Equipment Page

This is a Apple Imac computer, this computer is the one we used when editing our film. It has a 21.5 inch screen which enhances the screening of any movie etc. It values at around £949. It has many built in applictions which include Safari, Garage Band and Final Cut Pro.

This is the editing programme that was used. It is a built

in application on Apple imac computers. Its the 7th upgrade to the Final Cut Pro series. It is a non-linear, non-destructive editing programme. It supports any type of Quick Time compatible videoss and also it enables you to input any sort of audio. This latest edition also has the feature of turning it into HD. Also it can also be uploaded to any ipod and other MP3 devices.

The tripod that we used was a Sony Triopd. This piece of eqiupment allows you to keep the camera steady, this is done by attaching the camera to the top of the tripod. When in place you cam then swivel it side to side or up and down. This is done by using the handle on the side. Also by uncliping the legs you can increase the length of the leg size.

This is a Canon ZR700, this was the camera we used to capture of film. This is a SD (standard definition) camera that has optimal zoom. To capture the film you need to input a tape. To input it to a computer such as the Apple imac. it has a FireWire slot which then enables the film to be inputed onto the computer

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

Our group learnt quite a bit from doing the preliminary task that helped us in our main task. One thing especially that we learnt was the 180 degree rule. This enabled us to input a conversation into our opening scene, which gave a different dimension to the film. This rule enabled us to put shot reverse shots. We also had a taste on the type of cameras we will be using also the other type of equipment such as the tripod and the steady cam. By having this proir experience with the equipment I think that this enabled us to be make less time consuming mistakes when we were filming our main task.

Other things that we learned to improve from our preliminary task were things such as lighting, soundtrack and editing techniques. In our preliminary task, because we were filming in college amd had limited locations, our location didn't have the best lighting. In our main task, because we could choose out own location outside college, I think that we learned what places would work well, and what places wouldn't.

Also, in our preliminary task our soundtrack was quite bland and qliche. The main reason for this i think was because of the short time that we had to do the task, but with our main task, we were able to fully delve into garage band and we knew to stay away from the qliche overused sounds. With the editing side of things, I think from having that initial play around with the programme we learned quite alot of techniques to save time. Such as when we had to log and capture for our preliminary task we had all of our footage in order and each clip went toghether straight away, so little editing actually had be done. We tried to do the same in the main task because we knew that it would be better for us, so we could focus on the blog. Anlong with this keyboard shorcuts, the easily appliable effects and the title templates made editing the main task on the whole, a easy and enjoyable experience.

On our main task, we had to learn the hard way how important planning is the hard way. We innitially started filming on our initial idea. The story had gaps, we had no where enough footage, and the whole thing wasn't really believable. If we would of came up with a few ideas in the pleminary and really went in depth with solid storyboards, and shot list then we wouldn't of have to waste alot of time filming and idea that was no where near good enough, then having to think of a new one and re film everything for our main task.

Other input to audiences..

Who would be the audience for your media product?

Teenagers would be the target audience for my product

Media audiences (classification)

social grade
social status
occupation

A
upper middle class
higher managerial, administrative or professional
B
middle class
intermediate managerial, administrative or professional
C1
lower middle class
supervisory or clerical, junior managerial, administrative or professional
C2
skilled working class
skilled manual workers
D
working class
semi and unskilled manual workers
E
those at lowest level of subsistence
state pensioners or widows (no other earner), casual or lowest grade workers

Our media production I think is inbetween working class and skilled working class.
The genre of the film is horror so the audience classification for our media production
Would be from ages 18-34 which would be the target audience for our production. Our product is a niche market production which is aimed at a specific market. A niche market is the subset of the market on which a specific product is focusing; therefore the market niche defines the specific product features aimed at satisfying specific market needs, as well as the price range, production quality and the demographics that is intended to impact.

The specific market we are looking for are from ages 18-34 and we are targeting working class and skilled working class audiences which would be interested in our media production.

Quotes of people talking about our film..

"I really liked the use of still and the way the credits appeared on the screen, it looked professional."

"The use of props and shadows was really effective in showing and not telling, it kept suspense."

"It would get people's curiosity because people would want to know if he's ok, who the guy in the glove was and if he hurt him and why."

A film that has a lot in commom with our film?

A film that is very in common to our film is Nosferatu (1922). This is the first Dracula film. Nosferatu is also like a prototype for Dracula movies to come. It had big influences on how some horrors are made due to the dark elemets which incorporate it fully.

It is about an Estate agent clerk in the city of Bremen leaves his bride to conduct business in the distant Carpathian mountains with an eccentric clinet named Graf Orlok.

During a long and hazardous journey, the closer he gets to his destination, the more terrified are the people he meets. What he finds when he reached Orlok's sinister castle is enough to make the skin of the most devoted horror fan crawl.

The main similarities of our film with nosferatu is mainly, the overall look and color of the film, and the use of our vilian hiding behind a shadow. Nosferatu was the leader in horror film at that time, and they type of suspense and fright that it created is still relevant today, as we have portrayed in our main task. Our was in a dark, almost black and white tint, similar to nosferatu. A key element of nosferatu was its using of representation and expressionistic lighting. We tried to link this by using the gothic type arch that is shown frequently in our film.

Rating of our film

The rating of our film is 15 due the violence which is incorporated and also the 'stalker' essence which could be disturbing to certain younger members. Also the dark and maybe disturbing elements may influence the age rating.

How did you attract/address your audience?

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

Who would be the audience for your media product?

Distribution of our film?

After doing research into different film distribution companies I found an independent film distributo. The name of this distributor is Artisan Entertainment. This distributor is involved in the distribution of the film 'Blair witch project' and 'Candyman 3'. This distributor mainly focuses on 'home movies' which is a diffrence compared to other independent distributors. This will favour our film due to the 'home movies' element it posseses, which is enabled by the dark effect added to the film. In the 1990's Artisan Entertainment got bought by Lionsgate Distribution which beacame their parent company. Now Artisan entertainment only focus on terror and horror style, home filmic type of productions. So if our film was going to produced officially I think this would be a very good option.

Another Independent movie distributer, which would be intrested in our film if it was an official product, is Lions Gate Films Home Entertainment. This is a branch off the major company Lionsgate Entertainments. This distributor only focuses on independent, home made films. Such films like my groups. However what is even more important is that Lionsgate is owned by Sony Entertainment, this means that the film that is being distributed has more money for marketing and more worldwide distribution which will increase the recognition of the film. So therefore this is very important due to the worldwide release which may be available.

Which social group?

Due to the inclusion of woods, teenagers and a stalker this congers up the recipe to attract any psychological loving maniac. It attacks the sense of being watched by something you know is there but you tell yourself its not. The film is based around people aged 16-24. This posted a lot of problems to the development of the story line as we never wanted to it be a cliché stalker film. So therefore we thought of the audience our film will be aimed at, we thought about this thoroughly and in depth by looking at other films that our film relates to. We then looked at the 'fan base' or the social groups that them certain films aim at and is followed by. As we continued the research we found out social groups that focus on watching films of our genre are an audience of 'art house' or 'independent film' taste.

So therefore we reached out to this audience in our film by adding originality which is mostly seen in art house or independent films. Other major factors which contribute into adding the originality is the expressionism and the symbolism that was co-orporated. The other way representation is included is the location of the film such as it is filmed in the woods and most teenagers hang about in the woods.

This link enables the audience to engage with the characters, also the dressing of the characters such as dressing in tracksuits, latest clothes and maybe the inclusion of the Ipod which is 'need-to-have gadget' which represents teenagers more.

Arthouse is the classification of a type of a film. It involves the way the film is made and structured to portray the film in an original type of way. This is also considered a social group due to this type of filmic following of fans.

Present Shot List

Establishing Shot - of trees setting the location

Establishing Shot - of a ruined arc to show symbolism

Long shot - of protagonist running and bouncing of a wall

High angled shot - to show expression on Protagonist's face when hitting the wall

Tracking Medium close up - of protagonist running in woods

Tracking Shot - of protagonist still running in woods

Insert shot - of iPod dropping

Medium shot - of protagonist running more into the woods

Insert shot - of antagonist picking up the iPod

POV shot - of antagonist watching protagonist coming out of the woods on to a path

Tracking into zoom - of protagonist walking then a hand grabbing his shoulder

Over the shoulder shot - of protagonist and protagonist's friend having an argument

POV shot - of antagonist watching the conversation

Two shot - of protagonist slapping his friend's arm out of anger

Extreme close up - of protagonist face showing his anger

Tracking shot - of friend walking away

POV shot - of antagonist watching protagonist's friend walk away

Medium close up tracking shot - of protagonist walking towards a tree to take a rest but however looking distress.

Close up - of a hand suffocating the protagonist

Long shot framed by protagonist leaning against the tree lifeless - of protagonist's friend walking out of the trees on to the path looking for the protagonist

Insert shot - of antagonist picking up the protagonist's body

Medium shot panning into medium close up - of the shadow of the antagonist then of the lifeless body of the protagonist

Main Task - About the film?

The genre that our film is focused around is thriller. Our group chose this particular genre due to it engages with the audience in the sense of 'if you were in the same predicament, how would you react?’ By having this feature or element it gives the opening a different dimension to other films. Our film, as mentioned before, focuses on the elements of Blair witch product. This is done because 'The Blair witch project (1999)' uses an antagonist or a sense of evilness which you cannot see; we used this in our opening as it gives an eerie feel about it. The comparison between our film and the 'The Blair witch project' is that the mise - en - scene is very similar, this is done as both locations are filmed in the forest or woods to create that 'no were to run' atmosphere about it. Other mise - en - scene comparisons are the costume are similar as being free and casual no distinctive set for dress, this gave the people in our film and maybe also in 'The Blair witch project' a sense of freedom. The dialogue in both films are similar structured due to in our film, the actors were giving a 'retrospective script', which meant they were giving outlines of what they should talk about but left the bulk of it to their own initiative, this was the case present in 'The Blair witch project' as the actors were giving the same instructions. This provided 'realness' as the actors could put emotion which can be sensed in our film. In terms of editing our group have just began editing, we are going to input alot of fast cuts to give a sense of distress in our film which could be put forward to our audience.

The cinematography in both films are similar as in our film we used a lot of close ups, medium close ups and tracking shot, for example using a tracking shot to see were the character is going but then fast cut to a close up of his face to show his expression which is a very good element in putting forward different views of the character. Howver a difference in our film compared to that of 'The Blair witch Project' is that our film wasn't filmed in real time, this was due to that it posed alot of problems as we notciced whilst filming we couldn't fit all we wanted to do. We used a Cannon MV890 handheld camera, this also posed problems to our group in using 'real time' filming as the sound wasn't to good and to add voice overs while editing would be almost impossible.

A way that we may have been original compared to that of other groups is our cinematography and our element of actor freedom. As I mentioned before we show many different views of the actors to show his body language, expression and pure feeling at any time. This is also complemented by the freedom they have say and speak as if they were really in that position.

The start...

1st Day of Filming - When begining our film we had substantial problems as our film was shot in 'real life'. This is when the film is shot a hand held camera without using a tripod or any support, either than the camera mans arm. As we progressed through the first day of filming we straight realised the strains of filming in 'real time' as to get most of our shots we would need longer than two minutes as an opening scene. However we carried on created some shots. The shots we took were a medium close up of a electricity transformer having the warning sighn 'beware'. This shot was taken due to the fact we were gonna use it as a symbolic shot. We then had to do other symbolic shots such as filming certain objects.

Opening Analysis - Blair Witch Project

The opening that we decided to look at was from the Blair witch project. This was because our film is going to be done in the same style. The key thing to note from this was that it is almost a documentary of a documentary. To differentiate from the documentary and other footage that had been taken from the cameras, the makers decided to have the documentary clips in grey scale. To try and make us believe that the footage was real, the makers deliberately had the camera shake every now and then, and had the typical amateur camera footage to give the viewer a feeling that there is possibility that the footage was real. The opening mainly consist of the documentary crew having interviews with different people from the town in the usual questions and answers format. Each person being interviewed tells of a different tale that they had heard about the legend that is the Blair witch such as "my grandmother used to tell us all to make us go to bed early, they say if you stay up after dark walk around the house too much the Blair witch will come and get you."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnqnHtp_nRs&feature=related

Previous Shot List

Mid Shot interviewer one

Close Up interviewer one

Mid Shot interviewer one

Close Up Interviewer two

Mid Shot / Two Shot interviewer three

Close Up interviewer three

Wide Shot of chairs

Wide Shot of chairs with people sitting on them

Wide shot of empty chairs

Tracking shot around park

Establishing shot of location

" "

" "

Tracking shot of reporter walking around park

Mid shot of reporter reporting on the news

Final Synopsis:

A student reporter and a student camera man go to look for the truth behind the attacks of Yellville woods that have taken the lives of 5 students that attend the near by Yellville college. Many rumors and supposed footage have emerged from the woods, but the two reporters want more than rumors fake footage, they want the real thing. Little do they know literally risking life and limb could be a chance they wish they never took because maybe the truth needs to be left alone, very alone.....



However after a lot of thought between the group this idea was scrapped. The idea then changed to:

A teenage boy is being stalked. He feels out of place due to the naturalistic surrounding around him. He runs through a forest in a great sense of panic, he seeks a way out of the woods, such like a refuge. He reaches a path were his friend then sneaks up behind him and scares him. Due to the protagonists’ state of anger and edginess he reacts with anger, he then hits his friend when he tries to calm him down. His friend then walks off and they both depart. The protagonist is seen by the stalker walking to a tree. Here the protagonist sits by the trunk of a tree, here he realises that he has dropped his iPod which was picked up by the stalker. Seconds after realising he has lost it, he is chocked. He is then picked up by the antagonist and put next to a grave stone. The final shot is when you see the antagonist throw the iPod on the protagonists lap. However it is not known the protagonist is really dead.

Initial Ideas:

Our initial idea for our film is based upon a horror type genre, the idea consists of a 'stalker feel' about the clip. The idea entails two students going to a piece of woodland near where they live, the woodland has a mysterious secret behind it. The students set out to discover this secert but they got more than they bargained for. They discovered the secret behind it, but it leaves off where one of the students is on the floor awaiting there doom.

In our preliminary task we were ask to make a short clip involving the two elements, 180 degree shots and different sources of camerea angles, this is what we learnt and found out along the way: Firstly we learnt how to frame a shot on the camera properly, to do this we knew you had to use a tripod. This kept the camera steady for filming which was useful in the making of the preliminary task.

We also learnt how to pan or track a shot, by holding the camera and following the person being filmed which created the effect that the character was being followed. When using the editing programme (Final cut pro) on the Apple Mac computers, we learnt how to capture the final piece from the camera on to the computer.

After capturing the final piece and then installing it on to the Mac we could finally start editing, by doing the we highlighted a part of my scene and then cropped it down, deleting unnecessary bits that are not needed. Whist using Final cut pro our group learnt how to fade in or fade out a scene in two different ways, by adding an editing transistion or using a 'pen tool' which done the transistion manualy. We also learnt how to add music via garage band by converting it into itunes then adding it into the scene, these are all the main things that were learnt.

One thing that went well was the co-operation that the group showed together, helping out and adding ideas which helpped towards the final production of the pleminary task. One thing that could of been improved was probably the location, in the location was too noisey in the sense that alot of uneeded background sounds were there, apart from this everything went good. In our clip there was only one element of shot/reverse were two people in our group are having a conversation about having a sip of a drink that was bought. This was the only part that included shot/reverse shot. At first we broke the 180 degree however we learnt how to correct it, so next time it was needed we knew how to do it.