Harrison's Evaluation

1. In What ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products.

All thrillers consist of creating suspense, and therefore thrilling the audiance. The typical thriller is made up of good guys versus the bad, and we are normaly positioned onto the side of the 'good guy', which typicaly triumphs at the end, restoring justice to the film. We had three choices on how we wished to open our thriller, they were; to start with the films conclusion, leaving the audiance with a high sense of enigma. Start in the middle of the dissequilebrium, meaning the film opens with action, but does not give to much away, which tends to be the case with thrillers that start at the with the films conclusion, and new equilibrium. Or finaly, start at the very beggining, this is not very common as typicaly the audiance want to be given a sense of the thrill yet to come, and this is not the case with this type of opening. We decided that our thriller would start in what would have been the middle of a our feature lengh film, when the distrubense is arising. This type of thriller opening is rare, and thats why we chose it, as it stands out from the rest by challenging traditional forms of films. Also we prefered the concept that by opening with the disturbance, the veiwers are given a small teaser of suspense, without actually giving too much away, like can be the case when a thriller opens with the end of the film.

Our film addressed the usual criteria of a Thriller, such as Engima, leaving the audiance with questions unanswered. Binory opposition, the clear contrast between good and evil. Narrative,  the order in which the story is pressented, usually a thriller would be laid out like this; Equilibrium - Disequilibrium - New equilibrium. Protagonist and Antagonist, good and evil, the main charcters that drive the plot of the film forward. 

 Film terms

Enigma -

A question that is not immediately answered and thus draws an audience into a text
eg. a body is discovered at the beginning of a tv detective drama. The killer's identity is an enigma. We watch to find out who the killer is.

Narrative

The way in which a story, or sequence of events, is put together within a text. All media texts have some sort of narrative, from a single photographic image to a sports report to a feature film.
Narrative may be reduced to one simple equation which is

equilibrium - disequilibrium - new equilibrium

Binory Opposition

The contrast between two mutually exclusive concepts or things that creates conflict and drives a narrative e.g. good/evil, day/night, male/female, presence/absence, old/young

Protagonist and Antagonist 

 Antagonist the character whose function in a plot is to oppose the protagonist. In straightforward hero's journey plots (most action adventures), the antagonist can be referred to as the villain. However, in character drama, the antagonist might not be a "bad" character, just someone who stands between the protagonist and his/her goals.
Protagonist
The character who drives the narrative forward, through the choices they make and the actions they take.

The key to any successful thriller opening, is creating tension and enigma, here are a few shots that i feel accomplish that;

This big close up shot, focueses on our protagonist. And its primary purpose is to establish character's roles in the plot. The shot begs the question to the audiance, who is this man? and why does he look so tense? The mood created by this shot, which focuses on establishing Max as one of our main characters, and his facial expressions, tells the reader that something is wrong with the situation he is in. Thus builds tension immediatly as the audiance wait to find out what this man is worried about.

This close up focuses on the antagonist, portrayed to be the likely villain through his hostility. By now the viewers are positioned into recongizing this man as the antagonist, and once again raise questions as to, why is this man so hostile? The general mood created by this shot is one of a tense and aggresive one, this shot is perfect at portraying this man as the binory opposition. In addition, the two shots above also establish the setting they are currently in. This is done through a mixture of diegetic sound and mis en scene. A plane is a typicaly easy enviroment to recongize so it was generally easy for us to quickly portray this to the audiance. We made put in diegetic sounds of common airplane noises, such as the sound of the air conditioning or the sound of the seatbelt sign ect. And the mis en scene of the the chairs and window are instantly recognizible to an aircraft, therefore by seeing this the audiance know that the two charcters are in an aircraft. But this also raises the questions of why, and whwhere are they going?

This close up shows the distress on the antagonist's face, and has been put in to give

clues as to the possible dissequilibrium between these two. It gives's further

suggestions that these two are the binory opponents in our thriller, but it also leaves certain enigma codes, such as why are these two men opposing each over, and why do they seem to be fairly civilisesed and relexed? However, this is also a good example of restricted narrative as the audiance do not know what reasons the antagonist has to be getting slowly more and more aggresive, and more uneased with the situation. This helps to build tension as well because suggests something may be building up to happen, possibly the disturbance.

The title of our film, "Hack" appears just as the disturbance is taking place, it cools the mood, but also allow the audiance the knowledge that what they just saw was yet to come in the film, and would eventually become clear. But despite that, it leaves the viewer entised and with the urge to keep watching in order to answere the questions that have been left unanswered. Cleverly, we decided to continoue with the opening, splitting it into two parts. The tittle sequence then fades into the hospital scene, accompinied by the non diegetic sound of heart moniters and paniced shouting. This raises yet more enigma codes, such as, did the plane crash? if so why? and is this the protagonist or antagonist in the hospital?

This is the first shot after the cut to the tittle sequence, and it is where the disturbance is continoued. The use of an extreme close up shows the viewers the terror in this charcter, and his confusion. However, the audiance do not yet know whether this is the antagonist or protagonist. They also dont know what condition he is in, but the panic and sudden cut into this shot suggests that this charcter also has no idea where he is, what happened and how.

This is the first glimpse the audiance have of what condition the charcter, who turned out to be the protagonist is in, but also the setting is fully established through mis en scene. Such as, the drip he is attached to, the mask, and the heart rate moniter all confirm that he is in a hospital. In addition the lighting used in this shot is dark, adding to the confussion and disorintation suffered from the charcter. Also the close up, portrays the terror on his face, which reflects backs to the veiwers creating the panicing mood we intended.

This mediam two shot shows a doctor and a nurse rushing to the room of our protagonist, accompionied by the non diegetic sound of the heart rate monitor getting faster and louder. This shots purpose is to add to the tension and build up suspense. This is acheived through the pace we created through fast editing and non diegetic sounds suggesting the protagonist is in seriouse trouble.

Screen grab unavalible

This is a long shot of the suspicouse briefcase. As of yet the audiance still have

no idea what is in the briefcase and why it is signicant, so this shot is just to

intensify perspective on the prop, and too raise even more enigma codes for the viewers.

The shot was filmed as a POV shot from the antagonist, and is extremely shacky 

and this adds to the concept of confussion a panic, but also suggests that 

the protagonist is going to the effort of trying to reach the briefcase, despite 

it being within his control. Furthermore, the audiance are left asking why, and how

the case managed to remain in his custody, despite him clearly having know understanding

of where he is and how he got here, if the viewers noticed this then it may lead them

to question wheather their is an added twist to the plot that has not yet been seen.

This screen grab shows the final shot of the opening sequence, and it was essential to finish with suspense and many questions unanswered. It is a low angle shot, which portrays the protagonist as a vulnerable person, who is clearly in shock and possibly uneased. Also it shows him latched on to the the breifcase, looking up to the doctors possibly weary of their prescence, which possibly could conotate to the audiance that he is on the run from someone (the antagonist from the plane) and is feeling insucure. There is no diegetic or non diegetic sound here of any kind, it is intentional to intensify the mood just before the cut, it adds to the tension and drama just yet again just for the audiance to be left in the dark and wanting more.

2. How does your media product repressent particular social groups?

In any feature lengh film, it is key to ensure the viewers understand what each charchter repressents, and subconciously recongize that persons background, which contributes with positioning the audiance's oppinion of that, and each charachter. This is essential to any good thriller. The typical thriller consists of a protagonist and an antagonist (the protagonist being the good guy, and the antagonist is the bad guy) it is crucial that the viewers can immediatly understand who plays which role, but also to highten oppinion of that person, for example, the antagonist has to come across as the enemy to the audiance, therefore the director has to make that character seem as evil as intended.

 In our thriller, Max playing the protagonist, roughly repressents a 20 to 30 year old, middle class man. Max being only 17, meant that we would have to convey the fact that he is portraing an older male through the uses of mis en scene and dialogue. Max was dressed in casual clothing, but plain, less collurful clothes, this is how you would expect a midle aged man, who doesn't worry about his appearence too much, to dress like. Also his hair is brushed to one side, without too much attention to detail, just a simple haircut, reflecting the type of charcter max plays. In addition, we have the steward address our protagonist as "Sir", suggesting maturity to Max's charcter, and also asserting the reader that Max is playing the role of an older male.

 And the escort (our antaganost) repressenting a mid thrity's male, who falls into the band of lower, upper-class law enforcing citizen. We make this clear to the audiance through his costume. Dan, the protagonist is dressed in black clothing, to suggest he is an older man, less concerned with his attire then younger men, but also the black leather jacket has meaning behind it. Leather clothing, especially dark leather, is commonly seen in thriller's, worn by more authoritive figures, therefore this acts as a hint to the veiwers that Dan, has a big part to play in our thriller.

This shot demonstrates clearly how we wanted our two main charchaters to be percieved. 

Max on the left, playing the role of the protagonist, is wearing just normal casual clothes, which do not give to much away about him and his personality, but the majorty of the audiance can relate

to him in his fashion. However, Dan our antagonist, has been dressed up with the intention

that the viewers will be able to piece together aspects of this man. The dark colours suggest

he's an older male, but the way he holds himself through body language and facial expressions

hints that this is an authoritive figure, and likely to hold a higher status then our antagonist.

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Obviously our thriller opening cost us no more then the price of our train fare's, and therefore was a low budget, simple film. Thiss type of production is what first time directors tend to do, to gain experiance and further knowledge. As a result a low budget film such as ours would certainly not be endorsed by production powerhouses such a Warner Brothers or Paramount pictures.

Therefore, we would expect a smaller, british company who support low budget films to distibute
"Hack". Possibly a company such as Film 4 would endorse our film. This company has helped publice other low budget british films, and supported many local British directors such as Danny Boyle, who has directed box office hits like; 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later, Slumdog Millionaire and 127 Hours. All these films also fall roughly within the "thriller" genre.

 Film4 Productions is the feature film commissioning department of Channel 4. It develops and co-finance a slate of smart and distinctive feature films like the Academy Award winning Slumdog Millionaire, Phyllida Lloyd's The Iron Lady and Steve McQueen's Shame.

The benefit of having film 4 produce our film, is that over recent years they have been behind some of the biggest films made, and therefore have built up a trust with its audiance that they endorse only the best. But also, channel four community has a vast expanse on the television world, therefore they could advertise our film on many different channels.



4. Who would be the audiance for your media product?

Our thriller is designed to be make the audiance think. The opening gives clues to the rest of the film, and potentially key concepts that the veiwer must recongise in order to understand the film. Therefore i would say our target audiance would be males between the ages of 14 and 26. My reasoning behind this is through the fact that its a computer based thriller, consisitng of violence and your typical boyish dialogue. So i would say our thriller would appeal to the typical technological thriller based audiance.

 This chart shows the results we gained from asking 100 boys and girls if they where interrested in the genre that is thriller...

The results were stageringly in favour of the traditional stereo-type that boys prefere actions packed films like is typical in a thriller, whereass girls are far less keen. This is why are targeted audiance was focused heavily on males.



5. How did you attract/address your 
audiance?

Our target audiance varied from young teenagers, to mid twenty's adults. And the film itself is targeted more at stereo typical men. Therefore to appeal to our audiance we had to first consider what would attract our audiance and draw them into the synopsis. Although it seems cliche, teenagers tend to be attracted to rebelious icons in a film, like batman or boyish films like the football factory where the almost outlaw type charchters are idolised. Therefore we decided on making our protagonist be portrayed as a seemingly law opposing middle aged man. We conveyed this to the audiance by having our protagonist remanded in handcuffs, suggesting he has proken the law.


In addition, in order to appeal to the older target audiance, we had to find away to make our audiance relate to our protagonist. We believed we achieved this through mis en scene. Dressing max up in a simmilar attire you would see worn by a typical mid twenties man. But also his natural hair style matched that of an older man, simply and effortlessly sweeped to the side.

You can see that max, the protagonist, is dressed in mostly darker colours like navy blue. But the clothes he is wearing are simple, they do not stand out, but like most people of the age of late twenties, his appearance matters, but he doesn't focus on it too much. This is how the older audiance can relate to him, through their simmilar, typical style's.




This still shows our protagonist, currently being protrayed as a criminal, or an outlaw. This is how the younger audiance of teenagers will idolise our main character, through admiration for his rebeliousness. Also, your given the sence through dialogue that Max will turn out to be the good guy, so the audiance look at him as an outlaw, who's trying to help society instead of hinder it.




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

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


Our preliminary task was hugely instrumentle in developing our pratical media skills as a whole, and also gave us the chance to try out techniques we had learnt, as well as find out our strenghs and weaknesses within the group. I feel that our progression and talent is demonstrated when you compare our two video's.

Preliminary final film:

Progression

Firstly, it is clear that in this film we had to work on our ability to use a tripod fast and effectivly. You can see that in many of the over shoulder shoots, that the camera is shacking, this made our film look unprofessional. Our main issue regarding the tripod was actually the quick change over's between shots. The whole process slowed us down, and as a result of complications, we did not have time to waste on loading and unloading the camera from the tripod. Also as just mentioned, our group suffered major set backs as we lost our footage twice. Since then we learned from our mistakes and became very orgonised with our planning when it came to our second film.

Also we didnt focus on our acting or script in the preliminary, and its clear that it brang the qulity or our film down hear. As a result we made sure that we put more effort into our script planning, and in our final film its clear that we took time and effort at the script turned out to be quite influential in creating a sense of tension and raising suspition.

Furthermore, we were all first time film makers, so we didnt know how long it would take to film or edit. From learning first hand just how long it takes to film a 1 minute piece, we new we had to be completely organised when it came to the 2 miute film in order to meet the deadline.

Jack's Evaluation

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

Thrillers are essentially about the battle between justice and injustice; there is often a price to be paid for the conclusion of the story. Usually the film concludes by gaining justice, however that is not always the case. A thriller is a film of suspense with a plot structure that reinforces the elements of gamesmanship and the chase. There are many different types of thrillers, some for example are domestic, psychological and crime. Commonly thrillers progress with a growing sense of threat or danger and as a result stimulate the viewer's moods, giving them a high level of anticipation, ultra-heightened expectation, and feelings of anxiousness.

Conventions of a thriller:

• Narrative - Thrillers usually adapt a complex narrative, which as a result creates false paths, clues and resolutions. This is made to mainly keep the audience questioning, and to make them work out what's going on, leaving strong enigmas. As well as this, thrillers create suspense in the narrative to conjure threat towards the audience. Additionally, thrillers also adapt the narrative to have an extraordinary event for example, in ordinary situations, this therefore lets the audience relate tho the situation, making the effect on the audience stronger. 

• Characters - Thrillers involve many different characters within the films. These include: victims, protagonists and antagonists. Themes of identity are also created so that the audience are able to establish who each character is, why they're there and also helps us identify the protagonist and antogonist

• Iconography - Specific settings are used to establish context and themes. For example, a dark setting with very little lighting can create a dark atmosphere and mood for a thriller.

• As our thriller was only an opening, we made it essential that all of these conventions were apparent as soon as possible, so that we could establish our film within the thriller genre. We straight away hooked the audience by creating elements of enigma, anxiety and suspense. 
• There are only 2 main character's in our opening, however the opening mainly focuses on one of them, which is the protagonist, who is actually the criminal in the film. The specific elements of mise en scene that we used were able to make the audience differentiate and define who the antagonist was, and who the protagonist was.

This is the end of the very first shot (tracking shot). The shot panned along the plane floor, passed the passengers feet, and then ended to focus on an extreme close up of a briefcase. This straight away creates enigma codes for the audience and will raise immediate questions such as: 'Who's is this?' 'Is it important?' 'Why is it there?'. With the use of the diegetic sound (ambience of aeroplane) and what you can see in the frame (plane chairs etc.) the audience have already established that this briefcase is placed in a plane and will lead them to think that maybe it could be significant to a possible hijack or important to a specific individual. Due to an aeroplane being a very recognisable and ordinary setting, this will enhance the audiences sense tension and concern to what may be in the suitcase, due to them possibly being about to relate to the situation. As a result of this, the effect and anxiousness will increase even from the first 5 seconds of the opening. The briefcase has been placed at the right side of the frame so that the passengers leg is visible as well. From here we can see that it is someones possession and we can see that the briefcase has been placed very close to them. Therefore, this is showing the proximity between the passenger and the briefcase, connoting the security that the briefcase needs to have. This will again, raise strong enigmas such as 'Why is the passenger taking such protection over it?'.

This is the second shot of the opening. It is a close up of the protagonist's hands, in handcuffs (the audience have not yet established that this is the protagonist). This will again, raise even more enigmas for the audience - 'Why is he handcuffed?' 'Who is he?'. This shot is straight after the first shot of the opening, in which there was focus on the briefcase. So as a result of this the audience could therefore link the two shots together, and would lead the audience to more understanding of why the briefcase is there. In this shot, the protagonist's hands are very fidgety, and do not look very relaxed. The use of the diegetic sound of the handcuff movement has also been used to reinforce the action that the protagonist is fidgety. With the use of the close up on the hands this makes the audience focus on his specific actions and without even seeing or being introduced to the protagonist's face, the hand movements are already connoting that the passenger is very nervous and agitated in the situation. This could suggest that he knows he is in the wrong and is scared what is going to happen to him, which would be revealed later on in the film. 

This is a medium close up 2-shot in which we have first been introduced to the protagonist and antagonist together.  The dialogue used by the protagonist: 'I'm fine' is said with a slight stutter, which is therefore expressing his nervs and anxiousness. With the use of the camera being focused on both, the protagonist and antagonist, this could condone possible reasons to why the protagonist is nervous. Is it because he knows the antagonist is taking note of everything he says? Although there is no dialogue from the antagonist the audience can straight away tell that he is in charge of the protagonist, in which we can see through the serious face expression, showing that he must keep control. This is also shown by the costume that the antagonist is wearing. He is wearing dark clothes, which creates a mysterious theme of identity towards him. Furthermore, the iconography has been used to enhance the effect on what is going to happen on the audience. It has shown more of the surroundings as well as having focus on the characters, and therefore the audience become more familiar and aware of the setting, which means when something does happen, the shock to the audience will be more extreme.

This is a close up of the antagonist's (escort's) face. Through his facial expressions and body language we can see that he is progressively getting annoyed with the steward and just wants the antagonist to be left alone. With the use of the close up, it brings the audience closer to the antagonist, as we can see that he is the one now becoming agitated and is ensuring that he can look after the protagonist himself. This is also expressed by the dialogue; the antagonist simply says the word 'Please?' which is in fact implying that he just wants the protagonist to be left alone. This could create possibly enigmas to the audience for example - 'why is it so essential that he must be left alone?' - this therefore connotes a threat and possible danger that the protagonist could bring if he is not left alone. This is an example of restricted narration, as the audience do not know specifically why he must be left be left alone, however the antagonist seems to know what he is doing by ensuring the steward that he must be left alone and he does not need any extra care.

This is a POV shot from the antagonist (escort) of a close up of the protagonist. This shot is showing the protagonist's reaction and response to what the protagonist has said - 'You look worried. I would be if I was you'. The protagonist, in response, says nothing. This therefore is stating that he does not really have anything to say, or it could possibly even be stating that he does not want to say anything, due to giving away any plans he has. Although with the use of the close up we can see the protagonist's facial expression which is showing slight fear and anxiousness. This will raise enigma within the audience as they will still not know what is going to happen/what the protagonist is going to do. Shallow depth of field has also been used so that the audience can focus on the protagonist's reaction/facial expression. This as a result, brings the audience closer to the protagonist, and even though he is the criminal, we somewhat sympathise with her.

The shot before this title zooms into the protagonists face/head. This title could somewhat resemble who the protagonist is , in other words by using the word 'Hack', it could connote that he is a hacker. There is a sound bridge used from the crashing of the aeroplane and the fade into this title; it is a nurse's voice saying 'We need another doctor in here' in a pleading tone. This has been used so that without even showing that the plane has crashed or that the character's have been harmed, it establishes and introduces the next context. I created a title with the word 'Hack' with a heart-beat line to fill in the letter 'A' - this heartbeat line can also resemble what is happening to the protagonist. For example, it has a very slow beat and then it falls to a flat line. This could therefore raise enigma for the audience, wondering if he is alive or not. In addition to this title being in the protagonist's perspective/mind, diegetic sound has been used for the sound of the heartbeat monitor which further emphasis that this is what's happening in his mind, and it's what he can hear as well as the audience. Non-diegetic sound has also been added in during this title; it is a sound of a slight ring and echo and the sound fades out towards the end of the title. This is being used to connote a sense of hopelessness within the protagonist i.e. as the sound is fading, he is also 'fading'. Additionally, the sound adds to the anxious feel and mood and again raises enigma as the audience do not know whether the protagonist is alive or not.

This is an extreme close up of the protagonist's face. It shows his eyes opening and is showing that he has survived the plane crash, and therefore shocking the audience as it was very doubtful that he had survived, due to all of the connotations brought up. Non-diegetic sound (a loud swoosh) was used in synchronous to his eye opening to emphasise the fact that he had survived, and therefore further shock the audience. As well as this, diegetic sound was also used which is the heavy breathing of the protagonist - this has been used to establish the state he is in. Even though the camera is only focused on the eye, we are able to tell the horrific state he is in with the use of the diegetic sound. Low key lighting was also used to in this shot to add to the mysterious and anxious feel. It also created shadows on the protagonist's face, so therefore this raises questions and enigmas codes in the audience, as he could in fact had suffered major injuries due to the plane crash, but with the use of the shadows it is hiding part of the protagonist's identity and the audience do not know if anything severe has happened to him. As well as this, further enigma codes will be created as the audience will wonder what has happened to the briefcase, it seemed to be so important to him, so does he still have it with him?

This is a medium shot of the protagonist. This shot type has been used so that the iconography can be further established. For example, it has let the viewers see the heart rate monitor in the background, establishing that he is in hospital. As well as this, it gives the audience a further understanding to what condition the protagonist is in as they can see the rate in which the monitor is going at. The costume also helps the understanding to what context the protagonist is now in, as he is dressed in a hospital gown, which shows that he has been looked after and helped in the hospital. The diegetic sound of the protagonist's breathing is continued throughout this clip so again further emphasise the suffering condition that the protagonist is in. This clip is also used for part of our title sequence, telling the audience who it was directed by. The font first of all appears in numbers and then turns into letters which could be representative of the hacking software in which the protagonist uses.

This is a POV shot from the doctors' perspective of the protagonist. It is one of the final shots in our opening. The POV long shot has been used to show him in relation to the rest of the room; he looks very small compared to the room, which connotes his helplessness and vulnerability in the situation. With the use of the cross-cutting between the protagonist trying to reach for his suitcase and the doctor's walking towards his room, tension is built up until this point at which he reaches the briefcase and the doctors walk in. The audience still do not really have any idea what is in the suitcase therefore questions will raise again as to why it's so important to him, and he's even pleading to be in reach of it in the condition that he is in. This is an example of restricted narration as the protagonist knows exactly what is in the briefcase whereas the audience does not. Low-key lighting has been used in the room as well to still create the anxious feel to it, as well as the lighting above shone down onto the protagonist to make sure that the main focus is on him. Although quiet (which was a technical fault), there is parallel, non-diegetic sound used in the background which is further helps to build the tension and create the apprehensive mood.

2.) How does your media product represent particular social groups?


In our thriller, there were two main character's represented; the protagonist and antagonist. The criminal being the protagonist and the escort being the antagonist. They each individually represented certain social groups, such as gender, age and social class. The audience are easily able to create a contrast between how each individual is representing the social groups due to how they have been presented in our film.

The protagonist - Max (Criminal) is a young/middle aged, middle class, intelligent male

The Antagonist - Dan (Escort) is a middle aged, upper class, dominant male

We mediated our characters as much as we could to make it suitable for who the characters are trying to represent (middle aged males). We tried to make the characters look as convincing as possible to be appropriate and credible for our context to be easily established.

Social class:

• The protagonist (criminal) has been represented as a reasonably average middle class man. This is shown through his costume; he is dressed in normal, typical clothes that can be suitable for anyone. His hair is also suitable for the average male person, as well as it being well-kept which means he does care about how he looks to some extent. Although his appearance does not convey that he is an intelligent person, other elements of mise en scene certainly do. For example, his witty response 'that's what you think' is showing that we have used certain dialogue to position the audience into thinking that he is has wit and is not the usual, stereotypical criminal. 
• The antagonist (escort) has been represented as a higher status than the character adjacent to him (the protagonist). This has been shown by his costume mainly, as he is dressed in a dark, black full body vest which would be presumed to be something of what an escort or security guard would normally be dressed in. Therefore stating his empowerment over the protagonist, furthermore proving that he is a higher class. The dialogue used also represents this: 'He's fine' - this is showing that he is control of the protagonist and that he is therefore seen as a higher status/class as the steward listens to the escort, due to him presuming that he is a higher class. 

Age:

• We mediated our characters as much as we could to make it suitable for who the characters are trying to represent (middle aged males). We tried to make the characters look as convincing as possible to be appropriate and credible for our context to be easily established. 

• The protagonist was meant to be a young/middle aged male, in which the film has engaged him with negative connotations. With the use of camera work and editing these connotations were able to be noticed. For example, first of all there is a close up of a pair of handcuffs attached to a pair of hands, and then the next cut is a close up of the protagonist's face, and therefore as an audience we automatically, and self-consiously link the two together and straight away form negative connotations towards the character. 
• The antagonist was meant to be a middle-aged male. His costume has been used to state his age. He is dressed accordingly to his age, to establish that he is of middle age, and not 17 years old in which he is. The dialogue used such as 'he's fine' shows his dominance within the film in regards to the control he has over the protagonist. This furthermore shows that he is control as he is the older male. Presumably, and presumptively someone who is of higher age is able to take control over someone younger, which has therefore been made apparent in the film. 

Gender:

• Each main character in our film holds very different connotations of the male gender. The protagonist is an intelligent, mysterious man he seems to be kept to himself. This has been expressed through his body language, facial expressions and the dialogue he uses. He is also assumed to be a rather normal looking, average man, however with a criminal mind. This has been shown by the costume he is wearing, just a normal jumper and jeans, which stereotypically fits a young/middle aged man. 

• The antagonist however, is represented in a very different way as a male. He is a controlling, and authoritative person and is of higher authority than the protagonist, which is why he is escorting him. This has been expressed through his costume, in which he is wearing a smart leather jacket and has more of a neat/superior haircut in contrast to the protagonist. The dialogue he uses such as 'He's fine' and 'Please..?' is making him fit in with the stereotypical male escort; wanting the protagonist to be left alone and for him to be in complete control of his actions, ensuring that he does not do anything to disobey. Furthermore, his facial expressions and body language further fit him in to the stereotypical male escort. 

3.) What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

• Film distribution is the placement of the film on as exhibition's screen and for home viewing. 
• There are numerous amounts of distributor's such as Warner Bros, Sony, Fox, Columbia pictures, however each distributor is only suitable for a certain type of film. I will therefore have to choose my distribution company accordingly to what my film is like and how suitable it is to fit in with the normal films that are distributed through the specific company. 
• To decide this, I have looked at other thriller films and how they have distributed theirs, to make sure mine can take full advantage to be accessible to the public, so that people can easily become aware of it and therefore, be successful.
• One thriller I looked at is 'The Disappearance of Alice Creed'. The film was distributed by CinemaNX.  It was screened at the 2009 London Film Festival, the Toronto International Film Festival, and the Tribeca Film Festival in 2010. The decisions made to where it was released was down to the public, as the distributors created a Facebook campaign so the public could vote, and the most popular vote is where the world premiere of the film would be held. After the cinema realise, the film then went on to be released on DVD a few months later. 
• By doing this it means that the viewers were aware of the film before it even came out, and therefore there was very high demand as soon as it came out. 

• Another film that I have looked at is 'The Dark Knight'.
• The Dark Knight was distributed by Warner Bros. 
• It used many distribution methods which is why is it was so successful. One method it used was called 'cross media convergence' - which means that the company combined with other companies to promote each other's products.
• Here are some examples of how this was used in The Dark Knight:

  

• I have also looked into some other distribution companies and what genres they release.
• Lions Gate Films - a global entertainment company that works on motion picture production, televisions programming, home entertainment, family entertainment and digital distribution. 
• Lions Gate have distributed films such as 'Tequila Body Shots', 'Cranks' and 'Claustrophobia'.

  

• Metrodome - a distribution company that owns, managers and distributes films, TV and digital content. 
• It has released films such as 'Airbourne', 'Twelve' and 'They Crawl'
• This company seems to distribute sci-fi, horrors and thrillers more than any other genre. 

• Taking all of this into account, I have decided that I will choose 'Warner Bros.' to distribute my thriller film. 
• The reason being is that it has very good techniques e.g. cross media convergence to gain the awareness of the film.
• This awareness of my film is essential as I have also decided that I am going to be putting the film in place of a country wide release, so therefore it will be released in multiplex cinemas, such as the iMax. It is vital that I gain the public gain awareness of my film before it is released, and I feel that Warner Bros. have the best method of doing this. 
• We have decided that the audience of our film is anyone from around the age of 15-24, therefore we feel that a modern method os distribution, as well as the cinema will be the best approach to distributing our film. We will approach this by creating a campaign over the internet to establish if/where there is any demand for the film in certain areas, otherwise money may be wasted on distributing to the cinemas in certain areas that it will not be very popular in. I feel it is essential for our film to be in the cinema so that the viewer can gain the best experience possible from it. The sound, atmosphere and the visuals on screen will most certainly enlighten the viewing of the film by a vast amount.
• As our film may not appeal to such a broad audience as such (as it's about hacking - some people this may not seem appealing to) we will be creating many different posters/adverts, that each will be to entice different members of the audience. For example, one could focus on the 'hacking' and 'technological' side of the storyline, whereas another advert could focus on the story plot as a whole and the action within it, which would appeal to a different audience, making it a lot more popular and therefore a lot more demand to see it. 
• Another method (still following the modern methods) is that we will be releasing it online to buy, as our main audience will most likely be young and the awareness will be easily available to them due to them. The thriller will be sold online on the 'iTunes Store' to download. A reason to doing this is that nowadays, most 16-24 year olds will own a smart phone, and in that case they can easily go onto the itunes store and straight away purchase it from there. This means that it will save a lot of money, as instead of producing lots of money on making the DVD's, it can just be easily downloaded from the itunes store. However, one disadvantage to realising it online is that by using this method it will make it a lot easier for people to illegally download the movie of another website, or in fact make money of our film by selling it to other consumers online. 

• These pictures show how easy it is to download music from itunes onto your smart phones, and this is the same with the movies:

• By looking at most of the films released by Warner Bros., we have given the our film the certification of a 15+. We have chosen this because we feel that one reason, it may be too complex for an audience below 15 to understand. Also under 15 year olds may not get the aspect of hacking, and what actually goes into it, and this would make them un-interested and therefore not enjoying the film. Some parts of the film will also shock the audience dramatically and these may not be appealing or suitable for a child under 15 years of age to watch. 

Here is the certification data for a '15' from the bbfc website:

4.) Who would be the audience for your media product?

• Our thriller is designed to be for an audience that are able to work out the storyline for themselves. The film will give clues, however, the audience will have to notice these clues an adapt the storyline themselves to what is really going on. This is therefore I feel the audience will be at around 16-24 year olds. It could possibly be higher, however I feel the older audience may not be interested in the film as a whole, as it's about 'hacking' and I feel that the younger generation will gain more enjoyment than this than the older audience will.
• Hopefully, by the age of 16 the audience will be able to understand what is going on in the storyline and at the same time, gain fright and enjoyment from it. 
• However, I do not think that many females, stereotypically, will be appealed to this type of film. As the main protagonist is a male, the male audience could somewhat imagine themselves in its position, making the enjoyment of the film, a lot more interactive and therefore having more of an effect on the audience. I don't feel the female audience will be attracted to this film as such as it has quite a technical and criminality side to it, which does not seem to appeal to many girls. 
• We established our audience by creating a survey on Facebook on which type of audiences would be appealed to our film. 

We asked a total of 100 people in total; 50 boys and 50 girls, to say whether they were interested in the 'thriller' genre or not. These are the results:

                                        

As we had already established our audience to the majority being male, we went through our contacts on Facebook and members of our family and simply asked what their favourite genre of film is. These were the results. 

• Here are some other films that our demographic will be interested in:
• Taken-

• This film has been categorised into Action/crime/thriller - this is very similar to what genre and category our film is defined as. Taken also has a certificate 15, in which ours does also, showing that the film will have a very similar audience as ours. By looking at the Taken reviews, I can see that the audience is also mainly males, which again is who our audience is. 

Looking at these reviews, we can see that each review has been written by a male, in which they say that they enjoyed it.
Therefore, this type of audience will be very similar to ours.

• The Disappearance of Alice Creed - 

This film is also about criminality which is similar to ours and in our case, the hacker is the criminal.

Here we can see that one of the plot keywords is 'Handcuffs', in which case this could also be one of our plot keywords due to it being very focused on the protagonist in the handcuffs right at the start of our film. 

By looking at many reviews I can see that most of the audience that have stated that they enjoyed the film are mostly in the male demographic, therefore this audience will be very similar to ours. 

5.) How did you attract/address your audience?

• In our opening we wanted to give clues straight away to who the criminal (protagonist) was and who the escort (antagonist) was. One being a young/middle-aged man and one being a slightly older middle-aged man. We wanted to establish this straight away so that our audience were immediately interested in each character. For example, either the audience will gain a relationship with the criminal, although he is the 'bad guy', they may sympathise with him and hope that the synopsis benefits him accordingly. On the other hand, they could form a relationship and be attracted to the position of the escort. We did this with the use of props and costume. Our second cut in the film was a close up on the handcuffs:

By doing this it straight away attracted the audience in, and let them know that one of the main characters may possibly be a criminal.

Here you can see where we used the two shot of the characters to show the contrast in both of their costumes. The protagonist is dressed typically how a young/middle-aged man would - this could possibly attract the audience to being on the protagonist's side due to being able to relate to them and possibly put themselves in his position. Then we have dressed the antagonist in a rather smarter/important looking way - the audience could be attracted to this as they may think it looks 'cool' and 'secret agent-type' and this would therefore appeal to them.

• Since our audience is young/middle aged men, we felt that having to character's that may appeal to the audience the best choice, as some may disagree with the criminality and some may in a way, like the criminality and find it appealing to watch. The dialogue we used increased the amount of impressions that the audience could gain from each character. For example, the criminal (protagonist) does not say much, but when he does, it seems as if he knows what he's talking about and is using his wit. E.g. "That's what you think...". This could attract the audience due to the mysteriousness of him and the continuous enigma risen. 
• There is very high tension throughout the majority of the opening. There are slow cuts to start of with, however that was essential, as it was used to set the scene and introduce the character's into the film. However, tension was risen in a different way. Instead of using editing and increasing the pace, it was done by the dialogue used. There is a very fast pace throughout the majority of our film. For example, if you go to 0.55 of the opening the pace increases by a vast amount until the title comes in. There are a total of 11 cuts from 0.55 to 1.04 which means there is more than 1 cut every second. This will therefore be very interesting for our younger demographic; it is fast moving with constant enigma codes. 

• We also attracted our audience through the modern use of the titles - the titles turn from numbers into letters and look very modern. This therefore fits in with our audience as they're young males and would be most certainly aware of how this text looks and what it can relate to, further constructing the understanding and meaning of the film.

• I showed our opening to audience members which fit in with our audience (16-24 year olds) and asked them these specific questions:

- Are the characters convincing?
- How can the opening be improved?
- Did it target its audience correctly?
- How old are you?
- What did you enjoy about the film?

Here are two of my conversations:

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

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

Editing:

• During the preliminary task I only really knew the basics of Final Cut Pro. I knew how to put clips into the timeline and put them in a sequence together and that was it. However, now I can use many of the different features of Final Cut Pro which was essential in order for the film to look realistic. My skills have not only developed in Final Cut Pro, however my skills in Adobe After Effects has improved. As mentioned in the question above, an example of editing that I used to add elements of realism is the camera shake preset that I put on the clip, to make the plane crashing much more realistic. 

You can see this from 0.55 where the shake on the camera suddenly increases by a vast amount. 

• I am now aware that you can use different programmes which can then be put into final cut pro to then be further edited. An example of where we used this is our credits. In our thriller opening we used an additional programme called 'Motion' - this allowed us to put an effect on our text to make it much more suitable to our context. Whereas before, in the preliminary task I was unaware that you could do this and therefore just used the standard text in final cut pro for our credits. 

Credits in Preliminary task

Credits in thriller opening

• During the preliminary we did not record our sound externally, in other words, we just recorded it straight of the camera. However, in the thriller opening we used a rode microphone to record the audio externally. This as a result gave a much more natural and realistic touch to the opening. 

• In our preliminary task we only used parallel editing which therefore did not add much of a tense atmosphere as there was not really a build up to anything. Whereas in the thriller opening, I used a different editing technique called 'cross cutting' in the hospital scene between the doctors approaching the room and the character getting out of bed. This was used to build up tension and suspense, as the viewers can see the doctors getting closer and closer to the room it raises the tension as they know that something is going to happen. This technique starts being used at 1.32 and climaxes as the doctors walk in at 1.58.

Lighting:

• There was no lighting used in our preliminary task - we only relied on natural light. Therefore, because of this we were unable to create a tense/dramatic mood in which the clip was meant to be. It just seemed like a normal room, whereas if we used lighting, it could say for example hide some of the character's identity to add elements of mysteriousness, or just to dim the room to create a specific mood. 

Clip from preliminary task

• Lighting was however used in our thriller opening very dramatically. In the plane scene we relied on natural lighting for focus on the characters but used the lighting outside of the plane to shine through the window so that it actually looked like the plane was flying in the sky.

You can see the bright light in the window gives the illusion of the plane being in the sky

• Lighting was also used in the hospital scene of our thriller opening. 

• I have learned to be able to use lighting to create mood and a specific atmosphere, and in our thriller film, I created a tense/anxious atmosphere and mood through the lighting used. 

Character representation:


I have learned many different things in how I can represent/construct certain aspects of a character. This can be done through many different techniques:
- mise en scene
- camera work
- sound
- editing
Each of these can be used to represent the character in a certain way.

• In our thriller we mainly used elements of mise en scene to construct our characters. As mentioned in a previous question, we mainly used the character's costume and props to construct the character's. For example, the handcuffs were used to establish that that character is the criminal, in which we focused on the handcuffs with a close up to gain attention to them straight away. 

Close up on handcuffs

• We also used specific costumes to construct our character's such as the protagonist dressed in the smart clothing that represented him to be important. 

Smart clothing on escort

• We also used costume to contrast other roles in our thriller. For example, the air steward was dressed up smartly to show that he is part of the cabin crew, in which the audience will automatically presume due to the costume.

Smart clothing on steward

• In the hospital scene, we also used costume to construct the condition that the character was in. It proves that he has been looked after and has been there for over night or maybe even nights. 

Character wearing hospital gown

• However in our preliminary task we did not use this to represent our character's, they each both wore normal clothing, so the audience were not able to automatically make presumptions to who they are or what they could be up to, due to the character not being able to be represented in a certain way. 

Casual clothing on character

• You can see in this clip that only normal clothing was used to represented the character, the only attempt made to construct the character was the use of putting the hood up. 

• I have also learned that you can represent character's through certain camera techniques. For example, in our thriller to express the character's vulnerability in the hospital, high shots were used to prove how vulnerable he is in the environment, and how helpless he is in the situation. This is something that we did not use in our preliminary task, and if we did it would have established the relationship between the two character's and who was the one in charge/more dominant. 

Birds eye view of character

High angle of character

Camera work:

• I feel I have improved a vast amount in this area. In our preliminary task the camera was all hand-held which was meant to give it an anxious feel, however it did not really work. We did not really have any camera movement apart from one panning shot when one of the character's got out of his chair. Therefore there was not much variety to it.
• However, in our thriller opening I feel I improved a lot more in the camera work as more of a variety of different camera shot types and movement was used. Such as a tracking shot: 

Tracking shot along plane floor

• I also used the camera much more appropriately to convey specific aspects of the characters. In which I did not do so in the preliminary task; the camera was mainly only focused in one place which usually was the character's face. But in the thriller opening I used different shots such as the close-up on the character's handcuffs first, without even introducing the character. 

By Jack Peagam