Glossary

Hey,

Here are some key words that I will find useful in my media course:

Overall thriller opening experience

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Overall the filming process was really fun and a huge learning curve for myself and the group. We had to overcome many challenges including lighting difficulty, dialogue issues and shots where we accidentally chopped out something important from the frame. We all participated equally in the group and we all brought something to the group project.  

We grew largely since our preliminary task back in November and we have learnt a lot that will help us out in the second part of this course next year.

We all enjoyed working together, we had some disagreements about the thriller regarding certain choices but we were all able to sort it out and come to an agreement. 

We managed to upload the thriller and we got feedback and many people enjoyed it so it was nice to know that our hard work was noticed and appreciated. We are all looking forward to the next part of the cource now we know what to expect and now we are comfortable with our knowledge and understanding of media.

Scenes from our thriller that I filmed

Hey,

When filming I was able to have the privilege to film many scenes as I enjoy filming and the whole process of filming and directing. Here are some shot that I was proud of and why I think they are significant and how they help create suspense. 

In the filming process I made sure that we filmed each shot at least 3 times so when it came to editing we had more than enough shots to choose from if one of them had gone wrong or not looked as we wanted. 

Here is a quote that I knew nd pitched to the group. The black background shows the darkness of the scene and the upcoming story whereas the white writing shows light and presents hope. I suggested this quote for the beginning of the movie to add suspense to the scene and give the audience a preview on what the movie is about. I knew about this quote and pitched it to the group and we all agreed that we liked it, therefore we added it to our thriller opening. The quote is accompanied by heartbeats. This adds tension and builds suspense. The heartbeats can represent how the family and the kidnapped are feeling.

The first scene that I shot was actually the first scene. I decided to change the shot at the last minute and try something new. I discussed my idea with the group and they were all on board on at least trying it out. I filmed the shot in this new way and decided to keep it. I decided to change the scene because If we had shot the scene from across the road we would not have been able to see her emotions which helps portray the story and the mood and atmosphere. 

The second shot that I filmed and directed was a over the shoulder shot of Amy's character walking towards the door. This shot is significant because we can see she is going home and from the previous shot we know she has just been somewhere stressful because of her body language and emotions.  Here you can hear the diegetic sounds of her feet, no other music. This creates an eerie atmosphere and develops her characters portrayal. 

The next shot I filmed was a low angle shot. We decided to have the scene dark so it could foreshadow the events and story that is yet to com. It creates an uncertnty with the audience and hopefully makes them think and question what is going on. I choose a low angle shot to also foreshadow the mood of the character. She is stressed and feeling low, therefore the use of a dark low angle shot was a perfect fit. The shot is important because it helps add to the atmosphere of the scene this then helps the audience when watching to know 

This shot wasn't exactly filmed by me but it was my idea to create. I had an idea that putting the camera in the fridge to see Amy's character reach for the beer would give the audience a different perspective other than looking over her shoulder all the time. It was also something different and I believe it made this scene better as we needed some ranges of shot and I believe that this shot did just that. The miss-en-scene in this scene helps show a family environment, for example the family table and flowers, all suggesting a family environment. 

Evaluation question 7

Hey,

Question 7;
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Looking back at our preliminary task I can see a huge improvement not only on our project but also our group atmosphere and our ethics.

To start, we grew as a group, some of us did not know each other at the beginning of the course and of course this made it hard to communicate with each other at the beginning and we found it hard to get our point across and make sure we all ha a say in what was going on. I am guilty for this as I took the responsibility of the filming and a predominate amount of the editing as I was familiar with it. After speaking with my teachers I made the decision to let the rest of the group help out as well and not take all of the work on my shoulders. This worked out when we started our real task as we where all able to work on the project and excel in what we do best. 

We have also improved in our editing skills. In the prelim the some of the shots were too quick and interfered with the continuity of the piece. We also used a phone camera to film our prelim instead of a camera which of course effected the quality of our footage.  This was a good lesson to learn that we used my canon camera from home to record the real thing. The quality was much better than before and I believe that this would be the first big difference anyone would see when comparing the two.

Additionally we also learnt a lot amount the significance of camera angles and shots and how they can enhance, change and develop a scene. We learnt about new angles that we could use in our opening and how we can use them to represent certain emotions and scenarios. We used camera angles and shots a lot in outtalk to help portray the characters emotions and well as help tell the story.

Lastly we learnt how to use certain fonts and music that goes well with the movie. We had to improve on our audio largely since our prelim, as the voice over we used was sloppy, inaudible and all together not that great to listen to as it overpowered the rest of the scene and ruined the viewing experience. We needed to find a song that wasn't copyrighted which of course the song that we used for the prelim was in 'The Hunger Games' and therefore copyrighted.

The preliminary task was extremely important and a learning curve for us as we learnt to not make the same mistakes and it also helped us make our up to date task the best that is could be. We learnt about the importance of lighting, camera angles and miss en scene can bring to enhance a scene or shot and help develop the story.

Evaluation question 6

Hey,

Question 6;
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

I have always used the program we used to piece together our thriller which of course was iMovie. I have always enjoyed making videos and editing clips from home. However no one can know everything about anything. I learnt how to stabilise shaky clips which I did a lot in the editing process as at times the clip was shaky and looked unprofessional and messy. 

Secondly I learnt a lot about how to develop audio and how you can layer audio clips on top of each other to create a better quality piece. I really enjoyed using IMovie as I was familiar of the program and use it a lot at home. I believe I have a second nature with technology as I have studied ICT since year 3 and completed a GCSE and I am studying it at A level. I also had the privilege of helping out members of my group learn the devices of IMovie with certain aspects of the editing process such as fixing the quality of a clip, adding audio/video and adjusting the timing so the clips ran smoother. 

The second program we almost used was garage band. The reason we decided not to use it as we found that the music we created didn't sound the way we liked and we didn't want to spend too much time just on the music, so we continued our search and eventually found a song that was not copyrighted and that went really well with our media product. 

Lastly I introduced the group to a free legal downloading site where we downloaded the song from youtube to iMovie and used it in our product. This website was easy to use and free of charge which was a bonus as well.

The use of these technologies made us realise how much work that a company would have to do to create an entire movie. Using these mediums have given us great experience within the work and we got used to them quickly and I enjoyed using them.

Evaluation question 5

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Question 5;
How did you attract/address your audience?

We would distribute our movie to local cinemas, that are big named cinemas for example odeon and cineworld, this way we can get the most customers as these cinemas are highly visited, especially visited by our target audience (18-25 year olds). 

Secondly we will advertise our movie using the power of social media. We have decided this because our target audience is 18-25. This age group uses social media on a large scale and regularly. This way we will reach a larger audience and we can not only promote our movie for free on social media by making film accounts but we can also pay companies such as Facebook and Instagram to have adverts of our movie on the specific persons timeline (they will be targeted by age group). Users can share, like or comment on a post which will go on their timeline and ultimately spread the word about the movie for free. We could also use youtube by having the movie beginning, a clip or trailer of the movie before a video. This way the person has to watch the video and they could possibly be intrigued by the movie. I researched movies that I personally saw advertise on Facebook and from my own knowledge and research the movies did extremely well in the box office and I know in my case I wouldn't have known about half the movies I saw advertised if they haven't had been advertised on social media. This is why social media is a great way to advertise a new film release especially when targeted at young adults.

Additionally we would make our trailer as intriguing as possible, so that our target audience would be interested in watching the movie as this would be the only way to get an audience to go out and watch a movie. We would advertise on platforms that this age group typically use and place posters, billboards etc of the movie poster at places that this age group frequents at. 

Evaluation question 4

Hey, 

Question 4;
Who would be the audience for your media product?

Our target audience for our media product is 18-25 year olds. This is because when I conducted our Questionnaire I posted it to Facebook; 

and the main feedback that we got was from two age ranges which were 16-20 and 21-30. Therefore we decided to do the age range of 18-25 as this is the age most people are going out to the cinema and watching thrillers.  We are appealing to both genders as a thriller appeals to both male and female customers. 

We are aiming our thriller at a mass audience because of the company's that are distributing our product. They are large companies that will appeal to larger audiences, so it makes sense to  appeal to this audience. 

Here is a prezi presentation that I created to show our target audience and how and why they were targeted for our thriller;

Prezi on audience