Evaluation Questions

Question 1:

Question 2:

Question 3:

Question 4+5:

Question 6:

Question 7:

Opening scene feedback and improvements

What went well

Our stab match on action scene was especially commented on, complimented by a lot of the audience. Many people said it looked very realistic and looked very professional. They also said they liked the look of the blood on the knife from the stab wound, which they also liked, and the blood in the water. A lot of people also liked our use of sound, particularly the distorted music and ringtone. They also liked the sound editing when the headphones fell out and the music cut out but was still playing very quietly. Overall, I think our sound was especially effective. People also positively commented on the location, saying it was suitable for the genre and concept and worked well.

Improvements

A common improvement we were given was overuse of the waterfall shot. The feedback suggested we remove a couple so give the same effect but not as overwhelming, so Josh did this. We were also told our title screen was too short for the audience to read, so Josh made this longer to make it easier to read. Another criticism made was on the lighting, saying that it was too bright and needed to be dimmer to give the effect that the scene is set in the early evening, and also they said the blood on the jumper was too pink. Both of these were fixed by Eve adjusting the exposure and saturation of the clips. There were some comments saying that the Blumhouse production company was unsuitable for our genre, and also that the logo that we did use was out of date. Chloe was given the job to research more into this, by looking at her blogs and also doing extra research. Finally, we were told to remove the wind sound in our opening to create a more professional finish, as well as to add in a sinister typical horror movie sound when the killer is shown to add drama and suspense to the scene for the audience, both of which I did. We were also told to add in a sound when the killer is scraping the knife on the fence to mimic whats happening on screen, again which I did. 

Killer age in slasher horror films

In The Texas chainsaw massacre the killer is middle aged and is called 'leather face'. This is because he wears a leather mask on his face to disguise his identity. This is a common convention of a slasher film for the killer to be of this age.



Another slasher film that has a middle aged killer is 'My bloody Valentine'. As shown below, again this conforms to common conventions of a slasher genre by having a middle age killer.



Throughout of the film the killer wears a gas mask over his face so that you can't see his identity till the end of the film when it is revealed.

Finally, in the film 'Hatchet' the killer is also middle aged as shown in the picture below, therefore conforms to common conventions of a slasher genre.

Comparing the difference between a 15 certificate rating and a 15

15 certificate rating

Discrimination

The work as a whole must not endorse discriminatory language or behaviour, although there may be racist, homophobic or other discriminatory themes and language.
 

Drugs

Drug taking may be shown but the work as a whole must not promote or encourage drug misuse (for example, through instructional detail). The misuse of easily accessible and highly dangerous substances (for example, aerosols or solvents) is unlikely to be acceptable.

Imitable behaviour

Dangerous behaviour (for example, hanging, suicide and self-harming) should not dwell on detail which could be copied. Whether the depiction of easily accessible weapons is acceptable will depend on factors such as realism, context and setting.
 

Language

There may be strong language. Very strong language may be permitted, depending on the manner in which it is used, who is using the language, its frequency within the work as a whole and any special contextual justification.

Nudity

There are no constraints on nudity in a non-sexual or educational context. There may be nudity in a sexual context but usually without strong detail.
 

Sex

Sexual activity may be portrayed, but usually without strong detail. There may be strong verbal references to sexual behaviour, but the strongest references are unlikely to be acceptable unless justified by context. Works whose primary purpose is sexual arousal or stimulation are unlikely to be acceptable.

Threat

There may be strong threat and horror. A sustained focus on sadistic or sexual threat is unlikely to be acceptable.

Violence

Violence may be strong but should not dwell on the infliction of pain or injury. The strongest gory images are unlikely to be acceptable. Strong sadistic violence is also unlikely to be acceptable. There may be detailed verbal references to sexual violence but the depiction of sexual violence must be discreet and justified by context.

18 certificate rating

Exceptions are most likely in the following areas:

• where the material is in breach of the criminal law, or has been created through the commission of a criminal offence
• where material or treatment appears to us to risk harm to individuals or, through their behaviour, to society. For example, the detailed portrayal of violent or dangerous acts, or of illegal drug use, which may cause harm to public health or morals. This may include portrayals of sadistic or sexual violence which make this violence look appealing; reinforce the suggestion that victims enjoy sexual violence; or which invite viewer complicity in sexual violence or other harmful violent activities
• where there are more explicit images of sexual activity in the context of a sex work (see below) or where the primary purpose of the images in question is sexual arousal In the case of video works, which may be more accessible to younger viewers, intervention may be more frequent than for cinema films.

Sex education at 18

Where sex material genuinely seeks to inform and educate in matters such as human sexuality or safer sex and health, explicit images of sexual activity may be permitted.

Sex works at 18

Sex works are works whose primary purpose is sexual arousal or stimulation. Sex works containing only material which may be simulated are generally passed 18. Sex works containing clear images of real sex, strong fetish material, sexually explicit animated images, or other very strong sexual images will be confined to the R18 category. Material which is unacceptable in a sex work at R18 is also unacceptable in a sex work at 18.
 

AS Media - Opening Scene Feedback and Improvements

The Brief:

- To consider the audience feedback and implement any changes necessary.

After reading the comments regarding improvements needed, there were significant consistencies such as the too repetitive nature of having a shot of a waterfall as a break between the main narrative. With this in mind I decided to remove the beginning waterfall as in the space of three clips there are two waterfall shots, making one unnecessary. Hence, below, I deleted one of them.

After this, we gained feedback on the length of the typography appearing being too short, therefore I had to change this, I started by deleting the original transition between the typography and the first scene as seen below.

After this I attempted to extend the length of the clip further to fill the time necessary, however this did not work.

Therefore, I had to re-import the text into final cut and select the 8 seconds of footage needed. Using CMD + I to import I then highlighted the text and dragged and dropped it into the correct position.

After this I re-applied a different effect that shakes the screen slightly with a blur as the original radial blur was seen as unconventional.

After this I addressed the improvement necessary of adding sound over the title, as seen below i created a fade out and fade in from the highlighted green audio clip of a stream running to the start of the film.

Opening Scene Evaluation and Improvements

After publishing our first draft onto YouTube, we showed it to an audience where they gave us feedback on things that they liked and constructive criticism.

What Went Well

One of the most common 'good/effective' comments that were made was for the match on action for the stab scene. A lot of people said that it looked very realistic and professionally done. As well as this, they like the use of the blood on the knife, stab wound and in the water.

A lot of people also liked the use of sound, especially the distorted music and ringtone and they also liked when the music was cut off when the headphones fell out. I believe that we were very effective with our sound. 

Another positive comment was on the location. This was seen to be suitable for the genre and concept and seemed to work well. 

Improvements

One of the most commented criticisms was that there was too many waterfall shots. To improve this, our audience suggested that we remove one or two of the shots.

Another comment was that the title screen was too short and needed to be much longer in order for audiences to be able to read it. This will be easy to fix.

Another criticism made was that the lighting was too bright and needed to be 'dimmed' and also that the blood on the jumper was too pink. This can easily be fixed by experimenting with the exposure and saturation.

Some members of the audience also commented that the Blumhouse production company was not suitable for our genre and that the logo that we used was out of date. To solve this problem we decided to look at Chloe's production company research blog and also to do some extra research.

The final comments made was to remove a 'wind' sound to make our opening scene seem more professional and also to add in a sinister sound when we see the killer to make it clear to the audience that something will happen and also to make it seem more dramatic. It was also suggested to include a sound effect when the killer is scraping the knife on the fence.


As a group, we split up the constrictive comments to help us improve our final piece. My job was to dim the lighting throughout the opening scene and to also adjust the colour of the blood on the jumper where the fake blood looked pink on camera.    

Improving the Opening Scene

Firs of all, I decided to change the exposure an saturation of all of the shots. I needed to make the lighting darker and seem more mysterious and scary as originally it was quite light and did not look scary enough. 

To do this,  I reduced the saturation down by -32% and also decreased the exposure down by -19%. As you can see from the screen shots down below, the lighting is much dimmer and the colour is much more washed out, giving a sinister and dusk effect. I applies these settings for most of the shots.  

The only shots that I did not apply the exposure to was the stream shot at the end and the blood dripping on the leaves. First of all, I edited the blood on the leaves. To do this, I reduced the global exposure down by -2%. Then I reduced the global saturation down by -32%. However, when I completed exiting this shot, it did not lo right so I then changed the global exposure to -19% and the highlight exposure to -10%. This looked much better.

The other shot that I did not apply the -32% saturation and the -19% exposure to was the end shot of the blood in the stream (the second shot).This was because it was quite dark anyway.  For this shot I reduced the saturation down by -10% and the exposure down by -10% as well.

When I looked back on the shot of the fake blood that looked pink, after I had changed the saturation and exposure to -32% and -19%, it looked more realistic. 

Here is the final draft of our opening scene:

Audience Feedback

What went well:

• One of the things that went well in our audience feedback is that most people really liked the blood in our clips. They thought that it was really realistic and looked really effective.
• People also liked our use of sound manipulation
• They also liked that you could still hear the sound of the music playing through the headphones really quietly, when the phone was dropped onto the floor. 

Improvements:

• Make the title screen longer 
• Another improvement that our group needs to make based on our feedback is that we need to cut out some of the waterfalls at the beginning of our opening scene as they are not needed. However, we are going to keep the ones that build up tension before the victim is stabbed.
• Some of the feedback that we were given is that our professional production company logo, Blumhouse, is used more for psychological horrors rather than slasher horror films. 
• People also said that the Professional production company logo was the out of date version, therefore our group decided that we would change it to Lionsgate's horror version of their professional production company logo.
• Another thing that our group needs to improve is the brightness. In the feedback that we got they think our film opening will look more effective if it was darker and it will also make it creepier.
• Some of the blood colouring in some of our shots is quite bright red therefore we are going to adjust the lighting and saturation to try and make it look more realistic. 
• As the killer walks up the steps following the victim, he scrapes a knife against a chai link fence. In the feedback that we got the audience think that it would sound more effective if we added a scarping sound of a knife to the clip.
• There was also some background noise of wind in our clip, which we need to cut out.

We divided up these improvements within our group so that we all could improve our film opening. I changed the production company logo to the Lionsgate horror professional company logo. I also deleted the wind background sound in one of our shots of the victim in the alley. Below our screenshots of me completing these improvements. 

AS Media - Heartbeat SFX Practical Experiment

The Brief:

-To make my own heart beat SFX

Different ideas:

In my sound effects research of the old radio days, I understand that to create heartbeats, they placed the arm of a record player on a towel or other kind of soft fabric – with the needle actually touching the cloth. Light taps on the fabric translated as low-end thumps when amplified through the record player. The “heartbeats” could then be performed as needed. I don’t know how “good” they sounded, but it’s certainly one method.
– Steve Lee

A buddy of mine created a very nice heartbeat using a large plastic trash can. The plastic popping in and out was very controllable and created two distinct in/out “pumping” sounds.
– Bob Kessler

Take a piece of fabric and hold it with a loose grip. Then quickly stretch the fabric for a pounding, heart-like sound.
– David Filskov

Bare your chest (!), position a microphone pointing at your shoulder region and then make a quick inward pull with your arms and hands and stop abruptly. Keeps you warm as well :)
– David Filskov

Any kind of thump run through a lowpass filter sequenced in a reasonably rhythmic sequence will give you the effect. It might be fun to throw in some “flushing blood” kind of liquid.
– Jamey Scott

Anyone try contact mics on a pulse point? This might work well if you also employ a BP cuff (don’t try it on the one in your neck :)
– David Steinwedel

I double the heartbeat with a kick drum. Filter anything below 60Hz, add an insane amount of mid frequency.
– Jerome Boiteau

Sourced from: http://www.epicsound.com/sfx/

Due to my lack of equipment, the availability to much of the methods previously discussed is limited. Therefore, I decided to use one of the methods, being making the noise with my mouth.

After doing the experiment the sound created are linked below:

-

Evaluation Percussion Noise (made with my mouth)

Pros;

- The right sound levels

- The right volume

- The sound was a deep sound that didn't need any distorting or manipulating

Cons;

- Slightly unrealistic

- The quality of the sound was not up to standard

- No increase in the rate, making it harder to use

Further evaluation:

In my opinion the sound created was useful in portraying a rested heart rate, however to a lesser extent. I feel it would be more useful to have an external professional sound effect as it would make the noise, one more realistic and two, more conventional as it would create a more suspenseful effect as that is the purpose behind the professional sound effects.

Shooting script 21/12/2016

Date of Filming:

• Wednesday 21st December 2016

Meeting Place:

• Loose Valley at 8 am

Who is attending: 

• Eve Grundy- Bringing camera and spare batteries, un-smashed phone, cushion.
• Lucy Armstrong- Bringing tripod, acting clothes, microphone, spare top, knife.
• Chloe Biggs- Bringing fake blood, stick, smashed phone.
• Josh Kamara- Bringing acting clothes, blood pouches, real blood. 

Location 1: 

• Loose Valley Stream

Shots to do:

• Establishing shot x1
• Long shot x5
• Close-Up shot x2
• Extreme Close-Up shot x2
• High-angle x1
• Low-angle x1
• Over-The-Shoulder shot x1
• Point-Of-View shot x3
• Medium shot x3
• Tracking shot x2
• Tilt x1

Location 2: 

• Loose Valley Alleyway

Shots to do:

• Long shot x1
• Close-Up shot x2
• Extreme Close-Up shot x1
• High-angle x1
• Over-The-Shoulder shot x1
• Medium shot x1
• Tracking shot x1

Editing Sound- Practical

In this task I added the twig snap sound effect that I created with celery. I downloaded my sound effect off of YouTube and dragged the sound effect into the appropriate place in our film opening. We decided to add it just before the extreme close up of Lucy's eyes looking around, and at the end of the clip where the killer is scrapping his knife against the chain link fence as he walks up the stairs. I then cut the beginning of the clip where there was no sound, and the end of the clip so that you could just hear the twig snap sound. As shown in the screenshot below.


In the screenshot below it shows that I moved the twig snap sound to the appropriate place in our film opening. The sound effect has also been cut.
















I then turned down the sound slightly so that it sounded more realistic. We decided to add the twig snap at the end of the clip where the killer is walking up the stairs, as it would sound and look as though he had made that sound as he was walking up the stairs. This therefore meant that Lucy turned around.

Editing Task- Practical

In this task I added and edited our newly filmed clips into our film opening. I used dropbox to add the clips from my phone as we decided to use my Iphone 7 as it was better quality than our camera that we alternatively used. I transferred the clips onto dropbox and downloaded them onto the desktop so that I could simply drag the clips into the right places in our film opening.



The screenshot below shows the new clips, saved into our coursework folder in our desktop.


In the screenshot below it shows that I have added in our new clip of blood dripping down Lucy's hand. I cut the beginning and ending of the clip as at the beginning it showed Eve pouring the food colouring onto Lucy's hand. I also cut the ending as the blood slowed down and began to stop dripping. I made sure that I overlapped this with the stream sound effect as the blood was dripping into the stream so would therefore sound more effective and realistic.


I then added in the clip where Lucy is lying dead by the side of the stream. We changed this clip from our other one by including a tilt upwards to show 'The killer' walking away from the body. I decided to film it in this way as I thought it would look more effective and creepy. I cut the beginning of this clip as it showed a pause before Josh started walking away from Lucy's dead body.


Next, I cut the clip where the animal blood drips onto the wet autumn leaves. I cut the end of this clip so that the clip only showed to points where the blood was dripping the fastest onto the leaves, to show that the stab had caused a lot of blood.


In the screenshot below it shows that I added the stabbing clip where Josh removed the bloody knife from Lucy's body. We didn't have to cut this clip because it was perfectly timed. However, we did decide to speed up the clip slightly to make the scene more intense.


I then added in the clip where it shows a extreme close up of Lucy's hand and hair being dragged away, down to the stream. This was a new clip that we decided to film so that our film opening would flow better.

Voice-over

Using GarageBand, I recorded a voiceover of me humming the song we use in our film opening for when I'm walking whilst dragging my hand along the bush. I did this as in our storyboard our original plan was to include this, as it creates a creepy,  sinister effect. I hummed the first 20 seconds of the song, and in the recording there was no background noise. 

In our editing process and after watching our film opening, we collectively decided not to include the humming as it didn't quite sound right in the clip. We instead used the sound of a heartbeat which we think sounded better as it created more tension and when we showed it to an audience they said "It made them feel very unsettled and uncomfortable".

Adding in Production Company logo

I added in Josh's production company logo into our film opening. I cut end of this clip as it showed the picture in burnt ashes for 2 seconds with nothing really happening in the clip,  therefore I decided to cut it.


In this screenshot it shows that I also cut the beginning of Josh's production company logo as it had a long pause at the beginning and it showed Josh lighting the picture. The camera also went very shaky at this point so I thought it would be best to cut the beginning.


I also decided that to make the production company logo look more professional and appealing to our audience, I waned to add sound effects to it. I decided to add diegetic sound of a crackling fire in the background so that you can hear the polaroid picture being burnt. I found a clip on YouTube which I thought fitted best with our clip and inserted the sound into our film opening. I then cut the sound so that it fit with the length of clip and so that the sound matched alongside with the production company logo.


I added a fade into the music so that there was an increase in volume when the fire was it its biggest, and as it started to go out I added a fade so that it sounded more realistic.


We later decided to play around with the lighting of the clip and adjusted it so that it was really dark in black and white other than the flame which was a strong orange red colour. This looks more effective and eye catching for the audience to watch. I also added a transformation so that it cut the brick out of shot to look more effective.

Editing No.3

My final piece of editing to do was to add in and edit the stabbing sound that I had downloaded. For this, I instead the sound clip into the correct place in our opening scene.

Next, I bladed the start and the end of the clip, as it was too long for what we needed it for, as we just needed one 'stab', where as the clip gave us multiple.

When I listened back to the clip, it seemed to be out of time and did not flow with the rest of the shots. To edit this, I bladed the start of the clip as there was no sound, which was causing the delay.

Next, when I listened back to the clip again, I found that the sound effect was too quick. To fix this, I reduced the speed of the clip to 80%. When we listened back to this, it sounded much better and the audience would be able to hear the sound more clearly.

Making a 'Stab' Sound Effect

For this practical, I made a 'stabbing' sound effect. For this I used a sharp kitchen knife, half a melon and a phone to record the sound.

I then started to record the sound of the knife going into the melon at different speeds and at different points of the melon, fr example, through the skin or through the seeds etc.

However, when I listened back to the sounds, they did not sound like I would have liked them to. When I showed the rest of my group the sounds, we made a group decision that we would use a pre-made sound effect that would sound more professional and realistic.

Here is the final sound effect that we used in our opening scene:

From this video, we used the first stab sound.

'Stabbing' Sound Effect Research

For this research task, I looked on YouTube for stabbing scenes to research stabbing sound effects so that I could re create my own for our coursework.

The first video that I clicked on was from the TV series, 'Game Of Thrones'. In this scene, on of the characters gets stabbed multiple times giving the audience a gruesome image and sound. When the character gets stabbed, the audience can hear squelching and oozing sounds as a character stabs the other multiple times. This sounds realistic and gruesome for the audience.
'Game Of Thrones' Clip

The next clip that I found was from the film, 'Fertile Ground'. In this clip a female character stabs a male character. The sounds that the audience hears when the woman stabs the man repeatedly are almost like a shovel has been shoved into the ground. These sound effects are less 'bloody' than the previous clip.
'Fertile Ground' Clip

In the film 'The Babadook' a little boy stabs his mother. When the knife enters her stomach, it makes a thumping noise and there is not sound of flesh or blood being cut through. Although this may be a realistic sound effect, it does not portray the 'slasher' effect that we are looking for.
'The Babadook' Clip

In conclusion, I believe that the most realistic and gruesome effect is from the 'Game Of Thrones' clip. This is because you can hear flesh being sliced and you can also hear the sound of blood oozing out of the wound. This therefore makes the sound effect realistic and give it the 'slasher' effect.

AS Media - Filming Evalation 2

The Brief:
- To evaluate the time that we spent filming for our final piece

Prep:

Our preparation for filming was positive as we organised a shooting script which clearly stated what time we were supposed to meet and what we were supposed to bring equipment wise. We were able to equally share responsibility between the four of us, as we all had a relatively equal amount of equipment to bring and be responsible for. We fortunately all brought the correct equipment, props and costumes and had no problems arise due to this.

Meeting Time

We arranged our meeting time on our shooting script and all of us were on time this hindered the timings slightly as we were a bit early getting to the location although we did manage to get the shots in the same form of lighting as previously partially due to the absent change in weather that day meaning that the lighting and setting looked very similar throughout the both of the filming sessions.

Availability

We set a date that everyone was free and chose a location that is public and gives lenient guidelines about filming so that we were able to actually film in the area we wanted to film in.

Time Management

As previously mentioned all of us were on time which did shift the time frames that we anticipated and hindered the time we arrived at the location to film however we acknowledged this and were more careful with our shots managing to do all of the shots with similar conditions as previously experienced. This again shifted all the time frames forward and enabled us time to discuss what shots we had left and how much time we needed to film them in. However we still managed the time frames that we had changed and got everything completed.

Achieved?

Yes. We managed to do what we set out to do and complete our filming in one day. We got all the shots that we wanted.

Timings

We got our timings near perfect per shot however we were hindered by being early which didn't change much but the lighting did get a bit brighter.

If I did it again would I do it differently?

No because everything was planned for and went into place.

AS Media - Heart Beat Sound Effect

The brief:

-To find a heartbeat sound effect

Originally we had the idea of making our own heartbeat sound, this would consist of someone vocally making the noise or using percussion to emulate the feeling of a heart beating. However after some discussion and evaluation, we decided it was best to find one as although making our own would work, it would be more effective to get a more realistic one for the context of our film.

After listening to all of the sounds there was a noticeable difference between most of the synthetic ones made and the actual sounds recorded.

Below is the listed sources along with its type (synthetic or actual)
Sources used:

YouTube - Actual
Sound Bible - Synthetic
Sound Snap - Synthetic
Sound Jay - Synthetic
Audio Blocks - Actual
Free Sound - Actual
Free SFX - Synthetic

After hearing all of them I decided to go through the pros and cons of each sound:

YouTube - Actual:

Pros:
- realistic
- good sound quality
- good sound clarity
- the change in heart rate fits what we need

Cons:
- change in heart rate is quite sudden and "blocky"

Sound Bible - Synthetic

Pros:
- good sound quality
- good sound clarity
- the change in heart rate fits what we need

Cons:
- change in heart rate is quite sudden and "blocky"

- highly unrealistic and sounded off

Sound Snap - Synthetic

Pros:
- realistic
- the change in heart rate fits what we need

Cons:
- change in heart rate is quite sudden and "blocky"

- bad sound clarity

- poor download quality

Sound Jay - Synthetic

Pros:
- good sound quality
- good sound clarity

Cons:
- change in heart rate is poor and unprofessional

- unrealistic

Audio Blocks - Actual

Pros:
- good sound quality
- good sound clarity

Cons:
- change in heart rate is quite sudden and "blocky"

- the change in heart rate didn't fit what we need

- slightly unrealistic

Free Sound - Actual

Pros:
- realistic
- good sound quality
- good sound clarity

Cons:
- change in heart rate is in sections and is noticeably and significantly different

- heart rate did not fit what we needed

Free SFX - Synthetic

Pros:
- good sound quality
- good sound clarity

Cons:
- there is no change in heart rate

- unrealistic and slow

After further analysis, I came to the conclusion that the YouTube clip was the best as it also had a good resulting downloading quality and wasn't distorted once place into Final Cut Pro X

Below is the final sound effect that we used:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2_uxjALgdE

Editing

I sped up the clip we re filmed of the stabbing as it fitted better with the speed of the other clips. 

I then bladed the beginning of the next clip as we didn't need it.

I also bladed a bit of the clip before the stabbing and sped it up as well to make the match on action flow better.

I bladed a bit of the end of the dragging clip as it was unnecessary.

I also bladed the beginning of the clip where we see the blood in the water as it was also unnecessary and we could cut down our time if we cut the clip so the blood came on screen straight away.

Next I slightly altered the fades on my voice over as I felt it was still slightly harsh.

I cut the beginning of the distorted song so that it began where the other one ended. I then moved it so it was parallel to the other, and parallel to where it needed to begin.

I next bladed the song to the same lengths as the other ones so I could edit it in the same way. I made the volumes the same and put the same fades in so it was exactly the same, just with the right song. I made sure it was exactly precise.

I added in the distorted ringtone sound I made and added it where the phone begins to ring - jus before I take out my earphones to answer the call. I also cut it so that the sound clip began when the audio did.

I edited the sound of this by removing the background noise and adjusting the volume.

I copied and pasted the sound of the knife scraping on the metal fence and slowed it down to fit the clip. However we later decided we didn't like it.

I moved the scream sound so it overlapped the stabbing. I also added in nature sounds over the top.