Our Idea

Our idea for our thriller film is to do the sub genre of a 'Horror Thriller'. While talking through our plot we realised that it may be very hard to make sure the audience sees that it is a horror thriller in the first few minutes, as it may just look like a thriller film. Therefore we are going to have to have a think about how to get that horror across into our story line. We may be able to do this by getting a great piece of music which will help show the horror side to it. Other than this we made need to show the woman actually killing the man, however we were not going to do this in the first place because it is going to be a 15 rated film so we are not supposed to dwell on inflicting pain.We are going to have to think about how we can show that its a horror without going across the BBFC guidelines.

Our storyline is to have a woman being all seductive and killing men, she keeps pictures of all the men she has killed in a dark room. We wanted to be able to get across the idea of her printing her pictures, and then have the camera go through the picture of this man to change location to the man sitting in an empty white room where we see the woman killing this man after seducing him. To get all of this storyline into the first few minutes it may make it look too rushed therefore the idea of a dual intercutting was presented to us, where the woman can seduce the man and then intercut to her killing him and go back and forth between these two different times. This could help us get the Horror element across and would also help us in not trying to get too much into these first few minutes, as i feel the slower the scene is the more creepier it could look. 

Horror

As we decided on doing a horror thriller, i decided to look up the codes and conventions of a horror so that we can see what we need to include in ours and think of things that could make our horror thriller different to the usual horror films.

Camera Angles:
Extreme Close ups (emphasize the subject)
Tilt (to create disorientation)
Establishing shots (showing location, stereotypically isolated buildings e.g. mansions or forests)
Handheld (looks realistic, making it feel more believable)
Long Shots (help show the danger or what the lead character is surrounded by, usually isolated)
Tracking (where the camera moves at the side, following a character)
Dollying (where the camera follows the character from in front or behind, to make it feel as if the character is being followed/stalked)
Point of view shot (so the audience can see what the character sees, to feel as if they are looking through their eyes)

Codes and Conventions:
Atmosphere is usually sinister and location often appears dar and isolated.
Montage editing and quick shots in the trailer to increase tension and suspense. Often previews best bits to engage the audience and encourage them to see the film.
Dark music to help increase a frightening atmosphere.
Lead character often ends up surviving and slaying the antagonist character.
The antagonist usually has a pattern in the way they work or kill.
Usually good against evil.
Plot frequently involve themes of death, the supernatural or mental issues.

Our Planning

Once our resesearch was finished we then had to try and decide what kind of thriller we were going to make. From the research, we found out that the most common thriller movies were psychological ones, therefore we decided we did not want to do one of these as we wanted to do something different to what thriller films are out already. By bringing in all of our research and ideas we had, after a long discussion we finally decided on making a Horror Thriller. We thought this was a good idea as the codes and conventions of a horror thriller are quite clear so we thought we would be able to make it familiar but also something new at the same time which is what our audience will want.

we started out by making a brainstorm of  the plot ideas, the setting and the characters that we could use in our Horror Thrillers. Bringing in ideas using the usual conventions of a horror but also ones that would be quite different to what audiences have seen already. Here is our brainstorm:





Once we brainstormed all of our different ideas, we decided to choose one plot idea that we all very much liked. With this in our head we thought of the characters we would use in it, the clothing, the props and the different settings that we could use for this idea. This is what we came up with:





We came up with the idea to break the convention of a horror film where the woman is always the victim trying to get away and the man is the villain, we were thinking that we would change it so that in ours we would have the woman as the strong villain and the male as the weak victim. I feel that we all came up with some very good ideas on what we want to see in the opening of our horror thriller, however i feel that we need to try and stick to some of the conventions of a horror so that the audience will be able to have an idea of what type of genre it is. To help me out i am going to go and watch some openings to horrors and to see how they have made the audience feel alot of tension and suspense while watching.

Continuity Task Evaluation

I feel that me and my groups continuity task went quite well. When filming we had decided to take a couple of shots for each bit so that when we came to editing there were a few we could choose from. This worked very well as it helped us to quicken up the process a bit as we had everything we needed there already. However once we finished shooting and came back to edit, we realised that we had broken the 180 degree rule when Avey had opened the door. This meant we had to go out and film that part again which took up time, however it has helped me to realise that when we come to do our actual project then we should film more than enough so that we wouldn't waste time on having to re-film. Also once watching the task back after it had been edited we realised something was missing. This was that we did not have a shot of the face when Avey sees the note on the locker which would mean the audience would not see her reaction to it which is very important, therefore we had to go out and shoot that again. From doing this the background noise was different in this part than it was in the rest of the film which didn't look quite right. Therefore i have learnt that when making our coursework film we may have to put in the sound after we have filmed it. We also may have to do this with the dialogue because in our continuity task some of the dialogue is quite quiet and difficult to hear, so if we do the sound and dialogue separately it could sound better.

The storyboard was very effective when it came to filming as we then all had an idea of what we wanted it too look like. However, there were some changes made, as when we were filming we discussed some other ideas that hadn't occurred to us before and tried it to see if it looked good. Overall the storyboard helped alot and we did follow it quite closely although there were some changes that were made.

This continuity Task will help me in my actual coursework project, as now that i have had the chance to try and make a short film i have realised how much work and time is needed to put into it. I have learnt that it is always better to film alot so that there are choices when editing and also would be better as you wouldn't have to re film which would take up alot of the time, which would set us back. Story boarding is also very important as it would then save time when filming because you know exactly what you are wanting to shot.

Continuity Task

For our Continuity Task we had to create part of a film which was around 90 seconds. This film could be on anything but had to include a few things, these were:

·                     You must not break the 180 degrees rule

·                     You must include a shot-reverse-shot

·                     You must include a variety of appropriate camera angles

·                     You must edit so that continuity is apparent and meaning is clear

·                     You must include more than one location

·                     You must include some interaction between characters

·                     You must include some non-diogetic sound

Before we could start filming we had to decide on what we were actually going to film. To do this we had to create a storyboard, a script and a shotlist so that we knew what we were doing once we started filming. 


First of all we made a brainstorm of our ideas of what we wanted to do for this short film, these were things such as, what is going to happen, the people that are going to be in it, and part of a conversation.

After this we made a shotlist. On this we needed to write a list of all the shots we were going to use in our film to make sure there was a variety and to make it quicker for when we were filming, we then knew exactly what we were doing with the camera.

Next, we made a storyboard of exactly what was going to be happening in our film, which would again make it quicker for when we were filming as we now exactly what we want to get out of it. This was it:

After we had done the storyboard and knew where the characters would be going and what they would be doing, we decide to make a script so we knew what they would be talking about. 

Once finishing our plan on paper we then started shooting. As we had our storyboard we knew exactly what we needed to shoot. We decided to have Avey as our main character and then Rhiannon as our other character. We all took turns shooting so that we all got use to handling the camera properly, such as, filming so that it is not shaky, being able to zoom in and out softly so that it isn't jolty to the audience therefore keeping the effect of the continuity throughout the film and also being able to know how to create the different angles. When shooting we decided to take shots of the same thing a couple of times with different angles so that when it came to editing we knew we would have a choice over which shot we wanted to use, which would fit in with the rest of the film and to then not have to shoot again. It also meant that from doing it a couple of times from different angles it meant we could have different camera angles in our film. I believe that we managed to keep the 180 degree rule and did not break it. From doing this task i think it will help us when it comes to doing our proper filming as we would have already experienced how to use different camera angles and the 180 degree rule. Also i have learnt that it is helpful to film a couple of times, especially when doing the shot reverse shot as we can cut it to make it look really good. 

2nd audience survey

We decided to create a 2nd survey because with our first survey we were not able to find much information from our audience about what they wanted to see with the questions we were askng them. Therefore we thought harder about what questions we were going to ask our audience and decided to make them more open so that we would be able to get some good feedback to help us decide on what type of thriller we would want to make. the questions we asked were:

1. What are your top 5 favourite films?
2. Pick one of these films and explain what you enjoyed about it?
3. What are your faveourite types of films? select 3:
     Comedy
     Musical
     Horror
     Fantasy
     Animated
     Sci-fi
     Mystery/Suspense
     Action
     Romance
4. Do you prefer a title seuence or the titles to be superimposed over the poening of the scene?
5. Do you prefer the movie to go straight into the action or do you like there to be a slow build up?
















From these surveys we have found out some films that our audience like and gave them a chance to explain why they liked them. This is helpful for our research as it will help us find out what type of genres our audience like and what it is they enjoy about the films that they watch and then maybe create a hybrid or sub genre of these and try to include these in the opening of our thriller that we are going to make.