Link to Diverted final edit

Link to evaluation

Planning: initial editing of final edit

Editing our filming

After having found some difficulties arranging when my group would be able to film the main body of our thriller task, we began to film the opening sections of our film. We also began putting together our film company 'adverts'. 

We created the name 'Firewalk Entertainment' for the first film company, and then began editing a short sequence together featuring this name, as like an advert for this film company. We animated a fire stream bursting onto the stream and faded in the title before fading out the whole image. We found this to be very effective and also realistic, as I found through research that often, trailers and small clips introducing a thriller often featured short adverts for film companies who have worked on or produced the thriller.                                   After the 'Firewalk Entertainment' clip we also added in the 'Black Cat Production' title that we had created and designed previously and faded the two clips together, so that after the first title had closed the first one would appear straight away. 

We then began working on editing our first piece of footage that we filmed in the wooded area, our first location. The 'Firewalk Entertainment' fades out very quickly and straight away cuts to the opening sequence of the 'man' running through the wood, with shaky, jolty camera movements to convey this. Whilst editing this, myself and the other members of the group decided to have this sequence in slow motion, with eery suspense building music that we found when played over the movements of the camera, worked really well with the flow of the footage. However, we found that the quality of the footage was very blurry and not of a very high quality, but we had very little time to plan the rest of our final edit so we decided to focus on editing what footage we had together as best we could. For filming, we used a Nikon camera, which we found was very easy to work with and produced good quality footage, if the footage was well lit or the camera was steady, an issue we came across when we started to edit the footage was that we found that the quality of the footage was not as clear on screen as it had been on the camera. Also, we found that if the camera was moved or in the case of our filming, ran with, the footage was very blurry and poor quality. 

Planning the filming process

Planning the filming process

Costume

The costume we used was normal, modern day clothing fitting in with the time period. We featured only one character in our final edit, a young girl aged eleven and she was dressed in casual clothing, a grey jumper, jeans and boots, with her hair tied back in plaits. We chose to have our actress dressed simply as we wanted the main focus of our final edit more on what was happening on screen and not so much on what the young girl is wearing. Also, we felt that the normality of the clothing she was wearing contrasted with the abnormality of what happen later on in the clip.

Actress: Millie Fennell. We chose to use Millie for the actress in our final edit as we felt that as she was a young girl, she would easily portray the role of innocence and vulnerability, but also we noticed that horror films often have young girls involved in the story lines in some way and we felt that Millie would be perfect for portraying this role. 

 Locations

 We used three different locations in our final edit, the first location was a small wooded area near our college, where we filmed the opening section where the 'man' is running through the wood, his destination is unknown. We filmed this section in the late afternoon as we felt that the dark, gloomy light fitted the theme of our piece and also that the limited light coming through the branches added to the sinister feel of the clip. The second location we used was my dinning room. We felt that the warm, homely setting of this room contrasted with the dark of the wood and creates the sense that the young girl is at least safe, for now. We also felt that the shape of the room suited that types of camera angles and movements that we wanted to use in this section. The third location (is not actually noticeable from the clip) we used was in my back garden, which was pitch black and at the time of filming was very windy, which added to the uneasy feeling building in the clip and also the dark of the night highlighted the girls illuminated face even more.


Props 

 We used very minimal props, items that would have been found in the locations that we filmed in, such as a book that the actress is shown reading in our clip, and also a plant pot on the table, making the location seem more realistic. We also chose to use a torch whilst filming outside in order to cast a ghostly light onto our actresses face during the extreme close up at the end of the clip. 

Filming Schedule

Our filming schedule was very simple, we planned the filming when we were all available and filmed a week later, after having brain stormed our ideas and planned out everything we wanted to do and did some short filming practice before filming the final edit all in one go, having filmed the opening section prior to filming the final scenes.  

Planning: Risk Assessment

Risk Assessment 

Trip over the tripod

 As we were using a tripod for filming with, there was a risk that myself or one of the members in the group could trip over the legs of the tripod and cause injury to themselves or others aswell as damaging the tripod itself. We will attempt to avoid this risk by making sure we are aware of when the tripod is in use and to be careful of it and also to make sure we put away the tripod carefully after we have finished using it. 

Dropping equippment 

Dropping the equippment is an issue as it would mean that we damage the camera or tripod or other pieces of equippment which could result in them being damaged or broken. To avoid dropping any of the equippment, we will make sure to always wear the camera straps around our necks and to keep all camera equippment in the correct bags that they belong in to protect them from being damaged.

Tripping over branches, rocks, being aware of loose branches
We plan to do some of our filming in a wooded area, so some risks we might face are tripping over branches of trees, rocks and other folliage. This could result in injuries inflicted on either myself or the others in my group, and also, if conditions were windy, we would have to be mindful of any loose branches that could fall onto our heads whilst filming. To avoid this risk happening, we would be mindful of our location and be careful of where we walked. 

Get lost
The wooded area were want to film in was quite large so there was a possibility that my group could get seperated or confused to where we were and may get lost momentarily. We would make sure this wouldnt happen by not going to far into the wooded area and always be able to contact each other via mobile phones. This risk was unlikely to happen but we decided we still needed to consider the possiblity that this could happen. 

 

Research: The Thriller Sub Genre

• Comedy thriller: A genre that combines elements of comedy and thrillers, a combination of humor and suspense or action. Example: Mr and Mrs Smith 

•  Crime thriller: This particular genre is a hybrid type of both crime films and thrillers that offers a suspenseful account of a successful or failed crime or crimes. These films often focus on the criminal(s) rather than a policeman. Central topics of these films include serial killers/murders, robberies, chases and double crosses. Example: Seven.  

• Psychological thriller: In which (until the often violent resolution) the conflict between the main characters is mental and emotional, rather than physical. Characters, either by accident or their own curiousness, are dragged into a dangerous conflict or situation that they are not prepared to resolve. Characters are not reliant on physical strength to overcome their brutish enemies, but rather are reliant on their mental resources, whether it be by battling wits with a formidable opponent or by battling for equilibrium in the character's own mind. At times, the characters attempt solving, or are involved in, a mystery. The suspense created by psychological thrillers often comes from two or more characters preying upon one another's minds, either by playing deceptive games with the other or by merely trying to demolish the other's mental state. Examples:  David Lynch's bizarre and influential Blue Velvet, The Taleneted Mr Ripley and Psycho. 

• Supernatural thriller: In which the film brings in an otherworldly element (such as fantasy and/or the supernatural) mixed with tension, suspense and plot twists. Sometimes the protagonist and/or villain has some physhic ability and superpowers. Examples: Fallen, Knowing.

• Techno thriller: A suspense film in which the manipulation of sophisticated technology plays a prominent part. There is a bit of action and science fiction

Questionnaire for thriller research

Questionnaire researching into the type of thrillers each age group enjoys and why?

What is your age? 

12 ///

16 //////

17 ////

22 ///

45 //

47 /

72 //

What is your favorite kind of thriller? Action, horror,  crime, psychological, sci-fi, adventure
Horror ////

Action ///

Crime //

Psychological 

Sci-Fi /

Adventure //

What do you like about thriller movies and why? 
twelve year old responses: we like thriller films that have lots of action and exciting story lines with famous actors that we know and love. We also do enjoy sci-fi thrillers with aliens, similar to the Star Wars movies. 

sixteen & seventeen year old responses: we enjoy thriller movies that keeps us on the edge of our seats and has lots of actions and events that happen in the film that give us that 'thriller' feeling. Action, crime and horror are some of our favorite types of sub-genre for thriller films. 

twenty two year old response: Our favorite types of thriller movies are horror, as they are more interesting and captivating to watch, as well as the fact that you never know whats going to happen next really sets your heart racing and makes them great films to watch. 

forty five & forty seven response: Our favorite type of thriller movies are sci-fi related, because it offers us viewers the feeling of escapism, allows us to escape the day to day normal story and there are characters that are fantastic and the unbelievable is achieved, making us want to watch these types of films over and over again.  

seventy two year old response: we don't really watch thriller movies, but when we do we enjoy films with entertaining elements, films that make you laugh as well as thrill and shock you. Crime thrillers are also very interesting to watch. 

Which do you think sounds like a better title for a thriller?

The missing ///
Stolen //

Diverted ///////////

The Abscent  /////