Synopsis:
“When everything falls apart and the light goes dark, love comes.”
“And truth is not the same as what it seems.”
Elijah is an aspiring photographer who is preparing for an exhibition. Unfortunately, he experiences a car crash and his parents passed away. His eyesight starts to deteriorate, believed to be caused by a severe form of depression: hysterical blindness. His conditions worsens as his world falls apart.
As a photographer, Elijah suffers even more. His photography skills are affected by his impaired vision, his exhibition is at stake. Janet, his assistant, noticed Elijah’s sufferings and is willing to help him through thick and thin. He develops a liking for Janet.
However, Janet starts to find out that something is not right regarding Elijah. His parents did not die due to a car accident. Elijah starts to remember something buried deep in his memory, a dark past that he has forgotten from that tragic day.
Who is Elijah?
Reflections
From this project of shooting a trailer, our group learnt the ups and downs of actually taking the time and filming one. Even with pre-preparation through watching trailers made by the professionals, going heads into the project and really doing it with our hands was a great experience that we feel could only be taught through this.
First and foremost, we changed our original plot due to the fact that the main character was not as relatable, nor strong. This created a sense of distance for the audience and changing it helped the story to flow better with better dynamics. We also thought that incorporating a mystery also adds a very interesting twist, making the trailer more compelling.
While filming for “Find Me”, there were definitely setbacks that held us with instances like how to plan our shots, how to tweak the story to make the character/story more appealing, deal with inconsistency with our story, or even locations that were not suitable and had to be changed at the last minute.
Overall, it was definitely a wonderful experience that was fulfilling and also very fun, mainly due to the ability for us to work so well as a team. Everyone was very co-operative and extremely supportive of each other, we are very thankful for having each other as teammates 🙂
Process – Story
The story is a combination of Find Me by Alfred and Clandestine by Gladys. By taking almost equal amount of elements from both stories, we crafted an interesting twist in the final story: Find Me.
Original Find Me by Alfred is about a young man who lost his family in a car crash. He was depressed because of the deaths of his parents and eventually developed hysterical blindness. Love seemingly rescued him from his depression and also his disabilities of losing his eyesight. In conclusion, the story is about his struggle and how he fought his hopelessness. (Genre: Tragedy, Drama)
In the other hand, Clandestine by Gladys is about corporate warfare in the modern setting. The story is about the wife of a businessman who is caught in a moral dilemma: to support her husband’s evil schemes or to expose him. (Genre: Psychological Thriller, Drama)
As a result, the final Find Me took the idea about a young man who lost his parents from the original Find Me and a woman who faces moral dilemma from Clandestine. To create a better flow of the story, we added the idea that the death of the parents are not because of an accident, but potentially a murder which is a mystery to unveil.
Process – Editing
An early trial edit of the first few footages taken.
The result felt more like a short film, we ought to make it more trailer-like by jumbling some of the sequence and changing the music.
Roles
We did most of the work together, planning the story sequence and art direction as a team.
- Gladys: Main editor and cameraman, actor
- Alfred: Main actor and story writer, editor
- Feli: Main Animator/effects and story writer, cameraman
Music
- Trailer: “I Started A Joke” by Becky Hanson
- Process: “The Last of Us” by Gustavo Santaolalla
Locations
- Kranji memorial park
- Shaw Tower
- Gladys’ house
- NTU’s Hive, ADM, Hall
- Singapore Zoo
- Bugis area
- SAM
Bloopers
HAVE FUN LAUGHING!
