Horror Trailer, Production Evaulation

Production Evaluation
The purpose of an evaluation is for you to revisit the pre-production, Production and post-production stages of the assignment. Through doing this you will be able to decide if you have achieved the outcome that you had originally planned.The important aspect of this evaluation is not that everything went to plan and you are happy with that outcome, although this is still important. What we also need to see is that you have carefully considered each aspect of the assignment and taken from that assignment any lessons or do’s and don’ts that can be transferred on to the next assignment. It is only through such a process that you can really gauge how far and how much you have taken from the course

.1. What do you feel is the most important area of learning that you have taken from this assignment? Look at all the production stages and ask your self which areas of this assignment have given you a new way of thinking or approaching you future projects. (50 Words)

Looking back on our production I would say that this project has given me a lot of useful experience in all stages of production, firstly from the pre-production stage I learnt that it really is important to get all of your pre production work and paperwork out of the way as soon as possible and to have it as concrete as possible, with this project we were a little loose with our pre-production work and I think it defiantly slowed us down in some areas, not only that but also as you are filming you do have to make changes and it is really very much easier just to go back and make a few changes throughout your paper work. Secondly throughout filming we had to get other people to film for us at certain points and you really do need to be specific in what you want because if your not in the long run it just costs you extra time and as long as you ask in a nice way, a lot of people are happy to do things to your specification. During the editing stage we had trouble finding music to fit our piece I think next time it will defiantly be something I need to look into a lot earlier in the project so as to give myself more time and get the best result possible

2. From your finished project what parts are you most happy with? With the same level of consideration what areas do you feel you need to improve on? (50 Words)

From the finished project I would say I’m quite happy with the piece overall, although it is a little slow but this was mainly due to the fact that we really did try and stick religiously to the time specification given. Also if I could go back I would get a different sound track. Because there is quite a bit of text in our trailer and upon viewing it didn’t stand out all that clearly I would defiantly rectify that by making the front bigger bolder and maybe in a different color, there are certain aspects of my parts of the trailer I would change but that’s mainly to do with camera angles and shots, for starters I would try and get a lot more close ups in but with shorter scenes and really try and capture the actors facial expressions.

3. How well do you think you and your group worked in achieving all the goals that were set by the assignment brief? (50 Words)

I think for this project we did fairly well but could have done better. As a group we communicated well but had issues with myself and other group members being absent which obviously is problematic, when you’re trying to film especially. We worked well with coming up with the initial idea and everyone was happy with the one we came up with and we discussed it a lot, and even though throughout the production we pretty much ended up tweaking every scene if only a little we managed to work well enough together to do that with out any major delays or mishaps. For my part I think I tend to take control a little to much so for this project I tried to step back a little and let other be in charge, it worked out better because it gives people there own responsibility and means I don’t worry as much about things I shouldn’t have too.

4. What would you change or do differently in the next production? (50 Words)

In the next production I would make sure that we absolutely had all the paper work finished and in order before we even considered filming. Also really try and make sure that every member of cast and crew will be present when needed as I think these were our biggest downfalls in this project. I would also consider the practicality of the chosen storyline a lot further, in this project when we came up with the ideas they seemed brilliant but then when we had to film some of them just weren’t practical so we had to stop and look at other things to replace them this defiantly cost us time that we could have used making sure we had better footage and in editing. I would also make sure we had more time to edit as we were right down to the deadline with this project.

5. How does your trailer fit with the look and style of a real example that you looked at in research, think about how your trailer looks and how it is edited (50 Words)

I think our trailer is about 50/50 for the brief, looking at real trailers. when coming up with the ideas for the trailer I kept going back to the idea of a story that was set up for you really, throughout the trailer there is text explaining things that would seem unclear or unrealistic if you didn’t know the story line behind them but without giving away what’s happening in the film too much, I took this idea mainly from the film the ‘Blair Witch Project’, although I’ve never seen the film, having watched the trailers they used the same technique and it does help build a sense of tension and intrigue for the film. I think our trailer was perhaps a bit slow to be a conventional trailer and maybe not dramatic enough for a horror trailer, during editing we tried to make it quite choppy, as a lot of horror trailer are fast, with short choppy scenes, this worked to an extent but I think overall some of our scenes where just to long and in future we would have to consider that more when planning. Also as a general rule horror trailers have a darker atmosphere and setting but because we were filming during the day it was hard to get round that, if we could have filmed later in the day or at night it would have been better things that happen at night always seem scarier than during the day, I know as a rule that most horror films I watch during the day don’t bother me nearly quite as much as the one I watch later at night.