Becky Sorsby Evaluation
1 In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our film, Vampire Tweed of the Heavenly Energizer, is a vampire horror/thriller. We have researched many other vampire films and thrillers and applied certain features of them to our own film. The thriller film we took inspiration from was Taken; a classic film with not too much action, but more mystery to it which makes the audience think about it more and maintain interest. Vampire films such as Van Helsing, Twilight and Nosferatu were amongst our main research. We firstly used a blue hue over the shot when editing. This effect is used in Twilight and Van Helsing. This effect is to give a chilling, scary atmosphere but emotional at the same time, as blue is normally associated with feeling sad. The first scene is also in black and white to also give the illusion that it is in the past (as black and white scenes look old, like black and white photos or films). We also used red writing to give the illusion of blood. This stood out over the black and white background as well. Adding to the red theme was after the death scene of the main character, Jacob. As Jacob is dying, the camera cuts to panning up at a view of dark trees with a red hue layered over. This red effect is not only to represent blood but to also show danger, giving out the message that whatever killed Jacob is now at large, which creates a scary atmosphere amongst the audience.
The costume consideration was also important. The antagonist of the, Marcus, we made to dress as a typical vampire but with a modern twist to appeal to a younger audience. We dressed him in a black shirt and black jeans with a black trilby. Jeans and trilbies are modern forms of dress amongst the younger generation. However the all black look on vampires has existed since the first ever vampire film was released; Nosferatu. The black shows the audience that this character is evil and untrustworthy. The trilby was not only to look modern but it also cast a shadow over Marcus’ eyes, showing that he had another side to him than what the audience saw before them. The shoes were a big factor as well. His shoes were black, leather and pointy like business man shoes. This was to give the character power and a high status.
As for Jacob, we dressed him in a cheap, blue jacket with simple jeans to show him as an ordinary character and so the status difference would stand out when shooting him with Marcus. The bright colour also shows him as being a good character in the movie but also vulnerable.
Another visual concept we used was the locations. The graveyard is a typical location to shoot vampire films, so we thought it would make the film appear more realistic.
We used panning shots when Jacob (Matt) is walking from college and down the street to capture his movement. This is to show that he is the centre of attention and who the audience should focus on. This foreshadows that something interesting is about to happen to him. An example of continuity is when we cut from the panning to a close up of Jacobs back, still walking, as the shot gradually grew to a long shot. This was also to indicate that something was behind him. Through this first scene, also, we gradually shortened the length of the shots to build up tension. We use a similar technique in the next scene where Jacob is confronted by Marcus, the vampire. Within this scene, as Jacob is thrown to the ground, Marcus is framed in a low angle shot to show his status above Jacob, who is shot in a high angle shot within this shot reverse shot scene. In the next few shots, there is an eye-line shot-reverse-shot. Although they are at an eye line match, when the camera cuts to Jacob, he is shot at a slightly higher angle, maintaining Marcus’ authority. In the next scene, Jacob is filmed from an extreme long shot to a medium long shot. As we figured from the last scene, Marcus is evil and the long walk gives the impression that he is walking his final mile of life, as the saying goes. It then cuts to a medium close up as we see him hand the package to a random hand that wasn’t there before, which shocks the audience and creates mystery. There is then a close up of the woman staring at Jacob, allowing the audience to wonder why she is doing this. Half her face is cast in shadows, which also gives her a mysterious appearance. The camera then cuts to a close up of Jacob, showing the audience his change of expression as he is supposedly attacked. The reason we did a close up of the face to then cut to a panning shot of trees was to leave the gore to the audience’s imagination. This also creates mystery.
As for the music, the soft guitar music in a minor key indicates a calm, quiet atmosphere. This is to get the audience at ease and to shock them when the clack figure dashes in front of the camera. As this happens, the music changes into a diminished key. Diminished keys are usually used to indicate when something is wrong or out of the ordinary, and sound spooky. In the last scene there is a soft, orchestral music that gets slightly faster to build up tension. As the female looks at Jacob, the music breaks into a huge crescendo to indicate the climax of the sequence.
2 How does your media project represent particular social groups?
We created the stereotype of typical vampires and how their victims react to them. However we slightly broke away from the stereotype with the costumes that I discussed in section one. The stereotypical features we included were, firstly, the Romanian accent our actor did for us. The legend of vampires originates from the Romanian state, Transylvania. The black clothing is also a typical factor of how vampires are portrayed. We also made Marcus seem more powerful than Jacob through the use of cinematography and dialogue, commanding his victim to run errands for him, as Vampires usually do in typical Vampire films. The typical vampire legend is that they have super speed, strength and charm. We made Marcus use sophisticated language, and we did an edit to make it look like he moved next to Jacob at an unnatural speed.
As for Jacob, we directed him to speak as loud as the vampire, as the vampire’s victims seem to have unusual courage and ignorance. Instead of simply doing what they’re asked to survive, they always ask questions, which seems to infuriate the vampire, in which it does so in our film when Marcus responds with telling Jacob “I will kill all your family, mother f*****”. Vampires also seem to have their own evil laugh, as does any antagonist in a story. Marcus, after releasing his frustration, scoffs at Jacob to regain his authority and power, as killing people seems amusing to him as if he does it all the time. Additionally, the other vampire that Jacob comes across shows the typical stereotype of a female vampire. They normally appear to have lots of make-up on with neat hair and luxurious clothing, as the case is in ours. She has a long, black coat with fancy, silver buttons with lots of black make-up. To conclude, we have tried to maintain the majority of stereotypical vampire aspects but made a few changes to make them more modern to appeal to a younger audience.
3 What kind of media institution might distribute your film?
I believe our film would be instituted by a media company such as Warp films, as our film wouldn’t require a high budget or a great number of special effects or locations that would require a high budget, as our locations were local and didn’t require permission. Our film is filmed locally and with not many special effects that can’t be achieved on regular editing software. Warp films commonly finance films like this such as Four Lions, which was filmed in Sheffield and had only a budget of £2.5 million. The actors are usually also not well known or in experienced, like our own actors in our film. If Warner Bros or Time Warner had produced our film, the budget and quality would have been higher and the actors used would have been better known. However, our inspirational film, Taken, is a low budget film of only $26 million with a very famous actor, Liam Neeson, and was distributed by 20th Century Fox. A big factor amongst all this is that the storyline of the film is entertaining. Compared to other vampire films, Interview with a Vampire’s cast had Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Kirsten Dunst in it; 3 popular actors who would have probably been in our film had Time Warner produced it.
4 Who would be the target audience for your media product?
Our target audience is mainly for people above 15 as our film certificate is 15 as the film includes supernatural monsters, violence, and language. The maturity of the film means it could be watched from people up to the age of 40, also according to our film survey. The film will appeal to people who enjoy vampire or any fantasy films, mystery films or action thrillers, such as the film Taken. It is also set locally in Barnsley, so people from this area will find the film subtly pleasing in that way.
To get a rough idea for our target audience regarding age, a questionnaire was completed from local residents. The age range was from 18 to 46, where 66% would watch it for free and 33% would pay to watch it. 66% called the film synopsis “intriguing” and 33% of the younger age range called the synopsis “grasping”. Another question asked was what the survey thought the age certificate would be. The female answered 15 because it would include horror and gore. The remaining males answered 12A. The older male’s reason was that vampire violence is vaguely comical. The younger male’s reason was that it didn’t sound very violent at all. From this, the film would appeal the most to younger males from their late teens to early twenties, or older males depending on their favourite genre, which was, in both cases, action.
Overall, the questionnaire wasn’t as successful as planned, as we did not receive many recipients, and therefore not much data to help us.
5 How did you attract/address your audience?
By using trendy effects, this is most commonly liked by younger viewers to people in their early 40’s who, in their youth, would have had the first experience of modern film technology. We have evidence of this in our questionnaire.
In addition, the way we wrote our synopsis was colloquial but descriptive. By doing this, everybody from 15 onwards can understand the synopsis, but the description adds interest to it along with sophistication for the older generations to relate to.
6 What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Throughout the creation of our product, we have planned on the location of our filming, the actors, props, timing and availability. Firstly, we produced a story board, indicating the actions and images in each of our filming frames which improved our organisation and a risk assessment sheet assessing the safety of the locations (along with permission which wasn’t needed). We eventually agreed to film in a local area so we didn’t have to carry all our equipment around for too long. The risk assessment evaluated the safety of the equipment and the crew, along with the actors, for example; uneven roads or cars.
The technologies we used were Final Cut Express software, Facebook, Google, Google blogger and YouTube, all of which were assessed on the Apple Mac. We have sued Google blogger to post all evidence of our research, inspiration, outcomes and products of ours and for the public to view and feedback on. My self and Jake used Face book to evaluate our questionnaire and to communicate, whether it was to help one another or discuss what to do in our next time period. Additionally, we used YouTube to find video clips to support us in our search for ideas on cinematography, editing and dialogue. We found clips such as Twilight, Nosferatu and Taken. Finally, we also used Google images to find photos of costumes and props that were needed in our film, such as black clothing, typical locations and accessories.
During the filming process, we used Sony DV Camera tape and a camera tripod. We used the Sony tape to record all our frames. We realised that using the tape method of filming was useful as we would take it out and keep hold of it; that way no one could film over the top of our clips or loose our clips which makes it a reliable way of filming. The tripod was able to fix the tripod in place whilst securing successful panning without bumping or wobbling and at different heights.
After filming, we used Final Cut Express to edit our film. This was used to apply music, effects and text to the video along with motion wipers from clip to clip and fade in-out effects along with cutting to maintain smooth continuity.
All of these worked apart from YouTube and Final Cut Express at times when it froze frequently and was rather complicated and unclear to use and YouTube videos sometimes refused to play, froze or wouldn’t allow embedding so we could upload them to our blog.
7 Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression to the full product?
Our brief was to fulfil continuity of the filming and editing of a character opening a door whilst remembering the 180 degree rule in shot reverse shot.
The main task was to create a 2 minute opening to a film.
Main skills that I have improved would be the knowledge of editing and cinematography. I have learnt what editing techniques work well together and how to create a desired effect using certain editing techniques. As for cinematography, I have learnt now how to create effective continuity and how to include different types of shot into my films.
Here are some images of vampire characters and their costumes. The smallest image is Vlad the Impaler, whom Dracula's character is based on. In his portrait, he is depicted as having long black hair and black medieval clothing. When audiences watch typical vampire movies, they resemble this image. The closest to Vlad the Impaler costume wise is Nosferatu. He wears a very similar hat to Vlad the Impaler (in the Royal family of romania in the 15th Century, the hat he is wearing was instead of a crown). He also is wearing a luxurious coat with brass buttons, like Vlad the Impaler. Additionally, we can see the Vlad isn't wearing any black clothing, but has black hair. Maybe the typical black clothing worn by vampires is to make up for that or resemble the same meaning of evilness. The fact that they both lived in castles is also a huge resemblance. Lastly, the star in the middle of Vlad's "crown" is usually seen as a crest worn around their necks. This is a subtle way of saying they're the same person or descendent without them looking identical. In addition, we can see Vlad is also wearing a fur cape. Maybe this is where vampires originally get their caped look from. 
