Our Finished opening.

Evaluation Activity 5

Filming Diary

Day 1
We arrive on set, an abandoned house, early and start filming straight away. We have already planned what rooms we are going to use so get straight to it. The first scene at the house is when Lewis pulls up in his car. We film him doing this using a pan but unfortunately the first time a van drives past and gets in the way of our shot. We have to do another take but we get it perfect this time. The next shot, as we are having to use the same natural lighting, is filmed straight away and this is of Lewis stepping out his car. We play around with the camera angle, seeing what it would look like from various parts of the car. We decide behind the door is best and film. Next, the scene is completely black and for this, Isobel had to get in the boot while Lewis drove and Isobel breathed heavy, as if she was kidnapped. We did this to create the correct noise effects. The next scenes are in the house. By chance Robbie discovered a really good angle of Lewis treading on broken glass, which looks really effective. We film the next few scenes in the upstairs rooms. For the CCTV effect, Isobel had to sit in the corner of the room for 5 minutes while the camera filmed. Once we have all our inside shots done we head home.

Day 2
Today we are filming the beginning part of the opening. This is of Lewis driving. We had to get many camera angles to make this look effective. One angle Robbie and Matt stood in the middle of a field while Lewis drove past. Another is Robbie leaning out on the roof while Lewis drives. We thought this would create another interesting angle. After filming each angle a few times we call it a day.

Day 3
We had to re shoot some scenes today as when we came to edit our thriller we found they just didn't work properly. None of them were too hard to re film and in the end it was worth going back to do them properly!

Analysis of a Film Poster

Above is an analysis of the promotional poster for the film 'Insidious'. The film poster and some of the elements used are the inspiration for our promotional poster when we come to later design it. We like the use of the picture within the background of the window and may use this element when later designing our poster.

Influences

Mise en Scene

The term Mise En Scene, or ‘Place in the scene’, is used within theatre and film to describe the visual aspects. This includes props, costume, setting, make-up, non-verbal communication (NVC), performance, lighting and set design. The director uses these to develop the film thus making it seem more believable and to evoke the audience emotion. For example, a director may use ‘horror’ make-up (cuts, bruising) in a horror film, such as The Exorcist, to convey the full horror of the exorcism, than to what would’ve been without make-up.

Within our thriller 'Netherton' we have decided that the location alone is enough to set a grim atmosphere. At first we though upon using a costume on Lewis's character to make the film more realistic but on further thought we would do flash backs of his before life and therefore the doctors costume would be needed for that. We have chosen a more professional attire of a suit trousers and tie combination.

Isobel's character is the 'innocent young girl' and therefore for her costume we have chosen a simple dress and shoes, portraying her innocence and femininity.

Props we are going to use within the film are a crow bar and a rusty saw, which we found on location. These props symbolise violence and brutality.

These visual aspects of the film will help to make our film more realistic and hopefully, more professional.

British Board of Film Classification

The British Board of Classification (BBFC) is an independent body, set up in 1912, to classify films so audiences know what is appropriate for which age and preference. Every film that is released has to be classified by the BBFC in accordance to its guidelines. These guidelines set the barrier as to who may go and see the film and buy the film when it is later released.

We have decided to rate our thriller film as a 15. This is because some scenes contain horror and violence and could disturb a younger audience.

Classification of our film

Using the Board of Film Classification guidelines we have decided to classify our film as a 15. This means that the film contains themes of a sexual nature, horror and violence and may not be viewed by someone under the age of 15 at the cinema.
We have decided on a 15 classification as our film contains horror and violence that may upset a younger audience.

We referred to other films such as "Scream" which are 15 rated BBFC films, in order to decide our rating. We compared the violence and the weapons that the antagonist uses as a way of establishing the suitable viewing age for our thriller.

 The BBFC logo itself is a light shade of red, which we thought detracted from the atmosphere that we tried to portray in the promotional poster that Robbie created. Therefore he added a bloody, dark shade of red, to make the BBFC logo fit the dark mood of the image.

Demographics and Pyschographics

Within marketing, Demographics are the most recent statistical characteristics of a population. They are about the population and the culture of the people within the population. Commonly used demographics are gender, race, age, disabilities, mobility, home ownership, employment status, and class. Marketers use these demographics to provide enough information about the typical member of their target group to create a mental picture, which once constructed, they can use to develop a marketing strategy and marketing plan. Below is the 6 demographic groups, labeled A - E.

A-High management, Bankers, Lawyers, Doctors and Surgeons and other such professionals.

B-Middle management, Teachers, Creative and Media Professional. 

C1-Junior management, Nurses, Receptionists.

C2-Skilled manual workers (e.g plumbers, builders, electricians)

D-Semi-skilled and Unskilled manual workers (e.g shop workers)

E-Unemployed, Students, Pensioners, Casual workers.


Our target group would be group E as we are targeting the thriller at students.


The Pyschographics are the personalities of the individuals and sub categorizes the target audience even more. For our thriller we have decided that our target audience is 'Explorers' and 'Mainstream'. A description of which can be found below.


Explorers- Energy, individualism and experience. Values difference and adventure. Brand choice highlights satisfaction, and instant effect. the first to try new brand. Younger demographic - students


Mainstream- Tend to be domestic, conformist, sentimental- favour value for money family brands. Nearly always the largest group.


We have chosen these as we view our audience to be a normal person but who likes to be scared and put 'on edge'.

Questonnaire

This is our questionnaire that we created asking the audience of both genders, and of all ages what main aspects of a thriller movie they prefered, we will concider these ideas when making our thriller opening.

The power of a title sequence

We are using this title sequence as inspiration for our film in the respects that it sets the location for the film and introduces the production companies, directors and stars of he film.

Year 13 talk - Do's and Don'ts

Within our class we received a talk from the year 13's who had done their thrillers the previous year. Using their learning experience they advised us on the best way to make a thriller. Below is a list of the do's and don't they advised.

• Try and be original with the location. Everyone can find an abandoned house but something original and rarely seen will make examiners, and in the case if the film was real, the audience, pay attention.
• While filming the thriller try not to use dialogue. This is because it can rarely be heard clearly and therefore will need a voice over. Within the first few minutes of a thriller there is usually music playing so this could create the wrong effect.
• When filming scenes, try to get them from every camera angle and do a test run. This is so when you come to editing you have the best choice of clips to edit from.
• Don't over edit the thriller.
• Keep the blog updated and play your part. Make sure you don't let your group down.
• Do keep organized and keep a plan of when your filming and who is doing what.
• Do pay attention to every little detail. This includes the filming, editing and blog work. It is all important.

After receiving this talk we got a better understanding and some knowledge on how best to do our thriller.

Prelim Task

For our preliminary task we were asked to create a short film showing various camera shots, including shot reverse shot, 180 degree rule and match on action to show that our knowledge of using the camera was acceptable to later create the start of a thriller. This preliminary task also gave us an opportunity to explore various techniques, both through editing and the use of the camera.
We started the task by viewing other students preliminaries, which allowed us to see what makes a good prelim and what makes a poor quality one. We then completed a 'mini' mood board so we had both writing and sketches of our ideas.
Our idea was incredibly basic. Isobel walking up the stairs, to then enter a room and receive a small package from Lewis, which she then left upon receiving.
We decided to do a simple prelim as we wanted to concentrate on the camera angles and if we were using them correctly. We also included other shots, such as over the shoulder, which is seen when Isobel is entering the room and Lewis is looking towards her. The 180 degree rule is used when a conversation is happening between Isobel and Lewis, thus not confusing the audience as to who is talking. We used the match on action shot when Isobel was opening the door to ensure our clip flowed smoothly. We did not include the shot reverse shot angle as we used the over the shoulder shot instead, but our knowledge of the shot reverse shot angle is that when two people are talking the camera moves from one to the other to create the sense of a conversation while facing each other. We discovered that when using the equipment, a camera and a tripod, a tripod is a must to ensure the film doesn't look amateurish, therefore hindering the quality. 

Prelim Task Part 2

For our preliminary task we were asked to create a short film showing various camera shots, including shot reverse shot, 180 degree rule and match on action to show that our knowledge of using the camera was acceptable to later create the start of a thriller. This preliminary task also gave us an opportunity to explore various techniques, both through editing and the use of the camera.
We started the task by viewing other students preliminaries, which allowed us to see what makes a good prelim and what makes a poor quality one. We then completed a 'mini' mood board so we had both writing and sketches of our ideas.
Our idea was incredibly basic. Isobel walking up the stairs, to then enter a room and receive a small package from Lewis, which she then left upon receiving.

We decided to do a simple prelim as we wanted to concentrate on the camera angles and if we was using them correctly. We also included other shots, such as over the shoulder, which is seen when Isobel is entering the room and Lewis is looking towards her. The 180 degree rule is used when a conversation is happening between Isobel and Lewis, thus not confusing the audience as to who is talking. We used the match on action shot when Isobel was opening the door to ensure our clip flowed smoothly. We did not include the shot reverse shot angle as we used the over the shoulder shot instead, but our knowledge of the shot reverse shot angle is that when two people are talking the camera moves from one to the other to create the sense of a conversation while facing each other. We discovered that when using the equipment, a camera and a tripod, a tripod is a must to ensure the film doesn't look amateurish, therefore hindering the quality.