CCR Question #1

 This first CCR question delves into the conventions of a horror film, and how it represents social groups and issues. For the first two questions I will be doing an interview with a host. This is how I would answer the question in my CCR video...

What makes your horror film, a horror film?

For our film, we followed some classic horror traits, we have the themes of death, dark suspense, and a villain. But we dropped the jump scare aspect, and the heavy gore. We did this because making gore special effects makeup and mis-en-scene elements is tricky and expensive. Usually, horror films start off with a bang, a big jump scare, but starting off slow and building the suspense is something I find more pleasing in films, so we went that way. 

What issues does Haunted Memories touch on?

Haunted Memories touches on some difficult topics, one of them being abuse. It follows the relationship between a teenage girl and her abusive father. No physical abuse is ever shown in the opening, but its heavily hinted at, we focused more on emotional abuse. The rest of the film would have some flashbacks of physical abuse between Olivia and her father Jonathan. Representing this type of a relationship is important considering the staggering statistics we currently have of abused teenagers. One in four girls are estimated to experience child abuse, according to the National Children's Alliance. It’s really heartbreaking and more attention should be focused on resolving this issue. Depression from grief is also something that is noticeably big in this opening, as we see Jonathan struggle deeply with the loss of his wife. It leads him to live a very alcoholic, aggressive, and abusive life towards Olivia. We would continue this message through the remaining of the film by keeping the alcohol bottles around the house, and by having more heavy scenes of Oliva and Jonathan arguing.

What social groups are represented in your opening? 

We represent a broken family, a sad social group. The addiction, abuse, trauma, and loss are all factors that contribute to the falling apart of this family. Which leads to the end of the film where Olivia and Jonathan would go their separate ways, despite Olivia having defeated the killer who was after her and her relationship. Dysfunctional social groups and relationships are common things you can find in films, but what makes them all stand out is the effects they each toll on their characters, and how the relationships effect their decision making throughout the story.

Sources: 

-Click me!

Editing the credits

On Adobe, I've been working on our credit sequence and title. We start the opening off with the credit sequence, and then it transitions into the title, so I thought it would be fitting for me to start with this. The credits are going to be five photos of Anabella and her parents, from her childhood to show the life and bonds they had before the mother passed. Some of the photos are of Anabella and her mom, Anabella and her dad, or Anabella and both of her parents. The photos stay on the screen for about six seconds each, while the credit text boxes roll over them. We wanted to aim for a thirty second credit sequence, so that all the credits can roll, and the photos can sink in with the viewer because they are important establishing blocks. Our credits include, the director, producer, writer, names of the main actors, editors, cinematographer, and the copyrighted music for the three audios I talked about yesterday. We might add some more along the way if we think of any others, but we covered most of the roles that went and are going into this project.

When we learned about this project, and how to create it we learned that our title shouldn't go at the end of the opening, so we decided to have it play right after the credits. Originally, we were going to have the title appear during one of the scenes like the one of Anabella in the mirror, but we ended up with putting it over a black screen after the credits, right before we begin with the father driving home after work. We are still playing around with a few different options for the font of the title. Adobe has a lot of options, and we don't know what to choose, but we want something that looks professional (but kind of scary). 

(One of the family photos used in the credit sequence)

(One of the mother-daughter photos used in the credit sequence)

Editing sounds

Now that we filmed all our scenes, we started transferring our files to a new project on Adobe Premier Pro. We were able to log in and use it for free with our school email, me and Anabella shared the project with each other so we can both edit it simultaneously. We don't have a lot of experience with Adobe, but our teacher did provide us with a lot of tutorials a few months back on how to use it and it’s cool features. We also have had multiple lectures on editing from our teacher, so I have been looking back at my notes to help me plan out this editing process. 

 When we were still in our planning phase, we chose a few sounds, and I shared them here on my blog. We are working with integrating certain clips off those sounds into the background of scenes as well as adding in some of the foley sounds me and Anabella recorded this week during the production days. 

 For our foley sounds, we made one for the dad walking in, the leash being clipped onto the dog, the door slamming shut, the door opening, and some more walking. We did all of these with various things we found in Anabella' house. For the footsteps Anabella placed her hands inside her shoes and stomped around while I followed closely with my phone to catch the audio. For the leash clip noise, we took one of those big carabiner clips and snapped it loudly, with again the phone right next to it to catch the audio. 

 When we integrated these sounds into our project on Adobe, we placed the file of audio over the scenes we chose to go with them. The same was done for the audios that I talked more about in one of my planning blogs. For the editing process, Anabella and I decided that we will both work on it, we both know we don't know how to do certain parts as well so we'll just help each other and divide the work that way. We have been able to call a bit to discuss choices in editing, and to edit together.

I have been really liking Adobe so far, I remember it all looked really complicated at the start, but over time I understood the functions and it became simple. I have re-watched a few tutorials on YouTube to be able to see how to overlay things properly and smoothen the audio over a clip, it's been helpful.

(What our Adobe project looks like so far)

That's a wrap!

 We finished our productions! It was really successful and fun. For this second day of filming, we used all of our props. The photo frame, the mask, the bottles, and the tattoos. We finished making our props over the weekend, for the bottles I ran them under hot water to be able to melt and peel off the pre-existing stickers. I then printed out simple labels of alcohol that I found online and taped them onto the bottles. For the killer's mask, I dyed Anabella's old pink go kart mask black. To do this, I used black fabric dye from the supermarket. I ordered an antique looking photo frame from Amazon, I got a small one because we are just framing the face of the mother. With all of the other props, the tattoos pushed us out of our budget, so we decided to make them ourselves by drawing them on with marker. 

  (This week at a glance!)

We worked on all of the shots that take place inside of the house this week, which concluded our filming. We filmed at my partner Anabella's house, we used her kitchen and bedroom. For the kitchen scene with her and her father, we scattered the bottles around the frame and told Anabella's mom not to wash dishes for the whole day, so the sink was filled with dirty dishes. After we did their argument scene, I followed Anabella to her room for a clip of her slamming her door shut with rage. Thankfully, we borrowed our teachers stabilizer and used it for filming because it made all the shots steady and made it easier to hold the phone for filming. 

In Anabella's room, we did the majority of the content. Before I came over, she set up her room to make it fit the character and use the props we bought. She taped up some of the collage photos she bought, and she hung up the tapestry although it didn't end up in the frame. She cleared her things from the wall and her vanity. We set up the photo frame on the vanity, with a printed photo of her mom inside. She started off by doing heavy eye makeup, with black eyeshadow, thick mascara, and a little bit of purple mixed with red eyeshadow underneath her eyes to make the crying look more realistic. Since she couldn't cry on command, we used eye drops to make it look like black tears of mascara were running down her face. For the costume, Anabella and her dad both wore the same thing they wore last time we filmed. Anabella wore a hoodie and shorts, to resemble she is comfortable and just relaxing at home. Her dad wore something a little nicer, because he had just come home from work in these scenes. 

When I was filming scenes, lighting was a big thing I kept playing around with. On the phone, I would click the frame and adjust the lighting to try and get better shots, it also helped the camera focus on the characters a bit more. Now that we have begun editing we can fix that better, but it was fun to adjust to see what worked best with different angles.

Doorbell

 The final scene we recorded on Friday was through the camera of the doorbell. This was really essential in showing that she is leaving the house, and moving away from the fighting scene with her dad. Ellie the dog, wasn't really cooperating anymore at this point, so to calm her down and have her follow Anabella we had Chloe stand on the side of the house, where she was not in frame holding a treat to motivate her! She was so sweet and cute. 

(Ellie!)

The camera in the doorbell is a little bit different from the one used for the other clips on the driveway, this one has the date and time of the recording printed at the bottom. Since the others don't have this, when we edit them together into a sequence we can either remove it on the doorbell clip, or try to edit and add it in onto the other clips as an overlay, to keep everything consistent. When I was on the app recording the scenes, I tried to play around and toggle with buttons to see if I could enable the date and time at the bottom just like how the one on the doorbell looked, but it didn't work. 

(Doorbell camera)

(Photo from our filming)

Overall, we had a lot of fun, and we filmed the clips well. The walk was smooth, and it looked natural which was perfect. From me and Anabella's past projects we know our acting ruined many clips, so we tried to work on that for this project, to improve it. Obviously, we are not professional actors and developing good acting skills takes a lot of time and effort, but we are definitely trying harder and making adjustments. 

Security cameras

 The two scenes we recorded from the security cameras yesterday where essentially just different angles of the same walk. We positioned the cameras on two different sides of the driveway of the house. One of these angles was really high up, and the other one was at floor-level. We chose these heights so we could have contrast in the same scene, and so we could have more movement when jumping from one camera to another. For the first clip, we placed the camera on top of one of the lanterns outside that sits next to the garage door. 

(Circled in blue is where we positioned the camera for the first shot)

(Setting up the angle)

To adjust and make sure we liked the spot before actually carrying out the scene, we looked at it through the app, and saw what the camera was looking at. We then tweaked it and moved it a little bit towards the left side so we could focus more on Olivia walking the dog. Once we found a good spot, we all moved out of the frame and I gave a countdown, and then clicked record on the app while Anabella walked Ellie right through where the camera was pointing at. 

She kept the same route and movement through the walk since she did the same one for all three scenes. The footage from the camera really resembled a normal security camera footage, it was a little bit grainy and it looked very pixelated. Now that we have the footage, once we go into our editing process we can tweak the brightness, and crop the clip however we need to. 

 Although they were recorded out of order, when we edit the opening, the sequence of these clips would be going from the doorbell camera, to the floor angle, and then the angle from higher up because that order follows the path that she takes with the dog to leave the house and go for a walk. That way we follow her out with different shots and angles. 

The second scene we got was a completely different angle, at floor level that faced the entrance to the house. We placed the camera behind a leaf from a sprouting plant behind it, to show that these cameras are hidden and they are attempting to look natural by blending in with the nature around them. On the footage, a little bit of the plant got caught into the frame which is exactly what we where going for, as we didn't want the whole frame to be covered by the plant. It made it look like you are watching Olivia secretly and discreetly, it really added an eerie touch. 

(Where we placed the camera for the second shot)

This angle mainly focuses on the lower half of Olivia and the dog, it brings in a new perspective of her on the walk. The footage came out the same as the last, with the grainy effect because the same camera was used, but in a different position. The quality is consistent throughout the scenes while it accentuates the authenticity of the scenes quality through the security cameras. I didn't think I would be so excited and anticipating for the editing, but after getting these scenes I honestly can't wait to edit them all together and add all these effects and transitions I keep imagining to make everything flow and make it creepy.