Task 7. What do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

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

We started shooting on the 24 of January. As we were taught during media lessons in studio that for shooting we needed a tripod and a camera. We used a Sony NX5 camera for our thriller shooting. We made a plenty of shots, there were sets of middle shots, close-up shots and wide shots which then we can use to cut and made a thriller out of them. We set up the camera several times and changed some features as the different types of lenses, temperature and balance as we were changing locations during the process of shooting. Moreover, we have done the time lapses shooting with clock using s photo camera !The idea was to show the audience the time running.

We also used two different types of micro: a boom mic was used to make sure that any foreign noise would not appear and the micro on the top of the camera was the main, it recorded all the sound.

The next day after shooting we transferred our footages into computer Mac Pro and added them into the program me Final Cut Pro where all the process of editing had to take place. To make the process more easier and quicker we were told to sort out our shots and put them into bins which we named “log bin” and “rush bin”. In the rush bin we placed all footages which we decided to put into our thriller sequence. Then we needed to decide on the plan of editing process. Our group’s first decision was to make all footages together and then add tittles however after two days of discussions we came to the decision to make firstly all titles and then add in between them our scenes. This process can be seen as conjunction and scenes are used as a “glue” for our thriller.

The art of title is a very important and hard work so we spent mostly all the time messing around with it and trying many different things. Firstly, we searched in the internet for the information regarding titles. The length of the title on the screen is about 4 seconds and can be checked by reading in the head a title for 3 times. This is done to make sure that the audience will notice the name of a person and it will stay in mind. Secondly, we used jump cutting with different size, font and position of titles to create the effect of abruptness. We placed titles on a black basic background to make the audience pay more attention to what happens on the screen ignoring the surrounding.

After this we decided that’s time for music to be added. So, we searched for some tragic, scary and creepy sounds which can affect on our thriller and help us to create the whole feeling of the triller atmosphere. We add some similar sounds which suited out sequence and can be used as connotations of scenes. We used shortcuts as “B” for Blade, “ M” for Marker and “A” for Arrow to cut, separate or split the pieces of sound. After the creation of an absolutely new sound, we saved it as a wave product and opened in Soundtrack Cut Pro program. There we messed around with the waves of the sound and its amplitude, raised the cadence and add some effects. 

After this we put the new transformed sound on the timeline as a main sound in titles sequences however we needed the background music which would develop with the plot and would come to the end with the audience. So, we searched for another soundtrack and edit it in the same way as the previous one. After we put it on the timeline as the background sound and put the tone down in the bits where the titles appear on the screen not to distract the audience with a mess of sound.

After this we came to the main process of editing the shots we took. We used the same shortcuts features as “B”, “A” and a new one “TTT” which helped us to move the pieces of work to the left or to the right depending on where we needed more places for scenes. So, the idea was to put scenes in-between titles and their length has to be no more than 3 seconds. The effect which was used to create the effect of connotation is called the Kuleshov’s effect, so its main purpose is to make audience to create their own understanding of the picture and finish the plot. Our role in this was just to make the sound and the picture work together and make this effect.

Moreover, after this was done, we added an extra effect on the scenes “ Bad film” effect, which helped us to create a creepy image of crosses, graves and other pics.

Overall, the shooting and the editing process took about 1 month and we learned more about both of these processes, how to use the camera and edit footages.

Here is our final piece with annotations added.

Task 5. How did you attract/adress your audience?

TRANSCRIPT:

How did you attract/address your audience?

We have taken notes from other thrillers to include several conventions in our opening sequence. During the first few shots of our thriller a conventional close-up over the head shot is shown to suggest she is daydreaming or thinking which attracts the audience as she is looking directly in to the camera and engaging them in her thought process.  The titles we used are also seen to be conventional, as they are expected to be there in all movies not just the thriller genre. Another convention we used was to build suspense using sound, which is seen in nearly every thriller opening (look at films such as Inception and tv shows like American Horror Story).

Narrator-Plot/Enigma

Similar to Final Destination, a thriller based upon a girl who is able to foresee when people are going to die. Considering that the plotline and narrative are easy to follow, the same fan base that would find these types of supernatural movies exciting would hopefully find ours attractive too.

Shot choice & selection

We used a series of shots which would build suspense such as the shaky middle shot of fight, the tight close up panning shot of the girl dying on the road. Also, we used hand held shots to make it more disturbing and to create verisimilitude. Moreover, the Kuleshov Effect was used during the shooting, our plot comprised scenes which follow in a certain order, the implication was that viewers bring their own emotional reactions and connote the plot in the way they want. 

Use of sound

We cut the sound according to the credits. We added a second layer of sound to create a cut up and abstract sound track with an underlying and constant ghostly sounds. Also,we used purely non-diegetic sounds as we wanted to create a dream like and surreal sense for the audience. The sound reaches its climactic point right at the end of the opening, when the clock speeds up and arrows move furiously, the climax of the music stops as the screen blacks out, then the titles are shown in synchronization with the distorted sound again. 

Unique Selling Point

Our unique selling point in this thriller is definitely the storyline, as it is suspenseful, original and has a strong marketable theme “Mystical gift”.

What’s being represented?

Unexpected events which happen to everyone in this life, personal problems and their mystic dawn are shown in our thriller This girl seems to be ordinary however inside everyone has some difficulties which are not conceivable for society and she’s an example for this.

Task 4. Who would be the audince for "Charlotte"?

The target audience of a media product is the group of people that the programme-makers are trying to persuade to watch it.

Our thriller "Charlotte" is targeted on the audience of young people aged 16-25. This is the group of people with a common interest in cinematography.

Here are representatives of this social group, they form our potential audience.

1. The girl name is Amalie Denver. She is 24 years old. One aspect on which she's keen on is cinematography, especially thriller and drama genre movies.

2. The girl name is Maria. She is 16 years old. She's a media student and beleives that thriller is the most interesting and popular genre in cinematography.

3. The girl name is Ksenia. She is 17 years old. She is very polymathic and despite the fact that science is her second name, she's keen on films and prefers thrillers like "American horror story" to a chemistry test.

Task 3. What kind of media institution might distribute "Charlotte" and why?

Task3 from Dasha Zhukova

Task 2. How does "Charlotte" repsent particular social group?

Task 1. In what ways does "Charlotte" use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Convention: A widely used and accepted device or technique, as in drama, literature, or painting. 
 
  

Convention is one of the most important thing in creation and development of a film. Easier it can be named as the audience’s expectation. This connection is usually commonly agreed between producers of a media product and the viewer. Our thriller also involves certain characteristics of common features used in thriller genre. As an example we took an opening sequence of a tv-serial “American horror story”, this product is made in drama and thriller genre.  They used distorted sound which applies to images put in certain order. This effect was made by a Russian film-maker Kuleshov (an article about the Kuleshov’s effect was published previously in my blog). This effect they used to create a feeling of unexpectation, danger and fright.

The font has its own weight, we decided to put titles on a plain black background, so the white colour of font exude and moreover we add the effect of  “increase-decrease” for the font. So, titles in our opening sequence appear, move fast then they increase in their size and sudden decrease. All these if followed by distorted sound which we cut. All together these pieces of editing sum up and we receive many scenes which tie up together with main images and carry the main idea to the audience. This is the unique selling point of “Charlotte”. The audience by watching 3 minutes of this opening sequence will made their own decision and review.

Convention is made to ensure that audience gets the main idea, realises what type of genre the film is and makes certain that the movie will have success.  By convention producer makes sure that  the unique selling point is chosen wisely and correctly. In addition to the disordered sound and titles, we added the effect of cutting scenes, so the images are cut and tied together, the audience feels the effect of interruption into the plot.