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Conventions of Opening Sequences, and how our film conforms to them.…

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        Cast and Crew Credits
        
        This is one of the only forms of opening sequences that we didn't conform to in our opening sequence, as it wasn't conventional of the genre. However we did have some crew credits on our clapperboard shot. For our Credits the only people we credited were Me and Noa, who are the directors and producers of our film, and therefore the most important members of the Crew.
        
        It is very conventional of films to credit the cast and crew of the film in the opening sequence, as can be seen inBack to the Future. The film will usually start with the credits of the most important members of the Cast/Crew, such as the director and the main actors, then it will move on to the less important, but still significant, members of cast.
        
        Distribution and Production Credits
        
        We conformed to this aspect of a conventional opening sequence by also using an ident for our distributor, Focus Features, however we did not use any idents for our production company, and instead had the credits on a clapperboard in one of our first shots to keep in the style of the genre.
        
        These are usually in the form of idents right at the beginning of the film, like the Disney ident features at the beginning of all of their films. These credits allow the audience to know what producers or distributors have created this film.
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        Intertitles
        
        Intertitles are a very conventional way for mockumentaries to set-up the story line of their films, it allows them to convey lots of information quickly, and also often helps to create a humerus tone to the opening sequence, as they often seem quite serious in comparison with the shots following them. We can see this in What we do in the Shadows.
        
        We used quite a lot of intertitles in our film, as they worked well for creating humour, and setting up the main premise of the film.
        
        Cast and Crew Credits
        
        Mockumentaries do not tend to include cast and crew credits, however when they do they are included in constructive ways to maintain, the style of the mockumentary. We can see this in the opening toSurf's Up, which uses a clapperboard to credit the main crew members of the film, Chris Buck and Ash Brannon, the directors of the film.
        
        We really liked this idea, and chose to emulate it in our opening sequence, as we felt it really kept in the informal, filming style of mockumentaries.
        
        Distribution and production credits
        
        Mockumentaries also use idents at the beginning of films for the credits of their production and distribution companies. However they tend to only have idents for the Distribution companies, for instance Metrodome in What we do in the Shadows. This is because Mockumentaries tend to be Independent Films, which conventionally have many Production Houses, and would take up quite a lot of the opening sequence.
        
        We conformed to this convention of mockumentary opening sequences, as we used an ident to credit our distributor, which was Focus features, and did not use any idents to credit our production companies, which were Triggertoa Films, Film 4 and BFI .
- - - - What we do in the Shadows starts with intertitles explaining the premise of the film, then Viago waking up in his bedroom.
      - For our opening we had the conventional mockumentary intertitles setting up the premise of our film, followed by Joyce waking Toby up, and the reveal that Toby is actually invisible
    - - Usually takes up the main bulk of the opening sequence.
        
        In What we do in the Shadows we then follow Viago, as he takes us around the house, introducing us to the other main characters of the film
        
        In our sequence we continued by having the interview shots, and Toby introduce us to the family. We also included lots of cross-cutting with other shots to create humour in our sequence.
    - - At the end of the opening sequence of What we do in the Shadows the flatmates have a house meeting, and this helps to set up the humerus tone of the film to come.
      - Our Opening sequence ends with Toby being driven off to University by Joyce. This bookmarks, the end of the opening sequence, and helps to set up the tone and premise of what is to come in the rest of the film.
    - - In What we do in the Shadows we see the flatmates living relatively happily together before the disruption, which is the arrival of Nick into the vampire's lives.
      - In our sequence, we see Toby living happily at home with his mother, without many worries or responsibilities. However this is all going to change when he goes to university.
- - - - For our sequence we wanted to go for a more naturalistic look, to better convey the idea that this is a real-life documentary. We also tried to give a more humerus and happy tone to the sequence, by using quite warm colours when grading like orange and yellow. This is quite common of Mockumentaries, for instance Waiting for Guffman and What we do in the Shadows. We tried to emulate the styles of these films when making our opening sequence
    - - To try and further push into the style of Mockumentaries, we used interview shots for each of the characters, this is a convention of Mockumentaries like What we do in the Shadows and Trollhunter. To try and get really natural, realistic dialogue we got our actors to improv quite a lot, to where they would stay in role, and we would just ask them questions. This worked really well to emulate the unplanned dialogue you usually get in mockumentaries.
    - - In our sequence we used a lot of hand-held camera movement, this is a staple of Mockumentaries, and really helped to give our film, an informal, documentary style. This is a great technique, because not only does it give a more documentary feel to our sequence, it also helps the audience to suspend their disbelief. This is very prominent in What we do in the Shadows, as the film focuses on a group of vampires, and therefore has to be in someway believable. This example also mirrors our film, as it focuses on an Invisible Boy, which is ridiculous, but we also have to make it believable for the audience.
    - - Jump cuts worked really well to create humour in our film opening. They are very conventional for the mockumentary genre, and allow for us to create humour whilst still maintaining the overall pacing of the sequence.