Evaluation
AS Media Production – Lily
We
chose to do a psychological thriller because we thought that it would be
different from the rest of the group and we like the idea of a plot that people
can relate to.
We
were thinking of what to call our thriller. I came up with Charlie but I found
out that it was already taken by googling it. Then out of the blue, Lily popped
in my head and shared it with the group and all three of us agreed that it
would fit perfectly because we all wanted the audience to think that is about
an innocent little girl but it will actually play on their minds.
We
thought that a psychological thriller would be different compared to others and
it also links into our theme and plot because the audience thinks that it will
be about an innocent little girl but what we wanted was for the audience to
think about what is going to happen and predict what they want to happen not
what is going to happen.
Question one
In
what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions
of real media products?
In
our media productions of Lily, we used many conventions of thriller. For
example, in the Prezi below, it shows what should be in a thriller and why:
Definition
of thriller:
1.
A novel, play, or movie with an exciting plot, typically involving crime
or espionage.
2.
A person, thing, or experience that thrills.
What
sort of thriller sub-genres are there?
-
Crime- Disaster
- Mystery
- Political
- Psychological
- Religious
- Supernatural
Which sub-genre of thriller did you choose? Why?
What
are the audience’s expectations for this genre?
People
usually expect a psychological thriller to have a complex narrative. It has
a heavy focus on the unstable
emotional states of the characters in the film. It is combined with mystery and
thriller as well. Depending on the theme of the film, for example death, mind
and identity, it helps the audience’s expectations for the film because if a
film starts with death/murder, the audience will expect the film to be about
revenge or crime involving the police. Our theme would mostly likely be death
because Lily is dead and comes out of nowhere to warn Ronnie and Wayne about
something. The audience at the start of the thriller does not yet know about
how Lily has died but if we carried on with the thriller then it would explain
it close to the end of the film so we would then get a better reaction from the
audience so with or title sequence when the audience views it their
expectations of the film would be presuming different perceptions about each of
the characters.
The
elements we used were from psychological thrillers which we used to create an
effect of a typical psychological thriller. We made the shot link together so it can flow smoothly instead of stopping and starting with gaps if the audience did that. By doing this and making it run smoothly throughout the opening of the thriller, the audience’s reaction and opinion of the thriller would be greater and the reaction from the audience would be brilliant. We did this by using quick and simple shots which built tension by hiding the identity of the protagonists. I think doing a psychological thriller was the best decision we made together because I think it is the type of genre that best gets a reaction from our audience.
During
the time when we were filming our thriller, we developed many elements
involving our thriller. For example, we used a different variety shots in our
thriller. By doing this it makes it more interesting to watch instead of just
having one shot for the whole two minutes.
Looking at the shot on the right of Lily brushing her sister’s face must suggest curiousness and interest for the audience because they don’t yet know who she is and why she is touching her face.
There
was one challenge with making our thriller and that was when we were filming
the car sequence and making sure that the 180 degree rule was in place. We had
to do this because otherwise the thriller wouldn’t make sense. As the car would
be going one way then other in a matter of seconds without the audience see it
turned.
The
typical conventions
of a thriller would be:
1. The protagonist(s) deals with death, their own or
someone else’s death.
2. The main storyline for the protagonists is usually
some sort of quest for them.
3. The main plotline focuses on a mystery that must
be solved
4. The film’s narrative construction is dominated by
the protagonist’s point of view (POV).
5. All action and characters must be incredibly
realistic and natural in their representation on the screen.
6. The two major themes that underpin the thriller
are the desire for justice and the morality of individuals.
7. One small but significant aspect of a great
thriller is the presence of innocence in what is seen as an essentially corrupt
world.
Shutter
Island
PLOT
– In 1954, a U.S. marshal, Teddy Daniels is assigned to investigate the
disappearance of a patient from Boston's Shutter Island Ashecliffe Hospital.
He's been pushing for an assignment on the island for personal reasons, but
before long he wonders whether he hasn't been brought there as part of a
twisted plot by hospital doctors whose radical treatments range from unethical
to illegal to downright sinister. As
a hurricane cuts off communication with the mainland, more dangerous criminals "escape"
in the confusion, and the puzzling, improbable clues multiply, Teddy begins to
doubt everything - his memory, his partner, even his own sanity.
Setting
The
film is set on an island to show isolation from the rest for the world and it’s
creepy because there is nowhere to run or hide. This relates to our thriller as
the idea of the isolation from the rest of the world matches the isolation in
our car sequence as the family (Ronnie and Wayne) want to shut out the rest of
the world because how the way that they are feeling about the their
daughter/sister’s death whereas in the film, Shutter Island, they want to
protect the people outside of the prison.
Comparing
Shutter Island to other psychological film like Leon for example, Shutter
Island is a different thriller from the rest. It tells the audience a story
about a passionate but troubled man. However right at the end of the movie
there is a massive twist, for a first viewer, no one would expect because of
the way the film is set up at the start. What is good about this movie is there
are so many twists and different suggestions to it; it always keeps the
audience’s eyes attached to the TV screen. The way the film is set up to use
interesting shots which create emotions which then the audience can relate to.
This makes the film a prime example of a typical thriller. But the film Leon is
a different type of psychological thriller. There is something about Leon that
makes the audience be pulled in by interest. Starting with the beginning of the
film, Leon himself is seen as an assassin, train killer and from an audience
point of view, it is not a good thing but has the film goes on, Leon is seen as
a king, loving and caring person. For example, he looks after his plant like
it’s his own child and also with the little girl. He lets her into his
apartment to hide her from the real bad guys in the film who just killed her
family.
Shutter
Island and Leon are two completely different thrillers but both with extremely
engaging plot to captivate the viewers. This is because they both use the
conventions of a thriller which include mise-en-scene, editing and sound.
Screenshots
of the film Shutter Island
Mise-en-scene
Setting
This low angle
shot could suggest two thing:
·
The weather
could suggest a storm is on its way and the storm could represent something bad
that is going to happen. The lighting in this shot helps emphases the sky and
the colour of the marshal’s clothing for example Teddy’s coat/ The coat blends
in with the rocks and this could suggest that he is fitting in with the characters
and location or could perhaps shows that Teddy is fading away from the rest of
the world by getting more and more involved with the investigation.
·
Also, a low
angle shot also suggest that the three people in the shot have power and
authority and they are seen as he hierarchy. Scorsese has placed a low angle
shot in here to make the audience feel intimidated and they look like they are
been looked down onto which also links with their power as well.
The
shot below from our thriller shows hierarchy in our thriller. The shot is
looking down on Lily and this high angle shot suggest that Lily is vulnerable
and need adult protection.
What are the audience’s expectations for this
genre?
Mainly the audience general expectations for
psychological thrillers would be:
·
Murder and
Death
·
Perhaps not a
happy ending for all involved for all the characters
·
Gritty
·
Makes the
audience think about what is going on instead of the plot being an obvious one
·
Twists and
turn in the story line
·
Character easy
to relate to for the audience – feel the character’s real emotions
·
One
protagonist - Crazy, not interested and careless
·
Other protagonist(s)
– caring, thoughtful, get the job done
·
Young
vulnerable and innocence girl who has died and turned into a ghost
·
Typical
location – seclude from everything thing
·
Protect her
family
·
Murder others
who hurts her family
What conventions are used to make an effective thriller opening?
- Mise-en-scene
- Actors and their character
- Shot types
- Sound
·
We got our
ideas from other thrillers that we previously watched in class and this helped
my group decided what made an effective thriller opening. An effective thriller
opening consists of conventions like mise-en-scene and sound. This is because
if we have these conventions in our thriller it will create an atmosphere and
the audience will enjoy the thrill that it gives out. By studying and comparing
previous thriller openings, it gave us rough thoughts and ideas for our
opening. Thrillers that we have studied and observed are films like Leon, The
Butterfly Effect and The Sixth Sense.
It also helped us establish the conventions (sound,
mise-en-scene…) that thriller openings so then we could move on and plan and
film our thriller opening. To make an effective thriller, we needed to engage
the audience with Lily does and they need to know what is happening and by
doing this we need to introduce Lily in two different ways, which we did. We
started off with her playing, skipping and enjoy her childhood (set in
Grimsthorpe Castle, effects – black and white) then with the car sequence and
her family she is seen as an evil little girl who scares others people
including her own sister and father.
Mise-en-scene
– Setting
·
Choosing the
setting where we were going to film took time and research. The place had to be
perfect because we needed somewhere that is in the middle of nowhere and where
not many people go. So we chose Graby. This was a great place to film our
opening to psychological thriller because it is isolated from the rest the
world and this shows how alone the family is and how they are effected by
Lily’s death. Also, where it is set gives the audience an idea of what could
happen in the movie. However, if there is more than one location that we have
used in our thriller, then this could be a twist in the story line. This makes
it more interesting and confusing in a way for the audience because it plays
with their minds because the audience will predict who the characters are by
the trailer and also if they suspect one person but then mostly likely the plot
will have a twist and it will be someone they thought was on a good side.
Salt
trailer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJsozafkGwI
Movie2k-
Clips
of Salt showing twists in the storyline
http://www.movie2k.to/movie.php?id=291371&part=1
- 15minutes and 19 seconds in the film - part 1
- 12 minutes and 1 second onto part two of the film, a twist that reveals that Salt is actually the Russian mole.
http://www.movie2k.to/movie.php?id=291371&part=1
- 15minutes and 19 seconds in the film - part 1
- 12 minutes and 1 second onto part two of the film, a twist that reveals that Salt is actually the Russian mole.
Sound/Music
The music reflects what is happening at some point
in time in the film or even what happens throughout the film. Our music for our
opening of a thriller begins slow and gradually starts to speed up and build
tension. Every thriller that I have looked at like the Butterfly Effect Seven
always has music to build tension so it gives a thriller for the audience
watching.
Clips
of thriller that build up tension
We
started the music right at the start to introduce LRS Production but then we
changed when the thriller began.
Screenshot
of the first shot
We
did this because we thought it would help create an atmosphere for the audience
and it would help the mood within the scenes especially with the scene with
Lily looking at Ronnie in the left side of the car.
Shot
types
A
variety of different shot types is other conventions which help the thriller
opening be effective.
Actors
and their character
·
In a usual
psychological thriller, there should be situations and characters that are
conventional for thrillers. Often the thriller genre plays with the
supernatural and they use young children are act as innocent witnesses or who
they get controlled by other character in the film. The audience expect a
killer/villain in film especially thrillers. In any films we meet a mad,
dangerous killer and are invited to experience both sides of his personality.
One side is the friendly and a pleasure to be around. The other side of him is
purely psychotic. We usually see the friendly side first because the audience
would have a bigger reaction when they find out he/she is the villian in the
movie. We usually have to wait until right at the end until we find out who the
killer is. They do this to keep the audience entertained and thinking who is
who.
Inspirations
What thriller openings inspired you? How?
We were thinking about putting a poem about Lilys
at the start our thriller but in the end, we decided not because we thought thar it would be too much and perhaps wouldn't link in with the storyline.
The music in this shot start to build tension and
then the audience would be ready when something happens.
Our first shot is of Lily but theaudience cannot her face so it’s a lack of identity. The shot from above from The Butterfly Effect inspired me because it gave a sense of mystery to the audience
Here show Evan, the protagonist writing something
but we don’t yet know why he is writing it and who is he writing it for.
The next shot is of another person with a touch while
Evan is still talking out loud about what he is writing. This creates mystery
and grabs the audience attention by keeping them fixed on the story.
The Sixth Sense
The shot on the left is one of the shots that inspired us
when we were planning our thriller. We thought that this particular shot would
be good to put it our thriller because it show both the protagonists’ expressions
and also clearly shows Ronnie’s reaction to when she saw Lily.
Leon
With this shot from the film Leon, we used the same two-shot
in our thriller to show interest in each other and what they are doing. With
the shot on the left, Leon is showing Mathilda how to use a gun and
how to use it and with ours, Lily Is interested in Ronnie’s face and perhaps
what she could be saying to Wayne (Lily & Ronnie’s father). Also, I believe
that these two shots show the relationship between the two characters in the
shot. With ours, it suggest that Lily is curious and perhaps trying to communicate
with her family.
Fast and Furious
The shot (left) from the film Fast and Furious was one of my
inspirations with when we were shooting our car sequence.
The shot gave me some ideas that we could put into our car sequence.
Even though the car from F&F is going about 100mph and our was going around
20mph the shot itself is similar and I thought by using this shot in our
thriller would help:
1st – variety of shots
2nd
– give some ideas to the audience about the location of where it is set
3rd - show the Lily point of view
Psycho
This mid shot from the film Psycho in 1998 resembles our
shot in our thriller. Before filming our thriller, we looked at several
different thrillers and I believe that Psycho is a great example for so many
different shots in one scene (the shower scene). Using the mid shot shows the
audience some body language and also shows strong facial expressions as well. Comparing
Psycho to our shot from our thriller, it seems that she is reaching out for
something or someone. If I were the audience, I would feel sorry for her
because no one is helping her. However, in our shot, Lily is staring at the
audience so they could feel intimidated by her. The reason why we did this was
because we wanted to show two sides to Lily: a helpless and vulnerable side and
a creepy side to scare the audience.
QUESTION TWO
How
does your media product represent particular social groups?
In our thriller opening, we don’t really have a
particular role that we wished to present. However, Lily, played by me was a
typical little girl who had died from something but the audience does not know
what she died from (yet).Since it was only the opening to a thriller, not the
whole film, we didn’t want to give it away too much at the start of the film. Ronnie
and Wayne (who played Lily’s sister and father), could be represented as the
hero and heroine. It could perhaps be shown to the audience that they could
have Lily in the road for a reason. Later in the film would show and most
definitely explain why she is in the road and obviously explaining the whole
storyline throughout. By Ronnie and Wayne seeing Lily in the road could suggest
her coming back and trying to communicate to them. As the protagonist of this
thriller, we tried to show Lily as the young, vulnerable and innocence little
girl.
What kind of media
institution might distribute your product and why?
What kind of media institutions might distribute
your media product and why?
·
A media institution
is a company or organisation that is accountable for a media text. This could
be through marketing, production, distribution or regulation
Which do you think will suit your product and why?
I have chosen Working Title as our media
institution. It is a very popular, British Institution and I thought it would
suit our thriller very nicely because it is well known by the British public. Working
title films are a production company, based in London. They have been the
production company for some amazing films like Les Miserables (2012) Paul
(2011) Wimbledon (2004) and even the amazing, Billy Elliot (2000). None of
these films are psychological thriller and it will be nice for they to produce
one because it will shows all different genres of films and genre.
Working Title is a production company based in
London, England. Even though Working Title is a company inside a company,
Universals Studio, (a huge American company), this will help our thriller get
to the best ability. For example, the number of viewers will be greater because
it will be in the US and the UK then could perhaps expand to other smaller and
perhaps larger countries.
Choose a thriller that a been distribute by that
media institution
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aco15ScXCwA
The mystery
thriller, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy was distributed by Working Title. It is a
film about the bleak days of the Cold War. A espionage veteran, George Smiley,
is forced from semi-retirement to uncover a Soviet agent within MI6.
In the
early 1970s during the Cold War, the head of British Intelligence, Control,
resigns after an operation in Budapest, Hungary goes badly wrong. It transpires
that Control believed one of four senior figures in the service was in fact a
Russian agent - a mole - and the Hungary operation was an attempt to identify
which of them it was. Smiley had been forced into retirement by the departure
of Control, but is asked by a senior government figure to investigate a story
told to him by a rogue agent, Ricky Tarr, that there was a mole. Smiley considers
that the failure of the Hungary operation and the continuing success of
Operation Witchcraft (an apparent source of significant Soviet intelligence)
confirms this, and takes up the task of finding him.
The film is written by written
by David Brain and directed by Thomas Alfredson.
I thought that this thriller
would be a good comparison to our thriller because we both have mystery in them
and also it an interesting plot behind it. However our thriller is more
psychological and Tinker Tailor Solider Sky is a stated as a drama.
Overall, I think that is company
is the right production company for our thriller because it is popular,
professional and has got loads of experience with producing movies.
Our thriller cover
Our cover gives a sense of mystery and thought. It
gives the audience an idea of what the story is about.
Discuss your production company name and logo and
the role of such companies - why did you choose it?
This is a picture of our LRS Production company
logo. Shannon was the main creator and drawer for our logo but we all gave our
ideas to contribute to it. We thought the colour red would enhance it to make
it stand out because normally when most people picture a wolf you see blue
tones and shades, but this red tone in our logo will make it more unique and
people may remember it a little better because the colour red represents so
many thing. For example it could represent: danger, death, murder, blood or
even love and hatred.
One of my inspirations were DreamWorks
One reason for this is because of its colouring.
The blues within the shot links closely with the theme that it produces which
it usually childlike films. For example the films Small Soldiers, Shrek and
Hotel for Dogs. But other more adult like themes like the films Disturbia and Gladiator.
Our thriller I would say is more for adult rather than children. I would rate
our thriller a 15.
Explain what a production company does
The main definition of a production company is to
provide the physical basis for works in the realms of the performing arts, new
media art, film, television, radio, and video.
The production company may be directly responsible
for fundraising for the production (a film for example) or may accomplish this
through a parent company, partner, or private investor.
It handles budgeting, scheduling, scripting, the
supply with talent and resources, the organization of staff, the production
itself, post-production, distribution, and marketing.
Production companies are often either owned or
under contract with a media company, film studio, entertainment company, or
Motion Picture Company (who act as the production company's partner). This has
become known as the "studio system".
QUESTION FOUR
Who would be the audience for your media product?
Who do you identify as your audience?
I
would suggest that thriller, Lily, is mostly likely to be rated a 15 certificate
because according to the BBFC (British Board
of Film Classification) a 15 rating consists of:
·
Strong
violence
·
Frequent
strong language (eg 'f***').
·
Portrayals of
sexual activity
·
Strong verbal
references to sex
·
Sexual nudity
·
Brief scenes
of sexual violence or verbal references to sexual violence
·
Discriminatory
language or behaviour
·
Drug taking
I think that the certification of a 15 gives us more of range of people to
show it to. It gives us the opportunity to show relevant context for 15 and
overs. I think the females would like our thriller more than males because they
could perhaps relate to it because the story is about sisters and the youngest
one died from something that the audience don’t know about. We didn’t want to
give away too much at the beginning. However because it is classed as a 15, I
would be losing out on profit for 0-14 years as they will be able to see this
thriller and this is potential loss for us. But if we did lower is age rating
to 12 for example, we would get complaints of concerned parents so in the end
we want the people to enjoy our thriller and get good reviews so it is worth
the loss. If we want to get loads of viewers from people then we have to make
sure and it is rememberable and use all the conventions to make successful
thriller.
We gave questionnaires out in our school with a
range of ages (16-45) and giving them to both genders so it’s a large range of
people. We did this because we wanted to see different people’s choices with
regards to thriller and what they like to watch.
How did you research your audience?
One way that I research my audience and their age
range is I produced a questionnaire to see who likes what kind of films and see
other facts. For example, do you watch TV often? What programmes they do to
watch? We choose this particular age groups because firstly the certificate was
classed as 15 and I thought that it would be a good idea to give the
questionnaire so a range of age groups and both genders.
This graph shows that
people prefer thrillers to any other genre of films.
This graph shows that
a good proportion of the population prefer psychological thriller to sci-fi and
horrors.
For an older viewer, Lily would be understood by
them a lot more than younger viewers because they would show sympathy towards her even though they do not what
happened to her. However, for the younger audience they would mostly likely be scared of
her and show completely different emotions than if you were an adult viewer
that watched our thriller. So, in a way, I would prefer an adult audience
because we would mostly likely get a better reaction for them.
This picture is evidence that
people prefer thrillers to any other genre of films.
QUESTION FIVE
How did you attract/address you audience
What are people expectations for thrillers?
- Suspense
- End project to be resolved
- Twist
- Keep you on the edge of your seat
- Keep the audience thinking over
- Hero and villain
Say how you fulfilled your audience’s
expectations, based on what they ‘wanted’ in their questionnaire
We used different types of shots from long shots
to close-up shots to help us fulfil the audience’s expectations for thrillers.
The music and sound are two main priorities for
making a thriller. However, for our opening, we edited by cutting out all the diegetic
and placed our music onto it. If we didn’t compose the right music then the
suspense wouldn’t be right and there would be no tension in the film. Tension
is key especially in thrillers because it keeps the audience on the edge of
their seats and keeps them thinking over and thinking what could happen next
and why it could happen. We used the child’s nursery rhyme, tinkle tinkle
little star, to create a disturbing atmosphere. We recorded me singing on a Mac
then after that we put a reverb and slowed it down so it would be more intense
for the audience.
I have produced our rather short four question
questionnaire for an audience because I wanted to see what they would say about
thrillers and why.
1. What do you expect to feel when you are
watching a thriller?
2. What was the last thriller you watch and why
did that particular thriller attract you?
3. Did this thriller have usual conventions that a
thriller would normal have or did it have something unusual and different about
it?
4. When you think of a thriller, what is the first
thing that comes to your mind and why?
From our audience’s answers, I found out that
younger people that I have asked were more likely to watch our thriller because
they think it will give them a ‘thrill’ and ‘have a great experience’ when they
watch it.
How did you use the audience research?
We thought by taking into an account what the
audience would like would be better because we thought that if we by using what
our audience wanted to see, it would give us a better review because it is what
they want to hear not what they don’t.
How did we put what our audience wanted into our
thriller?
Creating a thrill for the audience is very
important because it enhances to the feeling of the plot and to build tension
for the audience.
Associating with the tension in the thriller, I
think that the music has a very good link in building up tension and make the
thriller much more creepy and effective.
How does your opening link to other similar films
in order to attract the audience?
- Only 7 seconds in, after
the LRS Productions, the first shot is of Lily throwing and a pebble on the hop
scotch. This will demonstrate to the audience that this must be the
protagonists and by introducing Lily with the back towards the audience then it creates mystery. The music builds tension and suspense for the viewers
protagonists and by introducing Lily with the back towards the audience then it creates mystery. The music builds tension and suspense for the viewers
- Comparing this with another
thriller, The Butterfly Effect, this also shows mystery at the beginning of the
film because at the start it shows a person’s outline and this creates mystery
for the audience. The music builds up tension for the audience in this first
scene and the hidden identity creates suspense and altogether this produces a
fantastic opening to a psychological thriller. Psychological thrillers are
meant to keep your mind ticking and thinking about why that has happen and what
could happen next.
Since The Butterfly Effect is also a psychological
thriller, I was inspired by it and we aimed out thriller at a similar audience.
Since The Butterfly was a huge success producing gross earnings of $96 million
from a budget of $13 million. This was an eye opener for me and the film gave
me ideas to create tension and build suspense within our own psychological thriller.
We put the flashback in black and white so it suggests
the time that it is set. This would help the audience figure out why what has
happen to Lily because its shows all the happy times she has and how much
freedom she had away from her family.
Linking in with the last point, it suggests that
it must have been taken some time ago and the age that Lily must have been
during and time it was taken.
- The long shot on the screenshot of the film Psycho
shows the location of where she is. This gives the viewers some thoughts and
ideas of what might happen and why it could happen. I think that the long shot
gives an idea and sense of location and their setting and I would personally be
thinking why they are there.
Firstly, the clothes that the men are wearing
gives us as the audience the sense of time and class and authority. For
example, the man on the left shows us that he is wearing a uniform and suggests
he must have more authority then the two other men (middle and right). But the
three different men to this shot shows their purposes in life by the way they
stand and hold their selves.
The two shots above are both long shots and
suggest so many things to the audience. All the relevant context that I have
mentioned before in the previous paragraphs.
How did you use genre conventions, use of music/
sound, editing, mise-en-scene, plot and plot sequence to attract your audience?
We needed to use as may conventions as possible so
that our thriller would be a film that everyone wants to watch. The music and
sound is very important especially in a psychological thriller to build tension
and suspense.
Editing is another convention that we used
incredibly well. Putting in the order we all wanted , placing all the effects
onto it to make it more creepy and mess with the audience minds took a lot of
time but was so worth it when we completed it and saw it all for the first
time.
Mise-en-scene took a long to plan because we had
to pick a specific location that the audience can relate to. The lighting in
all the coloured shots had to be right because it would tell what time of day
it was and lighting helps enhances and character’s facial expressions and body
language. The lighter and set is the better it is. The costume that the actor
wears will always depend on the character that they are playing. For example,
with my character, Lily, her costume is a girly, colourful dress, with a navy
blue, long sleeved top with wellington boots on her feet. The clothing that she
wears shows the audience how old she is mentally not physical. Lily’s hair was
simple and her make-up was straightforward and pale with no colour so show that
she Is not human.
Lily’s plot is meant to be curious and confusing
to engage the audience. We have made it clear for our audience about the
different time difference. The black and white shows the time where she was
free and the coloured scene, the car sequence, is where she is coming back to
try and save her family.
QUESTION SIX
How did you learn to shoot effective footage?
To begin with importing all the raw footage onto the Mac was the first thing. This took some time to put it all on the computer. Editing took the longest amount of time to complete. My group and I had to make sure that there was continuity throughout our thriller opening. We filmed part of the car sequence the wrong way wrong so we had to flip the clip otherwise it wouldn’t make sense. Making a sequence out of all the footage that we have just put onto the Mac was tough. We had to find the correct clips, cut the clips and make it run smoothly. I have learnt many things on the Mac. For instance, how to cut clips, put effects in our piece and placed music onto the Mac. We have rather a lot of effects in our thriller because we wanted it to be a mystery and create a creepy atmosphere for the viewers. The effect like dissolve and flip made it run smoothly and also make sense.
Adding non-diegetic sound (sound effects, mood
music) into the thriller was challenging. This reason for this is because it
had to be so precise and link in with the footage that we have decided to place
into our thriller. In our free periods we made sure that we would go up to A11
and keep working on the thriller. We really worked hard as a team to make it
how it is.
The title and credits that we put in our thriller
were a lot easier to place onto iMovie than I predicted because we just created
a picture saying Lily to end the thriller and with the credits, that was
involved with our tile sequence, the hop scotch. At the end when Lily appears
it created a mystery and it also suggests a sense of innocence within because
of the writing and the way it is lay out.
Using a tripod is very
important to keep the shots straight and steady. The tripod also helped me with
the variety of shots in our thriller because then we could get an effective low
angle shot and high angle shot.
For example:
We use it for an extreme high shot and balanced it
when we took a shot of Lily’s feet when she was skipping down the road in Grimsthorpe
Castle. (picture above). Using this shot helped us give more variety of shots
and help us show the audience how she travelled from one place to another.
From the beginning, we said that I would be best
if we got has many shots as possible and then we could delete some if need be.
I preferred if we did more shots than fewer shots because then we can sort them
out nicely instead of panicking and rushed around no shots that we don’t have.
We thought by putting a good variety of shots in our thriller it would help the
understanding of the plot even though it could cause confusion as well. It
could cause confusion because they could not keep up with the plot and there is
too much to take in for that short period of time. The most common shot that we used was the long
shot.
This was because we had to give an idea about the
location and setting of the thriller.
To shoots sensible, realistic thriller we had to
focus on the 180 degree rule. The 180 degree rule is so important when you are
filming any type of commercial and especially movies because if no one applies to
this rule then nothing would make sense on TV.
180 degree rule
In
film making, the 180° rule is a basic guideline regarding the on-screen spatial
relationship between a character and another character or object within a
scene. We never had a particular bad issue with the 180° rule because we knew
that we had to stick to it.
An imaginary line called the axis connects the
characters and by keeping the camera on one side of this axis for every shot in
the scene. The first character will always be framed to the right of the second
character, who is then always framed on the left. If the camera passes over the
axis, it is called jumping the line or crossing the line.
Sound
When we were filming outside for the car sequence,
it was raining and very windy so we had to be careful about where we were
positioned the camera. It all depended on where we were standing and if we
could got a huge breeze and this could of effect our thriller. But the wind and
rain could have caused problems with our thriller because it could have
affected our sound. Lucky it didn’t as we blanked out all the diegetic sound
and place our composed music in instead.
Learning: other technologies
- Blogger
- Youtube
- Prezi
Using Blogger to show my evidence is a lot more
helpful than writing everything up and handing it in by paper. It has helped me
edit and retype different piece of work that I have needed to change.
YouTube is also a great way to show evidence
towards what you have done in regards to our thriller. I can post different
video and compare them to other films and see similarities and differences as
well. It also help me get inspiration from other clips on the internet.
Prezi is creative way to present an idea which I
might have towards this thriller. During this evaluation I have complete quite
a few of prezi to shows my understanding of the question and it also shows that
I can show different ways to present different ideas to an audience.
QUESTION SEVEN
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you
feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
·
How have you
developed as a film maker?
During this project for making the opening to a
thriller, I have developed my understanding of film making. Even the little
things like working a camera and the tripod, I have learnt all about the
different shot types (high angle shots, mid shots…) and how and when to use
them and linking in with that, what high and low angle shot suggest. Being a
film maker for the last 3 months has made me realise how difficult it is and
how much work is needed to be put in to make a film successful and enjoyable.
The skills that I have developed so many skills over the last 3 months are mainly
the use of the Mac; the editing side of the film making. I knew absolutely
nothing about Mac when I first started by now I know how to edit and create a
psychological thriller opening by cutting clips and putting effects onto it.
Explain the
strengths / weaknesses of your prelim – and how you built on / addressed these
- We have improved so much
over the time from the preliminary task to out official thriller opening.
OUR FINISHED OPENING OF A THRILLER
OUR PREMLIMARY
The strengths for our preliminary task:
- Different variety of shots in it.
- The tracking shot
- Simple location where students can relate to
because it was set in a school
Comparing our official opening to a thriller to
our preliminary task, I can see so many weaknesses that we had in our prelim.
- Jump cuts – There was so many jump cuts in our
preliminary task. We didn’t have much experience with cameras nor the Mac. The
shots that we collected were over two days so there wasn’t as much continuity
as I would have like to be in it either.
- No exciting action – There was any real action to
engage to the audience. The tracking shot was good but took too long and to be
honest, it was boring to watch. I suppose the real action came when we started
you play card and Ronnie cheated.
- Not many shots- Even though they was a variety of
shots, long shot, close- up and so on, in my opinion, there wasn’t enough shots
in the preliminary.
Planning and research
Research the location and setting in Grimsthorpe
Castle Planned our filming days Preparing a shot list Drawing out a storyboard
·
Review how
successful your opening is. Point out
any areas you would have improved, stating why.
Female viewer – ‘engaging, intense and thrilling’
Male viewer – ‘interesting, deep and intriguing’
The strengths of the thriller
- Variety of shots
- Clear plot
- Conventions of a psychological thriller
- Sound and music
- Effectively put relevant effects onto our thriller
- Developed a narrative – past and present
The weaknesses of the thriller
- Could be confusing for the audience where Lily
comes back from the dead and tries to communicate with her family, the car
sequence.
- People in younger than 15. People under the age of
15 may not understand the plot because of the changes in the time differences
and since it is a psychological thriller they may not understand why Lily has
come back to help her family.
- Our shot have improve but the camerawork being
more stable and that’s creates a more effective thriller because the shots are
clear and smooth.
- We had a slight lighting for the car sequence
because we filmed around 2-3o’clock in the afternoon and it was winter so the
nights got darker quicker. But in the end it was a scene and made sense to the
audience.
- There is one jump cut in our thriller and that is
with the mirror. There wasn’t smooth continuity throughout our thriller which
was annoying. It was very hard to try and get that shot perfect because we
would have never have got the camera in the exact place that it was at before.
So we tried our best to put the camera as close as we could to the first
position.
Comparing our preliminary task to our official
thriller, I see a huge change between them both.
In our preliminary task, it was too long winded
and not enough action for the viewers to enjoy. However with our official
thriller, there was loads of different shot, great understanding of the plot,
great locations there they were set in and also the way it all came together.
It was a great experience to have and I have
learnt so many skills by doing this. I have produced it, created it, directed
it, edited it and acted in our opening to a thriller called Lily.
