Evaluation Q6

6)

What have you learnt about technologies from the processes of constructing this product ?

During the construction of our thriller film we learnt about several aspects of the different technology involved in constructing, not just a thriller, but any genre film.

One of the first things we learnt to use was the camera that we were using, which was my own compact camera. We chose to use this camera over the school cameras because we though that is would be easier to capture/copy the footage onto the computers that we were using and to start editing them. However we found this difficult because of the programs that we were using, which was originally Adobe Premiere Elements 1 for the other people in our group who were editing on the school computers, and Serif Movie Plus SE (a free program) for us as we were editing on my own laptop. We found that both programs would not open the raw footage produced by my camera, however we solved this by buying a add-on for the program on my laptop and converting the footage to a format that would work on the school computers. Eventually though we found that the program that we were using was not providing the results we were hoping for and I managed to buy a copy of Adobe Premiere Elements 10, which we found to be a much more capable piece of software.

Another problem that we had to overcome was that of lighting. We found that the camera itself would sometimes record slightly darker than the scene actually was. This lead us to re-record a large proportion of the scenes with more ambient lighting as we did not have access to studio lighting that would have been available to thriller films with higher budgets than we did.

Another piece of technology that we use extensively throughout the production of our thriller was Youtube. We used this primarily for looking for clips from other thriller films for inspiration. We also found that there were many videos of other thriller films made by people also doing Media studies. There was also a great many videos providing us with examples of the thriller genre. We also had to learn to use Blogger for our blogs. This involved us embedding videos, as well as prezis and documents from other online services such as scribd.

Evaluation Q5

5)
How did we attract/address our audience ?

We attracted our audience mainly though the use of the soundtrack. We chose this particular soundtrack because of the way it builds tension. The soundtrack we chose builds tension through its very slow tempo, and it way that we have cut it so it gets louder during the scene. We have also cut it so that when the “killer” pours the chemical/poison into the cups the sound becomes quite loud and then goes suddenly quiet. We feel that this draws in the audience into what is happening before them and to signify that what is currently happening within the scene is important in relation to the plot-line. This is similar to the opening scene of Casino Royal (which has some thriller conventions) in which the soundtrack gets louder or quieter as the two characters talk or depending on the action happening within the scene.

No County For Old Men

We also used familiar location that the audience would recognise or have some familiarity to other locations (such as their own house or street or other parts of Britain). We did this so the audience could have some connection to the actual film. This is unlike some other thriller films such as No country for old men which used filming locations that would be recognisable to some American audiences, however it would be very difficult for a European audience to “connect” with the characters and find some recognisable features within the filming locations. Contrary to this would be thrillers such as The Bourne Ultimatum/ Supremacy and Unknown. These are thrillers that are primarily filmed in European locations and therefore would be more likely for a European audience to connect with as they would have more likely seen or been too the filming locations.

Q2 Evaluation

2. How Does our media product represent particular social groups ?

Our thriller represents a couple of social groups, mainly to do with gender. Though the way we have represented challenge some social stereotypes.

One way that we have represented the female gender is though the killer. We have portrayed her as a very hidden character. We have also created her be quite masculine though her costume as the large coat which could show that she is a masculine, but also that she could be a very “closed-off” or isolated character. However the way we have filmed also gives her a presence within the scenes, and the other characters lack this presence – suggesting that they are not important in the scene. This is quite a negative representation of the female gender. We have also included another female character who is the complete opposite of this, appears to be very open, although she lacks presence as do the other two male characters. This would be contrary to the stereotypical male who is controlling and in charge of the situation – an example of this would be the character of Bill in the opening scenes of 'Kill Bill Vol.1', whereas the male characters in this scene are more like the character L.B. Jefferies in 'Rear Window' – unable to her with what he believes to be a murder. This film also has a very negative representation of the female gender, as It objectifys women as a femme fatale of the character Lisa.

Another Way that we have represented a social Groups – although not as strongly as gender – is social class. The characters within our product are represented as low/middle class though the clothes they are wearing. They are wearing very nondescript clothing as to suggest being unimportant, though not wearing scruffy clothes which suggests a lower class and not wearing smart clothes – such as suits – which suggests a high social class or even aspirations to be in a social class than they are currently. This differs from the main character – or “the killer” - who wears the large coat, which could suggest that she is in a lower social class than the rest of the characters.

We decided not to show any other social groups as some could be quite sensitive – race for example – and we didn't not feel comfortable or confident representing them. We also had the limitations that no-one in our group was of a different ethnicity, sexual orientation or explicitly religious.

Question 3 Evaluation

Q3 Evaluation

Our Final Thriller Opening

Please Note My (Jack Monahan) candidate number is 2545

Filming Update

We recently had to film the scenes which are filmed in the house and in the final part of our thriller opening. This was mainly due to the fact that the original footage was too dark. We also did this to give us more to edit with, although we are almost over two minuets already in our edit without these parts we have re-filmed. As a consequence our edit might be longer than 2 minuets, though we will try to shorten it as much as possible.

Shooting Locations And Some Problems We Had

We Have Now finished our filming and beginning to edit. Among the locations that we filmed in were;

- Eaton Road outside CNS for the shots were the Evil girl is walking to a friends house. However we had to re-shoot the walking scene along Eaton road due to a continuity error.

- A room at school for the scene where the evil girl is creating the chemical that we see being poured into one of the mugs.

- We also filmed in a small basement for the same scene to try and create a feeling of claustrophobia and  Mysteriousness. However we decided not to use this footage as it was too dark to make-out the action in the scene.

- The Living room and kitchen of another person in our group's house for the scene where the friends are socialising and the scene where the evil girl is pouring the chemical into one of the mugs.

We did most of this within a couple of weeks, although we couldn't get it done quicker due to the fact that most of the only times we could film were in lesson time and one day after school. Also we had a problem with the format of the video that my camera outputted as the software we were using to edit as it wouldn't open. Although I converted it into a format that should work it would still not work on the software and we have yet to solve the problem. If I could do anything different about the filming next time I would have planed more in advance.