Day 70 : Filming Update

This post is going to be an update of some of the filming we have done so far, including the last 2 last weeks filming. I will address what went well and what problems may have occurred. 

Thursday 9th of January 4:00pm - 6:15pm

- This is a knife in which are protagonist Megan uses within our trailer. In
terms of iconography me and Priscilla thought that this knife would be
extremely effective due to the largeness but also sharpness, which would most likely
shock the audience when presented in the trailer.

- I filmed a scene of Francesca (Megan) from outside of the window which was a scene influenced by Halloween, when

one of Laurie's friends was in the kitchen making popcorn and Mychael was watching her. POV shots are one of my favoruite shots when used in Horror. This scene worked extremely well, due to the contrast between the light in the inside of the house and the darkness outside almost representing the themes of good and evil presented in our narrative.

Here are some aspects of mise en scene which we included:

- A shattered mirror which we agreed could represent Flora's personality, due to the dark history of her parents
effecting the decisions she makes in life.

- These are the male gaze scenes with Megan. They are quite slow but due to our
teachers feedback on these shots, we will definitely increase the speed through manipulation or
show a quick clip of this scene rather than a long one. This scene also presents the element of male gaze
through camera angles as the camera pans across her body, reinforcing the conventional nature of her character.

- We were planning on using this notepad with bright red lipstick saying "Thank God for my Father's Death", however due to a spelling mistake which we only realised later on in the week we agreed we will not use this scene.

Monday 13th January - P3 & 4 - Streatham Park

- We decided to film chase scenes in the park which are a conventional aspect to the Horror cannon.
They are often effective and build tension which is why we wanted to use them. Filming in Streatham Park was a good idea due to the aspect of an isolate location, however the only downside was the fact that the sunlight kept on getting into the camera which meant that the gloomy and scary aura of some scenes were hard to capture which meant we had to keep re-filming parts, however we got there in the end with clips that had perfect lighting.

- On the way back from Streatham we then decided to reenact another scene from Halloween (1978), however with an element of subversion due to it being daytime. (The scene where Laurie is banging on the neighbors door when Mychael is after her). We asked the owner of the house if we could use her door and she agreed so we went ahead with filming. These scenes were successful through shot, angle and mise en scene , however the only downside would be that when Francesca was asking scared there wasn't a sense of urgency which meant it wasn't as effective as it could have been. In result this meant we may not use these scenes however if we remove the sound and slow down the clip it could still work.

Filming from 3:15pm - 5:45pm

- We filmed most of the core scenes with Flora at Afreen's house on Monday the 13th. This was one of our best days of filming as all members were present and all the shots were going well. Safia is a natural when following directions which meant are filming process was fun and quick as time was used effectively. The only downside would be that the fake blood that we used was hard to scrub off, which meant when trying to do more scenes which didn't involve blood on Flora's hands different camera angles to hide it was needed.

Thursday 16th January - P5 & end of lunch time

- Our last day of filming. This scene represents Flora cutting out the faces of her family members and stabbing them with a fake knife. This meant I had to get on the floor as well as use the tripod to film a wide variety of angles in order to get the right message of evil and twisted-ness prevalent in Flora's character across. There was no tribulations when filming this scene, however having only 45 minutes to film everything was stressful which is why in future projects I will make sure all participants are able to film for a realistic period of time.