Goodbye!

Dear Moderator,

I hope that you enjoy looking through my blog posts, prezi presentations and the final cut of my thriller opening sequence and evaluation tasks. I certainly enjoyed putting the whole project together!

Goodbye :)

Yasmin Amey

Final Cut of our thriller opening sequence - Premonition

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

See post on my Preliminary Exercise with screengrabs and evaluation here:

http://yasminsthrillerblog.blogspot.com/search/label/Preliminary%20Excerise

See post on my Continuity Exercise with a short evaluation here:
http://yasminsthrillerblog.blogspot.com/2010/09/continuity-taskexercise.html

Here are the links to my previous relevant posts to illustrate how I planned better for my thriller film opening compared to my preliminary exercise.

• Shot List = http://mediathrillergroup.blogspot.com/2010/12/shot-list-for-untitled-by-yasmin.html
• Shoot Schedule = http://mediathrillergroup.blogspot.com/2010/12/shoot-schedule-group-4-yasmin-khushel.html
• Group Meetings = http://mediathrillergroup.blogspot.com/2010/12/group-meetings.html
• Certification of our Film = http://mediathrillergroup.blogspot.com/2010/12/certification-of-film.html
• Title Sequences = http://mediathrillergroup.blogspot.com/2011/01/title-sequences.html
• Storyboard = http://mediathrillergroup.blogspot.com/2011/01/storyboard.html
• Audience Research = http://mediathrillergroup.blogspot.com/2011/01/audience-research-video.html
• Research/Planning = http://yasminsthrillerblog.blogspot.com/search/label/Research%2FPlanning

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

Evaluation 6 - What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product? on Prezi

Evaluation 5: How did you attract/address your audience:

For evaluation five both myself and Khushel decided that we would do something creative for this particular evaluation task and show off our skills by filming our peers and teachers answering a variety of questions based upon our thriller opening sequence ‘Premonition.’ We believed that by creating this video we would be provided with a much better, in depth profile of what our peers thought of our film and what improvements could be made in order to make it a successful thriller. What is more, is that by filming and editing the footage we were able to take scenes out from our own thriller opening sequence and by ‘wire framing’ the footage we could incorporate segments of it and fit it into the evaluation video where people began to  comment on specific examples from our film. By doing this, our audience would be provided with a clearer, understandable view of areas which shone out to our viewers and those which captured their hearts.

When it came to choosing a selection of people who would appear in our evaluation video, we decided that we would choose people who reflected our target audience, this being citizens aged 15+. We included a variety of college students and two teachers, one who is in their late 20s and one who is in their 40s into our evaluation task so that we would be provided with information and opinions from people who come from different ethnicity backgrounds and are different ages. Moreover, considering the fact that we did not create a film poster to promote and advertise our film to our target audience we decided to use other strategies to attract our audience, these being that we could send our DVD release of our thriller film to a variety of television companies for them to preview on their film review shows such as the BBC’s ‘Film 2011’ hosted by Claudia Winkleman, London Tonight and This Morning where film critics could review the film and explain to the audience’s their thoughts and opinions upon the film and whether it is a successful thriller. By allowing film critics to review the film on live TV, viewers will become interested in the film and will then decide to either research into the film by visiting official websites to read plot synopsis and watching trailers of the film before ordering and buying the film when it’s released in UK stores.





When filming our fellow peers and teachers for our evaluation video the majority of them answered the questions correctly providing us with positive, optimistic answers that we had originally wanted to hear from our target audience.

We asked our target audience, ‘Whether they believed our film was successful as an opening sequence.’ The older teacher out of the two answered saying “Absolutely, it sets out the whole tone of what you can expect, whether it’s a trailer or a clip you saw before hand.” This was a very encouraging comment for us to hear for the reason that it enabled us to realise that not only had our opening sequence interested and drawn in our younger audiences but it also branched out to our older audiences as they found it entertaining and dark.

Another question we asked was, ‘What are the successful features of conveying the genre of a thriller film?’ One of our fellow peers answered saying “It was when you were in the bed and you were moving around that was successful because it presents psychiatric behaviour.” On one hand, the youngest teacher out of the two claimed that “The music definitely and I thought that the set decoration was quite apt as well. It looked sleek and the colours were quite dark, you could tell it was meant to be a psychological thriller.” On the other hand, the older teacher out of the two explained that “The clipping back from the actual real, the character waking up, talking to a potential boyfriend and then the vision in her head that she’s already dreaming.” The evidence that we gained from our audience’s answers was that both the student and the youngest teacher spoke more about the scenes in the film and the successful features which enabled the film to become a successful psychological thriller. Whilst, the older teacher did sometimes speak about a couple of scenes from the film but mainly focused on the dreaming side of the narrative rather than the impact it had on allowing it to become a successful thriller film. Perhaps this is to do with audience’s age difference or whether they prefer to watch and observe different aspects of the film compared to one another.

As a group, we wanted to find out whether, ‘The soundtrack fit the storyline and genre of the film’ so we asked our target audience what their thoughts and ideas were upon this subject. We asked only the students for their opinion on this question and they provided us with both positive and negative feedback explaining that:

• “Yes it made it creepy.”
• “Yes the suspense throughout the movie lead up to that moment so it really did.”
• “Personally I don’t think it did, it didn’t have enough tension. I think it was good but it could have changed later on. I think that it could have started one way and as the tension built up, the music could have become tenser as it went along.”
• “It was intense but dreamy which went with the whole dreaming idea.”

Clearly, from the student’s answers the majority of them believed that the soundtrack was appropriate and fit into the psychological thriller exceptionally well as the melody delivered a dark, eerie, tense, atmospheric sound. However, one of the students believed that whilst the soundtrack was good and interesting, he thought that it could have started one way and perhaps the tempo or frequency of the melody could change to a different format so that it allowed more tension and anxiousness to build up throughout the opening sequence.

The final question we asked our target audience was that, ‘Did they understand the film.’ We questioned the youngest teacher out of the two and one of the students so that we could identify their answers and see whether there was any differences in their response. The teacher explained that “Yes, I basically think that it was a girl who was dreaming and she had a premonition that she was going to be killed by her partner.” Whilst the student claimed that “Yes, the title of the film helped it and helped you understand the film a lot more.” From both of these responses, it became noticeable that they both understood the narrative of our thriller opening sequence. Additionally, the fact that our title had such a bold meaning to it, our audience knew instantly when watching our opening sequence what the remainder of the film would consist of.

All in all, we took on board both the positive and the negative feedback we gained from our audience research and if we were ever able to re-shoot or make changes to our thriller opening sequence we would have definitely made sure that we met the needs of our target audience.

Evaluation 4: Who would be the audience for your media product?

Both Khushel and I decided to record a video of ourselves discussing who would be the audience for our media product, whether the film is open to any gender as well as discussing features that we incorporated from other films such as ‘Cape Fear, Premonition, What Lies Beneath and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly,’ into our own thriller opening sequence. We decided that rather than typing our answers onto our thriller blogs, we thought that we’d act creatively and illustrate our excellent skills by using digital technology as part of our evaluation task.

This is Sabeen Husain and Priyanka Ganatra, one is sixteen years old whilst the other is seventeen. Sabeen lives in Harrow, whiles Priyanka lives in Hayes and they both attend college together. These girls like to dress casually if they are attending college. However, as soon as they are out of the school premises they enjoy dressing up a little smarter if it means that they are going to be attending a party or an event in the evening. They both enjoy going shopping whenever they have free time on their hands, and they especially take pleasure in shopping at New Look, River Island, H&M and Topshop. Sabeen and Priyanka love to watch thriller films such as ‘The Orphan, the Strangers, Drag Me to Hell, and they definitely luxuriate in watching these films as soon as they hit the box office in their local cinema.  Both of these girls enjoy watching television programs, for instance  90210, Gossip Girl, Friends, Eastenders, Hollyoaks and

Waterloo Road

, either by themselves or with their friends for a night in. The channels that they would watch these programs on would be Channel 4, BBC 1, E4, MTV and  ITV2. Each of these girls are definitely tuned in to the latest music varying from RnB, Hip Hop, Grime and Rock. Moreover, they enjoy listening to the likes of Rihanna, Beyonce, Avril Lavine, Enrique Iglesias, Trey Songz, Chris Brown and many more.

This is Manan Vekaria, Roberto Caccaviello and Shyam Chandarana they are all seventeen years old, living in harrow and they each attend college. These boys like to dress casually whilst they are attending school but as soon as they are offsite, they enjoy dressing up a little smarter if it means that they are attending a party or an event in the evening. These boys enjoy watching television, playing football or tennis together, listening to music, going shopping, playing x-box and Shyam often enjoys spending his time undertaking flower picking! Manan, Roberto and Shyam especially love to watch thriller films such as ‘Dark Knight, Inception, Se7en, Terminator, Chucky, Paranormal Activity and the Omen which they definitely indulge in watching as soon as these films hit the box office in their local cinema. Each of these boys enjoy watching television programs, for example Friends, My Wife and Kids, Prison Break, Eastenders, Family Guy and Alan Carr - Chatty Man, either by themselves or with their friends. The channels that they would often watch these programs on would be Channel 4, BBC 1, BBC3, E4 and Sky 1. Clearly, the boys are undoubtedly tuned in to the latest releases in the music industry as they enjoy listening to the likes of Calvin Harris, Dizzee Rascal, 50 Cent, Ryan Leslie, Lupe Fiasco and Pharrell.

One might say, that our thriller opening sequence ‘Premonition,’ would definitely appeal to our target audience for the reason that the girls we interviewed as part of our audience research share the same stereotypical qualities as the female character in our own thriller opening sequence. They are both exceedingly girly and take pleasure in undergoing lots of girly events and activities. Additionally, the boys we interviewed as part of our audience research also share the same stereotypical qualities, similar to the male character in our own thriller opening sequence, as they each enjoy watching dark, eerie films that build up drama, suspense and trepidation within minutes of the opening sequence. As a result of this, if our thriller opening sequence was to be showcased at the teenagers local cinema, this may appeal to them and grab their attention immediately, encouraging them to go and watch the film instantly as our opening sequence is incredibly alike to the thriller films that they already enjoy. Moreover, I think that our opening sequence would appeal to this particular target audience for the reason that they may become drawn to the story and begin to empathise with the female character. They may also begin to question why it is that the boyfriend feels the need to murder his girlfriend. Additionally, many girls may look up to the female character and think of her as a role model due to her courage and confidence as she attempts to escape from a perilous situation which sadly only ends in debacle.

Below is some feedback that we received by our target audience after they had watched our thriller opening sequence. We received some brilliant feedback by the public as they explained to us the thriller conventions that appealed to them the most when watching our sequence. Additionally, the audience revealed to us how the violence and suspense kept them gripped to it the entire time as the movie built up anticipation and fear, allowing them to question would events might occur in the subsequent scenes of the film.

By making sure that we chose the correct classification rating for our thriller opening sequence, we visited the BBFC guidelines website so that we were able to identify what certificate our film deserved and to show our understanding of media industries and institutions. We already created a post on the group blog illustrating the reasons behind choosing a 15 certificate rating so here is the link to the relevant post.

http://mediathrillergroup.blogspot.com/2010/12/certification-of-film.html

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

If we were given the opportunity to create movie trailers for our film, we would have definitely chosen to do this for the reason that movie trailers are the first chance to promote a movie to its target audience. We would be able to start it up a year in advance before the major release of the film would be sold onto DVD or Blu-Ray. The idea is to give ‘moviegoers’ a taste of the special effects and plot twists of the studios upcoming release.

Another thing that could be added to promote the film is that the movie studio could unveil an official website for the film so that it allows visitors to view trailers, watch behind the scenes, interviews with the cast, plot synopsis, play games and even pre-order tickets for events following and promoting the film. The websites are only the start of a much larger marketing campaign.

Another strategy that we could use is highly visible product tie-ins so that in the weeks heading up to the release of our film we could have images of the main characters in the film appear on either cans of coke/sprite or on biscuit packets and even beer boxes.