Key conventions of a thriller:
Generally thrillers show good and evil with an element of
suspense, threat or danger to build tension. There are two main characters
the protagonist who ends up in conflict because of the antagonist which the
audience are more likely to identify . It is usually shown from the
protagonists point of view with events in the sequence that the hero must overcome.
Filming techniques to help build on the suspense involve camera work, how the
film is edited, the aspects of mise en scene and sound.
These conventions wereincluded in our Media thriller to help show the genre of our film.
These conventions wereincluded in our Media thriller to help show the genre of our film.
Our main character for our
thriller is a boy that is shown in the first scene on a beach on his own. Here
we tried to get across to the audience he is feeling alone and upset, I also
think as we filmed this on a rainy day it helps the mood of the scene to be
gloomy which matched how the character was feeling. Our main prop in our
thriller was a necklace which we then later see the boy throwing away
for a reason that is not clear at the beginning. This was because it links him
to some sort of danger which we tried to convey through the use of camera work
and the characters body language and facial expression. The next scene to our
film then becomes clearer as to why he was getting rid of it as someone else with
the same necklace is shot. Here we tried to build up suspense as
before this unknown character is killed there are a few extreme close ups of
his face as he looks towards the person who has called out his name in shock
and at that point he is shot. This may be unclear to the audience as to why he
was killed, was it because of the necklace or nothing to do with it. This
raises questions for out film such as:
What connects the boy to the necklace?
Who’s is it?
Why did the other character get shot?
The gardens is a strange place for teenagers to be
hanging around instead of a stereotypical place so why are they there?
The first shot is establishing the setting with an extreme long shot so you get a feel of the emptiness. The charcter is in the distance so he is not a distraction as the camera pans around to show the location. The
charcter is in the distance so he is not a distraction as the camera pans
around to show the location. We added in diegetic sound of the rain pouring to
create more of a gloomy atmosphere.
The second shot is a cloesup of the charcters feet to emphasise firstly how he is feeling as it seems he is walking quickly and heavily sinking into each step he takes suggesting he knows what hes got to do and wants to do it quickly which links to him sighing after he has thrown the object in the water. The fact that the charcater is out in the rain on his own in an empty place makes the audience question what someone his age would be doing somehwere like that as it is no the type of place you generally see people of that age walking around. The lighting used was natural as adding other light would not have the same effect on the gloominess of the scene. 
The third shot is the back of the character so we can see where he has ended up. As the charcter is not facing the camera there is an element of hidden identity which also creates suspense as to why he has stopped by the river and what was the purpous of him going there. From this the audience know very little about the character so far. It is also very difficult to determin what his body language is like and how he is feeling at this point.
Shot four shows the side of the charcters face. Here we still cant see him clearly as his hood is up. However the object in his hand is the main focus in the shot, but is too far away to be able to see clearly what it is which create suspense. His body language when he gets to the river
suggests he feels almost uncomfortable standing there and his facial expression seems vacant as he holds up the necklace in his hand almost contemplating throwing it away.
Shot five is the title. We chose kosmima as it stands for jewellery in Greek. I think this name fits our film well as it is all based around the necklace. It is also a title which the audience would be thinking about as to what it means and the point at which we chose for it to come in our film. The fact we but it in the middle of a black screen is so nothing else would detract from it such as a image in the background and it would have more impact.
Shot six is out title carrying on to our second scene and fades out when the camera moves acroiss the wall. We thought putting it in here would make it fit more smoothly than to just having our black screen and going straight into the second scene. We decided to keep the text white o it didnt stand out too much but was visible against the colour of the wall.- Shot seven is all the characters chatting and their names appearing underneatht them. This is also an etablishing shot as the setting has changed and they are in the gardens. Straight away the scene change would make the audience question why teenagers were hanging around a place like that instead of a stereotypical placeand causing trouble. The costume for these charcaters is casual as is their body language. However some of their facial expressions seem tense and have the look of annoyance. The camera work is a slow pace when it pans around the wall as the charcaters step in. The composition they are all standing in seems awkward, like they've been placed there. This helps show they are not getting on which follows onto the next shot where the other two charcaters walk ahead.
- Shot eight is an extreme close up of a new charcter in the scene. Here another source of light was used to show facial expresion clearly. It is apparent that this character seems on edge from his shocked expression when he hears his name being called out. The charcaters placement is to the corner of the wall with his body turned way from the camera slightly. This suggests he knows something is going to happen as we later see why he was looking down at his hands.
- Shot nine is a closeup of the charcters hand once he has been shot. As the other charcters rush up they find the necklace clasped in his hand.
The social groups our media thriller represents is mainly young teenagers. However it
is difficult to put a class on the characters in our film as you don’t know
much about their backgrounds. However
the character in our first scene we know he may be linked to something
dangerous. His clothes are quite plain and most of the camera angles used in
this first scene are low, suggesting he is not particularly important The
feeling we get off this charcater seems panicked which the audience can relate
to as everyone has experienced it at some point.
We then see all our charcters
together. Here we dont get a feeling than any character is higher than the
other as they are all wearing casual clothes and the camera position is the
same level on each character when filmed individually.
As there are two males in this scene and only one female it would seem from a
steroetypical point of view that she is seen as unimportant and that the scene
where they are discussing amongst themselves she wouldnt be listened to.
However taking this into consideration we made sure our film did not do
this. Age - The charcters in our film are teenagers roughly the same age, which would be another reason it would appeal to teenagers. I think people can relate to it more and be able to put themselves in the charcaters position if they are the same age.
3. What kind of media institutions might distribute your media product and why?
The main thing was to
decide on a target audience for our film. Once we decided that it would be
about making it appeal to a wide audience with as little cost as possible. I
think our filming going straight to a DVD release is the best way as there is
then a lower amount of money spent on marketing.The day we distribute our
film is crucial as most new film releases are on a wednesday which gives more
people a chance to find out about it during the week and you are more likely to
go and watch it. Advertising our film on sites like youtube and facebook is
another idea if it got enough views and was popular with the age group it was
aimed at who would reccoment it to others could mean it going on to TV. Another way to distribute
our media product would be to have a multi platform release that way you are distributing
it in as many ways as possible. I think trying to do it yourself would
take too long and would not be the best way for people to find out about it.
Distributing it to as many portable devices as possible is going to increase
the amount of people that are going to see it which is creating a much bigger
target audience than just putting it on two sites as it would be avalible on a
wider scale. This way it is also keeping cost down. I think a good way to distribute our media
product would be to have a multi platform release that way you are distributing
it in as many ways as possible.
4. Who would be the audience for your media product?
I think the certificate rating our
film would get from the BBFC (British Board Of Film Classification) would be a
15 rating. we would be increasing the viewing audience for our thriller by
aiming it at males and females from the ages 13-18 as our film has charcacters
of the same age so they would be able to relate to it. If our film is being
distributed multi platform release people in that age category are more likely
to see it as it will be available on portable devices. I don’t think it will be
a stereotypical thriller where more males will see it just because the main
charcters are both male, i think both males and females will equally come to
see it, that is why I think if the rating were any younger than 15 it would not
be sutible as the content in it such as the gun scene would not be appropriate
for younger age groups.
5. How did you attract/ adress your audience?
To show our film we used the internet and word of mouth. Telling other
people about our film and asking their opinion of it and to suggest it to
others meant it would get more people interested to see what it was and what
they thought about it. This then meant more people telling their friends
meaning a bigger audience watching it online. I also think this was a good way
of attracting our audience as most people now have a computer allowing them to
access the web which is why we put it on a main site – you tube as younger
people are familiar with it, and we also put it on blogger. It seemed logical
doing it this way as teenagers generally find out about things via internet so
we thought this would be the best way.The important part was to keep our
audience engaged with the film, and keep the suspense or tension going so they
didnt get bored. The use of props such as the gun which came into our film at
the end was deliberate so it would end with hopefully the audience raising
questions such as why he got shot and who did it. Sound for our film took more
thinking. We decided on various soundtracks and had to make a decision as to
weather a fast pace track would better suit our film than a slow paced one. In
the end we decided to tart it off with a low tone soudtrack that then built up
suspense with drums jut as the character was shot.The setting for our thriller
was not one which you generally see teenagers hanging around in so fitted
perfectly for the end of our film when he got shot raising questions like did
he arrange to meet someone there? did someone follow him? The panicked look on
the characters face when he hears his name being called out suggests he is very
edgy and gives the impression he didnt know anyone else would be there.
6. What have you learnt about technoligies from the proccess of constructing this product?
I have learnt alot about the technologies through producing the film.
Remembering to set the white balance each time was tricky, as we found out when
we filmed a short cene and played it back on the mac to find it was almost too
bright for the mood we were trying to create. To resolve this we had to
desaturate the colour. For out thriller we used a HD camera which allowed us to
see the difference in quality between that and the one we used for our
preliminary task. I have never used any of the editing programs and software such
as garage band, final cut pro and adobe after effects, that we had to use to
edit our film together. For our first scene we used a hand held camera which
allowed us to get the type of effect we wanted when our title was fading as the
camera moved across the wall. Using a mac was difficult for me at first i have
not used before so i had to learn how it worked. I personally found final cut
pro quite complicated to pick up at first as there seemed alot to remember such
as rendering after cutting out parts of the film we didnt want. Inserting
soundtracks in from garage band i found easier as we searched for what we
wanted, for example footsteps in mud. However matching it up exactly for when
the character was walking took time to get the timing right. The lighting
equipment was also new to me, i had to know how to set up the lights on the
stands and the angles to put them and also adjust the brightness. I also
learned how you can add transitions in such as dissolve fade or wipe to make
the title of your film fit moothly into the film and chose where you would like
it to come in, weather it be at the beginning on a black screen or half way
through the beginning and fading out.
7.Looking back at your preliminary task what do you feel you have learned in the progression from it to full product?From the preliminary task to our thriller film i think we have all developed new or improved on skills to do with the camera work, editing, mise en scene and sound.
- The props used in our thriller were the key to creating the suspense and tension build up for the ending. The difference between the preliminary and actual thriller film is the amount of time we had to decide on costume and thought into our props to keep the excitement going. The setting for our thriller had alot more thought put into, we wanted a spacious setting and one that would raise questions and not be the norm for teenagers to be. Whereas our preliminary we went off and had to find somewhere in the college to film which was hard as it had alot of posters and deks and people were constantly walking past whilst we were filming which meant we had to keep refilming as we only had a set amount of time.
- Camera work in our thriller was considerably different to the preliminary task where we hardly had any variety of camera distances, shots and angles. throughout the task it was mainly at eye level. However we did include the 180 degree rule and shot reverse shot of which we also used in our thriller. Camera distances in our thriller varied from ECU'S, LS, MCU and ELS. We also had some high and low angles to covey a sense of a certain character having the position of power or in the case for the start of our film, the low angle used was to get a sense that the charcter was not that important and felt alone.This was important as the audience need to stay engaged with the film and if there is no variation with camera work it does not look that good.
- Lighting in our preliminary was not good as we did not really know how to angle them or what brightness we wanted to create the effect we were after. The task we were given to recreate an image off a film jut using the lighting did not go well as we did not know how to position them at certain angles In our thriller our lighting was considerably better as we had hand held lights we gave us more flexibility where we wanted to poition them and the right angle we need it at.
- Sound in our thriller was crucial to giving the impact we needed. Our non diagetic parallel soundtrack which built up suspense toward the gun shot scene created suspense. However for out preliminary we had mostly dialogue and added in a non diagetic soundtrack at the end which was contrapuntal to our scene.
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