Initial Ideas- Bloggers/ Forums

Blog/Forum Research

 

Whilst looking for locations film our teaser trailer on, we stumbled across Forums online where people could discuss abandoned buildings, their location and pictures of the buildings to other users. People who venture into these builders are called Urban Explorers. This gave us an idea of what our teaser trailer could be about, possibly basing it on the idea of some of these Explorers going into the factory and disturbing something or someone leading to horrific events.

 

28dayslater-forums

 

 

derelictplaces- forum



 

• These specific blogs are quite close knit, with members meeting up to go on visits. Its taken very seriously and there seems to be a code of conduct that isnt formal.
• Urban Explorers hate vandalism of these buildings and prefer to leave them as they are and find the unique qualities in each.
• The photos are also prided on as art and documention, they believe they are preserving england so bits won't be forgotten:

Also, I looked into video blogs (vlogs) of Urban Exploration. They were difficult to come but but there were a few found on youtube. The common denominatioj between them all was, it wasnt about the explorers it was about showing the site to everyone. Each video contained no speaking, just a video of the site edited with music. For example...

 

 

Some have permant names and groups on youtube such as URBEX who also try to give a documented history to the buildings they record. For example...

 

 



Sound Effects

Sound effects are used constantly within film and other parts of media to emphasise the content in that part of media. Though in terms of film, there are different types of sound effects including:

Hard sound effects: sounds that you would hear commonly in real life e.g. door slams, cars driving by.
Background sound effects: these sounds give an indication to the audience about the setting of the film. Background sound effects can also be used to set the atmosphere within the film.
Foley sound effects: sounds that synchronise on screen e.g. footsteps
 

Hung telephones – the sound of a hung up telephone is also another effect which can give a sense of uncertainty within the atmosphere and could be effective at the end of a film trailer as it could leave on a cliffhanger.

Pixelation – pixilation tends to be used to blur a part of a video or image and is usually used for censorship. Yet for film, it can give the effect of something which has suddenly stopped. The audience get the feeling of something broken and maybe a sense of “what’s going on” depending on the atmosphere. Pixelations can also be used in a clever way to mark a victim/villain in a trailer to give the film a sense of uncertainty and persuade the audience to see the film.

 

Screams – these are a very common sound effect used in horror films, with the two most popular and known screams (Wilhelm and howie) being used in numerous amount of films right now. Screams are often heard when an event such as a death or explosion happens or when someone is genuinely shocked at something. As these do tend to be the most common sound effect used, if we were to try and use something a bit more effective and unique sound effect to give the audience a shock, this shouldn’t be the one to use as it could make the trailer sound a little bit unpredictable.  

Black Mirror: 15 Million Merits

In this episode we are shown the future reality world and a sarcastic version of a reality show where people live in a secluded world. They must exercise on a bike daily, arranged in cells in order to power their surroundings and generate currency for themselves called Merits. The only way to get out of the world is to impress 3 judges at a talent show called “Hot Shots” (basically X Factor but a very exaggerated version).

This episode sums up the title of the series ‘Black Mirror’ which is partly a reference to an Arcade Fire song and partly an allusion to a turned off screen: all you see is a black reflection staring back. Nearly every surface in the episode was a screen. From the moment inhabitants of this dystopia woke up to the moment they went to sleep they were always looking at a monitor. An individual could even incur a penalty by shutting their eyes and not looking at a display.

Again, technology was a big part of this programme and showed our addiction to the digital world. Have all we come to is looking at a computer screen all day? Is the best way of communicating with people is through a screen rather than face to face? It also shows how far reality shows have come in this modern day and age and what has become of it. The writers in the programme have blatantly criticized reality shows for how they are made and then shown towards the audience. It is a scintillating piece that addresses how these shows work and how they manipulate and meld people so that they can be sold on the market. They are showing that reality shows may be pristine on the outside but on the inside they are much more of a vicious and cruel nature. This could be relatable to our film where if you get a character/building they may be pure and good/beautiful on the outside but on the inside you may get a person that is morally evil or a building that has toxic chemicals that you wouldn’t expect.    

         

Containment Trailer

In the trailer we are first shown television pixilation before the typography of “If the door to insanity” “were opened,” “would you walk through it?”. These were shown in 3 separates cuts with dongs through each quote. This is to make each part of the quote more effective and to create more tension in the atmosphere. Non-diegetic sound in the form of the dongs could symbolise something like “the end is nearing” for the main protagonist which could show how he may get killed/similar situation during the trailer. We are shown a number of different questions during the trailer and could try to be telling a story and making the audience think about the film &trailer before watching it. High pitched sounds were used each time to show important parts of the trailer which shows hints about the film to the audience - this is a cheap and easy way to give subtle hints to the audience without giving away the whole plot.

Pixelation was used as transitional jump cuts within the trailer and makes the audience confused as to what has just happened – something during the scene has just cut off and they do not know what is going to happen next. This is also a cheap and easy method as we can just generally download the sound & picture onto a computer. Other non-diegetic sound effects used within the film were gun shots and quick pace movements of the antagonist which symbolised the change of the pace within the trailer. Montages of quick jump cuts during the trailer was effective because it showed a lot more of the plot but within 30 seconds – yet sometimes trailers like these may show too much of the plot and then the whole story is already revealed within the trailer (something that we do not want to do at all – we want to tantalise the audience into watching the film without revealing too much of the plot). 

During the trailer, the camera used was hand-held for the whole of trailer (the picture above shows the security guard holding the camera to show as evidence of perculiar creatures within the film). This resembles a more real-life feel but the problem with using a hand-held camera for the whole of the film is that it looks really unprofessional – for some scenes it is effective but for the whole trailer = no.

At the end we are shown two extra scenes of CCTV footage from the film. The audience would of not been expecting it and shows how the film makers could be showing a message saying “there’s more to the film than you expect” and puts the trailer on a cliffhanger and tries to persuade the audience even more to watch the film. 

The film was made with a low budget in mind and shows that it is very possible for our group to make a film trailer like this. The film is done in the same surroundings (office block) but with different camera angles used (e.g. high angles, medium & close up shots), the trailer looked like it had been filmed in a number of different locations. There was one main actor used for the trailer and the main mise-en-scene used for the film was cling film for the antagonist but still looked effective due to the editing of the trailer. They did not use stereotypes such as “made from the producers of that famous film” or “based on a true story”; they relied on a good plot to counter the fact they had practically no money for the acting and technical aspects of the film and that is something we should concentrate on because of the low budget we have.  

Children of Men: Primary school scene

While still in debate over what location we should use for shooting our trailer, I decided to research the primary school scene from children of men to see how the location of an abandoned school was used in a film. At this point, we see the three main characters fleeing and seeing them wake up at an abandoned primary school.

From the pictures above, you can see it was more content with pictures by the front of the school showing the teachers. Yet 10 + years down the line, you see graffiti all over the walls which could show how much Britain has changed over the past years and also the sense of violence within the country and shows childless dystopia which is the main point of the film.

Also, the colours within these pictures show of many colours but then the graffiti on the walls is of specific colours of black and red, could this symbolise how we are in much more danger than we were in before? Something like drawing graffiti on the walls if we use the abandoned school could be effective in the sense that the school is a place of urban exploitations.

We then enter an empty classroom which still has resources in the room with writing still on the blackboards – this is very similar to one of the classrooms we had found when looking at the abandoned school. Although our trailer will be in a different context and genre compared to this classroom in children of men, it shows that resources and writing on the blackboards still in the room can be linked the context of the film (children of men - there are no primary school children left to teach, our film – teachers/old students come back to life/haunt the school).        

We are then shown a pan back to the right side of the classroom where you can see the window glass shattered and the symbol of the film (the teardrop) with Kee positioned inside the teardrop. This may not be fully relevant to the research the of the location but it is important in terms of getting the little details of all our trailer correct. The director deliberately positioned the character so when the pan of Miriam walked up to talked to Theo, you could see Kee perfectly positioned. As the teardrop was shown in the poster of the film, it obviously symbolises the importance of Kee within the film and if we were to doing something like in our trailer, it could be effective as it would reveal a little bit of the plot & showing the importance but not showing too much of the storyline.

Children of Men poster

Typography – “children of men” – spray painted on in bold font, white = pure but the typography being sprayed = relates to graffiti = crime and vandalism, also shows symbolic & political messages. Red = danger, emergency.

Genre – sci-fi, says: “set in the year 2027” i.e. in the future.

Tagline – “The year 2027: The last days of the human race, no child has been born for 18 years, he must protect our only hope” – capitalized words make it appear as one of the important features of the poster but small enough to make sure the audience look more into the poster.

Image – presume it’s the main character; glass shattered to look like a teardrop so it could show there’s a mix of action and not just a sad story of “there are no children left in the world”. Eye with foetus inside, clever as not only does it symbolise the sadness of infertility but could also show the hope/miracle of when someone is pregnant. 

Positioning of elements – here, the typography part is to the left whilst the picture is to the right, not everything in the centre which would make the audience look for more than half a second towards the poster.

Target Audience – not clear, set in year 2027 = could be for more of a young audience but social & political issues such as immigration and terrorism which could suit a more older audience. So a very wide range of target audience, 15-44 shows a good range of audience. 

Black Mirror: The National Anthem

When people hear the words “national anthem” you would think ‘patriotism’ or ‘public spirit’ and it is one of the biggest symbols in the UK – if ruined: the Uk’s reputation may never be the same. In Black Mirror: The National Anthem, we are shown Princess Susannah is kidnapped and for her to be released, the prime minister must have sex with a pig live on television. We know this as a Youtube video was released instead of the government trying to cover it up and it then being announced on the news.

This made the social media go ballistic – if this happened 10 years ago, we didn’t have this type of technology as we only had the news and newspapers to inform us which would quickly print out and spread around the news but by then the government would of had more opportunity to try and cover the situation up and solve it before anymore of the situation is leaked out to the newspapers. Now: If a YouTube video/tweet is shared and takes everyone’s interest – this can spread around the world in minutes (this was shown during the programme when a normal couple were looking through Twitter and seeing every tweet being about the kidnapping & the YouTube video having over 1 million views within 10 minutes.) In relation to our film, it shows that government cover ups are not as easy in the modern day because once the media has got a good story, they can spread it around numerous amount of social media before they print it in the newspapers. To think that the PM had so many advisers but none of them could make an impact = powerless. Yet in reality, this would probably never happen as no broadcaster would be able to show it as they may get shut down immediately, surely they would not want to risk their company that much?

When creating the plot for the film, we have to think about what type of media should be put in to our film. News reports are very effective in terms of it being very informative and trustworthy but if we were to create it, we would have to work at the graphics for it to be professional otherwise we would end up with a not very convincing news report in our trailer. If we were going to set our plot in the modern day, social media as from the programme we realise how a tweet/status can spread like fire around the world – for example if a pandemic was to happen, the use of social media would be so important to spread the news around and show how powerful the internet & social media is. 

The programme had very dark satire and was not for everyone. Of course every programme would always have mixed reactions but was the programme really about a parable of the modern world of technology (the intended message) or was it really just a mock of the current PM and how he does not always stand by his decisions. When making/researching the film we have to think about the cultural reference – this was very much to do with today’s contemporary culture and the digital world and caused a lot of debate & discussion. We would want our plot to not only create a clear intended message but also create discussion about the trailer.