Ancillary problems

My blog will not allow me to upload my ancillary product research for the magazine cover of 'Cape Fear'. However, I will take in the influence/research when it comes to producing our own magazine cover.

Update on filming

Last weekend, we concluded our filming for our initial shots. We also filmed the 'hill shot' of Sophie clambering up a hill in yesterdays lesson. However, we ran out of time and had difficulty with some shots, so:

• We still need to film the 'static' shot that will conclude our trailer. Jess attempted this at home later on after filming, although she had difficulty with this. She did manage to film a static shot, but she noted that the shot looked blurry/tacky and you could see some of her reflection. Therefore, we will aim to re-film this, or simply find an image online of static
• At the weekend we ran out of time to film Sophie reading books on ghosts/paranormal/poltergeists, etc... so we filmed this in school hours on Tuesday. We also filmed a few reaction shots during this time, to add to addition possible shots whilst editing
• We had difficulty filming the 'laptop/webcam' shot. Whilst I could film well enough on the video camera of Sophie on the laptop, Jess' webcam did not record when needed, and then recorded the wrong scenes when mistakenly clicked on. We then ran out of time. However, Jess has noted after re watching the mistaken filming from her laptop that the shot didn't look visually presentable. Therefore, we are going to discuss re-filming this scene, or we may use the video camera to represent the webcam instead.
• We have also not had enough time to re film the stop motion 'arm scene' this week either. This is due to exams, other commitments, and other filming in our lessons. Therefore, on top of our other commitments in media next week, we are hoping to reconsider this shot; whether this being re filming it, using the one we already have, or deleting the shot from our teaser trailer.

Ancillary research

As said, I have been having some difficulty uploading the videos to illustrate my research into the ancillary products for the 1991 film, 'Cape Fear'. I am still struggling to upload the magazine cover video, but here is the video for its poster:

Our main magazine and poster ideas...

After some discussion we have narrowed our magazine and poster ideas down to what we would like to have as our ancillary products.

1. The photo below shows one of our poster selections. The scanner has made it difficult to see, but this illustration shows the two girls either side of the poster, putting their hands on a Ouija board, denoting that they are playing the game. The poster illustrates the two 'actresses' through their names being centre top - between them. The Ouija board is centre focus, however, as it dominates the image and represents the significance of the prop, as well as synergy with the film title.

2. The image below represents our second favourite idea for our film poster. It shows the girls in split screens, as well as highlighting the Ouija board 'surrounding them'. We have featured the title of the film above the two left hand images, as well as the main 'actresses' names on the right. We have also included the stereotypical convention of 'Coming Soon' for a teaser poster.

1. Next are our two favourites for the magazine cover. We decided on the title 'FULL SCREEN' as it indicates and implies film theory, as well as the use of 'FULL' showing it represents a mass amount. Therefore, this title has been put about 2/8's of the way down, centre near the top, of the cover, stereotypically found on the magazines we had previously analysed; such as 'EMPIRE' and 'TOTAL FILM'. The core image is of the two girls' hands clasping onto the Ouija board, emphasisng this alongside the title of the film. It also has synergy with the poster idea above. We have also included stereotypical conventions of a magazine cover here, such as sub-titles, images, the price, etc...
   
   

2. Here too is an idea for the magazine 'FULL SCREEN'. This is much simpler, but features only the title of the film and an image of the main actress' silhouette in the distance. She is sitting at a chair, simply playing the game. However, the use of her only being black and faded adds a mysterious feel, as well as our ideas focusing on the back cover being neon red. This would contrast with the black silhouette, on top of denoting horror, blood and gore.

Poster Ideas

These drawings represent our initial ideas for the poster for our teaser trailer. We have coloured in parts of the posters to represent what our rough drawings mean, but we have not coloured them in as we feel we should focus on their outline for now. Here are our ideas:

• The top left image is through synergy with a shot we have filmed of Sophie dribbling 'blood' from her mouth. We have followed the conventions of 'coming soon' on this poster.
  
• The image in the top right hand left corner shows synergy with our initial magazine cover idea of the high angle shot of the Ouija board, with the two hands placed on it, representing they are about to play. We have simply zoomed out of our original idea, and focused on our two characters too. If this were a real film poster, the use of representing well-known actors may lure in a wider audience; therefore here too. We have enlarged the Ouija board however to show this is the main focus, so in a photo the camera would have to almost be at the boards level; highlighting its dominance.
  
• The bottom left corner illustration shows the two girls running away, but looking back scared. This is synergy with a shot we have filmed of the two girls running through a tunnel, and looking back to pull/help each other. We have also featured separate images to cover to the top half of the poster. Whilst the actress' would dominate, these images would hint at other references in the film. We got the idea for this poster from a 'Harry Potter' film poster, as shown here:

• The bottom right poster from our ideas is of a close up of the protagonist's eyes with mud around them, showing fear, harm and violence. Whilst researching my ancillary ideas, I got influence from the remake of 'Cape Fear's' poster, which features a extreme close-up of De Niro's menacing eyes. Therefore, in our group we decided on following the use of this close-up in shooting, and the use of mud around the eyes was influence from 'The Descent' (as said in a previous blog). Therefore, synergy with the shot can also be found again with this poster:

More of our ideas are featured here:

• We got influence from the first idea from 'The Blair Witch Projects' poster, featuring titles and information at the top with the dominating emotion shot of one of the film crew in the film covering the bottom of the poster. We feel this adds a mysterious element with the use of little information and the large gap vertical down the poster, but the strong reaction shot from the main actress would connote fear:

• The next poster features information throughout the page, but the use of split screens to highlight different parts of the film. The two outer splits show an image of a Ouija board, but only segments of it so that it can be understand on the cover. The centre images feature the two main characters - as played by Sophie and Jess - with close-up reaction shots of the two girls. We feel this connotes the girls being divided by the power and curse of the Ouija board, as well as split up and apart from one another. We got influence from the use of these separated shots from posters for both 'My Own Private Idaho' and 'The Limey':

Magazine Ideas

These are our initial ideas for our magazine cover ancillary product. Although in rough, they represent three separate ideas; a silhouette of an individual at a table (representing Sophie's character playing on the Ouija board); a split screen of Sophie's characters face and the Ouija board, and a high angle shot looking down on the board with two hands touching it, ready to play the game. They all show synergy with our shots and our film. We got some influence through deciding on these ideas. The first image of the silhouette was from looking at various posters, and admiring the 'Saving Private Ryan' and 'Mission: Impossible' theatrical posters (shown below)



We got influence from our preliminary task last year in reference to the top right hand corner magazine poster, which shows a split face. The image for this can be seen below:

However we thought of our third idea ourselves, after discussing the the Ouija board should be at more focus.

Next week...

...we will finalise our ancillary product ideas and then enlarge them, scan then and present them on our blogs. However, after this we will focus on our teaser trailer for now in order to prioritise our group.
As well as this, we will edit our new storyboards accurately (make the shots more precise and highlight how quicker we want them) as well as film both the hill scene and arm scene during school time.
We will also make a quick video diary upon how filming goes this weekend. From this, we are hoping we will have finalised our shots and can conclude our trailer with finishing editing touches afterwards.

Plans for this weekend

We are filming tomorrow from 11am in Whetstone. We plan to film the outdoor scenes firstly, followed by those in my house (such as filming from my window and the bath scene). We are hoping to be finished at around 2pm, as the shots will all be filmed quite close together. We are prepared with our shooting schedules, the weather will be cold but clear and hope everything will go to plan! Jess is also planning on filming the concluding 'static' shot when she gets home because her television easily does this.

Currently...

...I am having difficulty with uploading two ancillary product videos based on the 1991 film 'Cape Fear'. However, I will attempt to overcome this next week to present my ideas, although I can still take my research in influence.

From this, in yesterdays lesson we began to discuss ideas for our ancillary products. We completed six ideas for a poster, and selected two to enlarge to be our possible artefact

In today's lesson we acknowledged this and continued our research by producing ideas for our magazine cover. We completed three ideas, and have also narrowed these plans to two possible finale artefact's.

We will scan both our initial ideas and enlarged ideas next week at school to present on our blogs, as well as take photographs for our ideas over the weekend whilst filming.

As well as this, we need to arrange our new storyboard video so that our shots are quick and precise to correlate with teaser trailer conventions (at the moment, the music is right but the storyboard images are slow and do not fit in with the fast pace we have previously planned)

Development

Based upon our new shot ideas for our teaser trailer, as said we discussed new concepts and approaches to filming. For example, we liked certain ideas but felt the way we had originally filmed them was not successful (such as the scene where Sophie throws up 'blood' on a bench). We also deleted some shots entirely, as the visual form was not ideal compared to our initial thoughts. On top of this, we produced completely new ideas.
Therefore, I am going to inform of ideas we re-developed; those we scrapped, and those we created. Some of our new shots were from influence from watching various other trailers/films that we acknowledged.

RE-FILM:

• We featured a point of view shot of Sophie running, facing the camera to her feet. However, this seemed quite blurry and too zoomed in, which we didn't realise until the editing process. Therefore, we will re-film this shot with more preparation, in the same place as before (a path in Whetstone) as shown below from an original shot:
  

• We are going to refilm the throwing up blood shot, as said. The first shot featured Sophie leaning over a bench appearing to throw up blood (ketchup). We prepared this shot by taking it from various angles, although through editing we realised it was not obvious what the character was doing. Therefore, we are going to refilm this with a close-up of the 'blood' dribbling down her face/chin. Below is a photograph from our first day of filming that indicates this:

Next, we are going to re-film the stop-motion, jump cuts of Sophie's arm. This shot features her arm appearing to be carved by a cross with blood dribbling down it (through the use of pausing the camera, and using black nail varnish/fake blood) However, our teacher feels it would be more appropriate to use a programme on the Mac which allows a stop-by-stop frame to be photographed in order for the shot to appear more realistic. As well as this, he noted that the use of the table in the shot is obviously a school table, which may come across as lazy. Therefore, we are hoping to use the Mac programme, with bringing in a towel/table cloth to disguise the background. If this fails again, however, we may scrap this shot.

• We are re-filming a shot where Sophie appears 'crazy'. She was moving around violently whilst being filmed, which we fast-paced during editing to make her appear possessed/out of control. However, it looks a bit random and is quite dark, so therefore we are going to refilm this in more light. Also, instead of having her simply standing there, she will be laying down on a bed and using her arms more efficiently to appear 'out of control'. We feel that this would look better if we were to use shot-reverse-shots of this image of her, alongside other shots we film for the overall trailer, as it will focus on the panicky, troubled character. We got inspiration for the use of shot reverse shots of an individual close up from the 1991 film, 'Jacob's Ladder' (as shown here at the beginning of the film's trailer):

• We filmed a long shot of Sophie on a hill. Our idea was to have her run up the hill and leap in the air as she reached the top, so that when we reversed this during editing it would appear that an unknown force had grabbed her and pulled her down the hill without her permission. However, it wasn't very accurate or realistic once we had presented this, so therefore we have scrapped this; although we liked the idea of a hill, as it resembles climbing up and down (the protagonist's journey in the film). Therefore, we are going to film a high angle shot looking down on Sophie, as she aims to clamber up the hill in desperation. This will represent a force looking down on her, as well as showing her inferiority here. We will be using the same field/hill as before, as indicated here:
  
  
• We are going to re-film more close up shots of Sophie's face, as 'emotion shots'. We filmed one shot in night vision which we already like, although Sophie has glitter on her face. We are going to film various more to use at least one in our trailer. Here is the original reaction shot:
  
• We are replacing a shot featuring the protagonist's friend appearing to be dead in an illusion as it looked a bit tacky and unrealistic. Instead, we are going to film a shot featuring the friends talking on the phone. We got inspiration for this from 'The Ring', where the girls talk on the phone in the opening scenes.
  

• We are replacing the CCTV footage of the girl being followed by the 'thing' with a different high angle shot, to indicate she is being watched. The CCTV footage highlights continuity as it had been snowing, as well as the scratchy effect we had planned actually looking a bit tacky. We were also unable to change the time/date on the footage, which was irritating and a further negative on continuity. Therefore, we are instead filming a scene from behind my window, watching outside my house. This will feature Sophie leaving 'her house', walking down the path and then the drive. The use of us watching her from above will add an eerie effect as she will not know. Here is a frame from the original shot:
  
  

• We are going to include more flash shots of the Ouija board, to emphasis the game and the reasoning behind the film:

• We have changed the title card of 'Here comes a curse...' to another one after a few shots concluding '...that will never end'. Instead, we have altered the words to 'From the acclaimed director of [ ]' ... comes a '[ ]' as this is more popular in trailers. We got influence from 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' trailer, which notes 'it was a true story', as well as developing upon this and noting 'from acclaimed director...' We noted that being specific in our titles was more appealing:
  
  
  

NEW SHOTS

As well as this, we have decided to film entirely new shots all together. Some of these shots were influenced from other films/trailers, whilst some were ones we invented ourselves. These new shots that we decided upon include:

• A strangle shot (to make the demon appear to physically harm her)


• A long shot following the two girl friends in the film running and appearing to help one another. This will be filmed in a dark tunnel with the girls reaching out for one another and helping each other escape. The use of the handheld/shaky camera will give a eerie effect, as it will connote that the demon 'thing' is following them


• We are going to scrap our original ending of Sophie appearing to be taken over by the 'thing' and have a possessed voice. From this, we are instead going to combine a shot from Jess' webcam with one of our own camera. This will show Sophie's character updating on her webcam of what is going on around her, although the laptop will fall over alongside a bang/noise, which will then turn to black, pause, and then turn to static. We think this will be easier to correlate and produce. Here is a print screen from our original ending:
  
• We may add a heartbeat within the editing process, as this is this typically illustrates a personal concept for an individual, as well as highlighting a 'countdown' to the films release, the protagonist's fears, the girls end, etc...

INFLUENCE

As well as this, we developed upon ideas that have already been used, highlighting intertextuality. We aimed to focus on those films under the horror/thriller/psychological thriller genre, as we feel these are more appropriate for our filming. Although in a previous blog we posted a diary update of what films have influenced us, the following illustrate the one's we prefer and could complete successfully:

• A bath shot, which will feature Sophie distressed in a bath tub. We got influence from this from Daren Aronofsky's film 'Requiem For a Dream', with the female character screaming under the bath water towards the end of the trailer:
  
• We noted that our trailer seemed to focused upon human characters; in particular the protagonist. Whilst she is the most vital part of the film, upon researching trailers we noted that a wider range of shots are more appealing to sell the film. Therefore, after watching the trailer for 'The Ring' again, we noted a wide use of focusing on landscapes/settings, so therefore took influence from this. We plan to shoot a range of landscape shots. These form of visuals can be seen here:
  
  
  
• We plan to film a shot of the lead girl struggling in pain. We had already planned to show her throwing up blood again, although after watching the trailer for 'The Human Centipede', we thought the girl dribbling other liquids or spit would look effective. We feel that Sophie spitting her own saliva out in a shot would not look amazingly effective on film, so instead we plan to use milk. Here is the trailer for this influence. The girl struggling on the floor and spitting everywhere is towards the end:

• We may use an echo/distant scream in the editing of the music in our trailer. This can be heard from 'The Descent':

• We noted in the trailer for 'The Dunwich Horror' that the use of research/newspaper/the media news/press is ideal, as it alerts the story within the plot, as well as hopefully to the audience watching it. The use of the media being interested in the story is seen in this trailer. However, we like the use of the magazine/newspaper titles and images correlating and dissolving over one another. Therefore, we are going to film the protagonist researching on her eerie events. We will get books based on ghosts/aliens/the paranormal out of the library, and use dissolve effects of the girl flicking through pages on this subject. Here is our influence:

• We have already edited heavy breathing in our trailer alongside the non-diegetic soundtrack. The use of heavy breathing adds tension, as well as a creep effect. We notified the use of this from the trailer for 'The Amityville Horror':

• We have already focused on the concept of filming the girls emotion repeatedly, although we wanted a widespread view of this. Therefore, upon watching the trailer for ' ' we like the use of a extreme close-up of the eyes, with either mud or blood around them. The use of mud varies as we have already featured blood on the face:

• We also like the idea of focusing on a particular vulnerable area. After watching the trailer for 'Let The Right One In', the use of bloody, muddy fingers and hands is visually appealing for our genre and could be easily done:

WE HAVE ALSO DECIDED TO KEEP OUR ORIGINAL OUIJA BOARD SCENES. WE WERE CONSIDERING MAKING PAPER ONES SO WE COULD FOCUS MORE ON THE LETTERING/MEANING OF THE GAME, ALTHOUGH AFTER EDITING WE FEEL THE 'FLASH' SHOT OF OUR ORIGINAL FOOTAGE OF THE BOARD GAME IS IDEAL AND TO OUR PREFERENCE

Photos from Day 2 (28th November)

These are slightly delayed, but these are the photos from our Day 2 of filming a few months ago from November 28th:

Health and safety video for new shots

Our new ideas in storyboard

Shooting schedule for Saturday 22nd

At the moment...

I am currently researching a few ancillary products in contribution to the discussions upon our own products this week; consisting of theatrical film posters and magazine covers featuring the same film
As a team, we have been stimulating a range of ideas that will be included within our teaser trailer. Having concluded these ideas, we drew up a storyboard and should complete a video alongside our music in tomorrows lesson to visually serve what new ideas we have thought of.
I will then produce a blog on influences/changes we have made from class discussions throughout last week, which will be concluded tomorrow
From this, we are also going to complete a shooting schedule for Saturday's filming session and then begin ideas for our own ancillary products, to which we will hopefully complete in time for the weekends filming/photography session
We then aim to edit and hopefully finalise our teaser trailer, followed by focusing on our ancillary products that will parallel alongside the advertisement.

Further ancillary product research

Ancillary product research

I am going to research my ancillary products from films of the horror/thriller genre as I feel these will be more familiar to our research on top of influencing us further. I have begun with 'The Silence of the Lambs' (1991). Although almost 20 years old, I feel that time is not relevant but rather a varied structure of research is needed here.

MAGAZINE COVER:

• The magazine headline is positioned at the top centre, likewise to traditional magazine covers. It is bold and striking, alerting the audience to its title
• Unlike the one studied, the price/date is positioned almost within the titles font – therefore combing the advertisement of the magazine itself, on top of the appeal to the audience through its selling point
• The use of the ‘selling line’ is linked to the main image featured for the magazine’s focused article for the particular issue. The use of ‘What’s cooking?’ and the films protagonist ‘Hannibal’ interlinks with the portrayal of the character for the main image. The audience has to use interpretation to understand this selling point, but the deadly sinister eyes of Anthony Hopkins combined with the quote next to his face indicates that this character is making this statement; therefore, adding to questioning, horrific thoughts.
• The top half of the magazine draws more attention, with the striking eyes and magazine title
• Further information about this film is underneath: this is obvious with the use of intertextual red and white colours, linking the pieces of text together. Also, the colour scheme works well with the bold red ‘EMPIRE’ logo
• The barcode is stereotypically situated out of site; at the bottom of the cover in order to divert its lack of information in comparison to what is being featured within the magazine
• The dark colours on the cover indicate a horror, questioning feel, whilst the murky photograph of the individual featured has almost a brown/dirty tinge, combined with a striking red eye; noted for blood, evil, the devil, etc... This releases further information upon this character (i.e. one of horror)
• However, the title of the film is not actually shown on the cover. This adds to a questioning, commercial device; in order for the audience to find out, they must buy the magazine
• The one bold image highlights the feature, although there is one, far more smaller image in the centre top of the cover; actress Minnie Driver, as indicated through the information on the right side. This is in order to add to further feature elements
• Extra cover lines: the cover is not too cluttered, only with information/hints of the main feature e.g. ‘The most shocking scenes ever’; this lures in the audience further. Some further information about what will be included in this issue is then presented in the bottom right hand corner, with film celebrity names to lure in ‘film lovers’ through presenting these well known names. There is probably a hierarchy of ‘well-known’ individuals, with the most known at the top to advertise further information
• The advertisement ‘EVERY NEW FILM REVIEWED’ is the brightest element of the cover. Whilst the majority of the cover features whites, darks and red, this piece is in a contrasting bright yellow. The use of this device with bold, black letters almost screams at the audience. This is in order for a more widespread demographic to purchase the magazine.

POSTER

An intertextual link is instantly recognised between the magazine and the poster; both feature a close-up image of an individual (presumably an character in the film to unknown viewers) However, one is male and one is female. Here is my analysis for the theatrical poster for the film, 'Silence of the Lambs':

Ancillary Product Conventions

Currently we are developing further ideas upon what kind of shots we could include within our trailer. However, we are also preparing ourselves to consider the ancillary products (magazine cover and poster for our film) to go alongside our teaser trailer.

From this, I am going to research various ancillary products upon our particular genre; horror film. Therefore, here is an example of the conventions for a horror film ('The Shining') alongside an example of both its poster and feature on the film magazine, Empire:

MAGAZINE COVER:

POSTER:

Recognising how stereotypical film posters and magazine covers are presented will contribute towards my research and understanding of the ancillary products, on top of influencing decisions upon how my group will inflict these conventions upon our own products.

Plan...

Yesterday, we discussed a definite plan for over these next few weeks. Throughout this week, we will continue to explore more ideas/plans upon what we will shoot for our teaser trailer. We have been and are going to continue completing this within class.

From this, next week - once completed ideas - we are going to plan a shooting schedule for Saturday 22nd January (when we plan to film throughout the day).

As well as this, next week we will also plan our ancillary products (the magazine cover and poster for our trailer/film) We are going to do this in order for photography/filming to be completed on the 22nd whilst filming, as we may be able to put part of our filming as a picture onto one of our ancillary products. We will plan our ancillary products by going through all of our ideas in detail, and plotting what we think will be ideal.

On top of this, throughout the week we will research ancillary products individually, in order for influence/research purposes; therefore contributing further to our ideas next week.

Inspiration from Other Film Trailers