Double Dealing Script

Studio Expectations

When considering Studio options for this semester, Constraints as Creative Fuel stood out as it specified working with and around limitations. When working on media, I find defining what the project can and cannot be is extremely important early in the creative process. A great deal of the time, this is informed by identifying external constraints such as budget, skill level or geography; each of which imposes different limitations but can lead to adopting self-imposed constraints which inform the style and ultimately serve to give the project a clearer creative direction. I feel I discover new techniques, solutions, or skills most commonly when I am working around external constraints.

For example, when I participated in the Synthetic Media Studio, to more accurately synthesise a voice without paying fees to companies for access to their Text-to-speech AI; I learned how to use open-source AI software Tortoise TTS using Python. What the AI-generated was an ethereal voice, got stuck on words and felt disconnected from reality, this was a result of my inexperience with the Software. But, upon reflection, I can see that this constraint informed the style of the piece as the voice would have been too clean had I paid for an online AI TTS website. As a result, I decided to embrace an ethereal and disconnected feeling throughout the piece.

Ultimately, my goals in the studio are to develop my ability to utilise limitations to inform my creative direction. I enjoy using different types of technologies, pieces of software, and editing techniques to create media, especially when it involves learning media production methods. Within the context of working in a film crew, I’d love to hone my editing; and begin developing a better understanding of the scriptwriting process as I feel it is a particular weakness of mine when creating media pieces.

Reflective Posts: Self-Imposed Creative Constraints

For homework, we had to consider media we had previously engaged with or created and identify self-imposed creative constraints. I initially found myself naming external constraints such as budget or classification guides, when reconsidering with the Dogma 95 rules in mind self-imposed constraints became easier to identify.

A self-imposed constraint that struck me was director Adam Curtis’ near-exclusive use of Archival Footage in his documentary-making process. By weaving together footage of the past and present, Curtis weaves together historical events, encouraging viewers to consider how they may be related and have contributed to the current political climate we exist.

Can’t Get You Out of My Head (2021)

This approach however has been criticised as he bombards audiences with confronting images accompanied by carefully selected soundtracks and assumes a position of authority, he is encouraging audiences to be critical. In response, Curtis created Trauma Zone: 1985-1999 (2022) where he documents the fall of the Soviet Union and the rise of Oligarchs in Russia without using dialogue, utilising superimposed text to identify key pieces of information throughout the piece.

TraumaZone 1985 – 1999 (2022)

Constraints influencing style became more noticeable as I considered Curtis’ work, and I began considering constraints chosen by filmmakers that affect the overall experience of the film. For example, Kevin Smith’s choice to film Clerk’s (1995) on black and white film is not a deliberate aesthetic choice, but to remove a green glare that would be present due to the lighting on location. This choice enhanced the relatability of the piece, adding to its grounded feel and allowing viewers to feel as if they were observing an actual convenience store through CCTV cameras.

Boy and His Atom (2013)

Constraints do not always have to be a result of happenstance or economic situation, for example, a film made by IBM in 2013 was made by arranging CO molecules under a Microscope at 1 million times zoom. Whilst a novelty, the film represents massive leaps in technology and science and is an accessible way to explain a monumental discovery in atomic science.

Clerks (1994)

Finally, the most recent example I could think of for this task was Yorgos Lanthimos’s choice to use actors Jesse Plemmons, Emma Stone and Willem Dafoe in different roles throughout his triptych Kinds of Kindness (2024). This choice makes the film feel extremely self-contained and encourages the audience to ruminate further on the nature of power within relationships explored in the piece.

Kinds of Kindness (2024)

Reflective Posts: Script Writing Activity

In class, we chose a song at random to listen to on a loop whilst writing out ideas. I immediately took to my initial genre of Mockumentary as I am a big fan of media such as Documentary Now! (2015 – Present), Reno 911 (2003 – 2009) and Brass Eye (1997). The use of unfamiliar music allowed me to focus on writing out my idea in full, as I began to construct a mockumentary in the style of online investigative journalism. This choice was inspired by the previously mentioned programmes, as they use absurd humour to explore tropes of television documentary making which I hope to include in the final script.

Using the outline I wrote during the music listening exercise, I began to write a vomit draft script using writer duet. I revisited the previous mockumentaries and VICE’s many videos exploring the world of drug trade and manufacturing. Whilst watching VICE pieces I found that they utilise Creative Commons footage, as well as a lot of B-Roll to supplement their pieces, and I sought to include these montages within the script. This led to me having a learning moment in the inclusion of voiceovers within a montage sequence, solving this issue by integrating the dialogue and visual direction when writing the script.

Throughout using writer duet, I could feel my scriptwriting skills develop, as I used the program the routine of writing dialogue and action became much easier; I began to stop and consider how the characters would be moving and reacting as they interacted. I attempted to include some humour as this is a mockumentary at its core. But I feel I may have been clumsy with my integration of the revenge genre constraint; however, I am pleased with the narrative arc I created while writing this script.

Initiative Post

After beginning this course my view of constraints has expanded to see them as points of creative generation and opportunity. Whilst I had always enjoyed limitations and surpassing them, viewing them as opportunities has changed my perspective of constraints as being exclusively external. The possibility of media makers deliberately setting constraints for themselves was something I was aware of, but I had considered them as setting arbitrary challenges for themselves as a selling point of their pieces.

However, as this studio has progressed, I have changed this cynical viewpoint. I am becoming more interested in deliberate creative choices through including obstacles in the creation process can lead to unique and provoking pieces that challenge the norms of production. The example we watched in class of The Five Obstructions (2003) grew on me greatly when I realised the intent of Lars. By watching him attempt to encourage his idol and friend to return to himself through realising his own capability by meeting and exceeding constraints and limitations.

This caused me to reflect on choices made by media makers, as previously mentioned Yorgos Lanthimos and Adam Curtis have made clear styles out of self-imposed creative constraints, and they have led to pieces that I enjoy immensely. Adam Elliot’s Memoir of a Snail (2024) and Mary and Max (2009) also benefit greatly from his choice to create his works within the medium of clay stop-motion. The choice of medium is extremely important to the overall style of the piece, and when considering clay as a self-imposed choice; Elliot’s dark and uncomfortable world retains a child-like charm which allows for the exploration of deeply sombre but human stories.

Memoir of a Snail (2024)

External constraints can also lead to these pieces, as seen in Jafar Panahi’s Offside (2006) in which he hybridises documentary and drama. Offside (2006) is an Iranian film focusing on a group of teenagers seeking to attend a football match in Tehran despite some of them being girls. Panahi creates a piece that feels as if you are following this group in their daring attempt to dodge the Iranian police at the football stadium; the line between reality and fiction is extremely thin and as a result this piece is banned from being screened in Iran. The subversion of massive cultural and political external constraints adds a lot to the experience of the film, as the stakes are extremely apparent and close to the actors whom you aren’t entirely sure are safe.

Offside (2006)

The selection of constraints and negotiation unavoidable constraints each guide the creative process in different ways, but both provide an opportunity to tell a narrative. Furthermore, the range of constraints as I understood them has expanded significantly and has provided me a new lens to look at other pieces of media. By developing this understanding, I look forward to the ways this studio will influence my creative processes, and hopefully help me be more agile and adaptable to limitations arising. As well as purposefully choosing constraints to guide me through a creative process, informing the style, production, medium, and product as a whole.

Research

Revenge

While researching for Double Dealing, I considered revenge films which have stayed with me long after viewing. Films such as Black ’47 (2018), Mad Max (1979) and Promising Young Woman (2020) sit within the genre of revenge, but each film fulfils tropes of the genre in different ways and to various extent. A key element shared across all three films reflects a revenge film genre trope explained by Robson, “The victims are usually those directly involved in causing the perceived harm or someone taken to represent institutional harm.” (Robson 2021). Considering this explanation and following parallels from the three films helped inform my script writing process. As they both inspired me to further develop the relationship between the two characters to create a clearer narrative reason for the revenge to take place.

Robson further explains, “A major trope within the vengeance roster are those films which centre on revenge for wrongs visited on family or friends which goes unpunished” (Robson 2021). I felt that this “unpunished perpetrator” trope resonated well with drug dealers. Whilst many are caught, the life of drug dealers is often free from the consequences of the narcotics they distribute into their community until the day they are apprehended. Within the context of a revenge story, I wanted to explore the impacts felt by the families of the victims of drug use; and worked to develop my script to reflect the choices of drug dealers and justifications they may have for their actions.

Mocumentary Genre

Having been familiar with Mockumentaries as a genre, considering the integration of mockumentary tropes within a revenge context provided a challenge. The feasibility of replicating both genres brought up concerns surrounding the well-established mockumentary trope of the presence of a documentary crew to establish a sense of documentarian authority within the piece.

This can be seen in films such as Best in Show (2000), Surfs Up (2007) and District 9 (2009), which use these crews in establishing the context of their stories. But often the presence of these crews fades when the documentary feel has been established; this as discussed by Wallace has become a staple of modern mockumentaries, as audiences have become overfamiliar with these tropes. Thus, my script remained similar in its small crew size, but my scriptwriting began more frequently using the “immediacy of the camerawork, the urgency in the image [to suggest] that ‘this is happening right now and can only be captured on film at this very moment’, and the mode of performance.” (Wallace 2018)

Reflection

Using genre as a starting point provided me with ‘goalposts’ that I could use when generating ideas for my script. Researching these genres and discovering the tropes within them, allowed me to begin structuring a narrative in broad strokes, providing time to considering influences and themes I wanted to include in my script. Having one genre I was familiar with also helped in this task and allowed me to further explore a genre I hadn’t fully considered, as I originally considered revenge as a plot element rather than rigid genre definition. The use of genre as a guide has shown me a new approach to creating media, as often the choice of genre is left to my own choice and often I would struggle with the overwhelming range of potential creative choices I could make.

Researching tropes also provided me with tools to construct this narrative, as I found they illuminated choices made in the production of films I am familiar with and provided stepping stones between narrative moments. These stepping stones allowed me to revisit and rewrite parts of my script to follow or subvert established genre conventions. Understanding these tropes informed me on which elements of my narrative could potentially satisfy audiences expectations when viewing pieces within the genre. And as a result, replicating the visual iconography of the genres became easier to integrate into my script writing.

References:

Robson, P. W. G. (2021). Developments in Revenge, Justice and Rape in the Cinema. International Journal for the Semiotics of Law Revue Internationale de Sémiotique Juridique

Wallace, R. (2018). Mockumentary comedy : performing authenticity. Palgrave Macmillan.

Blog Posts

Vimeo Link

Production Folder

Week 4 Pre-Production

We began our final project with assigned roles and two operating constraints. My roles were Production Design, Cinematographer and Colourist. As a group, we decided to film in a single location and use only natural lighting during the production of our piece. These roles were mostly familiar, as on previous projects I had taken on the role of production designer, and I’ve had some experience working on colour grades in Premiere Pro. Cinematography however was entirely new to me, I was quite nervous to take on such an important role in the project; so I began by working with the director Caelan to find a movie I could watch to fully understand the visual aesthetic he had in mind.

I left our first class as a group with the film Before Sunrise (1995) directed by Richard Linklater; to be honest, it was a film I wasn’t familiar with and a genre I had limited experience watching. But, watching the film alongside collating a list of similar movies, the group and I began to share a common vision as to how the piece was to be filmed. As Caelan worked on a script, I began trying to find comparable scenes from Before Sunrise (1995) as I worked on developing a shot list. We presented our pitch presentations during week 4 and received a lot of feedback we can easily take onboard and integrate into our piece. I began watching Premiere Pro tutorials on YouTube to refresh my understanding of Lumetri Colour and the various ways that colour can be used in films to aid in visual storytelling.

Week 5 Production

Production on 8 Minutes Until Midnight began quickly, on Monday we spent a few hours filming with our actress Olivia Skinner who played the main character Alex. Sourcing a location had proved more of a challenge than initially thought, and we had to settle on filming in a house rather than an apartment. This turned out to be in our favour as it lessened the potential impact of the sun affecting our shoot, which was an issue raised during our pitch presentation. I relied heavily on getting feedback for how I set up shots from the director and received several helpful recommendations from other crew members that informed my filming process. As the shoot progressed, and especially on our second day of filming, I gained more and more confidence in my ability to frame shots and using the onboard technology of the FX-3 made focusing, adjusting ISO, and levelling shots.

During Week 5 we also had two production meetings where we went through the progress we had made as a group. These production meetings were useful as they provided individuals a chance to speak on how they perceived the production process. Furthermore, the meetings were an opportunity to receive valuable advice we could apply during the second night of filming. Following Leah’s call sheet and shot list made the second night flow faster, but admittedly we had filmed most of the project on the first night. My biggest issue during the shoot was the use of handheld during some scenes, on the first night I drank too much caffeine and the result was some shaky clips that I wasn’t particularly proud of. But come the second night I had learned my lesson, limited my caffeine intake and shot the breakup scene completely handheld, and I was quite proud of how the footage came out at the end.

Week 6 Post-Production

The footage we recorded was assembled into a rough draft, which we presented to the class on Tuesday of Week 6. I was extremely late for class and missed the chance to view other works made by the class, but the group had taken on board a lot of feedback from the presentation.

We entered the editing bays as a group, and I paid attention to how the piece was structured so I could begin contemplating how to grade the footage for the final piece. We found that a few sections of the piece came off as awkward, as there were lengthy silences. So the group split, with one remaining in the editing bay and the other group beginning the search for the SFX we could use to fill those silences. Furthermore, we began constructing a rough colour grade as we worked, increasing the saturation and contrast, and using colour tints to convey feelings of cold sadness and warm happiness.

Overall, working as a group was extremely pleasant, we all had different areas of expertise and without overstepping our assigned roles were comfortable in offering and receiving advice and feedback throughout the production process. I was extremely pleased when I saw how the footage looked after tweaking the colours and developing a fine and final cut. But, having a role in this production has shown me new ways of working alongside others, and reminded me that there is a deep well of potential to tap into when working in a group.

Studio Reflection

Golden Age Cinema

Initially I was uninterested in Golden Age Cinema as I had preemptively decided it was about movies I respect but am uninterested in replicating or exploring. However, upon finding out it was inspired by the golden age of television my opinion changed dramatically, and I engaged with two pieces from the studio eager to see how the studio groups replicated this golden era. The promise of narrative complexity, episodic plots and twists, drew me further into the concept of the studio outline and has encouraged me to look further into studio descriptions when choosing in the future. The pieces I chose to reflect on were Out of Sight (2024) and Heather (2024).

Out of Sight (2024) tells the story of two friends going camping who become the victims of an unseen stalker. Directed by Emma Boyce, the piece creates a world for the audience that remains cohesive despite having supernatural or surreal elements. It reminds me of Black Mirror and Lost, and features many of the aspects of golden age television explained in the studio brief. The technical capability of the production team resulted in a piece that felt tense and left a sense of lingering dread after viewing. But ultimately remained well produced and of a high degree of visual and audio quality.

Heather (2024) is a mediation that demonstrates the capability of high visual fidelity and direction of effectively telling a story. Directed by Mir Israni, Heather (2024) is quite visually compelling and effectively tells a complex story of grief and loss with only a single word. The team used tight cinematography with technically adventurous shots that are reminiscent of golden age television shows, and the technical capability of the sound and colour design aided in walking audiences through the interior lives of the characters on screen.

Whilst I was dismissive of the Golden Age Cinema studio, I will remember in future semesters to more thoroughly consider each studio, as the pieces I watched when reflecting on the studio were of such an exceptional quality.

Constraints as Creative Fuel

Constraints as Creative Fuel was a studio unlike others I have completed during my comms degree. When considering constraints both internal and external, as useful tools of the creative process rather than just as obstructions; I found that my creative process had a much clearer direction. And as a result I was able to engage with new skills and techniques with less apprehension or dismissiveness than I would have previously. The constraints we explored in classes allowed us to be ready to adapt, and the resulting pieces are able to integrate their constraints in ways that added positively to the viewing experience.

Let Him In (2024) is a romance thriller directed by Bambi Cheung, while watching it as an audience member I found it to be visually stunning. It had excellent cinematography from T who captured a well dressed set that was lit immaculately. Its actors and writers presented a story of a relationship collapse and eventual murder, but used it to explore the role of vanity and social media and the real world consequences of speaking without thinking. Their use of a pen prop added a particular brutality to the penultimate scene of the piece, and the inclusion of their randomly selected line was slick and flowed well in dialogue. With constraints from the script guiding the plot, I believe the inclusion of constraints on further production added to the grounded nature of the piece and added to the tension needed for a successful queer revenge thriller piece.

Red Kush (2024) is a crime thriller directed by Xavier Donovan. Its use of constraints in the scriptwriting process has created a piece that clearly resides within the crime thriller genre, and was another well produced piece from the studio. The team captured Chinatown and Suburban Melbourne with an excellent eye, and told an interesting story of drug use and revenge. They similarly managed to include their assigned line within a dialogue exchange and assigned prop used to light a dingy drug den. The group’s piece was aided immensely by the efforts they went through to record within the Melbourne CBD, as it created an interesting hook to the start of the piece.

Constraints as Creative Fuel was a studio that allowed groups to achieve pieces they were confident in, the constraints imposed made creative adaptation mandatory, which helped in other creative areas as we could identify limitations of the piece we were working on.

Milk Run (2024) was a great chance to practice the use of comedy as a mode, collaborative work, and develop my production skills. I hope our piece effectively utilized the theories of comedy we explored during the semester, as we intended to hybridize coming of age and Harper’s unique lived experiences with comedy as a concept. Ideally, I would like to finish refining my edit to create a piece that has a more cohesive soundscape, as well as further tweaking the pacing of the dialogue scenes. Moving forward I am glad to have gained experience working in group settings as well as had the chance to further develop my understanding of the Adobe suite when creating a piece of media.

Rogue (2024) is a film by Bobby Nguyen, Chloe Stelling, Zoe Anderton, Anna Duong, and Oscar Allen. Blending action and comedy Rogue (2024) is a thoroughly entertaining blend of spy films, time travel adventures, and TikTok dance troupes. I found this group was able to seamlessly blend its stylistic and narrative inspirations with comedy, like Johnny English (2003), Get Smart (1969), and Jazzpunk (2014). The camera work and fight scene choreography coupled with the scriptwriting created a piece that effectively utilized the different comedic forms we have explored over this semester, creating a piece that was extremely funny and memorable.

“TripUp” (2024) is a film by Angus Alexander, Giorgio Curcio, Saskia Christensen, Ben Smith and K Ghassemi. “TripUp” is very similar to films such as The Hangover (2009), Due Date (2010), and Project X (2012), effectively taking a psychedelic approach to the use of comedy within their piece. The film delivered a relatable story of the unexpected consequences of substances taken from a stranger, the plot whilst simple was engaging and was ripe for comedic opportunities which the group utilized to great effect. The cinematography and editing were also extremely well done, I found the piece was effective in maintaining the pace of the narrative whilst maintaining a comedic feeling throughout the piece.

Re-imagining Crime Club was a studio dedicated to Australian True Crime, focused on reimagining crime for a contemporary audience. Using the Crawford Collection from the AFI research collection, this studio examined the genre of True Crime within the context of modern consumption. The Crawford Collection itself was a form of True Crime radio play popular in the 1950s but proves that the public interest in the dramatization of crime has always existed and will continue to exist as technologies change. The story chosen was A Case of Suicide (1954) in which a husband is interrogated for the suspicious circumstances of his partner’s suicide, the group responsible created a series of recreations that provided a new element to the screenplays written by Dorothy Crawford.

Open Case – A Case of Suicide (2024) a piece by Charlotte Thomas, Emily Waters, Ethan Reid, and Riley Collins Dobricic. They weave narration and character performances together to take the audience along for the mystery contained within A Case of Suicide (1954). Whilst some technical aspects could be improved regarding sound and other parts of the edit, the piece itself feels cohesive and allows modern audiences to have a new perspective on a piece of True Crime media that entertained people 70 years ago. The inclusion of archival footage also ensured this piece was memorable, as it provides a deeper context for viewers in that it allows them to determine the period the plot takes place in; potentially encouraging audiences to consider if much has changed.

Group Agreement

This week we formed our groups for our Major Media project, I have experience working with most of my group members Sam, Harper, and Trang from previous group projects and had some understanding of their comedic preference. I haven’t worked with Amy and Matylda before, but I recognized pieces of media included in their mood boards group and was able to better understand what each group member found funny.
While deciding on the form of our project we discussed ideas of a sitcom-style piece, with a focus on understated comedy; we shared funny experiences we had recently, to which I told a story of a housemate having an extremely loud glass of water. I had an idea of a series of sketches of people doing annoying things, presented in the style of The Twilight Zone; with an overarching moral (or none at all). Whilst this idea went unused, the familiarity of student share house life, sensory issues surrounding Misophonia, and the idea of having a strange pairing of characters to focus on resonated with the group.

MoodBoard

My mood board was very scattered because I began listing things I found funny, rather than direct inspirations for our piece, I included several different films and television shows, including the Irish sitcom Father Ted which was played constantly growing up. It was one of the first programs to criticize the Catholic Church as an institution in Ireland through its satire of Priests in the society of remote coastal Irish villages. Having grown up outside of Ireland and religion as an institution, Father Ted framed community figures who are often beloved in Irish villages, as gambling addicts, alcoholics, control freaks, and dimwits.
Similarly, I included video games such as Fallout: New Vegas, and the Metal Gear Solid Franchise which take familiar settings, historical events, and human problems and warp them to comment on larger societal issues surrounding data surveillance, nuclear war, and government oversight. I have included books such as Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas which blends reality and fiction to a mind-boggling degree.
I’d like to mention Viagra Boys specifically. An absurdist punk band Viagra Boy’s album Cave World dissects online right-wing masculinity, through a deeply funny album that critiques paleo-conservative internet users that thrive in conspiracy and misinformation. This album was one of the first times I’d heard such accurate and funny observations on a niche section of the internet. I want to extend this feeling of niche observational comedy on experiences that living in Melbourne is comprised of.

Finally, this was another unused sketch of a plot we could adapt a story around that went unused. Inspired by Apocalypse Now and Heart of Darkness, this was an understandably niche reference that did not resonate well with the group, but I was proud of it nonetheless.

Apocalypse Now

Final Reflection: https://www.mediafactory.org.au/danielcaballmoore/2024/06/03/final-reflection/
Week 11: https://www.mediafactory.org.au/danielcaballmoore/2024/06/03/week-11-reflection/
Week 10: https://www.mediafactory.org.au/danielcaballmoore/2024/06/03/week-10-reflection/
Week 9: https://www.mediafactory.org.au/danielcaballmoore/2024/06/03/week-9-reflection/
Week 8: https://www.mediafactory.org.au/danielcaballmoore/2024/06/03/week-8-reflection/
Week 7: https://www.mediafactory.org.au/danielcaballmoore/2024/06/04/week-7-reflection/

Milk Run – Beyond a Joke Beyond a Genre from Media Factory on Vimeo.

I hope we showed a unique representation of student life that was relatable to our audience, I think the fish-out-of-water qualities of Max as a protagonist were well emphasized and added to the coming-of-age feeling we were trying to capture. By integrating Harper’s lived experiences of moving to Melbourne, we were able to get a different perspective on things we take for granted living in Melbourne. His unique observations allowed us to comment on the cost-of-living crisis, the issues with furniture at cafes, and more in an understated way, with comedy that isn’t at first immediately apparent. We approached the group project with the aim of hybridizing comedy and a coming-of-age film, a goal which I think we achieved to a degree.

Over the course of the semester, I feel as if my approach to comedy has become if not more sophisticated, easier to describe. I found myself revisiting previous pieces of content that I had found tremendously funny with a new way of looking at how they were able to achieve this effect. The concept of comedy as a mode of production in the creation of a piece of media inspired me to explore the genre of comedy verité, “[that], is comedy for audiences raised on television formats.” (Mills 2004, p.78) having already been familiar with the work of John Wilson and Nathan Fielder. I watched different forms of cinema verité which were produced with a comedic goal in mind, films including Spinal Tap (1984), Symbiopsychotaxiplasm (1968) and web series Hardy Bucks (2007), each blending fiction with reality within the form of documentary style recordings.

These comedies and the approach their creators have taken have each produced vastly different results, but what remains consistent is a goal to subvert, commentate, and give representation to those who are living its source material. In my future projects, where appropriate, I would like to replicate this approach to hybridise various types of media with comedic production methods.

If I were to continue working on this piece, there are a few aspects I would alter. I would like the chance to go through and further refine the sound, adding more SFX and atmos to scenes that lacked dialogue. Furthermore, I feel that there were improvements to the cuts in dialogue scenes I could have made to make them funnier, by altering the pace of Max and Charlie’s delivery and practicing more ‘cutting on the absurd’ (Middleton 2002 p.57).

If I were to modify the result of my groups work it would be to extend and lean further into the character of Charlie. I found that our actor Matt really brought Charlie to life with his portrayal and that Charlie worked well as a “comic character” (Toplyn 2014 p.229), if he were to have a goal and a few more exaggerated characteristics, I could see there being more kitchen cadaver situations to explore in a comedic way. Finally, I would have liked the lighting of scenes to have been better but due to time constraints, we had to colour-correct shots in post-production to achieve cohesive flow of time throughout the piece.

Working to create the piece collaboratively was initially slow, as we each had different comedic styles to amalgamate into a script we were happy with. As we gave up control of the script to Harper and Amy to refine, I found that things began to move faster, being allowed to work in a specific role meant I was able to focus on planning props, locations, and pieces of equipment we needed for the shoot.

Filming collaboratively was similarly easier when roles were defined and stuck to, there was a fair degree of overlap in people’s roles and sometimes there were inconsistent qualities of work being recorded to put together the final piece in the edit. When matching up audio there were often two or three different action calls being made by different people, this made things difficult to sync and I had to use other audio cues such as loud noises or single words to line things up in Premiere, for future projects I will be more vigilant about following protocol when calling action to avoid the time it took to synchronise audio.

Amy’s sound mixing was essential for Milk Run to come together as a final piece as I had little experience working with audio in Premiere and Audition. I learned new ways to work with sound across the Adobe suite including techniques for sound isolation and recovering dialogue from scenes with excessive background noise; these will be essential skills to refine as I progress in my media-making career.

Reference List:
Mills B (2004) Comedy verite: contemporary sitcom form Screen (London), 63–78.
Toplyn J (2014) Story Sketches Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV Twenty Lane Media, pp. 221–238.
Middleton J (2002) Documentary Comedy Media International Australia Incorporating Culture & Policy, 104, 55–66.

We began filming on Monday, Amy and I picked up the equipment from the techs at RMIT and met with the rest of the group at Harper’s house. Our first day of filming began slowly, as people arrived, they began to familiarize themselves with their respective equipment. Sam and Harper worked together to operate the camera, they unfortunately had a loose viewscreen to work around which made checking shots difficult between the DOP (Sam) and Director (Harper). Amy was on sound with the assistance of Matylda and Trang, who also helped with running props and checking continuity whilst I was occupied acting as a driver.

We ran into problems as the shoot progressed, after a late lunch group members had to leave and street traffic increased as it was school pickup time, so we decided to wrap up filming for the day and film the final pieces on Wednesday.
On day 2, I had all the props packed and picked up the filming gear from the tech store in my car as we had to transport a lighting kit as well for Wednesday’s shoot. In last-minute prop acquisition, I bought milk, cured meat, and some strips of beef and planned to wrap them around the hands of the mannequin which conveniently unscrewed. The result was underwhelming, and they weren’t included in the final piece, but I took a photo of them anyway.

Hand Photo

We had time before our actor for Charlie (Matthew Robinson) was due to arrive, so we shot some exterior shots of Harper’s house and planned to finish shooting the car scene. As the weather was different the entire car scene was reshot with Harper’s housemate acting as the driver, Matylda, and Trang shared sound responsibilities. We reached the same point as the previous day, and we agreed to have a late lunch as school pickup began again and other group members had to leave.

We resumed shooting when our actor Matt arrived; we then shot until 8 pm and fully knocked out all the interior dialogue filming. We will have to schedule another day to film our montage in Fitzroy Gardens and an original edit of the car scene Amy made was scrapped as well. Hopefully, we can get the shots we need when filming at Edithvale General Store on Sunday.

On Monday we presented to Stayci Taylor and Hannah Camilleri, their feedback was extremely useful in understanding what did and didn’t work with our media project. There was a lack of focus in our pitch and the slides felt disconnected from what we read from our script; I feel this was likely due to the approach of having everyone write a vomit draft as we had begun to form assumptions as to how the piece was going to come together. We wrote down their suggestions and discussed them as a group after the presentations.
Written Feedback from Amy

I liked the idea of addressing the cost-of-living crisis in an understated way, and I really enjoyed their recommendation to repeat the Perth accent joke. This seemed to be at odds with our intention of creating an understated piece of comedy though, Sam pointed out the piece stopped being understated when a cadaver was introduced, which I agreed with wholeheartedly.
During the week I began acquiring props for the production. I abandoned the idea of scalpels and instead settled on kitchen utensils as the scene we’re filming is taking place in a kitchen and due to the low-budget life of a student, it felt fitting the character would be using mismatched equipment. I solved the issue of finding petri dishes after some investigation and found a nearby Mushroom Growing Supply Store (https://aussiemushroomsupplies.com.au/) that sold directly to the public.

Petri Dishes

The costume for the housemate had to similarly reflect a mesh of professional-looking equipment and a university student trying their best. As all backyard chemists do, I looked through the Bunnings website for inspiration, I found painter’s overalls that look similar to medical coveralls and picked up some wood dust masks for an industrial medicine look. To complete this outfit, I borrowed a pair of red sunglasses from a housemate, I felt it would look good on camera and tie together the aesthetic we were aiming for.

Suit

I have one of the Tiny Chairs we need already, I just need to buy a second one which I can get from Officeworks. Furthermore, I’m picturing gross combinations of meat and milk to complete the vision of a deranged medical student with a cadaver, almost like Frankenstein’s monster taking a bath in milk but I have yet to finalize an idea of how to execute this.

Tiny Chair with and without Monkey

In preparation for filming next week, I have prepared a list of equipment we would need for filming, I tried to hire equipment team members were familiar with or that I had a good understanding of how to use myself.

Equipment List

Vomit Draft

Over the weekend several group members wrote vomit drafts based on the three-act structure we had agreed upon last week. We handed the writing process handed off to Amy and Harper who are going to work on refining the script for our presentation next week.

I began the process of organizing locations, and props, based on the rough three-act structure we had all somewhat followed in our vomit drafts. The group agreed on filming the bulk of the project at Harper’s house as we all live similar distances from it and it has a palpable share house vibe. Some of our scripts featured trips to a supermarket, cafés, and bars; this was more difficult to pin down as individual locations to shoot at. I floated the idea of my workplace which is a café and general store in two connected shopfronts, I’ve filmed there before for a previous studio and both sides look like very different places. The owner and I have a good relationship and after asking him on Tuesday I had secured permission for filming, I began the process of preparing a location release form for him to sign before we film.

The idea of filming a montage sequence was also discussed, focusing on enhancing the sense of isolation our protagonist feels throughout the piece as well as providing moments for quick moments of observational humour. We agreed filming around Fitzroy Gardens would be the best decision, as it was near Harper’s house and had the potential for shots where we could isolate the protagonist amongst people enjoying their days. This did raise the question of whether we had permission to film within the city of Melbourne, Bradley confirmed a filming information page I had read was written for commercial filming within the city of Melbourne. After looking into it further I found due to the small size of the crew and equipment, and our intention to film in an unobstructive manner we were classified as “low impact” and weren’t required to notify the city of Melbourne.

After finalizing the filming locations with my group I began a hypothetical shot list as the script progressed. This allowed me to plan the props needed for each scene, some were easy such as a mannequin which I had found in hard rubbish for a cadaver; others such as petri-dishes seemed to be a niche consumer item and were primarily in online-only storefronts.

Shot List

Also, just for fun, I made this poster for the film, Tiny Chairs was floated as a title among other things, and I enjoyed the time to practice some Photoshop.

Poster

I was absent for Monday’s pitch but as we didn’t have a truly cohesive concept to pitch my group members told me feedback was minimal. I had alerted my group to my absence through the discord, and after the group explained the changes they had made with the feedback we set out with the agreement that we wanted the piece we were making to have an understated approach to comedy, utilizing the setting of a share house and the relationship between two students who are opposites.

On Wednesday we honed in on developing a piece with a three-act structure, following a character’s journey around Melbourne to find a place to relax after a bizarre roommate makes the house unliveable for the day. The oddball housemate has taken on inspiration from a friend of Harper’s who as a medical student makes cold remarks, this contributed to the concept of creating characters that are opposites, pairing a medicine student with an art student for example, would create plenty of points of tension to make observations on.

We also discussed highlighting the fish-out-of-nature experience of attending university, particularly close to Harper’s experiences of moving from Perth to Melbourne. We also discussed highlighting the class divide in the university experience as well as the inconveniences of Melbourne life such as tiny furniture in cafes, the phrase “when in Rome” was a point of discussion as the adherence to strange new customs had the potential for a variety of comedic situations by having a newcomer experience everyday life in Melbourne whilst remaining dry and offering observations on Melbourne norms.

Amy graciously compiled all our ramblings into an extremely useful OUTLINE DOCUMENT LINK which has the beginnings of a story being structured, in the future, we will use it to collate all our different ideas for the direction of the piece. We discussed writing vomit drafts to fully flush out all our possible ideas and then frankensteining them together to create a piece that everyone had a part in making.