Audience Feedback

Here are some productive comments people in our class have said about our thriller:

•  Max Waple –

1.      Spy taking photographs, maybe an MP or someone famous.

2.      The camera work and the fact it is in black and white adds to usual twist of thriller

3.      I didn’t understand the end maybe make that clearer

·         Bertie Chatfield –

1.      Private detective sent to spy on a couple, and then to send a message through violence

2.      The use of black and white gave a more tense feeling to the clip, combined with the eerie non – diegetic music

3.      No

·         Ivan Gover –

1.      Detective film

2.      The music and the editing gave it suspense

3.      Nothing

·         Andrew Irving –

1.      A professional killer/ private investigator witnesses a murder

2.      The sinister music and the editing or when the camera takes a shot

3.      The story to be clearer

·         Tom Simpson –

1.      A man stalking a couple which he plans to kill

2.      The lack of speech and the darkness because it builds lots of tension and sound effects to do this.

Evaluation Task 7 - Looking Back At Your Preliminary Task, What Do You Feel You Have Learn't In The Progression From It To The Full Product?

I think that my filming and editing skills have progressed from my prelim task to the final product. Our prelim was very basic, using dialogue and not providing the actors with costumes, just wearing their own clothes. We also used very simple shots and filmed the 2 people trying to get one of them to press an alarm. However our overall thriller was a lot more complicated, as we based it around the 1950s, therefore the costumes had to be 1950s clothes and when doing the editing we had to put the opening title sequence into black and white to fit with the 1950s. From start to finish the, whole day was more complex as we were shooting in different location, therefore we needed a detailed storyboard and also a shooting schedule so that we knew what we had to do at what times.

Adding sound to the two pieces has developed from the prelim to our final opening title sequence. Although we didn't use dialogue in our final thriller, like we did in our prelim, it was still more complex due to the fact that we used soundtracks and added other sounds to the title sequence from soundtrack pro, also heightening the sounds that were already in our clip to make it more realistic. We decided not to use any dialogue so that it fit with the film noir theme. We also had to merge two tracks together which was also more complex than the prelim as we only used dialogue, no music or sounds.



Editing was another big thing that has developed between our overall thriller task and our prelim. We were much more creative when editing our final task as we used final cut pro to create the atmosphere of the 1950s, also creating a shot of reflecting what was happening in the window into the lens of the camera. We put more detail in to the media thriller compared to the prelim task as we had more time to do it. When editing the prelim task shots together, you could see where we had cut them and fitted them together because it did not flow as well as our main task. This is because we were more confident with final cut pro as we had done it before therefore we could tell when shots didn't fit together, therefore being able to make it flow smoothly.  We also used more of a variety of shots in the media thriller such as low angle shot, tracking shots and high angle shots compared to our prelim task. We were more confident with final cut pro when editing the final piece therefore we could explore the different things that could be done to our piece making it much more interesting to watch, such as making a white screen so that it looked like there had been a flash and fading into a still image of the picture the photographer had taken. We did more research for our media thriller than our prelim as we had to find the correct costumes and props for the 1950s so that it fitted the time period and would not look odd. Also we were able to create a title for our final product rather than just having our names which would draw the audience in to watch want to watch it. 

When filming our final media product we knew what more of the buttons meant on the camera meaning that we could film the shots better and in a way that we wanted them without having to ask for help.

Evaluation Task 6 - What Have You Learn't About Technologies From The Process Of Constructing Your Product?

Here is an annotated version of our final product:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTnnnqg4vXA

Evaluation Task 5 - How Did You Attract/Address Your Target Audience

The specific target audience of our film is male’s ages 18 – 44 because the younger end of this age group would enjoy a thriller with guns and a crowbars and the older end would enjoy the film noir part of it. We backed up this information by looking at the user views for China Town and LA Confidential, which is what we based our film around. When we decided that our opening title sequence was going to be a crime thriller, we had to consider the audience we were aiming at.

To attract the younger bracket of the age group we included guns and crowbars, therefore including violence, which would draw any young male in due to the fact that they like violence. We also used a young girl. Although you can’t see her very well this would draw the males in to watch it, we also had the girl in control as the man was being hit with a champagne bottle, therefore females would be attracted because they can see a woman in control over a man. 

   

This shows an argument between 2 upper class, rich people, therefore the  audience can imagine themselves in this position drawing them into the film wanting to know what is about to happen. Also the audience is about the same age as the male and female in the window therefore they can think about how they would react if they were in this position.

To attract the older end of the age group we put our film into black and white and set it in the 1950s. 

The 28 -44 age group would be able to relate to the detective as he is roughly the same age but also relate to the girl as they wonder what is going to happen to her. The fact that she is alone in the room with a man makes the audience wonder what is happening in the room and why someone’s taking pictures of them. The audience could be wondering why there is such a big age gap, is something inappropriate going on, what are they doing in a room alone together and because this is a thriller and relating back to the last task about conventions of a thriller you can presume something weird is going on.

Evaluation Task 4 - Who Would Be The Audience For Your Media Product?

To make our film become successful, we need to establish what our target audience is and what demographic would enjoy the film by relating to the characters. We think that the people that would enjoy this thriller would be well educated, intelligent, males aged 18 - 44. There are a few reasons for this.

We thought that the audience should be intelligent and well educated because the opening title sequence is set in the 1950s, and then in the film we decided that it would skip forward to the future. This would prove that the audience has to be intelligent to realise what is going on. The audience also needs to be intelligent because it is set in the 1950s therefore they need to know about the 1950s and what social groups and demographic groups there were. Also there is quite a lot of jumping in our thriller film therefore they need to be able to work out what is going on.

We thought that it would be aimed at males because they tend to be interested in thrillers. To back this up, I looked up the user views of LA Confidential, which is a film noir, thriller, in the same sub genre as our opening title sequence and is what we used as well as China Town and The Lovely Bones to base our thriller idea around. On the user ratings report below for LA Confidential, it highlights that males take up the majority of the ratings compared to females with a ratio of 1 female:7.5 males. This proves how males are more likely to watch it, also the fact that men like crime films. I also had a brief look at China Town to see what the user ratings report for this was, and this also showed that males were the major viewers of this film. This suggested to me that males were going to be the main audience of our film, and they would also be the people that made our film more successful.

The younger end of the age group, indicated above, would view this film because the film skips forward to about 50 years later so they would be able to relate to what is happening in the film. I studied the information below which showed that males aged 18 - 44 are more likely to watch the film as the younger part of the age group would watch thriller and the older part of the age group would be more interested in the 1950s, film noir, black and white part. Out of 83,000 18 - 29's that have watched LA Confidential, 75,000 of them are males. I also briefly looked at China Town which also proves that the age group that watches it are 18 - 44 year olds.

Evaluation Task 3 - What Kind Of Media Instituion Might Distribute Your Media Product And Why?

Our opening title sequence is a black and white, film noir set in the 1950s. The opening title sequence is about a detective being given a task to follow and take photographs of a man and a woman, later developing the pictures.

I think that the institution that would produce, distribute and exhibit our film is Paramount Pictures, a Hollywood film production company due to the possibility of it being a high concept film.

Paramount Pictures is an American Hollywood film production and distribution company set p in 1912 and is a subsidiary of the media conglomerate Viacom. It was founded by Adolph Zukor and Jesse L. Lasky and currently makes a revenue of $1.2 billion. Paramount Pictures produced thrillers such as China Town, Shutter Island and The Lovely Bones, all of which we used to influence our ideas of our overall thriller piece. Shutter Island is set in roughly the same time period as our film, China Town is a film noir which is what our thriller is and The Lovely Bones is the film that we got our idea of using photos and a window to secretly watch the people.

If Paramount Pictures said yes to our film, they would have a huge implication on our production, distribution and exhibition. If they produced our film, we would be able to have big star actors, that are also very well known. There would also be able to be more special effects and they would be of a much better quality. We would also be able to have a bigger budget because Paramount have more money than any Small British Independent Company. The distribution of the product would be much better using Paramount as the marketing would be on a much bigger scale, targeting a variety of audiences. Also Paramount is a well known company therefore more people are likely to watch the film. Due to Paramount having so much money, they would be able to put the film out to cinemas as well as DVD and Blu - Ray, meaning that it would become more well known and also give Paramount a good reputation and more money.

Black and White Pictures was set up in 1999 by Sean Blowers and Joy Mellins to develop and produce new and exciting quality work for the film. Some of Black and White Pictures films are Sanctuary, Cut and Paste and The Way Home.

Due to this company being a small independent film company, it would be a low concept film, but would be able to create the tense atmosphere that a thriller would need just as well as a Hollywood film company. As it would be created by a small independent company, the cast would be low quality and the film would probably be distributed straight to DVD as they would not be able to afford going through the stages of cinemas and everything else. 

Overall, I would probably choose to use Paramount due to the fact that it is a much bigger company, therefore meaning that the DVDs could be distributed worldwide rather than just in the UK.

Black and White Pictures -  http://blackandwhitepictures.co.uk/

Paramount Pictures - http://www.paramount.com/
China Town - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071315/
Shutter Island - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1130884/
The Lovely Bones - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0380510/

Evaluation Task 2 - How Does Your Product Represent Particular Social Groups?

As our film is based around the 1950s, I have based this around the social groups of this time period. The social groups in this time period are:

• the wealthy, well dressed, well educated people.
• the young, glamorous people
• the poor, not wealthy, poor clothed, work for a living people
• the old people

Our opening title sequence being based around the 1950s uses the first 3 social groups.

When we see the man and the girl through the window, this shows the wealthy, well dressed and the young glamorous people as the girl is wearing a sophisticated white dress and is looking elegant.

The man is wearing a suit which shows he is wealthy and well educated. Also the fact that they are drinking champagne and have a champagne bottle also suggests that they are quite wealthy and upper class.

We also have the photographer and messenger who are not as wealthy and have to work for a living. He is wearing cheap clothes which shows that he is in the poor, lower class bracket.

Overall in our piece we have focused on highlighting the upper and lower social groups in costumes. We have the upper class, rich people in the room and the lower class messenger that is working for the upper class people.

Evaluation Task 1 - In What Ways Does Your Media Product Use, Develop Or Challenge Forms And Conventions Of Real Media Products

Summer In February

On 4th March I went to watch my friends dad film a scene from his film 'Summer In February'. Summer In February is directed by Christopher Menaul, written bu Jonathan Smith and produced by Jeremy Cowdrey. The film stars Dan Stevens, Dominic Cooper and Emily Browning. The company that is going to produce it are CrossDay Productions LTD, Apart Films and Marwood Pictures. It is a British Independent film that is hopefully going to go to cinema.

Summer In February is set in Larmona, Cornwall. It is adapted from Jonathan Smith's novel, Summer In February and tells the story of a love triangle set in the Edwardian Artists' colony in Cornwall. Dominic Cooper has been starred as the artist, Alfred Munning's, who competes with land agent Gilbert Evans played by Dan Stevens for the affections of Florence Carter - Wood played by Emily Browning.

When I went to watch them film this scene, it was very interesting as everything came to life. I saw how they have to put so much work into setting up the scene and all the props. Also, they have to get a person that will stand in the position of where the actor would be standing so that they can check that the camera angle is right. Then they call the actual actors to come when they are ready to shoot the scene with them. Also the cameras they use to film it are very professional. They have to film a lot of shots before they get the right shots and the right angle. After filming the director then has to say whether he thinks the shot is ok and whether it should be done again.

Below are some pictures of some of the filming that has gone on: