Post production part 2

Prior to even shooting our title sequence we knew that we were going to have some sort of soundtrack, although due to copyright as well as the mood of the song we wanted we decided to go against this original song.

We created tension through the use of fast-paced editing whereby there is constant action yet the audience doesn't know what is going to happen next nor who will eventually get killed. Moreover, we created suspense through the use of multiple soundtracks and sound effects, whereby one soundtrack is fairly sombre with a contrast of instruments that reflects the events within the scene, whereas the other soundtrack has a faster pace, the use of drums gives it a more tribal feel as well as creating tension as the audience feel almost as though its a chase. Moreover, tension was created through the use of suspenseful yet abstract camera angles whereby we enhanced the mysterious connotations to the forest by focusing many of our shots on trees as well as the use of ambient sounds of leaves. 

Our film is targeted at people aged 15 and older, this age group gets bored relatively quickly due to apps such as TikTok whereby videos only last for 15 seconds. Therefore, due to the fast-paced editing as well as our sequence only being two minutes, this leaves little time for people to look away or become bored. Films similar to ours (inc "The Hunt" and "The Purge") are targeted at audiences over the age of 15, hence our guidance for our age limit. Moreover, the gruesome aspect whereby one of the girls gets her throat slit helps to engage the audience within the first 10 seconds. Moreover, I think that the target audience would want to continue watching the movie, as we left the sequence on a cliffhanger, as we don't know whether or not the girl is going to survive the rest of the hunt or not, therefore the audience will continue watching in order to find out the backstory as to why the shoot is taking place or to find out whether or not the girl survives and what will happen next.

we chose to only have 4 titles, the production company, the funding company, the director, and the title of the film. We used a random word generator as well as said random words that we thought would sound good in order to come up with all of the names bar the title, as prior to filming we knew that we wanted to use the song "This is the Day" by The The, as we all agreed it would work well in a contrapuntal type of way. Additionally, we knew that we wanted a big, bold font for the title, so we looked through different fonts and chose one that we thought would look the best. We then changed the size of specific words in order to make other words appear more important. We decided to use yellow words on top of a black background in order to make it bolder and stand out as it will be the last thing the audience will see. Moreover, common connotations to yellow are: Happiness, purity, joy, and optimism, therefore these titles juxtapose the narrative of the movie. Although, on the other hand, yellow can also represent: jealousy, betrayal, and danger which could foreshadow the events of the movie.

Before we adjusted any sound we made sure that the order of the shots was correct. When editing the sound we began by listening to the entire edited sequence and then we were able to detach the audio from the video and adjust it until it was perfect! Because we used an external microphone there were two sets of audios so we listened to both of them and then deleted the one that wasn't so good. We then made sure that the audio we liked was on the left and right sides. Once the basic audio was completed we then looked at different sound effects, we knew we certainly needed a gunshot as well as ambient sound of the forest, by looking in already saved sounds on the computer we were able to use realistic sound effects that we knew wouldn't get copyrighted. Finally, we added various soundtracks, the first being an upbeat drum track which sets the scene of an intense chase, we then switch to a soundtrack which is more mellow yet eerie that a peer of ours, Felix W, made for us, specifically for our sequence.

To conclude, I think that our opening title sequence turned out much better than I had anticipated. I personally think that the flow of the sequences works incredibly well as nothing feels out of place and each scene seamlessly passes into the next. Moreover, the fact that we took so many takes on the day of the shoot really helped us out when editing as we were able to use multiple takes and angles when showing one specific scene. A couple of things went wrong when editing, although it wasn't entirely down to my group and I, as a few times Premiere Pro completely shut down and deleted all of the changes we had made, this set us back on editing therefore we had to redo quite a bit.

Post production: Part 1

We began editing by watching all of the footage back and labeling the ones we liked by character and the specific shot, for example "Zaza Close-up Tree Shot 1". We liked the majority of the shots so began putting the rushes into bins depending on the character to make it easier to edit, as we had a rough idea from our shot list the order we wanted to edit in.

There were no crucial mistakes that we noticed, although there were some shots we didn't use solely due to us not liking them. an example of this is a shot whereby we panned the camera to show the sky and then tilted it down to introduce one of the characters, due to the placement of it in our sequence it stopped the sequence flowing as it didn't fit with the pace and the tension that had already been created. Moreover, there were a few shots whereby the characters were walking the wrong way or the composition was off so we decided not to use them. In addition to this, the sound was a bit of an issue whereby our only line, "have fun" which tells the audience lots about the narrative wasn't really picked up very well in the shot we wanted to use, therefore our only options were to either use another take, get rid of the scene (which could lead to later confusion) or unlink the audio and use it alongside the take we actually liked- although it may not have matched up. therefore we decided to firstly try and turn the sound up on the shot we liked although it didn't sound great so we just used several takes and made sure we just used the audio from the one where you can hear the dialogue. 

Some early choices we made that shaped our final opening title sequence include the use of costume, sound, and composition within the frame. Prior to filming, we made a shot list whereby we planned the shots we deemed necessary and put them into order, this gave us a rough idea of everything we needed to do on the day as well as helped us plan when editing as it helped us gauge where everything went. A crucial part to our sequence is the ending whereby we want to leave the audience on a cliffhanger and make them want to watch more, we initially intended for her to walk over the hunter's body while the titles play although we decided this wouldn't be as effective as it makes the opening sequence more into a short film, therefore we cut while she was still killing the hunter, on the day we made our protagonist- Daisy, hit the camera with the back of the gun which blacked out the entire screen, although by doing this didn't look very realistic as her movements were much slower than other shots we got, therefore instead of blacking out the screen with the base of the gun, we just cut to a black screen and bright yellow titles. Furthermore, from the offset, we knew that we wanted the hunters walking from the left to the right, and in any confrontation we wanted the girl to be on the left, as much like reading a book the audience read the screen from the left to the right, therefore if anyone walks in from the right it can create tension and unease.

It's difficult to pinpoint two choices that we made when editing, although as an introduction to our opening scene we were going to have one of our hunters - Stu - walking around the forest, this would set the scene as It shows off the location as well as his costume, being tweed and a gun. From this shot, we were going to cut to a black screen whereby some titles, including the production company and director, would appear, and then the action would begin. Although, we decided to get rid of this shot of the hunter as we decided that it would be more gripping if it started with action as people would want to watch more as they're gripped from the offset. In addition to this, we were going to have the protagonist - Daisy - run from her hideout, through trees and then "stalk" the hunter, and we took several takes of this one-shot, although we decided that due to the length of it, it slowed down the flow and therefore broke down the tension, therefore, we decided to just cut from her in the hut to her stalking the hunter, the faster pace helps heighten the tension as more action is taking place in less time, therefore the audience is more likely to be gripped as they don't want to stop watching in case they miss anything.

Mise-en-scene video

 

Saul Bass

Psycho

Psycho was made in 1960 by Universal pictures and Paramount, it was directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Saul Bass made the title sequence for it. The opening title sequence reflects the genre, theme, and mood of the film through the use of colours as well as the movement and the positioning of the titles. It is evident from the titles alone that this is going to follow the horror genre, although there may be some aspects of thriller within it. The genre is made apparent from even before anything Psycho based is shown, the distorted paramount logo highlights the horror genre from very early on.

There are several clues at the narrative through the use of editing, whereby the titles are incredibly fast-paced and jolty which instills the feeling of unease and fear in the audience, much like the rest of the film will, considering the genre. Moreover, the fast-paced editing, as well as the parallel soundtrack, creates fear in the audience as they feel as though they're being chased or followed, this suggests hints as to what's to come in the rest of the movie. Additionally, the soundtrack builds tension through the fast pace as well as instrument choices, whereby it really does cement the horror genre through the unpredictable tone of the music. 

The simplicity of the sequence also subverts from Bass' common foreshadowing technique, although this minimalistic approach hints at far more of the story than you would think, as the mysterious yet uncomfortable tone of the sequence could reflect the narrative of the movie, as it foreshadows further events. The colour scheme is incredibly basic, whereby it's kept to just black and white, although the simplistic colours help to build tension in the scene as the colour black is often connotated with death and evil, and the white text really stands out in contrast to the dark background. Finally, the jolty movements of the graphics and the distorted titles make the audience feel uneasy as they create an element of suspense as we are unsure as to what will happen next.

By incorporating the titles into a sequence as opposed to still images the audience are already engaged from the offset as they almost feel obliged to depict what can happen in the rest of the movies from the titles alone.

We researched the opening title sequence of Grease a few months ago, I believe that this also follows this style as it creates a backstory to the actual movie, whereby the characters and main locations are introduced to the audience. I thoroughly enjoyed the titles of Grease as you're emerged in the movie from the offset, although Grease is more of a musical with elements of romance and comedy, therefore these two movies are almost incomparable. 

Additionally, the titles of Psycho could be compared to those of James Bond whereby the opening title sequences of the James Bond franchise are a key part of the movies as they tell a story within themselves. Moreover, both Psycho and Skyfall (James Bond) follow a dark colour palette and both use elements of text positioning and size to hint at the narrative.

Saul Bass and Elaine Bass

Saul Bass was born on the 8th May 1920 in New York. He was a famous graphic designer within the film industry. It is believed that he was so successful because his ideas were so different and innovative, his ideas consisted of foreshadowing the upcoming plot through the use of titles. For his work, he has won numerous awards, including, an academy award for best documentary.

In 1961 Saul Bass married his wife Elaine, she also was a title designer and filmmaker, they worked alongside each other for over 40 years, and together they worked with icons such as: Martin Scorsese, Danny DeVito, and Alfred Hitchcock. Saul and Elaine Bass had 2 children, although they continued to work together up until Saul died in 1996.

Saul and Elaine Bass were considered modern for the time due to the way their sequences were created. Moreover, they changed the idea of title sequences whereby they used to be less related to the movie and often just still images whereas Bass created a small story within the sequence that related to events within the movie. 

Saul Bass is also known for logo designs, including: Kleenex (1980), Bell (1969), and AT&T (1986). He started out in advertising until he had his first big job which was for a film called Carmen Jones in 1954, whereby the filmmakers were so pleased with his work on the poster that they asked him to design the title credits as well.

The BBFC

The BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) was founded in 1912 as a non-governmental organisation that monitors all films distributed in the UK. They enforced the national classification and censorship of films, whereby they assign a specific age rating to every film, this includes: U, PG, 12A, 12, 15, 18, and R18. If the BBFC decides that a certain film isn't suitable, it can't be shown in Britain. I would say that every single person in the UK is subconsciously aware of the BBFC, as their ratings are forever around us - at the cinema, on movie packaging, and even on streaming sites such as Netflix. 

What do the ratings mean?

Universal (U)

Universal films must be suitable for audiences aged 4 and over, therefore it should be a reassuringly positive movie whereby the language is tame and there is no offensive content including: dangerous behaviour, sex (only kissing), and violence (it must be very mild if shown).

Parental Guidance (PG)

Parental Guidance movies are targeted at children over 8 although at the parent's discretion, meaning that anyone can watch these, although it is advised not to show easily upset children. Anti-social behaviour is discouraged as children are likely to copy this. Moreover, threat and horror sequences should be minimized, and are advised to be comedic.

12A/12

Films rated 12 mean that no one under the age of 12 can watch the movie, although the rating of 12A means that if a child under the age of 12 is accompanied by an adult they're able to watch the movie at the discretion of the adult. Drug misuse is allowed although it mustn't be glamourized and should be infrequent. Additionally, bad language is permitted although should be kept to a minimum. Sexual activity is permitted although it should be discrete. 

15

Films rated 15 are suitable for people ages 15 and over, this is because a more mature audience is necessary for some of the scenes that are allowed to be shown. Moderate dangerous behaviour is permitted, although it shouldn't be a focal point. Moreover, drugs may be shown and used although they shouldn't be promoted in a good light. As well as this, strong language may be permitted although the context is extremely important and can lead to a difference in ratings. Nudity and sexual activity are allowed although detail is kept to a minimum.

18

Films rated 18 are permitted for "adults" (anyone 18 and over). There are few rules apart from serious breaches of conduct including: content that is in breach of the criminal law when the material is seen to put people in danger or harm individuals. And finally, if there are hints at sex workers.  

R18

Films rated R18 are only allowed to be shown in specific cinemas which have licences, or these films are supplied to licensed sex shops. The minimum age to watch this material is 18 as it is often centered around sexual activity. Despite this, there are still certain things that can't be shown, including: material that is in breach of the criminal law, material that could encourage sexual abuse, sexual activity which is non-concential.

When setting the rating of a film, the BBFC have to take into account numerous things, this includes:

- Scenes including violence of all kinds

- Scenes including sex and nudity

- Scenes including obscene language

- Scenes with discriminatory language

- Scenes of self halm

- Scenes of criminal activity

- Scenes. with dangerous behavior e.g lying on train tracks

- Scenes with drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes

- Scenes involving child actors/characters

- Strobe lighting

They also have to consider context, specifically how realistic movies are, animated movies are often far lower-rated despite violence due to the fact that the audience should know the content isn't real. 

Moreover, it is evident that the BBFC can be more strict when it comes to rating DVDs as opposed to cinema release ratings. An example that proves this is for The Hunger Games, whereby it was rated a 12A at the cinema, this means that anyone over 12 can see it, but children under 12 can see it at their own discretion with an adult. When The Hunger Games was released on DVD, the BBFC had to decide whether it would be more fitting to change the rating to a PG, 12 or a 15. In the end, the BBFC decided to raise it to a 15 due to the "strong violence".

How does the BBFC go about rating them?

There is a brief process that every production company must follow in order for their film to be verified to move forward. Firstly, the production company needs to send a copy of the film to the BBFC, whereby they watch the movie and come to a conclusion on a suitable certificate. If the production company disagrees with the set rating from the BBFC they're able to appeal this by re-editing the movie and asking the BBFC to reassign a new rating.

Due to the BBFC rating every single movie you've seen within the UK, some people argue that a few of their ratings are "wrong", some of these movies include:

- The Dark Knight (2008) which received over 350 complaints surrounding the amount of violence shown for the 12 rating.

- Minions received many complaints from parents as it appeared to show a noose in a child's movie which was rated U.

- Mrs Doubtfire received lots of backlash as it was rated 12, although many families wanted to attend this movie together. The numerous complaints resulted in 20th-century fox releasing an edited version which the BBFC changed the rating to a PG.

- Finally, Spectre is supposedly the most complained about movie to the BBFC, whereby it is thought that there was too much violence for a 12A. 

I believe that my group's coursework would be rated a 15 due to the strong violence shown which certainly wouldn't be suitable for children under the age of 15. The next rating down would be a 12 or 12A, whereby violence is allowed although it shouldn't be too graphic as well as this the glamourisation of accessible weapons is not permitted, and the opening of our title sequence shows a girl's throat being slit with a knife, which certainly would not be allowed to be shown to a 12-year-old. The rating up from a 15 is an 18, although I don't believe the severity of our sequence is as graphic as an 18 whereby the main things not permitted when showing 18s are surrounded by a breach in law (which our sequence most probable adheres to) although, I don't believe our sequence is so severe as the rules surrounding 18 rated movies are more-so targetted at sexual activity as opposed to violence. Therefore, I believe that the BBFC would rate our opening title sequence as a 15.

Media shoot behind the scenes

 

shoot day reflection

Today (Thursday, March 3rd) we had our official media shoot for our opening title sequence, overall I think that it went really well and we got almost all the shots we needed.

For our shoot, we used a 4k Blackmagic URSA mini camera to film all of our shots, we had this set up on a tripod which we adjusted the height depending on our desired shot. We generally used natural lighting, although for some shots we decided to use a lightbox to enhance specific features by maximizing the exposure. For sound, we used a microphone which we plugged into the camera and held near the action to make sure when editing the sound is crisp!

Our day started at 8:30 whereby we got all of our props etc organised and ready to load the minibus up with. We then proceeded to do the actress's makeup, this was all finished by 09:00 whereby we were ready to head to our location. In the minibus, we debriefed the cast and told them everything we wanted from them, and once we were at our location the cast were all dressed in their costumes and we began sorting out the location. Will and I needed to pin posters up warning people who passed by that we were filming and that they shouldn't be alarmed by men walking around holding guns! And by 10:00 we began filming.

We had a few errors that we had to overcome, the first and most important being the costumes! The night before we realised that the jumpsuits we had ordered had "prisoner" writing all over the back of them, Cole tried to salvage this by using spray paint to cover it, although it wasn't as successful as we had anticipated. Considering it was the night before our shoot we had little/no options, therefore we resulted back to our original idea of the girls wearing dresses, although due to the weather conditions at the moment, this idea wasn't feasible, so we had to borrow navy jumpsuits from the theatre department at school in the morning of the shoot, the main problem with this is that we couldn't (really) get them dirty and we couldn't customise them (spray paint numbers), although we used them on the day and I do think they looked better than our intended orange jumpsuits. Another problem we encountered regarding the weather is that during the shoot we only shot one girl at a time, therefore the other was left standing around in only a jumpsuit, therefore they got incredibly cold, we offered them extra layers, coats, warm drinks, etc, although being cold proved to be an extreme issue for everyone on set! Despite this not being a major issue and we did find several solutions, the girls did get extremely cold whilst waiting around! Moreover, we had only anticipated to shoot the first girl (Zaza) for an hour or so as she only had a few scenes that she was in, although we ended up shooting her for the entire morning (10:00-13:00), which meant that Daisy was stood around for the entire morning and we could only film her in the afternoon. Furthermore, despite getting several shots that we hadn't anticipated for Zaza this meant that we only had the afternoon (14:00-16:30) to shoot Daisy's scenes due to the limited daylight hours, we did manage to get all of our necessary shots although timings did prove to be an issue as the sun going down began to creep up on us. Finally, a major issue we had to overcome is that whilst filming one of our scenes which involved fake blood and prop knives, we forgot to press "record", therefore none of the footage we got of that scene was recorded. We overcame this by reshooting the scenes, although it meant that we had to reapply makeup and that if we didn't pick up on this mistake we would be left without crucial footage that helps to move the storyline along.

Despite the many problems we had to overcome, lots of things did go much better than we had anticipated, including the overall filming of the shoot which I do think went seamlessly as we all stuck to our roles (with a few exceptions whereby we all wanted to try out other roles), by sticking to our assigned roles we all knew exactly what we had to do and when; moreover this led to an overall "smooth" day of filming. Due to the signs that we put up around the area we were filming we had no interruptions as people passing by knew that we were filming, several people did pass by and stop to see what was happening, although due to the wide proximity they didn't affect our filming at all. Moreover, due to the competence of our actors, we ended up getting far more shots than we thought we would, and we ended up adding extra scenes into our original storyboard and shot list, including far more coverage of the first girl. Additionally, we changed parts of our story including the part where the hunters depart from each other, we changed this to Hunter 1 (Stu) being the "games keeper", and as hunter 2 (Mike) takes the dog tags off the girl he killed, he passes them to Stu as they act almost as a trophy or a tally count of the girls he's killed. Moreover, we completely changed our final shot of the title sequence, we intended for the girl to walk over the hunter's body whereby she was covered in blood and angered with determination to kill the next hunter, although we decided during the shoot that that wouldn't be an end to an opening title sequence as the scene would be too elongated and create more of a short story as opposed to an opening title sequence, therefore we ended up finishing the scene with the girl (Daisy) killing the hunter (Mike) whereby she hits him several times with the base of the shotgun, wrangled the camera on the floor whereby she was able to thrust the base of the gun over the camera to create a black screen, whereby our titles will appear. Finally, we decided that since we no longer had numbers on our jumpsuits a way in which to show the audience the scale of the shoot would be to prove that there are more than two girls being hunted, therefore we filmed extra scenes with Zaza, whereby we changed her appearance by putting her hair up and changing her makeup whilst on set. By having more people this adds an element of depth and complexity, whereby the audience wants to watch more as they don't know what's going to happen next.

We used several different camera angles and movements, including a variety of wide shots, mid shots, and close-ups. We also used a panning technique of the sky, whereby we then panned the camera down to a wide shot of one of the girls running. Each time we introduced a new character we panned to show the scenery and then them, this also shows the audience their capabilities as the protagonist was displaying her survival skills by being hidden in a man-made wooden hut whilst making a survival weapon. 

Shooting and editing the dialogue sequence

Shooting the dialogue sequence

We shot our dialogue sequence on Thursday 10th February as a practice sequence in order to gain more practice before we shoot our final opening title sequence. I worked with Ollie, Isabella, Meadow, Lila and Matthew. Our group did a simple sketch of a man (Ollie) sweeping a broom around a woman (Meadow) whereby she fires him from his job. 

We used several skills we learned in our first filming workshop, including several rules on set, the 180-degree rule, and rules of thirds. The 180-degree rule was incredibly important during our sequence especially because we had an added focal point of dialogue which we hadn't done in previous workshops, the 180-degree rule brings in an aspect of continuity for the audience as it goes hand in hand with composition, specifically rules of thirds, we tried to keep all of Ollies sequences in the left-hand quadrant and all of Meadows scenes in the right-hand quadrant, this not only helps the sequence flow more easily, but it helps the audience gauge who is talking and what action is taking place. In addition to this, rules on set are extremely important, before each shot the director said "stand by" whereby they waited for the answer of "standing by" from everyone on set, then they were able to have everyone's attention and make sure everyone was ready to begin filming, the director then said "roll camera" whereby the camera operator would reply with "camera rolling" this ensures that the camera is recording and no silly errors are made such as the camera operator to forget to film the scene! after this, the director then proceeds to say "action" whereby the action in front of the camera begins, once the scene is completely finished the director then yells "cut!". The use of these rules ensures that everyone on set knows what they're doing at that exact time and that the people on set and behind the camera are completely focused on what they're supposed to be doing.

Our shoot went fairly smoothly, although some problems we faced were continuity and timing issues as putting the action and dialogue together over several shoots proved more complicated than imaginable, therefore when editing our clips these errors may become more apparent... in addition to this, we also couldn't decide the camera angles necessary, therefore we did several angles such as wide angles, close-ups and over the shoulder shots. If we were to do another practice sequence I think that we should focus on headspace when doing wide shots as well as mid shots, in certain scenes in our sequence, we cut out people's feet in substitution for extra space of the ceiling! Additionally, when filing properly we need to make sure we bubble our camera every time we reset our angle and shot, and also remember to change the white balance depending on where we are filming.

Editing the Dialogue Sequence

Today, (28th February) we edited our dialogue sequence, I worked alongside Lila to edit our footage on Premiere Pro.

We began by looking through our footage to see which clips would be feasible and what wouldn't work at all. Once we had a rough idea we began editing in a "ping pong" manner, whereby the shot focused on whoever was talking, meaning that the shots kept cutting and going back and forth, similar to ping pong!

We then moved on to editing in a way that portrayed who held the power in the scene, we did this by focusing on one character rather than the other, a key way to do this is to focus on their reaction to the other person's dialogue. When editing this we decided to give Meadow the focus of the scene, whereby we used no close-ups or mid shots of Ollie alone and gave all of the focus to her. This type of editing is extremely useful to represent who "the good guys" are within a scene because as the audience watches they see it from a completely different perspective as normally they feel inclined to like the character they're predominantly watching. Examples of this are when the audience sees robbers' perspectives and you feel inclined to want them to get away with it as opposed to the police stopping them!

Moreover, we used the "unlink" tool which detaches the audio from the clip. This tool is extremely useful within editing as it gives you the ability to reuse sound as well as link shots together, for example, we had a midshot of meadow and then cut to a close up of her face, by detaching the audio we reduced any change in the sound of the clips as well as helping the clip to flow more. Despite this, it was extremely difficult to match the clips and sound up, although we managed to make it work! In addition to this we also learnt how to help different sound clips match up using the "constant power" effect, this helps two sounds flow into one another seeminglessly as the sounds match up to each other far better than they would without this effect.

A crucial mistake we made was the white balance, whereby we were filming in a well-lit room and I believe we had the outdoor setting on. The white balance is incredibly important to adjust depending on where you shoot, by forgetting to change it, this resulted in all of our clips having an orangy undertone to then, whereby it was clear we were in the wrong setting. In addition to this, we also didn't choose the best camera angles, despite using a range of camera angles by starting out by using wide shots and then slowly doing more specific shots, some of our shots just weren't as effective as we had anticipated. An example of this is when we did a close up of Ollies feet, we hadn't positioned the camera in the correct place and there was too much coverage of the floor as opposed to Ollie and his legs. Therefore, when filimging our actual opening title sequence I would focus moreso on rules of thirds and positioning within the shot. Finally, another error we made was to do with continuity, I don't think well find this problem as much during our actual opening title sequence as due to the length of the scene as well as the lack of dialogue many of the shots will be able to work by themselves. But during our shooting of the dialogue sequence we struggled to get the continuity balance whereby swapping between scenes when editing added up seeminglessly, an example of this is when Ollie begins to talk to his broom, in a few of the shots he's looking at it, although in other clips he's looking at Meadow, therefore when editing its difficult to match up the shots seeminglessly.

We didn't entirely follow the 180 degree rule due to the complexity of our sequence although we did try to follow it as well as we could have. The 180-degree rule focuses on an imaginary line between the two characters which helps you keep each character to their own side of the screen, specifically when filming over the shoulder shots. Due to the lack of 180-degree rule, editing our footage proved to be quite difficult! Therefore, when shooting our actual sequence its crucial that we take into account the 180-degree rule.

When editing our actual sequence we wouldn't edit it using the ping pong technique, this is not only because we have little to no dialogue but because it takes away elements of hierarchy and power within the scene, as during our scene we want the audience to favour the girl, and portray her as strong, powerful and admirable. By having more shots of her and also placing the hunter in the far ground, this highlights her empowerment within the scene.

Target Audience

As a group we discussed what age rating our opening title sequence should be, we decided that it should be targeted at people 15 and over, as several similar products including: The Hunt, The Purge, and Squid Game are all rated a 15. By looking at similar products we can gauge who our target audience will be, I used ratings from IMDB to see a rough age range and how many men and women liked the similar products, these results suggest that our sequence should be more so skewed to be targeted at the male audience:

                  The Hunt                                                                      The Purge

               Squid Game                                                         The Hunger games

Even though IMDB suggests that our opening title sequence should have a clear male audience with the ages ranging from 30-44, these figures arent entirely accurate. As firstly- not everyone logs their reviews, whereby reviews are often connotated with an older audience, especially on IMDB. Also, the movie is rated a 15, therefore if anyone younger were to leave a review, their age would be registered as older than 18. Moreover, all of the reviews hint that IMDB is more of a middle-aged men's website whereby movie reviews were logged, this is proven whereby I looked at the statistics for the children's movie "UP" where over 300,000 of the 1,000,000 reviews were from men between the ages of 30-44.

Despite the slight skew in the data, these reviews are still crucial when looking into who our target audience is, and we can take these reviews on board when setting our target audience.

I think that if we were to make our title sequence into a movie, it would be targeted at no specific gender with the ages ranging from 18-20, although despite this I don't believe that the estimated target age defines who would watch it and that a wider age range would certainly watch it. Moreover, I think that our opening title sequence could be targeted at males or females depending on the way we edit it and the costumes we use.

The targeted age is people over 15, this is because of some of the gruesome aspects we show, including the scene where we slit Meadow's throat. Therefore, by setting our target audience at a minimum of 15 we still have a wide target audience who will watch the movie, targeting it at an older audience makes the movie appeal more to a formal background whereby the audicen knows that the plotline should be rougue and not people under the age of 15 (children).

By targeting a specific audience were able to market our product to a specific group using marketing that's effective for them. For example, using television advertising wouldn't be so effective for us as firstly we don't have the budget for that and also that not everyone would want to watch our movie! by using specific social media advertisements through the use of data of the consumer that would be more effective, it would also be effective to market it through action thriller specific websites our target audience will be more exposed to our movie.

I think our target audience could lean moreso towards the male audience through the use of Laura Mulvey's theory of the male gaze, whereby men are more inclinded to watch something if there's an attractive woman in the movie. Our opening title sequence is based around two girls being hunted, stereotypically hunting is a "mans sport" whereby the use of guns and shooting can be extremely violent which is stereotypically not for girls due to their fragility. 

Although I do also think that the empowerment of women targets a female audience, whereby women are more likely to enjoy a movie based around strong, independent women. Moreover, we made the protagonists character a strong representative of women, which would make the female audience more inclined to watch the movie as it subverts common stereotypes which don't represent women in such a inspirational manner. 

To conclude there's no clear gender-targeted audience, as it is targeted at both the female and male audience. The use of no specific targets could lead to a more profitable movie as more people feel inclined to watch it.

research into similar product conventions

 Our opening title sequence is a hybrid genre, whereby we are combining the genres of thriller and action. it also has some additional conventions of a slasher horror. 

Some movies and TV shows that share these conventions are:

• The hunt -This movie is probably the most similar to ours out of all of the movies/tv shows. This is because of the hunting people for sport element 

  
  

• Squid game - This series is similar to our opening title sequence because of the costume as well as the narrative of how the people are killed. 

• The purge -This movie is similar to our opening title sequence as the movie is centered around a national holiday whereby crime is legalized for a day, therefore people go around killing each other for an entire day. This is similar to ours through the way in which innocent civilians are killed for no apparent reason.

• The purge (amazon) -This series is similar to our opening title sequence for similar reasons to its prequel movie “The Purge” (above), through the dehumanized killing spree. 

• Battle royale -This movie is similar to our opening title sequence because innocent people are put into a killing game, whereby they have to fight for their survival.

• The hunger games -This movie is similar to our opening title sequence because it's centered around survival to prove which district is “the best”. Therefore the innocent killing reflects aspects of our sequence.

• The silencing -This movie is similar to our opening title sequence whereby innocent girls are being hunted for sport, a major difference is the mysterious aspect of who is doing the hunting.

• The revenant -This movie follows the same hunting aspect of our sequence, alongside the key forest location. Although, the same theme of struggling to survive is prominent in both our sequence and this movie.

• Assassination nation -This movie is similar to our opening title sequence because of the strong female role whereby the girls in Assassination nation are represented as “badass” due to their strong subversions of stereotypes which they embrace.

The Hunt was made in 2020 by Universal Pictures and Blumhouse Productions and it was directed by Craig Zobel. I would say that this movie is incredibly similar to our proposed opening title sequence whereby the narrative follows the same hierarchical theme centered around class and an underlying battle whereby the upper-class use money as a representative of power over the lower class. The Hunt is based around 12 strangers who have been kidnapped and forced into a “hunt” whereby wealthy people are hunting them for sport. The film is centered around how the hunted rebel and fight back above their hierarchy. The entire narrative is incredibly similar to ours due to the classist dilemmas as well as portraying a strong, independent woman as the protagonist. We decided to subvert the common stereotypes of a girl (ditsy, sexy, weak) to portray her as a role model for the female audience, as she should be seen as independent and empowering. Moreover, The Hunt is incredibly gruesome whereby they're not afraid to show blood or detached limbs, ours isn't quite so explicit, although we do intend to have a lot of fake blood as well as a very gory death as the first scene of our opening title sequence, this will help to entice the audience. Finally, a crucial similarity is that the hunters evidently messed with the wrong girl who is clearly far more capable than they may have imagined, this is also apparent in our title sequence whereby the girl who is made out to look like a victim to the audience clearly isn't your average victim, as she is able to hunt and kill one of the hunters through the use of her quick thinking and intelligence.

Squid Game is a Korean series made in 2021 by Netflix, it was directed by Hwang Dong-hyuk. Some elements of this series are similar to our opening title sequence including the blue tracksuits which the victims wear, as well as the red jumpsuits that the “hunters” wear. In addition to this, the theme of survival is extremely prominent in Squid Game, whereby people have to play games in order to survive and the overall winner wins a large sum of money. Our opening title sequence also plays on the theme of survival whereby the girls do indeed fight for their survival, although in our sequence there is no clear way out of danger nor being hunted. The use of costumes in Squid Game clearly differentiates the victims from the games keepers, whereby the victims wear turquoise tracksuits whereby they each have individual numbers to differentiate their same uniform. In contrast, the hunters wear red jumpsuits and masks, whereby red shares connotations with danger highlighting their power within the scene, and the blue tracksuits connotate sorrow as well as peace whereby they are just fighting in order to survive. 

The Purge was made by several production companies including Universal Pictures and Blumhouse Productions, it was directed by James DeMonaco in 2013. It is based around an annual holiday whereby all crime is legalized for a day every year, therefore this day turns into a killing massacre. The key element shared with our opening title sequence is the theme of rebellion, whereby everyone goes against each other and nobody is able to trust anyone. Moreover, people's personalities are portrayed through their fight or flight instincts, whereby the weakest people who additionally lack determination die first, and the strongest survive all the way to the end which also highlights their intelligence as their journey of survival is represented through their resilience and quick thinking. In addition to this, the strong violence within The Purge, whereby groups of people kill other groups of innocent people is prominently shown, the game-like aspect also reflects scenes from our sequence whereby ours is centered around men killing girls for sport. Moreover, the use of costume in The Purge suggests an element of uniform. The people who act on The Purge and participate in the killing sprees wear different masks and costumes in order to conceal their identities, in our sequence the protagonist (girl 2) changes her costume from the other girls in order to show her identity which reflects her badass attitude as well as her intelligence when it comes to life skills. 

Finally, The Hunger Games (Catching Fire) was made in 2013 by Lionsgate and directed by Francis Lawrence. The Hunger Games is about the 12 districts in a nation and how annually 2 people (a boy and girl) are chosen from each district to fight in “The Hunger Games” which is televised to the rest of the nation, only one person is able to “win” the games, therefore fighting for survival is incredibly intense, which relates to our opening title sequence whereby two young girls our being hunted and have to fight for their survival whereby their intelligence is their only weapon. A key theme that relates to our opening scene is power, in our sequence, the hunters supposedly hold the power throughout as they're in charge of the hunt as it is their way of fun, whereas in the hunger games the president, president snow created the hunger games. Snow was similarly portrayed in an evil manner whereby he ended up being killed, which is similar to the hunters in our sequence, whereby we will present them in a light where the girl will be the favorable character. Furthermore, in The Hunger Games, the protagonist is a knowledgeable, powerful, badass girl, who isn't afraid to fight, this is similar to our sequence whereby our protagonist will be 10 steps ahead and additionally, won't look out of place with a powerful weapon.