Opening Sequence Analysis - Rosemary's Baby

 1.) We are introduced to a young couple who are looking to settle down and are house hunting - very natural, realistic setting based around this couple, but as we watch them being shown around the apartment and see a cabinet blocking a door to a cupboard and immediately we wonder why it’s been moved there – what is it blocking/hiding?
2.) We see them discussing the apartment and hear a story of past experiences within the building involving the death and sacrifice of young children. We wonder how this will relate to them once they move in as we expect something bad to happen because of the horror genre. Rosemary mentions early in the clip that they’re hoping to have children soon so that could possibly link in to the existing stories surrounding the buildings past. We see their neighbours who are quite odd and we worry slightly for the pair as they are surrounded by these people who seem to have quite strange intentions and beliefs, whilst appearing friendly.
3.) The part of the opening I personally found the most unnerving was the music accompanying the opening credits, I think it really did set a creepy, frightening tone for the film – it definitely adds to the fear and expectations that something bad is going to happen. It sounds like a lullaby in some ways (possibly linking to rosemary wanting a baby) but has a scary edge to it; it doesn’t sound comfortable/happy.
4 + 5.) Its set within an urban environment, focussed obviously in a certain apartment block, which is responsible for the entire plot really – it’s the start of all the problems for the couple. It appears very spacious but there seems to be a lot of corridors and quite tight spaces - very enclosed in terms of it appearing very dark and haunting due to it being lit quite dimly – allowing for lots of shadows and sharp edges in beams of light. We often just see peoples outline or profile rather than if being brightly lit and allowing us to see the whole face and body. This makes us wonder if there’s someone hiding or watching, or something about to creep up on Rosemary.

I think the single enclosed setting, the shadows and the instantly unnerving opening due to the unsettling music are all aspects that work really effectively in this scene and ones which we could work into our own film.

Catherine

Intentions for our film - Narrative Ideas.

We discussed films that we had seen from our subgenre and possible ideas for our opening sequence.

1.) Characters -
We thought that having a single character would work well as many psychological horror films focus on seclusion and whats in your head rather than having a large group of characters. We decided that it would work well having a young teenage girl as the main character as stereotypically girls are more easily afraid and many of the films we had watched of this subgenre used teenagers a the central character.

2.) Narrative -
A young girl is walking home, we see her walking down her street towards her house just as its starting to get dark. She enters her house and sits down in front of the tv. There's a power cut and the lights flicker before the tv and lights go out. She tries to turn the lights back on and attempts to make a call but instead just hears heavy breathing. We see a shadow of a person behind her and hear laughing through the phone. She turns round screaming for the person to show themselves. She scans the room before a hand taps her on the shoulder, we see her drop the phone and scream before it fades to black.

3.) Costume -
Neutral colours, maybe quite dark clothes. Very simple - we dont want that to contrast the tone and feel of the film by being very bright/patterned.

4.) Lighting and Setting -
We thought for the setting it would need to be somewhere quite isolated, we want the character to be remote as it instantly adds to the fear. We first wanted it to be set at night to give that eerie feel to the film but we thought about the films that we'd watched and most of them took place in a natural setting, on a normal day - making it more shocking when something happens as its unexpected. As we discussed the films we had seen we realised that all included lots of shadows and dimly lit interior settings which we thought worked really well. We rewatched the opening sequence from The Ring which really influenced our ideas for our own opening scene.

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Wordle for The Shining

The wordle above shows all the key words within the film. Words such as the main characters name 'Danny, Jack and Wendy' are included in this, so its implying that something drastic will happen to them. The characters are the main feature in this film as it is all based on them. The medium sized words including 'hotel, room, door' etc are saying that the film is based in a hotel and something inside the hotel room in a particular room number is implying that something bad has happened in there and you shouldnt step inside that room. The smaller words such as 'caretaker, ghost, maze' etc imply that part of the film is based in a maze outside the hotel and the caretaker has something to do with being a ghost.

I think that the main characters are in the largest size because the sub genre is pyschological, the film is based on how their mind works and how they react to certain circumstances.

Wordle for Insidious

There are the keys words from the plot of 'Insidious'. The larger words are the words that appeared most in the plot. From this I can gather that the characters are the most prominent in the movie, as they are the largest words that appear. However, whilst saying that, I also notice that among the larger of the words is 'something', a vague pronoun. This could maybe indicate that we should have an unidentifiable factor to our movie. This could be a character, a sound, or even an image. 'Renai', 'Elise' and 'woman' all refer to females, possibly hinting that we should use a female protagonist. Whilst 'Josh' is the largest of the words, after reading the plot I realise he amounts to being the 'desperado'

Wordle for The Sixth Sense

This wordle puts words like 'ghosts', 'night', 'dead' and 'appears' as some of the bigger words showing that they were the most important in the plot of the film, other than the characters. It shows the characters names as the largest words showing that this subgenre of horror films is very much absed on characters and I think in our film we would want to follow this - its a subgenre where the threat often isnt seen so it has to focus on the characters and their reactions. I think having the film set at night could work well as it instantly appears more haunting.

Title Sequence

The Shining
http://www.artofthetitle.com/2011/10/31/the-shining/

We are shown the names of the Production Company for the film, the supporting studio and the names of the cast members. We are also given the names of some of the crew, namely the producer, the director, the executive producer, the screen-play director and also the novel upon which the movie is based

The visuals appear to tell the audience nothing about the movie. It gives little if anything away. We are given long shots of beautiful scenery like clear calm rivers or high angle shots of secluded country roads. Whilst these may appear irrelevant to the movie, they have significant connotations to them as to what to expect in the movie. A key element of any psychological horror is creating seclusion between the victim and any form of refuge. The first scene shows a clear river with an oasis of plants and trees dead in the middle. This image may indicate the theme of seclusion that continues in the title sequence. The yellow car we follow is the only live object in the entire sequence beside a car that passes by – in the other direction. The director has clearly used very subtle indicators of loneliness and isolation to create a light element of fear in the audience. Thought the shots are very bright and undoubtedly beautiful, they are juxtaposed by the slight fear and prospect that the car is travelling to a place of no help, refuge and witnesses

The most prominent and significant element to the opening sequence is the background music. A tenor brass instrument is used initially, which appears quite neutral. It does not create any element of fear, it just carries with the rest of the sequence, but then an eerie screech accompanies it which changes the entire aura of the sequence. The atmosphere of the piece goes from calm and well relaxed to peculiar and on edge. The sound is one the audience will not be able to associate with anything besides maybe previous horror movies. The audience now has a sense of expectation and anticipation of the worst, rather than being able to appreciate the juxtaposing scenery

I personally feel this sequence is a bit weak, because it requires a lot of dissecting to really find relevance in some of the elements, such as the subject of the shots. Despite this, I feel the most effective part to it is the sound in the background. I think the sound creates the only real effect in the sequence, and brings out the potential horror elements in the rest of the sequence. Without the sound, the scenes would look quite alluring and comforting, but the moment the music is introduced the once beautiful scenery begins to possess sinister elements

With this in mind, we can use the idea of juxtaposition and strong musical influence to help design and shoot our own title sequence. Whilst this sequence gave a lot of pointers as to what not to do, it also gave a couple ideas of what we could do

#brainstorming

Title Research

Analysing title sequence from horror film of our chosen sub-genre -

http://www.artofthetitle.com/2010/02/22/the-thing/

- We are shown the names of the Production Company for the film and supporting studio, in this case - Universal Pictures and Turnman Foster Company Production. We are also shown the names of the main crew -  i.e Production designer, composer, D.O.P, assistant producer, screenwriter and director as well as the name of the main cast.
- The fonts used give quite a mixed up/confusing feel - all the letters are varying sizes and we see the words forming as though their being put together from something else to create a new thing. Its got quite a messy look to it and isnt particularly clear despite it being in white to contrast against the dark background.
- The visuals are very unclear - we see more shapes and shadows rather than actual images so it doesnt particularly let anything pass in terms of clues about the plot. The use of shadows is quite typical of this subgenre as the main foucs of psychological horrors is that the threat often isnt seen, instead- just the effects of the threat. All the images are very unlcear - some not focussed and very dark  -they arent lit in a way that allows us to see the image clearly. The ECUs make us really try and focus on the images but its very hard to decipher, leading us to want to watch the film and discover the plot and threat. At one point we see the shadow of fingers reaching out, however it loks very alien - its not a natural proportion as the fingers are much too long, so this gives us a clue about a possible threat.
- I think the use of quite unclear images works quite well in this case - it makes the viewer want to keep watching to uncover these images and what their seeing and i think that technique could work well in our film. I think the way the font and typography of the insitutional and cast/crew information can reflect and add to the storyline is really interesting and i hope to use a similar idea for our own title sequence. I think the title sequence is really important in setting the tone and feel of the film so i think getting ideas from sequences like this is coming in really useful in helping us with our own designs and ideas.


Catherine Middleton

Evaluation of our Assessment Piece - Emily Pyrek

Use of the Camera

In our re-created horror film, I found that we can hold a steady shot, although when the birds fly down to the water where the actor threw the pendant in the lake, and when the man walks across the lake on the other side, the camera jolts quite a bit so it doesn’t run smoothly. In my opinion I think that the frames were shot appropriately as we used a variety of shot types in the right places such as CU, MCU, LS, CA and MS Etc...We used these type of angles to create atmosphere (close ups and mid-shots to focus on facial expression, long-shot to identify location/setting and canted angle) to add effect on his emotion. However, some shots weren’t framed correctly such as when he stood up from the bench, his head wasn’t in the shot and when he was walking towards the lake, there wasn’t enough lead room. We also used high angles, this gave the effect that the character is vulnerable and the person behind the camera is the most powerful.

Use of Editing

After editing the finished film, I found that the shots flown really smoothly; there wasn’t too much shaking and jumping of the camera and the effects created an airy feeling to the atmosphere, making the audience feeling irritable about what is about to happen next and what happened before that scene to make him have a problem with the pendant. Whose is that pendant and what happened? The transitions of the shots fit well together for example, when it gradually changes to black and white when the shot changes to the OSS, for a more spooky feeling, rather than it to sticking to the same contrast. The heavy breathing makes it a more on edge feeling as it questions the audience about who/what is out to get him and if anything happens to the main character as it just blacks out at the end of the film once the camera has approached him.

Selection of Content

For filming we didn’t really have a costume design, we decided to go with the casual look as it is more natural, although if we was to shoot it again, maybe we could of chose more darker clothing as the costume was too colourful for a horror film, as it didn’t really have a daunting effect. I thought that the pendant which was used was too girly and light to be able to drop in the water like it did (due to the feathers) though the size was perfect. The location and setting worked well as it was quite closed in and away from the crowd, though we did have a few problems as to when the pedestrians saw that we was filming, so all they wanted to do was be in the shot, which slowed our filming time down as we had to wait until they passed. I don’t think we chose appropriate actors for our film as he wasn’t experienced and didn’t really seem that enthusiastic, you could tell by the way he speaks, it doesn’t sound very threatening, furthermore, his facial expressions aren’t very frightening either, as you can see he is trying his hardest not to laugh.

Self-Assessment

My contribution to the film is based in all areas, including, helping to plan the film e.g. deciding which part of the original film to focus on and helping Catherine decide on the shot types so it was easier for her to fill in the shot list sheet ready for filming. I also helped operating the camera, by setting the white balance, focus and exposure and adjusting the camera shots to match our planned ones. If I was to film this again I would make sure that all the camera operation was correct such as rule of thirds/180 degree rule/30 degree rule/enough lead room for movement. For my final coursework film, I would use a different actor and location and a better quality camera. 

Emily Pyrek

Final coursework group

Hello, today we made our final groups and for you lucky readers, we decided to stick to our same group as last time, because we're cool and thought our film was amazing when we worked together. That group is of course, Josh Livingston, Emily Pyrek and Catherine Middleton.

In todays Media lesson we had to decide individually what film we would like to create for our coursework, and it turns out that we our group all chose the same genre, so to save us time making a new blog and getting to know different peoples strengths and weaknesses we decided to stay together as we all know each others from re creating our horror film before.

The genre of film we decided we wanted to film is Psychological, this is because we found that we had some extremely great but terrifying ideas between us to create our story line. Instead of writing them all down, you will be able to see a scanned in picture of our mind map full of our creativity.

I think thats enough information for you guys today, but we will be writing to you very soon to keep you updated on our work!

Project Mindmap

We thought about the various stereotypes and expectations that come with our chosen sub genre of psychological horrors which then gave us a starting point for ideas for our own film. For example, we found that psychological horrors often are not focussed around blood / death etc, but more on mental instabilities and we thoguht about how we could create this in our film through things such as shadows, hallucinations and black outs etc. This collection of ideas gave us a basic plan for the base of our film. For our film sequence, we have decided that we are going to use a quiet environment to create that airy feeling somebody/something mysterious is within the house along with the character, by doing this is will make the actor seem afraid of her own thoughts which causes her to become paranoid. The audience will be able to relate to the character as we will use camera shots and types, editing techniques, sound effects and effective mise-en-scene so they will be able to share the fear that the actor is feeling.

Evaluation of Assessment Piece - Josh Livingston

Use of the Camera

Generally, our shots were okay. They were heavily inconsistent, sometimes being very well framed, others where portions of the actors head was cut off. We had a number of well framed shots, especially   our long shot 0:27, which I feel gave across a sense of seclusion and loneliness. We adhered to the general conventions of using a camera, e.g. Rule of thirds, head room and lead room etc, however there were occasions where we deliberately broke these rules, like using a canted angle shot to illustrate confusion in the character and the abnormality of the preceding events, and other occasions where we broke them accidently (0:39).  The shot where we track the character walking toward the pond was not given enough lead room, yet somehow worked to an eerie effect. However, the one error we consistently made in a number of our shots that only worked out occasionally was cropping body parts of the character due to incorrect framing. This went unnoticed during the shoot but because a problem in the editing process

We used a variety of shots, including Close Ups to focus the attention of the viewer to specific points, Mid Shots to give an illusion of normality and Long Shots to show seclusion and loneliness. I believe we used an effective range of shots which kept the audience interested and used the right shots in the right places to create an affective atmosphere. We used basic camera movements such as pans and tracking, but we also used an active movement of the cameraman/woman running toward the character. This was done from a POV (Point of View) Shot at 0:43, from the POV of the attacker. We did this to show the attacker approaching the character without showing the attacker. Not seeing the attacker creates an element of fear toward the attacker, which is essential and imperative in a horror clip

The main issue we had to face with the camera was handling it steadily. In a lot of our shots, there were sharps jolts or sways, or static shakes whilst tracking the character. Not all of these could have been prevented, but it is something to look on and seek to improve in future.

Use of Editing

Editing was a key part in our process. I believe the editing really brought the piece together, and gave it atmosphere. The shots flow very nicely, without jumping or moving on too fast. The clip has a very steady pace and keeps the audience on their toes. I key highlight of the editing would be the subtle sound effects in the background that loops for the majority of the piece, and particularly the MS/POV shot steadily walking toward the character sat on the bench.  The fade into black and white proved an effectual technique in drawing and sustaining the audience’s attention. The shot was simply a slowed version of the latter, but because of the way it was edited it seemed to be a completely different shot. The sound editing was strong and well formulated, with sound clips extracted from different clips (some recorded but unused) and applied to new ones. Slight changes were made to the sound in a number of clips, which gave the piece a very awkward and eerie atmosphere

Selection of Content

We were very limited to actors, with few people being available and even fewer people having a form of acting ability. The actor that was eventually used had no acting experience but was available so we had to settle with him. Though his acting was not brilliant and he looked at the camera on numerous occasions, his contribution was sufficed to us achieving our task. The costume was in direct contrast to the mood of the piece; bright and well relaxed. This could have been improved by wearing darker colours to suit the tone of the piece; dark and dreary. The location was great for our piece, as it was well isolated, it had every component that we required for the piece and conveniently had an unknown man walking nearby who we captured in our piece. The location was very natural, and did not require any artificial input from the team. The pendant seemed quite feminine and delicate, but in terms of size, weight and general attributes it worked well. Because the accessory was light, the wind blew easier on it, making the final scene seem more realistic and almost natural

Self Assessment

My contribution was to the editing stage. I was not able to be at the shoot and both Catherine and Emily were better suited to planning than I, so I focussed on my strong point which consequently was editing. I cut up the shots and separated them, applied the necessary effects and extractions, and pretty much pieced the final product together. I personally am quite pleased with my contribution, working efficiently and effectively under a timed condition whilst making a few improvements to the original piece. On the flip side, I feel my contribution would have been better if I took part in the composition of the piece and attended the shoot, but my group worked well without me

Overall, I feel our piece is very good and well devised, though it could have been improved in terms of acting quality and camera adjustments. Generally, a job well done

#Go Team!!

Josh Livingston

Evaluation of our Assessment Piece - Catherine Middleton

Use of the Camera-

Generally, we had steady shots, but after looking at the final piece I’m not happy with the shot across the lake as the camera shakes and jolts and doesn’t flow smoothly.  Most of the framing was good –i.e. using the rule of thirds and allowing enough head room. However, sometimes we broke this rule (e.g. the CU of his face, using a slightly canted angle – this worked due to it showing his confusion.) Some shots weren’t framed correctly, for example the shot showing him walking towards the water doesn’t give enough lead room and occasionally we crop out some of his body/head. We tried to follow both the 30 and 180 degree rules where possible and this worked successfully I think. We tried to use a range of shots – mainly using CU’s and MS’s in order to show detail and emotions of his face, as well as LS’s to establish location and space/movement. We also used a canted angle (MCU of him) to show confusion, and high angles to show power and make him look vulnerable. We didn’t use too much camera movement other than simple pans and tracking, for example in the MS/LS following him as he moves towards the water. I think we maybe could have improved our use of camera movement by making the pan on the LS across the lake a lot smoother as it looks really jolty.

Use of Editing –

I think our shots flow really nicely – it’s not to jumpy or too quick and sets a good pace to make the scene feel worrying and to make you feel apprehensive about what’s coming next. I think the transitions and effects work really well, especially the mumbling of the voices and slight fade to black and white rather than a bright colour shot during the MS/POV shot walking towards him as he sits of the bench – it adds to the creepy atmosphere and the creates more suspense, making the viewer feel uncomfortable and worried for the main character and what could happen.

Selection of Content –

I don’t think we chose appropriate actors really as the quality of the acting could be improved and distracts from the story and camera work.  However, the location worked really well I think –quite isolated, making it feel quite unnerving. I think the costume could be improved as the colours of his clothes seem too bright and set a happier tone than we would want for a horror film, perhaps all black would be better. I think the pendant was maybe slightly girly but worked well in terms of shape and size!

Self-Assessment –

I mainly contributed to the planning and filming stages, rather than the editing. I drew out our shots into a storyboard and wrote up our shot list ready for shooting our film. I then helped shoot the sequence by operating the camera and adjusting our planned shots to accommodate our exact location and weather etc. I think overall some shots could be improved in terms of framing and composition and the acting could be of better quality, but generally I was really happy with our film.

Catherine Middleton

The Final Product

WE'RE DONE!!!!!

It's taken us a couple weeks but after much hard work, and a tad of determination, we're done. Here's the finished piece

So after filming and editing our footage, we looked over our finished piece and evaluated and compare it to the original film we based it on. We thought that generally the composition and continuity of our shots was good - we tried to use a wide range of shots, choosing the most appropriate for the scene, including long-shots, close-ups and mid-shots as well as experimenting with using a canted angle to show confusion and panic. We thought the shots flowed quite well together due to us following the 30 and 180 degree rules throughout the filming. 
I think were we to re-shoot, we would have to improve the acting quality to make the scene more believable and also to improve the general quality of the clip. We would also consider reframing some of the shots as some don't use the rule of thirds to focus your attention on specific points in the shot, and occasionally exclude parts of the actor from the shot: such as his head.
However, despite the few downfalls to the project, we believe this project proved a success. 


Go Team :P

Composition Exercise.

We shot a short clip focussing on the composition of our 6 shots using the rule of thirds and the 180 and 30 degree rules.  After editing our footage we watched it back and thought that the close up shot of Josh's face set an eery effect on the clip. We used the rule of thirds to focus the viewers attention to particular points of the shot. However we found it quite hard to follow the 30 degree rule sometimes, as the location didnt have a lot of room to film in. We thought the final edited footage ran quite smoothly, however some of the transitions could have been smoother. There was the odd occasion where it seemed to jump but that was only visible to a more critical eye. Our shots were well framed, bar the odd occasion where there was a lack of head room, but again, that was not a major problem to our footage
Editing was hard, mainly because we did not have enough shots to fall back on in case there was an error we had missed whilst recording. Acting was not recognized as a weak point, solely because the focus was not on the actors, but on the editing and camera skills.

First Continuity Exercise

Hello! well this week we have been filming our first continuity exercise. This is basically where we ensure that factors occurring in our scenes do not cause confusion to the viewer, eg. moving more than 30 degrees after each shot to prevent creating the illusion of "de ja vu". If this does happen, it is called a "jump shot" (just a bit of Media terminology for you guys)

Firstly, we planned our exercise using play dough. We created little characters (as cute as they were) with pictures of our faces on it, pretending that they were us. I know it seems pointless, but we did it so we could establish which shot types we were going to use. After we attempted to film a short film with play dough, we went on to film our real film. This proved much harder than we thought it would be. We opened up this exercise with an establishing shot with the camera facing the actor. This was tricky to film as when we imported it on to the computer you could see the director (Catherine) holding the door open for the actor to walk through. We then moved on to film the actor with the camera behind the actor, this took many attempts but eventually we managed to get it just right! Yes, we will eventually upload the out-takes of that scene. Afterwards we filmed a close up of the door being opened, this was hard to edit in as we had to many shots of it so therefore it kept jumping, which didnt look very good on camera. 

We then moved on to the next scene; the most difficult scene! As the character walked through the door it jumped a huge amount to a different angle so it looks like the actor opened the door and jumped to the position what she was standing in. The disadvantage of doing the next shot was that as character 2 walked through the automatic doors, the 2 actors kept laughing at each other so it was very hard to carry on with the filming, so after numerous shots we decided to give up and move on to the next shot. This looked odd as this also jumped, character 2 didnt walk close enough to character 1 to start a conversation, so you can see where we have cut the camera to begin the next shot. Another disadvantage is the close up shot of the camera. When character 2 asks for the time, character 1 forgets to tell character 2 the time and then immediately, without focusing on the time, she automatically says that she is late and runs off, leaving character 2 feeling awkward as she runs out the door and up the stairs to where she has just come from.

If we was to re film this scene, we would change location to a straight corridor instead of a small corridor in which the character have to rotate to begin the next scene. The reason for this is because it was very hard to stick to the script and it was very hard to film the 30 degree rule as there wasn't much space. Also we had many interruptions because were filming in one of the main entrances in the college so we had numerous amounts of people walking through our shots, so therefore it took longer to film and most of all we got too distracted and couldn't concentrate on what we was doing during the main scene.

That's all for now. Don't worry, you'll hear from us again soon

First Filming Exercise.

Today we were set the task of filming a short sequence and editing our shots. We tried to include a range of shot types and angles including mid shots, high and low angles, close ups, over shoulder shots and p.o.v shots. We also had to alter the camera settings so the exposure, focus and white balance were all ready to film. When it came to editing we noticed some slight reflections in the background of shots, including the camera and crew. We also didn't recheck the white balance when we moved to a new location so therefore there is a slight noticeable change in the lighting and colour of the shots. When editing we tried to cut the shots so that it told a story and made you wonder where the main character was heading, why he was looking at the time etc. However we found that when we shot the close up of the phone we didnt move further than a 30 degree angle so when its viewed next to the other shots it looks repeated and slows down the story. If we were to reshoot and edit it we would move to a more exciting location that could help make it more interesting and atmospheric. We would also add more video effects to make the audience more interested. However, we think for our first filming experience the quality of our film is good, but could be improved with further practice.

Media introduction

This is officially or first blog post, so we're a bit out of practice. By we, I mean the group; Emily Pyrek, Catherine Middleton and Josh Livingston. Cut a long story short, we've been thrown together to work on a Media Project; re-creating a 30/40 second sequence of last years AS group. 
Riviting
Amongst learning how to work in a group we've only met two weeks ago, we're expected to develop our skills with the camera, such as framing, shot types, focussing etc. Storyboarding and Genre Conventions are amongst the various skills that will be put to the test


Quite frankly, we have nothing more to say, so until next time.