Our film UK Ambition is about a young basketball player who with the help of many, progresses to reach proffesional level, and follows a rags to riches concept. We were originally going to m,ake it an action film, but decided a sporting drama would be more original and intersting to film. Whilst planning, we also decided the location, dialogue and camera shots we that we were goin to use. I was filming most of the film, and Mirzo Young and Alex Cox were mainly acting.



For the opening 2 minutes we decided to use a range of camera shots and angles, and started off with an establishing shot, so the audience instantly gets a clear picture of where the current scene is taking place. A second establishing shot is used later on in the scene of the railway bridge, informing the audience that the setting by this time had changed. A simple close up of the alarm clock was used so the audience also gained the knowledge of the time of day. We used fairly basic camera shots for most of the opening sequence to keep a steady opening. However some more complex shots were also used. A close up of the basketball was used to hi-light it's importance in both the genre and narrative of the film. Another close up of the greeting of the two characters was used to emphasize their close friendship, and the conversation that followed used over-the-shoulder shot which included the 180 degree rule, so the audience did not become disorientated.


At the end of the opening two minutes a low angle shot was used of Mirzo practicing his basketball skills, to portray him as the character in the ascendency, and the character who holds power and confidence in the film. For most of our opening 2 minutes we used a tripod to keep the camera steady, but handheld the camera when needed for more sophisticated shots. Panning was used quite often to track the movement of the two characters prior to their meeting. To keep the film realistic we needed to convey steady camera movement to the audience.



It was important for the audience to believe what the narrative delivering to them, so the clothes and music we used had to fit the genre. Therefore we had Alex Cox and Mirzo Young wearing sporting clothes, and not designer wear, to emphasize the characters lack of money and status. We filmed inside an outdoor basketball court, and included a shot of the surrounding grafitti, to give the location a gritty, urban apperarance. Other props such as the basketball were also included in the mise-en-scene, to help establish the contempory, urban feel we were looking for.



We decided we would use an urban soundtrack, of either the UK hip hop or grime genre, to fit with our film. After experimenting with many different soundtracks, we felt the one we chose complemented the film best. The beat dropped in unison with the transition of the characters waking up and getting ready, and the speed was well suited to the pace of the film. The singer has a confident voice, which represents the character's ambition. This soundtrack was played throughout the sequence and acted as a sound bridge, so the scenes appeared to flow uninterrupted. Also some of the lyrics such as, 'you're so crisp' and 'im not a top breh' explained the characters position at that point of the film. The dialogue of the two characters is to the point, and of an informal manner, showing them to be friends. Whilst scripting it, we included words and phrases, for example 'safe' to further get across the characters personalities.





The amount of editing we could use was obviously limited as we only had two minutes, though we ddi include some which helped the pace of our opening. Fow smooth transitions, wipe screens were often used as it gave a competitive feeling of the two characters jostling for screen space, which is symbolic of their competitve nature in the narrative. Slow motion was also used for the very last shot, in order to capture the skill of the young basketball player and create a unique visual effect for the audience to enjoy. Match on action of the characters leaving their houses was used to keep the scene interesting and fast paced, so that the camera shots did not simply just feed the film to the audience.

Whilst filming, and after recieving feedback from several people, some issues were encountered and rectified. During the conversation we did not properly use the 180 rule, and so refilmed this part for the benefit of the audience, making it easier for them to understand where the conversation is taking place. It was difficult to include all the props and clothes in all the shots and retakes that we did, but as we were short on time we decided it did not notice badly enough to be a real problem. The weather also caused a problem, as in the same scene it changes from snowy to sunny in a matter of seconds. However because we filmed over a number of days, and were quite restricted with time, there was nothing that we could really do about this.

Having evaluated our opening, if we were to do this again we would have put more thought into the planning and organisation of the filming to avoid the problems that are listed above. We would also have spent longer developing the dialogue, as we felt that this could have been stronger. Other than that we felt we succeeded in most other areas in executing an opening two minutes which exposed the culture, atmosphere and tone of the film to come.

By Matt Harrop