Evaluation

Thriller Opening Sequence Evaluation

In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Prior to creating my media product I did research into typical codes and conventions of a thriller film or TV series. The conventions of a typical thriller are very hard to establish as thrillers have many different sub genres, however one way of defining a thriller would be its ability to thrill an audience, typical conventions of a thriller would be; dark lighting, scary atmospheric music and usually a remote setting such as an abandoned warehouse or an old farm. In recent years thrillers have averted to more of a horror based theme, with the use of gore and gruesome imaging. My thriller doesn’t comply with this, my thriller is more psychological and is very minimalistic when it comes to shocking imaging. However this is only an opening sequence, it is not a short film meaning that it should only build the atmosphere to finish the film. The intension for my opening sequence was to get the audience thinking and questioning what has happened or what is going to happen. For example in sin city the opening sequence shows an man and a woman on a balcony in what appears to be a very built up city scape. As of this point the audience don’t know who either of the characters are, why they are in that situation or their relevance to the film. After a short conversation which gives no clue to the audience as to what is happening or what is yet to come, the man then shoots the woman and the camera does a swift zoom out to the bird’s eye view of the city landscape in which the film’s title emerges. In my thriller I have used a similar of idea of putting a death in the opening sequence in order to get the audience thinking what is going to happen next it creates suspense. But the film doesn’t actually show the victim killed, it is suggestive that he has been killed or that something bad has happened to him, this is done through the use of camera, mise en scene and lighting in the entrance of the second character into the victims home. My thriller conveys to the typical conventions of a thriller, in parts it is low lit and the music used is very eerie and dark. At the same time though I wanted to try and create a normality to the characters life, I wanted him to appear as a normal businessman however the twist was that he was carrying a gun with him to work, this makes the audience question him as a character. Why is he carrying a gun? What is it for? Is he the killer, is he going to kill somebody? But then he is killed off at the start, which then makes the audience question, who killed him? Why did they kill him? Was he carrying the gun for a reason? Or was he killed by his own gun? All of this gets the audience thinking as to what is going to happen next and builds the tension, keeping them thrilled on the edge of their seats. I took inspiration for my thriller from two opening sequences, Sin City and the opening sequence of the TV show Dexter. Sin city gave my thriller the cold dark murderous feel whilst Dexter gave me a feeling of normality with a sinister twist this Is explained in my evaluations of the two clips.

Social Group

The social group that my thriller represents are middle aged males between working and middle class. The two characters in the opening sequence. Typically the main characters in films are teenage males and females. This is probably because the typical audience of thrillers are young men and women usually between the ages of 16 and 25. My thriller is intended to be sophisticated and mature in the way that it tells a story. The story is typical of a thriller surrounded by murder and crime. The film is set in modern day however is in black and white giving it a classic feel, this makes it feel like a flashback dream of an elderly person about an event that surrounded them but set in modern day.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

If I was to go professional I would like to re-create the film on a large budget and hopefully give it a more professional and higher quality feel. The distribution company that I would hope to distribute my media would be warner bros. Warner Brothers are an American based company however work co-ordination with some UK film producers. An example of this is the Harry Potter films, it was produced by a UK based company using British actors however it was distributed my Warner Brothers. This benefits Warner Brothers as they get a cut in the profits made in the film sale, and it also benefits the production company as they get their film endorsed by a well-known name in the industry. Benefits of this are, the film gets screened in more cinemas in the UK and in America as well as being able to use their name and logo in the advertisement of the film. Warner Brothers are an extremely well-known name in the film industry and are one of the oldest distribution companies. Examples of their work include new films such as “sucker punch”, “Clash of the Titans” and “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part One” I would be happy if warner brothers distributed my film as they are known for producing big blockbuster films usually in the genres of action, thriller and comedy. An example of a thriller distributed by them would be The Town, is is a crime based thriller and follows the life of a long term criminal as he tries to escape from the criminal world to continue a normal life.

How did you attract/ address your audience?

My target audience was young males between the ages of 16 and 25, I decided upon this through research into typical thriller audiences and this one was the most dominant. I addressed my target audience by creating a thriller which combined the two sub-genres of crime and psychological. These two genres especially crime are heavily watched by young men. The thrill surrounding murder and crime make for very appealing stories for young men, most violent crimes are associated with the male gender and so movies based upon crime and action have s specific appeal for men. My thriller is crime based, within the opening sequence of the film I kill off one of the characters shocking the audience and start creating an overall theme of murder and crime which will continue throughout the film.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

When constructing my product I have learnt a lot about the use of cameras, lighting and the positioning of cameras. I have learnt how to use advanced editing software and have gained an advanced understating of applying effects, transitions and the importing and exporting of files. I know through experience the importance of getting the ratio of the sequence correct to the way in which it was filmed as not to squash your image when it is exported. I tried to obtain the beat quality possible for filming and tried to maintain that quality during the importing, editing, exporting and uploading stage. Before I did this project I had no idea how to use Adobe Premiere pro, however now I feel that I have an advanced understating of how to construct a basic timeline and apply effects and audio to it. It is good to learn the theory of creating a film and gaining an understanding of the typical conventions. However it is much better if you are able to apply that theory and give it your own personal creativity and input. Then assessing yourself once you have created you piece of art, taking on constructive criticism and going back and seeing where you can improve learning new techniques and better ways of getting the desired effect you want.

Looking back at your preliminary task what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

One very noticeable difference between my opening sequence and my preliminary task is the ratio for the video, it was during the process of creating my thriller that I learn the importance of getting the ratio of the sequence and the export size correct and that this would be dependent on the camera that I filmed with. I also feel that my use of titles and transitions is much more effective in my thriller and I apply the use of video effects and transitions much better in order to give the video a professional appearance. Overall I feel my use of camera angles audio and lighting has dramatically improved during the period between the creation of my preliminary task and my thriller opening sequence.

Richard Kish

Overall, I felt that the opening sequence was good but it seemed to lack the necessary hook that I would expect in a Thriller. Some of the camera angles were very clever and rather interesting and if they had been linked with a slightly more engaging narrative then they would have been really effective. I also thought that there certainly was evidence of the enigma code in the ending of the opening sequence and this was perhaps the most effective piece of the entire film. I did notice a few problems with the edit, mainly, some of the credits are impossible to read due to the black & white effect on the background, the music does not add the gravitas to the sequence like it probably should do and overall the sequence does not feel as thrilling or interesting as I would expect from the genre, but this might be a conscious decision.

Response to feedback

I understand Richards critical points of my film, I do feel that the overall feel of my film doesn’t create the thriller effect I wanted it to have to the best of my ability. The music was a mistake of communication on my behalf, the person that I asked to construct my music track viewed the wrong video that I intended, I directed him to be YouTube channel however didn’t make the title of the video I wanted him to make it to clear. As a result of this mistake I made, he created a really good track for me however it had been tailored to suit my first thriller I had created before I split from my group. I wasn’t able to ask for him to make changes to the track as I was running out of time to upload my final edit, so I risked using the track as it still had a thriller them and although didn’t work as effectively as I had hoped it still provided a background for my video. The credits was a difficult part of my film, the lighting was very bright and I had used a simple white text font for my credits, I did my best to position the credits as best as visibly possible without disrupting the look of the film.

Editing

I used adobe premiere pro to construct my clip, I considered using after effects for adding tints and an animated introduction however I found this was too complicated and I would have had to learn how to use it on top of what I was already having to get done. I didn’t see the use of after effects as an essential, it would have been a luxury to finish the film off. All of my filming was done on my personal camera shown in figure 1, the reason for this was, I was ill on the Friday I went to collect my camera and tripod from school, I was filming on the Saturday and so wasn’t able to obtain a camera or tripod for filming. So I used my personal digital camera and a small tripod I found in the house. The tripod was only 10 inches long and so for head height shots I had to either use a raised surface or film by hand. This had an effect on the steadiness of my shots and it limited my positioning of camera angles. Despite this I feel that I produce and a very good range of clips to use in the editing process and selected those with as little shake as possible. After opening premiere pro for the first time, you have to create a new project. Within the project you are then presented with this screen, this is the sequence, the sequence will be what your files are edited on and forms a timeline for your clips. Selecting the ratio and quality of your sequence will depend on the format you filmed in whether it be widescreen or standard ratio. This will be important to ensuring the best quality video after editing, exporting and then uploading. Once you have created your project you need to import your video clips. Select file from the main toolbar and go down to where it says import, you need to select this which will take you to the file select screen. This is the file select, here you can select the video files you want to use for your project. These files have to be saved in the same driver as your project, in my case these were all saved into my T drive. If you move these clips after you have imported them into your project then premiere pro will ask you to relocate them, so it is best to leave them in the same location once you have started. The imported file/s will show up in the far left sidebar. From here you are able to drag and drop them onto your sequence at the bottom centre of you screen. All files whether they be video, audio, images and titles will appear in this left hand box, all of them work on a drag and drop basis, but everything is edited on you sequence. Once your files have been dragged onto your sequence you can start editing. The sequence itself is built up from audio and video columns video in the top half and audio in the bottom half. All video files, images and titles should be placed in the video columns, and all soundtracks and sound effects should be placed in the audio columns. When you drag your clip onto the video column, the audio from that video will automatically appear directly below it in one of the audio columns. There are a couple of simple buttons at the side of each column these are basic actions such as muting audio and darkening a video. You are able to layer these clips in several columns, including placing text over you video, this is done by using several columns. Editing my project I enjoyed the editing process of creating my project I found it really enjoyable and feel that I did a good job of it. In my storyboarding and planning I didn’t plan specific effects and transitions I decided on those through experimentation and watching over the film. I haven’t use this software before and so had to learn the basics from scratch, at home I watched YouTube tutorials on the basics of the software and when I came to college I put this into practise. But with all things you learn by practise and experimenting with the software. Effects In my film I didn’t use a lot of visual effects the area I concentrated on was lighting and colouring to create atmosphere. The biggest effect that I used was a black and white tint. This turned the entire video black and white, I hadn’t intended on doing this however felt that it was much more effective than standard colourisation. . The lighting in my house was very yellowy, it made the video look to happy and not as sinister which is what I was going for. Some films pull the black and white effect very well, such as Sin City however in Sin City certain objects are colourised such as the lady in the red dress during the intro and the green in her eyes. I would have used this in my film however I was unsure how to do this and so settled for a simple black and white effect. This effect was called tint. The second effect that I used in my film was a Luma curve, I used this on the entrance of the killer this emphasises the shadows in the shot and gives it a darker more ominous feel. Combined with the low angle this creates a very menacing image. Transitions Most of the transitions in my film are straight cuts because with fading transitions it creates the feel of flow and softness. This was something that I wanted to avoid as I am creating a thriller. The use of transition was mainly used in the titles fading in and out and the odd cross dissolve to show time passing. The three transition effects that I used are additive dissolve, cross dissolve and fade to black, all of these were used in a specific way mainly to dissolve and image in dissolve it out or dissolve one image into the other. Titles The title for the Production Company and studios was just a simple image inserted into the sequence with video transitions applied to it. I created these titles in fireworks, the SWA studios is a small animation company that myself and my friend used to run a YouTube channel for and now he uses it as the name for his multimedia production company, in graphics and web design as well as the sub YouTube channel I have setup which he supports all the graphics and media for. This meant that he already had a logo and them for the company and I just customised this theme to create a professional simplistic title. The RazzleTaz production company was just made up specifically for the video and I just created the title from the simple idea of making it black in colour and professional.

The Suit Final Edit

New Draft for Thriller The Suit

After receiving feedback from my class mates and my teacher i have found ways of improving my opening sequence ready for the final edit. As yet i have no music on my thriller as i am currently waiting for it to be made by my friend. I have had trouble obtaining music for my opening sequence and so wasn't able to put any on my first edit. i have been delayed in getting this video up as i have had trouble working in my group there was dispute on the amount of editing each individual contributed to the film as for the first opening sequence we did i did most of the editing myself as my group were not confident in using the software. I decided to split from the groups and create this new project quickly brainstorming my idea that lesson. I am now currently working at re-doing my research and planning to suit this new opening sequence and then will we re-drafting it for the final edit and then evaluating. The improvements that i make to this thriller will be minimal as i don't have a large amount of time space to get it finished and evaluated. This means that i will not be re-filming anything, although i would like to as in parts it was commented that the camera was shaky, this was because i was unable to obtain a large enough tripod to film the whole thing. The only improvement i will be making to the thriller is to add a sound track to it. There is more that i would like to do however i don't have time to do it if i want to meet deadlines.

Draft Thriller

This thriller was created by myself, Rachel Aylott and Samantha Milne. After a viewing from classmates and my teacher we were told that we needed to put a soundtrack to our opening sequence and that more effects and titles were needed as well as the use of a studio and production company title. However the and i feel that we are not working effectively together, so i have decided to leave this group and start and new project myself and adapt my blog to fit my new film. I have realized that my blog needs a lot of improvement so will be putting in extra time and effort to ensuring that it meets the standards i need in hope to achieve a high grade. I think that this course has taught me that i need to keep on top of my coursework and not fall behind as now i have lost marks for deadlines and so need to make them up in the quality of my work from now on and any improvements that i make.However the feedback that i received on this opening sequence will be put into place in my new thriller opening sequence and hopefully i can use that to ensure that my film is to the best of my ability.

Actors and Characters

Characters and Actors

Character 1

Name: Character 1

Played by: Chris Gray

Role: Character killed off at start of the film shocking the audience as he is setup as though he will be the main character in the film. Possibilities for if the film is continued could reveal that he is and then it leads up to how and why he is killed or following on after his death the reasoning for it. The character is introduced at the very start of the film and is presented to the audience as having a very important role to play.

Character 2

Name: Character 2

Played by: James Verran

Role: Has a suggestive role at the end of the clip which shows him entering the victims house holding his work bag with the victims inside it. The Conventions used in the clip will make it out as though this character has killed character 1 this is done by mise en scene in the victims house and holding his bag, lighting darker lighting and luma curve suggesting that this character is in some way evil, and camera, the camera is at a low angle to the character suggesting dominance.

Actors

For my characters I stuck to friends that I knew and could get in easy contact with and organise to film with reliably, I also chose them based on previous acting experience and I feel

confident in their acting abilities.

Character 1 – Played by Chris Gray, I chose Chris for this role as the character is a mature businessman and so to play the rolecorrectly required and mature look and ability to play out a serious role without laughing or smiling.

Character 2 –

This was played by James Verran this role was very minimal and only required a couple of seconds of film

time. James offered to play this role enthusiastically and

maintained good facial expression during the filming.

He was reliable and did a good job of laying this role.

Filming Schedule

Filming Schedule

For my second media thriller I filmed between Saturday 26th and an overflow day on Sunday 27th March. In these two days I planned to get all of my filming done to edit for the following week. Saturday 26th March would be the main filming day and then I will use Sunday as an overflow day for any work that for any reason get done on Saturday. I believe that this is very much achievable as I only have to film in my house this means that I am not having to travel very far to film and then save the files to my computer. The two actors that I plan on using live locally and I am in regular contact with them this will insure that they are reliable on the day. I have already organised timings for when they come round for filming and so far everything is arranged for the day that I have assigned if circumstances force one or both of my actors to be unable to attend on Saturday then I would look into filming on the Sunday or if not find actors readily available in the date.

Set

All filming will be done inside my home and should only take roughly 2 hours at most to film depending on the number of takes. All my actors live within 20 minutes from my home so should be readily available to film, they are both friends of mine and so are willing to be flexible as to timings as well as being in constant contact with me, this communication would become essential if one were to drop out last minute and I had to rearrange. I have taken some location shots displayed below of where filming will take place.

Sin City Opening Sequence Analysis

Sin city is an example of a new age thriller with an aged look, the film is very good at enveloping the audience in the life of crime and sin, hence the title. At the very start of the clip it is a black screen the audience can hear the distant sound of police or ambulance sirens.This shows that straight away the director is trying to surround the audience in a world of crime and corruption. The camera fades up from black to reveal and young blonde woman walking away from camera towards a balcony railing,the camera is at a high angle suggesting that she could be some form of victim or insignificant. The sound of the sirens continues in the background accompanied by the high pitched brassy sound of a jazz trumpet. From looking at the mise en scene we can see that the movie appears to be dated around the mid 1950's, the majority of the film is black and white however the red long evening dress worn by the blonde woman in shot has been highlighted so that it stands out in contrast to the black and white. The color red represents lust and blood, giving a sinister appearance to this female character "the lady in red". A few seconds after the woman reaches the balcony we hear a voice over, the commentator is male he appears to be complimenting this women through the use of poetic wording use metaphors and similes. However " She shivers in the wind like the last leaf on a dying tree" this technical use of poetic language appears to be very sinister. It implies death, loneliness and weakness / vulnerability. As this point the audience haven;t yet established who each character is so at this point the clip is very unpredictable and exciting. The camera angle then changes and we get a mid shot over the shoulder of the woman, we see a man approaching her, he is dressed in formal wear and is suited to the time frame of the rest of the film. At this point me find out through the use of camera that this man is the narrator, he explains how he lets her hear his footsteps as he approaches, this is very intimidating he wants her to know he is there even though she probably already knows that, this creates a dominance of his character over her she appears very weak cold and vulnerable whilst he is cool calm and confident.

Dexter Opening Sequence Analysis

The Thriller Genre

Questionaire 1.) What sub-genre of thriller would you typically watch? A - Crime B- Horror C- Medical D- Psychological 2.) What gender are you? A- male B- Female 3.) How old are you? A- 15-20 B- 21-25 C- 25+ 4.) What emotion do you want to feel most when watching a thriller? A- Excited B- Scared C- Confused D- Hopeful Results Question 1: A= 7 B= 5 C= 3 D= 10 Question 2: A= 18 B= 7 Question 3: A= 19 B= 3 C= 3 Question 4: A= 10 B= 6 C= 5 D=4 Story Board These two images show my final storyboard that i will be basing my filming on. Each box shows a clear idea on the camera angle and shot that each scene will use. There are going to be more shots than just these 6. These are the key shots that most of the scene will be based around any other shots will mainly be used for simple continuity. Obviously this may change on the day of filming depending on the circumstances and wether it looks right on film or not during the diting stage in which case i will re film it.

The Story My story idea for my thriller opening sequence follows a middle aged man as he prepares to go for work. The idea is to create a feeling of normality. During the morning routine I intened to have a thriller based soundtrack this is to ensure that it keeps of feeling of thriller. The emphasis in this morning routine will be the man putting a gun in his briefcase to take to work with him. I will emphasis this using camera shots showing him getting the gun out of his sock draw placing it in his bag whilst still showing the rest of his morning routine. Once the man leaves his house i will fade to black. The next shot will be of the front door of the house he has just left, however returning will not be the first character but the introduction of a second character. This man will be holding the bag of the man who has just left with the gun hanging out of the side pocket. The cmaera will be at an extremley low angle and the lighting will be more shadfowed to make this man seem menacing. At this point it will fade to black and the clip will end, this leaves the story open eneded, the question on the audience's mind will be what has happened to the first character has he been killed, has he been kidnapped, who else is in the house, and why is this man returning to the first man's home. Research Thriller is an amazing genre of film and television, it is heartpounding and shocking leaving the audience on the edge of their seats. Thriller is a large genre and is made up from various sub genres, these include; physcological thriller, crime thriller, political thriller, action thriller, supernatural thriller and medical thriller. All of the sub genres of thriller have their own typical situations/ story lines. Typical stories of crime thrillers would be, ransoms, kidnappings, murders, revenge crimes and heists. The thriller genre is often described as being a sub genre to the horror genre, both of which use suspense and atmosphere to cause feelings of dread in their audiences. Alfred Hitchcock was a extremley famous thriller director from the 50's examples of his best known thrillers include; vertigo, psycho and the torn curtain. A genuine, standalone thriller is a film that provide thrills and keeps the audience cliff-hanging at the "edge of their seats" as the plot builds towards a climax. The tension usually arises when the character(s) is placed in a menacing situation, a mystery, or a trap from which escaping seems impossible. Life is threatened, usually because the principal character is unsuspectingly or unknowingly involved in a dangerous or potentially deadly situation. hrillers mostly take place in ordinary suburbs/cities. Though sometimes, they may take place wholly or partly in exotic settings such as foreign cities, deserts, polar regions, or the high seas. The heroes in most thrillers are frequently ordinary citizens unaccustomed to danger. However, more common in crime thrillers, they may also be "hard men" accustomed to danger, like police officers. Traditionally it has been men who have lead as characters, recently there has been increased amounts of female lead characters. Thrillers often overlap with mystery stories but are distinguished by the structure of their plots. In a thriller, the hero must thwart the plans of an enemy rather than uncover a crime that has already happened. While a murder mystery would be spoiled by a premature disclosure of the murderer's identity, in a thriller the identity of a murderer or other villain is typically known all along. This keeps the audience engrossed in the film due to anticipation, the film or tv show will have them guessing the end of the story before it has happened interating and engaging with them. In crime thrillers the crimes that must be prevented are serial or mass murder, terrorism, assassination, or the overthrow of governments. Jeopardy and violent confrontations are standard plot elements. While a mystery thriller climaxes when the mystery is solved, a thriller climaxes when the hero finally defeats the villan. More recent thrillers have begun incorpirating more elements of the horror genre, often they will invlove blood, gore and torture. These new types of thriller shock the audience by presenting them with grotesk imagery and sound. As thrillers advance directors are becoming more creative in ways of shocking audiecnes making the storylines of their films sicker and more disturbed than before. Obviously this is considered as a sub genre of the classic thriller but is coomon in the modern age.

Assesment of Task

The video didnt go 100% to plan there are two parts in which the camera freezes on a frame i thought that once it had exported that it would be ok. So the video has been restricted to one camera angle however the image is very dark anyway so we wanted to concerntrate on the audio ands getting the atmosphere right. I wanted the video to feel like the individual was trapped and confined in a small area and we think we have done this well and will learn from these mistakes ready for our thriller video.

Final Cut

Editing

I wasn't able to put anything on the blog yesterday so i am in at my lunch time now writting up what we did yesterday and doing some more editing. Some of the files that we have off one camera are not playing properly in premier pro. I think is because thes school computers are slow so i am hoping that it will smooth out when i export the file. In our team we are concerntrating on each others strong points and spreading the work load evenly. I am happy editing i like that side of the project and the others are doing story boards and scripts, i have contributed to one of the story boards and made a document of screenshots that i am meaning to upload. Dug has been coming in and working with me on the editing and i have been showing him what i have been doing.

Editing

Today we were editing the clips that we have recorded trying to piece it together.For filming we used two different cameras which has slightly complicated things because my camera hadnt saved the files in the right format for the software at school so wasn't working correctly to adjust this i will have to take it home and use a format converter. Editing is going well the software that we are using is Adobe cs4 premiur pro, i have never used this software before so i spent about 10 minutes looking at how to use it and getting help from one of the technician staff who was in our lesson. Most of the clips are now edited and put into sequence i really like the software that we have i now find it very easy to use it is less complicated than i thought. I have taken some screen shots of the editing process and will have to anotate those tonight. Tomorrow lunch i am going to spend some time editing in the new clips that i will get tonight off my computer and hopefully should have most of the editing finished by tomorrow.

Filming

Thursday 20th January, today was our main filming session. When filming we changed several camera angles from the original storyboard this was due to the room we were able to use for filming. The orginal plan was to use a sports store and the school premisis however this was unavailable so we used a storebuboard in the social sciences block. I am going to upload a scanned in picture of the new story board. Filming went well today and we got all of our filming done for now, we used two different cameras. I brought in a camera and Steph borrowed one from a friend, these were very useful as they were in HD. No real costumes were needed for the filming it was just normal cloths and Steph brought in some fake blood. All of our team members were here today and gave us the oportunity to confer together on the making of the short film. The team consists of myself James, Dugey, Emma and Steph.

Planning

Starting our final planning and storyboarding for the preliminary task, this is going to be aimed and testing our initial camera and editing skills. I am not a complete novice with camera and editing however do believe it will be a good way of focusing to the main coursework task and become comfortable with editing with the software we have. Today only Steph and I are in the class the other two group members are not here, this may be due to an exam. We already have an initial idea for our task and will be writing up and extending upon it in this lesson.