Evaluation

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

When researching Horror films it was clear that the most common type of convention used in them was that the girls are seen as the victims and the boys are seen as the 'baddies'. My research for the film opening of 'Scream' shows this well as it is a man controlling a girl on the phone. It is scarier for a man to be threatening a girl then the other way round. I thought the opening scene to scream was really effective and wanted to portray this as much as possible in our own horror film. I believe we accomplished this by having the two victims in the film be girls with a man being shown as the 'baddie', the one you can't trust. We were contemplating having boys as well as the girls going into the building, but decided against this as we thought that the girls would seem a lot more vulnerable being by themselves.

Another important convention of horror films is the editing of the sound and lighting that they use. I believe we did this very well in our film and that it is the sounds we use that makes the tension hit it's climax the best. We decided to keep lighting for the clips of the girls inside quite dark as this adds mystery and fear of the unknown.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

The main story line to our film is that two girls have been asked to take part in a 'Social Experiment' to gain money. However, both girls don't realise that the man behind the social experiment is in fact Rosy's, one of the girls doing the experiment, father. Rosy has never met her father so is unaware of this. The man wants to torture and kill Rosy in order to get back at her mother.

I think our film opening represents teen aged girls well. The fact that both of these young girls have agreed to go into a completely unknown environment and trusting a strange man to take part in an experiment they know nothing about just to receive money shows you that they are vulnerable and aren't thinking things through. Teenage girls are often portrayed to be vulnerable when it comes to men, so our film is exaggerating this.
In the second scene when the two girls are shown, Gwen, is nervous and doesn't want to go into the house, she is having second thoughts. Rosy persuades her to go in and tells her to "Stop being a baby!" This is a good example of peer pressure. Gwen is only going into the house because she is scared of what Rosy would think of her if she didn't.

What types of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

I previously looked at '20th Century Fox' film institute as part of my research. Although this is a popular film institute, I don't know whether it would keep in theme with our film. It is more renowned for films and programmes such as; Ice Age, Star Wars, The Simpson's and Family Guy and not horror films. However, because of it being such a popular institute it can franchise many films for many ages.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The target audience for our Horror film, 'The Social Experiment', would be eighteen year old's and over. The film has graphic scenes that wouldn't be appropriate for children under the age of eighteen. By researching other Horror Films the majority of the ages are 18. Our film would be targeted at both girls and boys as it has a storyline that would fit both.


How did you attract/address your audience?

Being teenagers ourselves it was easier to understand what type of conventions our film would need to attract an audience of our age and older. We tried to make our film as believable as possible so that our audience could relate to it as much as possible. What would they do if they were in the girls shoes?
Myself ad Rosy carried out questionnaires ourselves on both, girls and boys, aged 18 and over. We wanted to see if this age range that we had targeted it at find it scary. We got positive responses from both telling us that they did in fact find it scary.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

From creating this film opening and preliminary task I have experienced a lot of new techniques and programmes that I never have before. It has allowed me to see what programmes i work with best and what one gives the best outcome at the end.

For our preliminary task we used a flip cam to film it. This type of camera was easy to use as it was small and light so we could move it around easily to get all the different types of camera angles and shots we wanted.
Are first attempt at editing our preliminary task was on 'Final Cut' on the macs. However something had happened which meant all our clips were being played in slow motion, so made it very hard to edit. We then tried editing it on Movie Maker, a much simpler form of editing. This worked fine as all we had to do was to crop and cut some scenes. This allowed us to use different types of editing programmes before we started are main film and to get familiar with both.

For our final film opening we again used a flip cam to film our scenes because we were confident that it would do a good job. It allowed us to film our scenes quick and easily with no trouble. To edit our film we used 'Final Cut' on the macs as it has a lot more editing techniques to use then 'Movie Maker'. After a few goes at editing on the macs we had become a lot more familiar with it and found it easy to use. We did have some problems here and there but in the end it allowed us to use all the techniques that we wanted in our film. The best part about using the Macs was the quality that it produced in the outcome of our film. It made our film opening a lot more smoother then our preliminary task. Each scene runs smoothly onto the next one making it look that little bit more professional. It also allowed us to use different types of sound effects and edits to help build the tension to reach its climax. I would definitely use Final Cut again on any up coming projects.


Looking back at your preliminary task what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

Our preliminary task was a good way of introducing us to filming and editing. It allowed us to experiment with different types of camera angles and shots, such as;

1 - Match on action shot

2 - Match on action

1 - Shot reverse shot

2 - Shot Reverse shot

We kept the horror theme for the preliminary task as it would be a good start for our research into horror films and the conventions of it. We decided to not have the same story line as our final horror film opening as we wanted the preliminary task to be mainly about showing off our skills and techniques with camera angles. We didn't want to concentrate too much on the setting and costume of the characters as it was our main focus at this point.
I think we progressed hugely from our preliminary task to our final film opening.

For me, the best part about our film is the use of sound that we used in each scene. Each type of sound adds to the suspense of the film and helps build climax throughout. My favourite part is at 2:06 - 2:12 when Rosy is walking down the stairs to find Gwen's body hanging on the wall. This is where the sound is at it's best and when the climax is at it's highest. This is my favourite type of sound that we used in all of the opening. I also like how we carried on the same Jewelry Box music at different parts in the film. This would make me want to carry on watching to see if it has any particular significance in the rest of the film.

However, there are some parts that I would change about our film. I think the storyline itself is a good idea but if we were to do it again I would make it more clear as to what is going on from the start, why are there pictures of Rosy's mum and sister on the wall and what are the two girls doing at this mans house in the first place? I would probably change this by adding some more speech of us greeting the man at the door and him explaining why we are here. Although this could be seen as a positive. If people are unsure about why there are pictures of Rosy's mum and sister and what the girls are doing there, it may encourage them to watch on to find out.

Overall I am pleased with the outcome of our film. I think it captures the main conventions of a Horror film and builds tension well throughout. If I was to do this task again i would still use 'Final Cut' as I am pleased with the way are film turned out.

Questionnaire

As part of my research I interviewed two boys, aged, 19 and 21. I wanted to see whether or not it would target boys as well as girls as Rosy had already interviewed two girls aged, 19 and 18. It would also help us to know whether or not people find this film scary, whether they would pay to see it, what changes they would make and would they recommend it?


1. Did you find our Horror film opening effective and why?
Jerome: Yes, I thought that you created tension well with the different sound effects you used and the way you edit the film.
Alex: Yes, I agree. It made me want to carry on watching to see who the man was and what was going to happen to the girls.

2. Was there any types of editing that you thought were most effective?
Jerome: I particularly liked the bit at the beginning when Tom turned his head in slow motion, looking back at the grave yard.
Alex: I liked the music you used when Rosy was walking down the stairs to find Gwen's body hanging. I thought the music you used here was very effective.

3. Are there any parts that you would change?
Jerome: I wouldn't necessarily change any certain parts but I would maybe make the storyline a bit clearer by adding another scene or two. I got a bit confused as to why there were pictures of Rosy's mum and sister upstairs.
Alex: I agree.

4. Do you think this film targets both males and Females?
Jerome: Yes.
Alex: Yes, but I think females would enjoy it more because of the two main roles being girls.

5. What age would you target this film at?
Jerome: Eighteen and older.
Alex: Fifteen and older.

6. Would you carry on watching the film to find out what happens and would you recommend it?
Jerome: Yes.
Alex: Yes.

9th January 2012 - We have finished our film!

Editing our final film opening - 3

January 9th 2012 - Myself, Rosy and Mia all stayed to finish off the editing to our film today. All we had left to do was to add our production company name at the begining of the film and some effects to the music and editing.

 We chose the name "FearsomeFilms" as our production company as it goes well with the theme of our horror film opening.
Our production company logo:

We chose this type of font and style for our logo as we think it stands out and looks professional. We wanted it to look as realistic as possible. By looking at other film company logos we realised that the majority of them used bold and simple fonts that stand out.
We added this to the begining of our film.


Aswell as adding our company logo, we added some affects to our film to build the tension as much as possible and make sure that it runs smoothly.
At the begining of our film when the church bells are ringing we wanted to fade the sound out so it blends in with the music that's about to start. We did this by using the 'fade in fade out' tool on the final cut programme. This did exaclty what we wanted. Each sounds runs smoothly into another. We aslo used this tool at the end of each song so that it doesn't sound cut and chop when we're about to talk.

Another tool we used was the 'speed up, slow down' tool. We used this at different points in the music that we used so that parts of the music matched with the scene and made it look alot smoother. We aslo used this tool to slow and speed up parts of the scene as well; e.g. when Tom turns his head to look at the gravestones behind him. We thought this added tension and mystery to the scene.

Editing our final film opening - 2

January 6th 2012 - Rosy and I stayed for just under 3 hours after school to try and get as much work done to our opening as possible. We really wanted to move on as quickly as possible to start adding affects to our film. We started off by making sure everything flowed right from the beginning to end and made sure that it made sense. All the clips are now in the right order which meant we could move on to editing our film by adding effects, sound and writing. 
 

We started adding captions at the point where Tom is walking away from the gravestones and into the building; "Starring Gwen Caple" "Rosy Vega" "Tom White". Toms name is mentioned as he shuts the door. This gives the audinece a sense of mystery behind him. What is in the building? What is he going to do?





We also added music throughout at different points.

1. When Tom is at the church and walking to the building
2. When Rosy and I walk through the corridor and down the stairs
3. When Rosy walks upstairs
4. When Rosy finds me hanging.

Music really builds up the tension even more in a scene. It helps create an atmosphere that people are unsure about. To make our film even creepier we decided to play a particular type of music throughout different point in the opening. It was 'Black swan Music box.' This song reminded us of the type of music a little girl would listen to. This relates to our story as Rosy plays Tom's little girl in the film. We played this music when Tom is walking back from the church, when Rosy finds the pictures of herself and when Rosy finds me hanging. We chose these moments as we thought they all linked well to the music.
We found all our music from http://www.freesounds.org/ .

The black swan music we used.  

All we have left to do now is to add more effect to the other scenes and to add our production company logo that we still have yet to make.
We also have the idea of adding all the torturing clips of Rosy at the end that we filmed previously for our orginal idea. We thought this would add mysetery and confusion as to what is about to happen to her. However we are not sure if this will make it look more like a trailer rather then an opening. We will continue editing on Monday.

Editing our final film opening - 1

January 6th 2012 - We had a big problem when trying to edit our clips today. When going onto our mac and viewing our film, Final Cut was telling us 'Media Offline'. This happened because we hadn't saved our clips onto the mac, instead we had just been keeping them on the flip cam and inserting that into the mac every time we wanted to use it. Unfortunately this meant that some of our clips had been deleted by other people using the flip cam, so we no longer had them on the time line. We decided to just edit the beginning bit again. To do this we had to import all our videos onto final cut again and start over. We managed to get this all done in an hour or so. We would come back at the end of the day to get as much done to our film opening as possible. All we have left to do now is finish off the end and start adding effects, e.g music and different motion affects. Hopefully our film will be finished by Monday.



Example of 'media offline' on final cut.

Re-filming our opening - 3

January 5th 2012 - The morning before going to film our new scenes we realised that the continuity would be all wrong. I was not wearing the same clothes as last time, neither did I have the same hair as I had dyed it since the last time we filmed. We came up with ANOTHER idea to work around this. We wanted to try and make it so we didn't have to film any more scenes with me in and to try and use the scenes that we had of me before. Together we all managed to come up with an idea that would work around this problem.

Final Idea:

We decided to keep the begining bit the same of Tom at the graveyard and walking to the door. We kept the next shot also of us talking to Tom and us being shown down to the room below. The lights turn off but when they turn back on, I am no longer there. Rosy is in the room by herself. Tom comes down and tells Rosy; "Gwen is being interviwed upstairs, you can go and see her if you like." Rosy runs upstairs and the next shot you see is of her at the top of the stairs. Rosy curiously walks through the corridor and finds a knife with blood over it and pictures of herself and her mum and sister from when she was younger. Rosy is confused, why does he have these pictures? Tom appears again at the top of the stairs and tells Rosy to go down. The next shot you see is of Rosy appearing at the bottom of the stairs and her screaming my name. The next shot is of me tied up on the wall wearing a white gown, hanging.

The only scene that we would have to film again would be:

1. Rosy going upstairs and finding the knife and pictures
2. Tom telling rosy to go downstairs
3. Rosy screaming because she's found me hanging on the wall 

We used the same characters and setting as last time and managed to film the new scenes in under an hour. We all agreed that this would work. We were able to use the shot of me hanging from what we had filmed last time because fortunately that was one of the clips that was bright enough to use again.

This film opening allows us to carry on the film. People will want to carry on watching to find out what happens to Rosy and am I dead?

Mia filmed these scenes using a flip cam and myself, Rosy and Tom stared in it.

Props used:

The coat Tom wears

The knife Rosy finds

The photos Rosy finds of herself,
Mum and sister.

The fake blood we used on the knife..