Creative Critical Reflection

Here is my refection on my project linked here but also displayed below. I'm sorry that I sort of get cut off at the end but I think you'll be ok with it after having heard 15 minutes of my voice already. :) Enjoy!

FInal Project: The Shopping Cart Diaries

All the blood, sweat, and tears poured into this quirky masterpiece. Linked here but also present below. Enjoy! :)

Marketing

So I just wanted to share with you a poster that my group mate Emily Gitten created on canvas. Just in case this film gets picked up by a huge producer on Hollywood, I expect this poster to be the initial marketing product used in promoting the movie. I hope you think it's as cute as I do!

Filming

We have officially filmed all of our scenes! It was difficult to get everyone to focus, but I actually had a lot more fun than I thought I would filming this project. We couldn't stop laughing at people watching us while we shot awkward scenes in the middle of the grocery store. While filming, I had my teacher's voice in the back of my head reminding me to take multiple shots because it's always better to have too much film than not enough. We also tried to make heavy use of different angles to make sure that the film opening is aesthetically engaging and interesting. While I can't show you everything we filmed yet, below is a shot of one of my favorite bloopers. Let the editing begin!!

Sound

Earlier in the year, my teacher had us do a project relating to sound where we had to portray a story using only sound. What I learned from this assignment was just how important the sound aspect of a production is. I know that our intro would require the perfect music in order to convey our mood and tone. The only problem is, we had no idea where to start. I wasn't emotionally attached to any song enough to seek out the rights for it. When we asked for help a fellow classmate recommended a site that contains royalty free music entitled Purple Planet. After searching through this site for what felt like hours, we found the perfect songs that we wanted to use. The songs are entitled "Cool Clicker" and "All Together" and both were found under the "fun background music" tab. The most exciting part about listening to this music was that it made the vision for the movie really start to come together in my mind. Next step: filming!!

Purple Planet Royalty Free Music. (n.d.). Retrieved March 30, 2015, from http://www.purple-planet.com

The Actor

As we get ready to begin filming our final project, we had to make careful choices as to who we were going to cast for our main character. We knew that we wanted our character to be dorky, lovable, and somewhat relatable. Initially I thought of my tall, awkward, white friend named Jake. He perfectly embodied the character. However, I couldn't stop thinking about how our film was supposed to "challenge social conventions." I went home that day, like every other day, and sat down next to my mom as she watched a show on television called "Fresh Off the Boat." It was then that I had an epiphany (or as close to an epiphany as an 18 year old can get) and knew how we could challenge social conventions. Not only in the news but everyday at school I hear people talk about stereotypes in one form or another. "All Asians ___," or "All Jews ___," and I am getting annoyed with theses bold generalizations. Not only that, but these stereotypes were being used for entertainment on my own television. I decided to do some research and came across many websites such as this one and this one. Basically, they talk about how Asians are still being underrepresented in media while films are (thankfully) making reforms to incorporate black and female representation.

Growing up in Southern California, I was constantly surrounded by Asian Americans as well as their culture. I noticed that what I saw on screen didn't match what I saw in real life and even though I have absolutely no Asian blood running through my veins, I couldn't help but feel offended. I knew that for our film we wanted to have an Asian American cast as our lead. I can't even recall a movie I have seen where an Asian was the lead. As I started thinking about who to cast, I needn't look further past Aaron Wong. I met Aaron in my economics class this year and he was the perfect balance between cute and awkward. It was clear that Aaron would be the perfect choice to represent Asians in media for our project. Below I have a picture of Aaron looking off into the future of Asian representation in media: and it is looking bright.

Cheng, J., Hsieh, C., Lu, S., & Talgo, S. (n.d.). Media Representations of Asians. Retrieved March 26, 2015, from http://sitemaker.umich.edu/psy457_tizzle/home

Haque, Z. (n.d.). Representation of Asian Americans in film limited. Retrieved March 26, 2015, from http://www.nyunews.com/2014/12/05/haque-9/

Storyboard

Before we film anything, it's very important to have a clear idea of which shots exactly we want to film in order to effectively portray our tone and style. When looking at other films similar to the one we want to make, I noticed that they made heavy use of long shots. In order to keep with this trend, we decided that the best way to open our film was with a long shot of a barren street. After a second or two, a shopping cart rolls by in and out of the screen and then some music begins to play as our opening title sequence begins. We're deciding to take the Napoleon Dynamite route and show our credits before introducing any characters or the story. Keeping with this inspiration, we plan to use the labels of items in the grocery store to show the credits.

After more deliberation on which scenes exactly we wanted to include in our limited, two minute film opening, we finished out story board!! It is displayed below. :)