The Doll Shed (opening sequence)

This is our final version of the opening sequence of a horror film - The Doll Shed

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Evaluation

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our horror film was very disturbing and confusing. Throughout our horror, the film would slowly and carefully reveal why things are happening and what really is going on at the moment and what's only past or hallucination. It uses all the different camera shots and angles such as high and low angle to show the powers, over the shoulder shot, point of view shot... We used so many different angles and shot to create the right tension and to keep our target audience entertained. Our opening sequence challenges the conventions of real media product because it is very confusing. If the audience doesn't pay attention, even the smallest little thing makes a change in one's opinion. We studied the opening sequence of Scream, and discussed several shots and angles, and why it is important for the film to use them. We could say that our horror film was inspired by several horror films and real events that happened such as Blair Which, Paranormal Activity, Human Centipede and a real case of a man who killed people to make dolls out of them. We made our film hard to understand (but not too hard), and made our audience feel sorry for the psychopath Dannie even though she's the killer.

How does your product re-present particular social groups?
Our film is aimed at younger audience - teenagers, therefore our film is about a teen girl. The audience should be able to find a link between her and themselves, whether they feel sorry for her or not. Because Dannie's mother dies and her father drives away and never comes back, it might remind some of our audience of their family, and their relationships between their parents.

What kind of media institution might distribute your film and why?

Brain Damage Films is an independent horror film distribution. They only concentrate on horror films of any kind, and therefore our film will be more successful. Brain Damage Films has been one of the most respected independent horror film distributors worldwide. Our horror film would fit under psychological horror films.

Who would be the audience for your media products?

I already covered this in one of the earlier posts on this blog. We we're looking for audience that has a lot of free time and money, and is willing to watch something that will scare them. The only audience to fit this would be young audience, between 16-25. Unfortunately we had to target our audience for the age between 18-24 as some of the scenes are too violent and disturbing for the younger teens to be seen. Young audience is often known for spending time with their friends and talking about games/films. They love to be scared and want to fit in within their social life and friends therefore would pay to buy a DVD or see the latest horror film at the cinema. We did a questionnaire before we started filming to find out what would make our target audience want to see our film and the results were clear. Confusing, disturbing and lot of blood.

What have you learned about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

We have used cameras, camcorders, Mac computers and normal computers and  a few of programs (Photoshop, iVideo and iDVD) to edit and make our film. Fortunately, all of the listed technologies worked for us, the only thing that was putting pressure on us was the lack of time we had. We made the most out of everything and put a great opening sequence of our horror film together. Another thing that was slowing us down was the speed of Mac computers and the actual editing program which at times was incredibly slow and because of that we didn't manage to add opening credits and the preliminary work on our DVD, but on the bright side it had everything we needed. All the audio, transitions and effect we needed were already included in the program.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learned in the progression from it to the full product?

One of the biggest skills I've learned that I didn't know before were how different angles and camera shots can change the relationship between two characters in a film. For example low angle on a person shows power, whereas high angle on a person shows no power. I've learned that not only the character but everything going on in the frame is important including detail such as colours or people in the background. All the codes and scenes have to be put together carefully so that the horror film does its job. The colours and music play very important role in the horror film. Grey and dark colour create the perfect feeling for a dark film, so does the weather (pathetic fallacy). The music has to be uncomfortable and needs to create suspense and tension, so that the audience feels like there's something scary about to pop up any second.

BBC Short Film Network

I looked at this website a few times to get some good ideas about filming techniques. This BBC website really helped me out.

BBC Short Film Network

Locations

The Doll Shed has 1 key scene, which is the actual shed where everything happens. Dannie is only young, but already in so much trouble. She's already shows schizophrenia signs, doesn't trust anyone, doesn't talk to anyone. We had to find a shed big enough to be able to fit everything in it, but small enough to make the audience feel trapped and feel claustrophobic.

Looks like an ordinary shed, so nothing look suspicious, but inside, the worst things happen. The door of the shed is red, which clearly indicates Dannie's anger and haters towards others.

We also used the back of our Media room. In the corner there was some black paper stuck to the wall which created perfect negative and emotional image, after we filmed scene with depressed Dannie there.

Streets... there was only 3 things we were looking at when we were filming on streets. We had to make sure there is no one around, the weather wasn't sunny and the houses weren't too appealing or happy.

Props

We had some disturbing props we had to use in our horror film. One scene shows Dannie's schizophrenic memory and flashes bits from present time. She however doesn't really realise what she is doing at that moment. For this we had to use some meat, skin, hearts and blood. Pretty disgusting, but it worked well:

Story Board

Before we could start filming or thinking about making changes in our film, we had to make a full sotry board of the opening sequence. Here it is:

Filming & Editing

Our filming went well, we filmed our opening sequence (just under 3minutes) in less than 12 hours. Seems like a long time but we had to be careful about the scene and we had to watch everything. We couldn't have people or cars passing by which sometimes was harder than it looked. We had to film some scenes several times to make it up to our expectations.

We had another 12 hours to edit and burn our opening sequence onto DVD. Editing was harder than I thought it would be. Everything had to be perfect. The audio, frame, colours... Because editing plays big role in the film, we had to be careful what effects, music and the transitions.

The Book

The book is very important in this film. It gives Dannie idea and brings all the memories back. We've chosen 'Dead Souls' by Nikolai Gogol, as it links with the story of our horror film.

Film Plot

Dannie is a 17 years old girl who's parents, John and Rose, died when she was just 16. Ever since then she tried hard to have a normal life, but it was really hard for her. She got to the point where should couln't cope with a life without parents anymore and she start's thinking about murdering people to bring her parents back. One day at college, she reads a book when a photo falls out of it. She picks it up and realises how much she misses her parents. The flashback brings the worst memories and the emotional feelings of saddnes and anger back to her. She grabs the key she took of her dead mothers neck, and heads home straight to the back garden shed. That's where all the killing and recreating happens. She uncovers the already dead body and starts cutting it open with amateur equipment until she gets the heart out of it. Next day, she comes back to college all scruffy and she looks for another person to kill and use body parts and organs from. This goes on for a while until she has everything she neads. When everything is stiched and stapeled together the truth is revealed. It was her parents she was recreating, and now she has them back. Covered in blood and dirt, she dies in her dead and recreated mothers arms.

Name of our horror film

The Doll Shed

This is our official name for our horror film. The Doll Shed. We've chosen this title because it shows there's something wrong with it, as normally people would get doll houses or barbie houses but not sheds. Shed is very depressive, dark and claustrophopic place and most people are scared to spend time there because it is known as a place where all the scary spiders and creepy creatures live.

Doll, on the other hand has connotations of childhood and happines, which includes Dannie's (the main character) childhood. She's only 17 when both of her parents die, and she is left on her own to cope with her life. The doll therefore represents something she will recreate from dead body parts and organs. Her 'doll' is not a typical barbie doll, her doll is dead bodies stiched together.

Film ideas mind map2

This is another, more colourful and more clear mind map about the ideas of our horror film. The name had to be changed from 'The Doll House' to 'The Doll Shed' for various reasons which I will explain in my next post. Here is the colourfull mind map showing our ideas...

Horror poster 2

This is a poster I've created to show what people expect to see in horror films and what are people afraid of. There are pictures and words cut out of various magazines that show this. The bigges fear would be death but very important is money. People are scared that if they don't have money they will loose their homes and family and will end up homeless taking drugs which also leads to death. Most of these words are linked to death or lead to death somehow.

Characters

In our horror film, the main character is a 17 years old teenage girl called Dannie Palmer. Her parents die shortly after she turns 17, and she can't handle the situation anymore.

John and Rose - her biological parents will only be shown in flashbacks and photos. They are middle working class (C2/D)

Here are detailed information we've created:

Name of production and logo

We've chosen the name E & I for a simple reason: there are the initials of our first names. Very simple but has got a good reason and doesn't confuse others.

Our logo is red and navy blue. Red connotes blood, fire or anger which perfectly fits with horror movies, and navy connotes coldness or feeling of being trapped witch also goes with horror movies. Once again, the logo is quite simple.

Plot sketch 1

This is a sketch of our plot. Very brief timeline with some sketches to show our ideas.

Horror film ideas (brain storm)

So here's a little brain storm of what we're thinking our horror film should be and should include.
We already knew what we wanted to do, so we developed our ideas and went into detail.

What do we expect to see in horrors?

  Violence

Blood  

Creatures

These are the 3 main things audience loves to see in horror films.They also expects to see disturbing images, mystery and death.

 

Audience profile

This is our audience profile poster.
We are concentrating on both genders aged 18-24. We've chosen this age because these people are young, have money and free time therefore are more likely to go and see our horror film in a cinema. We went for 18-24 instead of 16-24 because our horror is highly disturbing and contains a lot of violence.

All around the poster are shown Social networks, types of films, shops, drinks and foods that our target audience is likely to shop at and buy products from.

Scream (opening scene)

Scream has a very mystery establishing shot. We've been shown a ringing telephone. Straight away we feel quite uncomfortable because we don't know who our characters are, and where they are (place, area). We associate the sound of ringing phone with friends and happiness, but this sound takes us throughout the film and becomes very uncomfortable.

Later on, Casey is at home which is usually associated with safety, family, comfort and warmth however Casey's house becomes a living hell for her. She is trapped, not safe and alone and has to do exactly what the stranger says.

Film making tutorial video

Here are some useful rules and tips for filming. This video includes uses of light, angles, shot sequences tips and 180 degree rule.