Plot & Storyboard Ideas

In lesson we started talking in a group about what is actually going to happen in our opening scene and what plot we should have. Lauren then started talking about some hide and seek film which then gave me an epiphany. So I then started to write down notes of my ideas and story line that I randomly thought about. The following image below are my notes:

I was originally thinking of a little girl standing by a tree and then counting and watching her friends run away. Throughout this I thought the sound of little children laughing and a little girl counting down throughout would give it this thriller/horror theme. I thought the establishing shot could be quiet pan shot of the scenery with the wind blowing and then the screen goes all static with loud static sound and it then fades through the cinematic titles. This is when the opening will really start.

Audio Blog of Our Ideas & Brainstorming

The following link is a link to a mp3 audio file of our conversation of ideas and what we are going to do, as well as what we think is a good, bad and why we think this. However to listen you have to download the mp3 file by pressing the text saying "download" in blue.
Audio Blog Link

Storyboarding

Graphic visualizing process (storyboarding) is when directors begin to think about bringing their ideas to life. Thinking about the story, character development and meaning.

Why are storyboards important?

• pitching an idea
• links planning to film process
• visualizing images and ideas
• visualize links between shots, action/graphic matches
• timings,continuity and pace
• technical awareness and understanding
• revise narrative sequences
• chance to make decisions and revise

Graphic Mask is a part of an editing process. Matching a graphic of a similar shape and size, and matching it to another one in another shot.

Cutting is linked with t.v soaps etc. This can be over used and lose detail, meaning and the tone of the scene. Therefore some directors don't cut too much and in fact use the camera to tell the story instead of editing more cuts in post production. This is to hold the verisimilitude and the audiences attention. Therefore creating a completely different feel and making it more of a movie or real life rather than just some edited t.v programme.

How to storyboard:

• photocopying a set of storyboards sheets
• use small frames
• draw in pencil
• number the shots
• make short notes
• note down the camera position
• little annotations on the storyboard with arrows

The storyboard is generally about already knowing what the scene is going to look like so it therefore is easier for the process.

What To Do

We then discussed the things we needed to do at home in our personal time to help our research and planning into our genre of Horror-Thriller.

Previous Thriller Response Analysis

Analysis:
The establishing shot is of a middle classed house on a street at night with a street lamp on. This is presented with a long shot to show the scenery and how isolated the house is at this time. The light from the living room in the house then turns on and then we see movement coming from within the house. This is presented with the use of shadows. We then see a figure come to the window to close the curtains this then cuts to a low shot of the window at a close up of the action of her closing the curtains but viewing into the house. This is shown like this to maybe make it seem as if it is someone hiding in the garden crouching down and looking in. Or to make it seem more mysterious. Furthermore this is presented in a very dark surrounding with only light coming from the window with the lights on. This then cuts to a shot of a pov camera shot of an extreme close up at the window as if someone is peering through the crack in the curtain.  This is shown through the camera constantly moving as if it someone looking and not actually a camera.This then cuts to a shot of inside the house from a high camera looking down on the action and movement of a woman walking around. This then cuts to extreme close up's of the woman's movements. This to emphasise the drama and tension in scene and in what she is doing. This then cuts in to an extreme close up of her laptop screen and the chat on the screen. This can be to show the chat as something significant.The girl then gets up and then as she gets up the camera jump cuts to flash up shots of link in the chat to show what it says and make it come across as dramatic. This therefore links to the start with the pov camera implying someone is looking in to the window or someone mysterious is there. This then fades to white with a match on action of two shots of the woman getting up and going in to the kitchen. The second shot is taken with a mid shot from a distance to show the girl coming towards the camera and walking past. As she walks past though a dark black figure walks past the hallway in the background. this then creates more tension and links into the horror genre as it just mentioned on the laptop screen reports of murders. there are then shots of the lights flickering on and off and this is captured with the camera looking into a mirror. In one of the flashes we see the dark figure again for a split second where he is standing next to the girl. It then cuts to a long shot looking down a corridor where the girl the walks towards the camera. It then turns to a pov shot of her reaching for the handle and this is shown through a wobbly camera to make it seem as if she is actually moving and the camera is her pov. This then changes to a low shot from the basement with darkness surrounding the open door with the women at the top. She is presented as dominant here as the camera is looking up to her. Furthermore this is shown through the lighting as all the light is coming from the doorway where she is standing at the top of the stairs. This shows her a superior with the black negative space around.

Horror Research - Guidelines and Women

BBFC guidelines on horror:

U- should be mild should take account of the presence of young audiences. The outcome should be reassuring.

PG- can be frightening but shouldn't be too intense.

12- sustained threat with occasional gory moments only. 15- sustained or detailed infliction of pain or injury is not acceptable.

18- no constraints at this level on theme, language, nudity or horror.

My group have decided we are most likely going to do a 15 mainly because we are around the same age so we have an idea of what we would normally see in a 15 horror film, but also because it doesn't give us too strict boundaries so we don't have to restrict our ideas.

Representing women:

In films during the ... women were represented as the 'damsel in distress' who were always the victim and never the culprit. They wore dresses, had beautiful hair and looked stereotypically feminine. This is because at the time women were seen to be the weaker sex and didn't do bad or horrific things. However, across the course of the 20th century many changes have taken place to how women are represented on screen. For example, the Dracula story offers an interesting take on that change, as the different screen versions remain true to the original novel in making women broadly passive figures. The film began to show good women vs bad women through Count Dracula's success lies in his seduction of women from good to evil. In today's films women are shown that they can be just as powerful, violent and evil as male characters which could be argued to be a positive and negative thing for representing women.

Brainstorm & Genre

First of al for our main project we had to choose what type of thriller we would do as there are so many sub-genres of thriller. Therefore we looked to our survey we previously made. In our survey the majority of the answers to "What is your favourite type of thriller? And Why?" were action thriller and secondly horror. Therefore we decided this was these would be the best genre for our task.

We then started to brainstorm on the two genres and discuss what is stereotypical of these horrors within camera & editing, setting, sound, characters and costume/make up. We decides to do this to see what we would need to do if we chose either of these genres, as well as to choose which genre we prefer and what would be best.

After looking at both of these we decided to choose a Thriller-Horror. This was because we looked at previous media thriller tasks and the high majority of responses were action-thriller, therefore we wanted to do something different and not stereotypical of the thriller task. Furthermore we wanted to do something that hasn't already been done. As well as this we decided on Horror as action-thriller was a high majority of the choice to our questionnaire question and horror was second. Therefore we want to instead target a niche audience and target them more specifically instead of aiming at an audience so broad. Consequently we are now going to make a second question asking specifically about Action-Thrillers and see the response to help us with our research and planning for our project.

 We then later went on to brainstorm scene ideas and opening plot ideas related and to do with our genre horror thriller. We decided to do this as we felt we needed to have unique and not stereotypical opening of a horror thriller. So by brainstorming our ideas and thoughts on the genre it allows us to then reflect on them and decide as a group what to do.

Continuity Task - Evaluation

Evaluation:

When I look back at my continuity task and what I have done I can see my strengths as weaknesses personally and as a group - what we have done well and not so well. We realised that the sound in our film was not very clear and had background noise which was inevitable as we had to film this in our school at only certain free periods and there is always something going on, especially in the cafe. Furthermore we felt that some of the camera movement isn't as clean as it could be with swift movements like pans and tilts. However we felt that we included all the shots we needed to with low and high angles, tilt and pan shots as well as the 180 degree rule, match on action and eye line match shot reverse shot we had to include. We these aspects I think we especially did well and presented them well within our storyboard. Consequently as a group we realise how important the setting and sound can be as well as the lighting of it, otherwise this can ruin your entire film. As well as this we struggled with enough footage or variety of it which we then had to go out and get more and add to our story. Therefore we then realised we need to make sure we take lots of footage and a variety of different shots and test out new things because something could look better later or we might need something else later which we wont have and have to then re-shoot for.

Overall by producing the continuity task it has helped me to progress in my learning as I k=now know my weaknesses and what to do better next time which will help my group and I to improve ourselves as our final film. I personally feel we all worked well and I even enjoyed when we were filming and editing as when we knew what we were doing we therefore found it easier for ourselves. I feel we have done well on producing our film through the content, filming and editing. However one thing I would change next time and build upon more is the sound and include more music and variety instead of just the sound in the scene. As this made it feel very rookie and not professional at all. Therefore sound would bring the whole film together which we realise now and can improve on.

Continuity Task - Final Cut

With our final cut we decided to re-film all our scenes as none of them were good enough before. When re-filming our continuity task we looked at all the problems we faced and made sure we saw to the previous problems to make sure our continuity task final cut is majorly better technically. We have included all the shots that we needed to like: shot reverse shot, match on action, pan and tilt shots as well as keeping the 180 degree rule, which we broke in the last cut. In this final cut we also used a variety of other shots like higher and lower angles and had a longer clip and more footage. With our final cut we improved a lot technically and our story even improved.

Audiences & Institutions

In todays lesson we started to look into the consumers and the congolometers of the world.

Conglometers are producers of media/organisations e.g. The warner brothers.

We began by descussing who has the most power, the mass audience that consume the media or the media itself. Perosnally I think this can differ as the consumer chooses what is good, bad and popular in the world, therefore deciding what should be displayed by the media. However the media decide what they display and only give us certain ways to be and things to look at, so consequently the media has power too and argumently more than the consumer. 

We then went on to look at racism in Disney. One of the 6 main conglometers in the world. This then led on to discussions of Disney indoctrinating the mass audience and the fact that disney have influence over the younger audience which can therefore have a bigger wffect on there latter life as your childhood is what makes you who you are and become when you are older. As you learn all your opinions and views from a young age due to the fact you have none at that age. Meaning Disney can inject information into the youth and this is a great power. This left us with an extremely confused mind set and a lot to take away from the lesson.