Scouting locations

Last class, we went on an adventure outside to scout a location for the film.  We are limited to our school's patio as a general location, but the patio is so big, we are able to choose specific areas for our group to record at. 

Before going in, my group already had an idea of where we were going to film. We wanted one of the picnic tables near the garden area because it was one of the prettier and more isolated areas in the patio. When we got there, we came across some possible problems that we could have while filming so we started searching for another option. For option 2 we chose an area that was closer to buildings. With the two options decided on, we had to weigh the pros and cons for our final decision. 

This was our first option and what we pictured when we were working on the movie. We loved the fact that it had a garden in the background and a lot of plants surrounding the area. The foliage gave a very lively and calm atmosphere but was also one of the negatives of this location. The plants, especially the tree, can be very distracting if a windy day happens. And the fact that if we wanted to do a shot that showed the side opposite to the garden, there could be random people there that were not planned. 

This was the second location, one that countered all the cons of the first one but had cons of itself. This location didn't have any moving parts, or people filming close by so there weren't any possible distractions. But one of the biggest cons of this location is that it didn't have a table to put the chess set, so if we wanted to film, we would have needed to get a table, move one of picnic benches, or use the little walls as our table. The other con was that it was a pretty boring background as it was just the white building. 

We ended up choosing option 1, as we figured out how to overcome most of the cons. For people walking in shots that don't feature the garden we will use shallow focus, to make sure the background doesn't stand out. The tree won't be too much of a worried as a lot of our shots won't have the tree and the character action in the film would be too over-the-top that it will keep the audience focus on them. To make sure that the attention stays on the character instead of the background, the characters will wear out of place costumes that won't blend.