Lighting in the Red Room.

Lighting was a major part in the production of "Red Room" it was key in creating the atmosphere's we required. In the opening shot we see ambient lighting, it is the only scene in the trailer set during the day, and therefore the presence of the sun was a major part in the shot. The ambient day light itself symbolises safety, especially when placed in the horror genre (it is conventional to have the scary scenes at night in a horror film). However by capturing the shot whilst the sun is relatively low in the sky, whilst it is setting, we give the impression of oncoming night and darkness. Which as Bourdieu’s theory of cultural competence states, the audience will associate the setting sun placed in the horror genre as a sign of negative things to come.



The next shots we see are the shots in the lawyers office. The lighting in this scene was very important, firstly the lighting had to tell the audience this scene was a flashback and secondly we had again create a sense of sinisterness. To achieve these things we used relatively low key lighting, the lighting we used was artificial so to achieve an unnatural look, this would help bolster both the sinister side of the shot and the flashback. After this we put the shot in grayscale and used an after effect on the imovie editing software and put the entire scene into "Dream" this darkened the dark patches of the shot and brightened the light patches whilst adding a slight haze. This worked really well and along with the unnatural lighting we really created a paranormal and sinister flashback scene.



As the trailer arrives at the house and the Red Room, we see it has become night (again night is conventional and stereotypical in the horror genre as the time of day the paranormal takes place) although the audience has seen no shots of the night exteriors of the house yet, it is clearly visible to be night outside. This finishs the transition we started with the setting sun at the start of the film, and coupled with the unnatural lighting and effects in the lawyer scene, the audience now know something sinister is afoot. Whilst the protaganist is exploring the house we used very low key lighting, only illuminating the character and objects directly involved with the plot of the film. The rest of the shot was often black, or lit to a very small extent.



We did this so to give the impression of the main characters isolation and loneliness. Having only him lit or as shown in the photo above, the photo album creates a huge sense of tension. Its basic human instinct to be afraid of the dark, because we cannot see what possible threats may be lurking in it. This was a really important aspect for us to play on as by creating a black hole around the main character at all time we kept the tension high as the audience didn't know what possible fearful things could come out of the dark. This again is coventional to the horror genre and has been used for years, a good example is the "Vent Scene" in Ridley Scott's "Alien". One of the protagonists heads down into a pitch black vent to hunt the antagonist alien, with only the flame on the end of his flame thrower for light the scene sets up huge tension. Until finally he turns around and the alien is right behind him, which comes as a huge shock to the audience.

During the shots where the scenery in the house is slightly illuminated it was necessary to capture the most important parts of the set in those shots. For instance the stair scene.



In certain shots, it was prudent to light certain objects or parts of the house to move the narrative along. A good example of this is the shot above, we had to show the audience that the protagonist was ascending into the unknown, to symbolise this we used a set of stairs. So obviously it was important that the audience could see him climb said stairs, therefore of screen lighting was used. I would say a slightly negative point in the production of the trailer was our lack of preparation lighting wise. We were very limited to the torch the main character used and a couple of smaller less powerful torches to light the shots of screen. As unfortunately the building we filmed in only has really bright strip lights. Which wouldn't have worked too well with the low key lighting we employed in the majority of the film.

From a technical standpoint we chose to use a mag-light 4 cell led torch for the protagonist to use. As this cast again an unnatural blue light and kept the colour pallet of the film very cold and dark, two things conventional research tells us an audience associates with horror. The digital HD camera we used to shoot, really payed off in the dark scenes as it picked up images in the darkened environment a standard resolution camera would not.

Some mention should go to the neck grab scene that occurs in the bathroom, to achieve this fast pace flickering light effect, we loosened the batteries on the torch so with the slightest of movements it backed out. We then got will (whom played the main character) to shake the torch so the light cut out and relit really frantically. He held the torch below shot, and as the hands grabbed his neck he shook the torch, not only does the flickering light symbolise something sinister about happen (we see often in horror films the convention of the flickering light, the uncertainty that the bulb will last and coupled with the generic symbolism of the dark, when the bulb goes and everything is black, bad stuff will happen) The flickering light also allowed us to get the hands away from wills neck so to make them seem that they have disappeared supernaturally.



As the narrative moves on we see the main character turn a lamp on to reveal the "Red Room" the lamp used a cream shade so to bolster the browns and blacks in the shot and not to add anymore colour. (We wanted to keep browns and blacks as this was important too one keeping continuity with the ancillary products of the production, and creating a sense of an old, dark and date atmosphere in the "Red Room" once again this is conventional and generic in the horror genre as old buildings are associated with ghosts and the arcane (haunted houses)



As the plot thickens we see another flickering light, again being used for numerous tasks, such as lighting a wall displaying sinister photos, designed to move the plot forward such as the stair scene, and two building a sense of tension as it was used in the bathroom scene. I think this was one of our best achievements as it combined different factors of our lighting to bring the trailer to its crescendo.

Technically the effect was achieved by having one of our group hide under a desk and turn a lamp on and off randomly so not to create an consistency or reason to the flicker.



Finally the night scenes at the end of the trailer reinforce the narrative we started at the start of the trailer with the setting sun, as now it is night and full paranormal activities are in swing. The final shot of the trailer is of the main character banging on the "Red Room" door, to create a cliff hanger for the viewers to attract them into watching the film we used a lamp and had a group member walk past it to cast a shadow that appeared to be moving towards the protagonist. Again using Bourdieu’s theory of cultural competence, the audience will associate this with a threat and want to see what happens to him.



All in all I feel we put the lighting in the film to good use to heighten tension, to create tension, to push narrative and to create interesting effects. I feel next time we should be more prepared definitely as this time on a technical front we lacked the equipment we needed in several situations. However it should be said that we used ingenuity to conquer this and overall did a great job.