Final Thriller Opening

Costuming

When planning what costumes we wanted our characters to wear in our thriller opening, we carefully decided to dress our main character in such a way that their appearance reinforced conventions and stereotypes typically held about their character type.

Our main character is a female teenager, who presents signs of emotional vulnerability due to the death of her parents, which in her mind was caused prematurely by an overdose on drugs. We represented our character in this way through the planning of her outfit by choosing black ripped jeans, a black top, black boots and an oversized denim jacket. The use of the colour black represents the theme of mystery surrounding our character and we feel that black works much more effectively in her outfit than using coloured clothing, which would have drawn a significant amount of attention away from the character's vulnerable state of mind. We also feel that teenage stereotypes are reinforced by her outfit as darker tones are commonly associated with the clothing of teenagers who seek to fit in with each other rather than standing out. It is important to address the target audience through our main character's outfit, as a stereotypical teenage outfit will encourage our audience to identify with our main character.

We also decided to reinforce stereotypes surrounding the outfit of our older male character by presenting him in a traditional outfit associated with a male of his age group. The outfit we chose was a jumper, dark trousers and a T-shirt underneath with the collar showing. We decided to dress him in such away to convey a sense of normality to the audience with regards to his character, which would later juxtapose with the fact that he is the killer of the female character's parents. The normality of his outfit also allow the audience to make connections with the character's relation to the female as granddad, and recognise his potential personality type.

McFoLowes Thriller Film Evaluation

Evaluation Work

In today's lesson, my group and I began work on the evaluation for our draft thriller opening. We set out the division of labour, making sure the bigger, more important questions were completed as a group, and began work on the smaller questions - 4 and 5 (who are the target audience and how have we addressed them).

Thriller Opening Sequence Draft

Editing - Draft Montage

Draft Montage from McFoLowes on Vimeo.

Editing - Overlaying Clips (delayed effect)

Clip Overlay from McFoLowes on Vimeo.

Evidence of Editing

In today's lesson we continued the editing of our thriller opening.


Titles Recording from McFoLowes on Vimeo.

Title Sequence Analysis - Seven

This is the unsettling title sequence for the movie SE7EN, which differs considerably from other title sequences for its individual artistic narrative. While the title sequence is conventional in its contents - such as actors titles, directors and producers, director of photography, and designers - the internal narrative is what makes this sequence differ, for it artistically links to the movie's narrative and drops massive hints to the audience without them realising. When presented with shots such as the antagonist removing his fingerprints, the audience will likely be unsettled and engaged, questioning the shots' significance to the narrative.

Using a mixture of both handwritten scrawls and typed fonts connotes a sense of narrative. For example, the handwritten scrawl looks untidy and rushed, which not only unsettles the audience, but suggests that a killer, or indeed a victim wrote the titles. The titles are placed on darkened areas of each shot, or on black backgrounds, which make the titles stand out - being white in colour - and contrast heavily with the background drawing the audience's attention to the motion of the text. The aim of this is to disorientate the audience.

Finally, one convention of all title sequences is to prioritise the cast members whom are seen as selling points for the film. Typically these cast member's names are presented to the audience earlier on. For example, David Fincher, Brad Pitt, and Morgan Freeman's titles are displayed before the other cast member's.

Filming Montage Shots

In today's lesson my group and I worked on filming for some of the shots that will make up our montage title sequence. We took various shots of an image developing in the photography darkroom and a tap dripping. The developing image links with our narrative - when the printed photograph arrives through the door in an envelope. Red lighting is used in the darkroom which has given the shots strong red highlights and very dark shadows which could look effective and lead to tension in our montage.

Panic Room - Title Analysis

This is the title sequence for Panic Room, which is a thriller movie about a mother and daughter who are forced to take refuge in the panic room of their new home. The narrative takes place in a developed city which links with the title sequence in which the text is angled in such a way that it appears to be as if it the text is affixed to the tall city buildings.

Typical branding of the distribution and production companies are presented immediately, followed by actors, who are conventionally presented in order of publicity, next is the film title itself, which is displayed very boldly, in capital letters, alongside the music score it gives dominance to the idea of a panic room and connotes a sense of something unsettling that surrounds the narrative. Finally, we are then presented with the less well-known actors, the casting manager, costume designer, music producer, editors, director of photography... etc. It is conventional among most films to leave the less recognised titles until last.

A sense of journey is created in this title sequence when it smoothly transitions the audience from the establishing shots of the tall cityscape, to a small park where a character of importance is introduced.

Designing a Brand

Taking the surnames of our group members, (McNamara, Fotheringham, and Lowes), we combined them to make our group name - McFoLowes. Using Adobe Photoshop CS6, I experimented with logo designs and opening ideas. This is not final.

American Horror Story - Title Analysis

This is the title sequence to the horror-thriller TV show American Horror Story: Asylum. Using a montage of faced paced shots with included titles, leaves the audience feeling on edge and discomforted. Repetition of narrative themes, such as shots of nuns, young children and fire, is also key to the success of this title sequence.

The title font is unique to the American Horror Story brand, and has been made to fit in with the genre/tone with the use of flashy, transitions in which the titles appear to dissolve as if an acid was poured onto them. This not only makes the audience question any significance to the narrative, but the fast paced dissolving transitions puts them on edge. White and yellow font colours are used to make the titles contrast highly with the shots and black backgrounds in order to draw attention to them.

The titles themselves are conventional; actors, distributors, producers and directors are given precedence with the most well know titles displayed earlier on in the sequence, such as Zachary Quinto.

Finding Music for our Thriller Opening Sequence

In today's lesson we have been looking online for copyright free music to use in our thriller opening. We are also considering using a variety of sound effects with an underlying tense, eerie beat that we will edit together ourselves. We have been using various websites to find loops.

In the image above, we layered sound effects with an underlying score.

Titles - The Importance of Titles in Films

In todays lesson, we discussed the importance of titles in films and how to use them effectively. We also considered how to incorporate titles into our current idea by coming up with a shotlist.

Titles from Sam McNamara

Scripting

In today's lesson, my group and I worked on creating a script for the voice over in our thriller opening. This will be played over the first minute of our thriller opening.

Evidence of Editing

Editing

In today's lesson, my group and I continued work on the editing of our thriller opening sequence. Using Final Cut Pro, we arranged our clips and are now ready to stylise our shots.

We also worked on the scripting for the voice over which we decided should take the form of a confession letter and be played over our shots to add to the suspense of our thriller opening.

Font Ideas

The following video, made with Adobe Photoshop CS6, is a list of the fonts we may use in our title sequence. Fonts were found at DaFont.com

Evidence of Filming

The images below are of our group at our main location on the day we set up and filmed. We filmed in this location on the Saturday the 14th of November 2015 at 2pm till 5pm.

The next two images show set up for the first series of shots. We arranged the tables and chairs so that our main character can sit and face out of the window.