Production : Test Filming

Before we started filming our we started filming our the footage for opening of our teen horror film we practised with the camera we would be using, since we first started filming with 
I-pads  going onto the cameras were very different and we had to learn how to handle them and film correctly. We did this so our footage for our project would be better and more professional.

John test filming

Me test filming

Agne test filming

Overall we found this extremely useful when we started filming as we had experience with the camera and knew how to sort out the focus and contrast, as well as learning to zoom before recording.

Planning : Shot List

Planning : Mise-en-Scene

Mise-en-scene is a French term that simply defines 'put in the scene'. This term covers the main elements of symbolic codes like costumer, make-up, setting and props. By attaching symbolic values to these certain items, we'll have our audiences make assumptions or impressions about those codes.

Evangeline will have smudged make-up on her face – what is known as ‘mascara tears’ – this will show the emotional turmoil she's gone through. 

We will also have blood of her victims from previous crimes smeared on her face to show clearly what she has done and that it was her that did it. As well as blood splattered onto her white dress, which will represent her corrupted innocence.

Her hair will be messed up and big, showing how she’s gone feral.

For the clothing, we came to a conclusion of a white dress because it will represent her innocence – or lack of - but will also allow the red of blood stand out against the white. We also decided for Evangeline to be barefoot because it gives her the look of someone wild and out of control.

We came to a decision of using a meat cleaver, discarded and covered in blood. We think that it's relatively a messy but traditional weapon for the killers in common horror movies, and we also thought that using such a close contact weapon, Evangeline would get he pleasure of the blood – the lifeline – of a person running down her arms, allowing her to feel it, makes it more personal.

By showing old photos of her previous families will give brief ideas of the range of types of families Evangeline has experienced in the past. The photos will progress from very old photos to more modern ones as the opening titles go on to give a brief timeline to the audience. Along will these there will be features of newspapers consisting of articles mentioning some of the families' mysterious deaths. There will be blood splattered across the top of the newspaper.

To further support the fact that Evangeline is possessed by a demon, we thought of featuring symbols related to the devil, like a devil's trap or a demon sigil - these will be painted on wallpaper and put onto a wall - to represent possession and give the audience clues of Evangeline's current condition and relationships with evil.

Demon sigil

Planning : Casting

This is Evie Brudenall, she is 16 - making her the right age to play Evangeline. Evie is a great actor and does drama for A-level. However, she will not be able to film when we need her and couldn't get to where we need to film. Because of this she will not be cast as Evangeline.

 

 



 

This is Amy Boyce, she is 16 - making her the right age to play Evangeline. Amy is a good actor and is perfect for our character of Evangeline. She also will be able to film whenever and will be able to get to where we are filming, therefore making her perfect for the part of Evangeline.





This is Nicole Storey, she is also 16 - also making her her the right age to play Evangeline. Nicole does A-level drama. However, she won't be able to play the part of Evangeline as she's to busy to be able to film and wouldn't have a way to get to where we're going to film.


As a group we have decided to cast Amy to play the part of Evangeline as she seemed the most suitable and easy to work with, as she'll be able to film nearly anytime and anywhere, as she hasn't got a busy schedule. This will make it easier for us as a group to finish filming quickly and efficiently.

Planning : Location

I think that it's a good way of visualising the story board if you take photos of your planned location. With the shots of our location, we have a brief understanding of how our video will look like as a result.

When deciding on the best place to do our shooting, we looked at what settings are possible because having that sorted out before filming saves us time and avoids all the fuss.

In the end, we came to a conclusion of doing our filming at a shed because it meets most of our expectations. First off, it is a dark area, which will allow us to play around with light and shadows. We think this is a very great advantage for our opening titles since it's in a dark atmosphere with little hints of light. We can also use our own source of light, like a torch, where we have full control over.

Additionally, it's an unusual (and unlikely) place for a child to hang around with the dangers lurking around every corner, and we thought it'd be a great place for shooting Evangeline within the setting because it will go well with how wrecked Evangeline is. I believe that the mess in the shed could've been expanded from within her to her surroundings.

Planning : Storyboard

For our pre-production, John and I created a storyboard to show as much detail as possible like camera instructions and details of camera movement. We managed to include some scene duration and details of text like their placement. We think that by observing each shot in a panel helps us visualise our opening titles easier.

Although I believe we could have included further detail for each scene like the current location of the shot and the duration of how long the scene will stay on the screen. Also, we could have included details on sound used in each scene.

I think that in certain areas we managed to explain, or at least attempt to visualise a transition between two scenes, but to really go into detail we could have done a transition for each scene.

Planning : Screenplay

'CHRISTO'

by

Agne Jurkenaite, John Panther and Rebecca Brown

14th December 2013

FADE IN

Monochrome photograph, family, burning. Black background, only colour is that of the fire.

TITLE: DIRECTED BY... (White font, sharp, flickering, blurred.)

LATIN EXORCISM BEGINS PLAYING IN THE BACKGROUND

Panning shot of newspapers being thrown onto bench, blood splatters on few, begins slowly and the pace picks up. Evangeline will be on every article, camera tracks closer to the image of her face, close up showing emotion in her eyes.

Between this, meat cleaver, flickers when a new paper has been threw, blood stained and rusted slightly.

PRODUCED BY...

Transitions become faster, build of tension, from picture-video-picture-video etc.

Goes back to the fire and we see more burning.

QUICK SHOT OF EVANGELINE HUNCHED IN A DARK CORNER.

Possessed; black and white, monochrome. Brief and then slips away.

Pentagram of a devil's trap is seen, painted in red, blood. Only piece of colour.

PAINTBRUSH IS CONSTANTLY MOVING<GLIMPSES OF A HAND IN CONTROL OF OBJECT

EXECUTIVE PRODUCER...

Arm in pool of blood, only colour is red. Flickers so we get brief shot. Close-up.

Back to the burning photo before it switches to a dark, empty park with a swing. Creaking and moving slightly.

COSTUME DESIGN...

Back to newspapers. More thrown down.

EVANGELINE GETTING EVER CLOSER, NO FACE SEEN.

Wall with blood splat.

Burning photographs. More added to fire. Close-up on the child in the final photo.

MUSIC BY...

EVANGELINE APPEARS. STILL NO FACE.

Instant flash to a demon sigil with a hand in a pool of blood.

EVANGELINE. BLOOD MOUTH, DILATED PUPILS<CLOSE UP. SCREAMING.

FADE TO BLACK

'CHRISTO'

END

Research : What is a Screenplay?

A Screenplay is writing what is intended to be turned into a film and what the audience will see and hear when they are in the cinema. As well as this, the screenplay isn't the final idea and multiple other people will change it who are on the team when you direct a film.
To the right is an example and its 'Scream' which will be useful as we are creating a horror opening.
So from this, I know that a screenplay is different from a script for multiple reasons. The characters name is in the middle and everything is cut down considerably and has little detail as to what will happen. Written down as well is the shots and what the audience will see as well as what they will hear.
I know that I don't have to include every minor detail and I can just focus on the basis as to what will be included into our opening which is good because it means that it is open for re-working, developing and later changing our ideas.
One page of a screenplay usually indicates and equates to a minute in time and as our opening will be roughly be 2 minutes long we will only need 2 pages as to what will go into our opening. Also the names must be centered and capitalised whereas the dialogue will appear underneath and does not have to be in capitals. Scripts normally begin with a 'FADE IN' and end with 'FADE TO BLACK'. So I will ensure to include this when doing my own.
There are many different types of screenplays including;

• Literary Screenplay - language used is the same as fiction and is literary.

• Publisistic Screenplay - 'broken' language which is normally found in newspaper articles.
• Original Screenplay - written independently and is the original work.
• Derivative Screenplay - adaptation to the original.
• Director's Screenplay - descriptive part which usually includes boundaries between the definite shots.

In conclusion, I know that I will be doing an independent screenplay for now but one that may be adapted or have changes later on. This could be due to problems with filming, group not agreeing with the ideas or changing our minds about some of the things we intend to include from the Treatment.

Research : The Importance of Sound in Horror Films

This video allows us to see the similarity between what people think the top ten horror film theme songs are, for example a lot of them use instruments that produce sharp sound - e.g. violin, piano - or they use drums almost as a heart rate monitor to keep the pace and speed up when they want your heart rate to speed up, building up tension, there is also a lot of uses of children's voices as you get lower down on the scale and with this they use the music to give you the idea of a child's music box or lullaby. The use of a repeated motif is also used quite a lot, for example Exorcist's 'Tubular Bells', Halloween's theme and also Saw's theme used these a lot.

The effect of a lullaby or a nursery rhyme, shows the innocence of the victim or the killer. Lullabies and nursery rhymes also have quite a dark history and a lot of them are quite morbid, these are a few examples: 

- Mary, Mary, quite contrary
  How does your garden grow?
  With silver bells and cackle shells
  And pretty maids all in a row

 Which is a nursery rhyme about Bloody Mary and her bad habit of killing young girls and bathing in their blood.

- Ring a ring o’roses

  A pocketful of posies
  Ah-tishoo, ah-tishoo
  We all fall down.

This is a song about the bubonic plague, the 'ring o'roses' was one of the symptoms of Black Death - a red/rosie rash, they also used the posies were carried as protection and to ward off the smell of the disease and death, the 'Ah-tishoo' part is the catching of the plague - the final fatal symptom and the 'we all fall down' was exactly what they did, dead.

Also the use of the music box music in Suspiria is quite foreshadowing since it's a Horror film about ballet dancers and the most common music box always has a little spinning ballerina spinning around in the middle of the box.


Also this article suggests that maybe the reason we're so effected by the sounds in horror films is because they resemble the screams of frightened animals through the use of discordant and unexpected sounds. So the use of ‘non-linear sounds’ ‘enhances the emotional impact of scenes'. So they use our sub-consciences to manipulate our feelings with the use of sound, so that we immediately become scared through what the noises represent and symbolise to our brains, usually danger.


So the piano, strings and other instruments can just be used in a way that scares us through the use of minor chords, harsh notes that clash and don't fit together and sharp tones breaking away from the norm of harmony and thing fitting together, going against what we expect. This scares us due to the fact that it is unknown and unusual and as humans we fear the unknown, no-one knows the secrets held by all things unknown and people most probably won't try find out either. 


The majority of the sound for the film is produced after the film has been finished so that it can fit with what's happening within the film - e.g. so it fits with the opening and the film itself, for example Suspiria, the music at the start of this film sets the tone for the rest of the film, as sub-consciously you recognise the music box sound and you, link it to the little ballet dancer that always spun it the middle of it.