My Cast

In my opening I have 5 actors that each have there own important roles and provide an incite into what they do in this film opening.

My 5 actors are.....

:Oliver Morley Brown

  Oliver Played my Hostage in my opening and was willing to be tied to a chair and taped up to represent a stereotypical hostage and played the part reasonably well. the scene were he looks out a window then turns back to the ultranationalists he gives use the impression that he is aware of his rescue or just looking out the window this works well as it then grips the audience into whether or not he knows about the rescue or not and keeps the audience glued to the screen.


:George Moffit

  George played the main Ultranationalist of my opening and provided the opening with a basic incite to his role and power of his character as the negotiator of the group. he played his part reasonably but did have his amateur moments when talking on the phone but I am happy with his performance.


:Isaac Dawson

  Isaac played my aggressive ultranationalist in my opening and quickly indicated his power and attitude in his opening scene by bossing the other ultranationalist about then going and hitting the hostage. Isaac's performance was by far my favorite as he showed try emotion of the character he played with a realistic type anger and attitude.


:Matthew Hunter

  Matt's Played the 3rd ultranationalist who is quickly established as a basic soldier that follows orders and opinion isn't valid  although his act was brief he quickly explained his role in the opening as a guard/hired gun


:James Harmsworth

  James scene was brief, a few seconds to be exact as he was my sniper on the hill side and all he did was hold the gun and look like an SAS type soldier/ Mercenary he proved this well as the serious look on his face shows the true reality of the situation

sniper scope effect "how i did it"

In my opening i have a scene were a Point of view shot is used through a sniper scope to look at the hostage.
this shot wasn't actually taken through a scope or a filter attached to the camera it was in fact an effect I learned after researching how to do it on YouTube.

It was actually very simple all I had to do was take an existing image and play it over the original footage I gathered from researching the effect but my problem was I had to create my own scope so I took a easy image off Google images as a template and designed my own in a bit of Software called "Adobe Fireworks"

 The one above was the original image I used as a template to get an idea how to make my own. my own production is the one below which i made from a series of different shapes and mathematical precision in placing each one to create the sort of scope I was after.

Once I had created my own scope I saved it as a JPEG and transferred it by memory stick on to the Apple Macs which then was converted to a quick time image which I could then upload into final cut pro. in final cut pro it was simple all I had to do was place the image above the original footage in a separate video play bar and then select the positioning of the scope to get the area I want visible in the scope.

The image works because the white inside it does not play in the film and when another bit of footage is played at the same time it replaces the white with that footage and wear as the black cancels out the footage. both of these create the effect I am after which is my sniper scope shot.

Editing my 2 Minute opening

There was a problem with actually filming my footage as i had had a problem finding a location after my previous location was no longer accessible so I took the idea of multi set filming and filmed half and half, half being were i live and the other half in a board room in a local primary school. Please note that I had run out of options by this point as I had all my filming set for 2 days after my proffered location was no longer available to use so I took what i could use and tried to make it ideal.  but the actual setting of the hostage room was a form of old abandoned school room so the setting is sort of correct to my opening.

  Anyhow I managed to get the footage I needed and got them uploaded on to the Apple Mac I would be using to edit my footage.  

Only around 1 minute 20 seconds of my opening is actual footage I shot the rest is all institutional information and effects to give it a more professional affect on the audience.

 My institutional information contains a prologue to give the audience an idea of how the situation came about and this taken up 30 seconds of my institutional info,

 some films Like Black Hawk Down "which I researched earlier" do the exact same and use a prologue to give the audience the background of the story and in that case lasts the full two minute opening. Mine does not use the full two minutes to create a prologue/ background image for the audience to get a better understanding of the film about to be shown. some films use this as attraction for audiences and give away small scenes that make the audience want to see more

   My sound track for my opening was hard as most films have fully made songs that span there whole opening what maintain a dramatic impact and follow the pace of the scene.  so I had to create a song of different parts of samples of music to suit and improve the scene e.g. for the end shot of the sniper to the film title  i had a loud base to give impact. also sound effects like the mobile phone were also put in give the object "the phone" importance to the film so sound plays a key part to what is happening in the film and I used as much as I could to the best of my ability.