The preliminary task gave me experience in camera work. This was the first time I had filmed with a video camera and this experience has taught me little things such as remembering to turn off the night mode, which I made the mistake of leaving on for a portion of the technical task, therefore having to cut those sections. I also learned that when wanting to zoom into a close up shot, it is better to move towards the object, rather than using the zoom button. Both tasks also gave me experience in editing and I am now more comfortable using the Mac’s. Furthermore this task increased my awareness of the 180-degree rule, as it was vital to follow it.
One of the good things about the main task is the camera shots used. The extreme close up shots, of parts of the bodies of the characters running is good as it helped to reveal enough for the audience to know what is going on but not much about it, so there was an enigma created of who are the characters and why are they running? Creating enigmas and mystery is also a convention of horror/thriller genre. Another good shot is the point of view shot from the antagonist chasing the protagonist as that shows the pace of the chase quite well and helps to draw the audience into it more by making them see from a characters viewpoint. Also, the worm’s eye view shot from the broken glass is good as the sharp glass is a connotation of danger and when the class veiwed this shot, they also gave positive feedback on this.
A second positive point of the sequence is the sound. It sets the mood very well and creates a dark atmosphere, which is good for the horror/thriller genre we were aiming to create. The slow tempo of the non-digetic sound juxtaposed the pace of the chase effectively as well. Also using the programme “Garage Band” has given me experience in creating some good non-digetic sound to go with films, which is quite useful seeing as we were not allowed to use any ready-made songs due to copyright reasons. Another point with the sound is I learnt how to edit it out certain parts when they were not necessary, for example in the antagonist’s point of view shot, the actor decided to do heavy breathing which made it sound less serious, so it had to be edited out.
Also, we had difficulty finding a cast to be in the film. As one of us had to film, just one of us could act in it, but we managed to get Josh to participate. Just having two characters in the sequence turned out to be an advantage as even though it is set in a public street, there are no other people visible, therefore created an isolated setting, which is a typical convention of the horror genre. Also, Josh and I are 17 and 16 years old, which helps to appeal to the target audience of a similar age range (about 15 – 35) because being of a similar age helps the audience to sympathise and relate to the characters more than characters of different ages.
However an issue with the film is the time of day it was filmed. After watching back the film, we saw that it was a bit too bright. This was an issue picked up on by the class as well. We filmed it at that point of the day, as we knew that if it got too dark, it would not be too visible. After viewing another film that was darker, we found that they filmed it at a later time than us, so perhaps it would have been better for to have also filmed it later. Overall though it doesn’t matter a lot, but on the one hand it would have been better if it was darker as that is a good connotation of danger, but on the other hand it challenges the normal convention of danger occurring at night time effectively well because the sound and isolated setting help to outline the mood.
The main issue that the class picked up on whilst watching the film back was the part of the film where I (the protagonist being chased) enter the house. We originally filmed a scene inside involving a door slamming and me taking a knife to investigate. However the class made note of some poor camera work and editing at this point. They also fedback that the inside scene was not necessary as the chase scene was sufficient enough. After taking note of this, Marty and I decided to cut the film at the point where I enter the house and bring the title up there. After doing this, the feedback we got was quite positive.
The product does not particularly represent social groups, however it could be seen as following the stereotype of the young men/teenager boys getting into trouble and violence.
The kind of institution that might distribute the product would be a small private cinema company as there is a very small budget and unknown actors; so big cinemas would not be willing to show the film. Another way of distributing the film is via the internet as files can be shared easily. Videos can also be easily viewed on sights such as Youtube, so this would be a good place to aim it. Another strength of showing this product on Youtube is that it is accessed a lot by young people/students a lot, as well as a lot of older people. Internet networking groups would also be a good place to advertise the product as well, especially to the young target audience as they have a lot of internet access and have signed up to networks like Facebook and Myspace, where videos can be viewed and have word spread.
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