Opening Sceneration- Miss Miller

When filming our opening scene, we made many changes from our original narrative. My group and I had developed on some more ideas that we could include within our scene and therefore, thought it would be a good idea to include them. We added them to our opening scene as we believed it would create a suspense building feel and appeal to our audience more. 

The first frame in our opening scene we are shown a long shot of the house, with it zooming in also. We thought that the long shot and the use of the zooming in would be effective for the audience, emphasising the house and ultimately making them focus on it. The sound here is diagetic sound in which is a soundtrack in which we believe creates an eerie feel making the audience feel uncomfortable and leading them to wonder what may be happening within the house. 

Going on to the next frame, we used a dissolve effect. This effect allows for a smooth transition between the frames making it more professional and easy for the audience to understand. The next frame shows a mysterious figure walking towards the house. The camera is from the point of view of the house. With the previous frame playing on the audiences mind, wondering why the house is so important, the man walking towards the house makes the audience feel on edge with what may happen. It makes the audience question what is in the house and why the man is walking towards it. The sound again is the soundtrack in which is heard in the previous frame. The eerie feel is being carried on allowing for a fearful atmosphere to build. The transition into the next shot is again a dissolve. 

The next shot shows a man sitting on a garden chair, smoking. The cinematography used here is a handheld, point of view (POV) shot. The use of the POV shot makes the audience want to know whose point of view it is of. With what has already been shown to the audience, they are likely to believe it is the mysterious man. As the shot is from a Point Of View, this automatically builds the tension within the frame as it makes the audience want to find out more. We added this shot here in order to make the audience scared on the mans behalf, then, allowing for the audience to build a relationship with the character already. 

The next frame then goes into the house in where the man was walking towards. This frame shows a girl cooking. She is in her pyjamas and looks like she is home alone. We dressed this character in pyjamas as it portrays vulnerability and innocence. The sound is still the soundtrack with occaisonal on screen sound of the pots and pans moving. This sound makes the frame more realistic and gives a sense of reality. This frame ultimately introduces the victim. 

The editing going into the next frame is quick. We used quick editing in order to pick up the pace of the scene. As the action and drama starts to begin, quick editing sets the scene of the fast pace of what is going to happen next. The frame shows the floor then suddenly a light switches off. The off screen sound of the light switching off again gives a sense of reality, yet, makes the audience suspicious to who turned it off and why it switched off.

The next frame is highly typical of the thriller genre. The camera shot is again a point of view, looking down at the knife which is scraping across the kitchen surface. There are many typical elements of the thriller genre used within this frame. The iconography in which we decided to use, a knife, allows for the audience to believe that something bad is going to happen to the victim. The diagetic sound of the knife scraping across the surface makes the audience feel uncomfortable as they know that ultimately something bad will happen with the knife making the frame more eerie. This frame allows for the tension and suspense to build. 

When the girl hears the knife, she looks up towards the camera. Looking into the camera lens is effective as the previous shot is a POV, this makes it seem she is looking into the killers eyes. She then screams and begins to run out of the house. As the camera follows her, this again makes it seem as if the killer is following her out of the house and chasing her. This makes the audience feel scared for her, again, building the relationship with the characters. The editing here is quick with the frame changing quickly, because of this quick editing the pace of the scene is quickened allowing for the action and drama to build. 

The next frame is a long shot of the girl running onto the street, away from her house. The use of the long shot here allows for us to see her surroundings. There is no body around and is dark, this shows her vulnerablity to the audience, showing she has no where to go. A few seconds into the frame we are able to see the mysterious man following her. This makes the audience sit on edge as she is being followed by him and we are aware he is armed with a knife, making the audience know something bad is potentionally going to happen. 

The dissolve into the next frame shows a point of view shot of the girl running away from the man, yet, we can still see him behind her. The close up POV shot, makes it clear of the emotion on her face, which is portraying fear and panic. We are able to know how the girl is feeling through her facial expressions and we are therefore able to sympathsise with her. The sound being used is the eerie soundtrack again. The repition of this soundtrack plays on the audiences minds, making them feel uncomfortable and on edge. This frame only lasts for 5 seconds then we are introduced into a new frame. 

This next frame is a high angled shot of the girl. She is sitting on the floor curled up into a ball. The high angled shot and her body language portrays to the audience her vulnerability. The body language in which the girl is doing makes the audience understand they way that she is feeling, she is scared of what is going to happen and is scared of the man. The scene then takes a dramatic twist, the man hands her the knife. We added this twist into the scene as we believe it would make the audience question even more what is going to happen and why the man is handing her the knife. This twist, we believed, was unexpected which is why we thought it would be effective. The high angled POV shot, with the man handing her the knife makes her seem smaller than she is, portraying her innocence. When she is holding the knife, her facial expressions still portray to us that she is scared of what is going to happen,

The next frame is again unexpcted. The long shot of the two characters holding hands walking back to the house allows for the audience to then believe that the girl isnt the victim anymore. Yet, with knowledge from the previous frames, the audience know believe that the man in the garden may be. This frame we are able to see the knife being held by the girl, making it seem as if she isn't vulnerable anymore but more evil.

As the two characters are walking into the distance, the frame then cuts into the garden in where the character George is. We are seen a close up of his face in which has blood over it. We used the close up here in order to see the damage that has been done to him, enabling the audience to feel sorry for him. This close up shot of the male is conventional of the thriller genre as it adds dramatic effect, we are able to see that he is dead and this creates tension for the audience. 

The frame then zooms out from his his face, leading down to his feet then fading away into darkness. The zooming away creates an emotional detatchment from this character. The zooming out connotes that the character is not important and therefore we are able to know that he creates no importance to the scene. Another reason in why we added the zooming out was to portray the scene coming to an end. This frame includes a handheld shot, this handheld shot creates a sense of chaos portrayed through the jerky movements of the camera.  

Overall, the use of cinematography and editing within our opening sequence creates an eerie atmosphere and creates the tension and suspense in which we wanted to create. We used handheld and POV shots throughout the clip in order to heighten the thriller effect.

Evaluation- Miss Georgiou

Question 1:

When planning for our opening scene we looked into the conventions of the thriller genre. We did this in order to know what to include in our thriller, to make sure that we could produce a clip that was a successful as it could be. By looking at the conventions of the thriller genre, it gave us a wide look into what we could include in our clip and what would work well within our narrative.

One of the main ad generic conventions in which ran through most of the thriller films in which I had analysed was the use of the female victim. This was noticed in paranormal activity, drag me to hell, physco and the human centipede. These were all very successful in their portrayal of the female victim. They all related to their intended audience and because of this, it increased the fear and tension within the film making the audience feel vulnerable. Another generic convention of this genre is low key lighting. Within every thriller film that i watched there was use of low key lighting whether is was for a scene or throughout. Films such as incidious, sinister and saw included low key lighting. These films were all extremely tension building and fearful as the low key lighting makes the atmosphere tense and eerie. The last generic convention within the thriller genre is iconography. Iconography allows for the audience have more of an understanding of what is happening and what may potentionally happen. Iconography is used within every thriller film in order to engage the audience and make them fearful to what is to come. I noticed iconography in The Shining, Human Centipede, Sinister and Saw. Each of these films have different iconography within them but, yet, all portray fear and suspense.

Within our thriller clip we followed the generic conventions and applied them within our opening sequence. The main character within our clip was a teenage girl in whom is home alone at night time. We thought carefully about how we wanted the girl to look and what she would wear. We dressed her in pyjamas in order to make her look extremely vulnerable and an easy target, however, this is already portrayed as the stereotypical view on a teenage girl is vulnerable and oblivious to what is around her. This view on the teenage girl is proved correct within our thriller as she is unware someone is watching her until all the lights cut off. We used a teenage girl as we believe it would create tension and mystery. The next convention in which was used was low key lighting. We set our opening in a night setting in order to create a mysterious and tension building atmosphere. In order to follow this convention we had to film late at night, we wanted to create the eeriest atmosphere in which we believe we created. The last convention was iconography. The iconography that we used was the use of a knife. To present the knife we scraped it along the kitchen work top which made a disturbing sound. We used the knife as we believed it was the weapon most conventional to a thriller. Using this, we were able to create a fearful atmosphere and make the audience feel on edge as to what may happen, making them feel scared on the girls behalf.

My group and I believe that our opening sequence defines the thriller genre. We have created a clip in which collides with the codes and conventions of a thriller. The elements in which we used within our clip make it clear that this is a thriller clip. First of all, the low key lighting that is used gives the audience an indication that there is something suspicious going on, creating a mysterious feel. Within the clip there is use of handheld shots and close ups. These shots and angles give us a clear view of the victims emotions and panic. By adding these to our thriller clip, we are making the audience aware of the emotion and what the girl is feeling. This is definitive of the thriller genre as the emotions in which the girl is feeling then reflects on the audience making us feel sorry for her. There is also very limited dialogue within our opening. Again, this defines the thriller genre as the use of no dialogue makes the clip fast pace in which is used within many thriller films.

When looking at our thriller clip, it can compare to many thriller films. The first in which i noticed was The Shining. Within the shining there is use of iconography, low key lighting and a chase scene all in which are included in our opening. The iconogrpahy used is different from our clip to the clip from The Shining yet it still portrays the same effect which is fear. The chase scene from this clip is fast pace with many different camera angles in which is reflective of our opening scene. The clip uses long shots and handheld movements, in which our clip uses also. With use of the long shots we are able to have a view of the victims surroundings enabling the audience to know what the victim could ultimately do.

Question 2:

Within our film we had 3 characters throughout. The first character and whom is only seen twice throughout the whole clip is the Boyfriend of the main character, his name is George. The main character in our clip is the innocent girl who is home alone and is unaware of what is going to happen. Her name is Heather. The final character in the clip is the killer in whom kills Heathers boyfriend.

Each character within our opening sequence is represented differently and uniquely. The main character Heather, is portrayed to be an innocent girl. This is inferred through her clothing and actions. She is wearing pyjamas in the scene in order to present that she is unaware of her surroundings and making it seem like she extremely vulnerable. She is again presented to be innocent by what she is doing, when we are introduced to her she is cooking. From her actions, it seems that she is independent and responsable, this reflects her age in which is 17. We included this character in our opening scene as we believe it is conventional to the thriller genre and would increase the fear. Another reason in why we included her is to appeal to the targeted audience, with her being 17 and the intended audience being 15/16, they are almost the same age, therefore making the whole clip more realistic and dramatic. 

The next character is the killer, although being played by a girl, we dressed the girl up in boy clothes in order to present the killer as a boy. As we are never able to see the killers face, he is represented to be a mysterious and somewhat scary character. Not being able to see his face adds to the scariness and suspicious feel of the scene. We included the killer into the scene as we wanted the audience to feel scared. Adding such a dramatic character to the scene builds to the effect of a dramatic twist. 

The last character is the murdered victim. As we are not shown this character often and he has no dialogue, we are unable to know what is purpose is. Although, by showing him murdered, we are led to believe that he must of done something wrong or upsetting in order for this to happen. We included him within the scene to portray fear. When we see him dead the audience are led to believe that something else is going to happen to the girl. 

Within our scene, gender is represented is a stereotypical way. The female within the scene is portrayed to be oblivious to what is happening around her. This is stereotypical within the thriller genre as females are always seen to be more vulnerable than men. However, the killer is very stereotypical because of his gender. Within the thriller genre, the killer is always seen to be a male in which is reflected in our scene. He is wearing a large jumper and baggy tracksuit bottoms in which is very stereotypical of the gender. 

Each character will appeal to the audience as they are all teenagers and the target audience is teenagers also, with the rating being a 15. The teenagers themselves watching the sequence would be able to engage with the characters more as its seen to be realistic and gives the sequence a sense of reality as it could potentially happen to them.

Question 3:

Question 4:

When planning our thriller we had to think about our target audience. A target audience is important to consider when making any film as you are able to know what things you can and cant put in your film. Without thinking of our target audience before we started to film, we are not able to plan and film our thriller as we could of included things in which may not be aloud to be shown for a certain age. The target audience gives us an outline and idea of how much gore and offensive language in which we could put into our thriller. The target audience of our thriller is teenagers with the rating being a 15. We decided to make our thriller a rating of 15 as we believe that because of the characters within our clip, the audience would be able to relate to them. The audience would feel as if it has a sense of reality and could therefore happen to them. Also, when looking into target audiences, we believed that rating it as a 15 would be the most appropriate thing to do as we could include as much gore and explicit scenes as we thought would be necessary. 

When discussing our thriller film, we believe that it appeals to our intended audience. The narrative of our thriller is engaging to the audience, it makes the audience want to know what is going to happen next. For instance, when the killer hands over the knife to the girl it makes the audience want to know what the outcome will be. Also, the age of the characters appeals to the audience as they are roughly the same age. The soundtrack in which we used in our clip is extremely eerie and suspicious, because of the repition of the sound, the audience are led to think that something is going to jump out at anytime. This is appealing the audience as it increases the fear. Another way in which our thriller appeals to the audience is through the use of the camera shots. We have a variety of camera shots within our scene, because of the variety, we are giving the audience the complete view of what is going on. For example, when a long shot is used, we are giving the audience the view of her surroundings and what is around her, letting the audience know what is going on around her. Another example is the usage of close up, we are able to show the full emotion of her by her facial expressions. This appeals to the audience as they feel as if they are aware fully of whats going on, making them seem involved within the scene. The mise-en-scene elements within our clip are also appealing to the audience as it engages them even more. The use of lighting is extremely noticable within our scene, the low key lighting, being part of mise-en-scene, is making the audience sit on edge as the lighting portrays an eerie and suspicious feel. This is appealing to our audience as the fear factor is increased in which they want to see. 

Question 5:

When my group and I were planning our opening sequence, we collected primary research in order to give us a wide view of what the thriller genre expects. Collecting primary research was essential to our production as it gave us a wide view of what we should include within our thriller sequence in order to create a successful opening. When researching we did a variety of things, analysed thriller films, looked into film certificates, researched into the narrative theory and carried out questionnaires.

When we analysed thriller films, this helped us gather inspirations and ideas in which we could include in our opening sequence. When we looked at the thriller films in depth, this gave our group a good understanding of what is expected to be included within a thriller film. Because of this research, we gathered lots of information and tips on what to be included and when it came to filming, we included these into our clip.
The next bit of research that we did was looking into age certificates. This helped our group when planning to film as we knew what we could include within our clip and what we couldn't include. Also researching this abled us to decide what age certificate we should put our clip into. We decided together that it should be a 15 as this certificate allowed us to include the things in which we wanted without it being unsuitable for the certain age. 
During the planning process for our thriller, we carried out questionnaires in which we gave to 40 people. The questionnaires allowed us to ask questions to the audience, asking them what they would like to see in a thriller and what would make it successful, as well as more questions. The questionnaire enabled us to have a wide view on what the audience wanted to see and from their feedback, we were able to include specific details into our thriller in order to make it successful and scary for the intended audience.
The research in which we carried out before starting to plan our thriller was extremely helpful as it assisted us with our planning. The thriller films that we analysed helped with our planning as it gave us ideas in which we could put into our own clips. The thriller films that we watched gave us inspiration with what to do within our thriller, therefore, making the planning process easier to do. The research into age certificates also helped with our planning as we were able to sucessfully identify what age to rate our thriller and making the frames suitable for the viewers. Again, the questionnaire results helped us extremely well as we were able to find out what we should include in our thriller to make it successful as it could be. 

Question 6:
When researching, planning, filming and editing our thrillers, we used a variety of technology in which was neccessary to use in order to get the tasks complete. Some of the technology that we used was Blogger.com on the computer, another website for downloading the sounds in which we wanted to include in our thriller, we also used the camera and the tripod in order to film, we then used an editing software called Final Cut Pro X in which we were able to edit our thriller on.
Before we began filming we were able to have the chance to use the camera and tripod. We found this useful as the group had a good understanding of how the camera and the tripod worked. In order to learn how they worked, we set up a scene within the school grounds and filmed a conversation of two people. By doing this, we were then able to know how the tripod manouvered and how to use the camera succsessfully. We also learnt how to place the camera on the tripod.
When it came to filming our trhriller, we planned to use a variety of different camera shots in order to make it more interesting for the audience. However, there were some shots in which the group and I found difficult to film. The hardest one to film was the high angled shots. This was because the tripod did not extend high enough in order for it to be a high angled shot. However, we overcame this by making a member of the group stand on a chair and point the camera down, making sure that they were holding it steadily keeping the scene fluent.
The editing software that we used was named Final Cut Pro X, this software allowed us to edit our clips and put them together to make the scene run smoothly. The software had many devices in which abled us to make our clips look like a thriller. For example, it allowed us to dim the lighting in the clips, enhancing the effect of the low key lighting. Another thing it was able to do was add credits into the scene, adding these were a good touch to the thriller genre as the font in which we decided to use was extremely eerie and typical of what the font should look like in the thriller genre. Another element in which we was able to do was the transitions between shots. Instead of going straight from one clip to another, by adding effects in between each transition made the clip flow better and made it look more professional.
When editing I learnt many new things in which I had never done before. A thing in which I had learnt was how to crop moving images. One of the clips from our scene had something noticable in which we didnt want to show, the only way to get rid of it was by croping it. I searched on the software and found where it said crop and I then cropped it. I had never been told how to do this and i taught myself how to do it. However, during the editing process I noticed that I had some weaknessess. Importing the clips from the camera was one of my weaknessess, once the clips were imported onto the computer, it took me a long time to find them and so successfully upload them to Final Cut Pro X which was a disadvantage because it then look a longer time to edit. My strengths, however, when filming were adding effects to the clips. In order to create a thrilling feel, we believed that we had to add some effect to the film for this to happen. When looking through the different effects, I believe that the one i chose was the most suitable one, making this one of my strengths.
One area of the thriller film in which refelcts my editing skills was the credits. My group and I decided that i would be in charge of placing the credits in the film. The credits in which i chose, i believe, were the most successful credits that I could of chose in order to create a thrilling effect to the audience.

Question 7:

Rough Cut- Miss Miller

Whilst editing our opening scene our group created a rough cut of our final piece. A rough cut is important to consider when making a media product as it gives you a chance to share your work with others to gain constructive criticism from them and then to help make it better. The rough cut should be similar to the final piece so the audience can give their feedback and opnions in a fair way. If our group had not of made a rough cut and sent our final piece of without any feedback, then the clip may of not shown its full potential as 

there could of been many improvements to be made.

Audience feedback is extremely important to consider as it gives you a chance to get an honest opinion on our opening sequence. As well as the feedback being honest, it is also un-baised as it is coming from someone outside of our group in whom has never seen before. The audience can give you productive critisicm to help us improve on elements that may not be working well. Audience feedback allows us to understand what the audience exactly want to see, allowing for us to improve it and make it suitable for the audience.

When showing our rough cut, we did it through the use of a presentation. My group and I created a presentation, we showed this in our class. This allowed them to get a better understanding of our clip, so they would then be able to give us some more constructive feedback. The presentation included:

- What our group narrative was

- How we decided on the narrative 

- What our final narrative is

- Our individual narratives

- What we wanted to create, adding how we think we did

- How conventional it was to the thriller genre

We then presented this to the class along with showing them our rough cut of our thriller sequence. When receiving feedback, we were told that we had many strengths and weaknesses. Our strengths included:

- Conventional to the thriller genre- low key lighting

- Good variety of shots used- high angles, low angles and handheld etc.

- Shot distances- Close ups, long shots, extreme close ups

- Good use of sound- builds up tension and suspsense.

- Good suspense building- again conventional to the genre

- Use of characters- relating to the audience.

Although we had a lot of strenghts, we did have some weakenesses:

- Not enough credits used

- Same colour of credits throughout- needs to change more/ more variety

- Music the same throughout- Needs to have more changes to build tension.

Because of the feedback that we had recieven and there noticably some weaknesses to our thriller, we then started to think about how we could improve these weaknesses and therefore had to make some changes. An element that we decided to change was the music, we changed it when the scene got more dramatic. For instance, when the girl is running away from the killer, we made the music more sinister and faster to emphasise the situation. We made sure the credits were suitable for the thriller genre and therefore made them more eerie. 

The feedback ultimately will help our group and I with finalising our thriller opening sequence as it has given us an idea of how to improve our clip. We now have an understanding of how the audience will react to our thriller when it has been completed. By changing and adjusting certain elements, we can make our thriller sequence the most effective it can be.