Final Edit Of The Blog.

We all have been through all of our posts, we have checked that everything fits onto the blog and that there are no technical faults with any links,  pictures or videos on the blog, we each have checked our spelling on each post that we have done, we have checked that the background and colour scheme of the blog goes with the thriller film.
Lastly we have made sure that all of the posts are in order, so the first thing people see will be the audience feedback then the evaluation activities.
There are no spelling mistakes, no faults with link, videos or pictures and no mistake with the order of the posts.


                                        The Existence.

Audience Feedback

This video shows the audience feedback after watching our thriller. This would help us if we did this again as we would know what the audience like and dislike.

Information

All the videos that are on this blog are on youtube.
Type in on the search bar "shscarm" and there will be all of the videos that we have used.

Evaluation question 1

1. The title.
The title of the film itself was called 'the existence'.  As a group, we decided to use this because it was an appropriate name for our thriller, giving the audience an idea of the genre of film (physiological thriller).  It also suggests abnormality, because 'existence' is not a word used commonly in everyday situations, and is often related to spiritual events or the dead, therefore foreshadowing our storyline.  The title also creates enigma as it allows the audience to ask themselves questions about what 'the existence' is, whether it means somebody or a spirit etc.  When researching what name would be best suited for our thriller, we completed some careful research and planning; through this we found name with only one word was most effective. Examples of this are: scream, & identity.  This is why we chose 'The existence', the word 'the' had to be put into the title, otherwise there is a risk it would not make sense and confuse the audience.

2. Setting/Location.
We used a variety of different settings and locations, as during the research process this is found to keep audience’s attention, and they were less likely to be distracted if there was more than one location.  The location on the mood board shows a narrow path, surrounded by woodland at each side, this is a normal road and path used, showing a normal thriller conventions as many thrillers events happen in everyday situations.  We chose this as it creates a feeling of isolation for the character.  The trees represent the pressure that is about to surround her when she can see hallucinations of a girl, the trees and narrow path also represent that she is trapped.  It also gives the audience an idea this is not her fault, and this is what is going to inevitably happen to her.  The second image on the mood board portrays this well, and although this is a normal thriller convention, it is used for a different purpose. 

3. Costume.
The costume for one of the main characters was an important introduction to our thriller, as it instantly showed the audience she was abnormal and the character can be seen fully in a negative light.  She appears several times throughout the film, also showing her abnormality as this is not consistent.  She is wearing a white dress which represents innocence, however it has severe blood stains down it with mud and grass stains as well.  This shows the audience her innocence has changed now, also shown by the pale face and black makeup running down her face.  We decided for her to wear this item of clothing, as it creates enigma for the audience whilst allowing the film to develop exploiting this character.  This goes against the normal conventions of a thriller, as it is typically seen that the protagonist would be male, it is unlikely there is both a protagonist female and an antagonist female.  This could appeal to a wider demographic for our thriller, as it creates an unusual situation which is not typical of this type of film.

4. Camera work.
This image shows a long shot of Tabi walking; this image is successful because we decided to film at a particular time when the sun was setting.  Therefore, this allowed the sun to be shining through the trees where Tabi was walking, the difference between light and dark represents her mental unstableness, that she has two sides to her personality and is in fact schizophrenic.  This is also represented by her costume as she is wearing dark trousers with a white top.   We chose to use a long shot as it shows how she is coping on her own, exploiting her unstable-ness as she falls down during the scene and has extreme hallucinations’ when normal everyday life is going on around her (the public is seen in the background).  This goes against the conventions of a thriller, as alot of thrillers use low key lighting to set a dark mood, however here we have used a selection of lighting making our thriller different from the others. 

5. Title font and style.
The title font and style challenge typical thriller conventions because the majority of thriller films have spaced out writing that is clear and easy to read.  Our thriller goes against these conventions, with the writing being close together, without large spaces and is not easy to read.  This suggests our thriller will not be foreseeable, and this is what we aim to achieve.  We have also used the connotations of black on white to represent life and death, as our main character is struggling in the middle of both of these extremes with her mental illness.  The font we used fits in well with our thriller, and is consistent throughout each individual title font during the beginning of the film.

6.  Story.
The typical storyline for thrillers are dependent on their genre.  In physiological thrillers, it often involves illusions, crimes committed due to a poor mental state or the main character searching for somebody.  In our film, we have illusions, as our main character can see things that are not there.  However, this is not shown in the typical stage of events within our film, as this is introduced straight away suggesting there may be more events taking place when the film continues.  Although we are following the same ideas in our thriller, the way they are laid out is different showing we have been original within completing our work. From having an enigma the whole way through it builds tension for the audience as they do not know who Alex is as it is never explained.

7. Props.
This scene contains certain props, we have used extreme make up and fake blood to create a sense of instability amongst one character, however the most important prop used was the mirror.  This was used to show when the abnormal girl was there, and when she wasn't, this helped make a clear distinction between was real and what wasn't.  The over the shoulder shot in picture 7, show the main characters mind playing tricks on her, with all the hallucinations which are taking place.  If this prop was not used, it would have been significantly difficult to get this message across to the audience, and was extremely important when filming.  This prop is a typical convention of a thriller, and is often used in physiological thriller for the same purpose.  However, an over the shoulder shot against a mirror is unusual, as the series of abnormal events usually take place in the mirrors reflection within thrillers.  An example of this is the film 'mirrors'.

8. Genre.
The genre of our film is shown by the disturbed girl, the way she watches the main character (Tabi) suggests she could be a stalker, a hallucination or somebody who has died.  All of these ideas have a link with mental illness that the audience may have already noticed.  The theme of mental illness links in with our film well, as our genre is a physiological film, with our main character suffering from schizophrenia.  This is also clearly shown as the public are in the background haven't appeared to have seen this girl, showing she is abnormal.  This sets the tone of our film and represents what it is ultimately going to be about, this goes against the normal conventions of a thriller as it is unusual to see the characters together at the beginning of a film.  Usually, one character develops from a series of events, or something that has been triggered such as a past memory in physiological films.  An example of this happening is in 'mirrors' or 'inception'.

9. Characters.
The two main characters are show in picture 9; the pictures are put next to each other to show the differences between the characters appearances.  They are shown in a serious way, as what happens in our film is not based around crime, but about mental disability.  The shot of our main character (abnormal girl) standing over our other main character at the beginning of the film shows proximity between them and suggests they will have some type of relationship later on or already within the film.  This goes against the normal conventions of a thriller, as usually the characters are gradually introduced as the story develops, however in this beginning scene they have close proximity to each other.  This creates enigma for the audience, as questions build in their mind of how they could possibly know each other, and why one is standing over the other one sleeping - this is distinctly abnormal.  The audience don't know whether the person sleeping (Tabi) knows she is being watched or not therefore raising more questions between the characters, intriguing the audience to watch the rest of the film.

Evaluation Activity 2

The character played by Tabi was inspired by the character of Nina Sayers in the film Black Swan. They both struggle with schizophrenia, suffering from hallucinations and self-harm, Throughout Black Swan, Nina generally has a natural appearance, lacking make-up and having her hair slicked back, whereas Tabi has more eye make-up but still in keeping with her hair tied up. Nina tends to be seen in her ballet attire, wearing a pale cream knitted shrug to cover up her wounds; Tabi wears a large knitted jumper in a white colour to reflect her innocence, just like Nina. Nina hallucinates about real people, and sees blood on her body which is non-existent, in the end she sees herself grow feathers and become the black swan for the finale; she also battles with another character, Lily, who turns out to be a figment of her imagination when she is actually stabbing herself causing her death. Tabi hallucinations consist of a young girl, dark eyes and a blood-stained white dress, destroying the innocence portrayed by the white dress. Tabi’s character runs away from her hallucinations instead of battling them like Nina. Both of these characters are protagonists, the films are both focussed on a part of their life, in this case, the end of their lives. Black Swan is based on the struggle of a professional ballet dancer dancing the part of a hybrid between two characters which also reflects her life, she has been split into two people, however The Existence is about a young girl being haunted by a young dead girl of her past. Tabi is playing a girl of her age (teenager) as opposed to Nina Sayers who is a woman in her late 20s. Each film has a dominant female cast, this could be down to their genre both being psychological thrillers which usually have females presenting themselves in a possessed way, and this is clearer in The Existence but more subtle in Black Swan.

Evaluation Activity 3

Evaluation Activity 4

Who would be the audience for your media product? 

Our thriller is aimed at both males and females, aged from 15 – 25. We decided this as be believed our thriller would fit into the 15+ age band well as it doesn’t involve swearing or any sexual acts. We thought that 25 is the oldest age group that would watch it as it doesn’t include much adult content which may not grab their attention for long enough. Whereas 15+ would enjoy it because of that reason. Below are a couple of people we thought our thriller would suit.

Name: Clare Brook
Age: 17
Interests: Clare loves psychological books, programmes like ‘Exile’ on BBC 1, and films like ‘Se7en’. She likes happy, meaningful songs from a classic rock genre including The Beatles. Clare is in her second year at Ashbourne sixth form in London, studying her favourite subject - psychology. Her part-time job is at an insurance company at the weekends, which doesn’t hold her interest too much but does help her with money, so she can go to the cinema and watch the newest films that she likes.  Clare loves the constant buzz in London and also the social aspect. In her spare time, Clare goes to the cinema with her 3 best friends, who also love psychological thrillers. Her favourite film is ‘Cape Fear’ as she likes the enigmas, story line and characters.

 

Name: Dan Cooper
Age: 23
Interests: Dan also loves psychological TV programmes, films and books when he has time. He likes to listen to classical music so he can relax and study to it. Dan goes to Bournemouth University and also studies psychology. In addition, Dan likes going to the sea-side and reading a good psychological book when he has the time. He enjoys the social life there and also the night life. Dan favourite film is ‘Silence of the Lambs’ as it includes an enigma and an amazing story line which he loves. 

Evaluation Activity 5

Evaluation Activity 6

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS8q9eg9lMs

This is the editing diary.

This is a video of the technologies.

Evaluation Activity 7

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rDB9L4wR1Y&feature=player_profilepage

We have done this evaluation activity by video. We have played the thriller film whilst analysing and explaining the choices that we have made.

We included the over the shoulder shot when we filmed this. We played the footage of the Preliminary Task so viewers can understand what we mean once they see it.

The Final Poster

Final Piece. The Existence

On our thriller the end 5 seconds were cut off because the film would not upload fully onto YouTube which has therefore cut off the end. In the last 3 seconds Alex hushes Tabi and she realises that Alex is real and not just a dream. Also the title ‘The Existence’ comes up with the music on quietly. Furthermore, some of the music has been cut out during the film on this YouTube clip as it wouldn’t upload properly onto the hard-drive which then was put onto YouTube. 

BBFC

Now we have finished the film, we have looked back on the British Board of Film Class (BBFC) to see what we would now rate our thriller. From looking at what each certificate allows in films, we have decided to stay with certificate 15. This is an appropriate certificate as it then allows us to include adult themes, hard drugs, strong words, moderate-strong violence/sex references and mild non detailed sex activity. Films that are like this are ‘Good Luck Chuck’ and ‘The Uninvited’. In our thriller we have not used any of these features as we didn’t feel the need to include them, but later in the film there is then a chance for it to include any of the themes listed above.

Marketing

As marketing is one of the most important things for a film we decided to make this page to help to promote and market ‘The Existence’. As the social networking site, ‘Facebook’ has increasingly more popular, we thought that this would be the perfect way to get people to notice our film by suggesting the page to our friends who can then send it onto their friends to get more and more people involved. 

As ‘Twitter’ is becoming the new ‘Facebook’, we have also used it to promote our film as more teenagers are using it. We thought this would be a good way to sponsor our thriller as it would allow us to get in contact with the public to see what their views are and what they thought we could improve or keep in the thriller. Also, as people could re-tweet us, this would mean that more people would find out about the film.

Influences now the film has been completed.

As I saw the final product I realised that the previous influences of our Thriller didn't really fit well with our media film.

‘Black Swan’ is defiantly more similar to our Thriller "The Existence". It’s a physiological thriller that plays tricks on the mind with the viewer. In the film ‘Black Swan’ the main character is clearly getting stalked by something that is not human, this makes her do abnormal things that are unlike her personality. Our Thriller ‘The Existence’ also has an inhuman creature that can possess or control the main character.
Black Swan has everything that a psychological thriller has to offer, so we wanted to do the same.

Spell Check

As our blog is almost finished, It was important to spell check everything on the blog to make sure it the grammar was correct and made sense.   This involved looking at each of the posts and studying the language to see if there were any errors.

Music

We had a lot of trouble trying to find music to fit in with our thriller as nothing quite fitted with what was happening in our thriller. After a lot of searching between the group Alex found ‘Abducted’ which amazingly fit in with every scene! We chose this piece of music because as each scene was getting to a tense moment, so was the music which gives the audience a feeling of anxiety and it sustained the tension. Also, conveniently the music was just the right length for our film as we didn’t have music at the beginning which built up the tension as it was just Tabi sleeping.

    

Poster Influences

This poster has influenced us quite a lot on thinking about what to include in our initial poster. Firstly, the man looks very normal which immediately tricks the audience. He is wearing a bow tie which shows he could be a part of the business world. The red background shows the viewer that the film is a thriller and not a children film as it is a blood red which shows that death could be involved in this film. The line at the top reads ‘A man who has everything has everything to hide’ which could mean that the main character (Mr Brooks) has a deep secret that you will find out in the film, which again makes the audience want to watch the film. The date at the bottom of the poster tells the viewer when the film comes out which is vital information to sell the film and this has influenced us to include this on our thriller poster. The red mark at the bottom could be blood which gives the audience a clue of what the plot could be or what is going to happen during the film which is death. Also, the dot after Mr is the same blood mark as the one at the bottom. The edgy red boarder around the poster demonstrates that the film is edgy and thrilling. The colour of the boarder fades into black near the bottom which could intend that evil takes over this man in the film. The plot of the film could be included in this poster as the protagonist and antagonist could be one person. On this poster, the square of his face is red which shows that he may have split a personality or someone always with him. One of our ideas for a poster is to have the antagonist with half of her face with evil make-up on and the other side is innocent to show the split personalities that the protagonist has whilst suffering from schizophrenia. Also, the name of the main characters are included on the poster along with the directors name underneath to show the viewer who is in the film as they may like one of the actors usual films. The title of the thriller is one of the main selling points as well as drawing the viewer into watching it.

Soundtrack possibilities. (Not finished)

We looked at a variety of different music for our thriller. Using http://www.freeplaymusic.com/  it allowed us to find a variety of different styles of music that isnt copy write, therefore we could see what one would be most suitable. Initially, we decided on a classical music soundtrack, as this involved violins which created a fast pace tone for our thriller. It also involved certain music stings which would have been suitable for our thriller. However, once our thriller had been filmed we decided the classical music did not fit as our thriller was too modern. Now, we are looking at other soundtrack possibilities

Changing actress'

Our actress’ have drastically changed since we first planned our thriller film. First of all we decided to have Alex Fresco’s cousin (Georgia Fresco) as she has had acting experience from the west end and films with Madonna. The other actress we originally wanted to use Lucy Kane as she has blonde hair and would fit into the protagonist stereotype. When we initially tried to film, everywhere that we had planned to film was either locked or the lighting wasn’t correct. As these actress’ are not in our group or even school it was very hard to organise when and where we could film. We changed the protagonist to Tabitha Munday as she is doing Drama AS level and also attends our school. The little girl is now Alex Fresco as she is in our group, did GCSE Drama and is willing to act. Even though Tabitha attends our school, it is still very hard to plan when to film as she does a lot of extra curriculum activities outside of school.

Location of Shooting Thriller

This is the location where we did the first day of filming. This picture is found on Google Maps. We chose this location because it was unique and it was surrounded by a heavily wooded area which does fall into a stereotype of a thriller convention but we filmed on the pavement, not directly inside the woods. Many other media groups chose to use the same location which was a 'house' but we wanted to be different and change the location from the pavement next to the woods, to the toilets, to the bedroom.

Focus Group Findings

I asked a selection of people the questions that would identify conventions and stereotypes of Thrillers. This was helpful because we learnt what people expected and what they wanted from Thriller films.
Thank-you to those that took part and gave us their time to help us with the focus group findings.

Video Influences

The film The Unborn has a lot of similarities to our Thriller film The Existence. The Unborn has a haunting in it of some ancient demon called a debook and our thriller has a demon young girl in it. The Victim in both films are young females. The Unborn uses music to scare the audience and to help the film come across as scary; we will be using music that helps create suspense and tension when certain events are happening. The use of cinematography is important to the film The Unborn because when the demon appears the audience is always presented of him in a close up or an extreme close up. We also want to achieve this because in some cases it actually makes the audience jump and that is the effect that we want to have on our audience.

Risk assesment

This is the busy road that was mentioned in our risk assessment.  At the top of the road, there are more cars and it is busier, this was when we began to film through rush area and how dangerous the road was changed.  As a group, we were aware of the changing situation and adapted our filming because of this.  This involved moving all our equipment to one side of the road so we would not have to keep crossing whilst there was moving traffic.

This picture shows a small area of densely compacted twigs near the pavement.  Some of these were sticking up, and across the pavement so we made our actors aware of this and moved any twigs and sticks out of the way of each filming area before we started.  We also kept looking at whether any had moved once members of the general public had walked past as they could have moved the twigs which may have caused injury to our actors if they went unnoticed.                    

Tester Film

This was just me testing out shots and angles that would be useful for our film, this is a clip of the very first shot of the film. It was filmed on the camera built in on an iPhone 4 for easy upload to YouTube.

Pitch of The Existence

Day 2 Of Filming

Alex is ready to be filmed; she is wearing the costume that we have designed for her to wear which we have put blood on and dirt. I have done her make-up with is black eye shadow and blood on her eye.

This is the make-up that I have used, it a black SBC brand that I used for her eyes; this will make her look scary and freaky.

The tri-pod is ready waiting if we need to use it.

Charlotte has to straddle Tabi for a certain shot that we needed. This was fun filming and we got the shot which was good.

Charlotte filming at the location.

Tabi acting and practising what she needs to do for the role.

Dairy of a day shooting

We planned to film on Saturday 19^th March 2011 at 6pm. We all met in Ongar high street to film on the street for the first scene. The first scene had been filmed and we wanted to watch it back but found out the camera had broken and the head needed cleaning which means it won’t let us watch any footage back and we were unable to tell if anything had actually recorded. As one of our group members (Charlotte Mackenzie) had an iPhone 4 we decided to film a scene on that to see how it turned out. The quality of the recording was good but we would not have been able to edit on there and this would have been a massive problem later on. We then went to our second location, which was the public toilets but they were locked. Our third location was a bedroom and one of our members (Alex Fresco) lived very near the locations, so that scene was easy to film. As the rest of the filming did not work we didn’t want to film one scene as we are going to use other actors if we did not get all the filming done that day as the actors we used cannot get any time off school.    

We have planned to next try and film Wednesday 23^rd March 2011 after school in the original location in King Georges in Brentwood.  This worked successfully, with each scene being shot a few times so we could choose the best one when it came to editing, we did not have any major interruptions either.  However with our main actor having to go at half 5 for college we could not complete all of our filming on this day, therefore we kept and uploaded the footage onto the school system, and completed the rest of the scenes needed on Tuesday 28th March 2011 straight after school. 

Here, on Wednesday 23rd March 2011.  Rachel is completing Alex's make-up ready for filming, and in order to complete filming to a high standard.  Black make-up around the eyes was used to show abnormality.


I needed to make Alex look messed up and to make her look weak and basically dead. I used black eye shadow to make her eyes look deeper and i put white powder over he face to make her like ghostly and ill. I also put blood on her top to make it look like she had been cut and that she still has the wounds that killed her. I also put black make up round her face and on her arms to make her look dirty. This look was important to the shooting because we needed her not to look 'normal' or real.

Textual Analysis: Donnie Darko

During the opening credits you can hear the sound of a storm, which acts as contrapuntal sound when you realise that it is not in fact raining, the sound stops within the first few seconds of the scene starting. The titles are on a simple black background with bold white writing, the gothic style font gives away the genre. The use of an establishing shot gives an idea of location; here it is a shot into a valley where it pans across to reveal a long shot of Donnie laying in the road, although it is not yet clear that it is Donnie.

 The ambient sounds of birds reflect the time and place; it is shown to be dawn. As the camera moves closer it sparks an enigma, making the audience ask “what is it?” this is key to creating suspense in a thriller. You can begin to make out that it is a person in the road, and laying on a bend on the road – a very dangerous place to be, this could symbolise the danger of Donnie’s condition, which is schizophrenia, intertwined with the big open space around him showing that with this mental illness, he is alone. A non-diegetic soundtrack begins to play matching a classical genre with choral singing, tying in very much with the psychological thriller genre. As the camera moves around Donnie, it makes it clear to the audience that he is the main protagonist, this leads to the first cut of the movie, the use of this first long take creates suspense and possibly representing that Donnie is currently calm. You then see another pan of the location and when the camera stops, Donnie stand up and the back of his is revealed in the shot, this suggests he is in the middle of it all.

                When Donnie turns his head and we see him smirk and laugh it gives the impression he is unstable interlocking with his mental illness. We can see that he is wearing pyjamas, giving viewers an idea of the time again but also symbolising that what he does is out of his control, it’s not classified as a social norm to cycle to an unknown place and sleep in the road.

After the shot of Donnie laughing and walking out of shot, the title of the movie appears in the same gothic font but what’s really affective is the sun getting brighter and creating a blank screen to move on to the first cut of the movie, the use of this first long take creates suspense and possibly representing that Donnie is currently calm. Donnie begins riding his bike and the editing becomes more rapid, fitting in with the different non-diegetic soundtrack that has begun to play fitting in more with a rock genre but still creepy. Some of the shots are from Donnie’s perspective going along the road; this represents the journey he has to go on to get home or to be ‘normal’.

Many of the takes throughout the opening are shot with a handheld camera, this makes it feel more real, and like you’re there with him or observing him, this makes the audience feel more involved. I chose to analyse this film because it’s a psychological thriller which is what our film will be, I also like the story and the soundtrack throughout.