Editing: Finishing touches

Unknown from Emily Smith on Vimeo.

Above, is hopefully my final cut of my teaser trailer, I just had to make a few tiny improvements to better it and make it all flow more smoothly;

Muting the clip of me getting out of the car

Lowering the noise of the footsteps

Shortening the clip of the brothers running

Amplifying the volume of Carl's dialogue

The main little adjustments that I needed to make was volume; in the clip of me getting out of the car you could hear the keys jingling therefore I needed to mute that completely, then in the shot of mum and dad walking I lowered the volume of the footsteps as they were too loud and overpowering, then I also had to make Carl's new bit of dialogue a bit louder so that you could hear him clearly over top of the score. Then the only little adjustment that didn't have anything to do with sound was the trimming of the shot of Carl and Alex running, as I felt it lingered for too long which didn't fit well with the convention of teaser trailers being made up of lots of short little clips and snippets from the overall film.

Editing: Second focus group for my teaser trailer

Unknown from Emily Smith on Vimeo.

Now, I have re-filmed the scenes that I want and put them all together with all the different sounds that I have created and recorded. Below, I have filmed my media class again giving me feedback on what they liked and what they thought was good about, also their constructive criticism on where to go next.


MAH00824 from Emily Smith on Vimeo.

The first comment was that 'Unknown' is apparently already a film name, however my film is not using the same ideas as this film, as well as this it is clear in previous research and planning posts that the name and ideas for my film were not influenced by this film at all and because of this I am choosing to stick with the name that I already have, and you can hear my media teacher saying that it is not a problem to have the same name because of those reasons and also because many films around the world have either the same or similar names, and also because it's not iconic, I will also talk about this in my evaluation.
Secondly, it was picked up on that Carl's dialogue is not very clear, however before I'd done this focus group I had noticed that Carl's dialogue also sounds staged which I have mentioned previously and I will record him saying again but several times to find a more natural and clearer one.
There was a query about the black and white filters over some of the shots, however it was only one person who was slightly thrown off by this and everyone else commented that they thought it was fine and actually really liked the effects, therefore I have considered this comment but I am choosing not to worry about it too much as it was only one viewer and they weren't sure why it was throwing them off or how to fix that.
Sam said he really liked my titles and the end and said that they looked very professional, and others agreed with him.
There was a question about the gunshot sound, and whether I wanted it to end so shortly and I had tried playing around to prolong but this always made it last too long and sound completely wrong, then again when I listened to other gunshot sounds, they also came to sudden ends because gunshots are loud and fast and over quickly, hence it being a popular choice of weapon for murder because it can kill quickly.
A compliment was that it had more narrative and depth to it compared to my last draft which I was happy to hear as that was what I had been working towards, also that it follows the conventions and readings of a teaser trailer, and that the music was a good choice for build up and creating pace alongside the different shots.

Editing: Sorting out my titles

Sorting the titles

Another one of the jobs that was important to sort out was the titles that appear at the end of the teaser trailer, the style of title and the font and size was fine, even what was written on screen was fine, but I decided to have the name of the film appear before the 'Coming Soon' title and also after this title, as well as this the hashtag, main characters names and directors name flows from the 'Coming Soon' title screen into the beginning of the last 'Unknown' title screen. It has been commented that my titles now look much more professional and resemble teaser trailer titles, especially by not giving too much away. Also, another comment was that I made my music also fade at the end of the teaser trailer so that it didn't just come to a sudden end.

Editing: Adding more transitions

Cross dissolve

Fade away

I added two more transitions to my teaser trailer (I have already added one before which was the flash transition because it represented that time had passed between the light switch shot and the funeral scenes, it also implies the death of the parents with the whole 'going into the light' idea associated with death), I didn't want to many otherwise it would become too unnatural, which is why I chose more subtle transitions like the two in these pictures. I chose the cross dissolve one to appear between the shot of Carl looking at the baby pictures and then to the close-up of the baby picture, because then I felt it would create more of a drama and reaction from the audience, as well as enigma. And then for the second one which is the fade away transition which happens after the footsteps and this just makes the shot flow into the light switch shot more smoothly whereas before it was a bit of an abrupt change in shots.

Editing: Getting the score to fade in and out

Getting my music to fade in and out

With my score, in a previous post I mentioned how I used the blade to split it in half so I could have the build up and the intense bit that is the climax of the music piece in my teaser trailer, well when I listened and played it through the bit where it changes from the build up to the climax sounded to abrupt and faltered instead of flowing easily into one another, therefore I made the build up fade out and made it continue to play longer into the title shot instead of ending when the baby photograph does, this way it was fading out while the climax bit was fading in, and because of this they were not clashing with each other, they ended up flowing nicely into one another.

Editing: Moving a clip to fit the teaser trailer convention

Moving a specific clip from the teaser trailer

A new clip that I filmed for my teaser trailer was of the mother arguing with one of the sons, I wanted this because my media teacher made a comment after viewing my first draft that it was unclear as to who had died, and although one of the dialogues mention who it is who has been murdered I also decided to film a clip with one of the parents actually in it, and originally in the clip the mother was telling her son to "sort himself out" because originally this clip was added to the beginning of the whole teaser trailer, however watching it all together I decided that I really did not like the clip being in the position that it was, I felt the parents walking towards the house was much more of an effective, stronger opening. Although, I knew that I definitely still wanted to use this clip, because of this I chose to move it to appear somewhere else in the teaser trailer and I decided it actually fit in quite well where the music got more intense and the clips were getting a lot faster and shorter, so I trimmed the clip a bit shorter so you just saw the mum pointing at the son angrily and getting up in his face, and I took all sound and speech out of it as I felt it did not need this because the intense part of the music made it more dramatic and it was obvious by her hand gestures and positioning that she was angry. Also, I added a black and white effect over top of the shot to portray it as a flashback; however I've also put black and white filters over top of the scene of the parents walking towards the house and also over top of the closeup of the baby photo, I've done this because I feel these are two very important scenes in the teaser trailer that could be easily missed and therefore the effect draws the audiences attention towards them.

Editing: Sorting the foleyed explosion to sound more realistic

Making my explosion more realistic

For my gunshot, I did foley it with many different items to try and make the sound as you'll see in a previous post 'Using the marantz'. However, I could not decide which one sounded more life-like, therefore I chose three of the best recordings and then because they were over too quickly and suddenly, I slowed all three of their speeds down by 50% and they actually ended up sounding perfect together for a gunshot. and I turned up their volumes a bit so that they were amplified as well to add effect. I'm pretty happy with how my gunshot has turned out though.

Editing: Splitting the score clip to fit with the scenes that are happening on screen

Splitting the score (Epic and Dramatic Trailer Music)

As I had always imagined the music would build up so that it climaxed when it got to the title "Secrets can ruin lives", because I feel this is the turning point in the teaser trailer where things start to get more intense and the pace quickens, therefore the music being at it's highest point really fits in with these scenes, however because of how long the piece of music is compared to the actually teaser trailer, the highest point in the piece of music actually never even makes it in the teaser trailer if I done nothing to it, therefore I have trimmed the beginning bit of the piece of the music to where the music starts building up a bit more and then I used the 'Blade' tool to split the piece of music from where the beginning of the build up ends to where the highest point of the music starts, and then I trimmed the build up piece to finish where the close-up of the baby photo shot ends, and then added the piece of music where the climax in the song starts to where the title "Secrets can ruin lives" is and then I trimmed this to finish when the whole teaser trailer finishes.

Editing: Adding all the foleying, wild track sounds, dialogue, sorting all the silence and the score to fit the scenes

Adding my sounds

As I made sure to record all of my dialogue, wild-track and foleyed sounds several times so that when it came to editing then I could listen to them all with the clips and choose the ones that work best. Luckily the dialogue of my dad speaking only took one take and it has worked really well within my teaser trailer and my media teacher agreed with me on that one, however I tried listening to all the different recordings of Carl saying his line of speech and unfortunately they all sounded too staged/set up for the scene and it just wasn't natural, so I will have record that one again to add in, and I'll try to make him have a conversation and say that line within it and then I'll trim the bits before and after that line out and then hopefully it will sound much more natural.
With my wild-track, I wanted the audience to be able to distinctly hear the sound of wind in the background of the graveyard scenes because these are the only outside scenes where the music is still quite quiet, therefore this adds to the atmosphere of it sound realistic.
Finally, adding the foleyed sound of a gunshot in, I was unsure of which one sounded most like an gunshot, therefore I added in all three sounds to the editing of the teaser trailer, and I'll talk more about them in the post where I explain how I made my explosion sound more realistic.

Editing: Adding all the new film clips and trimming them

Adding my new clips

The new clips that I have added make it look more like a teaser trailer as it is a mixture of clips at all different angles, showing off different areas of the film, but also creating some sort of story with an enigma in there to attract my target audiences to come watch it. Especially as in my new clips I have included a gun which attracts the majority of my male target audience as well.

These new re-filmed scenes add pace to the teaser trailer, which goes with the build up of the music and the suspense and drama of the Thriller is unfolding, which attracts the audience and crates some sort of emotion from them.

Editing: Adding music to my teaser trailer

I've tried out the two pieces of music that I liked most with my teaser trailer as I was still undecided on which one I liked:

Me adding my chosen piece to the teaser trailer

After, listening to these two pieces separately in the teaser trailer I have decided that my favourite is the Dramatic and Epic piece made by ........ because it adds suspension and creates emotion from the audience when watching the teaser trailer, and the anticipation created makes the viewers want to go and view it. Plus it builds up and does not get boring, especially not repetitive. My original worry was that it may be too dramatic, however a Thriller's suspense is created by drama, therefore this music actually fits the conventions of a Thriller.

My final choice of the two pieces of music has been added to the trailer.

Production: Choosing the music for my teaser trailer

After doing a research post and talking to my focus group about which type of music would be most appropriate to use in my teaser trailer, I have managed to come to the conclusion that a piece that creates suspension is what I want, so this could be a piece that is created by string instruments or a drum.

I am going to be posting all different pieces that I like the sound of in this post and then choosing which one I want and that fits with the scenes I've filmed in the end.

1.



I like the way this builds up, keeping the same sounds all the way through but just introducing them all at different times one after another. However, I would only use the piece from 0.00-1.45 because after 1.45 the music starts to filter in some bass which takes over top and ends up making it sound slightly upbeat which wouldn't really fit with my teaser trailer as it's quite sad and gritty.
Next, I wanted to just check whether the YouTuber who created this allowed people to use it themselves and this is what he posted about it:

As long as I am not using it for one of the reasons in his list on the left which I am not then I do not need to personally email him to use his music which was very helpful as a reply may have taken a while, even though he does not mention if I use him in my teaser trailer I will pay credit to him in my titles at the end of the film as he has provided me with a very important feature to my teaser trailer that I need.















2.



I loved this piece of music, I loved the emotions it made me feel while listening and how you could really connect to it. My only problem is that I feel it would fit better with a teaser trailer of the Drama genre, especially because it has a piano riff all the way throughout it. Therefore, I will have to fit the piece with my teaser trailer and see what I think of it then, if I am still unsure then I will show it to a focus group.

Again, this YouTuber doesn't ask for you to contact him personally unless you are using his music in a video which will promote something or to get money for it which again I am not, therefore he is allowing me to use his music in my teaser trailer, and as before I will credit him in my titles if his music is what I choose for my teaser trailer (This is my choice, he has not been asked to be credited).

Production: Using the Marantz

The marantz is what I used to record my two bits of dialogue that appear overtop of shots where you do not see the character actually talking, so in my case where the vicar is conducting the funeral but the shot is of the two brothers, and when one of the brothers says "I wonder what else mum and dad were hiding from us." Over top of the clip where he is looking at the mysterious baby pictures.


IMG 2349[1] from Emily Smith on Vimeo.

Next, I used the marantz for a wild track as well, I felt as the clips of them at the graveyard are the only outdoors scenes where there is quiet music playing, then I would also record a wildtrack of the wind to have in the background to add to the effect of them being outside.

Finally, I used the marantz for the foleying noise of the gunshot at the beginning when he flicks the light, and to do this I used two large empty crisp packets and got my dad to blow air into them and then smack them so it made the loud bang, and then to have a bit of a snap to the gunshot as well I recorded myself smacking a placemat against the table.


IMG 2357[1] from Emily Smith on Vimeo.

Research: Conventional gunshot sounds

Planning: Allocation of tasks

What have I got left to do:
Now, I have completed and posted all Research and Planning posts, I need to put a list together of all my actions to take place next, at the top of the list will be tasks that are most important and at the bottom will be tasks that can be left a little while before they need to be done;

• Finish editing my teaser trailer
• Take pictures for my ancillary products
• Edit my film poster and magazine cover (ancillary products)
• Focus group of me showing my second rough draft of my teaser trailer
• Change or re-film any criticism there was for my teaser trailer
• Present my ancillary products to a focus group
• Edit any criticism that the class have about these products
• Show my teaser trailer to my target audience and make changes on any criticism they have
• Show my ancillary products to the target audience, and again make any changes that they think I should
• Finally, upload both the final production of my teaser trailer and the final edits of my ancillary products
• (After performing each one of the tasks above, I will upload a blog post on them about how they went and what I did, and any feedback I got back from them).

The deadline I have set myself to have all of these tasks done by is Friday 13th February.

Planning: Dialogue, music, sound

Planning: Sound - diegetic and non-diegetic/synchronus