Question1- In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Question1- In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

I constantly looked to develop the generic conventions of the thriller genre within my media project in order to replicate the effects created through the use of these conventions in the hope of achieving the same success of the films that used these conventions in a similar if not identical way. 

The most frequent convention associated with the thriller genre is that of a female victim. This convention is generally used to elevate the level of vulnerability portrayed by the victim, as females are considered more submissive and weak as apposed to men. The more the audience perceive the victim to be vulnerable the greater the relationship between audience and character. So when the victim is being stalked all effects are heightened such as tension when she is hiding from the antagonist, as the audience feel more involved with the characters and what they are feeling. A popular example of a thriller film with a female victim would be ‘Taken’ where a former CIA operative’s daughter is kidnapped and trafficked into the world of sexual slavery. The use of a female victim within this film (the kidnapped daughter) helps to elevate the effect of vulnerability that comes with the thriller convention of a female victim as a young female (a image of which can be seen on the right) are weaker and therefore easier targets for traffickers. Which creates allot of tension and suspense within the narrative as the CIA operative has less time to get to her and save her.

I used the convention of a female victim in my thriller opening in the hopes to achieve the desired effects of vulnerability and therefore increase the tension and suspense the audience feel as a result as they begin to build a relationship with the female victim, building the sympathy they feel towards her. An example of which would be the high angle shot used at 2:10 as it is vary effective in perceiving the female victim in a much more vulnerable way as the high angle shot portrays our female in a way that makes her appear small and helpless. The female victim is also blonde and tied up in the ‘shed’ leaving her helpless building on the idea of vulnerability that the thriller convention of female victim possesses. The quotations of a blonde female victim make the female victim appear more pure, beautiful and innocent and therefore more vulnerable to antagonists. Taking inspiration from popular thriller films such as ‘Psycho’ by respected Thriller director Alfred Hitchcock the thought a blonde female in particular was an essential within our narrative as when used in generic thriller films in was effective in conveying the themes of tension and suspense which make a thriller film so effective.

The next generic convention of a thriller film is a masked antagonist. This is commonly used to represent how anybody could potentially be the killer created an atmosphere of mystery. This mystery in turn makes the thriller more effective in portraying the conventional effects of tension and suspense as we as an audience an afraid of the unknown. However the way in which the antagonist conceals his identity within a film is detrimental to the effect they are looking to covey. An example of a thriller film in which this example is used would be ‘Scream’. The ghostly mask seen on the right connotes characteristics of stealth and death within the antagonist and therefore increases suspense, as the audience are unaware of when and where he will strike from.

Contrasting the Scream mask would be clowns mask in the film ‘IT’ which can also be seen to the right. This is contrapuntal as a clown is suppose to signify happiness and laughter however in this thriller it has be used to produce more sinister effects such as fear as a clown is a common relatable childhood fear.

I have followed this convention within my thriller opening through the use of concealing the antagonist with a mask that can be seen bellow. As a group we agreed that the clown mask in ‘IT’ was scary and the contrapuntal effect was one that we hope to replicate in some way into our work. The antagonist’s identity being concealed also enhanced suspense and tension as it creates an enigma. Viewers are unaware of who the killer is and so they continue to guess who it is throughout the film keeping them enthralled in the narrative. I was always looking to make my themes relatable to thriller conventions such as hidden identity as the thriller conventions create the effects that all successful thriller have, tension, suspense and fear.

 My thriller film shows massive similarities to ‘Halloween’. They both share the same general conventions as I took massive inspiration from it as I identified it as a generic thriller film, one if which that defined the thriller genre. One of which was a female victim. The female victim used within Halloweens opening is naked suggesting that she is defenceless to the antagonists attack. Although we could not replicate this idea into my work as I thought nudity was inappropriate for my target audience of young teens and I wanted to maintain an age certificate of 15, so I looked for other ways I could make the female victim appear more vulnerable and I used a blonde female victim to do this. This effect was also used within Halloweens opening.

The POV effect that was utilized by both my thriller opening and Halloween. This shot makes the film feel more realistic and insights more fear as the viewers become increasingly aware that anyone is capable of murder. This particular camera shot is relatable to the thriller genre as it creates tension through seeing the murder through the killer’s eyes and tension is what thrillers always look to achieve in the filming

Angles are also a significant point of comparison within both works. Different camera angles help to create different effects and make the film feel more dynamic. For example a high angle shot is used within the opening to adopt the convention of vulnerability and portray the female victim in a more vulnerable way. This then creates a relationship between the audience and character on screen. Helping build more suspense as it is furthering the audience's ideas of the characters feelings/emotions making them feel more sympathy for her. Their uses within Halloween make the film feel more real and believable, helping the audience to build a relationship with the characters on screen, as does my thriller opening.

I would argue that my thriller film is that of a conventional one as throught planning as well as production I constantly looked to use inspiration taken from other conventional thriller films such as Halloween. An example of this would be from point 1:21 to point 1:36 during my thriller film as the point of view shot is similar to that of Halloweens, (see image bellow).

I hoped to replicate the tension taking inspiration from Halloween, as I found that a POV shot on the antagonist, particularly when watching the victim, was really effective in making the audience feel uneasy, as if they where being watched themselves and therefore increase the suspense within the film. Similarly I used iconography in the form of a knife to elevate the sense to vulnerability on top of the antagonist watching the victim. Therefore I would argue that I was able to make my thriller opening conventional through researching and taking ideas and conventions from previously successful films in the thriller genre.

Evaluation introduction

Evaluation

My brief was to create an opening two-minute sequence, for a thriller film which included the credits and a soundtrack. I also had to create a blog to document the planning and research that I carried out.

To complete the task of creating this thriller opening sequence I worked within a group. My group consisted of me, Daniel Armstrong and Reggie Witham. Daniel and me paired up imminently and we where allocated Reggie as an additional group member to complete our group.

The production roles our group identified as the most primary where director of photography, director of editing, director of sound and actors.

Director of photography- Daniel Armstrong was assigned to this production role and was responsible for operating the camera. Determining how scenes are shot, how closely/far away the camera is from the character/object on set as well as controlling the lighting on set. 

Director of editing- The director of editing was tasked with piecing the film together using computer program ‘Final cut Pro.’ Inserting effects and music to make the film feel more real and dynamic. (For this task two group members where used. Me and Reggie. as apposed to one as the size and importance of this production role was huge.)

Director of sound- I took on the role of the director of sound and was responsible for all sound on set. Whether it was diegetic or non-diegetic I would use sound to, in the case of our thriller opening, increase the effects of tension and suspense. 

Actors- A primary production role in all filming, actors play a huge part in defining our opening and what we want to portray. Our actors where Cara Gaffney (female victim), Daniel Armstrong (Antagonist) and me, who played a small cameo part as the victims boyfriend at the start. As an actor our jobs where to follow instruction and the script to ensure our director of photography (Daniel Armstrong) gets the desired shot.

With creating a thriller opening with out any first hand experience being a pretty dawning task for us to take on our group thought It was imperative that every group member was allocated at least one of the above production role’s within the creation of our thriller film. This would help keep our thriller opening on track and all group members would be able to share all potential ideas allows us to make a opening with good conventional thriller genre ideas as well as allows every group member to get involved with the project. They will also be specialized in the specific task they where allocated allowing them to become more familiar with the techniques and allowing them to become better at it, making our thriller film better as a result.

In order to allocate each member of our group a specific role we sat down and all wrote down any relevant experience or skills we had that where relatable to the project. This was done to make the group feel comfortable with the task they where assigned to do as they had previous experience doing it and had a basic understanding of how to complete it, this made the group member more motivated to complete the task to a good standard.

My production role was the director of sound as I had previous experience working on the Garage band application through school use as well as some home use. I was responsible for overseeing all audio aspects of my project, diegetic and non-diegetic however my main duty was to produce a soundtrack to be played throughout my thriller opening. This was a vital job in order for my thriller opening to be successful as much of the thriller openings tension is sourced from the music that is being played in the background and so I look at previous successful thriller opening on YouTube such as Shutter island, Insidious and Se7en to take inspiration and replicate the effete that they created. Although after creating my soundtrack our group opted to use another piece, which they got from an audio sharing site called www.freesound.org.

From my time being director of sound I have learnt the basics of what it takes to become an effective director of sound using the variety of sound techniques at my disposal such as music and dialogue to enhance the effects of tension, suspense and desperation our group is looking to achieve with the filming to thriller opening, conventional of the thriller genre. I also increased my teamwork skills as working within my small group of three pushed us to work together combining points and notes to achieve an opening we all thought appropriate. As well as this I also gathered a more advanced knowledge of sound in media, learning new terminology and techniques to make my work even more effective.

Overall I would say that my group performed well with one another one the project. As they where able to specialize and excel in the task they where individually assigned and as a result we where able to spend more time as a group on the harder tasks that took longer such as editing making editing done to a excellent standard. The only problem we as a group encountered was the naming of our film. With suggestions from my group members such as 'the disappearance' and 'the taken’ feeling to generic, I put forward the title name of 'Phobia' relating to the target audience of teens relatable 'phobia' of clowns (our antagonist) which was ultimately chosen as our films title. As we where all familiar with one another we felt comfortable talking and conversing ideas with one another this made communication much easier and as a result I would argue that it increased our productivity and quality of our work as a whole.

During the course of planning my thriller opening our group incorporated as many thriller conventions as we thought necessary. In doing this we are making our thriller film more convention and therefore more effective in the portrayal of the conventional thriller effects of tension and suspense.  So yes I would say that our thriller film is a successful one as a result of relating back to its conventions to support our points.

Thriller comparison- Miss Georgiou

I would argue that my thriller opening is successful as i have ensured that i have used many of the thriller conventions such as vulnerability, a blonde female victim and lighting. In using these conventions i hope to achieve the same success that the films i took inspiration from did. The combination of cinematography with mise-en-scene, setting, costume and sound complimented the film and made it feel more suited to the thriller genre as all elements looked to produce tension and suspense with the narrative. An example would be in the picture bellow one minute into our thriller opening.
The darkness is a representation of isolation and vulnerability as the victim is unable to see as they have something covering their face. This as well as the conventional thriller soundtrack and the struggling dialogue from our female victim sets the typical thriller scene, one that is conventional to the genre and in order for our thriller opening to be successful it had to also be conventional.

Arguably i would say that although our characters where essential in the development of a audience/character relationship and the source for most of our tension without our opening i would say that lighting was our most influenual micro element when i came to our creativity and understanding of thriller conventions. We understood that in order for our thriller to be that of a conventional one low key lighting needed to be prominent throughout and so we looked to do this but we encountered problems with filming. The set became too dark to film and so we thought that by using small lights he could light up the set in a eerie yet professional way to ensure we could get the correct scene.
As you can see in the pictures bellow the two lights provided an excellent contrast of both low and high key lighting allowing us to take advantage of the low key lighting convention and create a mysterious blurry effect in doing so which allowed us to further the concept of hidden identity and mystery surrounding our antagonist and his motives.

If was to compare my thriller opening to a successful thriller opening i would have to choose Halloween as i took allot of insertion from it to make it as conventional as it is. The similar use of the POV shot which can be seen bellow is conventional as it helps builds tension as the audience is put in the antagonists shoes, and are unaware when or what he might do, allowing them to understand his mental instability and therefore further the tension and suspense as they know that he is unpredictable.


                     Halloween P.O.V

Phobia- P.O.V (My thriller opening)












Although not completely identical we both shared to same general concept that seeing from the antagonists point of view made the film much more tense as the audience are unaware what they are going to do. Halloweens P.O.V shows the antagonist watching the female victim. Her femininity, beauty and blonde hair suggests venerability.  Her being naked also suggests that she is defenceless to the attack, furthering my initial interpretation about her vulnerability during the scene. The theme of vulnerability is why they are used again and again as easy targets for murderers throughout the genre as the audience feel even more scared of the antagonist as they are killing a symbol of western vulnerability. This contrasts my P.OV as i focus more on the iconography, the knife. I do this to enhance the feeling of danger to relatable to the more modern thriller conventions of violence and gore in films such as Last house on the left. As the antagonist paces the room, focusing on the weapon builds tension making the audience feel uneasy. So in taking inspiration from films such as Halloween i am able to make my film conventional and therefore successful.

Audience Feedback- Miss Georgiou

Audience feedback is essential in creating any successful production. It allows us as the producers to produce film that is effective in reaching its desired target audience, which is in our case young teens (13-16 years old). Without audience feedback through focus groups, questionnaires, pre screening etc we would be unable to accurately pick what effects, miss-en-scene, cinematography, setting or music would be the best to use in terms of making our thriller opening as conventional and targeted to our audience as possible. Therefore through the use of audience feedback i am able to identify what would make of thriller successful through communication with our potential audiences.

I was able to get audience feedback on my work through screening it to my peers and group members. From this i was able to get constructive criticism on areas i could change to make it more convention to the thriller genre and therefore achieve a higher mark. An example of this would be when a friend suggested that i should add an effect that would work with the music in order to make the film feel more dynamic. I choose the static effect that can be seen bellow as i would argue that at certain points within my soundtrack it gives a jumpy, unsetting, sinister effect, and is what you would expect to hear in any conventional thriller film. This particular type of audience feedback i found much more helpful as apposed to others such as questionnaire and focus groups as after someone has viewed your work they are able to gain an idea of the context and so potential ideas and effects can be applied more accurately and not just for the sake to make it more conventional but to make it feel much more suspenseful.

The feedback i got would benefit my production as it would be more appropriate to the audience it is being targeted at. If i screen it to my peers, which are consequently my target audience, i will be able to make my film more effectively in reaching and invoking tension and suspense within this certain audience. So for example audience feedback played a huge part in our character development within our production. We consistently received feedback that relatable characters where essential within our film and so we tried our best to do this using age and even costume through the use of the antagonist wearing a tracksuit; a relatable outfit to the youth of today. This feedback was also relatable to many  conventional thriller films such as The last house on the left where a young blonde victim is used to be relatable to its target audience of a similar age range of 14-18.

This feedback is helpful to the film industry in general as it allows them to get an idea of what their audience want or don't want in a film and allow them to see what ideas would be more tailored to the film and its audience. This feedback is also relatively inexpensive all they will need to do is pay for an audience if they don't want to come willingly which would not be much for media conglomerates such as Warner Bros.

We received many positive comments on our setting within our thriller film. Joe Wagh in particular was quoted saying "your setting is really good because it is conventional to the thriller genre". Reflecting on Joe's comment i would argue that he was correct in that are setting is that of a conventional one. The isolated shed in contrast with the modern car park shared both modern and aged thriller conventions to ensure we got a varied share of both to make our film as conventional to the thriller genre as possible.

Another one of my peers; James Barry, gave us positive feedback on my characters saying "they are relatable to your audience". With our target audience being 13-16 years old we took this feedback as positive. Our characters are relatable through their use of costume and age. Our young female victim is relatable through her age of 16 which is the same age of our target audience of 13-16 years old and our antagonist is relatable through the use of costume. His black tracksuit is an outfit that many of the modern youth can relate to today, particularly the males in the audience. This relatablity that our audience feel towards our characters helps to further the audience/character relationship and in turn help increase the tension and suspense on screen.

Another significant positive comment we got on our work was our editing style and techniques used.
Instead of using straight cuts, i instead opted to use alternative options such as the fade and swipe to bring in the clips next shot. The swipe at 0:10 in our clip was one of the edits we received the most positive feedback on and is therefore one of the most relevant examples to use. As you can you in the image bellow the swipe comes in from the right and moves to the left (As the arrow shows). We used this effect in the hopes of replicating the illusion of an antagonist moving in front of the camera, blocking its view. I was right in that this piece of editing make the audience feel uneasy as they are know aware that someone is stalking our victim as Hannah Mahoney supported this saying "the editing at the start is really good, it makes the audience aware someone is watching her".

However we also received some constructive criticism on our work. Our peer, Shaun Mcfarlane said "your camera angles could do with some improving. They don't really change much". Taking on that criticism we looked to include as many different camera angles as possible to make our film much more diverse and using a varied cinematography to include more thriller conventions such as vulnerability using a high angle shot, which we was later able to include within our thriller opening.

The length of our thriller opening was widely criticised through our audience feedback. Being only one minute and two seconds long it we needed an extra 58 seconds of filming to make our opening suitable to meet the task criteria. To achieve this mammoth task he decided to add another setting to film in carrying on from where our first narrative ended.

I have followed the aims of the brief to create my two minute thriller opening by completing and improving my blogs assigned to me by my teacher. In doing this i have gained vital knowledge through research to make my thriller opening as effective as possible in portraying conventional thriller themes and effects.

Rough cut- Miss Miller

A rough cut is important to consider within the final stages of completing our thriller opening as it gives our group a 'rough' idea about how our thriller opening is going and gives our peers a chance to review it, helping us to improve different areas that could be better and therefore achieve a better mark.

Audience feedback is a necessary party of our thriller opening evaluation as at the rough cut stage we are able to present what we have to our peers and give them a chance to give us criticism as to what we could improve on and tell us what we are doing well. From this outside member feedback we are able to make necessary changes to our thriller opening that we did not recognize. This will maximize our thriller openings effectiveness in conveying the desired conventions and effects of tension and suspense and as a result we will achieve a better mark.

We received our feedback through a group presentation prepared by Reggie Witham. It gave a brief explanation of our narrative and then went on to explain how effective some of the conventions used in our thriller opening, such as a female victim where in conveying the desired effects of venerability, tension and suspense. At the end of our presentation a YouTube video of our thriller opening rough cut is shown and this is what we receive our feedback from. Our rough cut can be seen in the video bellow.

On the whole our feedback from our rough cut was generally positive. We received great feedback on the use of the generic thriller conventions used throughout, including a blonde female victim, iconography including a knife, soundtrack and slow editing techniques. Our peers who assessed our work said we done an excellent job in achieving the effects of tension and suspense (generic themes to be explored in the thriller genre) through the use of these conventions, as they are so relatable to the thriller genre. We also received positive feedback on our editing skills that pieced together our thriller opening. Particularly the effect of 'Bad TV' used in coordination with the music that created an effect of confusion, danger and instability, which we hoped to relate that to our antagonist and according to our feedback, we done it well. However there were still parts that needed to be improved on. For example we did not incorporate our film title 'Phobia' into the opening credits which is a circumstantial flaw within our work that was must change. We also needed to make our film shorter by at least 20 seconds as it is over the two minute and ten second limit, our feedback showed the general trend that we should delete the scene with the girl texting her mum to adhere to the time limit as this scene took focus out of the tension and suspense within the narrative and severed no real purpose in our thriller opening.

The feedback we have received as a result of our group doing a presentation to our peers will help us in finalizing our thriller opening sequence as we are now aware of specific elements we need to change or put in to our work to make it as effective as possible in portraying the effects of tension and suspense, making it a conventional thriller opening, achieving full marks.