These are some comments from people that have seen 'Angeldust' and what they thought about it...
Hermione Cameron: "I thought it was interesting and different to a conventional thriller." RATING: 8/10
Giulia Di Lorenzo: "I liked it. I didn't get why it was called 'Angeldust' though. I liked the way you had a white background for the Facespace pages and red for the Artbox ones. I think that it was good because it could be a real life situation and i think it's a thriller that could be made into something unlike a conventual thriller." RATING 8/10
Emma Carragher: "I loved the editing. I loved the 3D bit at the beginning and i loved the whole idea of Facespace and Artbox. I understood it but if i didn't already know somethings bout the story I don't think i would have understood where angeldust, the drug, came into it. Also i like the bit where Chloe walks out of the room at the end." RATING 7.98/10
Laura Blyfield: "I liked the editing and the After Effects but you could have told the story better because i didn't get that he was an internet stalker." RATING 9/10
Steph Kufferath: " I loved the storyline and i think the chose of actress was really good and i liked the way she acted. Iliked the pace of editing and the After Effects and i think the layout of thetitles was really good too." RATING 10/10
Hannah Winter: "I liked the style of editing and the use of After Effects for Artbox. I think it's probably the best thriller because of the editing. I liked the ways it was cut because there was a lot to get in and happening." RATING 10/10
Sarah Kurzrock: "Editing was good. But what i liked most was that you didn't know what was going to happen next and it made me want to see the rest of the film." RATING 8/10
Olivia Cox: 'I thought it was unique and the editing was amazing and i liked the plot." RATING 9/10
Other comments: "chloe looks hot. good after effects. must have worked hard," "Good editing, looks like it was a hard job but you did it really well. I'm not fully understanding the plot though."
Overall i think they were pretty good reviews and I i got people to rate it between 1 and 10 and we got quite good ratings, which ranged from 7 to 10.
The main concern that flagged up in a lot of the comments was that they didn't understand the plot very well and a lot of people didn't know what angeldust/PCP, the drug, was so they didn't know what to look for. Angeldust was our enigma code but the audience didn't seem to pick up on it. We had originally designed it to incorrporate the spiking of the victims drink to make it clear but we want to leave all of the gory parts ( in the opening sequence anyway..) to the audience imagination, which a lot stronger and more effective. However, people liked our style of editing an use of After effects, which were our key selling points of the film.
Looking back at the preliminary task I know that i have improved a considerable amount and gained vital knowledge of different programmes a media conventions and forms and techniques.
The Preliminary task was very basic. The script was already done and we just had to plan out how we wanted the lines delivered by the actors and what extra camera angles we were going to use and how to use final cut pro. cut our footage up. It was all very basic compared to what i have done for my final product 'ANGELDUST'.
First there was a lot more planning for the final product. We had to be much more indepth. We had to come up with the film idea then draw a storyboard for it and then decide on what actors we needed what they might wear, how we wanted the actors to deliver the lines, if there were any props needed, transport if we had to go to a location, shooting script so everyone on set knew what they were doing, location itself, script for the actors, making up a production company, set design, lighting design, and finally learn how to use Final Cut Pro in more depth and After Effects and Soundtrack. Whereas for the prelim. task we had to know how we wanted the actors to deliver the lines, what they would wear and any extra shots we wanted to add to the list of shots we already had given to us. Because we had planned exactly what we were going to shot and the nature of what we were shooting (MTV blog style) there was only one angle to shoot of our character Angel3323 so there was no need to shoot wide-medium-close which we had to do for the prelim task. However, we did do a range of shots of Lester727 but because we wanted to keep him a mystery we shot him all up in close up.
These are screen grab of the prelim task, showing a close up, medium and wide shot.
The prelim was completely different to my final product so they are quite hard to compare, for example the style of editing. For the prelim it all had to flow whereas for 'Angeldust' we decided to do straight cuts making it quite jagged and disjointed because we were cutting it in an MTV blog style. However, we did have to make the transitions from each clip flow, which is where After Effects (AFX) came in handy because we were able to animate parts using pages we had made on photoshop which, made the story clearer and flow from one clip to the next.
For the prelim we only used the audio that we had got on the day but in the final product we used artificial sounds form Soundtrack and one member of our group, Josh, made the soundtrack which we cut to fit our product. Soundtrack is where we got the artifical typing sound. The sound was difficult because unlike the prelim we had music and soundeffects so that meant we had to change the sound levels throughout the opening sequence and we had to cut it to fit the footage.
The biggest hurdle we had to jump over was learning how to use AFX. Most of our product is made up of AFX. We used it to make 'Angeldust' unique and visually exciting and dynamic. But i found it quite complicted at the start so it was very trial and error whether any of the footage we edited in AFX was going to work. Using AFX made our product more sophisticated and complicant than the prelim and improved our editing skills and ideas now that we know how to use AFX.
Our product turned out really well i think because we knew the basics from doing the prelim so we were able to build on top of that experience and experiment with new technology and ideas.
I don't think that our media product, 'Angel Dust', appeals to just a niche audience (a niche audience is a small group of people interested in a specific media product) but to a commercial audience (Commercial/ mainstream audience is a group of people that are interested in a variety of different media products). This is because there has been a lot of worry and argument over whether social network sites are safe or not. 'Angel Dust' addresses these issues. Even though it does show social network sites as a bad thing because of the death of some people in the film because of the social network sites, I think that older members of the audience may want to see it, so they can see a small representation of what some people live for in the world but know that it is an exaggerated and that there isn't an insane murder staking everyone on the internet. It can also be used as a sort or warning to the younger generation that use these kinds of social network sites all the time that they have to be carefull about who they talk to and that if it sounds like it's too good to be true then it probably is. Although there is a very small chance of something like that every happening it may make people be more aware. Facebook, the biggest social network site, is what our media product is based on and looking a statistics at of what sites are used most by internet users, Facebook came on top by a lot. As you can see here... In the end i have decided that the type of people most likely to see 'Angel Dust' would be these people... 'Angel Dust' would appeal, mostly, to people in their late teens and twenties. This is because they are more likely to have more of a disposable income and more likely to spend it on a night at the cinema. They are also the type of people who use social network sites like 'Facebook' and so may be of interest to them. These are the statistics for Facebook all over the world of the different ages that use Facebook the most and which country uses it the most. Also most horror films are aimed at teens because they usually have teens in the film itself. To generate interest we used teen actors in our opening sequence. This will appeal to people of her age, our main target audience for the film. I think 'Angel Dust' appeals to both genders although i think it may appeal slightly more to the male gender because of the gore and the actors. However like i have said before i still think that even the female gender would also enjoy this film. Amount of money won't affect who comes to see our film. Whether you are rich or poor it is a film for all, it just depends whether you are a horror lover or hater as to whether to see this film or not. This also applies to whether the audience is educated or not. This won't affect the desision to see 'Angel Dust'. Even though it is mainly a teen audience, it may be of interest to other people too because of the issue that 'Angel Dust' covers. Also people who are interested in the animation/graphics will also like, and want to see 'Angel Dust' because it is mainly animated. This makes it more visually dynamic and interesting for the audience. This guy below is our idea of our main target audience. He is obviously into media products because of the headphones around his neck meaning that he listens to music, a type of media. He will probably come to see our media product because it is a horror film. Young audiences seem to like the horror genre because of the thrill and gratification they get from it, this means that they go to a horror to be scared but in the safety of the cinema so it gives them the same thrill but in the comfort of the cinema knowing they, themselves can't get hurt. He will also probably come to see 'Angel Dust' because young teen actors are featured in our thriller, so he can relate to them and also to see our pretty female actress featured in the opening sequence. This goes for all teenagers around his age.
There are lots of Distributers that we could have used but we had to pick one that would be more likely to take our film on. We did this by look at what films some distributers had distributed previously. Also so that we had more money we decided to use two distributers so that we could get more publicity and have more money to use in the film. We looked at examples of films that have done that and found that the 'Saw' films use Lionsgate and Twisted pictures and they are a very successful horror film franchise. So we decided to use Magnolia Pictures, which have produced horror films like 'Shrooms' and 'Survival of the Dead'. 'Angeldust' is similar to those films because of the violence and gore and in 'Shrooms' use of drugs. Therefore i think Manolia Pictures would probably take our film on because they have done films like ours before so it's a safe film to work on.
Brain Damage Films, is a small company, that if you send them a horror film that you have made they will distribute it all over the world. They only distribute horror films. Looking at there site, we could see that our film would 'Angeldust' would probably be taken on by them because once again our film is similar to films they have distributed before. We chose these distributers because they were small and different and Brain Damage Films specialises in Horror films. We chose to use both because we would get more advertising and more money to make the film but that did mean that we may get less profit because both distributers take their percentage of the profit first leaving the rest for our production company 'Awkward Turtle Productions.' However, if we are able to advertise 'Angeldust' more, we will get more interest because more people will know about, therefore more people will come and see it, therefore more profit, therefore more money to split between Magnolia Pictures, Brain Damage Films and Awkward Turtle Productions.
Both distributers will distribute 'Angeldust' because of the main target audience it attracts... mid teens and young adults, and HORROR just happens to be one of the most popular genres so there is a safe bet that a lot of people between the ages of 16-29 will want to see this film.
The social group 'Angeldust' represents is teenage girls and boys. 'Angel3323' played by Chloe is the silll but pretty blonde girl that sees no wrong with the world. She is very selfobsessed. This is an example of a stereotypically teenage girl. In the opening title sequence we have chosen to represent her as a silly, innocent girl because this is what is expected by audiences going to see a horror film with teens in it. We also represented her in this way so that our target audience, teens and young adults, could relate to her. The audience may also get gratification from watching her because 'Angeldust' is one of those films where you scream at the TV because they are going into the dark house when the door has been opened and the lights don't work or they decide to walk home through the haunted wood or something along those lines. So the audience can have the gratification that if they were in that situation they wouldn't do the things the stupid characters in the horror film did. 'Angel3323' also represents the middle class teenage girl who gets what she wants from Daddy and gets to go to paris etc. but all under supervision. This makes her very naive and innocent and not street wise therefore thinking the world is all ok. Well everyone knows it isn't and that it's tough. These are both stereotypes and 'Angel3323' represents both of them. Although there is probably some people out there like her and do conform exactly to these stereotypes. In films like 'Cabin Fever' the teenagers are all very naive but however it does oppose conventions of a teen horror movie. But the stereotypical girls are still represent in it. The goody goody girl dies first, which is very unconventual because she usually survives till the end but she doesn't in Cabin Fever and I think this i what we have done with Angel3323 in Angeldust.
For 'Angeldust' we did conform to some conventions but challenged others. We did what we thought was best for our thriller and if that meant breaking or sticking with a convention or form then we would. An example would be where we put our distributer and production company.
Above is our production company. This appears before any of the film is shown which goes against some conventions because they usually appear during the title sequence whereas we have kept our seperate. Now I'll explain the titles...
Unlike some films where the font of their titles fits the film. At first glance ours doesn't, for example 'ANGELDUST' above. The font isn't very unique or particularly exciting but this is why we animated our sequence. The title above types on to the screen using animation, therefore keeping to conventing of our title fitting the film. However, we have challenged some forms by having the title appear at the end over the top of some of our footage. We have done a lot of layering of different element, which is what makes our film different and interesting. The smaller titles are the same they appear over animated footage and recorded clips. There is an example below...
Here there is the footage of 'Angel3323' aka Chloe. We have had the title slowly fade in so that it is clear for the audience and used a gursian blur to blur the footage of Chloe so we can force the audience to look at the titles. There are several focus pulls in and out depending on where we wanted the audience to focus. Here is an example of a sequence below... It starts off focused on Chloe and then focuses to some animated typing coming across the screen to look as if our killer 'lester727's' is typing.
This breaks some conventions because we are layering up shots with animated text and clips of Chloe and fading titles in and out.
Above is an example of where the first clip comes in. The clip is out of focus along with the animated typing and the audiences focus is then pulled towards the title. Next the title fade out to focus in on the animated text...
Then the focus pull to Chloe again and reveals her title underneath...
A new film out at the moment called 'Up in the Air' incorporates its titles like we have for 'ANGELDUST'.
Below in a screen grab from our opening sequence of the computer matrix. To make our film more visually dynamic and interesting we have used this to track back through to show the distance between the Facespace page and the Artbox page. This is also shown below. This is the matrix...
And this is the sequence below to show that the shots flow from one shot to the other...
It goes from the facespace page to the matrix. Then from the matrix fading through to the art box page...
We have definately challenged conventions by having our murderer 'Lester727' played by a young man who see's killing people as ART. He attracts the audience and 'Angel3323' by being mysterious and secretive. Usually these types of murderers and paedos are old and kill for pleasure.
'Lester727' is different in that respect. However we did shoot some shoots of him from his POV, which conforms to conventions. Usually murderers are shot from their POV so that they remain a mystery to the audience.
'Angel3323' also conforms to stereotypes of herself but the way we filmed her challenges conventions. She conforms to her stereotype of the silly, naive, blonde victim but we had her act directly to the camera. This is usually only ever done to create get moments of emotion. So she break convention by looking into the camera all the time but there is the fact that she is shooting blog posts so it had to filmed in this way portray this. This camera shot give the audience the chance to engage with the character and feel as if they are looking through the webcam themselves.
So that we were able to do our editing Josh and I created the forum pages we were going to intercut with the blog clips and the shoots of 'Lester 727'. Josh, as i've mentioned previously, designed the 'Facespace' pages and I have created and designed the 'Artbox' page. Here are some pictures of some of the pages I created using photoshop.
The original idea, to animate to entire opening sequence, we still wanted to keep elements of.We had this idea after seeing the opening sequence for 'Catch Me If you Can' by Steven Spielberg. But we are going to include shots of 'Angel 3323' blogging and of 'Lester 727' typing.
Editing Process
We start off by Logging all of the shots but into seperate log bins. We put all of the shots of 'Angel 3323' into a bin called Chloes bin and then we put all the shots of 'Lester 727' in a log bin called Paedo bin. Chloes Bin Shots: 1) Weekend 2) Necklace/Paris 3) Iphone Chat 4) Iphone app chat 5) Lipgloss/interuption 6) Short walk to Bed 7) Sleepover 8) Weirdos appearing 9) Luke in Room 10) Going to bed/ potentially exciting news 11) Mention of 'Artbox' 12) Chloe eatting a banana 13) Putting Top on (Being casual) 14) 'Lester 727' first mention 15) Going out 1 16) 'Lester 727' kiss 17) Big Brother chat 18) More Big Brother chat 19) Great night out 1 20) 'Facespace' mention 1 21) Met 'Lester 727' 1 22) Artbox/ 'Lester 727 date 23) 'Lester 727' in the bathroom 1 24) 'Lester 727' in the bathroom 2 25) 'Lester 727' in the room/ final of Chloe 26) Empty room
Paedo Shots
1) Side on typing 2) CU of typing side on 3) High angle typing 4) CU of necklace 5) Side on face 1 6) CU eyes 7) Sweat drips 8) CU mouth 9) POV typing 10) CU enter 11) Mouse Moving 12) CU Angel Dust 13) Angel Dust and Necklace 14) POV typing 2
We cut up all of these shots, so we didn't have out takes etc. and then started deciding which ones to use. Then we started dragging them onto the timeline. At first we place all of chloes shots onto the time line and put them in order. We then place the shots of Lester where we thought they maybe place. This just made the time line a mess. So experimented with only using small clips of several shots intercut with Lesters shots but this seemed really messy. So we then experimented with cutting it up MTV style. This seemed to work really well so we did this to Chloes shots.
After we had cut up all of the shots, we began to use 'After Effects'. This programme will enable us to animate around the clips and allow us to insert the 'Facespace' and 'Artbox' pages in too.
After Effects
Wikipedia: Adobe After Effects is primarily used for creating motion graphics and visual effects. After Effects allows users to animate, alter, and composite media in 2D and 3D space with various built-in tools and third party plug-ins, as well as individual attention to variables like parallax and user-adjustable angle of observation. Both After Effects and some non-linear editing systems (NLEs) are layer-oriented, meaning that each individual media object (video clip, audio clip, still image, etc.) occupies its own track. In contrast, other NLEs use a system where individual media objects can occupy the same track as long as they do not overlap in time. This track-oriented system is more suited for editing and can keep project files much more concise. The layer-oriented system that After Effects adopts is suited for extensive effects work and keyframing. Although other compositing packages—especially ones that employ tree or node workflows, such asApple Shake—are better suited to manage large volumes of objects within a composite, After Effects is able to somewhat counter the clutter by selectively hiding layers (using the Shy switch) or by grouping them into pre-compositions. The main interface consists of several panels (windows in versions prior to After Effects 7.0). Three of the most commonly used panels are the Project panel, the Composition panel, and the Timeline panel. The Project panel acts as a bin to import stills, video, and audio footage items. Footage items in the Project panel are used in the Timeline panel, where layer order and timing can be adjusted. The items visible at the current time marker are displayed in the Composition panel.
We are using After Effects to make our thriller different from all the other groups work and make ours visually dynamic and interesting. Using final cut we have used our 'blog' like footage of our actress Chloe and cut it up in an MTV style. This makes it very fast moving, which is what we what to achieve in our thriller. Also to give it an errie, sinister affect we have made some of the starts and ends of blogs flicker with one of them having a subliminal image inserted of 'Lester 727' within it. These blogs, once edited, are inserted into After Effects which is where our piece starts to take shape. We have decided to startwith one of our blogs filling the whole scene which after a few seconds will start to move back revealing other parts of the Facespace page but in different layers and these layers appear as the camera zooms further and further out creating a 3D effect. The camera then continues to zoom further and further out and goes through a pixel like wall to show that this is all within a computer and then ends up going through to the Artbox page, where we have animated typing, which is suppose to look like Lester727 is typing in real time. We are then getting lots of other peoples comments to pop up as the camera zooms out to reveal more of the page. Now that we have established that this is all based within the world wide web network, we are now just going to manipulate the camera in different and interesting ways intercuting it with clips of Lester727 and Angel3323's facespace page. The titles, we want to be animated as if someone is typing them and they will appear throughout the sequence. The story line is very simple, creepy guy stakes pretty girl, he pretends to be something he's not, she believes it, goes to meet him and then he kills her, but hopefully the editing makes this simple plot visually exciting and dynamic. I found After Effects very difficult to use because there are so many options and it's all a trial and error process to see whether bits will work or not, which makes the process longer and tiring but it has really given our thriller life and made it look like an opening sequence and not a trailer or a teaser trailer or a miniture film, which is the whole aim of the AS level.
Both distributers will distribute 'Angeldust' because of the main target audience it attracts... mid teens and young adults, and HORROR just happens to be one of the most popular genres so there is a safe bet that a lot of people between the ages of 16-29 will want to see this film.
