Online Tutorials- Editing

While searching YouTube, I was able to find a simple tutorial that covers the basics of the editing software 'iMovie'. The software itself is great for beginners, which will be useful for our group as none of us have extensive experience at using editing software. This tutorial firstly covered the location of the clips you have filmed and how to actually import the footage in order to begin editing it. Some of the things that I learnt from this tutorial include how to add transitions effectively (including how to split a clip) and also about the different titles with regards to how to extend the amount of time they are on the screen, or to change the font or the colour. It was also made clear that there are pre made backgrounds available for any user to use. One of the areas of this tutorial that I found the most useful was the focus on sound. I was able to learn how to add music to our footage from iTunes or sound effects, and also how to adjust the volume of each sound by making it louder or softer. Another thing that was mentioned was about colouring and saturation for any footage, and also how to crop or rotate any shots that have been imported. How to stabilise a shot was also briefly mentioned, which may be useful to our group if we are not able to have access to a tripod at any point during our filming process. Something that was also briefly mentioned in this tutorial was that iMovie would provide our group with the ability to get rid of any background noise, which would be essential as we cannot guarantee that there will not be any external noises during the filming process. The final element of this tutorial was how our group would be able to share our production via YouTube or other social media, which will be an essential part of our process.

I later found this tutorial on editing software 'Final Cut Pro X', which may initially be too advanced for us but it may be more effective for our production, so more research would need to be done before we decided which software to use. In this tutorial, I learnt that footage can be imported by selecting the 'New Event' tab and how to only select the appropriate footage that you would like to use. It also discussed how to import the footage in a way that will take up the least amount of storage. The next thing that was discussed was the 'thumbnail view', which allows users to easily look through all their footage and also how to add footage to the storyline by clicking and dragging it. Moving on, I learnt how to refine edits and how to insert sounds, whether they are preloaded sounds or from the user's iTunes library. The sound effects are attached to the clips, even if they are moved around on the storyline. The tutorial also displayed how to change the colouring of shots and how to insert titles by dragging them on top of the clip, and also how to change the font and the colour of each title. The final element of the tutorial involved the discussion of how to share the video once you have completed the editing. From Final Cut Pro X, users are able to share their video to social media and they are also able to customise the sharing location.

Resources/Equipment

Costume Ideas

Dan Neary

16/12/15- Risk Assessment

I carried out a risk assessment at our chosen location to assess any possible hazards such as electrical equipment, cleanliness and fire hazards. I asked the owner of the location to complete a risk assessment form to assess each possible hazard and the level of risk that is created by this hazard. In addition, they also completed a section about which controls are in place to reduce any possible risk to a low level of risk. By completing this form, this allows our group to carry out our filming in a safe location as several controls have been put in place to ensure that the level of risk is low.

Mood Board

I created a mood board that will allow our group to gather inspiration for our own production. This mood board uses conventional settings of the horror genre and psychological horror sub-genre, and also demonstrates the style and colour palette that we would be looking to apply to our own production.

Final Survey Results

Work by Dan Neary

Summary of Conventions

Email to a professional

As a group, we emailed 20th Century Fox to advise us in the best approach to begin our production stage. Even without a reply, we have still research into the company and collated facts & figures ourselves to benefit our knowledge regarding existing horror films in the media.

7/12/15

In this week, our group hopes to complete any remaining research to an excellent standard and shift our main focus on to completing our planning. Depending on how far we get with our planning tasks, we would hope to begin filming either this weekend or as soon as we possibly can.

Narrative Theory

Work by Dan Neary

Technical Research

Audience Profiling

Profile by Dan Neary

Demographics are used in media marketing to classify as audience into age, gender, race and other categories. The three main factors used are gender, age and job/income. A person's demographic category depends on their job and status, however this is based on the occupation of the head of the household. Despite this, demographics and easily accessible and easy to categorise.

 Using psychographics involves dividing the population into groups that are based on social class, lifestyle and personality characteristics. However, they are based on the assumption that purchases and interests of a person always reflects that person's characteristics and patterns of living.

Psychographics deal more with the audience's behaviour and personality rather than the jobs that they have. They provide more detail as there is more variety within the groups, allowing it to be more individual. However, some people may have more than one personality so they may overlap between sections, which can make it less accurate.

Form Research

Audience Theories

This is some extra research on Audience Theories, presented in an alternative format. Work is by Dan Neary.

Uses and Gratifications Theory

Work by Charlie Ball

Reception Theory

Work by Charlie Ball

Location Test Shots

I gained permission from my relative to take photos of our desired location and found that the location had many diverse elements which we could apply to our production to make it more effective. Above are a selection of the shots which demonstrate the variety of areas that we could film in for our production.

Also, if you follow this link below you can view the full collection of the location shots that I took to fully demonstrate the diversity of the location.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/16014392@N07/sets/72157661282760270/

We chose to use this location because as it a Victorian building, it will offer an authentic atmosphere for our production which will in turn allow the plot to have more of an impact on the audience. Within the inside of the house itself, there are many different types of locations due to the fact that it is a large building and it also includes many elements from the Victorian time period that will create an effective atmosphere. For example, around the house there are a selection of black and white photographs which we could feature some shots of in order to create a creepy, old fashioned effect. The house also has many outside locations which will be effective to use as they include an area of trees, which is a typical setting for a horror film and some out buildings which have been worn down over time. This will create the effect of an abandoned building, which is a conventional setting, due to any damages that have been done to the buildings.