Conventions of the opening title sequence for Viral Terror

Question 4: Audience ProfileWhen identifying an audience which would conform to my film, Viral Terror, I have analyzed various demographics, psychographics, uses and gratifications and general audience elements.

DemographicsFrom observing audiences occupations and the films theyd watch it is clear that certain job statuses, can influence the type of film an audience would watch. For example audiences watching Saw, are likely to be under demographics D, and predominantly E. This is because the film has a cast of mainly young people/teenagers, and as demographic E is made up of students, and casual workers they are more likely to watch the film as they can easily relate to the young people within the film. In addition the audience being young has been specifically chosen by the director to give an impression of innocence, and vulnerable to the dangers of the killer, Jigsaw, within Saw, as if the audience were to be under high employment, such as a doctor, in demographic A, then it perhaps wouldnt of been as effective when giving an impact of them suffering within the film, as this demographic is mostly of a middle aged audience, 45-59 years old, which would mean they could potentially exert their status, against the villain.

Viral TerrorWhen observing our film it is clear that Viral Terror would be under demographic E and D as similarly to Saw, the cast of the audience is made up of young people apart from Charlies character David, who we portrayed as much older, and bigger character. This is because alike Saw, a young cast would attract a young audience of D and E, who are between the ages 15-22, and of male and female audiences, as the film is equally balanced between genders. These audiences would either have a part-time/weekend job, and be studying at college, sixth-form, and even school, and therefore would like the fact within the film the young characters are similar to themselves. We portrayed this using costumes which appeared to be seen as normal clothing for the average young person/older teenager so this would reinforce the cast being similar to the audience.

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Question 4: Audience ProfileWhen identifying an audience which would conform to my film, Viral Terror, I have analyzed various demographics, psychographics, uses and gratifications and general audience elements.

PsychographicsWe can interpret from our film that as weve identified demographics E and D, the psychographics for our audience would be mainstreamers and aspirers. This would be because mainstreamers typically value branding and follow the way others around them behave, and their attitudes which in turn makes them the largest group. This would relate to our film as the group being young people/teenagers as the audience are likely to be the largest group of people conforming to mainstreamers, due to the fact theyll typically follow new trends within fashion, and film and would use social media. This means in turn they are likely to discuss Viral Terror with friends face to faced, or even online; giving their own opinion of the film to others, which conforms to mainstream audience.

When focusing on aspirers my audience would relate to this psychographic, as students and young people aspire towards the future, and seek a status with a certain appearance; e.g. upper class look of wealth with designer clothing. This would relate to my audience wanting to keep up with the latest trends, which are seen with the clothing and items celebrities would own, and my audience of young people would be attracted to this. My audience would relate to the film under aspirers, as theyd see young people within the film having their lives taken away from them, and losing their future. This would cause them to potentially value their own future even more.

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Question 4: Audience ProfileHere is a specific detailed audience profile with what a typical member of my audience would be like, their lifestyle and personal interests.

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Age: The age range for my audience already stated would be 15-22 year olds, as the cast of the film are made up of young people/teenagers, so teenagers watching the film would be able to build up their own personal relationship with the characters, and understanding as they are still fairly young their lives have almost been taken too early.Gender: Our gender for our audience would be mixed between male and female due to having a mixed cast so again gender references would be favored by both males and females.Income: Our audiences income would be either none or very little in either a small part-time job, or casual work. This is typical of demographic E and a young/teenage audience which would assume the characters seen in our opening would probably have the seem type of job or a low income.Personality: Our audience under mainstreamers and demographic E are likely to go to parties like most teenagers would, or social events such as the cinema or bowling. Again our audience would assume the characters within our opening would do the same.Likes/dislikes: The teenage audience likely to watch our film would favour to watch films which are full of action and excitement leaving you on edge. However they are less likely to watch films which are dramas are love stories, typical seen under demographic B and A who are more likely to watch these films being an older audience, and this would suit them.

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Question 5: How our media product addresses our audience?From observations made on our film, Viral Terror, we have addressed our audience using various techniques, to conform to their demographics and psychographics, along with uses and gratification.

One of the ways we met our audiences interests was by using sounds which are typically heard in most horror films. However for our horror film to be a Psychological thriller, and appeal to our audience we used various combinations of sounds to create a fearful backing track; creating tension and the on edge feel which comes with most horror films. This tension can be heard within our sound as there is a rapid pace of sound when David begins to attack Laura and Carl, along with the pitch quickly getting higher which is typically heard in most horror films, to portray fear to the audience. We wanted to create this effect as it related to the uses and gratification of entertainment which fits within our young audiences profile, as they conform to this idea of being young, and wanting to watch exciting films with friends at the cinema and experience that unknown horror feel.

Below is a sample of what we used in Davids scene of him killing Laura and Carl, which just shows using sound the impact of how fearful and disturbing this music sounds.

In addition to the sound we used characters linking to our audience which has been discussed in question 4. We originally picked teenage characters to relate to our audience of being made up of young people/teenagers, however we were still specific in which teenagers we would choose. As a group we decided to use an older range of teenagers from 16 onwards, as we felt a younger selection of teenagers wouldnt be appropriate for this type of film, for example 13-15 year olds. This is because our audience being teenagers themselves may of found the use of younger teenagers being killed in the film a bit graphic, and couldnt relate as well to someone who is roughly the same age as them. In addition we chose for our characters to be dressed in relatively normal clothing, which most teenagers would wear, so that they seemed no different to our audience. This would cause our audience to feel as if they could relate to the characters seen in the film, and question what if this was to happen to me?.

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Question 5: How our media product addresses our audience?When creating our film we specifically picked out key things which the audience would see on screen, which made up the mise en scene of our film. We can use the Carl and Laura scene to show how we used mise en scene to address our audience. Within the shot the camera is given a Rasta effect as if it were recorded footage on CCTV, which is where we wanted the shot to come from, and take the role of a CCTV recording.

In addition we placed the characters within an apartment block as being from a low demographic E, the audience would be able to relate to this idea of a small income and therefore not being able to live in some where such as a house which would cost a lot more, than an apartment block. In addition we placed Emilys character of Daisy in one of the flats with items such as a bottle of Coca-cola on the side. Now we specifically chose for Emily to reach in the fridge and grab the Coke bottle, as our audience of teenagers can relate to this as they are most likely to consume these products within their lives, as a teenage audience like the idea od having fizzy drinks and sugary foods within their diet, to create excitement and being hyper. This makes our opening seem even more relatable and realistic to a degree as we as a group wanted to portray Daisy as if she were just another ordinary teen.

Finally we focused on which camera angles wed use within our film to shoot the story line. We used a high angle shot to portray the shot as if it were being filmed from CCTV when Laura and Carl are killed. This shot to our audience showed the two characters to be seen as weak and vulnerable along with the low, underlying sound which created a sense of uneasiness which the audience wouldve felt. In addition we decided to make David come towards the camera shot, as if he knew it was there and he wanted the footage to be recorded. To the audience when David approaches the camera it seems as if hes coming for them, which will create even more tension amongst the audiences watching.

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Question 6: Technologies and ConstructionStarting the process

When I first started our project to create an opening title sequence, I had little experience when it came to editing the film, applying sound and choosing vaious shots. I had one advantage however which was id previously used imovie but on a very basic vague scale, without using it in depth. Within our group although we all filmed together and the others contributed to the editing process I decided id take on the main lead role to edit the footage and place myself in a new field id never properly entered before in detail.

With little experience when we filmed our first cut of our opening and edited it, we recieved feedback from other peer groups who gave us feedback which we adopted within our work. An example of this could be we were told to silent any diagetic sound within Laura and Carls scene as its CCTV, and this in turn resulted in giving an unknown effect due to it being silent, which is typically seen in horror films where the scene is kept quiet before the villain strikes

Technology

The technology we used within our process of making the opening title varied from cameras to editing software. We firstly recorded the whole of our opening title using Sony Video Cameras and a tripod, as we felt as if this would be the most appropriate piece of equipment to film with, comapred to an iphone for instance, which may end up looking less professional. In addition throughout our filming process we kept a behind the scenes recording of make-up and on set moments, which ive selected the make-up stages video to be put onto my blog of Davids character, to show how we applied the make up. To edit our film we used iMovie as it enabled us to edit and change certain parts of our footage easily, without using any advanced software, which may have been to complex. I learnt that from using iMovie you can add some effects and cut certain bits of footage to fit within your film and create an impression or effect of a scene to your audience. An example of this could be when we saturated the colour of Daisys scene to seem dull and lifeless, which could relate to her death and being killed by David. Id never experienced using and managing a blog before which was a whole nex experience for me, and in turn this increased my understanding of how a blog is to be used, and how you can visually engage and interest an audience to view your blog through seeing presentations, videos and text posts.

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Question 6: Technologies and Construction

Technology

In addition to using a blog to upload material onto the blog sites I used online sources such as Scribd. And Slide Share to upload any which included any text posts on Word or Powerpoint, along with video content which was uploaded using tools on Blogger. Finally when editing our music to match the visuals we chose a soundtrack which would be suitable and fit within our genre of horror being Psychological. This wasnt easy at frst as we first used a carnival like horror sound which youd typically hear in films such as Stephen Kings, IT the Clown, and we felt as if alhtough this is another Psychological horror we researched, the tone of the music we had sued didnt fit within the style of our villan David being silent, and ruthless and therefore we needed more of an unverving and distubring tone of a mixture of fast and slow paced high pitched sounds, to create this idea of one minute the scene being normal, then next death has been brought in, and the music weve used helps to enhance this feel and look towards the audience.

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Question 7: Final ReflectionBelow this final section will discuss my overall findings and improvements to aim towards to for future work within media products, and how to generally improve my understanding of the media.

Planning and ResearchWhen I completed my storyboard, planning and research at the time I believed that this would be the plan for our final piece to be presented to an audience, and the plan would exactly correspond with the on screen product we had created. Firstly I believe although I conducted research into horror openings and especially psychological horror openings, such as Psycho, I couldve included reference to the directors motives as to why the opening has been made this way by doing external research, and comparing their aims to whether as a group our ideas were similar, or would completely differ, which would allow us to see if our plan for the opening of Viral Terror was of a typical psychological horror.

In addition instead of strictly following our plan through out the creation of our product, we had to divert from various ideas within our plan and even our script has become effected by this.

Editing Raw footageWhen editing and filming our footage we found at first that it fit well together, yet when we started to fully analyze our footage we found many flaws and scenes which didnt make much sense within the opening itself. One of the main problems we faced was cutting out three of our characters within the film which then effected our script and plan. This is because we first of all filmed Daisys, Jamies and Carl and Laura scene, but once we filmed these scenes and went to edit them we found the footage to have a time of 3 minutes and 47 seconds, which exceeded the time limit. This meant as a group we had to much footage, and in turn had to make cuts to our opening. We asked peers what they felt worked within the opening of Viral Terror, and what didnt. From this feedback we received comments such as Daisys scene being drowned works well, perhaps not in a bucket as this seems to set up along with Jamies scene seems a bit forced within the opening; as in it not fitting the opening. As a group after discussions we decided to not film the other two characters of Robbie Andrews and Antonio Borelli, along with removing Jamies scene which we felt as if as he was the main character of the story, his appearance should be seen later.

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In addition to this we also decided from our plans of having Daisy being drowned in blood in a bucket of some sort we would get David to drown her in a sink as this seemed more realistic, and less set up as if the bucket was just there, which in turn made our opening seem more believable. Along with this from our plan where by we stated wed have a split screen of CCTV into four recordings, we decided this idea wouldnt be possible on a basic level of editing software, compared to what is available in the large film industries, e.g. Black-magic editing software. Instead we got rid of this idea seen below, and decided to use the same idea of CCTV, yet just two different recordings, as this still fit within our plot line.

What Ive learntIve learnt from the early stages of editing within film is that plan what is realistic for the resources you have to work with and how effective use of iMovie can still give the professional, realistic look we wanted within our film. In addition ive learnt recieiving feedback from peers is a good source of improvement outside of your own group, as it allows outsiders to view your work, of some who belong under your audiencem and comment on what they felt the film could do and bring to them, which gave us a much better understanding of how to edit and shoot our film to meet our audiences purposes.

Question 7: Final Reflection

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Group OrganisationAs a group I feel as if we were organised relatively well on set as we managed to complete all filming before deadlines, and we used communication through messenger chats, and face to face to help organise filming times and sessions, where by everyone could film without any setbacks or things getting in the way. We all managed to be on set for the filming processing and each had our own input into helping the characters understand what they needed to do and always keeping a script near by to follow it. In addition we had set roles for each team member within our group which we decided, which made it far easier to film as it saved time as each of us knew what to do. These roles are listed below:

-Myself/Jack Editing/Camera/Lighting-Haydn Editing/Camera/Hair styling for Charlies character, David Donnell-Tia Editing/Camera-Alannah Editing/Makeup

However if I were to improve our group in the future, Id perhaps consider letting others take hold of the filming process by encouraging them even more to get involved as it times I felt as if it was select individuals in the group who took the leadership role, where as in the future I believe we could encourage one another even more to help create an even better opening. What Ive learnt from group organisation is that in order for the filming to run smoothly and stick to a well planned time schedule the communication must be high, and as individuals within the group everyone has to be open minded to allow others to put forward their ideas, which was seen in our group in the editing process where even though the opening was on my computer, others in my group made good suggestions which improved the overall look of our work.

Camera shots, movements and anglesFrom using various shot types Ive learnt that certain shots within footage can depict a certain image of a character. Within our opening we used a low angle shot on Daisy walking up the staircase on the CCTV footage to her apartment which portrays her as vulnerable and weak, which links to this idea of her being young and innocent. To add too this we used a long shot to reinforce this idea of Daisy being vulnerable, which resulted in the overall shot being effective. What I learnt from this as that to an audience this can build up tension within the scene before something happens to the character, which keeps the audience wondering as to what is about to happen. I also learnt that shot movements such as a Dolly allows us to follow the character, which was used in Daisys scene when she entered her apartment and then went to the fridge. From the dolly movement and other tracking movement it allows as the audience to have a personal feel for the character and engage within their story even more.

Question 7: Final Reflection

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Overall

When reflecting back on our preliminary task I felt as if my understandings of how shots can be used effectively have progressed through to achieve a fairly realistic opening scene, which seems convincing. This is because the choice of shots and camera movements effectively displays the theme of vulnerability, along with dominance within the shots, which has been highlighted on the previous slide when Daisys scene is discussed.

Along with improvements with using the camera, I believe our choice of music and sound has improved. This is because with the preliminary task it was only one soundtrack played throughout, and other peer groups actually found it quite comical when the plot was meant to be on a serious matter. To solve this not only did we use various soundtracks within our opening to create a more interesting impression of what was going on to the audience, but we chose appropriate music, which would reflect the plot of the film.

In addition our editing has also improved since our preliminary task as weve used certain cuts with static within our opening, at quick intervals. We did this because compared to our prelim task where the cuts where there to simply show the scene continuing, in Viral Terror the cuts are there to create a sense of the killings David committed to be quick and not having an explanation, which this quick static does along with portraying this idea of distortion, which we can relate to David being a psychotic killer, and being ruthless with his actions.

In conclusion I believe our final opening has improved from our preliminary task in various ways, and the above state the main examples of where improvement and progression has been identified.

Question 7: Final Reflection

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Purple Planet Musicnull2014Instrumental129312.0eng - Purple Planet Music