When constructing our media piece we took into account all the conventions and techniques used in other films we had studied in order to use them within our own product. We concentrated mainly on the use of sound as I believe the use of sound is one of the most important aspects to creating a thriller well and being able to connect with the audience's emotions and feelings. However, this is not always the case as in some films the absence of sound is used extremely effectively to create tension and create an intimate relationship between the characters and the audience. Many real media products and big hollywood thrillers use music made specifically for their film however, as an AS level media group, we were not able to compose our own music. Instead, we took notes on the type and genre of music used in the most iconic and most impacting thrillers and found that orchestral music was very common and very effective in grabbing the audience's attention and tuning into their emotions. Therefore this led to me researching this genre of music and finding out what would be effective to use for our thriller opening.
As this was only the opening to a thriller we had to take into account the use of titles. We took inspiration from the film Se7en, during the opening titles, to create flashing images in the background to make the audience feel uneasy. We did this by simply filming whilst the camera was in a person's pocket whilst the walked around. We were extremely happy with the end product of this and although some was unable to be used, it created a flashing image which we used to display the credits on. In a similar way to real media products we tried to make sure we had one weak character and one powerful evil character, this means that the audience can connect with the position of the weak character and can feel his emotion throughout the film. The thriller genre isn't scared to challenge the normal rules to a film and a happy ending that action films and family films have. Understanding this, we aimed to use the characters emotions and the feeling of being followed to relate to the audience watching and that there is not always a happy ending.
2) How does your media product represent particular social groups?
The representation of particular social groups is not specifically identified within our thriller opening and therefore it is open for interpretation. The ‘shadow’ character is shown with a covered face and black clothing which can be linked with many different social groups. The main character Tom is wearing a smart jacket, black shoes and jeans which could be related to a middle/upper class person in casual wear. This could mean he may have been targeted for his wealth or his association with powerful people. As the actors are all teenage people the thriller opening could also relate to vulnerability of this age group.
3) What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
Media institutes such as New Line cinema and Working Title would be ideal companies to distribute our product as they receive a large revenue due to their extremely effective advertisement technique and popularity with the people. Their good reputation draws the audience in and if a big institute such as New Line cinema was behind the media product then it would be able to reach people form all over the world and this will increase the chance of more people buying the film and going to watch the final product. However we do understand that our media product is low budget, low level production and would not necessarily be distributed on this scale, therefore smaller 'art house' cinemas may be more realistic as a place where our media product would be displayed.
4) Who would be the audience for your media product?
Our product contains little blood or aggressive violence therefore it has a larger potential audience than other films in the thriller genre. Our film would ideally be a 12 or 15 certificate which means that our audience would be significantly increased and the film would receive more revenue and numbers of people going to see the film than if it was rated 18. Although there is no blood or gore there are images of violent actions and the meaning to do harm and kill therefore the BBFC would most likely rate this film 15 as this is also only opening to the thriller and the nature of the opening and the murderous character suggests there may be more murders to happen throughout the film.
5) How did you attract/address your audience?
In order to gain good publicity and to address our audience of our media product, we would have to produce a trailer of our film so that it can be distributed to different TV companies such as ITV, BBC and Sky so that it can reach a mass audience. If the film was rated 15 we would therefore have to show the trailer past 9 o’clock due to its violent content, this would massively reduce our target audience therefore other methods of advertisement may become more effective. These might include billboards and posters around the cities and towns to attract a lot of attention as the majority of people living in the area of the billboard will be likely see the advertisement a number of times throughout the day. As our target audience is young adults and teenagers the social networking sites are also a huge platform to advertise on as millions of people across the world can access it. We would put advertisement campaigns on sites such as Facebook and Twitter as we can access the huge numbers of people living within the UK and countries worldwide.
6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Throughout creating this product I have learnt that to create a Hollywood worthy thriller a high budget and world class actors are needed. However, to make a product look professional you do not necessarily need these things. Our knowledge of the thriller genre and the forms and conventions used allowed us to create a good, low budget amateur opening to a thriller that impacted the audience and successfully built tension through the use of music and editing. To film our final product we used the Kodak Playsport HD which operates on a 1080p format which allowed us to film good quality footage and had crisp sound quality. For the editing I used Imovie 09 on a Mac computer and this allowed me to experiment with different visual effects, for example being able to slow shots down or speed them up. The editing process took up most of the time when producing our opening and highlighted to me how important and skilled the editors are in the film industry today.
7) Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
When filming our continuity piece ‘The Decoy’ we rushed the filming process and didn’t plan in advance the purpose and aim of the final product as effectively as we should have. This meant that the continuity lacked content and we did not use knowledge we had of the techniques used in the thriller genre to their full potential, for example the music to give the film its thrilling aspect. However filming this initial piece allowed us to experiment with different camera angles so that we knew what would work effectively for the final product. It also allowed us to become familiar with the camera equipment and how to use a tripod which was important as we were to use them when filming our final piece. When constructing our final piece I focussed on sound and music as in the continuity piece we did not do enough research or put enough time into choosing the correct soundtrack. The time and effort put into the final piece meant that we came out with a good quality piece of film that used the techniques and conventions well to draw the audience into the story and successfully build tension and suspense. When filming the continuity we also made sure everyone had time in front of camera and behind to get a feeling for both roles of filming and acting. This meant that when planning the final piece we could assign jobs to each individual as some members of the group would rather act within the film and others would prefer to be operating the camera.
