Rough cut - Miss Miller

A rough cut is important as it is when the film first starts to look like the final product so that any changes and improvements can be made and the cast and crew can change certain aspects of the film if they think it doesn't look as good. In our rough cut we realised that the sounds and effects could have been improved to make the thriller aspects be evoked further towards the audience, also, more transactions needed to be edited in to make the film flow better. This is why a rough cut is important as it shows a clear indication of where improvements can be made to make our thriller opening better and appeal more towards our audience.

Audience feedback is very important because they are the people that the film is aimed to, so our thriller genre must appeal to them in order to receive positive comments on our opening. Also the target audience can comer up with better ideas that we can use in our thriller opening to make it more satisfactory to watch. Audience feedback can also boost confidence in our group if we receive positive comments which can allow us to try more effects and sounds without worrying if the audience will like it or not.

We received our feedback from questionnaires given to the whole class which included questions such as; what went well?, what could be improved? and an overall mark out of 60. This allowed us to see what our target audience (teenagers) wanted to see in our thriller opening that we may not have included, it also shows us what we done well so we know what aspects to keep in our opening when we alter it.

Our feedback had good marks out of 60 from everyone who done the questionnaire which was helpful as it indicated to us that we were on the right tracks with our editing and shots etc. Also, in the 'what could be improved?' section the answers were small things such as: 'don't repeat shots too much' and 'sound was too loud' which is easy to alter and doesn't need any re-filming. Also the comments in the 'what went well?' section were very positive and morale boosting for our group with comments such as 'editing was good' and 'iconography was scary' which was our aim in our opening thriller scene.

This feedback from our peers will help us improve our thriller because multiple peers have written specific comments which shows that it is a fault in our opening which can be easily fixed by our editor Joe. When finalising our thriller opening we will not be changing our positive comments as we know those aspects appeal to our target audience making our opening a success.

Planning group storyboard - Miss Miller

A group storyboard is important as it allows everybody in our group, (Me, Joe and Cara) to understand exactly what is going on and not to get confused as it is one storyboard for all of us which also reduces the chances of us making any mistakes or doing something in an incorrect order. It also creates a guideline for the group to follow and make filming and editing less complicated and make sure everyone of us is on the same wave length.

Before our group storyboard each of us in our group made an individual storyboard of our own ideas and shots. When told to make a group storyboard we had to put all of our ideas together taking different aspects

Opening scenaration - Miss Miller

The opening scene of our thriller film begins with a little girl in Victorian clothing sitting in a garden playing with a doll whilst singing, we see many different angles of the girl then she suddenly drops the doll and runs away. The camera zooms into the doll which has a large leaf on its head to create foreboding. The scene cuts to inside the house when the little girl is running up the stairs but her face isn't shown, the babysitter then walks through the door saying 'bye' to Alice's parents, the puts her blanket on the side and hears some banging upstairs. She calls out 'Alice?' and without an answer walks up the stairs and turns on the lights. The camera then follows over her shoulder when she walks into a room and finds a gas mask on the bed, when she picks it up a slam of a door sounds and alarms the babysitter causing her to drop the mask and run down to where the sound came from. She puts her ear to the door and a music box sound is playing, she opens the door and calls out 'Alice?' again, the window is open and as she goes to shut it Alice is outside under a lamp post with a gas mask on facing away from the babysitter. Alice then turns round and the camera jumps to her face the cuts back to the babysitter running down the stairs to the front door, the camera goes into a handheld shot and jumps with flashes towards Alice with mysterious singing echoing in the background. The babysitter puts her hand on Alice's shoulder and Alice looks round quickly with the mask on her face and the scene ends.

We could improve our opening scene by cutting down on the amount of repeated shots of Alice in the garden, it took up quite a lot of our 2 minute limit, it also may bore the audience as it takes some time for the opening to become scary and mysterious. Also we could have less shots following the babysitter, although it puts the audience in her point of view and create an emotional link, it can come across quite boring at times especially if the opening is only 2 minutes long.

Filming schedule - Miss Miller

Shot	Date & time	Location	Content /Action	Shot type & Duration	Costume/ hair/ make up	Iconography	Personnel	Equipment
1	25.11.13 3:10	Cara's garden	Little girl playing in the garden with dolls and tea cups looking innocent.	Close up 5 seconds, high angle 4 seconds, tracking shot 6 seconds, zoom in shot 3 seconds.	Little girl in old fashioned dress to show when it is set, not showing her face hiding identity.	Blanket, teddy bears, doll, tea cups and plates.	Hannah acting, Joe camera man, me (Shaun) director and Cara also directing.	Digital camera, batteries, tripod, Tape / memory card.
2	25.11.13 3:30	Cara's house	Little girl running up the stairs still not showing her face creating mystery	Tracking pan shot 5 seconds	Again, old fashioned dress to show the era.	None	Hannah acting, me (Shaun) camera man, Joe director and Cara also directing.	Digital camera, batteries, tripod, Tape / memory card.
3	25.11.13 3:40	Cara's house
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Planning sound - Miss Miller

Sound is important within in a thriller film as different soundtracks can evoke different feelings and emotions to the audience. Also sound effects and techniques at certain parts in the film can create a better understanding and create tension, enigma and create an element of surprise.

We will be using a child's singing as a diagetic and contrapuntal sound as we can see it on the screen, the point of this is to give the audience a better understanding of the opening as they can hear the child as well as see her playing. Also the laughing will mislead the audience as it is a thriller film which is contrasts the happy laughing when the little girl is playing. This will shock and surprise the audience when something horrific happens as they don't associate nice singing with thriller films.

Another contrapuntal sound that will be used in our thriller opening is a music box, when the babysitter is scouring the house for Alice she hears a music box playing a nice calm song which confuses, and scares the audience as nice music isn't associated with killings. This is conventional to many thriller films such as Insidious when a happy song is playing whilst a demon is sharpening his blades, we want to create a similar effect to this win our opening scene.

Another sound we will be using in our opening scene will be a non-diagetic bird to make the film seem realistic and not in an artificial garden, this will make our opening scene more professional. Also the bird's tweet can convey happiness which will then be contrasted by the horror occurring in the house during our opening scene. This is conventional to a thriller film as the contrasting effect of good and bad is represented simply by a non-diagetic sound.

These sounds are very important to films specifically thriller films as they can have a great effect on the audience as it makes the film enjoyable are professional looking, also the use of contrapuntal, diagetic and non-diagetic sounds evoke different emotions such as mystery, enigma and tension.

Planning characters - Miss Miller

Characters are important to any film, without any characters its nearly impossible to have a narrative, characters are people in films that the audience to relate to and create emotional links with to make the film more understanding and to create empathy. Especially in thriller films, the characters in the film are similar to the target audience so that they can relate to them and feel their emotions during the film, when the characters are in danger or a fight scene for example this creates excitement within the audience fear for the protagonist which ensures that the audience don't get bored.

In our thriller opening our first, and most important character is the protagonist, acted by Cleo, she is a blonde babysitter who is vulnerable and the same age as our target audience so that they can create an emotional connection. She is home alone which is also conventional to a thriller film and in our opening scene you can see how nervous she is when she says "Alice?". She is wearing normal, modern day clothes to show that the film is set in the modern day which makes her character more relatable to the target audience as they can see it as being themselves home alone. She is very innocent

Our other main character is the antagonist Alice, she is a little girl who is possessed, this is mysterious as the audience wont suspect a little girl to be a killer. This tension and mystery is conventional to a thriller and keeps the audience enticed and also makes them question why a little girl would be a killer. When Alice is under the lamp post it creates a very eerie atmosphere for the audience and makes them fear what will happen to the babysitter when she goes outside.

Our main characters have a huge effect on our opening film as they relate to the audience to evoke more emotions such as fear and enigma to make the film more enjoyable. Also the narrative of the film wouldn't go very well if the characters weren't chosen and make correctly to fit the genre of the film and create an emotional link between the characters and the audience.

Planning editing styles - Miss Georgiou

Editing is important as it provides coherence and continuity to a film, in editing shots are combined with the script to produce the finished film. Editing makes the film look professional and evoke specific emotions to the audience through the different editing styles used. In an opening scene, it is conventional of a thriller to create enigma through the editing.

In our opening scene will use slow editing quite alot, this makes the scene flow more as it looks as if it is happening in real time, thus creating more enigma and suspense towards the audience. It also creates an emotional link between the audience and the characters as the film will be more understandable. When the babysitter is scurrying around the house looking for Alice, the use of slow editing when the camera follows her around the house puts the audience in her point of view as it doesn't switch scenes to keep the enigma.

Also, in our opening scene we used fast editing when Alice is spotted with a gas mask, the scenes change very quickly in order to set a high tempo make the audience feel excited and fearful. The second Alice is spotted the editing speeds up keeping the audience on edge which is typical of a thriller film, we hope that the fast editing in our opening scene creates the same effect as the chase scene 'Scream' showing various angles of the protagonist and antagonist to build tension and create mystery.

A Kuleshov effect is used in our film at the end, this is where two clips are put together to create a third meaning. In our opening scene the two clips of; Cleo walking to Alice, and Alice turning round frightfully with a gas mask on gives the third meaning that she has been possessed as she is acting strange and scary. This creates mystery as the audience don't physically see what is happening, but know that it has happened in their minds, making Alice seem even creepier as they don't know where she is or what she will do next.

These editing styles that we have chosen to use in our film are conventional to films in the thriller genre and create typical thriller elements such as; surprise, shock, mystery, suspicion and tension. This will help our opening to appeal to our target audience and entice the audience within the opening two minutes that we have.

Inspirations for opening scene - Miss Miller

We need inspiration when making our opening thriller clip because seeing something that scares us from another film, can be used in our opening to present the same feelings towards our target audience. This is my inspirations for mise-en-scene, editing and cinematography.


Mise-en-scene is everything you see in a camera shot in a film, it is made up of five different elements: Setting and iconography, costume,hair and make up, facial expressions and body language, lighting and colour and positioning of characters or objects. I took my inspiration from The woman in black because the little girls tea cups are mysterious and create tension, the little girls dresses and old fashioned hair shows us the era that the film is set to give the audience a better understanding of things that may go on and why, the scary stillness of the woman in black creates tension as we don't know if she is going to jump out and scare us, the dark lighting when she is around shows us that she is the antagonist, the positioning of the killer behind the camera scares the audience because it is as if she is behind us when watching the film which creates fear and enigma.

Cinematogophy is The art of movie photography and camera angles including both the shooting and development of the film. I took my cinematoraphy insiration from 'The devil inside', A high angle shot is used to show the audience the room Maria is in and whats in it. The working man's uniform shows us that Maria is in a mental institution which is mysterious and makes the audience curious of why she is there. Also the high angle shot could represent a security camera watching Maria in case she does anything bad, this makes the audience see her as very sinister which is conventional to a thriller movie. Also an extreme close-up is used is ued to show Maria's arm which has cuts on it. This creates a sense of mystery again, as of why she has cut herself. The extreme close up makes her arm cover the whole shot which looks very gory and strange which are conventional themes to a thriller movie.

Editing is used after a movie has been filmed, it helps the film run smoothly. A reaction shot is used to show that the mother is in pain, we can see this when she gets stabbed and the camera instantly jumps to her screaming face. This shows us the horrific pain she's in after being stabbed and also makes the audience feel sorry for her as the shot of her face indicates how much she is hurt, this reaction shot also makes the audience curious of what she can do to fight off Esther after being stabbed which creates tension. Pain and curiosity are themes linked to thriller films such as 'Orphan'.

Production roles - Miss Miller

When creating a film, different people are allocated different roles, these are: producers ,directors, actors, director of photography, music producers, screenplay writer, MES coordinator and editors. These different roles are used so different parts of the film production can work smoothly and efficiently without any confusion, also because different people in the production team are specialised in different areas, they are allocated to a specific role.

In our group, to decide who should be allocated to which role, we discussed who was the best at certain roles in out of me, Joe and Cara.

 I was allocated as the director, I supervised the filming commenting on shots and angles that could improve the opening. I also had to read over the storyboard and improvise with situations such as not finding a suitable costume for the actors.

Joe was the director of photography because he was most experienced with the camera so he knew the best shots to use and to pan smoothly and many other professional shots to help our opening look the best it can be such as: tracking, zoom in and hand held camera shots. These skills that Joe has helped our opening to run smoothly with no rough, jerky shots or any bad angles. Joe was also our editor as he was most familiar with a mac and was very confident with what he was doing, although me and Cara contributed to some of the editing ideas, Joe made it happen on the mac, the video effects used by Joe were very professional and made the film look alot better. Also the transitions and soundtracks he used improved the film too.

.I was also the producer, I found the location to film, prepared the film and supervised it as we went along to change things that needed improving, I sat with Joe whilst he was editing and gave him some ideas that he could work with to improve the film in many ways.

Screen play writer was Cara, this is because her narrative runs mostly throughout our opening with bits and pieces from mine and Joe's. She done the storyboards and drew the pictures to go along with it. I, director and producer altered some of the narrative during our filming as we found some things to fit together and we carried on from there and continued from the rest of the storyboard.

The actors played a massive part in our film, they were Hannah and Cleo, Hannah's size allowed us to use her as a little girl to create enigma, Cleo looked like a typical teenage babysitter which allows the audience to relate and feel her fear and discomfort.

Music producer was Cara, she knew which scary music to play at which time to evoke scary emotions to the audience such as horror and mystery. Also the sudden jumpy noises she chose shocked and surprised the audience.

These allocated roles helped the filming, editing and production of our film run smoothly and efficiently as possible. This allowed us to film and edit really quickly yet at a good quality to create suspense, mystery and enigma towards our target audience.

Risk assessment - Miss Georgiou

Risk assessment

Risk                                                                                             Prevention of hazard

Dropping the camera during a handheld camera shot                  Use strap around your hand

Trailing leads when filming                                                         Use gaffer tape to secure

Tripping over the tri-pod                                                           Place it sensibly when not using it

Getting too cold when filming outside                                        Wear warm clothes and have breaks inside

Falling over when running                                                         Make sure the area is clear before running

Shot	Date & time	Location	Content /Action	Shot type & Duration	Costume/ hair/ make up	Iconography	Personnel	Equipment
1	25.11.13 3:10	Cara's garden	Little girl playing in the garden with dolls and tea cups looking innocent.	Close up 5 seconds, high angle 4 seconds, tracking shot 6 seconds, zoom in shot 3 seconds.	Little girl in old fashioned dress to show when it is set, not showing her face hiding identity.	Blanket, teddy bears, doll, tea cups and plates.	Hannah acting, Joe camera man, me (Shaun) director and Cara also directing.	Digital camera, batteries, tripod, Tape / memory card.
2	25.11.13 3:30	Cara's house	Little girl running up the stairs still not showing her face creating mystery	Tracking pan shot 5 seconds	Again, old fashioned dress to show the era.	None	Hannah acting, me (Shaun) camera man, Joe director and Cara also directing.	Digital camera, batteries, tripod, Tape / memory card.
3	25.11.13 3:40	Cara's house
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