Influences on ideas/moodboard

Days we will be shooting

If all goes to plan, and weather is okay to shoot in, we should be shooting on:
Sunday 8th January 2pm onwards for London scene
Thursday 12th January 4pm onwards for car park scene

Permissions

To see my work on Permissions, visit the following link:
http://danbeckiebeth-asmedia.blogspot.com/2011/12/permissions.html

Animatic

Thriller Expectations Vox-Pops

Film Production Company Research

Hammer Film Production's are a British Production Company who specialize in gothic 'Hammer Horror' films but also produce sci-fi, thrillers, film noir and comedies but also some TV series. They were founded in 1934 and were financially beneficial in their most successful years when they dominated the horror film market between the mid 1950's until the 1970's.

The logo is simple and just includes the name of the production company in a font which reflects their genre of film that they produce. The red is very bright and stands out on the background which shows the importance. Inbetween the two words, is just the first letter of the production companies name, the 'h'. 

20th Century Fox is a U.S. film production company which was found in 1935, their most successful productions are the Star Wars Saga, The Chronicles of Narnia and Avatar. They are claimed to be one of the 6 best production companies as of 2011. They have also produced TV Series such as The Simpsons and Family Guy. 

The logo says the production companies name in big bold writing which shows how important this is and the colouring this is in, the gold, may also show importance as gold is represented as a royalty colour. The fact the title is high up makes it look important and that a low angle shot of this is used also shows the importance. The lights on it, give it the effect that it is very important and popular. 

Fox Searchlight Pictures are a low budget production company who were established in 1998 and specialized in independent or indie and British films, one of their most famous films were Napoleon Dynamite which was a low budget film which cost around $400,000 to film and produce. 

This logo is again very similar to the 20th century Fox logo as it has the bold, big, gold writing showing the importance. The fact that it is up high and a low angle shot is used on it to again show the importance, and the lights shining up on it making it look important. Both logo's have the city buildings around the outside and the same sort of weather in the background. 

Thriller Audience Research of 3 Contemporary thriller films

Inception -                                                      


This shows that Inception is aimed at a male audience aged 18-29 years old.

Shutter Island - 

This shows that Shutter Island is aimed at male audience aged 18-29 years old.

Hanna-

This shows that Hanna is aimed at a male audience aged 18-29 years old. Even though this rating says that this film is for men, I would more say that the film is aimed at female's as I feel that this film has the female main character.


All of these films say that they are aimed at the male audience aged 18-29 which shows that this is the majority of thriller film's target audience.

Progression...

Through these last two modules, I feel that I have progressed increasingly amount. I feel that at first when I was analysing a film or its opening, I was just picking out the most obvious parts and was just leaving my analysis like this. However, now I feel that when just watching an opening, I pick out in my head what has happened, why this has happened, what the director expected the audience to feel by this, and what else could possibly have been taken from this. I feel that now I can't watch a film without this constant thought progress running through my head!

I feel that after the first module, I would have only been at a Level One as although I had done the work I had posted barely any evidence of this onto my blog and you wouldn't have known at all what I had done and what not, for someone else to look at my work, it would seem as though I had no work done at all. My time management was really bad and I was struggling to finish the work all work set and have it on my blog. Looking back now, I realise that me and my group has little communication with one another so a lot of the group work wasn't done as we didn't know who was doing which part of it. I feel that looking at my blog at this stage would have seemed like I didn't know anything about a thriller film and that I had never watched one as there was minimal evidence of this. I wish I could go back to this stage and complete all work on time and post it on my blog straight away as I learnt from this that I lost a lot of work by not posting it as I had done it.

However, from making all of these mistakes, I have learnt from them and have hopefully changed!

Now, a week before the end of module two; I feel that my progression has changed a lot! I would now hope that my work would be at about a Level Three. I think this because I have got a lot more communicative with members of my group and done all of the work I was meant to and hoping that they have done their part too. Although we lost a group member, I feel that this has helped us as it is easier to meet up together, as we can find more time to get this work done. I feel that I have put in a lot of more time into my research of thrillers and tried a lot harder this module. The only thing I think I could change is by making my work more creatively and presenting this, this way. 

Sound in Catch Me If you Can opening sequence

At the beginning the piece of music used is a very similar piece of music although some aspects change, for example the volume, the speed and the tone. The music starts with being very quiet and after playing a short melody there is a 'shhh' sort of sound. This repeats itself again. The music then does this melody again but louder, a bit faster and for longer. The music then seems to slow down again but seems to be the same piece of music used from before, there is a sudden speed up in the music for a few seconds which has the pitch going up and down.
After, there is a fast piece of music which seems like it has claps within the music every so often. This piece of music is then used again at 0.37 but this time is a little faster. The music then seems to drastically slow down.
At one minute, the music gets a bit more classical as it seems like it has included a different instrument into the music this time. The music played at this point sounds a bit like the music should be playing in water as it is classical and slow. The music speeds up a bit but keeps with the classical, after a while, the clicking noises start to return. The music seems to get very intense and is building up suspense, it would make the audience feel that something is going to happen.
Then the music quietens down, but is brought straight back up afterwards but at a slower speed.
The music suddenly changes into something completely different with deeper sounds used. Then the music goes back to classical softness, after the music goes intense and fast again leading to a build up.
At the end, the music fades out and ends with the clapping sound.

Words associated with Thriller's

Juno - Map of Titles

Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs - Map of Titles

In case this can not be read the titles are as followed: 

Title 1 - 'Written for the screen and directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller'

Title 2 - 'Produced by Pam Marsden'

Title 3 - 'Based upon the book Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, written by Judi Barrett, Illustrated by Ron Barrett'

Title 4 - 'Bill Hader' 

Title 5 - 'Anna Faris'

Title 6 - 'James Caan'

Title 7 - 'Bruce Campbell' 

Title 8 - 'Andy Samberg'

Title 9 - 'Bobb'e J. Thompson, Mr. T'

Title 10 - 'Benjamin Bratt, Neil Patrick Harris' 

Title 11 - Al Roker, Lauren Graham, Will Forte'

Title 12 - Executive Producer...' 

Title 13 - 'Co-Producers...' 

Title 14 - 'Music by...'

Title 15 - 'Editor...'

Title 16 - 'Production Designer...'

Title 17 - 'Visual Effects Supervisor...' 

Title 18 - 'Head of Story...' 

Title 19 - 'Art Director...'

Title 20 - 'Character Designer...'

Title 21 - 'Senior Animation Supervisor...' 

Title 22 - 'Head of layout..'

Title 23 - 'Digital Effects Supervisor...'

Title 24 - 'Supervising Animators..' 

Title 25 - ' CG Supervisors...' 

Casino Royale - Map of Titles

Reflection on Reservoir Dogs

I found that getting actors to do this for us was pretty hard as most people were quite unreliable and didn't just agree to it easily so a lot of persuading was needed but what would what have helped us would have been to of sorted out who our actors were before we started.

We also found the problem with timing hard with this as a member of our group kept not turning up for when we had planned to film and after adjusting the date's a few times, we finally just did it without him which solved many problems.

Another problem we occurred was that because we left our filming till the last minute, when it came down to filming it, we didn't have the props we needed, the sunglasses. I think this really showed on our piece and it didn't reflect Tarantino's work as much as we would have liked it too. I feel that from this, I learnt that I needed to plan things out more and in more time to have got these props ready.

Once we started filming this, our only other problem was that we found it hard to have a steady camera as we were following the actors as we walked backwards (we were in front of them) as many of our actors were too tall to have used a tripod on but also it wouldn't have worked if a tripod was used as we moving and then the camera still would have been a bit wonky. I think that from this I learnt that we should have better planned this out and thought about this problem before or we could have filmed from further out and then edited this on the computer's later to be a close up of the actor's face.

Reflection on 25 Word Pitch

I found the 25 word pitch hard to do at first. Although I found coming up with the idea for the film pretty easy, I then found it hard to put my whole idea within 25 word's but I ended up only going a few words over this which I found was quite good.

Reflection on Title Timeline

From doing the title timeline, I learnt how many titles are actually shown in a title sequence, I didn't realise that it was this many and was really shocked. There are so many different people involved in making a film. I learnt that I wouldn't be able to put this many in my opening film sequence but I would still need quite a few. I saw that film titles are often put in interesting ways which are all different and I found out that the titles of a film are a legal requirement and they are often needed to be put in certain places throughout the title sequence.

Reflection on Parity

From doing a remake of another students work, I learned that it is really hard to rely on people as many people don't show up for certain meetings about what you will be doing or won't show up on a date in which you decided to film and can be very unreliable. It is hard to work around other students schedule and when they can do stuff the same time as you, doesn't also work. I also learned that sometimes things come up and things can't get done e.g. being ill. However, I had to get over this and after rescheduling a couple of dates, we just came up with a date and told all group member's to be there or we would have to do it without them otherwise, this was to get over this problem.

Once we started filming, we found it quite difficult to figure out from where a shot would have been taken from and tried to copy the exact angle used, I learned from this that we should have worked all of this out before. During filming, we had to re shoot some of our scenes as the actor's facial expressions looked wrong and inappropriate which couldn't be helped but we again learnt from it and worked out that we should have thought about the expressions before hand and told the actor's how we wanted them to look.

Before now I didn't realise how much time it would have taken to film this sequence and how much thought and effort went in it so I think now we should have given ourselves a bit more time to complete and we ended up rushing some parts. We could have helped ourselves by making sure the camera was fully charged before we started filming which is what we will need to do for our real thing.

However, I feel that we did well on finding a place to shoot in and the thought we put in of the mise-en-scene. The fact our character's were wearing the right costumes and we had the use of a knife, 'blood' which was ketchup and this could have been checked to make sure and changed to make this look more realistic. We also had the use of the mop and bucket which all these things helped the scene.

Other student's work

When looking at other students work of their thriller openings, I learnt that:
- In my thriller opening I will need the use of titles, they will need to be interesting and have quite a few of them. They will need to include many different titles and include the name of the film but can't be too repetitive.
- I can't give too much away in the opening sequence as it isn't a trailer, it's only the opening. It can't include too much about the storyline and have something that will ruin the rest of the film as then the audience wouldn't want to watch the rest of the film. However, it can't include too little in which makes the opening confusing for the audience and have them not knowing what's going on as this too would be a bad opening.
- The sound is really important and without it, the opening sequence would not have the same effect on the audience. A lot of opening sequences use foley to add in the sounds of things happening, the most common of these include breathing, footsteps and the shutting of a door. If any speech is used, the sound should be clear and understandable. However, many thriller opening's don't use too much speech so I should use little of this too. The music should be suitable and interesting, don't pick something random.
- The title's should include the production company's name and logo clearly near the beginning on the opening sequence. They should be unique and not just copying another company.
- The actor's used should be good and sensible - they shouldn't be laughing or smiling if the scene is serious as this ruins a lot. As the genre of the opening sequence is a thriller, generally older actors (or actors who look like an adult) are more appropriate as these are the type of actor's you would see in a thriller.
- You shouldn't include your school's name or your candidate number or the fact it is an 'AS Thriller Film Opening' as this doesn't look professional and you wouldn't see this in a real film.
- There should be lots of close up's used, most commonly on a character's hands, feet, eyes or an important mise-en-scene item, there would be lots of these used in a professional thriller film opening.
- The opening should look original and thrilling. You want to make it look interesting and leave the audience wanting more, rather than copying something which has already been made.
- The setting needs to be carefully thought about, especially if you wanted the setting to look empty apart from your characters and if you then have a lot of people in the background, this hasn't been done well. However, if I want the scene to look busy, I should pick a place in which lot's of people are around.
- When editing the piece together, it should all be done correctly and without any mistakes. The shot's should continually flow to one another unless your intention is not to do this.
- If editing the colour of the scene later one during the editing stage, the colour should be carefully chosen and should match in with the scene. It should look professional and not like you've just stuck a colour over the top.
- Don't follow the characters around, let them walk out of the shot as it looks more professional.
- The scene should look realistic and professional, not like student's have filmed it.
- Don't follow the characters exact steps all the way through the scene, use ellipsis and cut out parts that are not needed.
- Remember to use high and low angles to show information about the character.
- The mise-en-scene should be carefully chosen out and really thought about.
- Make sure the expressions on the characters faces are correct and that they are portraying the right emotion you want the scene to show.
- Use a steady and good camera, shaky camera's look messy and can ruin a whole scene if it was not intended to be this way.
- Make sure the lighting is correct and look's right.
- Think carefully about the timing and the speed of the shots each one should take.

When looking at other students work, I saw a shot I liked of when someone was stalking another character, to have the camera in front of both characters, focussing on the character being followed but being able to see the stalker character in the background.

Lesson Reflection

CLOSE UP'S ARE SO IMPORTANT!!! 
>> don't go any more than three shots without a close up

FOLEY


First Titles:
1. Production Company
2. Director
3. Actors etc.

Catch me if you Can, title sequence - map of titles

For my map of titles work I chose to do 'Catch me if you Can' the opening titles were 2 minutes 32 seconds long. Th first picture shows a main image in the opening titles of the name of the film, which was at 44 seconds. The second picture shows what title appeared at what time in the opening sequence, there was 28 different titles throughout the title opening. The titles tell the audiences who has directed, produced, acted in the film and anyone else who helped with their job title. 

From doing this task, I learnt that in films, there are a lot of different title's that need to appear for legal reasons, I now know what type of titles need to be in my opening.

Production Company Logo

We created seven different ideas using different fonts to choose from for our final production company logo and chose five different images that we can chose from for our logo. We decided that we liked the name 'Fancy Vision' and were going to keep it rather than experimenting with this too.

Costume ideas for 'The Hunt' opening - our final idea

Our killer will be wearing a suit similar to this and shoes similar to the one's below. We have put our killer wearing this because we feel that this will make him look professional and also in thriller films, the characters look older and we think that by putting our actor in this costume, this will increase the look of his age.

Both our victims will be wearing black suits like the one on the left hand side because we again feel that this will help to make them look professional and older. This would also give the women the look of a independent business woman, not giving the typical stereotype of a woman victim.
Both women victims will be wearing black, flat shoes which makes them still look smart.