Day1 - Recording Our News Reporter Speech

In Mary's lesson, we prepared and gave Mickey our 'breaking news' speech to record. We told him the narrative of the story in advance, so he could think about the pace and accent of his voice. In the film, this recording will be played during Susan's nightmares of killing a girl. We planned to receive this next lesson on CD. Whilst this was being processed, our group planned our storyboard and production schedule. This helped no time being waste in the making of out thriller.

Pitching Our Thriller

In Dan's lesson me and my group brainstormed ideas on our thriller. We came up of a script about a possessed girl that finds out she is the killer of Susan's death.
As a group, we pitched our ideas to our teachers, as you would to a film producer. They thought it was successful which meant we could begin our thorough plan. My group and I discussed that in next lesson we will ask Dan or Mickey to be our news reporter. Their role is to voice record the 'breaking news' speech we prepared in class.

Editing Our Match Cut

In Mary's lesson, we continued and finished editing our match cut clip which is shown on the other post. The mise en scene of the diegetic sound showed the theme of the clip is more of a 'gangsta' thriller based on the count of beats. The narrative also help create this as the meeting between the two are serious and very private. Although comparing to our previous film making, I prefer the other one. This reason is because, i believe the overall use of edit wasn't enough and could have been better. However all experiences count.

Filming our Match Cut

In Dan's lesson, my group filmed our match cut on the corridor noticing the establishing shot of London. We followed out storyboard which was beneficial as no time was wasted. All had gone according to plan as usual. The only prop we used was a pen and paper to help show the narrative of the clip. These props illustrated the meeting being based on confidentiality.

Making a Pitch of Our Final Thriller Idea

In this lesson we were to present our final ideas for our thriller opening. Our first idea for the thriller opening was about a psychotic man who kidnaps and kills children. We were then told by Dan and Mickey that this idea had been used many times before and examiners prefer films that does not include children getting harassed or abused or paedophilia.

From help by Dan and Mickey, we decided that our thriller should be about a possessed girl. The synopsis of the thriller is 'A possessed girl who has a dream of someones murder. She does not know who committed the murder but awakes to find herself in her casual clothes, not in her night dress. As she is woken up by the morning breaking news on her radio, she finds blood on her hands.'

After presenting our idea to Dan, Mikey, Mareesa and the class, we recieved their approval to start filming. Everyone got the teachers approval to film their thrillers. We then finished by planning what we will be doing every media lesson starting from next lesson. In our next lesson we will get Dan to read the script we have written. Dan will be our news reader.

Filming Our Match Cut

This lesson started off straight away with filming, as we planned the shots in the previous lesson. Susan and Elelta were acting as the two characters while me and Lipi were directing and filming.

We decided to film in the canteen as we had planned that the setting where both characters meet would've been the canteen. Due to not having a door, which was our first shot of Susan entering, high angle shot from the corner as Susan entered This was not possible without a door, we then went back upstairs and shot the scene in the end of the corridor. The props used was a table, two chairs, a door and a contract paper and pen. This setting was perfect as we were able to get an establishing shot of London through the wide window.

We were told to use 180° shot, match cut shot and reverse shot. Our first shot was a high angle shot of Susan's feet then an over the shoulder shot from Elelta's shoulder while Susan takes her seat opposite Elelta. Here we use our first match cut shot. We then got a close up of Susan's face which then went into a mid shot of both Susan and Elelta. This shot also is an establishing shot as we see an outline of London. The reason we chose to get a couple of shots of Susan was because she is the main character with much more power. The next shot was a close up of Susan which went into an extreme close up of Susan's eyes. We then got a close up shot of Elelta following into an extreme shot of Elelta's eyes. Here we make use of 180° shot as the camera follows from Susan to Elelta.

To keep the scene flowing we then had a mid shot of both characters. Here Elelta passes contract papers to Susan to sign. As Elelta passes the papers, we took a mid shot from an angle of Susan's side. Elelta says her dialogue here 'Here's your contract sign it'. This dialogue was written this way as both the characters have met for pure business, nothing else. The scene followed with a mid shot of Susan taking the papers, then a close up of Susan signing the papers. The scene continues with an over the shoulder shot from a high angle from Susan's side. In this shot as Susan returns the papers to Elelta with force Susan shares her dialogue 'You'll get your money when the job's done'. This dialogue was written for Susan to say with force as she is the character with power. The Scene follows with a mid shot, over the shoulder from Elelta of Susan standing up ready to leave. We then include a match cut shot of Susan from Elelta's side, as Susan pushes in her chair we take a shot of her continuing to push her chair in and leaves from the set, off the camera.

Match Cut Introduction and Plan

In this lesson we were introduced to match cuts. As Mary, our teacher was not in, the lesson was taken over by the media technicians Mickey and Mareesa. We were given a task which included a scenario and we were to then write shots for example, camera angles, length of each shot and dialogues. The synopsis was 'Eastlondon, 3pm. A man chain smokes as he sits at his home PC. He copies confidential computer files and plans to a CD. He packages them and is seen posting them.' After planning 20 shots, we were put into our group. We then planned our own version and how we were to shoot the given scenario.

After planning our own shots Mickey had shown the class the video he had made from the given scenario. We were to compare our storyboard of the scenario with Mickeys video. There were only a few similarities such as over the shoulder shots and match cuts in a certain shot along with long shots.

Our next task was to plan with our group our own match cut clip. We had decided that there would be two characters, Susan and Elelta. The synopsis was 'A character opens a door, walks into a room, sits down opposite another character and they share a few lines of dialogue'.
We then planned with our group what our clip was to include and who would say what. We were finally ready to film for next lesson!

Real Thriller Idea

Today in dan's lesson we had to present our final and real thriller ideas with our groups to the whole class. We discussed in our groups what we wanted our thriller clip to be e.g the type of camera shots , setting and sound. if down was pleased with the idea then he let us keep our idea. This learn was more of a planning lesson rather than a practical lesson:

Our thriller idea was:
A girl who is possesed. our clip will be on her having a a bad dream. she wakes up to have blood on her hands. our main setting will be in a church perhaps at night time and the other one will be in a bedroom. we will use props such as defining dictionaries. knives and casual clothes. I dont really want to give out too much but Dan and the other media staff were alright with our idea so we have got the go ahead to start filming next lesson from Mary's lesson. The group is really pleased. Before the end of the lesson we started planning within our groups.

Previous AS Students Thriller Openings

We were shown a documentary about film openings in this lesson. Directors and film critics had commented and spoke about thriller openings.
Thomas Sutcliffe said “Films need to seduce their audience into long term commitment. While there are many types of seduction, the temptation to go for instant arousal is almost irresistible.” By this, Thomas meant that the film and audience need to have a relationship in order to enjoy the film. “Films need to seduce their audience into long term commitment.” This means the audience should want to watch the entire film. There are many types of temptations and seduction which is to take the audience straight into the action.

On the other hand, according to the director Jean Jacques Beineix the risk of instant arousal is not being to sustain the audience’s attention.
A quote in the documentary was “A good beginning must make the audience feel that it doesn’t know nearly enough yet, and at the same time make sure that it doesn’t know too little.” The implication in this quote is that there should be enough information to interest the audience, but not so much that the story is predictable or given away. The audience should remain curious.

The classic opening is described by the critic Stanley Kauffmann as establishing shots of New York, zooming into a sky scraper. This works as the audience is notified of where the film is shot and set.
Kyle Cooper’s title sequence to the film Seven is effective because it shows the audience the obsession and fanatical mad nature of the villain.
“A favourite trick of Film Noir” the term trick is meant that the ending is shown at the beginning, for example the film ‘Casino’ the character is killed in the beginning and the audience are impatient and curious to know why the character was killed.
The opening of The Shining creates suspense as the camera is used like a predator hunting the car from a far.

Introduction To Sound

This lesson we were introduced to how producers and editors make use of sound in thriller films. I enjoyed this lesson as we got to fiddle with different sounds. We sequenced sound in scenes from the 'Quantum of Solace'. We were given the sounds used in each clip and had to place the correct sound in the correct place, for example a car rushing towards the right side of the screen, the sound would then need to be placed on the right hand side of the screen. We then had to edit our final piece again and add our own sound effects. I had used a different background sound along with other sound effects.

Preliminary Match Cut Exercise

Filming our match-cut clip -( draft )

Today's lesson with Dan we filmed our match-cut clip within our groups that we planned the previous lesson when mary was absent, We started off by deciding our setting. We ended up changing our setting at the last minute. At first, our setting was in the canteen but there were too many people sitting there. This was not very practical as this could have affected the sound techniques.

So we decided to change our setting to the third floor corridor. This was a good setting as there were a lot of mise en scene to give our clip an establishing shot of London.

The next lesson we had Preliminary Match Cut Exercise we went into the mac room. we used the editing suite to edit our clip. e.g to make cuts and use different camera angles and different shots. we added techniques like sound and edited our clip entirely. Our clip had different shots e.g match cuts. Once our clip was finished we were allowed to go home.

A video above shows our film after it was editied. I think that the secong practice film went really well it was another chance for us to refresh our minds on how to work in a group and prepare us for shooting our thriller film, in terms of practising, editing and so on. I definately prefer this practise film to the old one because in the short space of time we have developed different techniques and learnt a lot of new things. In this shot we have used more different types of shots and used a lot of space to create detail and a very good mise en scene. I feel that i followed all the forms and conventions of real films a bit because we took on techniques from other films and used them in our own practise films. We also used different types of lighting and narrative especially the mise en scene as i have mentioned already.

Finally, i think that our practise films allows us to many comments about our presentation. We are deffinately learning new things and a lot more confident and as a result we are making this show in all our practicals.

Match cut clip plan

The next lesson Mary was not in so Mick and Mareesa covered the lesson. We did a task on Match cuts in video clips.

Our first task was to Make a list of shots of our own in a given scenario. The Synopsis was 'eastlondon, 3pm. A man chain smokes as he sits at his home PC. He copies confidential computer files and plans to a CD. He packages them and is seen posting them.'
We then in pairs made our own version of the clip using different camera shots and establishing shots of eastlondon.
We then watched a clip thay Mickey made and compared it to our own. There were a couple of similiarities such as long shots of the man walking to the post box and many more.We analysed these similarities with the class.

We were then told to gather up in our groups and plan our own clip for next lesson. The synopsis is: 'A character opens a door, walks into a room, sits down opposite another character and they share a few lines of dialogue'.
We all put in our own ideas and combined it altogether to create a clip. Which we will be filming next lesson!

Film Openings & Analysing Previous Student's Work

In today's lesson with Dan we watched a documentary on film openings andd learnt the following:

• "A good beginning must make the audience feel that it doesn't know nearly enough yet, and at the same time make sure that it doesn't know too little" because certain amout of information to the audience can limit their interest

• Thomas Sutcliffe says "Films need to seduce their audience into long term commitment. While there are many different types of seduction, the temptation to go for instant arousal is almost irrestistible". He means a way of attracting the audience's attention by making them want to watch the whole film

We then analysed previous students' work on their choice of location, camerawork, editing, lighting, and their use of diegetic and non-diegetic sound. My favourite video was Video5 because it attracted me the most in the audience, I understand what the film was about as it had different technique elements to keep me engaged to the film. I liked the way the opening didnt have too many settings. there were only was two locations (police office and essex road station) The opening seemed well planned and a lot of time put into producing. And finally, the use of sound; the non diegetic sound created more of a suspense. The editing sequences were shown in slow motion and there was little dramatic editing. There were various angle shots e.g match cuts.

The thriller that i disliked the most was Video6 because the clip showed poor planning, showed lack of media techniques and it was all rather messed up. And it showed through their insufficient footage. I also didn't like the dialogue they used and thought the clip looked far from being a thriller movie but more like it was rushed and not enough time put into planning.

Thriller Practical - Editing First Lesson

After learning how to use the software Final Cut Pro from the previous lesson, we were now ready to edit our own footage. Once we had loaded our video footage into the mac computers we then had to store it in a storage hard drive. We then had to capture the shots we needed for our final product using Final Cut Pro. This is done to help sequence the film and easier to find each shot.

To make the shots continuous we used transitions and effects. Not much transitions or effects were needed as our footage had many different angle shots that did not need effects added on, for example low angle into a tilt, point of view shots and high angle shots.

To finalise the video we needed a touch of sound. We then used a software called SoundTrack. We decided to add sound effects, for example we used a screeching sound for when the door opens and the sound of shuffling cards. We had also used the sound of a trigger being pulled and finally a gunshot. We had also used a background sound/music.

We then got our class and teachers to watch out final piece. Although it was a thriller the entire class seemed to have enjoyed it and thought it was funny. We had recieved a positive feedback from the class and teachers.

What Scares Us

What scares us?

• Blood
• The dark
• The colour red
• Knives
• Silence
• Scary voices
• Bathroom scenes
• The hallway scenes
• Sudden shock
• Sudden loud sounds
• Creatures
• Psychos

Filming our match-cut clip (draft)

In this lesson we filmed our match-cut clip that we planned the previous lesson, We started off by deciding our setting. At first, Dan our teacher suggested us to do it in the canteen of the college building. However, it didnt work out as their were too many people sitting there we wouldnt be able to hear the dialogue.
We finally decided to do it in the end of the coridoors of our floor. This was a good setting as there were big windows which would give our clip and establishing shot of London.
We were also told to follow the 180 degree rule. Which means to stay on one side and film your clip.
We used two chairs, a table, a door and paper and pen as props to film our clip. We all decided the context of our clip. The clip included two characters, A + B, Susan was character A and Elelta was character B. Character A comes in through the door, here we have a match cut, the first shot is a high angle of her feet and the second is an over the shoulder of her taking her seat.
We use many other shots such as close ups and extreme close ups. Character A is the main character, therefore we have m0re shots of her to establish her power.
We also have dialogue in this clip as we were given the task instructing us to include some dialogue.
There is a midshot of both characters so then we have our dialogue where character B says 'here is your contract, sign it' Our dialogue presents importance in their meeting. Then there is a midshot of character A taking the paper and followed by a closeup of her signing. This is a match cut shot.
As character A passes back the papers she says 'you'll get your money when the jobs done'
The clip then finishes off with a match cut an over the shoulder showing character A standing up to leave and then another shot where character A walks away from the shot.

Match Cut tutorial plan

In this lesson Mary was not in so Mick and Mareesa took over to teach us about Match cuts in video clips.
Our first task was to Make a list of shots of our own in a given scenario. The Synopsis was 'eastlondon, 3pm. A man chain smokes as he sits at his home PC. He copies confidential computer files and plans to a CD. He packages them and is seen posting them.'
We then in pairs made our own version of the clip using different camera shots and establishing shots of eastlondon.
We then watched the one Mickey made and compared it to our own. There were a couple of similiarities such as long shots of the man walking to the post box and many more.

We were then told to gather up in our groups and plan our own clip for next lesson. The synopsis is: 'A character opens a door, walks into a room, sits down opposite another character and they share a few lines of dialogue'.
We all put in our own ideas and combined it altogether to create a clip. Which we will be filming next lesson!

Watching thriller openings from previous students

In this lesson we were shown a documentary referring how thriller film makers attract their audience and what elements are used.
In the documentary, Professional directors and film critiques quoted on thriller films.
Thomas Sutcliffe said: 'Films need to seduce their audience into long term commitment while there are many types of seduction, the temptation to go for instant arousal is almost irresistable.'
By this he means that Films want their audience to continue watching the film. While there are types of seduction and temptation and irresistable instant arousal that will hit the audience. The temptation is to go straight into the action.
However, according to the director Jean Jacques Beineix the risks of instant arousal that it questions what comes after sustaining the audiences attention.
Another quote in the documentary was: 'a good beginning must make the audience feel that it doesnt know nearly enough yet, and at the same time make sure that it doesnt know too little'. This means that there should be enough to interest the audience, but not so much that the story is given away- the audience should stay curious.
Stanley Kauffman describes the classic opening. This consists of shots of places such as new york and zooming into a sky scraper. This works as it gives the audience ideas of setting and the stereo type of the character. So if it is a flat, it would represent the class and status of the character.
Kyle Coopers title sequence to the film 'Seven' is effective because it shows us the obsessive mad nature of the villain.
Orson Welles opening to the film 'A Touch of Evil' includes the ending at the beginning. He did this to achieve the curiosity of the audience of why the character was killed. Another film called 'Casino' a character is killed at the beginning, this increases the curiosity of the audience to why and had killed them. This is also referred to as a 'favourite trick of film noir.'
The opening of 'The Shining' creates suspense as it shows they travelling to the hotel which is a bad path. The camera pans the car at an angle that shows it is like a preditor hunting the car from far away.

Storyboard Tutorial & Match Cut Exercise

In today's lesson, Mary was absent although we was given an exercise to do in pairs. I worked with Susan, and we created a short list of shots if we was to create a sequence to show "East London. 3pm. A man chain-smokes as he sits at his home PC. He copies confidential computer files and plans to a CD. He packages them and is seen posting them." In doing this, Susan and I considered on what shot types to use, camera actions and camera angles. Our sequence had to have no more than 20 shots. When finished with our plan we watched the real clip made by Mickey to help contrast what parts we had right and what parts we could of improved on. Concluding with the lesson we began our storyboard to our preliminary film and the synopsis is: 'A character opens a door, walks into a room, sits down opposite another character and they share a few lines of dialogue'. Next lesson, we was going to film this.

Watching Film Openings & Analysing Previous Student's Work

In today's lesson with Dan we watched a documentart about film openings abd learnt the following:

• Thomas Sutcliffe says "Films need to seduce their audience into long term commitment. While there are many different types of seduction, the temptation to go for instant arousal is almost irrestistible". He means a way of attracting the audience's attention by making them want to watch the whole film
• According to the director Jean Jacques Beineix, the risk of instant arousal are what comes after. Sustaining the audience's attention
• "A good beginning must make the audience feel that it doesn't know nearly enough yet, and at the same time make sure that it doesn't know too little" because certain amout of information to the audience can limit their interest
• Critic Stanley Kauffmann described one film opening as classic because of the effective use of the camera zoom into a skyscraper
• Kyle Cooper's title sequence to the film 'Seven' is so effective because it shows us the obsessive mad nature of the villian
• The phrase "a favourite trick of Film Noir" means the ending of the film is shown at the beginning. E.g. like in 'Casino' we want to know why the character is killed
• The opening of 'The Shining' creates suspense by the camera's movements acting like a predator by hunting the car from a distance

We also analysed previous students' work on their choice of location, camerawork, editing, lighting, and their use of diegetic and non-diegetic sound. My favourite video was Video5 because as the audience, i felt i understand what the film would be about as it gave me enough information to influence me in watching the whole of the thriller. I liked the way the opening was set in two locations (police office and essex road station) because it showed they gave a lot of thought. I also enjoyed the way there was no diegetic sound being played as the non diegetic sound created more of a suspense. I liked their use of edits because parts of the sequence were in slow motion. The thriller that i disliked the most was Video6 because their poor planning showed through their insufficient footage. I also didn't like the dialogue they used and thought the clip looked far from being a thriller movie.

Editing with Sound

In today's lesson we used a program on the Mac computers to experiment how the different use of sounds can set the scene in a particular sequence. We used parts of the film 'Casino Royale' to help do this. The aim of the lesson was to learn how important sound plays in a film, and we gained this objective also by watching documentary clips that was part of the program we used itself.

Different Thriller Types

In today's lesson with Mary, we brainstormed the different types of Thriller. We found the following:

• Thrillers with action like 'Speed'
• Horror thrillers
• Innocent on-the-run plots
• Stealing someone's identity
• Supernatural thrillers
• Political thrillers
• Comedy thrillers
• Psychological thrillers (thrillers 'playing' with the mind)

As a classs we then analysed six clips from Thriller films. Whilst watching these clips we learnt a new term called 'intertextuality' and refers to how different kinds of films incorporate aspects of other films.

Sound tutorial

In this lesson our class were in the editing suite. We were shown how films produce their sound using software. We also got to sequence the sound of clips from the film 'Quantum of Solace.' I really enjoyed doing that as the sounds were already made for us, but all we had to do was sequence it into the correct place. There were sounds like, grunts, bomb blasts, running footsteps and many more. After making mine, it sounded and looked very professional. We also got to do other activities such as adding more sounds to pictures.
After completing the 'Quantum of Solace' activities, we were then told to edit our own clip that we produced before with our groups. This time as i edited the sound myself, i found it easier and more enjoyable. I added a different background music to it with a different beat. I also did many other different sound like the door opening etc.
The lesson went very quick and i really enjoyed it!

Sound Editing

Today in mary's lesson we went into the mac room. we watched a preview clip on sound. we learnt different elements and had A go at some activities.

We learnt how to edit our thrillers with sound by using a software on the Mac computers.

We also edited sounds of different scenes in the film 'Casino Royale'

In this lesson we were shown several thriller openings:
28 days later, The shining,collateral and What lies beneath.
We also explored the different types of thrillers such as -Psychological, Supernatural thrillers, Comedy Thrillers, Political thrillers, Romance/Murderous, Passion thrillers, Horror Thrillers, Action thrillers and many more.
As we analysed the clips, we looked at he mise en scene, the lighting, use of camera angles, music, editing and setting.

The clip that interested me the most was what lies beneath. I really liked the camera angles and movement. They were a lot of different camera angles such as over the shoulder. This angle to highlighted tension and built tense in the bath tub scene. There were more shots such as tilts and low angles. Long shots were in action when the woman was in the bathroom.
The clips were short but continuous. The lighting was natural and and quite bright and dull at times. There were a lot of sound techniques such as the tub water sucking to indicate the atmosphere and not so pleasent setting. The mise en scene that i like the most in this film would have to be the type of Lighting that is used, as i think its the most important thing in a film as it sets the mood.

I particularly liked the editing of the scenes. There wasn't too much cutting. I like how the opening scene started with tension and freaky. This made me anxious and curious in what was happening. it built a lot of tense and suspense. It gave me ideas for how i would like my thriller to be like. And ideas and techniques that i could adapt onto my thriller.
For my thriller, id like to create a sense of confusion and mystery.
If i had to change anything about the film it would possibly have to be the moral of the film as i think it could be much better.