Thriller re-editing

For the first half of the lesson, we watched our peers' opening sequences and gave constructive comments to help them improve. We had to think individually what we thought their plot was and then two points of feedback, one positive comment and one improvement.
Our feedback points were:

•Unusual approach
•Good camera work
•Good music choices - tension built at points
•Out of focus shot at the end - good ending
•Music - at points makes it sound like Television Drama
•Refilm some shots in wide screen
•Length of shots need to be edited and cut down
•"Tom" and "Sophie" romantic section, looks too "happy" and focused around them
•Cuts more from "stalkers" point of view so that it build up tension

The second half of this lesson we spent re-editing and discussing refilming. We decided that we should not film anymore of Andrew and should only refilm the photo pan. Andrew then spent some time downloading thematic music to use in our film. From a choice of five pieces of music, I thought the most suitable was a track called 'Secrets told' as it was very eiree. I also made more cuts between the stalker camera and the over the shoulder camera. To make a further distinction between the stalker camera and the over the shoulder camera, I increased the volume level of the interference in the stalker camera shots.

Out of Focus Draft

Thriller Editing 2

Today we continued with editing together our opening sequence. Today we managed to finish the outline of our editing by cutting all our shots and music to the right length and putting it in the correct order. This meant we could get started on the time consuming effects of brightness, saturation and transitions and titles. I added in the 'dip to black' transition inbetween other footage and the photo pan and the 'cross dissolve' transition between the photo pan and other footage. We had a discussion whether our opening sequence should be a mixture of greyscale and colour, just greyscale or just colour. We finally decided that the whole opening sequence should be in greyscale. This will hopefully give the impression of a sinister detective genre format. The greyscale footage gives the opening sequence an unusual and unpredictable tone and hopefully will conform to thriller conventions. Next lesson we need to finish the editing process by adding titles and making small changes.

Thriller Editing

Today, in lesson we captured the videos which we shot earlier and then started the editing process. Firstly we looked at all of the clips which we had taken throughout filming process. Whilst watching the clips we all had a discussion about which bits of that can be used and which bits we can be cut down slightly. We had made sure during filming process that we filmed more than we needed so that in the editing process, we had enough footage, rather than having to go out and reshoot scenes. We also decided that the full opening or most of it should be shown in greyscale as the tone of film contrasted with the colours in it. If it was not in greyscale, we wanted to use faded colours. We decided that the hand held camera shots for the multiple photo pan worked better than the tripod panning shots. This was because the handheld shots were very fluid and accurate while the tripod shots appeared rigid and inconsistent. We edited the clips of Andrew walking together to make the walking appear continuous. We used a cross disolve into the sequence and a fade out of it. We then placed in between two different edits of the multiple photo pan sequence. We experimented with the saturation and brightness levels because we initially wanted this part to be in very faded colours. However, we could not find a good and consistent affect to achieve what we wanted so we decided to just have it shown in greyscale.

Thriller Filming 4

We continued to do our filming for our opening scene. Our group travelled again to Archer's field with the intention of filming Tom and Sophie as a couple. We filmed them first from two different angles walking together in front of a small collection of trees and bushes. These shots were all intended to be an audince point of view rather than from the view of the stalker.













We then did a low angle shot close up of Tom and Sophie from Sophie's side and then a reversed shot of it. We intended the audience now to connect the images they saw in the photos earlier to the ones they are seeing then.

























We took several shots from inside the tree area from a first person point of view. Andrew was
controlling the camera here and moved the camera behind the trees more everytime either sophie or Tom showed signs that someone was there. After a short while, Andrew pretended to drop the camera while I ran towards Tom and Sophie with a hood up while they ran away. Andrew then filmed panning shots of Tom and Sophie running through a small woodland nearby, although we are unsure if we will need to use this footage. When we returned to college, we captured the footage.

Thriller Filming 3

We planned this lesson to film Tom and Andrew who were intended to be potential victims in our film. Sophie could not be here because of other obligations. We started by filming Andrew walking down a street. We did two different shots from across the road, one shot of Andrew walking into the camera and one of him walking away from the camera. We also did one take of a handheld, lower resolution camera behind him, insinuating that he is being followed and filmed. Next, we filmed Tom on the swings in a playpark. One shot was from the side/front, the other was a high angle shot to highlight his vulnerability. The vulnerability is also present in the mise en scene of the playpark. We also filmed with the low resolution camera from behind some trees to show that he was being watched.

Thriller Filming 2

We arranged the photos we had on a pin board and appropriately annotated them. We then took the pinboard, camera and tripod to Sophie's house where we filmed several panning shots of the photographs. When we were ready to film and we thought the camera was correctly set up, we encountered the problem that the resolution of the image had too high levels of green in it. We later discovered that the night lens had accidentally been turned on. We then filmed one handheld pan of the photos and one tripod pan of the photos to use for the start of the film. We then went back to the college and plan to capture the footage next lesson.

Thriller Filming

We spent the lesson taking photos of each other out of college for the opening panning shot of the photos. We traveled around to and from a place called 'Archers field and took photographs of each other while making the subject look unaware and the camera operator seem hidden eg. by having part of a close tree in a shot.

Risk Assessment:

Risk Assessment

Bodily Injury:
We will ensure that appropriate footwear is worn during all photo taking and filming sessions and make sure that the ground we are walking on during a scene/photo is extremely safe before capturing.

Getting Injured By a Moving Car:
We will ensure that precautions are put in to place for road safety during footage around roads and we will never film actors crossing busy roads. (If crossing of a road is necessary in one shot, then the cameraman will never rush actor and make sure he/she feels safe crossing the road and that they do it as naturally and safely as possible).

Getting Lost:
During certain "forest" scenes, we will make sure that all actors have phone in their pocket in their pocket if they cannot find way back. However, this will be prevented by filming in groups of three or four at all times, which will limit individual isolation.

Damage to Equipment:
We will make sure, when handling equipment, that we do so gently and slowly, preventing any quick slips, trips or falls with the equipment. We will also share the equipment when walking therefore preventing any one person to carry all of it by themselves, which will hopefully prevent injury or damage to person or equipment.

Strangers/Assault:
We will make sure as a group that we don't annoy or aggravate members of the public during the filming's of our scenes. We will choose fairly isolated areas during the day to avoid this, but if we encounter a person we will take extra safety precautions to avoid awkward questioning or negative vibes.

General Injury:
We will ensure that our locations are near college during, college hours, so if something happened we can quickly return to get help. Also we will always travel in a group of 4, therefore if someone is in trouble, one (or two) member(s) of the group can stay with them whilst the other one or two can run off for help.

Illness:
If a member of a group falls ill time needs to be used efficiently to remain on schedule. If its more than 2hrs we need to find replacement or a definite reschedule date will be set and be met without exception.

Thriller Planning 3

We decided to start storyboarding our project. We also updated the thriller questionnaire and gave it out to some of the other people in our class. However, we had trouble with the storyboarding as we had trouble agreeing on scenes. We eventually decided that we should have a panning shot of photos placed on a table of us. It would have tense music in the background and have actor and director names appearing in the shot. We also came up with the idea of having a montage a photos of us in full screen doing various things. The photos would be point of view and we would appear unaware of being photographed.

Thriller Planning 2

We started advancing our ideas for an opening shot with the idea of scattering photos of various mysterious places and people and panning over them with music in the background. The shot would then zoom into a photo which would then become part of the next scene. We began our initial design for a questionnaire and included questions involving fonts, titles and thriller preferences. We then began researching usable copyright free music which we could use for our project, we found a piece of music called (insert name) which we thought would work well with our project. It contains an eerie piano melody which we think will increase the atmosphere. We then began to storyboard our project and got upto the picture zoom. After a long discussion, we decided that it would feature us four in different places such as the city and the countryside. We came up with the idea of us being filmed in both the third and second person, indicating that there is a person actually filming the character. Sophie decided that she should finish the storyboard over the half term holidays.

Thriller Questionnaire Prototype

Thriller Research:Donnie Darko

Sound is used to create representations of thrillers. Building storm sounds increase the tension as the credits are displayed. When the establishing shot is displayed, ambient diegetic birdsong is present to indicate it as a safe haven. An electronic humming sound gradually gets louder as the zoom increases to increase the tension. This then turns into harpsichord music which has a childlike feel to it.

Thriller Research: The Bourne Identity (1988)

One of the ways which this is made a thriller is that the storm sounds grudually builds up during the short opening credits and then evolves into loud dramatic orchestra music. This all build up to the yell of the shooter and the fire of his gun. This creates suspense for the audience and readily sets the scene when the sea and boat shot is established. The music then becomes slower and sadder with added bubble sound effects. This slows the pace down but increases suspense as the audience is wondering if Jason will survive. The explosion at the end climaxes the scene as the man resurfaces and survives.

The camera angles also create thriller representations. The first shot is an establishing shot of the boat and sea which tells the audience the setting as well as leave them wondering what's going to happen there. As Jason is shot and falls down, there is a high angle shot to show his vulnerability.

The mise en scene is also important. When Jason is drowning, he is repeatedly being snagged by seaweed. This emphasises how he is underwater and likely to die, and makes it appear more sinister.

The editing is also used when there are constant switches between Jason and his shooter, while portraying their decreasing distance from each other. The fact that Jason gets more screentime foreshadows that Jason is the main character and that the shooter is unlikely to be important in the story. Jason's fall in the water is also repeated from a different angle to emphasise his fall.

Thriller Planning

After, being a test group for a teacher applying for our college, we decided our groups. I am in a group with Tom Adcock, Sophie Neil and Andrew Tinley. We then began brainstorming ideas. We decided first off that we wanted to do something conventional, but original. We also had the idea of it possibly being an action-horror-tragi-thriller. We had ideas of having death and murder as the openings background. Sophie then had the idea of during the opening credits, sepia photographs of people and settings could fade in and out on screen. On the final one, we would zoom into and it would become part of the action of a first scene. We began with ideas for a questionnaire to find out what people expect from a thriller.

Thriller Introduction 2

We finished watching 'The Usual Suspects'. We then discussed how it conformed to the conventions of thrillers in different ways. We then watched Thriller openings from past year groups to inspire us and learn from their mistakes.

Thriller Introduction

Our new task is to create the opening of a thriller. On Monday, our teacher talked us through the codes and conventions of thrillers in our lesson and taught us what a thriller requires in its characters, its plot and its atmosphere. We then watched the openings of 'Lost Highway', 'Signs' and 'Blood Simple'. We discussed use use of camera angles, mise en scene, editing and sound in the openings and how they help make it a thriller. We then began watching the beginning of 'The Usual Suspects'.

Preliminary Task: Record Scratch

Overall, I think that we produced our film very well and that we overcame all the problems we faced, such as losing one of our shots to a corrupted. One of the problems with it I feel, is when there is a tilt down of me, the camera hesitates slightly as it does it. I also feel that the handheld camera section does not work as well as it should have and is very juddery. I think we did the shot-reverse shot very well as we made the audiotrack seem whole as we switched between shots, we selected appropriote shots for different sections of dialouge and we didn't break the 180 degree rule.

Preliminary Editing 2

Today, for the next part of editing, we asked Oliver and Shaun to take control because they had not been involved directly in it yet. Firstly, they altered the length of the video and audio tracks so that the camera switched partway through dialouge. Next, they went throughthe entire audio and lowered it where it peaked at levels which may be damaging to the ears. Next, they took out the outtake as we all agreed that it was irrelevant. We then exported it to an AVI file and viewed it. We were confused at first as the player played it in 4:3 rather than the 16:9 that we filmed it it. We then realised that there was nothing wrong with the file and that 4:3 was the default viewing ratio for the player. We tried to upload it to Blogger but then realised that it exceeded the maximum capacity allowed by the site. We then re-exported it into a H.264 file and tried to upload it again. But when it finished, it was displayed strangely distorted and in negative. Instead we decided to upload it to YouTube and embed it into our blogs.

Preliminary Editing

Last monday, Sophie and I used Adobe Premier Pro to edit the film during the lesson. Shaun and Oliver's job was to find suitable music and sound for the film and also to photograph the storyboards and mindmap to upload. Sophie and I first had problems editing because the computer's version of the software had a glitch which wouldn't allow us to play back our clips. After we diagnosed the problem, we used a different computer and carried on. We put the clips in the order we wanted from the best shots we had, cut parts from the beginning and end of it and deleted some of the diegetic sound in them which we thought was unsuitable. Afterwards we inserted the song 'Dude looks like a Lady' - Aerosmith, a record scrattching sound effect and a piece of music called Cantina band remix. We also thought it would be suitable to include one of our outtakes in the credits.

Preliminary Storyboards and Brainstorm

Preliminary Filming

On friday, we took out cameras to film our story. Firstly, I checked the white balance on the camera, checked the DV tape and made sure it was filming in widescreen 16:9. We attached a tripod and took it out to our first filming location. We filmed Sophie walking repeatedly from various angles including from the side and from the front. We had to take many shots as it was difficult for me, replacing the absent Oliver, to pan across Sophie equally without it seeming jumpy. We then filmed a tilt up of Sophie at the door and a close up of her hand opening the door. We then filmed the cutaways which are intended to break up Sophie's shots. To do this scene I dressed up in a checkered shirt and put on glasses. We also borrowed a teacher's laptop to do this scene. Shaun then became the camera operator for the following shots. Our first shot was a tilt down showing me using the laptop. Secondly, we did an over the shoulder shot of me using the laptop to come up with ideas for valentines day. We then filmed Sophie using handheld camera come into the room, sit across from me and us exchanging dialouge. At this point Oliver returned from his exam and became the camera operator. After reattaching the tripod, we filmed the dialouge again twice over my shoulder of Sophie, twice as a close up of Sophie's face, twice over Sophie's shoulder of my face and finally twice as a close up of my face. Afterwards, we took the DV Tape out of the camera and captured it onto the computer. We realised that one of our first shots of Sophie was corrupted and realised we either had to refilm it or work out a way around it. Next lesson we are going to edit our film together.

Preliminary Planning

We were shown by Mr. Mitchell a short film which teaches methods of reverse shot and included information about establishing shots and the 180 degree rule. Afterwards, my group and I started the storyboards and had the idea of filming parts of Sophie's body as she walks along the corridor. We changed the idea of having Sophie as a 'Nerd' and changed her character to that of a 'chav, slag'. However my character would remain a 'nerd'. We tried filming some of our shots to see if they would be successful; they were. After that, we finished the draft storyboard and will probably begin filming next lesson. Our plot is that Sophie walks into the room where I am sitting, looking for Valentine's day ideas, and breaks up with me. We may also need to re-do the storyboard as it is currently messy and confusing. I need to remember to bring in a pair of glasses and a shirt for next lesson.

Planning Preliminary Task

I have been placed in group with Sophie, Shaun and Oliver to do the preliminary task. We discussed the roles in filming and decided that Sophie and I would be actors in this, Shaun would be costume designer and director while Oliver would be the camera man and be in charge of props. Then we discussed the plot and decided that Sophie and I would both apply to the 'nerd' stereotype. I would already be in the room when Sophie would walk in and then break up with me. We created part of a spider diagram with ideas on it.