2.
Our media product created was an opening sequence
to a thriller movie to which we aimed to follow the
codes and conventions of our thriller sub-genre:
horror. This question is essentially asking for the
evidence in regards to how we have used, challenged
and/.or developed the codes and conventions of our
chosen genre in our opening sequence. The follwing
asapects were taken into consideration to challenge
and/or develop our horror thriller to be easily
identified by our audience and challenge forms and
conventions or real media products.
3.
Props
As a group we aimed for our media product to follow and develop the
codes and conventions of our horror thriller sub-genre. There are
normally elements of things such as death, blood, murder, super natural
beings, and some kind of weapon such as a knife. We followed some of
these codes and conventions by developing it futher. For example, the
additional use of blood used in different media forms such as our
opening sequnce and main opening title. By frequently drawing links to
blood whether it be in our opening sequence title or as an added prop (to
exaggerate the death/murder of a character) we were able to develop
our opening sequence and use typical codes and conventions of our
genre. Audience feedback was able to support this. It was convluded that
the low angle and close up shots captured the "blood on her hands" to
which is an typical code and convention of horror thriller movie; it adds to
the gory/horrific side of horror thrillers and makes it easy was therefore
aggreeable to our feedback question 'does our opening sequence follow
the codes and convetions of our sub genre?'
4. Question 1 continued
& finalised:
Characters
Due to the previous examples of the selected horror thriller movies, we selected characters
that are teenagers and were females. Typically these categories of characters in thriller horror
movies like Evil Dead tend to be seen as vulnerable and easy targets compared to men. An
example of this would be Final Destination 5. A screen shot of our opening sequence of a
teenaged female character in our 'Bloody Mary' opening sequence being the first to being in
danger. This demonstrates the vulnerability portray in teen horrors in women. Our audience
feedback suggested that our use of teenage, female characters therefore followed the codes
and conventions of our aimed sub-genre as it creates vulnerability and creates a sense of
suspense to what they will fall for/happen to them. Even though our uses of young, teenage
characters does not cater our initial target audience (15-20), like our audience feedback said,
as the older side of our target audience (adults) will not be able to appeal to everyone. Older
audience views may want to have characters of older age to relate more to the things the
characters are doing however we also did receive contrasting audience feedback applying that
our opening sequence would be a success with the correct budget. This was due to the unique
selling point of the Bloody Mary dare/myth that audiences would easily be able to relate to
due to all experiencing doing the Bloody Mary dare before. A screen shot of a shot in our
opening sequence below. The screen shot of the teenager shows the character being the first
in danger. This demonstrates the vulnerability portrayed through teens in thriller horror
movies. Overall, developing of our characters in our opening sequence use codes and
conventions of real media products such as the above examples of horror thriller movies due
to having the same characteristics with in our characters as well as using the essence of
playing around with the supernatural beings and dangers.
5.
In my opening sequence the cast consist of 4 characters. The
first and main character/protagonist is named Tyra chuck, who
is the girl that the house in my movie belongs to along with her
parents and she is also the character who organizes the sleep
over in which all the main action within the opening sequence
as well as the majority of the rest of the film will occur in. The
second and third of my characters are named Monika Solanki
and Ruksana Monnan, these two characters are not the main
ones but are as just as important and featured in the opening
sequence as Tyra is. Together they will all make up a group of
friends having the sleep over and the turning victim to a series
of unfortunate events within the film based on the storyline.
The last character featured in my opening sequence and
throughout the whole of the film is spiritual but also very vital,
the antagonist , this role will be edited to be played
completely to its typical codes and conventions with the
antagonist being every bit of evil and troublesome in order to
suit its ‘ evil guy’ role.
6.
The main Character, Tyra will at first is represented as the typical female protagonist,
very vulnerable and also very much linked danger. I will use soft music, to show her
daring personality increasing her vulnerability and long timed camera shots while
focused on her so the viewers can get to know and understand her quickly by her body
language, speech and actions and easily through the extra emphasize on her showing
her to be the main character using those technical aspects. However I will then show
the other conventions of her typical protagonist like characteristics by using quick slick
camera shots and fast music whenever she is involved either in dialogue or action to
show her transformation into a heroine throughout. This Character reminds me of a
character named ‘Stacey’ from a similar horror movie called ‘cabin in the woods’
because both started off as very vulnerable but full of risk taking, typical female
representations in a horror movie but then ended up to fulfil the full role of the
protagonist they are aimed to be in similar story line equally showing how the female
can toughen up during the hardest and most scariest of situations
7. The other two characters Ruksana and Monika’s representation will be very
similar and basic from the start. With extra technical aspects of help I will show
them to be innocent and normal with little excitement and more cautiousness to
their actions within their personalities. Suspense building music will be a big
factor when it comes to dialogue between these characters as they will be inherit
the typical ‘better safe than sorry’ attitude throughout the film, from start till
finish which is very common in the genre film I am basing my production on
(Horror). These two characters both remind me of Characters from the ‘final
destination’ movie thriller and they have been based exactly from the characters
in that movie to ensure and increase accuracy within their roles.
The representation of the antagonist in my production will involve a large
amount of common technical aspects throughout. Slow, scary tension building
music and fast paced horrific sound effects, dark scenery and quick transitions
through camera work will all be used in order for this character to build as much
suspense as possible whenever involved and to also emphasize the evil, dark and
mysterious characteristics I intend for it to have so viewers easily recognize its
typical, common antagonist role.
8. Finally, right from watching the opening sequence you can recognise
our characters as having typical current teenage girl personalities.
The base of it all, the sleepover, shows what type of girls they seem
to be (active, modern day and the typical teenage girls who love to
spend time gossiping and trying new things out together). I used
these specific people in order to create a bond with my intended
target audience, mainly teenage girls from 13-18, as it was a good pull
factor to them because they could relate to the characters in my
film’s lifestyle due to being the same age and having the same
hobbies.
When in the process of recruiting my cast, I had to pick certain people
who not only fitted the character I wanted but also were available on
the day of filming. Thankfully I was able o find a group of girls which
was exactly what I wanted that were willing to act and comply to my
films need in terms of acting so there was no difficulty or problems
there however if we could have re-filmed and improved anything
from their contribution I would have asked them to improve the
quality and increase the confidence within their acting.
9. I think that a media institutions that would be very suitable for my media product
in terms of distribution would be a company like ‘Brain Damage Films’ (BDF0.
BDF specialise in the exact same sub-genre my movie falls under as it is a well
known and successful company. Since 2001 Brain Damage Films has been one of
the largest and most respected independent horror film distributors worldwide.
They have a catalog of hundreds of horror and shock movies ranging from
reality/shock classics like Traces of Death to newer, high quality independent
features.
The reason I chose this company specifically is because it is already very popular
therefore meaning advertising my movie will by very easy due to Bran Damage
Film’s mass consumer audience meaning it can quickly make my film known
anywhere around the world. Also this specific film distributor specializes in the
same genre I have focused my movie on, has experience of distributing similar
movies that have become a success and also focuses on the exact same target
audience I intend to reach with my movie making it therefore the perfect
platform for it to be invested in and become success like most of the other
movies BDF has been involved in.
http://braindamagefilms.com/about/
10.
The target audience of my media product (a horror movie) is a small but
venerable ( to my advantage) one of of teenagers who are mostly
curious and daring. This is because my horror film itself involve
unknowing, naive teenagers as the main protagonists, which are
normally the target of serial killers or psychopaths. Young women
especially aging from 13-19 would be my main intended target audience
due to the fact that, as found out from audience re-search, they
commonly enjoy horror films that challeneg their emotions through
suspense within the films and many of the events that happen in the film
not only include conventions they would expect from a film like this but
also are things they can relate to and engage with (e.g the sleep over
scene at the beginning of the opening) this is the exact main point and
intension of the movie because the more engaged and the more they can
relate to it,t the more successful our re-search and carried out actions will
make our actual movie to be because of the fact that the target audience
targeted was hit successfully.
11. Poster idea’s:
A large title which attracts the eye, bold colours
which stand out
from the background, intriguing picture of a
main character which would attract viewers to
the film, persuasive language which might
persuade the viewers to go
and see the film, using the main character's
name for promotion and a memorable scary
slogan since my film is of the horror genre to
attract them even further.
12. We believed that the storyline to our film would attract
most young audiences. The storyline is based around a
few young
female characters full of mischief. The storyline is also
based around
the lives of young adults and their everyday lives. For
example, in the opening of our film we show an
introduction to the sleep over and a gossip
scene, a scene which represents problems between a
young couple, and even a scene which represents
jealously amongst friends, all things which will relate to
Most young audiences especially our target audience
and will then attract them to watch the film as they
feel like it is addressed and focused on their
everyday similar relatable experiences
13. The main filming location in the opening of our film is
inside one of the main character's
house which is used for a sleep over. We know
that sleep over's are extremely popular amongst
young people and therefore we believed that this
would be a perfect location for our filming, in order to
attract the younger audiences which were targeting.
14. During the creation of my media product, a opening sequence, I’ve learnt
a great deal about technologies and they have vastly helped, and
improved, my media product.
We used a Canon XHAI camera in order to ensure our shots were clear and
technical aspects were to the fullest capabilities we had possible.
We found the canon camera to be very successful as we were able to record
the footage in high definition and the quality of sound was good. As our
shots required the camera to be extremely stable, used a tripod which I
learn to safely assemble the camera onto so we could have this stability.
This made our shots look more sleek and professional.
15.
We used as a computer and a software called Adobe premier to do all the
editing and special effects for our opening sequence. This enabled us to
cut/crop the unneeded frames. This would allow our sequence to flow
smoothly just like a normal opening film. As I had never used a Adobe
before it was quite hard getting used to the programme. However I
overcome this by practicing in school hours and getting help from other
students. Furthermore Adobe premier is a software we used to cut and
edit our shots and put the whole film opening together. Taking a lot of
time this was successful as the editing of the whole sequence with added
after affects such as fade in transitions and fade out affects was good as
the sequence flowed well. One of the main aspects that was good with
this programme was that it allowed us to edit our soundtrack by enabling
us to fade/ increase the tempo, so we could create the ideal soundtrack
for our opening.
In conclusion I have therefore learnt that technology is a very important
aspect when it comes to media production as it can play a big factor in
creating the realism and professionalism of it all meaning it is the main
and vital part of the jigsaw.
16.
Progress Summary (Prelim- Main Task)
Conclusively I would say I learnt a lot about the camera shots and
use of a camera. There was a dramatic level of progress in taking
and lining up camera shots by being re vocal within the group. For
example, spirit level, positing in the frame and lineup of shot.
Although i dud not do a lot of the main editing I got the hang of it
pretty quickly when I got more opportunity to edit and enjoyed
and am much more confident in doing it. The only issue we did
face in editing was the brightness of the frames, because it was
too bright when we originally filmed it. Our audience feedback
suggested we should have tried to make it even darker that how
we edited it in order to fit to the thriller horror sub genre. This
would have created more suspense in out main task opening
sequence. Other than that, collectively I think as a group we all
ore a substantial amount if progress working and articulating our
ideas and opinions more as well as technically improving our skills
such as editing and filming of camera skills
