Target Audience

Media theories will help me describe our target audience. A demographic way of disscussing our target audience is by using gender, race, age and socio-economic status. We will be wanting to attract male and females of any race to watch our film. We are wanting a cinema going audience who like to watch horror/thriller films to be attracted. The socio-economic staus of our audience will be anyone that can afford to buy a ticket to the cinemas or buy a DVD. Our target audience can be anyone from the self-actualization pyramid as anyone in this pyramid can watch our film.
Emma Jopson

Scripts For The Main Task

There will be no diologue playing when the news reporter is on television so we did not have to write a script for Aamir to say. We did decide that when the girl and her friend meet in the street there would be minimum diologue between them both. The only convesation they will have is:

• Seonade Cudden-(Screams)
• Joeseph Cudden- "What are you doing out here, so late"
• Seonade Cudden- "I'm going to a party"
• Joeseph Cudden- "Right, Well just be careful yeah?" (Joeseph gets stabbed)
• Seonade Cudden- (Screams)

Emma Jopson

Props List and Costume Plans

We have decided to keep the props and costume as simple as possible so that it does not make the clip look complicated.

Props will include a music player, and basic household items to be in the background of the shot at the begining of the clip.

Costume-

• Seonade Cudden-a black 'going out' dress/top to make her look like she is going to a party, with a coat as it is cold outside
• Joeseph Cudden-a casual jacket to make him look like he is an ordinary person
• Alix Sampford- a black hoodie so that he looks mysterious and unknown
• Aamir Shah- suit and tie to make him look like a reporter

Emma Jopson

Music For Our Main Task

It took us a long time to get the final music for our main task. We listened to many CDs to see if there were any that we could use. We found two songs from the corpright free CDs for the opening sequence. The creepy music and an up-beat song. However we later found out that the up-beat song was not copyright free, so we had to change the song as soon as possible. We had a look on copyright free internet websites. We came along www.jamendo.com where we found two possible choices for our clip. 'Satellite by Major Major' and 'Dropping Out Of School by Bad Sucks'. We asked people what they thought of the two songs and the majority of people said that 'Dropping Out Of School' was a more up-beat song. We found that it is quite hard to find copyright free music.
Emma Jopson

Saw 3 Opening Sequence

A film directed by Darren Lynn unlike many other horror films this has a creative story in which a jigsaw killer plays a game with the victims the reason being is that they dont appreciate their lifestyle. It is no doubt a strange reason but one that may leave enigmas and engages the audiences attention. The target audience for this film would be adults over the age og eighteen as blood, pain and enigmas appeals highly to them .
The film uses the general conventions you would expect in a horror film the intense sounds and the creepy music that develop suspense engaging the audiences interest as they wonder what is going to happen next. The music in the film is non- diagetic at the beginning it is very quiet then the pitch gets higher. It is mainly people screaming and intense sounds however this works well with the visual image with what is happening in the film.
The editing techniques are used very effectively they do two things they have an impact on the audience as well as creating suspense. The lighting used in the film follows the usual genre conventions of a thriller. In one point of the film the character is holding a torch which makes it look like he is lighting the room himself .This has an impact on the audience as they believe they are in the room with him.
A lot of the usual conventions are used throughout the movie blood,chains ,saws and dead bodies.It may be the standard conventions but when they are added to lighting and are edited they create a huge impact as they are much more terrifying and scary.
Published by Aamir Shah

Questionnaire Analysis

After completing a questionnaire to find out what people liked about horror films and finding out the results we have decided to analyse our results. The first question we asked was do people like horror films the majority of the results stated yes so this proves that horror films are a popular choice in todays modern society. This also proves that our target audience preferred horrot films. As a follow up question we asked did the last horror film you watched scare you we asked this question to find out whether horror films really do scare people. Following our results the majority of the people said yes so this proves that horror films do set out what they are supposed to do scare people, but this can also depend on factors like age group and gender for instance younger children will be scared if they watch horror films the same can be said about females if they witness a gruesome they will likely to be terrified that will cause them a reaction to scream.
The next question was another follow up question depending if the answer ws yes. What was the name of your favourite horror film we asked this question just to find out the range of different titles people preferred.
We wanted to find out whether people thought darkness was the correct stereotype ,so we asked the question do you think that the darkness within horror films is effective. Our results clearly show the evidence that people do believe that darkness in a horror film does create an impact.
We wanted to find out what were the favourite scenes in a horror film and which scenes people found interesting in a horror film so we asked the question do you prefer horror films with action or excitement or scenes which scare you. Based on our results we found out that people like a mixture of both . We wanted to find out how much interest people take in horror films so we asked the question do you often watch horror films , our feedback clearly shows that people do enjoy horror films and that they are certainly a popular choice.
From our next question we wanted to find out what impact the opening sequence had for the audience so we asked the question what should the opening sequence of a horror film do for you. This was a direct straightforward yes and no answer question we wanted to find out peoples opinions and we definitely indeed got a range of them .
The next question we asked was do you find horror films funny. From our results we found out that our audience does find horror films hillarious this proves that horror films do not create the purpose they are supposed to and that is to scare people.
We wanted to find out if certain scenes in a horror films gave them a frightening experience so we asked the question do certain scenes in horror films make you want to look away. Once again our results show that the people do find certain scenes in a horror film scary.
Our final question was does the music in a horror film scare you. Our results from the questionnaire show that people do find the music scary and that the intense music in a film does hook the audience into the films so they will continue to watch it.
We have found a range of different answers and opinions from our questionnaire , but as a group we are happy with them. We have got exactly what we wanted.

Aamir Shah

Filming Summary

When i was filming the material i needed to get for the film i was able to get just enough to edit. Some shots werent neccisary in the final edit of the film so i was able to get around to editing them out in order to stay within the time frame for my opening sequence. I was able to gather the actors for the film and we managed pull through, even though it was extremely cold. Unexpected was the snow which turned up. At first i didnt want to film with the snow because at that time i didnt think that my film would have suited to have snow in the background, but unfortunantly i didnt have time to waste waiting for the snow to clear up, so i made the best of what i had. I was able to use the snow to help me in filming because at night time the snow was able to make the surroundings brighter. So i wasnt limited to using just filming when it was dark and still a bit light. However i still faced the problem that if didnt get sufficient material then for the film i would have had to record all over again because the snow had gone by the time i was able to being editting. Fortunantly i was able to gain sufficient material.
When it came to editting it was hard to pick out scenes i didnt need, even though there was so many scences i was able to get rid of i couldnt grasp the concept that the film made sense without those scenes. I had filmed it but in some parts of the film they didnt look right but to other people they didnt think it looked wrong. However after the final draft i dont think i was able to get everything i wanted to get into the film because i wanted to more scence in the film but i was unable due to the needed lengh of the film. A problem i faced with editting was that it was extremely hard to choose the music used for the film because we needed to edit around the music to make the film clearer. Also it was hard to get a hold of decent copy-right free music. Overall it was hard for me to do the filming and the editting because alot of thought and preparation was needed. I faced multiple problems with actors unable to show up due to weather and with the weather being extremely cold at the time it was hard to hold the camera but i got through and im happy with myself for that but it was a stressful experience i never will forget.

Alix Sampford

Progress Report

In the weeks that I have been filming i found it very demanding. With locations probs and actors its all a big deal. Oranising our film wasnt the best however i was able to go through with filming and get the job done.
Alix Sampford

These are the location shots for our film. We were able to a near by house for the film. Also we used the near by out side area for the scenes done out side.

Alix Sampford

News Report

We filmed a news report so that we could play it on a television in the background of the girl getting ready, we will have her ignore this so that the audience are more aware of a killer on the loose than she is. Aamir was the news reporter, he wore a suit to make him look like a professional reporter. when editing the clips we decided not to have any dialogue as the girl will be listening to music. We still needed to make the audience know that there is a killer on the loose so we decided to use headlines that would scroll across the bottom of the screen to inform the audience of the news. We filmed this in Corporation Park using yellow and black tape attached to trees to make the scene look like it was a crime scene.

Emma Jopson

Storyboard

This is a basic storyboard of what is going to happen in our opening sequence to the horror film.

We decided to show shots of her ignoring the news report as she gets changed, so that the audience are more aware of what is going on than she is, this will make her vulnerable as she will not know that there is a killer on the loose. When she is walkin down the street we will have the camera behind her, it will look good as the light from the street will give her an outline. It will make it look like someone is following her when we have the camera as her friends point of view, i think this will create tension as the audience will not know who is following her. The last five camera shots will be fast pace to make the opening sequence more dramatic and add more tension to the situation that the girl is in.

Emma Jopson

Analysis for the Opening Sequence of 'SAW'

I have decided to analyse ‘SAW’ as it is a well known horror film.

The titles on the film show the production companies; ‘Loins Gate Films’ and ‘Twisted Pictures’. It then tells the audience who made the film in a wavy font, this moves up and down as it fades out onto the black background. A blue light appears from the top of the screen, when it moves down it reveals a closed eye. The blue light moves off the screen making it black again. The title fades up onto the dark background in the same wavy font as before. A piercing metal type sound joins the title as bigger ‘SAW’ letters move around it. The blue light comes back onto the screen, a straight cut shows a man open his eyes and open his mouth under water, this creates bubbles as he panics for breath. The sound of water and him coughing makes the audience want to know what has happened to him. The blue light goes down the plug whole; this tells the audience that he is in a bath tub. We see him stumble out of the bath in low key lighting whist hearing him coughing.

As he moves about we hear a chain being dragged, he starts to ask for help and panics as he hears someone talking to him. This makes the audience wonder who the other person is. Suddenly the lights are turned on and we see the man who was in the bath tub react to the bright lights. We see the lights turn on one by one as the room gets brighter. A point of view shot shows the audience his blurred vision from the lights. The camera cuts to a man holding onto a bar above his head with a cut on his face in an untidy shirt. The camera shows an establishing shot from the man’s point of view of the room they are in. It appears to be a very unclean small public toilets, this tells the audience where the characters are, however this is still an unclear idea to where they are, when it is and who they are. As the music becomes dramatic, the camera tilts down to a dead man on the floor covered in blood, it zooms out in a spiral motion to add affect to the dead body face down on the floor. The sound is almost like a person screaming. The audience are then shown a close up of the bloody dysfunctional head, a handheld cassette player in one hand, and a pistol gun in the other. This makes the audience members want to know who the dead man on the floor is and why he is holding a cassette player and a pistol.

This opening sequence makes many enigmas for the audience to think about, it gives the titles of a film, in a genre related font, and it also gets the audience interested. This opening sequence tells the audience its genre as it had low key lighting, however it also has high key lighting to make the characters feel intimidated, it has dramatic and creepy music. It includes the typical things included in a horror film; guns, blood and gore, unknown places and confused characters. I used this opening sequence example as it has many of the things for a good opening sequence.

Emma Jopson

Organised Actors

The actors that will appearing in the film are;

• Seonade Cudden- the girl in the sequence.
• Joeseph Cudden- The friend who scares the girl in the back ally.
• Aamir Shah- the reporter on the television when Seonade is getting ready to go out.
• Alix Sampford- the killer.

Emma Jopson

Group Member Roles

Director- Alix, Emma, Aamir
Sound (music)- One upbeat song for when Seonade is getting ready and one melodramatic song for when she walks down the back ally as we want the music to create a tense atmosphere. Chosen by all three group members
Casting-

• Seonade Cudden- Girl
• Joeseph Cudden- Girl's friend
• Alix Sampford - Killer
• Aamir Shah- Reporter
  

Emma Jopson