Day 3 - Planning

COM3105 Home

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Lesson Objective
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1) Production Plan Mind Map

• assignment part 1: finding a story
• assignment part 2: finding a protagonist

2) Developing a Story Statement

• assignment part 3: story statement

3) Developing an ending

• assignment part 4: ending statement

Additional Resources

Production Mind Map

To refine planning skills used for audio and video production you will explore key components of video language, screenplays and script writing, editing and production considerations, like dialogue, shot types and planning a project.

Begin your learning by becoming familiar with dialogue and camera considerations.

At the end of the module you will be creating a short film that will represent your skills as they apply to video and audio production. 

Meticulous planning will enable you to shoot the program you developed and then edit the show you shot.
The worst cause of video disasters is bad planning -- not just during the Pre-production phase, but right through to the end of Post-production. Professionals don't just make plans; they implement them and then they follow through on them. When you plan like a pro, you:

• Plan the shoot in pre-production.
• Shoot the plan in production.
• Edit the planned shoot in post-production.

Getting Started! The Story

It's not easy coming up with a story from scratch. If you need inspiration you could try the following.

• Look at other films (especially if you need to produce something in a particular genre) and consider:
  • What sorts of stories are typical (of the genre)?
  • What sorts of characters are typical?
  • Are there any opportunities for ‘hybridisation’ or mixing elements from  different films?
  • What qualities would you expect a main character or ‘protagonist’ to have?
• Look at newspapers and magazines and consider:
  • Which of the stories sound interesting?
  • Which would make a good visual story?
  • Can you identify a  protagonist?
  • Can you imagine what might drive  this protagonist?
• Look at your own experience and consider
  • An event that was funny/ shocking/scary/dramatic.
  • How might this event form part of a story?
  • Does an individual emerge as a central character?
  • How might they have reached the moment of the event?
  • What might they do  afterwards?

Finding a protagonist

You may have an idea for a moment, a character, an image but have difficulty seeing how this could be made into a story.

• Brainstorm for a while – use a big sheet of paper and put your character, moment or image in the middle, then just write down ANYTHING that occurs to you in relation to this central object.
• Your aim is to come up with a main character, male, female, young, old, gay, straight, rich, poor, black, white
  • who are they?
• Next, what do they want out of life? Perhaps the following list of things that make people act will give you some ideas:
  • Pursuit of love/lust
  • Desire for justice/order/revenge
  • Fear
  • Greed
  • Compassion
  • Ambition
  • Need for validation.
• So what will your character DO in this story? Will they be driven by different things at different points in the story?

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​Developing a story statement

 You should now have

• A protagonist;
• A sense of what this character will do in this story;
• A rough idea of what kind of story this will be – a romance, for example.

Write a statement of what your film is about. It should be one or two (but no more than three) sentences long and be based on your central
For example:
‘This story is about a  policeman who, on his last day in the job before retiring, promises a mother that he will find the killer of her daughter. His promise becomes an obsession and he ends up using another little girl as bait  in order to catch the murderer.’
Before you can get to this stage you will need to go through a number of longer versions. may have loads of ideas for what happens, but try to focus on the ‘essence’ of the story – what and who is it really about?
Read your statement to the group. Make a note of people’s questions and comments – they might help you develop your idea.

Developing an ending

You now have a statement of what your story is about.
You now need to come up with another statement which tells us:

• how your story will end;
• how your protagonist will have changed at the end.

For example, if your story were about:
‘A young unemployed man, separated from his wife and son, tries to make some money by organizing his unemployed friends into a group of male strippers.’ - The FULL MONTY
Your new statement could read:
‘Despite numerous setbacks they finally manage to put on a successful show. The protagonist will  have  forged a new relationship with his son and, more importantly, managed to regain some self-respect'.

Assignment - ​Categorising the story

Look at Phil Parker’s ten story types:

• The Romance
• The Unrecognised Virtue
• The Fatal Flaw
• The Debt That Must Be Repaid
• The Spider and the Fly
• The Gift Taken Away
• The Quest
• The Rites of Passage
• The Wanderer
• The Character Who Cannot Be Put Down

 
Look at Robert McKee’s six ‘plot types’.

1. Maturation Plot
2. Redemption Plot
3. Punitive Plot
4. Testing Plot
5. Education Plot
6. Disillusionment Plot

 
Look at your two statements about your story.

• What sort of story do you have? Does it fall into one or more of Parker’s categories? Which ones? If it doesn’t seem to fit anywhere why is this? Can you improve it by making it fit?
• Does your story fit any of McKee’s ‘plot types’? If not, why not? Your main character should have changed in some way by the end of the story – do they? If not, can you make them?

1) Create a good copy of your story outline using a Mind Map.
2) Include What type of story do you have? What plot type? What way does your character change over the course of your story?
3) Upload your complete document to the Google Classroom and share it with your teacher.