GROUP 31!!

Our bloggers. :)

(From left to right: Thao, Czarina, Dennetta and Kim)

Our group failed attempt in trying to show a sign of '31'.

We as a group developed insights to the media world, knowledge of technologies as well as building up friendships.

Overall it was a extremely rewarding experience! :D

Final Edit of Four Walls

Group Evaluation - Question 7

Here are some shots from our Preliminary task and a match cut task. However it then shows the improvement of mise-en-scene, camerawork and edits from our first time filimg to our thriller title sequence.

Evaluation - Question 6

For evaluation question 6, we had to get together as a group and think about our journey of progression with the use of technologies; to form the end product.

Evaluation - Question 8

Audience feedback and comment..

We received some great feedback from our classmates in one of the class exercise. We watched other groups title sequence then our teacher gave us a sheet to fill in and below are the words we got back from our classmates:

Below are some comments of what other students think of our title sequence..

Holly: "I think it was really good, i loved the special effects you did with the over layer, it was really cool."

Canhan: "It was really really good. Especially the sound."

Alison: "I thought it was very very very good, it was brilliant."

Harry: "Very good i really liked it."

Evaluation - Question 7

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learned in the progression from it to the full product?

Preliminary Tasks & Other Clips

Following a series of preliminary task, i developed my acting skills and was able to act like a professional in the Four Walls title sequence. In the first preliminary task, it involves two people playing cards which is myself (Thao) and Kim and our objective was to build suspense whilst playing cards. We had a lot of outtakes because we weren't used to acting in front of the camera so it was a little uncomfortable. However, on the day of filming, I've had a lot of practise on acting and was able to get into to character's personality and pulled it off in the end.

As for the camera work, the first time we filmed was the two people playing cards and if you watched the clip above, you can see that there was a scene where we tracks around the table. it was very unprofessional as we didn't have the Dolly for it to track round smoothly, instead we handheld it. Furthermore, whilst we was filming, one of our groups member was in the shot as she was unaware we was filming.

When we was filming Four Walls, we tried to film a scene where we tracks down the corridor but it was unsuccessful because the location where we filmed has an automatic lighting so it will turn on if it sen cor something moving. Furthermore, we had a few problem and one of it occurred in the second preliminary task as we for got to check if the camera was in focused.

Overall, I have learnt a lot in terms of acting and how to control mi self and not to laugh otherwise, it will take time for the work to be done quickly. Also, check if the camera is in focus before filming.

Evaluation - Question 5

Who would be the audience for your media product?

In my opinion, both gender would be suitable for our film. Women because our main character is a young woman therefore, female audience could easily related to her in terms of what she's going through. Male because a lot of young men enjoys thriller and horror movie because they are scary, exciting to watch and also suspenseful.

Here are some examples of who might be for our title sequence and the contents of their handbag/man bag:

Mary Wilson, 18 (College Student)

Hobbies: Reading, going cinema, shopping, traveling

Contents: Phone, purse, make-up, oyster card, reading book.

Mary is a good target because she enjoys going to cinema and she's also very mature and into thriller and drama movies.

Luke Smith, 24 (Journalist)

Hobbies: Reading, writing, traveling

Contents: Phone, reading book, newspaper, pen, notebook, oyster card, wallet.

Luke is a good target because he's a journalist and he write reviews for newspaper so he could make our film popular id he enjoys it.

Evaluation - Questions 3 & 4

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? How will you attract/address your audience?

YouTube is known as a popular site to view videos and i found a thriller opening called 'Cairo' by an AS student called Billy from Harrow College (You can watch the clip at the bottom of the page). The film has 2,638 views and more to come which show it is quite popular.

Compared to our title sequence, you can tell that both films

are low budget because our title sequence is distributed by New Line Cinema. Likewise, 'Cairo' uses great camera work, mise-en-scene and music but the student who made it stated that he uses Window Movies Maker to put it all together.

To distribute a product is very easy these days as technologies are more advanced. This is due to website such as YouTube as it is available worldwide and anyone can use it to promote their films, music videos, adverts, etc. Also, social networking sites such as Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, MSN, Yahoo, Bebo, etc.

As a group, we chose New Line Cinema as it distribute movies which are not highly budgeted nor low budgeted. They usually distributes movies which are middle budgeted such as Se7en and No Country For Old Men which are both thriller movies.

Our movie will be released globally like Star Trek, Transformers 2, Avatar, etc. This is because it will give our film popularity a huge boost and will get great feedback from the audience.

As for the advertisement, the trailer will appear on TV regularly but after 9pm because it is not suitable for younger viewers aged under 15. I also used photofunia to create the poster for the film and it will be advertise on buses, bus stops and at various train station.

Cairo - Thriller Opening (Harrow College - AS Media)

Evaluation - Question 2

How does your media product present particular social groups?

To present our character, we want her to look creepy and scary so we got our inspiaration from The Grudge movie character. This is because, the character from The Grudge is presented as creepy, long hair and scary. Likewise, our character has long hair and in order for her to look scary, we used make up such as eye shadow and mascara then smudged it.

However, even though these two characters look the same way, they have different personalities. For example, The Grudge's character is presented scary as a whole and she kills people. On the other hand, our character is a lonely isolated woman feeling vulnerable and depressed.

There isn't much or a particular social group as only one character is shown in the title sequence and pretty much expected she will be the main person throughout the film. This film will attract female audience because our main character so female audience can relate to the character easily. In addition, it will attract male audience because they are masculine so they would like scary movies. Furthermore, I would say the age group for this film will be 15 age and above.

Evaluation - Question 1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

For this part of the evaluation, i will compare 9 still shots from my title sequence (Four Walls) along with 9 still shots from the title sequence i was inspired by (Se7en).

Four Walls

Se7en

As a group, we were inspired be Se7ev's title sequence so our title sequence is quite similar to it. The objective of our aim was to build tension, create excitment and at the same time, make it suspenseful.

Compared to Se7ven, we have used similar techniques such as mise-en-scene and camera work in order to make it appealing towards the audience. In our 9 still shots, the main character was introduced and everything around involves her as she walk around and self harming herself. Whereas in Se7en, it is quite unclear who the character is and whether if that person is planning something and this make the audience questions themselves such as 'what is going on?' On the other hand, there are few similarities. For example, the fonts in both of the title sequences are white and it both show notes with writing on it.

Our camera work is a lot similar compared to Se7en's camera work. For example, we used many extreme close up shots to descibe the character as a whole. Likewise, in Se7en, it has a lot of extreme close up shots on the hands as the person is writing. However, in our title sequence, we also used other angles and different types of shots to emphasise certain things, for example, we used tiliting to descibe the character's personality as she suffer a psychological disorder.

For the mise-en-scene, we used an epmty space, dark lighting along with shadows to give it a spooky feeling and also to make it suspenseful.

Putting the sound together was not easy as we had to find the suitable music in or for it to match our title sequence. We also listened to Se7en's soundtrack as it is very squeaky so we added the squeakyness in our soundtrack. In the end, our soundtrack has a slow paced, a lot of squeakyness, drumbeats and some extra instrumentals.

For the props, it is also similar to Se7en as we see slicing hands using a blade unlike our one as we used a rusty scissors. we also used fake blood to make it very effective.

Overall, our inspiration is from the Se7en title sequence therefore, it is very similar as we used similar camera work, mise-en-scene, soundtrack and also props. In the end we managed to make it create the excitement and build tension and also, make it suspenseful.

Evaluation (Question 8)

Rough Cut Edit

This is our Rough cut edit (excluding sound) of our idea for a Thriller Title Sequence of which we named 'Four Walls.'

Soundtrack Edit pt2.

Here are screen shots where Czarina and Dennetta finished their editing- in which now I uploaded their final product so all we needed to do was put on the soundtrack and do the finishing touches- then finally export it into a 'submix' so that I can import it into Final Cut Pro for the complete final version of our title sequence.

As you can see, we imported the visual movie that they had exported from Final Cut Pro. All I needed to do was save it as a .mov file and then import it which will add to the sequence on the time-line on the soundtrack.

I took screen grabs on the process on importing the movie file onto soundtrack pro.

This is the final product- the final composition for Four Walls.

I had improved on it greatly by adding even more layers of sounds that are subtly heard in the sequence- such as more heartbeats and sounds that add to the tension. Towards the end of the soundtrack- where the consecutive consistent overlay footage where it builds up to the final scene where our title 'Four Walls appear, I made the sound loud and snappy to build up the tension which then ends in a explosion which finishes the whole title sequence.
I also added in screeches and different drones in the background- whilst the original upbeat music carries on throughout.
Thao's 'scream' in our Final Edit version was not actually hers- her real scream did not sound effective so instead, I found a suitable replacement which I lowered the audio volume because I did not want it to be overpowering.

However, I think the first one was better- because the sequence lasted roughly 1 minute 50 seconds I had to distribute it out more so- stretching out the sounds. Because of this, I personally think it does not build up the tension gradually, it is rather slow paced throughout until the very end.

The 'Making of the Film'

Our scheduled date to film was 10th March 2010, in which our group thoroughly planned the day because we would only have one attempt at it- which is why it is crucial to make it organised and to the best standards as we can.

We planned throughout the weeks after the pitching with ideas what we might do and how we would carry it out. We had planned to follow the storyboard- but as our idea for our film wasn't a series of follow-up events, we can add aspects that is not included in our storyboard as we just wanted to achieve the effects of different images, quick cut shots that does not necessarily need to tell a story.

Days before the filming day, we decided to experiment with makeup so that when it came to the day it would be 'almost perfect'. We also decided what kind of props to bring in- the table, camera equipment was provided by our college. These are the list of the different props we brang in to be included in our filming, such as:

• Fold up chair


• Scissors


• 'Disturbing images'


• Antique styled paper (with handwriting)


• Piece of white cloth


• Fake blood


• Pen


• Torch


• Makeup equipment


• Shirt


• Bracelet
  

These aspects were important in the making of the film to achieve the mise-en-scene we wanted to achieve. Obviously some of these are self-explanatory in why we brang it- we also had different props but we did not use it in the end as we found it unnecessary to use it.

Photos taken by: Czarina Baticos

Dennetta had printed out the photos- she had edited and altered the photos that she had printed out for copyright reasons. From 'Se7en', there is a series of 'disturbing' images and we wanted to achieve that Horror/Thriller aspect as we find it very appealing.

I myself (Kim) had provided the antique style looking paper- achieving different effects such as spilling tea all over the paper and also putting the paper in the oven- to give the crisp, old looking feel to it. I also had to study different 'gothic' fonts and 'script' looking fonts to achieve a eerie feel to it, as well as devising sentences that has the connotation of death, and associating that whoever wrote the letter was extremely hurt. E.g. "broken", "death", "hurt", "ripping", "tear" etc

With the fake blood, we had many ideas on how to make the fake blood. Originally we thought to mix soy sauce with ketchup- but that did not look as effective- instead we had researched on how to make fake blood, we concluded to buy glucose syrup, red food colouring and blue food colouring (to give it a different type of tint) which gave it a thick feel to it which looked almost real.













Photos taken by: Kim Nguyen

The first t-shirt that we bought had ended as a catastrophe, the first attempt in 'making the t-shirt look slightly dirty and worn out' had been ruined, so we had to throw it away and buy a new one. So on the day, this time me and Czarina was in charge of designing the tshirt to make it look worn-out but not too 'over the top'. Whilst we was doing this, Dennetta was helping Thao do her makeup and they were setting out the camera equipment and setting of the filming. We used a mixture of black eyeshadow, fake blood, scissors to cut and fray the edges of the t-shirt. We also had yellow wax- the effect was to make it seem like it is old and unwashed.

As you can see from the setting and environment of where we was filming, it looks very effective. Even though it is a public place, not many people were around. In the Safe Storage Store, they had automatic lights, so if there was hardly any movement around it will completely turn off- this was very important in making the film to give that dark, eerie feel to it.

In addition, this was very important as the variance of light could have gave different shot takes a different look when coming to watch it.

Thao had to get into the characters shoes, in which obviously her physical appearance but mainly her acting skills to make her seem deranged to fit her image- which she done really well. For the makeup, we decided not to go for a 'white faced' look, for the main part, we did not want our Title Sequence to look more as a horror, although in our personal opinion we thought it would look extremely effective.

From where the Photography Activity with the representations of the word, we felt that we should combine this aspect from what we did and use it. The words we previously used was Claustrophobic and Paranoia, in which we used this to our advantage from our previous knowledge of camera work.


Photo taken by: Czarina Baticos

Overall with the day, I think our group had done great, each of us (excluding Thao, for obvious reasons as she is the actress) had a go at being our own 'director' as us as individuals had our own ideas to make it effective.

More other pictures and film clips are shown in the 'Four Walls Behind the Scenes' video clip, made by Czarina Baticos.

Sound Track Edit

Currently the development of our editing of Four Walls is taking place, it is equally as important to concentrate on the sound of the music- so that the outcome of the final version of our Title Sequence will be effective. We are obviously aware that we had to make our own soundtrack- for copyright reasons but additionally, to make sound fully fit in with our title sequence.

We split up to devise a plan to make it more organised and focused- Czarina and Dennetta is in charge of the editing/livetype, Thao had helped giving feedback in both separate editing groups and myself (Kim) had put together the sequence of our soundtrack.

Thao and I at first familiarized with the Soundtrack Pro and selected appropriate 'Suspenseful' music and sounds that could combine to make a effective soundtrack. Our group is inspired by 'Se7en'; the visual effects and the upbeat music which is the effect we wanted to achieve.

Here is the first attempt that I made in making the soundtrack.

This second attempt had aspects from the first but I had adjusted it to make it sound different.

Here is screengrabs of the development of the music- we had to select the sounds we thought sounded effective- and try piece together a piece of music that sounded effective, scary but upbeat to keep up with the idea of our snappy cut shots.

The piece of music only lasted 20 seconds- the rest of the sound bars on the right hand side are sounds we selected that could achieve the effect we want, which may come to use later on.

ORIGINAL FIRST DRAFT:

Here is the first attempt in making the music- obviously it is not the best and there is always room for improvement.

We got back feedback in which most people found it to give off a "Sci-Fi" effect- but our initial idea was to make the music sound somewhat similar to the soundtrack in 'Se7en' in which our group is inspired by that title sequence.

SECOND DEVELOPED VERSION:

This screengrab is the development of the second idea- an improved, different version of the first draft. In addition, this version also paid special attention to the editing of the different shots and film cuts that we did. By watching the edited sequence of the Four Walls, we are able to take different points in the edited shots/film cuts and add sound effects to emphasize the intention we are trying to give out; e.g. The clip where there is a quick cut shots of 3 photographs in a consecutive follow up after another- here we added 3 heart beat sounds to combine with the edited sequence which was in sync.

Here we also had to fairly find a different upbeat kind of music but still took some aspects of the original soundtrack and embedded it into the new one to meet the "eerie" effect we wanted to achieve.

These are some of the compositions and the developments that I have created so far.

My group had found this second version much more better than my first attempt- so in result of that I will carry on improving this with the help of feedback from Thao and gain feedback from other people too.

Group 31's Pitch Presentation

Pitch Part 1

Pitch Part 2

Pitch Part 3

Pitch

As a group, we had to do our pitch presentation in front of the class and our media teachers. This was done so that our teachers and classmates can give us feedback on our presentation and what we need to change and improve it in order to make it work.

We took a long time to decide what our film will be called so individually, we all came up with one title:

• Four Walls


• The Room


• Deranged


• Fragile

During our presentation we told everyone we can't decide which one we'd use so our teachers suggested everyone should vote. In the end, almost everyone liked 'Four Walls' so we chose this as our title for our film.

The story line of our title sequence is about a young woman whose trapped inside this room and it is believe that she suffer a psychology disorder. This continue by her self-harming herself and writing on the paper. She also has a comfort object which is a charm bracelet and it seem very important to her.

The sub-genres of our thriller title sequence is psychological, horror and crime. But because the main character has a psychological disorder, we wanted our main theme to be psychological along side the theme of thriller. Furthermore, it will draw in the audience's attention as it play with their minds.

After we've decided what kind of thriller our film was going to be, we thought of a perfect location which was one of the exhibition room at the Barbican centre but unluckily, we did not get a chance to book it. Our second option was to film it in one of our bedroom but our teachers suggested it wouldn't be a good idea as we'd have to clear out the room in order for the mise en scene to match. In the end, they said we should hire an empty room and added props for it to work well together.

This lead to the mise-en-scene as we wanted it to be dark and empty along with a small amount of lighting. For the sounds, we used Soundtrack Pro to create our own soundtrack. We decided that it should slow paced and squeaky as horror is one of our sub-genres. However, we didn't want the horror genre to overshadowed the main genre as thriller, therefore, we added drum beats and other instrumentals.

Our target for this movie is young adults aged 15-30 years old and targeted at both gender. Male because a lot of boys enjoys horror movies, on the other hand, female because our main character is a young woman therefore the female audience could relate to her easily.

We didn't think much about the institutional detail but we knew what company we did not want, for example, WT2. This is because WT2 is well known for romantic & comedy movies and it is too common for British film production, therefore, it would be very unusual to use it. Also, our film has a dark side to it and it looks very professional and has a high buddget so we chose New Line Cinema because it is a subsidiary of Warner Bros. which is well known for high budgeted and blockbuster movies.

The Production Schedule:

• Filming on the 10th March 2010
• Editing in lessons, Lunchtimes/Workshops, After College.

Initial idea for the Story Board

During our Pitching, we came up with ideas of what our Title Sequence should be about. Since we was inspired by Se7en, we like the idea of close ups and extreme close up camera shots. The story plot for our Title Sequence is about a girl- who is suffering from a mental disorder who wants to seek revengence. The idea of her being enclosed in 'Four Walls' made us base the the following shots in a small room; where she is displaying extreme emotions and paranoia.
Because our idea does not have a set sequence that follows up, we can film any kind of shots or ideas and embed it into our final Title Sequence.


Here is ideas of what kind of shots to carry out:

As you can see, we have a mixture of different shots- from establishing shot (which we scrapped as well because the room would be small) to various mid-shots, close ups to extreme close ups.

(After our pitching, we had feedback of our whole idea. The teachers thought that doing our filming in someones room would not look as effective- so some of the sequence shots in this storyboard would have to be scrapped.)

Because of our idea, it is quite easy to do this anywhere else- all we needed was basic equipment such as a table and a chair. In this storyboard, we could carry this out without the bedroom setting. The idea we wanted to portray was quick edit shots that would last a minimum of 5 seconds to 30.

The first two storyboard was our first ideas- these other two had later developed as we visited the 'Safe Storage' place and we discussed what kind of props we should bring in.

In this storyboard, we wanted to achieve the 'paranoia' effect, in addition we wanted to give it a queasy, disorientating feeling as well. We wanted to give off the effect of a 'Chiller' (a horror/thriller)
















(In this storyboard, quite a few ideas was scrapped when we started filming. In the 'Safe Storage' there is numerous amount of doors that all look the same- we had a idea that we should track all the doors to give a ever lasting effect- but we decided to scrap that idea because the doors were bright yellow which had the 'Safe Storage' logo on it. We thought that we could edit that and make it a negative effect, such as the film title sequence of 'Arlington Road', which had a lot of disorientating camera edits, but we did not really like that idea much. Other ideas that we discussed we did not carry out in the real filming as we found it unnecessary to do so.)

All of these ideas of shots we mainly carried out in the real filming process- but when editing the actual Title Sequence of ours we did not use most of it. Some of the shots either wouldn't have followed up that well or we felt we did not need to use the other numerous shots we did.

IN addition, we also made a different storyboard for the actual sequence for our final product- but unfortunately we lost it.

Four Walls Behind The Scenes

Intro to Cameras & Health and Safety Tutorial

At the beginning, before we start our filming our teacher gave us a tutorial of how to use the camera correctly and safely. We were given a JVC GY-HM100E Camcorder, two 16GB memory cards, battery for the camcorder which allow us about 2 hours recording time and a tripod.

The camera has many functions which include a built in Mic therefore it doesn't need the external microphone unless necessary. On the side of the camera, there is an on/off button and it is very clever as the camera will switch off automatically if not used for 5 minutes. The lens is operated by the lever next to the focus ring. Our teacher told us that we must not touch the lens as when we editing because there will be finger prints on the clips. The viewfinder on the side tells us how much time recording time we have remaining and how much battery power is left. We can also focused on certain subject as well as zoom in and out. When recording, we are able to press 'Q.Review' to constantly play back the last few seconds of our shots.

The memory cards allow us to film up to 1 hour and 40 minutes and it has a switch on the side which protect our clips in case anyone used it, it will be locked.

The tripod were given to us for preventing the camera movement while filming, it reduce the camera from shaking. Also, it offers stability within a shot as well as certain desired heights. Furthermore, it allows free movement which you can track or pan as well as tilt up and down.