Re-shoots/Re-edits

Luckily the footage we originally filmed was good enough for us to use it in our trailer, therefore we did not have to do any re-shooting. Although, we took several shots of the same thing and then looked at which one of them would be best to use. We experimented with different angles and camera shots. However, we re-edited our actual footage several times to make it more effective and appealing to our target audience. The main reason for our re-editing was audience feedback. Throughout the whole editing process we frequently asked our target audience what they thought of particular shots, for example the length of them. We edited five parts of our trailer altogether.

1) The first shot that we had to re-edit was the chemistry lab scene, where we showed the boy walking through the class, getting tripped up, and getting acid spilt on him by our protagonist. We showed a close up of the beaker that spilled the acid on him. However, we edited this footage so that it was not in chronological order. We showed a shot of the spilled acid from the beaker first before showing what happened. This was proved to be the most effective way of presenting our footage by our target audience. It gives the audience a sense of suspense, and an understanding of what happens. We then cut to the shot of the boy walking before he gets tripped up, back to the beaker, and then shows the liquid spilling on him. The final shot of the beaker fades out gradually to give it a mysterious feel, and the feeling that something is about to happen. While this flashback scene is happening, we used the audio from our first clip of the protagonist and psychologist talking to each other about childhood trauma. We also sped up the scene to give it a sense of panic, and used an ominous piece of instrumental music to give it an eerie feel.

2) The second part of re-editing we did was within in the same flashback scene. Our target audience found it to be simple yet effective. For the original shot we had of the slow fadeout of the beaker that split the acid, we decided to use a ghostly image of the boys scarred face behind it. This is a contrast with the fadeout of the beaker, as the protagonists memory becomes more faded, the boys face becomes clearer. This denotes the idea that bad things are about to happen. Its almost as though his life has ended, but his new life as a psychological horror has begun after death. We did this by stretching and cutting the scene with the close up face to make it a slow frame. We then put it on another video track to make it the main image. We made the opacity roughly 40% to make the ghostly face look faded and mysterious.

3) The next piece of editing we did was in the graveyard where we edited the gravestone moving away from the flashback scene. This is the part where the boy/killer first appears in front of the gravestone. The first shot we did was of the gravestone by itself by the church. The second was the boy appearing by it looking straight in to the camera. We made this transmission smoother with a cross fade giving it a ghostly appearance. We also sped up the shot to fit it in with the pace of the rest of the trailer. We simply added the cross fade between scenes and used the stretch tool to shorten the shot.

4) The fourth piece of editing we did was the final shot after the credits, where the killer comes towards the camera quickly and unexpectedly. We did this after the credits to shock our audience as they think the trailer is over, therefore do not expect a final disturbing shot. The shot was initially backwards, and not as startling, so the movements appeared to be more natural, but we felt that an unnatural movement would be more effective. We sped up the scene significantly so that it is so fast it is almost subliminal. This was to leave a lasting flash of a gory image with out audience.

5) Finally, we re-edited the audio track. In order to use the track most effectively, we slowed it down while the psychologist was talking to the protagonist, not only to give it a creepy sound, but so that the audience can understand the conversation and aren't too distracted by the music. We also added an exponential fade at the end of the audio track to give the trailer a fade out as opposed to an abrupt and quick end. This made the trailer look alot smoother and it flowed together better.