Chosen Thriller Film

In class we had to present our Thriller ideas, after we had all seen a preview of other peoplee, we had to vote for what we thought were the best three to be filmed. Luckily mine was one of the 3 that were picked. This is my powerpoint presentation that i put forward during my presentation to the class. Enjoy.

The opening scene of a horror movie plot. My thriller idea, before and after group meeting -

Members of my group pitched ideas for their idea of a thriller, mine was the following....

My initial idea before group discussion –

DRIVE - It starts with a car driving up a drive, to a house at night. A man gets out, looks around, knocks on the front door of the house, nobody answers so he gets back in his car. He drives back down the drive and, all of a sudden, he stops as there is a masked child in the middle of the road. This child then walks slowly to car and the driver tries to reverse and get away, but everywhere he looks the child keeps popping up in front of the car. Eventually he drives off and you see in the rear view mirror the child in the back seat. Immediately after this, there is a blackout, leaving the audience with a sense of unease.

Stimulus - The Orphanage (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6KK8W1TpHs and http://lajauretsi.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/road_to_guantanamo_rejected_poster.jpg)

What I will need –
•Man (Tom Mison)
•A Child (Male Of Female)
•House (Peaslake)
•Car
•Mask- can make in art
•Shabby clothes or old dress for children
My Account of first group meeting –

After a group discussion and brief on my idea that was chosen we decided to change things and add more children and also expand on why the man might have been at the house at the time.

This was our final plot:

DRIVE - It starts with a car driving up a drive, to a house at night. A man gets out, looks around, knocks on the front door of the house, hears a humming noise and therefore gets back in the car. He drives back down the drive and, all of a sudden, he stops as there is a masked child in the middle of the road. The guy then has a flashback of a cellar, with himself stitching masks to children’s’ faces. This child then walks slowly to car and the driver tries to reverse and get away but, to his dismay, lots of children start to appear. Eventually he drives off and you see in the rear view mirror the child in the back seat. Immediately after this, there is a blackout, leaving the audience with a sense of unease.


What I will need –
•Man (Tom Mison)
•4 or more children
•House (Peaslake)
•Cellar - Ewhurst
•Car
•Needle and Thread
•Mask- can make in art
•Shabby clothes or old dress for children

An evaluation of 4 existing Horror & Thriller posters

As part of our research process, we examined a number of existing horror and thriller film promotional posters in order to better understand the specific, iconography and imagery that helps to anchor the conventions of the genre. These included ...

PROM NIGHT - Donnas senior prom is supposed to be the best night of her life, one of magic, beauty, and love. Surrounded by her best friends, she should be safe from the horrors of her past. But when the night turns from magic to murder there is only one man who could be responsible, the man she thought was gone forever. Now, Donna and her friends must find a way to escape the sadistic rampage of an obsessed killer, and survive their Prom Night.

THE ORPHANAGE - The former orphan Laura raises her adopted son Simón with her husband Carlos in an old house and former orphanage where she was raised. Simón is HIV positive and tells Laura that he has five invisible friends, and she believes they are fruit of his imagination. Laura decides to reopen an orphanage for handicapped children in the location and during the opening party; Simón calls her to show the little cabin of his friend Tomás. The busy Laura does not gives much attention to her son; then she sees a mysterious masked boy and Simón vanishes. Laura feels the presence of other persons in the house and months later, the desperate Laura invites a team of parapsychologists to try to unravel
the mystery.

ONE MISSED CALL - After the death of their friend Shelley, Leann Cole receives a voice mail from the future of the date and time when she would die. On the scheduled day, Leann sees weird things and in the precise informed hour, Leann is attacked by a supernatural force on a footbridge over a train station while talking to her friend Beth Raymond. Beth meets Leann's boyfriend Brian, who also received a call, and witnesses his death on the street. When her roommate Taylor Anthony receives a call, Beth befriends Det. Jack Andrews, who tells her that his sister was the first victim of the phone call. They decide to investigate the connections of Jack's sister and find the name of Marie Layton, who apparently abused of her daughters. Jack and Beth run against time trying to save Beth from her fate.

THE SKELETON KEY - Caroline is a twenty-five-year-old hospice worker who cares for the ailing and the elderly, a job designed to atone for her own mistake for ignoring her dying father in the past, when she had been a rock 'n' roll manager. After her latest charge passes away, Caroline takes a job in Louisiana, caring for Ben, a stroke-victim who is bed-ridden and cannot speak. But Caroline becomes suspicious of the house, and Ben's cold wife, Violet only adds to the creepy atmosphere. After acquiring a skeleton key, Caroline makes her way into a secret room within the attic where she discovers hair, blood, bones, spells, and other instruments for practicing hoodoo. Violet says she has never been in the secret room, but that the items probably belonged to the original owners' two house workers, who practiced black magic and were lynched as a result. Noting that Ben had his stroke in the attic after entering the room, Caroline is determined to unlock the secrets of the house, and rescue Ben from the horrors that hold him captive within.

DISTURBIA - After his father is killed in a car accident, things unravel for Kale Brecht and he is placed under house-arrest for punching his Spanish teacher. Having nothing better to do, Kale occupies himself by spying on his neighbours. But one night, he witnesses what appears to be a murder going on in Mr. Turner's house. Kale becomes obsessed with uncovering the truth behind these murders but, after a few unsettling run-ins with Mr. Turner, it becomes a matter of life and death. And the ominous question: Who is watching who?

VANTAGE POINT - The President of the United States is in Salamanca, Spain, about to address the city in a public square. We see a plain-clothes cop, his girlfriend with another man, a mother and child, an American tourist with a video camera, and a Secret Service agent newly returned from medical leave. Shots ring out and the President falls; a few minutes later, we hear a distant explosion, then a bomb goes off in the square. Those minutes are retold, several times, emphasizing different characters' actions. Gradually, we discover who's behind the plot. Is the Secret Service one step ahead, or have the President's adversaries thought of everything?

DRAG ME TO HELL - Evil Dead director Sam Raimi takes the helm for this "spook-a-blast" shocker about an ambitious L.A. loan officer who incurs the wrath of a malevolent gypsy by refusing to grant her an extension on her home loan. Determined to impress her boss and get a much-needed promotion at work, Christine Brown lays down the law when mysterious Mrs. Ganush literally comes begging for mercy at her feet. In retaliation for being publicly shamed, Mrs. Ganush places the dreaded curse of the Lamia on her unfortunate target, transforming Christine's life into a waking nightmare. Her sceptical boyfriend, Clay, casually brushing off her disturbing encounters as mere coincidence, Christine attempts to escape eternal damnation by seeking out the aid of seer Rham Jas. But Christine's time is fast running out, and unless she's able to break the curse, she'll be tormented by a demon for three days before literally being dragged to hell.

TAKING LIVES - A successful FBI profiler, Illeana Scott, is summoned to help out Quebec law enforcement in Montreal. Her task is to hunt down a serial killer who assumes the lives and identities of the people he kills as he travels across North America. This forces Illeana to adjust to working in a strange city with a police team with which she doesn't really fit in.

Definitions of Thriller and Horror

In our lesson today we began the process of preparing to begin the initial pre production of our foundation production films. This involved exploring the generic identity of the thriller and horror genre.

A THRILLER IS -
1. (Performing Arts / Theatre) books, film, play, etc., depicting crime, mystery, or espionage in an atmosphere of excitement and suspense
2. a person or thing that thrills
3.One that thrills, especially a sensational or suspenseful book, story, play, or movie.

A HORROR IS -
1. An intense, painful feeling of repugnance and fear.
2. Intense dislike; abhorrence.
3. A cause of horror.
4. Informal Something unpleasant, ugly, or disagreeable: That hat is a horror.
5. Horrors Informal Intense nervous depression or anxiety. Often used with the.

Preliminary Task Evaluation

For our preliminary task, the location we filmed in was the studio. This worked really well because we had professional lighting, a blue screen behind the window and the set was well suited to the script. I took and active role directing the location and angles of the camera. Tom Cunningham was behind the camera shooting the sequence. For our preliminary task, we used a mix between light and dark and used mainly hard light. This was effective and important to our scene because the light bought out the set and the hard light enhances the characters stance and position. The dark lighting was use to portray a derelict room and built tension to fit with the script. For the filming, we had to make sure that the camera was set up properly. We ran a colour bar and when needed, ensured that the tripod was at the right level for each shot. We moved the camera into different positions to make sure that we were filming the correct angle of the actors. We also made sure that the lighting equipment was not in the shot as this was not part of the script and when bright light hit the camera the rays blocked the actor’s faces. We choose appropriate shots and angles of shots. First we filmed the wide shots, and then we filmed over the shoulder shots. We added in mid shots to see whether these worked better than close ups but we also shot close ups. We did this purely for the purpose of when come to edit, what would look better. For both the mid shots and the close ups we film Dan in high angle and Laura in low angle. We also filmed a hero shot of Dan. This is because it gave Dan a role of importance and dominance and Laura a role of innocence and vulnerability. We filmed some ‘experimental shots’. These consisted of a close up of a door handle opening, a close up on Dan’s feet and extreme close up on a light switch and a bulb turning on. Also we added in a pan from right to left of Laura running from the light switch to the window. We filmed a Bird’s eye view of the whole scene. This was particularly effective of Laura looking very worried and nervous. Another effective extra shot we added in was a tilt of Laura’s feet upwards to her face. We also conformed to the 180 degree rule and never crossed the line. Finally we used the appropriate terminology, such as ‘stand by’, action’ and ‘cut’ which were very helpful to make sure everyone onset knew what was happening. In the editing of our preliminary task we had to cut down a lot of shots to fund ones that fitted with our plot. We eventually did that and then it was just a matter of putting them together. We were introduced to Final Cut pro, which was what we did most of the editing, but before all of that we had to use a ‘checking in, checking out’ process using Final Cut Server, this was were all our filming was stored and also where it was saved when we had finished editing after each lesson. During the editing process we came to a flaw where we had to insert a background image of a city in the window, because we were shooting in the studio we had a clue screen behind the window so that when it came to doing it, it was an easier process to insert. The process was very interesting to take part in as it showed us that it usually takes more time to edit than it does to shoot. We had to get the timing right when the actors were speaking, between different shots, so this meant we had to cut some parts out in order to insert others.

Preliminary Practical Preparation –

In our Preliminary Practical Preparation we had to come up with a series of different shots to fit with a sequence of our choice, it had to be no longer than a twenty second moving image sequence. We were put into groups of 4 and were then advised to come up with a location and summary of what we were going to shoot. Our group went to the top floor of the cafeteria and we made Amy walk and pick up a sugar pot from the table and then walk off with it. We used a series of different shots for this and also came up with out own. We used a close up and extreme close up of her hands touching the pot, and also a mid shot and wide angle shot to show her moving towards the sugar and then table. We came up with a number of different angles but the ones that we decided to choose were a close up of her feet/shoes as she was walking towards the point of view and also a tracking shot of her walking. The whole sequence worked because it was a very simple idea that could be expanded. In the process we had to move around quite a few of the tables and chairs so that the scene/background wasn’t to clustered. As a whole we worked well as a team and it gave is all a good in sight to what was to come. Our short ‘film’ then went on to winning and we got the chance to then film out preliminary task in the studio, here at Hurtwood.

Introduction To The Camera

In the lesson, we were given a camera to study, so that when it came to doing our practise practical we were aware of what to do with the camera.
In the screen of the Camera there are a series of different things that we had to take note of. Some of these are as follows.
in the top left hand corner there is an icon which tells you how many minutes of room is left. In the top right hand corner, there is an icon which tells you the time code and the number shown on each frame. There are 25 frames a second. 24 of these are film.
For example..
(_:_:_:_:) The first (_) is for the hours, the second (_) is for minutes, the third (_) is for seconds and the last (_) is to show the frames that have been shot.
The screen should shoot in a 16:9 wide which is the aspect ratio. The shutter speed on average should be 50, and the sound quality in average would be 48k. The centre of the screen is called a 'Hotspot'. DVCAM is short for digital video camera.
On the camera, there are 3 main aspects to it, Focus, Zoom and Exposure. These are located on the camera lenses. Focus being the front part of the camera, zoom being the long tube like shape and the exposure is right by the main camera itself. The bigger part of the whole object.

Introduction to Tripod and Settings

In the lesson we looked at a tripod and how it works, a tripod is a device that is used to hold a camera in place without having to hand hold it, it gives a more clear and sturdy image. It has 3 legs and can be height adjusted using a lock device which makes sure that the tripod legs don’t slip down etc. They are very easily adapted and can be carried around easily as well. The tripod head has pan (left to right and right to left) and tilt (up to down and down to up) locking nuts. It also has more resistance between movements. At the bottom of the camera (PD 170) there is a metal plate which you slide onto the shoe/camera plate. You then have to lock off the camera, to make sure its in the right place. Putting the microphone on the camera is important so sound is detected. To do this you need to un-tighten the thumb screw, and slip on the black foam material tube. This ensures that no back sound is detected.

Introduction to Photoshop

In the lesson, we went to the computer suite and opened up Adobe Photoshop CS2. We learnt how to edit pictures and layering different imagery onto others, this was the most important thing that we learnt as it is what makes the picture look good, it was really hard to grasp onto at first but after practise it got a lot easier. We took examples from the internet and copied them onto the software. We learnt how to use the drag tool, the spot healing tool this is used to cover any imperfections by taking pixels from around the area and copying them into the centre. The free transform tool, which changes the size of an image. We also learnt about the clone tool, which copies an area which you can paste anywhere else on the page. The dodge and smudge tool, the blur tool which helps blend areas together, the burn tool which give the image or features on the images a reddish burnt effect and the sharpen tool, which sharpens edges. We also learnt about pixels, these are a number of very small picture elements that make up a picture, as on a visual display unit.

Photos Of Me

This is a photo taken during a media lesson, where we were given a camera and had to take different types of shots, i.e. midshot, longshot, extreme close up etc..
This is a photo of me with the sun hitting me from my left side, allowing the image to be a lot clearer.

This is a long shot of me, this means that it is generally the angle which shows the image corresponding to the real distance between the audience and the screen. It was taken at night so there would've been a flash on the camera.

This is a picture of me, taken with a digital camera.
This is a motion picture, and is taken using a long shot. It shows you the real distance between the audience and the screen. The camera shows the full shot, showing the entire human body.

This is another picture taken during a media lesson, Millie took the picture and we then loaded them onto a memory stick, i then edited them on I-photo and enhanced the colour in places and darkened it in other. This is a medium close up.

This was a picture taken during a media lesson, we had to go and take pictures that had alot of power and domination in them. We then had to edit them in Photoshop. This is my first shot before editing.

Introduction

Hello, my name is Storm. I am 17 years old and am currently studying media, art, drama and dance at Hurtwood House School. I live in the Lake District, and have boarded since i was about 7. My favourite film is Elizabeth, because it shows just how much she did to the monarchy. I like scary films like The Orphanage and The Orphan, i think that those 2 films in particular were put together really well, and the plot really grabbed your attention. I like Musical Theatre, my favourite production is Spring Awakening. My favourite band is Kings of Leon and my favourite solo artist is Beyonce & Miley Cyrus.
In this blog i am going to be focusing on Media studies. Media Studies is very fun, so far i have being looking into a programme called Skins and the way it is portrayed to the audience, i.e. the different camera angles etc.. I chose Media studies because my dad is in the media industry and I’ve always been fascinated by it. I also want to go into the fashion industry and media is a good subject to have a qualification in, if i want to go down that path.