Evaluation

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

Our thriller incorporates generic conventions of the thriller genre – this can especially be seen in the flashback scenes, when the female character is running away in the woods from a male character. The setting of this scene, the woods, link in with common conventions of this genre as does the victim being female. What’s more, we tried to develop these conventions – for example, in the scenes within the wood, we chose to create them as flash back scenes and used techniques, such as darkening the shots and using a variety of P.O.V shots. Moreover, not many of the conventions we used indicated our thriller sub-genre; the music could be viewed as a horror sub-genre as could the close-up seen of the female characters eye. Nevertheless, the music is quite ambiguous, in that it is similar to that of a horror sub-genre, but also a psychological sub-genre. In addition to this, our opening contains no dialogue, which was done to ensure that the audience stay engaged with the narrative and protagonist, and makes the background music and sound of the tap running pivotal in creating tension. This is similar to the psychological thriller, which was released in 2001 and directed by Richard Kelly, Donnie Darko ; the opening of this film uses little dialogue, and as a result the audience stay focused on the main character and engage with the character through his expression and surroundings. Also, the way in which the titles have been designed in the opening - white font over a plain black background - is very common in the thriller genre, and can been seen in the thriller, The Village (M. Night Shyamalan and released in 2004).






This is an image of the woods used in The Blair Witch Project - like our thriller, many of the events take place in a wooded area.


How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our media product represents particular social groups through gender, age, class and in some ways, race. In our piece, we have a male and female as the main focus in our opening – with the male character playing the protagonist role. The fact that the male is the protagonist creates a stereotypical portrayal of the characters; the man plays the dominant, powerful and aggressive role, while the woman plays the victim – the weaker role. What’s more, the age of the two characters is key in our opening; not only do they help show the target audience, but they show the characteristics and nature of the younger generation. Additionally, the fact that the male protagonist is white gives a stereotypical view of the ‘male stalker’; in most thriller films, the male playing the ‘stalker’ is white. Therefore, in our piece, we have represented gender in a stereotypical role and have used race, age, class and gender to underline our characters. As a result of our stereotypical depiction, the audience can relate to the characters, and in many ways the verisimilitude is kept high – through the use of stereotypes. For example, the film Fatal Attraction holds a similar to narrative to our opening; however instead of a male character taking the stalker role, a female takes the role – thus showing that our film possesses qualities similar to that of similar films, but in a different depiction. Furthermore, the stalker based films: Taxi Driver, Cape Fear and Sleeping with the Enemy all use white male characters to play the stalker role. Similarly, Sleeping with the Enemy accentuates the obsessive, abusive and mentality that love can create – similar to the characteristics of the male character in our opening.







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

It is highly unlikely that our piece would be produced by a major Hollywood studio; it doesn’t hold the level of quality to be produced by a studio of that standard, and this wouldn’t appeal to a major Hollywood studio and our piece wouldn’t fit in with the quality. Additionally, while the narrative of our opening does follow the codes and conventions of the thriller genre and would appeal to certain audiences, it is quite cliché and holds a similar plot to many films already released. Thus, it wouldn’t seem appropriate or beneficial to be released in cinema. Nevertheless, it could be released as a TV movie or an internet only release; it would be easier for people to watch and could be used to fortify events going on in the ‘real’ world. For instance, how men are portrayed as the dominant gender and women are portrayed as the weaker gender – so our film could be used as an example. The corporation, Channel 4 would be an effective corporation to release our film; Channel 4 releases many documentaries and short films focusing upon real and current events – e.g. the documentary, Killer in a Small Town. This can be related to the shots of the female character running in the woods, and the P.O.V shots; these shots underline a fearful tone. Therefore, our opening could be used in reference to documentaries, like Killer in a Small Town; the narrative of our opening underlines a calm atmosphere when the protagonist is in his own environment but contrasting the setting and atmosphere of the woods.



Who would be the audience for your media product?

From watching our piece and from research with the BBFC, our thriller is aimed at a 15+ audience. Our narrative centres upon teenage characters, of 16/ 17 years old and we chose not to focus on lots of gore and explicitness, instead making it a psychological thriller - with a 15 certificate. Moreover, as the protagonist is male and the female is the victim, our opening may be more appealing to a male audience. This is reinforced by the style and narrative, which is quite sinister and emotional. Other films that are similar to our thriller opening are Signs and The Blair Witch Project. Both of these films have an age certificate of 15 and have similar reasons for doing so with our thriller. While The Blair Witch Project - directed by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez and released in 1999 - is intent on frightening the audience, the explicit contents within it aren’t very graphic; this is reinforced through the lack of gore. Thus, while The Blair Witch Project does evoke a fearful response from the audience, it does so in a psychological manner – focusing on the emotions of the characters and the setting, rather than through violence and aggression.

How did you attract/address your audience?

Before we began our opening, it was quintessential that we addressed our audience to establish ways in which could attract the target audience. This was done so by creating a questionnaire, the questionnaire enables us to recognise what the audience wanted to see in a thriller film and how we could produce an effective opening. Also, when the final animatic was created, this was used to help us see what the audience wanted and how we could improve this.

When the opening was finished, feedback was essential in allowing us to determine how effective our finished piece was — thus, a Facebook group was made to address the audience. (Facebook group)

As our opening uses teenage characters as the main focus, the audience is mainly a teenage audience. The female character seen in the flashbacks as the victim would appeal to a male audience; it symbolises men as the stronger gender and connotes women as being weak. In addition to this, the male character has more time on screen and is the character in which the audience engage with — through the camera tracking him in his environment, thus this would again mainly appeal to a male audience. The female character has little time on screen; she has quick shots to signify her fear and link in with the narrative, while the protagonist has a variety of shots, such as mid shots, tilt shots and close ups.

The tilt shot was especially effective in allowing the audience to engage with the audience, which can be seen at 59 seconds in the final opening. This shot allows the audience to get a full image of the male character. Similar to this, the mid shot of Jonny at 1.11 of the opening, is used to show the back of him and also his face in the mirror. Furthermore, the audience don’t actually witness the event of which is being implied, however it can be established what has occurred and what the protagonist has done. Thus, the audience see what the protagonist is doing after he has committed his crime, and allow the audience to determine the persona of the male character. This has a significant impact on the audience, as they witness the actions of the protagonist rather than the victim — so there is a sense of guilt and anxiety when watching the male character. What’s more, we used codes and conventions of the thriller genre to attract and address our audience. For instance, our use of setting and location was quite typical of the thriller genre — such as, the woods juxtaposing the setting within the house. This would appeal to thriller fans, as the codes and conventions would fit in with what they want to see in a film.



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

Before creating the opening of our thriller, we had to make an animatic based upon our shot list. This was done so effectively - using Adobe Premier Pro to generate the final animatic. We also used a a variety of sound effects to give more of an impact and create tension to the audience. Such as, the footsteps, the sound of the tap running and the non-diegetic background music. In contrast to our final piece, more diegetic sound was used in the animatic and this was felt to make the piece too loud and draw the audience away from the narrative. What's more, the animatic could have been improved, as we chose to draw the images rather than taking photographs. As people said the narrative became confusing in the animatic, using photographs could have helped the audience establish what was going on and we would have been able to visualize our ideas better. Furthermore, using Adobe Premier Pro for the animatic was good; it allowed us to get to grips with using the software for our final piece.

For our opening, we used a HD camera – this was effective and it didn’t take long to work out how to use the camera. However, while the camera was simple to use, it did manage to hinder the quality of our shots as the camera kept going in and out of focus to create the high definition quality. Also, a HD camera was not used in our continuity task, so there was a lack of experience and we weren’t used to the quality of the camera. This made some of our shots look as if the camera wasn’t being held steady. We didn’t face many problems with the equipment during the filming process, but to produce the best quality of sound for our diegetic sound, instead of using the camera to, we chose to use a sound recorder. This was better, as the sound couldn’t be heard as well and didn’t create the best effect when recorded by the camera. Thus, other than a few minor issues, we didn’t face many problems with the equipment. Moreover, editing software was used to produce our opening – Adobe Premier Pro and Adobe After Effects. At first, it was quite difficult getting to understand how to use the software, but as the software was being used much more, it became easier to use. After Effects was especially effective in the flashback scenes, in which we used this software to generate a ‘shaky’ feel and we also used it to adjust the colour levels and contrast – increasing the colour of red in the setting. This was mainly down to issues we faced with the lighting outside – some parts lighting was too dark, others too light. But, the red colour signified danger and to the audience and linked in to the blood of the victim - accentuating the violent aspects of the narrative.


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

I have learnt many things in the progression to the full product. This is down to the planning stage: research into the genre and finally, creating the animatic. As a group, we chose to focus upon the psychological sub-genre; therefore we researched on the thriller genre and the psychological sub-genre. This enabled us to see the common codes and conventions of these genres and helped us establish the type of shots, mise-en-scene we should use in our opening. Furthermore, creating the animatic enabled us and others to see how our opening would look based upon our initial ideas within the storyboard and whether we needed to improve certain things. Examples of improvements are, particularly of shot types – the close up of the eye of the female character has improved a lot from our animatic, along with the variety of shots of the male character in the bathroom washing his hands. The point of view shots of the flashbacks have also improved a great deal. Additionally, my confidence with the equipment has increased significantly from the preliminary task; I feel a lot more confident with using the camera equipment and the Adobe software. I feel that our end product is quite successful at fulfilling the task; the varieties of shots used were very effective and I especially think our use of sound – non-diegetic and diegetic – created a good impact on the audience. However, by comparing our opening to real thriller openings, such as Signs – directed by M. Night Shyamalan and released in 2002 – it is quite evident that our opening does lack in quality and doesn’t create as much tension. For example, the opening of Signs has little footage – instead focusing on one character in particular and allowing the audience to engage with the character and establish his surroundings. Whereas, our opening has quite a lot of footage, which gives quite a lot away to the audience, such as the overall narrative. Additionally, the non-diegetic sound over the titles in Signs is very effective, as it creates a lot of suspense and tension, before any footage is even seen.

Target audience: feedback and comments

As part of our evaluation, feedback was needed from members of our target audience. It was decided that Facebook was the most effective place to get the responses we needed.

Our group can be found on this link: AS Media Coursework - 'Reflections'

Here is some other feedback received from members of the target audience:

'The first main point that stuck out to me was at the 38th second, where you seen the eye after the shot of the door. The blood effects of the boy washing his hands and how he is dressed and with his hood up etc, are also very effective. I also like the part where the camera is in the fridge, and when you see he gets a glass out and it finishes there, it leaves you on a bit of a cliff hanger.'

'It's very good. The editing is effective and the music works well with all the camera work.'

‘I think overall it was excellent! The music was great, really made the atmosphere, it built up the tension. The running bit with Abbie was great, the second time you see her with the double smear effect was very good, really added to the atmosphere. The bit with Jonny in the bathroom could maybe have been tenser.’

‘As the scene opens I find that the water running is a very effective way to engage the audience, it immediately makes the audience want to watch more. When the camera flashes onto a close up of the eye, it gives you a sense of fright; this lets you know that the opening will be alarming and shocking. As the scene progresses and you get flash backs from the bathroom to a girl running in a forest, it immediately tells you that the two are connected. The dark lighting and music also symbolizes the eeriness of the film.’

From the feedback received from members of the target audience, it can be established that our opening was effective in creating a good impact and engaging the audience, but it is clear that there are some areas we could have improved. Such as, creating more tension and paying more attention to the mise-en-scene; it has been said that clothing of the characters could have been put into more consideration. For example, the protagonist is wearing white when he removes his hoodie, and white symbolises purity and innocence, which contrasts greatly to the character himself. Nevertheless, the majority of the feedback received has been positive towards our opening, and even though there are improvements that could be made, I believe the finished piece had an effective impact and was engaging.

Final

This is the final copy of our opening.

Many changes have been made, thus being:

- The titles have all been moved to the beginning of the opening, giving us more time for more footage.
- The style of the titles have been changed; adding a 'flickering' effect and, also adding a 'watery' effect.
- We increased the shots of Jonny. We showed more of his environment, which allows the audience to engage with the character.
- Jonny is seen again looking into a mirror, so there is more of a link to the title. Also, a photograph of Abbie is seen to show that there is a past between the two characters. There is a low angle shot of Jonny walking down the stairs and a long shot of him walking into the kitchen. Then finished with a close up from inside the fridge of Jonny.

By adding these shots, this allowed the audience to engage with the protagonist more. In our rough cut, the number of shots on both characters were similar, which meant that there was a lack of engagement between the protagonist and the audience. Therefore, this has had a good effect on the audience; it is now clear who the main character is.

The title's being moved to the beginning are quite effective in our opening, as they enabled us to have more shots of Jonny. Furthermore, the effects used on the titles linked in well with the title.

One of the main changes of our opening was the change in music. In comparison to our rough cut and with feedback, the change in music fitted in much better with the narrative and created a suspense/ tense tone.

Feedback from the class:

- Running water v.effective at the start
- Music builds up well, mystery and intriguing
- You can clearly see where title came from - reflections used
- Having no dialogue worked well with the psychological thriller
- Jonny's costume could connote his characters role more
- Camera work is good and steady where required
- Music is good
- Good variety of shots/ music matches action well e.g. looking in mirror
- Excellent titles. Effective without drawing focus away from narrative
- Jonny's costume, in particular wearing white at the end connotes purity/ innocence.
- Great camera angles
- Confusing narrative - going to the fridge
- Great juxtaposition of shots.

Feedback from teacher

Provisional grade from teacher - Grade A

- Demonstrates excellence across all technical aspects
- Dual narrative structure is very effective with controlled choice of shots.
- Match on action is particularly effective with well exectued soundtrack that adds polish to the piece.

- Costume could have been better considered - not entirely convincing for this style of thriller
- Some shots could have been re-shot/held for longer

Filming session

29th April

We completed our final shots for our final piece. What we filmed were new shots for our opening - putting more focus on the antagonist, which was suggested to us by our feedback from our teacher. We decided to focus on the title of our thriller, Reflections, by adding a shot of Jonny looking into the mirror, with an image of Abbie lying against the mirror.

Other shots:

- Low angle of Jonny walking down the stairs
- Jonny walking into the kitchen and panning as he goes to the fridge
- The camera inside the fridge, giving a close up as Jonny looks for something

We chose these shots because they add normality, and juxtapose the narrative and the character himself. He has murdered someone, but is acting as if nothing has happened, which allows the audience to connect with the character and evoke an emotional response.

We worked and communicated well with the filming and we each agree that our new shots are very effective for our opening.

The Sixth Sense, The Village and Lady in the Water

As a class, we analysed the thrillers - The Sixth Sense, The Village and Lady in the Water - all directed by M. Night Shyamalan.

We did this because it would give us an idea of what we need and don't need to include for our final opening. As our deadline is approaching, by analysing these, it could be established the changes that need to be made to the first draft.

From watching the three thrillers, I have been able to understand what needs to be changed and that there are many things in the opening that aren't even needed or haven't been included.

The Sixth Sense, The Village and Lady in the Water are all very different films, but hold the same level of audience engagement and create tension in similar ways.

- Music and sound is before action - building the suspense up, thus giving a gradual impact.
- There are also not that many shots used. This contrasts to our opening, in which we have used quite a lot of shots.
- The pace of music is very effective. For example, the pace of music increases in The Village after the main title.
- There is a focus on one particular character - having the longest amount of time on screen.

Therefore, from analysing these three openings, it's clear that our opening lacks in engaging the audience and doesn't hold an effective amount of suspense. We need to remove certain shots and change our music and its pace.

Evaluation Notes

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

- The narrative is similar to media representation - our portrayal of men; the more dominate + aggressive sex, shown in negative light, through rape and killing
- Portrayal of female character; the weaker sex and the victim.
- Stereotypical depiction of men and women
- Lighting and sound used to create suspense and tension

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

- Male youth - jealousy and obsession
- Female youth - fear and confusion
- Highlights the emotions and actions of younger people

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

- Internet or TV documentary
- Doesn't hold the level of quality to go into the cinema
- Could be used in a TV documentary to underline the behaviour of the younger generation

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

- People of the same age as the characters in our thriller
- 15+ audience; they would understand the storyline and maybe relate to the emotions involved. They would also relate to the process of making the opening - experience
- Male and female audience

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

- Looked closely at the themes linked to our chosen genre - psychological thriller
- Watched and analysed other, professional openings of the same genre
- Questionnaire - asked our target audience what they would like to see

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

- The software used was very useful and very effective
- Differences in quality of cameras - high definition

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

- To be quite blunt - simply get rid of things that aren't necessary
- Changing shots completely or just adjusting them can be very effective
- Use of different shot angles

These are notes to help with the final write up of the evaluation.

Comparison with another blog

It's instantly recognisable that my blog lacks in detail and contents.

Comparing my blog to another student's blog, I am aware of what's needed for a top grade blog. There are many things that I haven't blogged and there is also a lack of anaylsis.

It's evident that what's included in the other students blog is no different to what is included mine. However, there is a lot more analysis; for example, they have explained why they have chosen particular shots. Whereas, I tend to simply list shots, etc. They also use images and videos to present their ideas clearly. This is particularly evident in their chosen props - in which photographs are used and the title font choice. Furthermore, it's quite clear that this blog is updated on a regular basis, thus showing a detailed progress throughout and including a lot of detail.

Therefore, from analysing another blog, I can see the contrast of quality to mine. I need to ensure that my blog is updated regularly and remember to include, not only more detail, but more progress. For example, our choice of font for the title etc.

Sound choice

Our group used the website: freeplaymusic to find our piece of music.

Originally we used Personal Demons as our background music, which was included in our animatic and our first draft. However, our feedback from our final draft has highlighted that the piece of music we are using doesn't fit well with the opening. It's considered to be too fast and doesn't fit well with the mood. Thus, we will need to find another piece of music - as a group we think that a more ambient piece of music would flow better.

Furthermore, at the beginning of our opening, we have the gradual sound of tap running; this fits in with what the antagonist in our thriller is doing and leaves the audience in suspense. But, with feeback from our first draft, like our background music, we have to change the sound of the tap running. We are to make it much more gradual - to fit with the slow zoom of the door and create more suspense.

What's more, another sound we used is the creshendo music. This is felt to be very effective; it is timed well with the flashbacks and generates a 'jumpy' reaction.

Reflections

This is our first draft for our thriller opening - titled 'Reflections'.
We were unsure of what to name our thriller; we decided to changed it from our initial title, Portraits of Obsession. Nevertheless, Reflections was suggested to us by our teacher and it linked well with one of our shots - when the male character looks in the mirror, and looks directly into the camera. This shot is said to have an effective impact on the audience and thus would show a clear connection to the title.




This is the feedback and marks received from the teacher regarding the first draft of our opening:

Mark: 38
Level 3
Grade: C/D

Feedback:

- Camera work is controlled and steady throughout most of the extract
- Framing of shots is mostly well conceived with elements included / excluded as appropriate
- Shot distances are varied throughout the extract
- The material is appropriate to the task set, however it becomes quite repetitive. This results in the later half of the extract losing focus.
- Mise-en-scene has been clearly thought out with effective use of location choice, colour and lighting throughout the extract.
- Editing is competent - there is considerable scope for improvement here which will also improve pace and continuity. Particularly, in the development of the duel narrative.
- Shot transitions are effective but need to be better timed towards the later stages of the extract.
- Both diegetic and non-diegetic sound have been used effectively throughout the extract. However, as the editing falters towards the end of the extract, the match-on-action loses focus making the mood of the extract inconsistent.
- Titles are well made and feel appropriate to the genre, however they could be more evenly paced across the extract.

Targets for improvement:

- You need to include Production Company etc. at the beginning and hold a single frame of black for longer.
- I also recommend introducing the running water sound earlier and even more gradual - raising the volume very slowly - this will develop the mood of your opening more effectively.
- Later you have lost your way - some poor choices of shots have been included.
- Also, some shots need to be held for longer.
- Your titles need to be more evenly spread across the piece.
- Finally, you need to add more focus on to the antagonist as that is whom you are trying to establish.

Improvements we discussed as a group:

- Production Company with a very quiet sound of running water in the background
- Move titles to the beginning
- Remove music - maybe introduce it at the character
- Increase the length of the shot of the eye or move the shot
- Titles after Jonny washes his hands?
- Replace music with an ambiguous music
- Creshendo music at the end
- More focus on Jonny and his environment. More shots - less of Abbie.
- Music is overpowering - make it more subtle
- Slower zoom to the door
- Move the tilt of Jonny before he washes his hands
- Hold the shot of Jonny looking in the mirror (1-2 seconds longer)
- Running shots are ineffective - remove.
- Use different angle of shots for Jonny
- Jonny - show where he's going as he leaves the bathroom. Follow him into a room
- Include a mirror in the room - reflection of Abbie seen - links in with the title
- Shorter flash backs

Darkening Effects

For the final of our thriller opening, we chose to change certain shots by darkening them - giving a darker, red colour. It's felt that by doing this it fits well with the codes and conventions of the thriller genre. What's more, it creates a tense setting; the red reinforces blood, which links to danger and thus creates an impact on the audience. We feel it links well with the setting and the narrative of our opening.



This was used in our final opening and the colour fits very well with the other shots. For example, when the male character is washing the blood off his hands.