Remember Daniel? - Filming

 Filming for my final project has been difficult and I have had a lot of setbacks. I have also had to make a few changes to my original idea. I wanted the character to be able to fail and have to start over again, but instead I have chosen to narrow the results down by allowing them to re-choose their decision, so that they can always win and see the ending.

The project also has a name... ‘Remember Daniel?’ I chose the name around the narrative that the main character (Daniel) has awoken with short term memory loss and he can’t remember what he was supposed to do today. The user’s choices will help Daniel get back into his daily regime by choosing the correct options. I also wanted to make it quite comical in the options that you chose for entertainment purposes.

I began to script the storyline with the options already jotted out on paper and created a story in which the main character has no script, but the story is told by a narrator. This is how the Stanley Parable works and I think that if I could get the same dry sense of humour that they had achieved, then it would fit perfect into the storyline.

Basic Scripting for ‘Remember Daniel?’

 

I underwent filming with my main character who was my little brother, Daniel Molloy. I have a very good relationship with Daniel and he has featured in a number of my productions before. He also shares the same enthusiasm I have for my projects and listens very well to directions, he also fit the profile of the character I wanted for the film, a young adult who was just setting out in finding his feet with employment. Daniel is also a 2^nd year media student so it was good experience for him to be working at a higher level, so it was good to return something for his help in this project.

I began filming on location at the Redmond’s Building, filming on day where it wouldn’t be too busy, creating a lonely/isolated type of feeling. I chose this location because it had the elevators I needed in one of the choices the user came across. Filming had only a few minor difficulties such as; Other students using the elevators, but it only delayed the filming rather than damage it so I was happy with the way how it went, the second location was in my house. This was just for the introduction to the story and to ease the user into the story, it created a comfortable atmosphere and allowed me to add humour in at the right points with simple choices, I had no troubles at all with filming at home as I expected until I filmed the scenes of Daniel leaving the house. I had delayed filming for so long trying to find a good day to film these scenes as I wanted the weather to be nice, but I couldn’t delay filming any longer so had to have a dark moody day. I was disappointed because I wanted to give the film a good feel to it from the start and then slowly introduce darker lighting to make it more mysterious but I had almost been rushed into creating that feel simply because of the weather. This was also the case for the scenes where Daniel left the elevator/car to go to different locations, it just made the film look a bit grittier and rough which isn’t the look I was going for.