Extract Essay- Game of Thrones

Carla Choukroun 4/20/20 Period 2 Candidate No. 0102

  1. Discuss the ways in which the extract constructs meaning through the following:
-Camera shots, angles, movement and composition.
-Editing.
-Sound.
-Mis-En-Scene.

In the Games of Throne extract, there is a theme that prevails of mystery and most apparent, uncertainty. The vision that the author captures is through various aspects that begins in the very opening scenes, as the uneasy and rocky waves provide the first glimpse of an unknown atmosphere that will set itself for the premise of this extract.

To begin with, the first scene begins with an establishing shot of the large ship and powerful waves that surround it. Here, diegetic sound can be heard of the seagulls and waves crashing against each other as they overlap from the ships forward movements. During this scene, the camera diverts its attention to the two main characters, with the camera zooming in on them. Incidental sound intensifies, as the zoom allows the audience to examine the facial expressions of the two characters and showcasing their costume design of medieval set attire in formal wear. They show signs of being uncertain, timid and overall anxiety of what lays before them. This shows that the author was trying to capture these exact emotions with the zoom to enhance the theme, making the character and the audience alike uncertain of what events are foreshadowed as a crane shot tilts up of an entrance with a large, towering, statuesque figure of a warrior/soldier .

As the music slowly fades, the next scene is shown of the two main characters in a large dimly lit room, with a great big single horizontally-elongated medal table, accompanied with three large chairs and two small, cowardly looking stone benches on the other side for the two main men. As one of the main characters paces back and forward, the author shows this action as a way to add how uncertain the men are, with one pacing and the other trying to comfort or reassure the other. The camera is kept at a medium close-up to keep the camera focused on the men’s weakly lit faces. Finally, three men emerge, known to be the “bankers” in this scene. There is a moment of hesitation that the men are faced with, as they were met abruptly, even though they were waiting eagerly for these other men. They were plainly dressed, with only one of the “bankers” addressing the men collectively.

Now, the next scene begins with dialogue and shot/reverse-shot of all the characters discussing the matter at hand: heir to money. As the characters go back and forward, arguing and bickering, it is still clear that the author is portraying the uneasy atmosphere displayed amongst these men as it seems an agreement cannot be made. Another theme presents itself here: power. The only “banker” speaking appears very calm and collected and seems to be holding a higher ground than the two main characters. He is unbothered by their claims of who owns the right to the money lost and the heir to the throne to be titled as a Lord. Therefore, the author is presenting that the power is being held at a firmer grip amongst the bankers than the two main men.

With the next scene, the two main characters seem to be defeated of trying to argue with the banker. However, this is until one of the main characters stands to speak up. As the bankers are still seated, one of the main characters is shown in a medium long shot as he speaks in an upright position, which the author created to impose a sense of authority. As the men continue to bicker on grounds of loyalty and who holds the true title to aiding in the lost money, a main event is shown during this scene. One of the main characters uncovers his glove to show the banker. The author added this scene to create depth on the situation, which questioned the other main characters’ integrity, intentions and overall loyalty to the title of being a Lord. Upon removing the glove, the audience was met with a butchered hand- the fingers had been cut or amputated down to the joints of the fingers. A reaction shot was shown of the banker, his face mortified and shocked. The author provided an understanding and background by doing so to prove that the other main character was worthy of the title and the chance to the heir of money to the banker.

Conclusively, through these scenes, it is apparent that the author was trying to show how the theme of uncertainty followed these two main characters in the events that unfolded. They did not know what to expect, in more ways than one. The main characters did not know what the response would be from the banker, the audience did not know either, but even more so, the banker was not expecting of the actions of one of the main characters, with his justified arguments and points, which left the banker searching for words. Therefore, this solidifies the view and intentions of the author when creating the theme of mystery and uncertainty.

CCR for Film Video

This is the CCR I did for my film MUTANT. This was done in an interview style. I got into depth about my personal journey and the many ways I improved. The video length is 10 minutes long and I really incorporated all my progress into this reflection. It was definitely a fun and creative take on CCR’s that I have done in the past. I grew so much, especially at a time we are under with so much going on in the world today. Film productions around the world have stopped, theaters have closed, etc. So this is a very impactful time for film history especially! Nonetheless, I continued to use the resources I had at home to make the best out of the situation as you will see in my CCR for the film. I really tried to show my creative side to this. The interview style was a nice twist and was different. I added a lot of gifs to make it more comical and fun. I wanted it to be capture almost like a silent film. When something happens and then a text is followed. It was fun to film because I had my dad as the interviewer and my brother as the one filming. I had to reshoot the CCR about 5 times because I kept laughing. I’ve also never talked to a camera for 10 minutes straight. I’ve only ever done about 7 for another class, AICE global. But it was still fun and a bit out of my comfort zone. I hope you enjoy the CCR and find it informational.

Film Blog Video

This is my opening sequence for my film MUTANT! I really enjoyed making this film with my group and it was surprisingly the easiest to film. There is currently a lot going on in the world so I will admit, as a perfectionist, I wanted to do more editing on the titles. It truly disappointed me that I could not make the titles how I originally wanted to because it would have added so much more to the film! But, I was still super proud of the outcome. I came a long way to be able to film such a project, with all my hard work and skills coming together in the end for this final product! The biggest thing for me during this film was the acting. In my previous products, I never had to really act or go off a strict. With this, I had to pay attention to detail. This included the way I spoke, my tone in my voice, my facial expressions. Not only that, but making sure everyone was on the same page. So they had to practice likes and facial expressions with me. I will admit it was not entirely easy. We did our very best because at times you can notice smiles creeping in. This shows how much fun I had but how hard it was to be serious. Because after all, this is a horror film, not a comedy. It was not the easiest to be my character because I’ve never done something like it before. Regardless, I think I did a really good job. It was interesting and the storyline is there. But you can decide if it’s scary enough for you!

Music Video with CCR

Not only was this actually my hardest film, it was also the funnest for me. I genuinely enjoyed myself whilst filming this with my group. It was mostly hard for me because I had trouble with two things. For one, it was hard to get the film to match up with the audio of the music. This caused a bit of choppiness that I couldn't fix. The second thing was the editing I did. The split screen was interesting but still kind of difficult. My favorite part though was the cool jump cut/transition I came up with the idea to jump from one location to another. This video really got me frustrated a few times. This was the first time I used two different locations as well. The park and then the beach. THIS was the video I truly got out of my comfort zone. I had so many people looking at us whilst filming. For this video, I even called the park prior to filming to confirm if it was okay to film. I organized a lot of props. From flowers, to the love letter, I even designed costumes. It was important for me to capture a very light and sunny look on the actors. This video had a ton of retakes though. People would interrupt us and cause us to reshoot. This was a great learning experience and overall just really fun.

Commercial Blog with CCR

This is my commercial blog. I also attached the CCR I made for this video. This was the very first filming I did in AICE Media. Although it was the shortest film I did, it was also second to being the hardest to actually film and edit. It was difficult to reach the time because it was so minimal. I kept going over the time requirement. Since it also was my first time even filming, it was the first time I brought actual props, which was pretty fun. I enjoyed the music I found, which was also my first time ever converting songs to mp3. I did have a few friends help me with some editing as it was all still very new to me. It’s amazing to see how far I came with my directing, filming and editing skills. I remember I used to get so frustrated and would lose patience with editing. Something always was going wrong when I edited. This filming took place at school as well. So I wasn’t YET outside of my comfort zone. I did not know anyone really in the class also. So, I had to shake off the shyness and put myself out there. I found a really great group out of it. All of our products came out great too. It was hard work but it was fun nevertheless. This was my first step in the journey to come. Overall, I really enjoyed filming this commercial.

Editing Blog: Finalizing all edits Part 2

All editing has been successfully completed. Now all I had to do was go through the film in its entirety. So what I did was check on each scene. I first started by looking at each scene's lighting. The lighting looked good so I just made a few tweaks here and there. Like the killer scene, I added an extra lighting to it in editing. These were mostly last minute touch-ups. Then the next thing I looked at was sound. The sound in each clip was clear and understandable. During last minute editing I even considered adding some special effects. Since I was limited with my at-home editing software, I could not add any really nice special effects. The special effects I went through were fake rain, thunderstorm effects and loud crashing noises. None of these however worked out. Therefore, none of them were used. Thankfully, there was no more choppiness or lagging in the final product of the film. I also reviewed the soundtrack of the film. The music was really good and really corresponded with each scenes. I had a calm soundtrack, a build-up soundtrack and a major climax soundtrack.This editing was divided into two parts because they were done on the same day. Now, the final product has been completed.   

Editing Blog: Checking film for choppiness Part 1

Now, filming is complete and no other filming will be done. Editing is the main focus. Although I have been editing for awhile now, I still continue to go back to review my film. The editing consists now of minor fixes and changes. My editing has been converted from Pinnacle Studios to Microsoft Editing Software due to circumstances. This also means all editing is now at-home. Throughout the film, there was a bit of choppiness. Whenever I would begin exporting, the film came out with some choppiness. There was a few things I had to do to ensure this was fixed. So for one, I had to go through each clip to see which ones were lagging or buffering. The reason for this was because these were the scenes that made the video lag. This finally got resolved. The next thing I had to do was export the film to my google drive. By doing so, I was able to see how the film was overall. I noticed that the film was not choppy anymore. But I went a little further. I then exported the film to iMovie, an Apple program for filming. This helped me see how the soundtrack was in the film too. This made the film cleaner and smoother. The film was now ready to be exported.

Filming Blog: Finalizing all scenes (No Additional Filming)

Since filming was complete, I made sure all scenes were "finalized". Because my group and I are done filming and cannot film further due to circumstances, I am making sure and checking through all the film/footage. Sometimes I accidentally select the wrong footage to place into the film itself due to so many similarities. Therefore, this process allows me to go frame by frame in deciding which footage was appropriate. When filming, every scene had to re-shoot several times before the scene was completed. This is taking into account all angles and camera movements. Sometimes an object in the background had to be removed and therefore the entire clip had to be redone. Other times, cars were passing through during filming which caused us to stop filming. This made us re-do filming again. Even more so, background noise was an issue. During filming, it was hard to make sure the location was completely silent. So, filming for certain scenes was then re-shot multiple times. Even the noise I wanted and set up for the film had to be re-done. For example, the scene was the cups fall. This had to do a lot with timing. During this scene, the cups were supposed to crash as soon as the lights went out during the party scene. However, if I were just a second off from having the lights turn out, then the scene would not make sense. So, therefore, the scene specifically was re-shot twice, which was pretty good. With help, I had a few extra people to aid in the lights and sound effects. So, overall, this was my process of finalizing all scenes.

Editing Blog: Fixing titles and music

Titles took a lot of research and time. Many horror films have titles that are meant to portray what the film is about. For example, for vampires, they might have a title that drips blood. Due to some circumstances happening, there were a few things I could not to do. Since I am not in school and do not have access to Pinnacle Studios, I could not make the titles how I want to. The original title was in a font called "Bloodlust". However, the editing I did at home could not allow me to download and install personal fonts. This made me very frustrated because I took a lot of time deciding through hundreds of fonts which one I liked best. So, unfortunately, I had to use the fonts that were provided for me through my Microsoft Editing Software program. Even more so, that also meant I could not add my own color schemes to the titles. Originally, I had planned to made the actors, directors, editors etc, names' as first name in black and last name in green. I was also going to make the film title in green, but could not do that. As for the music now. I was able to download the original music that I had planned for the film. In total, I had three soundtracks of music for the film, with no dialogue. Those songs were researched as well for a few hours. Once the songs were picked and I was content with them, I converted the songs to mp3. I made sure the songs were royalty free first before downloading them. This ensured that I did not use songs that could have been copyrighted.

Filming Blog: Unable to Film, Dissecting/Reviewing Film

Due to circumstances, my group and I were unable to film more but there are some good information to report. All filming has been completed, despite wanting to do some more check-ups. So instead, I’ll discuss what my group and I were going to possibly film. So for one, I did a bit more reviewing on the film, just to make everything perfect. I was debating on which beginning scenes I liked most. The establishing shot was taken four times in total after reviewing the scenes. The establishing shot was held at a higher elevation. I didn’t want to use the tripod for this scene because of one main reason. I did not want to be unable to view the video as it was recording. I wanted to be fully able to see what was in the frame. You can notice in many of the scenes that lighting does change. This result was inevitable. A lot of the filming was done in different parts of the day, at different times of the day as well. I tried very hard to stay consistent with the lighting but it was difficult. However, I feel like I managed to keep it minimal and not too noticeable. For this specific scene, it was filmed during the late afternoon, around sunset. It captured a nice, ominous feeling and vibe for the opening sequence. Even more so, the night time filming was difficult because of the lack of light. Thankfully however, we use a phone light to cast a nice contrast. Overall, it really made the film come to light as a horror film.