mental hospital and therefore needs a bed, which is why this room is perfect for us. The only limitation is that because it's in school we only have a certain amount of time in the evenings before the school is locked. This means were going to have to use our time wisely which is why it is vital for us to have all our planning done before we go to film.

These are some images of the location before we removed the items we didn't need. To make it how we wanted, we removed the green seats, the clothes rail, the wheelchair, the boxes and the table.

Planning for filming

We decided on our location being the medical room in our school. We decided that this was going to be a good location for us as we can take out any furniture that didn't fit with what we wanted e.g. we took out the clothes rail and extra seats. However, the colour and size of the room and some objects such as curtains fitted our theme. Our general goal was to have it looking like a mental ward room. This may not be clear in our opening but it would become clear through the plot and subtle hints.


We met up to decide on what props we needed to bring. We came up with our prop list and decided on how and where we were going to get each item. Our props included a hospital gown, tablets, a photo frame, a photo of Mehreen and Nimra, a zip-lock bag, a teddy bear and a bracelet.

Mehreen was going to be our actress and following that decision we informed her on the details of the plot and she thought about how she would get into character and then we knew we were able to begin filming.

Since we filmed this we have made some changes and added more detail to our plan. In this filmed plan we just briefly touched on the idea of a photo and a bracelet. However, since this we have decided that we are going to have only one photo to add more emphasis and focus on that one and in that photo Mehreen is going to be wearing the bracelet. This is going to add more significance to the bracelet as she is then going to hold that bracelet too as that will also be in the box.
In the photo we are going to have Mehreen and Nimra laughing together, to signify this as a good memory.  Following on from this, we will have a 'flashback' video of this time where Mehreen and Nimra are laughing and joking together with another friend who is not identified behind the camera, to show its a 'home video'.

We are now ready to begin filming.