Storyboard For Preliminary Task

The preliminary task helped me in many ways:

• I got used to the camera equipment
• I got used to editing using the Apple Macs
• I got used to all the different camera shots, angles and Techniques

Overall the preliminary task helped me fulfill the needs of the main task, as when we were filming the main task I had already had the experience of filming and could therefore confidently film, using all the needed shots and angles.

I could also use the Apple Macs a lot easier as I had a better understanding of how the editing programme worked. Therefore when editing the main task I knew where to find all the different types of transitions etc.

Planning of Location

We had chosen to use Codicote Bottom as our location for our Thriller. Codicote Bottom is woods and is perfect for our location. This is for many reasons.

We will film our Thriller in the early evening, and therefore the lighting will be dark and dingy. As it is nearly pitch black the trees in the woods will create shadows, this will create tension. Also when the wind blows and howls through the trees and bushes it will give a ghostly feel to the thriller opening scene. It will also give a sense of mystery.

Also by having the perfect lighting it will fit the conventions of a thriller well and it will create tension and anticipation of what is going to happen next.

Woods are not a usual pathway home, so it will make the audience wonder what is going to happen next, this creates suspense.

Overal we felt that this location was perfect for our thriller film as it fit the conventions of a thriller and we thought that it went very well we our plot.

However when filming our first scenes, we came across many problems. When we eventually got there after school we found that it was far too dark to film. As codicote was far away we then decided it would probably be best to look for a closer location that we could get to easily.
Therefore we then looked at filming it at Ickleford Woods. But we soon realised that although it would be a good place for a thriller to start, we realised that it would take away our storyline. It would not fit with the idea of the 2 girls walking home as by looking at the pictures below you can see it was set near a train line.

But then we found a closer and better location, this is the woods near our school. This was obvioulsy the best place to film our thriller as it fitted the conventions well and also fitted the plot well. Also it was so close to our school therefore there was easy acces to it and we could manage to film after school as it would not be too dark.

The picture above shows where the man will be standing between the trees. We think this looks good as it gives a sense of mystery and as the man will be standing with a hoodie on we will not be able to see him very well. Which is what we want.

The picture to the right shows what the over the shoulder shot will look like with the man and the photo. Also looking at the girl walking off around the Blind Corner!

The flashback part of our opening scene will be filmed at Alices house and this is because it is a old and very mysterious house. We feel that it will create a lot of tension and scense of mystery.

Below is some pictures of the house and some pictures of the shots that we would like to do.

Planning of Characters And Actors

Annie - Played by Francesca (our friend)

Annie's Friend - Played by Elizabeth (our friend)

Man - Played by Sam (our Friend)

Annie is the central character and has a friend. We have not given Annie's Friend a name, this is on purpose as we don't want to draw attention away from the central character, Annie.

We are using to play Annie as she is 'the girl next door' and comes across very innocent. She fits the vulnerable character of Annie very well. Also we have made her wear bright red shoes, to try and fit the steryotype 'dorothy' character. We think taht this will also make her stand out more

Elizabeth is going to play Annie's friend as she is her best friend in real life and therefore there will be a connection between them and it will not look fake. It will generally look in the film that they are good friends.

We are using Sam to play the part of the Man that watches Annie in the woods. This is because he is older and will appeal to the target audience well. We will dress him appropriately to make him look more scary and mysterious.

Costumes

Fran and Elizabeth will be wearing their normal school Uniform, to indicate that they are walking home from school. Fran will be wearing red shoes. This is to show that she is the main character in the film. Therefore she will also stand out a lot more.

Sam will be wearing dark coloured clothing, this is so that he does not stand out. Also to make him look mysterious and scary. He will have his hood up on his hoodie, so that we can not see his face very clearly. This will also create mystery, and anticipation of who actually is the man.

Ideas For The Title Of The Thriller

As a group we have thought of many ideas of what the title of our film could be. Here are some ideas;

Annie, Ruby (after the characters names), The near encounter, Encounter, Near Miss, Too Close and Blind corner.

After thinking up of these names, we did an audience survey of what title they most liked and asked them for any feedback, these are our findings.

Annie 3
Ruby 0
The near Encounter 5
Encounter 0
Near miss 6
Too Close 0
Blind Corner 8

The numbers represent how many people liked the idea of the thriller title.

The people that we surveyed were of all different ages in our 15-25 target audience. This gave us a good idea of what they would like to see. We also told the people the plot, so that they could give us again an idea of what title would work best.

We quickly realised after doing the audience survey that by calling it after the characters name, we probably would not create as much interest. This is because it does not sound like a thriller film, it sounds like a sweet and Innocent film. Which it is not.
We liked the idea of The near encounter but then also realised that it by watching the opening credits and then knowing the film title, it would make our audience think that Annie got away and was away from harm.
We were left with Near Miss and Blind Corner as these were the titles that people liked the most.
We have chosen to use Blind Corner as the title for our film. This is because we felt that it would make the audience think about the film in more depth, also we think that it would get them more involved. The title gives us a sense of mystery as the opening scene does show that she has made the wrong turn, as there is a man following her. It makes the audience wonder what other wrong turns/decisions is she going to make during the film. Although we have found that this is a title of a film already, we have given our film a twist as the original film is a horror. Our film is going to be a thriller film and therefore is different to the horror version.

We decided not to use Near Miss as our title as when the audience saw the opening sequence and then the title, they would think that the girl was fine and that she was away from harm. it would make them think, 'is this a thriller'?

Our Target Audience and Genre Conventions

For our Thriller film we have decided on a target audience,

 

To be specific our target audience will mostly be:

• 15+
• Males and Females
• Male and Female Students as it will relate to them more, but also 18+ people who have got normal working class jobs.
• People who are interested in Thriller Films, and like the sense of mystery in films. Also being on the edge of their seat during a film, and people who go home and still think about the film once they have seen it.

The certificate of our film will be a 15. This is because we feel that our thriller would contain scenes that would not be suitable for children under 15 to watch. We think that some scenes may be too disturbing, and scare them. Also our thriller will contain mild swearing.
We have planned to meet the expectations and interests of our audience in many ways. We have planned our opening sequence many times and have thought of as many possible ways to grab our audience in the opening 2 mins. To meet their expectations we have watched many other thrillers and analysed them to see what works and what doesn't. Following this we asked many people in our target audience what they like about thrillers and we have tried to transfer their thoughts into our opening sequence. We have tried to match our audience's interests by making our storyline relevant to what they like to see. Also we will try and get our audience involved by using current issues and events in their everyday lives to help our thriller appear more interesting and appealing to them.
We have considered our audience when planning our thriller by doing many questionnaires as already stated we asked people in our target audience what they like and dislike about thriller films. We have also done questionnaires on what title they preferred (see post Ideas For The Title Of Our Thriller). We also did questionnaires to see what font for the title our target audience preferred. We did some research which showed us what age certificates some thriller films were given. This advised us what age certificate to put on our thriller film.
Our chosen target audience would be encouraged to watch our thriller as it involves people of their own age, so they can relate to them. Also it is not a full on scary thriller, it holds a sense of mystery and this is different to many other thrillers.

To target our selected audience, we will make sure that adverts pop up on msn, facebook and all other social networking sites, that the age group will know. We will also have the trailers appear on the television, but obviously on at a time suitable, just so that children are not scared.

 

Genre Conventions

Our thriller stands out as being original and unique, and this is because it does not have the same storyline as many other thrillers and we have aslo used actors of a younger age, which is not normally seen.
Our thriller meets the conventions of the thriller genre in man ways. For example it includes;

•  A flashback scene
• Black and White scenes
• A morally ambiguous charatcer
• A vunrable character
• Action being built up in a number of ways
• A soundtrack which fits the scene and genre

 The planning of our thriller matches the ideas of some of the other thriller opening sequences that we have watched, for example we have built up the action and suspense very quickly just like it does in The Usual Suspects.
We have also included the sense of confusion and anticipation like it does in Psycho.

Institutions Producing The Thriller Genre

There are many different institutions within the Thriller genre.

To start with there are many different animation studios, that have all done some sort of CGI for thriller films.

• Blue sky Studios (20th century fox)

These have made brilliant CGI films including Ice Age and Robots. They specialise in photo-realistic characters and animation.

• New Line Cinema

Often known as New Line, was founded in 1967 and is one of the major American film studios. It has helped films like Se7en distribute and they have also worked alongside the production team.

• Touchstone Pictures

Helped with producing and distributing Flight Plan. Established in 1984, and is under one of the many labels of Walt Disney pictures. It releases more mature themes, e.g thrillers. rather than the typical Disney child films.

• Miramax Films

Is an individual film division of again Walt Disney Pictures. They act as both producers and distributors of films such as Hostage. It was the leading independent film company in America until Walt Disney acquired it.

• PolyGram Filmed Entertainment

This was the English film company that helped with The Usual Suspects. It produces many films using other companies help on many occasions. The usual suspects had an English company helping it, an American company and then a company to manage the worldwide scene.

There are many ways of using music in a film and there are different institutions of getting the music into a film.

1. Musical film soundtracks, where the musical company record their song and allow the film company to use it.
2. Film scores where they showcase music in the background from non-musicals, this is usually music that has been composed by someone and made.
3. Music from pop albums/albums in the music industry, these are soundtracks of music that is already in the music industry, therefore the film company have to ask permission to use it.

Significant Developments Within The Genre: The Introduction To CGI

The obvious development within the genre and over all genres is that we now have our thriller movies in colour.

The film Psycho was in black and white and although it gave you a sense of fear and tension, it was not good as you couldn't quite relate yourself to the film. Nowadays thriller films such as se7en are in colour and they use it to there advantage. They use it to create dark shadows and cause us to be on edge throughout the film.


Another development with thriller films is that they used to be more physiological rather than having a fast moving plot. Take Psycho again as an example it was very psychological, and now the thriller films combine psychological elements with fast moving plots etc. The Bourne Supremacy (2004) has a fast moving plot and has many special effects and is very different to Psycho. They were mainly psychological because they did not have the advanced technology that we have now days, so therefore they made there thriller films play with your mind, rather than make it fast and exciting.


CGI is Computer Generated Imagery and this has made the thriller films fast and exciting using animation and many special effects.

It is a relatively new concept within the thriller genre. For example when Thunderbirds was released we could see the strings of the puppets etc. Now in the thriller movies we have people flying through the air, e.g Spiderman etc.
The first films that were heavily created with CGI were Tron(1982) and The Last Starfighter(1984). These films were commercially a disaster.

It was the film Jurassic Park in 1993 that revolutionized the film industry. As the dinosaurs fitted in seamlessly within the action scenes. 3D CGI became a success.

Then 2D CGI became increasingly popular and was used with the traditional animated movies such as Beauty and the Beast.

In 1995 the first fully CGI animated film was produced, Toy Story. This film was a big commercial success.
After this success many other animation studios went into production. (see Institutions Producing The Thriller Genre)

Thriller films benefit lots from CGI because many of the scenes now look realistic and they also help with all the needed conventions within Thrillers.

Now many other types of genre are using CGI as it is so effective.

Sub Genres Within The Thriller Genre

There are many sub-genres within the thriller genre. For example there are;

• Psychological Thrillers -these are where the conflict between the main characters is mental and emotional, rather than physical. The Alfred Hitchcock films are well known for this type of thriller.
• Medical Thrillers - These are where the main characters, hero's and heroine's play doctors or something involving a medical profession.
• Action Thrillers - these include a lot of violence and often a race against the clock. Also include guns and crime. They have a sense of mystery to them. A good example of these films are the James Bond movies.
• Drama Thrillers - These include convention of both thrillers and dramas. We get to know the character more and we see many plot twists along the way.
• Disaster Thrillers - these often have a natural disaster like floods for example as the main plot of the film.
• Crime Thrillers - These are where the film concentrates more on the crime that has taken place than the mystery of finding out what has happened, by detectives. For example Se7en is an example of a crime thriller.
• Conspiracy Thrillers - Is where the Hero or Heroine confronts a large powerful group and only they know the true extent of what the powerful enemies are. JFK is an example of this type of thriller.
• Political Thrillers - Is where the Hero or Heroine must make sure that the government stays stable.
• Spy Thrillers - This is where one of the main characters work as a government agent and they have to take violent action against a rival government. An example of this type of thriller is Mission : Impossible.