#6 Lighting and Mood (how they connect!)

 Lighting and Mood

Lighting in a film is another important aspect in a film’s final product. Not only does it illuminate the scene, it creates the mood in a particular scene, moves the audience’s eye/focus, and can emphasize the feeling the character(s) are experiencing in that scene as well.  

 Lighting is what brings your scene to life, it brings the dark to light and hides secrets from the audience in the dark. An example of this in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Pt.1). In the opening scene, there is a low lighting on the minister of magic when he is performing his monologue. This is to reflect there is more to what is being said, there is a secret waiting to be revealed. 

A particular scene in the media…

Although not a film, Outer Banks is a piece that focuses plenty on natural looking lighting, to convey the sense of realness (reality) that the show is trying to portray. It is set on the beautiful beaches of the outskirts of South Carolina and emphasizes the split between rich (the Kooks) and poor (the Pogues).

One part of the show that stands out is how the lighting changes from so saturated to shadowy. One scene in particular was the main group of Pogues searching for the “cross of gold” in the church. The lighting is warm and portrays the one of the Sun in the afternoon, and it creates the sense of heat and urgency to find the cross. When they return to the church after someone got injured, the shadowy lighting to create the feeling of night, also gives off the feeling of betrayal and secrecy, which later in the scene, the Pogues found out that some Kooks stole the cross without their knowledge. This makes the audience feel the excitement of the discovery to the disappointment of knowing that all that hard work has soon been taken away, showing how just from lighting, it makes the scene come alive and understandable. 

For my video…

The concept of my video surrounds the idea of long-distance. The mixture of heartbreak and hope. Similarly to the Outer Banks example, I would like to use (in correspondence to my composition of scenes), warm and shadowy lighting to show the difference of the couple’s feelings/thoughts at specific moments. 

For the beginning of the film's opening, I will use colorful and bright lighting to represent the abundance of love, and natural, dull lighting (almost monotone) to reflect the distance between the two and the weight of the feeling of separation. To further drive understanding of what I am trying to portray in the 2 minutes we have available.

  

#5 Personal Sound Motifs in Film! (and how I will utilize them)

 So…What exactly are sound motifs?

Sound motifs are a repetition of a sound that corresponds to a certain character, or part in a story. Every single time Superman comes on screen, you will know it's him just from the da daNa dananana (terrible rendition but you get my point). 

Why are they important? Like...what can they do?

Sound motifs remind the audience of a character, and what they bring to the story, that can reciprocate a good feeling or a bad feeling. These can impact greatly because when the audience hears a certain something, they will anticipate a particular action on screen. A prominent example will be Jaws. Every moment in which that sound appears, the audience will anticipate the shark or Jaws to appear on screen and some danger occurs. 

This continuous engagement from the audience is important, as they will understand the story more and be more immersed in the film’s plot. Like for example in Jaws, every time the shark theme is heard, the audience anticipates the great white to come along, and for someone else to be the next victim...

What does this have to do with me? 

For my 2-minute film opening component, the idea of a rom-com surrounding a long-distance relationship keeps on stirring my mind. For a sound motif idea, I thought that a certain song would be played every time they think about each other. 

Now, the sound can be diegetic or non-diegetic, or even trans-diegetic. Examples can be, one of the persons puts their headphones on and plays that certain song, or the song is played in the background when the thought of the other occurs, or the song is played in the background and switches to be heard from one of the person’s cell phones. 

Which sound would I use?

Various song/sounds have been roaming my mind, yet a few such as Pink + White [Frank Ocean], Return to Me [Dean Martin], (I Know) I’m Losing You [The Temptations], You Send Me [Sam Cooke] & Kiss and Say Good-bye [The Manhattans] have struck out. Of course, due to copyright restrictions there will be a small chance I will be able to use them, but the themes and instrumentation of these songs reflect what I want to portray on screen. 

What does it mean? 

For every time the sound/song is heard, the audience should be able to feel the longing love the two people have for each other, and for each time there is a mix of heartbreak and hope. The sound/song will be a sad reminder yet give each of the two an ounce of joy/hope that they need in the time they are apart from one another. (aww so cheesy…so sad)