Production

In a previous lesson i learnt about the three production phases;
pre-production
production
post production
While studying these, we read a passage about how a top hollywood film company would go about a movie from start to finish. I learnt that most of the time is spent in the pre-production process rather than the other aspects and that the general concept of finance is; the higher the budget, the more profit and popularity. However there are some exceptions to this for example; the blair witch project which was a low budget film with a high return.
As well as this; in our 'Hitchcock' group; we have started to decide what the storyline to our 2minute horror opening will be. We've had many ideas and think that we now have a final idea that we can work from ready to pitch later.

preliminary task

Today; our group (Matthew Tyler, Hannah George and I) took two hours to create the finished edited version of out preliminary task. We added transactions and many angles to our film and also created our own track on 'Garage Band' which we then added and this went well. Our film has now been transferred into a quicktime player copy which we could then burn onto a disk if we chose to. I think that our preliminary task has worked really well.

opening five minutes of a teen horror!

In our previous lesson, we watched the first opening 5 minutes of the teen horror; Wrong turn. We focused on the visual and audio features and conventions of what makes the film fit into the genre of teen horror. The first thing that the audience notices is the way in which the titles arrive onto the screen. In 'Wrong turn' they use a distorted, white font which slowly turns to reveal the words, this gives a mysterious feel already. As well as this the music starts while titles are running and becomes louder as the film starts.
     An establishing shot of the stretch of woods sets the scene as an isolated place with no sign of close habitation. From this we then see a young couple climbing up the side of a rock cliff. Already the couple being young is a signifier to the genre and allows the teen audience to relate. Also, the sport is known as being dangerous which could show the audience that the couple are in some sort of danger already and using the long angle shots gives impact to this. The language used between the couple is very easy for a teen audience to relate to as well as the idea of it being 'a race to the top'.
    Once the 'boyfriend' reaches the top and undoes the equiptment from himself, the girl is alone. The idea of a girl alone and not near the top yet would add tension to the scene because the audience can see that something is going to happen. A false scare also takes place when the girl slips a little against the rock and it's only when the audience feels calm again, when she's ok, that the unknown crisis happens. She hears her 'boyfriend' fall and a zoom in of his blood dripping against her face takes her away from feeling safe. She starts to be pulled up by the 'unknown' only to set herself free with a knife (this shot is a zoom in). A young girl is now stuck on the side of a cliff with no harness and 'something' wanting her, this is a typical setting for a teen horror and gets the audience excited to see what will happen. She falls and see's her boyfriends blood covered face and at this point she tries to run. Chase sequences are very popular in teen horror films and using a juttering camera helps the audience to 'feel' the chase. The car is close by as the girl runs to her 'safety' yet it's too far away as she's fallen down due to a razor wire. This is predictable as we all know she won't make it to safety just yet (if ever).
     The music throughout starts off slow yet the tempo soon picks up when danger is lurking. The high pitch of the stringed instruments creates a creepy setting and the regular beats of the drum the increase in volume add tension. Many sounds are enhanced at important points of shots. For example; the rope being cut, the blood drip and thud of her boyfriend falling to the ground.
     The trees rustling is and enhanced noise as something is running behind them which is still unknown and being unknown adds more of a scare to the viewers.

preliminary task preparation

My group and i have sorted through our footage and chosen the shots that we will be using. We've already spent an hour putting together the main filming of all the angles we want. However, we will be working into this more later on but so far everything is going well.

Horror presentation

a powerpoint of horror

Horror presentation

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horror film openings

we've now studied the opening few minutes of a few horror films including; deadwood, jeepers creepers and jeepers creepers 2. We looked at the conventions used and this. As well as this my group and i (the hitchcock group) watched a teen horror called 'Solstice' and noted the conventions.