Evaluation Questions

1. In what ways does your media project use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media texts?

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

3. What have you learned from your audience and feedback?

4. How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Editing: Adding Sound

Once we had researched the different sounds that we wanted to use, we then had the difficult task of positioning the sound clips in the desired place. We had chosen to use mostly non-diegetic sounds, including heart beats and a tense, fast-paced backing track to emphasise the torture scenes implemented. In addition to this, the end checkout scene also features diegetic dialogue whereby the victim (as the employee) announces the price of the items purchased. Attached below shows the process carried out in order to efficiently place the sound files. 

The Heartbeats:

As mentioned, we had researched the sound that we wanted to include prior to editing and thus, we were able to import the sound clips straight onto Final Cut.

This screenshot shows the 'Heartbeats' sound file once imported into Final Cut. As the image shows, there were numerous beats included as around 3 minutes worth of sound was downloaded; this then meant that we had to cut the clip down to the number desired using the Blade tool.

We had managed to shorten the clips to 4 beats in order to line up with the footage already shot. It was extremely tricky to line the starting beat of each heartbeat with the cut of the flashbacks as Final Cut would only allow default movement for the clip, meaning we could not get the sound and footage to play simultaneously. To fix this, we had to zoom the editing pane is substantially in order to allow for more movement of the sound clip.

In addition to the heartbeats, we also decided to add a heart beat monitor flat line sound to be layered over a black screen. The sound was extended quite dramatically in order to build the suspense and create enigma for the audience. This clip was easier to line up as the sound itself was continuous and not broken up. 

Glitch Sound Effect:

In order to coincide with the modern concept of our narrative, we decided to add in a glitching effect throughout the trailer, including during the checkout scene, which was achieved using cuts and blading. To emphasise this, we imported an 'interference' sound which resembled a 'buzz' and layered this over the Security transitions we had added previously. We then copied the footage once cut to the correct length and placed them over the other two glitching intervals added. 

This image above shows the footage zoomed in to allow a clearer view of the interference sound; they are the 3 smaller chunks of sound.

Tense and Fast-Paced Backing Track:

The non-diegetic backing track used in any film or trailer is key in creating the atmosphere for the audience watching it; for this reason, one of the most challenging aspects of creating this trailer was finding the best sound for the montage of torture clips.

In order to achieve the sound that we wanted, we decided to layer various different sound tracks together. Firstly, we added a sound clip called 'Epic Music' which was very upbeat with obvious loud 'Booms' throughout and coincide with the genre. Additionally, the positioning of the said 'Booms' played simultaneously to the black intervals between each torture clip; this creates tension for the audience as they are on edge whilst watching the torture yet also made to jump by the continuous loud bangs.

For the majority of the trailer, we chose an eerie slow and quiet backing track to be played in the background of all the additional sound clips. This meant that during the more calmer points of the trailer, a soundtrack which conformed to common conventions of Slasher horrors maintained the atmosphere for the audience.

There is also a torture clip which features the killer breaking the victim's finger; for this clip, we layered the diegetic sound of bones breaking to increase the tension for the audience and adhere to the slasher aspect. The Screenshot above shows the final view in Final Cut of all the sound layered in the trailer. 

Diegetic Dialogue:

Under the 'Window' drop down menu in Final Cut Pro, there is an option to 'Record Voiceover', which we selected to record the diegetic dialogue of the victim announcing the price in the hardware store. By selecting this, it brought up a 'Record' option.

Using headphones which we plugged into the Mac, we were able to use the attached microphone to record the sound. The attached image shows the pop-up with the recording settings and options we used to control the sound recording.

This shows the final sound recording once recorded and imported in time with the footage in Final Cut.

Evaluation:

 

As mentioned, sound is one of the most important aspects of any film, both diegetic and non-diegetic, for creating the atmosphere, particularly in a horror film. I feel that as a group we managed to execute the task of adding sound rather effectively despite the challenges that we faced. I also believe that individually, we showed a variety of different skills due to the various different software used to produce or import the desired sound. Overall, I feel that this was a very successful task which we executed well to produce a professional and creative teaser trailer for our chosen genre.



Editing: Audience Focus Group

In order for our group to create a successful trailer which attracted the desired target market as well as follow common conventions, we decided to carry out a focus group session with volunteers from our target market; this was to allow us to identify strengths and possible improvements for out trailer. Vast amounts of feedback was attained, which was then analysed and acted upon in our trailer, which is detailed below.

Audience Feedback:

1. Blink Effect:

One of the improvements suggested by volunteers was during the eye-opening scene whereby a point of view long shot of the victim looking at the killer is used, however, the eyes close first and open later. This was not ideal and thus, I improved upon this in editing.

 

Firstly, I deleted some of the footage initially used of the killer setting up the camera to reduce the number of transitions in use and thus, reduce the total time the teaser trailer ran on for as we were slightly over the allocated 60 seconds. 

As explained in a previous post in terms of how to create this effect, I added another 'Centre' transition, but this time set the start as 'Open'; as a result of this change, I then had to go through again and change the remaining transitions to the corresponding 'open' or 'close' setting. The two screenshots above show this process, whereby I cut the clip and then inserted the transition.

These next two screenshots show a repeat of the process explained above, detailing how I added another transition and removed extra footage no longer required later in the trailer.

2. Scene Re-Shoot:

Another suggestion was re-shooting the scene towards the end of the trailer in which the victim is seen in a dark hallway whereby the killer pulls her back into the darkness. The focus group concluded that the hands used in this shot were too delicate for the context of the scene and thus, a re-shoot would be best. 

Our group arranged to meet in the Dark room once again, this time bringing in a substitute male actor to stand in as the killer. Using the cameras, we then re-shot this scene and imported the new footage into Final Cut. 

This screenshot from our trailer shows the new footage of the victim being pulled into the darkness by the killer. 

3. Conventional Scream:

Moreover, many Slasher horror films and trailers feature the stereotypical victim scream, which we had not incorporated into our trailer. This was another suggesting from the focus group, to include a girl screaming at some point during the trailer. After further discussion with my group, we decided to include the sound just after the scene in which the victim is pulled back into the darkness.

Initially, we attempted to record our own scream sound using Audacity, however, once we had imported this into Final Cut, there was a lot of background interference and the scream did not sound authentic. For this reason, we later downloaded a royalty free scream sound effect from YouTube which best suited the context of the scene. I then edited the sound slightly, making it of a more appropriate length, and placed the sound in the correct location. 

4. Building Suspense:

 Finally, in the first third of the trailer, there is a clip in which a point of view shot of the victim opening her eyes to see the killer's eyes appear in her face, inserted to create a jump scare for the audience. Audience feedback for this scene was that the music at this point did not build up suspense for the jump scare and thus, the clip was ineffective. 

This screenshot shows the layout of the clips and sound in Editor view of Final Cut before the addition of the tense sound effect.

After extensive research on YouTube, I eventually found a suitable sound effect which built up the suspense for the audience but getting louder and faster only to suddenly stop, in which point I placed another 'Boom' sound effect. Once the trailer was then reviewed, the improvements built more suspense and created an effective jump scare for the audience. 

Evaluation:

From the feedback gathered, I feel that an audience focus group proved hugely beneficial in terms of allowing us as a group to further develop our trailer to better suit the target market and genre. Although the suggested improvements were basic, the adjustments when reviewed after made the trailer much more effective and successful. Meeting with volunteers of the target market also meant that the topics of discussion and suggested improvements were focused on our chosen genre rather than generic. As a result, I feel that the trailer is now much more professional looking and a successful Slasher horror trailer. 

Practical: Making the Billing's Block for the Poster

In addition to creating a teaser trailer for our chosen genre, it was necessary for our group to create a promotion film poster which conformed to common conventions. My task in this process was to create the Billings Block and production company logos to be placed in the bottom third of the poster. This post details the steps that I carried out in order to produce these.

Research:

In order to produce an appropriate Billings block for a film poster of our genre, I carried out some research, attached below.



Film Poster for "Smiley", a 2012 Slasher Horror

Film Poster for "Mirrors", a 2008 Mystery Horror


 

Example of Billings Block from "Gravity" Film Poster

 From my Research, I concluded that Billings Blocks are often faded or blended into the poster itself slightly in order to refrain from attracting the audience's attention first. The chosen fonts are often elongated, making the text look stretched out and difficult to read; this is to also prevent drawing the audience's attention whilst still being recognisable. Finally, they are always positioned at the bottom of the poster, often in a faded white font; the use of white will also conform to common conventions of our chosen genre as commonly, the colours red, black and white are used to depict horror and gore.

Creating the Billings Block:

Firstly, I typed out the different names that I wanted to use in a Microsoft Word Document, using the font 'Calibri', as this looked most like the examples investigated. I then centralised the text and made the whole block size 9 to accurately represent common examples. Once this was completed, I then manipulated the size of the job roles, such as 'Producer' or 'Director' so that they were of a smaller size, accentuating the names of the lead stars and conforming to common conventions of Billings Blocks; in order to understand the examples of job roles explored, I looked closely at the 'Saw' film poster, as this film is of a similar genre to our own piece.

This image shows the exported Billings Block .JPEG file

I then copied and imported the text box into a paint document in order to manipulate the text and elongate the font, as shown in my research above. To do this, I simply pulled the text box size downwards to elongate the font. Using the Paint software also enabled me to remove the background of the image to make the implementation onto the film poster much easier. Once this process was completed, I exported the image as a .JPEG ready for use on the film poster.

 Making the 'Featuring' Names:

 I then created titles for the poster which featured the names of the stars featuring in our trailer; this process was carried out in the same manner as I created the Billings Block, explored above. However, after further research into film posters of the horror genre, we discovered that many of the actors which feature in the films are not displayed on the film poster aside from in the Billings Block, particularly as many directors choose to use infamous names to promote the sense of realism in the film. For this reason, we later changed the names to 'From the Directors of...' as this was a much more common convention of horror film posters. 

Creating the Production Company Logos:

Since the logos for the production companies and associations that we used in our trailer rarely change, we decided to use examples that were implemented onto an existing film poster. Due to this argument, I decided to use the logos from the 'Saw' film poster, as the examples used for this type of genre were similar to that of our trailer.

 Firstly, I imported the film poster into paint and cropped the file to just show the logos found at the bottom of the poster. I then cropped this image further to show the 3 companies which I wanted to feature and saved these images as 3 separate .JPEG images.


This image shows the 3 exported .JPEG files for the companies which will feature on our film poster

The following image shows the completed Film Poster with the Billings Block and Company Logos positioned at the bottom:

Evaluation:

Overall, I feel that I created a successful and appropriate Billings Block for our chosen genre and trailer narrative. I feel that I was able to manipulate text and images well in order to produce the task as desired, as well as experimenting with different software in addition to just Photoshop and Final Cut. Once the images exported are implemented into the film poster, I believe that our promotional film poster will be both professional looking and conform to common conventions.

Filming Script: Kidnapped Victim Reshoot & Poster Photo-shoot

Once construction and editing began to unfold for our trailer, we held a focus group with volunteers from our target market. During this session, it was concluded that the scene in which the victim is dragged back into the darkness when the killer captures her would need to be re-shot as the hands used in the scene were not "harsh" enough to reflect a dominant and vicious killer. For this reason, we arranged to meet with our male actor once again to re-shoot the scene.

Day 4: Dark Room Re-Shoot and Poster Photo-shoot

Location:

Invicta Grammar School, Huntsman Lane, Maidstone, ME14 5DS

Date:

Thursday 28th January

Meeting Point:

Kelsey, Bethany and Hazel will be attending school on the Thursday, along with a substitute male actor (Samuel Bartholomew), whereby all have been notified to meet at the School's dark room at lunchtime (1:30 pm). Permission for the use of the photography room will be pre-arranged with the photography teacher by Bethany. 

Props:

Bethany: Bethany will bring the memory cards ready for filming along with a fake camera to be used in the poster photo-shoot. A slot in which to use the darkroom will also be organised prior to the shoot by Bethany. 

Kelsey: I will bring the camera to be used for the footage, a change of clothes and a mobile phone to use as a torch.

Hazel: Hazel has been instructed to bring a tripod.

Extras:

A slot to use the photography dark room will be pre-arranged by Bethany before filming commences. Also, the substitute actor (Samuel) will be shown the storyboard and existing footage prior to the meeting to allow for more efficient time usage as he will already be aware of what needs to take place.

What will be shot?

A re-shoot of the clip from the trailer whereby the victim is seen standing in a dark hallway hiding from the killer , in which he then pulls her back into the darkness out of sight from the audience. We will also take the images to be used for the film promotional poster, which consists of a close-up of the killer's face behind a camera. 

Total Time:

The filming of these clips should take no longer than the lunch hour provided, ideally around 40 minutes.

   

Finish time = 2:10

Editing: Implementing my Production Company Sequence

As one of my previous tasks detailed, I created my own production company sequence for our own company, which we named 'KAB Media'. The next instalment of the task involved me implementing the sequence into our teaser trailer alongside the existing production company sequence: 'Twisted Pictures'; the screenshots below explain this process.

Implementing the Sequence:

Firstly, I imported the clip of the production sequence from previous projects in Final Cut; these can be found in the top left hand corner of the software. The screenshot above also shows the addition of a 'Fade to Colour' transition between the sequence and the corresponding trailer footage. I included this so that the sequence faded out rather than just cut in order to allow a more professional look.

In a previous post, I detailed evidence of importing additional sound to build suspense, however, once the production company sequence was then added, the sound was not in the correct place. For this reason, I moved the sound clip to a little later so that the climatic 'Boom' effect played at the point in which the victim is seen opening her eyes to see an extreme close-up of the killer's eyes. In correspondence to this, I then adjusted the other sound clips previously imported to allow for a smoother transition of the trailer.

For the existing production company sequence, we had incorporated the YouTube logo using a glitch effect we created using various cuts and transitions; to continue this theme, I then incorporated the logo into my own sequence also. To do this, I simply cut the footage in the areas of the clip whereby I wanted the logo to appear. By deleting the small fragment of footage between these two points, I was then able to import the YouTube logo and, using the 'Security' transition, was able to create the glitch effect. Additionally, an interference sound was used for the existing sequence which I then copied onto my own production company sequence to achieve the same effect.

This image shows the final layout in the edit screen of Final Cut in terms of the positioning of the production company sequence and sound effects.

Evaluation:

Overall, the implement of the production company sequence made previously was very successful, with smooth transitions between the various clips and sounds to serve as a professional looking trailer. Although this clip then made the trailer longer, I was able to extend the sound clips, due to each clip being of a sufficient duration, in order to avoid obvious interruption in the trailer, which would have created a more amateur look.

Practical: Creating a production company

To create my own production company I decided to use candles which I would then blow out. To set this up I wanted it to be all black so that only the candles could be seen in the shot. Therefore, I covered a tissue box in a black cloth and placed this behind the candles which I had put on some black paper.

In order to get the right angle for the shot I placed a book down which I would then put my camera on top of. I wanted the candles to be at the bottom of the frame so that I could place our production company, Kab Media Productions, at the top of the frame. I wasn't sure if I wanted to add the candles being lit up and blown out so I filmed it altogether and decided that I only wanted to show them being blown out.

To edit the video I used Windows Movie Maker. As my hand was in some of the shots in order for me to light the candles I had to cut them out. Also the shot of the candles lasted too long so I had to shorten it down.

In addition to this I made the lighting darker as I wanted the background to be as dark as possible. At the end of the video one of the candles relights itself so I also had to edit this to make it look like all the candles went out the first time I blew them out. I didn't add any sound as our production company would be placed a few seconds into our trailer instead of the very beginning so we wanted the music from the trailer to be layered over the top of the production company therefore no sound was needed.

I put the production company name at the top of the shot where there was some black space. The text is in white so that it can be seen against the black background and I also added effects so that it would fade in and fade out as the candles went out.

The final video looked like this:

Evaluation

• The production company can be seen clearly
• It doesn't last too long
• More effects could be added to the title for example one letter could appear at a time