Analysing 3 Film Openings.

The Warriors.

The film, ‘The Warriors’ is a 1979 American film, based on the gangs of New York. The film opening is dark and mysterious with backing music that gives the audience the dark atmosphere that the opening is trying to show and helps the audience to understand. The music is a jazz piece where the bass guitar plays and gives the audience tension as it gives an effect that something bad is about to happen.

At first the opening starts with a fairground wheel, which is then followed by the credits of the director and producers etc. It is then followed by a wide shot of an old train station, which is very dark and mysterious. It then stops the credits and introduces one of the warriors, and has a medium close up onto him. He is talking to the rest of the Warriors but it does not show that.

Afterwards it introduces the rest of the Warriors as they all step onto the train and turn to face the camera, this gives the audience slight tension and unknowing as they do not really know what the characters are going to look like. The door then closes on the train and it goes off. The shot then goes back to how the opening started of the dark view of the fair ground wheel but this time also has the train in the shot coming towards the camera. The credits then reappear.

Afterwards there is a bridging shot, which changes the scene from the moving train and changes each time showing the viewer some of the other different gangs. The opening then swaps from the moving shots of the train and focuses on one of the characters on the train from the gang Warriors (medium shot) and afterwards does a bridging shot and shows two of the Warriors members in a two-shot talking, this gives the audience more of an idea about the characters and introduces them a bit more. 

The camera then swaps and does another bridging shot changing from another shot of a gang, to an extreme close-up of a train map zooming onto the word ‘Manhattan’ to tell the audience the place in which they are.  It then changes back to a following shot of the moving train. Afterwards it goes back to the Warriors and swaps to the different members talking to each other, the shots are an over the shoulder shot of one of the members and the other member talking towards them but with their face to the camera.

When the members of the Warriors are being shown and also talking they are all talking about the event that they are going to, which tells the audience where all these gangs that are being shown in the opening are going. This shows the audience what they are planning, and after it has finished introducing all the characters it then goes into an extreme wide-shot of the gathering that all the gangs are attending. The main gang member of all the gangs is in front of the camera looking down on all the others, this is a subjective camera, it also doesn’t show the face of this man just the back which gives an eeriness and also tension so the audience are waiting and wanting to see what this character looks like. 

Superbad.

The film ‘Superbad’ is a comedy movie, which was made in 2007. The music is by ‘The Bar Kays’ called ‘Too hot too stop.’ Which is an upbeat jazzy tempo song. The music gives the opening an old 70’s vibe and the music shows the audience that the film is a happy, comedy film. The opening before the actual movie opening where it shows the ‘Sony pictures entertainment’ advert, the music is playing whilst this is on the screen it then jolts that advert, to a part in the song where it says ‘WOO’ they use a sort of jump cut and it then focuses back onto the Sony advert again and carries on. The dance is spaced out into four different separate dances which uses a cartoon look effect where the outline of the characters bodies are different changing colours dancing to the music. The whole way through the opening the camera is set to a medium-long shot as the camera is still and has a whole view of the characters bodies. The opening is set to give a humorous effect to the audience and to show that the film is a comedy film. The dancing they are doing is a sort of 'nerdy' type of dancing which also describes how the characters act in the film. The colours that are used are bright and catch the audience's attention towards it. It also gives the audience a slight wanting also to see what the characters that are dancing actually look like as there faces are not shown. 

Juno.

The film Juno is a 2007 comedy drama-film about an average teenager who accidentally falls pregnant and how the events she has to face put pressure on her young teenage life.  The song used for the opening is "All i want is you" by Barry Polisar. The opening is Juno walking in her hometown but in a cartoon effect. As she walks she holds a big bottle of 'Sunny D' and frequently drinks it. As this is an unusual thing to do, this gives the audience watching an eeriness to why she is doing that and where she is walking to and why she is drinking a big bottle of drink. The shots used change frequently and are all different. There is close ups, extreme close ups, long shots, medium long shots, over the shoulder shots, birds eye view shots, head shots and medium-wide shots. This all give the audience a different view of the character 'Juno' and the shots also show her surroundings as she is walking. The characters face isn't happy and shows the audience that she is slightly worried or down about something. This also makes the audience wonder why she is feeling this way and make them interested to see what happens next in the film. The colours used in the opening are a dull grey, and blue also an orange colour is used when it is showing the autumn season and leaves appear but the colours used in her surroundings do not at all  stand out, but the outfit and Juno herself are the main shot of the camera and the outfit she is wearing stands out from the dull background colours.

Evaluation of city scape.

When I made the short clip of London's city scape I used the package Adobe Premiere Pro. This was the first time I've used this package and at first found it hard and difficult to understand. After a while I found it easier to use and understood the package more which made it easier to edit and make my short clip.

Making this clip we had several things that were vital to include:

-Importing sound tracks and after putting it onto the software
-Importing footage
-Adding and editing tiles
-Adding transitions
-Cutting and editing footage

Importing Soundtracks: To import a soundtrack to your project you enter your work in Premiere Pro then to file import, then choose and click on the track you want to import to your clip. It will then appear in the back at the side of the screen where you can then drag the track onto the clip you have made.

Importing Footage: Adding the footage that I wanted was also from file and then import, it then appears in the back at the side of the screen, i then had all of the footage to choose from at the side where i chose the footage I wanted and dragged it onto the sequence, and cut, edited and rearranged the clip to how i wanted to present it.

Titles: I added titles onto my clip at the beginning. I did this by clicking on the icon that was underneath the bank that has a big square and a little square on top of it. You then name the title which you want it to say when it comes up onto your clip and press ok. There is then another step where you then choose what font, colour and size you want for your title. When choosing a smaller screen of your clip will appear which gives you a better view of where you want to place your title and in what position etc. This is then in the bank ready to drag onto your clip.

Adding Transitions: Adding transitions to my clip made it better and makes it more interesting and eye catching to watch. This wasn't as hard as the other edits to the lip as all you had to do was click on the effects slide in the bottom left corner under the bank which you then have video transitions among other folders, clicking on the folder it also came up with many to choose from. I chose a transition that suited my video and also one that looked right entering and exiting the clip.

Cutting and Editing Footage: The footage I chose to have in my clip also needed to be cut and fitted better with the following clips that I also chose to include. To do this you click on the razor tool where to use this you have to find what part of the clip you want to cut and click on the area, then one side of the clip becomes highlighted and the other side of the clip which you have chose to mark is not, where you then decide what bit you want to keep. You then return to the set of tools and take the normal curser and click again on the bit you want to delete and press the delete key on the keyboard to cut the part you do not need.

My clip was mainly just a little experiment of the Adobe Premiere Pro package and for first time using I feel that I managed and understood it quite well. I tried to make my clip as interesting as possible and cut and put together the clips and fitted them together as best as I could. If I had to repeat and do the task again I would have used more clips then just of scenes from London and also used more effects to make it better and more eye catching to the audience. As I become more confident on Premiere Pro my editing skills will become more advanced and I will be able to know how to put effects and transitions on the projects that I do. I think that my next clip that I make and edit will definitely be better and more advanced as I have had more use of the package and know how to add effects and transitions etc to my clips.