Research and Planning Feedback Sheet

I recieved another Research and Planning Feedback sheet, during my parents evening last week, which shows me what I need to improve in this aspect of the coursework. All the tasks that have been set are still in the 'Proficient' column, so therefore i will try and improve my marks and make some of the ticks into the 'Excellent column. Here is what my teachers recommends me to do over the half term, to improve my blog:

Research into similar products and a potential target audience - Some conventions work (more target audience)

Organisation of actors, locations, costumes or props - Reports for progress

Work on shotlists, layouts, drafting, scripting or storyboarding - show more

Presentation of research and planning - Your presentation is getting better but early work not enough

Time managment - More focus

Quanity of posts - You could be doing more

The feedback that my teacher left was: More presintation aspects.      15/20

I feel that overall, I could be improving my blog over the holidays to achieve the most marks that I can. I need to improve my presentation mainly and the quanity of posts that are needed.

Results of Font choice survey

We have chosen font number 3 which is the most popular one on our survey and is our favourite.

Questionnaire for the font choice for our title sequence

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Conventions

Convention 1


One of the main conventions used in the thriller genre are cliffhangers: in Alfred Hitchcock's films, cliffhangers played a dominant role. In Saboteur, they had a literal cliffhanger:

The man on the Statue of Liberty was very good for its time, which was 1942.

Also there was the scene in Mount Rushmore in North by Northwest in 1959, in which there are 2 people hanging from the top of Mount Rushmore.
These two scenes show that cliffhangers/scenes that are very high above the ground are common in major Hitchcock films.

Convention 2

The use of music and suspense are very important conventions in thriller films. This is because they keep the viewer watching and is done well in the Hitchcock film Psycho, where the use of music keeps us watching when the woman gets killed at the beginning but the killer is not revealed and there is a feeling of suspense.

Convention 3

The use of blood, obviously, has a dramatic effect and is a key characteristic for this style of film. In the famous shower scene in Psycho, you can see the blood falling into the plug of the shower, and even though it is black and white, you can still tell that it is blood, which must have been difficult to do as it was made over 50 years ago. Also, you see the motion of the killer stabbing but you do not see it going into the victim's body.

This scene may have influenced other film directors to use blood as Hitchcock was one of the first thriller film makers, and it set the boundaries for thriller films, until over the years films became more graphic and you do see actual people being stabbed.

Convention 4

A very powerful way of keeping the viewer watching and making them know a murder is about to happen is the use of the shadow. The viewer knows that someone could be killed or is being watched, keeping the tension and making the viewer wanting to know what will happen next. When focusing on filming when we are considering the lighting, we could think about using a shadow for a dramatic effect on the viewer.

Conventions of Thrillers

There are various different conventions that Thriller films have. One is use of close ups. In various Thriller films, close ups are used to provide emphasis to different things. For example, a close up of a gun can provide emphasis for something about to happen. This is shown in this image:-

We could use this idea in some way to provide emphasis for the army theme that is strong in our Thriller. Or even use this idea for the science theme that is strong in our Thriller. Here is an example of that:-

Another convention that is strongly used in Thrillers is the over shoulder shot, this gives an emphasis of following/stalking/chasing. I'm not sure if we could use this, but it is a heavily used convention in Thrillers and if we find a place to use this, then it is good to use. Here is an example of it:-

A convention that is used in many Thrillers is the film being about Good vs Evil, or the Protagonist against the Antagonist. We could use this in a sense with our character. Here are some examples of it:-

Ways to create suspence - Alfred Hitchcock

I was looking at different ways to create suspense so that I could include them in my opening to a thriller film. I need to create tension in a short time, with leaving the opening catchy so that the audience will want to watch the rest of the film and not giving too much away in the opening scene. I looked at 'The master of suspense' Alfred Hitchcock's productions of his films.

Alfred Hitchcock used suspsense over surprise in the making of his films, as he beleived that it created a new audience (during the time that he produced his films). He made his films with the use of showing or telling the audience things in which the characters are not aware of yet. This automatically builds tension as the viewers are then unaware of how the character is going to react when they finally know the truth.

Hitchcock uses repetitive props or methods in his films to create a connection to all of his work. For example, the uses of trains are in a couple of his films like 'The 39 Steps' and 'North by NorthWest'. Or the repetition of the main woman character being blonde. In one case, he made the main character die her hair so that she could be blonde.

With all the repetitions and the different ways of building suspense, he has earned his name of 'The master or suspense.' I think that, if it would be possible, to create as many as the techniques that Hitchcock has. This would make the opening to the thriller more intresting and grasping as it holds onto the audience.

Blog Feedback Sheet

We were all given a progress sheet by our teacher to help us improve our blogs. It was set out as a table for our blog with different things that we had to improve and underneath the table, there was feed back for the preliminary task.

Research into similar products          -      Good but demostrate through screenshots
and a potential target audience

Organisation of actors, locations,      -     Show me this in action
costumes and props

Work on shotlists, layouts,               -     More individual posts on this - Show your progress
drafting, scrifting or storyboarding   

Presintation of the research and       -     More screenshots, videos, diagrams and details
the planning              

Quality of posts                              -     Present the posts in a more intresting way

Quantity of posts                            -    Try to do more


My teacher commented on my preliminary task saying 'Good - Consider camera and editing'
From these comments, i will try and follow the recomendations of what was advised to help improve my blog and get a better grade for my work. I will try and make my blog different with the way how i present my posts.

Research Methods and Target Audience

Research Methods:

` Online Research
` Questionaire
` Hand Outs
` Primary Research
` Secondary Research

Target Audience:

` Gender
` Age
` Class
` Religion
` Hobbies
` Lifestyle
` Box Office Figures
` You Tube Hits
` Titles of Thrillers

Thriller Themes

I was thinking about the themes that are constant in many of the thriller films and I came up with this list:

` Crime
` Investigation
` Mystery
` Murder
` Life and Death
` Psychological
` Super Natural

When my group and I makes our opeing to a thriller film, i would like to try and make it not cliche but at the same time, bring in many of the themes as possible to attract more viewers.

2 Minute Opening Credits of 'Bullitt'

Bullitt Opening Credits

0:12 Warner Bros - Seven Arts
0:16 Presents
0:26 Steve McQueen
0:34 In Bullitt - A Solar Production
0:44 Robert Vaughn
0:52 Jacqueline Bisset
0:59 Don Gordon
        Robert Duvall
        Simon Oakland
        Norman Fell
1:09 Featuring
1:10 - 1:17 (actors names)
1:27 Director of Photography
1:37 'Mr John Ross' 'Mr peter Ross' written on the door
1:43 Art Director - Albert Brenner
        Film Editor - Frank P. Keller, A.C.E
        Production Mangager - Jack N. Reddish
1:52 Titles by Pablo Ferro, Films
2:00 Costume Desginer - Theadora Van Runkle

Production Company Ideas

Unfortunately, I wasn't there for the lesson that my group produced the logo as I was on an educational school trip, however, I like the final result as it suits our group name best. I spoke to my group with how they have come up with the name and logo for our production, and they decided that the name of the company should not have any refrence to the films that we make. It would also cover a varity of films, capturing a wider audience. The overall image with the light shining down onto a dark sky with the words 'hyperion productions' written in red suits the company best. Hyperion was the god of light, so the name of the production company and the logo works well together, creating a connection. My group didn't intentially make this connection, however, i feel that it works best. I like the overall logo that my company made, it shows the quality of the company with the films that we make. I was just unfortunate not to be there in the lesson that day, however i am glad i caught up with the missed work.

'A Postcode' which was notes given to us, so we could refer back to them

A Postcode

Audience

Production
Ownership
Syngergy
Technology
Convergence
Online
Distrubtion
Exhibtion

These are the notes given to us, so that it would be easier for us to learn, so we could use it in our exam.

Costume

There are various different costumes we will need for our opening scene. Firstly, we will need white lab coats to keep the look of experimentation and science going during our opening scene.

It would also be good if we got a lab mask as this would make the experiment scene look for authentic to the audience.

Another costume we will need is the army clothing. We will need this to make the audience know that a strong theme in our film is the army.

Another costume we will need is the civilian clothing that our main character, 'Charlie' will be wearing, this could either be relaxed or be clothes that are smarter.

Props

We have in our opening scene, a scientific and army theme. Therefore props could be for the scientific bits, test tubes with liquid in (could be water with food colouring), pipettes etc. We would need these to keep the theme of science and experiments strong in our opening scene. This would make the audience question if an experiment on our main character has taken place.

 For the army scenes, we will need army medals (to keep up the army theme of our opening scene), a real-looking gun(to make the army troops in our scene look authentic).

More ideas for film opening

This is a version of the opening sequence of 'Dexter'. It uses ambiguous devices that lead to the audience believing that certain innocent things are sinister. We need to look at doing similar things like this in our opening scene as we are doing a 'Jekyll and Hyde' type film that needs to make the audience unsure on the innocence of actions. Ambiguity is needed to keep this kind of feel up, throughout the opening scene.

Ways to create Suspense

I have been looking at the ways Alfred Hitchcock created suspense, as he was known as the 'Master of Suspense'.

Hitchcock created suspense in a variety of ways. For example, in some of his films, he showed the viewer what danger there was at the beginning of the scene, and then, making sure the character does not see the danger, lets the scene play out as normal. Creating suspense for the viewer as they know about the incoming danger and the character does not. I believe we should do this in the our opening scene of a Thriller as this seems a very effective technique to create suspense. An example of this is in this clip:-

Thriller Themes

Thriller themes include:

1. Mystery
2. Crime
3. Investigation
4. Life and death
5. Murder
6. Psychological
7. Supernatural

Thrillers involve suspense and tensions. At the end the villain is usually killed and there are lots of cliffhangers throughout. After Kennedy died in 1963, there were political and paranoid thrillers and most of them were made by Alfred Hitchcock.

Timeline of opening credits of the film 'Bullitt'

0.12 - Warner bros- seven arts
0.15 - presents
0.26 - Steve McQueen
0.34 - In Bullitt,
0.34 - A solar production
0.45 - Robert Vaughn
0.52 - Jaqueline Bisset
0.59 - Don Gordon
0.59 - Robert Duvall
0.59 - Simon Oakland
0.59 - Norman Fell
1.08 - Featuring
1.11 - Georg Stanford Brown
1.11 - Justin Tarr
1.12 - Carl Reindel
1.12 - Felice Orlandi
1.13 - Robert Lipton, Victor Tayback
1.14 - Ed Peck, John Aprea
1.14 - Pat Remella
1.15 - Paul Genge
1.16 - Al Checco
1.17 - Bill Hickman
1.28 - Director of Photography, William A. Fraker, A.S.C
1.42 - Art Director, Albert Brenner
1.42 - Film Editor, Frank P. Keller, A.C.E
1.42 - Production manager, Jack N. Reddish
1.52 - Titles by, Pablo Ferro, Films
2.00 - Costume designer, Theadora Van Runkle

Audience Research on the Thriller film 'Inception'

Votes	No. of votes            Average (out of 10)
Males	189,897                             9.0
Females	32,595                                  9.1
Aged under 18	9,325                                 9.5
Males under 18	7,148                                 9.5
Females under 18	2,120                                 9.5
Aged 18-29	164,616                            9.2
Males Aged 18-29	139,628                            9.2
Females Aged 18-29	24,239                               9.2
Aged 30-44	41,668                               8.7
Males Aged 30-44	36,559                               8.7
Females Aged 30-44	4,781                                   8.7
Aged 45+	6,823                                 8.1
Males Aged 45+	5,537                                 8.1
Females Aged 45+	1,199                                 8.1
IMDb staff	53                                      9.2
Top 1000 voters	394                                    8.0
US users	46,885                                9.1
Non-US users	116,092                              9.0

 These are the results of user ratings on IMDB for the film 'Inception'. These results instantly show that the film has been very successful as most people have rated it highly. As most of the voters of the film are male, aged 18-29, I will not be under the illusion that the largest audience for the film is males aged 18-29 as many of the users of the IMDB website are males aged 18-29. From the ratings of the film, it is clear that people aged 45+ do not enjoy the film as much as people under 18, between 18-29 and aged 30-44. This could mean that the target audience for our thriller film would be the younger audience (between 18-29) as they have rated this thriller film higher than the other age brackets. These results also clearly show that there is not much of a difference between males and females on the opinion of the film. This makes it clear that we should not just aim for the male audience, as the female audience also enjoy thriller films.

This is our Thriller Questionnaire

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