Production Influences

The film we are making will be a low-budget horror film. We will not have as much sound and lighting equipment as bigger budget films so we will have to focus on how we use our camera. This means that we will need to use effective camera shots and angles to get the story to the audience and to create tension within our film. 

A couple of effective uses of camera that we hope to incorporate into our own style and that will inspire our filming techniques are from "Luther" and "Scream". 

"Luther" was a TV show aired on the BBC. It used clever camera angles and used the camera conventions of a thriller to entice the audience and increase suspense. They used careful framing and extended shots to create this effect on the audience. The extended shots would be useful as the shot would pause on a moment until the audience felt as uncomfortable with the situation as the characters in the show were. This was effective as it let the audience step into the situation and into the characters shoes. These moments are shown in the clip below. 

In this clip there are also some very interesting camera shots. When Luther is walking towards the crime scene, the use of the blurred background makes it clear to the audience who they should focus on within the scene. It gives him prevalence and makes the audience focus on what he is saying rather than get distracted by the rest of the crime scene. The dramatic high angled match cut when he walks through the white sheet is effective as it shows him to, again, be the one you should focus on as a high angle usually represents power and dominance. The match cut to a plain background uses the same technique as the blurred background. It keeps you focusing on him and his facial expressions as you watch. The expressions along with the jaunty angle of the shot makes it more mysterious and makes the audience slightly uneasy. The slow panning of the room increases the tension and uneasy feeling of the audience.

"Scream", released in 1996, was directed by Wes Craven, a very influential horror director. In the opening, Craven uses the same technique of lingering on moments as they do in "Luther". He does not directly show us the threat to any of the lead characters but shows us things throughout which we can focus on to make the audience themselves feel threatened as if they are in the film. 

In the clip above, Craven chooses to focus on the girl on the phone rather than her surroundings. Much the same as in "Luther", we don't get to see immediately what the characters are seeing, creating tension and suspense within the clip and setting up the rest of the film. The use of close-ups increase this tension as we still don't see what she is seeing. Her expressions show us that she is getting increasingly worried and scared about what she sees, yet the audience don't see it creating a fear of the unknown for the audience as well as the character.