Prelim to Main Task

  From our prelim to our thriller we have learned many new things. For example-

• We had never touched upon sound track pro for our preliminary task and so our sound was of not very good quality. For our thriller however we used Sound Track Pro to add special effects which helped add to the mood of the sequence and made it much more professional.

For Example: Here we used a piercing sound effect to shock the audience and add drama.

•  In our preliminary task we use only very basic camera angles and we only used a limited number of these. It therefore was quite amateur but since then we have learned all about the effects that different camera angles can have for films. In our thriller therefore we used many more different angles such as low angles to cast power over characters or higher angles to show them being powerless.

Here is an example of a high angle shot, we look down on the victim making him appear more vulnerable. this sort of thing was never used in our prelim.

As we can see from the two shots shown above, we also used special visual effects such as distortion and speed. When editing our prelim we didn't even know this was possible. It shows that we gave more time to discovering things about how to make our Thriller look more professional and shows that we spent a lot of time perfecting certain things such as the flash backs, giving the audience the shock factor that they expect.

As we can see in our Prelim, some of the shots are not linked up correctly. We see the end of an action without seeing the beginning as it is out of shot. For example-

Here is a wide shot of two people talking...

...it then cuts to her handing a gun. However we do not see her bringing up her hand or making and hint of doing this, therefore when we see the next shot it may become slightly confusing for viewers. It makes the sequence seem jolty and rushed.







An example of where we learnt how to fix this problem in our actual thriller is-

In the wise shot we see the detective leaning forward and starting to pull off the gaffer tape...

...it then cuts to a close up at exactly the same point as where the wide shot was cut. This all together looks seamless and keeps the sequence flowing.







All together the difference between our prelim and Thriller is clear. The visual and aural elements became far more advanced and took far more time to perfect. However the outcome was far more smooth and fits the conventions that we wished to include in our Thriller.

How we used technologies to make our thriller

In this YouTube clip of our thriller, we annotated certain areas going through how we used various technologies to create it...

How We Attracted Our Target Audience

How did we attract our target audience-

Evaluation Task 5- How we attracted our target audience

5

The perfect audience member to our film.

Our perfect audience members-

Meet jeremy!



He went to Eaton school. He speaks three languages fluently, latvian, english and french. His hobbies include poetry, painting, events planning. he considers himself to be a 'higher class' and matured at an early age, he was brought up by nannies in his country estate. He would enjoy our movie immensely as he would never have to face the paparazzi at the cinema as it would only ever be a box office. It wouldn't be too long, and so he could fit it into his busy schedule. he would enjoy the boyish nature of the killings and the slight horror aspect in which he could prove his bravery by watching. His favourite films and Tv programmes include the Davinci code, se7en and The town. Which share the same target audience.






His Best 'Mates' Rob and Steve- 


Rob and Steve did not go to eaton, they went to a public day school nearby. Jeremy enjoys having 'normal' friends other than the royalties that he is associated with. They  would enjoy the film also but for different reasons. They strive to be different, therefore dont conform to societies general standards and conventions. their music is alternative, such as the artic monkeys and the libertines. theyre favourite films include 500 days of summer and lost in translation. Watching a film in a different language will be 'cool' as not many latvian films are made. and will latet have the thrill of saying to their friends:
"OMG guys i watched a film in latvian the other day"

 to keep up their 'indie' reputation.

Target Audience

Our story is based on a police drug crime. I feel that the audience for our thriller will be mainly based on men. This is because there are no females in the thriller and the male characters are not relatable to a female audience. This is mainly because there isn’t a character that a female audience can aspire to. On the other hand it will appeal more to a male audience as the main character is based on an intelligent, well-witted, problem solving man; therefore this character can be someone that can be aspiring for men. The target audience will be older men, mainly from their mid-twenties. This is because the characters are of a certain sophistication that doesn’t interest younger men and teenagers, but our target audience will also be people interested in drug relate police crimes. 

For instance a TV drama called 'The Wire', similarly would mainly appeal to older males for the reasons

Which Institutions Would Make our Film?

If we were to ever actually release our Thriller, we would have to consider what company we would ask to distribute it. For this we looked at English distribution companies, as we felt our thriller would mainly appeal to a British audience, as well as possibly be distributed in other European countries. Therefore we came to the conclusion that we would ask Warp films to make it.

They would choose to make our film because they have made lots of other First time, short films on low budgets and short time frames- exactly what our thriller would be. They often make a lot of films for older audiences especially males, therefore a lot of thrillers too, with plenty of action and gadgets (both of which would feature strongly in our film). They seem to specialize in realism, unlike some American companies such as Warner Bros, who tend to lean towards idealism to please audiences. However our film would be fairly realistic to if the situation was real.

They would hopefully like the latvian theme as they have made other experimental films such as Rubber Johnny, which was a gruesome and disturbing film that not all audiences would enjoy. Doing a film such as this gives hope to accepting other controversies, such as ours. Warp Films has also shot many films in cross-media convergence, which would provide additional funding for production and distribution for our thriller, while demanding a bit less from each company.

Our film is a thriller/mystery and does not require a large budget or special effects, therefore meaning that filming and editing time would be quick. Warp films once shot a film in 22 days, something to aspire to with ours. Our thriller would be a 'British Film' except for international personnel, which fits perfectly to the ethos of WF.

We also feel that our film could be very cheaply done, but still effective. This is due to fact that the main characters are fairly poor therefore their clothes, office general equipment etc. Will not have to look particularly fancy. The actors will also be unknown and therefore will not have to be paid very much. Therefore there would be an overall low budget.

We would keep distribution costs low, being that our thriller is a first-time ow budget production. therefore we would put it straight onto DVD and possibly TV, assuring that people will watch it. we would not put it in cinemas as we only have a specific audience and distribution costs for licensing in the cinema would be too high. Therefore we would  keep marketing costs low too, but still effective, placing adverts in tactical places such 
as magazines libraries newspapers etc. Sticking to our target audience.

Due to the experimental nature of many films distributed and funded by WF, such as Rubber Johnny, we can see that they are very open to films that are not made for mainstream viewing. They allow the idea of 'niche' audiences ( a minority group of people) mainly due to the low budget, however still making a high profit in comparison to money spent on the procedure.

They also do not have any other thrillers similar to ours. Especially the aspect of having the majority of conversations spoken in Latvian, will give it an interesting edge, and is something that they haven’t done before, allowing it to quite cultured. 

We had to consider what kind of media institution would distribute our Thriller in America. To get an idea we researched other low budget films to see who had distributed them in the US. One that we found that was to a similar degree and was distributed very well was monsters.

Monsters was made on an incredibly low budget similar to how the rest of our film would be made. It was premiered at the SXSW film festival and was picked up by Magnet for distribution. It was then given a platform release over a three week 'pre-christmas' period. Spending a brief time in the cinema and going quickly to DVD. As there target audience are more likely to watch it at home on New Media Technologies such as YouTube, Netflix, Xbox Live and Play Station.

This sort of distribution would be advantageous for or film as there audience is very similar, and would also have more viewers watching it on New Media Technologies. Therefore based on this information iI would choose Magnet to be our distributer as hopefully using the same methods it would also be successful for our low budget film. especially since the distribution was also low budget as we wouldn't be able to afford expensive viewings. This is why New Media Technologies are so advantageous to institutions and audiences.

Evaluation- social groups

There are two main features that represent particular social groups:

The detective-

Another film character alike our detective would be, Agent K from Men in Black. He has similar qualities and fits the stereotypical aspects of the same social group.

We have manages to represent this stereotypical man, by the use of-

• A smart outfit
• Serious facial expressions
• Very little said
• Clever remarks
• Dismissive of his assistant 

The Killer-

The murderer

This murderer is much like Red John from the TV series The mentalist. We have shown this typical killer social group by-

• Leaving the hand print
• Sticking the knife through the head
• Making the victim a young teenager
• Leaving a riddle

Two other opposing social groups that we focused on while deciding suitable character profiles, was the age. We decided to make our character relevant to the average older and younger male picking out stereotypical aspects:

This sort of use to collect a wider audience variety is also used in other films such as



Something that seemed obvious to us when choosing cast was to keep it to a male cast as around 85% of all thrillers viewings are male. As it allows them someone to associate themselves and relate to. We researched and found other evidence of this in thriller for example-

All of these feature male leads, and
are a small example of many owning
the same aspect. 








Another reason for using a male cast was when we researched gangs and drug mules, reading various articles it seemed that women were never mentioned or included. Here is one of the atricles that we found:

 

This article talks about drug crime. If we analyse it, from the fact that no females are included in, we could then concur that men are more commonly associated with crime and this is one of the reasons that they are used in thrillers. to stick to social conventions and attract audiences.