Conventions of HORROR films...MISE EN SCENE!

Set Design -
Having the right set design is critical to creating a horror movie and setting the scene. The director would want to make the setting; believable and historically correct. A perfect example for this would be the film "Sweeney Todd: The demon barber on Fleet Street" as the setting and all the props involved would have to be historically correct and believable to the audience watching. 

  
For example in this picture the use of the old "barber chair" is historically correct and also links in the with story of Sweeney Todd.








Lighting -
The lighting effect is essential to creating mood and atmosphere in a film. Lighting can distinguish between night and day. It can also create the mood for scene just like in the film "Se7en" the lighting is quite dark and cynical.   

Space - Depth of the scene can make the finished product seem like as if the scene is bigger or smaller than it actually was/is. Size of the place your shooting is important as if you need to shoot a busy scene in the middle of london, you don't want to shoot it in a small park or road somewhere as you wont be getting the same effect as it would be in the main city centre. Proportions of the setting and/or objects.


Costume - Clothes of the actor would have to be the same in every shot; unless there is an obvious costume change which should be shown in the scene; if this rule is broken then the viewer could get confused and not fully understand what is going on in the scene. Keeping with costume the props that are used in the scene will be essential, if the actors use different props then this may also confuse the viewer.  For example if the actor was eating a doughnut with yellow icing and took one bite out of it, then in the next shot the actor had a red icing doughnut which was nearly fully eaten, this would confuse the viewer (if they notice it.) Here's an example from 'Back To The future':

Conventions of HORROR films...SOUND!

The music in the background of the opening scene is crucial for the effect it will have on the audience. For example; silence can create a sinister feel to the scene and creates a build up of tension as it usually suggest that something is going to jump out or something sudden is going to happen! However having some classical instruments involved works really well to create tension as well, as shown in the clip from Halloween which does both of the techniques above: Silence and build up of music. Build up of music is mostly used for horror films as a whole as it can create many different feelings to the audience from having different instruments playing at the same time or the tempo it's being played at.


Editors put in are sound effects to create different tensions as well in the scene and are very effective as well! For example adding in a crashing or abnormal sound frightens the viewer and can even create a tense or apprehensive feeling about what they are about to see next; I feel this is shown exceptionally well in the film "Se7en". It has weird crashing sounds in the clip and also involves some odd sounds that haven't been heard  before or you couldn't put an object to the thing creating the sound. 


Sticking to shocking and making the audience jump or be apprehensive on what they are going to be viewing next, a simple but effective piece of music is played when something has gone wrong or something has just happened for example this scene in "Insidious" as the child screams there is a sudden BOOM on the drums to startle and shock the viewer; ultimately creating tension and keeping the viewer on the end of their seats.  

Conventions of HORROR films...CAMERA ANGLES!

The camera angles in the movie openings, i have found to be different all according to the type of horror the film is. However i have found that most films use MS (Mid Shot) as most of whats being filmed for the beginning is letting the viewer know the basic story plot of whats going on for example in the film "IT."
Furthermore in the same film the directors use a lot of worms eye view shots throughout the opening of the film. I think the director uses this as it's as if the little girl was looking up at it herself to make the "IT" seem much bigger and scary.  

However in the film "Halloween" there were a variety of camera angles different to many other films. In the opening scene you see it through POV(Point Of View) as the young boy in the story first of all just a POV shot but then he puts a mask on and you see it still as a POV but the viewer is limited on what they can see. After he kills the two people it then walks outside, the camera cuts to a MS (Mid Shot) to show the boy with the knife and the police officer. This makes the viewer shocked as they don't know who's view they've seen it from and cutting to a new shot showing a little boy with the knife creates shock for the viewer. 

As aposed to the others; the film "Se7en" uses a different variety of shots. The shots used in the beginning of this scene are ECU (extreme close up) and CU (close up) the shots used in the scene as well are really bizarre and interesting.  




(ECU)

(CU) 

Conventions of HORROR films...EDITING!

I have picked up on many things with watching the opening scenes on what will make a horror film scary or to create tension in the opening minutes. 

Editing: 

In many horror film openings the shots have been edited by having the contrast turned right down so it gives the picture/image a greyscale tone to make the picture seem more sinister. What could be added to the picture/image is a black boarder round the picture. This is used exceptionally well in the opening of "Insidious."

In addition to this the editors also turn the contrast up on specific area's of the picture's or video clips this is used well in the film "30 Days Of Night" this edit could be used to emphasise different body parts, such as eyes (red eyes to emphasise evil) - 

Furthermore with editing some shots fade in and out of focus this creates a nervous disposition for the viewer and also keeps them keen to carry on watching. This editing technique is used well in the opening of "The Reaping" - 
Before: 

After:



In addition to all these edits, I noticed that in most of the clips I saw the speed of the cuts between shots were very fast or really slow. For example in the film "The Final Destination" the cuts between shots are very fast. As opposed to the opening of "Sweeney Todd" with this opening, the camera moves more than others but the shots don't cut for a longer period of time this could be used as the producer wants you to focus on what's happening in the clip rather than the short jumpy style where the producers don't want to give much away so they drop in picture's or clips that may be relevant to the film. 


Another thing to say about editing is the use of the text in the openings. In "The Blair Witch Project" and "Paranormal Activity" they use the same sort of style of text which is formal white text with a black background. Not spooky at all, but what the text says, that's spooky!

Paranormal Activity Writing:
In this film the text is still and easy to read, it gets the message across and gives the viewer long enough to read it all. 












The Blair Witch Project: 
However with this film, the writing seems to be jolting from left to right and up and down. Giving it a creepy and apprehensive feeling. 






Se7en:
In the film "Se7en" the text seems to be a different style of text. It seems to have a shadow on the text and is a more evil and 'damaged' text giving the film a more eerie feeling.   






With watching the opening to many different horror styled films we got information that the use of black background with a bright white text has shown to be popular. The basic use of contrasting colours really works as it sets a dark scene and initially tells the reader this is going to be a horror film. 

The Blair Witch Project Review...

Here is a link for the trailer of The Blair Witch Project. 

In the first 10 seconds it shows the opening scene for the movie by having some text saying 


"In October of 1994, three student filmmakers disappeared in the woods near Burkillaville, Maryland while shooting a documentary.


A year later their footage was found." 


The use of the text makes the viewer feel discomfort of what is going to come next as it's just a black screen with writing so anything could be in the next shot. It also makes the reader think of all the possibilities that could be coming up later in the film. Here is the clip of the film opening with interviews from people in the area talking about "The Blair Witch" this could be used in our opening scene. 

Media Coursework Video Task...

Me and my work partner Kaela have decided that for our video task we will be attempting to make a Horror title opening.

We have started looking at film title openings and looking at all the different feature's that a horror film opening may have. We've watched many different films which consist of different types of horrors. Here are a list of films we have watched:
. Insidious
. Blair Witch Project
. Paranormal Activity
. Rec.
. The Decent
. IT
. Se7en 

.Halloween
With watching all the openings to these films, it has given us a wider knowledge on how to create tension, what music to have, camera techniques and sound effects. 

Evaluation of Pre-lim task...

Video Task! :D (Pre-lim)...

Storyboard...

Rose Can't Find Her Book!