ruby's a2 media blog: 2017

Friday, 3 March 2017

Monday, 27 February 2017

Individual contribution

Other group members:

Zoya Ziauallah – 1200

Aamina Motala – 1135

The main area I managed

The element of the construction that I contributed most to was creating the poster. The main decisions I took over creating this section were: picking the image to use and designing the layout in a way that followed conventions of the genre, creating the layers and texts by finding and adding in features and also creating and typing up the different texts that could be seen on the poster and finally by using different techniques to manipulate the photo so that it looked scarier and better followed conventions.

Creating the trailer

Shooting:

The main shots that I filmed were the cupboard shot, the shot outside of the killer running at the camera, a shot of the characters eating (which was cut as we re-filmed due to an outfit change) and both angles of the protagonist running up the stairs.

Editing:

Towards the beginning of the editing process I began by lining up some of the clips in order to make form more cohesion between the sound and the visuals being used at the same time. However as we changed the sound track the clips that I originally aligned were again moved so that they worked well with the new soundtrack. I also created the moving texts clips that could be seen such as the title frame that appeared at the end of the trailer. I then embedded them into the trailer in places where the words would seem relevant and make more sense e.g. ‘he’s watching you’ as the protagonist is being filmed looking out the window from an outwards perspective.

Sound:

While I did not specifically pick the sound track used, as a group we all sat and listened to a range of different soundtracks each stating what worked well and what could be better in our own. This conversation influenced the eventual soundtrack choices.

Construction of poster

I contributed the majority of my effort during this project to create this element. To begin with I had to look into and research real media texts to see what the common conventions of a horror poster were. I then organised the text creating the layout and added the picture that Aamina had previously taken of the protagonist and antagonist. After doing these basics I changed the fonts and added in more text and features allowing the poster to further follow conventions of real media texts. After the poster had its basic form I then manipulated the photo using different techniques on photo shop to make it look better and more complete as a whole.

Construction of magazine

To contribute to this area I took the photo used on the magazine cover.

Creative contribution

To creatively contribute I suggested that we should do a psychological home invasion horror. This allowed us to start coming up with narrative ideas which I also played a large role in creating. Along with plot line contributions I also suggested certain shots that we should include in our trailer e.g. the cupboard scene and the shot of the killer running at the camera outside.

Timing and commitment

This was an area where as a group we all worked well and attended after school and lunchtime sessions out of lesson to get the work done. The main area that I would improve on if we had to re-do the project would be to film more concisely. I say this as during filming days we eventually procrastinated meaning we had more filming days than we needed to as we didn’t film enough footage in one go.

Wednesday, 22 February 2017

Soundtrack

From this music we cropped a small section to add to the jumpscare that we included at the start of the trailer. We did this as it made the jump more effective as there was a slow build up to it beforehand and without the music it would have been way less effective.

This was the music that we used in the introduction to the story line as it was calm yet still carried a spooky horror feel to it.

This was the tense music that we decided to use when everything started to go wrong for the protagonist. It continues to play throughout until the end of the trailer until the music fades out.

Tuesday, 21 February 2017

Friday, 17 February 2017

Poster photo manipulation

To manipulate this photo, I changed the brightness to make the mask brighter and stand out more so it didn't fade into the background. By making it brighter it also gives it more of a presence immediately showing the audience who the antagonist is.

In order to manipulate this photo I used the healing tool to remove small spots and blemishes on photoshop from Holly's face. Below I have circled the main areas that I smoothed out using the tool and the bottom image shows the smoothed blemish-less face.

Fonts

Making the trailer

Poster layout and production stages

Links between the three pieces

Script

(Heavy breathing)

Olivia: so do you wanna go out on Friday what do you think

Alex: I can't I have to revise

Olivia: it's just for one day we can just bunk school and then we'll go

Alex: I can't bunk

Olivia: come on Alex its just for one day

Olivia: see ya

Alex: get home safely

Olivia: thank you see you later bye

Alex: bye

(A loud scream)

Alex: (shouts) OLIVIAAAAA

(Whimpers and heavy breathing)

Alex: why are you doing this to me

Alex: (shouts) NO

(Scream)

Alex: please no, no please, please no…

Thursday, 19 January 2017

Horror makeup

As we decided that Olivia would die in the narrative, we made the death look as real as possible through the use of SFX and makeup. We filmed the process of creating a fake slit throat and made a time lapse from it which can be seen below.

Here are some still photos of the wound: