Tasks, Process and Evaluation

FINAL TASK

The last outcome of this project consists in making a short film about a scene of Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare.
It will be your job, over the next several weeks, to adapt the scene, write the script of your scene, shoot and/or play it. 

PROCESS

STEP ONE

LEARN how to write and adapt a scene through the study of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.

Task 1

Read and understand the plot summary of the play.

Task 2 
Study some extracts (original and modern versions) and compare them with the corresponding extracts from West Side Story.

Task 3
A. In threes, prepare a poster about one of the following themes:
- Shakespeare's life
- Shakespeare's plays
- Globe Theatre
- Royal Shakespeare Company
- Stratford-upon-Avon
- Elizabethan Era: political and social life
- Elizabethan Theatre (English Renaissance Theatre)

Your work should include:
- Photos about the theme you are to report on,
- Main information (dates, facts, analysis),
- A quiz about your theme, that is two say several questions (including multiple choice, true/false, yes/no and other types of questions).

B. Each member of the group prepares a ten-minute oral presentation of the theme.

--> The other students of the class will answer the questions of the quiz during the presentation.

Task 4
  Adapt another scene for another time period.
You will have to choose from five different time periods:   

• The Wild West
• 1860's Southern United States. 
• 1920's Chicago
• 1940's and World War II in Europe
• 1970's Northern Ireland 

Your work will be centred around a Theatrical Portfolio which you will create in conjunction with the research you do.

Your group portfolio will include:

Group work: The script of your rewrite

Individual work:

• A personal summary and short analysis of your scene --> Student 1
• A dictionary of tough Shakespearean terms you found in your original scene + a dictionary of difficult words you used in your own script + a phonetic transcription of the difficult words you used in your script. --> Student 2
• Drawings and detailed descriptions of costumes, sets, and props that could be used in performing your scene. --> Student 3
• A  cultural overview of the time period within which your scene takes place. --> Student 4

=> Find the scenes you have to adapt HERE.

Task 5

'Pitch' your idea to the class and convince them that your version is the best one.

You will have to explain what you have done, report on your findings about the period, account for your choice of costumes, sets and props, etc.

STEP TWO

This time, your work will be centred around the making of a short film. To achieve your task, you will need to:

• Draw the storyboard of the film,

• Play the roles, film the scene or edit the scene,

• Publish your film on Youtube and embed it on this blog.

EVALUATION

In addition to the final task (step two), tasks 3, 4 and 5 (step one) will be evaluated.
You will be given different evaluation grids.
To see the evaluation grids for tasks 4 and 5, click HERE.

2012 Scripts

Here are the scripts the 1L students wrote. Enjoy and vote for the best one!

Yasmine, Myrian, Mélissa and Constant's script

Ophélie, Léana and Thomas's script  

Maël, Tristan and Arthur's script

Steven, Sébastien and Mathilde's script

Audrey, Mathilde and Tiphanie's script

Thomas, Anaïs, Perrine and Alexia's script

Maurane and Géraud's script

How to draw a story board

Before shooting your film, you have to draw the storyboard of your film.

Click HERE to learn how to draw a storyboard.

Posters designed by the students of the class

Coming soon :-)

Scenes to adapt

Click the links below the find the scenes you have to adapt (original version and in modern English).

• Act 1, scene 1
• Act 1, scene 5
• Act 2, scenes 5 & 6
• Act 3, scene 1
• Act 3, scene 3
• Act 5, scenes 1 & 2
• Act 5, scene 3

Editing your work

You've finished your filming or recording.

Now you need to put it all together into your final masterpiece.

Here's some tips, hints and advice to help you edit your film.

General

Make sure you've got everything you'll need
You're going to need editing software, a computer and possibly a few other bits and pieces.

Establish your scene and characters
If your audience don't know who they're watching/listening to or where it's all taking place, they'll get confused and then bored.

Be organised
A list of which bits from each take you liked and might use will come in very handy.

Telling the story should be your first priority
Technical wizardry and fancy effects can help tell it, but don't let them sidetrack you.

Consider captions and voice-overs
If you need to quickly get over a lot of information, and can't do it with the shots or audio you have, try using a caption or voice over. This can be particularly useful for explaining jumps between places or times. For example, a caption saying "Twenty years later..." can save a lot of effort!

Try to make each scene more or less the same volume
If some are louder than others, adjust them until their volume until it matches.

Film

Keep it varied
Cut (i.e. switch between) different types of shots together for a more exciting final film. Try going from a wide shot to a close up , for instance.

Set the pace
Simply put, lots of cuts = a film with a fast, exciting pace. Fewer cuts = a slower, more thoughtful film. The average TV show has a cut every four seconds or so. Too many cuts, though, can be very confusing, as well as a bit headache-inducing.

About transitions
Transitions, or effects that take you between one shot and another, will be included in most video packages. Common ones include dissolves between pictures, fades from pictures to black, and wipes where one picture slides across another. They're well worth taking a look at, but beware! Fancy dissolves can look good, but if you overdo them, they'll look really cheesy.

About effects
Video packages will usually come complete with various effects you can add onto your film, such as colour changes, slow-motion, blur, motion and so on. It's well worth experimenting with these to see if they'll improve your film, but don't add on effects just for the sake of it.

Audio

Cutting between scenes in audio
To make it clear the scene is changing, fade the first scene down to silence, then fade in the next scene. You will need a little gap, otherwise your audience won't realise what's happened. To make scene changes clearer try adding in different background ambiences to each scene.

Avoiding clicks
Make sure you don't cut the start or end of a word off when editing. It'll cause a click or just sound plain weird.

Fade-in and fade-out each individual clip. They should quickly increase to the volume you want at the start, and do the reverse at the end. You can make the fade so quick you can't actually hear it. Without a fade, edit points may well make a clicking noise.

The sound of silence
If you want a silent moment in a scene, such as between two short clips, take a silent moment from your original recording and edit that in.

If you just leave a gap or turn the volume down to silent, it will sound strange, because that moment won't have the same background ambience as the rest of your piece.

Directing Advice

General advice

Safety first!
Make sure that the location where you do your filming and recording is safe, and you're not going to hurt yourself or anyone else. It's easy to get so wrapped up in what you're doing when you're directing that you might not notice a hazard, so never work on your own. Also, don't use expensive equipment anywhere it could tempt thieves.

Tell the story!
First and foremost, make sure you get the story across. Complex shots, scenes and audio will only improve your finished piece if they help tell the story.

Have a rehearsal before recording anything.
The actors can use it to get into their roles, and the camera operator or sound recordist can rehearse at the same time - making sure they know when they've got to change shot, checking that the sound is nice and clear and so on.

Don't shoot or record loads more than you need.
It might be tempting to give yourself lots of choice, but the more you shoot or record, the longer it will take to get it into the computer ready for editing, and the harder it will be to pick the best bits. And remember, you're going to have to watch or listen to it all back!

Keep a checklist.
If you have a lot of scenes, write up a list you can tick off as you finish them. It would be awful to finish and discover you've missed out a vital moment.

Filming advice

Use a tripod if you can.
Wobbly pictures are no fun to watch. If you haven't got a tripod, try rigging something up - put the camera on a table even! Only go handheld if there's a very good reason, and even then, don't wave the camera around all the time. You'll find the results really frustrating to edit if you do.

Make sure the light is behind you. If it's behind whatever you're shooting, then it'll come out as a black silhouette.

Try storyboarding your film.
Draw out a cartoon of what you want your finished film to look like. That way you'll have a much clearer idea of what shots you need to get. It doesn't matter if you can't draw - even a stick-figure storyboard will be really useful!

Don't overdo the zoom.
Zooms can often look a bit rubbish, frankly. Just move the camera in closer instead. Try taking a close-up and cutting between it and a long distance shot instead. It'll look a lot more professional. The same goes for moving the camera from side to side (panning) - it can be really distracting to watch, so only do it for a very good reason.

The more light, the better.
Shoot in natural sunlight if you can, or if you're indoors, turn as many lights on as you can.

Use lots of different shots.
Shots you could use include different angles, close-ups on faces and objects as well as long and medium shots that show the whole of the action. You can also shoot "general views" of interesting details, and "cutaways", close-up shots of relevant action. Varying the shot will make your finished film much more exciting to watch.

Give yourself some space
Try to film so that you have at least ten seconds before and after each shot - it'll make sure you don't miss anything, and makes capturing your film and editing it easier.

Build your own dolly.
In TV and film, a piece of equipment called a dolly is used for moving (called "tracking") shots. It's like a little railway the camera runs along. You won't have a dolly handy, but you could try putting the camera on a chair with wheels (wheelchairs are particularly good), and pushing it for a tracking shot.