Deconstruction: Target Audiences

Deconstruction: Target Audiences of Existing Horror Films

To ensure that our film opening appeals to our target market, we can use reviews from existing horror movies to get an idea of which films are successful. I looked at the reviews on popular critic websites on popular supernatural/possession horror movies.

Insidious (2010)

Insidious is a popular film series, it is a supernatural possession horror film, so therefore related to the same sub-genre as our film opening.
The first film grossed $97,009,150 internationally, making it the most successful film in 2010.

 

From the IMDb website, 162,486 users voted their rating of the film. The average is 6.8, slightly over half, this is further supported by Metascore rating the film 52/100.

We will take some common codes and conventions from the Insidious film series for example keeping enigma around the supernatural figure, but to be successful another concept may have to be chosen.

 

 

Annabelle (2014)

Annabelle is a prequel to The Conjuring, again, it is a supernatural possession horror film so the critic will relate to our film opening.

It grossed over $255 million so is one of the highest grossing horror films ever.

 

 

 

From the IMDb website, the users rated Annabelle as 5.5 out of 10. This is lower than Insidious but is done by less viewers which makes it less reliable. Again, we can take small bits of inspiration from Annabelle to use in the film opening but the overall film has a low rating.

 

In conclusion, instead of relying on a film for all of the ideas for our film opening, we should look at lots so that we do not copying an existing film. It is also important as the films above did not achieve high ratings on the IMDb website but still grossed large amounts. Although, we will not have the production funds of the films above so are unlikely to produce similar quality material.

 



Practical: Editing Flash Forwards

Practical: Editing Experiment - Flash Forwards

As we want a restricted narrative, I edited the story to include flash forwards to lead up to the final scenes. This increases the tension and forebodes future events, creating a good cinematic effect and fulfilling what our audience wants.

I had edited this part of the film opening before screen grabbing. But I have explained each step the exact way that I did it.

1. I layered two similar clips over each other by dragging one lower than the other on the storyboard. To then be able to see both at the same time I reduced their opacity so that the two clips overlap and are both seen, one over the other in the same timeframe.
 

2. To improve the transition of the clips I added a default transition. It was an replica of a ending tape. I made it shorter than the default setting as it made it less obvious and therefore made it flow better, and the flash forward scene worked better.

 

This technique of flash forward scenes means that the scenes fit in well and the whole scene fits in even if it is from a different time period.

 

Deconstruction: Answers to Questionnaire

Deconstruction: Answers to Questionnaire

To ensure that our target audience would enjoy our film opening we had to research who our target audience were and what they wanted.
We decided on having a target audience at a similar age to us (Late teens - 16 and 17). We did this by having actors at a similar age to our target audience.

All of the questions we asked on our questionnaire were multiple choice.

 

The main response to this question was supernatural - the sub-genre of horror that we chose to base our film opening on. As our character is possessed by a supernatural force, we incorporated the second highest want of our target audience - the possession sub-genre. Although some of our target audience wanted the other sub-genres we decided to use the most wanted option due to wanting to be successful with the majority of the target market.

 



 

The largest response to this question was having a supernatural villain in our film opening, which links to the sub-genre previously chosen. We decided to use this as an inspiration rather than a definite character as we do not have the programmes to be able to produce a believable ghost figure. Instead, we decided to use an undead girl. This conforms to common depictions in possession horror films. We are not planning to include large scenes of the girl as this will reduce the tension and enigma around the character, which again, is a common convention around villains in horror films.

 



 
To ensure that we knew how to address our target market we had to ask what they enjoyed seeing. This would allow us to include the most popular answers in our film opening. The largest want of our target audience is suspense and tension, we will ensure that we have this as it is also a common convention of horror film openings. We will do this through fast editing and a restricted narrative. Having a restricted narrative will also utilise unanswered questions and flashbacks, appealing to most of our target audience.

From these questions and answers we are able to get a good idea of what we need to include to be able to appeal to our target audience. We used a sample of 50 people in our target audience age which gives us a good representation of answers that the whole sample will want.

Practical: Cutting and Continuity Editing

Practical: Cutting and Continuity Editing Experiment

To ensure that our film opening flows well and is not obviously cut, I have to ensure that there is good continuity.  To achieve this, there are many options on Final Cut Pro. I filmed some clips in my own time to experiment. Due to filming new clips since I made this, this is not included in our film opening.

1. I imported all of the clips I wanted to edit and dragged them into the timeline.

2. I cropped and shortened the clips so that it wasn't as long as before. I did this through the 'blade' tool on FCP, as well as dragging the edge of the video to shorten it.

3. I zoomed into the timeline so that the clips are easier to recognise. I copied and pasted one of the clips of the hand as I believe it could look good with some added effects. The second clip I chose to reverse the clip, as shown below.

4. I then shortened it slightly to make the clips look better.

5. I then cut the beginning hand clip so that as soon as the clip begins the hand is in shot. This will decrease the length of time that the whole video goes on for. This will also have a better effect as the audience will not be waiting for the pale, undead hand to appear.

6. Again, I reversed this clip so that it create a good cinematic effect.

7. I felt as though the reversed clipped didn't have good continuity with the editing, so I increased the speed by 2x. Shown in the image below.

8. This is the final storyboard of the clips edited above.

The editing went well, I am likely to use this effect in the final product as it has a cinematic effect and creates tension as well as suspense. This is common convention in horror films. These effects are good to use during the titles, although, to create a better effect in our film opening we are planning to have the film opening interrupted by a full screen with each of our names on. 



Practical: Lighting Experiment

Practical: Lighting Experiment

I decided to film some close up shots of the girl's face to include in the fast edited sections of our film opening. As I didn't want the whole face in the shot to increase tension and keep the enigma around the girl character. I did a range of shots:

• The girls mouth
• The girl blowing out a candle
• The girls eye

Girls Mouth:

I used white face paint to paint the bottom half of my face, to represent the undead character. I started with white light facing opposite my face to create a blank lighting effect.

I noticed that the face was too bright and that the bare shoulder reduced the effect of the eerie mood that the shot was meant to create. So a placed a black blanket over my shoulders which made he face look a better shade of white and increased the eerie effect. 

After this I changed the lighting angle. I moved the bright white light downwards so that it was faced slightly upward, aiming under my chin. This made a large difference and the shot was complete. 

Girl with Candle:

I decided to include a candle in front of the girls face to increase the tension due to the candle blurring some of the face out. A common convention of the horror genre is to keep enigma around the main antagonist to create suspense and build anticipation.

The gap between the edge of the blanket and my jaw bone was too obvious in this shot. To improve both the colouring and the effect I didn't use a white light and relied on the light from the candle. This lighting worked better as created an eerie effect. 

I am unlikely to use this clip in the editing of the film opening as I do not believe it fits very well. I filmed the final shot to replace it.

Girl's eye:

I filmed this shot on a different day to the above. I used white face paint around my eye to keep the continuity in the clips and improve the effect of the girl's eye. I used a white contact to represent that the girl is possessed as it is unusual and when moved quickly becomes very eerie.

 

A close-up of the white contact lens

I used an extreme close up shot of my eye moving in different directions. As I filmed it myself the framing was off in parts of the three clips I filmed, but I believe that I will have enough footage to be able to edit parts into our film opening.

An example of the footage is below:



 

If there is not enough footage with the correct framing I can use the crop option on Final Cut Pro to ensure that there is no unpainted skin in the shot, decreasing the worth of the effect. 

Deconstruction: Production Companies

Deconstruction: Production Companies

Due to needing a real production company to include in our film opening I researched those that specialise in horror films.

Twisted Pictures

 

Twisted Pictures is an American independent production company created in 2002 by Mark Burg, Oren Koules and Gregg Hoffman.

 

Twisted Pictures produced the Saw films (2004 - 2009) in conjunction with Lionsgate. The Saw films are psychological horrors, and being the best known films by Twisted Productions, the production company are known for this sub-genre of horror and therefore not relevant to our film opening.

 

Ghost House Pictures

 

 

 

Ghost House Pictures was created by Robert Tapert.  

 

The production company are quite large in the horror film market. They produced The Grudge (2004), Drag Me To Hell (2009) and Conjuring (2012).

 

All of these films are supernatural/possession films like our film opening meaning using this production company would be a better idea than using Twisted Pictures.

 

 







Practical: Editing Experiment - Colouring

Practical: Colouring a Clip

As some of the shots we took are different colours and look too bright to fit into the majority of our other clips I had to edit the colour of them.
I edited one of the clips I shot of the girl. The clips were a little too bright to fit in with the others we had filmed to incorporate in the fast editing.

1) I cropped the beginning and ending of the clip so that the hand appeared as soon as the clip started. This will make it easier to add to the fast editing as the clip will be shorter and therefore look better with the others.

  
2) I selected the clip and then chose the 'colour' option. To decrease the colour in the shot I dragged the saturation bar down to -50%. This made the clip's colour less vibrant and therefore more eerie and horror-relevant.

 
3) To increase the darkness of the clip I changed the exposure i.e. the amount of light in the clip. I dragged the exposure bar down to -4% as the change is very sensitive. This made the clip darker and look as though it was filmed at night. It also made the contrast of the pale hand more obvious.

These are the differences:

The first clip s the original, the second is the changed saturation and the last is the changed exposure.

Evaluation:

• The editing had a god effect and had the desired outcome
• Changing the clips will allow us to edit them in and for it to still carry continuity
• This process can be repeated on multiple clips that need to be made lighter or darker

Practical: Filming Candles

Practical: Filming Candles

Using candles in horror film openings is a common convention, as if the candle is focused on the flame, the background becomes almost invisible, creating the effect of hiding something.  

The sound of a candle being blown out is also an effective sound as it is short and sharp and signifies the shot being put into darkness. 

I found 3 large candles and thought that they represented the eerie candles seen in most horror films. I placed them in front of a white background and filmed from a range of angles. 

 

 

This was the effect made in the footage. If I adjusted the focus on the camera I could make the background black which looked more effective than having the candle reflect the white background.

 

 



 

The shot on the left has part of the background showing whereas the shot on the right has a different focus and therefore has a completely black background.

 



 

To create the effect of someone blowing the candle out I needed someone to hold the camera. I got my mum to hold the camera at the place that I decided looked best and record me.

I ensured that the room was quiet because I wanted to use the diegetic sound of the candle blowing out. 

 

Evaluation:

• The clips filmed look good and can used during the fast editing of our film opening
• It is a common convention in horror films to have candles due to the connotations of focus and being put into darkness when they are out
• The candles do not link to our narrative, but I think they will look good if they are edited well

Deconstruction: Children Laughing

Deconstruction: Children Laughing

As we have a young girl in our film opening and children laughing is a common convention of horror films, I have decided to find a sound clip to use in our film opening.
It could be placed over the titles as a background, non diegetic sound.
Children laughing is a good sound to use in a horror film opening as:

• It is a juxapostion to the situation of the film opening, creating tension
• It is usually louder than other sounds, creating a distraction
• It conforms to the age of the possessed character in our film opening
• It is a common convention of horror films, seen in Indsidious

I found a sound effect on YouTube, I will download it and layer it over a nursery rhyme or a self-made sound track.

Girl laughing #1

Filming Evaluation - 7/2/15

Filming Evaluation

I shot a few clips on the 7th of February when the rest of the group couldn't meet up. They included close-ups of the girl hands and feet in a forestry area. I wanted the clips to have low, natural lighting so I decided to film later during the day and start the make-up at 3pm.

 

 

 

• I covered my hand and part of my arm in white face paint and let it dry.
• I then used black and purple eye shadow to create a bruised effect in between my fingers, around my nail beds and on my knuckles. 

I then went outside to the location that I decided to use as a contingency plan in one of my older posts. I asked my brother to help me, he held the camera as I directed and changed my hand movement for the shots. We started filming at 3.30pm. The lighting was really good and the clips we managed to shoot looked effective.

We shot for 20 minutes to get a range of clips as well as the number we needed for fast editing. I went back inside to then do the make-up on my foot/leg.

 



 

 

I repeated the same make-up on the foot, with multiple layers of white face paint and bruising around my toes, nail beds and ankle bone. This again took me 20 minutes so we filmed the next few clips at 4.10pm.

 

The next clips took longer to film as they were more complex than filming the hand as we needed to get the correct angle which was difficult as we needed to get the foot without the 'normal' skin at the top and we had no tripod to stand it on.

 

As we shot the clips later in the day, the lighting was different and darker so we needed to use a torch to be able to see the foot. This will effect the continuity of the clips so we will not use them next to each other in the film opening.

 

 



The filming went well and I was able to get all of the clips I needed. I will edit these and decide where they fit best in the film opening. I may not use most of the clips as they could be too dark or not have the same cinematic effect as some of our other clips.

I will sort the clips into fast editing and ones to include in other sections of the film opening and use different editing techniques i.e. the speed of the clip and reversing it, to ensure that the clips look good, and fit into the eerie theme.

Practical: Filming Short Clips

 Practical: Filming Clips for Fast Editing

  

 

 

In this clip, I step into shot. As I didn't paint the whole of my leg the small section of skin can be seen at the top of the shot. I could crop this out and use the whole clip although the whole shot is about 3 seconds. As I wouldn't have to use the whole thing, I will use the part in which I am stepping out and therefore only 'white' skin can be seen.

 

 
This clip is a POV shot, it is handheld and faces towards the ground. As I only painted one foot, as I was walking both the painted foot and my shoe could be seen. I will cut the shot when only the 'painted' foot can be seen. I may not use this clip, but if I do it should be enough to create an eerie effect during the fast editing.

 
I had trouble shooting this clip as I couldn't decide which motion/angle was the best to shoot it. I tried the clip multiple times:

• I kept my hand still and asked my friend to move the camera in a panning motion. As we didn't have a tripod I didn't think that it look effective and had an 'unprofessional' look.
•  I tried scratching the tree and keeping the camera as still as possible but still being a handheld shot. I looked better than the shot before but still looked slightly unprofessional. The clip was usable. I could shorten the clip and use it within the fast editing or layer it over one of the clips of the possession.
• I tried stroking the tree like the shot below, but due to the angle and keeping the camera still it didn't look effective so I will not be using the clip.
• I tried the scratching effect again but using a tracking shot instead of keeping it still, this looked more effective but it still lacked professionalism. I may use the clip in the fast editing but speed it up as the current clip is quite slow.

 
The shot above is another stroking clip. The camera pans while the hand is moving to the right side of the screen. This is the best clip shot. I think that I will include this in the fast editing as snippets and I may also use it as a longer clip during the film opening. I think that it could be sped up as the panning is a bit slow.

 

 This is another effective clip. The camera is at a level angle with the hand, and due to the colour it contrasts with the dark background. The clip shows the hand twitching. Again, I will probably use this clip sped up (and maybe reversed) in the fast editing and during another section of the film opening.

Deconstruction: Mise-en-scene in Possession Horror Films

Deconstruction: Mise-en-scene in Possession Horror Films

 I deconstructed the different mise-en-scene used on the actor to create a convincing character in The Grudge. I looked at the costume, make-up and hair of the character to be able to create a better example on the actor in our film opening.

The Grudge

The Grudge uses a young girl character. The character is not one that is seen a lot during the film. Due to the back story of the film, the character is less effected by dirt and mud. There is no one else in the film with interesting costume, so I focused on the character in which we are planning to have in our film opening.

Costume:



• The dress on this character is pristine, long and white and contrasting comparison to dresses in other possession horror films.
• The dress is worn with tights and there is no rips or tears, creating more of a perfect, untouched 'innocent' look. 
• This dress is obviously a night dress and therefore highlights vulnerability, which contrasts to the possession of  the character but conforms to the age of the actor.

 

Make-up:

 

 

 

The make-up on the young character is quite graphic.

• The characters face is very pale, an easy effect done with white face paint and therefore easy for us to recreate in our film opening.
• She has blood running from her eyes and hairline which makes the close-up of the character's face more intense and scarier. We can recreate this look with fake blood. We would have to experiment with this look as we want to make it look believable and have a good cinematic effect, if this make-up is filmed, lighted or applied badly it could ruin the desired look.

Hair:
 

• The character's hair is less messy and dirty than similar characters in other possession horror films.
• Her hair is parted in the centre and the only hairs out of the place are the few over her forehead, allowing her face to be completely on show, not hiding of the characters features. We could use this in our film opening although we want to keep a sense of mystery and enigma, so using the other use of hair would suit our film opening style better.

Evaluation

• The character in The Grudge is different to the girl in our film opening which means that some of the mise-en-scene will be different i.e. we wont use a pristine dress as our character has a different 'back story'.
• We are not planning for our film opening to include gore, so we won't use the large blood effect with the make-up but we will use the pale face used throughout The Grudge.

Deconstruction: Actors in Possession Horror Films

Deconstruction: Actors in Possession Horror Films

We need to research actors in other well-known possession horror films to ensure that our film opening contains convincing characters. My main focus was on the possessed girl as the other actor in our film opening will become possessed and therefore have normal personalities and looks. I researched The Possession.

The Possession

There is a little girl in The Possession. She subverts to the common media images of young children in horror films as she is normal and has no abnormal dress or make-up throughout most of the film. She becomes possessed so she is not in the same role as the young character we will have in our film opening. 

The actor is about 11 or 12, our actor will be older than this so we need to facilitate for the age difference to ensure that the costume we use suits the age of the actor and isn't an exact replica of the costume and make-up in The Possession.

Costume:

The only conforming costume of The Possession is the costume above.

• The young actor is put in a white dress. This dress is fitted and only slightly dirty. We could use this type of dress for the character in our film opening although we are only planning for the shoulder and face of the character to be in shot.
• This dress is long and have long sleeves. This is different to the majority of other possession horror films, as usually the dress is a nightdress. We need to decide the costume for the girl as we are only planning to have her shoulder in shot.

Make-up:

 
The make-up used for the make-up in The Possession is easy to recreate.

• She has white contacts which as a group we already own
• Her face is slightly pale -  easily recreated with white face paint
• Her mouth is filled with blood, which we could do with edible fake blood, a effect we were planning to use. We could use this in the section of fast editing to avoid the effect looking too fake.

The face the actor is making is not edited and made by the actor. This means that we can try to recreate the same look without needing any expertise in special effects.

Hair:

The hair of the actor in The Possession is natural.

• She has long dark hair, although not as dark as the common convention in horror films. Our actor has lighter hair than the actor in The Possession, but as we can take inspiration from this film we know that it will not look too out of place or ruin the genre.
• Her hair covers part of her face, this is to increase tension and create suspense. It also allows the creators to keep the make-up appearance of the girls face secret for longer or until the end of the film. We won't have the whole of the possessed girls face on display during any part of our film opening.
• Her hair is less dirty and messy than other films, a look we could use in our film opening. I think that a more messy look would be better as it would look more out of control - a reflection of the personality of the young girl we are planning to have.

Evaluation:

• Due to the length of The Possession the girl character is shown more times throughout. As we are only doing a film opening we can utilise the length of time to only show short clips of the girl, creating a good cinematic effect.
•  There is no large cost for this character/actor as the make-up used is simple, and we do not need multiple outfits due to only showing the shoulder of the girl in our film opening.

Deconstruction: Nursery Rhymes

Sound Deconstruction: Nursery Rhymes

Due to having a young character in our film opening, a common convention of possession horror films is to have non-diegetic nursery rhymes play over clips, I decided to find multiple non-copyrighted nursery rhymes and decide on one to have in our film opening. I found the following:

 Ring Around the Roses

I think this version of the song is very effective and will be good in our film opening in the scenes with the girl as:

• It has an eerie murmur in the background of the track, creating tension
• The voice is of a woman/child fitting in with our narrative
• The voice is a whisper which creates secrecy which is the main basis of the girl

As it is a copyrighted piece of music - from the video game Dead Space - we will make sure to give full ownership rights to the owner and we will use it layered with a piece of self-made sound so that we do not breach copyright.

Hush Little Baby

This song was made by the user of the YouTube channel, so I asked permission to use the track for our media project.

She said that it was fine so we do not have to worry about layering or editing the track.

I like this track as:

• The singing is chilling as it is a single girl
• There is minimal musical support to the voice which adds suspense
• The voice sounds quite innocent which juxtaposes the mood of our film opening

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

This song is again from the video game Dead Space so we will have to apply the same rules as before as well as layering it with a piece we have done ourselves.
I like this piece as:

• Again, the song has an eerie, demonic murmur in the background to the voice
• The voice is of the same woman as before which, if edited correcty, could be linked together
• I think the previous songs has more relvance lyrics wise as they are about children, linking to the narrative, although Twinkle Twinkle Little Star is a well-known nursery rhyme, the others are more fitting.

I am planning to place one of the songs at every point in which the girl can be seen. This will link the eerie nursery rhyme to the character, creating tension. It will also create dramatic irony as the character in the film opening will not see or know about the girl but the audience will.

I will choose the nursery rhyme that sounds the best when placed onto the clips and edited to fade in and out with the timings.