Initial Thriller Ideas

Initial Thriller Ideas

Our group had pitched our initial thoughts and ideas to each other and we listened to each other with great attention, and patience...

Our initial ideas varied in a few ways. Emily had the idea to create a horror like story which would include a psychopath licking the had of a girl in bed pretending it was her dog, which the psychopath had long ago killed, then viewing the dog's death in a full bloody bath, but we agreed that it fell too much into the horror genre, so we left that idea.

I then pitched my idea to the group which involved a hooded character following a teenager/young woman through a park e.g Richmond Park, then the girl would lose something and the hooded character would pretend to return the object to her, but replaces it with a fake and takes the real thing, including a long plot twist of the seemingly good guy revealing to be the bad guy, but we agreed that it was a bit too cliche. We did however decide to keep in the shot of the villains back in the train and kidnapping (The Boyfriend)

Finally Arthur pitched his idea and he came up with the idea of a girl being kidnapped off the train by a group of teenagers and then (The Boyfriend) didn't realise she was kidnapped. We also said that was a bit cliche with a girl being kidnapped.

We finally came to the compromise of combining a bit of each others ideas and of course, it wasn't as we planned, new ideas were introduced and old ones were thrown away.

Logos

These Are Our Production And Distribution Logos That I Had Created

These logos are very simple in their design. The production logo frames the typical British housing in the medieval style. The distribution logo frames one of the few famous buildings in London, The Cheesegrater. We didn't want to complicate our logos too much as we didn't want anything over the top like 'UNIVERSAL', with a large globe in the center and gold writing over the top.

Evaluation 7

Evaluation 6

Evaluation 5

Evaluation Question 5

How Did You Attract Your Audience?

Poster Design

This is a poster i had created in Photoshop. I had looked at many thriller posters to take inspiration from, to put into my design.

This poster is very simplistic in the way it looks but it's all that it needs to be. The poster states the title of the film with outer glow on the text, making it vivid for viewers to read. There is also some text stating who it was created by and their previous works. Stating previous works of the creators can attract larger audiences as it was probably a well reviewed film. There is also a list of 2 actors, the protagonist and antagonist, if they were big actors then it would attract an even larger audience.

I gained inspiration from this poster of fast and furious 7. The poster shows the most important cast of the film and some of the location behind the cast. I tried to do something similar but I didn't want to include the shot of the antagonist and protagonist in the same shot, as the only available shot was where they meet contact and the villain knocks (The Boyfriend) out.

Social Media!

We invited our audience/followers over from social media such as instagram and twitter to come check out our new thriller opening.

I posted an instagram post with my poster design for 'Station 43' and it attracted many people to come and like the post. This was a great technique to advertise our thriller opening as it provided good word of mouth for our thriller opening but it was a risky decision as it could have had the opposite effect.

Not being very active on twitter didn't bring us much recognition past our friends. This was a poor marketing option as it didn't bring any extra viewers/audience.

Evaluation 4

Evaluation Question 4

Who would be the audience for your media product?

Our Target Audience

Our group audience research provided us with vital information to be able to produce our thriller. For example our research showed us that around 77% of people that watch thrillers are aged 15-25 years old, the other 23% were 26 years of age or above. (As shown in the graph below)

Thriller Releases

The thriller genre is still a popular genre of films which was clearly evident with the release of The Revenant (Inaritu, 2016) which people showed great interest in before release and left great reviews after seeing the movie, with an 85% ‘Likes’ rating on Rotten Tomato. Another thriller released on the 3^rd March 2016 was London Has Fallen (Najafi) which showed even greater interest before release with 97% of people who said they ‘Wanted To See it', but when the movie was was released it received a lot of negative reviews, mostly commenting on the great cast that didn't have the chance to put across their great talent.  This research proved that the thriller genre is still popular in the current times and that people are still interested in watching thrillers. There was however one reason that pulled people away from thrillers, which was the slow unravelling of the plot, for example in Breakdown (Malachi, 2016) was criticized for a slow opening, receiving 5.3 stars on IMDb.

The Revenant

London Has Fallen

Breakdown

The information we had gained from the research allowed us to produce a successful thriller opening. Our thriller opening contained match-on-action shots, quick edits and amplified sounds, to create a fast paced and mysterious thriller opening. Our thriller opening started with mysterious music creeping into the scene as the couple walked towards the train. There was also music to match the action, for example as Arthur (The Bad Guy) sat down in the train the music had a sudden break building more and more tension within the scene.

Typical Audience

Our target audience would look like any ordinary teenager, some ripped jeans and and oversized hoodie and probably staying on top of the current fashion trends. There wasn’t however a trend of the gender of people that go to see thrillers. Our age certificate would have to be 15, as much as we would like to have it at 12 so that a younger audience is able to experience it, we are limited to 15 as we would still like for the film to contain some swearing and some sort of violence, which makes the thriller a 15. I think that having it on a lower certificate than 15 would deter the teenage and adult audience from the film as they would know that the content of the film would be more child appropriate and know that there wont be any adult language or fast paced fighting scenes

Evaluation 3

Evaluation Question 3

What Kind Of Media Institution Might Distribute Your Media Product And Why?

Spyglass Entertainment

Spyglass Entertainment are responsible for one of the greatest films of all times, the sixth sense (1999) which used the most interesting camera shots, movement and angles. I think that this production company would be an ideal candidate for our movie as we used many different angles in our film and showed the action from many different perspective, many places where the camera was hard to position.

The Wine Rack Shot

The sixth sense had an amazing shot from the perspective of a wine rack, putting the action behind the wine rack created the effect that the viewer is spying on the action going on in the scene, his also created the effect of being entrapped behind the construction of the wine rack

UNIVERSAL

UNIVERSAL have created some amazing thrillers such as 'Fast And Furious 7' (2015) and 'Jaws' (1975) which were two blockbuster films, no surprise as this company is a Hollywood based company and have been in the market for many years. This production company would not be a suitable company o produce our film as most of their films are action packed and use much more stylized locations, whereas our group used location shots and we film the less beautiful side of things compared to Hollywood views.

Fast And Furious 7

Fast And Furious 7 is a mixture of Action, Crime and Thriller. Our thriller opening has some similar aspects as Fast And Furious 7, with there being crime and action involved with the kidnapping of (The boyfriend) and the aspect of mystery with why he got kidnapped and (The Girlfriend) not knowing what happened to him.  The difference between our thriller opening and Fast And Furious 7 is the distinct lack of Vista Shots in our opening sequence, whereas F&F7 use quite a number of Vista Shots to establish the location in which they are in.

(Abu Dhabi Desert Shot)

(Skyscraper Shot)

(Los Angeles Shot)

Our only comparable shot was our establishing shot where we framed the two characters in the centre of the frame and kept the camera there for some time to establish the location of the film/shot.

(Ealing Broadway Station Shot)

This is still however not a kind of shot that we can call a Vista Shot / Long Shot as it looks very cramped with both the trains on either side. If we had the opportunity and equipment to do so, we would have the shot much higher up, a shot taken from a a higher up building or a crane for example, but with the camera not moving, so that it doesn't look like a Crane Shot.

Evaluation 2

Evaluation Question 2

How Does Your Media Product Represent Particular Social Groups?

Introduction Of Couple

This shot introduces the couple, this is clearly shown thorough the way they walk closely together and laugh, clearly looking down at something.

This shot shows more clearly what the couple is wearing, (The Boyfriend) suit trousers along with a jacket, whereas (The Girlfriend) is wearing a skirt with a jacket, this type of clothing marks the slight upper class the couple is, in comparison if they were wearing a tracksuit for example

This shot shows the couple looking down at a phone looking through pictures, more exactly selfies they took earlier, this activity shows the age of the couple and the typical activity a teenage couple would do.

Introduction Of Villain

This shot establishes a mysterious figure (The Villain) in dark clothing and a hat, not giving away any facial or body features. This shot also keeps distance from the villain, which gives the villain even more mystery.

This shot is a lot like the sixth sense shot, behind the bars of the train. This shot still keeps it's distance from the camera, keeping the mystery of the character in control.

This shot shows the first point of contact between the protagonist and the villain. In this shot the mystery is still kept at bay, making the audience dwell on the villain and the violence in the scene and why he did so.

Comparable Social Groups

This is a still from 'Now You See Me' and in this shot you can see a hooded figure in the off center of the frame. The camera keeps its distance like we did, keeping in with the mystery of the character.




This is a still from 'Unfriended' showing a group of friends talking in a skype call. This compares to the age of our couple and the social activities that they do.

Evaluation 1

Our Opening to a Thriller- Station 43

3 Point Lighting Technique

From the three point lighting technique we were able to find out what kind of lighting we would like to use for our thriller introduction. The fill light made the face full of shadows and made the character more mysterious which is the kind of light we would like to use. The back light also created a silhouette like character which is a motif of the thriller genre, another kind of light our group would like to use.

storyboard

3 point lighting

Timeline and Health and Saftey

11th March (Friday): 7.00pm meet up to film on a train at Waterloo, trains are stationary there for a while and we will avoid huge costs of time and money.
12th March (Saturday): 7.00pm same plan incase we don't get all our filming done. 
15th March (Tuesday): edit what has been filmed, do the cutting and ordering of the filming (look at story board for reference).
16th March (Wednesday): edit during break and lunch, do transitions and maybe fix lightings and other factors that maybe be affecting the film.
17th March (Thursday):carry on the editing process. 
18th March (Friday):  finish off with the credits and other texts like the title, try and add a cool effect such as the letters entering one by one as a train goes past.

IF WE FILM OVER TWO DAYS:

• use the same actor
• same outfits
• near same carriage and location should be almost exact

EQUIPMENT:

• tripod and camera
• same outfits
• lighting 
• microphones

HEALTH AND SAFETY:

• mind the gap between the train and the platform
• weird people at night, stay together
• make sure someones with equipment at all time so that it is not stolen

WHO IS DOING WHAT?:

• Arthur - Playing the bad guy, should dress in all black helping with filming and lighting
• Aaron- Filming and lighting
• Emily -Playing The Girlfriend, also helping with some filming and lighting
• Eryk- Playing The Boyfriend- also helping with doing filming and lighting

Station 43 from emilywillmer

Audience Research - Eryk Wiszenko

The Revenant (Gonzalez Inarritu, 2016) has been seeing good reviews for what it was anticipated to be, with the all time favourite actor Leonardi Di Caprio as the main protagonist. These reviews show us that people are still interested in watching thrillers and that the genre has not fallen short of the audiences expectations. Some of the reviews/rating are shown below.

London Has Fallen (Najafi 2016) is a highly anticipated thriller due to be released on the 3rd March with 'Want to see ratings' at over 95%!

This shows us that film goers are still interested in going to see thrillers, considering the same plot line/story line.

Thriller Survey - Eryk Wiszenko

I Asked My Parents What Made A Good Thriller...

This Is How They Answered!

Profile Research - Eryk Wiszenko

Profile Research:

This is how our typical female viewer would look like, a hoodie and jeans, with a cap, possibly following the latest fashion trends too.

This type of shoe (Yeezy Boost 350) is very popular within teenagers nowadays and we could expect them to wear this type of footwear.

We didn't have a trend where the people lived, either rural or urban. The location didn't matter, however the urban area had easier access to cinemas.

The 3/4 members of our group study photography, so we figured that it was a possible subject that people in our age would be interested in.

Thriller Survey

For A Starter, A Quick Survey To Help Us Make Something Better, For You!

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/XXSVSB2

Eryk Wiszenko

My Thriller Opening

My thriller would be based on a kidnapping of a young girl from a summier camp and her parents don't find out until the end of the investigation. The thriller would be surrounded by tense scenes of the kidnapper and the camp owners talking to him.

My thriller opening would start as a bright scene of young girls laying at a summer camp, contradictory of the usual dark/noir feeling of a thriller. The beginning of the of the thriller would introduce the family of the girl and her good life because of her rah parents. There would be bad things happening in the camp to lead to the introduction of the thriller.