Primary Target Audience

There are many important factors to focus on when it comes to thinking about your target audience. These include, genre preferences, class, gender, age, fears and anxieties, education, values and hopes.
Our primary target audience for our two minute opening sequence will probably be older teenagers and adults who enjoy horror films, because our opening sequence focuses heavily on this theme.
We will try to focus on audiences who fear similar things such as escaped people, being home alone, being stalked, the dark and unknown phone calls. These are the fears we will be portraying in our opening sequence. By focusing on our audiences fears we are trying to create a more tense atmosphere for their viewing pleasure.

We will also focus on audiences who have similar values and beliefs. For example, what one would do if someone broke into their house. All these values and beliefs would come together to make our opening sequence seem altogether more interesting and gripping.

For our own opening sequence we want to focus on a target audience that appreciates Japanese horror, primarily the westernised type, such as 'The Ring' (2002). We want our opening sequence to shock and scare our viewers, as horror films traditionally do. We want to focus on an opening with no special effects or over exaggerations, just simple costumes and makeup, going back to the traditional popular Japanese horrors, such as 'Dark Water'. These types of films rely on suspense rather that over-the-top scare tactics used in many American horrors. Many fans of Japanese horror like to think of themselves as away from 'mainstream' and part of a lesser known cult of J-horror, so we would like to focus on people who are already part of this Japanese horror cult.

Opening Sequence Observations for Planning

Having analysed a variety of openings, I would say there are 10-15 credits in a typical opening credit sequence.
The credits usually included in an opening sequence in conventional order are, production company logo, casting by, music by, main cast credits, produced by, cinematography by, directed by, edited by and the title of the film.
I would like to include aspects of narrative in my group opening such as, characterisation of the main character, the horror character and the setting.
We will set up our characters with use of their clothing, physical appearance and their dialogue. For example, for the horror character may wear a long white dress. She may also have long, black, limp hair. She will have little dialogue to retain  her mysterious aura. The main character will be dressed in casual attire, a hoodie and jeans.

Analysis of Japanese Horror Opening Sequences

Tale of Two Sisters (2003) A South Korean horror film
Tale of Two Sisters begins with a few opening credits, next it goes onto a patterned background with the title written across it in Korean. It then shows more credits consecutively across the patterned background which slowly dissolve away to the right. The camera then slowly pans out, and the pattern from the background starts floating away, as this happens the credits being shown turn from white to red. The image then fades to black and the story begins.

The Grudge (2004)
The opening begins with 'Columbia' film production's ident. It then moves onto Ghost House Pictures ident. Next, text shows up on a black background which begins to tell the narrative of the start of the story. The film begins, showing a scene of a couple, suddenly the man throws himself off the couple's balcony. Next, the credits begin on a black screen, they are written in red. After the credits, the black fades away to red, and the title of the film is shown, in Japanese, in black across a rep, rippled background. The red ripples are then disturbed by the silhouette of a hand, and the title is shown again in black, but this time written in English. This then ripples away and the rest of the credits are shown, all with a rippling sequence in between each one. Blackness then envelops the red, and the story begins.

Dark Water (2002)
The film opening begins with Kadokawa Shoten film ident. Next, the credits show in white across a black background. The black fades away to show murky water with a dim light shining in one corner of the scene, like a torch, still with consecutive white credits across the screen in different places. All the credits are written in Japanese. The water then gives way to the beginning of the story.

From my analysis of Japanese Horror opening sequences, I can understand that they focus heavily on red and white coloured credits with black backgrounds. I can also see that many of the credits dissolve or face eerily into the background, creating a mysterious and tense feel to the opening sequences.

Idea for Main Task

Our scene begins with a girl, sitting in her living room, listening to the radio on her iPhone. She is listening to a news report about a young girl that has escaped from a mental institution in her local area. The girl goes upstairs to get ready for bed. While going through her nightly routine, she hears a bang downstairs in her house. The girl runs downstairs to see that her front door is wide open, she shuts it and as the door shuts, a scary Yurei type ghost girl (the young girl from the mental institution) is standing behind her as the door closes..

Timeline Task

For this task, we watched an opening title sequence to a film of our choice, I chose 'Batman' (1989). We had to draw up a timeline showing the different times of each credit and how long each lasted. We also had to do the same for the music in the title sequence. We did this task to help us with our own creating of an opening title sequence.