Skills Audit; Filming

Filming

Our group filmed over the space of two days. On day one we spent it day filming at Highgate Woods and the second day at London Bridge.

when we went out filming we brought our storyboards with us, so that we knew what shots we had to film. When we were in the woods it was a bit difficult to film, as we didn't know what we should film because there wasn't much in the woods to actually film. In the end we filmed many shots; such as pans, tracking shots, high angle shots, low angle shots, close ups. We just went with it and did what we thought was right. our group had to remember to take a 2 min sound shot of the natural sound around us, this was so if we needed to add natural sound like if the sound was too windy or couldn't be used.

When we was filming at London Bridge Train Station, we started filming then was approached by a police officer who told us that we needed to get a permission pass to film at the station. We took a number of takes of the same shot because there was lots of different people there.

Filming was an enjoyable experience and if I had to do it again I would but only this time I would do it better.

Skills Audit: Editing

Our Skills Audits we were taught at the beggining of our Film project were vital for us to complete our final piece of work. The skills we were taught such as;

Final cut pro- cutting clips, changing speed, changing colour, adding edits

Livetype- creating text, changing its colour, adding effects, adding backgrounds, changing the style,

Sound Track Pro- Listening to the music, playing more than one track at the same time, fading sounds in and our, adding sound effects,

and overall just knowing how to use the programme.

Before beggining editing, our way of keeping all our shots organised was to arange them in order and rename each shot. This allowed us to allocate each shot easily once they were imported into final cut pro.
By then following the storyboard we was able to start putting the shots onto the timeline including extra shots we had filmed. For the changing of scene we put in "fade" edits to allow our film to flow. We began our shots with the woman in a urban enviroment. This gave the film an instant calm feel. Soon as the scene begins to change the normality of our film begins to disapear and the audience will realise somethings wrong with this "woods" setting. In order to make our "wood" settings stand out more, we changed the speed of the shots to a slower pace and added a black and white effect to some of them.
Changing the shots to differeng setting also allowed us to create an elipses. Cutting to the "wood" shots then back to the woman meant that we could skip time and put her in a different place each time rather than filming her whole movement.
The last shot of the woman throwing away the key was our most meaningful shot of our opening. The woman throwing away the key implied that she had something in her past she wanted to hide and she was doing this by throwing away the evidence to it.

Skills audit: Filming

(couldnt add any images to this blog as blogger says it has no more space for images)

During our filming process we spent 2 days filming.

For both days of filming we brought our storyboard along with us. This aloud us to follow what we had planned and reminded us what we wanted to do. Aswell as this, being in the setting also aloud us to realise other shots we could include.

We spent one day (saturday) up Highgate woods. We found it difficult filming in the woods as we were only filming the setting and not an action therefore deciding the shot angles etc was a struggle. However we filmed Tracking shots, Panning shots, High angle shots, Low angle shots, Establishing shots. When filming we just experimented with these types of shots and all took turns with the camera, to see if each of us could make these shots work in different ways.

Our second day of filming was the following tuesday at London Bridge. In order to film in the station we had to get a permission pass from the station offices. Once we started filming there was a lot of people around. In order to ensure that our shots were not disturbed by the people around us we filmed each shot a number of times. When filming the "tunnel shots" the area was a lot less busy therefore only had to take around 3 takes of each shot. However because of this we decided that we had extra time therefore filmed the shots in a number of different angles to give us a wider choice when editing. The bridge shots were most difficult as this road was very busy one minute, and the next minute only had a couple of people on it. This meant that when we were filming a tracking shot, people would walk in front of the camera or people who were vising the area would wave thinking we were famous.

On both days of filming we had to film a 2minute sound shot of each setting we used. This was so that if we wanted to use natural sound in our final piece it would match up.

Overall i enjoyed our filming experience. It was hard work but our whole group was very pleased with the shots we ended up with.

Changes in light of feedback from rough cut

From our rough cut there were only a couple changes we realised needed to be done.

When recieving feedback from our rough cut we were told that there was not much to split our shots of the woman from the wood shots. Although we planned on letting the music create the distance between these two shots, we also decided to change the wood shots slightly. On final cut pro we learnt how to slow down the motion of the clips and we also took away the colour leaving some of the clips in black and white. I think this gave these shots a more "thriller" feel to them.

Although we had not added the sound in our rough cut, when watching it back, we realised and so did others that some of the natural sound in our shots could not be used. There was a shot in the woods that we could not use the natural sound on as you can hear football players shouting in the background. There was also a clip of the woman on the bridge that we could not use as before the clip end the members of our group begin to talk. However we fixed these faults when adding sound so it did not effect our final piece.

Evaluation

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms a

nd conventions of real media products?

This is a 9 shot still image of Zombieland, i will compare this with stills from our own Thriller opening.

Just from looking you can straight away notice that shot is action packed and something attention grabbing is happening in them. In comparison to our Thriller "Twisted", there are big differences in how each film starts. Zombieland jumps straight into action in its open sequence whereas Twisted has a slow progressing typical thriller opening which switches between two completely different scenes/locations which quite different from Zombieland's approach but just as effective. Similar features of the opening sequences between the two include the credits, title of the film and pro

duction comapanies.

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Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learned in the progression from it to the full product?

The preliminary exercise gave us our first filming experience, we had guidelines and rules to abide by such as; not leaving too much space above a characters head, including a match cut, shot reverse shot and over the shoulder. This activity would be good for getting an idea about filming our final thriller, we firstly made a storyboard including drawings and specific camera movement within that shot, we followed the storyboard roughly and along the way changed an idea if we had thought of a better one.

One of the most obvious a

nd vital factors to consider whilst filming is to make sure the camera is in focus, unfortunately our group did not check to make sure we was filming with our camera in focus and we only realised this after we had uploaded the clips onto the computer and the exercise was finished. The shots that were shot out of focus look very unprofessional and you literally have to squint to watch the clip.

Comparing this to how we filmed the final thriller, our camera technique and experience has definately gotten better, learning from our mistakes we constantly checked if the camera was in focus when shooting each and every shot of the thriller opening. This paid off as all of our shots came out crystal clear and because of this we had plenty of shots to work with to build together our final piece.

Another factor we have improved since our preliminary exercise is the type and amount of shots used in a scene, the sh

ort sequence we made before was very dull as we used one shot to film one action. So when the character walked into the room, sat down, and had a talk with the other character, this was all shot using the same angel.

Films and programs will nev

er have this much action crammed into one shot, so we thought about this feature of the clip and decided it was a feature we definaitly needed to deal with and change for tour thriller. In the thriller we included a wide variety of shots and included as many shots into a scene as visually possible, when put together we had great match cuts in a lot of our scenes which we did not include in the preliminary exe

rcise.

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How does your media pro

duct represent particular social groups?

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? How will you attract/address your audience?

"Alseep" is a 2009 short student thriller trailer which was posted on Youtube on September 22, 2009 and has 8,184 views.

Releasing the short

film

onto the internet instantly gets it out to the world and it being on such a popular site as Youtube gave it very high chances of it getting recognised. The vid

eos success is not only due to it being on the most used video sharing site in the world, its actual content is very good. The filming is professional and of top class, they have used brave and inventive shots that work very well with storyline and mood the clip gives to the audience. The dissolves, match cuts, jumps cuts and other effects work smoothly together as one as well as those points the fashion in which the credits were presented really worked and suited well. As a whole i think the film is extremely good, the filming looks as if done by professional camera men and is way above average for a student project.

In comparison to

____________________________________________________________________

Who would be your the audience for your media product?

____________________________________________________________________

What have you learned about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

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Audience feedback and comment

Amber Bradley's Evaluation

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

The conversation

Similar to our film "Twisted," the sequence for "The Conversation" is established in a busy urban environment. In our sequence this is where the antagonist is introduced. Urban areas are regularly used in thrillers because it fits some of the popular occurring story-lines involving characters who suit this surrounding.

Other conventions of the opening of the thriller genre may include; establishing the main characters, keys props, close up shots, fast pace actions and some others.

In our film "Twisted" we shot a close up of a woman to establish her as the main character and get the audience to familiarize themselves with her. We also filmed a close up of our main prop which was a "key" to establish to the audience that this prop will be something important to the story-line.

The main character throwing something away creates tension and suspense. It tells the audience that she has done something which she wants to forget.

Although our opening is not particulary fast pace, we felt it contained suspence by cross cutting between 2 settings, the fast urban environment and the bleak annonomous empty woods.

The titles in our sequence are simple but the edit is edgy and creates a sense of fear.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our film represents an urban middle class life, whe

re a wealthy woman has killed her boyfriend because of domestic abuse.

In marathon man the protagonist is introduced running in an empty park, dressed in casual clothes.

Although my film opens with a si

milar theme of a woman traveling, she is not the protagonist but is the antagonist. We show this by making her stand out in a busy urban area because she is on her own, wearing big sunglasses to cover her face and once she is at her destination she throws something away showing she is trying to forget something. Her smart blazer, designer bag and smart boots show she is quite a sofisticated woman and is wealthy.

In thriller films, they do not normally give away immediately at the beginning who the antagonist is. This was our aim. Although by making our antagonist throw something away showing she has a secret, the way we dressed her does not give her secrets away. she looks "normal." Another film that does this is Jennifer's Body.

Although megan fox plays the antagonist in this film, the way she is dressed does not give this away.

Link to Jennifer's Body Official Website

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product

and why? How will you attract/ address your audience?

This student film has 5,612 views and has been online on youtube for a year.

I have an online marketing strategy and this is a step by step account of how i am going

to construct that strategy. In order to make my film successful on line, i am going to begin

by creating a vimeo. Once this has received a lot of hits i will then upload my video onto

youtube. I can do this because i am aware that it can now be successful. In order to

introduce people to my film i will create a Facebook page to advertise it and send a link

onto friends i have on this networking site. I could also have a screening of the film for

friends/ family and piers to introduce them to the film officially. I will then ask friends to

send this onto their friends and i think this is a good strategy to get a lot of hits. As well

as using youtube i could use other networking sites such as; Myspace, Bebo, Twitter etc.

I could also try to get my film into independent film festivals such as Raindance and they

may then put my film onto their virtual film websites.

Here is an example of a Facebook page specifically for films-

http://www.facebook.com/Film

Who will be your audience for your media product?

When preparing out opening sequence to our thriller, we had to think about our audience. Our audience would be aged between 20- 35, 80% skewed female, and their class will be C2DE.

Our audience is is Technically Savvy and is likely to be working class (profession such as admin officer/ secretary), enjoys socialising with friends, regular cinema visitor, will have their own page on a social networking site (most likely facebook or twitter), reads often (books aswell as celebrity magazines), owns a blackberry, uses public transport, takes pride in their image, busy scheduled, keeps a diary, healthy diet, has an ipod.

This is an image of what you may find in our audiences bag:

This bag belongs to Jennifer. She is a 26 year old woman who works as a receptionist in a solicitors firm.

· NOW magazine

· Diary and Pen

· Purse

· Hand cream

· Selfridges Receipt

· Water Bottle

· Blackberry

· Cinema Discount Vouchers

What have you learnt about technologies from the process constructing this product?

Before starting our film project all 3members of my group were new to everything. None of us had any experience therefore during preperation, filming and editing, we picked up loads of new skills.

Research and preperation:

Before we started filming we had to learn about different genres within the thriller genre. To research these we used the search engine google to look at various websites.

We watched various thriller films, including marathon man, to gain ideas on what skills are used in filming a thriller film e.g. camera angles, shots, music etc.

We watched openings of various thriller films to give us even more of an idea of what to include in our opening. We looked at the camera pace, match cuts, music, titles, and other aspects. We watched these clips mainly on youtube.

Before starting this product i did not realise the usefullness of google and youtube. The information we found out on google was easy to access and helped us a lot with our project. The clips we watched on youtube were easy to access and their was a wide range that we could study and analyse.

Productions:

When filming, we used our storyboard to help us keep track of what we needed to do. The storyboard aloud us to plan in advance; the angles of each shot, the mise en scene, the location and to know who in the group is going to be doing what. It kept us organised and allowed us to seperate tasks into the short time we had. A shot i think we used well in our thriller was the low angle shot of the woman on the bridge. The low angle shot made her look weak as she was so far away from the camera and her surrounding was very big compared to her. When filming we had to take into consideration the weather conditions. This is for the safety of the camera and also the different weather conditions would effect the editing of our final work. When filming shots for our match cut, one thing we need to do is make sure there arent any people in one shot that wouldnt be in the next, as it will look unproffesional. The area we chose (london bridge) was hard for our filming as the amount of people in the area changed rapidly. One minute the area would be empty and the next it would be crow

ded. If we was to film this project again, although i feel we edited it well, i would choose a setting that has a lot less people travelling through it.

Editing:

When editing out final piece of work, we put a lot of effort and time into making it as proffesional as we could. Our preliminary task helped us rehearse for this task and gave us the chance to get used to the software we needed to use.

Our edits from one setting to the other did not fit when we first put them onto Final Cut Pro, so we experimented with different effects to the find the one we thought suited them best.

For our match cuts we took a lot of time, playing the clips in slow motion, to make sure that they looked neat and accurate. We also included shot reverse shot when editing.

To create our titles we used "live Type". This programme contained a number of text styles, sizes, colours and also different effects. You could choose where on the page the font will appear and also decide whether you want a plain background or whether you would like the texts to go over your video. We chose to have our titles over our video as we wanting the tension to continue building and we felt that having a black screen seperationg the clips at any point would reduce the tension built.

For our music we used "Soundtrack Pro." On this programme we could upload our video and playback music over our clip, to see what went well and what didnt. The programme had loads of different styles of music, as well as different sound effect and it also allowed you to overlap sounds. This helped us to make our music as unique as we could. We used two different music clips onto our track, one to suit each setting. In order to make the music sound proffesional we had to learn how to fade it in and out and where it was appropriate to overlap. We also used some natural sound in our thriller opening.

We also put togever a video which explains in word out experiance of different technologies during out filming process -->

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learned in the

progression from it to the full product?

Our preliminary match cut exercise gave us an idea of how the process of making our final opening sequence would be. Firstly we drew up a story board in a single lesson and in our next double lesson we filmed for an hour, then spent the rest of our time editing this work.

our main problem with this exercise was that the camera was not in focus. Although we focused the camera when we started, we did not focus it after every shot which meant that it did not stay in focus. this made the film look unprofessional and was hard to see. This made us extra aware when filming our final piece and we checked after every shot that the camera was in focus. If we did not do this then we would have had to reshoot everything.

This clip shows a shot from our preliminary exercise and shows that the camera was unfocused

When filming our preliminary match cut we did not take a variety of footage. Rather than filming each shot from different angles, we planned what angle we wanted and just shot that. This meant that we could not change our mind about the way the shots would match therefore could not improve anything we didn't like. However because of this, we remembered to film each shot in loads of different angles for our final piece which gave us a wider variety of choice.

When filming our preliminary match cut we did not line up shots properly. This made our film look unprofessional and messy. Because of this, in our spare time we asked for help off one of the technicians who taught us how to line up shots properly and this allowed us to use this skill in our final film.

This clip shows that our shot was not lined up in our preliminary film. T'sharna's head is cut out.

Audience feedback and comments?

After our screening at the cinema, we got feedback off of some of our audience.

This image shows the words that came up most often:

We used Wordle to create this image.

We also asked one member of the audience to give us a video feedback of what they thought and what they would improve:

This interview was filmed in City And Islington College!!

T'sharna Bernard's Evaluation

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

In our film "Twisted"we set the two different scenes at the beginning of the film. This was the train station and the forest. In the station was where the antagonist character was introduced.

In the photo

above (which has been taken from art of the title sequence) from strange days, they used a close up shot of the main prop, the gun. This was done to show the audience what the main props were. we as a group decided to show a close up with our main prop, the key in the characters hand but she was playing with the keying.

The last shot in our film was a close up still shot of a hand, this was done to create suspense and to get the audience wondering but ours was in the forest under and bunch of leaves where as the hand in the image above is not underneath anything and i don't think it is used to create suspense.

How does your media product represent particular social groups

Marathon man opens and sets the scene with a man running around the park in the city. 'Marathon Man' can be compared to Twisted because both films open with someone walking or running somewhere, although in Marathon man, the man that is running is the protagonist where as in the film we produced Twisted it is a woman walking and she is the antagonist even though the audience don't become aware of this until the end of the film.

At the end of the film Twisted, the audience see a character, who hasn't been introduced before, they don't know who it is, or what has happened to them and why they are there. They audience

also don't know whether this character is a protagonist or an antagonist.

what kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? how will you attract/address your audience?

this student film had 13,715 views

genesis, A Level student Film

I have an online marketing strategy and this is a step by step of how

I'm going to construct this strategy. In order to make this work, I will upload my video online on to youtube. if the film was successful on youtube i would then try to promote the film in film festivals such as Raindance and Sundance (http://www.raindance.co.uk/site/) As weIl as using youtube, I would use other social networking sites such as; Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, Bebo and other networking sites. I would then send links to all my friends and would get them to forward it to there friends so this would create a 'buzz' around my film.

This is how i would advertise my film. This is a facebook link to the dark knight about promoting their film: http://www.facebook.com/darkknight

who would be the audience for your media product?

The audience for "Twisted" would come under the class of C2DE and would enjoy spending time socializing, shopping going to cinema's such as "the odeon" and "vue" and just enjoying life.

We took a picture of what we think a person that would watch our film would look like;

We think it would have;

- Smart phone, Blackberry, or iPhone

- Magazines

- Purse

-Essentials, like make up, hand cream

-Cinema Tickets, as they go to the cinema regularly

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

we made an animatic of what we learnt about the different technologies while making the product, some of these technologies are:

-research; blogger, youtube and google

-filming; it was just the camera's

- editing; final cut pro, soundtrack pro and livetype.

looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learned in the progression from it to the full product?

When doing our preliminary match cut exercise we had to make a short film with a match cut but it didn't go very well. Our group made a lot of mistakes such as; the film was out of focus so therefore the filming quality wasn't good. Also the lining of the shots were poor, as there was either too much space above the head or the top of the head had been cut off.

When we started the preliminary exercise we didn't really work well as a team and as we progressed into making our actual film our team work got better and we learnt to work together as a team and faster.

We filmed our match cut exercise during a double lesson and spent an hour filming and the other hour editing. Therefore we did not have much time to put it together, whereas with our final thriller opening we had a lot more time to film and work out our shots as we filmed over two different days and edited over something like two weeks.

In our final thriller opening our shots are in focus, so the quality of the filming is good also the framing of our shots has got better compared to the preliminary exercise, as there is just enough space above the characters head.

Audience feedback and comments

People in our class filled out audience feedback sheets saying what they thought about our film. We then went on to the website wordle.net and made a word cloud of all the words they came up with. The words that come up big are the words that came up the most such as "good"

After we finished watching our thriller opening in the cinema at The Screen on The Green, we asked our friends what they thought of our film and here is what some of them said;

"it was good but some of the cuts were a bit slow"

Planning The Preliminary Match Cut

The Preliminary Match Cut

We were given a task to come up with a story board for a match cut exercise, which had to include the following

- A match cut

- Dialogue

-Shot Reverse Shot

we planned to have a character walk down the corridor and into the room. we then match cut it of the character walking into the room.

There was then another character who was sitting on the chair opposite character one, which is where we included dialogue.

story board

This is the storyboard of our thriller opening. We imagined 26 shots that we were going to film, however once we started filming we realised that our shots would change. When looking at our storyboard then watchin out final piece of work you will notice a difference as a lot of shots have changed. However I feel we did follow our storyboard well in term of the order that things happen but the angles of the shots had changed completely. I think this is because we had not been to the setting and thought about the shots before creating the storyboard therefore we did not know what would work and what would not.

Skills Audit; LiveType And Soundtrack Pro

LiveType:

livetype is a programme which allows us to creates titles and change what they look like by adding effects, changing the colour's and the styles. These texts can then be imported into Final Cut Pro, and onto your film.

Soundtrack Pro:

Soundtrack Pro is a programme where soundtracks can be created. There are many different types of sounds, from instrumentals to rock and blues music. When the sound track is done and finished it can be imported in Final Cut Pro.

FinalCut Pro:

Final Cut Pro is a programme where you can edit shots, and create films. There are many different types of effects that can be used to add to your film.

Health And Safety Tutorial

In class we had a tutorial on how to use the cam camera's and the tripods. This was done to help get familiar with the equipment and so that we know how to use everything properly.

We learnt how to set up the tripod and how to adjust the height of it . Also, how to put the camera on the tripod and how to take it off. To remove the camera from the tripod you need to turn the black nob and press the red button and pull the camera forward otherwise it might not come off.

we were taught how to focus the camera, to do this you have to press the 'focus' button. You can tell if the camera is focused by the orange lines that come up on the screen. We were told that if we want to zoom then we should zoom before we start filming. The memory cards don't work unless they are unlocked.

Pitch

Before we started filming our Opening Sequence for out thriller, we had to present a pitch to our teachers.

We had to discuss our original plot with of our film. Our original idea was a Hansel and Gretel themed thriller, involving parents leaving their children in danger because of financial situations. Although this was our original plan, we went on to changing it as we thought our new idea was a lot more appropriate.

Our new plot ended up being about a woman, who has murdered her fiance for unknown reasons and throughout the film she tries to move on with life, but her past begins to haunt her and is slowly revealed.

In our pitch we revealed that we would film in Highgate woods and around the London bridge area. Our setting did not change. We chose these settings because we felt that Highgate woods would give a scary edgy feel to the opening. We chose London bridge because it is a calm urban area that fitted with the woman's lifestyle and character.

We also had to discuss safety aspect when presenting our pitch. These were things such as; DONT film in the rain, DONT touch the lens with your fingers, DO keep the camera in its case when were not using it, DO always remember to cover the lens when not using it.

We did a rough story board to give an idea of what our opening would look like. in this storyboard we had to display different shot to capture our characters in different angles. Each shot would be shot with a Point Of Vue shot, Close Up, Over Shoulder Shot, Pan, Long shot and some others.

Our pitch made us realise that we did have some faults in our plan such as the story line. It gave us the chance to go over our plan and change it so that it was improved. One we made these changes we had a clear idea of what to start doing first.

Rough Cut of Thriller Opening

This is our rough cut edit of our thriller opening. We have not yet added sound and have only just begun adding titles therefore we still have some work to do. Because we only have 1 week left until our final deadline we will be attending workshops to complete the overall piece on time.

Planning Preliminary Match Cut Exercise.

For our Match Cut exercise we were given a story board and another piece of paper which told us what we need to include.
For this exercise we need to include

• A match cut
• Dialogue
• Shot reverse shot

Our plan was to have one character walk down the corridor into a room and the match cut will show her entering the room.

We then planned to have another character sitting in the room and the characters to end up sitting opposite eachover. They would then start to talk which will be the use of dialogue and we will show this using a shot reverse shot.

Final Edit Of Livetype and Sound Filming Practice

The Bag Swap

To get used to using the camera and prepare us for our Thriller Opening Sequence, we did an excersice in class called "The bag swap."For this excersice we had to plan and film a short video of 2 people swapping bags. In class we created a story board to prepare us for this task and to make our filming schedule clear to us all. We shared the task of drawing the pictures and planning the shot between the 3 of us and all had an equal input. We decided that Josh would be in charge of the camera and me and T'sharna would be in the shots. Our location was college because of the time we had and because we thought that the use of the college lift would be a good way to catch the "Bag Swap."

Whilst filming, we included techniques such as; handheld camera, elipsis, tracking... We also used zoom, wich we realised does not look good on a moving shot.

Once we filmed our shots (this took 1hour), we went back to the classroom and used Final Cut Pro, to edit our shots into a sequence. We all worked togever closely for this task as it was our first experience of editing so we all wanted to get the practice in. Once we edited the shot into the sequence we wanted, we used Livetype to import the title into the sequence. We also used the programme Sound to import the music we felt matched the sequence.

Skills audit: Livetype and Sound

For our Skills audit we learnt how to use the two programmes Livetype and Sound.

Livetype is a programme which allows you to create texts and then edit it including;
background
colour
styles (etc)
This image can then be improted into the edits on final cut pro. This would usually be used for the title of the sequence, or for credits and other possible reasons.

Sound is a programme which has loads of different music, that you can play and imerge with other sounds. It allows you to create different feelings and make the music your own. When imported onto final cut pro, it adds effect to the sequence.

Intoduction to cameras & health and safety tutorial

In this lesson, in our groups we were given a tutorial of how to use the cam- corders and tripods. This excercise was to familiarise us with the equiptment so that we could use it properly.

We learnt how to set up the tripod and how to change the height and angle of shots using this tool. We also learnt what the buttons on the camera meant, aswell as learning how to focus the camera, insert our memory cards correctly, and other simple rules e.g. do not zoom whilst shooting.

After this tutorial we had the draw up a Story Board of a short sequence we were going to create called "The bag swap." The story board allowed us to discuss the shots we were going to use, and allowed us to have a cleared idea of what out final edit would look like. We only had 45minutes to film our shots so we decided to stay on site for this excercise.

How Is Suspence Created In Collateral?

Suspense in Collateral.

In Collateral the opening sequence of this film starts with an establishing shot of Tom Cruise, we then see another establishing shot of Jason Stathan. These establishing shots introduce the main characters to the audience.

The characters are in a place that is very crowed, with many people, this makes it suspicous as we as an audience don't know why their there. Although they are in a crowed place the people in the back ground and blurred out; this makes it clear to the audience that those two characters are the main focus. We then see a shot reverse shot between both characters , this carries connotations to the audience that there may be a link between them or the some how know eachother.

A medium shot of cruise and stanthan is shown, they then bump into each other and drop their bags. Both men are dressed in black suits and one in dark sunglasses which can be seen as suspicious as it may be thought to the audience that they are some kind of bad bussiness men, it would also make the audience think 'why is he wearing sunglasses?' or 'maybe he doesn't want people to see his eyes... but why?' The fact that both characters spoke to each other even though they are strangers to eachother is a bit weird they then pick up the bags but only they've swapped and they both knew that they had, which suggests to the audience that they may be associates.

The non diegetic sounds of footsteps and the diegetic accompaninment that stops and starts creates tension and gets the audience to wonder whats going to happen next.

Final Cut Pro; Bait Tutorial

Bait Tutorial

To be able to make an opening sequence for our Thriller Opening Sequence you have to be able to use Final Cut Pro. Our class had a bait tutorial which teaches us how to do skills on the apple mac computers.

When final cut pro is opened there are four different sections; the timeline, the files, the canvas and the viewer . All of the shots are located in the canvas in the top left of the screen. The timeline is where you create your final piece of work. To drag a shot into the timeline you have to select the part of the shot you want to do this, you need to decide where your in and out points are, for this you have to press 'i' from where you want it to start and 'o' from when you want it to end.

We learnt how to make match cuts for example we used a man taking a boys food then, it cuts from the boy with the food in his hand, then back to the man.

we also learnt how to close gaps quickly without having to move each one seperately to save time. To do this you have to press 'ctrl' and click on the mouse then click on 'close gap'. To put effects on to a clip, for example to add a dissolve you have to click in between the two shots, go to 'effects' then 'video transitions' then go to 'dissolve' then add the type of dissolve that you want.

Final edit of Livetype and Sound Practice

The Bag Swap

To get used to using the camera and prepare us for our Thriller Opening Sequence, we did an excersice in class called "The bag swap."


For this excersice we had to plan and film a short video of 2 people swapping bags.


Once we filmed our shots (this took 1hour), we went back to the classroom and used Final Cut Pro, to edit our shots into a sequence. We also used Livetype and Sound to finish off our sequence to the standards we required it to be.

How Suspense Is Caused In "Marathon Man"

Marathon man is a 1976 thriller based on the novel of the same name by William Goldman. The films stars Dustin Hoffman as the protagonist , Thomas "Babe" Levy, Roy Scheider as his brother, an undercover agent, and Laurence Oliver as Nazi dentist and war criminal, Dr. Christian Szell.
Through out the film there are countless times when suspense has been built up in a number of different ways. A first example of how suspense is caused is near the beginning of the film, when the car chase between the two old men is taking place.

Technical ordit or Bait Tutorial

Bait Tutorial

In order to create an opening sequence that looks proffesional, our class had a Bait Tutorial, which teaches us certain skills in editing on an apple mac.

There are 4 different sections on the screen; the Timeline, Canvas, Viewer and the files.When editing using Bait, all unedited shots are in the Canvas. To select a section of that shot which u would like to use; u select it by pressing "I" at the beggining of the shot, and pressing "O" at the end of the shot. You then drag your selection down to the Timelie. Any shots that are selcted and brought down to the Timeline can be watched in the Viewer.

On our tutorial we learnt how to use match cuts. The example that we used was of a man walking into a cafe and grabbing food from a plate. We cut from his body, to his hand, then back to his body. Match cuts make the shot change look natural and they have to be accurate for them to work.

There is a tool on Bait called Razor Blade. This tool allows u to select sections quickly and delete them with a click. It is easy and fast so that no time is wasted. It is found on the toolbar on the right of the screen.

If there are any gaps inbetween clips on the timeline, to get rid of them quickly and perfectly, click in the gap and press CTRL at the same time to close the space.

To edit shots so that they dissolve into eachover, click on the end of the shot and press CTRL and "T" on the keyboard and the effect will be added. However if there isnt sufficient space on the IN and OUT points the effect will not work and an error bar will appear.

To include music in your clip, select the music you want, using "I" and "O" for the IN and OUT points, select the hand at the top of the bar and drag it onto the Timeline underneath the clips.

Sherlock Holmes End Credits

Sherlock Holmes End Credits

The style of this films end credits is unique and gives a real sense to what time and era the film is set in. The credits appear in a hand written font as if written with an aged quilt pen. Short clips of the film appear in the ending scene, they then turn into a freeze frame and the contents of the freeze frame are put onto brown paper with the characters and background having the effect of being sketched onto the paper with some sort of scratch pen. This style fits in great with the film, as the story line of Sherlock Holmes

Art Of The Title Sequence; Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes End Credits

The style of the title sequence in the film Sherlock Holmes are in a hand written style. They look as if they have been written in a fountain pen. This a purposeful stylistic device to inform the audience that the film is set in the victorian period.

The titles say who the main characters are, the directors and producers. This gives the audience the information that they need to know about the people who made the film and the people who star in the film.

There are many images in the end credits of this film, they are all still images and show what has happened in the film.

Sherlock Holmes Opening Credits

In the opening sequence for Sherlock Holmes it starts off as a man taking a picture of two men and then turns into a flash, then a newspaper.

it then comes up with a still shot of 'Sherlock Holmes' in capital letters, from this we can tell that its from a newspaper. We then see an establishing shot, this sets the scene and the setting.

we are then introduced to a character through a establishing mid shot.