Findings & Inspiration
Storyboarding
We have found that a lot of RocketJump Film school's videos are useful and interesting. This introduction to storyboarding was vital to us coming up with our own template to use and keys to use to explain our storyboards.
Shot composition & Storyboarding
Although not horror related, this filmmaking video that analyses the cinematography of Drive definitely made us think more carefully when planning shots, keeping in mind the quadrant system which can be used effectively to tell a story (or two) as seen in the video.
Every Frame a Painting serves as a very interesting channel to watch and examine specific Directors and their style of cinematography, like the Coen Brother's Shot Reverse Shots.
Shot Inspiration
After watching this scene, every single member of the team was shook. We marvelled at this scene and began looking into how the behind the scenes aspect of how the mirror shot is achieved, found some tutorials and we strongly desired to incorporate a mirror scene into our own horror trailer.
Costume Inspiration
Jamie saw a picture of this mask on Reddit and showed the team, and this served as motivation to make our own mask for the killer to wear. We especially liked to distinct eye holes and teeth on the mask. It looks somewhat detailed yet still concealing and expressionless. It is a 9000-year-old stone mask found in the Judean hills in Israel.
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Story/Enigma ideas
Aimee looked at a range of different Horror Tales including a popular modern horror, an old famous tale and classic horror. Starting of with the mordern horror which is American Horror Story (AHS) - this is a tv show with all different horror situations such as a freak show, Coven and Murder House, all these different seasons have stories about character stuck in these places. I also looked at The tale of the headless horseman which is about a headless horseman! Finally the last thing I looked at was Classic Horrors such as Dracula, Night Of The Living Dead, Frankenstein and The Mummy. By looking at all these different theorys and stories it gave me some ideas of what to include within our horror trailer.
Sound Design
Jamie showed this video to the team. In the video, it shows the sound designer behind the horror video-game, "The Evil Within" making sound effects to be used in the game. He simply gets food from the supermarket and eats it with intention behind a mircophone. For example, he eats a melon and it sounds gruesome; the sound is used in the game when the protagonist is getting eaten by a monster. It reassured them of the sound effects we can make and use in our trailer, as opposed to just using royalty free sound effects from the internet.
Camera Technique/Film Inspiration
To achieve a POV shot that Harrison storyboarded, we looked at John Carpenter's Halloween for inspiration. In a narrative and thematic sense, there are similarities between our treatment idea and Halloween.
We thought that the use of a black filter over the camera lens to create a POV effect as if it's from the killer's eyes from under the mask was very smart and replicable. Hence, we made our own filter to use for a POV shot from the killer's eyes.
Camera Shots - The Trunk Shot - Quentin Tarantino's Popular Shot
Directors have their own unique form of cinematography and this is normally noticeable within their films, as there will be certain aspects in the direction that are similar. For example, Quentin Tarantino has popularised the trunk shot in his films (Kill Bill, Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction etc.), where the camera is placed in the trunk of a car as characters look into it, it is a specialized low shot. This Point of View cinematography directly involves and engages the audience. Although Tarantino doesn't make horror films, his film style is unique and inspired us to incorporate a trunk shot. We have used this idea in our film poster drafts and test footage.
Sequence/Shot Ideas
Harrison was inspired to create a sequence of shots that are similar in concept to these dance videos. Acetate is used to mark a position on the camera so that everyone is perfectly positioned and the transition between cuts is flawless/seamless as movement carries on from shot to shot/frame to frame.
We watched the behind the scenes to understand how this type of shot is achieved and considered applying the idea to our shots within our film trailer.
Shot Idea/ Filmmaking Technique - Contra-Zoom
After watching this clip from Jaws, we wanted to recreate a similar scene involving a dolly zoom on our masked killer, as we thought the warping background effect was very effective.
Sequence Idea- tilting upwards shot with quick cuts inbetween
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This sequence of shots builds up to reveal the Joker in a creative dramatic manner. As the camera tilts upwards, from his shoes to his neck, the shot is interrupted repeatedly and it cuts to black before you see the Joker's face, but you hear his voice, followed by a shot revealing his face.
We really admired this sequence from the trailer as it builds enigma. Hence, we recorded our own rendition, fitting to our trailer.