Final CCR!!

The final step to the long process! Thank you for following the process. 

Finally Done!! 

After a long process, our project is finally finished! Presenting... "Tiffany."

I Hear the End is Near

    Our final steps are complete! We were able to finally find and create the sounds that we needed in the remaining portions of the film in order to finish. From the use of online sources to find certain sounds such as the sound of some phone notifications and typing, to the music used throughout the film that we used to create the tone of the film, everything has finally come together in the final product.
    The first thing we did was find the background music for our film. As stated in previous posts, killer tracks was used for the pop song that we used in the film in order to introduce our "victim" and kind of introduce her personality without having her use any dialogue. This song also flowed well with the other music used in the film to create the horror vibe, not creating too much of a contrast in the tempo of the music throughout and allowing the intro to flow smoothly. Multiple creepy music was used in the film for different situations. The first we had was a little slower in pace and was more subtle than the second. It featured buildups throughout, but was not too over the top and allowed us to use it as almost a form of ambient noise in the film. The second song used featured some more depth and was less subtle, but allowed us to create a more fast paced section of the film, linking almost to heartbeats in the situation. It also features an eerie vibe, further contributing to the creepy vibe we were going for in the film.
    For sound effects we were able too use a mixture of the YouTube audio library and freesound.org to find sounds from phone notifications to typing, which was an important part of our project, especially with the phone notification sounds. We used the phone notifications not only to literally show the messages, but also as a way to create suspense and build tension through pacing. The timing of the messages allowed us to create almost a beat throughout the scene and speed up or slow down the scene when paired with cuts.

(Here is us creating the broken window sound)

(This is use recording the sound for the closing door in the film opening.)

    Finally, we were able to create some of the sounds on our own. We used a mixture of foley sounds and just recording sounds on our own, which allowed us to control the speed and effect that the sound had. For example, we recorded the sound of a door closing to use in the film when the door closes, allowing us to watch the portion of the film as we recorded, which let us sync the sound with the film. The other sound we created was the sound of broken glass. Rather than actually breaking a glass window, we resolved to a glass jar with pennies inside. This jar was placed in a plastic bag to prevent any pieces from spreading and injuring anybody, and we simply recorded the sound that the jar made when we dropped it on the floor. This turned out well and was something that we used in the film.

Freesound - Freesound. (n.d.). Retrieved April 13, 2018, from https://freesound.org/

Final Touches

    The final touches to our project is adding the sound. Over the last couple days we have been searching for a combination of sound effects and music that we could use in our project and create the vibe that we want throughout the film intro. Something we have had a hard time finding are the sound effects, such as phone notifications and a sound resembling breaking glass for the inferred broken window. Although there are many online sources for sounds that we can use, they have not had the effect that’s we want and we are going to try and use household items to create our own Foley sounds  per say and hopefully the result will turn out how we want. 

    The other important sound aspect that’s we felt we wanted to include was the use of music, mostly to establish the tone of specific scenes in our movie intro. One source that we used to find this music was killer tracks, which had many option sound for us to choose from and ended up being the place for us to find the “pop” sound that we wanted to use to introduce the main victim of the introduction. 

Other sources for music that we used were free music archive and the YouTube audio library, which also allowed us five find music to establish the creepy and horror vibe of our film intro. 

    We are planning to finish putting all the sounds in within the coming days San we continue to work on our CCRs.

Killer Tracks - Online Production Music Library Resource. (n.d.). Retrieved April 11, 2018, from https://www.bing.com/cr?IG=838B4F0621114EF480EC981EA5C77135&CID=2E3EE2C50A866E6304BBE90B0B296FCE&rd=1&h=j-FLEGUq7I4RVY4bfj5yZ-zSkauEn2_lSG7gy5fhz4M&v=1&r=https://www.killertracks.com/&p=DevEx,5069.1

Welcome to the Free Music Archive. (n.d.). Retrieved April 11, 2018, from http://www.freemusicarchive.com/

Finishing Touches

     Throughout the last few days we have been putting the final touches on our video project. Currently, we only need to add a few sounds and finish up the CCR and we will be home free! 

    Some clips that we have included in our film throughout the last few days include a concluding scene of the intro and some scenes of text messages that appear throughout the intro. The first scene we worked on was a scene after the murder that was basically the final shot of out intro. We had to make some fake blood however, which took several attempts to get something finally right, and eventually was able to set up the final shot. 

(This is an image of the first batch of fake blood that we made for the film)

 (This is the second (successful)  batch of fake blood that we ended up using for the film.)

(This is the setup we used for the film, along with some additional lighting effects. We had to make sure we didn't make a mess, but also wanted to make it  look good.)

   The other parts that we included were just simple close ups of text messages that make appearances throughout the introduction of our film that link the killer to the victim. We felt that this was a way to connect the two characters and a way to create suspense throughout the intro. 

     Another addition to our film was the use of audio narration from the character. We felt this would allow us to get across some vital information to understanding parts of the movie intro and kind of set the tone for the remainder of the movie and our social commentary. This allows use to also show the character of the killer, which is somewhat different than many other horror films that hide the identity of the killer. We were able to get a classmate to speak some lines into a microphone, which turned out to be a good choice because it somewhat sounds like it is in her head, rather than her speaking out loud, which is the overall goal we were looking for. 

    Overall, the additions we made brings us closer to completion of the project and helps us portray our overall horror genre, and it gave us some time to have fun playing with fake blood! 

Some Typical Horror Distribution

    As we move into the final stages of the project, finishing up editing of the video and adding sounds and basically moving towards the overall completion of the video itself, we also start to move into the CCR portion of the project. Several of the topics that we have to eventually touch upon are things that we experienced while working on the project, but distribution of the film was something that we felt we would need to look more into.
    The first thing that we wanted to touch upon was the use of movie theaters to first distribute the film. Not as much IF we would use the movie theater platform, but WHEN. An important aspect of horror films releasing in theaters is the month that they are released in. According to wheresthejump.com, most horror films tend to be released in the span of a few months. For example, October is an extremely popular time to release these films due  to Halloween and the appeal to the spirit surrounding the month, but the following months leading up to January, February and March tend to be less popular due to decreased appeal of horror films after the October abundance and the presence of some big name films that seek an alternative release to the summer releases, another time where horror releases are limited due to the abundance of other big name and popular films being released. This leaves January, February and March as other times for some lower budget horror films to be released, and may very well be the optimal time for us to release ours in thee future. Since our film is  very low budget and does not have thee recognition to compete with some of the bigger name and bigger budget fims that may crowd the month of October, it may be more optimal to choose the months with limited horror options, but also with limited big name alternatives. This could promote our film by basically creating a runoff effect for people to come watch and may indirectly promote the movie as people tell other people about the movie. A chart showing the monthly comparisons can be seen here.
     The biggest challenge would be the fact that our film may not have the backing of a major movie distributor, and we may need to resolve to a mixture of conventional and unconventional methods of distribution. According to wisegeek.com, securing limited releases in theaters is "the most sensible root," and some film festivals can be used to show the film on another platform. Films can also be distributed easily through DVD and online sources. They also discuss the possible use of smaller platforms to release the film such as streaming sources and even social media. These are all possible options for us to use if we move forward, but maybe the best idea would be to implement a little bit of everything in order to maximize the capability for people to view our product and spread it as best we can.
    Moving through the CCR will allow us to further reflect upon the project that we have been working on in the last few weeks, and this information will be extremely helpful in discussing some key elements of the CCR.

Monthly Distribution Of Horror Movies – During What Period Of The Year Are Most Horror Movies Released? (n.d.). Retrieved April 06, 2018, from https://wheresthejump.com/monthly-distribution-of-horror-movies-during-what-period-of-the-year-are-most-horror-movies-released/

Carrier, T., & Allen, J. (2018, April 02). What Are the Different Methods of Independent Film Distribution? Retrieved April 07, 2018, from http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-the-different-methods-of-independent-film-distribution.htm

Final Group Meetings

    In our final group meetings before the big push towards the end of the project, I was able to discuss some of the issues that we had been having throughout our filming process, along with some advice about other parts of the project that may be extremely helpful.
    The first thing I discussed was the fact that some of our scene is lit extremely poorly in the beginning portion of the scene. My group had several ideas involving this, one being to kind of abandon that part altogether. They were primarily discussing the fact that we were maybe trying to do too much with the film in the first two minutes of it, maybe even having too much going on to make sense, and that maybe leaving out the poorly lit part would be better overall. Another idea they discussed, along with some ideas given to us in the days before, would be to play with the brightness, saturation, and colors of the video clips themselves. This would allow us to try and improve the lighting in the scene without having to reshoot it, and would also allow us to control everything that is going on. Although neither is the most ideal, as the first would eliminate part of our planned story and the second would add some time to our editing process, both are preferable to reshooting, especially with the limited time left to work. These are things that we still need to discuss as a group, and will make further decisions in the next few days. A possible solution may be to edit thee second, more well lit portion of the video and see how it stands by itself without the first portion and work from there.
    Another thing brought up in our group meeting was the use of music and sound in our video. Although we had been thinking about this prior, a member in my group proposed that we use the website purple-planet.com for our music. They provide all types of music and movie genre specific music that may be extremely helpful as we move forward when adding sounds and music.

Purple Planet Royalty Free Music. (n.d.). Retrieved April 06, 2018, from http://www.purple-planet.com/