Analysis of the Animatic Process

A Critical Analysis of the Animatic Process of my group’s Film Trailer.

An animatic is the process of producing a preliminary version of a film trailer, which is produced by shooting successive segments of a storyboard. The preliminary version consists of still photographs that represent the moving pictures that will take place in the official trailer. Its function is to allow the film-maker to visually see whether the film trailer will be a success, it allows them to see if the plot works well with the props, location, camera shots etc that have already been decided upon. The animatic also allows the film-maker to plan how long each shot will be shown for and it allows them to see how individual shots will look visually on the moving trailer. They can therefore plan how each shot will be positioned or angled in the final product. The preliminary task generally allows the group to test their initial ideas before creating the final product so that they can identify what aspects of the animatic doesn’t work and needs to be changed before finalising it into a film trailer. Lastly by creating an animatic they can see whether their ideas are realistically achievable and can see if their ideas come across through the images in the way they wanted it to for example they get to see whether their soundtrack is effective along with the moving shots.

The process of an animatic includes various goals which all have to be completed in a specific time frame for example the storyboard, shots, soundtrack, editing etc must all be discussed and created by a specific deadline. An animatic works by first creating a storyboard with your media group this helps to take everyone’s ideas into consideration and helps to show how your ideas will look like put together on paper. The storyboard allowed us to organise the shots that we had imagined to look effective, by adjusting the layout and order of them to create a moving trailer that flows. The next step was to organise our shooting schedule, we achieved this by first looking at all our free time and noting when other members of the group were available when we each were. We noted these dates/times in our time tables and then came up with specific times based on this schedule that we were all able to visit our chosen location and film together. This was usually when we had a production lesson 5^th period so that we could use lunch time for filming and after school also. Alongside this schedule we had to try to make sure that we had all the props needed for these shoots so that we could bunch our shots together and take them in a hand full of shoots. We then had to choose actors, we based our decisions on who was the most flexible and reliable people available to us. We also considered people who would fit our characters best.

However our ‘schedule’ didn’t always turn out to how we planned as it was very hard to shoot with every actor available seen as everyone has a different daily routine and wasn’t always free when needed. Also it was hard to stick to our schedule as most of our shoots consisted of shots outdoors and we couldn’t always rely on the weather being dry, due to the difficulties with weather and availability of actors the time frame we had to take the shots was much shorter than planned originally when we was set this preliminary task. This effected our animatic quite a bit as it was rushed towards the end.

The final stage was to put all these shots together whilst editing the animatic. This stage is crucial as this is the first time that our group had visually seen the shots taken in chronological order. The editing is very important as it allows us to realistically imagine how the final product would look like, this therefore allows us to determine whether the film trailer would be a success. By looking at the edited shots we could see if there was any differences that we needed to make in the official task to make it more effective. At this time we considered how we wanted the soundtrack to sound like, we discussed whilst creating our storyboard that we would like Celtic chanting included in our trailer to fit in with the history of the plot. However due to our slow start this was the stage that we fell back on and didn’t take as seriously as we should have. We ran out of time and as a result it limited that time we had to edit our animatic.

We created and developed the narrative of our animatic by first writing an individual 500 word plot synopsis which had no group input what so ever, we did this so that we could express our own ideas about the plot and suggest how we would like our film trailer to be portrayed e.g type of genre horror, comedy, action etc. We then discussed our individual plots as a group and tried to compromise with each other’s ideas. We then came to an agreement and decided to merge all four individual plots together, taking the strengths of each plot. We moved on from deciding our film plot to making the animatic by creating our story board. The story board was incredibly useful as it gave us a set structure to follow as a result. This structure benefited our group as it allowed us to create a shooting schedule and it also made sure that we stayed on track and didn’t get our ideas confused.

Five Shoots took place in total, at two different main locations. The only props used were the book, the tents and the car. The actors were mainly chosen due to reliability but the characteristics of specific characters were taken into account also. Three of our actors (including myself) were members of our group. We each volunteered for this role as we were prepared to take this responsibility and knew that we were reliable as we would take the roles seriously. We used our storyboard to organise our shots by looking at the camera angles to see what looked most effective with each individual shot, it also helped to bunch all of our shots together that were in the same location which helped us structure our shooting schedule. Several shots were missing from our animatic as we were unable to take these photo in the time scale that we had. The missing shots were those from the montage which are very important as they represent the chosen genre of our film trailer which is horror.

When it came to the construction of our animatic we uploaded all of our photographs onto the software and placed them in the correct order which matched the one created initially with our storyboard. Once we had put the shots in the correct order we then added the intertitles which were already previously created by one of our group members who shows in an interest in ICT. We then added transitions and incorporated our own soundtrack.

We chose the length of our shots and transitions by following the estimated times we had made whilst creating our story board. However the timings sometimes varied whilst taking the shots as we decided to keep to conventional times of shots positioned in film trailers. Also when we edited our animatic and had a more realistic over view we decided to change the length of some of the opening intertitles which reveal the background history of our plot. We decided to shorten these intertitles in our official film trailer so that we keep the audience interested from the start of the trailer to the end; enticing them in with every shot seen as it is used as a promotional device.

As a group we discussed what we initially thought should be incorporated into our intertitles, we all had an input and suggested specific titles that we could use. We based the ideas of our intertitles around existing horror film trailers as we wanted a realistic representation of a moving video with conventional features. We tried not to rush into creating the intertitles as we wanted them to sound perfectly suitable for our film plot. We also decided to reveal to the audience enough background information to keep them in the link but also agreed on not revealing too much of the film plot e.g so that the code of enigma still existed. We then as a group decided to use a font style that reflects the time period in which the film is set. We used the colour scheme of red, black and white seen as this a conventional aspect of a horror film trailer.

Overall the soundtrack we used for our animatic I believe was very effective, it created tension and suspense which are the emotions which are expected to be felt by the audience whilst watching a horror film trailer. The purpose of the soundtrack is to relate to the genre of the film and in this case its purpose is to make the audience feel scared and distressed. The aim of the non-diegetic soundtrack is to make the audience almost experience emotional strain whilst watching the trailer. I believe that the soundtrack that we have used for our animatic is constructive as it achieves what we set out to do e.g the drum beat present which could be seen as symbolising a heartbeat emphasises the idea of death and therefore creates a tense atmosphere. The soundtrack also emphasises the pace of the editing, as the action increases so does the music. However the only negative side to our choice of soundtrack is that I personally feel that our music should reflect the time in which the film is set and should reveal some of the plot e.g Celtic chanting should be included in the soundtrack to emphasise the history of Wales and to create the emotions of distress and confusion.

Our completed animatic appeals to our target audience (ages 17-22 and of mix gender) as the film plot is about five University students that go on a camping trip and this is the age frame that represents students best.

Overall I believe that me and my media group have done a great job within the time we have had to create an animatic. However I also believe that there is quite a lot of room for improvements. I have created a list of improvements that I believe should be made for the real film trailer; firstly make a start with filming sooner to allow us more time to film, edit and create soundtrack, organise time better by creating a more effective schedule that we stick to, designate different roles for each member to allow us to work faster, make sure the trailer is saved and is backed up so that no valuable filming is lost, get group together more often to allow us to perform more shots, divide time specifically for editing and filming allowing us to keep up to date on both techniques, focus on fear aspect of the trailer by completing the montage effectively and lastly to sort out props and costumes as soon as possible before filming.

My role during this process was to organise times that we could meet up by negotiating times with my group, providing my group with a camera and driving us to the locations. I also had an input with a variety of shots whilst creating our story board. In addition to this I expressed my feelings and shared my ideas with my group member who was creating the soundtrack e.g we all agreed on how we would like it to sound. In the official moving trailer I will contribute to its production by; ordering equipment, helping others to create props, styling and applying makeup to the actors, providing transport and by acting in our film trailer.