Production

Production Diary

15/10/15
I filmed at the school having a number of different people sticking up posters around the surrounding areas; such as the field near the graveyard. I had to create the poster and ensured to incorporate the missing person's helpline on the poster to make it seem genuine. I found the filming enjoyable and easy, especially in comparison to what was about to come.

06/11/15
Filming at my home proved very challenging. With the days in the winter being short, the filming had to be done very quickly and efficiently. Beth was very patient and co-operative when it came to filming her. I luckily had my friend who is also doing media alongside me to help by bringing her camera also. This was incredibly helpful as it meant that I could film the same thing from a number of angles. Before she came, Beth was having to do the exact same thing over and over again to ensure a good angle. With the lighting becoming darker filming was cut short. I also filmed a clip with her under the bed, but the lighting was so bad that I had to change her hiding place to a less conventional table. The mise-en-scene she was wearing was her 'sixth form clothing'. The point of this was to make it apparent to the audience that the kidnapping can happen to anyone. It also made the most sense due to the time limit we had on filming the first draft. I am glad of these time limits though because it left plenty of time for improving that my trailer definitely needed.

08/11/15
I uploaded the footage I had an realised after all of the editing on Adobe Première elements that my trailer had become Beth running round my house at different angles. Obviously this was nothing like I wanted and a poor excuse for a first draft. I was wanting the doll element to be prominent in my work; the setting from my test shots had become unavailable and the person who I organised the use of it with had let me down. I looked back at my animatic and realised that I could have a better plot and better shots than the ones I had planned so I changed my plan completely and began plotting a new idea for my trailer.


09/12/15
I had begun making more thorough changes to my trailer by now, I was getting clips with dolls in and really incorporating different sounds in my trailer. The I had found a new location to film at which was a suburban home. This made it easier to make it more relatable to the audience. I had begun to think about my mise-en-scene more. The close-up shots were very important when showing the fear in the victim's face. I liked the idea of not showing the kidnappers identity in the trailer so it gave it more of an eerie feel. I began to start experimenting with the different lighting effects on the editing software. This made me have the option of putting different shades on the clips to improve the quality of the mise-en-scene. The filming was difficult at my new setting due to the fact I had to change the filming location so many times. It eventually worked out to my advantage.

15/12/15 
I decided to add a news reporter into my trailer to try and keep it close to my animatic. I tried filming this different clip so many different times from different settings. It was really difficult to do at my school due to the fact of other people always walking around. I eventually got the right clip I wanted. I should have made the mise-en-scene better in the sense of costume. 

21/12/15
I went back to the house were I made the trailer of Beth running around the house and decided to get some shots of her in the boot of a car. This was to make the effect that the film shows you the kidnappers POV and also the people looking for her POV. I managed to make this prominent within my trailer with the use of editing the lighting.

20/01/16
I finally started to like my trailer, I went back to my own house and began to film more dolls which I had bought online for my trailer. These were to add more of the prominent theme in the trailer. I also had Beth come over and I did her make-up. This was not that good of a quality so I decided to keep it as a short clip at the end. I edited Beth's voice as she said 'Please play with me' and added this at the end of the trailer to give it a really eerie feel.

22/01/16
I invited Beth back over my house to get some images for the ancillary products. They started off really awful as I was rushed to get a first draft in. They slowly improved and I managed to find the time to make them as professional as I wanted them. I wanted to insure I created a conventional magazine so experimented with the plugs and cover-lines over and over again before reaching a final product.

24/01/16
After uploading my final draft and finally being happy with my trailer, I began to use Photoshop to polish off my images for the ancillary products. This took me a lot shorter time than it did in year 12 due to the fact I had become comfortable with the programme. I did have to use some YouTube clips to ensure that I was doing it correctly. I also experimented by adding different colour corrections on the images and began to blend it in with the background more and more until I was finally happy.



Trailer so far....

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I still need to make changes to the trailer. The doll towards the end will be multiple dolls and I need to get a few more shots of more fake blood over items to add to the fast pace at the end. I want to make the sound flow a bit better and also want to make the titles a lot better than they are. I will use Photoshop to do this and hope to have my whole trailer completed by the next deadline. I need to refilm some of the footage aswell to improve the mise en scene, for instance when the 'news reporter' is reporting. I need to find a better background and have better costume and props.

 

The black scenes after the second title is where the 'news reporter' scenes are going to go and the shots towards the end are going to be of other dolls being shown at a really fast paced.


New Draft














For my ancillary the costumes and props have not yet arrived,so I have substituted and put a picture in so that you can get the main idea behind the poster and magazine cover.

After some audience feedback I needed to add more coverlines and also ensure that the image didn't pop as much as it did. The colour of the picture made the magazine look a lot more of an all around film-genre magazine rather than just a horror movie mag.