Friday 14 May 2010
Thursday 13 May 2010
These films inspired us for the original
Certain films inspired us with the original opening titles of a film, such as The Blair Witch Project. They used two cameras in their film, one as a prop and one as actually filming the footage. We decided we would use shakey camera to be more realistic for the audience, as if this was the actual footage and as if it was from their point of view. We wanted the footage to be shot from the characters perspective and this is what they do in The Blair Witch Project.
Amityville horror is also a good inspiration, they use documents in their opening titles to seem like real life. Using the media in the film really inspired so I wanted to use a missing photo advertisement.
Amityville horror is also a good inspiration, they use documents in their opening titles to seem like real life. Using the media in the film really inspired so I wanted to use a missing photo advertisement.
Distribution
We will distribute our film on youtube because it is accessible to everyone plus it is a WEB 2.0 type website, where society can interact and comment on the films.
Many people use youtube and many viewers from out target audience range use youtube.
If we could distribute the films in a cinema, it would be Cinema City or Vue because cinema city is an independant cinema and has films created by students shown on there. They also show a range of films, not just new releases. Vue shows a lot of scary films, such as Nightmare on Elm Street and our "The House" film does have conventions of a American style horror film. For more information check my prezi presentation on this which is a few blog posts down :)
Many people use youtube and many viewers from out target audience range use youtube.
If we could distribute the films in a cinema, it would be Cinema City or Vue because cinema city is an independant cinema and has films created by students shown on there. They also show a range of films, not just new releases. Vue shows a lot of scary films, such as Nightmare on Elm Street and our "The House" film does have conventions of a American style horror film. For more information check my prezi presentation on this which is a few blog posts down :)
Technical difficulties
I am experiencing some technical difficulties in uploading our video's onto the internet, there is a problem with the file type :(
Theories used for main task and preliminary
In some aspects we have used the hypodermic syringe theory, we have injected the idea that people should still be wary of criminals but not to stereotype people, this was used in our prelimary because the woman (me) reacted to the stalker (Robbie) but in the end, where there is comedy, she discovers that he was just trying to return her phone. The hypodermic syringe theory helps inject ideas and attitudes into the audience and that is what we have done.
In the main task we used many signs and signifiers (these are physical forms which give meaning).
Signifiers such as red fake blood signifies this film is about death and gore (The House) gravestones also signify this but can also signify sympathy when filmed differently and edited differently.
In the main task we used many signs and signifiers (these are physical forms which give meaning).
Signifiers such as red fake blood signifies this film is about death and gore (The House) gravestones also signify this but can also signify sympathy when filmed differently and edited differently.
Costume.
For our original idea for our opening titles we decided to have normal clothing that would represent the camping theme.
Outside wear such as scarves, jackets and jumpers is what we decided.
Alongside this we decided to create the mise-en-scene we would have to have props such as camp lamps, food tins, a tent etc.
Here is what the costume would be on one of the actresses.
Outside wear such as scarves, jackets and jumpers is what we decided.
Alongside this we decided to create the mise-en-scene we would have to have props such as camp lamps, food tins, a tent etc.
Here is what the costume would be on one of the actresses.
Original location
We decided to originally choose a Blair Witch style film about camping, and then individually each actor/ actress disppears but we would only show certain clips of this. We would use two cameras, one as a prop and one used actually for filming.
And we decided to create the camping atmosphere the location would have to represent the wilderness, being isolated. So we decided to use Mousehold as our location because it is a giant park/ forest.
And we decided to create the camping atmosphere the location would have to represent the wilderness, being isolated. So we decided to use Mousehold as our location because it is a giant park/ forest.
This was our original plan for our opening titles
Our original plan before the final idea for opening titles was this...
We decided what we were going to produce by discussing what possibilities there were. For example we decided that we would produce a film clip that was a thriller genre. However the other genre we thought about was a horror. These are the notes that we had made whilst talking as a group.
Thriller or horror ?
Dark, mysterious characters, tense gory complex main story line, sub plots, red herrings, twists, intimidating characters, stereotypical.
Music
- thriller, high-pitched, violins, cellos, creepy, low-key, stuttered goes along with the pace of the storyline.
Violins – to create tension only at certain points of the film, the background music fading in and out all the way through the film.
Ideas
Two cameras can switch between both cameras (from the Blair Witch project challenges the conventions)
People tearing through doors and windows to catch people
Location
Roof tops, streets
Mousehold- At night trees people hiding behind them, people in tents hear noises, camp fire, someone goes missing here are loud noises, see things in the dark, images of dead people, people cut and blood everywhere (would have to be special effects) there are missing posters, camera goes fuzzy at the end never see the monster or psycho people running screaming, can hear someone breathing deeply.
Make-up - every day make up however when flashing images of dead people make-up would be a very pale face with dark eyes, to look frozen.
Lighting normal street lights, torches and the camp fire and candles
Actors – Simon Lewis, Bokenham, Surridge, Robbie, Sophie, Alex, Becca, a small group of friends.
Costume – normal clothes, Camping clothes, e.g. Hoodie, Jeans, boots, coats, casual clothes
Props – tent, sleeping bags, torches, fire and a camera
conventions Characterised by fast pacing, frequent action and resourceful heroes who must thwart the plans of more powerful and better equipped villains.
Literary devices such as suspense, red herrings and cliff hangers are used extensively; thrillers often take place wholly or partly in exotic settings such as foreign cities deserts or high seas.
Heroes are normally law enforcement, officers, soldiers, spies or aviators; however they could also be ordinary citizens drawn into danger by accident.
Thrillers often overlap with mystery stories, but are distinguished by the structure of their plots.
In a thriller, the hero must thwart the plans of an enemy, rather than uncover a crime that has already happened. In recent years when thrillers have been increasingly influenced by horror or psychological horror exposure. The monster could be anything even an inferior physical force made superior only by their intellect, a supernatural entity, aliens serial killers.
We decided what we were going to produce by discussing what possibilities there were. For example we decided that we would produce a film clip that was a thriller genre. However the other genre we thought about was a horror. These are the notes that we had made whilst talking as a group.
Thriller or horror ?
Dark, mysterious characters, tense gory complex main story line, sub plots, red herrings, twists, intimidating characters, stereotypical.
Music
- thriller, high-pitched, violins, cellos, creepy, low-key, stuttered goes along with the pace of the storyline.
Violins – to create tension only at certain points of the film, the background music fading in and out all the way through the film.
Ideas
Two cameras can switch between both cameras (from the Blair Witch project challenges the conventions)
People tearing through doors and windows to catch people
Location
Roof tops, streets
Mousehold- At night trees people hiding behind them, people in tents hear noises, camp fire, someone goes missing here are loud noises, see things in the dark, images of dead people, people cut and blood everywhere (would have to be special effects) there are missing posters, camera goes fuzzy at the end never see the monster or psycho people running screaming, can hear someone breathing deeply.
Make-up - every day make up however when flashing images of dead people make-up would be a very pale face with dark eyes, to look frozen.
Lighting normal street lights, torches and the camp fire and candles
Actors – Simon Lewis, Bokenham, Surridge, Robbie, Sophie, Alex, Becca, a small group of friends.
Costume – normal clothes, Camping clothes, e.g. Hoodie, Jeans, boots, coats, casual clothes
Props – tent, sleeping bags, torches, fire and a camera
conventions Characterised by fast pacing, frequent action and resourceful heroes who must thwart the plans of more powerful and better equipped villains.
Literary devices such as suspense, red herrings and cliff hangers are used extensively; thrillers often take place wholly or partly in exotic settings such as foreign cities deserts or high seas.
Heroes are normally law enforcement, officers, soldiers, spies or aviators; however they could also be ordinary citizens drawn into danger by accident.
Thrillers often overlap with mystery stories, but are distinguished by the structure of their plots.
In a thriller, the hero must thwart the plans of an enemy, rather than uncover a crime that has already happened. In recent years when thrillers have been increasingly influenced by horror or psychological horror exposure. The monster could be anything even an inferior physical force made superior only by their intellect, a supernatural entity, aliens serial killers.
This is our new planning we discussed
Actors- Megan and possibly Sophie
Costume - Dress, skirt, tights all black
Make-up- White face, dark black eyes red lips, maybe blood everywhere from her mouth, eyes, blood dripping down her arms all over her dress.
Location- it will be set in a house we would like to film it during the night to make it look more effective. I think it should be filmed in a house because the storyline could be about friends going on holiday and have to stay in a haunted house. (Foreign cities is a convention of a thriller)
The props we will need will be fake blood, maybe a knife or a gun.
Lighting- would be normal lighting you get in a house, However I think we shouldn't’t use all the lights that we can because the darker it is the scarier. It looks Spookier; another possibility could be just candles because of a power cut.
Ideas the house is dull and empty there is a girl climbing out the cupboards and out from under the beds scratching on the floor while pulling her out, looking away from the camera and then at certain points of the film she suddenly looks straight into the camera. We want to create lots of tension and mystery. We think a good scene would be a girl walking down the hallway when suddenly she disappears. I think this would create suspense as she then re-appears down the hallway. Another scene could be a shot of the house from outside with the girl just standing at the window staring out of the window. Another could be the girl playing with a pool of blood. There could be an over-the-shoulder-shot of someone in the house doing something when the girl appears behind them then the screen goes black and you can hear a scream then the picture comes back and the person is lying on the floor with blood all around them.
Conventions Characterised by fast pacing, frequent action and resourceful heroes who must thwart the plans of more powerful and better equipped villains.
Literary devices such as suspense, red herrings and cliff hangers are used extensively; thrillers often take place wholly or partly in exotic settings such as foreign cities deserts or high seas.
Heroes are normally law enforcement, officers, soldiers, spies or aviators; however they could also be ordinary citizens drawn into danger by accident.
Thrillers often overlap with mystery stories, but are distinguished by the structure of their plots.
In a thriller, the hero must thwart the plans of an enemy, rather than uncover a crime that has already happened. In recent years when thrillers have been increasingly influenced by horror or psychological horror exposure. The monster could be anything even an inferior physical force made superior only by their intellect, a supernatural entity, aliens serial killers
Costume - Dress, skirt, tights all black
Make-up- White face, dark black eyes red lips, maybe blood everywhere from her mouth, eyes, blood dripping down her arms all over her dress.
Location- it will be set in a house we would like to film it during the night to make it look more effective. I think it should be filmed in a house because the storyline could be about friends going on holiday and have to stay in a haunted house. (Foreign cities is a convention of a thriller)
The props we will need will be fake blood, maybe a knife or a gun.
Lighting- would be normal lighting you get in a house, However I think we shouldn't’t use all the lights that we can because the darker it is the scarier. It looks Spookier; another possibility could be just candles because of a power cut.
Ideas the house is dull and empty there is a girl climbing out the cupboards and out from under the beds scratching on the floor while pulling her out, looking away from the camera and then at certain points of the film she suddenly looks straight into the camera. We want to create lots of tension and mystery. We think a good scene would be a girl walking down the hallway when suddenly she disappears. I think this would create suspense as she then re-appears down the hallway. Another scene could be a shot of the house from outside with the girl just standing at the window staring out of the window. Another could be the girl playing with a pool of blood. There could be an over-the-shoulder-shot of someone in the house doing something when the girl appears behind them then the screen goes black and you can hear a scream then the picture comes back and the person is lying on the floor with blood all around them.
Conventions Characterised by fast pacing, frequent action and resourceful heroes who must thwart the plans of more powerful and better equipped villains.
Literary devices such as suspense, red herrings and cliff hangers are used extensively; thrillers often take place wholly or partly in exotic settings such as foreign cities deserts or high seas.
Heroes are normally law enforcement, officers, soldiers, spies or aviators; however they could also be ordinary citizens drawn into danger by accident.
Thrillers often overlap with mystery stories, but are distinguished by the structure of their plots.
In a thriller, the hero must thwart the plans of an enemy, rather than uncover a crime that has already happened. In recent years when thrillers have been increasingly influenced by horror or psychological horror exposure. The monster could be anything even an inferior physical force made superior only by their intellect, a supernatural entity, aliens serial killers
Credits
At the start we did not know how to add titles onto our film so we decided to use an alternative, which was to write the titles and then film them, but we did manage to find out how to add titles onto our film :) so now we are putting a red title of "The House" at the start and then white small titles for the members involved.
This was the original...
We used red as a signifier for blood.
This was the original...
We used red as a signifier for blood.
Prezi
This is a presentation of the evaluation of all the projects we filmed.
Here is a link if there is a problem...
http://prezi.com/c4mshtbtlnyy/
Evaluation on Prezi
Here is a link if there is a problem...
http://prezi.com/c4mshtbtlnyy/
Thursday 6 May 2010
What is cinematography??? :/
Movie reviewers often relate their praise of a films Cinematography but do not give any details, possibly because of their calculation that the average moviegoer is primarly interested in the story and the actors. A Cinematographer is the employee who films the scenes with a motion picture camera (or more frequently these days with a High Definition Video Camera).
Sometimes listed in the credits as the Director of Photography he is the creative designer of the films "look" by selecting the film stock, cameras, and lighting equipment to be used in shooting the movie; making the creative and technical decisions that will translate into the images that are projected on a wide screen at 24 frames per second, or on television at 29.9 frames per second.
The Cinematographer is responsible for the work of the lighting and camera crews, working with the films director to achieve his vision of the film prior to the editing process. He can create the look of different periods in history and change the mood of the film as it is created according to notes made to the "Shooting Script".
Selecting filters to compensate for changing ambient lighting conditions as months of filming go by is an important part of the process. Even in "sunny Southern California" overcast days occur and these changing lighting conditions have to be made to conform to the rest of the scenes already filmed so that the audience is unaware of any changes in weather conditions.
Cinematographers have hours more work to do after the days' shoot is in "the can". The shooting script provides the basic outline that has to be broken-down into sequences of camera moves, light placement in relation to the actors and the requirements of special equipment that is selected from the various rental companies that serve the movie production industry.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/23360/what_is_cinematography.html?cat=40
Sometimes listed in the credits as the Director of Photography he is the creative designer of the films "look" by selecting the film stock, cameras, and lighting equipment to be used in shooting the movie; making the creative and technical decisions that will translate into the images that are projected on a wide screen at 24 frames per second, or on television at 29.9 frames per second.
The Cinematographer is responsible for the work of the lighting and camera crews, working with the films director to achieve his vision of the film prior to the editing process. He can create the look of different periods in history and change the mood of the film as it is created according to notes made to the "Shooting Script".
Selecting filters to compensate for changing ambient lighting conditions as months of filming go by is an important part of the process. Even in "sunny Southern California" overcast days occur and these changing lighting conditions have to be made to conform to the rest of the scenes already filmed so that the audience is unaware of any changes in weather conditions.
Cinematographers have hours more work to do after the days' shoot is in "the can". The shooting script provides the basic outline that has to be broken-down into sequences of camera moves, light placement in relation to the actors and the requirements of special equipment that is selected from the various rental companies that serve the movie production industry.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/23360/what_is_cinematography.html?cat=40
The best actor/ actress for the character?
For our film called "The House" we have discussed who is right for the main character of the opening film. We discussed who would be comfortable acting infront of a camera and who could easily portray the character. We have chosen Megan Forster to play the main character (The Ghost) and even though she has no real acting experience we thought we would take the risk and trial run how she is on camera before a few minutes of filming. Usually the casting director would choose a actress with a lot of experience and certainly if the film is a high-budget film, they would choose a well-known award winning actress in the real media world. Megan's acting skills did succeed even though there was a short amount of time to film in and she easily portrayed the character with help of costume and make-up and directing (I gave her directions on how to move and where to move from and to).
Storyboard...
When planning to produce a film, a storyboard is needed to plan out the scenes and what happens in the scenes this will help with directing. Here is the storyboard for “The House”. Now there may be a few changes, this is the process of filming and we may want to change a scene.
There were four films that inspired our opening titles these were…
The Ring
The plot of The Ring is about a adopted child named Samara and she was killed by her mother. A tape of was recorded and whoever watches the tape will die in seven days and on that seven day they will see Samara.
The film had a major influence on us because we wanted the character in our film to be similar to Samara in The Ring and for our actress to use similar movements as their character but we did not want the characters to be identical so I (the make-up artist) created a similar face colour. I used pale make-up to create a more scary image because in our opening titles we wanted the audience to know it is a horror film genre immediatly but we tried not to reveal too much about what the film was about.
We used The Ring as an inspiration in a few scenes, like the scene were the camera panes from the mirror to the television because the television in The Ring is reacting by Samara we thought we would do the same but unfortunately there was a problem making the television go that way, instead it went to a blue screen but we used this anyway. We thought the television idea would represent paranormal activity as in most films this idea has been used.
The scene where our actress appears and disappears was an improvised scene but we realised when watching our two minute opening title sequence that it was similar to a scene in The Ring when the character appears, disappears then re-appears. Also we did use a song from the film to play throughout our film but it is unnoticable it is a song from The Ring, we only used this because the eerie impact of the song suited our opening titles.
The Grudge
The Grudge is almost exactly like The Ring but the scenes in the film and the plot is entirely different. The Grudge had the same influence on us as The Ring but we used it in a different scene/ clip of our opening titles and this was the bed scene, when our actress was covered in fake blood on her arms and was crawling underneath the bed. In The Grudge the actress comes from underneath the duvet but we decided to have our actress crawl from underneath the bed. The mid-shot of the actress’s face near the door is a similar shot to a shot in The Grudge, the actresses face is not fully shown.
Hide and Seek
Hide and Seek in comparison is a majorly different film because it is a psychological horror rather than just a horror and the film’s purpose is to make the audience unravel and want to discover who this “Charlie” is. We did not use a lot of Hide and Seek to influence our work but in one aspect we did, in the mirror/ television scene the writting on the mirror was influenced by the scene in Hide and Seek when the blood writing was written on the bath curtain. We tried to create the blood effect but it was not as effective as the Hide and Seek writting.
Amityville II: The Possession
This was a much old film compared to the contemporary ones above, this film was a 1982 horror film and it influenced us on the certain scenes and choice of our titles. In the opening titles of this film, the camera is focusing on the house while panning across the garden and eventually zooms in on the house window. At the start of our two minute titles we decided to have a shot of the house while having the name of the film across the footage much like what this film did but instead of having a steady view of the house we had a jiggly camera view of the house to seem more realistic. Other than the main title, the credits were also in a similar font and colour to the Amityville II, both in the colour white to contrast well against the footage and in a gothic type font. We were going to focus on the window and have the actress appear in the window but we thought the zooming on the window would be too much like the Amityville II.
The Ring
The plot of The Ring is about a adopted child named Samara and she was killed by her mother. A tape of was recorded and whoever watches the tape will die in seven days and on that seven day they will see Samara.
The film had a major influence on us because we wanted the character in our film to be similar to Samara in The Ring and for our actress to use similar movements as their character but we did not want the characters to be identical so I (the make-up artist) created a similar face colour. I used pale make-up to create a more scary image because in our opening titles we wanted the audience to know it is a horror film genre immediatly but we tried not to reveal too much about what the film was about.
We used The Ring as an inspiration in a few scenes, like the scene were the camera panes from the mirror to the television because the television in The Ring is reacting by Samara we thought we would do the same but unfortunately there was a problem making the television go that way, instead it went to a blue screen but we used this anyway. We thought the television idea would represent paranormal activity as in most films this idea has been used.
The scene where our actress appears and disappears was an improvised scene but we realised when watching our two minute opening title sequence that it was similar to a scene in The Ring when the character appears, disappears then re-appears. Also we did use a song from the film to play throughout our film but it is unnoticable it is a song from The Ring, we only used this because the eerie impact of the song suited our opening titles.
The Grudge
The Grudge is almost exactly like The Ring but the scenes in the film and the plot is entirely different. The Grudge had the same influence on us as The Ring but we used it in a different scene/ clip of our opening titles and this was the bed scene, when our actress was covered in fake blood on her arms and was crawling underneath the bed. In The Grudge the actress comes from underneath the duvet but we decided to have our actress crawl from underneath the bed. The mid-shot of the actress’s face near the door is a similar shot to a shot in The Grudge, the actresses face is not fully shown.
Hide and Seek
Hide and Seek in comparison is a majorly different film because it is a psychological horror rather than just a horror and the film’s purpose is to make the audience unravel and want to discover who this “Charlie” is. We did not use a lot of Hide and Seek to influence our work but in one aspect we did, in the mirror/ television scene the writting on the mirror was influenced by the scene in Hide and Seek when the blood writing was written on the bath curtain. We tried to create the blood effect but it was not as effective as the Hide and Seek writting.
Amityville II: The Possession
This was a much old film compared to the contemporary ones above, this film was a 1982 horror film and it influenced us on the certain scenes and choice of our titles. In the opening titles of this film, the camera is focusing on the house while panning across the garden and eventually zooms in on the house window. At the start of our two minute titles we decided to have a shot of the house while having the name of the film across the footage much like what this film did but instead of having a steady view of the house we had a jiggly camera view of the house to seem more realistic. Other than the main title, the credits were also in a similar font and colour to the Amityville II, both in the colour white to contrast well against the footage and in a gothic type font. We were going to focus on the window and have the actress appear in the window but we thought the zooming on the window would be too much like the Amityville II.
Main Task evaluation
For the two-minute opening of a film our final version was to have a horror and for the location to be filmed at my house.
The story line was to have a ghost haunt a house and for the footage to be clips of what would happen in the film.
The equipment we used for this task was just a simple cam-corder/ camera and so it was easy to manage but we could of improved the footage by using a tripod.
We tried to include many shots, we included high, meduim and low shot and also a over the shoulder shot. We used close-ups and paning as well and shot reverse shot. For example when I filmed the high shot my aim was for the focus to be on the hands of the ghost (the actress) and to seem scary to audience and then I decided to slowly move the camera to focus on the face and body of the character with a medium shot, as the footage was meant to focus on the dynamics of the body and the make-up.
The costume, props and makeup turned out to work very well but it was time consuming and took about an hour to create the look of the character. I decided to give the character bruises, cuts and dark eyes to represent a dead person. In one clip I put a lot of make-up all over her arms to appear as blood and even though we did not have the most suitable make-up to use I managed to use what we had and improvise by using kitchen ingredients. I decided to have the actress wear a black dress because we did not want bright colours as it would set the wrong mood and gave her black riped tights to create the effect. We did not use props because it was unnessary because we used the background/ scene as it had plenty of detail anyway.
Health and safety is important when filming because when filming the film group is liable for any health and safety problems with the actors/ actresses or even themselves. We checked health and safety problems, for example before putting make-up on the actress I asked if she was allergic to any ingredients or products.
Our aim from the audience was to make them antispate what will happen in the film and the make the audience feel uncomfortable, nervous and scared. Hopefully we achieved at least one of these aims.
Managing human resources was simple, I asked a friend outside my media class to act in the film and because our film was edited ,and we were using music and sound effects throughout the two minute footage, I decided to give her directions while filming on how to move and she followed the directions easily.
Overall the main task finished perfectly except we should of discussed problems that could happen before filming because our original version/ idea did not work. Also re-filming a film is very time consuming and in the real film industry is costs a lot of money to film one film, let alone changing it. That is something we could improve on.
The audience aimed at for our film “The House” is aimed at teenagers/ adults (15′s and over) because of the genre and it is aimed at people who are horror fans of films like The Ring and supernatural films. Children would not be in the target audience (TA) because the horror genre may be too intense for them and their guardians may not want their children to watch it.
We attracted our audience by having a realistic shot of the house, we created this by using a jolting camera movement and the red title “The House” should automatically attract the audience because of the colour. Red immediatly implies it is a horror film because the colour red represents blood. The music we used in the opening titles was from the film The Ring and should create and eerie feeling for the audience because its an anticipating eerie sound and when our actress appears we wanted them to be intrigued about the film but also nervous. We created this by having different shots and moving from one shot to another because we wanted them to know it was a horror and give some detail of the film but we didn’t want to reveal too much.
The media institution that would distribute our media product would be Pinewood Studios because they have produced films of the same genre because they have a variety of films. They have produced the famous horror The Shining and most recently The Wolfman (even though it does not seem like a horror it is classed as a horror) and they have done sci-fi horrors such as Aliens. This media institution might distritbute our product because it is a British Film and Pinewood Studios is a British Film Institution. What makes this film a British Film is that it was filmed in Britain and the actress in the film was from the UK.
The story line was to have a ghost haunt a house and for the footage to be clips of what would happen in the film.
The equipment we used for this task was just a simple cam-corder/ camera and so it was easy to manage but we could of improved the footage by using a tripod.
We tried to include many shots, we included high, meduim and low shot and also a over the shoulder shot. We used close-ups and paning as well and shot reverse shot. For example when I filmed the high shot my aim was for the focus to be on the hands of the ghost (the actress) and to seem scary to audience and then I decided to slowly move the camera to focus on the face and body of the character with a medium shot, as the footage was meant to focus on the dynamics of the body and the make-up.
The costume, props and makeup turned out to work very well but it was time consuming and took about an hour to create the look of the character. I decided to give the character bruises, cuts and dark eyes to represent a dead person. In one clip I put a lot of make-up all over her arms to appear as blood and even though we did not have the most suitable make-up to use I managed to use what we had and improvise by using kitchen ingredients. I decided to have the actress wear a black dress because we did not want bright colours as it would set the wrong mood and gave her black riped tights to create the effect. We did not use props because it was unnessary because we used the background/ scene as it had plenty of detail anyway.
Health and safety is important when filming because when filming the film group is liable for any health and safety problems with the actors/ actresses or even themselves. We checked health and safety problems, for example before putting make-up on the actress I asked if she was allergic to any ingredients or products.
Our aim from the audience was to make them antispate what will happen in the film and the make the audience feel uncomfortable, nervous and scared. Hopefully we achieved at least one of these aims.
Managing human resources was simple, I asked a friend outside my media class to act in the film and because our film was edited ,and we were using music and sound effects throughout the two minute footage, I decided to give her directions while filming on how to move and she followed the directions easily.
Overall the main task finished perfectly except we should of discussed problems that could happen before filming because our original version/ idea did not work. Also re-filming a film is very time consuming and in the real film industry is costs a lot of money to film one film, let alone changing it. That is something we could improve on.
The audience aimed at for our film “The House” is aimed at teenagers/ adults (15′s and over) because of the genre and it is aimed at people who are horror fans of films like The Ring and supernatural films. Children would not be in the target audience (TA) because the horror genre may be too intense for them and their guardians may not want their children to watch it.
We attracted our audience by having a realistic shot of the house, we created this by using a jolting camera movement and the red title “The House” should automatically attract the audience because of the colour. Red immediatly implies it is a horror film because the colour red represents blood. The music we used in the opening titles was from the film The Ring and should create and eerie feeling for the audience because its an anticipating eerie sound and when our actress appears we wanted them to be intrigued about the film but also nervous. We created this by having different shots and moving from one shot to another because we wanted them to know it was a horror and give some detail of the film but we didn’t want to reveal too much.
The media institution that would distribute our media product would be Pinewood Studios because they have produced films of the same genre because they have a variety of films. They have produced the famous horror The Shining and most recently The Wolfman (even though it does not seem like a horror it is classed as a horror) and they have done sci-fi horrors such as Aliens. This media institution might distritbute our product because it is a British Film and Pinewood Studios is a British Film Institution. What makes this film a British Film is that it was filmed in Britain and the actress in the film was from the UK.
Costume
The costume, for our horror film for the main task, is simple clothing but mainly make-up :D
Megan who plays “The dead girl” will wear…
A simple black dress with lace around the collar
Ripped black tights
Her hair will be down and rough looking, this will mainly be done by hair curlers and back-combing the hair
She will wear pale face make-up and eye shadow as bruises etc
Here are the costume and make-up photos:
Hair/ make-up
Here we added as much make-up as possible to make it effective. I did the whole costume and make-up so I decided to give her scars and bruises to emphasis the death look.
A stereotypical look of death, much like Samara from the ring and the grudge.
Costume:
Megan who plays “The dead girl” will wear…
A simple black dress with lace around the collar
Ripped black tights
Her hair will be down and rough looking, this will mainly be done by hair curlers and back-combing the hair
She will wear pale face make-up and eye shadow as bruises etc
Here are the costume and make-up photos:
Hair/ make-up
Here we added as much make-up as possible to make it effective. I did the whole costume and make-up so I decided to give her scars and bruises to emphasis the death look.
A stereotypical look of death, much like Samara from the ring and the grudge.
Costume:
Two minute opening of a film
For our main task we have to create a two-minute opening of a film, we have discussed some ideas for this task. The genre of our opening of a film is a horror/ thriller. When the opening titles/ credits appears there is going to be a footage of missing peoples flyers, focusing on a few missing teenagers and this will be shot at either a police station or in a telephone booth or somewhere similar along those lines. While this is happening there will be eerie, scary music that has repetition in the tune. We will have clips of the film played either as full screen or on a black screen with titles at the side of it while playing, these clips will be footage taken by the characters (which will actually be us, the group taking the footage but is meant to be taken by them in the storyline). We have decided we will show footage of them running away and the camera falling on the floor, maybe a scream at the end also there will be a clip from the morning of the event before all the strange things happen. Before these clips, we were thinking about having the sound of a heart beating and the sound of heavy breathing. In the clips we will use realistic camera movement to create the feeling of fear but the last clip will not show what happens because we want the audience to be reeled in for the film. We may have footage of a tree with breeze, and fast forward from morning into night. After the opening titles we will show the start of the film. We may use special effects, like a camera being turned off/ broken when there is a fuzzy screen.
There is a few inspirations for this opening of a film like The Blair Witch Project, the camera work used in this is an element we will use in our two-minute opening of a film. The realistic movement and effects creates a tense and scared but nervous feeling for the audience and that is the aim we want from our audience. Also we are using the idea about camping during morning and night.
The story behind our film is about a few teenagers go camping for a media project but end up going missing. Strange happenings occur and people start to go missing and in the end the all die.
Our jobs for this tasks have been planned out, for filming the production all of us will do this job (me, Robbie and Alex). Robbie will have the task of lighting and technical props, I will be doing make-up and some of the props while Alex will be doing costume. Alex and me will be in charge of camera equipment but we all will be filming.
Our actors still need to be arranged but we have an idea for our location. We will use two camera’s one camera for main footage of the characters (also on the character holding a camera) and another camera for realistic movement and used as a prop in the footage. The make-up will be natural but have pale effects to link in with the scene. The props will be mainly a camping light, camping bag, maybe a tent, basically camping equipment. For the lighting it will all mainly be natural light but we may need a bigger and stronger light to see the scene at night but we will also use another camera hopefully with a night-light to create more effect and the costume for the characters will be casual camping clothing, mainly jeans, jumpers, coats, boots and scarves etc.
We decided to change our two minute film because of the weather conditions and the idea was to difficult because of there was not enough lighting.
Our new idea was to keep to the same genre but change the story line, the new story line was to have clips of a house and the actress and to have a pre-view of what would happen in the film. The full story line is about a ghost trapped in the house and anyone who enters the house is at risk.
I came up with the different clips and decided to have the first clip, the ghost behind a cupboard door and her slowly coming out of the door. The second clip is a shot of a mirror in a bedroom and then it panes to a tv and then reverses back to the mirror but the mirror has writting on it. The third shot is having the actress who plays the ghost crawling underneath the bed and the fourth shot is to have her near a sink of blood (which we will make) and I thought a over the shoulder shot of that. The next clip is to have the actress appear, walk and then disappear. Alex thought of having footage of a graveyard because it would symbolise death and that fits with the storyline.
The occupations for our filming will be me filming four of the scenes and Alex to the other two which is the graveyard scene and the sink scene. Robbie will film the outside footage of the house. I will be doing make-up and costume and we all will be doing editing. Alex will be making sure the lighting is to a high standard, making sure we do not need any lights.
The location of the film will be in my house because there is a good use of props and facilities and it is easier to film in a sheltered location because there is no weather to effect filming. The filming will take place at night like the previous idea because our aim is to set the mood of fear.
There is a few inspirations for this opening of a film like The Blair Witch Project, the camera work used in this is an element we will use in our two-minute opening of a film. The realistic movement and effects creates a tense and scared but nervous feeling for the audience and that is the aim we want from our audience. Also we are using the idea about camping during morning and night.
The story behind our film is about a few teenagers go camping for a media project but end up going missing. Strange happenings occur and people start to go missing and in the end the all die.
Our jobs for this tasks have been planned out, for filming the production all of us will do this job (me, Robbie and Alex). Robbie will have the task of lighting and technical props, I will be doing make-up and some of the props while Alex will be doing costume. Alex and me will be in charge of camera equipment but we all will be filming.
Our actors still need to be arranged but we have an idea for our location. We will use two camera’s one camera for main footage of the characters (also on the character holding a camera) and another camera for realistic movement and used as a prop in the footage. The make-up will be natural but have pale effects to link in with the scene. The props will be mainly a camping light, camping bag, maybe a tent, basically camping equipment. For the lighting it will all mainly be natural light but we may need a bigger and stronger light to see the scene at night but we will also use another camera hopefully with a night-light to create more effect and the costume for the characters will be casual camping clothing, mainly jeans, jumpers, coats, boots and scarves etc.
We decided to change our two minute film because of the weather conditions and the idea was to difficult because of there was not enough lighting.
Our new idea was to keep to the same genre but change the story line, the new story line was to have clips of a house and the actress and to have a pre-view of what would happen in the film. The full story line is about a ghost trapped in the house and anyone who enters the house is at risk.
I came up with the different clips and decided to have the first clip, the ghost behind a cupboard door and her slowly coming out of the door. The second clip is a shot of a mirror in a bedroom and then it panes to a tv and then reverses back to the mirror but the mirror has writting on it. The third shot is having the actress who plays the ghost crawling underneath the bed and the fourth shot is to have her near a sink of blood (which we will make) and I thought a over the shoulder shot of that. The next clip is to have the actress appear, walk and then disappear. Alex thought of having footage of a graveyard because it would symbolise death and that fits with the storyline.
The occupations for our filming will be me filming four of the scenes and Alex to the other two which is the graveyard scene and the sink scene. Robbie will film the outside footage of the house. I will be doing make-up and costume and we all will be doing editing. Alex will be making sure the lighting is to a high standard, making sure we do not need any lights.
The location of the film will be in my house because there is a good use of props and facilities and it is easier to film in a sheltered location because there is no weather to effect filming. The filming will take place at night like the previous idea because our aim is to set the mood of fear.
Preliminary task evaluation
For our preliminary task, we had to create a short film with just a few lines of dialogue. Someone would have to enter the room and with another character and say the dialogue. Our genre for this short film was a ’spoof’ about a woman (me) being followed by a stranger. a young man/ teenager(Robbie Kuhn). The woman misreads this as him stalking her but in fact he is just trying to give her phone she dropped.
We had to plan out the mise-en-scene (location, props, costume) for the costume we decided to have the stranger wear a hoodie because that way you don’t see all his face at the start to make the audience nervous but also the other character, also we decided to have a hoodie because the character is a young adult/ teenager and so we based it on a stereotypical teenager, they often wear hoodies. For the woman we decided to have her wear originally a dress but decided that would make the character seem younger in age also we had a problem with continuity so just decided to create a whole new outfit to jeans, top and high-heeled shoes. The location was a problem with planning also, it was difficult trying to find a quiet place to shoot the footage, originally we were going to film in the sixth form block at Sewell park college but then changed to the hallway in Sewell park college and entered a cookery room. We only used a few props in the footage, which was a mobile phone and table and chairs.
The equipment we used for recording the footage was simply a camera and tripod so it was easy to manage. We did include many shots, we did include shot reverse shot and 180 degree shot, we also used a low, medium and high shot. When film editing we had to cut a lot of the footage and we re-arranged some of the cuts and we cut out all the footage that was not useful to us. Then I edited the colour to black and white colour because we wanted it to seem fictional and then turn into reality by changing the colour back to original colour at the end, I also used a video transition to change it from one colour to the other. I used this transition because we wanted to make it obvious we had edited it. I decided to change the volume of the footage because of sound in the background, that was a problem and we could learn from this problem, we should have found a more quiet location, we made the volume loud when the two actors ran and during the dialogue because it is important to have the digetic sound. We added music (non-digetic sound) to build the tension to the film but also to fill in the clips without sound, the music we used was called The Pouncer by Christopher Salvski.
Our aim was to get a reaction out of the audience, at the start of the film our aim was to get the audience anticipated about what the film is about and what is going to happen and when the stranger is following the woman we wanted the audience to get nervous. Finally we wanted the audience to have to be relieved but find the end of the film funny because there is a comedy ending. I am mainly confident we have achieved at least a few of these reactions from the audience.
Health and safety is important when filming, so it does not endanger film crew or the actors. When filming the running down the hallway scene, we made sure there was nothing on the floor that could endanger the actors (me and Robbie Kuhn) and the group so when running no one would fall over while running.
Managing human resources was mainly fine, when filming everyone was part of the production, each person got to film, act or make decisions about filming for example when we would use certain shots. When editing, each person got to do editing because we wanted everyone to have experience with editing, not just filming.
Overall the preliminary task had a few problems but we managed to overcome these problems and finish the task.
We had to plan out the mise-en-scene (location, props, costume) for the costume we decided to have the stranger wear a hoodie because that way you don’t see all his face at the start to make the audience nervous but also the other character, also we decided to have a hoodie because the character is a young adult/ teenager and so we based it on a stereotypical teenager, they often wear hoodies. For the woman we decided to have her wear originally a dress but decided that would make the character seem younger in age also we had a problem with continuity so just decided to create a whole new outfit to jeans, top and high-heeled shoes. The location was a problem with planning also, it was difficult trying to find a quiet place to shoot the footage, originally we were going to film in the sixth form block at Sewell park college but then changed to the hallway in Sewell park college and entered a cookery room. We only used a few props in the footage, which was a mobile phone and table and chairs.
The equipment we used for recording the footage was simply a camera and tripod so it was easy to manage. We did include many shots, we did include shot reverse shot and 180 degree shot, we also used a low, medium and high shot. When film editing we had to cut a lot of the footage and we re-arranged some of the cuts and we cut out all the footage that was not useful to us. Then I edited the colour to black and white colour because we wanted it to seem fictional and then turn into reality by changing the colour back to original colour at the end, I also used a video transition to change it from one colour to the other. I used this transition because we wanted to make it obvious we had edited it. I decided to change the volume of the footage because of sound in the background, that was a problem and we could learn from this problem, we should have found a more quiet location, we made the volume loud when the two actors ran and during the dialogue because it is important to have the digetic sound. We added music (non-digetic sound) to build the tension to the film but also to fill in the clips without sound, the music we used was called The Pouncer by Christopher Salvski.
Our aim was to get a reaction out of the audience, at the start of the film our aim was to get the audience anticipated about what the film is about and what is going to happen and when the stranger is following the woman we wanted the audience to get nervous. Finally we wanted the audience to have to be relieved but find the end of the film funny because there is a comedy ending. I am mainly confident we have achieved at least a few of these reactions from the audience.
Health and safety is important when filming, so it does not endanger film crew or the actors. When filming the running down the hallway scene, we made sure there was nothing on the floor that could endanger the actors (me and Robbie Kuhn) and the group so when running no one would fall over while running.
Managing human resources was mainly fine, when filming everyone was part of the production, each person got to film, act or make decisions about filming for example when we would use certain shots. When editing, each person got to do editing because we wanted everyone to have experience with editing, not just filming.
Overall the preliminary task had a few problems but we managed to overcome these problems and finish the task.
Location shots
These are the location shots for our two minute opening titles film “The House”. The film is shot at my house but in different rooms at my house. (These are not in order)
Picture one is the sink full of blood scene, there is an over the shoulder shot of the actress.
Picture two is the cupboard scene, there is a high shot of the actress sitting on the floor behind the cupboard
Picture three is the bedroom scene, there is a high shot again/ a crane shot where there is a birds eye view of the actress crawling from underneath the bed and then pivoting to a mid shot infront of the actress
Picture four is the mirror and television scene, when there is paning from the mirror to the television and then back towards the mirror with writting on it.
Picture five is the shot of the exterior of the house and there will be a main title across it and shakey/ jolting camera movement.
Picture one is the sink full of blood scene, there is an over the shoulder shot of the actress.
Picture two is the cupboard scene, there is a high shot of the actress sitting on the floor behind the cupboard
Picture three is the bedroom scene, there is a high shot again/ a crane shot where there is a birds eye view of the actress crawling from underneath the bed and then pivoting to a mid shot infront of the actress
Picture four is the mirror and television scene, when there is paning from the mirror to the television and then back towards the mirror with writting on it.
Picture five is the shot of the exterior of the house and there will be a main title across it and shakey/ jolting camera movement.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)