Audience research continued

Audience research

This is our audience research for short films. using this survey we have found out what different people like to see from short film, and feature length films. We found out that a lot of people found hybrid genres very effective, and like to see them in feature lenth films. people also would rather see a full film at the cinema than a short film. Above we have tallied all of our results. below is a sample of one of our surveys.

Short Film - Prototype camera angles

There are camera shots of the bedroom, the landing, the passageway and the kitchen in the house we are going to use for our short film. This is to work out which would be the best camera angle for Cam. 1, Cam .2, Cam. 3 and Cam. 4

My short film

My group and I have recently began our planning on our short film for A2 Media. We have chosen a horror genre, mixed with some aspects of technological failure. For example a tv and xbox will turn on and off on their own, and light switches will have a mind of their own. given the extremely low budget we are running on, we have decided to set the film in the home of one of the members of our group, which will probably be me. we have drawn out some sketches of the camera shot, and I will be taking some pictures of the different camera shots we could use and uploading everything shortly. We are going to work on the budget as well as we can, and will probably be taking a similar route to films like Paranormal activity, with minimal camera angles, possibly some hand held camera moments, and minimal music. some horror techniques and ideas could be taken from such films as .REC also.

Mise-en-scene

Mise-en-scene is the placement and usage of props and scenery on a film set, that is mostly used to set the scene. It can be used to help present setting and situation the audience, and make it easier to work out where the characters are, and what is going on. It also helps to make the genre of the film more apparent to the audience, and sets a certain atmosphere around a scene.

An example of effective mise-en-scene is in the British horror film "The Descent". The film is set in underground caves and tunnels, setting a claustrophobic atmosphere, and is very dark. Also at some points, red and green lighting filters were used to create diegetic lighting from blood and glowsticks, to create a horrifically realistic atmosphere.

Viral Marketing for Cloverfield and District 9

Cloverfield - The viral marketing for Cloverfield began with the title itself. The name of the film began as the release date, which was 01.18.06. It was then up to the audience to pick a name for the film, which added a lot more mystery as they didn't know anything as to what the film was to be about. this helped to create a lot of hype for the film. The film posters also had a huge part in this, as they showed nothing except a city with a huge shadow hanging over it, showing that something biug was coming. a few posters showed only a little of the city, with a destroyed landmark, such as the decapitated Statue of Liberty, or a wrecked Empire State Building, which created the same hype. A sense of realism and mystery was created by some posters, as one only shows what looks like blurry mobile camera footage of a distressed woman surrounded by policemen, talking on her phone.

Viral Marketing for The Dark Knight

As more modern techniques and higher budgets are being achieved, viral marketing is being used more and more within the film industry for advertising the films, and creating enigma within the audience. This leads to campaigns where objects and characters reach out from the film and into real life, creating a huge buzz within the audience. A good example of this is "The Dark Knight", the most recent Batman film, from Christopher Nolan. In this viral campaign groups of people supporting Harvey Dent and the Joker created factions in different cities. An online version of the fictional newspaper The Gotham Times arrived and was followed by numerous websites, including a defaced Joker version of the paper called The Ha Ha Ha Times and even a website for the Gotham City Rail with a subway map of the city. The Joker placed objects from the film to create clues for his fans to follow and posters were put up around the
world and in America. This created a huge hype for The Dark Knight, and made fans a lot more
involved.

Across the hall

Across the hall is an award winning short film from 2007, which was re-made in 2009 as a full length movie.

The trailers of these two versions have some key differences, making it easy to spot which version the trailer is advertising. the main differences are how much is revealed of the plot in them, and the suspense that is created using screen titles, and other distancing devices.

For example the short film leaves a lot more open to the imagination, as there is not much in the way of sound and dialogue, and it also doesn't reveal much of the narrative of the film either.

The feature length trailer is much longer and contains more techniques to engage with the audience. It creates much more suspense by having a background narrator, but it also tells the audience more of the narrative. It also creates a lot more suspense using music.

The two posters advertising the films (short film - left, feature film - right) differ on some key style and quality points. The poster advertising the film is noticeably more colourful, and is visually obvious that it was made by some high-budget Hollywood film company. It also contains many images merged together, probably in photoshop, whereas the short film version contains one image of relatively low quality, which is a screenshot from the film. This suggests that not a lot of effort has been put into the advertising of the short film, as the poster is merely a screenshot from the film with some white writing over the top of it. However the Hollywood version has different images for every character on the poster, and all of the actors have been airbrushed and made to look near perfect by the high-budget Hollywood designers.

I'm Here film poster

I will need to include a movie poster in the production of my short film, so i have made this one using photoshop for the Spike Jonze short film, "I'm here"

My favourite short films

The short film scene generally attracts an audience of students, film fans,

and films companies looking for fresh, talented directors.

Short films are distributed amosng film festivals and competitions mostly,

but more mainstream companies are starting to do their part with websites

such as http://www.virginmediashorts.co.uk/.

Anyway, here is a small selection of my favourite short films from the internet, each for their different qualities......

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KX61PUZ3xkI
The Crimson Permanent Assurance - Terry Gilliam
Used as a prelude to Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life"
Is sometimes shown on its own as a short film.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bm1PqYI0zSY&feature=related
Random zombie attack movie set around a $10 budget for fake blood. I like it because the acting is relatively good, the comedy is good, and they have done well considering the budget.






http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ha4xY7ED9dw
Jerry Jackson at the Scunthorpe Festival - BBC

Hybrid Genres

Hybrid Genre films are use multiple genres to mix up the plot, style, setting, and general atmosphere of the film. A good example of this is Robert Rodriguez’s horror, From Dusk Till Dawn. The film is heavily influenced by Quentin Tarantino, who wrote it and also made a cameo appearance. Tarantino works quite heavily with hybrid genres in his other films such as Kill Bill, Inglorious Basterds and Pulp Fiction, and this Horror/Western/Gangster/Comedy is no different. It starts out as the story of two murdering criminals, who rob, and burn down, a shop in the desert, before taking a family hostage. There are indications of a gangster thriller here, but the main focus is on the western themes. The music is quite light hearted through the first half of the film, and involves a lot of slide guitar, and other country and western techniques. Also it is set in the desert, as a kind of road movie, so there are more genres being brought into play.

There are a few jokes in From Dusk Till Dawn, mainly for subtle comedy effect rather than blatant slapstick, such as the two criminals walking away from the petrol station shop as it explodes, arguing as if there was nothing happening. Audiences find films a lot easier to watch with a side of subtle comedy, so this is a crucial aspect of this particular film.

The atmosphere of the film gets considerably darker when the characters enter the bar, and the music gets a bit more sinister. Soon after this is when the film turns into a full blown vampire horror, with all the characters being attacked by them as they transform from the bar staff and patrons. To me this is one of the most varied hybrid genre movies to date, using western, action and horror techniques very effectively.

Media – Genre

There are many important aspects to consider in the production and advertisement of films. A primary example of these factors is genre. Genre defines a film using several aspects of its content. These can be things like camera work (action films commonly use fast, jerky camera work with occasional slow motion), and lighting (usually low-key in horror films.)

Actors can (and many have) use genre to build their film career around, and make themselves more known for that particular genre. For example, Adam Sandler is well known for his work in comedy films, while Robert Englund is known more for his many roles as Freddy Krueger in A Nightmare on Elm Street, therefore horror films. However he is also quite well known for his work with low budget horror flicks, and B-movies.

This brings me to sub genres. A B-movie is among the many variations of sub-genre of horror film, some of which include monster movie, slasher, zombie, vampire, and snuff film. Pretty much all genres can be broken down into sub genres, however horror is the most likely to have the widest variety.

The most important use of genre is in advertising, and it is to inform the public what to expect from the content of the film. For example is someone watches the trailer to Twilight, if it wasn’t for the poignant, melodramatic music (suggesting love story) then people would just think it was another vampire horror.

Robert Englund posing with his character Freddy Krueger.