I visited many of our friends houses and walked through where the scenes would be to find the set of the house. After I had taken photos and walked through me and Sarah sat down and discussed what would work and what wouldn't and finally decided on the location that would work best. For example we walked through Sarah's house, her living room is big and open and joins on the kitchen and dining room so it is all one room. This was not suitable because we walked a long hallway with wooden floor (to make the shot where Jake enters the house and kitchen more tense as you can hear his footsteps walking) Another reason against Sarah's house was that we wanted a room in which the killer could stand in the doorway of to create tension, however the room we would use was right at the top of the stairs so Jake and Rachel would potentially be able to see them and wouldn't work.
We decided on my house because it fitted what we wanted really well, there is a wooden hallway leading to the kitchen (where we find Rachel for the first time). It also works as we can shoot from outside at Rachel and Jake walking up the stairs creating a sense of tension that someone is watching them. I also looked into places we could film the outdoor shots, we decided on certain areas because they would work well on camera.
Creating the shooting schedule and setting target dates was important to make sure we had filmed all we needed too and on time. I looked through the storyboard and where we had located each shot and decided what would be best filmed and on what date. I arranged dates that all the actors we free and a time when the lighting was best. For example the shots of Jake and Rachel opening the door to find no one there needed to be almost pitch black as it would have been in the middle of the night. The shots of the dead people outside needed to be in daylight as we will need to see them in the shot. I made sure I left enough time for each shot and time for make up and setting up the mis-en-scene. Like the shot of the dead person in the bath tub, we needed to leave time to fill up the bath with ketchup and food colouring and then making the actor look dead. I set target dates of when we will have filmed a certain scene and made sure we made all those target dates to keep on schedule. This ensures we will have filmed it all in time for editing and have enough days where all the actors needed are free.
It was Sarah's responsibility to hold character interviews and then we both discussed what actor would work best. We wanted the main man to be stronger looking and the main women to be able to suit the typical 'housewife' role. We wanted the killer to be quite big built and the dead people to be quite average looking that the audience could possibly relate to. After holding out the interviews Sarah showed me her notes and her judgement on who would best suit the role. We discussed it and decided on the actors we have in the film now.
Sarah was also in charge of the actors costumes and getting them together, this included their make up. After discussing what would work best Sarah decided that the male lead should be wearing a suit to represent the typical 'male' role of going out to work and earning all the money for the wife. The female lead was wearing pink and white, which we wanted to represent as the soft, caring character that has conformed to the typical wife/mother role. This relates back to Laura Mulvey's theory of our female lead either being a madonna or a whore and that the females are usually passive and males are usually active.
I was in charge of the props used, I wanted props that would help represent the characters and their roles effectively. I chose the lead male at the beginning to carry a briefcase representing that he had been out at work in the typical 'male' role coming home and finding the lead female who has props like a cutting board and knife conforming to the typical housewife role. We also needed props in the next scene at the dining table like cutlery, plates and glasses and a bottle of wine to help show that they are a happy couple. We also needed other props for the deaths (ketchup and food colouring for the blood), and other everyday objects like the can of coke for the dead man by the bridge. We tried to show that they were typical people in normal everyday situations, for example the man dead by the bridge could have been sipping coke on the bridge normally before he died.
We both discussed possible titles for our film, we wanted a title that would interest the audience and also suit the genre of horror. We came up with many possible names including:
-Taken
-3:33
-The Minds of Others
-Took
-Captured
-Unexplained
-Mysteria
We decided on the title Mysteria because it was the most interesting one that was spooky and represents our film quite well. It comes from the word mystery, which relates to our film as it is a mystery as to what happened to the female lead or to who took her.
We also both decided on what shots to use and where, we both had a clear image of the direction we wanted to take our film in and easily discussed what shots would work best to create tension and keep the audience engaged. We created storyboards and experimented on what shots would be most appropriate, we used different shots like close ups and long shots to keep the suspense and tension within the film. Me and my partner found this task quite easy as we both knew what we wanted our film to be like and could easily compromise to get the best result of our film possible. We made our storyboards detailed and tried to make them as realistic as to what we could film as possible.
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