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Short film evaluation

FILM IDEA:
The genre of my film is a mix of horror and thriller, me and my team decided to pick this hybrid
genre because we believed it was a fun genre to make and challenging to write compelling
script with good characters and a villain who can frighten the audience , but at the same time
easy to do without needing a wide range of things such as a big budget , there are many
examples of horror films who achieved international success on a low budget such as the movie
“Saw” which had a budget of 2000 dollars. Furthermore, horror is one of the most popular
genres today according to stats horror is the 4 highest grossing movies of 2018, grossing 900
million dollars despite releasing 25 less films than the number one genre action, by choosing
horror we could attract a larger audience to see our film.

the story revolves around the main character (Joe) being kidnapped by a mysterious

unknown character, he is then brought to a dark room with 2


other dead bodies , he wakes ups and tries to escape the room he is in only to find out he is
locked in , he starts panicking but hears a moan behind him , he goes and investigate pulls the
cover off the body finding out that the man (Ryan) under the cover is alive together they decide
to team up and break out of the room when they are interrupted by mysterious man with a
dark voice telling them the only they can escape is if they battle to death with only one of them
being able to escape , left with no choice they battle to death and when Ryan win he decides to
kill joe as he believes it is morally wrong but is persuaded by the kidnapper who reveals to him
that joe is his girlfriend boss who abused her and fired her leading her to attempt suicide ,
filled with rage Ryan is about to kill joe but is stabbed in the back by the third body who both
Joe and Ryan thought was dead and the shot we see Ryan body being dragged out.

My short film fits the conventions of horror/thriller films through the setting; most locations in
horror films are isolated, dark and abandoned just like in my film , we used a drama hut and we
shut all the blinds giving the film a low-key lighting effect but also making the film more
mysterious and giving it a gloomy and cynical atmosphere.
Another way that our short film fits with the conventions of a horror/thriller film is through the
character types, the characters incorporated in the film fits well with horror film, there is the
main protagonist who is neither a hero or a villain as he has unintentionally made decisions
which has led to deaths of another person. There is also a villain, a serial killer who thinks his
actions are justified, which is what makes my film compelling and different. This is because it
questions the morals of people in our society, even though the main protagonists has made
mistakes, which has led other people deaths, does he deserve to die for blunder he has made
and lets the audience make their decision over the course of the film, this is a theme commonly
used in horror films such as Saw.
Another way our short film follows the convention of horror is because it follows the type of
lighting present in most short films. In my film there is the use of low-key lighting, which is
often used in horror/thriller films. This is often used to create a dark eerie atmosphere making
the audience feel frightened, agitated and vulnerable. We integrated these ideas in our film by
filming in dark drama studio and using flashlights to make it look like there is a damp light bulb
in the room as seen in movies such as saw (2003).
Additionally, we used props associated with the horror genre such as fake blood, which is use to
enhance the story by making it look like the protagonists was seriously harmed and in a bad
state also the use of knife which is perhaps the most iconic prop used in horror films because it
is more personal in comparison to the use of a gun, making it personal and in your face, it also
creates a tension as death using a knife is much more slower than a gun , we used a fake bloody
knife prop which one of the people in our group already had access to , this was helpful as we
didn’t need to spend our own money to buy props.
There were many theorists we took into considerations in our film such as Laura Mulvey male
gaze theory, particularly in horror films genders are represented stereotypically with men being
portrayed as dominant , strong and intellectual while on the other hand women are seen as
weak , emotional and in horror films usually the one being vulnerable and in need of
protection. The female lead tends to be blonde, young and attractive helping to appeal to a
wider range of male audience; this is furthermore expanded by Laura Mulvey who argued that
films represent women as passive objects by using specific shots which objectify women; this is
heavily used in the horror genre so myself and my group decided to avoid using this stereotype
by using a lead actor who will be a male diverting away from the stereotype and making him
the same age as target audience making him relatable to the audience. This makes our horror
film different to other horror films as we wanted the film to be relatable and realistic to add to
the aspect of fear.

Lastly Like many horror films, we wanted the narrative to keep the audience not knowing
exactly what is going on and want them to keep watching to find out , so we purposefully left
out some key information during conversations between characters which will be revealed later
in the film such as the main protagonist Joe being responsible for attempted suicide of Ryan
girlfriend this wasn’t revealed until the third act of the film, by giving the audience minimal
information we added a sense of mystery and allowing the audience to come up with different
theories themselves making it more enjoyable for them. We wanted to keep the "excitement
appeal" so at the end, we decided that we would keep the suspense right to the end and not
fully conclude the story fully - The audience never gets to see what happens to the main
protagonist after he is left trapped in the cabin . This leaves the audience continue thinking
about what happens, therefore creating a conversation after. This is a basic for social
interaction. For our film, we followed Todorov's theory in which he suggested there is 5 stages
of narrative. The last stage is resolution, but we changed this as we don't fully resolve or reveal
the end of the story. We wanted the audience to talk about our film after hence why we added
a cliff hanger on the end. If almost allows the audience to finish the end of the story and have
their own interpretation on the narrative. This again is a convention of horror to keep them
feeling uneasy and uncertain whether it could happen to them.

Cinematography:
To make the film as best as we could, we wanted to incorporate as many camera angles and
movements as possible, I wanted to use a use of close up shots and extreme close up as this is
what is traditionally used in a horror film we used closed up shot displayed in the picture
underneath to show the raw emotions of the characters who are confused and scared after
being kidnapped. This was a way of showing the protagonists emotion which in this case is fear,
the shot below is used when the protagonists of the film wake up after being kidnaped showing
confusion and fear which we were able to display by using a close up shot of his face.
We also used a tracking shot at the start of the film to show how the main protagonist was in
danger , this type of shot is commonly used in horror/thriller films and is quite effective as we
as the audience aren't observing things from a distance any longer, we now move with the
narrative , stalking the character and creeping behind them makes the audience more involved
using this shot we are also abled to build up the suspense as the audience are not sure what is
going to happen next. To film this we used a gimbal which we rented from the school to create
smooth tracking shots to build up tension and give the impression that something was going to
happen to this character. This also made the film look more professional.

Editing
Editing is an important process in the making of horror films and we used some editing
techniques to ensure the success of our short film for example we used fade to black
transitions, we used fade to black transitions because it gives the film a mysterious and tense
feel , we used this right after the main protagonist is kidnapped leaving the audience pondering
of what happened to him making them feel unease. We also used different paces of shots in
our short film, we used fast paced shots to increase the speed which in turn creates more
tension , we used this shot when the two main protagonists were fighting cutting back and
forth with the game and their reaction to being hit creates tension. We made the beginning of
the film with longer takes when the character was walking, to build up suspense and encourage
the audience that something was going to happen.

Sound
The music we used in our short film was a tense, brooding type of music, we also used the
sound effects and music to also create tension, sound effects enable us to make the
environment believable to the audience which makes them susceptible to stronger reactions,
we used sound effects such as door creaking and wind sound effects.
We also tempered with the voice of the villain making his voice deeper and more threatening, I
achieved this by using pitch bender on premier pro and lowering the pitch and adding
distortions on the voice to achieve a dark voice , this was done to give the villain a more
threatening vibe to the audience legitimizing his craziness.
We used music to build tension and jump scares by a loud slow building which can help put the
audience on the edge, we found the sound effects on a site online where you could download
sound effects packs for free , there weren't difficult to add in and edit them I as I already knew
when to the

Pre-Production:
The pre-production stage was an important process which helped us complete the film at a fast
pace making our filming process more efficient the different stages we went through were my
initial Development ideas in which we had to pick one which would be our main project, story
board , location recce , risk assessment , equipment list and production schedule.

Mind Map:
Before filming my short film, me and my group made a mind map and brainstormed all the
different ideas we had about making a short film, we chose 3 different possible genres for our
short film which were drama, horror and sport a film. We chose those three genres because we
believed those specific genres enabled us to tell a story which will be enjoyable to for the
audience with minimal props, budget and locations. It was helpful as by choosing different
genres it developed our mindset with different ideas we could go into. These were drama, sport
and horror. In the end we decided to go with the horror/thriller hybrid genre as it is the of our
short film , the mind map was useful as it enabled us to be flexible to come up with different
ideas and concepts that can be easily restructured or be added to the map , it helped us with
the easy flow of ideas making us link ideas between the three different genres . The mind map
proved to be a solid and beneficent tool because our idea was used from this mind map and did
not change for example the killing weapons being the video game Mortal Kombat we made
little changes to the story line for example we added more depth to the characters and villain
to make it more relatable to the audience before the villain kidnapped the 2 characters for the
fun of it but we changed it to him to being sort of an anti-hero where his morals and reasons for
what he is doing can be at least understood by the audience.

Development ideas:

Before filming my short film, I had to brainstorm all the potential ideas me and team wanted to
incorporate in this film, it was like a process of trial and error going through each idea one by
one, eliminating the ideas we thought wasn’t good or creative enough for example we wanted
to use a gun to kill the main protagonists but went against this idea and decided to choose a
knife as we believed that I was more personal and fitted more with the genre and conventions
of horror , you can also see from the brainstorm above that the storyline of the movie changed
, the first initial story was that three different characters who never met each other were all
kidnapped by a psychopath and made to kill each other until one survives , but we changed this
as we believed the villain was too one dimensional and lacked depth so we decided that
humanize him a little bit by changing the story to him kidnapping two people who didn't know
each other but were much more closer to each other than they think as one of them is
responsible for attempted suicide of the others girlfriend , we also decided to keep some ideas
which we thought we thought were competent such as the location being in a small dark room
with confined spaces. Changing the initial idea of the film was a good idea as it improved the
storyline of our film, by doing this we made our audience more connected to the characters
and creating an empathetic understanding to both the protagonists and the villains. Overall this
mind map was very useful from the first mind map as we managed to develop our ideas further
by considering it further and making further changes as mentioned.

Client Notes:

The use of clients notes were also useful in helping us maximise the standard of our short film ,
the clients notes is where we get feedback of our project from our client who suggests ideas on
how we could improve our film , for example one of the points discussed in my clients notes
feedback was to make clear the purpose of the video game and make a link between the
characters being hurt and the game , this was a problem as in our first script draft we didn’t
make it clear that that the game was responsible for the protagonists being hurt in real life due
to lack of dialogue. Thanks to this feedback we changed the script making the villain explain to
the protagonists that if they get hurt in the game then they will feel the pain in real life and that
they need to play the game if they want to survive and that only one of them can come out
alive.
The client's notes was a crucial part of the pre-production process as it allowed us as group to
have a moment of self-reflection by getting our ideas and concepts evaluated by our clients this
made us see mistakes and flaws in our concepts that we would not have been to detect
ourselves therefore improving the calibre of our short film. This was particularly helpful as I
think that the narrative is clear in the film because of the script change.

Storyboard:
The storyboard process was probably the most utilitarian part of the whole pre-production
process as it helped me to visualise what I wanted my film to look, what camera shots, angles ,
editing techniques I wanted, drawing the storyboard enabled us to plan the film in advance ,
identifying our errors which could corrected easily using the storyboard , this helped save much
necessary time and effort. This process proved to be crucial as most of the shots and the film in
general are similar to the storyboard with only a few scenes and shots from the story changed ,
I took the storyboard with me to the set of my short film and influenced our film and was useful
as it made the recording process swift , we took a lot of inspirations from our storyboard it
indicated us what camera shots to use and different editing techniques that will be applied in
the scene. Even though we stuck rigidly to the storyboard we also made some changes where
we thought was necessary to improve the film for example we at the start of the film, the
protagonists gets kidnapped from a medium side shot where we see the protagonist get pulled
out of camera frame but we decided before using that shot we should add a POV tracking shot
seeing the protagonists getting kidnapped by kidnapper from his point of view. We changed
this because we thought it would be more mysterious than if we saw him actually take him, and
we wanted to avoid it looking comedic.
I also made an animated version of the storyboard because I wanted a visual layout of the film
using more colours unlike the first storyboard, making the animated version of storyboard was
useful especially in the editing process as it gave us an idea of the of the colour grading, we
wanted to use in our actual film mainly low key lighting , making the animated storyboard also
made us detected problems in the early stages such as the initial location, we were going to use
a wide shot in the streets but changed this to an small alleyway as we thought it fitted the
horror genre more. This looked better as it was more realistic as a location for someone to be
taken as it is less likely for people to be around.
Overall the storyboard was useful a in helping the process of making our short film , it was an
useful way for everyone in my group to share their vision and brainstorming our ideas we had
about making this short film , I believe making the storyboard as a group improved the quality
of our short film.
Location recee:

Location recce was the easiest part of the pre-production process for my team as the locations
needed in our film was minimal to start with, we only needed 2 locations, the first location was
an alleyway which was a public space so we didn’t need to ask permission to authorities as long
as we didn’t disrupt local residence therefore we decided to film in the morning instead of
night. For the drama hut we sent an email to the teacher of the classroom who gave us the
schedules to when the hut would be free for us to use , the drama hut was also on school site
which made it easier for the crew as we didn’t have to travel far to film and could stay after
school to film if needed to do so making this a good location for the film as we could stay after
school to improve our work if needed to and also being in school we didn’t have a lot of
restriction which we would have had if we filmed outside of school.

Risk Assessments:
There were mild risks to the crew while making the film the most concerning one was filming In
public , inappropriate contact with the general public could have led to having the police called
or complaints being filled to the school so to reduce this we briefed the team to conduct
themselves in good manner and not make too much noise and also record quickly as possible in
public so that we don’t cause disturbances. Other risks included fatigue from long periods of
filming to prevent this the crew was given as many breaks as they desired, and drinks were
available on set making crew was hydrated and energized. Finally there were specific risks for
my film such as filming in a dark room which could have affected the quality of my film , we had
to make sure that the room wasn’t too dark to the point where we won't be able to see what
we are filming to be adjusted the lighting by opening the blinds and using flash lights on our
phone to get more light where we thought was necessary.

overall making a risk assessment was useful to our film as it enabled us to prevent any potential
injuries and keeping our crew safe during filming maximising the effort we put in our film.

Equipment list:

Making an equipment list before starting filming was


useful , it made sure that everything we needed to make our movie was already on the set ,
most of the equipment on the list was already owned such as a suit and a phone , we used a
Samsung galaxy s10 mainly because the camera quality of the phone is of high quality and looks
professional also because the quality was better than camera available at school , it was also
reliable as we did not need an SD card which we would have needed if we used a camera ,
losing the SD card would have meant losing all of our work so having all of our work was
reassuring and lastly the reason why my group preferred to use phone as camera is because the
battery can last longer the Samsung galaxy s10 has battery that can last up to 10 hours unlike
camera given at school which would run out after 2 hours of filming , a longer battery life
meant that we could film for longer without being worried of phone running out of battery. The
camera was preferable as the footage looked very professional due to the phone that was used
and we were happy with the overall look.
Other equipment we didn’t not have such as editing software premiere pro and Gimbal was
provided by the school , using the Gimbal was successful at it improved the quality of my short
film for example without the gimbal we would have recorded using our bare hands which
would have made the footage shaky but using the gimbal made steady camera
shots/movements such as tracking shot we used in the start of our film smooth. Editing
software premiere pro was easily accessible as it was free and in school which that we could
film our film which we filmed on school site and edit it during our free periods and after school
if we wanted improving our productivity.

However there were some down sides to equipment's we used for examples equipment's such
as Gimbal were limited as they weren't enough for every group filming so sometimes we had to
wait for gimbal to be handed back by another group or wait to film another day as it wasn’t
available at the time. We got around this by booking it out in advance before filming as we
learnt that they were not always available. This was very useful as our shots are smooth and
made the film look more realistic and cinematic.
Overall the equipment needed for this short film was minimal due to our idea not needing
much equipment as it is all set in one room and use minimal props and accessing the
equipment we needed was mostly easy as we already owned them, or it was already provided
by the school making the process easier and equipment list successful.

Production schedule:

The production schedule was useful as it


illustrated to the client and the crew of the film when the film was roughly going to be started
and finished, having a production schedule also made the crew more organized as we knew
when the deadline was, making us work harder to meet that deadline. Thanks to the
production schedule we finished our short film on time to edit it and send off to the client.
Overall the pre-production process was an important part of the filming process , it was
successful and helped to maximize the benefits of my project by working in advance and
planning every part of the film from location that will be used and the schedule and time those
locations will be available to shoot in , the pre-production helped to save time and budget , it
helped to provide the ideas to help my team and I create a final coherent product which is
successful. We used this throughout our pre-production and production stages so as a group
we could stick to our deadlines.

Script

The script is one of the most important parts of our pre-production process because it helped
us with the structure of our film helping us to lay out the film from start to finish, the script
also helped us with perhaps the most important part which is the dialogue of the film , the
dialogue helps us describe the characters to the audience e.g. their background , their age and
their preferences just by using the dialogue , furthermore the dialogue helped us describe the
characters visually so that the director of our film can encapsulate the vibes and aura of the
characters on scene for the audience to better understand.
Another reason why the script is important is because it is important in dictating the schedule
of our film by using the script we can roughly determine how long our filming is going to be and
make a schedule , for my film due to the long script , we divided the script in 9 different
sections each sections would be the days we will be filming and based on that we made our
schedule.
We also had two drafts of the scripts, the first draft was our initial idea but were drafted it
again to add more details to the characters adding more depth to their characters and making
them more congenial to the audience , the first initial script was also written on word but for
the second draft we used a website to turn our script into a more professional formatted script
making it look more proficient.

Proposal
We created a proposal to perform to our client after our client notes had been fed back to us.
The proposal was useful as it made us as a group understand our idea fully and were all on the
same page. We did this in a Power Point and added our pre-production documentation on
there and discussed our idea in detail. We had spoken about how we would contact each other
and share information- all of which was done through a group chat which was created to
arrange filming sessions and talk about the progress of our film. From doing this it made us
work well together as a team by being on the same page and aware of what was needed to do.
Our feedback from our client was very positive as it is clear which genre ours would be from our
idea and the pre-production documents, and we were told that we were well organised
together as a group.

Production:
I believe that the production of the film went better than initially expected we were well
prepared for the task of making a short film, we had the right locations for our film , the right
cast and the director/ producer , filming the project was enlightening and challenging e.g. we
struggled with the lighting of the room for a while but managed to find the right lighting ,
during this period I learned a lot of new skills such as how to work and function effectively in a
team of people with different ideas and perspective but still get the best out of everyone and
get the project done. I also learned how to be a better organizer, organizing the props we will
needed, the locations and the time they would be available and managing everyone else in the
group and finally to be a better communicator, communication is very important when working
of a large project I believe my communication skills improved a lot during filming.
The most challenging part of this film was the pre-production as the process can be enduring
and tiring, coming up with the ideas and getting the whole team to choose one out of 5, coming
up with a creative storyboard , choosing the right actors to be in the film and the director to
envision what the producer envisioned In his storyboard and bringing that to life. Also, the lack
of a budget was particularly hard to work with a larger budget I believe we would have been
able to get better props and better lighting props.
My film constantly demonstrates the conventions of the horror genre using the sound effects
and music we implemented in our film during the editing process, we added a dark ambient
music and sound effects associated with the horror/thriller genre. Also, through the mise en
scene, the location used is a mysterious undisclosed cabin this is purposefully to make the
characters feel lost and hopeless of escape intimidating the audience. The props we used also
fits with the conventions of horror such as a knife, the lighting that we choose for our film also
fits with the conventions of the horror/thriller genre, the lighting is dark and atmospheric which
is usually used in horror film.
If I could change an element in my film, it would be to add more comedic elements to lighten
the dark mood and also develop the villain of the story to have more of a backstory and not a
one sided psychopath villain who just kills and hurt people for the fun of it as I believe that a
villain in which the audience can relate to and understand their motives makes the storyline
and film better and more enjoyable.
The production process went without difficulty thanks to the pre-production plan we made; the
production schedule was particularly useful as we knew exactly when to film and for how long,
we filmed 3 times a week for 2 weeks for 1-hour periods , the storyboard was helpful as it
already gave us a rough idea of we wanted to do in terms of camera shots , editing etc. , we
stuck to the storyboard and the rarely diverted away from what we drew on the storyboard ,
the final film is almost identical to the storyboard, these pre-production parts helped the
production run smoothly and allowing to complete the film more quickly.
After finishing filming, I editing the film using adobe premiere pro, I did not know how to use it,
so I had to watch tutorials on YouTube about the layout of the software and how to use
efficiently which was useful. I used a pitch bender on the software to create a deep, monotone
voice for the kidnapper changing the original voice making his voice intimidating and
threatening. I also used colorista which I used to darken the footage we shot during the day
which I thought was too bright for a horror/thriller film therefore added the effect to slightly
darken the footage therefore creating a low-key lighting effect. I added sound effects to
enhance the film and tempered with the background music taking it to low pitch to high pitch
creating tension. A last editing technique I used in my short film is the camera goes in and out
of focus which we done on purpose to make it look like he is in a dream sequence.

Analysis of Production:
The challenges we faced while under production was limited but were there were small
challenges such as lack of the budget restricting us from being as creative as we wanted to be,
with a higher budget we would have been able to buy more props which I believe would have
taken our film to the next level, the lighting was also hard to work with we wanted to create a
dark atmosphere which appeared to be natural to the audience which was hard to achieve and
took us a couple of days of figure out the lighting we wanted to use in the end , these were
small challenges and did not disturb the filming process.

One part of the production, which went well, was the editing process as we achieved
everything, we wanted the editing was the most successful element of my short film , it was
challenging at the start as I didn't know how to edit but after teaching myself by watching
tutorials on YouTube I found it easier as the days went by and more enjoyable learning how to
add sound effects and alternate pitch of voices.

The most successful element of my film was fighting game sequence from where the two
protagonists Joe and Ryan are forced to fight each other to the death in a video game but they
are hit in the game they can feel it in real life and therefore if killed in the game they die in real
life. I thought this idea was unique and was not a something that was used before in the
horror/thriller genre where a video game is responsible for deaths of characters instead of
being at the hands of the main villain. We used the game mortal Kombat which also fits the
horror genre for its violent nature where characters can be decapitated and dark lighting which
I believed fit perfectly with the horror genre.
If given the chance to do this film again I would try and add a variation of different shots in my
film , I believe that my current film lacks a variation of shots , I would use unique shots such as a
POV shot , high angle and low angle shots and also quick zoom , I believe incorporating these
type of shots in my short film would make it more unique and distinctive , I would also have
liked to add more visual effects to the film such as giving the whole film a red lighting effect like
the characters are in another dimension or another world such as in the film SAW IV in the bed
trap scene , I believe that this makes the audience intimidated and adds more of a cynical factor
after all the colour red has a lots of connotations such as evil and danger foreshadowing what
will happen in the film.
In conclusion I am happy with the
results of our short film as I believe
that our effective use of mise en
scene, cinematography, editing and
camera shots has enabled us to
meet the expectations of what a
horror/thriller film is supposed to
be , the success of our film can be
attributed to our fruitful planning
in which gave us a solid structure
through the use of production
schedule which gave us a goal to reach and a deadline making us work more efficiently to reach
the deadline , I believe that this helped to increase the success of our film other pre-production
such as location recce also contributed.

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