Final Thriller

The final thriller opening, created by me and my group.

7) Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learned in the progression from it to the product?

Over the few months between the preliminary task and the filming and editing of the thriller opening, I believe I have learnt a few valuable lessons on how to use my resources effectively, therefore improving the overall quality of my work. I have edited both, the preliminary task and the final thriller.

During the gap between the tasks I have learnt how to achieve a desired effect of suspense on the audience through the editing by adapting the length and timing of the different shots according to the situation presented.



I have used different shots to build tension like for example showing only Jakes leg while Afsana was cleaning up instead of showing the whole body straight away.



While working on the preliminary task we were mainly focused on getting as many different shots and techniques as possible. Which didn't really work out and some of the shots didn't look quite right, especially the jump cut in the corridor that was rather unnecessary.



We made sure to do a lot of research regarding thriller openings and how to keep the audience eager to see more of the film. I found out that it is important to catch the audiences attention within the first few minutes of the film, so that they will want to watch the rest.

Preliminary task beginning:

Final thriller:

When we planned the story line for our thriller we made sure to include different camera angles and practiced a lot to make sure they are effective and used correctly. We also filmed a lot more shots than me and Jake did for the preliminary task. We ended up with around 380 videos that I then had to go through and pink out the best ones to put into our two minute opening.

Whereas for the preliminary task we focused mainly on the storyboard and didn't have much time left for filming. Me and Jake did recorded most of it in one day and came out with only the necessary shots. We lacked variety however I managed to put it all together in a way that worked.

We learnt a valuable lesson through doing that, because when it came to us filming the thriller we focused more on the mise-en-scene and getting a a wide variety of shots, which turned out to work quite well. When we did the preliminary task the storyboard was our only planning sheet, but during the planning for our thriller opening we used many other planning sheets like:

• Risk assessment
• Animatic
• Shooting schedule
• Costumes & Props sheet
• Treatment
• Location sheet
• Shot list

Since the preliminary task I learnt a lot about editing and how every little frame counts. If one frame is out of place it will all look wrong. Therefore it took me a lot longer to edit it all since I attempted to make it as close to perfect as I could.

In the preliminary task we have only used the basic shots like long shot, establishing shot, medium shot etc. which made the film not as effective.

However in the final piece we attempted to add shots that could help is create an atmosphere. Like a low angle shot, wide shot, etc. The low angle shot of Afsana shows that she is powerful as the villain.

I discovered the importance of diagetic and non-diagetic sound. We made sure that we had eerie background music playing during the opening because we felt like it added to the overall feel of the film putting the audience on edge. In the preliminary task we had no music playing and instead all you could hear is people talking.

Video transitions are also important when trying to connect two events together making a smooth transition from one shot to the next. While editing the preliminary task I was not aware of how to use those features effectively therefore ended up with a badly edited jump cut.



In the final task everything seemed to flow smoothly from one shot to the next...

Other than a mistake in the shop where the camera seems a bit shaky



The camera was also shaky at one point during the preliminary task, and so we failed to improve on that aspect.

6) What have you learned about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

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5) How did you attract/address your audience?

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4) Who would be the audience for your media product?

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

 
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1) In what ways does your media product use develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products

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Screening

Me and Jake have shown our thriller opening to a few people in our class so that we could receive feedback and make alterations if needed. Despite us being nervous about it we received quite positive feedback which I talk about in my other post "Audience Feedback"

We had to play the video from my iMac due to the issues we encountered with exporting of the video. We were unable to render it and export it on time therefore we just played it on Adobe Premier Pro. People seemed to enjoy the video.

Audience feedback

Me and Jake showed our short thriller opening to a few people in our class and asked for their feedback on it so that we could alter it if needed.

Question 1: Did you like the film?

Every person we have asked said they enjoyed our film.

Question 2: Did you understand the storyline?

Almost  everyone knew what was going on in the opening however, one person asked why the main character did what she has done.

Question 3: Is there anything that you think we should reconsider?

A few people raised concerns about the organisation of the shots.

Question 4: Are there any other comments about the film that you would like to make regarding anything?

Some people that I have asked this question, told me that the audio should be lowered because the music was too loud as for a background sound. Therefore I made alterations.

Past Student Thrillers

This thriller opening makes no sense and the music does not match that much because to me it sounds like it is more happy than creepy, which defeats the point of a thriller. The quality of the video is bad and it appears more like a horror, showing that they were unsuccessful in making a thriller. Those flashbacks to the mentally unstable looking girl seemed random and confusing. I give it a 1/4

q

The film is not good. They recorded it at night time and you can't see much of what is happening. The camera makes the video look darker anyway and so if you want to record a shot that is meant to appear as if it is night time, it is best to record at 5-6pm when there is still some light visible. The story made no sense and the ending was predictable. I give this a 1/4



The film is quite well made and the music in the background creates tension. The acting shown is better than in most of the student thrillers I have seen and they conveyed emotion effectively, showing the connection between the two characters present. The whole thing was edited well and filmed using different types of shots showing a good understanding of cinematography. I would give this a 4/4

Making of the Title Sequence

After I have finished editing the thriller, I added the titles and the Ident to the opening. The titles were easy to make and I made sure the font matches the thriller climate. I had to ensure that on each shot the titles are in the right place so that they look the same. The titles were made by me and I decided to make them white because our ident's name is in white and so they go well together.

How To Film A Thriller

  

Long shot establishes the scenery and is important, to inform the audience of where it is all happening.

The diagetic sound gives the film an atmosphere and the music makes us feel uneasy and suspenseful.


The camera movement is important because different shots will represent different emotions and present the character from different points of view.



The idea that is implanted into our heads through a shot like that makes us feel uneasy and since we don't know who or what is watching the character we tend to feel tension.



The pace of the music is important when trying to create tension because it tells us how to feel in any given situation. When the music speeds up we know something is about to happen or something bad is happening and the character has to act fast. The fast editing helps to keep the audience focused and ensures that they don't look away from the screen because if they did they could miss something. The shot being tilted to one side suggests that the character does not feel safe and is in potential danger.


The warm light and the fading out of musics may confuse the audience and raise questions like, Was the character really in danger? Was anything even there? Why is everything suddenly peaceful again?



We are given a false feeling that everything is okay and there is no danger anymore.


Then an extreme close up of an eye is shown suggesting that she was watching the man this whole time. The music makes us feel uneasy once again creating tension and raising questions.

First Draft

This is our first version of the thriller. We decided to keep the majority of shots and the background music. We asked the teachers for advice and we received constructive criticism from three teachers. Each of them gave us an idea of how to make the ending look better. I agreed that it was not as good as the rest, therefore me and Jake went out to film another time just to change the shots of me and make the ending more professional and thriller like. The finished version will also contain an Ident that we did not have at the time when I exported this video. Jake has created an Ident that fits well with the theme of the film.

The Birds

The birds is a suspense/horror film directed by Alfred Hitchcock in 1963. The main character is Melanie Daniels played by Tippi Hedren, who meets a guy she falls for in a bird shop. His name is Mitch Brenner played by Rod Taylor, he lives in Bodega Bay and after she finds out that he wanted to buy love-birds for his sister's birthday, Melanie sees it as a chance to get close to Mitch. She decides to order the love-birds for him and take them over to his house where his sister could find them and it would be a pleasant surprise that would put Melanie in a positive light in front of Mitch. However, what seemed like a perfect plan soon turns into a nightmare. The moment Melanie arrives in his home town, the birds begin to go crazy and start to attack humans. The rabid creatures are killing people and no one understands why.

Hitchcock wanted people to see the movie from the beginning to finish. No one was allowed to enter after the movie started in the cinema to ensure that everyone could get the full experience of it.

The film ends abruptly and we are left on a cliff hanger wondering what will happen to Melanie and Mitch's family we are . The film ending being "unfinished" allows space for a sequel and it means people will be more likely to watch the other part to see how the story plans out. 

Making an Ident

Today I downloaded Adobe Premier Pro onto my computer and I attempted to create an Ident. I consulted Jake about what the company name should be and I suggested "Rabid Swan Productions" however Jake did not think that it was a good production name therefore we compromised with "Dark Swan Productions".

I created an Ident but I was not fully pleased with the way it has turned out and decided to let Jake create a possible Ident we could use. We agreed to be called "Dark Productions" and I ensured that that production company, did not already exist before Jake started designing the Ident for it. He created an Ident with a flickering candle in the dark, that I thought looked professional and worked quite well with the theme I had in mind for our company's Ident. We still have to consult the other members of the group Afsana and Ryan but I am convinced that we will keep this one. In case the group didn't like the original version Jake has prepared another version with a different font for the others to choose from. 

Studio Idents

Ident (short for identification) is a short sequence shown before a title sequence during a film shown on television between programmes to identify the channel.

It is shown at the beginning of the film, to present the production that has helped with producing the film. Sometimes, the production Ident will be altered in order to fit the theme of the movie. So for example in a cartoon type film the Ident may look more colourful and unrealistic. Whereas if it is a thriller or a horror film the colours will be much darker and gloomy. This helps to predict what sort of film you are about to see.

Over the years the Ident will be edited to match the current trends. The production company wants to be remembered by the audience and the introduction through the Ident has to be grand and epic. In the Universal Ident we can see that over the years it was transformed by adding more vibrant colours and special effects making it original and eye catching.

4th day of editing

I was editing for the whole lesson while Jake, Afsana and Ryan worked on their blogs. Occasionally I asked Jake to look at the video and tell me if the shots I chose were good.

2nd day of editing

I worked on the editing with Jakes advice. While Afsana worked on the blog posts for the group.

Issues encountered during editing

first day of editing

Our First Day of Editing :D

Psycho

The film Psycho is a psychological horror thriller from the 1960's directed by Alfred Hitchcock. The main character is a woman named Marion Crane played by Janet Leigh. Films main plot revolves around Marion stealing $40,000 from the place she works at so that she could then afford to pay for a wedding she planned with her boyfriend. Marion was told to deposit the money into the bank by her boss but she decided to run away with the money. She ends up at the "Bates Motel". The place where the famous "Shower Scene" takes place and Marion is murdered.

Psycho is seen as Hitchcock's best work. This is due to the fact that he used a variety of different camera tricks to make the stabbing look more realistic and unsettling to the audience. He challenged the use of "black and white" (bad vs good) binary opposites by presenting the audience with the character of Norman Bates played by Anthony Perkins. Norman is a character clouded by mystery, on one hand he seems like he is a positive character since the beginning when he helped Marion by letting her stay at his motel and tried his best to be friendly and engage in a conversation with her. However, there is also something about the way he acts that makes the audience feel uneasy and alert despite how nice he seems. Towards the end we discover that he has a split personality and due to the events that occur he becomes permanently trapped in the persona of his mother. We find out that he has killed his mother and her lover ten years prior, which affected his mental state.

As I mentioned at the beginning, the shower scene is the most popular scene out of the movie and possibly one of the most iconic in history of film. It was considered gruesome and violent by the production company and originally they were unsure if they wanted to take on the film. However after some alterations and negotiation between Hitchcock and the production company, they agreed to use it in the final version of the movie. The sound effects and the sharp music also contributed to the popularity of this scene and that soundtrack has been used in many other films after that.

Risk Assessment #2

Risk Assessment

Group Members:                                                                                        

Hazard	Person(s) at Risk	Likelihood of Hazard 1 – Extremely Unlikely 5 – Extremely Likely	Severity of Hazard Outcomes 1 – Very Low Risk 5 – Very High Risk	Risk Level (Likelihood + Severity) 2	Measures to Take to Manage Risk	Risk Managed? Y/N
Car accident	Everyone	2	3	2.5	A member has to watch for cars during filming	Yes
hurting yourself with a knife	Afsana and Jake	4	3	7	Be careful when handling the knife.	Yes
Breaking Merchandise in shop	Everyone	2	1	1.5	Contact with merchandise should be kept to a minimum	Yes

1st Day of filming

  On wednesday we started filming. We planned on going to Asda and film a few shots in the cleaning isle for the beginning of our thriller. Unfortunately we were not able to film in there. We spoke to the people at the customer service desk and they told us we have to talk to the manager. After a long while of waiting a man came over. We were told that unfortunately we were not allowed to film there.

We then decided to go to Sainsbury's hoping that they let us film there. When we got there we approached a woman at the customer service desk. She called over another nice lady that told us we can film, but she told us not to take too long. We set up the equipment and started to film the first scene. After a few minutes a Sainsbury's worker asked us if we have gotten permission from the manager to film here. We were unsure if the lady was the manager, however we said we nodded to confirm we acquired a permission. He then walked away and jake continued to film Afsana in the cleaning isle. Me and Ryan were feeling uneasy because we were out of our comfort zone, filming in a shop while everyone was staring at us. A few shots later, a man came over to us. He said he was the manager and asked who gave us the permission to film. The others didn't really know what to say and so I quickly explained the situation to him and what exactly we are doing. He said that it is okay for us to film after we promised to hurry up.

When we finished at Sainsbury's, we walked out through the door to the car park to film a shot of Afsana leaving the shop. It was raining and we had to make sure the camera didn't get wet. We managed to avoid that by hiding under a roof. We then left the car park and walked to Jakes house to film the second part of our thriller. We got soaked by the rain. We started out by filming in the kitchen which is the first "room" you walk into. Jake filmed a few shots of Afsana, making sure that we have plenty to work with. Me and Ryan then tried to make fake blood. Our attempts failed. We have tried three different washing up liquid colours, and added red food colouring to each one. However for some reason the substance always ended up a brownish-purple colour.

We tried many things that we could mix together with the red dye and yet it always ended up looking wrong. After a few unsuccessful attempts, we gave up. The filming of the rest of our thriller had to be moved to another day.

Storyboard

Production meeting 4

  We have met up today to discuss what we have done and when we can start filming. Ryan has been assigned with the task to complete the storyboard, however it has taken quite a while for it to be finished. We encountered issues with our idea and had to work around it with a slightly different plot line. We decided to film in Asda and in Jakes house. We have agreed to not do the filming at the car park, since we couldn't get a car.

Modern Thriller Openings

This is a blog post focusing on the different openings to modern thriller films.

History of Violence

History of violence starts out with an ambient, obnoxious sound that is diagetic. There is dialogue between the two men present in frame, they talk calmly despite the things they have done in the previous place. They are casually dressed and their outfits seem to be colour coded to inform us on what the characters are like. The guy that does the killing is dressed all in black showing us that he is a bad character, where as the other guy wears a white t-shirt with black trousers, from which I understood that the guy may not necessarily be bad or maybe he is torn between good and bad. This creates a contrast between the two main characters we are presented with.

When one of the guys gets into the car the ambient music seems to stop and is then replaced with country music.When the car stops the sound of music cuts and you can hear a car driving past. When the guy goes into the house, He moves the trolley to reveal dead bodies. A little girl comes out of her room looking terrified, he tells her to stay quiet and shoots her. The shot then switches to a different girl screaming in bed.

Zodiac

Fireworks
We hear non diagetic background music
See houses people celebrating
girl picks up the guy from his house
Two people in car
Theres some sort of party
4th of july
The girl drives off with the guy
We see the girl flirting
They are somewhere away from people but you can hear diagetic music
A car drives up behind them but no one gets out
the car drives off after they are uneasy girl looks worried
The car tires screech off the screen
the car comes back behind them
someone we cant see gets out
Shines light on the guy with the girl and shoots him
The music gets louder
she gets shotmany times
the guy walks back to his car

Brick
There is music playing
showing the guys feet
Then his face
crouching in a mouth of the tunnel in front of his dead ex girlfriend
there is a graphic match of the girls hand with bracelets on it, that goes from the dead body to the same girls hand in the corridor
lighting was dim and blue which can be interpreted as cold just like the girl laying on the ground is now frozen
No country for old men

non diagetic- narration
Showing shots of the dessert
Peaceful but deadly looking places
Police man arresting a guy whos face is not seen as he turns the other way
In the car his face is hidden by shadows
in the police station the guy walks up to the oblivious police officer and attacks him,
they are shown struggling on the ground
there is a lot of blood on the ground
The police officer dies
He washes his hands we see scars and blood down the sink
He then steals the police car and kills a man on the road

Animatic

This is an animatic created by Jake Cook. It is a moving version of the storyboard, that helps us determine how long the thriller may be after we are done with editing it. The pictures were drawn by Ryan and each one is shown for the amount of time we would have that particular shot playing. Jake had to take pictures of each individual box from the storyboard, then import them into Adobe Premier Pro where he put them all together. As you can see the video is too short to match the requirements and we have to keep that in mind when we film, by maybe adding extra shots into the sequence.

shoting schedule

Day	Scene	Location	Equipment	Costumes	Props	Cast +Crew
1	1	Shop	Camera Tripod	Long Grey Coat, Headscarf, Shirt, Trousers.	Basket & Bag	Jake Cook Beata rumian Ryan Sellstrom Afsana begum
2	2	Car park	Camera Tripod	Long Grey Coat, Headscarf, Shirt, Trousers.	Bag & Car	Jake Cook Beata rumian Ryan Sellstrom Afsana begum

Costumes and props

Costumes and Props

Character Name:  Afsana
Costume: -Long grey coat -red headscarf -Black trouses -Shirt	Props: -Car                  -Shopping cart -Asda bag -Cleaning products