Sound at the End

We downloaded a guitar melody to compliment the final shot of me walking up the drive. It is simple but we both feel it works as it contrasts the tension built up beforehand. We took it again from the web site 'free sound.org'. This web site has proven to be very useful to us as we have got all of our sounds barring the diagetic ones, from there.

Image Control

We needed to make all the walking shots more gloomy, so we changed the image control and pushed the blue bar up slightly so we took out all the warmth. It was too red with the leaves so the blue toned that down a bit. We also moved a few things around such as the close up of my face bleeding in the mirror so it made the film easier to understand what was going on.

Film Opening Changes

We decided to change our film opening compared to our storyboard as we felt it would fit better with the story. What i mean by this is that the ending on our storyboard didn't have '3 Days Earlier'. We felt we needed to change it also so because we needed to include an extra few seconds so we could get to the time limit of 10% either side of two minutes. We added on the '3 days earlier' shot so our film didn't look like a trailer and it looked like a film opening.

Credits

We open our crdits with 'Critical Pictures presents' which then cuts back to me walking. A few seconds later we cut to black to see 'A Waters/Smith production'. Yet again we cut back to the action with myself walking to the stairs. It then cuts to 'A Nathan Waters Film'. We then have 'Directed by Nathan Waters' when the tap shot is being shown. Then it cuts to 'Produced by Owen Smith'

Hue and Saturation

To make each flashback obvious to the audience, we subtly changed the hue and saturation. We put the hue up on every shot tht involed myself walking to the woods. We put it up to about 10. For the saturation, we put the saturation up to 130 on every bathroom scene. For the bathroom shots we also put the Hue down to minus 15. This created a contrast from the woods to the flashbacks as both were different saturations. This also creates a darker feel over the flashbacks as this is where Mary is in the mirror.

Editing - The Mirror Scene

For the mirror scene, we had to overlay two images in the mirror. To do this we used the Four-Point Garbage Matte which allowed us to cut part of one shot, the mirror, with the shot of me looking at my hands. This is what we set out to do as now it shows me panicking while in the mirror, Mary is in my body staring at me. Blood is pouring from my eyes in the mirror but not in real life. We then added a fast blur over the top so it covered up any gap in the mirror and made it look like Mary fades in. We had positioned the camera in my bath so we had a set position. This meant that the camera wouldn't be moving meaning the angle of both images would be the same. This was important because if they were at different angles it wouldn't look the same.

Sound - 23rd March 2010

We have found a few sounds to use as the backtrack in our film. The main backing track is simply called tension and we got this from the website free sounds.org . Another sound we are thinking of using is called toms effect. It is a few drums beating a very slightly different times to create a tension builder.

Rough Cut (very rough)

No sound. It finishes at about minute. This is also old now as we have a far improved cut which will be posted soon.

Final Shoot - 24th March 2010

In our final shoot we hope to achieve the mirror shots that see the boy start bleeding and then controlled by Mary. To do this we will have to get the correct angle of shot so that the audience can see the boy but also Mary in the mirror. The camera will be positioned to the left of the mirror so we can clearly see the boy but because of the angle we wont be able to see the camera's reflection. What we intend to do then is to have he boy look into the mirror and then start to feel pain, because of Mary. Then we hope to overlay the mirror with another image. What i mean by this is that we will have two images, the original one where I'm looking into the mirror and starting to feel pain and then the one where Mary is controlling me and in the mirror. The camera will show me bending down in pain but the mirror will show me standing in the mirror looking at me in pain.

It shouldn't be to hard to edit this clip as although we have to add another image over the mirror in the scene, it should just be the simple process of putting it in the video 2 line in Adobe Premiere. It should then be overlayed into are original shot.

The final shoot went extremely well as we achieved all the shots we intended to get and also played about with a few things as well. We put blood all over my hand and then put a hand mark on the mirror just so we had something extra to convey evil.

Editing
After we captured everything in and watched it back, we felt it needed to change certain parts in it to make it better. Instead of just having the mirror scene and then the woods scene, we decided to have flashbacks of the mirror scene inbetween the walking shots. The titles would also be inbetween each walking shot for the first thirty seconds or so.

Time Lapse

While editing, we needed a way to speed the walking up. We had two choices, either cut out a lot of shots or use the time lapse tool. We ended up using time lapse. This tool allows us to speed up any shot we have got. It creates a quite edgy effect as it makes me look like im walking extremely fast. It also makes the sound speed up which again makes it feel dark and scary.

Third Shoot - Re-shoot - 17th March 2010

As a lot of the shots that myself and Nathan had got weren't good enough, we have booked the camera kit one final time to try and achieve some better shots. We are going to do this by re-writing part of the plot in the opening two minutes. Instead of Amanda dying, we will have a boy committing suicide. We will still have the bathroom scene, where it will appear Mary is controlling the teenage boy out of the house and off a cliff. We will create fake blood, which will be pouring from the eyes of the teen. We will have close ups of the boys face to show the lack of expression on his face and we will follow him until he jumps.

Rather than going to the supernatural direction, we are going to be true to the horror genre and be menacing and horrific. Blood will be pouring out the teens eyes and he will be controlled until he kills himself.

This shoot went much better than the previous one as the natural light really helped us when filming. We shot all of the woods scene and the cliff scene, which looked quite good. the only problem we had was that when showing the rest of the class it looked repetitive. This was re in forced by the class so we are thinking of cutting a lot of the wood parts out to make it more exciting for the audience. The other thing we need to do is shoot the scene in the bathroom with me there. This will also include Bloody Mary hopefully.

Editing
For the opening titles, we are having the tap shot fading in and out and in between each fade there will be a black screen. After this has happened, Bloody Mary will fade in. For the tap shots, we have desaturated the colour. Originally we had a lot of time lapse in our film but it got repetitive and overused so we have put a cross dissolve instead in some parts. This still shows passing time but it makes me disappear for a second and then re-appear a bit further in the shot.

Sound - 15th March 2010

For our film opening, we would need some realistic sound effects to create a dark, gloomy feel about are film. We needed sounds to create tension for the audience as it is after all a horror film. At first we used some diagetic sounds such as the scream or the tap running as we would not have found more realistic sounds. We used the site http://www.freesound.org/index.php to get our sounds for tension and of Mary breathing.

http://www.freesound.org/searchText.php
Breathing/ Whispers

http://www.freesound.org/searchText.php?search=tension&start=15&searchDescriptions=1&searchTags=1&searchFilenames=0&searchUsernames=0
Backing Track

Both these are rough so we may or may not use them in our final cut.

Second Shoot - 14th March 2010

We shot most of the main shots today including the bedroom shot where Amanda eventually dies. This shot took a long time to get right as we felt lighting was a key issue to address. At first we thought we could just use bare daylight but as the shot progressed we felt it would not have been appropriate as it would have been too sunny to see the candle blown out and the light flicker on and off. We then closed the curtains which created a very dark atmosphere- too dark for the camera to pick up anything so finally we put on a lamp in the corner which has the ability to flicker without having to turn the light on and off. We then lit the candle and put that next to the mirror and the room was then ready to be shot in.

We shot Amanda sitting in her chair and then turning around to the lights flickering and then the candle goes out. I think this went really well as it looks good on camera but also has an edgy feel about it which, when put together with music, should sound brilliant and scary. Futhermore, we shot the scream fom Amanda wiht the door swinging shut and the light turning off. To do this, we had to have someone stand behind the door and someone kneeling next to the light, so when the door shut and the light turned off, it gave the impression that Bloody Mary had something to do with it. For that shot, the camera was positioned outside the door, giving us that extra bit of secrecy about the locations of the people doing things with the door and the light but also to leave the audience wondering how Amanda is dying. I like this style of horror as it leaves the death to the imgination of the viewer which in my opinion, is far more scary tan a film such as Saw where you see all the violence and gore.

However we are thinking that we may have to re-shoot a lot of this as it hasnt come out as well as we had expected. We have to many shots from a high angle, meaning we are constantly looking down on Amanda which doesnt work that well. Futhermore, we need to shoot the scene with Mary in the mirror as we have not yet done that.

First Shots - 6th March 2010

We decided to start filming on the saturday as both of us were free. Nathan came to my house and we used the outside of my house and the bathroom. We shot the first 12 seconds, basically the tap scene which opens are film. This went very well as we had diagetic sound which we think works beautifully. This saved us from using the dictaphone and recording sound. We took three different angles of the tap and took two shots of each angle just in case one didnt come up well enough.

The second location was just outside my house. We have two takes again for each shot and the shot starts with me walking out of the door of my house and then walking up my drive. Again we tried different angles but we made a mistake at the top of the drive where we broke the 180 rule. This means we will have to re-shoot that sequence to undo this error.

Editing

For the editing, we cut each shot slightly to cut the bits we didnt need. For example, for the opening, we cut each view of the tap to about 3 or 4 seconds and added the credits. We also added fades between each ut, changinging the opacity.

Rough Animatic

The Pitch

Mary - final presentation 1

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Shot List - Group

Tap running. (5)
Amanda washing face. (6)
Truth or Dare whispered. (Sound Bridge) (10)
Flashback to her friends daring Leila to say Bloody Mary three times. (15)
Leila responds don’t be silly.(3)
Flash-forward to Amanda drying her face.(10)
Amanda walks out of bathroom, not aware of Mary in the mirror.(5)
Walks into her bedroom. Brushing her hair, looking into the mirror.(20)
Looks down, candle goes out at this point, looks back up and Mary is in the mirror.(10)
She turns around but no one is there.(2)
Cuts to outside the door with the light flickering and Amanda eventually screaming.(15)

Roll titles.