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

Below is a Prezi presentation I have created which answers the seventh and final evaluation question, explaining what techniques of film making I have learned from my journey from the preliminary task to the final opening title sequence. Both of these films are embedded on the Prezi on the final page.

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

Below is a PowToon video that I have created which answers the sixth evaluation question, explaining how my work with technology has improved from creating my preliminary task, the re-creation of a thriller opening title sequence and my final opening title sequence.

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

Below is a SlideShare presentation that I have created which answers the fifth evaluation question and explains who my target audience is and how we addressed them to the film.

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

Embedded below is an Emaze presentation I have created which answers the fourth evaluation question and explains how I chose my target audience and what their general demographic and psychographic is.

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

Below is an Issuu booklet that I have created which answers the third evaluation question, I explain which film distribution company I think would be most suitable for distributing my product, as well as explaining why based on which type of films the company often distributes.

Evaluation Question 2: How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Below is a Pinterest board I have created which answers the second evaluation question of how my media product represents particular social groups, demonstrating how it does with screenshots and annotations from my opening title sequence. 

Follow Heather's board Evaluation Question 2 on Pinterest.

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

Below is a Scribd document that I have created which answers the first evaluation. Within this I explain how my opening title sequence conforms to typical conventions within real films and also how some aspects challenge these.

Evaluation Question 1

My Final Opening Title Sequence

Embedded below is a YouTube video of my final opening title sequence to a thriller film. 

How Has Research and Planning Influenced My OTS?

Below is a Scribd document I have created as a plenary for the research and planning aspect of this coursework. I explain the journey I have taken throughout all of this blog work since September 2014, and how it has all built up to the production of my opening title sequence.

Research and Planning Plenary

Audiences and Institutions - My Audience

Below is a Scribd document I have created that explains the demographics and psychographics of my audience for my film, which is important to bear in mind when creating my OTS because it is important to film based on the type of people who are going to be watching, so it has to appeal to them. I also explain which distribution company would distribute my film.

Audiences and Institutions - My Audience

Independent vs Hollywood

Independent Films: film production resulting in a feature film that is produced mostly outside of the major film studio. 

Hollywood Films: the entertainment industries involved in producing and distributing blockbuster movies.

Some films are made independently rather than by a major film distributor studio. The Hollywood film industry is so dominant of the whole film industry because many people who want to see a new release will almost 100% of the time go to see a film in a multiplex cinema. 

Successful British films like 'Slumdog Millionaire' (2008) and the Harry Potter (2001-2011) series can only be thankful for their success due to distribution by Twentieth Century Fox. This means that the profits of these films does not all go back into the British film industry. 

Commercially successful British films, e.g. 'The Inbetweeners Movie' (2011) have higher production costs than independent films such as 'Happy Go Lucky' (2008) because the aim of the directors for these films is to gain critical success through the art of film making rather than commercial success.

Costs involved in making a Hollywood movie include:

• Budget
• Story Rights
• Screenplay
• Director
• Producers
• Cast
• Production
• Visual Effects
• Music
• Marketing

Ways of how Hollywood movies try to break-even include:

• Box Office
• DVD/Blu-Ray Sales
• Merchandising
• TV Releases

Information from: Blockbuster Economics - BBC Article. This article was useful as it has given me an insight on how expensive the Hollywood film industry is with how many costs that go into producing and distributing a film. 

Film Distribution

Below is a SlideShare presentation I have created which explains how film distribution companies work and some examples of some big ones.

Film Marketing

Below is an ExamTime flashcard set that I have created based on my own research of how films are marketed. (Please note: the flashcards are double-sided)

Film Marketing Research I gathered my research using this website, I found it useful because it was in a lot of depth which allowed me to summarise key points into my flashcard presentation.

Flash Card Deck created by Heather Larkin with ExamTime

Convergence

Technological Convergence: the process of new technology moving to single platforms which can perform multiple media outputs that can be used to reach audiences. For example, a PlayStation 4's main function is to enable people to play games on, however, you can watch films, listen to music, browse the internet and download films and music.

Audiences can consume more than one type of media from one platform through technological convergence.

Digital projection is a form of technological convergence because films that have been produced by digital means have moved away from the 'physical' film medium that can be supplied to theatres in digital format. This lowers costs for film distributors because less work will need to be carried out to get the film on to Blu-Ray, DVD, internet trailers etc. because the film has already been converted into a digital format.

Cross Media Convergence is where a company produces more than one type of media.

Synergy

Synergy: the interaction or co-operation of more than one organisation to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects.

 

Simply, synergy means working together to achieve an objective that would not be able to be achieved independently.

 

Cross Media Convergence helps to create synergy, for example Disney, has a TV channel as well as a physical store which it sells merchandise from films as well as DVD's and CD's from their films.

 

 

Synergy helps products to sell each other, for example a film selling a computer game or soundtrack.

     

  

 

 

Above is an example of cross-media convergence from Disney's Frozen (2013). The phenomenon of the film means many copies of DVD's, the CD soundtrack and children's toys have been sold.

 

 

Film Institutions

Below is a SlideShare presentation that defines the different types of film institutions.

Independent Resarch

To further the research and planning aspect of my coursework, before creating my opening title sequence to a film I decided to carry out some independent research.

I looked at both opening title sequences from thriller films and previous students' work in order to get inspiration from and to avoid as much as possible at making mistakes in my work that others have made in the past.

I decided to firstly get a clearer idea of what to include in my opening title sequence and a big factor in it is credits.

Opening Credits - BBC : This link was very useful to my research as it gave me a clearer idea of the credits to include in my opening title sequence, as well as what order they should appear in.

The positioning of credits in an opening title sequence is also important, the typography and colour must be readable wherever they are positioned. An idea is to position credits within the scene, for example, against a wall or dark object.

Typography
is important in opening title sequences, as different types foreshadow the type of genre and mood to the film. E.g. Romance


From our BFI trip, a talk was held by Pete Fraser, who runs a media studies blog. He has created a PowerPoint on 'making film openings', which included common mistakes made by students, how to avoid this and how to get the best possible grade by stressing the importance of organisation.

Pete's Making Film Openings PowerPoint

I found this post useful as it informed me of how to go about striving for the best possible grade.

Pre-Production: Storyboard

Below is a photo of our storyboard that we have drafted to work from when it comes to filming and constructing our opening title sequence. This is vitally important in the production stage, as it keeps our time management to a good level because we are clear on the exact shots that we need to film, and if shots do not work out we can leave enough time for ourselves to re-film them due to this advanced planning. 

Pre-Production: Distribution Co. Ident

Below is the image I have created using Photoshop that will be the indent of my distribution company, HCH Films, for my opening title sequence. We decided on the name 'HCH Films' as it is an initial for our names put together, Heather Casey Henry, the logo is simplistic as it is simply just the letters together, which symbolises the simplicity of our films as we are a low budget, British independent distributor.

Pre-Production: List of Credits

Here I have created a list of all of the credits that will appear in my opening title sequence and in the correct order that they will appear on screen.




Name of the Studio HCH Films

Name of the Production Company “A KLS Production”

Name of the Producer “A film by Heather Larkin”

Name of the Starring Actors/Actresses “Starring Jack Norris, ”

Name of the Film “Amnesia”

Name of any Featured Actors/Actresses

Name of who did the Casting of the Film “Casting Casey Phillips”

Name of who did the Music of the Film: “Original Score by ”

Name of who did the Production Design “Production Design Henry Hardman”

Name of the Editor “Edited by Casey Phillips”

Name of the Director of Photography “Director of Photography Heather Larkin”

Name of the Producer/Executive Producer “Executive Producer Henry Hardman”

Name of the person who wrote the Story “Story by Casey Phillips”

Name of the Writers “Screenplay Henry Hardman”

Name of the Director “Directed by Heather Larkin”

Pre-Production: Equipment & Props List

Created by: Casey Phillips

Pre-Production: Equipment & Prop List

Pre-Production: Character Development

Created by: Heather Larkin

Soldier: Henry Jones is 45 years old and suffers from memory loss illness, amnesia. He is married with two children, a 15 year old girl and a 12 year old boy. He had to retire from the army due to this illness as he was a potential threat towards giving away military information carelessly to the enemy.

His Wife: Mary Jones is a 43 year old Doctor. Met her husband aged 18 at Oxford University and they would have been married for 20 years in July, however, she has been captured by the enemy of the military as well as her two children.

Children: Isabelle Jones, aged 15 and Jacob Jones, aged 12. Both are getting top grades in their classes and enjoy playing sports in their free time such as football.                                         

Pre-Production: Location Recce

Created by: Henry Hardman

Pre-Production: Location Recce

Pre-Production: Shot List

Created by: Heather Larkin

Below is a list of camera shots that we plan to use when we are shooting our opening title sequence.

• Close Up - facial expressions of all characters and of objects to set the scene.

• Mid Shot - possibly of characters walking.

• Long Shot - similarly to mid-shot, mainly to show body language of characters.

• Canted Angle - of soldier to denote that his memory is bleak.

• High Angle - to portray the vulnerability of the characters who are endangered.

Pre-Production: Risk Assessment

Created by: Henry Hardman

Pre Production: Risk Assessment

Textual Analysis of an Influential OTS

'Before I Go To Sleep' (2014) is a film that is influential to ours because it is a thriller and about a woman with amnesia, similar to the soldier in my film.

In the opening to this film, unusually there are no credits other than the distribution and production companies and the title of the film. Having the correct number of credits (24) in my opening title sequence is very important as it is part of the marking criteria, so this will have to be thought about carefully, as well as the order that they go in.

The typography for the title of the film is only showed on screen for a second before it distorts and blurs off the screen. This foreshadows the plot to the film, the woman has amnesia and this connotes that her memory is short term by the short time the text is displayed and that it is distorted by the movement of the text off the screen. The sound over the top is someone heavily breathing which sounds like a woman, this denotes anxiety and the woman in the film could feel anxious about not being able to remember parts of her life.

The first shot of a character in the film is a close-up shot of the main female character at a canted angle, which signifies that something is not quite right and this gives the audience the position of being by her bedside when she wakes up in the morning with memory loss. 


Although there were not many credits in this sequence, it gave me the idea of how to compose different shots based on my idea, for example, the canted angle gives a sense of distortion and foreshadows some later events. I will ensure to include 24 credits in a good order starting with the name of the studio and ending with the directors' name, with cast, the films name and various other roles of production in the middle. 

Logline into Treatment

Below is a Scribd document I have created where I developed the logline for our film idea into a longer treatment that describes what happens in the film in more depth.

Logline Into Treatment

Feedback On Group Logline

Below is a Scribd Document I have created, which shows feedback that our group received when drafting our logline.

Feedback on Group LogLine

What is a Log Line?



A logline is a one or two sentence summary of a film that gives the reader an emotional insight into the story as a whole.

It is different to a tagline, but must not be confused with this because a tagline is a piece of marketing copy designed to go on posters to sell the film.


10 Tips for Creating Log Lines:

(from 10 Tips for Writing Loglines)

1.     It must contain; the protagonist, their goal, the antagonist.
2.     Don’t use a character name.
3.     Use adjectives to describe the character.
4.     Quickly present the goal of the protagonist.
5.     Describe the antagonist.
6.     Protagonist must be pro-active.
7.     Where possible, include stakes/’time ticking’.
8.     Contain the setup.
9.     Do not reveal the ending.
10. “Don’t tell the story, sell the story.”


This article was useful for me because it has given me ideas of how to write a logline, what is important to include and what should not be included.


Examples of Loglines for Thriller Films

Gone Girl (2014) : "With his wife's disappearance having become the focus of an intense media circus, a man sees the spotlight turned on him when it's suspected that he may not be innocent."

 

Divergent (2014) : "In a world divided by factions based on virtues, Tris learns she's Divergent and won't fit in. When she discovers a plot to destroy Divergents, Tris and the mysterious Four must find out what makes Divergents dangerous before it's too late."
 

 

Inception (2010) : "A thief who steals corporate secrets through use of dream-sharing technology is given the inverse task of planting an idea into the mind of a CEO."

My Own Practice of Writing a Logline:

"A young girl disappears from her home and a body is found days later. When one of her friends receives a letter from her supposedly dead friend, events start to get twisted.."