Question 1- In what ways your media product use does, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

A thriller is a movie that grabs the audience's attention from the word go, they often use suspense, tension and red herrings to keep the viewers and guessing what could happen. An example of a thriller could be Limitless or James Bond. A thriller is usually fast paced and provides the audience with sudden rushes of emotion. Often the viewer’s get involved with the movie to an extent that they do not realise there is many small plots but often there is something bigger and much more important happening. Sometimes this is not realised until the end of the movie, some movies you have to watch it a few times to understand them. Another thing that thrillers sometime include is disjoined narrative and contrasting characters. A disjoined narrative is when the story jumps, the film don’t necessarily run in order; flashbacks are often used to keep the viewer on their toes. Contrasting characters are also used in thrillers; this is when there are characters that are completely different.

I have looked at a few different thrillers, these consist of;

Seven : http://www.watchthetitles.com/articles/00169-Seven

The Butterfly Effect : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hrV9xt50Vc

Leon : http://vimeo.com/34870706

Shutter Island  : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iaYLCiq5RM

I,Robot : http://vimeo.com/17496357

Below is a mindmap that discusses the different conventions of a thriller, this consists of sound, editing, characters, different elements and the sub genres of a thriller.

 

When thinking about a thriller there are many different subgenres, these consist of, conspiracy thriller, crime thriller,  disaster thriller, mystery thriller, political thriller, psychological thriller, religious thriller, supernatural thriller, techno thriller.

Movies are made up of 4 key parts, these consist of titles, naratice, camera shots and sound.

Titles are normlly one of the first parts of a movie, they play a massive part in giving an insight into what the movie could be like. They do this by using different fonts, different locations etc. The titles also normally include everybodys names that has worked on the movie. Everybody from the director to the actors etc. A good example of this would be I,Robot.

I have looked at the titles sequences of I,Robot, Gold Finger and Dexter.

Narratives - this is all the plot of the movie. Thriller narrative conventions are usually dominated by the protagonist’s point of view, all the characters must also be realistic in their representation on screen. It is normally dominated by the protagonist's point of view to help the audience become more involved.  This helps them relate and come closer to the characters in different situations. However other points of views are used for example the point of view of the villain, this means they could play short clips from the villains point of view. Uses of flashbacks are also used to help show a difference, to compare how somebody has changed or how things have changed. Flashbacks often creates sympathy for the villain and can often give an insight into why he is the evil party now. There are two themes that usual sum up thrillers, one is the desire for justice and the other is morality of individuals. A good aspect of a thriller is the presence of innocence in what is seen as abnormal and essentially corrupt environment. When thinking about the conventions of a thriller, In a typical thriller there are a few things that occur, they consist of, the protagonist normally deals with death, and this could be somebody else’s or their own. The main plotline is that the protagonist is usually set on some kind of quest; this is a mysterious quest that the protagonist must solve.

Conventional camera shots are used for many different reasons in a thriller opening; they can show location of characters and can help create a mood / emotion. An example could be a close up; these are used to help show the audience something important that is happening within the movie. A director could also use this to focus on one point, creating tension; this helps the audience to see how characters have reacted in different ways. An establishing shot also helps show the location giving the audience an insight to the surrounding environment.

Sounds are a important part of thrillers. In a thriller and all other genres diegetic sounds are used to hear what a character is saying or general background noises, this could be a traffic jam in a city in a thriller. Non diegetic sounds are sounds that have been added in, for example if a character was using a fake gun, you are able to add in a 'bang' to make the scene seem much more realistic. Music is often also used in thrillers to make scenes more dramatic, create tension and most of all help enhance an atmosphere.

In the title sequence of I, Robot for example, music is played throughout the titles, it is almost an eerie soundtrack that plays all the way through the titles. It is also then accompanied by the sounds of the robot trying to save the humans. This consists of some loud bangs and struggling. The sounds throughout the title sequence has been kept simple so that it allows the audience to focus on what is going on, for example the three laws, for the audience to truly understand the movie they need to read these three laws, this is why the music has been kept simple.

Another title sequence that I looked at was Dexter. The title sequence of Dexter immediately represents blood, which to me represents death, it is clear that it is a movie about killing people. It starts with the death of a spider, and almost shows Dexters morning routine, this includes getting ready, having a shave, making breakfast etc but all these normal morning things are portrayed in a different, death like light as they are all referring death. The music is also creepy and makes us think that it is going to be a death filled movie, but very cleverly thought out killings. I think that it is a good title scene as it gives people a good insight to what the movie is going to be about.

There are also different conventions of a thriller opening.Here is a worlde to show these.

In a typical thriller there are a few things that occur, they consist of, the protagonist normally deals with death, and this could be somebody else’s or their own. The main plotline is that the protagonist is usually set on some kind of quest; this is a mysterious quest that the protagonist must solve.

We decided that we wanted to aim for a psychological thriller; it plays with the audiences minds and produces suspense in film because it reflects the main characters conflict being mental and emotionally damaged. It shows the mentality of a character and the thought processes that they go through which makes this sub-genre so suspenseful. This is a sub genre that we thought we could create a strong production for and started planning our production based on the mental and emotional side of things.

When watching a psychological thriller from an audience could expect a lot of different emotions being used to get the audience into the story line, such as happiness, sadness, betrayal, victory etc.  They are often based around somebody being mental or something along those lines. For example Shutter Island is the reason why we have used the idea of somebody being mentally disturbed in our production.

Shutter Island is a physiological thriller starring Leonardo Di Caprio as Teddy Daniels, a U.S.marshal, who is assigned to find a patient that has escaped from the remote shutter island, a mental institute for only the worst patients.

The music we have also used is very childlike, creating an emotional bond between the production and audience immediately. We also used the thought that we wanted to create something that not everybody would immediately understand. We have done this by as our thriller opening goes on, we have put clips of Kieran hill rocking backwards and forwards, this was used not only to build tension but to keep the viewer’s guessing until his identity is revealed towards the end of the opening. As we were only creating the opening of a thriller we wanted people to want to see the rest of the movie, this is why we finished our production on a cliff hanger and left people considering what could happen next. We did this by building the tension then revealing Kieran’s appearance. The idea that the people would have to watch our production a few times to fully understand the storyline is something we liked the idea of. We also liked the idea of making people really think about what is going on, and what could have happened before for them to be in this position. This is why we have used different clips of what could be about to happen throughout our opening.

Editing is when you tweak your original footage to emphasise the message you are trying to get across. An example of this would be a scene fading out to show time passing before going onto another scene. For a thriller the cuts are normally fast, this keeps the pace of the movie fast. Another way to keep the pace of the movie fast is to use short clips. Flashbacks are also used. They are used to show things that may have happened in a past, they can often provide reasoning's to something that is now happening. There are many things that you can do when editing a movie, for example you can use special effect in many different ways, to make unrealistic objects such as flying cars realistic in that movie.

Mise-en-scene consists of everything that you see within the your set. This can be where things are positioned etc. The director is in charge of mis-en-scene and uses it to get the exact look they are going for. Something that is included in mis-en-scene is actors -  in a stereotypical thriller there would be a villain, a killer or the victim and someone that needs saving. There is also a hero to save them and as the movie unravels there is always somebody to try and stop the hero from 'saving the day' as it were. A lot of the time in a thriller the main character is often a male character that is well presented and educated. This could be someone that is working in an office, for example, in Limitless the main characters are all male and there are more male characters than female. But if you then consider James Bond they have made the female character 'M' to look more dominant via different shots, props and positioning.

Setting - The main place for a thriller to be set is in a suburban area / cities. Sometimes thrillers are set in other places such as foreign countries, high-seas or in the desert. Usually the main colours are black, grey and white to emphasise the helplessness of the first character we see. Thrillers can also be set in isolated places, such as a quite country village, often the villain will be from poverty or a small village. Other places that thrillers are often set are abandoned places, this can be anything from abandoned hospitals to normal abandoned houses. It is set in realistic places so that the audience can relate to the thriller.

Props - In a thriller props vary, this means that in many thrillers props are different and it depends which you are watching. For example in Limitless the props consist of many things from scene to scene. The main prop being the drug that enhancing his mental performance. Normally in thrillers props consist of weapons, usually large and easily identified, for example swords and knives, and loud threatening weapons such as guns. The weapon is often suited to the character and link into the plot of the movie.

When thinking about we have been influenced when creating our thriller, we had all seen the Batman two face scene, this is something that we decided if we could recreate would add something to our production to give it an overall more professional feel. We used liquid latex along with different food colouring and face paints to create this effect, in all it took about an hour to do on the morning of our shoot and I feel was extremely successful and gives our production an added edge. We was also able to link this to the history of our location (Nocton Hall) as it was burnt down. It is reasonably conventional of thrillers to include facial disfigurements, but we wanted to try and keep it as realistic as possible.

We decided that we would like Kieran Hill, the son that was abandoned in the fire, to be in smart attire, almost like he was still making an effort for his farther. We also thought that it would be a good idea to include some burns, as he was abandoned in a fire it will make the story line easier to understand and have better continuity. My narrative is conventional to a thriller film because there is a hidden antagonist which creates mystery and suspense. Also the eerie and quiet atmosphere will be conventional as it will put the audience on edge. The low key lighting is conventional as it creates shadows and hides any lurking unknown characters.

I feel that our production has been influenced by a few movies. These consist of Insidious, Shutter Island, Batman and The Butterfly Effect. In the movie Insidious they used a very old track within one of their scenes. This is something that we all thought was a great was to build the tension. We also likes it as old music had more of a past and was just generally more eerie, it almost had more personality that a simple soundtrack. This isn’t very conventional of a thriller but we going it worked extremely well in our production. This is because we linked our production with the past, the war styled theme of our production worked well with the jolly music throughout the tension building thriller opening.

We also took influence from both Shuttle Island and Batman. This is because we found the way both movies had given different characters different injuries etc. In Shutter Island there is one particular female patient that we all identified as a very disturbing image, this is something we wanted to try and include in our production. She has cuts on her neck from which we believe is where she may have tried to commit suicide or somebody else has tried to kill her. This works really well as it makes us wonder how she has obtained these injuries.

Also when we watched The Butterfly Effect in class we noticed how they had used flashbacks and put clips over one another. This is something that we liked the look of doing but was unsure whether the software we wasn’t going to be using would be able to allow us to do this. When playing with Final Cut Pro we realised we could do this, so near the beginning of our production we used them to make potentially long boring clips of Jake walking down corridors more interesting. This helped create a lot more suspense and mystery. I feel this is unconventional of a thriller but helped hold and build the tension in our thriller production.

I feel that the sound we used was unconventional but I feel it worked extremely well for our production. I feel that the camera shots we used were reasonably conventional along with our editing, We started with longer clips and slowly made the cuts faster and using shorter clips to help build tension. The problems with our narrative is that the main protagonist is a teenage boy which may not be as conventional as a teenage girl as boys are usually less vulnerable in situations. However having a teenage boy is going against the grain making the sequence less predictable and gaining a wider audience.

We thought that because the general idea of Jacob Anderson going into the building is because he has heard the rumours of music being played from the abandoned building and wanted to find out for himself if this was true. So we thought that it would be a good idea to dress him in casual attire. This is conventional of a thriller as they are normally set in everyday life, so the fact that Jake Anderson was wearing casual clothing was very conventional.

Another way that we have stuck to the conventions of a thriller is that it is immediately obvious who the main character is going to be, and that he is set on a quest / journey to discover something. I feel that the location we used is also conventions of a typical thriller. We set our production in the abandoned Nocton Hall. Using an abandoned building is very conventional of a thriller.

Overall I feel that we have used all the conventions of a typical thriller. Form everything from costume to the plot everything was conventional as it is obvious that there is a journey to be undertaken for our main character (Jake) to discover something.

Question 2 - How does your media product represent particular social groups?

In our thriller we wanted to have a young actor, this helps to portray the innocence of the character whilst he searches through the old building to find the mysterious music.

We wanted to have our character in casual clothes. I feel this casual style helps to enhance the tension of the location by contrasting the calm look of the character and the old, destroyed look of the building. We also chose to have this type of clothing so it can relate as much as possible to our younger audience, as it is simply clothes that they would wear out and about, such as the hoody and jeans.

Because we have chosen Batman as our main inspiration, we chose to compare Jake with Detective John Blake, one of the reasons for this is their adventurous nature, the way Jake investigates the building is much like how the detective investigates the areas he is sent to, he also looks extremely like him, with the black hair and young face.

However, a simple difference is the costumes, the detective is dressed relatively smart, though this is a smart look, it wouldn’t have suited our production.

As you can see from the photos provided the main influence we have taken from The Dark Knight is Two Face’s makeup. I feel that the makeup turned out very well and gave the production an overall professional feel. The aim was to have Kieran looking as old as we could make him, we did his by getting him to grow a slight beard, we did this because the idea was that he had been abandoned in a fire by his farther many years ago. This is where he gained his facial burns and is now mentally challenged / scared.

In The Dark Knight, Two Face (Harvey Dent) is a good guy that unfortunately has half his face burnt off. He is a police offer that is trying to do the right thing. This is a slight comparison as in our production you have no reason to believe that Kieran is a bad character, until the very end of the production when he kills Jake.

A effective comparison is costume, because Havery Dent in the mayor or Gotham City, he is always seen in very smart clothing, such as a suit or just a smart shirt and as you can see from the photo, Kieran is wearing a smart, white shirt, this also  links with our war theme as it was part of their costume, but the use of the white shirt also helps to contrast the purity of white compared to his burns and the blood from his wounds.

Kieran is represented in our thriller as a character with physical disturbances, this is displayed within the shots of him rocking back and forth in the chair, this simple motion creates a very disturbing essence around his character, leading him to be seen as the antagonist within the opening, we had to use ideas such as the burns and the rocking as we didn’t want to have any dialogue, this could have left people confused otherwise.

In the Batman movie you see how Harvey Dent gains his injury; we decided that it would be better and more dramatic if there was no clear reason for the burns. Also in the batman movie Harvey Dent is in hospital, he is In the correct hands and being taken care of, whereas In our movie the intention is that Kieran still hasn’t left the house that was burnt down. He does not care and may not feel the pain. This could be because of the dramatic experiences that he has been through. As Kieran stands up behind Jake he also shows no emotion in what he is about to do, this could suggest that he just doesn’t feel anything anymore. This could be due to the dramatic experiences he went through as a younger person.

Below is this script put over the appropriate scenes and images.



 

Question 3 - What kind of media institute might distribute your media product and why?

The production company usually oversees the film from when it’s just an idea to a finished product; this could include the budgeting, scheduling, scripting, casting and more. They are responsible for finding a director and the majority of acting talent required. However they are also responsible if anything were to go wrong on the film, for example and actor being injured or property being damaged.

 

I feel that our thriller should be produced and distributed by Paramount Pictures because of their amount of thrillers they have distributed such as Shutter Island and Mission Impossible II. This would mean that our thriller is distributed worldwide. Another reason that I think Paramount Pictures would be good to distribute our thriller is because it already has experience in producing, advertising and marketing big thrillers such as Shutter Island and Mission Impossible II. To date, Paramount Pictures is ranked as one of the largest and top grossing movie studios. Being based in America, Paramount Pictures were able to distribute their films to a larger audience. This meant that the films were seen on a larger scale and meant in the films being sent worldwide.

Both MTV and Nickelodeon Films are owned by Paramount Pictures which are both multimillion dollar companies and I think with Paramount Pictures being as big as it is, makes it the perfect company to distribute our production.  

 

Paramount Pictures have distributed Shutter Island; Shutter Island is a physiological thriller starring Leonardo Di Caprio as Teddy Daniels, a U.S.marshal, who is assigned to find a patient that has escaped from the remote shutter island, a mental institute for only the worst patients. I would like to think that we could compare our production to Shutter Island because of the physiological thriller elements that both productions share. With the knowledge that Paramount Pictures have applied to Shuttle Island I feel they could make The Lost Production into a success.

Question 4 - Who would be the audience for your media product?

We researched BBFC to find out different age ratings that would be suitable for our thriller opening. The British Board of Film Classification is an independent board, not funded by the government or the film industry. It has been classifying films since 1992, giving films different age restrictions.  The specification for a rated fifteen film is as follows; 'Only those over 15 years are admitted. Nobody younger than 15 can rent or buy a 15-rated VHS, DVD, Blu-ray Disc, UMD or game, or watch a film in the cinema with this rating. Films under this category can contain adult themes, hard drugs, frequent strong language and limited use of very strong language, strong violence and strong sex references, and nudity without graphic detail. Sexual activity may be portrayed but without any strong detail. Sexual violence may be shown if discreet and justified by context' I feel that our thriller opening would fit this criteria. This is because of the disturbing images we are portraying within the opening. As for the sexual content our production does not contain any, our production is more disturbing than containing sexual references.

To help us identify our audience we decided that it would benefit us if we were to put a questionnaire out to those within that age group that we wanted to aim at, so that we could then tailor make our production to what they would like. We gave 30 questionnaires out and had 30 back; this was a great response in which we were extremely happy with. We wanted to aim our production at the ages from 15- around 50. We thought this age group was appropriate as we think our production would be rated age 15 this means that anybody 15 or over can watch it. I also think that people over the age of 50 will stereotypically not enjoy it so much, this is why I have picked this age group. When we handed out questionnaires out we tried to make sure we were handing them out to people that were within our age bracket to help us gain valuable information that would help us produce our thriller.

The audience profile that we are aiming for is below. These are teenagers that are over the age of fifteen who also enjoy thrillers. We know this from our audience research. We want to aim our thriller at both genders; this is why we asked a similar amount of males to females, this gave us a wider range of opinions and ensured that our content caters for a unisex audience.

 

These are our audience profiles, we have used these people as they are very similar in some ways, and they all enjoy watching thrillers. They are all interested in psychological thrillers which are an added bonus considering that is what we are creating. Both males are interested in playing sport, rugby mainly and both females study hard to achieve their goals in going to university as do the males. Other types of media they would consume could consist of are video games and social networking etc.  

Question 5 - How did you attract/ address your audience?

I feel that there are a few in which we have made our production appeal to our audience. These being the narrative, different camera shots, editing techniques and sound. Here are some screen shots of shots I feel are appealing to our audience.

  

I feel that this image would attract our audiences attention simply because it is a shot which enables the viewer to see the sheer beauty of the building and the size of it. When you see this shot you can see that the building is derelict, that is not cared for and is completely abandoned.  In our questionnaires we discovered that the audience wanted something abandoned, as this is what they relate thriller too, so this is what we have done. This shot is also intriguing as it makes us want to see more of the building, the inside maybe. Also how the trees are in this shot makes all of the viewers focus go straight onto the building, it is the main focus of this shot.

Again I feel that this shots shows a few things that the audience would be attracted to. I feel that the audience would again find this shot appealing as it shows the size of the building against one of our main actors Jake Anderson. This shot also shows the state of the building. From our research we found out that the audience wanted a thriller to be based in somewhere that is abandoned. This has worked well in our thriller opening. From this shot you can establish that the building is literally falling to pieces. You can see that there is no roof on the building, no windows, no doors and is completely overgrown. This meant that we had to take careful consideration when thinking about shooting due to the health and safety of everybody involved. This shot is at the beginning of our production, it is a long clip to give the audience chance to see the scale and state of the building, along with introducing our main character. This shot also helped us build a sense of mystery, it makes the audience wonder why Jake is there and kick starts our production well.

As the building was abandoned there was different barbed wire all around the building, this made for a great camera shot. This shot also gives our production a sense of reality. It shows the wire has been put up to stop people from getting into the building, but why?. I also like this shot as the focus is completely on the wire, and when our main actor just steps over it, this could imply that nothing will stop him from getting into the building to look inside for himself.

This shot was a ironic shot for us. As you can read it says 'this is my happy place' on the wall, but the fact that we have included the broken glass from around the window pretty much undermines this statement. As this was already on the wall when we arrived it was also something we wanted to use. As we were shooting a psychological thriller, where a child got abandoned by his father in a burning building, we thought this shot could tie in and add another sense of dramatic tension.  In this shot the statement on the wall is clearly the main focus, our main actor comes across it and proceeds past it, and this shot is more for the viewer than it was for the main actor. This shot would also attract the audience as it just shows that the building is abandoned, and there has been people inside the building. This is a scary thought and one that may appeal to the audience.

As the opening progresses we decided that it would be a good idea to layer clips on top of one another and edit both clips together. This helped build tension dramatically. As you can see above we put different images a clip of our actor simply walking down a corridor. This also gives the viewer a good insight into what could happen later on in the video. I feel that these clips worked very well to keep the pace of the thriller opening and also meant that tension was built through a very simple method.

This is in my opinion one of the best and most dramatic shots of the production. For this shot, we thought that it would be dramatic to use a close up, point of view shot. This shot is near the end and happens after our main actor find this man rocking backwards and forwards in his chair. When Jake turns the music off to try and communicate with the man it triggers him into standing up and killing Jake. I also feel that this shot is an awesome shot to build the tension up to. I feel that this shot grabs the audience's attention both because of the visual and the audio that is playing. We thought it would be appropriate to put a scream a second or so after Kieran’s face appeared. This was a very dramatic end to the production and is not one to be forgotten in a hurry. This also represents the death of Jake. The makeup idea is something that has separated us and made us seem extremely professional. Although it looks great it took around 1 hour to do in Kieran's kitchen on the morning of the shoot.

Another thing that we took a while working on is our credits. As we was going with the old styled movie with a child like song we thought that having our credits in the old style would only be right. As the history of Nocton Hall is military based we decided to use this in our credits. We decided that we would all dress up in an old style uniform and hat. We would then put theses onto the computer and add our names at the bottom in a typewriter font, this also sticking with the time period. We then tea stained these photos and put them on the wall of the room we used at Nocton Hall. We also did this to engage the audience and again make them wonder about what is going to happen. The credits are as shown.

I feel this shot is effective in a few ways. This is the final shot in our production before our title 'The Lost Project' I feel that this will keep the audience thinking like a conventional thriller does as previously in the clip we have had both these shots before. Earlier in the production we had reversed the clip of driving away from Nocton hall to look like we was arriving, we used this within our titles. Later on we then say our main actor, (Jake Anderson) wiping rubble off the photo. This shows both clips are used again but in a different way, this time we are driving away from Nocton hall, and the picture has blood dripping onto it, this could imply that Jake was killed or seriously injured when the man approached him from behind. This is a good closing shot as it rounds off the opening in an effective manner.

Upon finishing our production we have recently put it onto YouTube and Facebook, this is to get feedback from our audience. Some feedback that I have already gained comes from asking people to write down what they thought of our production after they has seen it.

Julie Smith - 'After watching the lost project, I thought that overall it was great. I thought the film looked extremely professional and that the use of different camera shots to create tension worked well. The editing must have took forever, I say this because throughout the whole video the music is in sync with the production and the different shots work well next to each other. The overall result was fantastic and I would love to see the complete movie.

Morgan Arnett - 'After watching this thriller production I thought it has a very good start instantly making you want to know more, the shots taken were very precise and creative in terms of the angles and the projection of the story itself. I also think the location and transitions of shots used were very appropriate and added to the suspense and story line. Overall very good, seamless between shots, great build up alongside the dramatic effects and fantastic creativity. Naturally making the viewer wants to continue watching more.'

Kingston Capes - 'I thought the thriller really kept to the typical thriller conventions, using creative shots - especially through the hole in the wall. The mise-en-scene really fits the theme you were going for. The music also gives a very eerie feel to the whole production, building tension in a number of places. Overall a really good thriller production 5/5'

Joseph James - 'I like how you used a panning shot to set the scene when the video first starts to set the scene very well and from different angles, the smooth movement of the camera really enhances the types of shots too. The music suits the video and helps build up to the climax of the thriller. The way in which the video clips have been edited and the colours in the video clips enhance the fact it is set in an old building, almost a vintage effect. Overall a very good thriller, with a modern twist.

Question 6 - What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

For our production we learnt how to use Cameras, Tripods(glide cam), Apple Mac computers, editing software such as Final Cut Pro and music software such as Garage Band.

For the video shooting skills we firstly learnt how to film a steady shot using a tripod, then developed onto pans and then using different angles. There are many things I have learnt when shooting our production. One of the things I have learnt how to use is the cameras; in this task I had more chance to use the cameras as I was not acting in the production. We had two cameras set up for use when we was shooting our production at Nocton Hall, the camera I was operating was a Canon 550D. The other camera that we had set up to also shoot our footage in full HD was a Sony Handy cam HDR. We used these cameras as we they are both able to shoot in full HD, this gave us the quality we were looking for, they are also easy to use. I learnt how to use mainly the Canon 550D but also had basic knowledge on how to use the Sony Handy cam. Some of the things I have learnt are how to change the different zoom lengths. I also learnt how to use the manual focus on the Canon 550D, we used the manual focus when we wanted to change the focus from one thing to another. We used these cameras because of the high definition they deliver and the convenience of interchangeable lenses.

When we shot our preliminary task we did a few tracking shots, we did these by holding the tripod, they were effective for this task. But we thought that we could use them again but in a more professional manner. We were able to get hold of a glide cam for the day of our shoot, this allowed us to do these shots but a lot smoother.

The software we used to edit on was Final Cut Pro; Kieran Hill and I both had to learn how to use Final Cut Pro quickly and to a high standard. I feel we achieved this and our production turned out to have an extremely professional feel about it. I feel that I learnt how to cut the footage to select the pieces we wanted. It took us a long time to make sure the cuts were smooth and that we got the footage we wanted. An example of this would be where we wanted the video and soundtrack to match up. As Jake came down the rubble to proceed down the corridor, the music built up and was a false sense of tension as he appeared from the dark. This took us time to make sure each part was correct and meant cutting and re-cutting meticulously. As shown below.

Something else that I feel we mastered on Final Cut Pro was the ability to change the saturation in the clips. This means we were able to make our footage look darker to enhance the mysterious feel of the production. We also used different effects such as orange and teal to get the look we wanted. We used this effect on all of the clips throughout our production, we tried it with and without it and feel that it looked much better with it on all of the clips instead of just a few.

 

When creating our production we could not find a single soundtrack that would suit what we wanted. This meant that we had to combine many different sound effects and different tracks to get the feel we was going for. We used a few tracks such as Tiny Tim – Tiptoe Through The Tulips. Tiny Tim – Daddy. We mainly used Tiptoe Through The Tulips as it is a spooky childlike song and incorporated ‘Daddy’.

I also think that I was able to use different transitions to make the production run smoother. In a conventional thriller there are many straight cuts to keep the fast pace of the production; we did this along with some fades to black towards the end of our production. We did this so that it ran onto our titles effectively and smoothly.

When considering lighting, as our location had old shelters underground, and the room we used has only one old window which is mostly covered in overgrowth from outside, we had to rely on non-natural lighting, we used three 800 watt redhead lights, using these lights will benefit what we want to do as we can increase or decrease lighting in certain areas to helps us manipulate the audiences focus as you can see in this shot of Jake.

Also if it was to get dark we would be fine as we could increase the intensity of light. This was our intention but unfortunately the power source we had could not run these lights. This meant us having to use a different room, with more natural lighting. It caused us a few problems because as the day went on, it being a typical day in England (overcast) it began to get darker and darker, leaving us to use different lighting techniques from our mobile phones and any other lighting we could use at the time.

One idea that we really wanted to pursue was to do with our production ident, we felt that it would only right to stick with the name that we created for our prelim, which was ‘#ashtag productions’. Although since our prelim we have created an ident shown below for our thriller opening. We wanted to do something that  is a little different and creative with the way we want it to come into the production. We ideally would like the ‘ashtag’ or ‘production’ to come in fist, one after each other. Followed by the four lines of the hash tag ‘#’ with some sound effects. We put our production ident at the beginning of the thriller opening and the name of the thriller at the end. To do this meant that we would have to spend a lot of time on Final Cut Pro, being patient, to make our vision come alive.

Below is a screen grab of how we produced our production ident, we produced it by  inserting different text, using different shapes to resemble the #

 

Another website that I have had to come to grips with now is Blogger, we use blogger to make sure that we are recording all the different things we are doing. Its main use is to document our research and planning for our thriller. A successful blog contains all kinds of different media, this can include videos, images, wordles and prezzies. Which brings me on onto learning how to create a prezzi and wordles.

Another piece of software of software that we have to use is Idvd. We use this software to put our production onto dvds. This piece of software also enables us to put different menus and titles on it. You only use this software when u have finished it and have exported it. I did not have to know how to use this software extremely well, just know the basics so that I can make a professional looking DVD.

Another website that I have already had basic knowledge on how to use is Youtube. We are using this website for more than one reason, we are using it to both research different ideas from actual movies we like, to take inspiration and put into our thriller opening. We are also going to be using it to upload our video and hopefully gain some feedback. This would help us evaluate how successful other people feel our production was.