Evaluation Activity 7 (Gavin Fernandes)

Evaluation Activity 7

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

Firstly, looking at both our preliminary task and our actual thriller opening you can see that there is a big difference.

Evaluation Activity 6 (Gavin Fernandes)

Evaluation Activity 6

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

Evaluation Activity 5 (Gavin Fernandes)

Evaluation Activity 5

How did you attract/address your audience?

Real movie products usual attract their audiences using public advertisements to catch their attention about their film for instance, trailers, posters, merchandising etc. Hollywood Films tend to have a bigger budget to spend on distribution of the film.

This is a poster that I created for the marketing campaign...

Here I created a poster using the programme Microsoft Word. Firstly I researched posters from real movie products, particularly within the thriller genre. Then I had incorporated these ideas into my own design and took detail from posters within real movie products. If our movie were to be released, then I think that our poster would look something like this.

Our target audience for our Thriller Film 'Closed Doors' is the young demographic, consisting of anyone above the age of 15. We decided upon this as we found from our research that thriller films usually appeal to people aged 16-25 as the suspense and the excitement is something that intrigues them about a thriller film.

I think that posters and visual advertisements are very successful in attracting a specific target audience... 

•  It intrigues them
• Can make them share the movie with other people
• Can make them research more into the film (i.e. visit websites, watch interviews)
• Makes them excited to see the film
• Catches their attention
• Create anticipation for the movie release

Examples of thriller posters...

Posters-

The posters are normally the first form of marketing released, they actually sell the genre and the concept to the audience through their font, colour style and image- having the potential to build a theme around the title. Posters also have the potential to reach a wider audience and are very cost-effective, they can be produced even before the final product has been completed.

Trailers-
Another form of marketing that we could utilise, is the use of three different trailers: the sizzle trailer, the teaser trail and the official trailer (definitions can be found below). This is the most important element of marketing as it sells the film to the audience and creates a certain ambience. It is the first and only exposure of the film content and therefore helps attract the audience as they are given glimpses of what they can expect- building the excitement.

Sizzle Trailer-

A sizzle trailer is when the studio announces that they are releasing a movie. This is used to let people know it isnow being produced which therefore allows people to become excited and it starts the talk of the movie-allowing it to reach more people before it’s release

Teaser Trailer -

A teaser trailer is released to keep the waiting fans excited, showing them some special moments from the trailer and giving them more of teaser of the movie itself.

Official Trailer-

An official trailer is closer to the release date, its to show the larger fan-base what they’re waiting for. It also now generates more publicity as more and more people start watching it and sharing it.

Internet and Social Media-
As we know our demographic is an audience who frequents on the social media scene, we have decided the best way to address them all would be through Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and other social platforms. This form of viral marketing is not only cheap but interactive, therefore it engages the audience and is a method of pull marketing. This also allows our target audience, when we peak their interest, to comment, share and expose our film to a potentially global market.

Conventions of a Thriller

• A villain and a hero
• Thrilling to audience
• Tension and suspense
• Twists and turns
• Cliffhangers
• Red herrings- misleading the audience with information
• Clues pointing to the end

It is extremely difficult to apply all the conventions in just the opening because of the duration is very limited, it would be too much just for the beginning of the film. We didn't want our opening to have clues pointing to the ending just yet as it was too early in the film. Therefore we did not give away too much information as it we didn't want the audience to feel as if they watched the whole film.

Evaluation Activity 4 (Gavin Fernandes)

Evaluation Activity 4

Who would be the audience for your media product?

For our target audience of our thriller opening, as a group we collectively decided that the audience we would be targeting would be at the age of 15-25 year olds who would be mainly males however females too. Therefore we decided to have a film certificate of 15+. The age rating for our film is a 15 meaning that anyone aged 15 and over will be able to watch this film.

We decided that the age certificate should be 15 because from my audience research (questionnaire) that I conducted from my planning for our opening, I found that most peoples favourite sub-genre was action and crime and the majority of participants were aged 16-20. In addition to make our thriller more realistic and intriguing for the audience we for example used blood to convey many thriller conventions we knew that would not be appropriate for a younger audience to see.

Audience research (questionnaire)

In my audience research (questionnaire) I found that many females took my part and therefore we reconstructed from our initial idea of aiming directly for males to targeting both genders to engage in our thriller opening.

I think that it may not be appropriate for an older generation (as you can see in my questionnaire) older people do not tend to go for thriller films. This is probably due to the conventions that are seen in the film such as:

• Disturbing events and situations
• Fast paced actions at times
• Scenes that make the audience 'Jump'
• Loud music that adds tension

Furthermore some reasons why we chose age certificate 15 and not younger:

•  'Jumping' scenes may not be appropriate for young viewers.
• Disturbing events
• Plot line is aimed for an older audience 
• Detail of blood on hammer could disturb younger audience.

Similar Thriller filmFrom these two similar films, some other key thriller conventions we knew we needed to make sure we include within our thriller to attract our audiences is (ELEMENTS TO INCLUDE):

An existing film that is similar to ours is the Purge which in comparison has the same film rating as our Thriller opening (15). The Purge involves suspense (like ours), and unsettling disturbing scenes (like ours). Both films are very likely to draw the same type of audience due to the fact that there are lots of similarities. fff

 

Some key thriller conventions we knew we needed to make sure we included in our thriller opening to attract our audience were:

• A good story (an intriguing plot to endure the audience in to watching the film)
• An action-packed opening chapter (the introduction of a good thriller always sets the pace for the rest of the film)
• Keep the audience questioning to what is happening and what is going to happen
• Attractive, visuals are clear and look intriguing to audience
• Intriguing sound effects (Non-diegetic sound to build up the suspense)
• Keep the audience on the edge of their seats and thinking throughout the opening.

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Examples of our target audience

Here are examples of what my target audience may be like and shows the characteristics they possess and convey.

Audience research profile from ferng027313

Evaluation Activity 3 (Gavin Fernandes)

Evaluation Activity 3

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

This is a prezi i made of me explaining how and who would distribute our thriller film opening. 

How the distributors gain a mass audience:

Evaluation Question 2 (Gavin Fernandes)

Evaluation Activity 2

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Character 1- Protagonist (Janith) First character introduced
ANTAGONIST- 'unknown'

Protagonist is first introduced...
- Gives the audience a sense of what genre the film is.- The introduction of a villain gives suspense.



- Black hoodieconnotations: young, teenager, youth, trouble, danger.





- Camera angle at the point-of-view of the villain. Gives the audience a sense of discomfort as they watch the protagonist from the perspective of the antagonist. 

-Camera angle at the point-of-view of the villain. Gives the audience a sense of discomfort as they watch the protagonist from the perspective of the antagonist.

. Our protagonist was specifically chosen to be a male character. It adds a sense of dominance to the character which is contrasted with the female victim.
A male character conforms to a villain as a general stereotype to men is that they are more powerful and intimidating than a female. This as a result adds a mysterious atmosphere to the overall antagonist.
. The social groups represented in our thriller opening is age. The age of our protagonist is representing the age range of 17-20. We found that using an actor around the age group of 17-20 that it would be easier to relate to younger adults/teens.

Clip from our opening...

Can be compared to...

Evaluation Question 1 (Gavin Fernandes)

Evaluation Activity 1

In what ways do your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products (i.e. of film openings)

Here are 9 still frames for our thriller opening.

From top left to bottom left the frames are:

1) The production logo.

2) The distribution logo.

3) Shot of setting and idea of location.

4) Mid-Shot of protagonist.

5) Protagonist holding weapon with 'blood' stained on the weapon.

6) Names of the victims.

7) Producers credits.

8) Protagonist approaching victim and looking dangerous.

9) The title 'Closed Doors' fades in as protagonist is just about to hit victim.

Here is a video podcast of my analysis of how our thriller opening (Closed Doors) uses, develops or challenges forms and conventions of real media products.

Closed Doors - Thriller Opening.

Shot List (Group Post)

Shot list from ferng027313

Location Final Idea (Gavin Fernandes)

This is our final idea for our location.

Mood Board (Gavin Fernandes)

Mood Board

Mood board from ferng027313

Location Ideas (Gavin&Janith)

Storyboard Still Frame (Zak Green)

Storyboard- Animatic (Gavin&Janith)

Production Logo Research (Zak Green)

For the research of the production logos i simply went onto google images and typed in production logos. Here are a few examples.

The majority of these production logos have a very dark background, which links well with thriller films as the colour black relates to danger and darkness. The black colour also helps build up suspense because the dark colour scares people more than the light. One thing that our logo should have which isn't in any of these logo's is the colour red as it relates with blood and in our thriller opening there is going to be blood in numerous shots.

All of the big Hollywood production company logos have a unique design with a catchy name and bright in order to catch the viewers attention, the majority are quite simple as well. For example the Dream Works logo only has clouds which is very simple but it is something that the audience will remember.

Here are a few examples of independent film production companies.

Comparing these production logos with the more well known logos we can see that there is a clear difference. The independent film companies are mostly black and white with no other colours, this is probably because they had a much lower budget and therefore went  for the cheaper option and went with a plain logo. Being realistic i think that our production logo with have to be similar to these.

Script For Our Thriller Opening

Script from ferng027313

Technical: Three Point Lighting

How can this help us? What have we learnt?

This information also tells us what all the different types of lights are good at

We can this information to see what type of lighting will work with each of the different scenes in the opening. For example for the part when the camera looks at the names of the women on the wall the lighting will need to be very bright so that the audience can actually see the names, this means that we should both the key light and the fill light as they produce the brightest light and it is impossible to use the back light as the names are on the wall and it is impossible to get the light behind it.

Technical: Sound Test

Doing this investigation we found out that the sound quality is much better when we used the microphone. In the clip where we didn't use the microphone the quality of the sound was much worse than the quality of the sound where we used the microphone. 

From this investigation we can tell that when we record our thriller opening we need to make sure that we use the microphone to ensure that the quality of the sound is the best that it can be. 

Technical: Rule Of Thirds (Group Post)

From this we can see that when we record our thriller opening we should do our best to make sure that we try to position things in order to make sure that it follows the rule of thirds. This is important because when the audience is watching it they will feel much more comfortable than they would if we didn't follow the rule of thirds.

Health And Safety (Gavin Fernandes)

Health and Safety

A massive part of filming is the health and safety of all the people involved in making the opening sequence. When we are filming our opening to a Thriller film the surroundings will be dark meaning that everyone involved has to be very careful of the area around and not get hurt in the process. To ensure that nobody gets hurt during filming in the dark we will ensure that the floor is clear of any dangers such as nails or anything that can involve us getting hurt in the dark. The only things we should have in the surroundings are the props that have to be included in the opening. We have to ensure this because so we do not step on anything sharp or trip on any objects laying around. Collectively we will definitely check for any potential risks before filming so it does not affect us whilst filming. We will have everyone look out for any dangerous hazard however I will be the one constantly ensuring and checking for any potential hazards to ensure that we are all safe. In our opening we will be using a knife so the the person using the knife (Janith) will have to be completely safe whilst using the object and ensure that no will will get hurt. Additionally by establishing these risks and factor that could have an affect on our filming we are making sure that we can do our filming in a quick and idealistic way, meaning we have maximum time to film and in the event of an accident we will be prepared and it will not be as much as a shock if an accident did take place.