Introduction-
Originally we struggled
to find a idea for our film that we all liked. We then came up with idea of
basing our film of the game Slender: The Eight Pages and we all liked it, as we
knew plenty about the game and thought that it gave us plenty of creative
freedom as the game is very open to interpretation on the story. However we didn't want to just replicate the game in a film and so we made the film about a group of friends trying to prove the existence of Slenderman.
1. In what ways does your media product use, develop
or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Instead of trying to challenge media conventions in our film
we decided that we would embrace them and develop them further.
These are the areas that I am going to compare our film to
real life media products
·
narrative organisation and the
short film format
·
characterisation
·
sound
·
mise en scene
·
use of genre conventions
· editing
Narrative- The narrative of our film is linear as it just follows the
events of the film in chronological order following one event to another. We decided
to do this as we felt it would have been highly challenging to show it any
other way without giving away the ending and ruining the mystery of if
Slenderman was real and what is going to happen to the characters later on in
the film. There bit in the film where max finds the note and then it swaps to
the others setting up the camera and then it swaps back to max isn’t that clear
that it’s still chronological. This is because its showing two events at the
same and they are just in different locations.
Characterisation - For the characters in our film we decided to make them teenagers as this is typical of the genre conventions for a horror film based in a woodland location like The Evil Dead. Another reason why we decided to have teenage characters is so that the vast majority of the audience can relate easier as our film is appealing to a teenage audience. In terms of the characters attitudes in the film we had two characters with opposing views and a cocky character who is very skeptical of everything. When we were still coming up with the story of the film we had contemplated making Amy's character become the final one and so she would fit into the slasher movie convention of 'the Final Girl' as she was the rational sensible one of the group. However we decided not to do this as our film is is not a slasher horror and so it wouldn't fit very well as there is no form of conflict between the protagonists and the antagonist.
Mise en Scene- This is very important in all short films as it sets the mood and the atmosphere of the entire film. One of the main focuses for the Mise en Scene in this film is in the woodland location,this worked very well as woods can be very eerie and spooky places at night as everything looks the same and so you can easily get lost. This location was also very good in terms of lighting as there was no lights already there and so we were able to fully control the lighting ourselves and get a very dark and isolated feeling across to the audience. This level of low lighting is not normally used in other media products as it greatly restricts the amount you can see, however in the case with our film it worked well as if forces you to pay closer attention to the characters and what they are feeling.
In terms of the costume and the appearance of Slenderman our film is very close to the source material. The clothing Slenderman wears is quite iconic as he wears a suit which is a very strong symbol for dominance and power. In addition to the suit his head is that of a humans but white with no defining features, this is adds to the fear being created as its a twisted perversion of humanity which is common in most horror monsters like Frankenstein's Monster or Alice from Wakewood.
The props in this film were very important as they are what propelled the narrative and helped to explain about the story. The notes were drawn by Nick in the style of ones found in the game and originally we were going to have two notes in the film but the film was going to be too long if we did and we would have stuggled to include it with the rest of the film. The other prop we had was the photo of Slenderman that was used when explaining about Slenderman. I had created another version of the photograph where I had removed Slenderman from the image on Photoshop because when max was going to return to the camp he was going to see the picture and notice that Slenderman had left the picture somehow and was out in the woods. We decided to drop that idea as it seemed very gimmicky.
Genre conventions- The genre of the film for our film is a horror just like the game it is based off. I find the thing that makes the horror for the film is the atmosphere of isolation and entrapment created by many different areas of Mise en Scene previously mentioned. This atmosphere was also very strong in the game and is what helped it to become popular and I feel we captured it very well in our film. The sub-genre of horror I feel we fit into most is probably rural horrors like Wakewood and The Wicker Man, even though these are more to do with a village secret a great deal of these films are to do with the isolation from other people and the rest of the world. Another thing that our film does to stick to the conventions of horror is to create a lot of enigma and so the audience is constantly questioning themselves and trying to figure out what is going to happen next.
Editing- With our film we decided very early on that we wanted to some filter over the top of the footage to help to add to the surreal and spooky mood and so i did some tests to see what effects looked the best when put over footage. You can see the post about this here. We decided that the low saturation filter looked the best and so we copied the exact filter from that test and put it in our film. We made it so that the pace in our film started off relatively slowly and then gradually got faster to build to a crescendo in order to draw in the audiences attention to the sudden ending. We also applied some static effects to one of the shots of them setting up the camera as that is taking one of the ideas from the game that Slenderman causes electrical things to break when close to him. Another time where this electrical failure came into the film was after Max fell over and dropped the torch and it started flickering. I found it quite tricky to get a flickering effect that looked as if it was the torch cutting out and not just created in editing. I tried quite a few different methods to try and achive this and i evenutaly found out that the best way was to quickly fade down and up in the opacity of the footage. In the end i was happy with the results as its not noticeable that it was made via editing.
1- This shot is taken from the opening just before the characters are about the enter the woods. I like this shot because the light is very highly emphasised ans there is a lot of lens flair making the light seem surreal and very important (as he finds out how useless he is without it later on)
2- This short is part of a three way shot reverse shot sequence that includes five different shots. this scene is particularly important as this is where the the audience is introduced to the story and the characters.
3- This is showing the static effect on the camera that shows that Slenderman is around. Also the camera is is night vision to distinguish it from the other shots as that is meant to be a shot taken from inside the world of the film.
4- This is where things start to go downhill for the character as he has returned to find that the camp is messed up and that his two friends are no longer there. At the start of this shot the camera is also tracking him as if Slenderman is behind him and following him.
5- I really like this shot as it is taken from a very usual angle. This is also where the pace of the film starts to pick up.
6- This particular shot I took holding the camera high in the air as as its directly from Slenderman's point of view and he is meant to be very tall. Also as Slenderman is very close to Max the light starts flickering and then stops all together.
7- This shot is designed to be a jump scare for Max and also the audience as they have no clue that this is about to happen. This is also first time that Max encounters Slenderman. This short works really well because, when the match it lit it bursts up incredibly brightly at first but then dies down. When filming this we had also tried a few shots using the lights with a orange filter on them but it didn't work as well just the match.
8- This close up works really well as it gives a moments calm after the fast paced running scenes so that Max thinks he is free and everything is going to be OK once again. The fence is also a very strong symbol for being trapped and he has manged to get through it so the audience also thinks that he is safe. I also really like the lighting on the side as there is some very strong black shadows over half of his face.
9- This is the final shot of the film and it is really good as from the last you think he is going to be fine but then in this show he turns around and Slender is directly there in from of him. We also added a shaking and static effect so that the ending is true to what happens in the game when you loose and get too close to Slenderman.
2) How effective is the combination of your main product and your ancillary tasks?
Thorough out our production we have posted out work on Facebook, Youtube and Blogger in order to get responses from people about the film and to also check what kind of audience we have been attracting. From the Youtube statistics on our film we have discovered that our film was most popular with demographic group of females aged 13-17 and then followed by male 13-17 and 18-24. This is not what we were expecting as we thought that the views would be male dominated due to it being inspired by the video game. Apart from that though the views are from our targeted demographic.
Our Blog also drew quite a lot of attention towards the film and our production, we have had a total of 926 page views from 10 country's. However most of these these views were from the United Kingdom and the United States though. This could be due to that these places are also where the game 'Slender: The Eight Pages' is most popular and so it has drawn fans of the game rather than people interested in the film. Unfortunately none of these people left comments on our posts.
The responses we have had from Facebook comments for the compleeted film are that they really liked it and they thought it was done to a good quality and standard. The responses on the drawn posters were also very good as they had received a lot of 'likes' and on the drafts they had suggested changes to be made like making Slenderman a bit bigger so he seems like he is closer to the protagonist.
Also in general from showing people the film they have said that it is very good. I had one person that told me that the title scene with the torch light was a bit too pixelated but we decided it didn't matter that much as i would have meant re creating the whole title shot again.
http://prezi.com/lfmc8zfnrgaj/present/?auth_key=8l8n2lp&follow=lefkijj0kkyf
Characterisation - For the characters in our film we decided to make them teenagers as this is typical of the genre conventions for a horror film based in a woodland location like The Evil Dead. Another reason why we decided to have teenage characters is so that the vast majority of the audience can relate easier as our film is appealing to a teenage audience. In terms of the characters attitudes in the film we had two characters with opposing views and a cocky character who is very skeptical of everything. When we were still coming up with the story of the film we had contemplated making Amy's character become the final one and so she would fit into the slasher movie convention of 'the Final Girl' as she was the rational sensible one of the group. However we decided not to do this as our film is is not a slasher horror and so it wouldn't fit very well as there is no form of conflict between the protagonists and the antagonist.
Mise en Scene- This is very important in all short films as it sets the mood and the atmosphere of the entire film. One of the main focuses for the Mise en Scene in this film is in the woodland location,this worked very well as woods can be very eerie and spooky places at night as everything looks the same and so you can easily get lost. This location was also very good in terms of lighting as there was no lights already there and so we were able to fully control the lighting ourselves and get a very dark and isolated feeling across to the audience. This level of low lighting is not normally used in other media products as it greatly restricts the amount you can see, however in the case with our film it worked well as if forces you to pay closer attention to the characters and what they are feeling.
In terms of the costume and the appearance of Slenderman our film is very close to the source material. The clothing Slenderman wears is quite iconic as he wears a suit which is a very strong symbol for dominance and power. In addition to the suit his head is that of a humans but white with no defining features, this is adds to the fear being created as its a twisted perversion of humanity which is common in most horror monsters like Frankenstein's Monster or Alice from Wakewood.
The props in this film were very important as they are what propelled the narrative and helped to explain about the story. The notes were drawn by Nick in the style of ones found in the game and originally we were going to have two notes in the film but the film was going to be too long if we did and we would have stuggled to include it with the rest of the film. The other prop we had was the photo of Slenderman that was used when explaining about Slenderman. I had created another version of the photograph where I had removed Slenderman from the image on Photoshop because when max was going to return to the camp he was going to see the picture and notice that Slenderman had left the picture somehow and was out in the woods. We decided to drop that idea as it seemed very gimmicky.
Genre conventions- The genre of the film for our film is a horror just like the game it is based off. I find the thing that makes the horror for the film is the atmosphere of isolation and entrapment created by many different areas of Mise en Scene previously mentioned. This atmosphere was also very strong in the game and is what helped it to become popular and I feel we captured it very well in our film. The sub-genre of horror I feel we fit into most is probably rural horrors like Wakewood and The Wicker Man, even though these are more to do with a village secret a great deal of these films are to do with the isolation from other people and the rest of the world. Another thing that our film does to stick to the conventions of horror is to create a lot of enigma and so the audience is constantly questioning themselves and trying to figure out what is going to happen next.
Editing- With our film we decided very early on that we wanted to some filter over the top of the footage to help to add to the surreal and spooky mood and so i did some tests to see what effects looked the best when put over footage. You can see the post about this here. We decided that the low saturation filter looked the best and so we copied the exact filter from that test and put it in our film. We made it so that the pace in our film started off relatively slowly and then gradually got faster to build to a crescendo in order to draw in the audiences attention to the sudden ending. We also applied some static effects to one of the shots of them setting up the camera as that is taking one of the ideas from the game that Slenderman causes electrical things to break when close to him. Another time where this electrical failure came into the film was after Max fell over and dropped the torch and it started flickering. I found it quite tricky to get a flickering effect that looked as if it was the torch cutting out and not just created in editing. I tried quite a few different methods to try and achive this and i evenutaly found out that the best way was to quickly fade down and up in the opacity of the footage. In the end i was happy with the results as its not noticeable that it was made via editing.
1- This shot is taken from the opening just before the characters are about the enter the woods. I like this shot because the light is very highly emphasised ans there is a lot of lens flair making the light seem surreal and very important (as he finds out how useless he is without it later on)
2- This short is part of a three way shot reverse shot sequence that includes five different shots. this scene is particularly important as this is where the the audience is introduced to the story and the characters.
3- This is showing the static effect on the camera that shows that Slenderman is around. Also the camera is is night vision to distinguish it from the other shots as that is meant to be a shot taken from inside the world of the film.
4- This is where things start to go downhill for the character as he has returned to find that the camp is messed up and that his two friends are no longer there. At the start of this shot the camera is also tracking him as if Slenderman is behind him and following him.
5- I really like this shot as it is taken from a very usual angle. This is also where the pace of the film starts to pick up.
6- This particular shot I took holding the camera high in the air as as its directly from Slenderman's point of view and he is meant to be very tall. Also as Slenderman is very close to Max the light starts flickering and then stops all together.
7- This shot is designed to be a jump scare for Max and also the audience as they have no clue that this is about to happen. This is also first time that Max encounters Slenderman. This short works really well because, when the match it lit it bursts up incredibly brightly at first but then dies down. When filming this we had also tried a few shots using the lights with a orange filter on them but it didn't work as well just the match.
8- This close up works really well as it gives a moments calm after the fast paced running scenes so that Max thinks he is free and everything is going to be OK once again. The fence is also a very strong symbol for being trapped and he has manged to get through it so the audience also thinks that he is safe. I also really like the lighting on the side as there is some very strong black shadows over half of his face.
9- This is the final shot of the film and it is really good as from the last you think he is going to be fine but then in this show he turns around and Slender is directly there in from of him. We also added a shaking and static effect so that the ending is true to what happens in the game when you loose and get too close to Slenderman.
2) How effective is the combination of your main product and your ancillary tasks?
Video of me answering the question (sorry for the poor set up).
 |
| Poster 1 |
 |
| Poster 2 |
3. What have you
learned from your audience feedback?
Thorough out our production we have posted out work on Facebook, Youtube and Blogger in order to get responses from people about the film and to also check what kind of audience we have been attracting. From the Youtube statistics on our film we have discovered that our film was most popular with demographic group of females aged 13-17 and then followed by male 13-17 and 18-24. This is not what we were expecting as we thought that the views would be male dominated due to it being inspired by the video game. Apart from that though the views are from our targeted demographic.
Our Blog also drew quite a lot of attention towards the film and our production, we have had a total of 926 page views from 10 country's. However most of these these views were from the United Kingdom and the United States though. This could be due to that these places are also where the game 'Slender: The Eight Pages' is most popular and so it has drawn fans of the game rather than people interested in the film. Unfortunately none of these people left comments on our posts.
The responses we have had from Facebook comments for the compleeted film are that they really liked it and they thought it was done to a good quality and standard. The responses on the drawn posters were also very good as they had received a lot of 'likes' and on the drafts they had suggested changes to be made like making Slenderman a bit bigger so he seems like he is closer to the protagonist.
Also in general from showing people the film they have said that it is very good. I had one person that told me that the title scene with the torch light was a bit too pixelated but we decided it didn't matter that much as i would have meant re creating the whole title shot again.
4. How
did you use new media technologies in the construction, and research, planning
and evaluation stages?
http://prezi.com/lfmc8zfnrgaj/present/?auth_key=8l8n2lp&follow=lefkijj0kkyf
Andrew - this is said with a sorrowful face - :(((
ReplyDeleteWhy oh why have you only done question 1?! The rest must now be recorded as not done.
You have posted all 4 answers by the extended deadline, but the prezi is not playable. Please sort this out immediately.
ReplyDeleteI've tracked down your prezi by searching for your name on prezi, but there is no content. I'm afraid I can't award any marks for that question as a result.
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