Final Cut Thriller - New Breed

Preliminary Task - The Unsuspected

Evaluation Question 7

For this evaluation question, myself and Freddie decided to deal with it using a video commentary. The video consists of us sitting down, and watching our preliminary task, and our final cut of our films and then talking about what went well in both. We looked at all of the areas which included, Cinematography, Sound and Editing. We had a video of us speaking in the top right corner, while we played our preliminary task and final cut videos so the audience could understand what was going on.

Evaluation Question 6

Evaluation Question 5

Evaluation Question 4

Who would be the audience for your media product? (Use www.surveymonkey.com) 

Before we made our final cut, we did a target audience survey on www.surveymonkey.com to find out which type of people watch films. In the pictures above, you can see the questions we asked and the answers that we got. We asked about gender and age. As you can see above, these were the results that we got from 10 people who decided to answer the survey. 6 of the 10 people (60%) were female and 4 of the 10 people (40%) were male. Also, 5 of the 10 people (50%) were between the ages of 16-18, 2 of the 10 people (20%) were 26+. Also, for the age groups: Under 12, 12-15 and 19-25, only one person said that they were in each of those age groups (The other 30%).

From our results, we could see who the audience would be who would watch our film. The results from the gender question was almost the same, so in terms of gender, the audience for our film would be both male and female. The results from the age question are a bit more complicated. For the age rating of our thriller, we decided that we would give it an age rating of 15, due to the disturbing murder scene that minors under the age of 15 may find distressing. Due to this, the audience for our film would likely be teenagers and young adults. It would be anyone from ages 16-30. This is because this age group is usually more interested in watching films than any other age group, and would specifically be more likely to watch thriller films that contain deaths like our film does.

Also, we believe that this age group would be more likely to be the audience for our film because they would be mostly be able to associate with the actors/actresses in the film. All of the actors/actresses are teenagers from a working class background and from our target audience survey, the age group of 16-18 is more likely to watch films. As this age group is within the teenager years, they will be able to associate with the actors/actresses within our film because they would know what they are going through.

Also, we asked people what they like in thriller films. In the above wordle, you can see the words that they said. They are mostly aspects of most thriller films and they are included within our film. For example, there is suspense, chase and weapons within our thriller film and these are just three of the words that people who like thrillers like to see within the thriller films and what they expect and like to see. We saw the results of the questions that we asked and made sure that we included as many of these thriller aspects as possible so people would enjoy the film.

Evaluation Question 3

 In case the poppet does not work, here is a link for it. http://popplet.com/app/#/1701993

Evaluation Question 2

Evaluation Question 1

Evaluation Question 1 – In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our media product was the opening to a thriller movie. The thriller movie has certain forms and conventions that make a thriller movie unique from any other kind of movie.  The conventions of the thriller genre are:

• Red Herring
• McGuffin
• Cliffhanger
• Enigma

In our thriller, we used a red herring. A red herring is when the audience is tricked into thinking that something is going to happen, only for them to be surprised when it doesn’t actually happen. Red herrings are put into thriller films in order to make the audience think about the film, and for the film to be unpredictable. The red herring that we use in our film is the character of Alex. She is the red herring in our film because at the start of the film, she gets robbed of her handbag. As a result, the audience would think that she is a typical woman who is an easy target and who gets scared easily. However, at the end of the film, we learn that Alex actually gets Freddie killed. This is a red herring because the audience wouldn’t expect Alex to be behind it because of the way she is portrayed at the start of the film, and the audience are surprised when they find out that Alex was behind it all along.

In our thriller, we also use a McGuffin. A McGuffin is a sub-storyline within the film which first seems to have big meaning, or a big impact on the whole storyline, but nothing really happens to advance the sub-storyline so it is forgotten and undeveloped. The McGuffin in our film is when Freddie steals the handbag from Alex and finds the USB stick. At first, it seems like an important bit of the storyline because there must be something important on the USB that Freddie needs. However, the audience never get to find out what was on the USB stick and the sub-storyline fades away when Freddie gets the folder, and then is ultimately murdered. The audience then have to think about what was on the USB stick as it must have been important if Freddie was stealing it.

In our thriller, we also use a cliffhanger right at the very end of the film. A cliffhanger is when the film ends on a very critical moment in the storyline, but then it ends with a dramatic scene where the audience want answers to their questions, but they don’t get the answers until they watch the next one. Using cliffhangers within films almost forces the audience to watch the next one because they would want answers to their questions and can only get these answers by watching the next one. The cliffhanger we use in our thriller film is right at the very end when Alex is on the phone and says “Yeah, yeah it’s done” after Freddie has been murdered. This is a cliffhanger, as the audience would want to know answers to the questions that they would have. These questions would be: Why did Carl kill Freddie? Why are Alex and Carl working together? Who was Alex on the phone to? Will they kill again? The audience would want answers to these questions so they would be more likely to carry on watching.

How is our thriller different?

In our film, we don’t use an enigma. An enigma is when a hero has a difficult problem which needs to be solved before dealing with the problem of the villain. We don’t have an enigma in our film, because this is where our thriller is different to most others. This is because there are no heroes within our thriller, as everyone is a villain. Freddie is a villain as he is stealing the handbag. Alex and myself are villains as they organise and execute the plan of killing Freddie. This makes our thriller different to most thrillers because usually, they all have heroes that save the day by overcoming the villain. Our thriller is unique in the way that it has no heroes as the villains of the film kill the villain.

In our film, we also use an animal as one of the main characters. We use a dog as one of the main characters as it is used for a good portion of the film as it chases Freddie after he steals the handbag. This is unique because most thrillers don’t use animals as one of the focal points of the film because of the difficulties in getting it to co-operate. We managed to get the dog to co-operate and make it do its job within the film, which makes our thriller unique to others.

Another way that our thriller is unique compared to other thrillers is the way that we have a female lead character in Alex. Also, she is made to look like a strong character, as she is able to organise the death of Freddie. This is rare for thriller films because usually the lead actor is usually a man, and they are the ones that are overcoming the villain. Also, the women in most thrillers usually have to be rescued by the male heroes.  In our thriller, the lead actress is a woman, and she proves to be smart and successful, as she doesn’t have to be rescued like women in other thrillers. She is able to evil in her ways and is able to kill of Freddie.

What films influenced us?

 One of the films that influenced us in the making of this film is Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960). This film influenced us, because it was one of the first films to have a lead actress who was a female and she was blonde. We liked this idea in that film, and as we had a blonde girl in our group, we decided to use this idea in our thriller film. As you can see from the pictures on the left, the lead actress in Psycho (Janet Leigh) is blonde. Also, you can see a picture of Alex within our film and you can clearly tell that she is blonde too. 

Another film that influenced us in the making of our thriller is the James Bond film Casino Royale (2006). In particular, the chase scene in the video above is the one scene in the film that influenced us with the making of our thriller the most. It influenced us, because we feel that our thriller film needed a chase scene in it, because it is a key part of a thriller film as it puts audiences on their edge of their seat. However, we decided to use the idea of the chase scene from Casino Royale but manipulate the idea too. Instead of having a human chase human like it is in Casino Royale, we decided to have a dog chase a human. This would make our film different and unique to other films. As you can see from our thriller above, we have utilised the chase scene using the dog and human which is different from Casino Royale but is similar.

Audience Feedback

New Breed - Finished Thriller

Peer Analysis of Rough Cut/Focus Group

j

Peer blog review

After completing our rough cut, we asked a group of our classmates to watch our rough cut of our thriller opening. After they had watched it, we asked them what positives that they could take from the film and what they think we did well. They gave positive comments about it and especially praised us about how we managed to get the dog to co-operate in the film. They praised how well we got the dog to act.  We also asked our peers if they had anything that they didn’t like or understand with our film. We did get constructive criticism about the ending of our film and how it wasn't finished and how people may have found it to be confusing. As the ending is not quite finished filming, we already knew about this and will be fixing these errors. It wasn’t clear to understand. Another error that they spotted was the whole car scene that we already knew was a mess. They spotted the continuity error, which was the car door, which was open when Freddie was on the laptop. This is an obvious error as they was able to point it out straight away so that will be an improvement that we will do when we come to filming again. 

Rough Cut

This is a rough cut of our film for our thriller "New Breed'. This is a rough cut as we were asked to make it so we could outline our faults and try to correct them for when we actually finish making our thriller. The rough cut doesn't include the ending to the film.

Mistakes that we need to fix:
While watching our rough cut, we realised that we had made certain mistakes.

1. At 1:38 of the film, the car door is open and closed in different shots which is a bad use of continuity editing
2. At 1:57 of the film, the passenger car door is open and it shouldn't be. 
3. We broke the 180 degree rule at 1:55 of the film and Freddie's hand has a sudden change from top of the screen to side of the screen.

This rough cut has been useful for us a group as we have managed to spot mistakes which we didn't spot before and we will change them so that our thriller opening is as good as it can be.

Looking For Music

This is a few screenshots of when we looked for music to be in our thriller. We went on the website mobygratis.com and looked for some music that we could use in our film. You can see evidence of this from the first screenshot. Once we had found the music that we wanted to use, to get permission to use it, we had to apply for it. We had to put information on why we wanted to use and then what the story of our film was. You can see evidence of this from the second screenshot. We put in our thriller story in the box and then they said they would get back to us within the next telling us if we had permission to use their music or not.

Analysis of Target Audience Research

We made a survey to find out information about people who watch films. Our survey questions consisted of asking about the gender of the person, the age, where you like watching films, how you watch your films and why you watch films in this particular way. You can see the results below.   

We got 10 people to do our survey. 6 of these people were females and 4 people were males. Out of these people, 5 of these people were ages 16-18, 2 of these people were 26+ and there was 1 person each for the age groups: Under 12, 12-16 and 19-25. 

We also found out that 6 out of 10 people watch their films at home, 3 people go to the cinema and 1 person watches films on the go. I think that most people watch their films at home because it means that you can be lazy and watch films from the comfort of your own surroundings. People are more comfortable on their sofas and beds and would much rather prefer that than going to the cinema. 

We also found out that 4 out of 10 people use Netflix/Lovefilm to watch their films. 3 people use DVD's, 2 people use the cinema and 1 person uses sky movies. I think that the majority of people use Netflix and Lovefilm because it is the cheapest option out of the 4 and also you can do it from the comfort of your own home. A Netflix/Lovefilm subscription is usually £5.99 a month, which is alot cheaper than buying DVD's, using Sky Movies and buying cinema tickets. 

We then asked why do you watch films in this way. The majority of people comment on the fact that it is cheaper to use Lovefilm/Netflix and the ease of being able to use these services from the comfort of their own home. Other people comment on the fact that once you buy the DVD, you can watch it as many times as you want and you can watch it whenevr you want. Also, you can get extra footage on DVD's as one surveyor says. 

Editing Update 19/02/2014

Analysis of Film Title

This is the title for our film. We are going to use this at the end of the film. We decided to call our film "New Breed" because it can be viewed in many ways according to our film. For example, one of the main characters in our film is a dog so the title could suggest that the breed of good guys to fight the villains are going to be dogs. This could also suggest that a new group of people are ready to take control.

We decided to use this particular font and transition as we feel that it links in with our film. The transition has been used as it looks mysterious as it comes and goes pretty quickly with a bit of a shake which makes it mysterious. As the rest of our film would be a mystery film, we feel that this title has been used well.

Title Sequence

(1) 'Your Production Company' Presents
(2) A Film by 'One name - usually the director'
(3) Starring or With
(4) Male star
(5) Female star or other way round
(6) Title of film - or could be at the end
(7) Also starring - 2/3/names - each on seperate title
(8) Then 3/4/5 of the following - you choose - each on seperate title
Editing
Music
Cinematography or Director of Photography
Casting
Set Designer
Costume Designer
Script
(9) Then Producer(s) - can be more than one
(10) Always finish with Director - one name, usually the same as A Film By ...
(11) Could put title here
Remember to use LiveType and try to make titles interesting. They can be either over black or superimposed over your film. Space them out over the two minutes of the film.Give the audience plenty of time to read the titles. 
(12) Finish with a fade out & fade music out

Here is our version of it:
(1) 'AFA & Palmer Productions' Presents
(2) A Film by 'Alanta Tarling'
(3) Starring Freddie taylor (fade out)  
(4) Alex Malerich (fade out)
(5) Missy Malerich (fade out)
Carl Palmer
(6) Title of film - New Breed
(7) Also starring - Matt Smith
Alex tarling
Freddie palmer
Amanda Thurlock
(8) Then 3/4/5 of the following - you choose - each on seperate title
Editing - Freddie Taylor
Music
Cinematography or Director of Photography - Alanta Tarling
Set Designer - The Groundskeeper
Costume Designer - Alex Malerich
(9) Then Producer(s) - Carl Palmer
(10) Always finish with Director - A Film By Alanta Tarling 
(11) New Breed
(12) Finish with fade out & fade music out

Mood Board

Certification Analysis

These are the age ratings for all films. All films that get released in the UK will have one of these ratings. 

This is the specification for a U film. 

This is the specification for a PG film.

This is the specification for a 12 and 12A film.

This is the specification for a 15 film.

This is the specification for a 18 film.

Our thriller is probably going to be given the 15 certificate. This would be the certificate because the murder scene in our film will be quite violent and graphic but not enough to be an 18 and too much to be a 12. 

Research into Title Sequences

Before we created our own title sequence for our film, we decided to do some research and look at other films title sequences to be able to get ideas for our own. One film that we looked at is "The Avengers" and we watched the title sequences for this. This is a screenshot of just a few scenes from the title sequence. The title sequence is used to introduce the main actors and the main people who make the film (director, author, editor etc). The title sequence in Avengers does this as seen above. It also gives the audience a look at some of the props that will be used in the film. For example, the iron man suit will be used in the film and this is seen in the 4th picture. Also, the writing is quite small but in a good clear font which is easy to use which we will be likely to use in our film. We feel that doing research on title sequences will help us with our own when we come to do it.

Ident and Ident Analysis

Why We Chose The Name We Did:

we chose the name "AFA & Palmer Productions" because the group was originally called AFA productions with the first initials of me, alanta, and alex in the title. however we had an unexpected member join the group later on in the course. and we did not think adding his initials to the already made name would sound all that good, so we decided to give him a different production name all together and combine the two to make "AFA & Palmer Productions"

Why We Chose The Design That We Did:

We chose this font and design as we went through all of the presets in font and animation before this and they were all either a tiny bit faulty, we couldn't work them out, or looked bad. it took us a long time until we finally made this, and it was made by our newest unexpected member, Carl. 

Analysis of Font

This is the font that our group decided to have for the title sequence of our film. We picked this font because it is clear and easy to read and also has a serious look to it which will fit in well with the thriller genre of our film. The font is called "Franc Gothique Brush" and we obtained it from dafont.com

Animatic

This is the Animatic for our film.

Storyboard

Risk Assessment

Risk Assessment

Group Members: Carl Palmer, Freddie Taylor, Alanta Tarling, Alexandra Malerich

                                                                                              

 Location: Fairlop Waters Country Park

Hazard	Person(s) at Risk	Likelihood of Hazard 1 – Extremely Unlikely 5 – Extremely Likely	Severity of Hazard Outcomes 1 – Very Low Risk 5 – Very High Risk	Risk Level (Likelihood + Severity) 2	Measures to Take to Manage Risk	Risk Managed? Y/N
Might/probably will be very muddy	Everyone	1/2	1	2+1 / 2 = 1/2	Do not spend too much time on the grass	Y
It might rain and/or snow	Everyone	3	2	3 +2 / 2 = 2.5	Try to film some of the film inside, or at a dry place.	Y
The dog doing something dangerous	Freddie and camera	4	4	4+4 / 2 = 4	Make sure that Alex is always with the dog so nothing bad happens.	Y
Other people in the park running into us (kids)	Everyone	4	1	4 + 1 /2 = 1/2	Always be aware of our surroundings	Y

Contacts

Emergency Service:            999 or 07832382876: Freddie’s mum
Robert Clack School:            02082704222
Other Contacts:            `020 8500 9911: Fairlop park rangers