Evaluations

Evaluation
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products us?
Our media product complies with media horror conventions. We follow the conventions of gender within horror movies. The victim in our opeining is female and it's given the stereotypical label of 'damsel in distress'. Our inclusion of pictures in our opeining also furthers the horror conventions. The inclusion of pictures are used on many popular horror movies such as The Ring and Shutter.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?
In our opening scene we used a young female character as our main protagonist. In our intro, our character is seen as naïve and vulnerable as most girls are portrayed in horror movies. We used teenager as the main character and protagonist in our opening. We did this in order to appeal to our target audience, as we felt our audience would be able to relate to the character on screen; this is primarily because our target audience was aged roughly from 15-18.

Who would be the audience for your media product

• Thrill seekers - our target audience would be the typical adrenaline seeking junkees
• Working class/inner city teenagers
• Young adults of both sexes - our audience research showed a ratio of almost '1:1'.

We were mainly influenced by our target audience which allowed us to identify our specific audience.

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

I learnt a various number of skills in regarding camera skills and editing skills from the preliminary task. One of the most important things I learnt from the preliminary task was time management of filming and editing; this led me to excel much quicker a in my main task. Furthermore, due to all the handling of the cameras I was much more comfortable using a wide range of camera angles and shot types from al different positions. I also became very familiar with the editing software which I though was very complicated at first, however finally got the hang of after much practice.

Main task

https://vimeo.com/211680352

Here is the final production of our main task

Visiting the BBFC and classification of Our Horror Film

On January 24th, I, along with my media class, visited The British Board of Film Classification in London. We were introduced to a member of staff there who advanced to running an interactive presentation on the BBFC and film classifications. The BBFC hold the duty of classifying and censoring all films and video works discharged in the UK, as well as producing consumer advice listing references to violence, sex and coarse language among a variety of other things. Those over the certified age of a product can legally purchase it. The classifications used by the BBFC have changed significantly over time to mould to different generations and their outlooks. There are currently 6 different classifications used, which are as follows: U, PG, 12A, 12, 15, 18.
 

We were spoken to about the process it takes in order to classify a film on the higher side of classifications (15 and 18). In order to be classified highly on the list, a film must be deemed inappropriate for younger audiences due to the reoccurring themes of violence, sex and drug use, as well as other unsuitable themes: these also include discrimination (based on gender, sexuality, disability, religion or race), sexual violence, and peadophilia. The frequency of these themes, as well as their graphic and/or explicit nature, are what is the deciding factor of whether a video work is classified as a 15 or 18. It is also the BBFC's duty for making any necessary cuts to any video work. Cuts are often made if distributors request a less-restrictive rating, and are most commonly to any scenes of drug use, violence, or sex/sexual violence. An example of this comes from The Woman In Black, where the BBFC cut several seconds of footage showing a young girl being burned alive in order to obtain the classification of a 12A as opposed to a 15.

Regarding our own media project, it is important that we asses the themes featured. Whilst there are no reoccurring themes of violence, sex or drug or abuse, our last scene does display some aspects of violence. This is due to our paranormal antagonist attacking our main character whilst she screams for help. Although, this is not seen as significantly violent, we must take our younger viewers into consideration. For this reason we have classified our film at 15.

Shotlist

Silence of the lambs opening scene

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0A-1gbJzdU&t=1s


The film begins with a women running through a dark, misty woods. We are uncertain if she is just running out of own accord or running away from something. This shows some isolation and gives the shot a creepy feel. The bare trees and wash of blue colour adds to this. It is also misty which suggests it is the early hours of the morning.

It gradually becomes apparent that she is running an assault course, the audience start to think that the women is not a feminine as most women are portrayed in most films.

As she goes inside, the masculine blue theme continues. The wall and tables are lined with technology and male oriented items such as gadgets and guns.

The juxtaposition of the men and the female subject 'Clarice' exaggerates how weak she is because the elevator scene filled with men surrounding her making her seem smaller than she really is. Furthermore, the use of the men's red uniforms juxtaposed with the muted colours could possibly represent the male gender being a threat in this film because red connotes danger and death.

The camera work is mainly used to show that she is a women in a mans world. The rope shot seems to show this, as well as the lift shot. The panning shot of Clarice getting over the emphasises the amount of time it is taking her to get over the net to reach her goal. It suggests that she struggles with weakness but is resilient to overcome her obstacles.

The tracking shot and establishing shot cleverly shift the focus from the bigger picture to the main character to so we know who will be the main focus in the story. The title cover the shots and are very bold and the main focus point which could highlight that the scenes are not as important as they are the build up to the more tense areas. The showing of the female taking part in everyday normal activities tells us that she is an everyday person and this causes the audience to feel nervous as we realise this could be involving us as the audience more than we initially thought.

Equipment needed for our production

To create a scary and effective dark room, some props needed will be:

• Trays
• String
• Pegs
• Red Light 

In order to have a frightening antagonist(clown) we will need

• Face paint
• A suit
• Red Tie 
• Red ballon

Matilda:

• Hair tie 
• Hoodie 
• Professional camera 

Filming props:

• Canon camera 
• Tripod 

Editing equipment: 

• Adobe premiere
• Mac computer

Team members and their roles

Aaron - Camera Man, Editor, Music, Screenplay writer.
Isian - Main actress (Matilda), Make-up, Set design, Screenplay writer.
Raphael - Actor (Clown), Co-director, Screenplay writer.
Agnesa - Co-Director, Production Manager, Make-up, Screenplay writer.

Target audience survey

Before we started our project, we thought that it would be sensible to get our target audiences opinion on horror movies. To do we created a survey so that the target audience could answer our questions. We wanted to make the survey quick and easy for our audience.


Link to survey: https://freeonlinesurveys.com/s/KdUhywSF?embedded=true#/0


Below are the results we obtained:

From these results we learnt a number of things about our target audience and how we should carry out our film. This enabled us a group to conclude many disagreements that we had in our group and this made it easier to run our project more fluidly.

Production name ideas

location recee

Presentation pitch

Halloween opening scene textual analysis

In the opening scene of the 1978 independent horror slasher Halloween, suspense and fear is created and explored in a number of ways though the use of representations, mise-en-scene, camera shots, editing and technical codes.

In the opening sequence of a horror film the audience will expect to see fright and suspense building materials and this identifies the horror genre. The settings for horror films are the most commonly remote, suburban areas, which are sometimes seen as safe places to live. However suburban areas are where it is most likely for murders etc to happen as they create a sense of isolation.

The opening titles of the film are in black and orange, stereotypically eerie colours. Alongside these, there is a pumpkin which has connotations of being ghostly and evil as well as being a key symbol of Halloween, linking this event to the film; this pumpkin then slowly zooms to fill the shot.

Tense, creepy music plays in the background during the titles, this is a typical convention of Horror films, very few will work without it. Throughout the rest of the opening, no other sounds are used, besides footsteps and screams. This builds up suspense further, and the silence of the scene leaves the viewer almost holding their breath. The music and zoom on the pumpkin builds up the suspension, so that when the film starts, it will seem all the more jumpy.

The establishing shot is a long shot of a house in the dark. Low lighting is used to create lots of shadows, again a key convention of horror films. It plays with the viewers mind, and they look around, expecting something to be hiding there and it is built up for something bad to happen.

 A point of view shot is then used as the camera goes around the side of the house. As we haven’t yet seen this person, but we are seeing from their perspective and they are lurking in the shadows, it creates an uneasy feeling and we feel as though we are trespassing. The shot then shows two people through the window of the house, unaware that they are being watched. This is a common technique used in Horror films to build up suspense.

The point of view shot then develops so that we are seeing the shot through the eyes of the killers mask. Because of this, we can’t really see what is going on, which sets the audience on edge and gives an eerie feeling. Here, it is establisheed that it is the killer who’s mindset the viewer is in, which breaks typical conventions of Horror. It is unusual, as the viewer is normally made to relate to the victim, intending it to be that the killer is just as scary to them as though it was actually happening. In this film, it is more like the viewer is the killer, putting a different twist on the genre.

Mainly long shots are used, which is typical of the genre and is effective for two reasons. It means that with far less close-ups, the viewer doesn’t emotionally connect to the characters, which doesn’t happen in most horror films. Also, being a long shot, there is more than one thing to focus on. This puts the audience on edge, and it is almost as though they are looking for something to jump out. The only close-up used in the opening is of a knife being taken from the kitchen drawer, which is a dramatisation and appears to be significant, building up tension.

The victim is revealed as a naked young woman. The fact that she is a woman is very typical of the horror genre, the women are commonly portrayed as being weak and vulnerable, only there for appearance sake. Her nudity could also be a symbol for her vulnerability and to show how exposed she is to the killer. At the end of the opening, the shot zooms away from the point of view shot, and shows the killer is dressed as a clown. The use of clowns as a symbol of evil and a fear of clowns is common in horror films. The mask is then pulled off and it is revealed that the killer was in fact a child. This is a binary opposition of good and evil as children have connotations of innocence and love, which strongly contrasts to the scene of the child holding a blood covered knife, surrounded by police. During this shot, more lighting is used, which could symbolise the fact that the killer is now exposed, and the audience enlightened.

Scream opening scene textual analysis

The first thing the audience hear is a non-diegetic sound of a women screaming.  This is an audio representation of the title of the film, and helps the audience infer that the genre of the film is likely to be a thriller/horror as someone generally screams when they are in danger. The scream creates suspense and curiosity from the audience as they wonder as why the character is screaming and what danger they could possibly be in, which makes the audience intrigued of the storyline of the film from the beginning. Whilst the audience hear the scream, they also hear a non-diegetic heartbeat and phone call. The heartbeat build tension and the phone call creates suspicion in what a phone would have to do within a horror movie. The phone ringing acts as a soundbridge into the first scene and the screaming introduces the audience to a female character. At first the title is white, which may suggest a vulnerability and innocence of the characters in the film, which would make sense to the audience because usually in horror films there are often many victims. However, in seconds the title turns red, which way suggest a more sinister and evil undertone to the film. Furthermore, we usually associate the colour red with danger and blood which foreshadows possible future event in the film.

In the opening scene, the camera shows a phone ringing and then pans upwards to show a young women answering it. The fact that the main character in the film is a women is stereotypical as it is likely she will find herself and unable to defend herself. In addition, the women is wearing a white top which connotes purity and innocence.

A medium close of shot of the women is used to show her facial expression and the window behind, the showing that it Is dark outside.






It could be said that this is a symbolic code through the use of binary oppositions as the victim is dressed in lighter clothing also showing innocence and goodness whereas the use of the surrounding darkness and the killer is dressed in completely black representing unknowingness and evilness.