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From,
Aidan Szczurek, Candidate number- 1770
Jeremy Kumarathasan, Candidate number- 1400
Daniel Gittings, Candidate number- 1230
Our film follows many typical conventions of real media products and also in some cases challenges forms and conventions. I have split these similarities and differences under four main headings genre, narrative structure, form and style. Genre
'Element 115' is a zombie-action-adventure film. To be able to conform to the conventions of this genre, we looked into many different films around our chosen genre. The way we represented the characters- Daniel, Maran and also the zombies in our film. The Events- the close fights between zombies and humans , Themes- sacrifice and friendship, Iconography- guns and apocalyptic misc on scene.
Character Representations
We learnt from researching the film, that the main characters portrayed in the zombie genre were typically quite young and fit as shown in the picture the four main characters- Columbus, Tallahassee, Wichita and Little Rock. They all seemed to have a specialist skill set to suggest how they survive and cope in an apocalyptic world such as Columbus' intelligence and Tallahassee's combat skills. Using this information we made sure the two survivors in our opening sequence also had the characteristics and ability to survive in an zombie-infested world.
Another thing that inspired us from 'Zombieland' was the way the zombies were portrayed. The slow-moving pace and appearance of the 'undead' in 'Zombieland' was how we tried to resemble the zombies in 'Element 115'. Fast moving zombies in other apocalyptic films such as 'I am Legend' and '28 days later' we believed wouldn't suit our idea as we wanted the zombies to be easier to kill so we could show more action packed scenes.
Events
In zombie films there is use of binary opposites such as living vs the dead, this is the main struggle displayed in this genre, the survivors are trying to stay alive and must fend off zombies in the process. Zombie films always include lots of exciting fight scenes, and it is typical to see a characters be killed as well as zombies. Above is an example from the film 'Shaun of the Dead' in which there is is a struggle between the survivors and the zombies and some characters are killed by the zombies. Our film opening follows the convention of there is a lot of fighting between zombies and living however where as in most zombie films the fights happen up close, the fight between the survivors and zombies starts at a distance as a sniper is used. Our film therefore uses an adapted convention of the fights between the living and the dead.
Themes
There are many different themes used in zombie films, the main ones being survival, killing and death, we were quite interested in as well as the main themes, using less common themes such as friendship and sacrifice. The scene near the end of the film 'I am Legend' the protagonist Robert Neville choose to sacrifice himself to kill the zombies in order to help the other survivors. This is both and example of the themes sacrifice and friendship. This scene was a great inspiration for the end scene in our opening sequence in which the character Daniel uses a grenade to kill himself and the zombies so that Maran doesn't get harmed by them. Below is screenshots of the scene from 'I am Legend' and the scene from 'Element 115'.
This is the screenshot of Robert from 'I am Legend' sacrificing himself.
This is the screenshot of Daniel from 'Element 115' sacrificing himself.
Iconography
The typical iconography used in the zombie genre is zombies themselves and the apocalyptic setting, the other important bits of iconography are guns and weapons that the survivors often use to kill the zombies.
A scene from 'Shaun of the Dead' where Shaun and Ed use a spade and a cricket bat as weapons to fight the zombies with. In our film we used a sniper rifle and a pistol as iconic weapons that could be used to kill zombies in a encounter with them.
A scene from 28 weeks later showing the apocalyptic setting, there are upturned cars, rubble and the overall scene is unclean, the effect creates the sense of the apocalyptic world. On the right is a screenshot from our opening sequence showing a similar setting, there is pieces of scrap material such as the bin and the overall area also looks quite unclean.
Narrative Structure Todorov's Theory
The structure of most zombie films have a similar style and format, we found through research that they typically follow Izetan Todorov suggested theory of narrative structure. 'Zombieland' was a film we did a high amount of research into, so will be the case-study I use as an example of following Todorov's theory.
Diagram of the 5 steps of Todorov's theory. The diagram shows how the steps can repeat.
Equilibrium
In 'Zombieland' the equilibrium stage is set before what has occurred in the film. It is that the world is normal and no zombie pandemic as occurred. This is what we also wanted to imply in our film that the world and people's live were once normal.
Disruption
The disruption stage in 'Zombieland' is the spread of a zombie infection which is highlighted at the beginning of the film. Our overall disruption is also that a zombie virus has spread and infected most of the world's population called Element 115, we show this by trying to show the landscape as unclean and damaged to create a sense of the apocalyptic atmosphere. This disruption in our film leads to many other issues is that people now may have to fend for themselves and against other dangerous survival groups. Later on in the film there are other disruptions such as the rivalry between two survival groups and more fights against zombies.
On right screenshot of opening shot of our film showing apocalyptic landscape.
Recognition
The recognition stage of Todorov's theory in 'Zombieland' is the fact the zombies are a problem and are dangerous. We also show that the zombies are a threat and in the opening sequence of 'Element 115', as we show them being wary of the zombies and trying to keep there distance. Other recognitions later on in the film would be discovery of dangerous rival survival gangs.
Screenshot from 'Element 115' when Maran and Daniel spot and are aware of group of zombies.
Solution
The solution in most zombie films is either to run from them or kill them, in 'Zombieland' there is a lot of fight scenes with the zombies and sometimes escaping zombies, and in our film we also include many zombies being shot and killed, other solutions we include are running away from them such as the chase scene in the opening sequence. The solution to the problems with rival survival gangs later on in the film would be a fight, agreement or one group escaping and choosing to leave the area.
Shot of Columbus running from Zombie Shot of Maran running from zombies
Shot of Tallhassee killing Zombie Shot of Maran shooting zombie
Narrative techniques used
In all films different narrative techniques are used to have different effects on the audience and entertain and make the film overall more enjoyable. Below are a list of some of the narrative techniques we used in our opening sequence.
Cliffhanger:
Having this shot at the end of the scene is use of a cliffhanger, the audience is left wondering and eager to find out who the masked figure was why they knock out Maran.
Narrative Enigma:
We rose lots of narrative enigma throughout the sequence, on the left is just one example. Suspense is built up from when the zombies are mentioned by Maran, and the audience become more engaged wanting to see for themselves, the climax is where the audience actually see the zombies through the perspective of the binoculars.
Use of Ellipsis and fast pace
In order the sequence quick and exciting we used techniques such as Ellipsis, Sound bridges, quick cuts and fast paced music. We used ellipsis when Maran and Daniel run away from the zombies so the sequence stays at a fast pace. Quick cuts and sound bridges prevented the quick tempo of the sequence from faltering, which in turn keeps the audience engaged. The music keeps the sequence upbeat and flows well with the shot lengths and quick cuts.
Form
From our research on title sequences we learnt there are key features that title sequences need to include, such as the introduction of characters, the narrative, the style and genre. It is also important to provide the audience with some information about the film. Titles so information given
We used titles to provide the audience with information about the actors involved in the film and the people who had a part in creating the film. We also ended our opening sequence with a title shot of the name of the film, arguably the most important title.
Screenshot of title shot at end of our 'Element 115' sequence. How narrative is established
Narrative is established in our opening sequence from the conflict between the survivors and zombies, the audience learns that there must have been a zombie infection of some sort. The audience also learn key features of the story from dialogue used by the characters such as the fact they live at a camp.
How characters established
In our sequence we show the main character Maran first followed by another character Daniel, Both characters are shown frequently so the audience get the sense that these characters are important. We wanted to make the audience think both characters had a large role in the film so the scene where Daniel dies is more of a surprise to them.
Screenshot showing characters Maran and Daniel How genre established
Our opening establishing shot helps represent the genre as the setting shown in the shot is quite unclean and makes the land looks damaged. The grading is also quite dim to also help represent the apocalyptic mood and the inclusion of violence and zombies also connotes the zombie action genre.
Style
We wanted to create a feeling of a dystopian future and an apocalyptic atmosphere, as we believed this best suited the Zombie/Action genre. In order to obtain these effects we made the grading of our sequence overall slightly dim, as shown in a screenshot below where you can see the dim grading. The sense of dystopia is in our film is a lot like the setting in 'I am Legend'.
We wanted the style of our film to seem quite serious, and wanted people to see the grim reality of what could happen in a zombie apocalypse. A good example of a zombie film we wanted to have a similar style and mood to is the film '28 weeks later' the sense of dread and little hope. An example from in the opening sequence is near the end when Daniel chooses to blow himself up. We hoped this character's death would shock and surprise the audience and could relate to Maran's sadness at his friend death. Below on the right is a screenshot of the shot of Maran's reaction and shock to Daniel's death and on the left a screenshot of the dark scene in '28 weeks later'.
Our main focus on representations of social groups were age and gender, we wanted to challenge typical negative stereotypes of young people. Such as some shown on the news like when the London riots occured which made young people seem like hooligans and thugs. We also wanted to show that women can be leaders and are brave, we also hoped to show males and females at equal level when doing physical work like fighting zombies.
Representation of young males in our film
The characters shown in films seem to reflect and effect the representations of people that age and particular social groups. In our opening sequence we show two young males, but who seem quite mature and seem quite experienced and intelligent. Maran:
Maran is a young adult, but is quite mature for his age. His characteristics are intelligent, confident and a good fighter.
This challenges the stereotype that young people are immature and can be obnoxious.
Daniel:
Daniel is also a young adult, and mature for his age. He is a weapon expert and very courageous.
This challenges the stereotype that young people are naive, as he as the intelligent enough to use guns and weapons. Female character introduced later on
Later on in the film a female character in the early twenties would be introduced, who would have combat skills and a leadership trait. She would be challenge the typical stereotype that only the males would to the hard labour and fighting and be shown leading and controlling men.
Picture of Michone from the TV series 'The Walking Dead'. This survivor is similar to how I would portray the female introduced later on in 'Element 115'. She is good at fighting and is thought of as an equal to the other male survivors.
Our film is a British independent production so we believed we needed a British distribution company and an independent production company. We chose Momentum Pictures as our distribution company and Bitten Productions as our production company.
Momentum Pictures
We selected the distribution company Momentum Pictures to distribute our film. We wanted to find a well-known and popular distribution company that was British and that had worked with similar films before and Momentum Pictures fitted well due to it being British and because of a previous film it had distributed called 'The crazies'. We also liked that the fact it had distributed 'The King's Speech' a British independent film which was highly successful, which is what we wanted our film to be.
'The King's Speech' was a highly successful British independent film distributed by momentum pictures in 2010. A film this successful and British made us want to have the same company distributing our film.
'The Crazies' was a horror film distributed by momentum pictures in 2010. This zombie based film had a strong part in our decision to choose Momentum pictures as our distribution company, as 'The Crazies' had a similar genre to ours. The people of a town became infected by a contaminated water supply and as a result turned insane. This was similar to what could happen in a zombie infection outbreak.
Bitten Productions
This media institution was made up by us as a group it is a moderately known production company that produces high quality zombie films. We wanted to have a production company that specialised in making zombie based films, the film would therefore be of higher calibre as the production company is expertise at creating zombie films. Having the studio name could attract a wider audience and appeal to more fans of the zombie genre as the audience may know of the company and the previous great films they created.
Screenshots from our opening sequence showing the Momentum Pictures title and Bitten productions titles we inserted.
When we thought about who the our audience of our film was going to be we had to think about how the age rating of our film would be a 15 due to violence and gore. It was therefore not suitable for younger audiences, and meant that the big market of young audiences was out of the question. As our protagonist is British-Asian, this would widen the audience reach among other ethnicities such as British-Asian.
Here is a table showing our Primary and Secondary audiences and reasons why we chose them:
To attract and address our audience we had to use appealing themes and conventions that they would enjoy. The main things which were important in making sure our film appealed to the audience was the genre and the characters.
Genre
The genre of our film is Zombie-Action, our genre in itself has a large appeal to our primary audience of 16-24 year old males. Therefore to attract our target audience we made sure we conformed to some of the conventions of the genre.
We included many exciting shots of zombies getting killed and exciting fast paced action scenes in the opening sequence. Below is a screenshot of the exciting scene in which the first zombie is shot in the head by Daniel using a sniper.
We kept the overall sequence quick and upbeat, to match with the pace of the action chase scene. we did this using fast dramatic music and quick cuts. Screenshot of three shots that occur one after the other in the chase scene in 'Element 115'.
We frequently showed zombie in the opening sequence as shown in the screenshots below
Characters
The characters we used addressed our audience and made them want to aspire to be like them as the characteristics were positive.
Daniel on left. Maran on right.
Other general aspects to appeal to the audience
We included lots of enigma, such as the opening few shots where the audience don't see what the zombies that have been mentioned look like. And the cliffhanger at the end of the opening sequence which leaves the audience wondering who hit Maran.
Lots of exciting special effects such as gun shots and grenade blasts. Special effects happen from start so audience can expect rest of film to have exiting special effects and become more engaged.
Use of tension and suspense, when Daniel and Maran are running away the audience are excited and interested to know if they will escape or not.
Big moments such as Daniel's death, his death is likely to be a surprise to them, the outcome is enjoyable even if sad for the audience as it was unexpected.
Viral Marketing campaign
A viral marketing campaign that could appeal to our audience is to create online facilities as our target audience use computers and go online.
The things we could do online in order to get our film to reach our audience are:
Create a website and online adverts, as this is a great way for our audience to learn about our film as most people our target audience's age use a computer and go online.
Create a Facebook page and other social media website profiles, so information is spread about our film through messaging and sharing.
We could have games on the website, merchandise for sale and could have extra features exclusive to the website. This provides more entertainment for the audience and makes them more likely to think and remember about our film and in turn more likely to watch it.
We learnt many things about technologies throughout our film making process, mainly special effects such as gun shots, explosions and sound effects.
Below is a video of our director's commentary explaining some issues we had and briefly explaining what technologies we used to overcome them, or were unable to fix. The video is not completely in sync with the commentary.
Software
We used three main programmes to create our opening sequence:
Adobe Premier
Adobe After Effects
Adobe Audition
Adobe Premier
Adobe Premier was the main software programme we used to edit, we were quite familiar with using it from GCSE and knew how to use all the simple tools such as the select tool and razor tool, however we became even more experienced through the production of this piece. We got to grips and improved are ability to use effects such as grading and editing of the duration of shots to create slow motion and speed up shots.
Below is the animatic we created for our film using Adobe Premier:
The animatic was important in the fact it allowed us to:
See the timings of the shots.
Observe if the shot types and length's looked good visually.
See if the music fitted with the events happening.
Finished Sequence edited using Adobe Premier:
Adobe After Effects
This programme was new to me, we used it for all our special effects such as gun muzzle flashes, blood effects and explosions.
Muzzle Flashes To create the muzzle flash effects use masks and brightening effects. In the shot shown we had to make a mask layer of Jeremy and the gun, this allows the muzzle flash to be behind him and the gun. The muzzle flash was a image that we obtained searching on google images. As well as the mask, when the gun muzzle flash goes off, we changed the brightness of areas of Jeremy in the frame to create more realism as if the flash has lit up his face.
Explosion Effect
To create the explosion effect we used masks again to put the explosion behind the fence. The explosion was a animation effect that we had obtained from a data pack called action essentials. On the day of filming this shot we also threw up stones behind the fence to create the sense of a grenade blast. However only when editing did we realise that the grenade blast would have a larger effect on the surroundings.
Blood Effects
The blood effects were also animations in our data pack called action essentials. The process to create blood effects was very similar to muzzle flashes, but where as the muzzle flash only lasted a single frame the blood effect lasted longer. This meant we had to mask the zombie being shot for multiple frames, so the blood effect was positioned behind the zombie's body.
Adobe Audition
We used adobe audition to add in sound recordings such as zombies sounds and extra dialogue. One piece of dialogue we added was when Maran shouts 'Daniel!'. This needed to be added as Jeremy had forgot to say it on the day. We also forgot to get the zombies to make zombie sounds. Below is a scrrenshot of the zombie sounds we created using the Adobe Audition software.
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