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BRIEFMEDIA
CREATIVE
BRIEF
Title: “In Your Dreams – A
Documentary”
Produced By: Ben Martin
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INFORMATION ON COMPETITION
THE LONDON SHORT FILM FESTIVAL:
The reason I chose this film festival in particular is for a few reasons these being firstly that
the competition is fairly local to me as London is only a single train journey away, I also liked
the fact that the festival specialises in short films and documentaries that are below the 45-
minute run time which I am aiming my production to be within this run time. Finally, unlike
other film festivals I am able to meet the deadlines as they take place between the 5th of
April and 9th of August, the submission fees are also able to be met as the maximum fee I
would have to pay would be £32.
THE FEES AND DEADLINES:
Early bird deadline - 5/04/2021 - £18
Regular deadline - 14/06/2021 - £25
Late deadline - 9/08/2021 - £32
PRIZES ETC.
The winning prize for the main category wins £1000 towards their next production and a
£1000 cash prize, a runner up wins £500 to their next production as well. The winner of the
Low-Budget category wins £500.
EXTRA INFORMATION:
LSFF is taking place between the 14th – 22nd of January 2022.
The London Short Film Festival receives approximately 5000+ submissions every year.
Productions can be no longer than 45 minutes.
See rules and regulations further down.
OUTLINE OF FINAL IDEA
THE MEANING BEHIND DREAMING.
My final idea is a factual programme about the meanings of dreams and will hit the
important factors behind the science of dreaming but also the spiritual factors and common
beliefs people have behind why we dream. I may also hit on other topics such as lucid
dreaming and I may even tell and show my journey behind it with re-enactments etc.
Throughout my production I will use an array of different visual effects to portray dreaming
and keep it fairly light-hearted as dreaming is not a very serious topic so I want to capitalise
on this and make it a fun watch for the audience. I am aiming for this production to be
between 25- 35 minutes and no longer than 45 minutes as then it would not be applicable
for the LSFF. In my production I will aim to speak to an array of oneirologists and neurologists
to find out the exact science behind dreaming and why we do it, I will also interview religious
or spiritual people to find out what they believe the links between religion and dreaming are
and how they personally interpret them. The reason I chose this topic as it is something I am
genuinely interested to learn about and teach and audience about, I think it will also be able
show off my physical skills well such as camera work etc. I think this topic will also allow me
to use simple visual effects off creatively with distinctive editing with unique effects. After
sending out surveys with my 5 different ideas this was the most popular by far as it had 60%
of respondents answering that a documentary based on dreaming and becoming lucid would
be the most interesting and enjoyable to watch. I have previously created one documentary
so I believe I already have some skills in creating documentary and I know the basic principles
of the camera and lighting setups but throughout my research I will aim to improve these
skills to make my final production as good as possible.
In conclusion I believe this idea will be extremely interesting to research and I hopefully will
be able to make an enticing and enjoyable documentary that properly shows off my skills.
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RULES AND REGULATIONS
THE LSFF RULES AND REGULATIONS:
- Films must be no longer than 45 minutes in length.
- You are required to provide a QuickTime ProRes and DCP file.
- Deadlines must be met and submission fee must be payed.
- All entries must be in English or have English subtitles
- Submissions are only accepted through Film Freeway
- All entries are required to provide a subtitles track.
- Only completed films will be considered.
UAL EXAM BOARD RULES / REGULATIONS:
- Do not be offensive or give personal controversial opinions. This can mean many
things but mainly not to be homophobic, racist, sexist or transphobic or discriminate
against any group of people.
- They also require you to upload test shoots in your research
- Meet all deadlines
TARGET AUDIENCE
MY TARGET AUDIENCE:
The target audience of my production would be a very wide range of people but mainly
people from the ages of 14-25 as this is the main generation who uses social media etc so it
would be easier and more fitting to advertise towards them rather than the older generation
but the factual programme will not be restricted to a certain age range of people as
dreaming is something that everyone does so I believe that the documentary could be
enjoyed and teach something new to almost everyone. I believe social media will be
extremely important when it comes to promoting and advertising the production, to do this I
will use twitter, Facebook and Instagram which are all mainly populated with people from
younger generations. My production does not cater to a specific gender or income of people
rather it can be enjoyed by almost anyone as dreaming is an action that almost everyone on
earth has experienced at some point in there lives and most likely would like to learn more
about. The only audience that would not be able to watch it would be people who do not
speak or understand English as it is required by LSFF that the production either is spoken in
English or has English subtitles, I could overcome this by implementing some sort of caption
ß
system but this will not a priority but if given the time I will attempt to set it up so I have a
larger audience for my production.
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LEGAL AND ETHICAL ISSUES
ETHICS DEFINITION:
To have ethics is to have moral principles that govern a person’s behaviour or in this case a
person’s documentary or short film and know the differences between right and wrong.
HOW TO MAKE SURE I AM BEING ETHICAL AND FOLLOWING LAWS:
To create an ethical production, I must take into consideration the impact my work could
have on my audience for example I do not want it to have an overall negative effect on my
audience. As my production is on the topic of dreaming I believe it is quite light-hearted and
could not have a negative impact on the audience but if something sensitive is brought up I
will make sure to mention it at the beginning of the production with some sort of warning, I
will also have a minimum age requirement so no one underage should be watching the
factual programme.
Along with this I will always make sure to reference someone else’s work if it ever needs to
be used at some point to make sure they are given the credit they deserve and also to make
sure that the audience can distinguish my work from theirs. I will never steal anyone’s work
but only paraphrase and give a proper reference.
I will make sure that I follow all copyright laws so I am not breaking laws that could get me in
trouble. My production does not deal with any particularly sensitive subjects so I do not
believe that offending anyone will be a problem. Finally, to make sure that no one or location
is filmed without permissions I will produce a form that they can sign to say that they are
okay with being in the production and if they do not sign I will make sure I refilm the scene.
PRODUCTION SCHEDULE
Date – Week Plan of Action Evaluation
beginning
22nd March Complete LO1: Context Weekly blog
(Proposal, Idea Generation etc.)
29th March Research Weekly blog
5th April (HT) Research Weekly blog
12th April (HT) Research and Test Shoots / Edits Research Evaluation, Peer
Line up interviews and dates evaluation of research.
19th April Line up interviews and dates, Test shoots / Weekly blog
further test shoots.
26th April Pre-production and begin Planning evaluation
shooting b-roll and interviews
3rd May Film Production evaluation
10th May Film / Edit (Social Media and Weekly blog
Website Promotion.)
17th May Edit / Evaluation (21st deadline) * Weekly blog, screening to
friends and family to see first
reactions. Send out surveys for
the final production.
24th May Pitch * Upload recorded pitch
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