Review of test shoot

On Wednesday, we did a test shoot for our opening sequence in order to identify what parts of our idea worked well and where we need to make some changes. Below are some pictures of the test shoot:










Whilst I feel that the plot is clear due to the reveal of the man feeding the woman the poison shortly before her hands go limp, By adding more clues and shots of the man doing different activities to prepare the poison, I believe that we could communicate this from earlier on in the sequence. For example, as a group we have decided to add in extra details to create a sinister atmosphere from early on. For example, we have decided to include a scientific set up, such as the one that is used for distillation pictured below. This will add to the character of the man by revealing his meticulous nature and hinting at the fact that there is something unusual going on. We would include some extra close up shots of the roaring spirit burner flame and the clock ticking to add to the tension. We would also include a shot of the tweezers being sterilised using the fire This would also help to make the sequence longer, which is something that we struggled with during our test shoot. Furthermore, we failed to follow the on-set protocol, which states that the camera should be rolling for the duration of the shoot. By doing this, we would also have more footage to work with and this would allow us to extend our opening sequence to at least two minutes.














However, despite the difficulties we encountered, there were some aspects of our test shoot that worked well. For example, we thought that the shots we did take of the man preparing the poisonous mixture formed quite a mysterious yet enigmatic tone. One success of our test shoot was the last shot in which the woman's hands go limp which happens just as the music changes tone. This is something that we would like to include in our final shoot. I also believe that the close-up shots of the woman's hands and legs tied up communicate the idea of her being tortured by the man quite well. As a group, we have agreed that we think the second half of the opening sequence is much more engaging than the first half, and this is another reason why we wish to include more detail of the preparation of the poisonous substance from the beginning. I filmed some of the sequence from an off-centre angle and although this was a mistake, our group have agreed that we actually like this aspect of it and this is something that we might experiment further with. Next time, we also need to work on continuity. By making sure not to move any of the props, we should be able to achieve this.









With all this in mind, below is the new outline we have decided on:


Puts on the vinyl
Man whistling along to the song, he walks from left to right, pan follows his waist as he walks past his scientific set up (distillation, equipment out)
Over the shoulder shot from the woman to the man over by the window (silhouette)
The whistling stops and he takes out a bag of berries in the same shot
Close up of him holding up the berries to the light of the window
Extreme Close up of clock ticking with the sound
Extreme Close up of gentle roaring flame
Extreme Close up of bubbling water in the flask (foreshadowing the bubbling funnel)
Medium closeup of him putting the berries down
Close up of his chest and lower half of his face looking out of the window (from a diagonal angle)
A shot of outside through the window (POV) of the sky?
Close up of his chest and lower half of his face again but he returns to his task
Shot of all of the equipment again


Shot of foot struggling from behind as it is tied to the chair
Tweezers sterilise with fire
Pick the berries out of the bag and into the pestle and mortar
text message (shot of phone buzzing on a different surface). His wife asking what he wants for dinner that night
closeup when One falls on his hand
Uses bleach or a strong chemical to wash his hands because of the berry
he picks it up again with tweezers and discards it
Puts on rubber gloves, for extra protection
Wipes the tweezers off on a bit of tissue (something of that sort)
Extreme close up of blade slicing the berry
Crushes the berries with loud banging (shown through different angles and titled, distorted angles to create sinister intention)
Uses a spoon and puts it into a beaker
Close up of pure water dripping from the condenser of the setup into a (different) beaker, he grabs it
Pipette, a few drops into the crushed berries, swirls it around
Puts it down, sighs, tapping his finger / he is anxious
Sits down
Takes off his gloves, (sitting) and smokes as a reflection
Another over the shoulder shot from the woman of him smoking at the window
Puts it out, walks to the poison
The prepared poison in front of him, pan follows him as he walks to the woman
Extreme close up of her eyes, distressed
Silhouette of him coming towards her from her point of view
Quick cut her hands struggling hard
Quick cut feet pushing harder
Quick cut the vinyl spinning
Quick cut her eyes are wider, tears rolling down her cheeks (these quick cuts could be jumped between in editing to create a frantic desperation)
He pours in the poison
Over the shoulder shot looking down on her as she chokes
Extreme Close up of funnel bubbling, liquid spilling over and splashing her face
Extreme Close up of eyes getting weaker
Extreme close up Hands going limp