Saturday 24 April 2010

Evaluation presentation

Evaluation

For my advanced portfolio I produced a teaser trailer for a film entitled ETCH.
The purpose of the teaser trailer is to entices the audience and create suspense over the audience. It raises many questions and keeps the audience at the edge of their seat. in general, it is used to tease the audience, to set up certain expectations for the audience and to leave questions for the audience to answer and build on their own from their own knowledge from knowing what to expect from the genre. And it was also important to give the audience some sense of the genre of the forthcoming film.
Todorov argued that it was important to have theory of genre as of narrative. This is because it sets of expectations for the audience and so they know generally what kind of film their watching. Narrative is just the way the story is presented through the clip and then it is generalised as a certain category, which shows how it could be argued that a theory of genre is more important than narrative. Each new product presents itself in relation to the generic norms but also has an influence on them. The definition of genres cannot be fixed but paradigms (conventions) may be recognised.
The genre of the film is horror/thriller. Usually the thriller genre is a hybrid with another genre. The genre is established through the use of mise en scene (talk about each) location, costume, lighting, props, where I have adhered to the conventions of the genre. However, in terms of editing I have not conformed to using fast cuts, which would be more conventional. Instead, I used cuts that matched the sound track to add to the suspense and creepiness of the film and It adds to the detachedness of the story. I did this because I wanted to shock the audience at the end of the clip to add to the suspense, which has been carried out throughout the teaser trailer.
The lighting throughout the teaser is set up as dark and dull to meet the convention of a horror movie. It brings the viewers closer and captures the atmosphere that the film is going for making the audience believe that they are also part of the film.
The costume is set up to be stereotypical for the genre as I have chosen to use a black cloak worn by the villain and a black mask. However, the way we have challenged the standard convention of the costume is by adding a pattern on the mask. The symbolism behind this was so that it would show how the villain had a contrast in their personality like the two contrasting colours on their mask, it is etched on to their mask and cannot be separated like their personality, hence the reason for the title.
Some of the props used are unique to the genre, such as the yellow and red pill, this fits in more with the thriller genre category as but it is still a product that isn’t regularly used as a prop to decide life and death. By using this, I tried to evoke a new paradigm adding more excitement for the audience by presenting a fresh idea. Fake blood is a standard prop used for the horror genre as usually, the events that occur in them is death caused by violence.
Finally, the location creates a sense of entrapment in an environment that should be comfortable and safe. This causes the feeling of closure and endings for the audience adding to the adrenalin of the genre. All of these are used to create shock, thrill and scare.
The standard codes and conventions for this kind of genre can also be seen in films such as scream directed by Wes Craven in 1997. This film was put under the category genres: horror/thriller/mystery/crime. Another film with these conventions is Saw, directed by James Wan 2004. The film was put under the genre: horror, thriller and mystery. Familiarity with a genre means we know how it works: we find our own way around a text without too much difficulty and I wanted to get the genre established by using the standard conventions as well as portray my own ideas of what I believe horror should be.
The general themes used in ETCH is tricks and fears and masks and duality. These follow a certain group of horrors and open a new door for horrors as it also is about a psychological thriller combined with horror.
The reason why we chose not to give the film the age rating 15 and made it 18 is because it included realistic violence which would have not been suitable for under 18’s.Although this may close doors to the audience, the film doesn’t benefit people younger as it is purely made for the purpose of escapism. However, I also realise that people under the age 18 will enjoy the film and would watch it when they buy the DVD for pleasure.
Deconstruct in terms of iconography and link to real texts where possible: soundtrack/mise en scene, location, costume, props, make-up camera angle/shot, editing, sound. Are these typical or do they challenge expectations.
Generally, when a label (genre category) is given to a film, it sets up certain expectations for the film. However, it is the job of the film for the audience to know what to expect from the film but at the same time, they should feel that there is an unexpected situation, which they would want to find out. This is how genre attracts the audience.
How will generic of production appeal to the audience?
In a horror, the audience will expect that there will be a murderer and challenges for the characters as well as the audience to solve throughout the film. The audience will appeal to this as the audience find the genre that they are watching satisfying, as they know that they are set with certain expectations.



Wednesday 31 March 2010

progress

Below, is a documentation of my original time plan that was created for the purpose of me to structure and manage the tasks ahead of me.Using a Gantt chart technique helped me to understand the duration for each task and how I can break down the task in the week.

Planning

now reflecting back at my original time plan, I can look closely at what i have achieved in the time i initailly set.I planned to finish the website, poster and teaser by 23rd of march. Although i have met the deadline of the same week, i still haven't updated aspects which should have been finised on that date. Also i took extra time for filming because of the quility of the shot when we began to edit the teaser. the lighting was poor and had to be ajusted.

Althought the original plan considers aspects such as holidays, i forgot about my proority over my extended project quilification and studing for my resits, also, I study subjects that have a big pecentage for coursework and so, i have been over loaded with ork and deadlines to meet every week.

The editing process started later on and so left us little time for editing, so we were given an extentin due to circumstances, we then stayed after school often in order to meet the new deadline.

Thursday 25 March 2010

ETCH OFFICIAL Teaser/Trailer

Etch from St Marylebone Media Studies on Vimeo.

Final Website and Poster





How I designed the title

this is the URL to my website: http://www.stmaryleboneschool.com/studentsite/media/shenaz/

Friday 19 March 2010

poster and website



i have changed the billing box and the image as the other one was to pixilated.

Thursday 18 March 2010

draft of posters and websites

Drafts and Final
These are my drafts of my poster and website designs in order of development. i had changed my design so many times due to my target audience feedback. Many said that the first draft was nice but looks as if there is to much going on on the page.
By my final draft me and some of the target audience finally agreed that the final design suits the purpose of interesting the audience.

Friday 12 March 2010

mock ups

Mock up poster design 1 and 2




Mock up website design

animatic



Because of the constant change in our teaser plan, and the new shots created whislt filming, the animatic doesn't include all of the shots which has been taken during the filming process.

Monday 1 March 2010

ideas for how to create the mask and shooting schedule

how to make fake blood and ways to design mask to look interesting and to look like a unique part of the film.
Step 1

Here, I was trying to get inspiration on how
i should design the mask and how to make blood look realistic. However, I have bought some fake blood when I found it in a science kit.

Question to my target audience in a state of confusion.

Question

Key Quetions, synopisis and contacting actresses



Update of the Synopsis
There are a group of disliked popular friends who are mysteriously invited to a party never to be forgotten. One of the girls amongst them has a dual nature that they are not aware of and each is given a pill where there life depends on their choice. If they chose the wrong pill, which is identical to the safe one, they will die. Their life depends on the right choice of pill. Their fate lies in the pill.

Filming Schedule
As I am the cinematographer, I know that it is important to have a schedule for everyone to be able to see what dates I have planned to film and to see whether my actresses are available for these dates.
I wrote a checklist weekly where i wrote down what shots I wanted to shoot, then I emailed my actresses and they replied to me if they were available or not.

Emails for Media

powerpoint presentation

Research Mood Board and Target Audience

Research and planning presentation.

Etch Shenaz and Michelle PART 1 from St Marylebone Media Studies on Vimeo.


Etch Shenaz and Michelle PART 2 from St Marylebone Media Studies on Vimeo.

Sunday 28 February 2010

Script and arangements of actresses

Script Presentation to the Actresses

Research ideas for ETCH

Synopsis

This films genre will be horror/thriller.

We witness a series of murders of a few members of a group disliked popular group of students at secondary school. The main character is one of the students who are the least popular in the group and realises what it takes to be part of the group. She has a dual nature that she is not aware of and a symbolic yellow and red tablet shows the audience who is next to die. In addition, an old-fashioned watch around her neck is another symbolic prop where she times how long it takes the tablet to react and kill the victims.

The story is account from a Child's perspective making the story innocent, imaginative and disturbing. The child is the sibling of one of the victimised classmates and is forced to come along with her. Through the child, we witness the death of his older sibling and many more of the peers.

The ending will only have the child and one other classmate to tell the story. The child traumatised by the event and we later discover that the child develops psychological effects leaving the audience in suspense through a cliffhanger.

Target audience

My target audience will be people aged 15-19 as it will most of the characters are 16-19 and so the audience will be able to relate to the characters more. The rating of the film will be rated 15 as it will contain realistic violent scenes that is tolerable by this age range but not is not too violent that they won’t be able to cope with these scenes. It is not a film that is over powering and influential; however, the content may still be frightening for younger viewers which is the reason for the age rating for 15 years of age plus.

Tuesday 19 January 2010

Inspiration for editing of Engraved Split (the name of mine and michelle's film)

27/11/2009- 04/12/2009

drawn and have annotated storyboardsteaser plan is scenes written out.
2x Teaser/trailer Analysis texas chainsaw massacre and ...-comment on how these may influence your own teaser
BASEMENT JACK (Splatter-Horror) Teaser-Trailer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BASEMENT JACK (Splatter-Horror) Teaser-Trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QTov-pDSlc&feature=related
Production log:

•My role
•What went well.
•What could have been improved.
•What am I doing next week.

shot list our amimoto will be done.filming and sound completed.
This week I have made changes and developed my teaser plan further
Drawn my storyboard,
Arranged the actors for the teaser and a meeting were set up to organise which actor would suit best for each role.
Props were organised for a few of the scenes
Together me and Michelle have organised dates in which we will aim to finish filming due to the availability of our actors and the locations set.



This is the name that we have agreed on for our film title. Hopefully I am hoping for the blood in the background to be splattered on to the screen on the edited version of the film. So for e.g. engraved split will come up on the screen and then a splat of blood will come from behind. So I will firstly put the title on the screen then blood splat on top of it then bring title to the front then zoom into title.
Create a diary for the evaluation.

Monday 18 January 2010

film poster research

Poster, photo shoot plan, an film poster