Faith's Work on Props

PROPS:

One prop we decided to include was the use of bags to cover our victim's faces. I had these made out of a black material (thanks to my Mother) and used them to connote our character's vulnerability and restrictions. It's stereotypical of a horror, or even an actions films, to demonstrate a sense of fear of the unknown due to having their sight taken from them. The audience are able to feel sympathy for the characters as they have been made unable to see their surroundings and the dangers around them. The audience get a sense of fear also, as they are able to question the antagonist's intentions due to restricted their sight and knowledge of the place they've been taken to. The simplicity of the black bags work well to connote the darkness within the scene, and it also works well to keep the attention on the struggling bodies that wear them. 

Another prop we decided to use was a shovel. Karlton and I decided on this due to what it could suggest to our target audience. Our narrative is based upon what a person is willing to do for their best friend - as she does tasks that will reward her with clues. Using the shovel connotes the idea of something or someone being buried, therefore implying that our protagonist could have gone as far as killing someone. This as a result just helps to make our horror film trailer more sinister and cold, which is especially surprising due to the young age of the protagonist. Our protagonist is also supposed to be someone of good, so when we see such cold actions like this, it helps to signify her inner darkness to save someone she cares about. Another prop we used was a lighter for the use of fire in our horror film trailer. For the shot shown below, I used a shallow depth of field and focused on the hand and the lighter in the foreground. This then made the house in the background out of focus, meaning my target audience can focus on what's more important In this shot - which is the flame and the danger surrounding our protagonist's thoughts. The house in the background connotes the idea that our protagonist will be actually setting fire to the house she stands outside of - which then demonstrates one of the possible tasks she has to do to find her friend. Fire as a whole is associated with danger.

Another prop we used included the use of paper, a pen and fake blood. Due to the narrative being based upon friendship and tasks having to be performed to save one of them - we wanted to be able to show our target audience the clues visually, and not just with the use of a voice over or text. I used normal lined paper appose to anything else, as I waned it to have a sense of simplicity. Our protagonist is putting her life in danger for a piece of paper. Nothing more. This just tells our target audience how much power a simple piece of paper has over her. I used fake blood on it to connote bloodlust on our antagonist's part. Our target audience may take the blood on the clue, as the victim's blood, the protagonists blood suggesting injury, or even someone else's blood connoting a possible task that our protagonist had to do. I wrote 'Clue two', appose to 'Clue one', so that our target audience would be able to see that their are multiple clues of which the protagonist can earn. I also wanted to use 'Clue two', as it means the target audience isn't seeing the narrative in chronological order within our film trailer. In film trailers, they don't necessarily show the shots in order of narrative and events - however what they do tend to do, is show the most exciting shots in an order that provides excitement and tension.

We also created a missing poster, which you can see in the ancillary tasks, to make our narrative more real and believable. The poster assured our target audience that these characters have made the effort to use other sources to find her. It creates the idea of this girl being heavily loved and adored by the people around her, which creates further sympathy when we see her in pain and agony on screen. The missing poster gives a background to our characters, as it implies that they have a family and other people who wish for their teenage daughter back.

I think that these props worked well for our narrative, as they all  provide a sense of excitement and tension. We tried to think outside of the box to make our horror films trailer different, and we tried to make our props conventional to the horror film genre.