Mise-en-scene blog post

    The goal of this project was to portray a character using at least 10 elements and a mood board. My team and I planned to focus on the characters we received utilizing the resources we had at hand; my group specifically used Canva. The character prompt we received was "A former singer with a sharp wit and a love for storytelling. She lives in a cozy apartment filled with records and memories, often sharing life lessons with younger neighbors. From this we decided our character was a brunette woman in her 50's named Robin Campbell, who rarely sees her family and spends her time listening to jazz music and babysitting the neighborhood kids. To create this character, we made a Canva slide show with multiple collages representing her setting, aesthetic, music taste, and physical appearance.

    We attempted to combine multiple musical elements to emphasize its importance to "Robin Cambell" as she is a retired singer who still holds a strong passion for music. It was also to represent a musical era as most of the music is dated, with the exception of some artists like the cranberries who were used more for aesthetics.

    This slide includes her location, Chicago, and what we pictured her home interior to look like. We selected the Chicago location as we believed being a retired singer she would want to still live somewhere highly populated though we decided she would live in a nice flat by herself. The interior of her home would be very modern with a lot of wooden elements and familial ornaments.

    This slide was to establish that she is very minimalist and chooses a very natural look as she spends most of her time inside with no need to be ready for any special events. 

    In our character station, we wrote an instruction list for the students to click through the Canva at their own pace. As each student had the Canva open on their laptop, there was also a set of headphones attached to each computer as "Fly me to the Moon". The instrumental version was playing in the background of the Canva to add to the characters' personality. Additionally, my team left a guitar tuner and microphone for a tactile element to the station; these objects were both usable and had instructions for them at the table.

    Overall, our group worked well to create additional elements for a fictional character with little description. It was interesting to see how everyone initially interpreted the character as it appeared to reflect on what we are surrounded by, and it took a while for our group to come to a complete consensus on the character's interests, aesthetics, and appearance.

Media Studies Portfolio; Horror Research

Horror Research

    The horror genre often appeals to themes of fear involving the unknown, death, and the supernatural. This genre is known for being one of the most profitable genres seeing as low budget films can gross millions.

CONTENT

    The horror genre contains different types of content to ensure the genre is being portrayed directors use foreshadowing, suspense, disgust, and often the supernatural/ cultural lore. Foreshadowing is used in Horror movies to hint to the audience what will later be unveiled. The foreshadowing often adds an eerie sense although it is only truly understandable when a film is rewatched. This can be seen as a pattern throughout the "scream" movies, as the killer often has a close connection to the victims you can infer who the perpetrator is before their reveal. Similarly, this is also seen in the "I Know What You Did Last Summer" movies. Suspense is another element found in horror movies used to captivate the audience's attention as they build up the emotions experienced in the film. They also often set up room for a jump scare in a film as the audience is intensely focused. This is seen throughout most horror movies, most including jump scares like "insidious". Disgust is an important component of the horror genre as it makes the audience uncomfortable. Disgust affects both physical and psychological elements. This can be used in gore or psychological films as it makes the audience question why, when something is "gross" and "unfamiliar". This is seen in movies like "Fresh" and "Hereditary". Supernatural and cultural lore aren't always found in horror films but when they are the focus is on tune. They may not always be accurate, but they use it in the same way films have before. There are also appearances of films that solely focus on cultural lore like "La Lorna" or "Hagazussa".

PRODUCTION TECHNIQUES

    Techniques used in the genre heavily involve lighting and sound to assist in creating the film's atmosphere. By using lighting directors can use shadows and low lighting to create an ominous presence, especially when the audience interprets what is occurring on their own. While sound is used to make the audience uneasy waiting with anticipation as to what will come next. Both sound effects and long-lasting background sound are used to tense the audiences and mess with their perception.

GENRE MARKETING

The typical horror marketing age range is between 15-25 with a core demographic of 19-24; horror has the highest 19-24 age range than other genres. This is because the idea of thrillers, slashers, and gore often appeals more towards teenagers and young adults who are mature enough to watch these films. The movies are often marketed with trailers that capture the most thrilling and suspenseful moments as it entices the audience to want to watch the film, and to want to be scared. 

Sample 1: Silent Hill, 2006

A movie version of the popular video game, this film is a supernatural horror movie that follows a desperate mother who incidentally drives through a portal in reality where she ends up trapped in an almost abandoned town, Silent Hill.  She searches for her daughter in this town continuously encountering monstrous beings and citizens of the town, all who are surrounded by darkness that is slowly taking ahold of them. This film uses dark lighting and shadows to emphasize the town's abandonment and evil presence. The shadows are used to create illusions and to set up jump scares throughout the film. The consistent use of gore and creepy characters emphasizes the horror genre as this isn't typical in any other genre.

Sample 2: Megan Is Missing, 2011

This movie is a found footage psychological horror that revolves around Megan (Rachel Quinn) and her best friend Amy Herman (Amber Perkins) who end up chatting with a stranger online. One of the friends Megan (Rachel Quinn) attempts to meet up with the online stranger resulting in her disappearance. That is when her friend Amy attempts to find her, which results in her capture as well. The film's ending surrounds the reveal of what happened to Megan and what will happen to Amy. The film uses elements of suspense, disgust, and foreshadowing. This is seen at the beginning of the film when Megan chats with the man online those who are aware of the signs of danger may realize the danger this man possesses. While the disgust and suspense are seen in the methods of torture, the girls experience and the moment leading up to them.

Other Movies to Consider:

                                                                       The Shining (1980)

                                                             

                                                                         Long Legs (2024)

                                                                 

                                                                               Psycho (1960)

                                                                

                                                                             Poltergeist (1982)

                                                                

                                                                        The Evil Dead (1981)

                                                       

Sound Projects

    In this sound lesson I learned the types of sound that can be utilized to alter the way in which a scene is perceived.  For example, in this lesson we focused on the differences between diegetic and non diegetic sound as well as methods in almost interacting with the audience by using a sound motif, sound bridge, or voice over.

                                                                        Sound Project #1

    For the first sound project we were instructed to brainstorm a scene that would occur in a 1-2 minute timespan. When we were brainstorming these scenarios we also had to determine what sounds we needed to include as we would be portraying the scene entirely through sound without visuals. 

    To brainstorm for this project my partner and I created a sound outline that looked like this:

 Scene: School setting, janitor cleaning

I. Janitor Mopping

Man humming/ whistling

mopping

Mop falling

Janitor cart wheels 

Water swishing in cart

-Faint music-transition.

II. Walking closer to band room

Mopping abruptly stops

Human footsteps

Words: “Who’s there”

Music increases, footsteps-> music quality decreases

III. Arrives at the band room

Knocking on door

Key jangle/ unlocking

Words: “its after hours”

Music: Peak loudness

Music stops

-Gremlin cackle- transition

IV. Gremlin chaos

Terrible music quality

Words “en guard”(gremlin)

Drum stick clanging

Sybals 

MUSICAL INSTRUMENT CHAOS

END-> Gremlin connecting to AMP, loud guitar riff(could be rick rolling), power outage

    This outlined helped us structure there sequence of our sounds which was especially helpful because not having a visual made it difficult to follow a story line so the outline served as a checklist. My partner was able to access Adobe Express Premium while I had access to Office 365's Clip champ. The Adobe Express Premium platform was used for layering and embedding the sounds while the Clip champ was used for developing the foley sounds in a sequential order.

    My partner and I did a good job of detailing and planning out our idea however I do believe we were too ambitious with our idea and we overestimated how much we were able to convey in a 1-2 minute clip with no visuals. Our use of sound was strong although for some it may be too powerful as our scene was intended to be chaotic it may not suit all audiences

Here is the link to our Sound Project #1: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XO05loNRAAJtwqRflVIfKc-YEJstwb15/view?usp=share_link

    Sound Project #2

  For the second sound project we were instructed to embed and overlap sounds onto our original One Word Film project while considering diegetic sounds and their timing. 

    To brainstorm for this project my partner and I created a sound outline that looked like this: 

Scene: Classroom setting

I. Class is beginning

• School Bell

• Miscellaneous noises for unpacking

• Pencil clatter

• Class room chatter

II. Students Doodling & Note passing

• Paper noises

• Pen scribbles

• Air vent noise

• Sticky note ripping

• Students coughing

• Students whispering

III. Note is folded and passed to opposing side of room

• Papers crumbled and unwrapped

• Pen clicking

• Pen scribbles

• Air vent noise

• Student Whispers

• Banter of students becomes more lively (representing the shift in mood)

    This outlined helped determine what sounds we wanted to include and additionally assisted us in discovering sounds that would have been present but often overlooked like the air vent sound. My partner and I had access to Office 365's Clip champ, where we were able to over lap up to ten sounds.

My partner and I were successful in brainstorming additional sounds as the setting was familiar to us being in a typical classroom. Additionally the placement and timing of our sounds were fairly accurate especially when we were able to adjust the amplification of a sound which helped us add additional background noises like a cough for instance. However, there is always more to add to a scene and because it was familiar we may not have inspected the scene closely enough and overlook finite details.

    Here is the link to our second sound project: OWFSound_Diaz.mp4 or https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Dn0gNrzAXiHaNrKyy64LvkHxDyvuyjdR/view?usp=share_link