Horror film rough cut review

Recently during my lessons myself and partner have been editing our horror film and including various effects which could eventually make our film successful. We added a variety of opening credits and sound to go ontop. The research that i had done before hand on various film openings gave me an idea of what things to include. My partner and i included the directors, actors and actresses, film title and production company.

We then had to present our rough copy of our film to the class to get constructive criticism which could better our film later on. While the class watched our horror film 'Espiridion', the reactions were quite pleasing, because some of the class were quite shocked and scared. Although we got the ideal reaction from our audience, they then gave us feedback. We were told to improve on our sound effects and the timing of them. Within the film as the main character walked into the church, gospel music began to play. The music should have stopped smothly, or turned down in the background. However my partner and i cut it completly at a random point. Myself and partner took this into consideration and  made sure the foley sound was played continuously throughout, to make it seem more scary as if someone is constantly watching the character.

Another criticism we got was the lighting of the whole opening scene. We were told that it was difficult to see, which could effect the audiences response to the film. The lighting in the church was very dark, because it was taken and set in the night time. Myself and partner wanted to created a dull ghostly effect, but it came out different. So that the storyline was clear to the audience, we brightened the film and added various effects so that the darkness worked with the event happening. For example, we included a ghostly effect aswell as a distorted to show that the character isnt herself, which links to her surroundings which isnt normal either.

Various other people gave us very helful constructive feedback as they told us to add more opening credits. They told us to reduce the font of some so that it was suitable for the scene. As well as making changes to the different credits and the order of them we also changed the sound to go with it. Myself and partner included scary sounds as the writing came on screen. Depending on the credits we placed the right credits on the specific actors face. This made it clear to the audience who the actors were and what characters  they played.

My teacher made us aware that we would get less marks if the camera was jumpy and if the characters face was cut out. A variety of transitions did not work in certain places so we had to choose suitable ones. However, as well as the negative feedback the class gave us positive comments too. We were told our horror film opening was quite scary, that it had a clear story line, good sound effects and talented actors. My partner and i took all feedback onboard and made changes were it was needed.