Thriller Evaluation: Visuals

Media Product Evaluation

Thriller Evaluation

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

Before creating my media product, I researched films in the same genre to gain an understanding of the key conventions I should include in mine. Two films which I analysed were Psycho and Sin City. Psycho is completely in black and white which I think is effective as it creates a sense of mystery and darkness, so we used this concept in my flashbacks for the same effect. Psycho also uses non-diegetic music generic to the genre, which we included in our thriller opening as it creates a tense and suspenseful atmosphere. While analysing Sin City I noticed that this thriller film is also in black and white but certain parts are in colour, we believed this was effective in terms of a thriller film so therefore we decided to add this convention in my media product. The inspiration we got from this concept becomes evident in my thriller opening as some scenes are in colour, while the flashbacks are in black and white to add a sense of mystery.

My media product does however challenge certain conventions of this genre. A lot of thriller/horror films begin with setting shots to create an atmosphere, with little action and slow-paced editing. My opening challenges these conventions as it begins with instant action and fast-paced editing, this unsettles the audience as they have not been introduced to a setting or any characters so ultimately left in mystery as to who the characters seen are and why they are introduced instantly with no identity. Another convention which my media product challenges is that in a lot of thriller films the definite protagonist is introduced before the antagonist, while in mine the character who appeals to be the antagonist is the first character to be introduced, but as the audience do not know who this character is then they are left unsure as to his ambitions.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

After watching and analysing a number of thriller/horror films, I noticed that a lot of antagonists in these films are male as males are stereotypically strong and authoritative. Therefore we decided that our antagonist would be male, this makes our media product give a representation that males are strong. However all the victims that are murdered are also male, this gives off an opposite representation that males are infact weak. No females feature in the opening of our media product, this could suggest that they are seen as unimportant in the plotline of our film. On the other hand, it could suggest that as none of the victims are female, then females are strong characters.

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

If I was to make my media project into a full length film then I believe the sorts of distributors that would distribute the film would be the likes of Paramount Pictures or Hammer Film Productions. This is due to the similarities between my film and films previously distributed by these production companies.

Firstly Paramount Pictures distributed Psycho which I see as the main inspiration for my media product, mine bares a resemblance to the conventions shown in Psycho so therefore I believe that my film would be suited to this production company. Also audiences to films distributed by Paramount would be the right sort of audience to my film, rather than Hollywood production audiences.

Secondly Hammer Film Productions would be another ideal production company to distribute my film, this is due to the history of films that have been distributed by Hammer Film Productions who have a reputation for gothic horrors. Some films that have been distributed by this company are Frankenstein, Dracula and The Mummy, these films use similar conventions used in my media product. These films are in black and white, use a lot of generic non-diegetic music and feature murders, my thriller is similar so therefore I believe this production company would be ideal to distribute my film.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

After researching classifications on the BBFC website, I decided to classify my media product as a 15 due to; Horror and Violence. I think this is a good classification for my media product as it features horrific and violent scenes but there is no particular gore or graphic scenes which would bring the classification to an 18.

If this film were to be distributed, I believe the audience would mostly be males aged between 15-21. This is because of the genre of film which tends to have a male-based audience, also the actors and characters used in my thriller are between these ages so it would be right that this film attracts these sorts of ages.

How did you attract/address your audience?

Initially we attracted and addressed our audience during the planning stages of our production with questionnaires about our storyboard and rough drafts. This stage allowed us to identify our target audience our thriller would be aimed at, here we found that an audience of ages 15-21 would be suitable. We also found that the majority of this audience were male who had a keen interest in thriller/horror films, this was good for us as this is the sort of audience we initially planned on aiming at.

In order to gain further feedback, we posted our thriller intro on Facebook in order to receive opinions to document. This was extremely helpful as we received a lot of feedback, which was mostly positive but there was also some negative opinions so this allowed us to re-edit and re-evaluate our product.

Some of the comments me and my group received after posting our media product onto Facebook were:

“Really good nice work for your first proper film.”

“That’s well good it actually scared me a bit with the music and the black and white display.”

“Also the last shot is the best, good quality camera work throughout.”

“That’s actually pretty good.”

“Good use of different camera angles and shots, nice delivery throughout.”

“I like the tension and suspense which is built up by the music and the variety of different shots however it could be seen more as a short film than a thriller opening.”

“I think the shot of the male character running up the stairs could be shorter, as it is too long, however the use of the low angles are really well thought out.”

This sort of feedback made us feel confident with our thriller opening, and the negative comments we received were constructive and allowed us to go back over our product and edit bits which were negatively commented on.

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

Throughout the process of my product, I have learnt a lot of skills and a lot about different technologies in putting my product together. I have picked up a number of camera skills involving shot distances and angles, also skills involving the camera equipment. Since our continuity task, I feel me and my group have all largely enhanced our camera skills and these are evident in our final piece. Aswell as camera skills, I have also learnt a lot of in depth editorial skills using Premier Pro. This is the program we used to put our product together, during our continuity task I had a basic understanding of this program but now I feel that I have drastically improved my editing ability and have learnt a lot of new advanced skills. My editing has improved in terms of sequence smoothness, use of cuts, shot transitions, piecing of the non-diegetic sounds and overall editing ability. Another program I have used during the process of my product is After Effects, with this program I learnt a lot of animation skills. I used these new skills to animate the title sequence which I felt improved the overall complexity of our product. I feel that as a group we have raised our standard of work, we often re-shot scenes if we felt we could do better and we went through our sequence many times to edit and cut parts until we were confident with our final piece.

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

Reflecting on our preliminary task, I feel we have significantly progressed from this task to our final media product. During our preliminary task we spent a lot of time planning and not enough time filming, so by the time we had completed our planning we were left slightly clueless with the camera and the time we had remaining to complete our task. Our limited skills became apparent when we had to re-shoot a large part of it due to unsteady shots, overall our preliminary task went well but we learnt from the mistakes we made and we transferred this new knowledge into the production of our media product.

When we started off with our thriller opening, we were organised with our planning and the process was successful and fluid. Then when it came to the filming we built on the experience we already had and developed our camera and editing skills, which are presented in our final piece as it is a lot smoother and well produced than our preliminary task.

Overall I believe that individually and also as a group, we have all progressed and have learnt a lot during the production. Our final media product has turned out to be a success and we have created this product to a high standard due to the skills we have all learnt along the process.

Finished Product

Rough Cut Feedback

 

After posting my rough cut onto Facebook i recieved very positive feedback, 27 people 'liked' it which proved that a lot of people were impressed by it. I also got a lot of positive feedback, some of the comments recieved were:

 

‘Really good nice work for your first proper film.’

‘That’s well good it actually scared me a bit with the music and the black and white display.’

‘Also the last shot is the best, good quality camera work throughout.’

‘That’s actually pretty good.’

‘Good use of different camera angles and shots, nice delivery throughout.’

‘I like the tension and suspense which is built up by the music and the variety of different shots however it could be seen more as a short film than a thriller opening.’

‘I think the shot of the male character running up the stairs could be shorter, as it is too long, however the use of the low angles are really well thought out.’

‘The ending could be seen as a bit too concussive, apart from this the rest of the film is technically very good, the music fits the pace of the piece and the acting isn’t too bad.’

‘I like the pan of the dead body, it works really well on the circular seat, I also really like the shot of the male character in the distance, the variety of shots are all really well thought out and technically displayed.’

The feedback we recieved was very encouraging, we are proud of our product at this stage. We also recieved some of constuctive criticism which we will use when deciding on parts to add or change.

Rough Cut

This is our rough cut, it is what we have created up until this point. We are confident in our rough cut and are happy with what we have made, but we feel we can make further improvements. Therefore we are going to post this onto Facebook in order to receive feedback, with this feedback we will then re-evaluate our product and see what changes we could make to improve it.

Individual Progress Evaluation

At this stage of our production I feel that individually i have made good progress, mostly in terms of my editorial skills. At the beginning of the project i had little experience with editing, but after alot of use on the Mac I feel that my editing has improved greatly. I have learnt alot of new editing skills by using Premier Pro, and I have become somewhat of a perfectionist in terms of keeping the sequence running smoothly. I am happy with my improvements and I feel i can benefit for the group alot more with my new skills, my group members have each improved aswell so it is very beneficial for our product. I am confident with my ability at this stage and over the course of the production I imagine that my skills will become more enhanced.

Filming Session 01/03

While editing our footage, we noticed that some parts of the recently filmed death scene weren't at the standard quality and didn't run smoothly so therefore we went out and re-shot some parts. The main shot we focused on was the P.O.V shot from the antagonist as he stalks his victim, the previous shot wasn't steady and as this is an important shot we wanted to get it right.

The next shot we wanted to re-shoot was the LA mid-shot of the victim as the antagonist rises from behind him to attack him, we felt that this sort of shot would be effective as it makes the antagonist look menacing and powerful. We had some difficulty getting this shot as we had to make sure that the camera was straight and at the perfect angle, we filmed this shot a number of times until we felt happy that we had got it right.

Filming Session 15/02

In this session we attempted to shoot the first death scene, n this scene the antagonist lurks along a building and spots his victim, he then creeps up from hehind and attacks him. We managed to get some good footage which included a variety of shots such as long shots and mid shots, but we were rather unorganised and we spent alot of time trying to find the right angles to shoot from. This caused us to lose time and we could not finish our filming of this sequence, therefore the next time we film we will be more organised and plan the shots we want before-hand. During this filming session we focused hard on not breaking the 180 degree rule, we also tried to keep the tripod still and at the right level, these are past mistakes we have made and learnt from.

Editing Session 14/02

Our first editing session was somewhat of a success, we managed to edit together the first 40 seconds of 2 minute thriller opening. We believe that we have put it together well and it all runs smoothly, the cut transitions are good and the first bit of editing we have done has good fluidity. We had alot of material to work with which is good as it gave us the chance to choose from a number of shots to decide which ones looked best together, we are confident with what we have done in this session and we can build on this from here onwards. We have also put the title sequence together which was the main aim of this session.

During this session we came to a conclusion that we were going to change a section of our plotline. In the animatic our thriller began with location shots to reveal the setting and then fade to a flashback, however after re-evaluating our footage we have changed the order of our shots and our thriller is now going to begin with a flashback.

Filming Session 07/02

In our second filming session we were alot more wary of time, we were alot quicker getting the setting and props ready so we had a good amount of time to spend on the filming. With the last filming session we spent alot of time trying to decide on the correct sort of lighting, so this time we knew which position and placement to put the lamp to create the lighting which we wanted. We managed to completely re-shoot the scene of which we previously tried, adding new shots such as close-ups and mid-shots which we felt could make the final product more dimensional. We managed to get this sequece filmed in enough time to begin filming another part of the thriller, which was the introduction of our antagonist. We used a number of shots in this next part such as close-ups, mid-shots, long-shots and P.O.V shots, this meant we will have alot of filming to edit when we begin our editing session. Over the course of this filming session we managed to film alot of good material, and we will have alot to work with when we begin editing.

Filming Session 31/01

In our first filming session we attempted to film the opening scene of our thriller, this is the part where the setting is introduced as a corrider and staircase. We used a good location but as the room was very dark it made the camera blurry and unclear, therefore we spent alot of time finding lamps and setting them up correctly for the right amount of light we wanted. Once we eventually found the right lighting, we began filming but were unsure of the shot angles we were using. We couldn't get the right sort of shot we planned in order to reveal the setting, so we tried a number of other shots which we weren't too confident about. We soon ran out of time with this session, so we decided that we will re-shoot this part of the sequence in future filming sessions. Next time we attempt to film this part we will be more wary on the time we spend on lighting.

Evaluation of Animatic

After evaluating my animatic, I came the conclusion that the idea is good but the plotline is too basic. Therefore we are going to continue thinking of ideas to add to our thriller until we are happy with the amount of action we have planned, so by the time we start filming we will have an clear and organised list of shots to film. The drawings we used in our animatic are simple and present the plotline well, and the non-diegetic music is effective and gives us an understanding of how the final piece would appeal with the sound included.

Overall I felt our animatic is fairly good and will be a good platform to build on as we progress to our final ideas for our thriller intro. We will definately make some changes and adds new parts to it, but the we were given the task to make a 2 minute animatic and we have reached that goal. The drawings show clarity and are evident as to the genre of our film, so they worked well. I believe the non-diegetic music is very effective as it doesn't match with the action, which creates a spooky effect, also the daunting laugh heard as the antagonist appears is thrilling. Furthermore I believe that after we elaborate on this plotline, we will have a good plan to work with, I am confident with our production at this stage.

Thriller Opening Animatic

This is our animatic, we have created this based on our initial ideas. It will give us a good understanding of how our filmed thriller opening will appear and if it looks good, also if the non-diagetic music works well with the action.