Typeface Development; Title + Credits

This is the title and credit ideas as well as the typeface decisions for this project. slightly edited by shannon)

Title ideas:

Silent whisper

Silent stalker

Dark secrets

The haunting shadow

Whispers in the dark

In the shadows

Sinister Lurker

The night's prey

Dark pursuits

Veil of fear

Silent terror

Lurking shadows

Behind the shadows

Typeface ideas:

This is our title font

Thinker (capcut)

Thinker-RG (capcut)

Relax (capcut)

Ravenly (capcut)

Merchande-Rgh (capcut)

Sticky (capcut)

IM FELL (capcut)

(This is made by maxine) ⬆️

Eventually our group and I decided on this font which combines the fonts of Thinker in cap-cut and the crazy killer font from the pinterest board to create the font for the whole text of the movie except for some modifications from the movie introduction's title sequence that will be discussed further. 

Movies that created the inspiration for our font choices 

The crime and horror movie Se7en inspired the hand written scratchy look of our fonts. 

I liked how it's handwritten which gives it a personal and raw feel connoting  the eerieness and mystery of the Se7en's theme. I didn't like how it isn't really as messy or scribbly as what my team and I had planned but it's a good enough foundation / inspiration for our team to start with 

this is the final font we choose for the credits its called 

Jo wrote a love song regular using the official title "in the shadows"

We eventually choose this font because it's all over the place and messy enough to connote the energetic and anxiety induced thrill of our movie . We choose this style because it conveys the adrenaline and unsettling atmosphere of the whole movie opening. It's as if the killer himself wrote a notes to these teenagers which is exactly the feeling we want our audiences to feel. 

This was done by shannon ⬆️

Self Reflection:

I think this typeface quite suited for a movie title since it's about murder and horror. I particularly like the "thinker" font in cap cut as well as the ink font from pinterest which reflects blood and the tragedy that would occur which matches with the overall theme of our movie introduction but I'm glad we chose the final font to give the same feel for both the title and the credits. 

Production Organizing footage

This is the blog post that shows on what tech or applications used with screenshots, how it helps and what systems did we use to do this (made by Bamz, edited in detail by me)

To communicate with the group members :
WhatsApp

To download & store footage :

Google Drive

To edit the footage & organizing the footage within the application :

After Effects 2025

How Does it Help?

This was mostly done by Bamz ⬆️

Google drive

• It helped with sharing the files to others so, instead of one person that only has the access to the footage, everyone in our group has the access to the shared file this minimizes more work with exporting.
• This app also keeps the quality of the original footage from the camera in check without any quality compressions from other apps.
• This app also organizes our documents into a file to make it easier to find for our editor and keep many other files in one link that has already been shared to our group chat

Whatsapp

• Through communication apps such as WhatsApp as the app reduces the resolution and quality of the video which ruins the whole immersive aspect of the film opening. 
• However, whatsapp allows for easy communication between our 4 group members even if they are not physically in a room with me. We can still discuss, plan out new shooting dates, etc. 
• We also used WhatsApp to show the part where the editor is finished with the video so we can see segments of the video so we can make less mistakes instead of showing the full clip and finding it all in one that way

Adobe After Effects 

• In addition to that, our editors used After Effects the latest version which has more features such as the CGI as we have an idea of using CGI although. With the help of CGI our editor can make the audience feel immersive and more realistic and since it is the latest version of the editing software. 

•  This app also allows our editor to manipulate the lighting realistically to fit the movie genre. Because we filmed our video in the day which doesn't fit with the overall mood of our horror movie. 

• This app also allows the editor to download cool transitions from google that have hundreds of them which makes the movie more interesting for the audience. This also makes it easier and convenient for him to download and use many transition since adobe after effects offers many things. 

This was mostly done by me  ⬆️

Self reflection:

I think the existence of these apps are useful since it really help us manage our workload, communicate and edit efficiently. I think we as a group have better teamwork and synergy when using apps like whatsapp. Adobe after effects seems like an intimidating app but our editor is use to it so his editing looks good so far. 

Screen Test: Audience Feedback

This post explains how we showed a rough draft of our film opening to some members of our target audience in order to receive helpful feedback.

The purpose of a screen test is to gain audience feedback about our work and see if their are any improvements that can be made. We decided to use google forms to create a survey to share with our audience because it is a convenient way to get information without wasting time finding people around the school to interview. A link also allows our group to reach people outside to school without going to another school physically which is convenient.  Here are our questions:

What do you like about this horror movie introduction ??

What are your thoughts on the characters of the movie ??

What can we improve on ?

Which movie title for this horror movie ???

if all of these feedbacks were implemented in this movie opening would you watch the rest of the movie ?

If in the previous question your answer was no please explain your answer ?

We chose these questions because we wanted to understand our audience's dominant reading on our characters and how we could further make this movie introduction interesting to the point where our target audience would watch the whole movie. We showed the clip to 3 members of our target audience to ensure that the feedback we receive is appropriate and it was "horror" enough and suit their expectations. We also provided title options to them so the title wouldn't sound "cringey" or "weird" but suit the whole premise of the movie. 

Finding people for the screen test was quite difficult for me especially because most of my friends or people I know don't watch horror movies in general so it's hard for me to distribute this survey and get useful feedback from them. Luckily my teammates Max and Bamz do have friends who are horror / adrenaline enthusiasts as such we were able to get 3 people to answer the 6 six questions. 

Here is the draft that we showed audiences for the screen test:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aZNoa5TS_LFWem8HayxCq2i23cp7k_I0/view?usp=drive_link 

Here are the results from the audience feedback:

• What do you like about this horror movie introduction ??

• What are your thoughts on the characters of the movie ??

• What can we improve on ?

• Which movie title for this horror movie ???

• if all of these feedbacks were implemented in this movie opening would you watch the rest of the movie ?

• If in the previous question your answer was no please explain your answer ?

From the feedback we learned that we need to make our movie deeper, which means add more story / foreshadowing in the movie intro so they would be more interested. Another said we need to add context, it makes sense since the movie introduction is unfinished and our editor hasn't added any scene that moves the plot forward and the context / information on each character and their traits and what will happen. The dominant reading of the character were mysterious which is concerning as each character in the movie introduction should have different somewhat dominant readings than just "mysterious". The last thing they touched on is the fact this movie introduction leans more into mystery than horror. It's great constructive criticism because we can make that happen via editing and honestly after reviewing the footage again I completely agree. 

We are going to change the font of the title and add blood splatter animations to make it more horror filled. We might add more red to the introduction as a semantic code for death and destruction. The music can also be changed to more eerie and "ritual" like non diegetic or diegetic music so the movie can be more recognise as a horror movie. For the context part we can tell our editor to stitch up the important parts to add description into each scene and also add more depth to each character in the scene. 

This screen test was a useful part of our process because we are able to fully understand what the audience's preference so they could be intrigued into watching the whole movie. Even though the introduction's editing isn't finish and our editor left many parts behind leading to some of the criticism some of them made us change some parts of our movie so it can greatly improve. 

Reflection: This screen test made me rethink what a good horror movie should look like and allowed me to critically think of ways to improve like what the audience says. I think we could've ask more in depth answer to further understand their preference but overall this really helped our project. 

Dominant Reading

Here's our blog of my team's dominant reading for our film opening scene project

This is just a quick catch up session that we did as a group. We thought it would be a good idea to check what our intended dominant readings are for the different things being represented in our film opening. We have recently learned about Stuart Hall’s Reception Theory with Dominant, Oppositional, and Negotiated readings. For our media text to be successful, we want to make sure the message is clear and able to reach the correct audience. Below we will discuss our intended readings, and compare them to the intended readings we made in our Statement of Intent earlier on in the project. It will be interesting to see if our ideas have evolved.

 

	List	Our intended  Dominant Reading	How we will achieve this with technical elements
Individuals	Greg, Kenneth, Max	Kenneth = a paranoid  teenager  Greg = Kenneth's good friend, mindful of his surroundings  Max = careless, ignorant teenager	Kenneth  Mise en scene: The actor constantly looks at his surroundings and whatever's around him.  Camera: There is a close up of his concerned expression. There are also medium shots of his concerned body language. The camera pans from Kenneth to what he is looking at.  Editing: Multiple cuts of different camera angles. There is also an eyeline match of kenneth looking to his surroundings  Sound: Diegetic sounds of rustling leaves and footsteps of the stalker.  Greg  Mise en scene: The actor performance contained looking for his friend (kenneth) when he disappeared  Camera: There is a tracking shot of him trying to follow Kenneth's tracks. Medium shots of his body language turning around to find Kenneth.  Editing: Multiple cuts of different camera angles. There is also a reaction shot  of his worried face and Kenneth's “blood”.  Sound: Diegetic sounds of the actor’s dialogue contained words that worried about Kenneth after he disappeared.  Max Mise en scene: The actress carries headphones and has her emotionless expression when the camera focuses on her.  Camera: There are close up shots of her expressions that show that she doesn’t really care.
Social group	Teenagers	Teenagers should not be left alone without adult supervision.	There are multiple camera angles / close up shots of the paranoia of the teenagers. There is a tracking shot scene where Kenneth gets killed. The body language of both Greg and Kenneth are shaky and scared.
Places	Forest	Forests are a bad place to hangout.	There will be low key lighting that’s used to present the place. Many bushes and leaves will be used that hides hidden cameras that makes the scene unsafe for the characters and the audience.  Discordant non diegetic sounds will be used.
Events	Murder	Murder is bad / traumatic.	There is a medium shot of Greg worried for kenneth. A close up shot where he is shocked at the blood splatter. There is blood in some scenes and the color red on blood is a semantic code for death, anger, etc.
Overall Message	Teenagers shouldn’t be left alone in the forest because tragedies may happen as a result of murder.

How similar is it to the statement of intent ?

I think this is almost 90% similar to our statement of intent. Some of the similarities are,

• The name of the characters. Each character is either named greg, max or kenneth just like what our group discussed in the statement of intent.

• We represented places using low key lighting and a monochrome color palette which is what we said in our statement of intent which appeals to our horror audiences as well. 

•   In both the dominant reading and the statement of intent we have murder as one of the main action and a message that it is traumatic and bad. 

However, 

• We changed the storyline from a bunch of detective to a bunch of reckless teenagers who are left alone in the forest hanging out which changes the overall message / the dominant reading to the social group.

• The dominant reading or main message has also changed from "Always go home early, never go out at night alone. " to " Teenagers shouldn’t be left alone in the forest because tragedies may happen as a result of murder."

Self Reflection: 

I think this dominant reading make us reflect on the main meaning of our movie and what we want our audience to feel and think about when they watch our movie introduction. We also realize we changed some things from our statement of intent which is normal since we change the characters and some of the storyline of our original draft. Overall, hopefully our audience would get the same messages. 

Classwork: Editing practice

This blog post contains the work I did in my lesson on how to successfully edit. My teacher filmed the footage but I edited it together. My teacher also provided the template for the blog post.

Why is continuity editing important?

Continuity editing includes making sure that items like props or costumes stay consistent from scene to scene. But the more important work lies in editing shots together in a way that leaves viewers thoroughly grounded in both time and space that leaves the audience with an immersive and realistic experience. 


Different types of continuity edit

• Straight cut (cut)
• Eyeline match
• Shot /reverse shot
• Cutaway / Insert

*Match cut

Footage

Here is the footage that my teacher shot which utilises a variety of camera angles and movements. The scene is very simple, it involves a student standing up and leaving the classroom. A single shot here might be quite boring for the audience, by editing and combining the shots together we can make the scene feel more dynamic and exciting. 

Here is the youtube link to all the raw clips: 

My editing process

This is my first attempt at editing these clips.  I used an editing software called capcut so I can edit the clips smoothly. The clips given had some continuity errors such as the first clip they didn't consistently  put their hands inside their pockets so I had to cut the scenes where he doesn't put his hands in his pocket and another thing is the weird camera angles in the 4th and 5th clip but eventually I manage to sort it out by making a cut on the 4th and 5th clip. 

Some of the minor errors I made was audio. I didn't really have time to think about the audio and for the first clip I muted the whole clip which is not a good decision as it made the first scene boring. I also didn't consider the fact that cut are used to film the next action or make the film more dramatic but I think my cuts were kind of like that but next time I will keep that in mind while editing to make each action more immersive for the audience. 

This is the youtube video for my edited clip. 

Self Reflection:

I think I did an overall good job at this editing thing maybe next time I'll just figure out the audio for the next time I edit but luckily I'm not the editor in this comp 1 project which is a relieve. For the 4th and 5th clip transition I don't think I figured out as well as I thought but with the limited time I was given I thought it kind of make sense. I think this tutorial / trail will really help all of us especially our editor Kenneth so he can edit the shots for our movie opening smoothly. 

Shooting practice; horror scene recreation

 This post contains a mini project that helped us learn how to shoot a cinematic scene. We did this as a group. (Maxine, Bamz, Kenneth and me )

My teacher told us to find a scene from a movie and in our groups case a horror movie. Our groups task is to recreate it. We choose a scene from Jennifer's Body 2009. 

This is our story board ⬆️ (this was done by me)

This is our finished video ⬆️ edited by Kenneth & Max

Camera

Problem : The camera was sometimes shaky in the middle of recording due to constant imperfections within the camera angle or movement which can make some scenes with no sense and context ( character wasn't in the camera angle thus, talking to nobody or the camera movement was too far from the characters to be seen clearly )

Solution : We could possibly use a stabilizer or a tripod for the recording part to prevent
shake or weird angles within the recording session.

Next time : Most likely practice for the camera stillness because, purchasing a stabilizer or a tripod can be too far out of our current budget and we might need another cameraman that has a stable arm just incase for the camera movement.

Editing

Problem: Lip-syncing to the original audio was a bit abnormal due to the characters while recording can be either nervous, embarrassed or not good at acting for the sound to be synced to the audio.
 

Solution: Retake many shots to see if we can perfect it the original audio or get actors that are good at acting like doing a Screen Test with various actors we picked out that could be good within the context of our video to prevent weird lip-syncing to the audio.

Next time: Remember to take as many shots as possible to have a higher possibility that the lip-syncing wouldn't be as abnormal or off-synced.  

This part in green was written by Bamz 

Mise en scene 

Problem: We couldn't control the lighting as we were filming outside the classroom. The lighting for a horror movie especially for this one requires mostly low key lighting and since it was sunny today we didn't have access to that. 

Solution: Our teammates Max and Kenneth decided to adjust the video's lighting using the video editing apps to get the same feel as the clip from the movie. 

Next time: We will find a place with artificial lighting so we can easily control the lighting without much help from the video editing app to give it a more natural look instead of artificially increasing something. However, if this is not possible we will use the solution mentioned previously. 

Problem: In the first scene an actress looked at the camera. It's a subtle detail but our goal is so it would match perfectly to the scene we are trying to recreate. 

Solution: Our team tried to edit the video. However they couldn't fully fix that scene so we didn't find the right solution at that time. 

Next time:  we will rehearse and practice many times before we actually film the scenes. If not we can do multiple takes at the time and carefully look at the footage before deciding on another take. However, if all these repercussions fail then we can figure out how to edit it out. 

Sound 

Problem: We didn't have any problems with the sound as we use audio from the original clip which is very clear. 

Next time: I think we will continue doing this and for our upcoming project we will pre record the audio for the dialogue so we can get a clear sound. I also learned it's best not to record audio while we are recording a scene 

 This was done by me ⬆️

Self reflection:

This is my first time doing a shooting practice and I think it is quite fun to do. The hardest part is the fact that our group had to find a scene from a horror movie which is quite complicated due to our limitations. However, through our practice I learned that we need more practice and better team synergy (as we forgot to do the behind the scenes).  Overall, I think this shooting practice help me and my group learned many valuable lessons. 

 

Film schedule

 This is our film schedule for our film opening. We did this as a group  

Scene	Date/Time	Location	People	Equipment	Other
All	18 January 2024, 16:00	Taman Festival Bali	Maxine, Shannon, Kenneth, Bams ( possibly another dude )	Drone, Camera, Phones, Laptop, Car	Few other actor props to make it more immersive like cards

Self reflection:

This filming the movie opening scene will be all in one location. As such we decided we were going to film every single scene in one day since we all thought editing this movie opening will take more than a week. However if like for example it rained on the day of the shoot we plan to move it to monday after school. Hopefully we are able to finish it in a day but if there are re shoots we plan to go there maybe the next day or so.