Evaluation Questions

Today we received our evaluation questions which are:

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challange forms and conventions of real media products?
2. How effective is the combination of your main prodcut and ancillary texts?
3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?
4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Editing of final production - Session 1

Today my media class went to the CLC in order to start editing our final production that we had been filming. When we were given our footage we started off by watching it to make sure everything was on there that we needed and that all the sound was working properly, after this we began to start cutting clips out of the whole footage that we was going to use and placing them in the order that we wanted them to go in. We was doing this by following the storyboard we had previously done as the footage we filmed was not in the order we wanted it in as we had to film different sections at different times.
Whilst doing this we were told how to do split screen in case we wanted to include it in our production but we decided we didn't want to use it as it didn't fit in with our story. However, as we had a lot of footage we were unable to edit all of it in one day but this was not a problem as Miss Rudhan has booked us in for some extra sessions.

Gathering images & Music for final production

Today in lesson me and my group were gathering some images and music which we could use in our final production. We were looking for some music that would go perfectly with the theme of our production but we did not finalise anything as we couldn't think of anything that we really liked.

Filming our production

Yesterday we started to film the opening sequence of our thriller for our final production. First we started off by going to a cemetery in Dulwhich where we were going to film a short piece of footage that we wanted to include in the final production. When we got there the graveyard looked frosty from the cold and we thought it was would be a really good effect in the film so we started to set up the equipment before it all started to melt. However, one we finished setting up the equipment and was ready to film we realised that the camera wasn’t working so we took it upon ourselves to go to Maria’s house to find out what was wrong, when we got there we tried to charge the camera to see if that was the problem and we found out that the camera wasn’t working because it wasn’t charged so we had to charge it which put us behind schedule a little. Once the camera had finished charging we went back to the cemetery to try again but however when we got there and set up the equipment the light was too bright which meant that we couldn't see anything through the camera so we decided to leave that cemetery to go to the one in nunhead but the lighting was the same there as well so we had to make a decision to either film then or wait until the next day, so we decided to just go to Maya’s house to get on with the rest of the filming. When we got to Maya's we charged the camera and started to set up to film the rest, we then had to start putting the makeup on our actors and setting up outside. When we had finished this we went to our location to start filming, during the filming everything was going well but it was taking long as people kept interrupting and getting in the shot when we was filming which meant we had to do it over and over again and we was also trying to get a variety of shots. After filming outside in the woodlands we went back into Maya’s house to film the final scene of her in the bath dead with her attacker standing over her.
Today we went back to the cemetery to fill the scene that we were unable to film yesterday, when we got there we went to the place where we decided we was going to film and started to set up the equipment. Once we had done this we started to fill the scene. We decided to film some extra parts just in case we wanted to add in more things to the shots we had already got. Whilst doing this scene everything went well.

Animatic

Today we finished drawing our animatic and started taking pictures of it in order to load it onto the computer to gather an idea of how the final product will be. From doing this you can decided on if you want to add or take out anything and you can decide on a definite order for your production as you are able to put your images into order and play them to see what it looks like. You can also use this to help you decide on what type of music you could use to go with your footage. So from doing this we came up with a base of how we wanted our production to be but it wasn't finalised as you have to be prepared for things to go wrong or if you want to change things. We never decided on any music as we thought it would be better to choose that once we had seen the actual footage.

Storyboarding our ideas

Today during the lesson we started drawing up how we wananted each shot to be in our thriller. We decided on what shot types we were going to use like whether they will be close ups, high/low angle ect. We decided exactly where the character would be and what was going to be in the shot with them.

Thoughts and ideas

Today my group stayed after school to think of some ideas for how we wanted the opening sequence for out thriller to be. We came up with two different ideas that we could do for our production. One of which was a psychological thriller about a young child d who was bullied in her younger years which caused her to be mentally ill as she was growing up, we decided that this child would be fascinated with masks as she use to prefer wearing them as a child as other children use to call her ugly. The idea we came up with was that she is in a bathroom playing with her masks and as she leaves to go to her room she looks out of the window into the woodlands and she sees three people wearing mask outside dancing and she turns away in shock to discover when she looks back she realises one of them have a knife and then they disappear. She then goes to her room and starts reading her diary and she starts hearing voices of the children calling her ugly and gets angry and starts ripping it up. And then suddenly the knife that she saw out of the window was on her bed and she starts playing with it.
Our Second idea was of a dead person who's spirit is not at rest as she was brutally murdered and is our for revenge. She has killed many people and now they are back for her. We decided on a graveyard scene where the character will be walking through the cemetery towards her own grave holding dead flowers and when she reaches her grave she screams and throws the flowers down. We also decided on a scene in the woodlands with the main character sitting in the middle of trees with candles surrounding her and rope surrounding the trees. Whilst in there e the people who she had killed would appear from the bushes and tyring to get into the circle but fail. Also we thought it would be good to have a clip of the main character from far but gradually getting closer until she gets so close that you can only see her eyes. All the characters will be wearing a piece of white clothing with dramatic make-up.
After discussing between the group we decided to go with the second idea as we thought it was better and would have a better affect on the audience.

Second case study - Panic room

today i have been watching Panic room and analysing the first 5minutes of it.

First case study- Hide and seek

today, in ma lesson we was analysing the begining of the first 5mins of hide and seek.

Final editing session

Today we were able to add all of our finishing touches to our production to perfect it to the standards they should be at. We added some music in places were we felt it was needed and we were taught how to fade the sound when there was dialogue. Also we added a black and white effect to make it fit in with our genre.

Research continued

Today in class we was reading and annotating some research in order to be able to come up with my own thriller. We were highlighting and annotating things that we thought were important and also things that we thought could help us in the production of our work. We were discussing the sub-genres within thrillers and also discussing Sir Alfred Hitchcock and how he came about and things that influenced him in the work that he was producing.

Editing continued

Today we was editing our preliminary task in order to complete it but unfortunately it is still not finished completely as there are still a few finishing touches to be added. During the editing i came across the fact that the background sound on some of the clips was very fuzzy due to the fact that there was no headphones connected to the camera but I was not able to change this as there was also dialogue in the clip but I am happy I realised this now because it is a mistake that I can learn from and in the coursework I will know not to repeat the same mistake. Today we was told that we could make our production 1minute including transitions as everyone was still struggling to keep within the time frame. Also today we added the effects we wanted to perfect it to how we wanted the production to be and we were also able to add music in the background to give the production the full effect. We were also able to add in some transitions were we feel they was needed in order to make the production flow as smoothly as it possibly could. There are a few things that need to be changed such as the sound fading in places. After today's session I feel happy with the production I have produced and look forward to watching the finishing product.

Becoming familiar with thriller films

During the past week I have been watching some thriller films so i will become familiar with certain aspects that occur within these films. I have also been doing this as I wanted to gather some ideas of what kind of things i would like to include in my production. I have been watching a range of thriller films to get a rough idea of what types of features are included in the different genres within thrillers. From doing this I have been gathering some ideas of how to set out my production. I have been looking at how the codes and conventions of the thrillers are being followed and what makes them interestoing and intreguing. I tried to watch a range of thrillers to see how different sub-genres are carried out and to look at what makes them differ from each other.