Because our two opening two minutes of our horror film is based on teen horror films, we needed to find out information on the film classification and what is allowed and suitable for a 15 certified film.
I used the British Board of Film Classification's Website, www.bbfc.co.uk/ to find out information about the 15 aged certificate and what is unnacceptable and what is acceptable.

 The information below is taken from the website about the 15 classification:

 

Discrimination - The work as a whole must not approve disriminatory language or behaviour.

Drugs - Drug taking may be shown but the film as a whole must not promote or encourage drug misuse. The misuse of easily accessible and highly dangerous substances such as aerosols is likely to be unacceptable.

Horror - Strong threat and menace are permitted unless sadistic or sexualised.

Imitable behaviour - Dangerous behaviour (e.g. self-harming) should not dwell on detail which could be copied.

Language - There may be a frequent use of strong language. The strongest language may be acceptable if it is justified by context. Aggressive or repeated use of strong language may not be accepted.

Nudity and Sex - Nudity may be allowed in a sexual context but without strong detail. Also sexual activity may be portrayed without strong detail. Strong references may not be acceptable unless it is justified by context.   

Violence - Violence may be strong but should not dwell on the infliction of pain or injury. Strongest gory images and strong sadistic or sexualised violence are unlikely to be accepted.

Theme - All themes are allowed providing that they are appropriate for 15 year olds.

In our lesson on wednesday we had to start to think about the opening title of our horror film.
I started of by watching 3 different opening titles of 3 different films on the website www.artofthetitle.com

The Player

• Production
• Director
• Title of film
• Main actors/actresses

25th Hour

• Producer
• Production Company
• Production Company
• Main actors/actresses
• Title
• More actor/actresses
• Casting
• Music
• Costume Design
• Editor
• Production design
• Director of photography
• Executive producer
• Producers
• Screenplay
• Director

Halloween

• production
• Main actor
• Director
• Title
• Production
• Main Actors/Actresses
• screenplay
• director of photography
• film editors
• Music
• Associate producer
• Production manager
• Prodution design
• Executive producer
• Producer
• Director

Locations

On Wednesday 17th November we went to look for suitable locations to use in our opening of our horror film.

Below, are the pictures we took of different locations and their surroundings that could be suitable for our opening.

Location 1: Pleasure Park.

Pros - Lots of room to film
        - Not many people walk through the park

Cons - Sometimes walkers walk their dogs through the park
         - Have to get to the park to shoot earlier as it gets dark early.




Location 2 - Town

Pros - Lots of places to film from
        - Can film at anytime

Cons  -  Gets quite busy
         
One other location we thought we could use was the alleyway in Regent Street.

Location 3 - Regent Street

Pros - Quiet
        - Not many people walk through

Cons - Little & Tight space, making filming hard to do.
         - Difficult to use a variety of camera shots and angles.

Casting.

On Monday 15th November, we discussed and thought about the cast of our film, deciding who will be playing which characters. We also thought about the personalities of the characters so in the end, we decided that we'd cast people who related to their characters personalities.

Scarlett Colson - Ellie (Bubbly, Confident and Heartless)
Connor Hobbs - Ben (Short-tempered, Mysterious and Twisted)
Jamie Reed - Matt (Funny, Friendly and Smart)
Hayley Bell - Friend #1 (Happy, Sociable and Bubbly)
Natasha Weldon - Friend #2 (Loud, Sociable and Bubbly)
Ellie Markie - Friend #3 (Trustworthy, Honest and Caring)

In our lesson, we created storyboards to help us plan our film our opening 2 minutes of our film. In each box of our storyboard, we had to identify the location, the camera shot and the angle movement of the shot. This helps us make our opening more interesting because we have planned it carefully.

Below are the photos of our storyboards of our opening of our horror film.

Opening Ideas

Opening idea 1.

A girl and boy are enjoying a walk through the park and the girl decides to break up with the boy. The boy then is left in the park alone while the girl walks off to meet her new boyfriend who is also her exboyfriends best friend.

Opening idea 2.

A group of girls are heading into town to do some shopping when one of the girls spots her boyfriend and his mate. The girl goes over to the two lads and asks to speak to her boyfriend, she breaks up with her boyfriend and the group walk off leaving the girls ex boyfriend in the middle of town alone.

We decided to go with opening 2 because we could work more with the plot and the town is more accessible than the parks and it would relate better with our plot of our horror film.

In my lesson today, we had to pitch an idea for a teen horror film to Mr Henton, and Mr Henton told us that our idea was acceptable and we could go ahead to the pre-production stages of our work.

In my lesson today, we learnt the normal way a Hollywood movie is produced, and what happens in the 3 sections of production - pre-production, production and post-production. 
Also, we had sit in our groups again and start to think of an idea to pitch to our teacher about a teen horror film.

In my lesson on Wednesday, my teacher was absent, and we continued to edit our preliminary task.

Mr Henton,
i cant upload my presentation :(

In my double lesson on Monday,  in the first hour of my lesson we recorded the footage for our prelim task on the cameras.
In the second hour we uploaded the footage and started to edit our film together.

in our lesson on wednesday we watched the first 3 minutes of the film Wrong Turn and we had to take notes on he visual and the audio techniques in them minutes.

The audio effects in the opening of Wrong Turn were mainly the tempo of the music. The tempo and sounds get louder as the danger approaches the characters. The music at the beginning of the film was orcehestral and has a loud drum every couple of seconds.  The instrument you heard the most was the violin.

The sounds in the opening of the film are louder than they would be normally. This makes the audience jump when watching because they do not expect it. For example, when she cuts the rope the noise is really loud, which makes you intrigued yet scared for what is going to happen next.

There are also lots of different visual effects used in the opening of the film.
At the start of the film, there is a birds eye camera shot which shows you that they are a long way down and they are in extreme danger. Also, they use point of view shots because when her boyfriend is killed, you can see the terror in her eyes, which automatically makes you feel uncomfortable and scared.

Other shots used are low and high angle shots when the boy gets to the top of the cliff showing that he has the power to get to the top first. Also, the tension is increased when the camera shots get quicker.

In my lesson today, we learnt a little about the history of horror films and what kind of things we associate with horror films. We have to make a PowerPoint on the history of horror films and we also was assigned a horror film which we have to add in our presentation. My horror film is Prom Night.

In my double lesson on Monday, we used the cameras for the first time to start filming for our preliminary task. When we had used the cameras for an hour we went back to the media room where we swapped over with the other half of the class. Also, we carried on editing on Final Cut Express 4 and adding effects and sounds.

In our lesson on Monday, we learnt how to use the cameras by a demonstration from my teacher.

We also carried on finalizing our storyboards.

In our lesson today, we was taught how to use Final Cut Express 4 and the basics on how to upload videos and how to edit them.

In our lesson yesterday, we went through different types of camera angles and camera shots.
We got into our groups, I am in a group with Leanne Mok and Scarlett Colson. We started to storyboard our preliminary task.

My First Post

I was quite excited to start my Media Studies AS Level course at Kettering Buccleuch Academy.
I was shown how to set up my blog and how to change the design and add widgets to make it more personalized.
Today in our lesson, we was shown how to use the school email account so i can keep in touch with my teachers with information about my work.
I was then given a demonstration how to create an account on Slideshare and put powerpoints into my blog posts.
For the last bit of my class, i got into a group with two of my classmates and i will be creating a short performance and shown how to use the cameras and the different shots.