THE OPENING

here it is; UNHINGED

CELEBRATE

MEDIA OPENING FINISHED

LINK WILL BE UP SOON

film production companies

MAJOR COMPANIES
Fox entertainment group- formed in 1990s, it is now part owned by Rupert Murdoch, and is best known for Power Rnagers series in 1995.

Paramount motion pictures group- founded in 1912 by Adolph Zukor with films such as: Willy Wonka, A Dolls house and Judgement day.

DreamWorks SKG- American company began in 1994 with films such as: Antz, Shrek, Bee Movie, Flushed away and Shark tale.

Sony picture entertainment- In 1989 Sony acquired Columbia pictures entertainment. with films such as: Men in Black, Jeopardy, Spiderman, The Karate Kid and Ghostbusters.

NBC universal- formed in 2004, General Electric' NBC merged with Vevendi. In 2009 GE and US cable company Comcast agree to buyout NBC universal. Comcast getting 51% and GE getting 49% and GE are to buy out Vevendi.

INDEPENDENT
Dark Castle entertainment, Silver pictures, Sherwood pictures, O entertainment, ImageMovers, EMI films, Five and Two pictures, Gold circle films and Liberty Media.

We chose Dark Castle entertainment as we decided our opening was more likely to go straight to DVD is produced therefore would have a smaller company representing it. Dark Castles has represented Psycological thrillers such as: Gothika and Orphan although these were also shown by Warner Bros and Columbia pictures as they are the major companies. Dark Castle was formed in 1999 by Joel Silver, Robert Zemeckis, and Gilbert Adler. It usually produces horror films as its name pays respect to William Castle who was a filmmaker in 1950-1960, the company's goal was to remake these films, after two films, they decided to produce their own material. Beginning with RochnRolla, they produced other genre films other than horror.

Shameless; Blood on Hands (Jodie)

In a recent episode of TV Drama Shamless, I noticed an interesting similarity between it's storyline and our groups AS film opening. In Shamless, a character witnesses a brutal murder and because of the guilt he feels, starts to hallucinate blood on his hands. Here are photos from the episode;





This type of shot is exactly what we are trying to achieve in our film opening. We are using POV of view shots of our protagonist looking at blood on his hands because he has either witnessed or committed a murder and the blood is a symbol of his guilt.

This is useful for our blood research because it shows that the blood needs to look extremely authentic in order to be believable. As a group we decided that the blood used in Shameless does not look realistic when looked at close up. Therefore it ruins the horror effect they were trying to achieve as unrealstic looking blood does not intimidate the audience.

Therefore we need to work hard on creating authentic looking blood in order to scare and intimidate our own audience. This needs to be done as suspense and fear are key codes and conventions of pyschological thrillers; our chosen genre.

Breif update of filming work so far (Thea)

We filmed the first part of our opening, the running through the tunnel, the interuption/bumping into the girl and then running into the toilet with some POV shots of blood.

However, we have encounted some unexpected issues;

-The blood we have been using does not look realistic enough on the hands of the actor
-When our protagonist bumped into the girl (kristy) it looked as though there was some connection/possible romance between the two
-The POV shots when the camera was strapped to the head was to far to the right and was shaky
-We were told we could not film further at the station until we had permission (which we tried to obtain but failed)
-Our actor was over-acting which affected the opening as there was no speech so it all had to be portrayed with body language

We have overcome these issues;
-gettting hold of some lamb blood that will look very realistic and will have the right consistency and will wash off as normal human blood would
- we are using two female actors to bump into our protagonist as to show there is no possible connection or romance just a coinsidense
- film at a time which the station door will be open and very quickly so we will not be caught
- Changed actors to a Theatre studies A2 student that will have a lot of experience in acting and will be able to portray his emotion without being melodramatic.

Making Fake Blood (Jodie)

*please note colouring of photos is brighter than actual product*

To extend our research into fake blood I decided to develop Kathy's creation of hair gel and food colouring. This is because even though in large amounts in did look realistic, when it washed off hands it came off in clumps. This was a problem when we had shots of the protagonist washing the blood of as it did not seem authentic.

Therefore to resolve this problem I exp[erimented with making the mixture by using flour. This would absord the moisture from hte hair gel which was causing teh clumps when washing off. Then I added different coloured acrylic paints to obtain the right colour.



After I finally created a colour which I felt was most authentic, I tested what it looks like on paper to start with. Although it did have the right colour, it was too thick for human blood so I added a small amount of water.



I then tested to see what it looks like on actual hands. It did seem authentic when in large quantities, but when it was more spread out over the hand, the hair gel base made it seem quite sticky and gloopy in comparison to actual blood which is thinner. However when I tried adding more water to make it thiner, it would not mix with the hair gel properly or it became to watery and unrealsitic.




Finally as a group we deicded this blood creation is not as authentic looking as we wished and therefore we are going to develop the research furthur. At this moment in time we are currently looking into using real animal blood as it would be most realistic.

Police and emergency servies telephone calls (Thea)

Looking at emergency service calls on the internet a lot of the ones that are on youtube are unfortunately hoax calls or joke ones. However the greater remains the same. As you can see below, the operator answers the phone with; "Greater Manchester Police, How can I help?" Currently, in our opening, the operator says Hello, emergency services how can I help, although this is very similar. Perhaps our operator may need to say, they are the police as the call would probably have been directed to either 'Police, Ambulance or Fire' before being asked to give details of the incident so that their call could be advised clearer. We may need to re-record the telephone call depending on how much this authenticity will affect our opening.

Effective use of editing and sound that also reflects mise en scene (Thea)

Having look into our two minute film opening, we feel that the first 30 seconds is going to have a much bigger impact that then next two minutes. Due to this, we are keen to make sure that our editing is really effective and adds to the suspense and tension of the opening.




I have looked at The silence of the lambs trailer as it is a infamous psychological thriller. Although, it is a trailer and not an opening, the editing techniques are still incredibly effective. the quick shots of the Protagonist at the very beginning as 'Orion' pictures are displayed along with the intense burst of sound that sounds like a door or a metal frame is being closed? (not too sure), is very effective and definitely puts the audience on edge. This may be very effective for use within our opening perhaps especially as our protagonist is looking at his hands with the blood to reflect his unstable frame of mind.





I have looked at the opening of the psychological thriller se7en. The editing is very quick between shots and the music is distorted as is the mise en scene as it is unclear to see what the person is doing. However, it is clear that they are mentally unstable and the fast editing is a excellent reflection of this. Perhaps, the quick cutting from one object or scene to another is being used to reflect how indecisive and confused the main person is. the music is also distorded and although it clearly has a beat it does not seem to make clear logical sense and other than the undertone of the bass there appears to be no real sense of rhythm or structure with the other sounds. This is also reflects the insanity and lack of structure that the person feels within thei brain.
This may be useful within our opening as we want to reflect how our protagonist is very confused as he is not sure whether or not he has killed the girl. Also, the tempo/beat of the music increases as the tension of the opening does. We have used this affect within the first 30 seconds (where the photographs are being shown), although we may want to consider this with perhaps having an undertone of music running throughout the opening as our protagonist is running through the station and the tempo could build up as his unhinged state becomes clearer as the blood becomes more and more on his hands and eventually onto his face.

Name Ideas (Thea)

Having decided we wanted a name to be relevant to the film yet not give too much away (from audience research). We decided to look up the mains themes of our film in a thesarus to open some new ideas.
The themes are;
-Insanity/Insane
-Murder
-Blood
-Clensing
-Psychopathic

Insane;
Unhinged Deranged
Senseless Infested
Absurdity Criminality
Remorse Contribution
Blame Uncontrollable

Murder;
Slaughter Butchery
Shed the blood Slay
Massacre Kill
Mullitate Thrash

Blood;
Gore Extraction
Disposition

Clean/Clense;
Purify Purge
Absolve lustrate

Psychopathic;
Disturbed Insane
Maniac Deranged



Other ideas;
Sceptic, she (will add more after group discussion)


Lots of these are very simple and are one word which is good as one word/short titels are a code and convention of psychological thrillers. We will have a group discussion and then vote on the title for our film. We will also ask members outside of our group for their opinion on the name as we want to make sure it has the correct effect on our target audience.

Running POV shot

We researched ways in which we could get a POV shot of our protagonist whilst he was running, so we should also get shots of his hands. This would used as an insight into the mind of the protagonist and it let's the audience see what he is seeing himself. The main idea we had of using a POV shot while running is that the audience can see the blood on the hands of the protagonist which would create confusion as the opening focuses on the the question whether the blood is really there or not.

However after trying several methods of holding the camera to the eye level of our actor, this came with great difficulty as whoever was holding the camera's footsteps would be picking up on the sound and therefore two sets of footsteps could be heard when the footage was played back. Also if the person holding the camera was runnig at a different pace to the protagonist, the camera would not correspond the protagonist's running.Therefore, in order to tackle these issues we would actually strap the camera securely to the side of our protagonists head. Before hand we held the camera to see whether it looked like a POV shot, in which it did.

Firstly Thea and Jakob experimented running along side each other, whilst holding the camera to Jakobs head, however the camera was a bit shakey, and it was hard to keep in sync with one another.Therefore this method of creating a POV shot would be ineffective

We then used a method of attatching the actual camera to jakob's head using duck tape and a swimming cap to protect his hair. This worked very well as it got the exact height and angle of the protagonists eyes. However as Jakob could not see through the camera himself, we had to direct his hands to the right place where they could be seen. This was also difficult to create a 'looking down' affect because of the directioning.




We finally decided that the use of a POV of shot is not necessary when our protagonist is running as we realsied that you do not actually look at your hands when running. Therefore we have deicded as a group that we shall still use the POV of shot to show the blood on the protagonists's hand, however this will be done he is still.

The Poster Creation (Jodie)

After conducting my research on current Macbeth posters already created on the interent, I used their similarites and main attributes to create my own poster using Microsoft Word. Here is the final result;



I started by finding a picture of a blood splatter for the background becasue I thought it was very effective in one the posters I looked at for my research. Then I looked at a shakespearean style font to represent the tradition side of the play. I then looked up local performing art schools so that i could pick one to say who was performing the play. I also needed this so I can put a logo on the poster to make it look authentic and official.

The main issue i had was making the font readable against the busy background but I managed this by changing the contrast of the background image. I also made sure I used black font as this was often used in the posters i researched and it also symbolises the theme of death within the play.

As this picture is only a scan of the poster, the detailing is not clear. However when finished, I printed out the poster in A4 which means it will look quite small in an establisihng or long shot. Therefore should be used in intimate close up shots like in the toilets.

POV Shot (Jodie)

A main shot which we will be frequently using in our opening in a Point of View shot of the protagonist looking at his hands. This is so the audience can see the current events through his eyes and therefore they can see what he sees. Here is a video in which Thea is filming of Jakob's hands to give an idea of what we are wanting in the POV shot and what we are trying to create;

Tonbridge Station at Night - Looking at Lighting (Kathy and Jodie)

We went to tonbridge station at 7:30pm on the 1st February. Are aim was to see whether we would need any extra lighting when we actually filmed, as lighting is always different through a camera. Here is the video of us filming Tonbridge station in the dark;



We started off in the tunnel near the station which we thought might need extra lighting, however it turned out not too, as it was brightly lit. Therefore we consider trying to dim it when we edit to create a more dingy look. But one problem we found was the echo of the trains passing by was extremely loud in the tunnel therefore we would have to film between eahc passing of train to make surethe sound is not picked up on camera.

Then we went through the tunnel and looked at the CCTV type shot we are going to film of our protagonist running into the station, where the lighting was dimmer, and had a tint of yellow. So therefore didnt need any extra lighting. This yellow tint will also compliment the close up shot of the hands because it will enhance the colour of the blood, thus making it seem like there is more on the hands than we actually put on.

Finally we went along the platform and into the womens toilets (because tow girls walking into the men's toilets would seem weird) and again these had good lighting, and so we dont need to use any extra lighting in this section of our film opening. Although one thing we did notice about the womens toilets is that the mirrors are smaller which could be more useful when filming as there is a much smaller chance of the camera being seen in their reflection.

Rush Hour
Also one other issue we looked at was what time rush hour ends. We needed to look at this as we want as little people on the platform as possible and less frequent trains for continuety. After waiting around for a while we noticed that trains and people become less noticable on the platform around 8:15ish so we feel we should start filming after this time. However this may be different on a weekend especially Sundays as generally trains are less frequent on these days.

Name Analysis (Thea)

As we are progressing with our project, we still have the issue of choosing a name.
We have not been too keen to choose a name until we have finished filming so we can see how the film feels and what name will be appropriate. However, it is still important that we research into names of other psychological thrillers and do some audience research in relation to our target audience. (This piece of work is in a word document format that will look much prettier on the presentation!)


Audience Research for Name;
“What makes a film title good?” “Intriguing titles” (Female, 17) “A couple of words that sum up what the story is about e.g fast and furious” (Male, 52)
“Do you like abstract (where it appears irrelevant) or related titles?” “Related ones” (Male, 20) “It depends on the film, such as the ‘the hills have eyes’ makes you question it but can tell it’ll probably be a horror” (Female, 19)
“Do you think long or short names for films are better?” “Short Names” (Female, 28) “Short are better, because sometimes the long ones are annoying to say” (Male, 17)
“What is your favourite movie title and why?” “Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind because it is relevant to the film yet also poetic and unique” (Female, 46) “Fast and Furious because its short but sweet” (Male, 21)

What do we want the title to do/be;
-Be remember able
-Entice the audience to watch the film
-Be simple yet effective
-Be original and creative
-Short, but direct
-Allude to some aspects of the film but not give too much away
-Not hint who killed the girl that is in the opening, as we want this to be revealed at the very end of the production

Names of Successful Psychological thrillers;
-Rear Window -The Illusionist
-Silence of Lambs -Blue Velvet
-Taxi Driver -Memento
-Se7en -Thirteen
-The Game -Hard Candy
-Phone Booth -Straw Dogs
-Flightplan -American Psycho

Looking at the names of Psychological Thrillers, it would appear that all the titles are short (usually one or two words) and they hint towards aspects of the story (such as phone booth and Flightplan), yet they do not give too much information away. The use of two words has not changed much with time. Rear Window was released in 1954 and Phone Booth in 2002 yet two words are still used even though there is nearly a gap of 50 years. This is because two words/short titles are simple yet effective and there has been no need or reason for change.

On the presentation we will also have possible name ideas and why we do or don't want to use them.
If anybody has any good ideas for our film please post a comment!

CSI photograph day (Jodie)

Here are some behind the scene pictures I took during the day our media group focused on creating the CSI photos. here are ones I took of Katy taking pictures of the dead body;





By looking at these you can seen the true colours and tones of the scene before we edited the photos. Orginially we were going to have the photos in black and white so the bruises and cuts would look more realistic.but then we realised that CSI photos are normally in colour. Nevertheless here are some photos I took of the bruise and cut we made our selves using make up and paint, but in black and white;

Creating Advertisement (Jodie)

Although we have managed to obtain various posters from different organisations, we would still like an amateur Macbeth performance poster to emphasise our focus on the play. Therefore I have decided to attempt to create my own on microsoft Word or Publisher. I feel by creating my making my own it will add to the amateur feel; for example schools make posters for their productions. However before I start creating my own I need to look at examples of promotion for Macbeth already made to get a better idea of what they should look like to make it seem authentic.

Poster 1
The first part I notice about this poster is the position the figure is in. The hands against the head could represent the stress and anger that the character is going through. The background colours of the poster are mainly black and red to symbolise the tragic death and murder which the story of the play tells. The frayed edges of the colours also suggest that Macbeth is not a clean cut story with an happy ending and that is portrays a dark and tragic story.



Poster 2
The red colouring in the background of the poster looks as if it has been splattered across the page like a murder has just been committed. Also the large centred image of the crown focuses on the royalty and position of power the protagonist is in. Finally The details of the performance are in a black font to stand out against it's background.




Poster 3
This poster cleverly uses black and white photography to contrast against the colour of the blood on the subject's hands. By letting the blood remain in colour it emphesises its importance and how it represents a main feature within the play. Also by using a photograph instead of a 2d image, there is more focus on the actors in the play to highlight their acting abilties. The gives more of a live feel to the performance.



Poster 4
i felt this had a strong amateur homemade feel as it seems as if images have been layered upon each other but with no similar detailing. Although this is what I plan to do, I will make it seem more blended together by chosing apropriate images and colours which suit each other. However i found the font effective in this poster as it looks quite sinister because of the jagged shape and bright red colour.




Poster 5
The use of the soviet symbol and colours it would suggets this was a modern day Macbeth play tackling a modern day world issue. This subverts the audiences expectations of a traditional shakespearean era play. The use of a quote in the background is effective as the shade of the makes it quite subtle in the background but it still is visible enough for the audience to see and relate back to the traditional play. The white colour of the writing and it's centered placement puts more emphesis on the time and place of where the performance takes place, which is the main piece of information the viewer is looking for.


From my overall research I can conclude that the similarities between the posters are what I need to include within my own. These are that the font needs to contrast againsts its background so that it can read and that what it is saying needs to be a focus point. The poster also needs to incldue shades of red and black as well as include the theme of blood. The writing on hte psoter needs to mention the date nad time of the performance as well as venue it is being held. Any images used should be of either actors or objects which sybolise death such as weapons or skulls. By including these major features in my own poster, it will hopefully look authentic enough for the audience to believe that there was an actual performacne of Macbeth at the time this film was set/filmed.

Britsh Gas Advert (Subliminal Messages) - (Thea)

No Estimated Bills w..
Watch the ad...

Here is a clip of a britsh gas advert. With special attention to the poster in the background which states "Keep Calm And Carry On". This poster has come back into fashion with these posters being printed lots more and even T-shirts being made of this slogan. It is interesting as it displays the chaos within the household which in the displayed by the mess made in the living room by the young girl.

This is useful for our media project as we are using sublimnal posters such as; give blood, mind your head, Macbeth amateurs and the MIND poster.
We are using these posters and signs to remind the audience of the situation and the chaos occuring in the protagonists head. These are intended to be rather subtle, although we are sure some may conciously make the link.
The MIND poster states that; "1 in 4 people suffer from mental health problems", this is significant as there are a total of 4 people that will be concentrated on during the 2 minute clip (The protagonist, the female victim, the woman with the handbag and the male in the toilet) and there is the one person in the two minute clip that has some sort of mental health issue.
The 'Mind your head" sign which is above the tunnel exit that the protagonist runs through will be significant as it is ironic that he is reminded to "mind his head" as he has something wrong with his hormone balance / mental state. We will lightly focus on this in the opening to note this.
The Give Blood posters/leaflets are also is using dramatic irony as it is implied he played some role in taking the life of the young girl photographed which is contrasting to the give blood poster which asks "to save lives", it is also significant as he is 'washing blood' off of his hands and wants to get rid of it immediately.
The Amateur Macbeth poster is significant for reflecting the inspiration we recieved from Macbeth and Lady Mavbethgs insanity where she washes the blood of Duncan off her hands and also the quotes we are using by her such as; "where is she now".
Hopefully, all of these subliminal messages will be very effective within the short clip for reflecting different aspects of the clip and emphasising contrasts.

PICTURES!! (kathy)

On the 6th February our media group met up to take our CSI photos which would be in the beginnig of our film opening. We had already chosen a location, so after putting a scar on my neck, bruises on my arms, breaking a heel of one of the shoes and making a black eye we were ready to take the photos. We asked Katy Fields (an ex Weald of Kent pupil) to take our photos because she is doing photography AS and we wanted them to look professional and as realistic as possible.

When we got to our location, we started to set our scene up by boardering the area off with yellow tape for out establishing shot of a CSI investigation.


Then we set up the position of the dead girl, we decided she tripped backwards over the log, which was a fairly awkward postion to lay in if im honest. We added our fake blood to the dress so that it looked like a stab wound, dirted up the dress, and laddered the tights to make it look like she had been in a struggle.



We took close ups of the shoes, the stab wound, bruises, neck and eyes, to emphasise the importance of these features and to imitate CSI photos, who photograph close ups of aspects of a body where something has been done them





We are not using all these photos, only the ones with the date, time and CN number which we edited on the computer. We printed them off onto photographic paper (8" by 6") and made a white boarder round the edge like the CSI photos we were told about and researched into. We filmed the beginning to our opening at 7pm at jodies house, using her dad to be our CID dective looking at the pictures.

OTH make up (kathy)

This is a picture of the character Brooke Davis from One Tree Hill. I found it interesting to see how the professionals did the fake bruising around the eye. As you can see, they have used a lot of purple and blacks to blend together to make a realistic bruise. They have it darker near the eye and have it slowly fade towards the cheek bone. Towards the checkbone there is less makeup used, and looks as if it is faded into the skin.

They have also put less make up on her face to make her look washed out, and so the bruises stand out more. This make up really stood out to me as being realistic because her left eye is slightly puffy and shut making her look more tired and vunerable.

Black and White Photography: Filters (Jakob)

By placing a filter over the lens you can dramatically change the tone so a colour becomes darker or lighter grey. You may have seen a black & white landscape photograph with the dark blue sky turning almost black. The chances are this will have been taken with a red filter over the lens.
Filters allow certain wavelengths of light through and block others from reaching the film. The filter will let through it's own colour so the grey tone of subjects with the same colour as the filter will be lighter and the tones of subjects with contrasting colours will become darker.


The following filters are commonly used in black & white photography: Yellow, Orange, Red, Blue and Green, and the visual below shows what happens to the tones when the filters are used.



Original colour photograph for reference shot on a blue/grey background.






Photograph taken in black & white with no filters used.
Notice tones such as orange and light pink become almost identical so do blue and red.



Adding a yellow filter introduces a subtle change to to yellows, oranges and red which become slightly lighter.





The orange filter lightens oranges and reds and darkens the blue and green pencils.
It's the red filter that has a serious effect on tones. Notice the pink and orange are now almost white while the deep red displays similar values to the original orange, while the blue and green have become very dark.


Since we are featuring several black and white shots in our film, this research is seriously relevant. We are using a yellow dress based on the assumption that it will appear white when pictured in black and white on the camera we will use, but if that doesn't come out perfectly then we can use a yellow filter on the camera lens to achieve the desired effect.

(source: www.ephotozone.com)

Final Location (Tonbridge Station)

As a group we went to Tonbridge station to research furthur into our chosen location for the film opening. During this time we experimented with the camera around the location as well as putting it at different heights to see what effect is created. Here is the video of our finding and the path in which our protagonist is going to run from start to finish;




We decided the tunnel near tonbridge station would be perfect to use as part of our chase. The walls were dirty and the lighting was fairly bright, however we can edit this to make it look darker to increase the tension. Personally I (kathy) thought the tunnel was really good for what we anted to achieve in our thriller opening, and we stuck posters on the walls, which all have a reference to our protagonist for example a macbeth poster- blood on his hands etc.

Criminal minds clips, focus on Police/CSI photographs (Thea)

Sorry about the poor quality and the foreign subtitles but this was the only online version of this episode I could find!

You see the investigation team look into photographs taken of the victim and the location. They are of A4 size and appear to have a white border around them. (Kathy is gathering information from Kent police unit of what the photographs look like so I will not go into detail on what the ones here look like)

However, the photographs are of the victim and there is a close up of her eye approximately 6:35ish. This is due to the fact that her eye appears to be cut slightly. This is important in our production as we wish for the victims eye to be the last photograph shown and for it to be zoomed in and then out to the protagonist eye. However, as we have already discussed, each photograph has to have a reason (such as a cut or bruise) for it to be taken as evidence.

Police poster (Kathy)

I emailed Mark Ginsberg, and asked him to send us some police posters for our shots at the station, and he sent me 'Be seen, be Safe' which i thought was really good as it is contrapuntal to how our protagonist wants to be.

The information provided is in bullet points, so its easy to read and gets straight to the point they are trying to convey. It also has two large pictures so that it is more appealing from a distance and it has bright colours or high visibility colours so that it can also be seen from a distance which is parallel to what they are stating you should do when you go out at night.

At the bottom of the poster they have put on the contact details, for emergency's, non-emergency's and their website address.

The font is simple, so it is easily read, and the colour of the font depends on the back round colour, but it is white or black which could be said to be symbolic as it is the same as their uniforms.

Lighting Experiment (Jodie)

As I took the camera home, I experimented with lighting which was suitable for when we film someone looking at the CSI photos at the beginning of our film opening. i first looked at the effect of just using a spotlight in a dark room which is focused on the photos (but in this experiment I used a piece of paper). Here is what I filmed;



When the the paper in on the desk, it can easily been seen because the spotlight in focused on it. However when held up to the camera so that the audience can see the picture better, it becomes darkened because its blocking out the light to the camera. Therefore in my next experiment I tried putting a lamp behind the camera. Here is the result;




First I looked at what the picture would look like with just a source of light behind the camera. Although the piece of paper was seen it was still quite dim. So I next tried using a spotlight in front of the camera and a light behind it.

I believe this to be quite successful as the pictures are visible at all positions and angles because of the two points of lighting. Both sources of light area neccessity for the clarity of the pictures when they are on the desk and when held up to the camera. However we are trying to create quite a mysterious and dark feeling to the room the CSI pictures are being looked at in. This will be done by briefly filming in pitch black then turning on the spotlight after a few seconds. The spotlight will be focused on pictures already on the desk. Therefore both sources of will need to be turned on at the same time so that the light behind the camera is not noticed making it seem like the only source of light in the room is from the spotlight which will be in shot. This can be done on a countdown as we will be muting any sound picked up on the camera and laying the music track over the top.

Nike running advertisement - music and lighting analysis of running through a tunnel (Thea)

I know that this is an advertisement, so it is created to appeal to consumers and potiental customers. However, the music and the mise en scene are very useful.
At 0:08, the music begins to fade in and it appears to be in time with the couple running. The music has a steady pace and a reliable rhythm. This will be essential when we are recording the sound effects and music for our opening. As the music develops, it has a 'unorganised' feel to it. It appears to lose its steadiness and pace although there is a clear cymbal or tamberine (Im not sure! but its some sort of percussion) which keeps the pace so its still recognisable and relating to the pace of the running that the couple are doing. Although, the unorganised, amateur and cluttered feel that the string instrument has reflects the hecticness that the couple are having trying to out-run each other.

At 0:34 - 0:37 the couple run through a tunnel. For around one second (maybe slightly less) the couple are no longer clearly visible due to the lack of lighting in the tunnel as they run through. There is some background lighting which makes the couple appear 3D as they stand out from the shadow. However, it appears to only be natural light and not manufactured. Which is effective when trying to make a clip/film authentic and therfore believable (especially in advertisements).
As they progress through the first tunnel ( 0:35 ), the lighting appears to get brighter which makes the couple much clearer to see so there is less confusion.
The couple then progress to go through further tunnels of which they are clearly lit and then poorly lit. This means that the viewer has to look closer and concentrate more on the visible mise en scene in order to follow what is happening. This is especially useful to capture the attention of the audience.
This may be effective in our opening project, although we do not want the audience to not be able to see the protagonist's facial expressions clearly as this is vital to portray the feelings that he is experiencing at the time.

Analysis of running scene from Forest Gump (Thea)

From about 0:42 - 6:03 you see various shots of Tom Hanks running (with some clips where he goes back to sitting at the bus stop and likewise).
Although, there are some excellent shots of Tom Hanks running, the focus appears to be more on reflecting the location that he is in as shown below;




These are used to reflect the distance that he has run as this is an important part of the story at this point in the film. Although we want the audience to know where our protagonist is running (along the platform), it is not an essential element of the opening. However, the first scene where our protagonist is running in the tunnel in the dark, it may be very effective if it is unclear of the protagonists location as this will entice the viewer to discover where he is and why.



This is a still of Tom Hanks' arms as he is running. It reflects that he is not running as a professional would do - Arms moving forcefully with precision and to a definite rhythm to help with speed and stamina. I feel it is important that we make it clear that the protagonist in our opening, is not a proffessional runner and that he is just running out of desperation and out of, what he sees as, necessity not due to choice or recreational pleasure. Hopefully, we will be able to portray that he is an amateur runner but the lack of control in his arms and perhaps movement of his head (which professional runners are always advised not to do). However, if his head is moving, it may make it even more difficult to film successful and effective POV shots but we will have to find some way to overcome this when we are filming.

Costume Research

Whilst watching various other psychological thriller films such as: "The Butterfly effect" and "The Machinist" the protagonist wears a shirt usually done up, and it is mostly dull plain colours such as: pale blue, grey, brown etc. Which all matched their characters emotions at the time of the shot, therefore we used slightly baggy jeans and a grey and black hoodie, to correspond with our teenager character and what they would actually wear in day to day life, for our protagonist to show he was slightly crazy.


For our girl, we decided on a yellow party style dress, as yellow signifies innocence. She had red shoes showing love and passion however the broken heel shows that this has been demolished by her attacker. We chose this outfit as it portrayed her as innocent and as yellow is a bright and happy colour, it contrasts the darkness of our protagonists costume.


Our two girls (who our protagonist walks into) wore coats/ jackets as it was cold, and they were at a station at night. We wanted them to dress normally, so they wore skirts and then their jacket/coat covered the costume so the audience do not really see what they are wearing, as this wasn't relevant for our opening. We wanted them to look as if they were going out, or had been out.

All our costumes are what we expect teenagers to be wearing as we wanted our actors to be comfortable, and because they were all playing characters of their age, we wanted each character to have a different look about them. And by giving them costumes in which they would normally wear, they would act more like themselves and it would look more natural.

Trainspotting camera angles and filming techniques decoded (Thea)

I have been looking into camera angles and filming techniques of running scenes as I feel that we have done a lot of research on the shots of the dead body pictures but we need to also consider that our 2 minute clip has a large proportion of our protagonist running within it!

I have looked at the opening of trainspotting, As I knew that there was running within the first sequence.



This clip displays shows the behind of the main character running, the emphasis is on his feet and the environment he is running in. The pace he is running at and the movement of his feet are in time with the music/the beat. This is especially effective as the audience is drawn further in to the film from the ofset.
Although it is evident that the road he is running down is rather busy, due to the people in the background, there appears to be a clear space for him to run. This allows the audience to be more focused on the character and not distracted by extras in the shot. The fact that the opening scene is just a cloes up of feet, it leaves the audience curious to know who it is who's running. This is an excellent way to create interest and curiousity from the very beginning of the film. This could be used in our 2 minute clip as we need to capture interest from the beginning as our opening is very short.



This clip shows the main character and his starring partner running directly towards the camera. It is a mid shot of the pair running, with a group of people running in the bacground. This explains that there are a group of them. The fact they are running, already displays that they have done something wrong or have a reason to be running either from or to somewhere. The main character (on the left), his shirt appears to be undone or torn. This already implies to the audience that perhaps he does not have much money to be able to afford smarter clothes. The direct eye contact with the camera is rather intimidating and can be slightly unnerving. This may be very effective, although perhaps not appropriate for our film opening as we want the audience to feel sympathy towards the protagonist although at some points we will imply that the protagonist is the killer of the young girl photographed.





This shot and a few seconds before and after this are a POV shot from the main characters view. This is very useful as we wanted to display our protagonists point of view to create further a feeling of empathy as they will experience things with the protagonist. However, it may be difficult to potray his insanity as we wanted our protagonist to be looking at his hands to display how he feels there is blood on his hands, from the guilt he feels. This may be difficult to achieve, as we want him to still be running as we focus on his hands and the blood spreading.


The shot switches from point of view, to mid shot when he runs into/gets hit by the car. This is a great use of match on action, and this will be useful in our project as we are planning to have fast editing from the protagonists point of view to change to a mid shot/ close up of the protagonist runnning into a woman on the platform who then looks scared and confused that he may steal her handbag.



Having looked at the opening of trainspotting and some stills in detail, I feel that some of the techniques used in this could be extremely uesful for our project. Although, creating effective POV shots will be the most challenging aspect. Thgis is due to the fact we do not want an echo of the camera women/man's footsteps running behind with a camera which would ruin the continuity and distract full attention from the protagonist. This means, it is likely we will need to strap the camera to our protagonists head (thanks ms watts!) in order to create effective POV shots.

Update On Advertisement 2 (Jodie)

A couple of weeks ago I emailed The National Blood Service to see if they would be willing to send us some of their psoters to put in our Mise en Scene. But I never recived a definate reply, just an email back saying they have fowarded my request to the right department. However yesterday I recieved these in the post;


I recived 6 induvidual A4 posters. Here are a few of them close up;



The posters will work well in our mise en scene as the sentance "Give Blood" really stands out and it's the first part the audience will notice. This is effective as it is suggesting that the protagonist should give the blood on his hands. Also the posters mention saving peoples live's where as our opening suggests that the protagonist has just killed soemone therefore it is contrapuntual the story line.

However a problem with using any of the posters is their size becasue they are quite small to notice unless we put them near something which is constantly in shot such as the sink in the public toilet scene.