Now that our thriller is on YouTube we have got some feeback in the form of comments :)
FEEDBACK IS WELCOME!
Audience feedback will help us determine whether we have met our target audience and gained their interest...
LegacyOleg - YouTube Comment
Awesome and very atmospheric opening!
I like it :)
Sophie Evans - Personal Comment
I like the creative shots such as the tracking shots and the slow motion shots. I also like the tension building element and the titles with the blood.
Gabby Meech- Personal Feedback
My favourite shot is the birdseye high zoom at the end :)
mutemiss - YouTube Comment
Good tension at the beginning with the eye shots....Constantly building and kept me watching!Music is very suitable.Well edited :) Well done.
schreuderha - YouTube Comment
I love all the close ups! especially on the eyes in the begining it is a great way to build tension. I also think the tracking shots are very effective especially at the end and the slow motion effects are also very cool.Well done :)
stephaniemaureen - YouTube Comment
the end shot is absolutely INCREDIBLE!
hurtwoodhousemedia - YouTube Comment
great opening shot.
fatboy22222222222222 - YouTube Comment
The characters in this are well designed as they all oppose their stereotypes e.g. the female crime boss
Wednesday 31 March 2010
Thursday 18 March 2010
Task 7 - Looking back at your prelinary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?
When comparing the sophistication of planning and preparation of the thriller task to the simplicity preliminary, it becomes obvious why the thriller took much longer to plan for, shoot and edit. For example, we did not storyboard our prelim or even choose a certain costume for the actors to wear; we simply found two actors, taught them the lines and shot it within an hour with no fancy camera angle shots. However, the thriller task took weeks to prepare for. We had to account for every little detail to make our thriller the most authentic. Firstly, we made power point presentation about our idea and why our group should make that thriller. Once that had been chosen we quickly set to work on the storyboarding of the sequence; this took our group in particular a long time as we all had ideas about what we could do to make our opening sequence exciting and mysterious. Next we had to ask the actors we wanted if they were available for a day of shooting, unfortunately the boys we wanted were in the A2 and we were not allowed to have them as they had exams around that time. Because of this we had to use AS boys, which actually worked better as we did need them for the whole days shooting that the A2s would not have been able to do. After actors and storyboarding had been sorted out, Megan and I travelled down to the schools costume department and selected suits, hats and a fur coat. We also had to design the set and draw a picture of what we thought it should look like. Included in the drawing were where the lights should go and some camera angle we would like to use.
Thinking about using visual expressions rather then using dialogue to move our story forward was very difficult. We tried to come up with ways to show higher tension and give the story more of a meaning and it think we did this by having the eye shots at the beginning. But at first this was very difficult as we did not know whether to have tension through speaking or just facial expressions. We collectively thought facial expressions seems more real and tense as dialogue in the preliminary task should have built up more tension then it actually did.
Throughout the day of our shoot, our whole group were learning new ways of using the camera and developing our knowledge of sound recording too. The huge different between our prelim to our main task was the use of different camera shots. In the preliminary task we had a very ordinary shot list, basically consisting of over heads, close ups and medium shots. In the thriller, we tried to experiment with shots like tracking shots, crane shots and extreme close ups. I think every one of these shots made our thriller more scary. We not only experimented with the type of shot but also the framing of it. For example, we tried to use the rule of thirds in some frames like When Tim is drinking from the top right hand of the screen this could mean he is the evil one. By doing all of the preparation we wanted to achieve a fast paced mysterious opening sequence that perhaps may people may not understand.
My knowledge of editing sound has really increased from the preliminary task. I now know to add sound effects from soundtrack pro, alter the sound tot he right volume and render the sounds. Our sequence used quite a few sound effects like doors opening, footsteps and drink drinking. We also used a room tone, this is because actually all rooms have an underlying noise that gives away their location. We do not have the soundtrack to our thriller but instead we have a combination of high pitch noises, the pitch changes when Niki enters the room and other significant things happen. We did not use any sound effects in our preliminary task, so it’s another more sophisticated aspect in the main task.Final cut server became very familiar to us throughout the course of editing. We would make new log bins as we went a long for things like sounds, then drag them down onto the time bar and cut them to when we needed them. If the sound had a bar on top of it, it had not been rendered; to do this you can press the apple button and r. Another thing we learnt to do was add in titles. To do this you pressed text, then text again. Once you selected the size, font and alignment of the words you could preview it. If you were happy with your title, simply drag it down onto the time line and cut it to how long you want it to be. We used after effects, to add a squirt of blood onto the ACE title and a muzzle flash to the gun when Guy shoos Luke. The preliminary task only took a couple of days to edit although the thriller took about 5 weeks to complete because of the complexity of the editing
Thinking about using visual expressions rather then using dialogue to move our story forward was very difficult. We tried to come up with ways to show higher tension and give the story more of a meaning and it think we did this by having the eye shots at the beginning. But at first this was very difficult as we did not know whether to have tension through speaking or just facial expressions. We collectively thought facial expressions seems more real and tense as dialogue in the preliminary task should have built up more tension then it actually did.
Throughout the day of our shoot, our whole group were learning new ways of using the camera and developing our knowledge of sound recording too. The huge different between our prelim to our main task was the use of different camera shots. In the preliminary task we had a very ordinary shot list, basically consisting of over heads, close ups and medium shots. In the thriller, we tried to experiment with shots like tracking shots, crane shots and extreme close ups. I think every one of these shots made our thriller more scary. We not only experimented with the type of shot but also the framing of it. For example, we tried to use the rule of thirds in some frames like When Tim is drinking from the top right hand of the screen this could mean he is the evil one. By doing all of the preparation we wanted to achieve a fast paced mysterious opening sequence that perhaps may people may not understand.
My knowledge of editing sound has really increased from the preliminary task. I now know to add sound effects from soundtrack pro, alter the sound tot he right volume and render the sounds. Our sequence used quite a few sound effects like doors opening, footsteps and drink drinking. We also used a room tone, this is because actually all rooms have an underlying noise that gives away their location. We do not have the soundtrack to our thriller but instead we have a combination of high pitch noises, the pitch changes when Niki enters the room and other significant things happen. We did not use any sound effects in our preliminary task, so it’s another more sophisticated aspect in the main task.Final cut server became very familiar to us throughout the course of editing. We would make new log bins as we went a long for things like sounds, then drag them down onto the time bar and cut them to when we needed them. If the sound had a bar on top of it, it had not been rendered; to do this you can press the apple button and r. Another thing we learnt to do was add in titles. To do this you pressed text, then text again. Once you selected the size, font and alignment of the words you could preview it. If you were happy with your title, simply drag it down onto the time line and cut it to how long you want it to be. We used after effects, to add a squirt of blood onto the ACE title and a muzzle flash to the gun when Guy shoos Luke. The preliminary task only took a couple of days to edit although the thriller took about 5 weeks to complete because of the complexity of the editing
Task 4 - Who would be the audience for your media product?
The audience age range we aimed out media product was 16-30 year olds that will mostly be male. We thought his would be the most appropriate as our movie involves violence, gangs and conflict over a woman. This would appeal to mostly men as they can relate to our product more so then women. Stimulating scenes like a first death within the first two minute of screen time shows what kind of movie this will be. I think for the type of film we made that it would have a very strong majority of audience that share common interests. Just like most romantic comedies are aimed at women viewers, this thriller will appeal mostly to men. Although it does not contain nudity or scenes of a sexual nature like others like it, it will still hold their concentration for an hour and a half. Ways to do this are incorporating car chases, more violence, gory deaths, smart gadgets and humour into the film. Our target audience will be similar to that of films like James Bond, Fight club and Memento.
A profile of the typical watcher would be:
Age: 21
Occupation: student
Hobbies: Playing sports, going to the cinema, music festivals
This is a male of 21 years who enjoys watching thriller movies. His social class does not hugely matter but we predicted that middle classed men may be more likely to watch these film then upper middle class men. This is because the plot isn’t as thought provoking as other movies and it does not contain any movie stars. If our movie was a day time televisions show it would give away which social group it was being aimed at. For example, shows being shown at 6:00 am are being marketed to children whereas shows being shown at 11:00 am may be marketed to the elderly. Both people who didn’t attend and attended higher education will be attracted to this film. His psychographic profile may include interest like playing and watching sports, their attitude would be fun loving and interested in many different peoples’ lives. The reason we feel a large proportion of women will not come to watch this movie is because they are generally not hugely interested in weapons, gadgets and scenes that have violence. Although some may be, the majority will not have any interesting in coming to see this film.
A profile of the typical watcher would be:
Age: 21
Occupation: student
Hobbies: Playing sports, going to the cinema, music festivals
This is a male of 21 years who enjoys watching thriller movies. His social class does not hugely matter but we predicted that middle classed men may be more likely to watch these film then upper middle class men. This is because the plot isn’t as thought provoking as other movies and it does not contain any movie stars. If our movie was a day time televisions show it would give away which social group it was being aimed at. For example, shows being shown at 6:00 am are being marketed to children whereas shows being shown at 11:00 am may be marketed to the elderly. Both people who didn’t attend and attended higher education will be attracted to this film. His psychographic profile may include interest like playing and watching sports, their attitude would be fun loving and interested in many different peoples’ lives. The reason we feel a large proportion of women will not come to watch this movie is because they are generally not hugely interested in weapons, gadgets and scenes that have violence. Although some may be, the majority will not have any interesting in coming to see this film.
Task 3 - What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
As a group we chose Lionsgae to distribute our thriller. Their films are usually full of violence, gore and mystery; for example The Bank Job and The gamer. We feel Lionsgate would take an interest in our film because it ticks all of the boxes. Lionsgate is a very highly respected distributing company, which works to the films advantage too. For example they will know how to advertise and market our film to the right people. They are so experienced that they will be able to get the biggest profit possible. Our budget to make our thriller was very small and we just used props we already had e.g. ashtrays, glasses, bottles etc. Lionsgate also takes on low budget movies and turns them in to well known franchises like Saw. Saw has had six other film been made and it think Lionsgate as a distributor had a large part to play in this. Lionsgate has six films coming our between April and August this year, three of then being thriller/horror movies. This could suggest half the amounts of films they take on are the genre of horror.
Task 2 - How does your product represent particular social groups?
The product my group and I created shows a very niche social group: international high status gangsters. Whether they are men or women it is obvious that the poker players have high status, this has been created through mise en scene, costumes and lighting. Costumes were very important as in a film we can truly judge a persons character by their clothing. To give off the right impressions about our actors; we ensured their suits were sharp and their hair was either gelled into a side parting or wearing a hat. Interestingly we decided collectively as a group to challenge the stereotypical beliefs of the audience. Like other typical poker type thrillers there is an oriental guy, a Nigerian guy and a few Russians, these nationalities are always portrayed as “the bad guys”. Although at first glance our characters may be the obvious actors for their roles, second glance shows the people you though were Russian are actually from Ukraine. The oriental looking man is actually from Korea, this shows that you can judge a person by their appearance. We show the audience that actually no ethnicity is particularly worse then the other.
Media products represent social groups as extreme; it’s almost as if you have to be part on one of the known roles. Take a college for example; modern day media says that there will be set groups like jocks, cheerleaders, emo’s, geeks etc. Although the group of people we chose would not usually be in a useual high school movie as children. They could perhaps been included in the private lives children perhaps making them drop off drugs or fight other people. We thought it would be interesting to shoot a movie where we follow their lives.
Media products represent social groups as extreme; it’s almost as if you have to be part on one of the known roles. Take a college for example; modern day media says that there will be set groups like jocks, cheerleaders, emo’s, geeks etc. Although the group of people we chose would not usually be in a useual high school movie as children. They could perhaps been included in the private lives children perhaps making them drop off drugs or fight other people. We thought it would be interesting to shoot a movie where we follow their lives.
Task 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The media product the team and I produced challenges forms and conventions of real media products in many different ways. Firstly, it challenges traditional media as it contains a predominant female, unlike the typical male gang boss. This is shown to the audience through he arriving late and been given special treatment by one of the other men. None of the high status gangsters are questioning where she was or telling her that she can’t play. Silently, they deal her in and allow her to sit at the head of the table. Another way we showed her authority over the other men was seating her at what looks like the head of the table, also showing that they left the head of the table seat for her shows that they were expecting her. We also tried to challenge the stereotype of the male being more predominant in the relationship rather then the woman. To make Niki seem more in control, she had a toy boy enter in with her; Luke takes her coat, pushes her chair in and brings her a drink within the first two minutes of the sequence; which strongly raises the question, “why did he shoot Luke?” Normally in other media products it is an obvious character being killed but by killing a relatively unknown character it makes us as an audience wander why in greater depth.
These screen grab shows that we conformed to conventions of real media products. Like other media products we have selected a production company and have incorporated four titles within our opening sequence. We didn’t incorporate titles within the actual cut of our thriller as we felt it really interrupted the suspense we were building and detracted from the importance of each move the poker players were making; feel much more confident with the titles being at the beginning and end of out thriller opening as it gives a faster pace. Though we did not incorporate the titles within the sequence we still inform the audience our thrillers name, Production Company and the director of the film. Another way we conformed to real media product is by having a death within the opening two minute sequence. Other movies in the thriller genre conform to this not only to show the audience what kind of film this will be but also to excite the audience.
These screen grabs are examples of table shots. In all of these shots you can see the immensity of poker chips and collateral being put into the kitty, the stakes are getting higher and higher until Felix bets his car. These shots conform to real media products as they also give you a glimpse into the player’s hands to build suspense.
Tuesday 16 March 2010
Sound Effects
We have just started adding sound effects to our thriller, no only to accentuate some important images but because the sound we recorded was not sufficient in some of the takes. We got our noises form soundtrack pro, another programme on the editing computers. After entering the programme you had to choose from a list of topics for the sound effects. For the door sound we went to the “people” button. It contained lots of different sounds including footsteps and coughing etc. After we located our desired sound we when back to final cut pro and imported a new file and made a new bin entitled “sound effects”. You then drag the sound down onto the part of the toolbar you want; if the sound appears to have a red bar above it you must render it. Rendering is done by pressing apple r; this tells the computer that the sound is allowed. It is quite difficult to input the sound at exactly the right moment because if it isn’t right it really looks very bad.
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