Poster First Drafts & Ideas | Development

After the research I conducted on sitcom posters, I started to come up with ideas and draft designs for our sitcom.

I wanted to start off with the style that was carried throughout all of the examples I researched into - the plain background and eye catching characters style.
In order to begin I looked through the pictures we took of our actors on the day of our table read and chose the ones I thought worked the best. The characters that should be on the posters, in my own opinion, are Dean, Annie, Marie & Betty as they are all recurring characters within the series (especially Annie & Dean). I chose one picture of Marie and one of Betty that showed their characters personality clearly, and I found three different pictures of Annie and Dean that do the same thing.

I started off by deleting the background of each picture and adding the character into a separate canvas, which will act as our poster canvas. I proceeded to do this for all the pictures I wanted to use within the poster. I then postponed each character into a position that I thought would work well for the TV series. Annie & Dean are in the foreground, while Marie and Betty are in the background.

This composition gives the audience a clear idea as to who the two main characters are within the show, but also it gives off the impression that both Marie and Betty are important within the shows narrative. Marie's face shows an annoyed emotion which indicates her relationship between the two main characters. In comparison, Betty's face shows a flirty, nosey expression which indicates her role and personality within the show.
In the show, Betty introduces her 'pet' to the audience. Her robotic cat Arnold is basically seen as Betty's sidekick so I thought it would be a nice and humorous touch to add him into the poster.

The three different images I found of Annie & Dean all work really well in the poster, but in terms of facial expression they all tell a different story/emotion. I've placed all three images into the photoshop file, and they are all in the right position, so as the weeks go by I can see which works better.

I'm going to be showing this poster design to the others as well, to see what their opinions are, so they can also give me their opinions on the different Annie & Dean pictures.
After getting the images in place I added the title of our show and the logo of our production company.

I made sure, much like the posters in my research, that the title was clearly presented on the poster, and big enough so audience members can see it from a far. The colours in the title as well are eye-catching which makes the poster stand out, which in turn gets peoples attention which is our main aim. I didn't want the production company logo to be very loud and large compared to the title, so I made sure to keep it small and in the corner. That way, the audience can still see the production company, but they are mainly attracted to the title of the show and the characters in it.
When looking at this poster, I thought it still looked pretty boring and it needed some sort of background to keep the energy up.
I had many ideas as to what the background could be, one of them was the same living room background that is seen in the title sequence of the show.

I thought this would link the two together in an effective way, but upon placing it in the background I decided it didn't work as well as I would've hoped. The colours don't look very eye-catching for a poster, and it's too busy meaning the audience may be more attracted to whats going on in the background than the main part of the poster.
Instead, I went back to my research and decided to experiment with a plain, bright colour. I tried a few different bright colours like yellow, orange, green and blue. I asked my groups opinion and we all decided the orange worked nicely, as it gave the poster a boost of energy and added to the eye-catching effective. The plain orange, however, was a little too plain and I thought it needed some depth, shadowing or gradient to give it a little bit more design.
I started with the gradient, and I composed the lightness of the gradient in the centre of the image, so the darkness of the orange can be seen around the edge. This gave the colour a lot more depth, but it was still lacking something around the edge of the poster. I looked within the layer style of the photo and found an 'inner shadow' effect. I experimented with a dark colour orange, the blend mode - which was set to 'Multiply' - and the opacity to get the result I wanted.

When placing the other elements of the poster against the orange background, I found that all elements were eye-catching and the the background wasn't too distracting for the audience. The colour works with the characters outfits, the colour of the title and it gives the show a bright, fun, tone which was the desire of the poster.

Overall, I'm really happy with the outcome of this poster, and I think every element of it works well and is really effective when standing out against the crowd. It's clear that it resembles a lot of the research I had previously done, meaning it looks like a real TV sitcom poster. I am going to experiment with a few other different poster designs if I get the time, but if they don't work out this will be the one we go with. I still need to add a few lines of text, but that can be done later in the process.
I'm glad that I concluded the research I did, as it has helped me with the outcome of our own poster.

Sitcom Posters | Research

One of the jobs I have is to create the poster for our sitcom. In order to do this job effectively I needed to do some research on typical sitcom posters. I looked into the posters of the different sitcoms we have used as inspiration throughout this whole process to help.

The 'Mrs Browns Boys' poster includes all of the main characters that you see regularly in the series, but Mrs Brown is further forward and looks a little larger than the others. The characters are all in a line with the outfits that help show their personalities, and it seems as if the in-law characters are placed a little further back than the others in line. The background looks like wallpaper that is quite similar to the style of Mrs Browns house interior. The colour is light so it doesn't distract from the bright colours seen on the character's clothing, but also so it doesn't distract from the main character at the front of the image.

Similarly, the 'Gavin & Stacey' and 'Outnumbered' posters include the main characters that are seen throughout the series. The 'Gavin & Stacey' poster is very simple, with a white background and red being the main colour that is seen - both in the title font and Stacey's dress. You can already tell what the characters personalities and relationships are like just by looking at their composition in the image. The character's personalities are also highlighted and clearly presented in the 'Outnumbered' poster. The plain blue background helps the photo strips standout which makes the characters more defined and eye catching, helping the personalities of the characters come through in the pictures.

After looking at the posters of sitcoms that are our inspiration, I looked into posters of other sitcoms that are/or have been on TV. A recurring theme through all of the posters below is the plain background and the colouring. In the 'Seinfeld', 'the Goldbergs' and 'Raising Hope' posters the background is plain with not very bright colours filling it. In contrast 'the Big Bang Theory' poster has a dark green background but with a slight sci-fi effect to it, which clearly shows the theme of the sitcom. I like having the background quite plain, but also having some sort of effect on it to help show the theme of the show. By having the theme clearly being shown in the poster it helps the audience decide whether they want to watch it or not. The yellow and the blue backgrounds in 'the Goldbergs' poster and the 'Raising Hope' poster engages the audience as the colouring is quite bright, but not enough to distract from the main characters. This is something I want to have in our poster as I think it's really effective when getting the audiences attention.

The text stands out against the background, and it's also quite large in all four posters, clearly showing the audience what the show is called. This is a really important element of the poster as it tells the audience the name of the show, and without it the poster might be quite confusing to read as an audience member. The main characters are also clearly presented within all 4 posters so you can tell who will be on the show. The costumes of the characters clearly portray their personalities, for example; in 'the Big Bang Theory' poster the males are wearing suits in comparison to the female wearing a skin tight silver outfit. This presents the male characters as smart and almost nerdy, whilst presenting the female character as someone who cares about her appearance and the complete opposite to nerdy. Similarly in 'the Goldbergs' poster all of the characters are wearing the same outfits, creating the sense that they are a family and it's a family sitcom.
This is something I want to bring into our poster as I think it's effective for the audience to get an idea as to who the characters are, what their relations are and what their personalities are like.

When starting to design our poster, I'm going to keep it quite simple and not overly complicated, much like these examples. I'm going to keep the background plain, but have it fairy colourful, and make sure the characters and their personalities are clearly presented through their compositions. We have previously taken pictures of our actors for this poster, so I will have a few different poses to choose from. I'm also going to try different styles of posters so, as a group, we have a few different ones to choose from when deciding on the final poster.
Doing this research has been really effective when making a sitcom poster as I now know the elements I need to experiment with.

Christine Gernon ~ Director | Research

After looking at a director for a studio sitcom, I thought I would look into another director of one of our sitcom influences, but not a studio based one. We have used Gavin & Stacey quite a lot as inspiration throughout this project, so I thought I would look into the series director, Christine Gernon.

Christine Gernon

Gernon is a director and producer and is mainly known for Gavin & Stacey (2007), One Foot in the Grave (1990) and I'm With Stupid (2005), and has been directing since 1997 - based on her IMDB profile.
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0314641/?ref_=ttfc_fc_dr1

It has been said that Gernon has directed some of the most successful comedy series of the last two decades, which is quite an achievement. Along with that, she directed all three series of the BAFTA award winning comedy series, Gavin & Stacey which is well-known to most UK citizens. Not only does Gernon direct British comedy, she also tries her hand in directing US comedy series such as, New Girl, The Goldbergs, and more recently Speechless which is a new US series, showing on ABC.

https://www.curtisbrown.co.uk/client/christine-gernon

Gernon explains in an interview that she "didn't want to direct (or even know what directing was) until [she] walked onto a set and thought, that's what I want do." It's clear from this quote that she is quite a determined person, which in turn helps her skills as a director as they should always know what they want and find out a way to get it. Determination is a good skill for a director to have, and I will remember this throughout my time as a director in our own project.

She started off working at the BBC as a clerk in radio, then became a broadcast assistant, it was after that, that she moved over to BBC comedy for six months and worked as a runner/production secretary on the first series of One Foot in the Grave. She says "I realised being a director was a job and I went all out to become one." 10 years later her hard work payed off as she directed the last ever series of that show, which is quite a progression and experience to have. This meant that she had a lot of knowledge about the role of the director, which gave her the confidence and knowledge she needed when becoming one herself. Similarly, by doing this research, it will help me be a better and effective director, and I'll have the knowledge on being a director to help me along the way.

Gernon explains her job as taking the script and translating the words on the page onto a TV screen. She mentions that her job might start before the script as she'll work on ideas with the writers but the bottom line is she will read something and then make it into a visual thing. The whole look and feel of the show she is directing is done to her with help from a lot of people. This tells me that there are a lot of people that the director will work with when trying to make her vision come to life. Obviously, in our small production team, there isn't a big group to work with and communicate with, but all three of us will definitely work together in an effective way.

The way in which Gernon speaks about directing gives me a good outlook on the role. Even thought it's stressful and time consuming at times, it's still fun and you have to remember that especially when doing a comedy.

http://standardissuemagazine.com/voices/odd-job-christine-gernon/

When looking at the directing style fo Gavin & Stacey it is very natural and realistic, and if you were to watch it you wouldn't even think it was a scripted, rehearsed show. This is something I want to take into our own project, and I think Gernon's directing style will be one of my biggest influences, if not the biggest, when directing Young & Famous.

Dressing the Set | Development

After buying the props we met together with all of our crew and dressed the set. By having all of our crew around to do this, it meant that we would all be comfortable with the location, and everyone will know what props go where without having much instruction on the day.

The Hallway

This location will be used in scene 6, 8, 10, 15 & any doorway conversation.
For this location we added the vintage table runner that I found in my house, one of the flower ornaments that was purchased at a charity shop and a couple of photo frames. Along with some liquor bottle that were found at a charity shop, potpourri in a bowl of some sort, and a few other pieces of decor to make it look lived in.

The 'Grumpy Old Man' sign was placed on the stair banister meaning it will be quite visible in Scene 15, which is what we want as it's a good piece of decor for our set.
Along with that we added some multicoloured socks to show that the house is being lived in, and the socks show the personalities of the characters. As part of Dean's character profile& style, it says that he wears a lot of colourful socks, so this addition to the scene helps bring the planned style to reality. The slipper box was originally in the hallway before we dressed the set, but we thought it would be a nice touch to the setting. Along with that a small stool and a handbag was added to make the house seem a little bit cluttered, to portray the sense of a normal house.

When looking back at this location, I think a few more props need to be added. For example; a tall plant might add a little something extra, and the stool needs to be different. Instead of it being a small stool, I think it needs to be a bit bigger so it looks like someone can sit on it to out their shoes on.
Overall, I think this location looks realistic for Annie & Dean's house, and I'm happy with the outcome of what it looks like.

The Kitchen

This location will be used in scene 9 &11.
For this location we several different knick knacks. We placed our three vases/jugs/pots on the windowsill so you can see this decoration within the majority of our shots that we have planned. We also placed a small ornament of a girl in a dress as we though it would be something Annie & Dean would have in their kitchen as a little bit of decoration. We also draped a spotty tea towel on the oven door as we felt this is the type of pattern Dean would like, and it shows his loud personality.

On one side of the kitchen we decided to put a mug holder, with mugs filling up all of the empty spots, and the teapot with the cosy. This made the room feel a lot more homely and Annie & Dean like. I felt more lived in, and gave the room some colour. We also had a heat proof mat, with a mixture of different colours on it, and we placed it under the tea pot to add more colour, and to add more decor that would be seen in an old persons house. We also added a sign that said 'Man Cave' to show that Dean spends a lot of his time in the kitchen experimenting.

In scene 11, the two main props that are needed are the picnic basket and baking utensils to show Dean baking cookies. I already owned the picnic basket, and I didn't realise how big it was compared to the kitchen counters. As the weeks progress I might decide that we need to use something different to the basket, but for now that is what we're going to use. Due to the size of the basket, we moved Annie to stand on the other side of the sink. The basket fits better there, and based on our blocking we can get more effective shots.

When look back at this location, I think we have more than enough props to make the room look lived in by Annie & Dean. However, the basket still might change as it seems very problematic in terms of the size and the straps on it. Overall, I think this location looks realistic and it looks like somewhere Dean would spend a lot of time in.

The Living Room

This location will be used in Scene 7, but it may be seen during any of the scenes that take place in the entryway. 

For this location, we felt there was a lot we could do to make the room seem a lot more old people like. Laura had a few different throws, and we placed them onto the sofas in the room. Along with this, we added some floral pillows that are very old-fashioned and it definitely made the room feel a lot older.  We added a lot more photo frames, table cloths and a few knick knacks on the table to show that it has bene lived in, and it doesn't look too cluttered. when filming in the entryway we will need to make sure these props are in place if we can see inside the living room.

On the fireplace, we have added a lot more colour, and made it look a little bit more cluttered but not overly. We also added a few knitting material into a bag to act as Annie's knitting stuff. I thought this looked a too cluttered and messy, and I think it will look a lot better in a basket or something similar. We moved this prop around and found that it looked better on the right hand side of the fireplace than the left, so we need to remember this for the shoot week.

When looking at this location I think it looks very realistic and it definitely looks like Annie & Dean's living room. We still need to purchase a basket for the knitting stuff, and maybe a few other props that add a bit more colour, but overall I think it's perfect

Overall, dressing the set was a very good way for us to see what our set will look like and what we need to add, if anything. This house with the props looks a lot like I imagined Annie & dean's house to look like and I think it's going to look really good on camera. We're going to put a few props in the dining room like a table runner, candle and potentially a napkin holder. But other than that I am happy with the props we have and how it all looks together in the location. When shoot week comes we need to make sure all of the props go in the right place and we can do this through these pictures.

Buying Props & Costume | Development

To prepare for our shoot, one of the main tasks we had to do was to find and buy props & costume for our set and characters. Due to our setting being a modern house, we knew we needed to find some dated ornaments and decoration in order to create the mixture of old and new - linking with the theme of the show.

When going into the project, we knew a lot of the decorations and props we would need would be available to us through family members and objects we already owned. This meant that we wouldn't need to buy a large amount of props and our budget can be focused a lot on travel expenses. Laura made sure that we had a fair amount of money in our prop budget so we could go out and buy extra props so we would have a lot of choice when dressing the set.

We all went away and had a look at the props we owned ourselves. I found a vintage table runner, that I thought would show the age of the characters. I also found a couple of lace table clothes, which we all thought would be found in old aged people's houses, so in turn it would help highlight the age of the characters.

I also found an old-fashioned silver photo frame with floral details. I thought this would work well in the couples house as it's something Annie would have bought before she wanted to become young, or something that has been passed down in generations. Along with that, I had a jug type decoration that we could put flowers in or just have it on show as decor. 

We talked about having a knitted cosy to go on top of a tea pot, and my mum made one for us. This can go in the kitchen and will help carry on the theme of the old age couple. My grandparents also allowed me to borrow a sign they own with the text 'A Lovely Lady and Grumpy Old Man live here'. I thought this would be a humorous sign to include in the set and it helps show the personalities of our characters. I also thought using some framed photos that are already in use would be effective as well.

Along with these props, we organised a shopping day in which we would walk around the high street and find any other props we needed or thought would work well in our set. We bought the likes of flowers, potpourri, ornaments, jugs, vases and more. We found that buying more props for a cheap price was helpful as we would have an option when dressing the set. We found the majority of our props in charity shops and cheap shops such as Poundland, Wilkinsons & more.

Now we have all of the props we can go to our location and dress the set to see what it would look like. This will mean we are prepared for our shoot days and there won't be a lot of wasted time in deciding what goes where on the day.

Shot List & Storyboard UPDATE | Development

Shoot week isn't that far away, so myself and Nisserin decided it would be a good idea to revisit the Shot List & Storyboard and see if there were any changes that needed to be made.
When looking at the document we found that some of the shot sizes and pictures were different as to what we wanted, and we decided to make some changes. We had the shot list, storyboard & blocking images up and we made sure to change them all at the same time, in order to help everything make sense.

Scene 1 has always been a complicated scene to block due to not knowing where we were going to shoot it, or how big the space we are using was going to be. Now we know we're shooting in the studios, and we also know we'll be shooting on one side of the studio floor. This made it so much easier for me and Nisserin to block out actors and the camera positions.

We decided to move around the actors and have Dean in one corner, Marie & the boss in the other corner and Annie roughly in the middle. This meant we could get a shot of each character in each camera, and we'd have enough footage to work with. Once this was completed, we started to change the shot list based on where our cameras and characters are now placed.

The blocking aided us in a really effective way as we could easily decide what camera should be on what shot and we would cut to each shot in the editing. We've still got a few more weeks until we shoot this scene so this shot list and blocking might change, but for now Nisserin and I are very happy with how this scene will play out.
We still haven't visited the location for Marie's house, so we couldn't do much to the shot list for this scene, but we worked with the knowledge we had and tried to make the shot list clear and effective for us.

We mainly focused on the scenes set in Annie & Dean's location, as these were the scenes we'll be filming soon. We changed some of the blocking, but some of them were already the way we thought would work best.
For scenes 6, 7 & 8, the shots on the shot list were different as to what we thought would work better the second time round, so we changed that on the shot list. Luckily, the blocking was correct so that didn't need to be changed or adjusted.

This situation was similar to scenes 9 & 10, the blocking was pretty much the same, but the shot list was different. The shot list in the pre-production book had a lot more of Annie in the shots, and we wanted the main focus to be on Dean and Betty. We changed the positioning of Annie after Betty comes into the room, and we changed where Dean stands when he talks to Annie at the beginning so it seems more realistic and natural. There also seemed to be a lot of unnecessary shots that we didn't need, especially in scene 10, so we decided to condense the amount of shots we need, which will help the editing process easier.

The first shot list we had was based on draft 6 of the script, which has obviously changed so we had to adjust the shot list so it matched the last script draft. It made the shot list a lot shorter as we had a lot of unnecessary shots again, and it meant we could really focus on the story we wanted to tell. The blocking had to be changed to fit the script, and to fit the new camera positioning we wanted for scene 11.

One of the problems we found with this scene was seeing the characters faces. We weren't sure if going through the windows would be a good look or not, so we decided to stay indoors and film scene 11 similar to how we're going to shoot scene 9. This will probably the most difficult scene in terms of showing the action and the storyline progressing, but we're going to try and do it the best that we can and hope it turns out ok.

We updated the rest of the shot list based on our most recent script, and we changed some of the shots for scene 17. We decided that we wanted to see this film shot from 2 shots only - one would be from the crew camera's perspective and the other would be from a wide shot outside of the house. We discussed how it might look a bit odd going in and out of the crew camera, and we agreed that we would just show the scene from that camera, until Jordan Hamsay leaves. When directing the actor of Jordan Hamsay, I will need to tell him to look at the crew camera and at Dean so we see some of his face and his interaction with Dean and Annie.

The shot list is now up to date with the blocking of each scene, and it matches the newest version of the script. This helps us when visualising each scene, which in turn makes us feel a lot more prepared and ready for our shoot week.
Without the shot list & blocking being updated, we would've struggled with visualising the scenes, and our shoot week would be a lot more stressful and chaotic than it needs to be. I'm happy with how we have blocked every scene, and I hope it all turns out the way we hope it will.