Research Post: Fonts

We've finished filming! I am very glad to have gotten one of the biggest parts of this project out of the way! Now we have to work on the post-production aspects meaning editing, finding a song for our opening (which could've been both pre and post production), and making a title card for our opening, which could've also been done pre-production but I'm working on it today, nearly a month after we filmed! 

We already have our title, MANSLAUGHTER, but we've always wanted the "man" in the whole word to stick out as our main character is a serial killer targeting men. We were thinking of maybe having the word drip to make it appear as blood or have some sort of spooky element to it but it definitely will be visibly different from the word "slaughter." Regarding "slaughter," I'm thinking of having a "perfect" font for it considering Elena is a woman who wants perfection and will physically punish every man who doesn't give it to her.

The following is an idea of what we want. Again, we want "slaughter" to be a straight and perfect font but the "man" to be spooky in some way. I made the word red and while I do want to incorporate a dripping blood effect to the word, I decided to try out any other spooky elements that I could think of it and I landed on this knife. I'm probably not going to use it and resort to the dripping blood idea I've been thinking of but a lot of the "drippy" fonts are honestly... unappealing to look at in my opinion. This means I'm gonna have to make the drips myself and that's probably not going to be easy and it'll definitely take time but hopefully I get it complete within the week!

Research for Question #1 of CCR Post

While we chose our film opening to be a thriller, it came out to be a horror which isn't that surprising considering the two genres are like cousins. 

Genre conventions are common elements, themes, and/or styles that make up a genre and for horror, there are several that can be listed both content-wise and production-wise. 

Starting off with content, this genre usually includes isolation, victim versus monster, and violence. Isolation can be both physical and psychological as characters can be separated from society in an empty and quiet location but they can also be going through something mentally that others cannot see or relate to. Since protagonists and antagonists in the horror genre are more extreme than in other genres, victim versus monster is an accurate description as the main character is usually victim to whoever or whatever is chasing them down. or in this case, our main character is the antagonist and chasing down her victim. Another tough style that makes up this genre is violence which refers to the fighting, attacking, blood, gore, and other kinds of brutality as they are typically displayed in horror, varying in graphicness.

Genre conventions related to production tend to consist of lighting, camera techniques, and sounds. The lighting used in this genre tends to be lower/darker since little to no visibility creates a sense of vulnerability and bad omen to both the characters and the audience in the genre. Moving onto the shots and movements used, every film incorporates close-up shots, sometimes extreme close-up shots, and quick tilts and pans to make a production appear more chaotic and even produce fear. Additionally, the sounds used are very versatile as it can be very quiet and creepy to make a film ominous or extremely loud and terrifying to create jump scares and get reactions out of the characters and audience.

SOURCE FOR GENRE CONVENTIONS: https://media-studies.com/horror-genre/

In our film opening, we chose to challenge the main character being a victim to "whoever or whatever" is chasing them down. In our film, we decided to swap the roles and have our main character, Elena, be the antagonistic killer who chases down another "main" character. Besides that, we did follow the rest of the conventions including the "physical" and "psychological" separation from society. It's definitely physical as the two main characters are alone in a house with no help nearby. It's also psychological as Elena is genuinely insane considering she kills men who don't fall under her standards when it comes to dating. We also did include violence shown through blood and a "dead body" (me) on the floor!

When it comes to representation, we showed it through gender and age. For women, they're stereotyped as more picky and overreactive and so when our main character, Elena, kills men because they're not "perfect" for her, it definitely lines up with common stereotypes against women. We also had Elena wear a dress which is another common conception of females as they're expected to wear dresses mostly during formal occasions but also just in general. Moving onto age, the film has two young main characters, Elena and Jackson, that are in their 20s. How'd they meet? Oh, you know, just the normal place young lovers meet each other for the first time: Tinder. This shows how young people are stereotyped to be obsessed with technology and rely on everything to be digital, even their dating lives which can lead to marriages that'll affect their entire lives which can also indirectly mean putting their future generation of children in the hands of Tinder!

Post-Production Process: Editing (#2)

 

The following video is a video that all three of us, me, Vicky, and Bella, are using to help assist us with the coloring aspect of our editing/film opening. When we first came up with the idea for our film opening, we decided that when we had our flashback sequence to a more sinister moment, we wanted to have the coloring/lighting significantly different to not only make it known that it's a scene in the past but also to develop animosity. Even though we used red lighting during the shoot of the scenes to create that more sinister look, we can still adjust the coloring of not only the flashback scenes but the entirety of the opening in general. Vicky found this video for us to all watch and follow to help us with our editing process as me and Bella especially don't have much experience when it comes to this aspect of our project/film opening.

The video goes over all the basics of coloring and elaborates on terms I didn't know before. It went over correction, hue curves, color wheels, vignette, masks, etc. With this information, we can make our film opening appear for cinematic and also adjust the lighting for the several scenes we thought came out too dark or too bright. This also can apply to our flashback scene with red lighting as it can certainly be adjusted as well regarding coloring/lighting.

Post-Production Process: Editing (#1)

 For our editing, we have started off by simply organizing the clips and seeing our length. We had to skim through and find the clips that were bad takes and our actual final takes. At first, we had over 20 minutes of footage in total and honestly, I'd rather have too much than too little. We might have to take out some scenes or shorten them extremely even though out of those 20 minutes, the actual clips we're using are around 5 minutes in total. 

Since we used Vicky's camera and therefore couldn't be sent the footage, when we finally saw it, we were so glad to have not only amazing quality but no issues with the framing/speed. When we had first started filming, the recording was a bit glitchy and we had to wait 10 minutes while Vicky's CBTV friend assisted her through a call. We're so glad our only duties left regarding the film opening is editing and not having to reshoot anything!

Production Post: Behind The Scenes

The filming era of the portfolio project is complete! Now we have to move onto editing and focusing on our Creative Critical Reflections. I've always found behind the scenes to movies I watched so fascinating because obviously, on the screen, everything looks like the actual location and cinematic but once seeing the reality of it, it's a small set and different raw lighting and effects. I hope someone feels the same fascination I do after seeing our film and then the reality of it.

  

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Production Post: Dinner Montage

We knew what props we'd need for the montage of Elena setting up the dinner table and we also knew the order as we had the script but when it came to the angles, we had different ideas on it. We eventually decided to shoot both of our ideas so when it came to editing, we'd have more options. It took up time having to position items in the same spot for future shots and at times, we'd need to use something to prop the camera atop of for close-up shots. For example, we used these random textbooks Vicky found inside her house and she placed it on the corner of the dinner table for the camera to be propped on because we needed a stable close-up of Elena setting up the plates and cutlery.

At one point, I had this idea for one of the montage scenes when she was setting up the table mats to have her walk across the table/wall and have credits be revealed as she walks by. The camera would've needed to be further back than we planned so that's one example of when our difference in ideas surfaced. Once again, we decided to go with my idea for the shot/angle and also Vicky and Bella's. Filming the dinner montage scenes was definitely one of the most challenging and time consuming parts of this shoot but we survived it! (Barely).

Production Post: Fake Blood

Me, Vicky, and Bella figured the fake blood would've been a pretty easy part of our film opening to handle since we already had it in a bottle. The fake blood became one of our biggest obstacles very soon since we quickly realized that not only would it stain the floor, but it would also stain my clothes. We tested little droplets on the knife to ensure it wouldn't stain the knife either and while it was a relief that it didn't stain the knife, we still had to think about how we would put "blood" on my body and the floor next to me without using the actual realistic looking blood that we brought specifically for this part.

We put the fake blood on the gloves and the knife since it didn't stain the knife and we didn't care if it stained the gloves as obviously, nobody would be reusing gloves. We also used the blood to pour over paper towels in the trash can to make it appear as the leftovers of one of Elena's many bloody and messy crime scenes. We then had to think about what to use as a substitute for the fake blood and we were originally thinking of cranberry juice but we then had the idea of using red lighting in the shot to make it appear more sinister meaning all we would need is any dark liquid and it could easily appear as blood in the red lighting! So while I laid there on the floor, I heard Vicky going through her fridge and once she found her ingredients, it wasn't long until I felt the cold liquids on my arm and the sound of it splattering on the floor besides me. The aroma that arose from those liquids afterwards was horrid and I was laughing on the floor but trying so hard to close my mouth so I didn't inhale any of the toxins that were surrounding me. Once we got the shot, we cleaned up everything but even after my arm was washed in Vicky's kitchen sink, my dad gagged and asked me "What is that smell!?" once I got in his car when he came to pick me up...