In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The opening titles of a film are the most important features, this is due to the fact that this is what the audience see first, therefore giving them vital first impression of the proceeding thriller. These features of films are the most important not only because they hint at the storyline but also they are the pivotal decision whether the audience continue to watch.
My opening titles conform to the codes the conventions of a typical thriller by:
• Creating the narrative and introducing the themes associated with it
• Establishing the genre – Detective Thriller
• Gaining audiences’ interest by having the clip shift towards the end – from the stalkers perception and from the invisible cameras view. The incongruous sound of the innocent ambient track of birds tweeting overlays this clip making it seem uncomfortable, abstract and strange. This creates jux-ta position and makes the audience feel at ease. This hopefully engages their interest and builds up dramatic tension.
• Having opening credits (below)
• Creating enigmas – like wondering why the photographer runs towards the couple
Our thriller tried to adopt some of the features of the detective/ crime thriller.
However, we also didn’t conform to some of the generic techniques such as:
• Making our opening, stalker like, where it's cliche for the camera to just follow the back of the person throughout the whole of it
• Making the audience jump (sometimes used in thrillers to gain audience attention from the start
• Having dialogue in the opening sequence
• Giving away a lot of information about one character
•Introducing the antagonist / protagonist (s) – Who are the two past victims and the stalker (who you only see at the ending – but only the back of him in a medium blurry shot, this is to add to the mystery of the thriller and enhance our sub-genre)
Phone Booth (2003): Joel Schumacher
These opening titles (above) are from Phone Booth (Joel Schumacher, 2003). I like the base tone in these titles, however the opening theme and modern layout wouldn't suit our piece. Our piece is mainly a detective thriller, although it perhaps could come across as a hybrid of a crime and detective thriller. The opening titles above have a gripping opening title sequence backing track (incidental music), which engages the audience towards their film, therefore encouraging them to watch more. This sequence is heavily reliant on text, where as ours scans images and uses the pictures as a tyrant over text. I think it is important to know who is in the film, however to increase the audience's engagement I would also include some camera live movement or action (but not too distracting).
This clip conforms to the typical conventions of a thriller by having an opening titles, like ours, and introducing the themes which are crime, action and mystery. As an audience member during these opening titles you feel a bit on edge, due to the high graphic of the "3 dimensional" effect and fast pace electronic construction work. This was done to introduce the themes initially from the beginning of the film.
Double Jeopardy (TV - 1996): Deborah Dalton
The clip, above, shows the opening credits from a television series called Double Jeopardy. Although this isn't a thriller movie it has got themes of crime, murder, police, like our opening sequence. The things I like about this opening sequence is the fact that it incorporates the archaic music tones of that era, for example the slow tense music which has the feeling that the action on screen may suddenly become incongruous towards what the audience can see. Also the text font relates to the formal theme of the series - having serif font, which increases the formality of the series right from the start and introduces the audience to this theme from the beginning.
This clip conforms to the conventions of a movie thriller by having opening titles and again introducing themes associated with it, however these are not as evident as "Phone Booth" due to the pan across the cityscape (which could conform to the convention of introducing set and location). This isn't a film, therefore wouldn't be expected to conform as much, however due to its theme it should conform sightly.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
In our thriller the social groups that are highlighted are middle class teenagers who are doing things conventional to their age, genre and life. The girl in our thriller is aged 17 is wearing brown boots, blue jeans and a grey coat. These pieces of clothing represent an innocent teenager which hopefully will retain audience empathy due to her age and vulnerability. The boy in this scene is similar age; his costume consists of white shoes, black jeans, a shirt and a black jacket. This represents him as a typical teenage boy; this conforms to the conventions and stereotypical aspects of a typical teenage fashion. Also the dark colours represent him as perhaps the stronger character and the fact that he is taller reinforces this. The other boy in this opening sequence is similar age to the other two characters and is wearing red jacket, yellow shirt, blue jeans and white trainers. These items of clothing again represent him as a typical conventional teenager who has a conformist lifestyle.
(left are examples of the clothing the actors are wearing in the thriller)
Also the locations of the shots featured in our opening title sequence represent the social areas in which teenagers stereotypically would be seen in. For example the couple walking through a field towards a fence, near a park. Stereotypically, teenagers appear to be seen around parks and fields, therefore this clip conforms to the stereotypical views of teenagers, which many people have. However we tried to portray innocence in this clip by having a romantic couple walking through the open field. These range of shots suggest this couple have quite a strong, loving relationship, therefore hopefully engaging audiences’ empathy towards them, especially towards the end when the man runs after them.
(left are location shots of the types of ares in our film, which we thought would symbolise youth)
We could have gone for the stereotypical youth places like town centre or high streets but we thought it would just be be cliche and too youth based. I think filming it on an estate and field caters for a wide age range from teens to parents and grandparents, who could be interested in our thriller due to the educational and caution issues.
The other boy, his location consisted of a long street near an estate and busy road. This suggests he could be walking to college or a friend’s house. He has a backpack on his back, therefore, adding to the verisimilitude of the teenage boy’s lifestyle
These representations of young teenagers affect the young audience because it helps them relate to the characters and have empathy for their position. They will hopefully also gain and increase audience engagement because they can feel the emotions that the characters are going through due to their similar interests and age.
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
I think optimum distribution company (http://www.optimumreleasing.com/) may distribute our film with the help from EM Media who would provide set, locations, costumes, props etc. I have chosen this because I think our film is aimed at a niche specific target audience who are teen aged or parents, due to the age and location in which the actors are from. Whereas if our film was to be distributed by a major distribution company like Universal it wouldn’t get popularity due to the fact that our actors aren’t well known and it isn’t conventional to the big blockbuster movies which Universal help (in con-junction with others) distribute, such as Bridget Jones’s Diary (Shannon McGuire, 2001), Love Actually (Richard Curtis, 2004) and Notting Hill (Roger Mitchell, 1999). EM Media help produce films by providing them with certain things at a low cost, due to the fact that the films that EM Media aid usually have low budget, for example This Is England (Shane Meadows, 2004). I think our thriller would be appreciated more in local Broadway cinemas across the UK rather than the multiplexes, this is again due to the fact that it would be a low budget film, therefore limiting the familiar cast members or using conventions which majority audiences want to watch.
I would advertise using the inspiration from Universal’s advertising in Bridget Jones’s Diary, 2001. This film used synergy, the mutual benefit of both companies, as an advertising tool to gain the audience’s interest and make the film more popular. For example they marketed with Body Shop, Coke, Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Megastore by having promotions on “diet” coke, which fitting in with the narrative of the story, having offers on flights and body shop products, which again does connect to the narrative of the story. They also used Geri Halliwell, who sang (covered) main song in the film, as a familiar face and pop star at the time, to promote their film and engage audience’s interest.
(examples from romantic comedy advertisement strategy)
Although our film would be aimed at niche audience, and is a different genre, I think synergy is a really engaging way to advertise and promote the film. We could collaborate with certain brand which interest teenagers but also fit in with the narrative of the story like, Sony, Apple, Toshiba – who all could advertise Internet and general safety hazards which could prevent these horrible events from happening.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBpJ4ZuFP8E - this is the website link to "This Is England" opening title sequence(unfortunately the embed code wasn't available). Although this isn't a thriller it gives the impression of low budget title sequences.
The audience for our media product would be working/middle class teenagers and parents who want to know about the dangers of stalkers. This could be on the internet or just verbally. Our initial audience was this, however as we progressed on through filming I started to wonder whether males would prefer this film due to the thriller, fast paced genre with unsolved crime and mystery. I think this would appeal more to a male teenage audience because of the action, however also educational wise I think it’s important that female teenagers engage and watch this as well because the majority of victims sadly are female. I think showing this controversial issue in a modern way in which teenagers and parents can be involved and engage with it is very important to this film and due to the unfortunate real life stories that happen within this topic of “abduction” it has to be filmed, planned and processed carefully.
These audiences therefore will have a knock on effect towards our idea of marketing. As I stated above I think synergy is a very important tool, especially if it’s online, therefore can attract teenagers. Also, due to the fact that it is also aimed at parents, advertising could be leaflets in community centres or posters up in parent centres. Also email advertising could work towards parents and teenagers because most people are up to date with the latest technology. Perhaps offers in cinemas, collaboration with Broadway cinema’s in the UK, offering deals on tickets and food, due to the fact that, especially at this time, everyone wants to save money where they can.
How did you attract/address your audience?
We tried to involve modern fashion, set and props to add to the verisimilitude of the film being modern day, this would hopefully appeal to current and attract their interest because they can feel involved and can relate to certain parts of the film. This would hopefully mean that more teenagers would come and see our film therefore hopefully use different convergence methods to increase the films popularity. We also used typical conventions of thrillers to engage audience such as atmospheric music, tension and enhanced ambient sound. Also we introduced certain characters, including the stalker at the end to create a sense of mystery and confusion.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
I have learnt that you cannot take any shortcuts when producing your film and need to check everything, especially with camcorders and make sure you have the correct screen in all shots. Also consistency throughout your opening sequence needs to be present and continuity errors need to be verified and checked before end of filming session. Also filming sessions take longer than I thought they would take, for a 2 minute opening sequence we spend 5 hours, throughout the whole process filming.
During our preliminary task we used YouTube and found out that it took a while to upload, this is a time consuming process because the internet, during the afternoon in a college environment is being used is very slow and the broadband is being over used. However once it is up to YouTube, it is very easy and fast to transfer it to your blog. When we completed our first draft of “out of focus” we uploaded it over lunchtime, therefore the internet wasn’t overly busy, and therefore it was faster and took just under 10minutes to upload.
The editing process took a while, due to the complexity of Adobe Premier, however I have learnt what effects can be added to enhance the ending product and how different colour modes changed the whole feel of the opening titles. Also I learnt how different tracks enhanced certain parts of the opening titles.
(Above are evidence of Josh filming the field scenes, we all filmed sections, but we didn't always remember to take pictures)
In my preliminary task, we rushed certain parts therefore I learnt not to rush filming in the final product. This aim was achievable and we planned our time effectively, however towards the deadline after the first draft, we had quite a lot to re-film due to technical problems (wide screen issues) therefore we had to rush some of the filming, losing certain effects and natural scenery, because some bits had to be filmed in college.
I have also learnt the importance of filming certain shots more than once to prevent last minute filming or editing if one shot has the wrong type of ambient sound or is unevenly filmed. Also the varied angles and movements of shots is important because, the more varied it is the more interesting it looks and will increase audience engagement.
In my preliminary task I broke the 180 degree rule, however I couldn’t fix this in our final product because we didn’t have many obvious conversational scenes but I have learnt so film within 180 degrees of the person opposite and how unprofessional it looks if you break this rule, unless you are going for abstract and confusing effect. However in the last half of the thriller (more evident in the draft) we have two shots from Sophie’s back showing Tom’s face (1) and vice versa (2) which could be classed as a shot-reverse –shot, Which doesn’t break the 180 degree rule.
(above are the examples in my preliminary task where the 180 degree rule was broken)
(1) 
(2) 
No comments:
Post a Comment