First Post

I'm still not really sure what I'm using this blog for - I figure I'll just use it as a place to keep all of my notes, and links, as that seems like what this is for.

I'm going to lay out what I want to do for my coursework now, so that everything else makes sense.

We're all doing task two (I think? The one that's a trailer for a film.) and I wanted to a version of Romeo and Juliet. So the idea is this: A high school drama group wants to put on a play of Romeo and Juliet, but during the discussion of how to do the play, they get into an argument over different interpretations of the play. 2 guys are pulled apart by their friends who care about this much more than they do, and the group decides to split up and do two versions of the play. The two guys (Jerome and Julian, until I come up with something less cheesy) fall in love with one another, and the plot of Romeo and Juliet proceeds at a modern high school level, rather than that of Venetian nobles, so much less death and much more being told off by the teacher. 

We were told over the summer holiday to do a storyboard of the trailer - which I've done.

Sort of.

I can't draw to save my life, so my "storyboard" is a few stickmen, some arrows and a few camera angles, followed by 3 pages of explanation (in an A6 notebook, so not actually that much - maybe 2 paragraphs) for each of the scenes.

Romeo and Juliet research

As literally the best place to start any research on a writing project, I checked out TV Tropes first. They have a page that describes all the tropes that come up most commonly in versions of Romeo and Juliet, and explain different interpretations, as well as a list of all the versions made (Wikipedia has a more comprehensive list, but I probably shouldn't cite it as a source) and a walkthrough of each film, book, comic, manga, anime, song, play and musical even slightly inspired by the play. I'll probably read some of the books and watch some of the films to round out my knowledge of the play.

I do know the play reasonably well, but it's also a really dense read due to the "ye olde englisc", so I'd like a way to get the same story without wanting to set something on fire after a few hours.

The version closest to what I want to make is a crappy 2005 direct to TV film called "Pizza my heart", which lays its scene on Verona street, where two great pizza houses both alike in dignity etcetera - which looks both terrible and hilarious.

I also did some research on RomComs, because I'm sick of films where the gay couple ends up sad at the end, and also because RomComs are awesome.

I used TV Tropes again, which has a massive list of codes and conventions, but I also looked at the research others had done for this same course, all conveniently saved on slideshare or prezi. I will definitely follow all their links at a later date, down whatever research black hole that takes me, but I had work every night this week so I kind of just came home and slept - research at school is tedious, because any useful website is blocked, including this one.