Running order

Running Order
Documentary: Ghosts, Ghouls and Paranormal Happenings
Channel: Living
Scheduling: Monday 31st October
Duration: 28 minutes including advert break

Montage of clips of what is coming up in the documentary. Snippets of interviews, locations, videos and still images.

The Documentary title appears on location shot, the title (graphics) fade or break away as the camera jump cuts to have the location in the centre of the shot.
The door of the location will creak open and the camera will zoom through.

Fast Motion handheld, the camera will explore the building/location this introduces the setting. Voiceover introducing the location.

As the Fast Motion stops the first interviewee will be shown stood either in a room or outside the location.

Interviewee will explain any paranormal happenings that happened at this location.

Reconstruction of the paranormal happenings.

The sun setting fast motion (elliptical editing) to night time, the camera crew and others are shown walking around the location at night with torches kind of like a ghost hunt, handheld to stay with the action.

A spiritualist interviewed explaining if they can feel a presence.

Further walking around the location handheld camera movement to stay with the action.

A shot of a séance/ Ouija Board handheld camera movement to stay with the action.

Advert Break

After advert break handheld (steadicam) walking through a graveyard. Voiceover statists of paranormal beliefs.

Vox populi interviews.

Voiceover explaining how these superstitions have inspired Hollywood cinema, paranormal activity, Ghostbusters movie archive material.

Fast Motion birds eye view over countryside leading to Chillingham Castle one of the most haunted castles in England.

Voiceover ghost story about the castle.
Sun setting elliptical editing, cut to spiritualist interview explaining some sort of presence in the castle.

Camera crew, film makers walking around the castle.

Sun rising elliptical editing, interview with spiritualist who adds on to the paranormal happening that happened at the castle in the night. Cutaways of images taken in the night, apparition shown and orbs.

Voiceover balanced argument of people who believe in ghosts and those who are sceptical.

To finish montage of paranormal experiences archive material (videos).




These are the different types of texts that we asked our target audience not only what type of text they would like but also what they think would be best for our paranormal documentary.

Storyboard

This is my groups story board, myself and alex worked really hard to make this look as good as we could as we knew that this would make it easier when we needed to film, we have confirmed that we can film at tatton hall and this is great as we have been before we know what types of decore and 'mise-en-scene' there is inside.

This is the first shot and it just shows the titles coming up onto the middle of the screen and these will then slowly fade away leaving an establishing shot of tatton hall in the background setting the scene so people will know where we are now based.

This is the second scene and it shows tatton hall, there will be quiet music playing over the background this is a medium long shot of the hall allowing people to see and possibly associate themselves with the hall.  the music being played will be quite creepy maybe violins, and other string instruments to build the tension, the scene will then jump cut to the next.

This third shot is a medim shot of the front door to tatton hall and this will slowly open, if the door doesnt creak then this will have to be a sound effect added later in editing.  again this is a stereotype that haunted houses are creaky and this again will help build tension, the door will be centred in the middle of the frame.

This shot will be quite long in time however alot of editing will be used, when researching we thought of a great idea to show off the hall quickly whilst looking professional, we will use the camera and walk around the hall into all the rooms and then stop in a haunted room, we will then speed this up after to show a really quick walk around, we will put a voiceover the top introducing the rooms and the stories.

This shows 2 different choices we thought we would put both in, we know that there are old bookcases and rooms inside so we know that we could shoot the interview in there showing it is old and this would link as it would be filmed in a spooky room, or we could shoot it outside however we have already had a shot from outside at the beggining so it may be best to shoot the interview indoors.

When researching again we seen in shows like ours that people used reconstrusctions not only to scare people but also to fill the space and also show that people are actually seeing what we are reconstructing almost giving the documentary a sense of authenticity.  there will be scary music on quitly and sound effects added later in editing. 

This is the last shot on the story board and it is showing the camera set up on a tripod and the sun going down, we have ecided to show this as it will show clearly that it is now nightime, as the next scene will be at nightime, this also shows that the narrative is runing in a linear timeline from day through the night.

Tatton Hall

Myself and alex have done extensive research into places that are supposed to be haunted or have sightings and records of paranormal happenings, we contacted places such as Speke Hall, Walton Hall and finally we contacted Tatton Hall.

Not all of these attempts to contact were seccessful,  speke hall said that it would not be possible, and walton hall said it would be ok but we had our minds set on Tatton Hall, then we received an e-mail from the manager of Tatton Hall saying that it was not haunted but one of the old buildings is. We contacted the manager of "Old Hall" and a man named Mick Ricketts, and he explained that we would be able to come and film at Old Hall.

We had a walk around Old Hall when we first arrived and he explained that the hall originated from tudor times and was built at the turn of the 15th century, history does not state who built it but that there was the stanley family around at the time, they were a very powerful and wealthy family at the time, however some say that it was Sir Richard Brereton who joined the Stanley family through marriage. Mick explained that by 1958 the hall had been converted by Sir Thomas Egerton who owned the estate and was now being used as a manor house. This made me think that this hall has been there for 600 years how many people have lived there and even died there.

Mick first shown us the Great Hall, this is said to be a bad place for women to be, there are many stories of women feeling a tightening around the neck and a tightening as if unable to breath, we know this as in our reseach we watched a show named Most Haunted that had also been to Old Hall just like ourselves, they did report that this and when we asked our guide to clarify if anything had happened in the Great Hall he pointed us in the direction of a woman who works keeping the area clean and entertaining visitors, we then interviewed her as you will see in our documentary.

 

It was said that this is the angry spirit of a man that walks throughout the Old Hall terrorizing unsuspecting visitors and more than often women, further through the house, we seen a photograph of a man on the stairs named "Tom", in life he was an alcaholic and a wife beater, this drove him to an early death, this also may explain for his hatred towards women that are walking around and exploring the property in once he lived. My group felt a wiered feeling when walking around, i found myself walking around alone and was scared when i realised i was alone however i realise that because i was told the ghost stories this plays on my mind and makes me scared even when as part of a group.

It is reported that i haunted buildings drain batteries in items such as torches and camera batteries, and the idea behind this is that the ghosts are draining the energy to make themselves appear or make things happen by using the power from batteries, and after filming for 5 minites our battery that was full suddenly drained and took 5 minites for the camera to come back on i found this really creepy as i knew that battery could not have drained that fast.

As a group we were really happy that they got back to us and allowed us to go and film there, we were not expecting to get the ghost walk we got, Mick first showed us the outside of the building and explained the history, when it was built, who by and who inhabitted it until now. we then went inside the building mick set up candles on the table in the great hall and we continued our tour into every room up and down the house, there was about 8 rooms in total, we could not have asked for a better guide and we were trul greatful for mick and other staff at tatton park taking time out of their day for us.

We had all of the footage that we could of ever wanted, mick explained that most haunted had been there 3 times giving us clarification that this was a haunted place if an established paranormal group had been back 3 times. Mick also told us that Tatton old hall

Poster research

It is important that now that we have a documentary that it can be seen by the people it was meant to be viewed by, one way that people can find out about our documentary is the use of posters and flyers,adverts on TV and the radio.  When choosing our documentary and throughout our questionnaire we found out who our target audience and who would be intersted in watching it.

This is an example of a paranormal shows poster, this is what ours should look like, it has the name in bold lettering at the top so that people know what it is, it then has the 2 investigators with an ominous building in the background, this helps set the tone for the documentary. The sky has been changed in a program such as photoshop, it has been made green like the ghosts in the background, however some of the most important information is at the bottom, it has the chanell that it is to be aired on and what time and day.

Poster production

This is the first screen grab from my making of the poster, it is a photograph that i took whilst investigating tatton Hall, i like this shot because we can see the house and how scary it looks we can also see a front door, all i am doing in this shot is changing the brightness and contrast of the shot to make the outside look darker but the colour of the house and grass stand out even more.

This next shot shows me with a photograph of storm clouds that i took, i really like this photograph and after looking at other paranormal groups posters such as most haunted and ghost hunters, they have images often with abstract sky's and buildings, i have chosen to change the clouds to a green/yellow colour and this is because it is quite a dark colour and very scary.

This shot shows how now that i have my building and my sky seperatley created i now have to get them together, so i pasted the sky ontop of the photograph of Tatton Hall, i then create a layer mask which allows me to erase parts of the clouds photograph to fit around the picture of the hall.

Myself and alex used the blue screen in college to get a photograph of ourselves, we used a blue screen so that i would be able to put ourselves ontop of the Tatton hall image, we chose to have ourselves on the poster because we have made a partici[atory documentary so since we are in it we thought it would be best to have us on the front, and as the face of Ghosts, Ghouls and Paranormal happenings.

We then added a living logo and this was of course just to show what chanel our documentary will be shown on, and in our case it was living tv.

I found a text off the internet that resembled the living tv logo, and i used this for the time and date that it would be shown and then i chose the font that our target audience liked the best from the questionnaire and used it for the title of the documentary on the poster.  I added some fog into the poster and this again was just to add a slight mystery and spookyness to the poster as a small finishing touch. And if you look close you can see people or ghosts in the background by the house, i took photographs of my friends and then i placed them onto the poster, desaturated them and then changed the opacity so that it gave the illusion of ghosts and that is how i finished off the spooky documentary poster.

Breakdown of content and layers.

Graphics:Living purple font
Title of documentary
Date and Time of when airing

Background:Tatton park old hall

Foreground:Image of us, showing that the documentary is participatory.

Colours:Dark and creepy colours such as Black and Green, adding to the content of the documentary.

Codes and Conventions of filming and editing interviews

Codes and conventions!

There are certain codes and conventions that a director must take into consideration when filming a documentary, these are conventions that i will need to take into consideration when filming a documentary, following these and i will be able to make my audience feel and perceive a documentary.

LIGHTING

when interviewing someome there are certain rules that you need to follow, when filming outside the interviewee must be facing the sun, and this is to prevent glare on the camera and also means that in editing we do not have to fiz the white balance which can be time consuming. if you are inside filming  always have the interviewee infront of the camera and the camera not facing the window for the same reason.

this is an example of the rule of thirds and as you can see that when you do split the screen into squares the cross sections really do stand out and this is why we use the rule of thirds

CAMERA ANGLES

When interviwing people medium close ups are mostly used this is to show from the chest up (helping the audience see the body posture), however sometimes aclose up is used and this is to show emotion when something important is being said. an important thing to remember is that alot of these shots are applying the rule of thirds so it is important when planning the interviews to position the subject correctly. the most im portant point is that the intrviewer must sit next to the camera asking the questions because the interviewee must be looking away from the camera an eye level match between the interviewer and the interviewee is important.  we must also use a range of positioning from placing the interviewee on the left sometimes and sometimes on the right and this is to give the action a break.
Archive footage

Archive footage is footage that has been taken in the past and stored, people involved in putting the documentary together will go and find this footage, and its main purpose is to back up what point the documentary is trying to get across, so for example if the documentary was on world war 2 and they were talking about an old air base we would expect to see archive footage of the air base and life in world war 2.  In our docementaries we are allowed 30 seconds of archive footage, I feel that is this type of footage will give our haunted documentary added credibility it will deserve.

The voiceover

In expository documentaries there is an effect called a voiceover, this is later put on during editing over the footage that people collect,it is called the voice of god, and this is because the voice is all knowing and is almost overseeing what is happening and knows what is going to happen in the documentary, it also helps build a connection with the audience.

In the teeth of jaws!

This was the first documentary that i looked at

And I took a lot of notes about it, the first thing that I realised was the graphics along the bottom of the screen, they appeared each time a new person was on the screen , and I realised they did this so that as an audience we would realise their status and what they had to do with the film itself.  It also fitted in with the codes and conventions of documentaries as the interviewees where always placed along the rule of thirds and on the left or right. this is to give a break in the action, stops things getting to repetative, and is something i will have to look at when filming my own documentary, The background was either of the sea or a cut out of some jaws with the interviewee inside them playing on the title of the documentary “ in the teeth of jaws”.  there is alot use of a STATIC CAMERA when inerviewing people and this is so that we can focus mostly on the emotion of what is being said during the interviews.

The Simpsons 20th anniversarry special in 3d on ice.

this is the second documentary that i watched it was made for the simpsons 20th anniversarry special, this is rather different to the first documentary that i watched on jaws.  this is where i have started spotting similarities between the two documentaries, again medium close ups are being used in the interviws, so we can see the shoulders and head, and interviewees switched from the right side to the the left side of the screen, all of these are interviewees are placed along the rule of thirds.  there is also more similarities with the backgrounds in jaws they had photos of sharks and the sea and in the simpsons they had what characters the actors that were on screen played for example, at 9:58 on the video we have an actor named Hank Azaria the actor and the characters moe and apu underneath these are the characters he plays with the characters in the background, this helps us relate to the actor as well as the characters i will have to consider where to interview and what to have in the background.  Alot of archive footage is used during this show as compared to the documentar on jaws.

Music bizz Meatloaf special.

There are a few themes running throughout this documentarry and these are then built upon to create a grande knowlege of meatloaf and his carrer aswell as the music indistry.  it also digresses later in the documentary to show how other bands have made it in the industry with the village people they also used archive footage to show this.

The narrative structure for this documentary is quite simple it is a linear narrative showing a timeline from meatloaf when he first began and followed him all the way through until he was a successful recording artist, it does however have element of a non-linear narrative as it has flashbacks to times in his earlier carrer but this is just a code and convention of an expository documentary, they have to show his whole carrer for him to be exposed fully to the public. we also hear a narrator or a 'voice of god' in this documentary again proving that the meatloaf music special is an expoitory documentary.
Camerawork is very important when it comes to documentaries such as these as we can use certain angles and shots to make our intended audience feel a certain way, in this expository documentary the director uses alot of fast cuts between shot, this may be so he can fit as much footage of meatloaf and the music indistry into the documentary. the beggining starts with the celebrities on the red carpet, meatloaf is featured on the red carpoet this shows us that he is important and making us instantly interested as we are in an age obsessed with celebrities. 
again the Mise-en-scene is very important in expository documentaries such as this one, the backdrops are always relevent when the subjects are being interviewed, for example when people are being interviewed about the village people archive footage of the village people are playing on the backdrop in the background this is just one code and convention to do with documentaries. there are many types of sound used in documentaries especially in documentaries about the music bussiness the sound changes throughout this documentary there is constant music playing throught, there is alot of metal and rock music playing throughout and this is to show the relation with meatloaf and then it shows us meatloaf videos, this is synconus as what is happening on screen is happening with the music for example they show the music video of meatloafs bat out of hell and it is playing so it matches on screen.  i also made note that there are not many sound effects in this documentary showing the seriousness of it. there are only a few editing techniques used in this documentary it is mainly consistant of fast cuts between shots however there are some dissolves in there when trying to mix up the use of editing and a slight change from cuts, keeping the viewers interseted. the use of archive material is great in this documentary it shows footage of a bat out of hell video, it also uses cut aways and shows archive material.  it shows material of meatloaf all over the world from magazines, to newspapers showing that he was a worldwide phenomenon.


The devil made me do it!


The devil made me do it is again an expository documentary there to exploit and show what has happened in life and creating it into a dcoumentary that people would enjoy watching.  this documentary is about Marilyn manson and " boys who killed because they said they listned to his music.





There are many themes running through this documentary there is music, crime, media, violence, religion and even horror.  and this documentary is good as an expository documentary as it shows all of these themes and explores them for all too see.  again the narrative of this film is a linear narrative it plays strait from his music and where it all began and then plays through to what happened when the 2 boys did what they did when they murdered the 2 nuns.  it almost shows a almost "timeline" of events. again the camerwork mimics the camerawork in the meatlof music documentary and this is because it is a expository documentary but also because it has some of the same themes running through it such as music, media and the celebrity lifestyle.  there are atricles shown of newspapers and magazing the camera zooms in on these almost showing that these are important to the story and what happened.  there are also high angled camera shots showing maraliyn mansons fans not only showing his popularity but also showing there are millions of other fans that didnt do what these 2 fans did. Mise-en-scene again shows the backdrops have specific and relevant backdrops, there lots of religious symbols when they are talking about what happened to the nuns obviosly this relates as they were religious people.  people when being interviewed swapped from left to right hand side of the screen, rule of thirds is also used when interviewing another code and convention of documentaries. again like other expositoyr documentaries the sound is similar there is a narrator or also known as "the voice of god" playing over the top of whats happening on screen. when the religious part of the documentary is on the music changes from metal music like marilyn mansons to gospel music as this links to what is happening on screen.  we also hear sound effects such as fans screaming, trumoets and church bells ringing. there isnt too much editing just again simple cuts between shots and when showing archive footage they use dissolves to show the amount of footage shown on this story.  there was also montages made with all of the footage from newspapers and the news.




That thing, that thing Lara Croft.


there are not as many themes running throuout this documentary as some of the others that i have watched and previosly wrote about however some themes that do cross over are the media, violence some that dont but areprominent in this documentary are feminism, gaming, the age of technology. it again is a linear narrative showing a timeline from when the game began to recent day games but also has a seperate narrative running through it showing the film and how that has progressed.


game                               film


                           


the camera work in this documentary are rather simple there are a couple of shots where there camera crabs from left to right showing a lot of men sitting down playing lara croft, it can be argued that men are sexually attracted to lara croft which is why they play her games. it also zooms in on computer screens almost showing the obsession that these men have with her and this game. the mise-en-scene is different to what we have seen in previous documentaries as there is not as much archive footage used it shows real footage from the actual time it is up to date, it also shows shots off all of the "avid fans" and gives their point of view, it gives me multiple views on lara croft including the feminist views that  she is be littling the females of the world and making men obsessed as she is shown as a sex symbol for men to control.  the sound again is syncronus with what is haooening on screen there are alof of sound effects put into this game to give a sense of verisumilitude, there is also a male narrator showing the males obsession with lara croft. syncronus sounds of gun shots and sighs when the men are playing the game.  there are alot of match on actions in the we see a finger pressing play and then he clicks play and then it cuts to a shot of a man speaking inside the computer as a reult of the match on action. they also use cuts and a blue screen to play lara croft over the interviewees.  there is alot of archive footage from the game aswell as the film it shows lara croft in two different types of media and shows how the male audience is following her from the game to the film and beyond.









Stan lee's superhumans.



This is an Exository documentary the creator of comic books such as Spiderman, the fantastic four and the incrdible hulk, is the main producer in this documentary his name is Stan Lee.  He is searching for the worlds real superheroes and at the start is the 'voice of god' then we meet the worlds most flexible man who now becomes the voice of god and the narrator.  the narrative is stictly linear it goes from Stan lee wanting to find these superheroes to the worlds most flexible man setting out on his journey, it is almost set out as a timeline picking up superheroes as he goes. the narrative shows the man meeting ( in order) the human conductor, the human calculator, the radar then finally a man with super strength.

   


there is not too much archive footage in this documentary, the only it uses cutaways of comic books and that is the only type of archive footage in this documentary. this brings me into the type of editing that is used, the only type of editing i can see in this expository documentary is the cut aways used, there are also crossfades with the human calculator doing sums, the sums fade ontop of whats happening on screen.    again the mise-en-scene is used but the only main points that have really stayed the same are the use of rule of thirds, and the relevance of the background in the interviews.

Paranormal state

This is an expository documentary, the creator plays the voice of god however this voice of god is specialist to this documentary as they use a voice recorder effect, not only is this creepy as the documentary intends but it also is a participatory documentary Ryan is the creator of this and is also the main focal point and investigator, showing he is getting involved in the documentary.

There are many themes but mostly there are haunting themes, paranormal, ghosts and even horror themes running throughout, this is a reason why I chose to see this documentary as it relates to our own myself and Alex are going to make. It again like most expository documentary it is a linear narrative documenting the events from when they start the investigation through their research, to the investigation to the results.

The camerawork in the documentary is very simple and is almost like the camerawork off horror films such as paranormal activity and the blare witch project. I feel this has been done purposely as it fits into the codes and conventions of horror which is one of the themes running in this documentary. Rule of thirds have been used as you can see from this photograph.

There is not really any archive footage in this, there is sometimes archive footage when they have to research old ghost stories and local folklore, there are a few editing techniques used but however these are just strait cuts and dissolves when there is a lot of information across the screen.

Codes and conventions of a radio advert and editing

Radio Trailer examples
These are the codes and conventions of radio adverts that i have found and it is important that i looked at these so i know what will make our radio advertisment successful.

The title of the documentary is usually said along with the scheduling of the documentary.

They always include what channel the documentary will appear on (this is usually said last)

Extracts from the programme are used, usually involving a key element from the documentary, for example we will be using a clip of our guide talking about the ghosts at Tatton Hall.

There is a voice over which intercuts throughout and outlines the narrative, sometimes posting questions to the audience that will be addressed in the documentary. This is used to intrigue the audience into wanting to watch the documentary.

Usually lasts for 30 - 40 seconds.

There is always background music.

The advert is always played on an appropriate radio channel

Editing our radio advert!

These 2 screengrabs just show our small 30 second segment and the premire dashboard showing us messing around with the voice effects and also showing important factors such as the timeline.