Location Scouting - Bexleyheath Church

Location Scouting - Catholic Church in Bexleyheath

After a period of deliberation, we eventually decided on our final location being in a church in area close to our school: 

Pros of this location: 

• Supplies a vast amount of mise en scene to work with so we could gather the best shots 
• It is in an accessible location near to our school so we wouldn't have to travel far with the equipment
• Provides toilets meaning we could work for extended periods 
• No noises or disturbances during our filming hours so it is completed without interruptions
• Permission to use this church was easily granted
• In a safe location
• Has prominent stained glass windows which work perfectly to gain some effective shots 

Cons of this location:

• A lot of natural light which could vary throughout the day
• The church was only open for particular hours of the day meaning we may have to alter our school scheduled in order to go there
• Services and masses may effect the timings and availability of the church
• Lack of electricity to charge our equipment

It is evident that this location provides far more positive aspects rather than negative thus it is likely that we will use this for our final location to film in.

Film Title

Film Title 

After completing our film opening, we were left with an immensely difficult decision of what to name our sequence. After hours of deliberation, we formed a spider diagram containing a huge variety of possible options:

We analysed all of our suggestions and formed a list of the top 5. We then did a survey for people to vote between our top 4 which were:
-The Crypt
-Possessed
-The Martyr
-The Sacrifice 

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/L3NZVD6

We then gathered the results from out survey and discussed the outcome to help influence out decision:

From analysing our results, we could see that 'The Crypt' was the most popular option followed by ' Possessed'. We thought 'The Crypt' was very fitting as a 'Crypt' is an underground room underneath a church and since we included a lot of religious imagery in our sequence this name complements the theme perfectly. Additionally, there were several shots of our protagonist in an isolated underground location which could represent some sort of crypt too. Therefore we settled with this option and used this to name our opening sequence. 

Editing Research

Research on Editing 

Editing software

Normally I would use Sony Vegas Pro but seeing as Final Cut Pro was the only available software within the school computers, I had to adapt and research ways to edit, as I was familiar with editing techniques but the methods in which I could achieve these techniques were completely different. Editing research was useful to me , as final cut pro was not an editing software I was familiar with.

Visual effects

A 'fantasy eye effect' on my eye to highlight the 'unknown' essence within the scene. This could have be done via Photoshop for every single frame within the short shot but that would be extremely time consuming, so using Final Cut Pro and I assigned two glossy eyes to some frames which tracked accordingly with the eye. Points were added on my eyelid so that when my eye opened, the glossy eye showed up with it. This ensured that the effect looks realistic and subtle. I found that the close up shot of my eyes coupled with the 'fantasy eye effect' had the most effect on the audience as I had asked several people if it was better with or without the effect and if it should be in a different camera frame.

Flashback

 I also had to research what would be the best way to represent a flashback and found that the 'flash' effect on Final Cut Pro would be the best to show a flashback. I also discovered via editing that a slight change in the colour, saturation and hue would be best to convey a flashback. Near to the end of the scene we thought that it would be most suitable to use quick cut editing using short clips as a montage to increase the tension in cohesion with the music. 

Transitions

The definition of a transition is 'the process or a period of changing from one state or condition to another'. In the context of film making, a transition is what the editor shows between 2 shots. The connection of the scenes is the transition. Transition can be the next consecutive scene, or it can be a fade or image change. To create our flashbacks we had to use transitions to change from one scene to another.

Target Audience

Who is our Target Audience?

Seeing as how it is typical the younger generation that enjoy watching horror films, we decided that our target audience was going to be that of teenagers and young adults.

Certification

However, seeing as our film fit the criteria for being an 18 certificate, we had to debate whether a film aimed at teenagers yet is an 18 certificate is a contradictory statement. After discussing whether we thought this would be an issue, we decided that a vast proportion of our audience would be teenagers aged 18 and 19, and young adults in their early twenties. Furthermore, we subtly acknowledged the fact that although slightly younger audience's would not be able to view our film in cinemas, the unfortunate inevitability of younger audiences viewing our film at home is apparent.

What do our target audience want to see?

Costuming

• subtle costuming
• realism rather than extravagance
• casual, stylish clothing
• modern, contemporary clothing

Imagery

• visceral yet thoughtful
• controversial (perhaps a focus on taboos)
• set at night-time
• violent scenes
• lots of tension build-ups and releases
• unpredictability 

Casting

Casting for the Role of our Protagonist

Actor 1:

- subverts the stereotype of the main victim being female

- of a young adult age range

- more experienced acting skills

Actor 2:

- conforms to the convention of the main victim being a young female

- would allow us to experiment with innocent, natural-looking makeup as opposed to heavy makeup

- of a young adult age range which would appeal to our target audience

 Actor 3:

- again, conforms to the stereotype of the main protagonist being a female

- feminine features and long hair

- developed acting skills

 Actor 4

- subverts stereotypical feminine victim

- of a young adult age range

- limited acting skills

Conclusion

In conclusion, we as a group decided that actor 1 was going to be our actor of choice. The fact that he is a member of our group means that he will have a similar creative vision to us when acting and portraying his role. Although actor 2 was also a member of our group, we liked the fact that actor 1 subverted the stereotypical gender roles often displayed in horror.

18 certificate films - survey monkey

SURVEY MONKEY

After we decided to certify our film as an 18. We decided it would be best to research what makes an 18 certificate differ from a 15 in terms of horror, so therefore we made a survey monkey to ask general members of the public. We initially thought to only ask over 18s, because we believe that it would only be appropriate to ask them, however, after much thought, we decided it would be best to ask people of all ages. This is because it will allow us to know why someone of a younger age would not feel comfortable watching an 18 and we believed it was best to find that out from the younger generation themselves. Here are some of the questions we asked and their results. 

From the results of this question, we inferred that our film definitely certified as an 18 as it included challenging and taboo themes, such as controversial religious aspects etc.

We were slightly shocked by this result, as our film does not include any extremely violent or fighting themes. However, we decided that not all 18 certificate films had to include this and as nearly half voted "only the majority of them". 

From this result, we were able to reinforce our decision of making it our film an 18 certificate. This is because our opening does include taboo and challenging themes such as stigmata.

This really assisted in our research, as it allowed us to differentiate what we need to do to make sure our film is correctly certified.

-Caera Mendez

Pre-Lim Task

Pre-Lim Task

In our evaluation process, we decided it would be a useful to watch our pre-lim task to see our improvement. It is obvious from this piece that we have made vast improvement in our variation of cinematography, for example angles and movement, as well as our actually skills involving holding the camera.
Another great improvement that we saw, was our confidence when it came to post-production. We are now much more confident to add special effects and music. As well as, creating over shoulder shot reverse shots and match on action, has appeared to become much easier for us to do, due to our on going practice.

-Caera Mendez