Evaluation 7- Lauren Gilbert (7070)

This is our Preliminary task video:

This is our completed Thriller opening:

Pre-production, Planning:

Firstly, pre-production played a huge underlying role is the success in producing our thriller opening in comparison to our preliminary task. This is due to the fact that we had about 20 minutes to plan our preliminary tasks in comparison to the pre-planned and discussed plot for our thriller sequence. We achieved this by each person  proposing a film plot to the people who we decided to be in a group with. Then we collectively decided which one would be plausible to do and which one we could film and have the best outcome with. With this we brainstormed and altered the plot slightly to achieve a more realistic reality of what we could produce with less resources than a full scale production company such as Warner Bros; with this plot fully understood and each person in our group satisfied we collectively presented our ideas to the class through a power point presentation.

Following this, we further developed our idea by story boarding each scene with the camera shots that will take place , the transitions ect. In which we added our preferred soundtrack that we made on garage band as we felt that each 'sinister' or 'eerie' piece of music we found without copyright sounded almost cringey and took away from the uncomfortable feeling we wanted to achieve.  

We also planned and mapped out the days we were going to film and the locations that the filming was going to take place, as well as the dates we were going to spend editing. Furthermore; for our preliminary we had to put our script together whilst we were filming where as we were set on having very little dialogue throughout our opening from the offset as we believed it was quite conventional of thriller films to help build suspense. Overall, our planning for our final piece was a lot more detailed and thought through in comparison to our preliminary task and as a result of this it made filming and editing a clearer and smoother task; and made our media product more successful overall.

Production, filming:

Secondly, During production planning made it easier to achieve what we wanted; not only this but because I had experience using the camera when filming Ciara and Hannah for our preliminary task I found it easier to get used to when we were filming this time round, where as I struggled to move the handle and get good un-jittery  panning shots previously where as we have smooth and clear panning shots multiple times in our thriller opening. Not only this but i believe we got a really good point of view shot when you are the 'eyes' of the murderer running through the forest , we experimented here and got a really successful shot by running with the camera ourselves which makes it realistic. 

 As well as this , we  had a more developed understanding of shots which made our final piece appear more professional. I think this is really apparent in our match on match action shot where Hannah is seen leaving the bedroom and then seen shutting the door on the other side as we have achieved continuity editing very well here , very different to the beginning of our preliminary where we try to achieve this when Hannah opens the door and is seen walking up the stairs.  

(insert screenshots of both examples)

Furthermore, in our preliminary task the biggest problem we encountered was a lack of light as we wanted to achieve a dark and dingy appeal, in order for the scene to appear as if the protagonists were in an integration room. However , what we learned through the fact that most shots were too dark to see the character that we could have used final cut pro and put a filter on it so it looked darker but you could see our characters instead of them being indistinguishable.  

So from learning this in a preliminary , we built apon it in our thriller opening filming the establishing shot up to the shots of the protagonist acting distraught we wanted to appear some what grainy and grungy so we filmed them in a very light location so that the audience knew what they were seeing but then coated the shots in a filter whilst editing to achieve the effect we wanted.

Not only was i more comfortable and confident with the equipment this time, we had more equipment to film with which made the overall process a lot easier. Although we did not need it , if we were to recreate our preliminary we could have used LED lights that were available whilst filming this time. More over, our most crucial part of equipment that was very useful for our group that contributed to the success of our thriller opening was the mic. This is because it captured the crying of our protagonist which is very chilling and gripping , it adds to the cynicism of our sequence. Furthermore , it captured everyday sounds such as the door closing and the person walking down the stairs really well and it just adds to our continuity editing as it makes the piece overall appear more real instead of false and forced. 

 Post production , Editing:

 for our preliminary task my group left the editing mostly to Hannah , however this time round i done a lot of the editing by myself, i manage to pick up what to do and learnt to edit certain bits of our sequence which look really effective; some of these shots  include the shot of Hannah leaving the bedroom then shutting the door behind her which across really smoothly. Another shot is at the very end of our sequence where it slowly begins to zoom in and crop out surrounding things and ends on the Hannah's hand and face closing the door. 

we managed to create our own production and distribution logo to go at the beginning of our opening , which ensured that our piece looked more professional to add to this we added sound affects such as the kiss and the tiger roar which correlates to the pictures but it is similar to famous company's such as Pixar and Disney which have the bouncing light and the sprinkle on the castle. 

We encountered a few problems in the editing process which includes; struggling to find a filter that made the first half of the opening look sinister and eerie without making our protagonist and the hand look quite green. In comparison to our preliminary which we really struggled with the lighting in which you could hardly see our characters and we didn't have the experience with final cut pro in which we did not know how to lighten the scene.  Not only this we found it difficult to cut and trim shots to ensure that they didn't look like they ended to abruptly or continued for too long in order to achieve good continuity editing. However for our preliminary we hardly cut anything and was left with basic and elongated shits. Aswell as this we struggled to find a suitable soundtrack for the first half of our opening  that ensured it gave us a good tone from the offset we achieved this by making our own on garage band which i believe to be successful. In comparison to our preliminary where we just took one of YouTube unaware whether it had copyright or not.  



What I learnt:

Overall i found the production of our thriller opening satisfying as i believe we have really progressed form our preliminary task. This is due to the fact we have gained more experience and confidence with our equipment and applications. 

However , next year i would consider working in a group with different people because although being friends with people i was in a group with was easy in order to work out when to film and edit ect. It meant that we got almost too comfortable and relaxed when needing to do tasks also it could have created tension and awkwardness when distributing tasks to people in our group. 

I believe that our thriller opening met generic thriller conventions and was overall successful , next time my goal would be to improve our overall clarity of shots and the professionalism of shots which would make our piece appear better and more realistic.

Evaluation 6 (GROUP POST) Lauren Gilbert (7070)

Evaluation 5 (GROUP POST) Lauren Gilbert (7070)

How did you attract/address your audience? (GROUP)


Marketing and advertising is how companies generally attract an audience. Examples of this include, posters on buses, adshells, social media accounts, merchandise, trailers and more! Budget plays a huge role in creating an effective marketing campaign to attract an audience. For example, companies which are transnational have the ability to make bigger, more interesting campaigns attracting a bigger and wider audience. An example of this type of company would be Walt Disney as if you were to take a trip to your local shopping centre you would find some sort of Disney merchandise, accessories and even the actual Disney store.

Our target audience:

"Unmasked" is a certificate 15. We decided that our target audience would be for men and women from the age of 15 - 24 years old. We found that this was an appropriate audiecne as they have the most leisure time, and consequently we would be able to make more of a profit.

What aspects of our opening would appeal to our target audience?

- The upbeat music, as it is something we would listen to as 16 and 17 year olds.
- Our protagonist is of a similar age to  our target audience, hence they would be able to possibly relate to her.

Aspects such as the upbeat music, may not appeal to an older audience, as it is quite a young, upbeat track. The body language and make up of our protagonist may also not appeal to an older audience, this is because our protagonist may come across as quite self obsessed/insecure of her image and so spends a lot of time getting ready. This could be because of the increasing pressure on young people to look a certain way, a subject which an older generation may not have such knowledge about. However the storyline may be appealing to an older audience because, it is about a girl loosing her father and the pyschological effects and journey it takes her on, it is a relatable storyline so our storyline may attract a wider audience.


The audience will be drawn into our film by the eerie, mysterious music which helps to build the tension. The audience will also be drawn in by our blurred shot of the protagonist's father' shands, this is because the blurr is likely to create a sense of curiousity from the audience. Another scene which would draw the audience in is when hand-held camera effect in the woods as it builds suspense.

Conventions included in our thriller opening:

- A protagonist
-Supsenseful music
-Cliffhangers
-Montage of shots
-Diegetic sound

In "Unmasked" the audience are asked to relate to the protagonist as that is the only character, they properly see. They also witness a scene in which the protagonist is extremely distraught, triggering a sense of sympathy and empathy from the audience due to the death of her father, although this is not obviously revealed but rather subtly hinted as we wanted to keep that sense of msytery as it would not be possible to reveal everything in the opening.

We collected our audience feedback from two 18 year old boys, a 17 year old boy and a 19 year old woman as well as our peers, and teachers. In our film opening, our audience found our music most effective in setting a mysterious atmosphere. Our audience also enjoyed the acting as it made them feel emersed in the action and they believed what they were watching, They also found the reference to the dates helpful in understanding what was happening on the screen. They also enjoyed our continuity editing as it created a sense of verisimilitude.

MARKETING CAMPAIGN:

Social Media:

As our target audience is for 15-24 year old men and women. For most of our target audience, social media is a part of everyday life. . From our research we also found that 94% of British teenagers use at least one form of social media, making a social media campaign most successful for our film.

We would use our various social media pages to post updates and news on our film as well as release dates and reviews. We would also post cast interviews, bloopers as footage allowing our audience to have access to as much content relating to our film as possible. We would also have public profiles, allowing a wider audience to be aware of our film. Below is an example of our twitter page that we especially decided to focus on as we found our target audience use this a lot in comparison to other social media platforms like Facebook.

Our Twitter Page

Posters:

We also designed two posters that are shown below. These can be used on adshells, busses, handed out to the public and also shown and shared on social media. Below we have annotated them as to why they help attract out target audience and the decisions we took in relation to images, colour and text.

Evaluation 4- Lauren Gilbert (7070)

 On the basis that our thriller film is a 'psycological' thriller our film could be associated to 'Gone Girl’(2014, Fincher) because it jumps from different dates, furthermore you can also see similarites as our thriller opening could be seen as mysterious as you dont know what has happened to the victim just as like the beginning of 'Gone Girl' you dont know what has happened to Amy.

 If our film was to become a full feature length film you would then see what has happened to the victim as the film continues.

 In regards to the fact that the protagonist has lost a parent this could be linked to the   film 'Remember me' (2010, Coulter) where a young girl witnesses the death of her mother.

 As well as this we could link it to ‘Fathers and Daughters’ (2015, Muccino) due to the fact it depicts the loss of a parent also.

Examples of our Target Audience:

Teenage Female 15-21:

•Favourite places to shop:

•Topshop

•zara

•River Island

•MissGuided

•Music choice:

•pop

•House

•R&B

•Favourite food places:

•Nandos

•Mcdonalds

•wagamama's

•Dominos

Hobbies:

•shopping

•makeup

•going out with friends

Teenage Male 15-21:

•Favourite places to shop:

•TopMan

•zara

•Gstar

•Diesel

•Music choice:

•pop

•House

•grime

•rap

•Favourite food places:

•Nandos

•TGI'S

•Pizza hut

•chicken/kebab shop

•Hobbies:

•football

•sports of any kind

•going out with friends

•Partying

Evaluation 3- Lauren Gilbert (7070)

Evaluation 2- Lauren Gilbert (7070)

How does your media product represent particular social from Lauren Gilbert

Evaluation 1- Lauren Gilbert (7070)

From the top left to the bottom right (moving to the right direction) the frames are:

1. The establishing shot - The date of the 'murder'.

2. A clearer mid shot of the crucial part of our opening the 'murder'.

3. A close up shot of the perpetrator running away.

4. mid shot of the  perpetrator running away - different location.

5. Long shot - where the title of our film appears.

6. mid shot of a picture frame which the protagonist and victim are in.

7. Establishing mid shot of the protagonist.

8. Development of the protagonist- distraught because of the death of her father.

9. Mid close up of the protagonist switching back before the death of her father leaving for work.

I had made my nine frames before my group had added our production logo into our thriller opening, so our first frame is in fact our production logo 'Shadow Productions' we learnt that a black background made our production logo appear more professional , this was evident from logo's such as Miramax.

As a result we made this: 

Shot one:

Our first shot is the establishing shot where the date of the 'murder' appears on the screen immediately after our production company logo leaves the screen. You see the beginnings of the man’s hand which is covered in blood.

I believe it is crucial that you see the date first as it puts emphasis on the fact that the date is important in relation to the rest of our thriller opening.

Furthermore the pan up makes it seem more sinister as the hand is not shoved in your face at first glance.

As well as this the fact that the date is typed onto the screen makes it more sinister and correlates with our desired genre.

This challenges conventions of usual thriller openings but I believe it is very effective as it is different.

Shot Two:

The second shot is s mid shot of the hand covered in blood with the beginnings of our credits on , after this we added an affect so it now looks grungier and this relayed to the audience the genre of the film and made the 'blood' on his hands seem more legitimate.

Furthermore the concentration on the hand puts more emphasis on the fact that it is a real body/real hand/ 'real murder'.

A convention of a thriller film is used immediately as you hear the non-diegetic eerie music put with the visuals of the hand which is good as it causes suspense and builds tension from the offset.

The use of the watch as a prop , ensures that the hand appears very manly as a result of this . And the placement of the body on the tiled floor makes the scene appear cold.

This conforms to conventions of a thriller film , the use of blurry shots where we know that there is an arm covered in blood underneath is used to grip the audience straight away.

Shot Three:

This is a close up shot of the perpetrator running away, it emphasises that a crime has been committed in the previous shots.

Although the lighting appears bright in this picture; we later edited so that the picture is relayed in a darker tone which suits the dark tone of the overall thriller opening and does disrupt the pace and tone of the sequence.

As result of this running away shot it its easily conveyed to the audience that a murder has taken place.

As well as this, the use of the man running away begins to increase the pace which brings us into the next shots smoothly. This develops our plot as it adds to the story and may add more detail and clarity to the overall plot.

Shot four:

Shot four shows the continued escape of the murderer on the run , this is successfully achieved by the fact that Hannah held the camera and ran with it in order to get the most real shot we could to achieve verisimilitude.

we used the naturalistic lighting as it was a sunny day, however we completely dulled the light out when we edited as it meant that it did not look bright and happy and therefore again correlates back to our thriller genre which we did not want to veer from.

I believe this adds well to our opening as it means you don't go straight into the distraught clips of the protagonist.

This may challenge certain conventions of thriller films due to the fact that we see the escape of the murderer from a first person perspective.

Shot Five:

This shot is a long shot of a photo frame with the victim's family pictured inside of it, i really liked this shot because you get the naturalistic lighting which beams through the shutters.

I particularly like it because the sun is setting and it makes the moment appear bitter sweet. Just like the murder is horrible but she has the memories in these pictures.

We moved the title so it was differentiated from the other shots in which the credits are all on the left hand of the screen.

I like how the picture does not appear initially clear, which is conformist of thriller films as a lot of shots in thriller films appear unclear and unfocused in order to create suspense.

Shot six:

Following shot five shot six zooms into the photograph where you can see a clear shot of the picture that see the family together, which makes what the murderer has done more apparent. Furthermore; the fact that after the picture becomes clear it loses focus again hones in on the fact that the family will never be together again like that again.

However, I believe the way we introduce the title of our film and the background behind it challenges what is usually expected from a title. Instead of putting it on a black background we believed it was more effective to have it where you could see the victim’s family and the protagonist as a young girl.

We struggled at the placement of the text because we wanted it to stand out from the rest of our credits.

Shot seven:

This is an introduction to the protagonist of our opening; we decided to pan across her face as it challenges conventions where the protagonist is introduced with action straight away. As well as this it is put in to help make the connection with the girl in the photo frame and the one sat in front of the camera.

Not only this but we thought it was better to add this shot in because it is the only clear shot of her face you see throughout our sequence.

Shot Eight:

Shot eight develops the protagonists' stance in the opening, you see her distraught and upset about the death of her father.

This helps people know there is an emotional link between the two main people that feature in the opening.

A filter we have since added makes the shot appear similar to other famous thriller films E.G. Gone Girl, it is effective as it makes the scenes more sinister and eerie an atmospheric tone conforming to many thriller films.

Shot Nine:

Shot nine follows some match on match action, where you see the protagonist leave the room and close the door on the other side.

It is a really effective shot in our opening because it shows our editing to be really sleek; allows our opening to look more professional overall.

I think it is further exaggerated by the fact you can’t see her face in this shot and it means more camera angles were used , this is also honed in on when you see her come down the stairs.

Not only this; but the use of her coming down the stairs connects the scene of the crime to where she lives because both her and the murderer come down the same stair, I believe this is quite common but effective in thriller films to make connections in the film.

Our Finished Thriller Opening

Audience Feedback : Thriller Opening

Draft Thriller Opening

Editing process (post production)

Script

In our thriller opening we have decided to use very little dialogue in order to achieve the most sinister and mysterious sequence possible; as a result we only have one piece of dialogue in the whole of our opening.

Hannah: 'Bye dad , love you' 

As a group we decided that this was best to create the eery atmosphere needed. Also through our audience reasearch we found that the audience don't like much to be given away in the intro of a thriller hence why we decided to have little dialouge. 

Soundtracks

Our aim is to have an eerie and suspenseful soundtrack to compliment our thriller opening; these are
a few i thought would accompany our piece well:

I looked up different music that were not copyrighted and although many were good i believe they did not completely fit the feel of music and the atmosphere we were looking for. As when we researched and people filled out our surveys music was a key aspect which was seen to be important, because of this we decided that it would be best to make our own soundtrack to fit our thriller opening best. 

As a result we produced this soundtrack:

Mood Board

This mood board allows us to visualise our thriller opening so we are able to see some key themes and images that will potentially be used in our opening to our thriller 'Unmasked'. 

Costume

At first we would like our protagonist to be well dressed, in formal but feminine wear. We decided this as it is part of her clean, "perfect" image. Another reason why we chose this, is because we thought it would help to highlight the contrast and transformation of her.





We also had ideas of a sort of slouchy, comfortable more scruffy look to show the contrast between her well dressed, polished look.

Location

Our locations would include:





A bathroom that includes a mirror so the protagonist is able to look in it, we would use one of our bathrooms at home and make it look messy, which again, highlights the contrast to the protagonist's clean, polished image. We will use mine and Lauren's bathrooms.





We will use a front door/doorway in two scenes. In one scene the door will be slightly ajar and in the other scene we will use the door so that the protagonist can walk through it.



We would also use an upstairs landing as a point to film from.



We would also use one of our staircases to film on.



Another possible location is a bedroom.

AUDIENCE RESEARCH: storyboard

Storyboard (Still Frames and Animatic)

AUDIENCH REASERCH: Film Listings: Richmond Odeon

Top 5 films at Odeon Richmond:

Sing = Animation 

T2 Trainspotting = Drama

La La Land = Musical , comedy , romance

Split = Horror ,Thriller

Lion = Drama 

In the most demanded and screened films in the local cinema (Richmond Odeon) have a Thriller movie in their top 5 , displaying how popular they are. This discloses to us that there is a clear audience for Thriller films,  in which the cinema fulfils the audiences needs by screening Split. 

Furthermore, these are the Thriller films readily avaliable the local hounslow/ richmond borough being screened at cinema's: 

Top Thriller films of all time:(imdb)

1. The sixth sense

2. The dark knight rises

3.  Inception

4.  psyco

5.  The departed

6.  Shutter Island

7.  se7en

8. The Usual suspects

9. The silence of the lambs

10. Snatch 

AUDIENCE REASERCH- IMDb

This chart shows and ranks Box office statistics for thrillers released in 2016 and also thrillers released in the past that made money in 2016. 

This chart ranks movies by the amount they earned during 2017. It includes movies released in previous years that earned money during 2017.

Conclusion:

These charts show that Thriller films are still popular and that they can still produce an audience and Box Office statistics. Passengers produced the largest profit in 2017 with $34,939,291 and also made $61,264,152  raking it 5th in 2016.

Passengers:
IMDb Passengers: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1355644/

Conclusion:
From this research on Passenger I have found that Sience Fiction thrillers were popular in both 2016 and 2017 as well as being profitable when aimed at a target audience with an age rating of PG-13.