Double - Storytelling - Blog 25 (Snow Queen) (Evaluation) - 23/03/16

Story 1 ( Lorna's Story):
+ The recorded narration was very clear and well read and the music which accompanied helped set the mood of the scene.
+ The timing throughout the piece was accurate and we all were familiar with which movements were at which points.
+ Instead of actually wearing masks, we mimed wearing them as this removed the need for props.
- When placing the masks on some of us reached down to pick up these masks whereas others just put the masks on as if they were already holding them. This was due to poorly discussed last minute change.

Story 2 (James' Story):
+ Setting up the sheet for the silhouette was fluent and quick.
+ The beginning dance section was very well performed with good use of cannon, fluent movements and successful lifts.
+ Through our placement as silhouettes, the entrance of the Snow Queen was very effective at portraying her elegance and power.
+ The sledge silhouette was well performed due to our positioning and gestures.
+ Our use of gestures, facial expressions and 
- Our sheet we used for silhouettes could have been larger to hide any of us who were stood at the back waiting for our next part.
- The music should've been louder as the introduction is rather quiet so Lorna and I were unsure on when to start the dance.
- Having three lights to create the silhouettes was a bad choice as it created 3 different overlapping silhouettes rather than one bold silhouette.

Story 3 (Lewis' Story):
+ Our gestures, facial expressions, levels and stances helped portray our emotions very effectively.
+ Our placards featured large, bold text so it was easy for the audience to read from a distance.
- Members of the group were unsure on the movement at times so they had to look around for reassurance.
- People in the river stopped moving at some point when they're supposed to keep moving throughout the entire scene.

Story 4 (Rob's Story):
+ Our facial expressions and gestures helped add a level of depth to the story.
- There were major technical difficulties where the audio for this story was ill prepared.

Story 5 (Rhiannon's Story):
+ Our movement throughout the piece was very representative of the narration and helped the audience understand the story.
- At times a few of us were forgetting the movement and had to rely on copying the person beside us which caused a slight delay.

Story 6 (Charlie's Story):
+ The recorded narration was very clear and fluent
- None of us spoke our given words over the recording as we were unsure on what our words were and when they came in. This wasn't too much of an issue as none of us did it as opposed to some of us.

Story 7 (Ollie's Story):
+ Ollie engaged the audience at all times with gestures, varying tone of voice and interaction.
+ The slide show projection of images which Rob created was very effective at setting the mood.
- There was a technical issue where the slide show went to the laptop background at the end but this wasn't something we could help.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 24 (Snow Queen) - 09/03/16

Today in Snow Queen, we began working with the actual silhouette and improved Rob's scene.

We began by setting up the backdrop for James' silhouette scene. We set up the light correctly so that the silhouettes aren't too big and that we can portray the imagery correctly with the actors behind it. After we set the silhouette up, we did a runthrough of James' scene and these are the improvements we made following:

• Instead of having Rhiannon enter as Snow Queen by having Ollie and Charlie lift up the curtain, we'd have her walk in from over the light and just stay as a silhouette. We'd then have Charlie and Ollie use their shadows to perform the same hand gestures as Lorna and I on the floor. This adds an element of  mystery about the character of the Snow Queen and makes things a lot more simple for us. This also saves the audience being blinded by the light used for the silhouettes.
• Lorna and I practised our third lift we perform in our short dance sequence at the beginning. Lorna felt uncomfortable doing it as I didn't lift her high enough and she ended up landing quite heavily as I place her down. We rehearsed this lift a couple of times to decide whether to leave it in or not. After rectifying the mistakes, we kept the lift in as we felt it looked impressive.

After this, we discussed how we would set up and take down the sheet we’d be using during the performance. We at first thought to just start the piece with it up and at the end of James’ scene, we take it down. However, we completely forgot that we had Lorna’s scene before which requires a lot of space. Lorna then suggested that we leave the silhouette up during her scene but with the bottom corners pulled back and tied to a hook or window handle. We’d then cut/untie it from the hook/handle for James’ scene and then take it down prior to my scene.

We then worked on Rob’s scene; we ran through the scene once but felt that the narration was very muffled and was difficult to hear. Rob will rerecord his narration ready for next lesson. We also felt that me representing the lamp seemed to get in the way a lot and restricted Rob and Lorna’s movement. Instead, I’m now a crow along with Ollie and James. 

We also changed how we perform the line of men wanting to be her husband. We thought our original idea was very fast paced and it didn’t explain the story very well. Whilst the narration talked of men being confident when waiting but bottling it when they get to the queen, our movement just represented the sheer amount of men wanting the Snow Queen’s hand. Instead we change our movement to this:

• Lorna, Rob, Charlie and I are in a line to the right of the Snow Queen (Rhiannon)
• Whilst we are waiting we mime talking to each other and gesture confidently.
• However, as we walk in, one-by-one we all crack when going to talk to the Snow Queen. We all go to talk but shallow back and reserve ourselves.
• We get sent off by the Snow Queen and we circle back round to the back of the queue.

Next time, we will try to perform an entire runthrough of our piece and be ready for performing it to an audience the following week.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 23 (Snow Queen) - 02/03/16

Today in Snow Queen, we spent a lot of time working on the beginning scenes and making sure they're ready for performance.


We first began with Lorna's scene. Lorna had gotten her narration at home and mixed it with a track for her background music (Piano instrumental of Lukas Graham's "7 Years"). I felt the backing track matched the scene very well as the peaks in the audio were very compatible with the movements and story of this scene. The only issues we had with this runthrough was confusion regarding our arm placement at the beginning within the circle and we couldn't practise the lift this lesson as Ollie wasn't here. Besides that, Lorna's scene is perfected.


We moved onto James' scene. We began the scene but stopped partway through as the narration needed to be in time with the music. After a few tries, this mistake was rectified. Besides that James' scene is looking very good; this is probably because we spent the most time on it.


We then worked on my scene. Again there was confusion over the placement of arms at the beginning and end but this was mostly my fault. Where we had only spent less than two lessons on it, everyone had forgotten how my scene goes. This meant that we had to start and stop quickly and frequently and I had to call out the movement to everyone; we will rehearse this scene again soon.


Next lesson, we will continue running through the piece ready for the final performance. Ready for next lesson, we will record our narration.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 22 (Snow Queen) - 24/02/16

Today we performed a full run through of our entire piece.

We made notes after each scene of what we needed to improve and what needed adding. The way we've worked out who would change what, we decided we would alter our own scenes. Below are the changes which need to be made:

• Lorna's scene - Narration needs to be recorded
• James' scene - Silhouettes need to be sorted
• Lewis' scene - Narration needs to be recorded - Placards need to be made
• Rob's scene - Cut down
• Rhiannon's scene - 
• Charlie's scene - Learn our separate lines - use more expression - gesture towards the person we're standing by in the audience
• Ollie's scene - Need to sort projection and lighting

I will make my placards and record my narration ready for next lesson.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 21 (Snow Queen) - 10/02/16

Today we started on our last scene left for Snow Queen: Rhiannon's. For her scene, Rhiannon wanted to narrate the entire passage while we mime actions linked to the words. We spent the majority of the lesson annotating our passages on where we would add actions and which lines we would say. We remembered from sorting out Charlie's scene that all of us speaking one line can be too loud and lose the story telling effect with the mixed tones of voice. With this kept in mind, we split up the lines so that Lorna spoke the lines of Robber Maiden, James was the Reindeer, Charlie was the Pigeon and Rob, Ollie and I were Gerda

Below is the shortened passage with our actions annotated (my spoken lines are underlined):

Double - Storytelling - Blog 20 (Snow Queen) - 03/02/16

Today, we discussed the details of how we would perform Charlie's scene based on which way he chose to perform it. This led to us actually beginning to block and rehearse this scene.

Charlie decided that he didn't want any movement in his scene and that he wanted it to be him reading out the text while the rest of us speak some of the lines in unison. Choral voice is a great way to grab an audience's attention by highlighting some of the key words in a story by having more than one person speaking them.

We began by reading the story to make sure everyone knew what this section of The Snow Queen was about. We then read through it again but for each sentence we decided whether there was a word which we felt would be effective to all speak at once. This resulted in multiple adjectives and characters names being spoken in unison. We decided that we would definitely have the characters Snow Queen and Finland Lady spoken with choral voice as they are main characters in this section of The Snow Queen.

When we started to the read the text with the selected words spoke in unison, we decided that it sounded wrong to have so many people speak one word so we decided to allocate each word to one or two people. This lowered the volume a tad and made the story more interesting to listen to.

After reading through the text a couple of times, we decided to choose where we would have our audience and how we would be positioned. We thought placing ourselves within the audience will add an eerie effect to our story telling as it would seem they were hearing voices amongst them. We positioned ourselves so that there was some sort of gap between the speakers who say lines together very often. For example, James and I say quite a few lines in unison so we positioned ourselves at opposite sides of the class room from each other.

Next lesson, we will focus on Rhiannon's scene and therefore completely finish devising our performance. This means that after Rhiannon's scene, we'd focus on tidying up what we already have and recording the narration which needs recording.

Double - Storytelling - Research (Snow Queen)

Last night had put my developed story telling technique into practise! I decided to read my younger sister a bed time story. The story I read was Cinderella and took about 10 minutes to read. When telling the story I took notice of what I had learnt from my research on story telling:

• I varied my pitch/tone when reading to keep my voice interesting to listen to
• I changed my voice completely for when I spoke characters lines to give the effect that the story teller and the characters are all separate people. I also changed my voice appropriately to each character; for example when I spoke the lines of the Fairy Godmother, I was well-spoken and slightly higher pitched but as the Ugly Step-Sisters, I spoke rather common and sharp.
• I paced myself a lot better making sure I didn't rush through the story but not longing it out either.

After reading the story, my sister was well-entertained and wanted me to read another! This has improved my story telling skills a lot more as I've put them into practise. This will enhance my section of narration a lot and therefore improve the whole performance.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 19 (Snow Queen) - 27/01/16

Today, we spent time discussing our research we conducted on storytellers, watched performances of professional world champion storytellers, and discussed Ollie's plans for his scene.

To begin with, we observed each others research for different storytellers. Some of us chosen movie actors (e.g. Morgan Freeman) and others chose audiobook readers (e.g. Stephen Fry). My decision to choose James Earl Jones was very different compared to everyone else's as he used a very bassy tone and elongated vowel sounds to portray a wise character (much like his character Mufasa in The Lion King). Meanwhile, Lorna's choice of Judy Dench represented a more regal and well spoken approach to storytelling. Knowing the different dialects and word choices etc. of there storytellers has now broadened my knowledge on storytelling and I will utilise this in my performance.

Afterwards, we watched a performance of a world champion storyteller on YouTube. We analysed her different techniques she used such as exaggerative facial expressions, loud gestures and her constant movement. This showed us that there are different elements to story telling other than voice; movement plays a large role in telling a story.

Finally, we spent the rest of the lesson discussing how Ollie wanted his scene to be done. He wanted it to be just him on the stage telling the end of the story with projection (sorted out by him), a small dance sequence (to be choreographed by Lorna and I) and a 3D sound scape (designed by Rob).

Next lesson, we will focus on what Charlie wants for his scene and how we will make his different to everyone else's.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 18 (Snow Queen) 20/01/16

Today we finally moved onto a different section of Snow Queen! This time it was Rob's turn to devise a scene! Below are my actions during the piece:

• We start off as my sections ends, all in a circle around Rhiannon who is on the floor huddled up.
• When the Snow Queen is mentioned in Rob's narration, I exit the circle and leave the stage.
• When the narration mentions many men trying to win the queen's hand, I enter centre stage and walk towards her. I gesture towards her flirtatiously but when she gestures for me to leave I join the end of the line behind Lorna and Charlie. I then repeat this multiple times as they leave from rejection and I reach the front of the line.
• When the pearl is mentioned, I enter centre stage and lay on the floor as a ball and Rhiannon sits on me; at this point I'm representing the pearl. When Rhiannon stands, I exit.
• When the lamp is mentioned, I go on my knees and follow Lorna everywhere she goes.
• When the palm tree is mentioned, I stand behind the rest of the class in a line with my arms in the air like the leaves of a palm tree, our bodies representing the trunk of the tree. When everyone else falls, I resume my role as the lamp.
• When Lorna lies down, I stand and join the circle around her.

After devising this scene, we were asked to conduct some research on a narrator/storyteller whose voice captivates us. In my separate blog post is my research.

Double - Storytelling - Narrator Research - 20/01/16

Last lesson I was asked to conduct research on a specific narrator and how their voices captivates and immerses me into the story they are trying to tell. This was a difficult choice for me so I went with two very different narrators: Edward Norton, most commonly known for his role as The Narrator in the hit 1999 film Fight Club, and James Earl Jones, famed for voicing characters such as Darth Vader from Star Wars and Mufasa in The Lion King. Below is my research conducted on the pair in bullet point form:

James Earl Jones (Based on Mufasa monologue & "The Raven" by EAP reading)

• Extremely bassy voice
• Extends vowel sounds where appropriate to have you hanging onto the word for as long as possible
• Accurately placed pauses for effect
• Sharp yet low portrays raw authority and power
• Echoes embody the true supremacy of his characters

Edward Norton (Based on "An Urbanising Planet" narration & "Fight Club" monologue)

• Slightly high pitched american accent
• Fast paced speech makes you want to keep up with his narration
• Fast yet fluent speech impresses the listener thus maintaining their interest and attention
• Pauses are less frequent that JEJ but they match well with his high tempo speech

Double - Storytelling - Blog 17 (Snow Queen) - 13/01/16

Today, we've finally completed James' story and finally filmed it!

To begin with, Lorna and I took Rhiannon through the third story as she wasn't there when we spent the one lesson on it. We really needed to do this at some point as Rhiannon was playing the role of Gerda in this story who is a main role in this story. Now that we have Rhiannon completely up to date we can potentially perform the first three stories chronologically. 

We then cracked down on the second story and aimed to complete devising it. The last point we got to was  Kay (Me) jumping on the sledge and riding away with the Snow Queen (Rhiannon). For the next part Kay comes out from being a silhouette and has gotten off the sledge. Kay looks around scared and the Snow Queen appears. She (Rhiannon) kisses his (my) forehead twice sending sharp pains into his heart. I lie crippled and crumpled on the floor at this point as the Snow Queen watches in pleasure. We then both exit and as we exit, Charlie enters the silhouette as the Snow Queen and gets lifted to represent flying.

We decided to use Charlie as the Snow Queen as it would make the piece a lot more fluid if the moment someone exits, another enters; this is very difficult to achieve with Rhiannon constantly playing the role of Snow Queen. Also, where Rhiannon hasn't got much experience with being lifted, Charlie is very experienced with them and he's a great deal better at holding his core when in the air than Rhiannon. This lowers the risk of the lift failing and more importantly someone getting hurt.

Below is the final recording of the second story which we filmed yesterday:

The main thing I think needs improving is we need to add more to the short section at the end where the Snow Queen kisses Kay and freezes his heart. A great deal of it was Rhiannon and I giving each other awkward looks as if to say, "Now what?" If we were to add just simple gestures or movement, this section will become much less awkward.

Next lesson, we'll make sure that we add something new to the short section at the end and we'll also get round to filming the third story.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 16 (Snow Queen) - 07/01/16

Today we continued devising James' scene; story 2! We began running what we already had which was the dance featuring Lorna, Ollie Charlie and I. We did this to make sure we all remembered what we had already and it kept it fresh in our memories.

After this, we started to devise more of the scene. James based a lot of his devising on the words in the story as he wanted the movement/dance to portray the story so it would make sense without narration. This would make the dance much more effective at captivating the audience.

Below is the order of what we devised:

• Lorna and I roll from our last position, Charlie and Ollie lift the curtain for Rhiannon (The Snow Queen) to enter. As she walks, Lorna and I look at her respectively (to show our lower status. This is also well shown with our difference in height to Rhiannon).
• We then make jagged, sharp movements towards Rhiannon to represent the ice mentioned in the story.
• To end this part, Lorna and I roll off-stage either side and Rhiannon exits to the side a moment later too.
• Rob, Charlie, Ollie and Lorna form a group behind the sheet which makes them look like a mammoth as a silhouette. Meanwhile, I enter reading a story book about "beasts and birds" (which is why we have a mammoth silhouette.
• Next is the description of glass in Kay's eye. I react very melodramatically and constantly holding my eyes. When it gets out my eye, I mime panting in relief but still holding my heart as their is a shard of the mirror in Kay's heart but he not yet knows.
• Lorna then enters and asks what's wrong with me and I insist there's nothing wrong. Whilst this is happening, everyone else stands behind the sheet in a way that makes their silhouettes look like flowers. I mention how bad the flowers look, due to the illusions caused by the shard and when I kick the flowers, they all fall down. I push Lorna and I run off laughing. Lorna exits also.
• The mammoth is formed again but it starts to deform into something much more evil and vile and then the group split off into separate ugly creature silhouettes except Rob.
• Rob enters in front of the silhouette sheet and so do I. I notice Rob and I pretend to use strings to shape Robert into a deformed figure. This is representing how I see things differently due to the effects of the shard.
• After making Rob drop to the floor in disfigurement (and exit), I notice Lorna enter and exploit her even more and get her to the floor and force her to backwards roll off-stage.
• Next behind the silhouette Charlie, Ollie and Rhiannon are on all fours, with Rob sitting on the them. This makes the silhouette look like a sled which is mentioned in the story.
• I then run after it (silhouetted) and jump on.

After this, we will devise how The Snow Queen meets Kay and kisses his forehead. We will definitely need to work out how we will lift Rhiannon and I to create the illusion of flight.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 15 (Snow Queen) - 15/12/15 &17/12/15

15/12/15
Today, in our free periods, Lorna, Ollie, Charlie, James and I all worked on story 2. This part of the story focuses on describing the relationship between Kay and Gerda and establishing the change in Kay after the fragment of the mirror gets in his eye which leads to his disappearance. James decided he wanted to have silhouettes to distinguish his story from the others! I thought this was a great idea as this was a very uncommon form of story telling yet equally, if not more, effective at entertaining and informing the audience.

We started by assigning who would be each character and as it was James' story he got to choose. He decided he wanted Lorna to be Gerda and he wanted me to be Kay! I feel this pair-up was great as Lorna and I are very confident with each other so when performing lifts or movement which require a great deal of trust, we'll be okay. James had already decided on some music to be played in the background too; an acoustic instrumental of Justin Bieber's "The Feeling."

James consulted Lorna on some of he choreography as she has over a decade of dance experience. She thought I'd would be best to hear the narration and her and I improvise movement to gain first impressions on the narration for us to work on. I felt this was a useful exercise as it made us think about our story and the narration within which aided us in our understanding of the characters.

After this, we took Lorna's knowledge of dance and lifts and trialled a few lifts to test my ability and then performed them for real! We tested my ability first because if I wasn't able to do a lift and we went for it first time, then there's the risk that I could drop Lorna which could result in very serious and sever injuries!

After performing a few lifts, we picked our favourite ones and connected them with smooth flowing movement. The two lifts we chose was a. "Koala Bear" lift and a cradling lift. We chose these as they both represented childishness and innocence. 

Charlie then thought that at this point no one else had anything to do, so he suggested another pair perform the same sequence either simultaneously or in cannon. I then suggested to James that although he wanted his story to portrayed with silhouettes, we could still have some people not as silhouettes to bring some sort of diversity. I also thought this would be useful as having too many people as silhouettes would result in a great deal of masking which would render some people useless. We then changed it so that Lorna and I perform in front of the sheet being used for silhouetting and Charlie and Ollie be the silhouetted pair. We also though cannon would be best as well because having the two pairs perform simultaneously would be pointless as the audience will only really watch one pair then merely acknowledge the other pair.

Above is a video of the dance we have so far. Of course, the pair in the background, Charlie and Ollie, will be silhouetted in the legitimate performance but in the video they are just a few steps back. Source: (Click Here)

17/12/15
Today, during our lunchtime, we decided to add more to our dance! After quickly running what we already had, we slowly added more and more to our piece. This featured adding childlike hymn-hand movements. I thought adding this would further embody the child spirit in the actors (Lorna and I) playing the roles of Kay and Gerda. We also added a move where Gerda falls backwards and Kay catches her; we used this to portray the support between the two characters which then sets up their relationship! Having this strong bond established will make the kidnap of Kay a lot more traumatic.

We also briefly thought about how we would have The Snow Queen (Rhiannon) introduced. This would feature her rolling in as a silhouette, the rest of the silhouetted actors (Rob, Ollie & Charlie) covering her, then they disperse for the Rhiannon to strut out as the Snow Queen. This represents the clumping together of snowflakes which was mentioned in the narrative. Next lesson we will record this.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 14 (Snow Queen) - 09/12/15

Today, we spent time looking at Story Three of The Snow Queen; my part! I had already come to the lesson with a summarised and devised all of the movement. I wanted the focus of this story to be Epic Theatre made by practitioner Bertholt Brecht! I chose Brecht as I have a great deal knowledge on him as I spent a lot of time studying him for GCSE Drama. Some of the techniques he uses includes Narration, Placards, Tableaux and Breaking the Fourth Wall! On a separate blog post is the devising for my story.

To the right is a video of our runthrough after we learned the movement! After everyone forms a river, I take the place of Rhiannon as she was not in the lesson. I would be paired with everything Charlie does (become a cottage, a gate and a tree). Source:(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjnSETChnQU)

After Story 3, we looked at Story 2; James was leading this story. He decided he really liked the idea of silhouettes as a way to tell the story and I agreed with him fully 100%! I suggested we watch silhouette drama first before we start devising something so that we get an idea of what challenges we may face and what he could include. I suggested Britain's Got Talent winners Attraction! We decided to watch two of their videos and we took note of their abstract use of actors, their dance techniques and their time of performance.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 12 (Snow Queen) - 02/12/15

Today we quickly ran through what we had for Story 1 and then continued to devise what we had left. We finish on placing Charlie on the floor on, "Dashed into a hundred million or more pieces," and then continued with the following movements:

• Once on the floor, on the line, "as large as a grain of sand," all of us get into the foetal position.
• On, "which is evil," we all stand up. Ollie and Lewis lift Charlie (lying like a log) up to standing just by his arms and shoulders. Rob and Rhiannon walk towards Charlie with their upstage leg pressed against Charlie's foot (e.g. Rhiannon enters stage right, her left foot stands in front of Charlie's left foot and vice versa for Rob) Lorna and James, move downstage and as Charlie rises, they act as if they are pulling him up with rope.
• On, "splinter in their heart," we perform pulsing hand movements in the rhythm of a steady heartbeat, (this action is led by Lorna). On each pulse, Charlie pulses his chest.
• On, "window panes," we formed a circle around Charlie which was the same order as the circle at the beginning, with the exception of Charlie (Lorna, James, Lewis, Rhiannon, Ollie, Rob)
• On, "wicked sprite laughed," we each performed back bends in cannon. As we performed them, Charlie reached out to the audience in an attempt to escape.

For our performance of this Story, which is linked here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGVOn8UjDug , I have listed a few ways we could improve our performance:

• When we get, "dashed into a hundred million or more pieces," I got into the foetal position straight away as opposed to on the line, "grain of sand."
• Also on this move, Rob and James are supposed to switch positions so James is now at the front so he can pull his imaginary rope to help Charlie up, now when everyone gets up, James and Rob switch then which looks very messy.
• When we turn around when in a line, we are all meant to turn over our right shoulder. However, on both times, Charlie turned over his left.

Also in this lesson, we helped James summarise his Story so it is long enough to make a scene out of but not too long! For next lesson we will all already have our scenes summarised and bring in devised plans! I have already summarised my story (from four pages down to one and a bit) but I still need to devise my piece; I believe silhouettes would be a great way to portray my story!!

Double - Storytelling - Blog 11 (Snow Queen) - 25/11/15

Today in Double, we continued devising the first part of The Snow Queen. We first ran through what we had initially from last lesson so we knew where to take off from. What we already had went a little like this:

• Start in a circle, all facing in, right arm across the shoulder of the person on our right. Order in circle went: Lewis, Rhiannon, Ollie, Rob, Charlie, James.
• On, "Now let us begin," we all turn out over our right shoulder, we space around the room all facing different directions.
• On, "Reflected," we turn 180 degrees, on, "Poor," and "Mean," we make small jagged contractions to portray these adjectives and show the power of the mirror.
• On, "Magnified," we make an exaggerated jagged action; this links with the word magnified.

This lesson we had a great deal more devised. This is what we devised:

Formation A

Formation B

• On, "In this mirror," we all walk to the front in a line, the order goes: Lewis, James, Rhiannon, Lorna, Ollie, Charlie, Rob.
• On, "their faces," pick up mask, and on, "distorted," we put the masks on. On, "recognised," we all turn 180 degrees. After this, we all walk to centre stage and stand in formation (formation A).
• On, "magnified," we all reach out; long, slow and dynamically.
• On, "That's glorious fun!" we speak this in communal voice and we walk back into a straight line at he front; the order goes: James, Lewis, Rob, Lorna, Rhiannon, Charlie, Ollie.
• On, "If a good thought," we perform a hand movement with our left hand from right to left in cannon from Charlie to Lewis, on, "then grin," James expresses a grin on his face with his hands (not with his actual face obviously because of the mask).
• After this we arrange ourselves in a 232 formation (formation B). On, "how the world really looked," Rhiannon and James split away, as do Lorna and Rob. On, "They ran about," Ollie and Lewis lift Charlie from underneath the arms forward and backwards while Charlie runs in mid air.
• On, "So then they thought," Lewis, Ollie, Rob and Lorna lift Charlie as Rhiannon and James get down low on their knees on the floor. Lewis and Ollie take Charlie's arms, Rob takes his legs, and Lorna takes his thighs and butt. Rhiannon and James then swap sides and be ready to catch Charlie.
• On, "that it flew out," we drop Charlie but catch him lower; we then lower him down.
• On, "dashed in a hundred million and more pieces," we all (except Charlie of course) scatter across the floor to represent the "million and more pieces."

This is all we have so far but next lesson we will finish this scene off then move onto Scene 2.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 10 (Snow Queen) - 18/11/15

Today, we moved onto a new section of our Story Telling Unit! We had to devise a brand new piece based on any story we wanted, original or conventional.

We started by listing techniques and methods of storytelling. These were our ideas:

• Storyteller - tone/pitch/volume/pace of voice - recorded narration - contrasting speeds
• Sound effects - soundscape
• Dialogue - monologues - choral speaking
• Props
• Movement - dance - physical theatre
• Multimedia - projection - music
• Placards
• Thought tracking

I felt that a an original story would be good but this would require a great deal of brainstorming, so we decided to go with a pre-made conventional story.

When it came to deciding what story we would choose, we had to bare one thing in mind: our audience. We spoke about what age audience we would perform to and what stories would be suitable for them. We were first going to perform to a slightly younger audience but we felt that it would be best to perform to an audience of people of our age as it would be easier to think what they'd want to see. We thought of many different ideas such as Harry Potter (very recent series of books tailored for people of our age), Winnie the Pooh (Less recent and less tailored to our age range but would bring back memories) and Frozen (a very recent children's film which is popular with our age range too, due to catchy songs and elements of humour). After much discussion, we ended on the decision of Frozen but with a twist! We went for the story from which the film Frozen was initially inspired by, "The Snow Queen."

The outlook we wanted this piece was to portray something very dark and twisted and fully expressing the bad. We started by reading part 1 of 7 of The Snow Queen and we decided to think about who would narrate each parts as narration is a key part of story telling. We thought it would be logical to have one person narrate each scene as we had the right amount of people! We started our first scene vaguely with Lorna narrating. Our rule was that whoever was narrating would devise their scene. This was Lorna's time to shine!

All we got done so far was assign our starting positions (the all loosely positioned, spread out and facing different directions), and decided some movement. We make two small jagged movements, hunching over on the word, "*****", and shooting up with one large jagged movement on the word, "Magnified."

For homework, we will all devise each of the parts assigned to us e.g. I have to devise scene 3.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 9 (Greek Mythology) - 11/11/15

Today in Double we finished editing our stop-motion video. After editing this I wrote a script for my presentation within the piece and timed it with the speed of the video. While I present the stop-motion video which would be projected in the background of the piece, Charlie and Lorna perform still images for every scene in the background. I spent some time helping them by assigning which points they should change to the next still image and how they can smoothly transition between them.

After finishing devising and rehearsing, we finally performed the piece! When performing I feel our stop-motion video was very effective at telling the story and our still images were eye catching and included Round-By-Through but weren't distracting the audience from the main part of the performance; the video. The performance would've been better if I had timed my speech better with the stop motion video and made sure I knew what to say properly beforehand; despite having the script in my hands, I misread it and mixed up two names. Although this may have confused our audience, I kept focused and stuck to the names I used instead of back tracking; this wouldn't have displayed professionalism.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 8 (Greek Mythology) - 04/11/15

Today in our double lesson, we continued recording footage for our stop-motion video which would be projected in the background of our performance. When it came to beheading Medusa, we decided to use a big black piece of cloth which would then move across the set, frame by frame, when she's beheaded. This is a very effective way of showing Medusa being beheaded as Lorna would tuck her head in after being stabbed which creates the illusion of being headless.

After getting all of the photos, I added them to Windows Movie Maker and edited it so it looks smooth. I exported this file and it's now ready to be used for projection!

During that morning, I'd had an idea on how to narrate and present the projection but still keep the piece in a Storytelling genre. I thought, instead of each of us giving monologues related to our characters, it would be better if we were museum presenters and we would present the projection as if we were giving a tour of a Greek Mythology museum to a group of children on a school field trip. I shared this idea with Lorna and Charlie and they agreed this would be a great and effective way to tell the story of Medusa. Charlie suggested that instead of all of us presenting the projection, Lorna and Charlie would be statues in different positions for each scene within the projection whilst I present it at all times.

Next lesson, we will decide what I say when presenting and potentially perform the performance for real.

Double - Storytelling - Blog 7 (Greek Mythology) - 21/10/15

Today in Double, we started to devise how we would tell the Greek myth of Perseus and Medusa. In our group (Charlie, Lorna & I) looked at the research I had collected independently to see how many characters there were and who would be each character. We decided Charlie would be Perseus, Lorna would be Medusa, Perseus' mother, and the Greek goddess of wisdom and beauty, Athena and I would be Polydectes, the king.

After assigning parts, we made a quick outline of how the story went:

• The King steals Perseus' Mother
• Perseus has to kill Medusa
• Perseus receives gifts from Athena (Invisibility Helmet, Winged Sandals, Reflective Bronce Shield
• He kills Medusa
• Perseus turns the king to stone using Medusa's head
• He gives the head to Athena

We also collected ideas on how we would tell this story. Ideas we had were:

• Perform the narrative
• Projection
• Still Images
• Monologues and Duologues

We were, first, very hooked on the idea of monologues and duologues and we started planning out what our monologues would be describing but we decided that we would try something different. We decided that we would use still images, film them, then project them and narrate over the top of them. We then thought of an idea about using multiple still images to create a stop motion video. We would then narrate over the top of the videos. So far we've only got up to when Perseus receives his gifts so we will continue and perform this next lesson.