My two minute opening

And here is the final film opening 2 minuets- Refresh, Horror film

Evaluation question 1 and 3 podcasts

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (i.e. horror film openings)

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Evaluation question 2

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups ?

question 4 and 5 evaluation

4. Who would be the audience for your media product? and 5. How did you attract/address your audience?


question 4 and 5 evaluation

Evaluation question 6

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

Evaluation question 6

Evalution question 7

7. Looking back at your preliminary task (the continuity editing task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

At the start of course, myself and a couple of others made a preliminary task which was a small film using match on action shot, reverse shot and the 180 degree rule.

This task was the first practice on filming of that year, and during the course of making my opening I have learnt a lot about the elements needed for filmmaking. The first thing that I learnt was the filming process, generally as at the start of the year I was worried about how I would use the camera to get the shots. During the process I learnt how to hold the camera and use the tripod to not have a shaky picture, as well as learning how to change the camera position to get the shots in needed. I developed my skills in filming by filming different types of shots, such as close up and very wide shots. I learnt how to create them using my camera, and learnt different skills needed to film my opening 

I also learnt more about casting; I needed to chose the right people that would fit the genre and would be good actors/actress for my opening. From the preliminary task I learnt that just choosing people from having a lot of time to film and didn't know how to act was a bad idea as they may not have been right for what I wanted and made the film look amateur.
 I also learnt the problems of casting, and that sometimes casting friends could result in arguments. Also availability was sometimes being an issue of actors of my age, considering the amount of work that had to be put in for Sixth Form, and people of my age not having much time, this limited how much time I had to edit.  

I also learnt about the use of Mis-en-Scene to create atmosphere and a believable setting for my opening. I developed skills in choosing costume that would suit the character at the situation, such as using black and red to have a contention of horror. While in my preliminary task I did not have the knowledge of what would suit the characters in the situation they were in and I just had to use whatever was there.  I have also learnt the power of setting and locations, I discovered while in the process of making my product that settings had to look realistic and fit the realms of the film. For example I learnt that using my bed room for a male character to sleep in didn't not fit his character because of the differences in gender.

Over the past few months, I have learnt a lot about filming, technical wise with the practice with my camera and planning wise with the casting, location-finding etc. I have gained knowledge about how to develop my film-maker skills to create a opening which would fit the 2 minutes. I have also learnt the problems that can arise from poor planning. All in all I have learnt how to film a creative piece of media using different techniques which I learnt from practicing and expanding my knowledge on filming.

How I've changed my film

For my fully done two minute opening I have changed the idea of Adam killing  Angle (The two characters in my film) and the audience seeing her dying. I have filmed a more vague idea of murder, by showing his hands covered in blood. I decided this because it seems a lot more interesting than the majority of horror films shown today. I also wanted to create the more mysterious idea of what had happened.  

My change was influenced by the old Alfred Hitchcock film Psycho, the shower scene, where the  violence isn't fully shown however is implied with the use of editing online showing certain  cuts to imply that the women  is being killed. 

Here's the scene I am referencing:

This is our Preliminary exercise

This task involved filming two people, one of the actors would open a door, cross the room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom she/he then exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue. The task should demonstrate
 on

Match action shot


Shot/Reverse shot


This shot is usually done to show people having a conversation (An over the sholder shot to show which ever one is speaking at a time)

The 180 Degree rule




In this task I worked with Harry New ( He acted in the task) and Luke Bates ( He filmed the task)
As a group we decided the idea of an interview, however the person asking the questions seemed to be an little strange, as this would create simple comedy.

This was are first real chance to see what it was little using cameras and how to create simple shots, ready for our film. It was also chance to understand simple editing.

Below is our finished product.

Harry Potter studios

On 10th an 11th of February, our Media class went to London to The Harry Potter studios

We did this to gain understand of the film industry. 

Day 1:

The tour contained all aspects of the films of Harry Potter:

E.g.

Costumes 

Set designs 

Props

Plans of larger set

Information of the films themselves

Costumes

It was interesting to see the original costumes, there were so many different ones. As the Harry Potter world is full of some many character it was important for the designer to create an individual outfit which would suit there character, as well as suiting an keeping truth the original source martial. 

As well as make outfits which would likely appear in a wizarding world, such as wirzarding hats, robes. They also had to consider the time of the books. JK Rowling had set these books in the 90s, so the costume designer had to make choices based around that time. 

The designer had made a good choice on all of these aspects. 

Set Design

Just like the costumes, the set design had to be considered and work with the story and actors. 

The sets have set up the whole world. As the main part of Harry Potter takes place in Hogwarts. 

This means that most of the sets where class room based, The set designs effectively combined the familiar idea of real world class rooms and the magic of the Harry Potter world.

For example, The poisons room mixes text books, with caldrons. The sets help to create the world of Harry Potter, and has great amount of detail put into it to it. 

Props 

Harry Potter has a lot of props, such as wands, glasses. These had to be in a lot of detail as well. Unlike the books, the film has  different sets of wands depending on the personality of the wizard. I thought this idea was interesting as when wanting the Harry Potter films, many wouldn't notice the difference in the wands.
It helped to add more flavour in too each character. It was also a good idea in terms of sells of Harry Potter products as there was more to chose from.

One thing about the Harry Potter studio was the way the made the Hogwarts school, rather than film a castle that already existed. The makers of Harry Potter  decided to build a smaller model the well known magical school. I felt that this was the most impressive part of the tour, as it was a huge part of the film, as well as size being usually compared to the films themselves.


Here are some photos of the tour:
This contains
Costume
Set designs
and smaller models of the films.

  

Music- for my film

Why film markers use music in there production:
Film markers all around the world usually chose music to fit there film. The non-diegetic sound helps to create tension for the scene. For example, if a scene is a fast drama scene the music will be also fast and dramatic and if the scene is a slow painful scene the music will respond accordingly.
Some films use music/songs that already exist as  with well known music, audiences can connect to more, as well as using the lyrics to fit the film. While others want audiences to constraint on the film itself, so cause instrumental pieces to create the tension.
There is also music and songs for characters, such as Villains would have a dark dramatic instrumental music playing when there on scene to set the tone of their wrong doings.



As my film is a horror film, I have chosen music that suit this genre. Such as creepy piano pieces or soft scary melodies that would add tension to the product.
This piece of music called "Alone" by Stephan Fraser

I will have two pieces of music:
In the first scene of my opening I shall have a low creepy piano piece to show the danger and tension of the start.

I have chosen this music as it has an Atmosphere and will create tension. The slow rising music will help viewers to instantly recognize that its horror film. As well as it sounding like a rising heart beat that would fit the all over creepiness of my opening.







For the last scene of my opening I using a light, high creepy piano instrumental. To create tension and foreshadowing, and to make the image of my character Angle seem even creepier.
For this part I'm going to use the song:

Where a ghost rests is his discretion- from the Japanese anime Gintama.

Both of these music pieces belong to there original composers; they do not in any way belong to me.

Filming report

On January 25th I went to Wymondham, Norfolk to film the last part of my opening at the train station.

While I enjoyed putting my ideas into film; I found the whole process quite difficult, as I am inexperienced with filming and using a camera. I found that the technical side of the process was very hard to manage. Such as making the camera higher and getting a larger picture, this was because my tripod was quite old and was breaking.
In terms of the actors the commutation was quite clear, however the people involved (including myself) were all very tired and so I could not filming as much as I wanted to.

As of today I still need 16th January

I still need set more filming dates and start the filming of my opening, which is what I need to start doing in the next couple of weeks.
The only idea that I have changed in my opening is the title, I changed it from "Her" to "Refresh." I have kept everything else the same as I felt like I didn't need to over complete the opening.

Filming dates

• Sunday 19th January- 10:00-11:00, Establishing shots

People involved with filming process
Myself-Director

Update: 1/21/15- Filmed the first shot of the film.

• Sunday 25th of January

People involved with this filming process
Myself- Director
Grace Peirson -Actress
Jamie McGregor- Actor

Prop list

This is a list of props that I will need for my opening:

• A knife, covered in blood. For this I will use a blunt  knife and fake blood.- This will be used to kill Grace, as I think murder and blood would suit the genre.

• A phone, a smart phone- This will be necessary for the later seen where Adam is texting his mother. 

• Glasses- This will be for Adam character look as I wanted to show intelligence.  

Costume list:

• Jamie- A black t-shirt, and a purple t-shirt with jeans and trainers. I want him to look contemporary and suit the weather.

• Grace- One simple white lacy shirt with black leggings and  black boots, as well as a large black coat. I picked these clothes as the black and white showed her both innocence's and darkness.

Make up and hair:

• Grace- first scene will have messy hair, and blood on her face,
• The other scenes she will have simple make up such eyeliner and a pale face make up, to suggest that she is creepy and goth like. 

Story board

This is the story board of my opening, this opening has six story boards which show the main camera shots that I want to show.