Stairs/Titles Sequence To Be Re-edited

With this scene we need go back and edit it all because of the font used on the titles because it's not really a serif font or sans-serif font so we will go back and and apply a serif font to signify the slasher genre more as this is a common convention used is slashers. Also the audio is all out of sync because it sounds like the killer is dancing down the stairs because when it goes to a blank screen there's an overlap of footsteps and he seems to take forever to get down the stairs so we will go back and change this by cutting it and editing the audio so it sounds more realistic.

TARGET AUDIENCE

Black Nightmare is targeted at the teen audience, 15- 24 years, with a BBFC rating of 15 because this is mainly what the slasher genre is aimed at. A good example of this is Friday The 13th, where the teen audience would find it easier to relate to the characters as they're also mainly of the teen age in this film, and with our film Black Nightmare the casting are also of the teen age so our audience can relate to it as with Friday The 13th.

A good example for our film to relate to is Scream 4 ( Wes Craven, 2011 ) as it also has a BBFC rating of 15 and has characters of the teen age just like our film Black Nightmare. Also the protagonists in this film are the teenagers which is like in our film where the teenagers are the protagonists also , and the antagonist being the killer just like in our Black Nightmare film. This film also contains high levels of violence involving a lot of blood which is what the slasher genre audience expecting with this genre and with Black Nightmare we've tried to include these with violent scenes and lots of blood.

We didn't want to restrict our audience to just female or just male so our casting was chosen to provide interests from both genders, and we did this by having 2 female character and a male , but also our killer is of an older age and this helps to appeal to our secondary audience which is just older than our primary target audience and is form 24-34 years of age.

Directing

Whiles we were filming i'd give orders and directions for our actors and act as the director, and from this clip we can see how I did this , in some cases it mean't having to choose to go over the same scene twice if i didn't think it looked good enough. Also we had a shoot plan and i went along with this but at the same time made some adjustments as i went along so that it would look better.

Convention Influences.

Editing:

Psycho shower scene. 

Black Nightmare violent scene

For influence we looked at the film that introduced this fast paced editing to the violent scene into the slasher genre which was Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960), where in the shower scene to make the killing look realistic instead of doing long takes they chopped up their long takes into much shorter takes where it would cut away from the actual stabbing, because obviously they aren't physically able to stab the actor, but because it's done at a fast pace it leads the audience into believing the killing has taken place. So in our film, Black Nightmare, we looked to incorporate this editing technique for the scene where our killer attacks our scream queen with a bat, however instead of doing the fast paced editing completely we did short takes but instead of it being fast we slowed down the timing of the takes, and with this we tried to make it so that it would make the audience feel at unease for longer rather than just having the scene go at a normal pace and for it to be over quickly.

Black Nightmare's killer's POV

And we also look at John Carpenter's Halloween's (1978) for the opening where there's a very long take of a point of view shot which is from the killer's point of view, because we thought this had a good effect making the audience feel how the killer would feel in a way and even sympathising for the killer, however we thought that it was too long this take of the point of view shot so when we made out point of view shots from the killer we had them much shorter, this was to add to the flow of the scene and to make sure we didn't loose our audience's interesting in the opening by just doing a long take.  

Sound:

Black Nightmare's Soundtrack.

Firstly we looked at past slasher films for influence and what stood out to us was John Carpenter's Halloween's (1978) opening soundtrack, because whiles the titles in the opening are being shown there's a non-diegetic soundtrack in the background that's slowing building up tension, by starting with it's long drawn our notes to these notes slowing building up tempo and getting louder to the end, and in away these notes are plating with the audience's heartbeat and playing with their emotions so we wanted to try and produce a similar effect with our soundtrack in our opening titles sequence.

Mise-en-scene:

Laurie Strode

For our mise-en-scene influence we looked at John Carpenter's Halloween's (1978) again for the final girl character, because we wanted to signify our final girl like they did in Halloween with Laurie Strode , the final girl, carrying school books and unlike her friends which represents the scream queens who have boyfriends she doesn't have one and is more bothered about her education. So we tried to do this by having our final girl carry text books and whiles her friend , the scream queen, goes inside her house with her boyfriend. 

And with the killer's mask a good example that we looked at for influence is in Friday The 13th   ( Sean S. Cunningham, 1980 ) with the killer Jason Voorhees's mask. So we choose to use a black mask covering the whole of the killers face like killer Jason Voorhees's mask.

Casey

And with our scream queen we also stuck with the common conventions with her being blonde, not academic and sexually active,  we showed her sexual activity by having her go to the bedroom with her boyfriend and included an ellipsis after representing the sexual activity that took place. Also to show her not being intellectual our final girl walked off carrying books whereas she just walked in the house with her boyfriend. And a good influence we looked at was Casey in Scream ( Wes Craven, 1996 ) as she was blonde and had a boyfriend, but also she was vulnerable and useless in fighting the killer.

Rough Cut 2: Audience Feedback

We showed our media teacher our rough cut and recorded the feedback he gave us, which we can then go on to improve our film opening with.

Title

Firstly he noticed that with our subtitles at the start they're out of time with the scene with the killer walking down the stairs, and also some spelling mistakes in the actual credits so we need to go back and edit these, and he also picked up on the font we used as there wasn't much thought given into these credits so when we go back and edit these we should think about whether to use san serif font or serif font and why we've chosen to use this font, also at the start we didn't include our idents which we should of done. Then at the end of these subtitles the title of our film 'Black Nightmare' is shown but there wasn't much editing done for our title and it doesn't provide any exposition for the film genre which we were trying to so we should go back and change this so it looks more like a slasher genre title, and at the end of these titles our media teacher suggested we should have some sort of transition to the next scene to provide some continuity so it doesn't look odd, and we could use a distinctive noise or action to audio bridge from the credits to the next scene. Also the titles can be stretched out throughout our opening they don't need to be all at the start so we can experiment with this and see how it works.

Long Take

Then he thought that our long takes needed cutting down and shortening so they have more of an effect so we'll need to go back and edit this, and when we cut back from the stalk scene to the killer's room we could edit it so the cut back scene are distort to distinguish the difference in time and place. Also he noticed at points where our actors look at the camera so we need to cut out these so it's more realistic.

Then instead of re-shooting the chopping up of the meat where it's too slow we could speed of the chopping motion with the swing and add a loud bang on each chop so the aggression is more realistic from this killer, and we need some more continuity with our scenes so for example link up the chop with the closing of the door.

Also we need to work on our sound and cut out the wind interference so to replace this we should record ambient sound, and add all the sound that we're going to include in our final piece, for example we're going to re shoot the scene with the chopping up of the meat and include squelching noises of the meat and repulsive sounds to make the audience feel uncomfortable.

Violent Scene

And to make our violent scene more dramatic we need to break it up more and make it quicker with fast pace editing, and skip from where the killer picks up his victim to putting her into the car with the door on the car shutting with a final swing of the chopping up of the meat.

Improvements From Rough Cut 2

From the feedback we received from our media teacher and from our target audience we decided on making improvements, such as when it cuts from the steps down the stairs to the credits the foot steps are not in time with the sound so we need to go back and edit this. Also the credits could do with some improvements so that they anchor the slasher genre because they don't relate to the genre, and at the end of these credits the title ' Black Nightmare'  is shown, but it was boring and didn't signify the genre so we'll have to edit this also and possibly add some special effects which signify the genre more.

Psycho

And some of the shots that we have are too long and that they loose the build up of tension , instead these long shots provide oppositional reading which is what we are not trying to provide instead we need preferred reading so we'll have to go back and edit these shots so that they're shorter. Also the violent scene could do with some adjusting because it was too long so we'll go back and use shorter takes and include some fast pace editing, a good example of lots of takes and fast pace editing is the shower scene in Psycho ( Alfred Hitchcock ,1960 ) so we'll take influence from this and use it for out violent scene.

And for the scene where the killer is chopping of the bits of meat it wasn't aggressive enough with the meat as a killer would normally be. Also the sound could of been more effective to make the audience feel uncomfortable, for example squelching of the meat when the killer handles it. So this will be another scene that we'll have to either go back and edit with the sounds or re-shoot.

Rough Cut 2: Audience Feedback

We asked a group of teenagers, ages 16-17, to watch our rough cut and give feedback as it'd be useful to know what they think because they're in range of our target audience ( 15-25 ), then from this feedback we can see what worked and what didn't,  which we can then go on to make improvements to our film.

          

They thought the start worked well with the variable focus acting in away to provide narrative enigma with the killer's footsteps walking down the stairs. However, when it cuts from these steps down the stairs to the credits they noticed that the foot steps are not in time with the sound so we need to go back and edit this. Also the credits could do with some improvements so that they anchor the slasher genre because our audience didn't think they related to the genre, and at the end of these credits the title ' Black Nightmare'  is shown, but our audience thought that it was boring and didn't signify the genre so we'll have to edit this also and possibly add some special effects which signify the genre more.

Also our audience felt that some of the shots that we have are too long and that they loose the build up of tension , instead these long shots provide oppositional reading which is what we are not trying to provide instead we need preferred reading so we'll have to go back and edit these shots so that they're shorter. However they thought that the point of view shots from the killer's perspective in the bushes worked well and also provided the on going narrative enigma which is what we were aiming for, but the actually violent scene they thought could do with some adjusting because it was too long they thought so we'll go back and use shorter takes and include some fast pace editing, a good example of lots of takes and fast pace editing is the shower scene in Psycho ( Alfred Hitchcock ,1960 ) so we'll take influence from this and use it for out violent scene.



 Then they thought that the mise-en-scene for the killer's room worked well as the pictures on the wall gave the sense of this killer's stalking obsession with the victims, and also the blood on the killer's apron worked well along with his old black boots, however for the scene where the killer actually strikes his victim with the knife they thought it could of been faster and more aggressive as it doesn't look as scary it would if it was aggressive, also blood could of been used in this scene for the blows on the victim so we'll go back and re-shoot this scene.

And for the scene where the killer is chopping of the bits of meat our audience felt that he wasn't aggressive enough with the meat as a killer would normally be. Also the sound could of been more effective so make the audience feel uncomfortable, for example squelching of the meat when the killer handles it. So this will be another scene that we'll have to either go back and edit with the sounds or re-shoot.




These are clips of some of our target audience giving feedback...