What is hemophobia?

Hemophobia is the fear of blood in general. It is one of the most common fears and is often caused by direct or vicarious trauma in childhood and adolescence. However, some have suggested that this phobia runs in families.

Blood phobia is often associated with trypanophobia (the fear of needles), as well as the fear of injuries (traumatophobia). Indeed, severe cases of these fears can result in fainting, which is uncommon in other phobias. For this reason, these phobia are categorised as "blood-injection-injury phobia" by the DSM-IV. 

General symptoms of hemophobia:

Most types of specific phobia cause the heart rate and blood pressure to rise. Hemophobia and other blood-injection-injury phobias frequently cause a drop in blood pressure and heart rate. The sudden drop can lead to fainting, a relatively common response to the sight of blood.

Anticipatory anxiety, in which you may experience a racing heart, shaking, and gastrointestinal distress, is common in the hours and days before an upcoming encounter with blood.

As for me, when I see blood, I suddenly become very anxious, my body starts shaking and I can't stand still. This reaction usually lasts about 10 minutes.

However, contrary to popular belief that blood phobia is usually associated with trypanophobia as well as traumatophobia, I am not scared of needles or any sharp objects but I do tend to be more careful when it comes to physical activities or any kinds of activities that might lead into injuries.
When I get nosebleeds, for some reason, I don't get panic attacks or feel uncomfortable. I personally reckon that because I know that my blood is 100% safe and that nosebleeds are generally not painful.
My fear could be explained by the constant association of blood with death and pain.


Blood in movies:

Splatter film (also called Gore film), is a subgenre of horror of horror film that deliberately focuses on graphic portrayals of gore and graphic violence.

Tokyo Gore Police is a great example to demonstrate how bodily mutilation is utilized in horror movies. Bodily mutilation in film describes the apparent mutilation for theatrical purposes of a character in a film. Bodily mutilation is most usually portrayed in the context of horror and is used primarily either to shock or fascinate the audience of a film, or to add a sense of realism to a film.

Tokyo Gore Police is a 2008 Japanese-American film gore-film directed by Yoshihiro Nishimura.
Because of the impressive special effects used notably with blood, the film garnered positive reviews from critics and audiences alike. The film ranking website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 90% "Fresh" rating and an average rating of 6.4 out of 10, based upon a sample of ten reviews. Brian Chen reviewed Police with a score of 3.5/5. He comments, "It's not a horrible film; it's not a great film; it's just everything it tries to be — perverse, grotesque, bizarre — and a little more."

V.A. Musetto of the New York Post gave the film three stars out of four calling the film "bloody good". Michael Esposito of the Chicago Tribune gave the film three stars noting the film as "sick, twisted and gory, but surprisingly funny in an adolescent boy fantasy way — Beavis and Butt-Head would love it."

Prezi

Thinking About Fear

Grey: Me

Green: Nicole

Pink: Katie

Blue: Jack

 

The purpose of this research was a beneficial aid of our coursework, which is in this case to create a 120-second long opening of a teen horror movie. It helped us have a wider understanding of how fears are utilised in movies. During the task, we discussed our fears together and explained how they developed through the years. The purpose of that was to have a solid idea of what a fear actually is, how it makes you behave, and see how different people's fears are compared to yours. We all wrote our fears down and then we all added ideas on the sheet to show basic understanding of each other's fears. We also briefly thought of ways of how we could conquer our own fears. According to Psychology.about.com, the ten most common fears are:

 

• Fear of spiders
• Fear of snakes
• Fear of heights
• Fear of big spaces
• Fear of dogs
• Fear of injections
• Fear of social situations
• Fear of flying 
• Fear of germs and dirt

Fears in popular culture

 

Hemophobia, the fear of blood, is extremely common, which makes it frequently exploited in popular culture. Horror movies and Halloween events prey on our natural aversion to blood, often featuring large quantities of fake blood in full Technicolor glory. As the 1980s slasher genre proved, it is easy to become emotionally numb to such images, particularly for those who have a fear but not a full-blown phobia. Part of the reason that the shower scene in 1960s Psycho is still considered a masterpiece is the relative lack of gore. The scene was shot in black and white, and the knife never actually pierces the skin. Yet the mind fills in all of the details of a gruesome knife attack.

 

Acrophobia is also quite exploited quite a lot in movies. For instance in Mission: Impossile II, there is a famous scene where Tom Cruise is climbing atop the Utah's Dead Horse Point. The camera suddenly cuts to a long shot of Tom Cruise on a rock with massive mountains in the background. This cut (plus several instances shown below) can make the viewers, especially the acrophobics, uncomfortable and nauseous.

 

Main Task : Set Brief

The titles and opening of a new teen horror film, to last a maximum of two minutes.

All video and audio material must be original, produced by the candidate(s), with the exception of music or audio effects from a copyright-free source.

Preliminary Task Evaluation

1. What did you learn from the experience of filming the footage required for your preliminary task? What went well and what could have been done better?

I've learnt different shots but also how to use them effectively. For instance, when the character's about to walk in a room, a close-up of their hand grabbing the handle would be the most appropriate angle in this case give because it makes the whole scene more credible. I also learnt how to use different camera movements which included panning and over the shoulder shots. Most of the filming went well because the characters were focused and being cooperative  However, different factors hindered the filming process such as people walking in and out the room. To make the process easier, I could have warned people that a scene was being shot in a certain room so it couldn't be available to access.

 2. What is the difference between pre-production, production and post-production?

A pre-production is everything someone produced before the production, so the filming process will be smooth and the producers will be organised and the actors well-rehearsed. Pre-production tasks include the storyboard, the location planning as well as the casting. 

A production is the actual filming process. The main production should go smooth and there should be no major problems, thanks to the pre-production, which is made especially for thinking thoroughly about the production. 

Whereas the post-production is mainly about the editing of the main filming footage.

3. How easy did you find editing in iMovie? Explain at least 4 different skills or techniques that you learnt during this process. 

Editing in iMovie was relatively easy. During the process, I learnt how to:

• Import music onto your music library
• Add text onto my footage
• Trim bits of my raw footage and stick it onto the actual project
• Add in different sound effects onto the actual project                                                                                                          

4. What is continuity editing?

Continuity in editing means that everything flows in a consistent, orderly, smooth, sequential manner. For example, in one frame of a movie, a man might be wearing a red shirt. In the next scene or frame, he should still be wearing the same red shirt, not a blue or green one -- indicating that the shot was maybe repeated the next day and the wardrobe people forgot to have the actor wear the same shirt.

5. What do the following terms mean; a) match on action, and b) shot / reverse shot

a) Match on action is where the perspective of the camera changes during a scene and the scene continues to flow. 

b) A shot reverse shot is when a character is shown looking at another character and then the other character is shown looking back at the first character. Since the characters are shown facing in the opposite directions, the viewer assumes that they are looking at each other.

6. Analyse your preliminary task as a piece of continuity editing. What are its strengths and what are its weaknesses. You may find it useful to include targetted screen shots (cmd+shift+4)to illustrate the points that you make.

The strengths of my preliminary task were that I used different types of shots to make the short movie more entertaining and engaging. For instance I used a mid shot as shown on the picture on the left, and used a long shot as shown on the picture on the right. 

I also managed to display two moments simultaneously at the beginning of the movie: Jake making his way into the room, and Agne waiting and checking her phone. It makes the movie more interesting and detailed, but also gets the audience excited and intrigued.

The main weaknesses of my short movie are the stabilization and the sound. The stabilization in certain shots was poor which made the movie look not really professional. The sound was also feeble, due to background noises coming from the corridor. They can be heard especially during the dialogue, when the sound is hugely inconsistent and not really pleasing to the listener's ear. 

 

Completed Preliminary Task

Examples of camera shots

At the very beginning of the video, they used an arc shot to show what the character is doing and where the scene is set. It allows us to have a visual idea of where it is set and the character's emotion.

At 0.39, they used a mid shot on one of the character (Janet Kyle in this case). It allows us to see her facial expressions more clearly.

Throughout the first minute of the video, (when Janet and her husband, Micheal Kyle, are having a conversation), a shot reverse shot as well as an over the shoulder shot are used to show both characters' emotions and expressions.

Also, a match-on actions is used throughout the episode. A good example of this is between 10:25 and 10: 29, when the little girl turns her head to her left, a long shot is used to show both of the characters, and then, the camera cuts to the girl and she's in the same position she was before, which is essential to show continuity.

Moreover, at 12:43, a zoom is used to show the viewers where the scene is set and to give them more information on the nature of the scene as well.

My First Project!

The skills that I have learnt from the process were:

_How to add transitions, music, text and pictures onto the raw footage

_How to export the finished project onto Youtube

_How to cut chunks of music or footage

These skills are going to help me greatly because I will have to edit a lot of my raw footage, so thoroughly knowing how to use the software will allow me to take advantage of everything available and make my project the best it can be.