By Andrew Ward-Salt

Many horror movies or movies with a frightening or shocking theme are based around conventions. There is silence to build tension, there is a change on the volume and tempo of music to match the mood, and there is a large amount of close ups to hide the environment around the characters and add suspense. My movie follows most of the conventions, but breaks a few as well. My movie contains many silent shots to add tension, though this was often due to the overpowering ambient noise from wind. There is also a lot of scenes in the dark, and the movie in its entirety is filmed at night in the freezing cold when the night is at its darkest. One of the less conventional things about this though is that the shots which are filmed are not mostly close ups and do not feel as isolated as they should. This means that the tension is often lost by seeing a happy normal neighbourhood with the lights on in the window. Also, though the silence works well for the movie, I believe that musical tempo changes and volume changes add a great amount of suspense to real media products, which would have been useful for my movie. Still, I believe it can easily be distinguished as a horror movie due to its use of conventions

Media influences a lot of peoples thoughts in this day and age. If you see a movie with a terrorist who is of Arabic descent, you instantly think worse of the Arab population, its second nature. Its almost the same way that many times, in a good action movie, the antagonist is either British (with a strong accent) or Russian. The same goes for other media: you see a typical James Bond style character, with a tuxedo and a crew cut, and a large portion of Americans may instantly think “this man means business and this is what all the British are like”. Therefore, even without trying, media represents social groups and their stereotypes without even putting in any effort. My movie does not contain much which could represent a social group. One scene is in the bedroom of the main character, this is the only scene which shows a character in his entirety, the other character is a mystery. In this scene, you see a messy room, with clothes all over the desk, rubbish on the floor, and books littered around the place - a students room. This ties in with the old cliché that all students are messy young people with little organisation until they go to university. Though not completely fair in its use, this scene is the only scene where I saw I could have used representation to its fullest, so I did.

Many institutions rule the media world of today. Warner Bros and Sony are in a constant battle for control over the music world, whilst Warner Bros simultaneously combats many other companies such as Buena Vista for control of the film industry. I believe that Warner Bros would distribute my movie. This is because a lot of movies from the same genre as mine are distributed under Warner Bros already, but not so many that the market is completely flooded. The capital they could undoubtedly provide, even in this era of recession, would easily make distribution of movie quick and successful. The only concern I would have with Warner Bros distributing my movie is that they are largely based in America, with holdings of other smaller companies in different countries for span of control. This means that unlike a smaller firm, they would not be as personalised, and I believe that I would be working with a faceless corporation rather than a friendly person. Even though I much prefer a friendly relationship to a rewarding one, I believe that the kind of media institution to accept distribution of my movie would be a larger corporation, whom had a large grip over most avenues of media.

The audience for a media product influences it greatly, without it, the product would not be created – media is made to be seen or heard, not just as a sinkhole for money to fall into whenever someone feels like creating something. My movie would be geared towards people who like a good movie, plain and simple. I aimed to create a product which entices the audience and draws them in through an intricate plotline that isn’t entirely obvious (or makes you think it is, but then says otherwise later). In this I think I did a satisfactory job with the tools I was given. If I were to choose an audience, I would think of my audience as people in their early to late 20’s, maybe some younger who were curious, but unlike conventional horror movies which are made to scare the audience so thrill seekers go to watch them, I wanted to move more towards something more substantial then a quick shock. I wanted something that keeps the audience guessing, so that narrowed the audience down to people aged 20 and above, both of male and female, though it is geared more towards males due to its more violent aspects. Even though this is the main audience, I believe that older people wouldn’t mind the movie either, due to its intellectual styling.

Films attract and address their audiences in many ways, this being one of the focal points of a media product in general. They can attract them with a teaser trailer, posters which say a lot but leave you guessing, and all sorts of other techniques which make a movie a delectable buffet of surprises for the audience. I didn’t let on much about my movie. I said a little bit of the story, but that worked to my advantage. People are more drawn to a movie which entices them rather than tell them nothing or conversely, everything. The teaser hinted at monsters, which are popular in today’s movies, and even a little bit towards superpowers (foresight) which is good because superhero movies are some of the most popular movies of all time. This is why my method to attract was so simple. It required little effort but is a safe and easy way to attract an audience. It also addresses my audience simply. The people in the movie aren’t driving around in flash cars and wearing suits with big guns firing at monsters, they’re two teenagers in hoodys and jeans, and that’s all. As well as this its shot in a traditional lower/middle class area, no large houses, just semi-detached ones and bungalows. This almost addresses the audience as if to say “come watch this movie, it’s almost as if you’re in it”.

Technology is a key part of media in this day and age, and technology influences everything in some shape or form. I wasn’t really an idiot with technology when I began this project, but some things escaped me due to the fact I’ve never made a movie before. When I started the project, blogging and typing information into blogs was extremely simple for me to learn because typing and clicking is easy and I've been doing it for years, its just what you do on most of the internet, so I found it easy to learn. The same almost goes for the Camera: aside from some issues with using it (I usually use my phone not a camcorder) I understood that too. The biggest thing I learned from the process of constructing my project was the editing of the movie. Before I began this project I could not comprehend modifying a movie in any way, let alone filming, editing, and then adding effects to a movie. I learned how to change sound outputs, add sound to a film or tone down that which was already there, I even learned how to splice clips together and add text to the movie. Even the conveyance of this evaluation was beyond me before the project began, I assumed I would have to upload it to my blog as text and post it, but I used this instead as it seems cooler. Overall, this has been a learning experience for me, and I have learned a lot about technology.

My preliminary task was simple – walk down a corridor, through a door, talk to someone, whilst in the meantime, I film it. I believe I learned a lot from the progression from prelim to full product. When making my preliminary product, I didn’t plan a single thing, and this ended up with me botching it up first time, and because we filmed it on 2 totally different dates, there were obvious flaws in it. Because of this, I made a storyboard before my project was underway, and I did all of my character filming in one night to ensure fluidity. As time passed I also learned I should explore different avenues in my movie. I didn’t use a point of view shot in my preliminary, so I decided to try one in my final product, and I believe it came out really well. When it all came together for my full product, I had so much experience under my belt from editing the preliminary movie that I actually knew what I was doing. As well as learning how to edit on the run up from prelim to final, I also learned how to do a proper job. I felt I rushed my preliminary project, but I spent as much time as I could on the final so that it would look every bit as professional as I wanted it to. The most important thing of all I learned though was patience. Without it I would have rushed my movie to completion, and it may have failed totally.