This is the trailer for When a Stranger Calls...

This is our final film ~ The Intruder :)

This is my favorite part of our film.. this is because we used the idea of a ghostly presence and emphasized it by making the shot go THROUGH the door... Although this was very hard to film it turned out very effective as it adds to the confusion of the film.

This is a shot just after the camera has come upto the house focusing on the door.. the camera then pans from the view of the 'intruder' and turns to look as the oblivious babysitter who is unaware of the intruder looking in on her... we thought this was an effective mysterious shot to put into our movie

We chose this font to put as our titles using LiveType... We chose this effect because we thought it went nicely with the mysterious theme of our film... it also emphasized the ghostly effect we were trying to create! The blue represent the coldness aspect and the way the words shake emphasize the scary... quaking effect...

This is the point in which we decided to include a sense of voyuerism into our film. This is because we thought this gave a sense of vulnerabilityand was also very mysterious...

This freezeframe is from the trailer of 'When a Stranger Calls' - we really liked the idea of showing the house from the outside before the films action really begins.. this creates a feel of reality and realness and also prepares the audience for the climax.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression form it to the full product?

I feel I have learnt a lot throughout process of the filming and preparing of our movie. I have learnt how important camera angles, mise-en-scene, editing and sound are to a films success, as they all come together to create a real vision of reality to help the audience believe in what they are watching. I am very pleased that I have learnt how to use different programmes and the iMacs and I now feel I will be able to use these effectively and efficiently in the future. I have also realised that teamwork is a very big part of filmmaking. When our group all pulled together and each focused on different areas to help improve our movie, it worked very well and efficiently. Other than my improved technical skills, I have also learned how much time and organisation goes into filmmaking. We realised this as as first we only set aside 1 evening to film the whole of our movie and then soon realised it would take several days and evening to just get all the shots we needed. Also, sketching the storyboards and actually filming is completely different and takes up a lot of effort. Fortunately, we were all willing to put in that effort. Planning is a key aspect when producing a film and we have learnt that you need to make sure you are aware of the four main sections (mise en scene, cinematography, sound and editing) and I feel as a group we achieved this.When filming, we realised that patience and technical ability is always needed for the production of a film or any media product. All together, we are very pleased with the outcome of our efforts as we have all learnt a great deal and can now use these new abilities in the future.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

During the construction of our film we had many types of different technology at our disposal. Firstly, we had the choice of using a HD (high definition) camera or a standard video camera. At first we were considering the HD camera as this would make our film look a lot more professional and better quality. However, we decided to use a standard camera because we wanted our film to have more of a eerie feeling, we also thought this would enhance the voyeurism idea. We soon came to regret filming our film on a standard video camera as it didn’t look very professional and looked very home-made. We managed to come across many technical difficulties, especially when using the video camera. One of the starting shots of our film involves a pan shot through the hallway and into the living room. Achieving a smooth shot proved to be more difficult than we had first imagined as it was very jolty and unsmooth as we walked it through the hallway, after a long process of trial and error we came up with a very effective way of panning the camera through the hallway, this involved placing the camera and tripod on a rug, and then I had to lay on the floor, pulling the rug through the hallway and into the lounge. Although this sounds like a lot of time and effort, it allowed us to create a smooth moving pan shot through to the lounge. There were other issues with technologies during the process of constructing our film and that was learning to use an iMac. We used many of the programmes on the iMac’s such as Garageband (to create our music), FinalCutExpress (to edit and digitalize our film) and PhotoShop (to edit pictures and freezeframes). The music we used to emphasize the suspense and tension throughout our film was remixed in Garageband, we selected a piano peice and then remixed that with a drum beat to help build tension to the climax of our film. we also used a programme called LiveType, this was to create our credits at the beginning of our film. There were a few small problems when making our credits such as font size and letter alignment, but we soon figured it out and realised it was quite an easy programme to use. FinalCutExpress was the main programme we used throughout the production of our film and it was this programme that we used to insert and stick together all the bits and pieces that we had created on GarageBand and LiveType. The most irritating thing about FinalCutExpress was the fact that you had to ‘render’ the clip each time you cut it. I kept forgetting to do this so i was constantly confused.

How did you attract/address your audience?

Before we started producing and filming our film, we created a survey to ask the rest of the class. This was to see the ways in which we could attract 17 year olds and frighten them within our film. An advantage of our film being targeted at teenagers is that our group fall into this age group... this means any input, us or the rest of the class suggest is very useful as we are receiving advice from our audience. We came to a conclusion that we should build up tension throughout our movie using music and the feeling of voyeurism (when someone is being watched without them knowing). This would be an effective way to scare and attract our audience as it almost gives a ghostly feel. This is heightened by the fact that we filmed our film from the ‘Intruders’ perspective. This also confuses our audience a little as we made cuts which flash looking in on the babysitter from outside and then shots from inside the house looking at the babysitter, almost giving the impression that there are two unknown characters watching her. We don’t let the tension/ suspense of our film drop at any point, we only heighten it at the end when ‘the penny drops’ for the babysitter and there is the sound of big drums (like a heartbeat), as she ruses to check the child... To keep our film attractive to teenagers we made sure the character spoke as colloquial as possible, meaning our audience can relate to her and also to maximise the verisimilitude of the situation. We kept the TV on the whole time to create background noise – making our film seem more real and homely.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

we want to aim our film at the younger side of the public, this would include teenagers of 15 – 20yrs, however these ages are only a small section of the population and we want to aim to get as many viewers as possible therefore we would also aim our film at adults aged 20 – 30yrs, both male and female viewers. This means we would give our film a certificate 15. The only problem there is with the certificate being 15 is that if we are aiming our film at the 20-30yrs as well as teenagers, certificate 15 may seem like a young age limit which means it may discourage some of the older audience to come and see it. Research has shown that 12-18 year olds visit the cinema a lot more than other ages. Therefore it increases the chances of our film being a success as our target audience are the group of ages that visit the cinema frequently. This is an appropriate age group to aim our film at for many reasons...
Firstly, horror films are usually attractive to teenagers as they want a quick thrill (this mainly applies to boys of this age), this means a lot of teenagers will be encouraged to come and watch our film. Secondly, the main character in our film is a 17 year old babysitter. This is an everyday task carried out by many teenage girls so people will be able to relate to the character and put themselves in her shoes and feel slightly uneasy, this enables us to attract female viewers. Knowing who the target audience we wanted to base our film around was, we were able to make some useful decisions concerning the production of our film; including decisions on the mise en scene and the various camera angles we used.

What kind of institution might distribute your media product?

A company that would be great to distribute our film would be Working Title Films as it has distributed a wide variety of films such as; Notting Hill, Billy Elliot, Shaun of the Dead and Bridget Jones’ Diary – although none of these films have the same genre as ‘Intruder’ they all had very good box office takings and had very high ratings. Working Title Films is also associated with Film4 which means we could get our film to be broadcasted on the TV, this would broaden our audience and make people aware of our film, this would encourage them to come and watch it. Film4 also broadcasted About a Boy - which was a Working Title Film; this was a big success with huge box office takings meaning it would be wise idea to let them broadcast Intruder. Working Title would be useful to distribute our film as they have had loads of successful film releases in the past and present such as Four Weddings and a Funeral and Love Actually. This could increase the chances of our film being a big success rather than a ‘flop film’. Fans of Working Title Films will be inclined to come and see our film due to their previous film successes. It would also be a good idea to use a large American distribution company such Universal Studios. This would enable us to get our film available in the USA which would also broaden our audience – this would increase the box office takings and achieve high revenue and profits for the company and us. By releasing our film into the USA, it would make it much easier to distribute it into cinemas so lots of people will be able to view our film easily. We would also advertise our film in the cinemas encouraging lots of people to come and see our film. Our film will then be distributed onto DVD release. All these ways of selling our film will lead to wider audiences and varied reviews. However it will lead to maximum gross profits. An good idea to increase the number of people that come and watch our film would be to release snaps of our film onto the internet which will intrigue people and make them want to find out more, and may lead to higher purchases of our film.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Throughout our film, the only character the audience are able to see and empathise with is the babysitter; we do not show – at any point – the caller or the child she is supposedly babysitting. We felt she should be portrayed as a typical teenager which meant we dressed her in jeans and a t-shirt. The babysitter we used is age 17, this is a regular age that girls babysit, and therefore we used her as we wanted it to be a very familiar scene and very typical attitude and clothes to a real life situation. We also felt as though her clothes contributed to the mise-en-scene of our film as we do not want to give the impression that she is particularly special, this is why we filmed her watching TV and drinking Fanta. We have used props throughout our film to help add verisimilitude to encourage the viewer to believe that what they are watching is real – this can be shown by the typical clothes and style if the girl. We used a pile of magazines, a Fanta can and the television remote to show the fact that she has made herself at home and feels very comfortable... this is ironic and this is what we wanted to create to make our film confusing. We used a South-East accent for the babysitter as this is where our film was based The small details we used throughout our film helped to create meaning for our specific target audience as it includes them into the film and many of the audience can relate to our babysitter and put themselves into her position.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our group decided that the film we wanted to create would be effective if it was based around the horror genre. We liked this idea as we were recklessly looking through YouTube, watching trailers and clips from famous films which were renowned for their use of tension and horror. Our film (which we decided to call ‘Intruder’) is based on two American horror films – ‘Scream’ and ‘When a Stranger Calls’. We liked the trailer and the plot for ‘when a Stranger Calls’ so our film was influenced by the film greatly. We decided to use these films as we felt the storylines worked very well at making the audience scared and on the edge of their seats – this was our goal. We used the idea behind When a Stranger Calls because the director took an everyday teenage task (babysitting) and turned it into a fearful activity. The storyline of our film is very similar to what we were hoping to create so this inspired us in many ways, including our music choice. However, we also incorporate aspects of Scream into our film, for example the way it is a very suspicious, anxious and confusing rollercoaster of a storyline. Another good example of the way we incorporated ‘Scream’ into our film would be voyeurism, as it was a big part of our film, and we used voyeurism at a number of different points throughout – especially at the beginning when there is a shot of someone looking in on the babysitter from the outside, creating a spooky effect. By using voyeurism, it enabled us to create a sense of unease for the duration of the film. Our film is quite similar to ‘When a Stranger Calls’ as we incorporated many of the ideas that are used within the film such as having the ‘intruder’ located within and around the house as it seems as if the main character has no escape, again using voyeurism to emphasising the vulnerability of the character. We also chose to use the idea of the audience being able to hear the caller on the other end of the phone because this creates a feel of realism and allows the actor to be in the babysitters shoes – involving them more in the film and preparing them for the climax of the film, however we decided only to hear the caller’s breathing rather than a long conversation to emphasise the weirdness and confusion the babysitter is feeling.