The location of our horror film takes place in three different locations;
1) The first location is one of the film crews houses.
2) The second is the lane outside the house and the surrounding area.
3) The third a local school.
We chose to use the house in our filming because most of the scenes in the trailer focus around Summer being haunted inside her own house, it is also where the book is found and most of the action within the film happens. We also felt that the layout within the house allowed us to create the tense and terrifying atmosphere we desired. We had to make one minor change which was that the book was discovered in a garage rather than a base
ment due to the house we were shooting in not having one. Finally the house itself is situated in an area which has the perfect lighting at night to our horror films. All these elements combined perfectly and meant this was the perfect location for our film.
Additionally the area around the house itself has virtually no street lighting so it allowed us to cast the perfect shadows and create the terrifying chase scene we wanted. It fitted perfectly into our original idea of our location.
Finally the some of our scenes take place inside our local school. We needed to have a location that fitted in with the narrative seeing as one of the victims in the film is Summer's teacher professor Culkin. We both thought our local school would suit our needs perfectly. Stars;
To find our cast we held auditions to see who suited each role best. After the auditions we discussed who we should cast for the roles. I believe the people we chose to play our protagonist and the other main character fit the character descriptions we wanted and hopefully that pays off in the filming.
Props;
We used a variety of props during the making of our film;
1) Cardboard Boxes.
2) Book.
3) Kitchen Knife.
4) Fake Blood.
We needed to use props like these if our film shoot was going to be a success. The props helped us to create the drama and set the scene for our various clips. Without them it would not have been successful. We chose to use these particular props because we needed to create a number of things;
- We needed to replicate a newly moved into home which is why we used the cardboard removal boxes.
- As well as this we needed to find a book that fitted our sinister descripting and to set the basis for our film.
- The kitchen knife was used because our main protagonist Summer discovers a bloody knife in her bag in one of our scenes. Also the sinister connotations associated with a knife fitted in perfectly with our horror theme.
- Fake blood; fake blood was a key part of our film shooting, without it we would not have been able to film the gruesome and bloody scenes we needed and our initial footage would not look as good as it could do.
Costumes;
To fully create the characters needed for Lacerate we needed to make sure they had the correct costumes and makeup. For example Henry needed to be dressed up in a formal style to look like a teacher otherwise the footage would leave audiences confused about who was who. As well as this some of the characters go to school so obviously need to be wearing school uniform in the scenes they are in. The costumes played an important part in our filming because they allowed us to bring across the characters in the correct way.
Checklist;
Before filming could begin we had to make sure we ticked off the following things;
1) All camera equipment is fully functional and ready to film.
2) Spare batteries for all camera equipment and waterproof equipment in the case of bad weather.
3) All the casts costumes are ready and there are no changes in vital clothing.
4) Look at our notes and script to make sure we are shooting the right camera angles and the narrative done correctly.
5) All props and characters are in the correct position to film.
6) We are in the correct location for filming.
7) The cast know their lines.
