Dear Moderator

Dear Moderator,


This blog belongs to Tom Curtis and I worked with Doug Macaskill and Mark Rattigan individually to create an opening sequence to a horror film lasting approximately two minutes including titles. You can view the pages I have created at the top of my blog to navigate through my research, planning, construction and evaluation. I used wix to present my evaluation and I hope you enjoy my work,

Regards, Tom Curtis

The Pyre- Final Cut

Preliminary Task- Stolen 2

Detailed Opening Sequence Analysis

For this task I had to analyse a opening to a film of my chosen genre (horror). I chose REC as I felt it represented a good example of an opening sequence in my chosen genre and used good techniques in camera angles, music and sound effects, characters, theme and all around layout of the opening.

Audience Profile

The Pyre- Rough Cut 4

This is the fourth rough cut to our short film- The Pyre. We improved this by changing the music, adding sound to the end to create a better effect (making the audience wonder what happens next) and by adding a new section of the film of the boys entering the building so that the audience understands what is happening. We also changed the credits to improve the order to fit what normally happens.

The Pyre- Rough Cut 3

This is the third rough cut of our AS project, it shows great improvements compared to the last two videos. First of all this clip has an extra 20 seconds added to it which means that a larger variation of shots are included and the video is closer to meeting the expected 2 minutes maximum and specifications of the course module. This clip has also got some music added to it as well as opening credits although this still needs to be altered because the text position is too close to the edges.

The Pyre- Rough Cut 2

  The second rough cut is a lot like the first although the editing has been fixed by preventing jumps and by improving transitions by adding a picture (created on Adobe Photoshop using colour invert) between shots. This clip still not finished as it needs sounds opening credits and more clips to be added to make it longer.

The Pyre- Rough Cut 1

This is the first rough cut for our AS Media project- The Pyre. So far we have included a range of shots so the camera work is well although the editing is done poorly which has caused shots to jump; this can be seen a lot 0:14-0:24. Other things that need to be improved are the lack of music and that there are no opening credits.

Audience Research Survey Results

Institutional Research

Institutional research from tlcurtis

After doing the above research in film institutions and looking at further film production companies such as Paramount, DreamWorks Studios and Columbia Pictures, I have came to a conclusion that either Hammer or Paramount would be a appropriate film distributor for my horror. The reason for this is that both of these companies have released popular horror films that fit in the same sub genre that mine does.

Hammer has quite recently released the film Woman In Black, which is similar to The Pyre because of its use of a large abandoned building and super natural aspects; this could mean that Hammer are specific to making this type of film, which would make it fitting for them to release The Pyre. It is also notable to mention that Hammer are known to release mostly horrors, making them ideal for most horror sub genres. On the other hand Paramount are well known for their paranormal horror film Paranormal Activity which is one of the most successful and well remembered film of this sub genre.