CONSTRICTION

The Project

Working with youth groups in North London CONSTRICTION is a feature film project to introduce underprivileged teenagers to the art of filmmaking. We have today (25th of April) launched the projects crowd funding page and we’d really appreciate your donation and support. If you can’t make a donation then please share the below link and page on your social media accounts and help us to reach our production goal of $20,00.

http://www.indiegogo.com/constriction

The Film

Constriction is a psychological thriller by writer director Asa Bailey that explores the idea of hyper reality in motion picture story telling. The film is shot using only CCTV equipment that is set up in the films single location, a london family house. Each room of the house will be rigged with up to four cameras that will capture the action in wide and close up shots. These shots will be later edited together and enhanced in post production.

Through this restrictive shooting process the tension of the film will be heightened to a level that will see the films audience forget that they are watching a work of fiction, pulling them into the directors world of hyper reality.

The Script

The script tells the story of the Preston family who live in a large family home in the suburbs of North London. Mrs Holly Preston (43) is a housewife and mother of three children, Harry (6), Lance (12), and Chloe (5). Mr Carl Preston (45), works as an Arts Event Manger for the National Opera.

After finding bruises on the arms and legs of her children, Mrs Preston decides to fit the house out with CCTV equipment to record the house in their absence. Mr Preston’s work at the Opera means that the couple are often having to go away for the night, and so Mrs Preston is left with no choice but to hire babysitters from an agency to look after the young children.

After watching the family at home we are introduced to Carry a young 19 year old baby sitter from Eastern Europe. Now left alone with the children, Carry engages in harmless fun, she reads stories, the boys play on the x-box she the perfect carer. Then a mysterious phone call breaks the normality and Constriction becomes every parents nightmare, as the children have to fend for themselves, Carry and her guests make the most of The Preston’s happy family home.

Director Asa Bailey
Writer Christopher A Chang

Be Okay is a film about modern young-adults that reminds us to never, ever take life too seriously. Chris and Max are a pair of blasé, best-friends, roommates who are experiencing post-graduate angst in the awkward limbo between college and adult life.

Set against the backdrop of LA’s colourful yet lost, middle-class youth and to a soundtrack of their generation, Be Okay follows Max and Chris and their reactionary antics as they attempt to figure out love and life.

Through their coming of age story they realise that they may have the knowledge to become mature adults, but they lack the wisdom and often the desire to apply it.

It becomes clear that they have no control over life and that they are resigned to their new found knowledge. In the end they come to the conclusion that “growing up is easy if you don’t try too hard.”

www.beokaythemovie.com

Through Amazing Industries Ltd, Producer Steve Hodges, Luke Brandon Field, Director Asa Bailey and Writer Christopher A Chang are now seeking LA production partners to realise the screenplay to the big screen.

Asa Bailey to Direct Call of Duty The Movie, no the game, no it’s a movie hold on what is this.

In my dreams the world of the passive movie colide with the interactive environment of the video game, to come together to create an immersive mass audience experience.

Let me try and take you into this dream a little more, first you have to imagine that all this technology is in place, which it isn’t but lets not let that stop us from dreaming. After all given enough R&D budget nothing is imposible.

Back to the dream. In the dream world I see a new kind of mass theatre entertainment. I see a cinema full of eager young people, all the people wear a simple and comfortable pair of glasses through witch they can see the big screen, much like the best of todays 3D glasses.

They watch a film made up of live action characters who walk in a CGI created world (see my earlier Tim Burton VFX Breakdowns). As the film plays out the edit points cut and the human characters, played by leading actors and stars of our future, role, jump and shoot through the action. The audience watch their favourite cast take on the foes, the zombie horde or the alien invasion.

But then at a cut point the live action switches into the game. The audience now use their mobile phones as weapons, using the experiences smart phone app, they take over from the live action characters in the movie. The audience shoot through the final battle, or key stages of the script, they jump the ravine and they take the hero forward. Every member of the audience seeing a unique overlay version of events, through the glasses. If only we could get rid of the glasses, but alas we can not.

Rockstar Studios are you listing, are you there, come in. Asa Bailey is a Director with a vision to use top script writers and known live actors in a world built of CGI to create story cut sequences and immersive action, that seamlessly blends the experience of movie and game play.

As the team and I get ready to go into production on a number of projects this year I am finding it helpful to look at some detailed clips of the work of other directors. Here we take a look at the work of Tim Burton and the way he captures his creative vision, in this case for the film Alice in Wonderland. In these two clips we can see the use of the predominately green sound stage that is used to capture the live action, live action images that are then fed into the post production pipeline.

What it means to me to be a viral director – firstly it was never really about making skits and sticking them on youtube. But I have to agree that when we did do that and we clocked up millions of views, it was very impressive. It got the attention of the advertising industry and this basic viral video activity did define the viral movement for sometime.

But to be a viral director in my view is to consider how people will engage with your story on a wider platform and design experiences around multiple devices, you could even call them touch points. We use the term touch points in branding and advertising.

As a viral director I like to think about not only the screenplay, but what about the comics the album, the projects advertising campaign, the iPad application. How can the story grow to become a transmedia experience. How can the story be taken to all these touch points to the greater enjoyment and entertainment of the audience.

Viral directors understand the noise of the media world they operate in. Making a single well shot film is good, but how many more ways can filmmakers look through a lens? Close ups, dolly shots, long shots fast edits, it’s all been done. But what about taking the story to a live event, what about expanding the story into an immersive alternate reality game? Now lets go back to what I just said, now with these new screens and platforms in mind, lets look at how we can innovate as film makers through the art of filmmaking, by working with actors, crew and technicians to look for new and unique ways to tell our story.

Thinking in broader dimensions as to where your film will be engaged, has to be done at the start not as a bolt on at the end of production. To create content and grow your story to the multiple touch points requires you to shoot more content. This is the advantage of digital photography, it’s faster and cheeper than film to create the large amounts of content. Content that you will need to accommodate not only the cinema screen but the mobile phone, the ARG (Alternate Reality Game), the live events and concerts too.

You could say it is our way of thinking that has become viral, we think like a virus, of how our story can infect all aspects of our potential audiences lives. Putting that way sounds quite mercenary, but in todays media landscape it’s necessary to think this way to cut through the competition, the noise.

The term viral also refers to the technology and the fact that humans like to share good experiences. You are now taking your story to more than just one screen, you are making it an experience on multiple screens, in multiple environments. Word of mouth is the most powerful form of marketing for your story, but now it is not confined to just those that go to see the movie on the big screen. Today you can expand your experience to digital platforms where your new audience can tweet about it, facebook it, chat about it digitally, spreading your story like a virus through both word of mouth and digital networks.

But don’t forget, above everything else, the one rule, the only rule is for your content to be truly viral (creating content that spreads) it has to be amazing; an amazing idea, and amazing story, an amazing experience.

Asa Bailey is a Designer, Viral Director and founder of transmedia production company Amazing Industries Ltd.

Die Antwoord lead vocalist Ninja was part of the South African hip-hop scene for many years, fronting acts such as The Original Evergreens, MaxNormal.TV and The Constructus Corporation. Ninja told Rolling Stone, “Everything I did before Die Antwoord was me experimenting, messing around and trying to find die antwoord… Everything before it was disposable. It was all throwaway.” So then this is for real. Well we love it. NSFW.