Evaluation

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

We were able to develop our knowledge into understanding the forms and conventions of professional media products within this particular genre by watching and deconstructing well related films of this kind, looking into more depth at ones that specifically related to our sub genre we had chosen to do, aiming to use similar techniques to ensure our opening to a thriller was a success. When deciding how to open our thriller, we looking into whether we should begin with a relaxed opening of normality much like Law Abiding Citizens or that we should use unsettling scenes right from the start, like Taking Lives. We decided on giving the audience a sense of abnormality from the start as the majority of films we watched have done this - also considering the circumstances and the length of our film, we thought this would be more ideal. I found that emotion is an important element in creating an effective thriller and that the creators also tend to build up to an emotional high and 'take you along with the ride', something we aimed to do with specific shots and the information we kept hidden, disorientating the audience slightly causing them to become confused and question what was going to happen, ultimately scaring the viewer. This also makes our thriller unpredictable, important in relation to this genre. Silence of the Lambs effectively uses this technique, becoming a great success and knowing this proved to us that it could work well. We also focuses on the characters faces from time to time to help convey this emotion using their facial expressions. The setting and action in our thriller is also believable - we watched a few films in which i believed failed to do this, causing me to feel no emotion as i did not feel involved in the story, showing the importance of this particular form and the mise en scene within a thriller. We also ensured that the audience could connect with our thriller and therefore believe what is happening by including a sense of normality with the use of props and also having the teenagers act how they are perceived to be like in some cases, making use of stereotypes in which are used in the majority of films. A villain is a necessary part of a thriller in which should always over power the protagonist, in which our story perceives efficiently. However, i have found that the villain within a genre like this tends to be of a male in which we chose to challenge, making our thriller a little more unique and different. We also developed the idea of 'what is going to happen next' as this is important within a thriller, giving to much away to soon ruins the excitement and challenge of the audience themselves, having no mystery would cause the film to become dull and less effective. We also find that good and evil are used within a thriller, using binary oppositions to create that emotion discussed above. We chose to take advantage of this, showing the good and evil within the same character. We did this using the main character showing her happy and having a laugh with her boyfriend before she goes on to kill him - If this thriller were to be longer, there would be more scenes of her acting normal with her boyfriend to make use of this convention even further.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

We chose to use teenagers as our main characters rather than using adults or people of a younger age. We did this as relationship issues tend to effect this age group a considerable amount, in much grater deal than at any other life stage and it is also here in which people go through dramatic changes personally and scientifically in which could be the cause for Del's behaviour perhaps, as although this is made extreme, she is clearly going through changes here. We placed them in clothes that they would be typically seen in and expected to wear, allowing them to be generalised and used as stereotypes rather than looking in to much at there character personally as we did not have time for this. To do this we had the boys wearing baggy trousers and t-shirts, quite casual and laid back outfits. We wanted to insure the teenagers were represented as normal and like any other boy of this age, causing the audience to be able to connect with them. We looked into what they would be doing when they are seen in the shots at the beginning and chose that watching TV and having a cigarette outside were both usual and ordinary activities, giving an accurate perception of what teenagers are perceived to be like at the moment. We also adapted the narrative and story line to this particular social group relating to relationship issues and being given the house to themselves etc. We also represented gender here, in relation to boys in particular. Their style of clothes and their bodily stance could make them look as if they think they are 'big' and tough, much like what is thought to be usual for the audience. Although John searches the house for Del when she appears to be missing, he is still seen to act very casual and does not move quickly, showing that he is laid back and doesn't really think to much about it, representing this social group further. We used the idea of representations to also shock the viewer as girls are often thought to be the venerable and somewhat dependant on a male, in which we chose to differ from this efficiently.

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

I would be looking at film distribution's such as Universal, The Warner Brothers, Paramount or any big companies like these to distribute our film as they can distribute to many cinemas across the nation. The cinema would be the best place to show our film in as aiming to involve our audience as much as we can we believe that showing it on a big screen would help in doing this, ensuring all the effects can be notices and they have a real sense of involvement as the main character is seen walking to the camera, allowing us to create as much emotion as possible. This would also allow the audience to deteriorate between the lighting showing the flashbacks and what is present better and the non-diagetic music could have a bigger effect here, coming from a number of directions with the use of surround sound. Knowing that a number of films such as Taking Lives for example have been distributed by The Warner Brothers, this shows us that they have released successful thrillers that fit into the same sub genres as ours do. I feel our film would be at its best in a large modern cinema with all the latest equipment to enable it to show its full potential and create the desired effects we are looking to create such as tension. In advertising our film we would want our thriller to be advertised on the TV screens during the day or early evening, in between well known popular programmes, grabbing as much viewers as possible. However, we would have to be careful how this is done as we would need to ensure our trailer was fit to be viewed by people under the age of 15 at this time. We would add in extra elements and lengthening to our trailer that could only be shown after 9pm and over the Internet ensuring that we can get across the fear that would be involved in the film. We would like to show these on channels that we could benefit from, believing that the audience we were targeting would be watching these, such as ITV. Although we would use the Internet to promote our film, this would not be an ideal method to distribute as it would not gather as much viewers in this way and the quality of the film would not be as effective here. The dark lighting and lack of sound found in the cinema would also be beneficial in relation to this genre.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The audience has carefully been considered throughout the making of our thriller, aiming to draw in the minority of people but yet targeting one in particular to get the biggest effect. We looked into this in much detail, aiming to adapt our thriller to fit with this in such away. Factors such as age, gender, education and interests were all considered. We realised that making our film a classification of 15 would shorten our audience down my a short amount but we believed this would be beneficial in the long run, allowing us to add more horror elements and conventions of a thriller to gain more emotion from the audience, causing it to become more effective and popular in this way. Any age of 15 and above i believe would enjoy our film but this would depend on the persons personality and whether thrillers in general are appealing to them. We researched into this genre in particular, aiming to relate to this target audience. As being such a debated style of film the audience we are looking to attract would enjoy being afraid and influenced by the films they watch and we needed to get an understanding of where this particular interest came from. We found that the majority of people who watch thrillers tend to be teenagers, both of girls and boys and young adults. Having our main characters at this age we also helped would offer some further attraction to our film and relate well for them.

How did you attract/address your audience?

We aimed to address our audience with the music and image of the unknown location right from the start, we used an effect here in which could be said to relate to blood as we make the image unclear for a second, already showing the audience that something bad is going to happen and drawing them in to the story right from the beginning, creating a sense of tension and mystery and enhancing them to watch on and learn more. We have the main character looking into the camera at some stages and also have her walking towards it in which also draws the viewers in, giving a sense as though they are involved themselves and want to discover what is going on. The non diagetic sounds used give a sense of pace using a beat like structure, helping to convey the build up of an event as the sound becomes gradually loader before another track is added. We ensured our thriller was unpredictable and therefore created unanswered questions and the desire to want to learn more about it. Having text near the beginning showed the importance of some information, causing them to concentrate and realise that there was a case to be looked in to. We also made sure there was a lot of action and fast cutting so that the audience do not get bored or agitated.

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

The main thing i have learnt is in relation to editing and the importance of it. Having done all the editing myself i realised the effort in which has to be placed into it and the extent to which it brings everything together. It gave me a good understanding about the layout the clips have to be placed and how it can have a dramatic change on the mood and understand of the piece by a viewers point of view. The importance of getting the cuts in the right place and not dragging the clip on for to long or two short i also learnt, as well as the use effects can have, particularly taking use of slow motion in my piece. Although the majority of the film was filmed by someone else i did help out on the scenes in which i was not in and was in charge of filling in the preliminary task, both of which enabled me to make use out of the camera and understand what the shots, angles and movement within the frame contribute to and which ones are effective in giving particular messages across. I also found that the editing sometimes became difficult if some filming we believed would be ideal has simply not been filmed so we had to ensure that we had everything we needed. I made use of still frames, having the ability to change the pace of the clips, text, audio and its volume and effects, such as slow motion, colour change and flash. I believed i learnt how to control the mac and the camera efficiently and was pleased at how quickly i had adapted to this, taking much use out of our preliminary task to enable me to.

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

I found the preliminary task extremely helpful when looking at beginning my final product and my understanding of the media industry has developed a lot since then. It was a very good starting piece for us and allowed us to experiment with a number of ideas. As well as being given a good understanding of the camera and editing suite, this also enabled me to see what was effective and what was not in terms of camera angles, positions and the pace of editing. Choosing to relate the storyline of it to a thriller in itself also benefited us well, allowing us to develop methods and have a clearer understanding of a number of techniques that we could use in relation to this particular genre. This also includes understanding the effects non-diagetic sounds have in developing feeling and emotion within a story and therefore the importance of them relating well. We also found that facial reactions are important to convey with the use of close ups, drawing you in to the characters themselves and allowing you to see there emotion. I was also given the understanding of the importance of a call sheet or organising what was being filmed and when as this would have saved us a lot of time here. We had a much clearer understanding when beginning our thriller than we would have done otherwise and are grateful for this, being glad that we took use of our continuality piece. Further to this, we can see evidently when combining the two that the music i believe is much better in our thriller along with the use of effects. We also took much more care over the detail in relation to the surroundings of the action in our final product as after completing our first piece and researching into thrillers in more depth we realised how this can effect the viewers and make the story much more believe able, needed to ensure the storyline matched its location. After completing this task, i also discovered the importance of planning and due to this we thought out and noted in detail how we were going to complete this product with the use of deadlines and schedules. In doing this we found things went much smoother and we were much more organised in which i feel is visible when looking at our final opening to a thriller. We often found ourselves making decisions at the time of filming when completing our prelimilary task and we avoided this completely, saving much time and also meaning our filming looked more professional due to the detail we had put in and our exact understanding of how it was going to be shot before hand. When completing this task we found we only had a little footage to edit with and therefore found it difficult to lengthen the overall thing, causing it to look a little short. Considering this we filmed a lot more footage that we needed when doing our thriller to ensure that everything we needed was there and taking more than one shot of each cut allowed us to choose the better one out of the two rather than being stuck with something we were not completely happy with. The preliminary task taught me a lot of things and i believed helped improve my thriller dramatically having learnt what i had in doing this.

Commentry

1. We opened the film with this still image aiming to create a feeling of uncertainty and anxiety by the audience, being unclear what the image relates to or is about and how it links to the story - later revealing that this is where the killing takes place.
2. The second two clips are showing the main character with the guys she has murdered, appearing to be happy and smiling. Allowing the audience to connect with the two relationships slightly and realising that the killings are not through revenge or hatred, proving that the main character is slightly delusional and psychopathic. We thought about the mise en scene of these two clips, aiming for them to be doing something typical of a teenage couple, relating them to stereotypes. The text was included later on to ensure the audience understood the real gist of the story. It was done in a way in which the words are revealed step by step aiming to create a report like structure and to show that this information is important.
3. The non-diagetic music is then made to kick in here, showing that something dramatic is going to happen and that the story is now beginning.
4. The main character is shown getting out of bed before moving the camera to show she is leaving the room - the position of the camera was placed in a way to ensure that the audience could see John still asleep in the bed, being unaware that she has gone.
5. a close up of the door handle is done, ensuring the audience are fully aware that Del has left the room and exaggerating this, showing its importance. Diagetic sound has been included here as we hear the door squeak, a typical element to include in a thriller. This could also cause the audience to question whether John has woken up due to this noise or not, keeping some information hidden from them.
6. A medium- close up is done of the stairs, showing my legs as i walk town them. Looking through the banister here we hoped may cause the audience to feel as though they were there witnessing the event and also that they may see this to be stereotypical, as the actions the character is about to perform means she should rightfully be behind bars much like this shot shows us. We typically have shown my hand dragging down the banister, showing that i am in fact free and able to do whatever i wish. Showing my hand may also effect the audience, showing that i am perhaps going to make use of this party part in a disagreeable manor.
7. The main character is shown walking out of the front door in. We show the door from the outside before we see me walking out, a reverse shot from the one you witnessed upstairs when leaving the bedroom. We did this to show the audience the condition of the door, looking as though it is old and warn out and that the house may in fact be not that well looked after due to family problems, causing the girl to act the way she does. This camera angle also allowed us to show me approaching the door through the window, showing a shadow appear as i come closer to it - again, a typical element to use when aiming to thrill the audience.
8. As she walks out the door, her movements are important here. We wanted her to look calm but that she is also on a mission somehow, we did this by showing her move quickly but still carefully shutting the door. For a split second we have the actor look at the camera. This proved to be very effective and a number of people picked up on this. Having the character look at the audience draws them in making them feel involved within the story however this must be carefully done as you still want the audience to feel as though 'they are characters not actors' and believe the story. If the character looks at the camera for to long it can sometimes be made evident that they are being filmed and be ineffective.
9. The character is made to walk into the shot here as we do a panning shot and move the camera slightly to make it look as if this is being done through the audiences eyes as they watch, again bringing them in to the story. A medium shot is done of her on the phone before quickly cutting to John using the same shot length to relate the two, who is still asleep.
10. The non-diagetic music dims as we hear John's phone ring, a typical ring tone of a boy his age. He picks up the phone and looks confused. We thought it would be best for him to cut the phone call off rather than answering it as he would be puzzled and also believe that Del was still lying next to him in bed - it is made clear in this way that it is Del ringing him.
11. He then turns as the camera rises, slightly looking down on him disorientating the people watching a little. Narrative is used as he speaks the word 'del?' in confusion, helping to convey to the audience that she does not usually get up in the night giving them an idea by now that this is an unusual for her to do and that something is going on - they are typically not given any clues as to where she is going yet ensuring they still have unanswered questions. A close up of the phone is done as a cut away, placing the remote to the TV next to it here as this is a realistic thing people would usually do.
12. Again another close up is used - in not giving the audience the whole picture a lot of the time, we thought this would cause them to focus and want to know exactly what is going on. This is a shot of Del's legs as she is walking down a muddy lane. We used this clip to show that she has no shoes on even though she is walking along mud and stones - this violates what is classed as normal, showing the audience that she is in fact not with it at this moment in time. Wearing a short t-shirt also helps show this.
13. John is then seen searching the house searching for Del. We kept cutting between the both to give a sense of action and ensure the audience can see the actions of both characters, realising that something is going to happen between the two.
14. Some more non-diagetic music is included after this shot, used to build up tension. This new music and the use of slow motion and change in lighting are all used here to give a clue that this is a different part of the story, slightly separating the two as we show the flash backs. We show this event bit by bit, cutting backwards and forwards between the main character walk down the lane and what she did in the past showed her gradually making her way closer to the camera/audience as they begin to realise what she is capable of, causing the audience watching to become afraid. Again, we used a lot of close ups of the flashbacks here, used due to the reason mentioned above and also ensuring they see the important details and not miss them out. Diagetic sound is kept in here for a purpose - making it feel even more real to the audience.
15. The lighting changes as she reaches the camera, adding a slightly red tint in which relates to death and blood. Flashes are then used as we cut in to her body before loosing sight of her and cutting to another shot creating a sense of chaos here.
16. Del and John finally meet and we have Del approach him slightly before walking away, making the audience aware that she wants him to follow. We decided to use a long shot here, finally giving the audience the whole picture as the main event in the opening starts to take place. We also wanted to make sure the location was visible here, believing it added effect to the scene and related well.
17. Again, Del looks and John here but yet doesn't respond. We decided to keep the dogs seen at the right hand side of the frame visible as this makes the story line more realistic showing that the people living here own pets, just like the majority of people, relating to normality and using binary oppositions in showing what is normal and what is not.
18. John repeatedly shouts 'del' proving that she is not responding and perhaps in a world of her own. She looks at him again, convincing the audience that she wants to be following and giving the impression that something is going to happen.
19. We have a pause as she lifts the bat and the sound is prevented as this happens, adding tension and causing the audience to become nervous. A shot is then shown her looking down at John who is lying on the floor at this point, in doing this we aim to show that she is the domineering one, overpowering John on the floor.
20. A shot is done showing John completely here in which blood is visible, we also show Del walking away now, using diagetic sound effectively as the bat is dragged along the floor bringing attention to this.
21. We decided to include the scene of the main character waking up in the morning to prove to the audience that she is unaware of what she has done and showing that because of this she is quite capable of doing it again, feeling no remorse. Finishing here also leaves the audience with many unanswered questions in which come we began certain of when gaining our feedback.

Opening of our Thriller

Featuring: Jonathon Bryan, Simon Evans and Adele Jackson

Camera: Carly Price

Editing and music: Adele Jackson

Feedback

Before loading our final opening to our thriller, we gained feedback, asking a variety of people. We asked further media students, as well as students not related to this course, parents/relatives and other adults who were willing to watch. This ensured we varied the audience, however, we did stick to persons over the age of 15, realising that this was the audience we were basing our thriller on. We asked them all if they would kindly write a review on a piece of paper we provided, including any improvements they believe we should make.
The feedback was mainly positive, although some suggestions were put forward.

'the storyline is good and i think the location is very effective'

'i like the phone scene particularly and how you have cut back and forth from the characters when this is happening. i also realised how you kept the music of the phone ringing consistent and flowing even though a cut was performed in between this, well done'

'i really liked it. the sound was good and followed with the clips efficiently however, the bit with John searching the house is a bit to long and would be a little better if it was shortened.'

'the lighting was really good as we found it difficult to make our characters visible when filming outside in the dark as well as you have done'

'the fast cutting is good and i like the costumes the characters are in. The flash backs could have been made more obvious that these are what they are maybe as i got a little confused but really good otherwise'

'i like the fact that you have kept some sound as well as the music so you can hear you walking out the house and stuff. I also like how you have the girl in er pajamas and the storyline and the weapons used are realistic.'

'well, i would really like to see what happens next. Its certainly thrilling'

'dead good. the text could be made more effective though perhaps, using a different font for example as it is not half as scary as the rest of your film'

'i love the use of slow motion in this, especially the bit with you walking with the bat, very well done, this is the best bit.'

After watching this we also found that a lot of the audience questioned us about what was going to happen next such as 'will she kill again?', 'does she get caught?', 'does she realise she's done it and hind the body or just leave it?', 'how does she get away will it?' We were very pleased with this as it proved that the audience wanted to carry on watching ensuring us that we had done something right and effected the audience. When presenting this to people outside of school, we also received a lot of disappointment at the fact that it was so short receiving comments like 'is that it?' as they did not realise this was only an opening to a thriller. This also shows that they would be willing to watch on and interested in what was happening.

looking at the criticism we also aimed to improve this where necessary and take into account their ideas. We shortened the clip of the house being searched by John, cutting out bits of where he was on the room that we could not see, ensuring that it does not drag on for to long. We also dimmed the colour of the flash backs more than we had originally done.

Location

Film Classification

When looking at our Thriller we also looked at what certificate we would give it if it were to be distributing it to the public and which one we should try and create it around, depending on which one we believe would obtain the correct audiences. I researched into the different classification groups to see what the film must feature to fit into which one - The British Broad of Film Classification has been classifying films since 1912 and offer us the guidelines, showing details of each classification which are; U (universal), PG (parental guidance), 12A (aged twelve accompanied by an adult), 12, 15 and 18.

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/downloads/pub/Guidelines/BBFC%20Classification%20Guidelines%202009.pdf


After exploring these ratings and their boundaries, i feel the 15 classification is the perfect rating for our film. It contains violence and horror, however this is not looked into in enough detail for an 18 certificate to be necessary. I have included the issues below in which would cause our film to fall into this boundary.


Language: There may be evident use of strong language in our thriller, that persons under the age of 15 should not be permitted to hearing. However, language in which would be classed 'extremely strong' will not be used very often, if at all - this may cause the film to be suitable for 18 years and older if this was referenced frequently.

Horror/violence: this has been included, but dwelling on the infliction of pain is not often used. Also, techniques used to harm yourself is unlikely to be acceptable for this audience and therefore should not be made accessible to viewers - this includes things like, hanging yourself or killing using easily accessible weapons such as a kitchen knife.

Nudity and scenes of a sexual nature: this could beneficially be used in our thriller to help convey the love 'del' and her particular boyfriend have for one another before twisting the event, in a sexual context although this must not be of strong detail. There are no constrains on nudity in a educational or none sexual, however it will often remain fairly brief.


Theme: no particular theme is prohibited within the 15 classification as long as they convey with the rules above, allowing our thriller to fit in here and remain a psychological and criminal genre.

Camera shots/angles

Every film or television programme is made up of multiple shots and angles that are put together in sequence to create the story line. When talking or reviewing a shot, the length, angle and movement of each need to be considered. We needed to look at these before filming our thriller, learning which ones would be best to use and when. After researching these i decided to take some examples using my camera.

The most common shot/angle types include:

Extreme long shot: also known as an establishing shot.

This is most often used to set the scene indicating where the particular film or television programme is taking place. They may often be shots of famous land marks to show where the action is taking place such as Big Ben to identify London for example. This shot can also be used to convey big action scenes, allowing you to see all of what is going on, when representing a war is an example. There is usually very little detail visible in this shot, as it is normally intended to give general rather than specific information.

Long shot: also known as a wide shot

This is a shot in which you are close enough to see a particular character or object whilst still placing the emphasis on the environment - usually aiming to create a link between the two. This typically shows the entire object or human figure and the surroundings around them. The second example here could be said to be a long-medium shot - being in between the two.

Medium shot:

This shows the particular subject in some detail, whilst still allowing some of the setting to be seen. For example if it were a person we were being shown, they would usually be able to be seen down to their waist, leaving the legs off which could be seen to be unnecessary anyway. This is appropriate when the subject is speaking without much emotion or concentration. This shot also allows movement such as hang gestures to be seen and is a natural looking shot. The second example is of a medium two shot - referring to a shot with two people in the frame.

Medium-close up:

This is a shot in between a medium shot and a close up, allowing you to see the subject in more detail without you getting uncomfortably close.

Close up:

This is when a certain feature or object takes up most of the frame. They are particularly useful in showing detail and causing the audience to focus on a specific things, often used with cut-ins. (specifically showing a certain part of the subject) They are usually used to emphasize a persons state of mind, exaggerating facial expressions to convey emotion, almost taking you 'inside the mind' of a character.

Extreme close up:

This gets very close to show extreme detail. It is to close to show emotion unless it is a very dramatic scene and you would usually need a specific reason to use one of these. However, they can be beneficial when you really want your audience to see something - this shot could also be used in horror and thriller films, as they can sometimes cause confusion being so close effectively. An eye opening is often an example of an extreme close up or even a tear running down a cheek.

Two shot:

This is a shot of two people, a natural way of introducing them and is good for establishing a relationship between the two. They will usually have an equal stance and distance in the frame, implicating equality however this is not always the case. They can also be used to show that one person is domineering over the other by the stand they are positioned in, with perhaps one standing up and one sitting down for example.

Over the shoulder shot:

This places you behind a subject who is looking at another one in front. We are shown the back of a person, typically placed in the frame about 1/3 of the way and the other will be almost facing the camera due to looking at the subject we are placed behind, taking up the rest of the frame however this can vary slightly. This helps give you the feel as though you are looking at the person by the others point of view and helps establish the position of each person.

Point of view shot:


This shows a view from the subjects perspective, showing what the character is looking at. Sometimes this is taken over the shoulder of the person with them remaining in the frame.

Ariel shot:


This type of shot is usually taken from a plane, crane, balloon etc often used to show dramatic pans and are beneficial when wanting to view large landscapes. For example, when shooting a scene above the top of a building this could be used to show just how high up they are and there proportion to the rest of the surroundings. The example used is an image taken when we were looking into the location of our thriller.