From completing the final project, I have learnt many things about the type of technology that we used that I didn't know before. Firstly, in terms of the camera that we used to actually film our opening to our horror, it was not a fancy, expensive one but it was sufficient. We did not use any tripods as we wanted to keep our ideas simple but effective so for the subjective shot, it is better to not have a tripod than to have one. Through this new form of camera I learnt how to zoom in and out with a steady hand whilst recording. Although the most important thing I have learnt from the camera side of things is that you should always plan your surroundings. If the area you are working in is too bright/dark then it could change the overall mood of your piece and ruin your final idea but if you plan, your end product will really work.
Another key element to all media is the editing stage. In the editing process of our project, I learned a huge range of new skills and ways in which to improve a piece of film simply through the click of a button. It was the first time I had ever used a Mac so I knew it was going to take some getting used to. On the Macs was a programme called iMovie where you load up your filming and edit the stuff out that you don't need or things that didn't work. I had never done editing before but it was surprisingly easy and I picked it up very quickly. Within the editing process was where you could choose the piece of music to play over your film through a programme called Garageband. You could either pick a selected song or write your own.
A screen grab of us editing the differences in sound for the music box scene and our chosen song to use in our film from Garageband.
I already knew alot of different shots, movements and angles before the whole process begun but I had never looked into the idea of panning through movement in the camera with detail. The idea of the pan shot became more effective as we progressed in our final min task/project and we used it alot more frequently. We cut down the number of scenes with Pan's in them through the Macs but one scene still has this and this is the scene filmed in Abby's bedroom where Chloe's character is opening the music box and she has a violent breakdown from remembering sharing it with her sister. In this scene where she is hitting the walls and knocking books off shelves, the camera is following her through a pan shot to keep the audience in the action.
In terms of angles, where we did use a tripod, you can change the camera using tilts by using a handle attached to the back of the camera. This was the first time I had used it in this way and you can also use it for panning but mainly tilts (moving up and down). We used alot of angles and framing in our opening to our horror film as horrors use what is sometimes called off screen sound. This is where you here something that you know is there on screen but you cannot see it. For an example, if someone was screaming in fear up a tree but you cannot see the person, the camera can tilt/pan upwards towards the person. Voiceover's were useful too through the planing stage and eventually in the editing. In the film were Chloe whispers Aimee's name and her face appears is an example from our film of this type of sound.
This is the camera that we used on the tripod with the handle that allows you to tilt up/down and/or pan a particular scene.
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