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

Ident’s and Credits & TitlesOne of the most important aspects of our opening sequence are the credits and ident. From my previous blog posts you can see that there was in-depth research into what the typical conventions of thriller ident’s and credits. As you can see below there are screen shots of our final ident, credits and title (right hand side) and screenshots of the ident’s and credits of the same genre. I feel that overall we managed to keep to the conventions of the thriller genre. Our ident ‘Crimson Pictures’ follows the conventions of a typical ident as it represents the genre of film. This is done as the name ‘Crimson’ connotes the idea of red which is an icon of death and danger, this is then again highlighted by the flashes of red that run throughout and behind the text, setting the audience up for the thrills that are about to occur. Ident’s are always know to be simple and reach the point so by the background of our ident being black it keeps in line with the conventions of ident’s. However in some case our ident does challenge the conventions of ident’s as the colour red is also an icon of passion so it could produce films of the genre Romance, making it versatile and reach out to different audiences. Just like ‘Twisted Pictures’, ‘Crimson Pictures’ suites the genre thriller as it has a morbid sound to it.

Our credits however are very subtle and are not too bold unlike the credits from ‘Shutter Island’ who’s text is red and white making the audience on-edge as they do not know what is going to happen next. The colour of our text was a soft grey and this challenges the idea of the thriller genre as they blend in with the background as we felt the red jumper was to be the only bold colour on the screen. The text does not have any transitions unlike ‘Shutter Islands’ it just cuts straight to the next set. This made it appear jumpy and kept the audience attention on the screen. Although we researched ‘The Lion King’ as our title and this is not the same genre it holds qualities that represent the thriller genre such as the red. Our main focus was that we wanted the title to appear straight at the end of our footage, however this was not the case in the end as we found a light flicker effect that meant created an eerie effect, that was more suitable to the genre. We used a bold font and a bold colour (white) to make sure that the audience takes in the name of the film and that it leaves a lasting impact on them.

Shot TypesHarry PotterThe Syndrome

Our shots are vey typical of a ‘thriller’ genre , such as the tracking and the over the shoulder shots. However we have also added in our own shots that are not typical of a ‘thriller’ genre such as the canted shot (below on the left). Although you do tend to find canted shots in ‘thrillers’ this canted shot was not the conventional type as it was used as a point of view of our victim in a way that it was as if she had just regained consciousness. This was effective as it mean that the audience could put themselves in the v victims position illuminating the fear that is created. We used a lot more shots but the most effective one was a focus pull, (below on the right) this was our most effective shot in my opinion as it created a sense of mystery of the capturer as we had the focus pull on just the victim meaning that the capturer is out of focus, this is effective in our opening sequence as you are unable to see the face of the capturer until she notices him. Overall our shots all convert to the typical conventions of the ‘thriller’ genre.

This shot is known as a Tracking shot, this idea was influenced from the film ‘Harry Potter and the deathly hallows part 1’ as there is a chase scene through a forest which is the same as ours. A tracking shot will show the direction in which the character is running, it also enhances the speed at which they are running at. We were influenced by a variety of shots from ‘Harry Potter’ as you can see from one of my blog posts about Camera angles. When filming we made sure that we got more varied shots that we may of needed this allowed us to find the best ones and fit them into out footage.

Costume

Costume is what represents and gives a deeper understanding into the characters . They can help to establish what the characters were doing before, so in this case it would be that the victim was going for a walk in the woods possibly with a dog and then got captured. I feel that the costumes will appeal to our target audience as it modern to this day in age. The iconic red jumper is highly effective as it is alarming in the surrounding in the woods, this is not typical to ‘thriller’ genre as the “Victim’s” tend to blend in more or be wearing white to show their ‘purity’, we found this out in our research on ‘The Last House On The Left’ as the main girl who is escaping is wearing white. However the bold colour of red is very striking against the white background (Snow), this enhances the idea that there is no escape for her , because no one is around to notice her. The bright red is also an icon of danger and blood which represents the torture she has been through supporting the genre. Red is also and icon of passion and love this helps to signify the idea of her falling for her capturer. In our opening sequence we wanted the capturer to look as if he lived and was almost a part of the forest as he was able to guide his was around, we managed to achieve this as the green/brown jumper he is wearing blends in with the trees, this is typical of the role of a ‘capturer’ as you tend to find that they were colours that blend in with their surroundings. The costume design again for our capturer is practical , as by him wearing jeans it is clear to see in the footage that he is comfortable. The costumde design for our characters also highlights certain elements of them which is typical in ‘thrillers’, for example; our capturer is wearing a tight fitting jumper which enhances his muscles, whereas our victim is again wearing tight clothes but this time it is highlighting the fact that she is small and delicate. Both of our characters wore wellies, this was not only because it was safer for them to wear them but it was also due to it would show the practical side to them, that they know how to look after themselves which is ironic for our victim as she was on her own in the forest before been captured.

Location and lighting

After changing our minds with the locations of our film, due to the two minute limit, we decided to base all our filming in the woods of Moreton Pinkey which was near the house of one of the team members. When we had done our test shots we knew that these woods had a certain feel to them that would reflect in the footage. Before we started our filming there were weather warnings about snow, and as a team we though that we would have to postpone the filming however upon doing research on ‘thrillers’ that have been set in the snow ‘The Shinig’ was the main one this gave us an understanding of lighting in our location. It also gave pour group the confidence that our movie will be just as effective in the snow. Most ‘thrillers’ are set in a location such as a woods or forest as it illustrates to the audience that there is no escape. We were

lucky in the fact that the forest that we hade decided to film in was maze like as there was a lot of symmetrical pathways, which gave the location a feeling that they were in a maze. In our opening film we used all natural lighting, whereas in other films such as ‘The Shining’ and ‘Harry Potter’ they had used artificial lighting to create a more eerie effect to the location. The natural lighting of our shot helped to highlight the fact that there was no escape and that even so it was going to be more challenging as the snow was making it harder for them to run. Throughout our footage there are lots of different locations of the forest , this is just like the scene in ‘Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows part 1’ in this film there was a lot of different areas of the woods that they are in that makes the audience aware of how large the surroundings are this makes them realise that there is very little hope for the victim(s). Overall I though that our location worked out well, however the natural lighting could have been manipulated with our colour grading techniques that we had used on our test shots to make the location seem more eerie and create more suspense and fear.

Concept

The idea of our opening sequence is to create a Thriller. Thrillers generally tend to put the audience on the edge of their seats. From all of our research we picked up ideas that would influence us when creating our opening sequence, that would help us to appeal to the audience we are aiming for. I think that overall we managed to create a opening scene that will get the audience wanting more, and that includes all the elements of a typical Thriller genre. Although it contains elements that you would find in a typical thriller film, it also has certain elements that making it stand out from the rest of the Thriller genre.

Concept

The idea of our opening sequence is to create a Thriller. Thrillers generally tend to put the audience on the edge of their seats. From all of our research we picked up ideas that would influence us when creating our opening sequence, that would help us to appeal to the audience we are aiming for. I think that overall we managed to create a opening scene that will get the audience wanting more, and that includes all the elements of a typical Thriller genre. Although it contains elements that you would find in a typical thriller film, it also has certain elements that making it stand out from the rest of the Thriller genre.