Evaluation activity 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

- The title of the film

- For our opening two minutes title we used the setting of our opening two minutes which is where the victim ( me ) walks to the bridge. This shall make it more effective and realistic as it shows that its a place where we filmed which shall make the audience know that we made it ourselves and its original. For most horror film genres they don't tend to use there own setting for the background of there title they include a coloured background which makes there title stand out more. However, for our title we have used a white coloured font which also stands out from the background and its a lighter colour than the dark background which is the effect and image we wanted to create for our title of our opening two minutes.






- Setting/location


- The location we used is a typical horror film setting as its a quiet and eerie area. The location is a deserted area which makes the film more link to a horror genre. It makes the audience more tense as theres nothing around to make them guess whats going to happen within the film. Its more of a mystery o the audience. The outline of the trees in the background and the shadows make it more scary and unnerving environment.



- Costumes and props.

- This is the victims costume which is used mainly in a typical horror film as its just a normal girl whoes getting haunted by an antagonist which makes it more realistic and links to a horror genre film.

- This type of costume we used for the antagonist isn't usually featured in a horror film for the antagonist to wear as it doesn't fit within the horror genre and makes it look out of place within the film as it doesn't make it alarming towards to audience. Next time we film a horror we shall consider what the antagonist wears to make it go with our opening two minutes and fits within a typical horror film. We would make the antagonist wear black clothes without any words or patterns on which shall make it more realistic.




- Camerawork and editing.

- For this bit of the scene we used jump cuts which show the victim ( me ) from far away then gradually gets closer and closer to the victim which infers that its of the horror genre as this is often used to build up the tension.






- Title font and style.
 - The font style and colour we chose for our title isn't a normal horror cliche type of style for a title. The font style we chose is simple as we have chosen a background from the setting we used. We didn't want to make our title look over the top as we didn't want the title to be the main part of our opening two minutes we want the audience to remember whats included in our opening two minutes and whats going to happen as we feel that its the important bit to make the audience want to see the rest of the film. The title of our film can be similar to some horror films whereas, others use different styles and fonts which depends on what there film is about. We find that our title font and style links with our opening two minutes the pathway.





- Story and how the opening sets it up.

-The story of our film is when the antagonist kills a victim which is a normal teenage girl and the once hes done with her he shall find someone who was close to her then this carries on and towards the end we find out what he does and how he does it. The opening sets it up as we can infer that there is deaths involved in our horror film as we start the opening two minutes at a graveyard and the next victim is reading her friends letter she wrote before she was killed from the antagonist. Furthermore, we see the antagonist following the victim ( me) wherever she goes. He followed her from the graveyard to the bridge where the first victim shall have died from which is hopefully where the audience can infer this. We see the antagonist walking up behind the victim whilst she is looking over the bridge and once she turned around a saw the antagonist she turned around again and looked as if she had been attack by the antagonist as her face looked distort. In the opening two minutes we don't see whether the victim ( me ) dies or what happens to me which shall give more suspense and tension towards the audience what shall build up more tension within the film and towards the audience which is what horror films do as it wants to get the audience involved in with the film and they feel engaged with the characters which is when they can feel what the characters are going through especially the victim ( me ) the music we have included and used links with the tension of the opening to minutes, as we get closer to finding out what the killer looks like by face and how he kills his victims, it then tricks the audience then we don't find out which shall make the audience want to watch the horror film as they shall find out what happens. Which is the point in a horror genre film.






- Genre and how the opening suggest it.

- The opening of our two minutes infers that its a horror genre as its at a graveyard and you can insinuate that there is deaths and killing included within the opening two minutes which usually takes place in a horror film. Throughout the opening two minutes more things happen within the scenes like being introduced to the antagonist which doesn't give to much away as it doesn't show the events which happen to the victims,which is what horror films tend to do as it puts the audience more in suspense and builds up tension. We have a scene on the bridge where the antagonist is watching the victim and slowly goes behind her and she turns around looking normal then transforms to looking possessed which ends with a scream which shall make the audience feel more engaged within the film and shall be wanting to see what happens after the opening two minutes of the pathway which is why our opening two minutes goes into a genre of horror.







- How the characters are introduced.

- This is the main and first character which is introduced and the girl who lost her friend from the antagonist which we haven't met at this point and the audience don't know how this happened. By introducing to the audience the next victim ( me ) at the graveyard shall make it known to the audience that she is going to be approach by the antagonist within the opening two minutes or the rest of the film. This links with a typical horror genre film as we meet a girl alone in a graveyard reading a letter with it being deserted and no noise around which makes it more mysterious and alarming towards the audience as they shall think that anything shall happen when its as unpretentious as that.

- This is one of the other main characters within the opening two minutes. We are introduced to him second he is the antagonist. We are introduced to him as he is standing behind a tree and appears whilst the next victim ( me ) is at her friends grave reading a letter from her telling her to run as what she referred to as 'him' that he's coming and the next victim ( me ) needs to run. We see during the opening two minutes the antagonistic scrunching up a picture of the first victim he targeted then the next which was her friend. He does this in an angry way like they've done something wrong or hes just disturbed in making his victims life's hell. The antagonist follows the victim to the bridge where he watches her for a few seconds without her knowing then in small steps he gets closer and closer behind her as she turned around something happened whilst she was doing that and the antagonistic attack her in some way which we don't see in the opening two minutes. We see the victim looking possessed by the antagonist as he encroached her. This links with this character fitting into a typical horror genre film as not alot is given away at this point in the film as its only the opening two minutes which is what the majority of horror films tend to do which is where our introducing of the characters is fitting in with a horror genre type of film.

- Even though we don't meet the first victim we are still introduced by her as it briefly explains what it going to happen during the the film and what is going to be included. As she writes a letter telling her friend that shes sorry and was warning her friend to run and fight back and said ' its too late for me, but not too late for you' This gives us the impression that the same thing the antagonist did is going to happen to the second victim ( me ). This tends to happen in typical horror films where you don't meet a victim and they give you the information the audience needs to feel involved within the opening two minutes. Films like the ring include this. However, both of the girls are alive and one of the girls doesn't believe her friend about a tape. This links with how the next victim warning her friend which died telling her not to do something which we don't find out within the opening two minutes.



- Special effects.

- For the special effects we used slow motion. This effect slows down the scene which shall have an effect on the audience has the scene slows down and makes there have more tension. Has it slowly hits the floor the audience shall be thinking and trying to insinuate whats going to happen next. Slow motion shall make people remember that scene as its the only bit in slow motion and has impact on the audience. Horror films like saw use slow motion which has an effect on the film and the audience. 

- We have also make some of the scenes blurry which we did for effect as it makes the audience look closer into the picture which shall make the look more into the narrative and storyline the pathway and our opening two minutes which makes it more of question of the horror film towards the audience.



- The use of mise en scene in our opening two minutes -
- In our opening two minutes we included, setting and location, costume hair and makeup,lighting, camera angels and positions.
- Setting and location - the setting was chose was a graveyard and then a pathway with trees and bridge. Which was quiet and no one around or no noise apart from the trees and the wind. We started the opening two minutes with the location of the graveyard, this links with a horror genre as it shall infer to the audience that there is and shall be some killings involved within the opening two minutes which is what a horror genre shall include. Then we moved location throughout the opening two minutes to the pathway, we used this type of location because the opening two minutes shows a girl walking down the pathway on her own with no one around being watched from the antagonist. We felt that this shall make the narrative and storyline clearer for the audience to infer and understand what we are trying to get across towards to audience. These locations are used in other horror genre films which shows that we have done research to make sure that our film shall be similar to other horror genre films and opening two minutes.
- Costume - For the costume and makeup we used normal girl clothes which was basic and included a leather jacket, top and jeans and shoes which is a norm for girls the victims age. We chose this costume because it doesn't give to much away and presents the victims as a normal girl which is what we wanted to send across to the audience. This tends to occur in other horror films. From doing some research characters similar to the victim ( me ) included in our opening two minutes were the two girls from the ring, which were school uniform which shows that they are normal girls which is similar to ours and what we want the audience to know. For the antagonists clothing we didn't think go through what he was going to wear. However, this didn't cause to much of a problem as the antagonist wore black clothes which linked to our opening two minutes as we wanted the antagonist to look mysterious and to go with the horror genre look. The only problem which occurred was that he wore trackies which showed the sign of the brand on the leg. Due to this happening in our A2 task we shall make sure we check what each of the characters are wearing and there costumes which shall make it look more professional which links with a horror genre. The makeup used in our opening two minutes we only used on the victim ( me ) we included this when the victim ( me ) meets the antagonist. The makeup we used was white face paint, dark eye shadow around the eyes and applied some red lipstick under the victims ( me ) eyes which made the audience instantly notice the victims ( me ) face as she meets the antagonist. Makeup in horror genre films is usually used, we got our makeup idea from the ring which was the antagonist which worked well with our opening two minutes
- Lighting - The lighting we used was edited from movie maker which was black and white and we included the decrease in lighting and the increase of the contrast effect which made it more of a horror genre film effect which is which we wanted to happen which shall make it clearer for the audience know that its a horror genre opening two minutes.
-  Camera angels and positioning - We included camera shots which are used in the majority of films within film industries, especially horror genre films. Shot types we used included were long shot, medium shot, over the shoulder shots, extreme close up, low shots and close up and high shots.

- Mise en scene creates meanings and infers to the audience that each of the mise en scene link to make a horror genre film and our opening two minutes. The aspects of the various mise en scene help express the films vision and how its portrayed towards the audience which is included films with horror genres and its important to include in opening two minutes.