Film Opening Planning

Below is our first attempt at looking at planning our film opening. From the research done, we planned out our inspiration and ideas promoted by the research.

We thought about including a flashback to something that has happened in the past to link to the current time later on in the opening. To show that it's a flashback we thought that when it came to editing the clip, we could change the appearance of the picture by showing it in a sepia/ old style look to it. Also the sound could be faded by being made quieter and echo more. Mise-en-scene would be a big factor for a flashback as if it was a flashback to the early 1900's, then clothing of any characters used would have to be war style and the area around them would have to look like it's from that time, otherwise it could be confusing if there's a car in the background or something of the sort.

From looking at research we found out that sound affects and how they're used is very important as they create suspense in many ways for the horror genre. Even sounds such as footsteps create suspense as it depends on the pace of them and if they're exaggerated (eg. echoing, gradually getting louder etc). For example, if the footsteps are fast pace then this can create suspense as questions may be asked such as, why are they rushing? Who is it that's rushing? Has something bad happened? Are they going to or from an accident? Etc. Or if the footsteps are stepping slowly, this can make the viewer want to see who the owner of the footsteps belong to and the more the sound is prolonged, the more the viewer is kept in suspense. However if the footsteps go on too long, it can get boring to watch.

The location of the film opening is very important as it needs to be realistic such as a graveyard, a park, a house etc. This is so the viewer can relate to the film as the majority of people have been to a graveyard and place like this. We thought about using a graveyard as these are stereotypical shown as being haunted places where spirits of the dead come alive which links in nicely to our theme.

With all these factors in mind we developed our ideas making sure it was possible.
This was when we came up with the idea of a doll. We wanted to make our film more mysterious so we all liked this idea very much.

As we decided that we were going to use a doll, we thought that dolls are usually associated with young girls. With this in mind we also thought of names that may go with this nicely.