Feedback - FIlm opening first draft

Here is the feedback we received from 3 viewers of our initial draft for our film opening:

Film Opening Improvements

The main thing that we as a group decided to improve was the sound throughout our film opening as we needed to change the amount of screaming that we had In it and we needed to add in sounds to places where it was completely silent.

The things that we improved on where:

• making sure that the sound got more dramatic towards the end to create tension and build it up for the viewers of our film opening
• we also needed to add in dark suspense music towards the end where there was no sound and it was completely silent for a while which sounded odd in comparison to the rest of the film opening where sound was used.
• another thing that we improved on was changing the pitch, tone, and volume in places where it was appropriate, for example in places where there was a tense clip the music needed to be a low tone and of a loud volume for the viewer.

Here are the screenshots to show what we changed:

Film Opening - Evaluation

I feel that towards the end after improving our film opening the film opening became a lot better when we took into consideration the advice and feedback that we received from other people who had viewed our film opening.

The things that went well in our film opening was the cooperation between our group and ensuring that everyone carried out their required roles within the planning stage and also within the filming and editing stages. First of all within the planning it was required that everyone had deconstructed certain things and was aware of what ideas we needed to put forward in order to plan and decide what our film opening would be. The second thing that went well was the filming part when all 3 members of the group equally participated within the filming and all remembered to bring the required props and equipment that was required for the filming.

The things that we could have improved on for our film opening was something that occurred early on within the editing procedure. Once we had all of our footage filmed and we put it onto the computer and cropped it and put it into order we realised that our footage was not long enough and didn't have a variety of camera angles and shots therefore this lead to us having to re film. This caused another issue because we needed to use  the exact same actors as we were going to just add in an extra part to the beginning and we also needed to use the same location. This lead to multiple problems as we had to find time when everyone in our group was available to get to the location as it was quite difficult to get to and this wasn't able to happen so we had to change our location and the actor who played the dead girls friend as the other girl couldn't attend on the day. So this lead to use having to refilm our whole footage and put it all onto the computer again crop and put it into order.

Editing - Opening Credits

After our first initial draft of our film opening we decided that we needed to add in more titles as the feedback said there wasn't enough and we noticed this when reviewing it and the feedback said that they also stopped suddenly and didn't last long enough because there wasn't enough of them.
Early on in the editing when we added in the titles we decided and came to the conclusion after research that they needed to be 5 seconds away from each other. We also decided how long we wanted them to last for and we agreed on 4 seconds because it gives the viewer enough time to read them. In our first initial film opening draft we only included the names of the actual actors so to improve so there was real names we added in producers and editors as well as the names of  the actors that were in there.

Here is some screenshots on how we improved our opening titles:

Film Opening - Feedback

Film Opening Feedback:
Once we had submitted our first initial draft we received feedback from other people who viewed our film opening. This showed us and highlighted areas that we need to improve before submitting our final piece.


Generally from the feedback that we received everyone who viewed our film opening they were able to work out the genre of our film opening which is a slasher horror and this was seen through the use of blood, weapons and chase scenes.


The feedback that we received about our sound choices shows that we need to improve our sound the whole way throughout the film opening. With the feedback we received it states sound effects sounded like they were fake. Also in some of the feedback we received we got told to change the sound to a different sound during the chase scene which is more fast paced. The feedback from our sound also showed us that it should get louder and louder towards the end for effect.

Another comment that we received across all of our feedback was that some of the clips could be made shorter as they last to long and become in effective. There was two main clips that were highlighted to us to be made shorter which was the footsteps clip with the girl running and the clip of the dog running as they last too long.

A lot of our feedback that we received shows that the end title 'The Woods' that appears at the end of our film opening and a lot of our feedback shows that they liked the title because it linked well with the genre of our film opening and showed many conventions through the use of a title and typography.

Editing - Titles

Once we had finished editing our footage we needed to ensure that we had titles in with the names of actors and producers. Firstly we had to decide how far away we wanted each title to be fom the one before and how long we wanted the titles to last throughout our footage.

We decided that we would have the first name appear within the first 5 seconds of the film opening but this was after the production companies had been shown so it didnt appear immediately but we had enough time to fit all the names at the begining of our film opening. We then decided once we had added the first name we began adding everyone elses names that were involved. From watching and deconstructing other film titles during film openings we thought as a group it was better to have them spaced out equally so that they appeared on average every 5 seconds. We also agreed that the names should be visible for an average amount of seconds of 3-4 seconds so that we could fit all the names in at the begining and they didnt last too long that way.

Editing footage

Once we had filmed all of our footage we all got together and put our footage into one place on final cut pro this enabled us to sort out what we needed and what we didnt need. We started off by putting it all onto final cut pro and then deleting the clips that weren't appropritate and that we didn't need. After we had done that we then cut all of our clips so that we had the best parts of our footage and the end parts of some scenes and clips that weren't neded we could cut. We each as a group took part in cutting and edting these clips so that it all fitted together in the right order. Here is some evidence of what it first looked like and then what it looked like after we had all of our footage cut and in the right order:

The second image shows the footage that has been cut and the fotage that has been put in the right order trying to reduce to the time limit that we had to fill.

Refilming Shooting Script

Shooting script:

Before we re filmed our footage we had to make sure we planned everything and that it was completed in this way.

Meeting date: Saturday 16th January

Meeting time: 11:00 am

Meeting place: Someone's house where we would walk to the woods and forests

Travel arrangements: Louise, Hollie and Ashleigh planned to travel separately by car to Gemma's house where they would all meet and then walk with the dog to the woods.

Who brought what?
Ashleigh: Camera, Tripod, Black boots, black coat and trousers.
Hollie: Dagger, Phone
Louise: Fake blood, top covered in blood, hoodie

another actor who is not in the group brought her dog as we needed this in our footage for the parts we needed to add and re film.

Actors:
Ashleigh - Killer
Louise - Dead girl
Gemma - Girl who is friends with the girl who gets killed

Editing - production company

Professional Production Company:

When we had all of our footage edited and in the right order we needed to decide which professional production company we were going to use before our own production company. Before deciding this we had all done research on production companies so we had three to chose from that were related to the genre of our film opening. The way in which we went about deciding on which one would work and fit best was by looking back through the blogs and research we had done on production companies before and then re watching each of them

The production company that we decided on was Blumhouse and this was the one that I had previously researched prior to filming . We decided upon this one because it fits well with Ashleigh's own production company that we chose to use and it works well with the genre of our film opening.

Here is the production company in our footage:

After deciding upon the professional production company we were going to use we then as a group had to decide out of our own made production companies which one we were going to use. We followed the same procedure and looked back over the blogs and re watched each one. Once we had done this as a group we decided that we were going to use Ashleigh's this is because it showed the genre of our film opening effectively and was the one within the group that was of a high standard for our film opening.

This is the own made production company:

As you can see from the screenshot above of the own made production company the name is also effective as it works well with the backing of the production company and helps to show the genre.

Editing - sound

Sound:

Once we had cut all of our footage and had it all in the right order we needed to add sounds that we couldn't record to a high quality. The way that we added the sound was by using pre recorded tracks and edited it to fit in with our footage. We needed two sounds one was a girls scream and one was a twig snapping as we were unable to record this along with our footage as it wouldn't be a very good quality.

To find the sounds that we needed firstly we went onto sound cloud and then we went onto clip converter where we could download the two sounds that we needed and crop and edit them to fit in with our footage.

Here is evidence of the sound of the girl screaming being downloaded then put into our footage on final cut pro:

As we were unable to find a decent sound clip of a twig snapping we decided that one of us should go away and record this sound so that we can add it to fit with our footage and I took the responsiblity of doing this.

Refilming evaluation

Re filming evaluation:

Once we had finished filming out footage the first time round and we collected it all together onto the computer we realised that we didn't have enough footage to cover the time frame that we needed and that it didn't include all the camera angles and shots that we needed. As we had to re film this created a lot of practical issues within our group as we all had to available fairly soon and we had to all be able to get to the same location.

However some of these things weren't possible as in our first set of footage there was a girl who played the girl who gets chased and she was unable to make it for a long time which meant we had to change the person who played that part meaning that we had to re film most of the footage which had her in it with the girl who was going to play her part.

Another practical issue that we encountered was trying to all be able to get back to the same location which we used before which also wasn't possible but as it was a woods within our footage it isn't visible that other parts were filmed in a different location.

Once we had overcome these problems and we had a new set of footage the footage that we obtained was better than the first time and this is due to the fact that we knew what we were going to film with a more detailed storyboard and we knew that we needed more footage with more camera angles in it. Once wed had re filmed it and we collated all of our new footage we had a lot more footage which we were able to edit with and we could cut parts and use. Also the camera angles within our footage were more varied.

Storyboard - re filming

Storyboard - Re filming

Once we had used our other storyboard for the footage that we filmed previously when we put it all together we realised that out footage wasn't long enough. In order to overcome this, this meant as a group we had to re film our footage by adding things in and changing the storyline in order to obtain more footage. As we were re filming our footage as a group this meant that the storyboard had to be re drawn and I took the responsibility of this. The storyboard had to be re drawn because we added am extra scene at the beginning and change certain aspects.

This is our re drawn storyboard:

This time during our re film of our footage the storyboard was more helpful as it was done in more detail and there was more images drawn of what needed to be filmed which helped make it easier for us to obtain more footage and make sure that this time round we included more camera angles into our footage. When we were re filming and we used the re drawn storyboard we didn't change any aspects of it and we didn't cut out any of it which helped us to gather the amount of footage we did meaning that we could chose the best bits.

Storyboard

Storyboard and filming:

When we planned our film opening as a group we planned it by creating a storyboard. When we created the storyboard we included each part of the film in small detail by including shots that were going to be used, camera angles that were going to be part of that part of the opening scene and we also included a description of what was happening to help with the plot line. However as a group we knew that this would change when we came to filming on the day as we may have needed to change some of the angles or shots used or we may have had to add extras parts when we were filming.

This was the storyboard when we it started:

However when we began filming we altered the storyboard slightly towards the end of the film opening scene. The way that we changed things from the storyboard s that we aded parts such as different shots and camera angles so that we could include more match on action and more lower angle shots as we hadn't included much of this so we decided to add this in. However the initial plot line that was on our storyboard that we created stayed the same but we added in parts to make it more detail towards the end when the killer approaches the young girl. When we were filming we decided to add more point of view shots we included one from the girl running and being able to see her feet this is shown in the below changed storyboard, also as we were filming we decided to add in the girl falling over and this being filmed from the killers point of view.

This was the storyboard that was redrawn after filming:

Deconstruction - Actors - Louise Hyam

For my deconstruction task I decided to deconstruct actors within slasher horror films which i can compare to the actors that we have picked for our own slasher horror film. I will look at the gender and the age of the characters and actors used within the slasher horror film opening.

Prom Night:
The first film that I looked at the gender of the main characters and the ages of them. Below is a screenshot from the film Prom Night. The main protagonist is shown in this film conforming to the gender of a protagonist usually being a male because they are shown as stronger than the females. In the film Prom Night there is a scene where the main charatcer is the bad one and the female character is the one that is in trouble and this conforms to the gender roles within films as the male is always shown as inferior and the character that has more power over the women. below is a screenshot of Prom Night where the scene is shown of the male one of the main characters as being the bad one within the situation and the female is unable to help herself.

The second film that I looked at and looked at the main characters was the Hatchet. Most films usually have a victim and someone that is vulnerable. In the film the Hatchet the woman plays the role of the victim and this is common in slasher horror films because they are shown to be weak and the victim is usually shown as a female character with a male character that is the main protagonist. In the film Hatchet this is shown and conformed to through the use of a female character being looked at from behind with a male character standing behind her looking like he is going to do something to her.

The third film that I looked at was Nightmare on Elm Street:
Within Nightmare on Elm Street the main protagonist was shown as a man. This is conforming to roles of characters and actors within slasher horror films. The male character of this film is a male character this small character is used to scare people throughout the film which is a slasher horror film. This conforming to most of the other slasher horror films out where the male character is always shown to be the one that is victimising other people within the film and the male character is always shown as the bad protagonist. The male character is also the main character in the film this focuses all of the attention from the film onto the male character from Nightmare on Elm Street and this also helps to emphasise that fact that he is the main character but it also shows the audiences because they see him so much that he is the bad one as they always see what he does. This is also shown from the way he looks throughout the film and the audience can see from the main character who is shown in the below picture that he is abnormal has he has potential blades attached to his fingers which could be used as weapons and his face is different which automatically creates an effect on the audience showing that throughout the film he will be the bad character.

Practical Task - Gore/special effects - Louise Hyam

Practical Task:

For my practical task I decided to make gore and special effects that were suitable to what would be needed for the actors in our opening scene. For one part of my practical task I created a fake wound on the side of someones face and this will be present in our film opening scene on the girl who is running away from the murderer.

What did I use to make the fake wound?
- Fake Blod
- Glue
- Face Paint
- Makeup Brushes

The reason I chose these items to make the fake wound was because the fake blood can act as the blood within the wound and the glue was able to act as skin that was raised or cut and was inflamed. I used face paint to use the colours such as green to create a more dirty and infected look to the fake wound and I used the makeup brushes to apply all of this to the skin.
Below is a picture of all of the items i used throughout my practical task:

For the fake wound that I made that was on the face firstly I added glue to act as the skin and make it looked inflamed and raised from the skin to show the initial stages of a cut or wound on the side of a face.

After using the glue to act as skin I put a thin layer of fake blood over the top so that this would act as blood on top of raised skin however I only used a thin layer so that it didn't look too unrealistic otherwise the colour wouldn't have been to believable and the blood may have looked to red and the colour wouldn't have been right so I only used a thin layer as shown below.

Next after adding the fake blood onto the glue which was used as skin I added fake blood around the side to  make it look more realistic as blood smudges and doesn't stay in one place when someone is injured or wounded so i added it around the side of the wound and in between the glue that was acting as skin.

For the last step of the fake wound on the face I used face paint. I used face paint to make the fake wound look more dirty and make it seem like it was more realistic with bits of dirt in and so the fake wound wasn't so clean I added green and black face paint mixed together over parts of the fake wound.

This is my final product:

For the second part of my practical task I created another fake wound but this one was on the hand. I did the one on the hand to represent a stab wound that has bled quite a lot. For this wound I used the same products as before for the facial fake wound and I also followed the exact same steps.

For the first stage I added the glue to act as the raised skin like I did so in the previous fake wound.

After adding that I added the fake blood thinly again then I applied the face paint to make the same dirty looking effect on the stab wound in the hand.

This is my final product for the fake wound on the hand:

What went well?

The things that I think well about my practical task creating these fake wounds is that I think that the one on the face looks realistic with the shaping of it and the way that it is laid out on the face. I also think the idea of face paint to make it look dirty also worked well and created a good effect.

What would I improve?

For our opening scene when doing fake wounds the thing I think I would use for the skin being raised and cut instead of glue would be something better and easier to apply to skin. I would probably use liquid latex next time for our opening scene. 

Practical Task - Lighting - Louise Hyam

For my practical task I decided to experiment with lighting and the effectiveness of shadows as in the opening scene of our film we have decided to use shadow effects so for my practical task I decided to do lighting checks with this. For our opening scene there is a murderer and his face is never shown for my practical task I decided to try and make shadows using a person and a hoodie with low lighting.

First of all I got someone to put on the hoodie after that I positioned them so that only the outline of the face could seen to create more of an effect so that it was just a hoodie and an outline of the face. I then used low lighting to ensure that the outline of the face stood out in the low lighting making it more creepy as the face is never shown.

This is the outcome of my practical task experimenting with lighting and creating a shadow:

 

These two pictures above are showing a shadow created by the low lighting and it is shadow of the outline of the face and someone wearing a hoodie.

These two pictures above are showing someone wearing a hoodie and no face being shown at all in this shot. This shot would be used in a long shot from behind in our opening scene to show the killer with the hoodie on from behind with low lighting to make it more scary.

:

These two photos above are showing more of the outline of the face and more of the face is shown but the lighting is still low enough for the person to still be unrecognisable which is effective in a slasher because it doesn't give anything away. This was done by pulling the hoodie that the person was wearing further back so more features were shown and more of the face was shown but the lighting was kept low enough so the person is still unrecognisable.

 

 

The things that I think went well with this practical task is that the shadow is very effective because I made sure that the lighting was low enough and that the hood was pulled back just enough to show the outline of the face to make it more creepy. However for the real thing to improve I would make sure that there is nothing else that is going to cause a shadow within the filming and that it is only the shadow of the persons facial outline that can be seen.

Deconstruction - Camera Angles - Scream - Louise Hyam

For my deconstruction task I deconstructed the opening scene of Scream and deconstructed the camera angles that were included within the film.

Here is the opening scene of Scream:

The first camera angle that I found when I was deconstructing the opening scene was a mid - shot of the lady in the opening scene and this was interesting because the lady had put down the phone that she had just been on there was mid - shot shown of her reaction which shows the audience that she is a little bit more worried that the phone is ringing again and the mid - shot shows the audience the reaction she has to the phone ringing again.

The next camera angle shown is an establishing shot and this is required in this part of the film because it is showing the audience where the actors are and this establishing shot in the opening scene of Scream helps to show the house and how big it is which could suggest that something was about to happen indie the house and the lady inside is vulnerable and knows nothing about it.

After the house is shown with an establishing shot the camera goes back inside the house and focuses on the lady on the phone again. When she is on the phone talking to the man that keeps phoning her there is a close up shot and focus upon the knives that are in her kitchen when she is standing close to them and this could suggest to the audience that the knives being focused on could mean that they have a significance in the film and that the woman again is vulnerable.

Again there is a mid - shot of the lady showing her reaction after a the man says something that worries her over the phone when he says '' i want to know what I'm looking at ''  the lady then changes her reaction and her face changes completely and the camera focuses with a mid - shot on this.

There is a close up shot of the lady locking her door which could emphasise the fact that after that man said what he did to her over the phone she is worried and the lady believes that something is going to happen to her so the camera focuses close up on her locking the door suggesting this door is going to have a significance later on in the film.

The next shot that is shown is a long shot of her closing the door and locking it so no one can get in. The long shot is effective because it shows the audience that the lady is scared and from the position she is in locking the door this also shows that she is in a rush to shut and lock the doors.

After this a shot is shown of someone looking in on the house and the audience can see the ladies head which helps to show that something is going to happen to her and she is vulnerable in this situation.

Practical Task - Sound for Film - Louise Hyam

For my practical task I chose to make sound that was suitable for our film. We have decided upon our film and as a group have decided on the sounds that would make it effective to be a slasher horror. For my practical sound task I chose to make one sound clip which was leaves on the ground being rustled and a twig snapping which would also be used in our film for the chase scene.

The way that I made this sound was by recording someone standing on leaves and rustling their feet in them and then someone standing on a twig.






What went well?
I think the rustling of the leaves worked well because it made a clear sound and it was clear what the sound is. This helps for our sound for our opening scene because it will be clear that the leaves are causing discomfort and that they are getting in the way within a chase scene..

What would I improve for the real thing?
For the real film opening scene to improve the sound for this part I would try to improve the part of the sound with the twig breaking because it needs to sound more clear and I think I would have to do this by ensuring there is no background noise and the sound is focusing on recording the twig breaking ensuring it was a clear sound.

Deconstruction - Titles - Louise Hyam

For my deconstruction task I looked at the titles of slasher horror films so that i was able to use effective ideas to help think of the idea for the name of our film. When deconstructing the titles of the slasher horror films I looked out how effective they are and the impact upon the audience. I chose 5 film titles to look at.

The first film title I looked at was Halloween. Below is the film title page for it:

This title for this film is fictive because the word ''Halloween'' can be associated with spooky things. As it is associated with spookiness, horror and gore this is likely to have an effect on the audience. This could foreshadow the genre of a slasher horror. The effect that it will have on the audience is that it is just a one word title but it portrays parts of the theme that are going to come within the film. The use of just a one word title is also very effective because it is short and creates a quick impact upon them.

The second film I decided to look at the title was Nightmare on elm street.

The title of this film portrays the idea that something bad is going to happen within the film through the use of the word ''Nightmare'' this word is effective upon the audience because they are unsure what the nightmare will be within the film and this will make them want to watch it so that they could find out after seeing the title what it is about.
scream

The third slasher horror film that I looked at was Friday the 13th.

This title is effective because it relates to another horror related day in the year like halloween. This can also foreshadow the theme of horror excuse it is related to thad things that happen. This will be effective on the audience because it doesn't portray much about what is going to happen so this is effective upon making the audience want to watch it after seeing the title advertised.

The fourth film title I looked at for my deconstruction was Behind The Mask.

The film title ''Behind The Mask'' creates an uneasy effect on the audience straight away. It does this because the audience are unaware of what could be behind the mask. This title is effective because the effect it creates on the audience is an effect where they are unsure what the title means and they know that something may be behind the mask but they are unsure what, therefore this is an effective title because it will make them want to find out what is behind the mask. This title could also be fictive because it is very vague and gives little away about the film.

The last film that I chose when I deconstructed was Scream.

This film title is effective firstly because it is very short and snappy. The effectiveness of it being one word is that it doesn't give much away to the audience except about what the word says. The word ''scream'' suggest struggle and needing help, it suggests this because people usually scream when they are in trouble or in need of help. This therefore could portray from the title what may happen in the film.