Evaluation Question 2

Script used:

In our film we have used a young teenage girl to be the murderous stalker, using a girl made the theme of jealousy more believable as I think that girls commonly get more jealous than boys, there is examples of this in the media with the teen pop star Justin Bieber and the so called ‘Bieber fever’. Therefore we displayed her obsession to the extent she wants to kill all the females Chris has been in contact with. Our film complies with the male gaze theory to the extent we use high angle shots on Katie making her look vulnerable. However, we do not make the camera see Katie as a sexual object which is the main aim in Laura Mulvey’s male gaze theory. This is because she is a young girl and because she is the antagonist.

The representation of men in our film implies that young men are innocent and oblivious, as Chris has split up with Katie and he does not realise how much he has upset her. Also in the opening we do not have a reaction shot implying what Chris is thinking about the murder, then having the close up of shot with Katie saying ‘You’re next baby’ makes him look vulnerable because the audience do not see if he is aware or not.

The use of age in our film displays how attached teenagers can get, for example some teenagers get extremely obsessed with celebrities but we used an ex-boyfriend so that the audience can relate with the horror film. We did this because Denis McQuail explains in his theory of Uses and Gratifications that one of the audiences needs is to be able to identify with the characters. Also in the horror genre when the audience can relate with the characters they will be more scared. However, we have made it clear that not all female teenagers are obsessed with someone because Annie and the other females are not obsessive and controlling.

We had Katie as a lower class child; we showed this by not showing her home or family. Also her clothes were simple and unfashionable highlighting that she does not have enough money to buy new clothes. Chris and Annie on the other hand have fashionable clothing including jeans, and smart winter coats this shows that they are middle class. These representations could then lead to the audience thinking working class females are vicious and isolated because Katie is only seen in the forest where she plots revenge.

I think in some ways we have stuck to stereotypes for example the obsessed teenage girl stereotype. However, we have put our twist on it as it’s not a celebrity. Also some audience members may believe that we have used the ‘blonde bimbo’ stereotype as Annie is blonde and she is Chris’s new girlfriend and she is first to be killed making her look like an easy target.

But apart from that we haven’t stuck to the stereotypes of ‘innocent girl’ and ‘male killer’. We felt that it was typical to have the young girl to be stalked by a creepy man and have lots of girly high pitched screams but instead we went against those stereotypes to give the film a complete twist. Unlike Scream.

As the main part is the female and for once in a horror film she is the antagonist I think this would encourage more females to see the film as it would not worry them as it’s more intriguing to watch an unusual storyline.

Evaluation Question 3

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

1. 2. 3.

4. 5.

1. I researched Hollywood institutions to see if there was an institution that would be appropriate for my film. I looked up institutions that were mainly for horror films such as TriStar Pictures and institutions that focus on movies for everyone such as Twentieth Century Fox. However, Twentieth Century Fox have produced horror films, a recent one being Jennifer's Body (2009). I think Twentieth Century Fox are an institution too big and too popular for my film.

2. Whereas the institution TriStar pictures concentrates more on horror films two of which are Silent Hill (2006) and Godzilla (1998) these horror films are quite big well known and successful horror films, I personally do not think my film would be as successful as these films and therefore a Hollywood institution would not take the risk of taking on a film and losing money.

3.So I think my film would be better and more accepted in an independent film distribution, I researched independent film distributors and found, Exclusive Film Distribution, which are based in London and produce films from mixed genres. It has overall distributed 7 films, 3 of these are horrors, and one upcoming film is The Women in Black (2011) which is a well known film, but is being re made to update it. Also none of the horrors are similar to mine so it would be a good idea to have a new style of film which people would be interested in watching. As well as The Woman in Black, Exclusive Film Distribution has distributed Sliding Doors 1998 which is not a horror but it is very popular, which makes me think that our film would do well in this institution because other films have been successful.

4. I think our film would be for a niche audience because for a first time film it may not be to everyone’s horror standards so people who like horrors may not want to see it because it’s not scary and gory enough whereas people who don’t like horrors would not want to take the risk that it might scare them. So I do not think a mass audience would be a good idea because Cinema lines like Odeon and Empire would not take it on as the audience range is not wide enough. So instead I would like it to be just released to be downloaded off of Itunes, because Itunes is a well known site which is used by a wide range of people so the target audience could watch it also I think more females would watch it because it is not gory, which we found out from our target audience research that females do not like gore and blood.

5. I do not think our film has many merchandise opportunities because nobody would idolize Katie as she is the antagonist and she would be thought of as a psychopath. However, some teenagers may feel sympathy and connect with Chris and therefore buy a poster of him.

Evaluation Question 4

Eve 4

Evaluation Question 5

Eve 6

Evaluation Question 6

1.2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.



1. The cameras we used were quite good, the film quality was good if the light in the room was good, for example if the room was bright the quality would be excellent but we found when we filmed in a room with the light off we could see the complete contrast in the shot. Also when filming we felt pressured to finish the shots outside before it got dark because we knew that the camera would not pick this up. However, this put a good sort of pressure on us, and made us face the true reality of what professional film makers have to think about when filming at certain times.

2. We edited on the Apple Mac with Imovie, although Imovie does not have as many transitions and tools as Final Cut, we found it very useful and professional. The programme is very easy to use and saves automatically so we had no issues of losing footage. We found a font we really liked also and the colour scheme had a wide range of colours. In addition, we wanted to stick to the conventions of the shots being at night so the opening would look more eerie and follow the horror conventions. We were unable to film in the dark because of the cameras as they were incapable of picking up the shot in the dark, so instead we adjusted the colour contrast and filter on Imovie, no one picked up on this editing so it came across professional.

3. If we had more time, we would had more time to create the opening we would have made the music ourselves with mixers and instruments such as a piano. However, we found brilliant music and sound effects on the Mac. We used three different types of drone to play over all of the clips for the length of the opening; this worked very well as there was a constant flow of music with more volume at points of tension. Also, we used sound effects off the Mac such as the heart beat and the ambient sound effect for the flash back. These both created certain emotions for each part of the opening. For example, the flash back can be interpreted as a dream therefore this calm ambient sound makes the audience realise the different tempo and therefore understand that this is what sets Katie’s jealousy off. Also the heart beat builds tension and connotes panic.

4. We uploaded our film to Youtube from the Mac which took the maximum of 5 minutes so the process was extremely quick. Youtube is fantastic for all different types of audiences to watch our film. Also we can allow anybody to comment on our film which is great for feedback. Also it is a good website to be able to compare the rough cut to the final as when you have one up you can click on the side bar and watch the other so it is easy to access both.

5. To display my work and the group work I used Blogger, Blogger is a website used to write about anything and post blogs for anyone to read. On it you can paste html to embed videos and also work from Scribd, you can also upload pictures quickly and easily and write text on the website. The only issue I had with Blogger is when uploading pictures and writing text the format pushes both together so if you write about a picture the text may end up next to the wrong picture. I worked around this issue by using a lot of spacing and sometimes numbering pictures then writing about them that way. In the future I will definitely used Blogger again, because I enjoy reading other people’s views and seeing their work and would like to produce more of my own on my favourite subjects.

6. Another free website I used was Scribd, Scribd is a website which you become a member of then can upload any document in the correct format so that you can then view it online. I usually used Scribd to upload my work from Microsoft Word so that you can just embed the document onto the blog and read the document that way. Scribd makes most documents look neater and better presented on the blog. However, sometimes when uploading documents with lots of images it pushes all the images together so the document is overlapped and unreadable, usually I just needed to PDF the document then upload it to stop it from doing this.

7. Although work cannot be displayed on social networking sites it is easy to talk to each other when both online. Facebook is great for this; also we can upload our film onto it and get people to comment and like the film so we know if it has reached our target audience and if we can improve it.

8. As a group I think we worked really well, we communicated well and told each other our ideas and took into consideration everyone’s ideas. Working together editing was a lot easier than I thought as we all sat around and decided what music worked well and what transitions we liked and it all fit together really well. We have all had equal amounts of work updates on the blog. Also the technologies used helped us communicate when not together and make our film look professional.

Evaluation Question 7

Eve 77

Resit final titles

Me and Sophie picked our final font for specific reasons. Sophie wrote up a post on why we decided to choose this font. To see this post click here.

Resit final cut

This is the final cut of the film, we changed the film to suit the audience feedback and we are much happier with this cut than the first one.
Click here to see the final cut.

Resit rough cut

This is the rough cut of our opening, we uploaded this to Youtube then got feedback on it. Sophie wrote the feedback underneath the video on the group blog. Me and Sophie then sat down and discussed how we could improve our film to the audiences needs.
To see this rough cut post click here.

Resit filming diary

Sophie did this task as I was doing other tasks such as the film brief and storyboards. Click here to see the diary.

Resit Film Brief

I also did the film brief when Sophie did the Filming diary. I did a new film brief as the storyline is different to the old film therefore it could not be adapted. I did a film brief in detail which was a paragraph long and explained the plot in depth. The I did the film brief in 22 words, this is to show that I can shorten down the explanation of the storyline and it still make sense. I also did a detailed paragraph including media theories and connotations to show the wide range of research and genre knowledge that has gone into our film.

All three of these film briefs are on one document and post on the group blog. To see this click here.

Resit The scripts

I wrote both of the scripts.

The first draft of the script was just the dialogue section of the opening, this was to outline the key scripted part of the opening and to check Sophie was happy with what I wrote.

The first draft can be seen here.

The final script was the whole opening of the film, with the dialogue and setting. The script is very detailed with the characters names, locations and emotion behind each movement and speech. Also it is in each of its scenes making it easy and clear to follow. To see the final script click here.

Resit Animatic Storyboard

This is the animatic storyboard, I also did this myself. I printed out the photographic storyboard on A3 and filmed each picture and spoke over them. I described more connotations and aims for each shot to expand our reasoning and knowledge for our horror opening. Also I edited the film with titles sticking to the conventional colours of black and red and used Radiohead's song creep for the titles and credits as it sounds sincere like our storyline.

To watch the animatic storyboard click here.

Resit Photographic storyboard

I took the pictures and put the photographic storyboard together as me and Sophie decided to split tasks. The storyboard is not with the correct actors however it still gives a clear picture of the storyline and the shots we are aiming for. There is also descriptions about each shot and the justifications for them under each picture.

To see the photographic storyboard click here.

Resit Shot lists

I did both the shot lists, the first one did not include the final shot as we discussed that after I had completed the first shot list but I uploaded them both to show the improvements and shots added.

I made them very detailed so that anyone could pick up our shotlist and film the film, because details such as costume, reasons for the shots, location and other information is all included and very detailed.

These are the links to the shot lists:

The first shot list is here.

The Final shot list is here.

Resit Costume and Props

Sophie did the costume and props research and finalisation, but we had discussed what we are aiming for. To see these posts visit the group blog.
Costume research
Prop research
Costume final
Prop final

Resit Target Audience

Due to the change in storyline we had to adapt our target audience.
I did the target audience by myself as Sophie was doing a different task and I have put the new text in red so it is clear what I have changed. To see the target audience profile click here.

Resit Title transitions

We noticed last year that we did not focus on the titles at the opening of our film as in depth as we should have. Therefore I researched current and past title transitions so we have a good idea of what certain horror films use in the openings and what is conventional. To see this click here.

Also after visiting Theartofthetitle website I have found films that have iconic title sequences, so I looked at the list of films and watched a few then found Catch Me If You Can and decided I would analyse this sequence because it was the most unique and interesting. To see the analysis click here.

In addition I also looked at the running order in which the titles run in. For example, I looked at when the name of the film is revealed and when the director is revealed. I found patterns in the title sequences with the running order. This can be seen on the group blog here.

Resit Location Scouting

After thinking back on our last film, we realised that we settled for a location which was easy and convenient but not necessarily conventional. After researching in depth we have noticed large open natural spaces to be conventional. Therefore I took pictures of Hylands Park in Chelmsford, which has many quirky aspects we have considered and also large open spaces. In addition it is reasonaby easy to get to through different transport. On the group blog we have uploaded the pictures that we have taken and also went into detail on the hylands park pictures as they were the ones I had taken and therefore could draw connotations easily. To see the pictures and descriptions click here.

Resit Initial Ideas

As me and my group member Sophie Tindall are both resitting our portfolio we thought we should mind map new ideas, so we can start afresh with new ideas because we have decided to re-film. Me and Sophie sat down and mind mapped ideas about the horror genre. We took pictures of the mind maps and uploaded them onto the group blog. To see these mind maps click here.

Also we furthered our research by researching conventional horror films and around the genre. We then made this research into a film which we edited on Imovie on the mac. This was so we took a multimedia approach. To see this film click here.

Resit Introduction

I am resiting my G321 portfolio.
I have written a post on the group blog explaining why I am resitting. To see this on the group blog click here.