Question 7

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

My group and I have learnt a handful of things from the preliminary task to the final product. All of the things have contributed to the final product's completion. 

Continity editing - Continuity editing was a concern, especially with the dialogue that we originally planned to include. To ensure the final product would flow perfectly, we shot the scenes several times and using different angles so we had enough footage to work with. Team-work - I was working with 2 other people but we still divided tasks equally nevertheless. We gave honest feedback to each other's contributions and offered help as much as we could when a member needed it. When we had to come up with the film title and develop a sypnosis for the film, we all wrote our own short synospis then merged all three of them into the final one. During the filming we all took turns to film certain parts of the opening which allowed everyone in the group to have an active role.

Planning/Getting ready - We were all required to plan effectively as it would enable us to work better and in better conditions. For instance, we had to plan where and when the filming was taking place almost a month in advance so our group, as well as the cast could book time off work for example. On the day, we had all of our material ready to utilise so nothing goes wrong. The camera was fully charged with an empty memory card inserted and the tripod was fully operational. We also brought some bits of our coursework which was essential for us such as the storyboard and the shotlist.

Camera shots - We were advised to vary our shots and shoot from different angles which makes the piece more interesting to watch. During the filming, we got the cast to film various scenes several times (at least 3 times) using different angles every time. At the beginning of the year, we were taught many shot types, angles and movements such as panning shot and title shot.

Researching into target audience - We also researshed about our target audience further which proved to be essential. Thanks to that research, we found out what our target audience expected out of horror films and used their feedback effectively. We used SurveyMonkey to create a survey and handed it out to our target audience (which was teenagers and horror film enthusiasts) which enabled us to be more organised as paperwork is less reliable as it is more likely to be lost.

Question 6

What have you learnt about technologies form the process of constructing this project?
We have acquired skills on many technologies, which we were not familiar with at the beginning of the process. Indeed, all of the technologies below allowed me and my group and I to make our construction as varied as we could, so we could learn skills for later.

Blogger – Blogger was an essential piece for us, as it enabled is to display our work throughout the year. We could display the information in different ways such as using a Powtoon presentation or even by importing a PowerPoint presentation, which renders our blogs less repetitive. We learnt how to change the fonts or even the layouts to make the blogs as personal as we could. We also learnt how to import pictures and including them on any posts. Finally, we also used the HTML option, where we could include HTML links of Youtube videos so we could include the Youtube video directly. Using Blogger allowed us to store our coursework electronically instead of carrying loads of paper. 

iMovie/Premiere Pro - We utilised both of the editing softwares during the process. The softwares are rather different to one another but they were both facile to use and handle. We first used iMovie for the preliminary task, as iMovie is not as complex as Premiere Pro is. iMovie allowed us to familiarise ourselves with editing and gained certain editing skills. We learnt how to import all of our footage from the camera we used into the software and we also learnt how to post it onto Youtube. We also became familiar with basic effects such as transitions and fade outs. Premiere Pro had more in-depth editing tools which enabled us to do things we could not on iMovie such as creating titles, which facilitates importing. 

LiveType - We fleetingly utilised LiveType to get familiar with creating titles. We however thought that none of the effects or the fonts that were available fit the horror genre, so we carried on with the titling on Premiere Pro. 

Camera/Shooting - For the shooting, we used the Canon Legria HD, which allowed us to film our opening with high definition graphics. We were not familiar at all with the camera at first but we quickly got accustomed with using it. We carried out several training sessions with the same camera or occasionally with similar cameras.

Youtube/the Internet - We utilised several websites to back up some of the analysis we were doing throughout the year, for instance Youtube to post our 60 second pitch. We were not too familiar with Youtube at the beginning of the year and we had to create a Youtube account so we had an account to post our videos with. Websites briefly utilised include Prezi and Freesoundz. 

Question 5

How did you attract your audience?

When creating our film opening we had to decided apon a range of factors that would attract our audience like costume, character and location.

Characters:

In our film opening we had four main characters. Due to our film audience being teenagers we decided to age all four characters between 18 and 19. We did this as it allows our audience to relate to the characters. We decided to make them just a little bit older that the target audience of 17 years old as we wanted them to look up to the characters, making them more connected to the film.

We tried to include a range of personal qualities that best suite their characters. For example Logan is the "joker of the group" as well as a bully when It comes to William. He is eighteen and is in William's form class. Logan likes to mess about and play football... and bully William of course. He looks upon Jay, but sometimes acts arrogant against him so he can have some individuality. He has a love/hate relationship with Sarah, but remains really close with her. Overall Logan, is someone who seems fearless, careless and has a good sense of humour. This will help attract our audience as it represents a stereotypical male, which is part of out target audience. This also makes the film more realistic as the character has the correct personality making it easier for the audience to be engaged in.

Location:

 The sole location of our film opening is in the middle of some woods. This is seen as conventional location for a teen horror movie, but we believe it is on the movie screen for a reason because it is effective. This provides the perfect secluded location for our main characters to walk through. This will also help establish that this a horror film due to its generic location. The dirty and dead looking trees supply perfect atmosphere for the film, creating a more intense film, which should in turn attract the audience. This can be easily relatable for the audience as we see some type of woodland almost every day, therefore attracting them.

The long empty path suggests to the audience that they are deep inside the woods meaning no sign of help or communication with the outside world. This should help implant the image in the audience’s head that the main characters are alone with no access to help.

Costume:

When creating our costumes we had to be careful with what we picked. We had to consider current teenage trends as we want our characters to be looked up to so if the had the trendy clothes on they would appeal more to our audience. We also had to make sure our costumes fitted the characters personality.

Here are to of our character Logan and William. William is on the left and Logan is on the right. Logan is seen as the trendy character out of the two as you can see by his costume. We choose a laid back costume for Logan as we wanted the audience relate to the character as they may wear similar clothes in their day to day life making them more enticed with them film. This also suited Logan’s personality, which allowed the film to flow smoother. Whereas, William has a tie and shirt making him look more smart. This immediately identifies that William is a typical“ goody two shoes” to the audience. This is good as the audience can then create relationships with the characters on weather they like them as a character, which further entices them into the film

Question 4

Question 3

Question 2

Question 1

Dormez Mes Enfants

Preliminary Task