Pre-Production - Pirates of the Caribbean
Introduction
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of The Black Pearl is a pirate themed film that follows a narrative based around irreverent pirate, Jack Sparrow who goes on an epic quest to find the legendary "Black Pearl" ship. The production started around September 2002 for the film to be fully finished in February 2003 for the film to hit cinemas on the 8th of August the same year. Pirates of The Caribbean: The Curse of The Black Pearl had a budget of 140 Million USD. The film had to have a serious risk assessment as the filming took place at sea which could prove fatal if something went wrong. The film also featured very a luxurious set of filming locations which means that planning for all outcomes are essential as and any form of mishap could delay the film by a large amount.
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Pre-Production is the process of preplanning a film in order to ensure that the filming process goes smoothly and that the desired outcome is achieved. Production companies will possess a Pre-production department. This is to ensure that budget is distributed evenly, or to ensure that the film is possible to make within the time frame. This Pre-production process will often feature a legal team in order to prevent the company being sued, having legal loopholes or ensuring that the film can't be flagged in any sort of way.
This is Unit 4 - Learning Aims A. In U4 LAA we learned various details and features of film pre-production. We covered films such as London to Brighton and Veronica Mars which has allowed us to to understand the wider selection of film pre-production processes and film funding methods. This knowledge was essential to compile as we knew that we would go on to make our own film intros which require us to have a plethora of pre-production knowledge of methods and processes.
BBFC
The British Board of Film Classification is a film grading organisation that is used nationwide to grade and moderate films that are in circulation. This moderation is to make sure that children are seeing films that are age appropriate. The BBFC also stands to ensure that monetary gain goes to the right people by running anti piracy campaigns.
London To Brighton
London to Brighton is a highly successful film that was made on a low budget with guerrilla methods in order to achieve the finished result. London to Brighton is considered a socialist realist film which means that it is intended to make you believe that the film is real. It was mentioned that the actors used method acting to achieve this effect. Method acting is when actors act as if they were the character they're playing rather than playing a role. London to Brighton got a good reception despite its quite low budget of £500,000.
Shifty
Shifty was a crime thriller, produced by Between The Eyes, that was made on a really low budget of only £100,000. Despite this, the film grossed £244,579 after being distributed by metronome. The film caused a lot of controversy as the film was promoted through drug dealer-esque cards and pirate radio stations. While doing this to promote the film; it caught the attention of the media which allowed it to progress even further in the media therefore, giving it more publicity.
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The film was funded through the "microwave" scheme which allowed production to be finished in 18 days.
Life in a day
Life in a day was a film that was compiled and edited by Scott Free Productions. The film featured crowdsourced video footage and narrative that was designed to show the degree of difference that different people have. All filming took place on the 24th of July 2010 and was edited to show how peoples days differed. The production company sent a camera and two SD cards to different people spanning over 192 countries. This was vital in the production to allow a good variety of diversity in the film to be in place.
Media Production Examples
TV
Magazines
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Social Medias
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Advertising
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Newspapers
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Film
Advantages and Disadvantages of Single Camera Production.
Advantages:
Cheaper
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more consistent film
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Disadvantages:
Takes longer
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Less Storage
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Crowdfunding
Crowdsourcing
What needs to be financed
Crowdfunding is the process where a film is funded through relying on donations from the general public. These are often done a reward based incentive such as tiers or mentions.
Veronica Mars
Veronica Mars was a film that was conceptualised and then funded and created through the use the crowdfunding. The film when finished; was distributed by Warner brothers and produced by Spondoolie Productions. The film is known and renown for being the fastest film to ever reach one million dollars and two million dollars funded. The projects original ask was two million dollars however, the project ended up grossing six-point-six million total. The original goal of two million hours was achieved in a just eleven hours which makes Veronica Mars one of the most successful crowd funded endeavours in history. This Crowdfunding feat also broke the record for most backers on one project, standing at 91,585 donators.
Crowdsourcing is when a film is made and compiled through footage that has been filmed and made by members of the public who sign up to do it. This is the process that was used in life in a day.
Horizontal Integration
Horizontal Integration is where a media company will own multiple sources of media output such as magazines, newspapers, radio, television, etc. The media company will make use of these different output methods in order to amass more money and helps promote the company and their services.
Crew
Equipment
Transport
HR
Employees
Props
Cameras
Dollys
The Sets
Actors
CGI
Lights
Stuntmen
Accommodation
Advertising
Food
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