Media studies

 Specific Shots and Angles!      WOWZA ! Recently on this blog we have discussed representation, our recent days of shooting, and what i am finishing up, and more! As you would assume, filming was majorly difficult due to the specifics of the shots a their affects on the plot. Aden and I have been very particular while shooting this project about what shots and angles we take… In this blog I am going to give you a few examples and sneak peaks to our final angles and shots!      For starters! A great example of a specific shot we took was the Dutch angle still which shows the back door left open!! We chose to use a Dutch angles throughout film opening for a few different reasons. To add a level of disorientation, and a play with the depth of field in our shots. The attempt was to add to the already high level of eeriness and foreshadow the death coming soon.  Another example of the Dutch angle was our ending scene which displays the “almost” kill s...

  Day 2  of Shooting  SHOOTING!!! Aden and I have had a few new days of filming which not gonna lie these shots were excruciating to take. To be honest we just had major problems coordinating when the driveway would be empty to take a shot of it. Not to mention! The SHADOWS they absolutely killed us. The outside lights definitely caused certain issues regarding lighting. But on our last day of filming… we solved it!! We definitely worked extremely hard assuring each scene was specifically filmed and perfected.  After finishing shooting, Aden and I both agreed that despite these issues and challenges this experience has definitely taught us SO much about how much thought and detail is put towards filming. I would say that the most challenging aspect of these days was problem solving the little details. However! The process was super FUN , especially with my partner Aden.  A clip of me being the subject as Aden practiced the dolly zoom.  This is a clip of Ade...

  Representation      I would say the horror genre is considerably generalized in society. We see women as weak and highly influenced in the horror genre. In our film, the representation of women is alone and weak. Looking back it may have been interesting to see our character as a male. Seeing him in a situation to per se be “weak”. However, I do love the unexpectedness of the outgoing nature of my character as she begins to be “stalked”. It challenges the stereotypes in the build up of the filing, as well…       In many cases, horror uses exciting and exaggerated beginnings before showing extreme changes from happiness to death. Although, in our film opening we began using a depressing moody style. We did this for a few reasons, for starters, the way that our character was showing extreme signs of moodiness as her parents left her for the weekend. And thus foreshadowing the extreme horror that’s soon to show. The amount of close ups and extreme ...

What I have to finish!      As we near the end of this project, the clock begins ticking as we approach the end of this month to when this project needs to be wrapped up. So, it’s important we stay in check with what has to be done! To begin with, the first thing is our final touches filming session! Aden and I will both be doing a few shots by the end of this week. Following this, with Aden’s assistance, I will be working through all of the nitty gritty of EDITING! We will also be recording special folly sound recordings to insert into our editing. So we will probably do that on the same day as our final touches filming day! After that the editing of audio and visual is ALL that’s left! Aden and I are super excited to have worked on this project together and can’t wait to see the final results of our hard work.      Now, for editing I KNOW it is not gonna be simple. (Aden and I have learned that from our expectations of filming!) So, I am looking forward t...

Group Dynamics      Almost at the end! But not quite… my area of work and focus is really just getting started! I loved this project, because Aden and I split the work evenly, in my opinion! My partner Aden Mangones did the majority of the directing and planning out the film! But for the particular details of our film Aden included detailed mis en scene and creating intricate shots. We both knew he was the more intricate one which he used for his directing role. I did the acting as the main character, and he had a role as the killer's hand. When we began planning, we brainstormed and planned the story together. He even came up with the title sequence! I did the majority of the physical drawing out of story boarding, but the hard work of ideas was split between us. We had so many good ideas while brainstorming!     Moving on! When it came to directing he was the best! Since I was acting- the majority of the actual directing was done by Aden. He took the time to s...

  Updated storyboard!       Last blog, we discussed group dynamics! As we finish up our project, there was quite a few creative choices and moments in filming we took time to reconsider! Starting from the beginning, the first composition change was the Master Shot of the walkthrough of the set we added a shot of the homework and spilled coffee. In addition, a visual of the dog barking. We did this for a few reasons. For one, we knew how much depth the character had and wanted to add more! But even more so- the AMOUNT of depth and eeriness this added was unmatched. It added to the plot, as well as, the overall tone of our film opening.       Another small instance that changed. Was the was the point of view shot of grabbing the list is implemented. We added a cutaway shot here with the point of view shot. We did this because it definitely added variety in the shots which was important to the cohesiveness of our film altogether. To be honest, we r...

 Lighting!     What do you think of when you see horror? YOU THINK DARK!! Well in our film we took this quite literally and used lowkey lighting to dramatize the film to a new level! Using the moody and dark tones to draw attention to the serious subject matter at hand adding a dark emotional state as the audience anxiously awaits the plot of the film to unravel. Unlike high key lighting, which aims to capture a warm and inviting atmosphere to the audience. We used little to no direct light in this film. We chose our style of lighting because we knew the importance of making the audience feel something without even hearing the ominous music and sounds in the background.      Regarding the mis-en-scene, not even including the spilled coffee, dog barking, different shots… when it came to lighting we were extremely specific about wanting no daylight and the lighting to be source from our studio lights and small lights around our set. We were able to create an...

The Editing Process     My last blog post, I discussed the title sequence Aden and I are working on currently! Today I am going to talk about the beginning of our editing process. The good, bad, and ugly! We began with deciding what editing software to use for our film. After doing research and finding the BEST free software to use we decided to use HitFilm! HitFilm has certain aspects including motion tracking, auto-stabilize, audio-mixer for fine-tuning the film. It also has awesome tutorials showing how to use its programming that are very helpful. I will be the lead editor on this part of the project,given that Aden has been more of a lead director. As we begin with our editing we have been SUPRISED… we’ve found several undesirable shadows, inconsistencies, and on top of that we forgot to film our title sequence. YIKES! Just kidding, in reality it’s not that bad we just have scheduled in an extra filming day next week to perfect and add finishing touches to our film! ...

Title Sequence      BAM ! The camera pans to the word “ALONE” spread out in Q-tips… This was a creative technique that me and my partner decided on in for this title sequence. Following our research in the beginning of this class regarding different title sequences, for instance, the title sequence Severance. The suspense and creativity that was in this title sequence definitely inspired our sequence.      Our group went through a few different options including using blood dripping, white frosting, sticks, or paint. However, we decided to stick to Q-TIPS. Why?  We wanted to emphasize this is a film she is HOME. Home alone throughout this whole film and that when she is finally discovered it is foreshadowing to the bathroom she is caught in the final scene. Another important aspect of this film will include the font being white the background a beige bathroom countertop.       Below I will link a few different photos that were our i...