Film Opening Sequence Analysis

Film Opening Sequence Analysis of Ghost

Shot One: The main title is first in the opening sequence. This is done in order to gain the attention of the audience straight away. It is a bold and simple title in order to make a statement. The blue writing links with blue and grey colours in the rest of the title sequence. Plus, the title word of 'Ghost' has connotations of grey, preparing the viewer to link ideas that the rest of the title sequence is trying to portray.

Shot Two: In this shot, the credits begin but in the background there is a huge use of symbolism. The rope is there to begin creating the idea of an old room being redecorated which is how the story begins. But the rope is a symbol of death and therefore can be linked with ghosts. The grey colours help create the sense of a old dark room preparing the viewer for the first decorating scene but also creates an airy feel to this room which can also be a link with the ghosts. Furthermore, a light is shining in the centre of the background, "following the light" is often associated with death, the light also seems like it is coming through a door which can symbolise the door to heaven. It is coincidental that the light is shining on the actors name who plays the part of the ghost. All these symbols have been done on purpose to cleverly prepare the viewer for the rest of the film, giving slight clues away.

Shot Three: This shot is again a shot from the undecorated room. The lines upwards represent the gates to heaven and the holes in the gate shows the light of heaven shining through, therefore it is another shot with death connotations that can give clues to the viewer about the films plot.

Shot Four: This shot is of a lamp shade. I find it clever because I feel that the circular shape represents the Earth, the white cloth on top of it is showing that ghosts are on the earth too. There is a grey cloudy world, which is typically how a ghost world is viewed, watching us. The circular earth shape is grey and there are very dull colors surrounding it, I think this is representative of the rest of the film where we see that the world is a dark gloomy place where bad things often happen.

Shot Five: The white cloth takes up the  whole of this shot. I believe this is done because people often dress in white cloth to dress up as a ghost, furthermore, when someone dies they are often covered in white cloth for the autopsy. The cloth is a strong representation of ghosts and death so has been used in a whole shot so that the audience can take a mental note of this.

Shot Six: In the front of the shot, you can see fixtures of a building which is important to introduce the first scene of decorating an old room but in the background, there is a foggy look with a sharp object faint in the distance. I feel the sharp object represents how the new home the characters are decorating become problematic. It seems nice to do, achieving a dream to own your own home, but problems come like a sharp object to slice the happy times in this film.

Shot Seven: This shot shows a ball of clay which signals the female characters love for pottery making. There is a light behind the pottery, this represents the ghost. This is added as a shot in the title sequence as it is a clue to one of the most famous scenes in the film when the female who loves pottery begins to feel her deceased loved one helping her mould the clay.

Shot Eight: I feel this shot is the reverse of the technique in shot six. This time, the  camera is looking from the dark into the light room in order to show that the intentions of moving into their own home and decorating it was for happiness, for a bright future. It is sort of saying "look what could have been".

Shot Nine: This shot is taken from above. It is very clever as the way the ceiling has been smashed in the darkness lets the main three characters be introduced and creates a smooth transition from the titles into the rest of the film. This last shot of the opening sequence has sharp pieces above the three characters which I feel represents a harsh place, perhaps hell, signaling that problems are about to begin and the plot of the film is beginning.

Evaluation of the Preliminary Exercise

The camera work in our preliminary exercise was good overall as there was a mixture of shots including over the shoulder shots and extreme close ups which were mostly used correctly with the rule of thirds in order to make the film more professional. The camera was also held steadily with appropriate camera angles to keep the professional feel. Match on action was used which helped the flow of our film. However, the 180 degree rule was broken when filming the over the shoulder shots and we must remember to watch out for this in future filming.
The sound quality in our film isn't that clear. The beginning of the film was filmed in a busy corridor which meant unwanted sounds were picked up by the camera and in the future we must make sure that the sound from the surrounding environment is noticed before filming. The characters can be heard clearly though during the dialogue parts. We used hyperrealism in a scene where the door was closing but the shot had changed so didn't include the slamming of the door so we edited it in.
The match on action was edited well so that the movement was precisely shown without repeated action when viewing. The shots were cut to fit to the 30 second time limit however, the extreme close up of the eyes lasted on a bit too long which could have been cut shorter.
I feel my level of production skill in this task has been intermediate because I thought of ideas of what needed to be done to edit and film the shots, I just needed help from the other members in my group to work the software in order to carry out the ideas.

Preliminary Exercise Final Cut

Report on the Preliminary Exercise

 

My Group: Me, Bethan Grey and Billy Turner

Beth and Me (right) overseeing the camera angles with

Billy (left) acting for our preliminary exercise.

 

We filmed our preliminary exercise during a Media lesson. We chose to film the shots surrounding one of the schools classrooms: along the corridor outside of it, and then in the classroom.

We used a Canon Legeria Camcorder to film these shots using a stand. Once we had finished filming, the shots were then put together and edited by using Adobe Premier Editing Software. 

When filming, we used the rule of thirds and the 180 degree rule in order to make the filming professional. Before filming, the person with the camera would count down to filming so that none of the acting and movement would be missed. Various camera skills were used whilst filming. During a conversation, shot-reverse-shot was used. We also used close-ups of the actors eyes to build and show tension.

During the editing process, we used the technique of hyperealism to add the sound of a slap when one of the actors was hit. We used Hollywood editing so that the film flows naturally and also is professional. We still need to continue the editing and may use other techniques.