Thank-you for looking at my blog, I hope it was easy to use and pleasant to read. The other relevant blogs are linked under essential blogs on the left, including our group blog, main class blog and other group members’.
This blog contains all my individual research, planning and production notes from back when I did the preliminary task as well as my evaluation of our final opening sequence. At the top of my blog are the two final films I made, the top one being the opening sequence and the bottom one the preliminary clip.
Our group’s blog contains all the research planning and production information that our group worked on together, and in it the work relevant to my contribution is under the tag; Eva. The other tags I have over the two blogs are planning, production, research and preliminary task. They are pretty self explanatory, so I hope you enjoy our opening sequence Captive and look forward to your assessment.
1) In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
I am going to split this question into four main points; genre, narrative structure, form and style.
Genre
The genre of our film was Thriller/Horror. After some research on the genre, and the success of the last year’s work, we decided that it had sufficient success for us to use it for our final sequence. The trilogy ‘Scream’ has a similar style/genre opening sequence, and to date has grossed over $500 million in the box office so this encouraged us to take inspiration from the first film.
In our sequence, we wanted to create suspense and enigma over who the kidnapper is. A similar use of this idea is in the first Scream film opening sequence. There is a telephone conversation with the killer, but we don't find out who they are until the end of the film. This enigma helps prolong the excitement and suspense, which I found really effective.
These are the conventions we followed:
Key: (caps = convention)
FIGHT SCENE – there is a struggle where the girl is KIDNAPPED but there is ENIGMA involved as it is during a blackout so we are unaware of the appearance of the kidnapper. The GIRL’S LIFE IS THREATENED as the news report she listens to on the radio indicates that the kidnapper is Keith Roberts, a MURDERER that has escaped from jail. The HERO is implied through the appearance of the boyfriend. The title of the film is Captive, so further implies that the girl is being held HOSTAGE or has been CAPTURED for motives the audience is currently unaware of. This could be a REVENGE story, and by reading a synopsis of the film, you can see that it is, with Josh’s father being the cause of the CONFLICT. By the end of the story, the hero also manages to KILL THE ANTAGONIST.
As you can see, our plot follows many of the conventions of a thriller/horror, so we initially thought that we would be able to show in a mainstream cinema because there aren’t many unconventional factors. From our questionnaire results though, we found that 60% of our responses said that it should be shown in an independent cinema and 2% said it could be shown in either a mainstream or indie cinema.* From this data we have revised our initial thought of calling it a mainstream film, and now view it as an independent production.
Our narrative structure follows the conventions of Todorov’s narrative theory. There was a brief equilibrium with Dannie home alone preparing for her weekend which was followed by the disequilibrium of her kidnap. Later on in the film, the restoration of the equilibrium occurs with the rescue of Dannie by her boyfriend, Josh, and the murder of Keith Roberts.
Most films follow this convention in all of the genres available; for example in Star Wars Episode 4 this is shown.
Equilibrium: Luke at home with Uncle and Aunt
Disequilibrium: Luke’s Uncle and Aunt get killed
Restoration of Equilibrium: Luke blows up the Death Star
New Equilibrium: Luke is a rebel hero
This sequence of equilibrium-disequilibrium-restoration of equilibrium follows the same pattern as our film, so we are confident that applying this theory follows the expectations of the audience.
Levi-Srauss:
We also used Strauss’ theory of binary opposition.
Binary opposites we used:
·Lighting= before Dannie gets kidnapped there is strong lighting vs she gets kidnapped in a blackout connoting danger, confusion, mystery
·Good vs Bad
·Antagonist (Kidnapper) vs Protagonist (Josh)
·Teen vs Adult
·Innocence vs Corruption
Propp:
Propp’s character theory was also applicable in our opening sequence.
The 8 character roles: THE VILLAINS -The corrupt businessmen/ The prisoner THE HERO -Josh THE DONOR - The escaped prisoner who unintentionally leaves clues to Dannie's whereabouts THE HELPER -Charlotte THE PRINCESS / VICTIM -Dannie HER FATHER -Dannie's dad THE DISPATCHER -Josh's father, who is the primary cause of the disequilibrium
THE FALSE HERO - We do not have a false hero in our story
The use of Propp’s character roles in our film, following the traditional male hero rescuing female victim is similar to many comic-book action films. The representation of women as inferior or weaker to the men is somewhat developed in our film through Dannie’s inability to save herself without Josh.
In Spiderman, the contrast between the male characters and the female ones are quite prominent. The men have all of the main roles, while the only woman with a strong role is the love interest of Spiderman. This character plot mirrors ours, so again I would have hoped that the audience were able to relate to our opening sequence through its similarities with other films.
(The videos used in this presentation are not made by me, apart from the preliminary task example titled, 'The Transaction'.)
Form
The film we made was an opening sequence, so our aim was to make sure that this was understood by the audience. We achieved this by having the titles appear throughout the sequence, ending on the title of our film; Captive. We tried to use the sequence to introduce the primary characters. The girl, Dannie, was introduced on the phone to her dad, telling him that he could trust her to do the right thing; “you can trust me dad,” while carrying some alcohol. This immediately explained to the audience that she is slightly rebellious, a typical teen making the most of a free house. There are indicators in this conversation that something is going to happen to her when she says “nothing is going to happen”. We tried to use the dramatic irony to suggest that something WOULD happen, and believe that this was successful. Her dad is introduced as being away on a trip of some kind and that he was not going to be back for a few days. The boyfriend is first introduced via the text message conversation between Dannie and him, and the audience finds out that he would be arriving late. The radio report introduces the antagonist, and suggests the location of Dannie; London, and that he is heading her way. All of this information was used to show the isolation of Dannie, making her look more vulnerable. 91% of our audience in the premiere thought that the opening sequence was effective, with only 4 people disagreeing. From this we can deduce that on the whole, the film was effective as an opening sequence.
Style
We tried to follow the typical horror/thriller conventions, so our opening sequence had a similar style to lots of other horror/thriller film openings. We particularly took inspiration from ‘Scream’, and the rather ordinary setting and initial events that occur. We used the tripod for basically all of the shots, and this was to create the effect of normality and equilibrium before the kidnapping. The lighting was hardly changed post-production as we wanted the bright lighting that was already quite effective during Dannie’s time alone in the kitchen. For the blackout though, we faded into a completely black background as we did not have time to redo the blackout scene with illumination of her phone. Our audience response also indicated that this was something that we could have worked on, with 15 the people mentioning it as constructive criticism.
The only uses of a handheld shot were when we could not get the appropriate angle with a tripod –the close up over the shoulder shots were the only times this was a problem though, and there wasn’t any noticeable movement so it didn’t distract from the story.
created using the animated gifs maker at MakeAGif We used a point of view shot for Josh’s reaction, and had the camera loosely on the tripod so we were able to move it around effectively. As a last shot, I thought this was effective as it finished in a panicked situation.
The titles were a simple font so as not to distract from the film and to be enigmatic, not revealing the genre too clearly.
The main title at the end was in a different font, and was creepier, connoting the genre of the film more obviously.
2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?
The two main social groups represented in our opening sequence are age and gender.
Age
In our sequence, the 2 characters seen by the audience are a teenage girl, Dannie, and her boyfriend, Josh. The purpose of this was to indicate to the audience that Dannie is very isolated, and that the only responsible adult she is in contact with is on a work trip. This ambiguity furthers the gap between the ages, with her and her boyfriend in London, and her dad off somewhere unknown.
Dannie is a typical representation of a teenager, she promises her dad that she is going to just stay at home, but in reality the audience can see that she has alcohol and that her boyfriend is coming over. The alcohol and sexual implications via text conform to the classic teenage stereotypes, but not necessarily in a negative way. Hopefully this will be appealing to our primary audience; teenagers.
Teen stereotypes:
·Slackers/ Lazy
·Rule breakers
·Drink alcohol
·Take drugs
·Messy
·Have underage sex/ Promiscuous
·Go to parties/ raves
·Immature
·Unreliable
Gender
The portrayal of gender in films have traditionally been that the male characters are the heroes/ strong leads while the girls are weaker/ need saving. The horror/ thriller genre is particularly stereotypical in this sense, and often follows these conventions.
In our opening sequence, we followed the conventions of horror/ thriller films to an extent, as Dannie is the person that gets kidnapped and her boyfriend later on in the film is the person that goes to rescue her.
Dannie is the main character in our opening sequence, and seems to have the run of her house at that moment. She is presented as a strong lead in the beginning, managing to fool her dad and organise her boyfriend to come over. As the sequence goes on though, she loses her control of the situation; as soon as there is a blackout. Then the male (presumed via the news report) kidnapper has the power in the situation, and kidnaps her. The arrival of her boyfriend, Josh, restores some control over the situation, but linking to age, responsibility and maturity again, he is initially at a loss about what to do.
3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
Before we did our premiere and got our feedback from the audience, I thought that the efforts we had made to conform to the horror/thriller genre meant that we could potentially release our final film into a multiplex/mainstream scenario successfully. After we did the screening though, we found that the majority of people watching thought that it was more suited to an independent/ one off cinema release. From this, our release strategy changed, and would now be focused around film festivals.
We would then have the potential to branch into the horror/thriller genre festivals such as:
The Bram Stoker International Film Festival or the Dead by Dawn Festival (both in UK)
Or we could branch out into a worldwide festival audience and try and screen in such places as:
·Dark Carnival Film Festival (USA)
·A Night of Horror (Australia)
·Brussels International Festival of Fantasy Film (Belgium)
I feel that there is a lot of potential for our film within these circles because it is based around traditional horror/thriller themes, but the plot is slightly varied so there is a fresh part to it that gives it a chance at doing well. Our film is niche though, and due to its setting in London with teenage protagonists, the audience range will have decreased from general horror fans.
Our Production Company is Darkhouse Production, and we have decided that we specialise in the horror genre. Another Production Company that specialise in the horror/thriller genre is Dimension Films. They have produced and distributed many films such as Scream, Halloween, The Mist and Scary Movie.
Their specialism in this genre would be beneficial to our film as they would understand the best way to get the optimum reach for our film. A lot of their films are aimed at teenagers as well, and our feedback indicated that people thought the audience should be rated a 15, so we would be trying to draw in the late teens and young adults.
4. Who would be the audience for your media product?
I had a different idea of what our primary and secondary audience would be before and after the feedback from our screening.
My initial primary audience profile was something similar to this:
A teenage audience – 15+
Male + Female
Worldwide audience
Horror/Thriller fans
Crime fans
And my secondary audience was:
People outside the age restraints, but that are fans of the genre/ content – pre-teens and adults
Couples
After we received the feedback I decided to revise the primary audience profile to this:
15-25 Year olds
Male + female
Niche audience
British citizens/ Londoners
Horror/ thriller fans
Crime fans
Teenage couples
And the secondary audience to:
People outside the age restraints, but that are fans of the genre
Families with teenagers
People interested in British independent films
A character profile: Isaac
He is 17 and lives in London.
He enjoys horror and action films.
He has a girlfriend aged 17 who also likes horror and action films.
He goes to the cinema a couple of times a month and likes to watch DVDs with his girlfriend at home.
He likes to listen to an eclectic mix of music including dubstep and hip hop, and has an iPod touch.
He reads the metro on the way to college.
He studies Politics, Media, English and Mathematics.
He wants to work in journalism.
Isaac would be part of the primary audience for Captive. He could buy the DVD when it is released, or could go with his girlfriend or mates to the cinema. It is a film centred on where he lives, so that may also draw his interest. He likes to keep up to date with the news, and so may want to broaden his film knowledge by seeing this film.
Our primary audience was addressed in a variety of ways.
The protagonist of the opening sequence and hero of the film are both teenagers. This helped draw in the interest of people of similar ages without them having to see the whole film. The two characters visible in the opening sequence are a guy and a girl. The girl’s role within the film, and the suspense at her outcome should appeal to the female audience while the strong male protagonist should draw the male target audience in. The themes of horror, thriller and crime are often associated with men, but the romantic element between Dannie and Josh adds a feminine appeal to the film. The film is set in London, so British citizens, in particular Londoners, will be drawn to a film based around where they live.
Secondary Audience
The genre will appeal to people outside of our primary audience, such as adults that enjoy horror films or a family with older teenagers. The romance and chase, with only a few fight scenes means that those interested in slasher films would not be particularly interested, but those that like an action based thriller would be more inclined to watch.
Premiere
We held a premiere for our film at 1:00 on 30th March in the Latymer Media department. We advertised through posters and via the internet to get the largest amount of people that we could, with a variety in ages.
The premiere was a success with 47 people filling out feedback forms for us.
As you can see by our video, the majority of the audience enjoyed the film and through the questionnaires we can see that we got the majorities interest. By this we can deem that our opening sequence was successful at interesting the primary audience we chose.
6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Pre-production
Our group was slightly different to others because we decided to change our idea completely, with only a couple of weeks before the deadline. This meant that any practice we had using the cameras was all based on our initial idea. However, this was still relevant and we gained more knowledge through this change than we would have done without it. During pre-production, our group decided to try out the contra-zoom because it would have been a really good effect to end on in our initial idea. Our practice footage is below:
From this we learnt that achieving a successful, smooth contra-zoom would take a lot of time and practice, and we therefore decided not to use it.
Production
During production we used some different hardware.
Canon HV40 camera
Shotgun Mic
Tripod
The adjustable settings on each of these technologies meant that we were able to experiment with them, creating different effects.
Post-production
During post-production, the editing stage, we used two different types of software to edit our film and titles.
Livetype
For the titles, we used Livetype. This enabled us to animate and edit our titles easily as it had a range of preset animations and fonts to use.
Our final Title:
Adobe Premiere Pro
We used Adobe Premiere Pro to edit the footage and export the final film. There were multiple settings that Premiere Pro had to offer, including editing sound levels and a fast-forward effect that we used on our feedback screening video. We continuity edited the rough footage and made a rough cut. We had to think about were continuity, and making sure that the sequence flowed smoothly.
Blog
Throughout this brief, I used www.blogger.com. I had never used a blog before, so this experience has meant that I am now much more confident using a blog to display research and progress throughout a project.
7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
Prelim task Brief: To create a continuity sequence involving filming and editing a character opening a door, crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom he/she exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue. This task should demonstrate match on action, shot/reverse shot and the 180 degree rule.
Final task Brief: The titles and opening of a new fiction film, to last a maximum of two minutes.
As you can see, we were given a lot more freedom in our final brief, which allowed us to experiment with different film conventions and expand on our own ideas for an opening sequence for a film.
Learning curve:
There were some differences on how my respective groups went about planning our two short clips. The main differences between our prelim videos and our final ones are that the planning was much more structured for our opening sequence; we used a more advanced storyboard, a longer script, a shooting schedule and we had a longer time frame to work with. Also, throughout the research for the final sequence, I learnt more about different theorists and conventions of film. I have definitely progressed from the beginning of the year because this is the first year I have ever had of being taught Media.
Storyboard
vs
Our final storyboard was much more comprehensive, and there was a lot more planning involved. Also, for our final idea, we changed the entire plot after taking filming and doing a rough edit on our footage. We decided that the plot wouldn’t work with the time and realistic constraints we had to deal with. We decided to keep the horror genre, but decided to follow the conventions more. The storyboard was a quick and easy method of drafting up a new idea and estimating how realistic it would be to shoot. In our prelim task, we were not faced with this issue, and the storyboard was more for experience than necessity.
As you can see, our final script was more dynamic, and we even added more onto it for a greater effect after the blackout part. This meant that as a group, we developed our script writing skills in greater depth than previously to make sure that the final sequence was as realistic as possible.
Shooting schedule
Within the prelim task, the shooting schedule was useful, but contrasted greatly to the necessity of it during our final editing. Without it we would have taken a lot longer capturing our footage on Premiere Pro, and this would have limited the amount of editing time that we had. It was also useful during the shoots as a reference to what we had not yet filmed, so there was less of a chance of needing to reshoot.
Improvements:
There biggest issue that I had with our final footage was the blackout. This corresponds to our audience feedback as well; many people wrote that the blackout was either too long, or that there should have been some form of lighting within it. Ideally, we would have doen this, but an issue involving the availability of our primary actress meant that we were unable to film any more footage so the blackout had to remain pitch black.
I also feel that the sequence could have been more exciting. By trying to follow the conventions and not make the film so complex that we were unable to finish it again, I feel that we did not exploit the full potential of the task. I feel that there was not much more we could have done in the time constraints, but if we were to redo the shoot, I would like to experiment with different ways of making the scene more suspense-filled so that the blackout scene had more of an impact upon the audience and drew them in more readily.
"Earlier today it was reported that Keith Roberts, recently convicted of murdering Sarah Walsh in his north London home, has escaped while being transferred from Coldingley prison in Surrey to Castington in Northumberland. He was last sighted boarding a train heading for London on the 16th of March. If you think you have any information regarding Roberts’ whereabouts call the London crime stoppers hotline on 0800 555….." We decided to use a news report instead of music because it meant that we were able to subliminally add messages into the opening sequence in a short amount of time. Although the audience doesn't know anyway in which the criminal and the girl in our sequence are linked, the enigma caused by his mention suggests that she is in danger.
I've put the news report on my individual blog because I wrote it and recorded it with our voice actor.
This is our final idea. We decided to change our original final idea because our group was finding it hard to stay within the genre conventions, and make the footage seem realistic enough.
The full film synopsis:
The film begins with the sudden kidnap of one of our main characters, Dannie, who was at home alone waiting for her boyfriend, Josh.
Josh's dad recently died in a tragic car accident, meaning that Josh inherited his wealthy fortune. What Josh doesn't know is that the money was won out of a corrupt business deal between his dad's company and a rival firm in Italy. The owners of the rival firm actually murdered Josh's dad, and are hunting Josh down in order to reclaim the money. They help an old business partner out of prison and send him to kidnap Dannie: a trap to lure Josh.
Josh searches for Dannie with the help of Dannie's best friend Charlotte, and they eventually find her after a difficult search. However, after a brutal fight when they try to escape unharmed, Josh is killed. The girls manage to get away unscathed, however the baddies have won back their money.
We feel that writing an opening sequence for this type of film will be more realistically done than our previous idea. I didn't regret that we did that initial footage, because we gain invaluable knowledge about filming outside and experimenting with the manual focus.
The story focuses on a 16 year old schoolgirl, who appears to be innocent and composed. However, she once accidently killed someone after having an argument with them, and after realising that she enjoys murdering people, now kills anyone who annoys her. She hides her psycho killer personality under her innocent school girl appearance. The opening scene to our film is a flash-forward, and ends with the text ‘two years earlier’ on the screen at the end of the sequence. We then go back in time to when the girl first began killing, and as the film goes on she murders more and more people. The film ends when she frames another girl for the murders. She leaves free, ready for her next conquest.
GENRE AND THEMES
The genre of our film is chick-flick horror, which will appeal to a wide audience.
Everyone in our group enjoys chick flicks and horrors. As a genre hybrid, it is very original; however there are similar films that we can draw from.
Our film will be horror based, and will feature almost all conventions of a horror film, verging on parody to audiences familiar with the genre. However, for people who do not know much about horror films, it will seem quite gruesome. We will also include references to other films of the genre, to develop the element of parody further.
Our idea has been accepted by the media teachers, so we will start to plan our storyboard now.
How to create suspense and make an effective opening sequence using Hithcock as an inspiration.
Written text is a prominent narrative device used to pull Hitchcock’s viewers into the story openings through captions on the screen, signs on buildings, and newspaper hea dlines.
Movement of the camera through geographic space is one way that Hitchcock signals to the viewer that a new story is being uncovered.
Probably the most obvious example of a bright opening is in Trouble With Harry (1955), showing beautiful autumn scenery of orange leaves, rolling Vermont hills, and a church. Then an innocent child skips along and stumbles onto a dead body lying on green grass.
a majority of his suspense films opened in the bright daylight accompanied by playful music.
In the early part of Hitchcock’s career he wrote about the need for shifts in tone throughout a film, and that a comic opening is essential to suspense.
If we decided to use the thriller genre, this information would be useful to refer to.
Evaluating the popularity of our chosen genre; Thriller. In preparation for our final idea, we decided to look on some websites to see what genres were the most popular. The thriller/horror genre was definitely a popular choice. The third link describes it as being in the top 6 genres for ROI, with Paranormal Activity drawing in the most profit. From this research, we have decided that this genre will be a suitable one to make an opening sequence on.
