Film Opening Project and Creative Reflection Links

 Film Opening: Film Opening

Creative Critical Reflection #1: CCR Video 1 Link

Creative Critical Reflection #2: CCR Video 2 Link

Portfolio Project - Final Thoughts

 Intro:

It felt like just last week my instructor was telling me about this big project that was a huge part of our grades. I remember thinking: "I don't have to worry about that, its due date is weeks away." 8 weeks and 30+ blog posts later, here we are. For todays blog post, one of my last few, I will be discussing my final thoughts surrounding the project. This includes what I learned, what was difficult, what I found the most fun, etc. That being said, overall, I would say I really enjoyed doing this project and using skills I would not normally use in my day to day life. I got to take pride in my work, engage in my work, and was proud with how it turned out.

Thoughts:

What I learned - Over the course of the entire project, I had become much more efficient in using both hardware and software to create the desired product I wanted. This included hard ware like camera mounts to create shots a human hand would not be able to, as well as software like Clipchamp to edit and compile my clips. I also learned how to effectively research and utilize my research in any desired field. This was important when I was learning about genre conventions and how to attract my audiences.

What was difficult - Honestly, the most difficult components of this project turned out to be time management, which was not really surprising. Posting blog posts regularly was one of the hardest things to adjust to because I usually do not document my progress on stuff like these. So that was a good skill to be exposed to, however, I do not know if I would continue blogging post project.

What I enjoyed - I enjoyed working with my peers to try and create are best looking final product since it was one of the only academic challenges available to us. The project was one of the most engaging assignments of the year that made us get hands on with all our resources and engage us in home learning. The process of filming was especially fun because it was something we never usually did.

Portfolio Project - CCR Post Production

 Intro:

After gathering my CCR footage yesterday, today would be all about compiling the footage and editing them. This was more of a simple task after we had all edited the project and learned all the skills we would need. If anything, this portion of the project was more tedious than it was challenging. When I say tedious, I just mean repetitive since it still was pretty fun. I also had lots of fun making the YouTube video since that is something I watch quite frequently. In fact, as a child, I was so convinced that becoming a YouTuber was the path for me. However, I since then strayed from this path. Anyways, the editing process of my CCR was an extremely involved task.

Post Production:

1 and 2:

When editing the footage of this CCR, I had taken inspiration from the traditional YouTube reaction video format that addressed an audience. The format was a YouTuber reading his comments. This would prove as an interesting challenge for me since I had to put on a YouTuber persona, and record long clips at a time. This was pretty easy as I only had to adress these comments like a friend to have that familiarity that subscribers expect from their favorite creators. I had used editing to display 2 comments on the screen as I was speaking to them. This was extremely fun for me to do as I once had an interest in content creation. Also, for the comments, I used photoshop and A.I. to make 2 comments that had asked the CCR questions which was a creative way to incorporate them instead of reading them.

3 and 4:

When recording the footage of my CCR, I had recorded on my Dads phone since I regularly needed to look at mine between takes to review the script. One of the biggest challenges in filming, is that I kept forgetting my lines. Even in the polished version, some words vary from the script since I could not remember every vocabulary word I used. That being said, all necessary information was still conveyed. After sending the videos to my phone, I then uploaded them to OneDrive. Once they were on OneDrive, they could be accessed by ClipChamp. By now, you must know that ClipChamp is the main software that I use to compile and edit my clips. Through ClipChamp, I put all the videos in order, then came across a problem. During some scenes, the audio was tampered with by the environment. This included: wind, birds, and rustling trees. However, I had already accounted for this and used ClipChamps noise suppression feature which cleaned it up. To do so,  I had to detach the audio from all clips, re-upload them, then tweak their settings to make sure it worked perfectly. That was definitely the most tedious part. For the portions of my piece that were on websites, I included a screen recording of the website as I voiced it over. I thought that would make it more engaging then me standing in front of the camera for those segments.

Picture of my editing viewport on ClipChamp as I edited the second CCR video.

Portfolio Project - CCR Production

 Intro:

As one of the final times I would be filming for this project, I found it rather enjoyable since I now knew what to do. It almost felt surreal since I had begun working on it 8 weeks ago. I would be breaking down questions 1 and 2 into one video, and 3 and 4 into another video. Questions 1 and 2 would take the format of a YouTube video. Questions 3 and 4 would be my directors cut as mentioned in previous blog posts. I found producing the CCR footage for 3 and 4 to be much more fun then 1 and 2. 

Production:

For the first 2 questions, the production for them was much easier then the second 2. I acted as if I was a YouTuber making a video on my production of the film. This concept aligned with the questions answered in the video, which is why I chose it instead of the directors cut like the latter two. Specifically, it question 2 had questioned the distribution means of my film, which would be YouTube on the same channel. For the production, I had sat myself down in a quiet room to film the intro of the video and answer the CCR questions. This production method was more creative than just sitting in front of the camera and was relevant to my answers, so I thought it was best.

For questions 3 and 4, this production was much more difficult and required the help of both my parents to film. I had told them exactly what to do, however. It took place at the same road featured in the first segment of my film opening. To produce this, I had my dad record me introduce my self and answer the questions. But, with this format the CCR would be boring. So to transition from question 3 to 4, I used some of my editing skills to make a fun transition that was also relevant to my film opening since there was also a car crash in there as well. The transition was my mom driving across the cameras viewpoint pretending to lose control and crash. This would be sold with the sound effects that I would be explaining in my next blog.

Picture of a scene from my CCR answering questions 3 and 4

Portfolio Project - CCR Production Ideas

 Intro: 

After a long week of research and planning, I had finally had all my CCR question responses mapped out and ready to go. Naturally, the next step is how I would be filming it. What would I be doing, where would I be, etc. In todays blog post, I will be discussing possible productions for my CCR filming. This would be simple since my instructor had taught us a lesson on what to do and what not to do. She also told us what had become repetitive and common mistakes to avoid.

Plan:

What would suit my style? It certainly would not be something like a podcast, because I do not have that type of personality. After bouncing around some ideas in my head, it finally hit me. The perfect idea for me would be one that my teacher mentioned in class: the directors cut. Traditionally, the directors cut is a version of a piece that the creator has the opportunity to directly explain their choices. This is effective in conveying exactly what the creator wanted the audience to know, and usually features scenes not seen in the actual film. These are usually released after the film it covers, which would make it perfect for my film project which would already be out.

Idea:

I decided that I will most definitely be doing 2 directors cut style videos to answer the CCR questions. I would answer the first 2 in the first video, and the remaining in the next. Your probably wondering: "What makes this not boring?" Instead of the standard talking into the camera style video that we were told to avoid, I would use the new editing and shooting techniques I developed to shoot a visually engaging CCR response. It would include the car on the same road as my actual film opening, giving me a bridge to connect it back to my film opening with. However, I would not be acting as Adam, the main character, and would be taking on the persona of an actual director.

Picture of behind the scenes filming a piece

Portfolio Project - CCR #4

 Intro:

Todays blog post would be much easier to cover since it was about what I had been working on at the time: editing. This was also the very final question of my CCR response so I knew exactly what to do. But you may be wondering, "What is the final question?" The final question of my CCR read: "How did you integrate technologies- software, hardware, and online- in this project?" Turns out the question was more layered than I thought. Nonetheless, it still did not take any research since the question was pretty simple and direct.

Script:

Question: "How did you integrate technologies- software, hardware, and online- in this project?"

Answer: "Over the course of the project, I had learned various strategies and techniques that were necessary in the development of my final creation. Not only that, but I also used tools and applications I had used previously in other school projects. This included services like Microsoft's OneDrive to be able to gather and compile clips on various devices. That was especially helpful for editing at school, and editing at home on separate devices. Another one was a website called PixaBay that my instructor provided for us. On this website, we could find thousands of copyright free sound effects that we would be allowed to use in our production. And where did we put those sounds? We used ClipChamp to create an engaging layered sound scape to keep our scenes as immersive as possible! Those are some of the many ways we integrated various different technologies in our media project."

One Drive Logo (Used for File Sharing)

The PixaBay Website

Portfolio Project - CCR #3

 Intro:

After my post surrounding CCR question number 2, this one should come as no surprise. In todays post, I will be discussing CCR question number 3, which states: "How did your production skills develop throughout this project?" This question would be much simpler than the previous since it had less aspects to cover. Meaning, question 2 literally had 2 questions in it, while question 3 had 1 brief one. As mentioned in my very first CCR blog post,  I thought this question was especially easy since I had developed in various categories over the course of the portfolio project. That being said, this question would still require elaborate thought when it came to deciding what to write about. What qualified as a production skill? What did not?

Research:

After doing some research, I learned that the skills developed through a project like this had really been divided into a few key categories. This would be my technical skills like editing, and my physical skills like actual shooting. Both of these had definitely developed during the process of shooting. In fact, during the project, I had to do ample research in both categories to create the desired product. This included browsing the web for the most efficient iPhone mount that I could use to film the car scenes, and learning how to use platforms like ClipChamp for the editing of our footage. Refer down below to see a picture of the mount I had purchased for filming. Nonetheless, these skills would transfer over later in life as valuable tools to be able to use for future projects.

Script:

Question: "How did your production skills develop throughout this project?"

Answer: "My production skills developed in two main categories over the duration of the project. In terms of the physical aspect of producing my film opening, this project had taught me many key elements about physically shooting media that I did not know before. More specifically, I had learned the importance of proper camera equipment when shooting. There are some shots that are literally not possible to film withot a mount. *Cut to scene from my piece* This shot we filmed in the car was not possible with a human hand. We could not get a shot that was visually pleasing that captured the both of us in dialogue, hence why we decided to research to get a proper mount. The mount was extremely simple to use and just stuck to the windshield of the car. On the contrary, this project had taught us how to use ClipChamp to effectively build multi layered soundscapes over our footage. This was extremely important to give our opening a layer of depth and make it seem more real and professional. *Cut to car crash scene and layered audio edits of said scene* For example, this car crash scene had seemed so dull and bland before we added sounds. The dramatic sound effects we had learned to become proficient with had really brought the whole thing together."

Example of the mount we used that can be found at: Link

Example of the car scene that was shot with the mount.

Portfolio Project - CCR #2

 Intro:

As mentioned in my CCR Preparation blog, I knew I would be making more detailed and intricate posts answering the creative critical response questions. This post will be focusing on the second question of the CCR, which states: "How does your product engage with audiences and how would it be distributed as a media text?" This question had a lot to unpack since it was basically to completely different questions in one. Personally, I broke this down into the audience portion, and the distribution portion before beginning to plan my answer. That being said, I could not plan my answer with insufficient knowledge surrounding the two different questions.

Research:

Audience Engagement:

Many experts attribute the Psychological Thriller's genre conventions to be the key factor that keeps audiences at the edge of the seat. This concept is demonstrated by the very foundation that all psychological thrillers are built on: tension. Raising tension in the audience is one of the most compelling ways that audiences get engaged in what they are viewing. This is effective because it keeps viewers wanting more with every scene, every cliffhanger, and every thrill. And most credit the discrepancy between what the audience knows and what the character knows in the scene. Elaborating on this, a common example of this concept is when we the audience know that a monster is getting closer to a character that has no idea. Dare I say almost everyone can account for a moment or two similar to that.

Distribution:

When conducting my research for distribution, I had found it much easier since my instructor had provided a page of a few key terms to use when answering this question. Not only that, but my instructor also left some links for us students to get started on in our search. In reading this, I had learned that digital distribution would fit the most for my full film. This is because this method is the most easily accessible for all audiences, and the algorithms and filters would help my film reach as many people as possible.

Script:

Question: "How does your product engage with audiences and how would it be distributed as a real media text?"

Answer: "My product engages with audiences by incorporating key genre conventions throughout the entirety of the film. It does so by utilizing key concepts, like building tension, to keep viewers in constant anticipation of what will come next. A prime example of this is the driving scene before the crash in my opening. *Cut to the actual scene from the piece* This scene instantly begins by keeping audiences engaged with multiple angles of a couple fighting. The decision to keep the scene filmed through multiple different angles is a technique we were taught to add fresh perspectives and keep still scenes like dialogue interesting and engaging. It then rapidly cuts to the car crash segment, before it cuts to a black screen. This is primarily done to create a transition that can effectively cut to a different point in the story while keeping the audience on the edge of their seat, waiting to know what happens next. On the topic of distribution, my piece would be distributed as a real media text on relevant streaming services since it would be one of the most effective ways to access pre-existing audiences. This would be done via complex algorithms and genre filtering on these platforms. One of these platforms, YouTube, would be one of the easiest and most effective distribution methods since no license is required. Things like Netflix have a much more complex process to get your film featured. That being said, once our film gets traction, then we could start to look towards larger streaming services.

Sources:

Kim, Y. J., & Kim, Y. E. (2021, May 16). Why do we love psychological thrillers? Psychology Today.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/apple-a-day/202105/why-do-we-love-psychological-thrillers

Script & Shutter. (2025, March 18). The anatomy of a great thriller: How to keep audiences hooked.
https://scriptandshutter.blog/2025/03/18/the-anatomy-of-a-great-thriller-how-to-keep-audiences-hooked/

Portfolio Project - Editing Process

 Intro:

As previously mentioned in the last blog, today we filmed more of the remaining scenes. These included the room scenes, with only me in them. Although I did not find them as interesting, the room scenes were much easier to film than the car scenes, which required plenty of resources. After watching all the footage we gathered, we may decide to reshoot some scenes because they look tacky and not in the desired manner. That being said, today focused on Adam waking up 1 year later after the crash. It showed how deeply it affected him through clever shots and transition. However, this post is about editing, not the plot components of todays scene.

Editing:

Today was more of the same, we had compiled our raw footage once again, then filtered through them. After this, we imported the clips straight into ClipChamp. Today was much easier since we knew everything we must do. First, we put them into order in ClipChamp. Then we went on this sound effect database that our instructor provided to look for relevant sounds. This was extremely helpful in our editing process because we could easily add them. All we had to do was download the sounds to our computer, then drag and drop it to ClipChamp. We specifically edited the wake up scene, which was a picture of Adams eyes with a transition to the phone. Most of the editing from today was sound effects as well.

A picture of the editing process.

Portfolio Project - Editing Process

Intro:

When working on our portfolio project today, we did not film any new clips or segments at all. Today was solely focused on editing. We had used our previous clips to combine them and make a new product. As mentioned in my last post, we had used the software ClipChamp to do our editing processes. These processes had included: compiling clips, adding audio, and adding after effects to some clips. Whether they were too dark, or too bright, making some necessary touches when needed.

Editing:

The first step of editing was to find the appropriate clips that would be used in the product. This meant sifting through all raw footage and finding the footage with no flaws. No blur, no shaking, only intended behavior that represents the scene. After, we had put together the passing clips in the proper order, as represented in the story board. Then, we had added in a black screen that we had in mind for our scene. This was for the car crash scene; in order to not film an actual car crash, we filmed the build up to one and played the audio over a black screen. Finally, we had added layered sound effects to the entire piece. These included the actual sound of the crash, tires screeching, and the ambulance coming after. We also had some dialogue in between which was a part of the sound scape in our piece. Overall, we had spent today using ClipChamp to compile our raw footage, add sounds, and add after effects to our product.

Picture of my editing process in the ClipChamp software.

Portfolio Project - CCR Preparation

 Intro:

For todays blog, I will be writing about the lengthy research I did in regards to the CCR part of the project. After my teacher told me how important the CCR was to our overall project, I wasted no time and got started right away planning what I would do. She showed us various examples to get us comfortable with the concept, and explained why certain projects lost points or gained them. For that part of the lesson, I took lengthy notes of what should be expected in the CCR. Today is my research on 2 of the questions that had stood out to me initially. Obviously, I will be covering the remaining two another day, possibly in another blog post.

Skills:

The CCR question relating to skills was "How did your production skills develop throughout this project?" Originally, I thought this question was going to be rather difficult; however, doing some research had cleared some uncertainty around it. It made the improvements clear to me. During the filming process, I had originally been complacent with trying to film the entire piece on an iPhone, by hand. As I progressed through this process, it had made me realize the importance that proper preparation and equipment had on producing a good final product for my film opening. Because of this, I had begun to utilize equipment like stabilizers and mounts going forward. The project had developed my filming skills as I tried to create my best possible product.

Technologies:

This CCR question was "How did you integrate technologies -software, hardware, online- in this project?" While this one was a little more difficult to answer at this early stage, I had still noticed progress in these categories as is. After gathering our raw footage, we each edited it to our liking and compared it later. In doing so, we all improved our integration of editing softwares in our project. These included software like ClipChamp and Adobe Express. We had selected these because they were readily available by our schools resources and given to all students via a login portal. We integrated it by using them to combine the raw footage to our liking to begin to shape up our film opening in its earliest phases.

Portfolio Project - Shooting Process

 Intro:

This week, my group and I had finally begun our filming process. It turns out, most of the conflict before was just communication issues. If we kept at the same pace as yesterday, the day we filmed, we would be just fine for the rest of the project. Besides all that, our main goal for yesterday was the filming of our first scene, the car segment. Personally, I was very excited for this part because I really enjoy driving and doing stuff like that. The goal was to get as much footage as possible of the car stuff. That being said, once we had gotten to the location I had mentioned in one of my previous posts, we had realized we were thoroughly unprepared. The shots we had written on our storyboard were actually extremely difficult to set up in real life. Once we had come to this conclusion, we had to figure out a way to film those shots. We came to the conclusion that the best solution would be to purchase this mount from Amazon to mount a camera to parts of the car. However, Amazon is not instant and the product would take at least 1 day to arrive. Because of this, we had divided up our shots into 2 categories.

Film:

Shots that would require the mount, and shots that would not. By doing so, we were able to effectively film as much as possible without rushing our process and sacrificing nicer shots just to be done with it. The shots we filmed included simpler scenes like outside shots of the car. We have a few of the car going down a street filmed from outside on the street. These shots were relatively simple and did not take many takes. Not to mention, the planning that went into picking the location had paid off, since we were able to pretty much have that road to ourselves. Once we compile those shots, it will be easier to tell whether we need more shots of the car to keep the scene engaging since a 10-20 second scene of a car would be quite dull and boring. Working in a group of 3, we had 1 of us standing on the sidewalk filming the other 2 flying by in the car. We were all happy with how it came out, but it may need to be more visually engaging in the final product.

We were also able to film the death scene of Sarah, Adam's partner. This was really fun for the entire group since we got to use the makeup that we had practiced before for the actual film itself. (To see footage of the makeup production, please refer to below.) We had also made an attempt at depicting the crash as well, but I am not really sure whether that will make it to the final product. For this, we had a group members car parked and with their headlights on full blast. To simulate the crash, I was in charge of driving head on into her car as quickly as possible before steering off course as late as possible. This part was especially engaging. But, for everyone's safety I obviously maintained a safe distance and safe speed throughout the entire thing.

Portfolio Project - Special Makeup

 Overview:

As mentioned in the previous post, I mentioned issues pertaining to the project. These included the issues with scheduling and filming; however, we had made some progress in overcoming said issues. We had decided that we would delay filming until the upcoming week. That being said, we could not waste a day not doing anything. For today, we decided to practice the special effect makeup that would be used to film the crash. I personally had less of a major role on this than in the logo creation. One of the other group members handled this while I helped and took the pictures.

For this picture we had applied makeup to a willing volunteer around the head region. This was meant to represent the full look post crash. It included both cuts and bruises, which are elements expected to be shown in a crash. This had been the refined outcome after many attempts we finally gotten the result we wanted.

This photo represents the makeup we had done to practice our blood effects. To "master" this look we had done many attempts and relaized that we had to us both a red background of makeup paired with the blood splatter to make it look more realistic. 

This picture combines the experience gained from both trials to create a visual cut. We used a lot of layered makeup for the cut and then covered it with some blood to make it more realistic. This was one of the more difficult ones to create since making a cut from makeup would be a difficult task. Reflecting upon it, we might have wanted to add some more of the deep red blood from the first image in the actual cut itself to represent the open wound.

Portfolio Project - Problems and issues

Filming:

When we made our idea, we had never originally spoken about when to film. As time progressed, we knew we had to film sooner than later. This created an issue as all three group members would have to come together to film. Towards the start of the project a group chat was created to keep in touch between all members; however, as time progressed, the chat had become less and less responsive. This proved to be extremely inconvenient for the filming process for obvious reasons. After we were able to agree on possible dates for filming, we would not get together near the planned date. In fact, at the time of writing this,  we still had not gotten together to film. The worst possible outcome is that the project would be delayed and put off and rushed, especially since I would like it to look nice and not rushed.

Gathering Ideas:

As mentioned above, the three members in my group had created a group chat to stay in touch. This was needed to be able to bounce ideas off of each other and keep in contact. Also, our instructor had regularly allowed time us time in class to get together and work on our projects. Everything was good at first, but then some of our members would not show up to class for multiple periods. This has made it very hard to solidify our concept since in the planning phase, things were always changing and we all had to be on the same page. Not to mention, when we texted in the group chat, it would take a long time to get an answer from everyone.

Overall:

The only major problem we have in our group is communication and accessibility. I do not know what to do about the situation since it is kind of difficult to manage. Ideally, something changes soon so we can all focus on our project; especially since we used to work quite well before the sudden change in their behavior.

Portfolio Project - Logo Development

 Intro:

Separate of our actual filming and film opening, we needed to develop a production company that would be distributing our film. The company would not have to be very intricate, but would have to have the basic elements of all companies. The name and the logo. When coming up with the logo, we approached a creative roadblock in our effort. To overcome this, we simply combined the first letter of our names into a string of characters then attached media at the end of it. A.C.K. media. Addison, Chase, Kamilla Media.  When making the logo we decided to use Adobe Express, as it was easily accessible in our schools suite package. I also have had previous experience on the platform itself.

The Process:

The circle I had used for the initial backdrop of the logo. I had stylized the circle in many ways. First I had added a 6 pixel border around the circle and gave it a 60% opacity value. After I had set the color to a blue and grey gradient.

After, I had added the production company name and centered it both vertically and horizontally. I used the liberation serif font for this part.

I then felt like the circle was a bit empty so I added a background to the text and made sure everything was centered. I used a purple and blue gradient for this piece as shown above. 

After showing my teammates the previous progress point, they said they felt as if the logo should be in darker red themes to represent a more psychological horrorish genre. They took inspiration from existing production companies like BlumHouse where the logo is representative of the type of content they produce. So in this change, I switched the background gradient to a red and black color, and the text background to the same color as the border.

We still were not happy with how it looked as it looked lacking and light. After some fidgeting around on Adobe Express, I had found out that the first opacity value I changed in the first step had changed that value for all layers. Reverting this back to zero has darkened the whole logo back to the intended colors. We also changed the border color to solid black, as well as the text background. Also, the text in the center had been made the same color as the red in the gradient to match it and make it more visually pleasing.

Portfolio Project - Location Scouting

Intro

After solidifying our original idea, our refined final version had included scenes in 2 different settings. The scenes in the first half would be shot on the road outside, while the scenes in the second half would be shot inside a room. The first half would include the scene on the road containing the speeding and the crash; that being said, choosing a street of adequate length that was also relatively isolated would be difficult. However, the inside room location would be far easier to find. We actually already had a location in mind from when we made the idea. Below are pictures of locations along with descriptions explaining why we chose them.

Location 1:

Room we would be filming in

We chose this room for the indoor scenes for a multitude of reasons. Firstly, it has dark walls which would be perfectly representative of our main character Adam's emotions post accident. This would also support the overall color scheme of the entire project post crash. Elaborating on this, before the crash, Adam would be seen smiling and laughing, wearing bright colors and things of that nature. Sarah, Adam's lover, would be seen wearing bright clothing with unique patters to draw attention to her during her scene. After she dies and is removed from the narrative world, the overall color scheme would transition to a much darker theme. Another reason is that is a relatively empty room which means we would be able to fill it up with props.

Location 2: 

Road we would be filming on

We chose this street for the road scenes because of it checks all required boxes. The street is right behind a school, which may sound like a downside, however, since we our planning to begin shooting this weekend, a road near a school would be perfect since it would be empty on weekends. This emptiness would allow us to film the crash scene where the car would be stopped in the middle of the road and we show Sarah with prop blood on her post crash. Another reason is that it is a very long road which would make it very easy to create a realistic driving scene. This is because preceding the crash, we would be showing a very calm scene of the couple driving along the road, listening to music, and smiling and laughing. Those elements would also contribute to the sharp transition in the tone of the scene. Finally, this road is extremely accessible since the school is around 3-5 minutes from my house, making filming extremely easy and allowing us to prioritize on the final product.

Audio

 Audio is one of the most important components in the film design. This is especially true in the psychological horror genre, where things are conveyed via implication rather than direct mention. Ambience is a tool used in these films which is the underlying tone of the scene. This can be used to create tension in scenes where it is supposed to be silent. This is used in a plethora of horror films during intense chases, reveals, and other suspenseful moments. 

Moving on to more direct sounds, our film opening will use loud sound effects to build a serious tone in the piece. This would include sounds like an ambulance siren which would instantly reveal that the crash could possibly be lethal. On the mention of crash, we would also include a loud crash sound to put emphasis on how serious the crash was. These are just a couple of examples of sound effects that we can collect and compile in our film opening, obviously there would be many more!

Character Design

 Character design will be a very useful tool for us to use in our piece. Many films use this to convey a characters emotions and beliefs in their own films, which is an effective way of doing so subtly. This means a characters mental state could be shown without the use of dialogue or anything of that nature. In our case, this would be effective to show the characters declining mental state post-crash. We could depict them with unkept hair, dark eye bags, and other defining features of a depressed person. Eye bags would be extra effective to show how our character had been crying a lot and mourning the loss of their loved one.

Us (2019)

Above is a picture from the film Us where they use character design to reflect a inner change within a character. The change is noticeable compared to a before and after of what the character had looked like in the past. They used to be an upbeat happy young girl, to a terrified girl surrounded by blue hues to show her negative emotions. This is a very effective method since it uses character design to explain a characters emotions without using words or direct dialogue. Which in most cases of a psychological horror, emotions are better displayed silently rather than direct. 

Addition example from the movie Him (2025)

Mise-en-scene

 Although the title of this post is quite vague, this post will be focussing on the set. Since our idea will be a psychological horror about the grief of losing a loved one, our set will reflect the mental strain it puts on them. After the 1 year period post death, the character will be struggling mentally and physically in their day to day life. The scene where we will see this will be the characters room, which is why set design is so important. The room will have to be in deep chaos with objects scattered around the room, maybe unpacked laundry all over the floor. It will reflect the mental state of the character whom it belongs too. Using mise-en-scene in a piece like this is so important because it conveys what we want said without words, which is the struggle our character is going through. We could also show pills and other negative stuff scattered around the room as well. This would also show that the character has not been able to overcome what they have been burdened with, which is that death of the loved one as mentioned before.

We could also use mise-en-scene in our set design to create that horror aspect as well. We can use clever editing techniques like fast cuts or loud stings to create tension and anxiety in the audience. We can design the set and shot to be able to show small details in the room that are indicative of mental hallucination. We can maybe show like false memories of the loved one haunting the survivor, or the survivor can do things that remind them of the victim. We can pair these set choices with sound techniques to create fear in our audience. This is a very common technique used in horror movies up to today. This also represents the psychological horror side of our genre since all of this would be taking place in the survivors head and not in reality.

Scene from Smile (2022)

Above is a scene from the film Smile which is quite similar to what I was explaining about above. The 2022 movie used careful set design choices to create a dimly lit horror-like environment where they could show a hallucination of a character that has been tormenting the survivor. This is just one example of a technique commonly used in some of the biggest productions in the world.

Character Development

 Once we presented our instructor our original idea, she had a plethora of suggestions and revisions for us. Upon hearing these, we had improved our plot idea and came up with a new story. Our original idea had issues with the plot and brought many complications with how it would be filmed. Our instructor also said that the concept was very repetitive, referring to the knife-murder plot.

Our new plot had two people who had been involved in a lethal car accident. More specifically, about the effect of said car accident on the survivor of it, since one would die and the other would not. We would represent character development by showing how happy and upbeat the “survivor” is pre-accident. After the accident, a 1 year time gap will take place. The character development would be represented through the effect it has on her. This will be shown through hallucinations like seeing the dead companion in the corner of the room, and seeing things that are not actually there.

The character development we aim to show is the effect of losing a loved one during a tragic accident. We will do our best to represent the emotion that matches our project most: grief. Our character will represent the “film opening” segment of a film because it sets up the rest of the piece to dive into how our character overcomes this grief and moves on.