Group Task- Birthday Party Scene

In groups we were set the task to create a scene of a birthday and apply a genre to the scene. My group and I decided to go for a horror genre, we had a variety of idea that lead to us using a variety of props and even and even creating our own. Unfortunately we didn't have enough time to plan ahead, we really only had time to collect any props that we thought would be useful. We were the last group to take our shot, that gave us the benefit of the doubt as we had more time to figure out how we were going to set up the shot and what the could potential narrative could be.

At first we were all coming up with different ideas, before we all agreed that there should be one main focus to the shot and that like any film of the horror genre we can use effects to get the narrative and genre across better. Meaning in the end we decided to keep the scene as simple as we could. Therefore a member of our group volunteered to play the 'victim' and be the scenes main focus. We took multiple shots, some of just him against the blue screen (in case we wanted to add a background) and then we came up with the idea to add a balloon in front of the lens. This was better than using red lighting or just a red filter as it added more of a symbolic code that danger lied within the scene.

On the original picture you could see the outline of the balloon, as we all had to edit the images individually while still sticking to our chosen genre, I decided to keep the outline of the balloon and use it as a prop for my edited version of the scene. 

I first took the balloon and cut around the edges and added it to a black background. I believe this helped it stand out and it would be able to help with the mise-en-scene of the scene. The main characters body language shows how he is trapped and confined, as he has been tied up his body takes up very little room in the image. The decor when we took the actual shot we tried to keep it as plain as possible not only allowing us to edit it, but to also allow audiences to have a clear idea that there is nothing around to save the victim. Props we used to clearly signify the idea of a birthday party is the pointed hat we created before we took the shot as it is traditional to wear those especially at children s birthday party's. When it came to the lighting we first tried using no lighting and creating a dark and curious scene so that the audience would get the idea that something unexpected was going to happen. However when the images came up it was not visible to see enough detail, then we decided to place a spot light on the left hand corner next to the camera, this showed more detail within the image meaning more of a story could be told and it created a significance to the victim bringing up the idea that he was in trouble for whatever reason. Costume wise we did not prepare to bring in a certain costume, however we did work with what we had and as he was dressed casually it could mean that our character was just going on about his day before being violently dragged away from that and being placed in an unexpected situation that could lead to him being in trouble. When it come to performance our character didn't have to do a much as our use of props did most of the work, as he is being contained and unable to make any actions of his own. With our camera angle we went for a long shot this would allow use to make any individual changes when it came to the editing process, although our main idea was that with a long shot it can be shown how the character is isolated and nobody else seems to be around, which is a key convention before a victim in a horror narrative has something awful happen to them.

Audience Research

After we had created and edited our images, we were then set the task to send our individual images out onto social media websites and ask people what they believed was to genre it fits into and what they would believe is going on in the photo. Unfortunately when it came to this task I did not receive any answers on Twitter, although I did receive answers on Facebook I did not receive the 10 i required and there was also a lot of inappropriate answers given. Therefore I asked my teacher if there was any other alternative and she said that I could do it like a survey and asked people face-to-face, just as long as it was mixed gender and I asked people I was not friends with. Which was reasonable as this meant I would get fair, honest answers that would I clearly would not turn into biased ones. For this I went round the colleges social area and showed people my edited image and asked them to write down on a sticky note what they believed the genre and the narrative was. Here are my findings:

From these answers I can tell that me and my group applied the right conventions to help the genre of horror come across. Also with my edited image I did try to make it look like a trap and that the victim within the image was in some sort of trouble. I think the audiences could tell that with the red filter it signified danger and that added with the black background is a traditional convention when it comes to a horror genre representative. The audience also suggested that the character is positioned and represented in away that suggests that they are not in a situation that can be enjoyable and that they are about to be treated in away that someone or something is going to attack or torture them. I believe that this is a correct reading of the image as with any other horror film poster audiences are given the idea that something awful shall happen to the characters, while only giving them little hints that could give them a whole range of ideas and from my research I believe that I have created a similar image, however on a more ammeter level as when it did come to the editing I did come to some difficulty when trying to add in certain features such as the hands around the balloon. But over all I believe that the image is readable as a horror as it contains horror conventions that audiences will be able to identify.