Main Task finished- RIP

This is our main task. Everything we have filmed and edited for the last month has been finished.

Preliminary Task- reposted

Evaluation question 7

We have added tags explaining how we have improved using the mac and  cameras since our preliminary task. Looking back from our preliminary task to our final task we have improved quite a lot because we had much  more time to plan our main task and research about horror genre in further detail than we had with the preliminary task.
We researched more about what our film should be about and looked up different types of Gothic horror for inspiration on how we would represent our  opening sequence. Now that we are done with our main task, I feel much more confident with filming and editing more than I did in our preliminary task because I now have much more knowledge  about  camera angles, movement, compositions, mis-en-scene and etc. I now have more knowledge about how these camera angles and shots put forward someone's emotions and body language and also can really change a whole clip around and it's atmosphere. I also feel confident with using sound effects on movies and see whether they fit with it. Although i have gained knowledge about a lot of the technology for filming, I feel I still need to learn more about distribution in the film industry and to make a better movie.

Evaluation question 6

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

We did this as a group to show people who have never used iMovie before how to use it and what to do. This tutorial is meant to show people how to use iMovie and also how we used it throughout our entire project.  This is our first tutorial. We decided to make two of them. This was a practice tutorial.

This is a tutorial of how we did the main task. 

Evaluation question 5

How did you attract/address your audience?
Questions for our audience.
 If given the chance would you like to see more of the film? 
Is there anything you think would improve the film? 
Is there anything you find confusing? 
Was there anything you didn't like or found distasteful? 
Do you relate to the film?
Do you think it fits with the conventions of a Gothic horror film? 
Did the poster attract you to see the film? 
What did you think of the colour scheme and the music?

This is a video showing the opinions about what the audience thought about our main task. In this video there things such as what we can do to improve our movie and what was good and bad about it.

The feedback we got from our target audience has made us realise what we could have done better, what we need to do in the future and how we can work better at creating films.  With this feedback, I know what we could have done better in the film and how we can improve our technological skills in the future. Our interviews could have been a bit longer but  we didn't have enough time to conduct the interviews quicker.

Answers from our audience.
The audience said that they would like to see the film because they wanted to know more about what happened and also because it seemed really interesting. One of our audience said that they liked the shot where the protagonist was in a coffin. This was a bird's eye view.This shot was really hard to get right because the lighting wasn't exactly that great and also the fact that we did the shot in a cupboard which was much harder. This shot is very interesting because it gives the audience a sense of wonder as to what is going to happen to the protagonist or whether she'll be rescued. We could have made it better especially with the lighting but i feel that we managed to pull it off in the end. 
One person said that one way we could have improved our film was if we had a bit more shrieking. Another said that we could have made our title more clearer because she couldn't see it. We had done that at the start but then it just didn't match so we cut it out. We do however agree because it would have made the title clearer and better. One of the people said we should have improved the second credits in the film because it didn't flow with the film. One person said that it fit well with the convention of Gothic Horror because of the props we used and also the colour we used(black and white). One person said she related to our film because the protagonist was a normal typical teenager. We made we used a teenager because we wanted our audience to relate to her.

Most film posters depict the faces of the actors or characters who play a prominent role in the film. However, we decided that was to typical and instead used a simple headstone in a graveyard. We thought that this would leave the audience more interested and wouldn't give away too much of the plot itself. It does however indicate, even if only subtly, the genre of the film. On this poster, we decided to use fake names instead of our real ones. We used the black and white colours to reflect what how our movie is actually going to look like before our audience sees it. We out the posters around half of the school for display, including the main common room and the canteen. This was to attract different people from our year group to come and watch it.   Personally I had wanted to use an image of the protagonist and the antagonist but then I thought about it in detail and decided with the group that using the headstone is much better and has a better Gothic feel to it than it would have had if we had used the image of the protagonist and antagonist.

This was one of our inspirations for our film poster, they also use a headstone which could show that someone probably dies, because headstones in most cases depict death. The film is about a woman lurking in the shadows and anyone who sees her dies. This is kind of similar to our film because there is a stranger who is lurking in the shadows(not necessarily) but he is still stalking the protagonist and then she gets buried alive.

Evaluation question 4

 Who would be the audience for your main task?

This is Ivy Sullivan. She is 17 years old and she lives in London.  She is currently living with her family.  She has 2 brothers and 1 sister. She works at Costa Coffee and she loves it because she works with some of her friends and they have so much fun.

 She dresses fairly straight forwardly- mainly jeans and really cool personalised tops. She enjoy going out with her boyfriend and her girlfriends. Her favourite shops are Primark, River Island and New Look.
 She has an immense passion for art and music. The music she listens varies from rock, indie and sometimes pop. Her favourite kind of food is waffles.

 






Her favourite soaps are: Hollyoaks, Skins, Homeland, Revenge, Vampire Diaries and Misfits. One of the films that she's really excited to watch is RIP because all her friends have recommended it and she can't wait to see it.
Although Ivy works, she mainly likes staying at home and just helping around with the house work and everything. Her normal day to day routine is waking up, showering, breakfast and then school.  She's doing A-Levels at the moment and her subjects are: English Lit, Philosophy, History and Music. She performs well in class and all her teachers are very proud of her and her outstanding work. To Ivy school is a place where she can express herself and be who she wants to be. She is part of the film club at her school and her biggest interest is learning about Gothic Horror.  Ivy would watch our film because she has such a big interest in Gothic Horror movies. From an early age Ivy appreciated the concept of Gothic Horror. She has such an interest for Jekyll and Hyde (1886) which is about a the horrid split between the gentile and collective, pleasant side of the man and the cunning madness of the evil side. She also has an interest in things such as churches, haunted houses and really old movies, the fact that she also has an interest in movies such as Kill Bill etc. This would make her an ideal audience for our movie.

Ivy's interests.

Evaluation question 3

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

This is a short animation we made using the website 'Xtranormal'.  We used this website to help explain why a media institution might distribute our media product. We have also mentioned the production company which could possibly distribute it; Summit Entertainment. This gives a much better idea of what media institution might distribute our product. 

These are slideshows explaining what kind of media institution might distribute our product.

We used ipiccy to crop this screenshot. We used slideshare to upload our PowerPoint.

I have used ipiccy for all my pictures and screenshots for example if I want to frame a picture or crop it I use ipiccy.

Evaluation question 2

How does your media product represent particular socail groups?

1) Gabriel

The shot on the left hand side is taken from our film 'Rest in peace' and the one on the right is from the film 'Gabriel'. Both characters have their back towards the camera, they are both standing up straight and dressed all in black. The surroundings in both shots are similar in the way that they are both isolated, quiet and dull looking.The features of the characters in both shots are not shown, this makes it hard for the viewers to see what gender they are.

There is no dialogue in any of these shots. It is just the characters and their surroundings.

In terms of our cinematography, we chose to keep our characters identity hidden. You don't see the who our character is until the end. As you can see by looking in the shot of 'Gabriel', the characters identity also seems hidden. We chose to set our film in an old graveyard, in the shot from 'Gabriel' the scene is also quiet and old looking. Both shots are long-shots, you can see the characters and the surroundings.

The character that we are looking at in this shot from our film 'rest in peace' is a women who is in her late twenties. We have taken away the stereotypical view that the villain/killer in a film is male, so instead we decided to make ours a woman. We chose not to make it too obvious to our viewers that the character is a woman, as we felt it would make the film more interesting. The character from the film 'Gabriel' is a man, which is sticking to the stereotypical view. This contrasts with our film 'rest in peace'.



2) Kill Bill

















In the left hand side we have a shot of a girl from the film 'Kill Bill', and on the right hand side we have a shot of our main character from our film ' Rest in peace'. Both of these characters are young females. In the left sided shot of the girl from 'kill bill' a extreme close up is used to show the girls features and expression. This is the same for the right sided shot of our character, however it is not an extreme close up, but a close-up. In both shots we can see that the characters are both trapped in a small space. They have both been buried alive. Looking at their face expressions, they both seem confused as to where they are.

Once again in these two shots there is no dialogue being used, there is only non-diegetic sound of music being played.


The character in our film 'rest in peace' on the right hand side is a teenage girl, The way she is dressed is not shown in this shot, however in the other parts of the film we can see slight bits of what she is wearing, she dresses like a typical teenage girl, jeans, top, cardigan etc. The girl form the film 'kill bill' on the left side is also young, like the girl from our film she also dresses in jeans, tops , cardigans etc. Neither of the girls in the shots are wearing make-up, this may be seen as unusual, as teenage girls are usually expected to look nice and wear makeup. The only reason they are not wearing make-up is because they are meant to be seen as vulnerable and young. The difference between these two women is the fact that one looks really frightened and the other one just looks slightly frightened. This could probably be because of the age difference between them.  The character used in our movie is a black girl. This is in contrast to the character used in Kill Bill because she is a white girl. Most horror movie use white girls in such situations, this could maybe show the fact that white girls are easily scared and they are seen as vulnerable. But the fact that we used a black girl in our movie could be that we wanted to go against the stereotype of white girls always being portrayed in these movies. Also in most horror movies blonde girls are used because they are in most cases considered as attractive and desirable but then they are also perceived as dumb, unintelligent and only care about their looks. The girl used in Kill Bill is blonde which is seen as stereotypical straight away but we are shown that she is smart when she manages to use tactics to free herself.

3) Kill Bill

Both characters look a bit relaxed but also frightened at the same time. Both their hands are held together and they both seem to be staring at something. The character in our movie is seems to be holding a lighter whereas the character from "Kill Bill" seems to have her hands tied up. They are both lying down which could indicate that they are trapped. Both the characters are wearing casual clothes which is meant to make our audience which are mostly girls connect with the characters . A bird's eye view of Nene could show the viewer what she is wearing and how she feels.  And the fact that the character is not looking at the camera could mean that she is focusing on one thing which is getting the lighter to work.  In terms of age, our character looks younger than the one in Kill Bill. We used a younger girl because of the age of our target audience. We wanted them to connect with our character. 

In conclusion, we have made comparison between the main characters from our movie with other movies and how they are similar to each other. 

Evaluation Question 1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
1. Choose nine frames from your main task, that represent: 

The title of the film
Setting/location
Costumes and props
Camerawork and editing
Title font and style
Story and how the opening sets it up
Genre and how the opening suggests it
How characters are introduced
Special effects

2. Put them into a grid using Photo shop. 

3. Underneath write a detailed explanation. Explain why you have made these choices, and how they compare to typical horror films. Is your film different or similar to other horror films? 

In the first frame, I have chosen purgatory productions. We decided to have Purgatory productions because all films have production company they are made from. We chose Purgatory productions because it links well with our movie. Another reason we chose this design is because the text and design clearly reflect the Gothic horror genre.  Purgatory basically means being in-between Heaven and hell. The colours red and black are used to represent danger and darkness and seeing as our main character is exposed to both these things it works perfectly. The colours red and black compliment each other with the image because they simply imply a sense of evil and foreboding for the audience. The font also gives the impression that the words were scrawled in blood. The white image in the centre is a part of Satan, showing his mouth chewing on a human body.

The second frame has our title, originally the title was meant to carry on into the next scene and then fade out but we decided it was better to leave it just at the start because it would distract the audience from the actual scene, we chose this title because it has a Gothic ring to it and it is short, catchy and precise. RIP has connotations of death/ graves and etc. May the souls of the recently departed rest in peace. We decided that it would appeal to our target audience seeing as the word RIP seems somewhat interesting and a bit sinister. We also decided to it at the beginning because it helps the audience understand better what it is about instead of being confused. We got Maria to hand write the title since she has been taking calligraphy lessons and it really fitted with our film.

The third frame is our setting/location. We chose a mid-long shot in order for the audience to see the location better and to see one of the characters.
We chose this location in order for the audience to know that wherever you are then anything can happen to you whether you know it or not. The fact that she next to a church would make you think that she is at least protected but she's not.

The fourth frame shows one of the props we have used--the shovel. It also shows part of the shoes our antagonist is wearing. The antagonist is shown from the back so the audience doesn't really get a clear view of the antagonist because the face is not shown. This gives the audience a burning desire to find out who the character is and what their background story could be. This is the shovel used to dig up the grave for the burial of the protagonist.

The fifth square represents camerawork and editing, though mostly camerawork. The shot here is a long shot, with the protagonist framed by the branches and evident thorns. The mis- en- scene here is interesting, and was captured by our camerawoman.

The next shot is of the antagonist burying the main character, with the shovel. This represents our story as the title is, 'Rest In Peace' and this shot conveys to the audience the pinnacle of our opening scene, when we see the protagonist buried alive.

The next shot is of the antagonist, with the shovel sitting across the back of her shoulders. I have chosen this shot because it highlights the fact that our antagonist is a female, as opposed to horror films that commonly use a male as the antagonist. One could say that the antagonist looks extremely satisfied with what she has done depending on her body language.

The eighth shot is of our protagonist waking up from being unconscious. In this shot the protagonist looks confused as to where she is as we can see from the extreme close up of her eye. We decided to use this to emphasise the fact that she is not dead but just buried alive and it can make it easier for the audience to understand. It was pretty hard with this shot because we didn't have enough light and we had to keep changing the effects because we couldn't find the perfect effect to use but we finally found it. We used the clip effects on iMovie to do this.

The last and final shot is of the protagonist's feet being dragged along the ground. This is the instance when she is knocked unconscious for the antagonist to bury her in a grave.

The one film that really inspired us was "Kill Bill". The antagonist in Kill Bill is similar to ours, by keeping the face hidden suspense and tension is added in the film, but also leaves the viewer curious to know who the antagonist is.
Later on in Kill Bill, we see that the bride is trapped in a small confined space, underground. This scene is similar with ours, when Ava is trapped and buried alive by the antagonist. 

Photos of the Mis-En-Scene.

These are a few pictures we took while filming. We thought to use picture no. 2 as our film poster, as it clearly illustrates the content of our film.  But we changed it because it has already been used for Vendetta film. The head stones is where our protagonist would be sitting and remembering her mother.



Ideas for the soundtrack for our movie

For the soundtrack we realy wanted to use this piece but it's kind of copyrighted so that is a major problem for us when we tried it for our movie it fitted perfectly with it.



Another idea could be this song. This piece fills you with a sense of longing so it would be good to use for the start of our movie when the girl is in mourning for her mother and she just longs to be with her one more time

Logo.

This is the final one we agreed on. The reason we are going to use this is because it just ties in with our movie perfectly. Another reason we chose this design is because the text and design clearly reflect the gothic horror genre.  Purgatory basically means being in-between Heaven and hell. The colours red and black are used to represent danger and darkness and seeing as our main character is exposed to both these things it works perfectly. The colours red and black compliment each other with the image because they simply imply a sense of evil and foreboding for the audience. The font also gives the impression that the words were scrawled in blood. The white image in the centre is a part of Satan, showing his mouth chewing on a human body.

The name of our production company may be any of the following:

Never Watch Alone Productions

Levithan Productions

Hades Productions

Underworld Productions

Don’t Peek Productions 

G (L) O R Y PRODUCTIONS

Toe Curling Productions

Blood Curdling Screams Productions

S**T Your Pants Productions

Purgatory Productions-  we chose this one.

Dripping gore Production

Bloody scary Productions
Dead Days Productions

Scream in Your Dream

Productions
Nosferatu Productions

 

Just an idea although we are still using purgatory productions

 I decided to use this font because everyone would expect us to use something ghastly and gothic horror ish but i felt it would be better if i didn't do what everyone would have expected. But the title would the viewer a bit of a clue about what the movie is about. Lots of Gothic Horror movies use graves and so are we.

Locations for our main task

1) The first scene of the film is set in the Mac Room where the antagonist writes the title (RIP)
2)The second scene is set in a graveyard outside a church  where the protagonist is mourning for her mother while the antagonist is watching her and the antagonist buries the protagonist in that same graveyard. At least that's what the audience will think.
3) The third scene is set in a classroom and the protagonist is in a cupboard which is meant to be the ground she's buried alive in. We tested it to see if it works and we experienced some problem with the lighting and we used a lot of tools i.e. lighters, phones and at one point we decided to open one part of the cupboard and finally we did it by attaching an iPhone to the top of the cupboard inside and we got light which made it easier to film.

Filming Times and changes we made after filming.

We used our time quite well, we always made sure we filmed on Fridays from about 11:00 to 1:00. We kept this up quite well until we got to the holidays where we agreed to meet on a Wednesday and Thursday. This was tricky because we were meant to start at 11:30 and to be honest I have never woken up at 11:30 in the holidays. So those two days were wasted but then we decided that if we were ever going to get our filming we needed to put in more and because of that it paid off. Our last day of filming was Saturday 23 February. It was an amazing time because we got everything done and now we are on to editing.

Changes made after filming.
Originally in our film we had decided to use( In association with Inferno productions) but then we thought about it and it turns out it didn't really fit with our movie so we changed it to( In association with Opium productions) We asked some of our friends to look at it and see if it suited our film better than Inferno productions and they agreed so we changed it to Opium. When it came to the music for the film, we had a problem because we were meant to use non-copyrighted music. Our first try was Sherlock Holmes Smoke Alarm. The worst part was that it fitted so perfectly with our film that weeping was the only thing we could think of doing in that moment. The reason for this is because the music was copyrighted. But then we came up with an  idea and we trimmed half of it so we used just half which instantly made it uncopyrighted because we didn't use the whole song and it managed to work well with the movie and it was perfect. Another change was that originally we had decided to use a mask in our movie. The villain in our film was meant to wear a mask in order for her identity to be hidden but then when we watched the clips we had filmed, it didn't seem to fit because it now felt as if we were making a parody instead of an actual sequence so we took that put and we managed to keep the villain's identity hidden without even having to use the mask. We also wanted to use a close up of our protagonist to show her crying but our teacher said that it didn't connect with the other part of the film. So we decided not to use it because originally this villain is watching and the while film is from his perspective so it would have been absolutely weird if one minute the killer is watching her and the next minute we see a close-up of her face it would bring about confusion for our audience. And I personally feel that it was a good choice not to use the close-up.

Script.

There really isn't any dialogue in our movie which adds more tension, mystery and questions from our audience such as will the villain ever say anything, Is it a silent movie and no one really knows which makes the film even more interesting. 

Fonts used in Chris Brown's wall to wall at the beginning

These fonts are unique and i think it would be really good if we used them for our credits. The reason I chose this is because the fonts reflect with our production logo company. 

The fonts both look the same and they have the Gothic effect to them. for example with the effects used in Chris Brown's video has sharp tips which has like a satanic shape with it. This reflects well with our production company because we chose the same colour and the sharp tips on it.