Feedback of Smile

Improvements:
More base in the music.
The plot is slightly unclear.

Strengths:
Black and White contrasting.
Good Blood effect.
Good reverse clip of blood effect.
Good titles.
Great sounds and images.
Good sense of confusion.
Music matches shot change.

Evaluation Draft by Darren Crossman

While our thriller does have traditional elemants, it blends them with various new tricks and techniques to make a unique and well made opening piece.

Some of the traditional thriller techniques include blood, shadows, black and white, chase sequences, guns, a protagonist and an antagonist.

New things we have brought are fast cut techniques and well utilised fades, giving a moving, sea sick feel to the sequence, which adds to the feeling of actually being in a chase, and makes the sequence more thrilling.

Our audiance is mainly teenagers to young adults, and we have appealed to that, with no visable violence but some blood effects and hints at a more violent film. The fast pace will attract younger adults and the chase scenes and style will attract many others.

From constructing the thriller, we have learned many techniques such as fast cuts, sound effects, reversable sound, jump cuts, fades and many other techniques. Personally I found this task very useful for future projects.

I feel the progression to this project has been a great one, as we have experimented and in the long run came out more experianced in the genre of the thriller, and also in film making as a whole.

Evaluation (draft) by Ben Harradine

Evaluation (draft) by Ben Harradine

1) In Our thriller sequence we used several different conventions to make our thriller a success
• An opening chase scene,
• A mise-en-scene what is connoted of thrillers for example woodlands
• Darkness.
• Mystery
• Confusion

The idea of these conventions is so that the audience gets an idea of what the genre of the film is they are watching

2) Our thriller project doesn’t really represent any social groups however as Damien mentioned you could argue that they from different social groups because of the way they are dressed differently so they may be from different social groups.

3)-

4)the target range age range we would be targeting is between 15 –25. We would have to rate the project 15 due to the violent scene and the use of the weapon and the sight of the ink in the water may be connoted as being gory blood which cud stress children under 15

5) our target audience would be attracted to our thriller by the spookiness and confusion which would be sent out to the audience such as the title “smile” because it worries the audience and would play with there minds because smile is a big irony

6) During the production of the thriller I have learnt how to use to video camera and how to capture certain images and shots I have also learnt Programmes such as garage band in which I learnt how to add several different instruments and tracks together to make a thrilling theme tune for out sequence and final cut in which I learnt how to place the scenes together and add effects such as fades to make our thriller exciting.


7)-

Evaluation questions (SAM GRAVES)

Media Evaluation Questions(SAM GRAVES)


1. In our media product we have used some common conventions such as in our soundtrack we have made sure it fits the thriller criteria. We have done this by listening to soundtracks for exciting thrillers and trying to use ideas from them in ours, such as the fast paced riffs and drums. We have also used the technique of quick shots and it flashing to a water shot where the tiles can be introduced. We have added tension and mystery into the piece to try and keep the audience on the edge of the seats wanting to know more of the story.
2. I believe our media product doesn’t represent a certain social group, whereas it looks at a victim being chased by a killer.
3. I believe that our thriller opening would probably be distributed by a mainstream production company rather, than a small independent company, as it as more aspects of a mainstream opening.
4. I believe the audience for our media product would be young teenagers. I think this because it’s fast paced and has aspects from mainstream thrillers.
5. –
6. For taking part in the process of making this thriller opening I have learnt a lot about the technological side of film making. I now know how to work the cameras and set it all up on the tripod, upload the shots onto the computers, edit the shots on final cut and compose music for the piece on garage band.
7. -

Evaluation Draft - Damien Theuveny

1: Our thriller sequence uses several conventions that are typically found in thrillers such as:
A typical mise-en-scene found in thrillers (darkness, woodland),
An opening chase scene,
Mystery and confusion,
These conventions are used so the audience gets an idea of what they are watching and hints at what they should expect from the thriller.

2: Our thriller project doesn’t really represent social groups specifically however you could argue that they dress differently and so are from different social groups. However you could also argue the opposite and say that the 2 characters are in fact from similar social groups as they happen to be at the same location. The stalker could just be dressed to hide better or so he isn’t seen as easily.

3: I think our media product would be distributed by ....

4: Our target audience would probably include teenagers and young adults, perhaps 15 – 25. The media product would be rated a 15 because of the violent nature of the product. Although our sequence doesn’t include a lot of violence, the blood sinking into the water could imply the violence that is to come. The product targets both genders although I would expect an imbalance.

5:Our thriller sequence would attract the target audience by setting questions and confusion in the mind of the audience; Questions such as “Whose blood is that?” or “Why is he chasing him” and obviously “What happens next”.

6:I have learnt to use software such as final cut and garageband . I have also learnt that a lot of camera work and filming has to be done to fill up a minute of a sequence.

In Final cut I learnt to modify the speed and duration of clips to suit the theme and sound track better. Although I had done this before it was interesting to put/modify the footage to a sound track that we made ourselves. I used flashing effects and colour balance to change the look of the clips themselves so they fit the thriller genre better.

Garageband was a program I hadn’t used a lot before. I found my induction to garageband very useful when creating the thriller sequence. Importing the rough footage allowed us to see just how long or short our sections where (Chase scene, Blood and Titles) This made the editing stage a lot simpler and faster as I didn’t have to worry about going back into garageband to re-edit the sound.


7:Overall I felt all the work in the thriller was generally higher quality then the work done in the induction. In the planning we managed to do a more detailed storyboard and we fully anoted, labled and described each frame. We had a better detailed shot list and we had a backup location planned incase the woodland disapointed us or did not meet our requirements.

The Filming itself wasn't shakey as we planned and decided to film in open spaces so we can use the tripod effectivly.
The acting wasn't as poor as it was in our induction task; however it could have been a lot better and we were surprised some of the clips we took were actually usable. This was also helped by the extra effort we made in the editing stages.

T1-29 THRILLER ROUGHCUT

Shooting location

We will be shooting in a couple of locations. We will also film in a back up location in case our forest shoot isn't very effective.

• A Forest or some woods
• A bedroom
• A backup location

We will be shooting on Wednesday at 17.00.

Animatic Feedback

We had a lot of mixed feedback from our animatic sequence.

• Good Shot range
• Felt very actiony
• Good use of close ups
• Hard to understand what was happening
• Music does not fit very well

We plan to try some different music and the music will be changed to fit with our sequence.

THRILLER ANIMATIC

Images

Ink in Water.

Ink in Water


We plan to use this sort of imagery for our title frames.

Shot List

Shot1 * Medium shot of John sleeping in his bed.
Shot2 * Close up of John waking up from a nightmare. (Shocked expression)
Shot3 * Extreme long shot of John in the woods.
Shot4 * Medium shot of John starting to run from Smiler.
Shot5 * Over-shoulder shot of Smiler in the trees.
Shot6 * Low angle shot looking up at John and Smiler dropping out of a tree.
Shot7 * Extreme low angle shot of Smiler dropping out of a tree.
Shot8 * Medium shot of John running with Smiler in the background.
Shot9 * Over-shoulder shot of the forest from Johns point of view.
Shot10 * Reaction shot of John panting and exhausted from the chase.
Shot11 * Extreme close up of Johns eye.
Shot12 * Long shot/medium shot of John from behind.
Shot13 * Medium shot of Johns reaction to his phone ringing.
Shot14 * Close up of John reaching for the phone.
Shot15 * Extreme close up of the phone. (Text says "Smile")
Shot16 * Over-shoulder shot of John reading his text message.
Shot17 * Reaction shot of John. Smiler can be seen over John's shoulder.
Shot18 * Medium shot of Smiler pulling his gun out.
Shot19 * Close up gun being loaded.
Shot20 * Medium shot of John turning around.
Shot21 * Extreme close up of Smiler pulling the trigger.
Shot22 * Long shot of the gun being fired .
Shot23 * Medium shot of John sleeping in his bed.
Shot24 * Close up of John waking up. (Shocked expression)

Costumes

Balaclava * Smiler
Lumberjack coat * Smiler
Boots * Smiler
T-shirt * John
Jumper * John
Jeans * John

Prop List

Gun * End of chase scene.
Mask * Killer
Mobile phone *

Thriller Ideas

Thriller conventions:
Blood
Black & white
Darkness
Masks / Mistaken identity
Guns
Chase
Nightmares
Mystery
Confusion

Thriller Names:
Smile

Production:
Keyhole Productions

Analysis of Surface opening sequence

Surface Opening sequence. (student sequence)

I had a look at a couple of the student openning sequences and decided to analyise this one because it caught my attention. I thought the title sequence was affective from the start and looked proffesional. The transition from the titles to the footage was impressive and sound effects were well placed and very effective at points of transition. I also find that similarly to Se7en the sequence uses mainly close up shots or extrem close up shots; and similarly the same effect is reached. The angles reduce the viewers understanding of what is happening in the shots.

I found that the end of the sequence was highly effective mainly because of the sound effect and scream go really well with the title in the last couple of shots.

Credits List

A .......... Production presents
A .......... Film
(Cast1)..........
(Cast2)..........
(Cast3)..........
Costume Design by ..........
Art Direction by ..........
Production Design by ..........
Casting by ..........
Film Editing by ..........
Cinematography by ..........
Original Music by ..........
Produced by ..........
Directed by ..........
(Main Title)..........

T1-29 CONTINUITY EXERCISE 2008

Analysis of Se7en openning sequence

Se7en Opening sequence.

The opening sequence uses a lot of transitions and close up shots. The close up shots reduce the viewers sense of what is happening or rather who and where something is happening. The audio that goes with the sequence heightens the effect as the scratchy sounds as well as the flashing transitions which confuse the viewer. We believe this makes the sequence highly effective and it doesn't give too much away about the story.

The grainy film and frightening images linger in the mind, and make the viewer definitely want more. The title of the film is slightly mysterious, and the use of the number inside the lettering is interesting, yet we thought it was slightly cliché nowadays.

The thriller conventions used in Se7en are: Darkness, blood, miss-information, mystery, strange music, Strobes, scratchy sounds, distortion of text, quick camera changes and needles.