16 Dec 2008

Life on Mars, Shot by Shot analysis

The sequence starts with a shot from inside a car, from the angle that the character is looking into the car we can tell that he seems as if he is looking for something, while we are not sure what at this point, we can make a guess that this is his car. The scene then shows a very quick, blurred shot of Sam Tyler flashing off the screen, he says he had an accident, but at that very moment in time we can’t be sure what it was, but we assume it was a car crash. The sequence then cuts to a slip of him lying on the floor, this shows the audience that the blur they just saw was in fact Sam being moved from where he was next to the car to this position. In the next shot, we can assume that he is ok and has stood up, because the sequence shows the outside of the car’s wing mirror, with Sam Tyler dressed in very different clothing. He says “I woke up in 1973”, from the first few clips you wouldn’t be able to work this out, but in the next clips where he gets back to civilization this becomes more and more obvious.
The camera cleverly moves around the side of the car that it was already looking at and cross cuts into a clip of Sam walking down the street, turning around to look at everyone, and seem to act like he is unaware of what is going on. Sam Tyler is then show walking into What seems to be an office of sorts, the camera here show him walking in then cuts to a short panning shot of the whole room with everyone looking near the camera, and thanks to the establishing shot of Sam walking in, towards Sam. Without following the rules on continuity, the scene is quickly cut to an outside shot of Sam, with a Radial tracking shot from a low angle, and Sam is looking around confused; Sam moves outside a tall building, looking lost, this is both that he is lost in the city, but lost in his mind, because he doesn’t know where he is or why he is there, and while he is expressing that through the non-digetic narrative, he is also showing that in the way that he is acting in each of the short clips.
When the sequence picks up, and starts the tile sequence, the main clip at the beginning is that of sam’s face, which then cuts to him sitting up on the floor, like he is lost, and has just woken up out of a nightmare or something. Next you can see a very short clip of him getting out of bed. The Room that he is in looks scruffy, and as if it was designed in the 1970s, from this the audience can assume that throughout the series, Sam stays in 1973. After that, and with the help of a diagonal cross fade, we are shown a scene where Sam walks towards the edge of the camera, holding and showing quite clearly a police badge, obviously from this we can make out that he is a police officer, and some of the audience will work out that the office he was in earlier was in fact a police station.
The next scene shown is that of another man sitting at a desk and smoking a cigarette, which quickly cuts to the same man grabbing and ‘assaulting’ Sam, this may confuse the audience, and they may think that this second man is a thief or a criminal of some sort that is out to hurt Sam throughout the series.
The shot after them is one of a large orange muscle car speeding around the bend, this is presumably a police car, and at this point in time perhaps the audience presume that this is being driving by Sam Tyler. As the car swings around the corner, the footage cuts to a static clip of the first female character, the clip itself is fairly boring, but the audience can clearly see that she is a police officer; wearing her uniform and hat.
The next couple of clips are just there to show and introduce more and more characters, some of which are cops as well as Sam and are shown with him, and some are thieves that are in one or two episodes max, and are there for that individual story. In this sequence you learn that the man you saw sitting at a desk smoking earlier; is in fact a police officer also. The final shot is that of Both Sam, and the new Male Police character, Gene Hunt, Punching a guy in the face, and although you haven’t already seen the whole story, you can assume that this guy is in fact a criminal of sorts, and has been caught by Sam and/or Gene.

15 Dec 2008

Youtube Hits

Looking at a few of the already existing and very popular lego animations, I can see that a small list of tags are needed. Lego animation seems to be a thing that is searched allot on Youtube.

So this is all my group would need to put down:

Chuck
Lego Animation
Stopmotion
Series one

From what I have seen, a large amount of the very popular lego animations only have this sort of very limited tag list. But still get the hits.

2 Dec 2008

Holby Blue - A Very Peculiar Practice

The only Link that I could find for these two Tv Dramas was that both of them have used the genre Romance mixed with Police.

'Coverage' & 'Cut Away'

Coverage: Shooting one scene with a variety of camera shots, from different angles, and getting enough takes to provide the 'Editor' with enough choice. Using this technique is important because with this you can show lots of action happening in many different ways, keeping the audience interested.

Cut Away: Shooting the main action, then cutting to another shot that shows different action in the close vacinity, then cutting back to the original action. This is important because you may need to show a reaction shot, ie: There is a bystander to a fight, but the audience doesn't know he/she's there until the Cut Away shot is done. This technique is also useful to cover up missing bits of footage from a couple of shots of the action.

30 Nov 2008

1)While I am sure, Pete and/or Nick were thinking of a specific Website, I have found several:

http://www.petercooper.co.uk/archives/001169.html
http://www.lazinc.com/artists/paul-insect/original-art/784/
http://www.gumtree.com/london/99/29911399.html

And I am sure there are several more, including the one that they were thinking of. Unfortunatly, I couldn't find it, So will just have to make do with what I could find.

2)Start - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_Boys_of_Alabama
1 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alabama
2 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennessee
3 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nashville,_Tennessee
4 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blessed_Are...
5 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day_After_Tomorrow_(album)
End - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Earle

Although I know that this is not exactly what Pete\Nick were looking for, but there you go. This is the only method I had for connecting the two. Blind Boys of Alabama, obviously from Alabama - Alabama boarders Tennessee - NashVille is in Tennessee - The Album 'Blessed Are...' was recorded in Nashville - The Album 'Day After Tomorrow' Put together by the same person as 'Blessed are...', Joan Baez - Steve Earle is featured on the album 'Day after tomorrow'.

I am going to guess that the real connection that I was supposed to find, was something to do with the fact that Steve Earle played a drug addict in 'The Wire' for most of season 2, and then for some of season 5.

3)Un-Able to make the connection, Did I miss something in class?

4)

From this and a few of the other short clips I have seen showing the character 'Omar', I can see that he is a very up-front person, someone that does not like to be told what to do. He's got a strong aura about him, instantly scaring the other characters in the scene. When he shot 'Savino' he did it with an atitude that says to the audience that he will have no remorse for what he does. And even with his leg, limping everywhere (Do not know all the story behind that, so probably don't understand it fully) he still manages to be the big strong, scary character. There seems to be allot of will power in his character.

5)

25 Nov 2008

List of Tv Dramas, under the genre ' Childerens'

1) Ace of Wands - 1970
2) Adventures of Black beauty - 1972
3) The adventures of Robin hood - 1955
4) Carries War - 1974
5) Catwazle - 1970
6) The Chronicals of Narnia - 1988
7) Grange Hill - 1978
8) The Owl Service - 1969
9) The Railway Childeren -1968
10) The Secret Garden - 1975
11) Tuckers Luck - 1983
12) MI High - 2007
13) Sarah Jane Adventures - 2008
14) Tracy Beaker -2002
15) BagPuss - 1974
And Many many more...

Childerens Tv programs have evolved over many years of broadcasting, from the golden oldies of BagPuss in the 70s, up to things like MI High and Sarah Jane Adventures of today. They've changed the complexity of the story, and have accomanied all ranges of audience. Changes from the base storyline to special effects have increased over the years, olden programs use the classical "Good guy defeats Bad guy" Routine regularly, whereas today that storyline is still being used but on occasion, the 'Good guy' doesn't know who the 'Bad guy' is to begin with, and as the episode progresses they follow clues to work out who they are after. We are also seeing the increase of 'Memory' being used in childerens tv drama, so where one episode ends, the next picks up on. Taking ideas from more adult programs and applying them to simpler, easier to understand stories, aimed at a younger audience.

Video clips of different Childerens tv Dramas:

24 Nov 2008

Welcome

Welcome... Lol.