G321 Foundation Portfolio: 2012

Monday, 23 April 2012

Welcome to my blog

Dear Moderator,

This belongs to Matthew Thacker and I worked with Waqaar Mehdi and Liam Hedley. We were asked to create a 2 minute opening sequence to a horror film with titles. Use the tabs on the top of this blog to navigate through research, planning, construction and evaluation. You can also use the Timetoast Timeline to see our progress during the project.

The project was started on the 16th of January and the final deadline was 20th of April, so we have been given approximately 3 months to research, plan, create and evaluate our film. We hope you enjoy both the film and the blog.

Regards, Matthew Thacker.

Final Cut (Final Edit)

Here is our final cut with all the editing that we needed to do and all the sound has been dubbed over so that all the dialogue is understandable and so that the plot can be further understood.

Evaluation

Here is the link to our Wix evaluation, please click on the image above.

Tuesday, 27 March 2012

Evaluation Rough

2) Our product has the social group of teenagers and mixed ethnicity from different backgrounds of Social Class. This is saw through the characters, one being from a different ethnic background and two being from contrasting social backgrounds, which is portrayed through clothes, one dressing rather casually and the other dressing in jogging bottoms and a hoodie, suggesting the differences in backgrounds. However, gender is represented only by males showing that it is a male dominant film, especially in the opening sequence, but the movie as a whole, women are generally passive. We are hoping this will not affect our target audience because its not like females are missing from the whole idea of the film just not in the main roles. Our main aim was to link the film to the target audience through the matters of difference in social class and ethnicity but brought together by age and the fact that people can be friends despite the difference, so that can appeal to the target audience and also a larger audience from the differences between the characters.

4) The age we are looking to be our target audience is teenagers to young adults, mainly due to the characters. But due to the genre being a supernatural/psychological horror, similar to other hugely successful movies like Black Swan and hopefully the genre will be able to attract a sub-target audience of older people such as those over the young adult age range as well as the younger audience making our movie successful. Black Swan was able to attract a larger target audience due to its complex narrative that was unique and kept the audience gripped and entertained throughout. Another similar movie is that of Jacob's Ladder which again with its interesting narrative and film genre of supernatural/psychological horror allowed it to attract a large target audience when the genre was still young and unestablished, but it was successful.

REMINDER : These are not final answers, they are going to be developed on in the final evaluation.

Monday, 26 March 2012

Rough Cut 2

This is our second rough cut, we are hoping to cover the sound as peoples voices seem quiet and not really understandable. The only critism's we have gained are those on the sound, as without it the plot of the first scenes cannot be understood.

Preliminary Task

Shooting Schedule

Shooting schedule (New)

View more documents from waqa0121

Thursday, 22 March 2012

Anamatic

Anamatic of the storyboard, with commentary of all shots, character position and props.

Friday, 16 March 2012

Audience Profile

Audience profile

View more documents from Thacker123.

Tuesday, 13 March 2012

Risk Assessment: Updated

Risk Assessment Part 2

View more documents from waqa0121

Here is our updated risk assessment due to our change of location from wynard woods to Steetley, it includes all of the risk factors that we will be facing when filming.

Primary Audience Research

Horror movie questionnaire

View more documents from Thacker123.

Here is our Primary Audience research where we asked 25 people questions of what they want from a horror movie, the results are shown above.

Monday, 12 March 2012

Call Sheet: Part 2

Call sheetpart2-120305045749-phpapp01

View more documents from Thacker123.

Call sheet of the location of the house shots, and also the shot of the car pulling away.

Thursday, 8 March 2012

Rough Cut

Above is the first rough cut we have produced, the feedback has mainly been criticism of the wind blocking the actual speech in the video and also how some shots need to be edited as it doesn't flow as well as we hoped. Also we need to put music in the video to help create the tension and suspense that we want. Furthermore, we may need to dub over the speech as the wind makes it muffled and quiet, ultimately making it hard to understand.

Monday, 5 March 2012

Pitch: Disturbed

Pitch

View more documents from Thacker123.

The pitch for our film which discusses our target audience, the overall synopsis of the film, about our opening sequence and some ideas that have influenced us.

Sunday, 26 February 2012

Treatment Sheet

Treatment sheet

View more presentations from Thacker123.

The treatment sheet discusses things such as the mise-en-scene, camera shots and editing techniques displayed through images. We discuss location, costumes and props that will be key to carry the narrative in the opening sequence and the movie as a whole.

Thursday, 23 February 2012

Recce shot 1

This recce shot shows the location of the tunnel shot, where the main character meets his two friends.

Recce shot 2

Recce shot 2 shows us the location of where the characters walk across the rubble and the building they enter is in the background.

Recce shot 3

Recce Shot 3 is located in the derelict building, and is where the characters meet to go to the scene of where the character Anthony Hoddle died.

Recce shot 4

An exterior view of the derelict building, this will feature and extreme long shot in the sequence.

Call Sheet

Call sheet AS Media

View more documents from Thacker123.

This call sheet shows the location of the main filming in the opening sequence at steetley, as well as what we will need.

Monday, 20 February 2012

Storyboard

Here is our storyboard of our film, with all camera shots and scenes, and with some annotations to help commentate.

Company Logo

We have collaboratively decided to name our production company 'Panda Productions' after much deliberation over what would be an appropriate brand identity to associate our film with. The use of the panda to represent the company image has a number of different connotations. These not only relate to horror films, but represent values that we want to reflect to our audience.

Pandas can be vicious animals which reflects the often vicious nature of horror films, however the fact that they are sometimes labelled 'cute' also links in to the idea that our film, and any other films produced by the company, will try to be deceiving and not necessarily follow the generic trends. This will therefore give audiences a more enjoyable and 'frightening' experience as they might not know what to expect. It is being frightening which is one of the main purposes of horror films. Also, the fact that pandas are often least-accurately labelled in this way suggests that although predominantly producing horror films, the company has strong potential to diversify into other genres in the future should it be successful.

The panda is strong animal which represents strength in the quality of production and strength as company as a whole. It adds a certain assertive feel, showing that the company is confident in itself and therefore this will lure in audiences.

The actual use of an animal is quite anthropomorphic - there is a link between this and the fact that horror films are usually fiction. Most people tend to have a positive relationship or attitude towards animals which will help the company to become well-liked and less of a bureaucratic organisation with a negative press.

The use of alliteration (Panda Productions) means the name is memorable and catchy. This will in help the company to gain positive press (which can be used to advantage with future ventures) as people will associate previously successful films with their name

Using the name I have created the company logo (with approval from the rest of the group). I have produced two variants which can be used according to which is deemed more appropriate in the specific context, in terms of colours and impact, etc.

The main version of the logo which was designed with the intention of promoting the company as a whole when not being used for a specific product.

This is a variant of the main logo which is designed to be more impacting and specifically relevant to the horror genre so it is probably the variant which will be used at the beginning of our title sequence.

The logo has been designed so that it is simple and sophisticated yet impacting at the same time. It does this by using a sans-serif font which is modern and relates to the idea that the company's films are not conventional and do not always follow the generic trends; it is rather creatively innovative as already mentioned. Both variants use a simple black and white contrasting colour scheme retrospective of the panda concept, but also to help the text stand out and promote the name rather than the image as a whole. This is also aided by the fact that the text is in uppercase letters.

The logo has a copyright symbol which shows that the originally designed logo and company itself is protected by copyright laws and cannot be reproduced in any way. This is also the case for any content it produces. This is necessary for professional companies as it prevents fraud and helps to maintain status and respectability.

The fact that the the panda image is integrated with the words helps the logo to be less cluttered but also more creative and interesting. The red colour has connotations of blood, danger, evil, etc. which all relate to the horror genre. However, if the company changes direction to further genres this colour could be changed easily. The use of a simple panda will help audiences to associate the company's films with the logo better as images are often better remembered than text.

The screen dumps below show some of the aspects involved in creating the logo.

The panda graphic was used by downloading a font aptly entitled 'Panda' from the website 'dafont'. This is a ornamental typeface meaning that different graphics represent different keys on the keyboard and in our case the 'f' key represented the image that we wished to use. We chose the graphic that we did as it best resembled a letter that would be used in the text element of the logo more than any of the others. It was also clear, simple and eye-catching.

In Photoshop the font was utilised through a text layer which placed above all the over layers in order to make sure that it covered the space where otherwise the 'D' in panda would be placed. This space was created by placing a white (black in the variant) shape over the D, in the layer below.

The pitch of the text/image was 200pt, slightly larger than the main text itself as the images were quite small in comparison. It was important to maintain a consistent size to make the logo more aesthetically professional and pleasing.

Although the font style was regular, it was made 'strong' to help emphasise it did the red colouring (this also has connotations relating to horror - see earlier) which was applied by changing the 'layer style to colour overlay' as evident in the screenshot below.

It was important to make sure that the blend mode was set to 'Normal' so that full colour overlay effect would take place to full extent. Ensuring the opacity was at 100% made sure that the colour would differ from the one selected.

The shade of red selected was done so carefully. Although needing the graphic to stand out, a slightly darker and more burgundy shade was chosen as this conveyed sophistication rather than the standard, bright red which could have been considered 'tacky' and cheap'.

The colour of the panda was changed in this way rather than changing the font itself as it was more convenient - there is also has a very faint (i.e. low opacity) grey 'outer glow' which is too applied in this way.

When the variant of the logo was produced the layers were flattened and the image inverted to create what is shown below.

Because there were no layers, the panda image was then filled in the with the red colour using the paint bucket tool . The colour picker tool was used to ensure that the red used in the original logo was the same used in the varient.

The line separating the 'PANDA' and productions was done by selecting the line tool from the shapes menu as shown in the screen dump below. The shift key was held down whilst dragging the cursor across the page to ensure that the line was indeed straight.

The 'PRODUCTIONS' in the logo appears slightly faint. This is to draw attention to the 'PANDA' aspect and is done by placing a grey inner glow on the text and lowering the opacity to around 66% (this was changed several times after the below screenshot was taken).

Finally, using both a font downloaded from the internet and an included system font is fine in the instance of this coursework, although should our sequence and company actually be created for the 'real world' we would need to seek copyright permission in order to use them for commercial purposes.

When we use our logo at the beginning of our sequence we will need to consider how it will appear. Will it be animated by different aspects fading and flying in, etc.? At the moment we anticipate that the logo will fade in, in a slow and sophisticated manner, with the panda dropping down from above, before bouncing on the line and stabilising. This will be done to a 'bouncing' sound.

Title Sequence Timeline

As part of our research I have taken a look at the order in which the titles appear in the opening sequence of a horror film; The Wickerman (1973). In doing this I established the following order;

Introductory message / messages of thanks / prologue / contextual information relating to film
Production / distribution companies
Film's creator and title
Lead actors
Supporting actors / cameos
Technical roles (i.e. sound, casting, wardrobe, etc.)
Senior technical roles (music, photography, editors, screenplay writers, producers, always ends on film director)

However, I realised that the film may be a little dated and so compared the opening sequence from 1973 with that of the 2006 remake of 'The Wicker Man' as shown below.

Although both titles generally have the same order, those from 2006 were much more streamlined in the sense that there were fewer names on screen at the same time, despite that the fact that this meant a greater number of titles in all. In the 1973 version the name of the film was revealed near the beginning whereas in 2006 this was placed at the very end following the director - there was a gap between the two after a potential crux in the plot to build suspense and 'lure' in the audience. This also highlights another difference. In the original most of the titles cover the screen, overlaid over a series of establishing shots which sets the scene. In the remake the titles are placed in the corners and overlay the actual beginning of the narrative (including dialogue, etc.) When not placed in the corners the titles are less obstructing as there is usually only one name in this case.

The following screen shots illustrate the difference in titles mentioned above.

2006

1973

The 1973 titles look more like something that would be seen in the credits of a modern-day film.

The main similarity between the two is that they both overlay the text over shots rather than a plain background which is sometimes a convention of horror films (usually black). White is most likely used as this contrasts well with most colours. Another similarity is the use of uppercase letters to emphasise actors names.

Although our sequence will probably more closely follow that of the 2006 remake, it is important to understand how conventions have changed so that our titles are relevant to a 21st century audience. Finally, it is worth mentioning that in the 2006 version each title is closer together but are quicker to read in the allocated time because there is less time. This is something we will need to think about.

Friday, 10 February 2012

Risk Assessment

Risk assessment

View more documents from liamhedley

Tuesday, 31 January 2012

Audience Research

audience research

View more documents from waqa0121

This our secondary Audience research we will be doing primary research at a later day where we personally see what people like and want from a horror movie.