Film screenshots

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

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

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

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

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

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

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

Feedback to finished footage

• There was a flash up of a previous frame at the beginning of the film
• The music jumped at the start of the film which was a bit of a glitch
• The shots were too long
• Some fades were a bit too long
  
• The newspaper shot had a bit too much background sound
  

Teacher Feedback

Our teacher evaluated our footage over the weekend and has given us a small list of improvements to address before submitting our final piece. They include the following:

• To get rid of the jump cuts by doing an L shape audio edit
• To edit our text, thereby making it the same size and also overlapping it to add effect (note one of our titles was overlapped and we have been encouraged to do the same with all our written content). In addition, we were told to exclude the word starring as it gave too much of an old-stereotypical style which we felt want too appropriate for this type of piece.
  

T2-56 THRILLER ROUGHCUT

T2-56 THRILLER ROUGHCUT from SATMEDIASTUDIES on Vimeo.

ROUGHCUT PEER FEEDBACK

This is the rough cut peer feedback:

Strengths:

• We liked how it was in the dark abd well brought up
• Good parallel editing
• Titles: good, stand out, good font
• Long shots, creates suspense
• Great props
• Good shot location

Constructive Critisim:

• There was a few jump cuts
• Transitions not very smooth
• Cuts between shots

Overall we are proud with the strengths and the improvements as they outweigh each other, we will work on the critisim.

Newspaper

This is another newspaper we made to go in the opening.

After origionally making our concluding soundtrack only four bars long to act as a concluding moment to our thriller opening, we have decided to double the length of the track to accomodate some extra footage that we are considering adding. This extra footage entails some phase shots of our characters and of the set to add more uniqueness to our piece as opposed to just simply portraying our title and then cutting. The idea to end our piece this way has been taken from the final scenes from "The Lord Of The Rings, The return of the King' where Frodo and Sam are seen stranded on a rock; the shot then phases out into black before coming in again with eagles flying in through the background. Now obviously we wont be incorporating hobbits or large birds into our opening, however the idea to have shots of our charcters faces and thier concluding expressions phase in and out at the end will supply a lead to the rest of the film should it of been made, as well as again offering a slightly different ending to just orthodox conclusions.

Newspaper clipping

This shows a newspaper clipping that we created in photoshop that mirrors what we want in the film, it will be shown between two different clips to make the audience feel the suspense and thrill of the film

Progress Report

Today we are editing our film as well as constructing oth diagetic sounds for the actual sequences along with a small soundtrack snippet for the conclusion of our thriller opening. the actual editing entails cutting unnecessary footage, adjusting light on shots and also volume for dialogue etc. we are looking to make good progress with both our editing and music orchestrating to ensure we have a structured piece as the deadline for submission approaches.

in terms of the style of soundtrack we have gone for, the music is a mixture of dark and cinematic sounds with a late introduction of a heavy drum line to add emphasis the mood and suspense of a thriller. below are some screen-shots of us constructing it;

To be done

aspects that still need to incorporated into our thriller opening include:

• The newspaper cuttings.
  
• The soundtrack
• Putting the title into the film

Here is the criminal picture to be put into the newspaper

Progess

Post filming and it has ended up a success. we altered some shot selections as well as some of the dialogue which we felt more appropriate. We also went with another form of lighting to what we had originally decided on; this proved to be much more effective for the filming. We have now started the editing for the rough cut.

Script

sam-wearing hoody

tom-policeman

diegetic sounds dripping heard initially

sam sat on chair

split screen with tom putting on tie-don't see his face

Tom laughing

Sam muffled distorted voice - Hello? Hello?

sound of door opening and approaching footsteps

Tom - Calm yourself

Can you inform me of your whereabouts on the evening of the 19th at around 11.30

Sam - What? I ...erm... i'm not very distorted dialogue

Tom - OK lets try something different... walks around to behind Sam

Are you aware that Joseph Johnson is on the run?

Sam's eyes widen filled with horror and he starts screaming

Tom - are you aware of what he is capable of?

newspaper articles are thrown at Sam landing on the floor in front of him showing articles of Joseph Johnson aka Tom including crimes such as murder, rape, torture etc.

Problems with filming

The original two locations we were going to use; the underground bunker and behind the stage have both now been stopped from students being allowed to film there. We have now come to our third location, the changing rooms, which we will lower the lighting or turn them off completely and it should add the effects of suspense and unknowing. We have now booked the room for filming and so next lesson we will start filming for our final product.

Planning for filming

Costumes - as told in previous post including:

shirt, tie and badge

hoody

Lighting - as dark as possible but still able to make out characters, this will add to the suspense and keep the audience 'in the dark' about many key points such as the identity of the characters

Equipment required -

• movie camera
• tripod
• still camera-to take shots of us during the filming process
• shot list

Titles - created in photoshop to be edited into our film in final cut, the titles include the production logo, characters and management team; directing and producing

Sound - We think that it will be best to use both diegetic and non-diegetic sound. We are using a dialogue in the opening as well as music in the background, during times when the characters are speaking the music will fade out

Progress

Today we are doing the script for the opening, and plan to film next week.

We have to still purchase a few prop items , including a police badge before we start filming, this will be done over the weekend. For the filming we are going to use two locations of the gym toilets to do the mirror shot and behind the stage to do the seat shot.

Locations

Our original idea in the bunker was scrapped because we couldn't use the filming location, so we looked for different locations. We made a short film but it wont upload, it has two possible locations, including a staircase and a gym washing room. We feel that both show useful aspects we could use in our thriller opening. Especially the mirror in the changing rooms because it links in with our idea of the se7en opening with the shirt and tie. The staircase adds the darkness to the thriller opening and also gives us the opportunity to film Tom walking down the stairs to the hostage.

Filming practice

These are two shots that we have done to experiment with. They give us an idea of what some of our shots will look like in the final piece.

Mise-en-scene

Props
Mirror, Shirt & tie, trousers, Torch, chair, rope

Costume
Character 1
Shirt & tie, trousers, formal police man


Character 2
Hoody & jeans


Setting
The setting will be a dark cold, underground room.

More Ideas

This is an idea from are opening, when the character is doing up a tie, looking in the mirror. This screenshot is from the film Se7en, it also does give the idea of some mystrey to whats happening. In our opening we could also have the police badge shown in this shot (which is still to be made)

Location influence

This is a scene from the film Saw. The scene is based in a bathroom, similar to one of our location ideas. Like in Casino Royale, this scene was a main influence when trying to choose on a location that would be suitable for our opening sequence.

Location influence

This is a picture from the scene in Casino Royale, which is similar and a main influence to our idea for our opening. In the picture is a man in the centre of the room being interrogated, it is set in a bunker with little lighting, which influences one of our location ideas.

Film ideas: Silence of the Lambs

One of our ideas is to have our antagonist messing with the protagonists mind, creating a psychological thriller opening. One of our main influences for this idea is Hannibal Lecter (played by Anthony Hopkins) from 'Silence of the Lambs'.

Timeline

This was the timeline that we used and created to help place in the titles and order the shots of the opening.

Paper Work

This is the cast list.

This a storyboard of the shots we want to get while filming.

Filming Locations

These shots above have created an almost 'bunker' look as a possible site for shooting, to create that undercover, suspense feel. We would use lighting techniques as well as various camera shots to create tension for the audience as well as incorporating diegetic sounds to add that 'chill factor' and keep the audience on the 'edge of their seats so to speak. The idea for this type of location came from the torture scene in 'Casino Royal' where they are in a ship bunker

This is a simple prop idea that will be added to the shot and eventually play a key role within the scene

the shots above are trying to create an alternate feel from the bunker shots previous, for the audience in that we took our inspiration for this setting from the Saw film's, supplying an almost perilous, no-hope scenario for the character whilst still sustaining the theme of a thriller. we thought this an effective area to help emphasize our title 'misconception' as some audience members would look at this setting and view it as a simple room, whilst others may identify the similarity between it and the film inspiration we took it from; by which time they should have identified the theme/mood of the shot. again, as with the bunker shots, we will incorporate different camera angles and shot types as well as diegetic sounds and lighting techniques to add effect.

Film Titles

We created our titles for our thriller in Photoshop. We used several fonts and colours to add to the drama of the writing. Below are photos of the titles being created in photoshop and the final titles together on one page.

We feel that the end result of this mixture of different fonts, sizes and colours adds to any suspense that we will create in our film. The main title really stands out from the rest because it is in a completely different font from the rest.

Progress

Today we are looking at fonts for the titles.

We are also going to create the final idea for the film.

Fonts that we ahve come up with include:

• Trajan pro

Different titles within the film will obtain various sizes and fonts to emphasise various moods that will be incorporated into our thriller, for example 'a Measham film'.

We are also researching various font style idea's on a renowned site called www.freephotoshopfonts.com

This is one idea.

The photo below shows two of our ideas in photoshop whilst creating the titles. The mix of two different fonts in one title works quite well we think and adds to the mood of the video

Moodboard

Photos showing ideas

More film ideas

The aim of our idea is to fool the audience. The scene will be based around an interrogation between two characters, one of whom is a policeman and the other a criminal. The interrogator (who the audience believes is the policeman) asks the criminal (but really a policeman) several questions about the crime. At the end of the scene it turns out that the criminal being interrogated is really the policeman, who is being held hostage, and the interrogator was the criminal all along. Hence the title of the film being 'Misconception'. At the end of the scene something will be shown to prove that the criminal was really the policeman the whole time, e.g. a badge. We could also show something that proves the interrogator is a criminal, e.g. a news flash showing the criminal after having escaped from jail.

Ideas

These are some more ideas for our opening thriller:

• With the news report idea, the crime is being reported on the television, and the victim is the one watching it in a dark room. When zooms out you see the victim in the chair watching it. We will use photoshop to make the news report effects such as the banner at the bottom.
• The title of 'Misconception' is what it says on the tin, it relates to the what the actual film is about. When watching the film the audience will be misconceived. However the mix up with the police man will not be shown at the opening.
• The idea is that the opening is the ending of the film, and the film looks back on what happens before.
• The 24 type shots will show for example the hostage 'as such' his face and the next shot of his hands tied up

This is a mind-map of initial idea's for what to base our thriller opening on. As the text in this shot is small, below is its contents...

• criminal interview idea- short answers , yes, no, maybe. criminal interviewing policeman without audience realizing( title of opening maybe 'misconception')
• '24' style shots
• bodyparts shot, to show nerves and reactions, biting lips, sweating, hands fidgeting, heavy breathing
• news report on TV, zooms out from TV to reveal the shot is then in the scene.

the other screen shot is of our storyboards, within which are several approaches we could take in order to stage our opening. In other words they are creating a visual image of our idea's (see above).

During the creation of our thriller opening we were tasked to create a short piece for a production company to place at the start of our thriller. These are photos of the process of creating this production logo. It is a game of noughts and crosses that then fades out to reveal our production name: Criss Cross Productions

After we finished this video, we realized we would quite like some changes to be made to our video. Instead of just one nought moving across we decided to use three. The updated video is shown below. We as a group think that the updated video is a lot better and adds more effect.

Production logo

T2-56 PRODUCTION LOGO from SATMEDIASTUDIES on Vimeo.

As a group, we had to create a production logo to be used in our thriller opening.

We decided to call our production company 'Criss Cross Productions', this relates to the idea that our thriller could be about a game for example. The naughts and crosses would be created using 300 film style writing, giving it an edgy distorted look. As a background for the logo we decided to use a piece of paper that had burnt edges, which adds to the rough look and feel of the logo. The overall distorted look of the logo coincides with our thriller theme

Student work

This is a good thriller opening because of the two things happening at the same time. With the title 'Piece by piece' and the idea of playing chess and slowly beating the other player then he is slowly losing his chances of staying alive.
The music in the film creates a feeling of suspense and action at the same time. The tempo of the piece gets faster as the video progresses adding to the content in the video.

Memento

We were asked to analyze a thriller opening and we chose the psychological thriller 'Memento'

The plot of the film is based around the main character who cannot store memories. The film is about the internal psychological struggle he faces and how he copes. He questions who he can trust. It also allows the audience to follow the main character and try to figure out what will happen.

Political Thriller

'The Interpreter

Starring Sean Penn, is a political thriller.Escalating events begin when U.N. interpreter Silvia Broome alleges that she has overheard a death threat against an African head of state, spoken in a rare dialect few people other than Silvia can understand. Issues incorporated within the film include:

• conspiracies
• secrecy
• assassination
• general threat to life

Thriller definition

One definition of a thriller film is

"Thrillers often overlap with mystery stories, but are distinguished by the structure of their plots. In a thriller, the hero must thwart the plans of an enemy, rather than uncover a crime that has already happened; while a murder mystery would be spoiled by a premature disclosure of the murderer's identity, in a thriller the identity of a murderer or other villain is typically known all along. Thrillers also occur on a much grander scale: the crimes that must be prevented are serial or mass murder, terrorism, assassination, or the overthrow of governments. Jeopardy and violent confrontations are standard plot elements. While a mystery climaxes when the mystery is solved, a thriller climaxes when the hero finally defeats the villain, saving his own life and often the lives of others. In thrillers influenced by film noir and tragedy, the compromised hero is often killed in the process."

In our words a thriller is a film filled with mystery and throughout the film the audience has to try and guess from little pieces of information what the plot is. Often there are hidden messages or meanings