Reflections on shot

The shot signifies the mystery or horror genre by having a person look around a corner at something unknown, which increases the sense of mystery that the audience will understand from the image, as the audience know it is a convention of the genre. The area behind the subject is in shadow, another convention that makes the picture mysterious, as settings in shadow can connote that something is dangerous, abandoned, or suspicious.

To achieve the effect, we went to the back of the Great Hall balcony and used a corridor that is always dark, which was what we wanted to successfully show a mysterious setting to fit our idea. We also had a handheld light to illuminate the subject’s face from one side, to make the lighting look more dramatic and add to the contrast between the dark inside and the bright outside.

We wanted the audience to interpret the still as having a threat nearby, at some point in the narrative where the protagonist does not want to be discovered. The still does not fully give the scenario away, as you cannot see what the person sees, so the audience is kept in suspense.

The shot successfully uses a contrast in lighting between the bright foreground and the dark background, which emphasises the darkness of the background against the light. The shot is also framed within its frame, as the two white walls create a vertical letterbox effect. This makes the protagonist seem to be in a claustrophobic environment, as our view of them is restricted by the two walls in the foreground. The shot is taken from a low angle, which served to make the shot more interesting rather than to connote power of the character, which was not our intention. The medium shot worked well, as seeing the character’s legs is not necessary and the viewer’s attention is instead directed to the upper body, head and hands.

In hindsight, it could have been better if the subject were in the centre of the image, since the photograph currently has much more of the white wall on the left than it needs. A canted angle could have been employed to make the still more dramatic, especially to connote the movement of the person who has just looked around the corner.