Monday, February 28, 2022

Related genres

 Monday 28th February 2022

Films which include a psycho wife



Home Sweet Hell featuring Katherine Heigl is about a wife that finds out that her husband is cheating on her. The horror comedy is about a husband who doesn't like his sex life at home and decides to cheat on his wife with a lady at his store. In order to to keep her lover, the new girlfriend tells the husband that she is pregnant so that he will stay with her and not tell his wife. The wife finds out about this and begs her husband to hill her. The wife poisons that girlfriend and takes her home. She kills her with a hammer and cuts her body into pieces. The couple is now threatened by a gang that new the girlfriend which lets them to dig up the buried body. The wife ends up killing 2 of the gang members in order to not get caught and frames the other gang members for the killings. The husband is scared of the wife and plans to kill her. Once she has been killed he moves away with their children. At the end he was killed by the framed gang members.
This film features themes that is in our opening title sequence as they both contain a psycho wife who kills the women that their husband is cheating with. It is pretty conventional with films containing these themes to have the wife with blonde hair. In films blonde hair is conventionally portrayed as either not as bright/ intelligent or psycho and the man wife. The conventions of a thriller film that are the same as this film is the husband cheating on his wife and the wife killing the lover, they both use weapons in order to cause harm to their victims. Home Sweet Hell also uses red font for the title which we incorporated in our sequence as our colour scheme. Red font is used conventionally used in thriller films to portray the genre. 




Friday, February 25, 2022

shooting and editing a dialogue sequence




Friday 25th February 2022


Filming with sound



Once we entered the classroom that we were going to film in we set up the hardware that we were going to be filming with. We used the Vinten Tripod which we attached the camera onto. We then plugged in the Sennheiser shotgun mic into the back of the camera so that we could film with sound. As we wanted to play around with the sound, we used the protective cover over it some of the takes. Once editing however, I found out that it doesn't effect the sound indoors! We then moved the chairs and desks to be positioned where we needed them. I thought that it would be good to film in the centre of the classroom due to the bright sunlight going in from both directions of the room. Before we started filming, we attached the Lexar pro memory card so that we could transfer all of our filming up to the studio later on. One of the most important things to remember when filming a dialogue scene is the 90 degrees rule as you don't want it to be confusing for the audience. This meant that when we were filming we never crossed to the other side of the actors to film. We began by filming the dialogue facing Issy so that we made sure we had shots of her. We filmed it with the focus on her three times, one in a mid shot, one in a close up and one in a wide shot. We then repeated this but with Caitlin. After this we moved the camera to behind Caitlin so we could change up the persective for the audience. We also did this with Issy. As we still had more time afterward, we took some extra shots of Issy waiting for Caitlin to come into the frame. In this scene she is meant to be looking nervous and scared so we shot a close up of her feet tapping the floor and a close up of her biting her nails. 







Editing with sound



This editing process was much harder than I expected as my group wasn't in school so I had to edit the sequence on my own. However it was so much fun to do! When I got into the editing suit the first thing that I did look through all of the shots that we filmed on the software Premiere Pro. I began by sectioning them into the log bin and the rushes so that I knew which ones I wanted to use in the final cut. It is much more of a challenge editing with the sound as you had to always check that nothing overlapped or too short. Make sure to cut them down to the perfect length before I put them on the timeline and organise them into order. Once I did this I could then edit the sound to make sure everything matched up. When Tom came to look at mine he thought that I could challenge myself by trying to focus on one person in the scene so that's why in the final video there are two different sequences. One focuses on both the girls and the second one focuses on the victim. After this I wanted to make sure that my scene included tension video audience, so I went back to look in the log bin at some of the extra shots we filmed. I added in the nail biting and the toe tapping to achieve this. 





Final product:




Thursday, February 24, 2022

1st editing workshop

Mon 7th Feb 2022 

Editing our two sequences



All of our group helped edit this sequence in the editing suite. We were first taught by Matt how to edit on the software Premiere Pro. He showed us a step and then we repeated it in our own sequences. He first showed us how to look through all of our shots that we had taken and put them in a folder called the rushes. Then he told us to be the edited ones in the log bin incase we lost the original shots. We were then showed how to cut the shots and put them on the timeline. This was bit more challenging as you had to make sure to not cut too much off the shot. We were also reminded not to cut the shot on the 'action', which means that if someone is walking into the frame, don't cut when they are mid walking but before they enter the frame. Once we had everything on the time line we organised them into the correct order and made sure that everything flowed and nothing was overlapping. Our concept for the first sequence was to film Issy bending down and tying her shoelace and the one for the second one we filmed Mia and I doing a handshake. One thing that I learnt throughout this process which will help for the rest of the editing workshops is how to use the cutting buttons and the arrow button. If you learn how to use these buttons quickly then it will make the editing process faster.







Final cast

Thurs 24th Feb 2022

Completed cast list              

                                         

Cassie: Nicky Jones - the wife







                                                                                                                                            




                                                                                              

                                                                                                Thomas: Adam Grant - the husband










Kate: Freya Soley - the husbands lover












                                                                                                 The son: Teddy Gossage - the child




Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Finding a cast member

 Wednesday 23rd Feb 2022


Finding Kate:

We were having trouble finding a teacher to play the part of Kate as many female teachers we either busy during the day or it was there day off. For Kate we wanted her to have brown hair as we wanted her to contrast Nikki's hair who is playing Cassie. We wanted Kate to look significantly younger than Cassie to show that the husband Thomas is cheating with younger ladies. Both Doug and I emailed lots of suitable people but they all weren't free because of different things. We were getting bit more stressed about it because it was getting closer to our shoot day and we new that we needed to find somebody soon. Luckily, my mum said even though she doesn't like being in front of a camera, she would step in and help if we couldn't find anyone. This would also be helpful as my brother would be on set as he is playing the child. I told Adam in the morning that I couldn't find someone and he said that he will also ask around to see if any of the other teachers would be keen. 






Email to Susanna,

We first emailed Susannah to see if she was available to play the part. She wasn't available as she has already been cast in a few other shoots.








Email to Natalie:

We then emailed Natalie in the drama department. I knew that she might be pretty busy as she only works a few days and has young children. She was very apologetic when I spoke to her in person but unable to play to play the part.






Email to Ali:

We new that Ali would be hard to get as she has a very busy schedule and was very sorry when she said that she couldn't be in it. 









Talking to Adam:

I then spoke to Adam as I was worried that we weren't going to be able to find anyone to play the part in time. Adam suggested that we could use an A1 student to play the part if there wasn't anything romantic happening in the sequence. As the only thing that Kate needed to due was sit in a cafe, pub and be killed at the end, we decided that this was our best option. I then looked for people in my year that would fit our criteria. One of my best friends Freya fit the criteria and also looked mid 20s when she has make up on. I spoke to her and she agreed to play Kate on the day. As we didn't have too long until the actual shoot day, I told her that she should wear mum jeans, a sweater and a scarf as that is what is popular with ladies around 20 now. 

Freya Soley:




Wednesday, February 9, 2022

Last shot by shot

 Wed 9th Feb 2022


Last draft - shot by shot 

  • - Wide shot of wife sitting on a wall looking directly forward but not into camera. She reaches into - her pocket and pulls out cigarettes 


    - Mid shot of her lighting the cigarette 


    - Close up of her inhaling  


    - Mid shot of her breathing the smoke out  


    - Back to wide shot of her sitting on the wall for a few seconds, she looks at her phone as she has a text message


    - Mid shot of her looking at phone, in the left and the right composition of the frame, we edit the text messages from husband saying he's going out for the day with work


    - wide shot of women walking down a road. in the right composition of the frame you see the husband and Kate.


    - Wide shot directly facing the couple (side on), wife walks into the frame from the left side, she looks at the couple.


    - When she walks past the couple, they disappear showing that's its in her imagination


  • - Close up of ladies face drinking from her wine glass, she looks over her left shoulder 


  • - The scene then edits to a different location (her face is in the same place) and she's been killed 


    - wide shot of wife walking through graveyard she stops at a grave for a second


    - close up of her emotionless face


  • - wide shot of wife walking straight on (towards the camera) heading to the cafe 


  • - Mid shot of husband in café (filmed from outside of window), he passes a drink to a lady 


  • - POV Shot then goes through the window into the café  


  • - Camera pans to left to a mirror and in the reflection, you see the front of the wife holding her son


    - Close up of the lady at the counter being killed; different angle from the previous death 


    - Back to POV from wife's view- the couple in the cafe have disappeared


    - Back to wide shot of her sitting on the wall, staring into space (this is showing that she is spending loads of time thinking about it)


    - Mid shot of her lighting a cigarette


    - Mid shot of lady walking into a room (studio door or something)


    - Close up of her face, she is about to be hit over the head with a bat


    - Close up birds eye view shot of lady dead on ground. blue and red flashing light, in the bottom right composition of the frame you can see a bat swinging. (everything in slow motion)




Tuesday, February 8, 2022

Final script idea

 Tue 8th Feb 2022


What was discussed in the meeting:

Today we had our third meeting with Adam and Tom. We talked about our new idea about the husband cheating on the wife. Tom explained that we have too many locations to film in one day. We agreed so we decided to narrow it down to locations in Shere. We think that we will only need to film in two or three outdoor locations which are the pub, the cafe and the graveyard. The only indoor location we would need is the studio as we want to produce an effective death scene. To mentioned to us that it would look very cool if we had the husbands lover tied up and beaten by the wife in the studio shoot. I thought that this would be such a good idea as it would create a surprise for the audience and I also know how to do SFX make up so I would love to have a go at this. We then, as a group, discussed wether we should go back to a previous idea and use LEDs for the studio shoot to add atmosphere. I thought that red LEDs would create a tense and scary atmosphere that we want to achieve. For the rest of the meeting we discussed casting, costume and locations as I new that we didn't want to leave it till last minute. We all collaborated and chose what each of us should prioritise so we make sure that we are all organised for the shoot day and also for our next meeting. 


Final concept idea:

The scene will begin in Shere where are the audience will see a lady either driving or sitting on a wall
where she will received a text from her husband saying that he's "going to stay out late tonight" and will not be coming home. Then we see her walking around shere, probably where her and her husband live together. We then see her walk up to a pub where she looks into the window and sees an illusion that her husband is on a date with another lady. From the audience perspective we will understand that she is making this up on her mind but as the wife, she believes that he is cheating on her. When she turns around to walk away the audience to see that the couple behind her have disappeared emphasising that it was an illusion. We will then see the wife walk to her next location which is a café where she will walk up to the window and see her husband on another date with that lady, and also see her son sitting at the table meeting the lady. Same as the last location, when the wife walks away and behind her the couple at the table will disappear showing that that was also an illusion. The audience will see the wife getting in the car and driving off to a new location. The next scene will then begin in what looks like a warehouse where you see the husband's lover tied up onto a staircase. The audience will see that she has been beaten up very bad and is drowsy due to the pain. Then the wife enters through the back door holding a bat which she intends to kill the husbands lover with. From the audiences perspective they will see the wife swinging the bat into the lover's head. Then the title of the film will come up on the screen leaving the sequence with a cliffhanger as they don't know if the lady has been killed or not. 

Sunday, February 6, 2022

Location Hunting

 Monday 6th Feb 2022


The location of Shere 

Our initial idea from the start was to have a village location. In all three of our draft ideas we wanted to film in Shere as it is a location that is close to school and also has a few key shops in it. Our requirements for the place we want to film in has to include a pub, cafe and a bridge/wall. In Shere there are two pubs. One is the William Bray and the other the white horse. Preferably we want to film in the William Bray as it has an outside sitting area which is in front of the pub. Another thing that we think would be useful to have is the pub in walking distance from the cafe as in our first idea we had our main character walk from the pub to the cafe in a continuous shot. Preferably we wanted the cafe to have a big window at the front of it so we could film outside the cafe looking in. My grandma's friend owns Hilly's cafe which is perfectly in walking distance to the pub. The cafe also has a big window at the front of it which is perfect for our scene. For another location we want to film extra shots around Shere. Luckily Shere has a graveyard and a big wall so we can our protagonist sitting on it. The graveyard is very effective as the genre of our title sequence is crime and drama which gives the audience more anticipation for the rest of the film. The graveyard in winter also is covered in frost which will look cool on camera. Another extra scene we want is a shot of the wife sitting on a wall smoking by herself. Shere has many walls which would work for this shot as Shere is in the middle of the countryside. On shoot day we have a few ideas of which wall we want to film old but the one we choose is dependent on the weather and how busy the village is on.













This is a screen recording of all the possible locations in Shere:



Friday, February 4, 2022

Thursday, February 3, 2022

new casting

Thurs 3rd feb 2022

Casting our 4 characters 




Cassie- the wife

We decided that we wanted the person to play Cassie to be blonde hair which will contrast with Kate who is a brunette. We wanted Cassie to be late 40s or early 30s as she needs to look like a mum. So far we are hoping that Ali is available to play the part as Steph is pregnant at the moment and Ali is more age appropriate to the character. Both of the ladies also have the correct dress sense for the part so that makes them more appropriate for the character. 






Kate- the 'husbands lover'

The criteria for Kate has to be brunette and around early 30s as she has to contrast from Cassie. As Kate is the women that Thomas is cheating with, I would presume that she is younger. It would be beneficial to have the husband lover looking much younger than the wife to show the stereotype that men cheat with younger ladies. So far we think that Danielle would be perfect for Kate as she ticks all the boxes. We need to make sure that she is free on shoot date.



Thomas- the husband

For Thomas we need a man that looks like he can be a Dad. So far we have two ideas to play him, Adam and Peter. I think that Peter looks likes the character we were all visioning but Adam also ticks lots of the boxes. Peter will be a harder person to be available and Adam will be more practical as he will be there on shoot day with us. Both would be very suitable for the character and have the same dress sense as the character we are envisioning.



Teddy- the son

For the son we are going to cast my little brother Teddy who is six years old. As Teddy only features in a small part of the sequence we will only need him for an hour so he won't miss too much school. He loves acting and is very excited to play the part!


Shot by shot of new plan

 wed 2nd feb 2022

Shot by shot


  • - Wide shot of husband, wife and child sitting on the sofa watching tv. The son is lying on the wife's lap.  


  • - Mid shot to close up of husband standing up.  


  • - Mid shot on husband’s face saying “I'm going out to the pub” 


  • - Mid shot on family. Wife says “oh okay” and looks confused 


  • - Cuts to close up of husband a lady cheer-sing  


  • - Mid shot of the couple sitting at the bar talking. It's another lady not the wife. The wife crosses from left to right over the frame but the couple doesn’t notice her. 


  • - Close up of ladies face drinking from her wine glass, she looks over her left shoulder 


  • - The scene then edits to a different location (her face is in the same place) and she's been killed 


  • - Cuts to bird's eye view shot of husband and wife lying in bed. He is asleep but she is lying on her back staring up at the ceiling 


  • - Wide shot of husband walking out of the front garden of their house  


  • - Mid shot of husband in café (filmed from outside of window), he passes a drink to a lady 


  • - Shot then goes through the window into the café  


  • - Camera pans to left to a mirror and in the reflection, you see the back of the wife holding her son, she turns round  


    - Close up of the lady at the counter being killed; different angle from the previous death 


    - Close up of husband and wife's head 


    - It zooms out to a mid-shot and you see the family all together in the sitting room.  


    - Wide shot of wife sitting on a wall looking directly forward but not into camera. She reaches into - her pocket and pulls out cigarettes 


    - Mid shot of her lighting the cigarette 


    - Close up of her inhaling  


    - Mid shot of her breathing the smoke out  


    - Back to wide shot of her sitting on the wall for a few seconds 


    - Wide shot of hallway, husband walk in, boy runs in from bottom right corner and hubads bad, son walks backwards a bit 


    - close up of the so, he says “mum?” 


    - Close of husband's face with wife quickly entering behind him, she hits him over with a bat 


    - Stops when the bat is in front of the camera causing a black background. The title comes up.



Final sequence

  Monday 30th May 2022 Our completed title sequence: