The document compares the filmmaker's process for a preliminary short film task versus their main film opening task. For the preliminary, there was little planning, research, or attention to conventions. However, for the main opening they spent significant time: 1) researching horror film conventions, 2) planning locations, costumes, sounds, and story, 3) finding suitable actors through casting, 4) choosing an appropriate soundtrack, 5) using professional editing software, and 6) implementing lighting, titles, and sounds that fit genre conventions. This extensive planning and research resulted in a higher quality final product.

1. Looking back at
your preliminary,
what do you feel
you have learnt in
the progression
from it to the
main task?

2. Preliminary Task
> Planning - With our Preliminary task we did not complete any planning before the filming
process, with this task we were told what actions were supposed to be shown within the
product and it was then down to us to find a suitable location to complete the task of walking
up the stairs, opening a door to then have a conversation.
> Working in a group - We were put into groups by the teacher for our Preliminary, these groups
were people we did not know.
> Demonstrating match on action - Previous to the task, it was explained to us that we must make
the action match and we were shown examples of this.
> Shot reverse shot - Some of us were unfamiliar of what this was however we were shown an
example and it was explained to us.
> 180-degree rule - again, we were unfamiliar of this so it was explained however during the
filming of our preliminary, I was still slightly confused as to how this would work.
> Using sound - After filming and editing our Preliminary task, we did not spend much time on
which music should be used for example I picked the first one I felt would fit rather than looking
thouroughly for a good music.

3. > Looking back, the Preliminary task was a very rushed and we
did not spend very much time going through it at all, this
informed my film opening because I knew that to get a better
product, we must spend more time on deciding important
elements such as location, titles and music. Therefore we
spent a long time on research and planning for our film
opening and in my opinion this was very beneficial as we have
followed conventions well.

4. The opening for a Horror film -
Planning
> For our film opening we spent a very long time researching aspects
of existing horror films such as location, sound and mise-en-scéne
conventions. This meant we had to carry out extensive research
into what we wanted to use in our film opening.
> We created a location scouting sheet to help us decide on a
location and from this we decided to use Pelhurst on
Sawbridgeworth Road as the location for the house scene of the
film opening and then the Prisoner of War Camp located in Hatfield
Heath.
> We also looked into the conventions of horror films to decide on
aspects such as costume, makeup, lighting, sound and titles.

5. Generic Narative Sequence
> We were able to create a generic narative sequence due to our
research and planning. We evaluated existing horror films by doing
both a codal analysis and times analysis of three horror films, this
meant that we could tell what was typical of a horror film opening
and I also did some research into the story line of horror films.
> We then created a Prezi in our chosen groups with several horror
film ideas and presented them to the class. This helped us to
create a generic narative sequence because it meant that we had
gained audience feedback and the audience also gave suggestions
on how these could be improved. This also meant
we were learning what people wanted to see in a
horror film.

7. Casting Actors
> The process of casting our actor for our film opening was also very
different to when we created our Preliminary task.
> With the Preliminary we used the group we were in as our actors
however with our film opening, a lot of planning went into who we
wanted to use as our actor, for example, we knew we wanted a
teenage girl, we also wanted her to look very vulnerable and
innocent as this would fit with our story line.
> We found a very suitable actor and filmed all of the sequence from
in the house and then our actor dropped out meaning we had to find
another. This was challenging as we were very happy with the
image our first actor had however after finding a second actor and
filming the entire film opening, we were happy about this as we feel
that our actor was very good in the position.

8. Appropriate Soundtrack
> To find an appropraite soundtrack, we looked at a variety of
horror film openings and decided which type we felt would fit with
our opening, we then went onto youtube and also incompetech
and looked for similar music to that which we felt would fit with
our opening. We then found an appropriate one on incompetech
meaning it was not copyrighted and was available for use.

9. Editing
> When editing our preliminary task, we used iMovie, this is a very
ameteur software compared to PremierPro and meant that our
product from the preliminary wasnt as smooth or closely edited
as our film opening.
> When editing our film opening, we used PremierPro, this meant
that our product was of a very high standard and also meant that
we could edit quite extensively. Due t being such a good editing
software, our final product is of a very high quality. Although we
were nt very familiar with the sotware to begin with and it took
some explaining before I felt
comfortable using it however I now know the basics meaning I
could easily use it further.

10. iMovie

11. PremierPro

12. Titles
> With our Preliminary task we did not spend much time
thinking of our titles and we just entered classmates names
into the positions
> Whereas for the film openin we spent a long time looking into
existing titles, fonts and then adding appropriate names such
as the music producer being under the titles for music.

13. Sound
> With the sound for our preliminary task we did not spend any tim
at all picking any out, I know personally I picked the first music I
felt would fit in at all and we also did not record the conversation
on any external recording device, we used the sound from the
camera which is not very clear.
> With the music for our film opening however we spent a long time
findng an appropriate soundtrack. We watched existing horror
film openings and listened for the different types of sound track,
decided which we thought would be appropriate to use for our
film opening and then looked on incompetech and found one we
felt was very effective for our opening. We also chose not to
include much diologue or diegetic sound as we felt that the
recording on our cameras was not a very good quality and we did
not feel that we could lipsync our speach.

14. Lighting
> For our preliminary task we did not even think about the
lighting whilst filming, this means that we just used th lights
from our location.
> For our film opening however we did take into account what
lighting would fit into our genre conventions, for example with
the bathroom scene, we decided to use a particular bathroom
in the house as we felt that it had very harsh lighting which
would fit into conventions. We also decided to only use lamps
in the bedroom scenes as we felt this was darker and fit into
conventions slightly better.