Story Boarding

I am containing many different shot types of angles and movements to keep my short film entertaining as it is not an action film, there is not much excitement. Therefore I am trying to do this with the fast paced shots. Resulting from this there would be a very large amount of frames on my storyboard. Which is why I have story boarded very roughly. I have storyboarded basic ideas of what I want to see in my film. Though story boarding is often seen as an essential part of production, personally I don't rely heavily on story boards. I mainly have the image within my head of the scenes, in great detail. However this is a very bad habit I still think they are essential and useful. I do like having the idea of shots that you want before filming as you feel more prepared and less stressed. So i have used this opportunity very well.
Now I have a great idea of my films progression, I can start planning on location for the scenes and props necessary within my short film.

Example of one of my storyboard sheets:

Script

For my short film there is no dialogue so a script with many characters conversing is not needed. This is as I have decided my short film to be a narrative short film so the character in the short film is describing what he is doing within the short film. Here is my script for the short film:

Fade in:

Warren has a nightmare, a montage of him exploring areas but only 
finding horrible humans chasing him and no useful loot. 

Warren gets woken up by the gun shots in his nightmare and also the alarm clock.

Fade out:

WARREN, Middle aged English man nuclear war survivor who is in a bad mental state due to the loneliness from the intense dramatic fall.

Warren leans up and gasps for air from his nightmare and begins to get out of bed.

WARREN VOICEOVER
This is what my life has become, my unconscious time takes me back to the life I had before. Brought back to the reality of my life now. I long for the life I had before, what I wouldn't give to wind back the clock. Now after the devastation and carnage of the nuclear war, my life couldn't be more different. Alone, afraid and on the edge of going insane.

FADE IN:

INT. Inside house - DAY

Flashback of the day of the attack and Warren preparing.

WARREN VOICEOVER

The day of the attack, took the world by surprise. My survival was purely down to my paranoia and preparation. I remember years before thinking the cupboard under the stairs which was lined with aluminium to allow storage of wine would make a fantasticate nuclear shelter.

CUT TO SCENES OF TRUMP AND MILITARY

WARREN VOICEOVER

As tension grew around the world following president elect trumps victory, I began to make the cupboard more sustainable, as China and Russia started military manoeuvres. Water, canned food, bedding, medical supplies and any other necessities to keep me alive during the initial aftermath. My conscious seemed to pay off.

FADE OUT:

INT. Inside house - DAY

Warren begins his daily routine.

WARREN VOICEOVER

It feels like groundhog day. Everyday the same routine, I get up alone. Always with the hope and belief of someone out there who is friendly, someone close - who will make this life more bearable. I eat breakfast, usually either tinned fruit or baked beans followed by a small amount of water which I have to ration now as my stock is getting low. I know a foraging expedition with a town of friendly citizens is close, and this fills me full of dread. I have never been out that far and it is just too dangerous out there.

INT. Streets and neighbours house - DAY

Warren goes to scavenge stock at nearby houses.

WARREN VOICEOVER

So far I have only ventured beyond my immediate neighbours a few times. I mainly adventure only within my area as people are not trusted out there. However, it proved to be quite fruitful as being elderly had cupboards of tinned food, most of which was in date. My other neighbour was a kean hiker and camper and I managed to obtain two camping stoves and enough gas for six months - if I last that long.

My will to live was like a roller coaster, I wanted to curl up and die, as the loneliness and lack of human contact was beginning to make me hallucinate more and more. Slowly, I was going crazy with my own company. And on the other hand I had waves of excitement, trepidation and adrenalin at the thought of meeting people in the same position, just trying to get through the hell that has become our lives.

I miss the human contact, the ability to talk, touch and smell another human being. My life is full of dull routines mixed with vivid flashbacks of what my life used to be like. The reality is my initial stock of food is critically low, this fact together with my human instinct to see if there was anyone out there who is friendly has driven me to the decision that I must look further afield. Tomorrow, I will drive to the local campsite in the hope of supplies and human contact.

Fade out:

INT. Abandoned campsite - DAY

Warren goes around scavenging the abandoned campsite in hope for food and human life.

WARREN VOICEOVER

I was unprepared for the devastation and desolate surrounding. A place which I remember to be vibrant, noisy and full of life - was now a ghost town. It also looked like I was not person to have the same idea, stores, supplies, and anything useful has been stripped out. My heart had sunk, my hope crushed, what was the point..

Changes to Plot and Idea

My first plot idea: resulting to a worldwide nuclear attack it leaves one survivor, who is my dad, as he is immune to the nuclear substance due to him researching this area for his whole life. He is on a quest to find other human life and to restart the human race.

Now once I have had done research, I have came to realization that I want my plot to be slightly different and needed improvements. So here is my updated plot:

Due to Warren being deep below the surface when the bomb hit, along with supplies and water, he finds himself a lone survivor in a world ravaged by the effects of a nuclear war. It takes time to adjust to the surroundings, but the mental toll effects him badly. Knowing he probably wont see his wife, children and family again hit hard, his world will never be the same. The world will never be the same. He is on a quest to find supplies to last him longer and other human life and to restart the human race.

Deadline Plan for finishing Short Film

Now I have finished Research, I am now going to plan my deadlines for the planning, filming, editing and my final product. Being organised and following a deadline plan is very helpful to keep up with my work, be focused and on track. I wont complete these to the exact dates however I will try my best to keep up to date with it as possible. I decided to put it in a table as its easy to comprehend and know my deadline dates.

There will be many posts throughout this process of showing my journey of the short film. Once I have completed the main task, which will hopefully be before Christmas so I can have a break, I will then have a month to complete the two little projects, the subsidiary tasks. I feel like that will be plenty of time as the ones I have chosen are Photoshop based which I am quite good at. I will make a deadline list after I have created all short film related posts, so it doesn't get too confusing.

Short Film Questionaire

I had 30 members of my sixth form to fill in a questionnaire related to my short film. I am interested to know the majority of peoples opinion on my idea of a short film and short films in general. This will hopefully direct me in the right path and see how successful my own short film will be.

Evaluation of Results
This information has been very useful to myself and great research for my short film. Firstly, people expect a short film to be 5-7 minutes as 17 people responded saying this and second was 3-4 minutes with 7 voting for this. This tells us that people prefer around this time therefore I am going to try and keep it around 4-6 minutes as this will help with peoples expectations and also keeping with their attention spans.
Furthermore,  we received great feedback that the majority of people would like to see a film about a nuclear war survivor as 5 only said they wouldn't, meaning more than 80% of people I asked would enjoy to see this. The only negative feed back about this was my plot as it does seem quite unoriginal as many films use the same plot however I have tried to change it slightly by it being a nuclear war rather than zombies or virus's.
Moreover, peoples majority vote of the importance of a short film was to tell a story and portray a message. I need to defiantly keep these in mind when creating my own if this is what people think is most important for a short film.
Lastly, one of my most vital questions was the last - what attracts you when watching a film. The 30 students I asked mainly said the actors intrigue them the most and also the look of the actual film. I do not have any big, famous actors that will attract them to watch the film so this is a shame however I can make the film look as professional and interesting as I possibly can by using cinematic and a variety of shots to maintain the interest and engage them to watch.

Short Film Title Ideas

Looking back at my research and knowledge of films within the same genre I see that the titles are always linked to either the catastrophe, describing the earth in some way, or something about the character. Therefore I followed the trend and made a mind map with these titles and had some title ideas for each section. It is essential to have an interesting title so it will attract the audiences attention and make them watch it, a title itself is an enigma code pressing the viewer to look into the films, essentially. 

My favourites
SILENT EARTH & WORLD ON MUTE
Silent earth and world on mute describes the earth after the aftermath of the nuclear war. Its clear and once watching it you understand the title, that the catastrophe has made the earth so silent, abandoned and isolated. It has made the earth complete silent, when it would normally be full of life somewhere on the globe.
ALONE & SOLO
Alone and solo are simple, effective and explains the majority of the film in one word. It is effective as it makes you wonder, why is he alone/solo? what happened? 
LAST SURVIVOR
I love this title, as it makes the protagonist feel special as he is the last human a live. It draws your eyes to it and makes him seem very heroic which I like very much.
END OF TIME
This title stands out very well. It is also very dramatic as it means its the end of the world which will grab peoples attention and wanting to watch the short film.

Why I dislike some
LAST DAY
Last day does not technically make sense as it is not the last day as there is one survivor and perhaps many more out there. It is the last day for most of man kind but not completely so this is why I have not used this title as its not completely right.
LEGACY
Legacy looks great, its simple being one word and you can remember it very well. However I feel like it is too similar to one of my inspired films 'I am Legend' and therefore I do not want to use this as I want to be more unique.
A1ONE
I like A1one as it is has more meaning than 'alone'. A1one means alone however the 1 is mean to emphasise that he could be the only human left, theirs '1' human. It has great meaning to it however it isn't easy and catchy to say and comprehend and this is why I cant use it.
W.O.M.D

W.O.M.D meaning weapons of mass destruction is related to nuclear war so it is very relevant. However, it makes the short film sound like an action packed film with a lot of shooting and war. This is not what my short film is about as it is after all that has happened t (post-apocalyptic not action). So using this title sends off the wrong message and therefore I do not want to use it.

CONCLUSION

Having done this mind map I have came to a conclusion that I am going to use the title Outlaster. I think this title has never been used before. It sounds and looks great. It suggests he is special as he has outlasted something that not many have (In this case a nuclear attack). This title will intrigue people as they will be keen to know what he has outlasted and what happens next. It is short and simple and hopefully will bring people in to watch it.

Getting My Target Audience

Zombieland

I went on IMBD as this is the most popular movie review website and will have the most accurate feedback. I looked at two movies,' Zombieland' and 'I Am Legend', as they both follow similar plots and the same genre as mine. Getting information about the audience from already made films gives myself more a more specific idea of an audience to base mine off.

Gender

I Am Legend

Both of these charts show that males are more interested in these shows and are a more frequent viewer. With Zombieland having 281,891 males, 52,379 females and I Am Legend having 384,249 and 68,006 females. However on both charts over all both genders give the same rating, on Zombieland they both give it a 7.7 rating and on I Am Legend they both give a 7.2 rating. This suggests both genders equally like the film and this genre. However due to the protagonist both being male in the films this may suggest why more males have watched and reviewed it, as a male protagonist will attract males as they can relate more. 
In conclusion, I think post-apocalyptic genre is liked both both genders and they will both be in my target audience.

Age
Both 'Zombieland' and 'I Am Legend' have the most popular aged 18-29 as these have the most reviews by both on IMDB. This does make sense as this is where I would think the most popular age would be as they are the most frequent viewers of cinemas and streaming services. However, as for both films the age 30-44 is quite popular too, therefore I think I will increase the age range to 35, and also the protagonist in my short film will be old too so this should increase the target audience as they will be more a more relatable character. Moreover, I am also going to make the lower end 16 of the target audience as most people I know, being this age, like this genre a lot as it is some of there favourite films and series.

In conclusion:
From researching the reviews of already made post-apocalyptic films on IMDB it has gave me an indication of a more detailed target audience for my film. I have came to an conclusion that my short film will be targeted at both male and female as neither is dominant with the reviews so therefore it will be suited for both. Unlike other films you can see there is clearly a dominant gender such as looking at 'Grease' which is dominated by females mainly. Furthermore, I think my targeted age will be 16-35. I have gone slightly below the most popular age on the two reviews of similar genre and plot. This is as I feel like it is still very popular at 16 and 17 as this is my age and I know many love this genre. Moreover, I felt like I wanted a large age range as clearly higher ages is quite popular too looking at the information so I had to include them also.