Costume Considerations

Costume Considerations

For our first scene showing my character, Sophie's, and Freya's lying dead/still on the floor, we are initially considering wearing white T-shirts for an enhanced effect if/when we choose to use fake blood for the shot. Besides this, the outfits will be casual and not too far off what we would usually wear to give the impression that the death was unexpected and perhaps even unplanned.

For the second shot, which shows a flashback of two weeks ago before the character's deaths, my character will wear a button-up shirt accented with either a leather jacket or a three-quarter length jacket to give the impression of a stereotypical police detective: an image created by other films and TV shows. My counterpart will also wear something similar as I am supposed to be talking to another detective.

UPDATE 16th Feb: As aforementioned, a long jacket was used for the flashback scene (for both featured characters) to give a more convincing impression of both detectives. The T-shirts have also been purchased for the second shot that should be filmed by the 28th of Feburary (5th of March at the very latest).

Outfits for detective scene

Black long jacket for Gray; character name Detective Raven. Chosen as it is stereotypical for detectives

Navy blue long jacket for my character; Detective Blake. Very similar to Gray's but accented by casual jeans suggesting a familiar surrounding or a wish to be comfortable for his next course of action. 

The outfits for the dead bodies' scene

Detective Blake's costume for this scene; black t-shirt for a hint at dark past, and/or a play on words with `Blake` containing connotations to `Black`. 

Lilith and Thana's character costume. White T-shirt for hint at innocence in character. 

Location planning

Byward Avenue bird's sanctuary
1 Sundridge Road

The plan for our shooting locations include using the woods around Byward avenue to film a shot in which three characters lie dead for an enigma based opening; followed by using a friend's room to film a shot of two detectives discussing a case that links to the murders we see in the first shot.

UPDATE: The detective scene has been shot on the 16th of February at 1 Sundridge Road (friend's house) with a plan to film the second scene on the 28th of February.

These locations were chosen because having a friend's house to set up the stringboard and camera equipment was convenient for the group and it was an appropriate setting/background for the detective scene when the props were set up.

The woods were chosen for the second shot as it is a stereotypical place to find
a dead body and a good place to set up a character(s') death.

Google Maps images of our woods shooting location

Questionnaire

Questionnaire and Analysis of Questionnaire from thetaleofdemise

The data above shows good support for our film opening as the target audience of 17-21 year olds (with a secondary audience of 15-16 year olds) is in correlation with the people we gave the questionnaire to. We also had quite a lot of enthusiasm about our Horror/Thriller.

We found that while our target audience only goes to the cinema occasionally for the most part, they still selected horror as their favourite genre and they selected other members of their age group as most likely to watch the film with. This is reassuring as there appears to be strong interest in our film's genre (Thriller/Horror) and one interested person in our target audience age group could bring further interest and more viewers.

The questionnaire's results on cinema viewing frequency within our target audience's age group shows that home cinema release and online availablity would be very important for our film as they do not frequently go to the cinema and we can therefore assume that other platforms are their preffered way to watch movies.

Limitations of our questionnaire include a lack of variation with our participants. The majority of them were female and convieniently within the 17-21 age group. A few more male participants and a wider age group being questioned may have revealed a niche audience previously not considered and perhaps different results to the ones gathered.

Also, within the genre question listed, Thriller was not available as an option for participants which was a fairly major oversight as our film could be considered a Thriller as well as a Horror.

Preliminary Task evaluation

With the preliminary task, we was tasked with setting up a collection of shots in a 30 second sequence; including someone walking through a door and a conversation that follows the 180 degree rule and a shot reverse shot.

Continuity errors included the position of certain props and proxemics changing in some shots. This would be combated by taking a picture of the set and then making a note of the characters and items' positions; taking care to ensure they don't change dramatically without intention.

For re-filming purposes, we would measure how much the tripod height changes so that we have an appropriate height for each shot and set.

In terms of props, make a list of the vital items and make sure their position remains in the same place for different shots

For sound, we will use relevant/clear sound and dialogue for the main production task and be careful of cutting sections out so that the whole sequence flows. Also, we will be careful of ambient sound within indoor sections.

The scenario within this preliminary task included a conversation between two friends in which one friend became more `cool` after eating chewing gum. The same friend would then offer the same gum to their friend for a more comedic effect than our original scenario (a friend with a plan to make money).

If I was to film this section again, I would re-film any shots that included errors in continuity or that had poor sound. I would also pay  more attention to the height of the tripod used for filming so that the shots that were re-filmed had an appropriate height when viewed on-screen.

Genre Conventions

Our opening sequence could be considered a Thriller/Horror due to its main narrative being an investigation, violence being present in the opening, and enigmas/mysteries being central to keeping the audience under suspense.

While we are only showing two minutes of our film, if we was to put the entire film into production, it would feature many common conventions of a Thriller including:
- An enigma that has to be solved by the protagonist or "hero"
- Scenes of violence or close calls that keep the audience "on the edge of their seat"
- A plot twist or a cover-up of information to throw off the audience (restricted, intrusive narration, red herrings, etc)


Thrillers have many different conventions and its genre covers a large number of films which has given us some flexiblity in production. I believe it to be a sensible choice for this task as it does not demand special effects or a particularly complex setting like a sci-fi might demand. Also, this genre means that we can create a highly engaging opening that holds an audience within a short amount of time and goes straight into the story.

vlog progress check

This is our vlog progress check; from around the date of January/Feburary.

As quoted above in the video, a large part of our film is intended to be viewed as if it is found-footage (much like The Blair Witch Project) and our dead bodies scene shows what such a sequence would appear like during action, with first person shots and asynchronous sound from the person/character holding the camera.

Also stated in the vlog, my absence has admitted been something my group has had to work around. Due to an illness that often renders me unavailable to work for long periods of time, Sophie and Freya have had to make decisions and complete research without me.