Practical Task - Props

For my practical task, i decided to make a body bag prop. These can be used in our sequence where there are multiple bags hanging from a wall with blood dripping from them. They're incredibly easy to make and not only are they cheap, they also create a really creepy affect.

After a handful of failed attempts at making limbs and trying to get them shaped properly, I managed to create what resembles a small child wrapped up in bin liners and hung upside down. This creates a really creepy and almost sadistic feeling to any location. The process for making a body bag is really quite simple and this is how I made a "parent" for the child.

So I started with a pair of old trousers, an old t-shirt, a vast amount of newspaper, a roll of duct tape and then some bin liners and a knife to trim excess parts off.

The first step in actually making the body bag was sealing up any holes that would allow newspaper to fall out by its own accord (I also did this to the sleeves of the t-shirt).

I stuffed the trousers with balled up pieces of newspaper which worked really well to fill out the trouser legs to a "human" shape.

After using an entire newspaper to fill the trousers properly, they start to look really good and have taken up a nice shape.

I then had to tape the t-shirt to the trousers so the "body" keeps a fairly rigid shape and won't end up spilling any newspaper balls in the bin bag when it's all sealed up.

The dummy now has a very human-like shape and is now almost ready to be wrapped up.

The head was really difficult to shape correctly because newspaper really likes to do its own thing no matter how much tape you cover it in so I decided that the best way around this, was to tape up the neck really really tightly which gave the head more of a rounded shape and a better neck outline.

The body is now finally ready to be bagged up and hung to see if it will look good or not.

All it needed, was two bags, (one at each end) and to be tightly taped up.

I honestly feel that the taping could have been better done, however when I tried to adjust the tape, it tore the bin liner and I had used the last one to make the body bag so in the future I should have a better body shape to finish with, but the end product looks really good in my opinion and the use of string to hold the body tighter together and to hang it upside down makes it seem even more like a butchered piece of meat hanging to bleed.

practical task - Location scouting

So I chose to look at outside locations during my scout and came across a few excellent locations for use in a potential chase scene or to be used in establishing shots followed by a cut to the protagonist(s) in their current location(s).

My favourite, and first, of the locations, was in part of a woodland near to where I live in Yalding.

I really like this as a woodland location as you can see in the distance that it has plenty of ground space, but the trees still obscure direct view in most directions and so can be used as an effective chase location.

I can explain the use of the smoke. It was purely as a way of seeing the potential usage of smoke to create "fog" when it becomes dark enough to appear as night. The fact it was red is just as a way of seeing the effect as a more exaggeration since at night, we'd have lighting set up to shine through the white smoke which would be time consuming to replicate, however if this location is chosen alongside the mise-en-scene of the artificial smoke, we may revisit smoke grenades and their use.

With the help of some wind, I was able to get the effect I was after. As you see towards the left, the smoke is still thick, however, if a figure were to be stood within the smoke cloud with lighting behind them at night, we would be able to have an amazing effect of this ominous figure appearing from the mist which will be effective at building tension and gaining audience anticipation. Again, the smoke will be white if it were to be used in the actual sequence. However to make it easier to detect the effect created by the smoke, I have used red smoke during the daytime.

In my opinion, this is another great location for both an establishing shot of the area, and as a location where the killer can make a creepy first appearance where the protagonist walks across the entire frame and as they walk past, the killer is then perhaps stood beside one of the trees or a body is suddenly hanging from a tree, foreshadowing the protagonists inevitable outcome.

I really like this location for the sheer purpose that it is exceedingly creepy in the correct lighting. You're unable to see far in the distance and the space is claustrophobic as the trees line the path on both sides and also arch overhead to give the feeling that you're almost trapped which is a genuine feeling I get every time I walk along this path.

I don't know what it is about this part of the woodland location that I find eery, but I get the feeling that it's due to the hard foreground lighting and soft background lighting that make the space feel enclosed when actually it is the same clearing that the person is stood in holding the smoke grenades (photo 2). Again, to have a sudden jump cut to this exact location with the same lighting with a figure either stood here or dead here would increase the intensity of the sequence, especially if the protagonist(s) passes this location before they come across the killer.

Lighting

When tasked with lighting, I was relatively puzzled as to what to write about. However, after a few minutes of research I was overwhelmed with ways in which I could create effective lighting to bring attention to an object, or to draw attention past the object and towards the foreground or background. There are, however, two main methods of lighting I’d like to look at using in our production.

The first method is basically soft/hard lighting. This is a technique which was initially used in Noir films to add a more ‘cool’ feel to the film as the films were all about stylish gangster staring at something to the side for dramatic effect. This can be put into psychological horror films. For instance, someone is sat down working at a desk which is facing away from the door. The fore lighting would be as simple as a desk lamp which I've used for my demonstration, and then have harder lighting such as a hallway light which is shining into the room. This can be used to draw attention to the hallway from the audience to notice a person’s shadow darting across the hallway or to create an outline of a figure standing in the doorway to the room.

This is the setup I used. It involved a small desk lamp positioned behind/next to the camera and then harder lighting in the back ground to create the effect.

This was the effect created by the soft/hard lighting. The face of the guitar is gently lit up. However, I feel like my attention is being drawn towards the two guitars in the background as they're highlighted by the harder lighting.

The next method I have used for lighting, isn't a technique as such, but more of a way of directing light. I created my own lighting reflector as opposed to buying one and you can still get similar effects with a flat object and some foil.

As you can see, all I had done was wrap some foil around a baking tray and now it's good to go.

All I had done was use a music stand to hold the reflector steady and then angled hard lighting at the reflector.

This is the effect it created. Although the light is more focused at a single point compared to using the hard lighting I had avaliable, this is really good for filming outside at night as you could easily have a light directed at the reflector mounted on a tripod to pan following a character.

Preliminary Task - Planning Evaluation

Preliminary Task - Planning Evaluation

Our Brief: 

Continuity task involving filming and editing a character:

- opening a door
- crossing a room
- sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom he/she then exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue 

This task should demonstrate:

- match on action
- shot/reverse shot
- 180 degree rule
- over-the-shoulder shot

After receiving our brief, as a group we brainstormed our initial ideas for the brief. These included:

• James Bond Style Mission
• Drug Deal
• Chase Sequence
• Kidnapping

From these, we then narrowed it down to not only our favourite idea, but also the most practical. By analysing the logistics of each, we were able to see which idea's were possible to complete accurately and fulfil our brief. This therefore narrowed it down to:

• Drug Deal
• James Bond Style Mission

After much debate between the individuals in our group, we decided that we could incorporate both ideas together, which lead to our final idea: Mission Style Drug Deal.

We then began with the creation of the storyboard.

For each box, we decided the music that we would match with it, so we could prepare this before filming in order to accurately synchronise the audio with the visual. We also decided the camera angles that we would aim to use, so that we were as prepared as possible for the short amount of time that we had to film in.

Each box on the storyboard contained as much detail as possible, including the diagram, as this means that each shot would be easily recognised and will match the final preliminary task.

Every part of the storyboard also had multiple parts and a range of shots. We tried to incorporate this into the diagram so that every shot we were planning to film was on the storyboard. We used a jagged line through the middle of the diagram to show the transition between a variety of shots.

We also added as much detail as possible into the shot description, as we thought that this would help with the productivity of filming - if we knew exactly what we were doing step by step, we would be able to work efficiently and get all the filming done in the limited time we were given. 

We included all the details we needed on the storyboard, although during the initial planning phase, we hadn't fully decided on what music we wanted to use - but we roughly knew the beat that it needed to be, in order to fit the visuals, so we decided to illustrate this by writing the beat in the description. 

Within each section of the storyboard, we wanted to fully plan all of the mise-en-scene that we would need. This included all props, costumes and locations for every shot. We tried to incorporate this all into the diagram, so before each shot we would efficiently be able to set up ready for filming.

Evaluation

• Overall, evaluating the planning section of the preliminary task, the things that went well for our group would include the detail that we put into our storyboard. If this detail wasn't as in depth as it is, our productivity would have been reduced and we may not have been able to film all of the required shots within the time limit. 
• Another thing that went well, was the teamwork in creating the storyboard. Every person in our group contributed, and ideas were collaborated in order to get the best and strongest idea we had. 
• Also, the organisation of the storyboard was one of the things that assisted with producing the preliminary material, and our group was very organised with our ideas and were able to think of a strategic order for our shots. We also managed to incorporate all of the compulsory shots and and scenes into our storyboard so we didn't need to worry about this during filming.

• Although as a team we worked very effectively, we did encounter a small number of problems during this stage of the task. 
• One of the issues we faced was the struggle to illustrate our ideas accurately. We knew exactly what we wanted to draw, and had a vision but the time taken to get this vision down was longer than we expected. Luckily, we came up with a solution of doing a rough drawing and explaining what was going on, and then going back and improving the drawing after. 
• Another problem was that during the filming stages, we reevaluated some of our ideas, for example box 5 on our storyboard, as we didn't think that the 'rugby tackle' scene would be as effective as we initially thought - but we were able to rapidly think of a new, and more effective idea.

• If we were to complete our preliminary task again, we would use the same tactics of deciding our idea, as working closely as a group and ensuring everybody's ideas were contributed worked best for us. 
• We would also make sure that all of our ideas are practical and we were able to film them with the constraints that come with the task (timings and location). 
• Also, we would use a wider variety of shots which would add to the range of skills we were able to show in our final product. 
• Lastly, we could consider using more boxes for our storyboard, so that each one could show in depth what we were planning to do.