Consent form

This is the consenst form that people who are within my film will be filling out so that it is definitely ok with them that this goes on the internet.

Risk assessment

A description of the shots within the trailer and also added bits to complete the storyline

My idea for the storyline is that a boy called 'Adam' has the house to himself for the night and his friends 'Sam' and 'Jack' come over for the night. The friends are just having a typical 'boys night' until one of the friends, 'Jack' tells the others about a game that he heard about called 'Slender', he tells them that the character within the game 'Slender Man' stalks you down until he finally abducts and kills you and if you don't believe that the myth of the 'Slender Man' is true, he comes to get you. The friends then decide to play the game and decide to stop when the character jumps out and scares them, however they refuse to believe that the myth is real. 'Adam' then decides to shut the curtains as it's dark outside and its freaking the friends out, when shutting the curtains he scans outside whilst shutting them and for a split second thinks he sees the character out of the game outside before looking away, he's a bit worried so decides to look again and sees there is nothing there. The friends then get takeaway to carry on the conventions of a typical 'boys night in'. 'Sam' then goes over to pay the delivery man and as he does his eyes wander over the shoulder of the delivery man to a Lamp Post and see the character again just stood dead still. The delivery man then coughs to get 'Sams' attention again and looks stern as he wants the money so he can carry on with his job, once he's paid the delivery man, 'Sam' then looks back over the shoulder to find that the figure has disappeared again like the first time. 'Sam' and 'Adam' then say to 'Jack' that it may sound weird but they think they saw the figure of 'Slender Man' as they say this they hear a huge bang and metallic noises, they go to check it out and see that the door is now locked by a huge padlock and they now go back to the other room and conclude that 'Slender Man' is after them and is now in the house. The lights then turn off however nothing happens, as 'Jack' manages to light a candle 'Slender Man' is stood right behind him and the candle then gets put out again taking us into darkness however this time 'Jack' is taken. 'Sam' and 'Adam' are a little shook up about the whole thing however after getting themselves back in order, 'Sam' reveals that the only way to destroy 'Slender Man' is with a bullet to the heart. 'Sam' and 'Adam' then go and get 'Adams' dads gun as he is a police officer. As they do this 'Slender Man' once again confronts them however this time Adam shouts 'What do you want!?' in which 'Slender Man' proceeds to say with his only lines within the whole thing apart from some groans and shouts 'Your souls' after this 'Adam' and 'Sam' manage to get away however in the end 'Adam' leaves the house without 'Sam' due to 'Sam' selflessly telling 'Adam' to 'Save himself'. As 'Adam' leaves he runs down an alley close to his home however once he gets to the spotlight in the middle he sees 'Slender Man' at the other side so he turns to run the other way and again sees 'Slender Man' at the other side, 'Adam' therefore turns around a second time which as he does so puts him face to face with 'Slender Man' and this is were the trailer ends as it cuts to a black screen.

Codes and Conventions of Horrors

Codes and conventions of horrors:

• Secluded Location - Horrors are usually done in a lonely location so that there is nobody to help. These include; The woods, House in the middle of nowhere, a ghost town etc. An example could be House at the end of the Street
• Characters usually forget about the threat - There is usually a danger in a horror and the main character(s) (protagonist(s)) often forget about the threat or tackle it head on. E.g. Paranormal Activity, they know they're being haunted however they film and try to communicate with the demon rather than getting rid of it.
• Power cuts - A classic convention of Horrors is that the power goes out just before a killing. E.g. House at the end of the street when they're in the basement and the lights are out whilst the antagonist tries to kill the protagonist.
• Phone lines are cut - This way there is no way of communicating with anyone such as the police or friends. Another way this can be used is to have no signal on a mobile phone. E.g.
• Someone investigates a strange noise - There will be a noise that is heard and is a little bit suspicious and then one person goes to investigate it which usually leads to a scare. E.g. In Paranormal Activity when they hear a smash downstairs, Micah goes down to check it.
• Victim falls over - There is always the classic runaway from the predator and the prey falls over letting them closer. A well known convention within Horrors E.g. Freddie vs Jason, at the start when the girl is running through the forest and falls over.
• Vehicle wont start - Another one that happens whilst being chased is the vehicle not starting, such as jumping in a car and it not starting which again leads to the killer getting closer, another way to use this convention is to have the protagonist drop their keys. E.g. Zombieland when Columbus drops his keys when trying to get in the car. 
• The fake scare - This is used in nearly every Horror film that has ever been made, it is where the sound, cinematography and editing are all used as though there is going to be a scare and it all drops down and there is nothing there or its something else. E.g. House at the end of the street when the car pulls up you think she's going to get kidnapped and fear the worst but then it's just the neighbour offering a lift.
• Warning goes unheeded - This is when the Main character(s) defy a warning and do what they are warned about anyways. E.g. Again in paranormal activity they know not to agitate the demon however they do.
• The Shortcut - Even if there is a significant amount more danger by going through the shortcut it doesn't matter as they will always take the shortcut which leads to danger. E.g. The Shortcut
• Freaky Music - There is always music on the soundtrack to freak the audience out. E.g. Insidious with Tiptoe through the tulips - Tiny Tim, when the little Victorian boy puts the record player on and that is played.
• Crescendo - There is often a build up of instruments in the music which finally come to a crescendo when the scare is happening. E.g. Jaws, when the shark attacks you get the build up of the motif to the crescendo which makes you jump.

Change in genre choice

I have decided to change my genre to a horror film, I have decided to do this because I have been having more ideas that would go into the horror genre rather than a drama. Some inspirations I've had for a horror genre involve these different film trailers:



Paranormal Activity has been one of the most successful horror films and has therefore been a big influence to me especially because it was made with such a small budget and filmed within a household so I believe I can make a trailer in the same sort of way.



I have also taken inspiration off of the film sinister as well because in the film there is a man whos moved into a new house and finds some videos of the previous owners and there is bughuul or Mr. Boogie in every video and the new owner sees this bughuul and it starts to affect the kids and it there are many scary and frightening techniques which leads to a freaky horror. The reason this has influenced me is because I plan on using a reccuring figure like bughuul in my trailer.

 



Another text that I have taken inspiration from is the game 'Slender' which is about a mythical creature that stalks, abducts and kills people, this therefore is an idea in which I can develop in order to create the danger within my trailer

Reconstruction of a media text

For our reconstruction of a media text, we had a choice of the music videos for 'The Script song - The man who can't be moved', and the for the 'Nirvana song - Sliver', there was also a choice of two film trailers 'The Lucky One' and '127 Hours'. Due to the difficulty of reconstructing the two film trailers becuase of the rock climbing that would be to hard to get a reconstruction of in '127 Hours' and they were explosions within 'The Lucky One' trailer so again it would be to hard to create a reconstruction. So we had to choose between either 'Nirvana' and 'The Script' and we chose 'Nirvana' our reconstruction took place in the green room at college.

We made our own drum kit out of a stool and some boxes as we couldn't get a drum kit together, we also borrowed a bass guitar and microphone from the music department. We used Harley Young, Sam Shaw, Daniel Williamson and myself. Harley Young was the main singer within the video therefore he did the lip syncing, I was the drummer and therefore had to time when to hit the drum so that it matched the beat. Danny was playing the bass guitar and therefore he had to look like he could actually play the guitar. Sam was one of the props and we put him in a monkey onesie which and gave him two make shift cymbals which he had to bang together in order to recreate the video. After we had finished filming we all took turns in using the editing suites so we all got an idea on how they worked. We were able to get a background similar to the one in the video by editing the green screen with an image of a bedroom. This is the finished piece:


We also made another reconstruction however this one was more of a joke, however it did turn out well. This was a recreation of the cadburys advert were the gorilla plays the drums, we did this as we had spare time and had the monkey onesie and the make shift drum kit and decided that we would make another reconstruction. This time Sam Shaw was the protagonist and he had to time the beat of the drum to the video so it looked correct. This is the piece that was finally created for the gorilla recreation after editing had taken place.

Codes and Conventions of Film trailers

Film Trailers can have their each and own different set of codes and conventions depending on the genre of the film. Although there are still some conventions that are used throughout all film trailers which are seen as a guide on how to make a successful film. There are different ways in which you can put into your work, these include; Cinematography, such as camera shots and angles can connotate certain things therefore making it a code. Another method that you can use is editing, with editing you can use things such as continuity or montage to represent different things and you could also use the speed of the editing. Mise-en-scene is also another way in which you can use codes and conventions through items such as props and costume. Lastly the sound can also be used to add codes and conventions into your work. All of these will be needed in a film trailer in order to make the film successful. On average a film Trailer will last around 2:30 minutes, that is not a lot of time to put all of these things in so therefore they have to really think why and how they can put these methods into their work.

Cinematography can be used in many different ways to represent codes and conventions, one of these is close ups, these are usually used in a film trailer to represent the protagonist (main character), this way before we have even watched the film we have gained the knowledge that the person shown is the lead character and it also gets us emotionally attached to the character so we want to go and see the film for the character. They can also use establishing shots so that we know where the character is, this way we get a feel for how the film may pan out. A good example of both of these techniques in a film trailer is ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, as within the first 20 seconds we get these two shots which give us the feel that the man in the foreground of the close up two shot is the Protagonist and the man in the background could be a big part of the film and we also can find out that we’re in a game show.

Other shots that can be used include over the shoulder shots which can sometimes show the protagonist and what they have to do, or the mess that has been made by them, this is usually used in action films or thrillers. An example of this would be ‘From dusk till Dawn’ as it shows a building in the background being blown up and the two characters walking away to show they’ve done that and they’re getting away.

Going back to ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, not only is there Cinematography techniques used within the trailer to show codes and conventions there are also Editing methods used as well such as, Non-diegetic elements, as in the trailer it shows on the screen a question and it gives you four answers, this then builds on the earlier code that we are in the setting of a game show and takes us that one step further to that we’re on ‘who wants to be a millionaire’ as the question is set as if it would be a question on the show, not only does it show us this but It also gives us the storyline as it shows the question saying how did Jamal Malik win 20 million rupees and then gives you the answers to choose from and it then give you the answer saying ‘it is destiny’ so therefore we now know that it is about the man in the foreground, Jamal Malik? Winning 20 million rupees on who wants to be a millionaire because it was his destiny and we know all this because of the codes and conventions that are used throughout the trailer. 

There is also a fast paced montage edit used in the trailer of the stuff that’s happened in his life so far which gives you the feel that everything has rushed by leading towards this one moment in his life, during this montage you see other characters which you can tell will be a big part of the film such as a brother which will be his companion on his life journey and also what could be a love interest or ‘one true love’. These are again all found out through the use of the codes and conventions within the trailer.

Mise-en-scene is also used in order to show codes and conventions throughout the film as you can see here in the Slumdog millionaire trailer as it shows the setting of when he was younger and the clothes he is dressed in and this shows that he comes from a poor area and that they don’t have much money, therefore we feel sorry for him as he has been brought up with not much money which gives us an emotional attachment towards the character, the image from the trailer also shows them jumping from a rooftop which tells us also that they haven’t had a very safe upbringing.

Lastly Sound is another way in which Codes and conventions are used as there is an upbeat soundtrack playing in the background whilst there is the montage of his childhood and he always looks really happy however the music changes to a slower song when the girl ‘Latika’ is left behind from the train which shows that from that moment on he hasn’t been the same because he hasn’t been with his one true love so we get the feel that everything he’s done from that moment onwards has been done so that he can find Latika again.

Overall Codes and Conventions are used in film trailers in order to show what the genre of the film is and also, how the story will pan out throughout the film and why it is going to go like that. Therefore codes and conventions are what makes up the film trailer so that the audience can then read them to understand the film.