Evaluation of the Final Product

On our prelim task the shots we used were very basic. We had a list of shots we had to use in the task, while when we were preparing the final product we we able to come up with the shots that we wanted, giving us more independence and also teaching ourselves what shots would work and which wouldn't through trial and error. The editing on the final product was also more complex and we were introduced to after effects. On the day of the prelim task we didn't record any sound but merely recorded some after we had edited it, but when shooting the thriller we recorded sounds and we learnt how to import sounds onto the video.
When editing we had the idea to use the close ups as the first few shots, to create a sense of fear, confusion and closure as close ups would show little of what the audience wanted to see to answer the questions in their mind "where is he?" and "why is he there?" Initially we made the scene very slow paced before speeding up towards the end. We planned to have quick shots cutting between the bodies and rory's reaction but this didn't work as it looked poorly done. We realised that with the first shot it was a long take that lasted 30 seconds of the film. Because the film is only 2 minutes long, this dictated that the film wouldn't be fast paced. However, in order to make it faster and to make the horror more realistic we used several POV shots. POV shots enabled us to show the full extent of the horror on the screen, and also enabled us to get some quick shots and speed up the action. This gave the audience a sense of the horror of the situation.
On the day of the shoot we recorded many sounds, like a light switched on and off, a glass breaking, a table falling over and metal poles hitting and rolling on the floor. The scene didn't feature any music, only the sound effect we added over the top as well as the sound captured with the shots. When the final shot blacks out and the title appears, there is a loud strong metallic noise. This creates a further sense of fear, as the noise relates to the kinds of places generally feared like hospitals or prisons. Most of the film however has little or no sound, which makes the audience feel sympathy for the protagonist as the lack of music makes them think he is more alone.
Before the sequence starts, we introduce the production company 'Redrum'. It is a ficticious company that we liked the name of as it is inkeeping with the horror genre being murder backwards and being a famous phrase from horror classic The Shining. It comes in on a black background for a few seconds before it fades away to say the name of the director, another ficticious name. Both of these titles are in lower case. The title of the film however comes in after the sequence ends and is in capitals to seem more important. We didn't put any titles in the sequence itself to maintain tension.
I think the use of close up shots at the beginning was a good choice at it makes the audience want to keep watching in order to find out the key questions they would be asking. Redrum would intice any other horror fans who would have probably seen The Shining. The lack of sound creates an eerie sense of emptiness and helplessness in the scene, which again will make the audience want to know what happens to the protagonist. The increasing in pace increases tension which hopefully, after the title of the film appears, would make the audience want to keep watching. We had the aim of creating a horror film and the choices we made were influenced by targeting horror fans. Our choices were designed to maximise fear in out audience which is the desired effect of a horror film. We felt that keeping it to close ups emphasised the claustrophobia in our film, like in other films like Saw. POV and close ups were used to show fear on the faces of our actors which in turn would lend the film the look of a horror film and target our audience.