First Draft - The Bonsai Tree Teaser Poster

Question 1- split in two parts In what ways do your media products use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Q1b) In what ways do your media products use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The Bonsai Tree Official Trailer

Voice Over Script

The Yakuza are defined by 3 principles. [pause]

[Japanese words are said aloud, English translation are in subtitles] 
You have to fight...
... To prove your worth 

Chusei (Loyalty ), Gaman (endurance), seigo-sei(integrity ).

It’s never been in my nature to sit down and be idle. 

It was always about obeying my father’s wishes.

But I’ve realised… 

It means nothing to me now. 

My “family” fail to notice the Yakuza blood coursing through my veins…

I have never stood a chance against my brother.

I’m tired of walking in his shadow.

I have what he has, the power, conviction and blood thirst. 

Once I’ve climbed to the top… No one can stop me

They’ve underestimated me for too long.

I will dispose of anyone who gets in my way; even if it means burying my loyalty 

Draft 2 - The Bonsai Tree

Draft 1 - Bonsai Tree Trailer

This first draft of our trailer excludes any inter-titles as well as the voice over. 

Q3 - What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Q2- How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Q4) How did you use media technologies in the construction, research & planning, and evaluation stages?

Bonsai Tree BTS Vlog

Production Logo / Construction - Zen Productions

Character Profiles

VLOG: Car Scene Take 2

ACTORS: 

• Kaya Maki - Chantelle Anonuevo
• Yui/double-crossing yakuza member - James Tuano

SCENES: 

• James gives Chantelle an envelope which contains the profiles of the Yakuza's enemies and rivals
• James instructs Chantelle to kill the rival gangs bosses and accomplices in order to "gain the Yakuza's approval"

PROPS:

• Envelope containing pictures of rival bosses
• Black car

SHOT LIST:

• Perspective shot
• Over the shoulder shot
• Tilting/Tracking (passing envelope)
• Tracking (Chantelle walking) 
• Close up shot

The first time this scene was shot I was unable to attend and so the group had to use a different camera when filming this scene the first tie. The footage did not have the best quality and there fore we had to reshoot it, were time the whole group were in attendance and we used my Nikon D3300, the camera we originally used for filming the majority of our scenes. Celina filmed most of Chantelle's scenes while Chandler filmed James' perspective shot, and I co-directed.

Overall as a group we found that the The DSLR performed better under the dim lighting of the car and the footage appeared significantly clearer once we reviewed the footage on Adobe Premiere.

VLOG: Dunking Filip Scene

ACTORS

• Enemy Boss - Filip Jastrebszki
• Kaya Maki - Chantelle Anonuevo

SCENES

• Kaya proceeds to torture the enemy's boss by dunking his head in water

SHOT LIST

• 2-shot 
• Reaction shot (Extreme close up)
• Fast-paced tilting shot 
• Mid-shot/Profile shot
• Perspective shot
• Close up 
• Over the shoulder shot 

PROPS

• Black Bucket
• Black Duct Tape
• Chair for Filip to sit on
• Stool for the bucket
• Towel (to dry Filip's hair after each take)
• Warm water

Todays location shot was at my house specifically my back garden, where Chantelle was dunking fillips head in a bucket of water. I has in charge of vlogging whilst Chandler was both the shooting and directing along side Celina.

Editing: Piecing together the montages

Production Logo Intro

Today Chandler and James were in charge of the production logo for the beginning of the trailer.

Vlog - Bar Scene

ACTORS:

• Kaya Maki - Chantelle Anonuevo
• Aiko (Kaya's Bestfriend) - Me, Celina Laureta

SCENES:

• Kaya confides in Aiko about her brother, Kazuo, and the Yakuza's ignorance of her capabilities 

SHOT LIST:

• Close up
• Over the shoulder shot
• Profile shot

PROPS:

• Wine/Champagne bottles
• Crystal glasses
• Flowers in vase
• Bonsai tree centre piece
• Ribena juice (as an alcoholic beverage) 

Today myself and James was in charge of filming the Bar scene. In this scene we wanted Chantelle to emphases the statement " I'm tired of walking in his shadow to make  her feelings obvious to the audience. We had to retake the close up shot of the 'cheers' scene as the glasses kept coming out of frame but eventually with the help of chandler directing the actors we were able to capture it.

 

SCRIPTING and CHANGE IN PLOT: IMPORTANT

 

We have decided to change our original plot as we thought that it would allow the plot to flow much more easily and therefore be more easy to identify what it is. In terms of the dibbling rivalry and female empowerment those will remain as key themes. Although, the scene that we have filmed we felt didn't portray their rivalry great enough. And so knowing this we went with the decision of filming some scene with dialogue although most of out trailer will be in voice over. We also brought in the element of Japanese dialogue along with subtitle as we want it to appear as authentic as possible.

 

At this point we are 80% done with filming, below is the script for the rest of the scenes we going to film:

Francois (The father and head of the Yakuza) slaps Chantelle (Kaya Maki/The daughter) 

FRANCOIS: [Backhands Chantelle across the face] 

Anata wo basho o shitte iru
(TRANSLATION: Know your place) 

CHANTELLE: [Eyes wide open, staring at the floor in shock, breathing rapidly]

[stuttering] I.. I.. J-j-just... 

                                
                          Bar scene - Chantelle confiding in her best friend (Me)

CHANTELLE: [Takes a sip out of her glass]

I am fed up of walking in HIS shadow.

ME: His?

CHANTELLE: It's funny how they don't know what I'm capable of.

ME: [Scoffs] They don't.

[Toast each other's glasses] 

Information exchange scene 
["Sama" is a Japanese honorific suffix, it is important to include this in the dialogue as it shows that Kaya Maki is still the daughter of a Yakuza boss therefore she deserves respect because she has some authority]

JAMES: [Sitting in the car, holding an envelope containing pictures of the yakuza's enemies]  

CHANTELLE: [Looks around before getting in the car]

JAMES: Kaya-sama [bows] [rises from bow] 
JAMES: [Hands Chantelle the envelope] Get rid of these rats and you'll gain the Yakuza's approval. 

CHANTELLE: [Nods in determination] Is this all I need?

JAMES: Yes, Kaya-sama.

Torture scene 

CHANTELLE: [Begins to duct tape Filip to a chair, then grabs his hair and pushes his head inside a bucket full of water for a few seconds before pulling him out]

[Coolly] Had enough?

FILIP: [Stares at Chantelle with fear in his eyes]

Fighting scene
(My younger brother, Eugene, does karate so we will have him choreograph the fighting scene to make sure it looks as if Chantelle has the upper hand against him)
Fighting ensues between Eugene and Chantelle

CHANTELLE: [Throws a barrage of punches against Eugene and eventually pins him down to the floor]

EUGENE: [Straining] Dono yo ni fukaku watashitachi no rutsu? (TRANSLATION: How deep are your roots?) aka our tagline 

CHANTELLE: [Looks down at him]

[Apathetically] Sono fukakunai.
 (TRANSLATION: Not that deep)

CHANTELLE: [Punches Eugene's face]

 

Editing: The dinner table scene // Walking scene // Running from enemy scene // Bowing scene

Today Celina and I worked together to cut and edit together the footage of the dinner scene, the running scene, the walking scene and the bowing scene because Chandler and James were unavailable. 
Firstly, we chose to edit the bowing scene because there were only two clips that needed to be put together. Once the clips were dragged onto the timeline, Celina dragged the end of the clip to cut it where we wanted the scene to change.   Celina then dragged the dinner scene clips and grouped them in the order that we wanted.  Next we moved on to editing the running scene where Daniel is kicked down the stairs by Chantelle. There were also a total of four clips for this sequence and it was the first instance where we sped up the footage because it was too slow especially when she was runningTo make the walking scene a little more interesting, we decided to have the low angle shot of just their feet sandwiched between the the tilt upwards to their faces to extend the mystery before their faces are revealed. During production we purposefully readjusted the lens when he stops walking so that it focuses on his eyes - this was so there would be time for the voice over.
 
I found out during this that as I tried to edit on premier I wasn't getting the hang of it and so for the majority of the time I would give my input verbally but had Celina to piece it together technical wise on what we both wanted the scene to look like. Yay team work ! :)