Ideas Presentation

Presentation Script

     Beth                 Dan

For our first idea we wanted to show a little girl sat in an abandoned, derelict house with some old toys which have been worn with use. We also wanted to show flashback shots of when the child was younger and the times she had spent with her family. The montage of flashbacks would begin to pick up a pace until they reached a climax in which a quick shot of fire would be shown and an extreme close up of the little girls face.

Our storyline behind this is that the child’s family died in a house fire and she has been scarred by this ordeal, not wanting to leave the house of the toys which meant so much to her.

One of the props we wanted to use for this idea was an old dirty teddy bear with its head or limbs almost torn apart with the amount of times its been played with.

Another prop of choice was either a music box or jack in the box. The music played on either of these would be non-digetic sound throughout the whole sequence. As there would not be any digetic sound after the home footage was shown.

Finally our last prop would have been child’s spelling blocks and these would be also used to create our title sequence by spelling out the credits with them.

Our setting was an unused old barn house in Donnington, although we later decided that this wouldn't be realistic enough for what we had perhaps originally had in our minds.

Idea two begins with the audience seeing home footage and photos of a happy couple doing day to day things and living normal life’s; to contrast with this we would also show extreme close ups of a bloody knife and a warehouse corridor. In between these we would also show a panning shot of a wall in this warehouse, the wall will be completely covered with photographs and newspaper articles of mysterious murder cases.

These shots will merge in and out of each other until we hear the scream of a woman, this will then jump cut to a man who’s woken up from a bad dream.

The man will get up, go to his bathroom and splash his face with cold water to clam himself down, only to then see in the reflection of the mirror the woman in featured in his dream. This will only be for a split second a quick jump cut will then show that the woman is no longer there and suggest she was never there in the first place touching on psychological emotions of the audience.

The props we would use for this would be a mirror, a bloody knife, newspapers for the title sequence and also a photo frame which would be placed on the man’s bedside table. The photograph will show a picture of him and the woman in his dream (his girlfriend).

We decided after looking at other thrillers we would set this in a normal day to day house to relate to the audience and show a conventional family, but then have something very unordinary occur.

We would also use the old Warner’s factory to shoot our flashback shots for the warehouse scene.

Idea three begins with a low shot of a man’s legs briskly walking along a street. He would be dressed in a suit with smart shoes carrying a briefcase, although this would be all we would see. He then pauses at a street corner where almost in sync to him a large black car screeches to a hold in front of him, once getting in and still unaware of what the mysterious man looks like we hear some dialogue from the mysterious man.

The dialogue is to give the audience an insight into the story and set the scene, all the while seeing only close up shots of certain parts of his face to keep his identity hidden. After the dialogue is over, the man will light a cigar and then blow smoke into the camera which will trigger the title sequence. For this idea we took inspiration from films such as ‘Rock N Rolla And Lock’, ‘Stock’ and ‘Two Smoking Barrels’.

Props used in this idea would be a cigar, briefcase and the smart looking car which arrives on scene. We would also use some glasses to keep the element of hidden identity.

Finally the setting we would use would be Stamfrord, as its aesthetically pleasing and has a large area to film without the general public getting in shots.

Thank you for listening, any questions ?

Film Locations In Discussion

Warners Factory

Bourne - Abbey Road, Abandoned Building

Rippingale - Linnet Drive

Stamford

Abandoned Barn - Donnington

Inside Abandoned Barn - Donnington

Results And Trends From Research Questionnaire

10/10 Of the people we asked to fill out one of our research questionnaires said that they all watched thrillers and all enjoyed them.

What type of thrillers where enjoyed the most ?

We gathered the information that Action Thrillers where enjoyed the most followed closely by Psychological Thrillers; religious thrillers where found to be least popular with zero out of the ten people we asked said to enjoy them.

What setting is preferred for a thriller ?

An 'everyday setting' concluded to be the most popular setting for a thriller out of the people we asked, woods surprisingly wasn't any of the people's questioned favourite even though many thrillers produced each there are set there. 

7/10 of the people we asked liked a thriller to be mysterious however 7/10 also preferred the thriller to make sense at the end rather than be left unfinished.

8/10 liked to see gore in the thrillers they watch. 

Preferred three best elements to increase tension in a thriller ?

Close up shots, Flashing images and mystery are outstandingly the favourites to increase tension. 

All 10/10 people agreed that the newer thrillers using more technology where better than the old ones, it was also found out that a good creepy title sequence is 'important' to a thriller film to get the audience interested and in the mood.

We will use this research when deciding upon three ideas for our thriller opening in order produce a good film that the majority of the audience watching it will enjoy. 

Research Questionnaire

Thriller Research Questionnaire

Please circle the answer/answers most appropriate.

What gender are you ?
Male / Female

What age range do you appear under ?
Under 12 / 12 – 15 / 15 – 17 / 18+

Do you watch thrillers ?
Yes / No

Do you enjoy thrillers ?
Yes / No

What type of thrillers do you enjoy the most ?
Psychological Thrillers/ Action Thrillers / Crime Thrillers / Mystery Thrillers / Religious Thrillers

What setting do you feel is best for a thriller ?
Abandoned Building / Historic Building / Everyday Setting / Woods /
Unknown or Mysterious Setting/

Do you like the introduction of the thriller to make sense or be mysterious ?
Make Sense / Be Mysterious

Do you like the thriller to make sense at the end of be left for the audience to interpret ?
Make Sense / Left Unfinished

Do you like gore in a thriller ?
Yes / No

What do you think are the three best elements to increase tension in a thriller movie ?
Flashing Images / Close Up Shots / Dark Lighting / Action Shots / Gore / Non-Digetic Sound (Background music) / Mystery / Sound Effects /

Do you prefer the newer thrillers being produced with newer technology ?
Yes / No / Unsure

How important do you feel a good creepy title sequence is to a thriller ?
Very important / Important / Neither Important Or Not Important / Not Important /

Researching Of Media On An Industry Scale

BARB  (Broadcasters Audience research Board) is an organisation that measures UK television audiences. BARB commissions Specialist Company’s such as: RSMB, Ipsos, MORI and Kantar Media to measure the UK TV audience. This company collects data on which channels and programs in particular are being watched by the UK TV audience. They pay particular attention of what times particular programs are being watched and the type of people who are viewing at the same time. Data is collected second by second and delivered minute by minute for channels received in the UK. This research is captured by using a panel of privately owned TV viewing households representing about 5,000 homes. The data captured it used to estimate not only the programs being watched but also the times there being watched and the people watching them.

This research is very important to broadcasters such as ITV and the BBC to give them information on things such as:

• ·         Times people watch TV
• ·         The types of programs people watch
• ·         The amount of people watching a program
• ·         The amount of people watching a TV channel
• ·         The type of people watching different TV programs

All of this information helps the broadcasters keep viewers interested and watching their channels as they have competition with many others now available through services such as Freeview and Sky. On demand services can now aid broadcasters to monitor television audiences themselves to an extent by monitoring the viewing count on certain programs streamed online. Without this information broadcasters would not know how to develop their channels and programs to the best ability keeping a large viewing audience and a good reputation, if they where to lose viewers it would result in them losing money and possibly having to shut down.

Preliminary Task Evaluation

For our preliminary task my group consisted of me, Beth Ryman and Libby Gelsthorpe. We decided to base our film on mystery and aimed to create suspense and the feel of being watched too our audience as we thought this would help us with our main task of creating a thriller introduction because it will closely relate covering some common conventions of thrillers. The ways in which we anticipated to create this was to use lots of high angle shots made to look like CCTV camera views in order to follow people to a mysterious setting to show they are being watched. When following the characters to the mysterious setting we took many different angled shots to ensure we could edit it together without having to waste time filming again and to also help our film have more action too it so it doesn't seem boring to watch. The mysterious setting we chose to use for our task was our schools recording studio as it looks formal, has a high sense of security, and looks a mysterious technical setting; it also enabled us to use the screens to display shots we had recorded earlier in the form of CCTV.

The majority of shots we captured for our preliminary task where taken using a tripod to ensure they were consistently steady and could give a realistic CCTV effect, the shots taken by hand where ensured to be stable by the tensing of arm and hand whilst holding the camera. This helped all of our shots be as stable as possible throughout; however when editing we decided that more shots should have been taken by a steady hand rather than tripod too help us create more action within the film. We also found out when editing that some of the shots we had taken had focusing issues and appeared to jump as movement occurred close to the camera. The shots we mainly used where long shots and close ups, including over the shoulder and mid shots. Whilst filming abiding by the 180 degree rule was essential in order for our shots to be professional, we also considered the golden mean and the rule of thirds when angling the camera.

The framing of our shots briefly followed our storyboard and earlier ideas we had brainstormed. We aimed to make the characters in the shot the focus point, giving away little information on setting or the close up visuals of characters.

I feel that overall our preliminary task turned out well and how we expected. I think this is because we ensured we used a large variety of shots covering many shot types. Also I feel we considered Mise-en-scene into all of our shots which helped us create professional shots that where edited together to show the story of our task clearly. Lighting was not an issue in the settings we were filming in because all areas where bright enough to get professional looking shots. We thought it was appropriate for characters to wear formal clothing for this film adding to the idea of suspense but also giving the characters a sense of importance.

When editing our film we used mainly straight cuts to help the shots flow without delay whilst following characters to the final destination. The quick movement from shot too shot can help create tension and give more action to the film drawing the viewer in to make sure they follow it through. Upon arriving into the destination and the revealing of both characters a fade transition was used to separate the shots from the following to the destination, to the arriving. This also insinuated to the audience that a change of time was happening. For the end of our film we decided that the fade to black was the most appropriate way to end to keep the tension of the film and to signify to the audience that it was up to them to interpret the mystery for themselves. We also applied the stabiliser effect to all of our shots to ensure there was as minimal movement as possible within them.

In conclusion I think that our preliminary task went exactly as it was planned and we ended up with a near professional looking film. In the time we were given to complete this tasks we managed to record more than enough shots in order to enable us to create a flawless, easy to follow film that creates suspense and tension. I think the problem we occurred during this was the quality of the camera we were using, as it resulted in some of our shots being jumpy when they were intended to be still. When recording our thriller we will take this into consideration and use a higher quality camera to record our shots, possibly with manual focus; manually holding the camera may be another option when recording to give more of an action edge on our film making it less boring to watch as a final product. 

Media Prelim Video

Preliminary Task Storyboard

We decided for our preliminary task we where going to theme our idea on mystery and the following of characters to a mysterious setting. We chose our schools recording studio as our main setting but used the route to the studio through corridors to show the following of characters and to give the feel they where being watched. We used the recording studio's dual screens to display live videos previously seen in the sequence to give some of the shots we used a 'CCTV' feel; using high angle shots also helped us achieve this.

Here is the storyboard for our Preliminary Task