Planning - storyboard and shot list

 Storyboards

Production of our story boards

During the production of our story boards we tried to make sure that each part was drawn in enough detail for all of us to understand clearly what was happening in each scene, this also helped us when it came to the filming of our opening sequence as we could clearly see what was happening at each point during our film. The ideas we put into our storyboards were our initial ideas, however some things changed, or were added or removed during filming to improve the film.

Original Shot List

In the bedroom

• Establishing shot - sunrise
• Long/Mid shot - Girl in bed
• Close up - alarm ringing/ turning alarm off
• Panning down - from bed to slippers

MONTAGE - in bedroom

• Close up - feet getting out of bed (into slippers)
• Low close up (on the floor) - feet walking towards wardrobe, away from the camera
• Long shot - as feet walk further away
• Close up - note on wardrobe
• Close up - girls face reacting to the note
• Long shot - opening wardrobe
• Long shot - Clothes being thrown/piling up on the bed

MONTAGE - in bathroom

• Close up - dropping towel, feet stepping into shower 
• Low angled close up - turning on shower

MONTAGE - in bedroom

• Mid shot - brushing hair
• Extreme close up - applying lipstick
• Mid shot - spraying perfume
• Close up -doing hair 

MONTAGE - in hallway

• Long shot - walking down the stairs

In the car 

• Establishing shot - of houses as car drives past them all

School entrance 

• Extreme Long shot 

School corridor

• Long/Mid shot - girl at locker
• Long shot - Mean girls entering
• Long shot - knocking books out of the girls hand
• Long shot - "hi Dylan" as Amber walks past Dylan
• Shot Reverse Shot (close up shots) - conversation between Madison and Dylan
• Over the shoulder shot (Over Madison's shoulder) - Dylan giving books back
• Over the shoulder shot (Over Dylan's shoulder) - Madison thanking Dylan
• Over the shoulder shot (Over Madison's shoulder) - Dylan introducing himself
• Over the shoulder shot (Over Dylan's shoulder) - Madison introducing herself

Planning - Production Company Logo

We had two original designs for our film production company logos:

The first design shows a camera strip with the writing "star productions" across the top and two gold stars in the film strip. The use of the film strip  connotes that we are a low budget independent film company, and the use of the yellow writing connotes happiness, fun and excitement. We think this shows our audience what they should expect to see in our films. The use of the two golden stars suggests that we are of high 'star' quality and that our films will be of this too. 

Our second design is only in the colours black and white, which makes it look very sophisticated and classy. The logo features a film strip, which again connotes that we are a low budget film company, the words 'Maximum productions' are written inside the film strip in a clear, bold font which makes it very eye catching towards the audience, Above this is a scene from London, showing iconographic famous British landmarks, such as the London eye, Big Ben and the house of parliament. This suggests to the audience of our films that it is a British company and therefore any films that we produce will also be British based. 

I prefer the second design as I personally feel that it is of much better quality and in my opinion makes the film look more expensive than the other design does, I think this will impact the audience's views before they watch the film, and we want the audience to think highly of the film before they choose to watch it. 

We all decided we preferred the second design, but wanted to incorporate parts of the first design to improve this. In our final design we used the second design but added five stars around the edge. This suggests that our film is of five star quality. 

Planning - characters

Madison Griffis
This is the female lead character who is seen as a new girl joining the school. She is good looking and seen to care about her school work, a stereotypical characteristic of a female lead character. She comes from a troubled background, due to her recent family split, and this makes her very naive and easily mislead. This is seen when she leaves her friends to become one of the 'mean girls' changing the whole plot of the film and changing herself as a character. We tried to portray our lead girl like this as it makes her relatable to the target audience as she is a typical teenager facing everyday situations.


Dylan Barker
This is the male lead character who is portrayed as the most popular girl in school. He is athletic, good looking and lusted after by all the girls in the school. However the audience also learn that he is very self-conscious and thinks if he does not stay in a relationship with Amber (the popular mean girl) then he will loose his reputation, which makes him afraid of being targeted, especially if he ever got on the wrong side of Amber. The 'real Dylan' starts to develop in the film when Madison joins the school and he holds part of the blame for the conflict and rivalry between Amber and Madison. This is because he starts to  realise that perhaps Amber is not the girl for him and how much nicer Madison is.


Amber - the popular mean girl
Amber is the stereotypical mean girl of a teen angst film. She is arrogant, stuck-up and incredibly materialistic. Her main aims are to keep hold of her 'popularity', her appearance and of course keeping a relationship with the most popular, good-looking boy in the film, Dylan so that they can remain the ultimate 'it' couple with much more power. Amber thinks the whole school love her when in reality this is not the case. Madison and Amber are rivals throughout the film, until Madison ends up leaving her friends and moving to sit with the mean girls. However when Dylan ends up leaving Amber for Madison the friendship ends and the rivalry is worse than ever.


Mean girls 1 and 2
These two characters are Amber's followers. They thrive to be her and want to remain popular, therefore they do not want to get on the wrong side of her and do everything within their power to make sure she always likes them. They do not always enjoy spending time with Amber but they think it is better to be with Amber, than to be without her as they may be hated by others.

Social groups 

Within the film there are three main social groups. 

The first social group is the athletic sporty group. This is the group that Dylan belongs to, and he will often be seen with a member of this group kicking a football around or laughing together. Most of the good looking boys in the school are part of this group so there are often girls watching them, or lusting after one of them. This is what makes this group an important aspect of the film as the boys in it will be someone the target audience will want to watch.

The second social group in the film will be the 'Nerds'. This group will be identified by the mise-en-scene in which they wear. This will be glasses, unfashionable clothing and will often be seen carrying school books. They will dress smarter than the other students in the school which will connote their intelligence.

The final social group in the film will be the mean, popular girls. This is the group that Amber belongs to and that Madison joins for a short while. This group will often be see wearing pink coloured clothing as this connotes how girly they are as pink is seen to be an incredibly feminine colour. Activities that we see them doing include applying make-up, gossipping and trying to intimidate other students. This will be seen in the opening sequence when they knock Madison's school books out of her hands. This is their way of showing Madison where she belongs as they feel slightly intimidated by her due to her being attractive as well as smart. They know the boys in the school admire them and enjoy this attention and therefore do not want another girl to steal this from them.