Media Evaluation - Question Seven

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

I feel that from the beginning when creating the preliminary task to making the final thriller opening, that I have become more confident when creating new things. I feel the ideas that I have now I am prepared to try them out to see if they work or not and if they do not work then finding a way to make them work. By being more open about the ideas that I have I feel that it has made me more creative with what I want to produce therefore wanting to try more and not just do the expected.
From the beginning of the preliminary task I did not know how to film effectively or using the camera to get the best possible shot, however now I know what techniques to use to make sure the shot I get is the best I can get it. However, some shots that were used on the opening weren’t to the best of my ability, such as close ups were blurry as well as a pan shot wasn’t smooth enough therefore didn’t fit into the shot well, but I know why they ended up like they did therefore if I did them again they wouldn’t be that particular way. I like how I have got used to the cameras and all of the things I can do on the camera to make something that is simple into something that is interesting, for example, different angles of the camera, e.g. canted angles are effective in the way the shots are easy to get but have an accurate outcome.
As well as the camera, I have enjoyed using the iMacs to edit our opening as well as the practice videos we did before the final piece. It has made me more assured to do it again if I needed to as I know how to use them whereas before I didn’t therefore I wasn’t looking forward to using them.

I am glad I did a prelim task as it showed me how I can improve as a filmmaker to make the final piece a lot better than the prelim task. However, the strengths of the prelim that I created were some camera shots that I didn’t think would work however they did, for example continuity editing and making sure the camera was in the right place to make it look like there were two camera placed. All of the skills needed for that were shown through doing the prelim and it wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be which made me content to be behind the camera and get certain shots.
Although, some shots did not match up which made it not look as good as it could have, for example when the actors went into the room the shot through the window was not stable which didn’t make the shot look as good as I wanted it, however for the thriller task I made sure the shots I got were clear.
With the prelim I found that we needed a lot more footage than what we already originally had which ensured me to get enough or more than enough shots for the thriller opening so we would not be stuck for the clips that we needed to get.
Whilst creating the prelim I learnt that lighting was important to get the correct shot and make sure continuity was important so it didn’t change. Learning this skill helped me a lot and changed the way I looked at films that I watched as I noticed how important it is to make sure that it is right, therefore helping me to get the right shots and not break the 180 degree rule.

When filming there are specific skills that are needed to make sure it is effective to for the audience to watch. Firstly, there is the continuity editing 180 degree rule which we used throughout our opening. You can only cross the 180 degree line if you show the audience going past it, for example, going around the back of someone’s head o they know that the ways that they have changed will be the opposite way round. Shot-reverse-shot was not used in our prelim task as we thought we had put it in however the communication between the two characters did not make it a shot reverse shot to show the relationship between two characters when there was dialogue it was used between the two people so the audience knew who had given the sweet showing that close relationship that they have was shown but it was not as clear as it would have been if we used a shot-reverse-shot, which if we were to film it again we would have added it in. Match-on-action was also used to make sure the previous cut matched the next cut so it flowed well, for example, when going through the doors and opening and closing doors as well as coming up the stairs.
This helped when I was filming the thriller as it gave us more experience of what we needed to do to get an effective shot type so the film would look realistic and make it look successful. As we were used to the camera that we had to use for our prelim task we knew what we could do to the camera, for example, a smooth tracking shot using an elastic band on the end of the camera to move the camera slowly across without having a jumpy tracking shot. Part of our opening was meant to be filmed jumpy and shaky therefore it was a handheld camera shot which helped the home-filming technique that we wanted to create.

When we planned to do our ideas for what shots that we wanted to use we wanted to make sure we showed a variety of shots to keep it interesting for the audience. However, we wanted most of our shots to be close up or a long shot to show the environment that they are in or showing the injuries that the protagonist has. The pace of our thriller when we were editing it on Becky’s iPad, needed to be fast paced with lots of straight cuts to make the tension build by showing a lot of action in a short period of time, or photos, like at the end of the opening where it showed how it happened and how she got injured.  However, we also wanted to do the opposite of that and make some shots really slow and in slow motion, for example, going along the body of the girl to show the position she was in and what had happened, therefore building uncertainty whilst watching the opening and feeling tense about what is going to happen next.
Before we edited we watched some openings of thrillers to see what the common conventions were and how we can make ours use the conventions that ‘real’ thrillers use to make ours as close to a ‘real’ one as possible.

I feel that the thriller that we created was successful. We all as a group took part and played roles which made it successful therefore enjoyed making it as we worked together well. I feel that if we were to do it again we would use a camera of better quality. For the cuts of ‘death’ we used my camera which gave a clearer image that looked a lot better than the original camera that we used for the rest of the filming as it came across a bit blurry and different shades of darkness before we edited which meant when we did edited we got a lot of shots that weren’t continuously the same colour. However, with the camera quality that we had we got some good shots to use even if some were darker than others, so if I were to film this again I would use my camera to get the best possible quality for the film. I feel that when we used the handheld camera technique it worked well to follow the rope down the stairs however we used too much of the handheld camera shot therefore didn’t show as much skill as we could have if we used a tripod with different angles. I feel that a canted angle would have worked well to exaggerate the confusion of the place that the protagonist is in, as well as the antagonist could have had more close ups shown to emphasis the danger that he carries to make the audience feel more threatened by him.
I feel that the location worked really well with the thriller sub-genre as it was confusing to where the place may be, however created an atmosphere where doubt could build to what had happened as it was so dark and isolated from everywhere else as another location was not shown, so the main focus was on the location that they were in.
I would have also improved the costume of the antagonist, even though he did look threatening, the clothing that he could have been wearing would still have been smart, however ripped clothing or a stain of blood would have worked effectively as the audience would have known that there was a chance of being caught as he had the evidence of the death especially when the other girl walked in. Although, the protagonist did represent the colours of death and danger well by wearing black and not showing his identity therefore creating more tension it was distinctive which is a common convention in the thriller genre. I feel if it was to be filmed again more of how the killing happened would make the thriller more interesting to watch to build up to the climax of the death of the girl therefore having peak points for the audience to get nervous about watching, instead of just seeing the death. However, the use of different shots were effective as they showed what injuries she had was good as it gave the audience questions to ask and made it more confusing as to why it happened.

 Here, we used a black and white effect mid-shot of the two actors to show the location where they are and what they are wearing. Not using any particular costume or make-up you cannot tell who is the protagonist and antagonist as they are do not have any conventions to stereotype that person. Compared to the thriller we used close ups to show how the person was injured with a costume to show who they are and what type of age, for example a young weak girl and she doesn’t look threatening. The second image shows how our camera skills have improved because of the lighting. For the prelim we used what light we had which didn’t give a good enough effect of the danger that they may face giving no clues to what they are going to do with no specific topic, compared to the thriller showing it is an isolated environment with no image of any escape like the prelim task of not being intimidating at all.

 

Continuity editing has improved a lot compared to the prelim task as the prelim task had lagging on it so it didn’t show continuity compared to the thriller where opening doors was shown quicker in a more haunted way to build up the tension, as it was a lot slower than the prelim task. The shots changed with an effect as well to let the audience see the next shot before it fully came up giving them chance to feel that they are seeing what happens before the other person did, giving them a sense of fear and control as they know before she does. As seen below as well the difference of quality and camera angle it makes it a lot clearer creating a scarier environment.

 

When we started our prelim task we did not know how to use the macs therefore we found it hard to choose on a title that would fit in, the one that we chose clearly didn’t and did not give any ‘scare’ or ‘thrill’ out of it and looks like it was just put in. However compared to the thriller we used a range of titles from being on the body to give a more personal touch of it being as if the body is the main source of the film as well as other titles that were edited in to make it look more professional with a sans-serif text to ensure it followed the same text of being bold and the same font to show continuity and look professional like a normal thriller opening would. Below it is shown how much of a difference titles can make and how much better it looks when it is done to fit in with the film which make it build tension with the effects that go with it, a slow moving effect to make it drowsy like the start of the film is to get the audience engaged with the opening.

 

Certain camera types that we used were mid-shots as well as extreme-close ups on the injuries to ensure that the audience saw what had happened, firstly on a larger scale, for example half of the body then a close up on the injury, the neck. The audience would have then got an idea about how extreme the injury was therefore would see how dangerous the death of the girl.

A handheld camera shot was used the most throughout this opening; therefore it looked like it was a home-made video which gave it more of a personal feel to it, we did this as it was compared to the thriller/horror, ‘Paranormal Activity’ which looked really effective in the way we knew that they were the only ones who saw it so it made the thriller look scarier as no one else would know so the audience would feel as if they were there. Also, camera shots such as close ups of certain things, for example he body gave confusion as they wouldn’t have known how it happened or what part of the body it was until a mid or the rare long shots were used to show what had happened.

Finally, at the end were images shown from straight cuts to one another showing the death of the protagonist as well as images of how the killer murdered her. We used fast-paced editing so the audience would only see the images for a second but would still pick up on what had happened giving sense of misperception as well as making them feel muddled about what happened as the images changed so quick., we would have liked the images to go faster however we did not want to over-power it to make it seem too much and to lose the interest of the audience therefore was satisfied with what the final outcome was.