Evaluation

My final product is a film opening called “Not Another Vampire Movie”. The creators of this film were Me, Yasmin Khan and Paul McNamee.

The Genre of our film opening; “Not Another Vampire Movie”, is vampire/horror spoof. Our film has some conventions of a spoof genre; e.g. death being portrayed in a comical way. I also had a zoom out shot of the moon; this makes our opening authentic as with the sound effect it has a creepy atmosphere; this makes it look like a horror film more then as spoof. “The Slayer” is a stereotypical blonde person; this also conveys the spoof genre; for example in the “Scary Movie” films blonde, female characters are normally stupid.

The music at the start of our film is heavy and fits in with the horror genre as songs in horror films are usually heavy. In our film I used the same person to play two different characters, “The boyfriend” at the start and “the boyfriend” during the flashback this shows the spoof genre because it is comically. Mine and Yasmin’s character “The Slayer” and “The Vampire” communicate using our eyebrows; this is very different to media productions in the real world, I don’t think it has been used before. It also shows the spoof side as it is quite funny to watch if understood.

Vampires are generally portrayed as being gothic, so our film will probably be liked better by teenager’s interested in gothic style or heavy music. Vampire myths vary from film to film; I tried to stick with traditional ones e.g., vampires being creatures of the night and draining the blood of the living, no matter who they are. “The Slayer” and “boyfriend” could represent any sub culture as they dress sense is pretty average.

Our film would probably be distributed in independent cinemas as it is only aimed at a small audience type; also it is low budget production. The audience for this film would be teenagers and young adults (16-25); as they tend to enjoy horror and spoofs more then adults and younger children would. I also chose this age bracket as I am 16 and the spoofs I researched I all enjoy, so I know others our age will. Due to the adult content; such as, alcohol, “gore” and mild sexual referencing; this film would have a higher classification than the intended audience.

During my coursework I have learnt how to work a camera, the best way the hold it and what shots would look better with a tripod. I have also learnt the process of film; starting with production and the idea, to storyboarding, then filming, editing and burning it onto a DVD. Filming is the most interesting and you forget there is a purpose behind it. I also enjoyed editing as it is funny to mess around with the other and look back on your mistakes; even though at times it can be frustrating. If I did this task again I would prepare more for filming as a few props were forgotten when it came to re filming.

Technologies I used to create this film were apple Macs; this was used for the editing process and the program i-movie made it more straight-forward. The preliminary task was very basic were as with “Not Another Vampire Movie” I was able to express further knowledge of camera work and could incorporate features through using the apple Mac. I also added subtitling and better transitions then I did for the “Ghost” task. Over all I have enjoyed this task and feel that I made a good-quality and funny piece of film.

Filming: day/night 2

In the drama room at school; we shot the eyebrow scene. We decided on this as it was funnier than the Slayer and vampire talking; a lot of people may not understand this but we did it anyway because girls can communicate with their eyebrows.

We shot the flashback scenes at a different location; Yasmin's house. The main prop for this scene was a blonde wig to make Paul look like a different character. Over the shoulder shot were used as this would make to scene look more interesting than just two people talking. In the middle of this scene the camera is showing what the Slayer (me) is seeing; as this shows more emotion. When i was spinning round with the camera it looks blurring this shows dizziness as the slayer could be a bit drunk as it is a house party. We shot a close up of Paul character dead and zoomed out slowing for an effect. When my character is crying on the floor the camera is at a downwards view; this is through the vampire's (Yasmin) eyes and shows her power over me as she has just killed my friend.

Later on in the evening; we went back to Paul’s to re-film some of the shots; like when the vampire bites the victim, the first time this shot didn't look right so the second time we added a close up of the bite and it looked much better. We also shot Yasmin's entrance showing her walking up the stairs to show why it takes her so long to walk into the kitchen. We also shot my feet tripping up as without this it was clear why I fell and threw the sword. The last part we shot was the vampires exit. The slayers "bf" is a way of showing her angry for letting the vampire escape again in a comical way.

Filming day 1

Our first night of filming was at Paul's house. We decided to film outside first as it was dark and a full moon; this was perfect for our film as it conforms to the stereotypical horror genre. Filming the moon was quite difficult as we couldn't get the camera to stay still; to resolve this we put it on a tripod. We introduced the vampires first; showing them walking powerfully towards the house, to add to the atmosphere of a house party, we included music. Next, we filmed indoors the introduction of the slayer and the future victim of the head vampire. We chose to show the slayer (me) as a stereotypical blonde teenager like portrayed in "Buffy the vampire slayer" and the "scary movie" series. We then filmed the scene in which I accidently decapitate the head of the victim. This was to add some comedy, as our genre is a "spoof". Fake blood and a Tin-foil sword; were used as props in the scenes we filmed. A few problems occurred whilst filming mainly laughing during filming but this was resolved by filming the scene again and in the editing progress. this was an enjoyable experience.

Coursework

First; Me, Yasmin and Paul researched spoof film openings, for example the scary movie's. We did this as we are researching into the spoof/horror genre and wanted to see how they make something that would be serious funny and entertaining. They were all very funny and we liked some more then others but they all helped our research. From here we came up with the name "Not another vampire movie"; as our film will be a spoof vampire film, and we got this from the film "Not another teen movie".