Question 1- In what ways does your media prouct use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our opening is a flash-forward scene and challenges the characteristics of a horror convention because we didn't include any gory or bloody scenes which is what you would usually see in an opening of a horror movie. We saw that most psychological horror films tend to use gory, graphic, bloody scenes which completely strayed away from the actual psychological convention of horror which is why we wanted it to look more psychological to challenge the horror convention. We also challenged it in this way because we used the ident Lionsgate which usually distribute films which are gruesome and bloody such as the film Saw. Considering our decision to not use bloody scenes, we had to somehow make the opening scarier and more appealing to match the elements of a psychological horror convention. We did this by using a darker lighting in the editing process in Final Cut Pro which worked very well with our opening scene. Another way in which we challenged the conventions of real media products is by tackling the stereotypical ideology of female victims and doing the opposite and instead using male victims which introduced something new to the horror genre. We also developed conventions of real media products as we were influenced by certain films on our effective use of mise en scene such as the props we used like the wheelchair where we got the idea from the film Jacob's Ladder but developed it as the film used a trolly whereas we used a wheelchair wanting to make it original and more creative rather than to just steal an idea. We also used many props for the costumes which was also influenced by the film Jacob's Ladder such as the belt, and the white lab coats to fit in with the scene of the mental hospital and try to make it look real and effective for the audience.
Question 2- how does your media product represent particular social groups?
Our opening represents two main social groups. One social group is the mentally unstable psychopaths/sociopath who plays the role of the patient in the wheelchair.The reason we put him in the wheelchair is because he has an abnormal and violent behaviour. Isaac's disorder is noticed by his impulsive behaviour,, and his disregard for societal standards, and has no indications of fear or guilt. He shows no emotion and presents no facial expressions, yet when looking at him, he does not look like a serial killer up until he was strapped in that wheelchair where he looks dangerous. As a serial killer, we did not want him to look like a monster otherwise he would have been apprehended immediately, and him looking like a normal human being made the opening more realistic and matched the psychological convention of horror. He is completely oblivious to the people around him and his behaviour shows that he has no interest on what happens to his life.
Another social group is the stereotypical ideology of doctors. As you can see in our opening, we completely subverted from this stereotype of how a doctor should be which is caring, kind and gentle and fit it with medical ethics of a doctor-patient relationship which we gradually strayed away from as you find out that the doctor himself is a psychopath and is seeking revenge on the patient. We were influenced by a number of films which convey evil, horrific doctors. For example Dr. Hannibal Lecter in Silence of The Lambs 1991 who was a sociopathic doctor yet very intelligent. Another example would be the completely crazy, scary doctor Dr. Giggles in Dr. Giggles 1992 who killed his own patients for fun. Both the patient and the doctor share similar characteristics who are mentally unstable the patient who shows no regret in killing many people and ironically is the patient of the doctor who's wife he killed and has the perfect opportunity to seek revenge.
Another social group is the stereotypical ideology of doctors. As you can see in our opening, we completely subverted from this stereotype of how a doctor should be which is caring, kind and gentle and fit it with medical ethics of a doctor-patient relationship which we gradually strayed away from as you find out that the doctor himself is a psychopath and is seeking revenge on the patient. We were influenced by a number of films which convey evil, horrific doctors. For example Dr. Hannibal Lecter in Silence of The Lambs 1991 who was a sociopathic doctor yet very intelligent. Another example would be the completely crazy, scary doctor Dr. Giggles in Dr. Giggles 1992 who killed his own patients for fun. Both the patient and the doctor share similar characteristics who are mentally unstable the patient who shows no regret in killing many people and ironically is the patient of the doctor who's wife he killed and has the perfect opportunity to seek revenge.
Question 3- What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
As a group, we decided as to what media institution would distribute our film. Carefully researching into various distributors we finally decided to use Hammer Films as they were well-known for their psychological horrors such as The Women In Black, matching well with our own genre of horror film. This would help to attract a much larger viewing of our media product as the audience may be familiar with Hammer Films' product quality. We also decided to have Lionsgate distribute our film as we particularly liked their style done with the popular SAW franchise. This decision was purely based on how well established Lionsgate were in the horror film market as this would draw in a huge audience from fans of the distribution company.
Question4/5 - Who would be the audience for your media product & how did you attract the audience for your media product?
During research, we used surveys to help find out who our audience initially were and gathered that our audience would mostly appeal to 16-18 year old boys. This was assumed because boys stereotypically enjoy scary and intense films such as The Women In Black which is why we decided to use the Hammer ident to attract fans of the production company. However, after our pitch we had discovered we could extend to a larger audience from the feedback we received. Considering the genre of the film is psychological horror, we expanded it to a maturer audience, both male and female because psychological horrors also attract women in this particular genre. This would also attract an older audience because psychological horrors are typically more complex in terms of storyline, therefore requiring a more intellectual audience to fully understand. As you can see from this shot in our opening film, the scene is dominated by male actors throughout, which would appeal to a more masculine audience. This was also done because it challenged the typical horror convention of having a female victim. We have also included two different ethnicity's which would assist in attracting a much larger diversity from our audience and not alienate the film from different ethnic groups. Our film opening also aimed to appeal to fans of various other psychological horrors such as Jacob's Ladder and Stanley Kubrick's The Shining as they were both heavily influential for the ideas of this film production.
Question 6 - What have you learnt about the technologies from the process of constructing this product?
In the process of making the film opening we developed our skills on Final Cut Pro which is the software that we were able to edit our film opening on. The use of Final Cut Pro was most essential because we needed the software in order to place our footage and put it together correctly such as making the necessary cuts to the footage. Examples of changes made using Final Cut Pro were things such as adding non-diegetic sound, changing the speed and duration of certain footage, adding transitions to help create special effects for the film opening, and finally cutting and moving the footage to help gradually create the film's flow. Finally we learnt that music plays a key role in our genre because it must create a mood for the audience which fits the type of film we chose. The music we chose helped create that eerie and uncomfortable atmosphere in the audiences' mind. Without this, the film opening wouldn't be as mysterious and wouldn't show the build of tension throughout the opening as successfully. This was definitely our strongest technology used. Using a camera attached to a tripod on dolly wheels we also developed our camera skills greatly and fully used the technologies we were able to obtain.
Question 7- Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
In our film opening, compared to our preliminary task, the clips show a major difference in success. In fact, when we first did our preliminary task, we did find it hard at the time, but watching it over now, we don't know what was so difficult, because we only used a range of one or two different skills when filming. However, when looking at our film opening, we are reminded of how much hard work we put into it, showing different types of skills we learnt during the filming. We experimented on different ideas, and everyone had an input on what we should do which made it easier for us to come up with a decision. In the film opening, we used extreme close-ups which we didn't use in our preliminary. Our use of camera in our preliminary was not as great as our film opening, along with mise en scene, where in our film opening we had great use of it, using props such as a wheel hair, belts, lab-coat, blankets and many more. With mise en scene, we also thought about the lighting in our film opening which we didn't consider at all in our preliminary task . One similarity that our preliminary and our film opening share is that they were both filmed at school. It was a big risk doing our film opening in school, but when we pitched our ideas as a team, we came up with ideas to avoid our opening location looking like a school and more like a mental hospital which in fact was our school corridor but evidently for us was a success and it did not look like we were filming at school due to our use of camera and editing on Final Cut Pro which we also used in our preliminary task but was easier to edit because it was a much shorter clip, so it took quicker to edit than our opening. In terms of editing, our cuts were very smooth and well matched to the mese en scene in our opening. Looking back at our preliminary task, at that time we thought our editing and cuts were really good, especially with not much experience on filming by any of us, but our with our experiences now looking back at it we feel it is a very poor clip. However, we feel that our preliminary task has helped us to get to where we are, and as a group we have learnt different aspects of filming, and we feel that we have succeeded in differentiating our skills between our preliminary and our opening which was a much bugger improvement.