YouTube. (2011). Cabin in the Woods (2012 Movie) – Official Trailer – Chris Hemsworth & Jesse Williams. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NsIilFNNmkY [Accessed 23 May 2018].
YouTube. (2015). The Gift Official Trailer #1 (2015) – Jason Bateman Psychological Thriller HD. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3IiZU9JBuE [Accessed 23 May 2018].
YouTube. (2018). The Strangers: Prey at Night Trailer #1 (2018) | Movieclips Indie. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91-Z20uttEk [Accessed 23 May 2018].
YouTube. (2014). John Doe: Vigilante Exclusive Trailer (2014) – Crime Thriller HD. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBqEysLcJ-s [Accessed 23 May 2018].
YouTube. (2016). How to Add Real Gun Effects to Your Action Scene in Adobe Premiere Pro. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekt1iV8FQXE [Accessed 23 May 2018].
I believe that the final outcome of this FMP was quite good, I had a few setbacks with filming and time management but managed to overcome them and get the project done in the time frame, as stated before, there were some parts I was not happy with which could have made the project easier but I have learnt from my mistakes and are attempted to not do them again.
Writing the brief was the first part part of the project, which I think went well, going into the FMP I knew I wanted to do another video, as it is my favourite thing to do within the course. I wanted to broaden my portfolio so I knew I wanted to switch up what I do, as a majority of my portfolio is comedy-based. I id some research into genres I have never done pieces for yet I still found interesting and came out with 2 genres, the crime genre and inspirational videos, when I looked into the ideas I was leaning more towards the crime-side, but would’ve been contempt with doing the inspirational video. Ultimately I ended up deciding on the crime genre, I wanted to branch out and add a sub-genre, so I added thriller, it has been a genre I have been a big fan of for years but never got to produce a piece on the genre. I knew this would be more challenging than the inspirational video as it would be fiction, and many factors including storyboarding and script-writing would need to be thought about.
I believe my research was a pivotal factor for helping me produce the project in the long term, specifically the horror/thriller trailers, the reason why I believe it was a pivotal factor is because I without them I wouldn’t have realised many common trailer techniques in that genre e.g the cuts to black and text effects, without them being influenced I believe the piece would not have looked as good as it is.
The research portion as a whole went okay, as I did not make the decision to film a trailer at the start I only looked at short films, this research became relevant as I learnt common techniques that are used in short films. After the decision to change to a trailer I had to go back and do more research, which ultimately led me to fall behind on work, but again taught me many different techniques and characteristics which I conveyed in my piece. The extra research I did on effects also help, although I didn’t use all of them, I still taught new techniques that I could ultimately use in the future if I get a job in the sector.
After the research I began thinking about plot development, I looked back at the trailers in my research and tried to develop a unique plot that fits with the genre, this is where one of my major problems came into effect. I kept not enjoying the pieces I was thinking of and spent a lot of time developing the plots I already made, I attempted to make storyboards for ideas to further grasp me but nothing of what I was producing interested me, overall this led to me spending way too long of that stage, I originally planned to have a plot thought it 2 or 3 days but it ended up taking 8 before I finally thought of a plot I enjoyed and wanted to create. However a good thing that came from this portion was the many different ideas, it got my brain generating for new and unique ideas which could help me long term if I was in a future position where I needed to think creatively.
I then began looking at the characteristics of the thriller/crime and genre and thought about how I could interpret those characteristics into my piece, one of the key characteristics was fading in and out to black, I believe the reason for this is because it can bring along the plot is a small time frame, also it could add a factor of suspense to the film as the repeated black cuts could be nerve-wracking, I decided to incorporate that into the starting sequence of my piece.
Next up was filming, which was the key part of the entire project, this is where I had the most problems. Firstly, I had many struggles with casting, I asked many friends if they could help film an possibly star but I was let down many times, those who said they could do it ended up saying they didn’t want to do it which too a major impact to the final piece, when thinking about how it looked, I thought of many moving and panning shots but due to people not wanting to do it the camera had to have basic static shots which I am not a fan, to counter this setback I took many takes of scenes on multiple different angles, so I could cut between them so the piece would not get boring for the audience. The second problem I have was decided on locations, many of the scenes I thought of I had a clear idea of where I wanted to film but ultimately could not, an example of this is the second act, where the main character has been captured and is being told his task, I had the idea instantly to film is a run-down barn that my friends owns but, linking back to the first problem, could not get access to film there, so I had to improvise where the film, another example I had was in the third act. I wanted to film a shot in Port Sodrick near the abandoned buildings as I thought it would make a good shot, I didn’t think to look where exactly prior and when I went to film the building were demolished. Overall this led me to fall behind on filming as some parts I couldn’t film in the time I had. I have learnt from this mistake and if I do something similar in the future I will check the locations before filming.
Whilst filming I took clips I had into college and started editing them together, this was not as stressful as filming because I had a reasonable idea on what I wanted to do and didn’t need help from others, as my research was already there and I could take parts from it whenever it was needed. I got the opening sequence edited first, as stated before, I used fading in and out to fit the audio track I was using, the effects were very simple but I think it was effective in the long term. The next part I edited was the third act, from my research I took that quicker cuts made the film more exciting, so many of the clips I used were less than 10 seconds, and included action-style sequences like gun shots and weapon use. Another piece I picked up from research was text, any trailers used animated text to further explain the plot so I added some After Effects work to further grasp the viewer.
When it came to the exhibition I wasn’t too confident. My main idea from the start was to put it on the show-reel but I learnt just before explaining what we wanted that there was not going to be a show-reel, I developed an idea for a closed-in space so it would be dark, which fit with the genre, and nothing could distract the viewer. I wanted to have a area where it would be easy to make it dark but if not I thought of draping the top and side with a cloth-like material.
Overall I feel like this project was good, but could’ve been a lot better if the setbacks were not there, I also think I should’ve decided if I wanted to do a short film or trailer from the beginning as that took up a lot of time changing the idea. I felt like a trailer was the best option as I had a plot I enjoyed but could not figure out how to piece it all together, so with a trailer not every plot point has to be explained. Even with the change, I still think I fit the brief and the research related to the piece. As a last project to end the college course, I enjoyed it regardless of what went wrong, it has taught me to keep up with work regardless of the setbacks and be weary of those setbacks and how they could tackle them, the use of new effects could also help as they could be replicated if I get a job in the video sector in the future.
I also took peer reviews from those who did the mid-point ones to get the full review rather than just the opening sequence.
Callum M: “I quite liked that trailer, it fits with the genres chosen and has some cool effects used, but the dark scene drags out a bit and feels like it shouldn’t be there.”
Kieran B: “The final trailer is good but I do have some complaints, first off, as I said in the first review, the clips felt a bit too long, and the lighting during most of the film seems a bit too bright for the genre, I do like the effects though.”
Ben D: “I like the final result of the trailer, as I’ve seen a lot of time spent on editing so Jac took a lot of care in making it look good, the effects really work and the After Effects compliments the clips. The overall plot is clear to see also.”
For my film I am going with a mix of two genres, thriller and crime, the reason I have decided to go for these are because I am a fan of both genres and I think it would be an enjoyable piece to produce, also I can use this to broaden my portfolio as a large part of it is comedy-based, and a complete switch of tones can show I can do something other than comedy.
I have done research into short films, as that what my goal is, and a large portion of those I looked at were crime films, which had dark tones, which linked very well with the thriller genre. I took this research and started to develop possible plots.
Most of the plot ideas I were developing were either too similar to real films or I couldn’t picture how they would look, so I drew out a couple of storyboards showing how they would look, yet even with them I didn’t like how I imagined them.
After coming up with many different types of plot, I found one I could imagine well in my head which was the one on the right, with the main character being captured, I believed it had the most potential out of all the ideas I generated and flowed the easiest, on the same day I had a tutorial with Will, and when speaking about the piece I realised that I didn’t think of the story as a whole, but just the key areas, he then suggested about producing a trailer, as it would be much easier than a short film as I don’t have to write an entire script but just the key points that were on my plan. I thought this would be better in the long run and started to research into thriller/crime trailers.
After researching I thought about adding something paranormal, as my main idea including a monster in it, so I wrote down ideas on how that could be used but thought it would be better not to include as I couldn’t convey the sense of a paranormal being very well.
As I couldn’t convey paranormal very well, I decided to change my plot, I did a full plan above of the trailer from start and ran it through with many of my peers, who said they think it could work well if done right. The plot is quite similar with the main character being captured and being told to kill or be killed but instead of paranormal I turned it more crime based, mentioning he is missing and linked to recent crimes.
After deciding what the plot is I started thinking about possible shots for the piece, I tried to link shots to the plot, as an example, the bottom left being a shot depicting a murder, I thought about camera height and angles.
Filming & Editing
A problem I encountered during this time was how long I actually spent on plot development, compared to last year I already filmed half of the film but now I had nothing filmed, because I couldn’t find what I enjoyed, so I had to start filming as soon as possible, when thinking about the locations, my house was a certainty as the first portion of the film is supposed to depict a ‘normal’ day. So I booked out a camera and started filming the next morning.
For the opening scene, I tried to get multiple shots of one location, so it isn’t the same shot over and over as it would get too repetitive, so with a scene, I would film it 3 times in 3 different locations, and then when editing I would mash them all together, I think this gives the film some life to it.
Other shots were also included in this session, like the toaster popping and the main character on the phone, I did this so it wouldn’t be disinteresting for the viewers as he same 2 or 3 shots for a minute would be quite boring.
I then went to college to put the clips together, my way of doing it is by cutting all the clips down and placing them side-by-side, and checking if they flow well, if they do, I go more complex with the editing, luckily they did, and immediately wanted to work with transitions of the break in.
As the door opening is a long opening and it’s supposed to add suspense I calmed the scene down by making the loud bang the toaster popping up, the sound of the door and the pop were very similar and also the door handle going down to the toast going up links up very well, I asked Kieran about the transition and he said it was ‘bloody brilliant!’ I also cut the current music and right after he transition I faded in suspenseful music to fit the tone.
The next scene I wanted to film was the dark, interrogation scene with the person who captured the main character, I originally had the location sorted which was a run-down barn area owned by a friend, but during the times when I could film, it could not be accessed, I was going to settle with my garage but I encountered another problem, across the road there were builders so scenes couldn’t be filmed as the audio of that was easily picked up on camera. In the mean time, I filmed scenes just after the scene I wanted to film, which is the start of the final act of the trailer, the killings. I wanted the area to be open but somewhat secluded at the same time, and decided upon the plantation behind the Creg-Ny-Ba, I chose it because it is quiet there so scenes wouldn’t be interrupted and there was a lot of room to work with. I stayed there for around 4 hours and filmed dozens of shots, which a majority weren’t included in the final piece, partly because I believe that most of the shots weren’t very good, the lighting on the still shots didn’t end up good and the moving shots were hard to keep steady as the cameramen had to walk on bumpy surfaces.Similar to the kitchen shots, I filmed multiple shots on different angles and I believe the scene where the main character attacks someone works really well with the multiple angles
For about the next week, I spent a majority of my time piecing together the scenes I had, I started on refining the opening sequence.
The clips I had were already cut and put together, with some parts that I thought should stay untouched e.g the toaster transition and started experiment on how I could make them look better. One technique I tried was using swiping transition, however I felt it looked too unprofessional for a trailer so I went to look back at the trailers in my research. From my research I noticed a lot of trailers did fades to black to show what is going on in a quick way, so I tried to replicate it and cane up with the idea to match cuts with the piano keys in the audio I was using, I used the ‘film dissolve’ effect and I believe it works very well.
The scenes I filmed in the plantation took a long time to pick out and edit, in total I had over 40 clips with most over a minute long so I had to rewatch all of them and chop them down, I realised I should have took a bite of the scenes I thought were good but I didn’t, chopping them down took over an hour and a half alone which wasted a lot of time, but then choosing which clips I wanted also added another 30 minutes or so. There were 7 out of the many that I picked out as if I picked more the trailer would’ve been too long, 3 of them is a kill scene and the other 4 are miscellaneous shots for use when there is a voiceover.
I started to work on the kill scene, and going back to my research I liked the idea of text giving more plot, as seen in the trailer for John Doe: Vigilante. First I had to find a suitable font, I went onto dafont and went to the ‘Broken’ section, it had many fonts I didn’t like but one called Broken Detroit caught my eye, it was a thick font with scratches and marks in it which I thought fit the mood of the trailer perfectly so I downloaded it.
I opened an After Effects file and opened a new text layer, I didn’t know what to write to begin with so I thought how the plot links with the kills, so I decided upon “If you were told to kill… could you do it?” I decided this so it somewhat breaks the 4th wall and asks the audience if they could do the same thing. Rather than the text just appearing I wanted to animate it, I originally tried moving it to be side slightly but that was not working, a random thought reminded me of the last project, and the use of the glitching text effect, I enjoyed it a lot so decided upon using that for both, I rendered the sentences into two separate files and placed them between the clips.
The next part I worked on was one of the hardest but arguable best effect sin the trailer, a gunshot that looks real, I tried to figure it out myself with lighting effects but I had to look on YouTube for a tutorials. The one I used was this
I tried to replicate the tutorial but for some reason the lighting wasn’t coming up, so I tried to delete the clips and replace them, luckily it started working and I messed around with the mask feather to try and make it look smoother, to add effect, I added a gunshot effect, overall I think the effect looks really good.
After that was done, I filmed some more clips, sadly, those who said they could help film let me down after multiple times so the shots had to be static, I went up to Marine Drive and wanted the film some background shots for voiceovers later on, but also filmed another kill scene, as I wanted to use the gunshot effect again.
I wants the gun to be seen in this shot so I could try out a muzzle flare alongside the flash, I downloaded a green screen of one and did the same steps as in the tutorial and I think it looks better than the original, the lighting is definitely brighter and the muzzle flash works well with it.
The next piece of work I did was the voiceovers, the first was for the villain, as I didn’t want the identity to be known, when I recorded it, I played around with many distortion effect so it is deep and undefinable, I think it works very well with the genre of the trailer.
The next one I wanted was for the last scene I filmed, as it is the main character walking out of hiding I wanted a voiceover if someone as a news anchor mentioning that the main character is on the run and linked the the deaths, I got Ben Dempsey to do that voice and didn’t add any audio effects to it.
The penultimate voice clip I got was the main character explaining that he is going to find and kill the guy responsible for all that’s happened to him, I added that near the end over the miscellaneous shots I filmed prior.
Finally, the last one I got was the main character explaining that they didn’t want to kill but they have to do, I linked it up with a video but cut it so the voiceover is shown over 2 clips. I think all the voice clips turned out very good and wouldn’t change much about them.
I finally got the time to film the interrogation scene of the trailer, which took a long time as I wanted to make this part very captivating, I thoroughly remembered what the voiceclip I previously recorded was so I could reply to it. Again, I used the multiple takes from different angles approach, and even took head movements into thought, as you would see, my head goes right and it cuts to my head still turning, I had to limit angles though due to the garage having stuff that would not fit with the theme of the trailer e.g a bike in the background, so to avoid that I just didn’t film where it was seen in the background, this scene took a long time to edit as I wanted the voiceline and clips to match up perfectly, which I believe did work, I also added a thud for the door closing for added effect.
I only needed one more shot before filming was done, which was a transition to black, the way I did this was by the main character throwing a black object over the camera lense, so then I could cut it to black, I used a similar technique for my title sequence last FMP and thought it looked good so I reused it. I filmed it in the printing room and the walls are very broken and don’t look very appealing, which fits the tone.
Finally, I needed to add the ending sequence, I had the audio already selected out for this piece as I felt it would work the best. I opened a new file in After Effects and using he same font as I used prior, I put the title ‘The Killer Within” in the center, the trailers in my research had the logo animated in most so I added a small scale change which is simple but effective. I then cut it to a screen saying ‘Coming Soon’ as trailers commonly do that, another little piece I added was a social media hashtag, in this generation, social media is a pivotal piece of society so generating buzz with a hashtag would be a good marketing strategy, so I put ‘#KillerWithin’ in the corner. I also added a fade to black, signifying the end of the trailer.
Costume Design
When it came to my film, one of the things I cared about the most was continuity, and this focused heavily on costume design, as the plot has the main character on the run, he wouldn’t be able to go home and get changed, so to keep with continuity, when I filmed every scene, I had the same clothes on, start to finish. A small feature you may not see is the hair, throughout it gets messier, this is similar to the clothing, a convict would not be able to go get a haircut, so the hair would just keep growing and getting more messy. I believe the continuity is a small feature but extremely effective as it would take viewers out of the immersion if clothes and hair kept changing.
Final Thoughts
Overall I enjoyed my piece, even with be setbacks I faced, I go more in-depth with my Final Evaluation on what parts I liked, didn’t like, and what I would change.
Week beginning 19th March: Researched into short films, more detail into the crime films rather than crime-detective, started looking into plot ideas.
Week beginning 26th March: Continued looking into plot develop, discussed with Will to turn film into trailer, researched into Horror/Thriller trailers, then thought of creepy ideas for a thriller-esque trailer.
Week beginning 2nd April: Looked into characteristics of the thriller and crime genres, and how they can both link, started storyboarding ideas, also sketched some shot lists, continued with more plot development, also looked into possible effects that could be used.
Week beginning 9th April: Started filming sequences, took them into college and started roughly editing the pieces together, wrote shot-for-shot lists for rest of film.
Week beginning 16th April (Where we’re at whilst writing): Started filming some scenes, but due to being let down not a lot, focused heavily on editing the starting sequences to a professional standard, start to look at music and background sounds. Get peer reviews on starting sequence.
Week beginning 23rd April: Have audio decided and start filming missing scenes, during college edit what I have, re-watch effect tutorials and how I could incorporate them.
Week beginning 30th April: Attempt to finish off filming (if done by then) and focus solely on editing pieces together, finally decide on a title, start to think how to display work when done.
Week beginning 7th May: Finish off core editing and if not satisfied go more in-depth with editing ideas (cuts, transitions etc.) Add After Effects pieces showing title and ‘coming soon’ at the end to fit with the trailer vibe. Near end of week start to render.
Week beginning 14th May: Re-check audio is in right place, scenes are in order, effects are good, and the audio is synced up with the film. Also check if rendered right (H.264, 720P.)
During the production of my final major project I have experienced a lot of mishaps which have forced me to change the project in the long term, first is the film as a whole, due to time constraints and the footage I currently have I have decided to make my video a trailer for the film rather than the fully fledged piece. A reason I have decided upon this is I spent a long time trying to piece together a full plot, but with a trailer, it is acceptable to leave pieces not told, as it could be a catalyst for seeing the movie. Producing a trailer can also leave me more time to edit the piece together rather than going out filming.
Another problem I came across was casting, many of those I asked to either star in the film/trailer or help out with work declined, which I was not prepared about as I thought they would’ve agreed. Overall, this has taken a toll on production as many of the shots are just me and still as I had to set up the camera myself, I believe this is not very good as the film may not be captivating with many still shots.
For the next half of the project I am going to focus heavily on getting all the filming done and spending most of the time on editing, as I believe that will be the catalyst of if the trailer is good or not, which I am hoping is. Currently I have the opening scene for the trailer near completion with some clips in the middle which I when not placed together.
Peer Reviews:
Kieran B: “The starting sequence of Jac’s film looks good, I didn’t realise it was a trailer though because some of the shots seemed a bit long, however I still believe it could work with editing.”
Callum M: “The starting sequence looks pretty good, the clips are a bit too long though and need to be trimmed down.”
Ben D: “Jac’s trailer looks alright so far, the clips fit together good but he defiantly needs to get more filming done as the starting sequence alone doesn’t hold up by itself.”
Idea 1: The first idea I have for displaying my piece is via the showreel, or if there is not enough videos for it, and the room is free, use it myself, the reason why I believe this would be a good idea of displaying is because the some of my film is shot in the dark, and along with a dark area, it could compliment much better than just a computer screen in the light. If I were to use it I would attempt to re-create part of the trailer, where the main character is told what he needs to do, alone, in the dark.
What will be needed:
Projector
Speaker
Chairs
Dark Space
Big Space
Idea 2: The second idea I have is somewhat similar to the first but a more personal space for my piece. One of the key conventions I want for my film is to have it shown in darkness as I believe it goes along with the film, the idea is quite simple, have a screen on a table/stand and covering all sides is a sort of tarp-like material, this way it can block most light from the area where the piece is and the person watching can be fully invested in the project. I also thought of possibly adding props to the exhibition so it makes it look a bit better than just a screen.
“Hello Jac, you are probably wondering why you are here, it is because i have a task for you. In front of you are pictures of humans, your task is to kill them… I know it may come as a shock but you have already been selected, you cannot run or hide, we are always watching your every move. You will now be working off-the-grid, under my instructions, the police will not be brought into this game, if they are, you, along with your family, will die. If you do not co-operate or complete in the timeframe, you will die. You have 2 weeks, it’s kill… or be killed… let the games begin…”
The One Minute Time Machine trailer has to quickly show what the film is about without spoiling it too much as the entire film is only 30 seconds long, they grab the audience with many of the best lines throughout the film so people know exactly that it is a comedy film, and what the plot is, the man going back in time to speak to the woman.
Thriller/Horror Trailers
In the Insidious: The Last Key trailer one of the prominent things it does it show quick cuts so it doesn’t give too much away in specific areas, it also starts by showing the main demon on the film, Keyface, to show viewers exactly who the main antagonist of the film is, when showing portions of the film is also includes a voiceover from Elise, the protagonist, about what she’s been through and what she’s trying to do, so viewers have an idea of what the plot is so they don’t go into the film blind.
The Cabin in the Woods trailer is near polar-opposite to that of the Insidious trailer, rather than showing a lot of the plot with a voiceover it doesn’t show any key points of the plot but shows a lot more action-style parts e.g. the van getting destroyed and windows breaking, there is a slight voiceover that subtly tells the plot but not enough to piece together the full plot. This ensures that viewers can go see the film without a majority of the plot being shown prior.
The trailer for The Gift is slightly different, which is good for broadening research, rather than all the tension coming in right from the start, it goes from normal and progressively gets creepier with just gifts, then looking through the window to then video tapes being sent, this trailer clearly shows what the problem is from the trailer but leaves out key plot points like what Simon did 25 years ago which may lead people going to find out what that was, also the conclusion to who Gordo is and why he keeps coming to the house.
Similar to that of The Gift trailer, The Strangers: Prey at Night trailer starts normal and ever so slightly gets more creepy, up to the reveal of the main antagonist and the trailer goes full action. Showing a lot of tension and intensity from the antagonists.
The trailer for John Doe: Vigilante takes a more action side than the previous trailers, it starts by letting the audience know exactly who the killer is and what his intensions are, however as the ‘Vigilante Movement’ goes on it goes more action-esque, especially around 1:58, where rock music is being played over gunfights and explosions. However, for my trailer I am not wanting to go for an action feeling to it.
The trailer for You’re Next includes many styles that I am wanting to include into my trailer, the first one is how everything seems normal and happy at the start, and then a big moment which changes the feel of the trailer straight away, it also uses quick cuts and fades to black, which adds tension
Since my film is the crime genre, a gun would most likely be used, and with a muzzle flash it makes the gun realistic
Double Exposure Titles-
With the double exposure titles. It shows a nice effect without the film being taken off track with the title sequence e.g where a character starts driving and the exposure titles appear, a small but effective technique
Deep It is an award winning film made in London and produced by Fully Focused. One of the key points I enjoy about this film is the dialogue, due to it trying to be real, and based off a true story, the dialogue for nearly every character flows perfectly and sounds like a real conversation. Another point of the film I like is the cinematography, after the main character has been slapped the camera starts shaken and on angles to convey that he’s been getting angry and going insane. As it is a short film the characters would not have enough time to be fleshed out but the film conveys what the characters are like very well, from the great written dialogue.
Notes:
Use of dynamic cutting at the start and end to portray everything as real
Based on a true story
Already fleshed out characters, no need for full fleshing
Key point of the film clearly shown with recurring cast
One of the key parts of this film that I enjoy is the camerawork, every shit seems to be cleverly though about from the angle to framing, there are a couple of shots that pan from something far away to close and vise versa which is a simple but good transition to focus on something else, I also like the different use of effects, especially when the character listens to music that would be in a Wild West film, the camera cuts to borders and a filter, it keeps he viewer watching. One of the problems with this film though is the pacing, some scenes seem a bit drawn out, an example of this is placing all the weapons in the the back of the car, then choosing all of them, it does not fit to the sport off the rest of the film.
Notes:
Gives off that it is not crime related at the beginning, quick reveal with back seat shot of girl
Used differ et film techniques, with the Wild West theming with the music
Uses explosion effects, adds more depth to techniques
Signal is a crime/comedy short film made by JKK Films, the gag of the film is a car with criminals heading to commit a crime, and instead of driving, waiting for a car to go part, but the car did not signal and turned, the best part about this film is defiantly the lighting, as it is pitch black, the careful placement of the lights from cars and police lights light up the scene and keep up the feeling of a police car there, as they keep they would keep their lights on, the gunshot effects are also very good and look almost lifelike, I would like to include something like that in my film.
Notes:
Very short, no character depth
Takes a more comical side, crime film yet includes waiting at stop signs, use of happy music for killing
Careful use of lighting
Use of gunshot effects, not just the shot but lighting effects around the area
Contact is a thriller film made by JStuStudios, it focuses on a radio randomly turning on and giving co-ordinates, this adds a feeling of paranormal activity to the film, as the film is from the main characters perspective, many of the shots are directly facing him, so the facial expressions can be used to show reaction to many factors of the film, the camerawork and the lighting seems very nostalgic, especially the shots in the bedroom, they look straight out of the mid 2000’s horror films with the high contrast popping every colour out in the room, as I am wanting my film to be quite dark I don’t think I would be using that effect. One of the things that lets this film down is the acting, especially from the friend, when speaking to the main character his lines are not fluent at all and sound like it was straight off the script, with no expression to make it sound genuine, this takes me out of the film as it sounds too unrealistic for friends to speak with that robotic-ness.
Notes:
Professional Intro, starts off the film like any other
Lots of shots camera is moving with the actor, seeing his perspective at all times, sticks until the ending where you don’t see the ‘monster.’ Lots of use of reaction shots
Use of Dutch tilt when there is suspended scenes
Mise-en-scene when in the bedroom tends to mostly focus on the radio, as it is the key factor of the film
Minimal to no use of a soundtrack. All natural sounds, plays off well with the radio randomly being turned on
Jump-cuts in between running to add further tension to the film.
Poor acting from side-characters gives off unrealistic vibe as friends would be fluent when talking
Abrupt ending so viewers can interpret what they think the ending is.
Out of Depth is a crime short film made by Boxed Globe Productions. One of the key fractures I like about this film is the use of After Effects, it is used when the character is texting, the reason why I like this is so the plot can keep developing whilst showing the message, it could also be way to not show the phone, as the camera shot may not be very good, this film also uses gunshots, which as I stated earlier, I want to include in my film. A smart idea for this film is not dialogue, this means the cast does not have to be perfect as they only have to convey the film through facial emotions rather than facial emotions and dialogue, it also means viewers could interpret what they think the characters are thinking.
Notes:
Plot of the movie is clear, there is a target and someone needs to kill them
Think the kill is completed straight away, but there is a flashback
Use of text message showing up on screen via After Effects, see the expression of the character with the message
No talking, this means the level of acting does not have to be very good
Most of the plot ideas I were developing were either too similar to real films or I couldn’t picture how they would look, so I drew out a couple of storyboards showing how they would look, yet even with them I didn’t like how I imagined them.
After researching I thought about adding something paranormal, as my main idea including a monster in it, so I wrote down ideas on how that could be used but thought it would be better not to include as I couldn’t convey the sense of a paranormal being very well.
As I couldn’t convey paranormal very well, I decided to change my plot, I did a full plan above of the trailer from start and ran it through with many of my peers, who said they think it could work well if done right. The plot is quite similar with the main character being captured and being told to kill or be killed but instead of paranormal I turned it more crime based, mentioning he is missing and linked to recent crimes.
After deciding what the plot is I started thinking about possible shots for the piece, I tried to link shots to the plot, as an example, the bottom left being a shot depicting a murder, I thought about camera height and angles.
Similar to the kitchen shots, I filmed multiple shots on different angles and I believe the scene where the main character attacks someone works really well with the multiple angles
The next piece of work I did was the voiceovers, the first was for the villain, as I didn’t want the identity to be known, when I recorded it, I played around with many distortion effect so it is deep and undefinable, I think it works very well with the genre of the trailer.
Jac Cannon- Level 3 Creative Media -Year 2 