Second Shooting Day

For the second shooting day we had to compromise about what appearence our main character should have in this scene as we hadn't planned to be filming on that day as we hadn't yet asked permission to film in the coffee shop.

We finally decided that she should be in-a-way reformed, so her appearence was normal but obviously better than before, in the corridor scene. We did get pemission from the employees in the coffee shop to film but were told that if any members of the public were in the shot then we had to ask for their permission, which wasn't a problem.

The whole relevance of filming in the cafe was in order for the audience to get to know the main character in an everyday setting to show her normal side. In the film, she is potentially a villian in the sense she is killing someone however, we also want the viewers to sympathise with her painful past. It is important to see the contrast between her two personalities. By filming her in the cafe the audience will be able to recognise her as a normal person which shows her calmer everyday personality.   

When actually filming we incorporated only a little bit of the cafe in the background so there wasn't a risk of people looking into the camera when filming. We positioned the shot so it was over the shoulder of someone sitting with her. 

Filming this scene only took roughly 45 minutes so we went back to school and uploaded the footage and started playing around with the music over some of the previous shots we had done and started to place our shots in order

First Day of Filming

Due to reasons beyond our control, snow days, our filming schedule had to be changed. We originally scheduled to start shooting on the Monday when we received the cameras and equipment but couldn't start until the following Monday.
As we planned to be shooting in a flat in Sutton we thought it best to get all the scenes that would be shot nearer to home done first, this meant starting in school. We initially thought about shooting in a stairwell but soon changed our minds as getting enough time to shoot without interruptions would be difficult, so we chose to shoot in the lower school, first floor corridor.
We roughly spent only a few minutes deciding what shots we were going to do as we had already briefed everyone taking part on what would be happening and what shots we should include.
As the persona of the main character had to be different to that of when she was entering the flat, our main character had to adjust her appearance, so we found some glasses for her to put on and a large jumper and also made her hair messy to give her an appearance of someone who didn't care.
While shooting we still did encounter some problems like teachers and the odd pupil walking into the shots & the class change over but eventually managed to get all the shots needed on time before the next lesson change over. As we had a significant amount of time we decided that we could squeeze in a few more shots in the downstairs janitors area. This meant that our main character had to do another outfit change and smarten up.
As the scene in the janitors area entailed switching on and off of the light we noticed that the camera took a while to focus which could potentially cause problems so we cut our shooting short with only a few shots of the main character standing around thinking, and decided to use the flats hall way for walking in shot.

Entry Four: Our Presentation

For our presentation we divided tasks between us so we all had something to contribute.

Natalie researched the atmosphere and mood and how this would affect the audience. Camera movements and angles were considered to give the right effect we were looking for. e.g. an extreme close up on the face of one character to show their reaction. Colours were also considered knowing that they often symbolize something; in this case, red and black would be vital to symbolize evilness.
To create suspense and tension, we made the decision that we would show the audience what the characters cannot see.

Elliott spoke about the storyline, briefly explaining what is going to happen. He also took care of the enigmas, saying how we’ve created them. The audience will be left wondering why she is seeking vengeance on people who have hurt her and what consequences will result from this.
Style and inspiration was also done by Elliott. For our film much inspiration was taken from Psycho in the famous shower scene where the woman in the shower does not see what the audience can – which is her murderer about to kill her. We were also inspired with the way the villain was kept in the dark and her features were hidden.

We noticed that in many of Martin Scorsese’s films, he used red and black to symbolize violence, murder, evilness and things of that nature. Therefore we wanted to adopt that style and use it in our own film.

Run Lola Run gave us many ideas for style and inspiration such as the voiceover at the beginning of the film. The female lead narrates the beginning of the film and makes it very exciting as she explains what’s happened. The music in the beginning also builds up a climax. This is what we want to also achieve.

Together, Nicola and Hattie took photos of the locations we were going use. This included pictures of the house and school. Hattie spoke about the audience profile and who would be interested in this type of film, she came up with a target audience of young adults and females since they are able to familiarise themselves with this.

Nicola found a track called, "Fear Factor" which will be used in flasbacks and the music builds tension. The music is royalty free so we can therefore use it without worry of copyright infringement. As she is the main character she will also be doing the voiceover.

Audience research was conducted by Hattie, Nicola and Natalie. We printed out three questionnaires to ask people which of the three scenarios sounded more entertaining and since they preferred the third we decided to go with that one and work on what they sggested would make it better.

Entry Three: Pitch Feedback

From our pitch, Ms Taylor gave us some very important feedback, which we have incorporated into our final thriller film plan.

Firstly we where told that the knife scene may be hard to carry out, as trying to portray a believable knife slice scene on a small budget may look unbelievable or tacky. We took this feedback, and now the knife scene will instead be from behind the victim, therefore removing all problems of trying to create a gory death scene. This in addition works to our advantage as it in effect creates more tension as we don’t see the death scene itself face on.

Secondly, Ms Taylor suggested that we have the main girl wearing glasses in certain scenes. This is to portray her as closed and that she sees the world in a different light to other people. We have incorporated this into our final plan also.

Finally we where going to use Juliet, a friend of the group member Hattie for the lead roll. However from feedback from our pitch, we realised that she may not be the best choice to use as she could be unreliable, and therefore a strain on our group. We have since elected Nicola as the female lead roll, which has so far worked for the better. We can be sure that she is accessible, and does not need to be briefed on the story line, thus making the overall working process easier.