Netflix Distribution Research

We chose Netflix as our distributor because it reaches such a large audience and has niche marketing, which works out because we are making a film noir. 

According to this website, Netflix reaches 93 million people, and is only growing. Netflix has realized that "Each show doesn’t need a mass audience—which is the measure of success for advertiser-funded television—but the service does need to provide enough value that subscribers continue to pay." Netflix can saturate their streaming service with tons of different kinds of content because of the large variety of audiences it reaches.

Furthermore, "Netflix has adopted what I call a 'conglomerated niche' strategy: It develops programs for a handful of—maybe a dozen—different audience interests. These include complicated serial dramas (House of Cards), action series (Daredevil), horror series (Hemlock Grove), and exclusive films starring a popular actor (e.g. Adam Sandler)." This is perfect for our film noir because it would not serve a mass audience because it is a film noir, but would do well on Netflix because of the broad range of subscribers.

The website describes Netflix as "an expansive library with many small nooks and rooms." This gives our short film the ability to thrive in Netflix's environment because it allows many productions to try to satisfy different people's tastes.

Even this website says that Netflix wants to "give people a wide variety of good content and [not] ask too much for it." The website also goes on to say that "Niche marketing has been a real strength for Netflix, producing original programming that its core audience could easily connect with and get excited about."

I think Pupa would be perfect For Netflix because it would provide a place where people will find it and easily access it.

Making the Website Part 3

I have added more items to the website. Here is a screen recording of the progress:

I keep starting each page so that Taylor and Joanne can go back and add more items to it. I have not added something to all the pages yet, but I feel like if we at least have the base work done we are in good shape. I am trying to make the website very interactive, so I made it so when you hover over the image it shows more information. I also want to make an interactive contact page, but I have not gotten around to it. I am going to have Taylor and Joanne help me do it.

I am still unsure about having the doll as the homepage background. Also, we need to shoot more pictures to add to the website (such as for the about page). I also need to add pictures and descriptions of the crew page and finish the cast page. I am happy that I at least have some ground work done. 

I am also unsure about the moving gray background for the other pages. I'm not sure if a black background would work better. Here are the backgrounds side to side:

I like how the gray background moves because it makes the website more interesting.

The black background is kind of plain, so I think I'm leaning more towards the gray.

I am happy with how the website is coming along, but there are still some things that need to be added. Once we finish the film, I also want to put it on the website.

Making the Website Part 2

I thought of the idea of making 4 character poster wallpapers to put on the website. It will add an interactive element to the website since they are downloadable and can be used as a wallpaper on your phone, laptop, etc. This is similar to how the film Avengers Infinity War created character posters to market the film. (Examples below):

The wallpapers will create hype for the movie. We are distributing the film on Netflix, so I dowloaded the Netflix font to put on the posters. We also chose the font Horror Sketch because we thought it would look best. Here are the wallpapers I made from the pictures Taylor sent me:

I got inspiration from these Netflix movie posters I found on Google:

I am using both layouts of having the Netflix logo bigger on top (for the wallpapers) and smaller on the bottom with the release date (for the website home page). 

Here are the two posters I put on the website so far:

 I added an interactive button to say download when you hover over the image, so it is easy to download.

I really like how the posters turned out, and I am going to work on the flyer next week. First, I have to do research for the flyer. I will make a blog post on it next week.

Starting the Website...

I started the website because we have to film after spring break now because everyone is very busy. I figured if we do the website and flyer while we wait to film, we will still be in a good place. 

I researched different horror movie websites to get some inspiration with our website. We are going to stick with the colors black and white because our film is in black and white. We will also probably add some red color too. My favorite website I researched was Annabelle Comes Home. It has a really cool interactive feature of when your mouse hovers over the page, a flashlight appears to light up the face of the Annabelle doll. Here is a screen recording of it:

I think that is a really nice feature for audiences because it is unexpected and very creepy. It also has all of the social media in the top right corner. 

Another website I looked at is for Child's Play. I like how it is marketing the Chucky doll as if it is real. Here is the home page of the website so you can see what I am talking about:

I started the rough outline of the website so Joanne and Taylor can continue it. Here is a screen recording of the website so far:

I just created the tabs and the text for the home page

More Problems with Scheduling & Film Noir Research

We have to film after spring break because we do not have time. We are going to film April 2 because we have no school because of testing, so we have the whole day to film. That would mean we have about 1 week to edit. Because of this, we are going to start the flyer and website and try to finish it before we have to edit. 

We have also decided to make it a film noir so we don't have to dye the doll's hair, and it will  add a stylistic element to the film. Taylor is also trying to find a way to use that song we want in the film. Hopefully she is able to, but we need to look up more audio to use. I hope that we are able to stick to this schedule and have enough time to work on everything. 

According to this website, film noirs have "An oppressive atmosphere of menace, pessimism, anxiety, suspicion that anything can go wrong, dingy realism, futility, fatalism, defeat and entrapment were stylized characteristics of film noir. The protagonists in film noir were normally driven by their past or by human weakness to repeat former mistakes."

This goes well with our film because our main character is suspicious and is driven by the human weakness of loneliness. Our main character also corresponds to this website where they describe a film noir character as "a loner, introverted, troubled, hard-boiled, pessimistic. He is not the conventional film hero, confident/exceptional/certain, but rather average and conventional, often is a war veteran or detective, and is defined by his ability to survive and restore normality."

Because "The iconography of noir uses dark sidewalks, rain-drenched streets, flashing neon signs, fairgrounds and carnivals (associated with madness in German expressionism), the city as villain dangerous/hostile, the border town or the casino, imagery of water and alcohol that represent merging and release rather than fragmentation and blockage." This means when we film the scene of Amber walking, we need to make sure it is dark and put a puddle on the ground to align more with the genre.

Learning How Adobe Lightroom Classic Works...

I have Lightroom on my computer, and I want to learn how to use it to edit images for the website/flyer. Lightroom looks like a really fun software to use, and photos definitely look more professional after using it. On the Adobe website, I found information lots of information on basically everything you would need to know about Lightroom. 

I made a screen recording to show all the resources I found on the Adobe website:

Here is the specific information I found especially helpful:

I really like how Lightroom has so many options to edit the photos. I am especially excited to play with the shadows to make our photos seem creepy.

This is very helpful, and I really like shortcuts because it makes me go a lot faster (when I use Photoshop and Premiere Pro). 

When I opened up Lightroom to see for myself, I noticed it also has many filter presets. With just a click of a button, you can make the entire image blue, red, black and white, vintage, etc. It seems overwhelming at first when you open Lightroom, but the Adobe website made things easier. I really like this resource, and I am ready to start editing photos!

Production Decisions...

Here is more of the storyboard that we have completed:

My group discussed all the props we need to get before we start filming. We have decided to dye the doll's hair to brown because we don't know anyone with red hair to play the part of the kidnapped girl. My group has been arguing if the doll needs to look like the kidnapped girl, and have come to the conclusion that it is very important to the story. This is because we want to make sure the audience understands what is going on. We also have to find the same shade of green the doll is wearing. Another prop we need is rope to leave hints for the audience that Amber has kidnapped someone. We have discussed the end scene in more depth, and have decided that we are going to need fake blood for the scene. 

In the end scene, Amber is shaking the doll and yelling "Why won't you talk to me?!" Amber grabs the knife next to her and continues to scream at the doll "Talk to me! Talk to me!" She then proceeds to stab the doll, and the scene cuts to the girl she kidnapped in shock holding the stab wound with blood pouring out.

We want the end scene to be dramatic, and tie in our main idea of how loneliness has driven our main character to do something pretty crazy.

While looking for good music, Taylor found a creepy song that we want to use, but are unsure if we can because of rights issues. Here is the link to the song:

https://youtu.be/fOjVjc5vJ6I

We think it will work well in the montage scenes of Amber doing daily activities with the doll. We need to look for more music, especially for the pivotal end scene. We also need to make sure we have lots of sound elements during the montage scene.

We are excited and ready to film next week!