Sound effects Research

Sound effects research

We have spent a large amount of time looking at different sound effects that we can use in our opening sequence and have come to the conclusion that we will use a mixture of sound effects that we have found on final cut pro and sound effects that we have created ourselves in the woods with leaves, birds and twigs around us.

Background sounds 

We will be using these sound clips in our opening sequence to  create suspension. The electronic noise will be played at different intervals to shock the viewer and build on the tension of the sequence and create a atmosphere of fear.

Ambient sounds

We will be using these ambient sounds in our opening sequence to create a realistic setting and to help remind the viewer of the surroundings of the characters. This ambient sound will also helps us to create tension at points and create a scary setting.

Music in horror films

Music in horror films

Music is used in horror films to intensify the events of the movie. Without this music the film would not have the same effect on the audience as they would not feel the same tension they feel while watching the film.

  

To create the tension in our opening sequence, we have researched a range of different horror sounds to enable us to create the best atmosphere for our opening sequence. We have found that different genres of horror use different types of music. For example, in the remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers uses hymns, this makes the audience think about what the character goes through as they feel closer to the storyline.

 

 

In doing research online we found out that 90% of people found that music in horror trailers made it more appealing. This showed us that we should use music within our opening sequence to attract our target audience (16-17 year olds).

 

As well as finding out people were attracted to trailers with music, we were able to go deeper into that and find out what type of sounds they like. 50% of people said they like to have a mix of music and a voiceover, this would create tension within the trailer, attracting them to watch the film. 33% said they like just music and 11% said they like just a voiceover. Only 6% said they think there should be no music or voiceovers, which shows that the majority of people like to have at least some sound effects.

 

Closer look into costumes

Closer look into costumes

Choosing costume for our opening sequence may have only been a small part of what we had to think about however we did have to take into consideration what the teenagers in our opening sequence would be wearing in the woods. We had to take into consideration the fact that we were in the woods at night so the characters will have to be wearing fairly warm clothes for practical reasons as well as continuity reasons. Although it may be a small element of the make up of a film but in essence it can be a very useful tool. For example some films have such memorable costumes that they contribute to the success of the film and also possibly popularity. For example:

• Christian Bale's costume in batman begins as 'Batman'.
• Johnny Depp's costume in Charlie and the chocolate factory as 'Willie Wonka'

For the actors we wanted to keep it simple and have them wearing their own clothes to allow a low budget and to help the actors be more comfortable. But we did give them guidelines as to how to dress for the scene taking into consideration the weather and the time of year. Our suggested items of costume to the actors were very normal clothes of current teenagers to build a connection with the audience. For example:

So we decided to use dark and plain colour for our actors to use but have also decided that they will be wearing very common clothes with nothing out of the ordinary, we believe that this will help build a connection with the audience.

Props and mise on scene

Mise on scene and props

First scene with India:

• Phone - so that it appears as if she is videoing the situation.

• Torch on phone - to provide extra lighting as well as emphasise that its dark and make it seem late at night.

• Common and plain clothes - to emphasise  the point that she is a normal and average teenager, which causes the audience to connect better to the story. 

• Her hair will have curls in - to show innocence.

• Dark mascara - so that it can be smudged to show that she has been crying and create a better dramatic effect.

Second scene with the group:

• Alcohol bottles (filled with juice or water)

• Blankets

• Ouija board (homemade) 

• glass (to place on the Ouija board)

• Plain clothes - all characters will wear fairly normal outfits to connect better with the audience.

Past students work analysis

Past student work analysis 

This film opening was from the thriller genre but uses lots of the same techniques that are used in the horror genre to film. We find this opening sequence impressive and useful because, from the start we are able to see that something bad is going to happen and through every shot they are able to build tension which makes the viewer more and more tense as the shots go on.  This technique was also very effective because it makes up for the lack of dialogue in the opening sequence. At the end of the opening sequence they use a good tracking shot as the protagonist enters the market to place the bomb. Overall we think this opening sequence was good and used some good techniques that we believe we can use in our opening sequence, the main improvements that I would recommend would be to show more of the minor characters and how this bomb will effect them, by doing this they would create empathy for the sub characters which would help to build on the tension.  Another fault with this opening sequence is that at times the camera was shaky which could be improved by filming with a tripod.

Focus pull technique

Focus pull technique 

In this clip we have attempted to use the focus pull technique to full focus from the tree to the building. We have done this task to gain a better understanding of the technique so that we are able to use interesting techniques in our filming. This task was reasonably successful but it took a while for us to work out how to do the technique properly so there were many failed attempts. Because of this task we now have a greater understanding of this technique.

Blog feedback

Blog Feedback 

From this feedback we have been able to improve specific things on our blog.

To improve our blog we re-read through it and corrected all spelling and grammar mistakes. We noticed from the blog feedback that we had repeated some words in our opening sequences post and the cashing shots post. We were then able to correct this and change the wording of the posts.

The blog feedback mentioned that our target audience research post needed to be more specific. It suggested adding in some graphs showing demographics for similar films from the imdb website. We have now added graphs and analysed them to be able to understand our genre fully.

Although we already had extra posts on the blog, we were able to add more while exploring different range of ICT skills. 

Production logo designing

Production Logo Design 

We are planning to use the concept of a playing card to be part of our logo. This stems from our name being ace media. We are planning on using an ace of spades in some form.

These clips have given us different ideas to use in our production logo and we hope to use animation if possible. In these videos we look at two different animation techniques which allows us to experiment with different techniques of animation.

Ace of spades 

We like the idea of using an ace of spades as our logo because of our name 'ace media'. We hope to incorporate the ace of spades logo in our production logo animation.

Ace media production logo

This image above shows our final idea for our Ace Media productions logo. Although it looks simplistic, we feel that this is suitable to our film as the aged coloured background links well with our opening sequence idea as Ouija boards are similar in colour as well as fonts. Initially this playing card had ace symbols in opposite corners but we chose to erase and blur these out as we felt that the logo would then become to crowded and overpowering, drawing attention away from our production title. We hope to make this logo more appealing and eye catching by including this into an animation along side two other playing cards which are turned over one by one to reveal the title of the production company.