FutureCam

quade · Posted: Sat Jun 27, 2009 2:26 am Post subject: FutureCam

I have an idea and a couple of scenes in my head but I'm having issues figuring out what genre to stick it in. Tone I'm going for is an action movie with some funny moments in it -- National Treasure(ish).

(world's worst logline for sales purposes.)
A scientist invents a camera that can see the future. Bad guys try to steal it but it gets switched and falls into the hands of a news camera woman.

I think the theme stated is either going to be;

If you could see the future you could rule the world, but should you?
or
You can never know if what you're doing now is good or bad in the long run.

I think what happens next sort of defines what genre it goes into.

OOB means that it's the woman's story and she uses it to solve some issue in her own life only to discover she had the power within her all along -- right?

DWAP means that it's still the woman's story and she uses it to save the day.

GF means it's the scientists story and he's trying to get it back.

I guess what I'm asking is what do you folks think makes the most sense as far as overall direction? Even though it has a "magical" element to it, I don't think the OOB formula quite works for the tone I'm trying to hit, or does it? I mean, it's not magic-magic, it's sci-fi so does the OOB formula make any sense at all?

crazrick · Liger Joined: 28 Mar 2008 Posts: 655

not sure I would consider OOTB, but rather SUPERHERO, as who ever has the camera has the 'special power' and the Nemesis are the bad guys who want to use that power for evil purposes and personal gain, and the ability to see the future is kinda a curse because you never know if you can change that future you saw, or if by doing what you think is right to change that future, you actually cause that future, or do more harm than good... so, the curse to surmount would be to not be influenced by the future you saw, destroy the camera and just live and let live, come what may... the hero girl being a new camera operator might have trouble letting go of that power, knowing what it could do for her career and her lifestyle...

kinda OOTB I guess, but moreso SH, ain't it??

maybe not...

good start tho!

write on!
Cool

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quade · Posted: Sat Jun 27, 2009 2:59 am Post subject:

Thanks. I'll have to reread that chapter before hitting the sack.

Rachel T. · Ocelot Joined: 15 Jan 2008 Posts: 768 Location: Michigan

Quade, you might wanna go watch Paycheck. It's more of a whydunnit/fleece than your idea, but it might give you some ideas for the heroes and villains, and the ethical questions of being able to see the future at all.

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crazrick · Liger Joined: 28 Mar 2008 Posts: 655

ya PAYCHECK is a perfect fit for researching this idea

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Mike Rinaldi · Liger Joined: 19 Nov 2007 Posts: 1810 Location: California

I think your theme should be never trust a news reporter, especially when she says, "Of course I'll have dinner with you." Oh wait... nevermind.

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fletch137 · Posted: Sun Jun 28, 2009 12:41 am Post subject:

There was an old Twilight Zone episode that had a couple find a camera that takes pictures of 10 minutes into the future. In the end they got a photo of them lying dead outside the window. (umm...SPOILER?)

I guess you have to decide if the story is *about* the camera, or if the camera is just a tool to tell the story of something else.

My first take on the concept is to make it a mystery. The first picture the woman takes is of a dead body or something that will, eventually, be lying in her living room (or wherever). From clues in the photo, she's able to track down the information about who the guy is and solve his murder minutes before it happens. I'd avoid preventing the murder 'cause paradox is a bitch to write around.

You could put an artificial limitation on your futurecam by revealing (in Act II, probably) that each picture is less distant in the future than the previous one. The body, fer instance, could be four days away, but towards the end of the movie she's keeping one step ahead of the killer with a series of pictures from 6 minutes in the future. If nothing else, it'll increase the tempo towards the end and make things feel more imminent as well as give a "the end" moment to the movie when futurecam develops a picture of now. And then, after the credits, reveals a picture from 4 minutes ago...

Anyhoo, that's my first vibe on the concept. Definitely a SuperHero story.

gimpat01 · Cub Joined: 16 Jun 2009 Posts: 8 Location: Georgia

I saw a dvd today that made me think of this thread. It has to do with a camera that shows an eery woman in every pic even though she's not there when the photo is taken. It's called Shutter and I believe it can be found in the Thriller/Horror area of a video store.

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quade

So many ideas and each takes off in a different direction.

I think a piece of my problem is that I've been attending classes and working on this for awhile now, but every time I think I have it worked out, somebody comes along and shoots down why this or that should be different or just doesn't work at all for them.

Thanks all for the suggestions so far. After rereading STCGTTM I think it really does end up being a SH movie. To me what is so strange about BS's theories is that with just slight modifications it can also fall into other genres as well. Well, at least at this stage and maybe even during rewrites.

Do other people also go through this phase? Beat it up, outline it, get about to page 55 and then have a nervous breakdown over whether or not they're telling the story the right way?

crazrick · Liger Joined: 28 Mar 2008 Posts: 655

generally speaking, if you get to the half-way mark and start to lose confidence, it IS because you are not so set on theme and/or genre as you thought you were...

if you get into enough detail in the research and development stage, plotting and outlining every step before the actual screenwriting begins, you'd know sooner where the trouble spots might develop.

you can either plug on ahead using the genre you've originally chosen, or back up, make changes and forge ahead under a new genre, with slight modifications to come to the story as it progresses...

I'd pound thru the first draft then see which genre and thematic elements hold up the strongest thru the draft, so you know better where to shift your focus for the inevitable but dreaded rewrites.

All is not lost yet (you're only at Mid-Point after all Very Happy

) all wont be lost for 20 more pages or so...

keep at it!
write on!
Cool

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90Shillings · Cat Joined: 20 Jun 2009 Posts: 15 Location: Northern Cal

A few questions I'm asking myself:
How far does the camera see into the future?
What plausible technology did the inventor use? (Only has to be as plausible as Love Potion #9.)
What good will the camera ultimately serve?

It's a good hook, makes me think of "Click" and how a utopian world isn't necessarily a happy one, or the right one.

Minority Report meets Click?

quade · Posted: Wed Jul 01, 2009 12:34 am Post subject:

The camera is a video camera. It has a knob on the front of it that controls a circuit that switches the imaging chip to detect tachyons and a bit of poetic license sci-fi that makes it variable up to 24 hours. I'm not worried at all about the science behind it. I have that fairly well figured out and in my mind it makes perfect sense (and I'm a huge techno-geek). There is a "Jurassic Park" briefing before the mid-point that will explain it all. The farther into the future the camera sees, the fuzzier the images are, beyond 24 hours the algorithms completely break down.

The government agency funding the research saw it as a logical extension of an early warning system for nuclear strikes. Sort of how radar enabled London to see when the Germans were launching air strikes against them. It gave them time to be prepared. The scientist working on the project took it a logical step farther than simply a detector and put a lot of them on a single chip turning it into a camera.

The bad guy wants it so he can rule the world, well, obviously!

The camera does have another slight flaw, it's off by three seconds. In a macro way, this is hardly important if you're looking hours in advance, but it's the thing that's going to do the bad guy in at the end.

The entire point of the story would center around the fact that no matter what good you think you're doing at the moment, you can never ultimately know if what you're doing is good or bad. Save the life of the President today and maybe he starts a nuclear war tomorrow. Maybe it would have been better to let him die in the terrorist attack. Not that this is my mid-point, but just to give you an idea. That technology isn't really the answer (although it's extremely helpful), but that smart people really need to rule the day and not fortune tellers or religious prophets for that matter.

fletch137 · Posted: Wed Jul 01, 2009 1:27 am Post subject:

Does that mean you have a better idea of the storyline? You've got a couple beats in mind. My instinct is to not let the camera be so easily controlled, but if you've got a plan...

quade · Posted: Wed Jul 01, 2009 1:55 am Post subject:

What it means is I do have some beats and scenes I really want to include in the story. Where this thread started out though was the issue of what exact genre to put it in. I think the beats I've mentioned so far can be woven into any of the genres that I was considering.

I'm pretty well set now on a SH story though and I think that's going to be the easiest and most focused way of telling the story from this point forward. It's allowed me to cut out a LOT of crap I had going on as far as the backstories go. While fun to think about and maybe refer to briefly in the story, I don't think anybody really gives a flying poo about how the woman recently got a divorce and that had blindsided her and if only she hand been able to see it coming, blah, blah, blah. I may at some future point sneak pieces of that back in, but I certainly don't have to waste pages on it now. One sympathetic beat at the beginning should suffice for now.

90Shillings · Cat Joined: 20 Jun 2009 Posts: 15 Location: Northern Cal

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