If the other side of the wall is a secret to the audience, you could have a low shot, from a minifigure like point of view, and then get the top of the wall.  This makes the wall look are and daunting and showing the top implies he is trying to get over it.

I think the harder thing would be communicating why he wants to get past the wall. If he were a boy, perhaps his ball got kicked onto the other side. I'm trying to figure out why an older man would be so intent to climb a wall.

Thanks guys this is super helpful, and has given me some really good ideas. The film is a little like my easter entry so you can kind of figure out why he's trying to get out [he's stuck in a really nasty place].

Thanks so much guys
OsomStudios

Tomorrow's the general electrion here in the UK, and for the first time I'm eligible to vote. Loads of the people I know keep who are also voting for the first time are, well, choosing not to, and while I can partially understand their reasoning I also think it's a great shame. For me, it's actually quite exciting - even today, the afternoon before the election, I'm still trying to decide which party I want to put my faith in.

"Nothing goes down 'less I'm involved. No nuggets. No onion rings. No nothin'. A cheeseburger gets sold in the park, I want in! You got fat while we starved on the streets...now it's my turn!" -Harley Morenstein

So, I was filming a fight scene for my live action movie today at school. There is some brief violence which involved using some small hand guns. They were clap guns, with blue tips. I also had a huge NERF gun, which I painted in the art room. Obviously fake. Anyway, we were 10 minutes into filming when 2 custodians and a teacher caused a halt. One of the custodians saw me holding the gun, and was apparently close to calling a lock down, the police, bomb squad, riot squad, and other funky stuff, which was an overreaction. The problem I have is that they knew it was fake, but they confiscated my guns anyway. They almost took my "shotgun" microphone. They will talk to my art and communications teacher about whether or not they knew about it. So, I was forced to improvise the fight scene. All scenes expect one that featured the guns weren't filmed yet, and they had to be scrapped/ rewritten. This is just one of many issues for my short 5 min film. Probably won't be very rewarding when I'm finished everything.

Last edited by funmiproductions (May 6, 2015 (03:57pm))

My Film Review blog http://funmismoviereviews.blogspot.ca/
My artwork http://funmiproductions.deviantart.com/

There was a group on my course last year (so the current second years) who, for their end-of-year technical assignment, had a scene involving someone tied to a tree while another person waves a very blunt machete at them. Campus security was called on them twice, in two different locations (once during filming and once as they were setting up), and in addition to that, a couple of people walking their dog tried to rush in and play vigilante. Moral of the story: it's always best to make sure the local authorities know you're filming when weapons of any kind are involved. A sign of some kind can help avoid confrontations with public bystanders, too.

Still, when you have cap and Nerf guns (in the case of the latter, it's incredibly hard to confuse them for real guns) it's normally pretty obvious that they're fake, and I'm sorry they were taken off you. At least you've managed to rewrite in some cases, but it's a shame you've been derailed from your original vision.

In the UK, there are actually regs that replica guns have to have 30% of their surface area (I think) painted in a bright colour, to distinguish them from real weapons. I'm guessing that's not the case in the states, what with the second amendment.

"Nothing goes down 'less I'm involved. No nuggets. No onion rings. No nothin'. A cheeseburger gets sold in the park, I want in! You got fat while we starved on the streets...now it's my turn!" -Harley Morenstein

Once back when I was part of a theater group, we rehearsed at a public school (despite a majority of our crew being homeschoolers)

We were doing And Then There Were None, based upon an Agatha Christie mystery.  For our murder weapon, the revolver, our dear friend Doug (who also plays Batman in my films and the mobster in Bank) brought a real revolver his family owned (unloaded, of course).

Luckily, no one at the school found out about about it, as no officials attended our rehearsals in the stage.  However, we did realize afterwards that that was a terribly troll-witted idea, as schools have very strong zero-tolerance policies towards weapons here in America.  I've even heard tell of people being kicked out of school for having a gun on a shirt, or bringing along a tiny brickarms gun, which is ridiculous since you can't possibly seriously hurt someone with a tiny toy gun.  Of course, the revolver was an actual gun, and even unloaded, getting in trouble over it would likely be well warranted.  Luckily someone on our squad realized our mistake before we proceeded any further.  And nobody got in trouble.

(Although, after rehearsing, we eventually decided to have the play someplace else not at a school, and in the final play Doug did get to pretend to shoot me with the revolver so even that worked out nicely.)

Also, the year before last, I was at a library doing absolutely nothing illegal at all when I was very nearly arrested because somebody thought I looked suspicious.  Thankfully my sister was nearby and was able to verify my story and I got out of there.  However, ever since that experience I have been unable to quell an extremely strong fear of policemen and ever leaving home.

As far as your films are concerned, Funmi, the safest action would probably be to write action away from schools, or any public places really.  Perhaps something isolated, like a forest.  This also gains the advantage of not having do deal with bystanders interrupting you or making noise.  Of course, you'd have to write stuff differently.  But it would probably be better than having no weapons for your gunfight.

If you want to get your props back, the best thing would probably be to request them back in a very polite manner.  Express that you had no intention of causing any harm, admit it was a mistake, and assure them that you won't plan on ever bringing them back to the school area ever again.  Hopefully that might work.  It all depends.

If it is your prop, though, it should be yours since it originally belonged to you.  People can't just go around holding on to stuff that they snatched from others.
Well, probably, I don't actually know, Law is a tricky nasty thing sometimes, and it depends upon where you are.

(Just remember, kids, always check before you do something to make sure it's legal if you think maybe you are not sure.  It's a good move.)

Last edited by Squid (May 6, 2015 (06:37pm))

I don't know.  I guess I just happen to look that way.  Not much I can do about it.  I usually prefer to avoid eye-contact with people, so perhaps this was misinterpreted as hiding something.

I was part of my friends film that involved guns. We just went into a wooded area away from people. Worked fine.