Construction: First Rough Edit

This is some raw footage of our opening to our horror film. It shows that we have implemented some key media/filming techniques like 180 degree rule, shot reverse shot and high/low angle shots. We  edited this raw footage to add a lot more continuity to make it seem like a real opening to a movie. In this footage we have tried to make sure it is already quite continuous so that it has match on action for when each clip changes. What we have made sure as well is that we have filmed it all as quick as we can so that the time of day doesn't effect the continuity within the opening. however we still need to add in sound of our own and the opening titles.

As you can see from this rough edit, the lighting is quite bright due to the time of day we filmed at. To improve this, we will look at some colour effects in the editing phase to get a colder and more horror like feel to the film. This could mean adding some blue and changing the input levels for black and white.

Music is another feature that needs to be added. This will add a lot more tension and suspense during the film which will make it more like a horror. As I researched my previous post 'The importance of sound', Sound is a key element to any type of film as it can affect the mood and atmosphere of it all.

Construction: Sound Editing

Sound

Sound is a massive part of horror films as they add a lot of tension, drama and suspense which is all very much needed if you want your film to be successful. Within our horror film we added a lot of sound to enable us to achieve that horror feel to it. This meant adding background noise throughout to give a generally spooky mood for the whole film.

All of the sounds we collected were off of a very good free website called 'free sound.org'. This site allowed us to download any type of sound we could find and use it within our film. They had an extremely wide variety of sounds as well which allowed us to browse loads of different tracks until we found the one we wanted.

Once we had found and downloaded the sounds that were most suitable for our film opening we dragged and dropped each clip, much like the camera footage we had used. This made it very easy to edit and arrange each track to our liking.

A problem which i noticed during the sound editing stage was that some tracks were much too loud for a clip. This meant that it was so loud that the audio in the original clip couldn't be heard. To overcome this problem we had to look at how to decrease the volume of the track slightly just when the dialogue had commenced. This was very much the case during a clip where Sam and Elliott were talking. The image below shows how the sound dips to compliment the dialogue so they can be heard.

Sound was also a key factor in adding suspense to the opening. So during the clips where the villain was shown holding the hammer and when he goes for Brian when he was taking a pee, we added some sound that would really add tension to the scene. Heavy breathing and a very dark and bold sound could be heard when we were shown the hammer which help to indicate danger and that Brian was in trouble. The clip afterwards is a lot faster which indicates danger is coming rapidly and the use of sound on top of this is much like a scuttling insect running quickly. This makes it seem more creepy and exciting.