04/05/11 Log (Evaluation: Group Interview)

28/04/11 Log (Fraction Final Project)

28/04/11 Log (Audience Feedback From Other Media Students)

28/04/11 Log (Audience Feedback Via Facebook)

On the 26th April, Izak posted our final project onto his Facebook profile so that we could get some feedback from people other than our peers. I was really pleased to log back into Facebook hours later and see that so many people had 'liked' the video. Above are a few of the many positive comments the we had received from my friends on facebook.

20/04/11 Log (Final Touches)

On Wednesday 20th of April, Izak, Kadeem and Tanika all came into school to make any small alterations to our final film. The alterations made were based on the audience feedback and included things such as the titles and the soundtrack. Whilst Izak and Tanika were working together to produce a more thriller conventional soundtrack, Kadeem was working on the titles, changing the colours and what they read. Izak completely changed up the soundtrack to make it sound more cinematic to create a more chilling atmosphere. As a group, we approved of the new soundtrack which we had produced and decided that we will use that soundtrack rather than the old soundtrack, as the old one sounded more horror/paranormal than crime thriller. We also approved of Kadeem titles and will be replacing the old red and white titles, with the new grey and white titles, which have been composed in a different way.

04/04/11 Log (LiveType Finishes)

Today, I (Kadeem) was assigned by the group to finish off the titles On 'LiveType'. In our rough edit, we were given advice from the other groups and was told that our titles are too dark. Because the scenery we shot in consisted of natural colours (dark and eerie) and our titles were dark red, the two colours didnt go together very well. We took the criticism on board and changed the colour of our titles to white/grey. This way its easier for the audience to read the titles and creates tension. It was also said that our titles were too big so I had to make the font smaller to reduce the the titles restricting the filming.

31/03/11 Log (Imitation Of Evidence Marker)

The above picture shows the imitation of the evidence markers that we created for our mise en scene. To create this we used resources from our school. These markers were very easy to manufacture. We simply used some yellow sugar paper and a black marker to colour in the numbers. We made 6 of these evidence cards and placed them all around the crime scene to add a sense of realism to the mise en scene.

29/03/11 Log (Fraction Rough Edit)

Above, is the rough edit of our AS media studies project titled 'Fraction' (Not uploaded in HQ due to errors with the site). We have been working on this project for roughly over 2 months now and as a group, we are very pleased with the outcome. Our opening sequence for Fraction was played in front of our teacher and our peers, and we asked them for feedback for our project. We received a little bit of negative criticism but overall, the feedback that we had received was mainly positive. 

Our peers described our mise en scene as realistic, conventional, remote, believable and one person even wrote '10/10' in the strengths box! Not one person in the class gave any negative feedback about the location of the opening sequence or the use of props. Our classmates told us that we had used our props well to make the opening sequence look as real as possible, and as a group, we also think that we have managed to capture that sense of realism within the opening sequence through the use of props, costumes and location.

Our cinematography was also described as good and our peers said that we had cleverly used a wide variety of different camera shots to create a sense of realism within the opening sequence. Yet again, we had received no negative feedback for the cinematography. However, our teacher suggested that when the man in the forensic suit is taking pictures, the audience should have an insight into what exactly he is taking pictures of. As a group, we have taken our teachers advice on board and have decided that we will take pictures showing the audience what the man in the forensic suit is taking pictures of, and we will insert them into our opening sequence. We will add a black and white effect to each picture to make it clear to the audience that they are photographs.

Our peers told us that the non diegetic soundtrack that we created using garageband fit in well with the opening sequence, and that it fit in well with the whole thriller genre. One person described the soundtrack as having a 'good flow' and others said that it suited the scenes from the opening sequence. However, our soundtrack did receive a little bit of criticism. Two of our classmates told us that our soundtrack sounded slightly 'repetitive'. As a group, we agreed. We took the criticism on the chin and we decided that we were going to fix up the soundtrack by adding more sounds into the soundtrack using garageband. Our teacher suggested to us that when the distorted male appears, we should insert a high pitch violin sound or something similar to create a chilling atmosphere for the audience at the point. We have taken our teachers advice on board and we will try and find some samples to add to the soundtrack to create a more chilling atmosphere.

When it came to the editing, one of our classmates said that we made a 'good use of time and pace'. Others said that we had a 'really good match on action', we had really 'clean cuts', the opening sequence 'flowed' and it was also described as 'smooth'. Our teacher had also said to us that she really likes our use of transitions at certain points of the opening sequence, for example, where the scene cross dissolves from the distorted male in the confined room to the detective out in the common at the crime scene. As a group, we personally think that we couldn't have done any better with our editing and the time that we put into editing was worth it. Our peers and our teacher did not give us any negative feedback about the editing techniques used in our opening sequence.

One of our classmates described our titles as 'original' which we were very pleased about. Others said that the 'titles fit in perfectly with the movie', the 'titles were well thought out' and that the 'incorporation was good'. However, we did receive some criticism about our titles, which was purely based on the fact that they could not be seen properly due to the colour of them. We received the following criticisms about our titles: 'was not very clear', 'hard to read on the shots (change the colour)', 'harder to see titles at certain points'. These comments were clearly reasonable as when viewing our opening sequence on the big screen, we also found it hard to read the titles, due to the colour contrast between the text and the scenes in the background. Our teacher also told us that we shouldn't use the colour red as it is too cliche and it seems like the kind of colour used in the title sequence of a horror film rather than a thriller. Our teacher also suggested that we take out the titles where the word FRACTION appears with the letters jumbled up as it creates confusion for the audience and it just generally looks messy. As a group, we have agreed to change the colour of the titles from red, to a light grey colour to ensure that the audience can read them properly. However the titles in white were fine. We have also agreed to take up the titles whereby the word FRACTION appears with the letters jumbled up.

Overall, our teachers and our peers were very impressed by our opening sequence and the feedback that we had received was mainly positive. Our classmates went and told other students around the school about our opening sequence and more and more students came to us requesting to see it. Our media teacher said that she would expect us roughly to get around 53 marks out of 60 based on the rough edit, which is an A grade.

21/03/2011 Log (Police Incident)

 

In the process of filming our opening sequence, many citizens were intrigued in what we were doing and approached our scene. In fact, they thought that is was real and that there was actually a forensic team and detective investigating a murder. Many people were looking out the windows of their homes and people walking their dogs came over to see what was going on. It was so realistic that people started to call the police. An undercover police came over to our scenery and started questioning us, asking us 'what is going on here?' and asking us why he hasn't been informed about the case. We told him that what we were doing was for our AS media coursework and that none of this was real. He then told us that he thought it was a real situation and that people were calling the police headquarters reporting a murder. He told us that in future we should call the council and the police and get permission to do this before we begin filming on free land. One thing we didn't consider was how people would react when filming, and people did react as expected. However, we overcame this problem by filming our opening sequence in a more secluded part of tooting bec common.

16/03/11 Log (Images Of Filming)

Today, myself (Izak), Tanika and Kadeem finished decorating the small confined room in which we wanted to film in. We perfected the room by mounting large sheets of white paper up on the walls. when we had done this, Tanika and Kadeem then began to splash the fake blood which we made as a group ontop of the white paper. We decided to use bloody handprints on the walls to create a chilling and creepy atmosphere. After completely decorating the room, we then started filming the scenes where the distorted man is in the small confined room. The images above are of the team filming and acting.

The filming was done by both Tanika and Izak, and Kadeem played the character of the distorted male. The blood proved to be very effective when we were filming as it added to the insane appearance of the distorted male. Even though the colour of our blood wasnt completely accurate, the red lighting that we used in the room helped to elicit that dark red colour that we were yearning for. Overall, today has been an extremely busy and productive day.

11/03/11 Log (Overlapping Test Shot)

Today in media studies we decided to do some test shooting before we shot the real footage in order to determine if our ideas were possible to carry out. We thought that this would initially save us time when it came to editing; in case our ideas didn't work, we would be able to find a solution now rather then after we shoot the real footage.

The image overlapping that we had practiced today showed us that we could face some difficulty in making all three images appear in one shot. Izak filmed a few shots of Kadeem with his head tilted in three different directions. What we wanted to accomplish was a final shot of all three of these shots combined into one, with each layer having different opacities. We uploaded the shots that we had filmed up onto Final Cut Express and from there, we cut them to make each shot the same length. We then layered each shot on top each other and changed the opacity of each shot so that the shot of Kadeem sitting up straight was opaque, and the other shots with his head titled either side were slightly more transparent.

However, the shot of Kadeem sitting up straight isn't quite as opaque as we wanted it to be. It is slightly transparent. To overcome this problem as a group we decided that we would trial various different editing tools and see if the idea will be possible. If we are not able to overcome this overlapping problem then will will need to alter the way in which cinematography will portray the distorted male played by Kadeem Gordon.

07/03/11 Log (Production Props)

 

To reinforce the realism of our mise en scene we created an imitation of evidence markers that we have seen many times before in television shows such as 'C.S.I' and 'Criminal Minds'. By using these props we feel that it will make our mise en scene look extremely realistic and believe to our viewers.   

As we want our opening sequence of Fraction to look as authentic as possible, as a group we decided that we would use overalls as shown in the picture above for the actors who are playing the parts of the forensic investigators to wear while they are assessing the crime scene. By using this prop as a group we feel that it will make the opening sequence look more realistic and will also show a clear designation of roles between the cast and make it much easier for the audience to differentiate between the characters rather than having all of the detectives dressed similar.

 

The body bag is another prop that we would like to use in order for the opening sequence of Fraction to look as realistic as possible. The body bag will contain the female victims body in one scene, and the distorted males in the other scene. The body bag that we will be using in our opening sequence will be black rather than blue, because the colour black is an eerie colour which represents death. It fits the mood and the opening sequence a bit better because the scene will be shot at the scene of a murder.

Police tape is one of the most vital props that we will be using in our opening sequence. By using police tape alone, the audience are able to understand that the opening scene is being shot at a crime scene without the use of dialect. It will help to make the opening sequence look more legit and realistic. We will tie the police tape around the trees at tooting bec common. It will be surrounding the area in which the victim was murdered.

Another prop which we are going to need in order for us to film our opening sequence successfully is fake blood, which myself (Izak), Kadeem and Tanika will attempt to make with icing sugar, red colouring dye, cocoa powder, golden syrup and blue pen ink. We included the ink and syrup to make the blood look more dark and realistic. We used the blood for our antagonist (Kadeem) to make him look more sinister and evil as well as confused and insane. We used the majority of the blood to splatter on the walls to make the area look more grim and scary.

04/03/2011 Log (Print Screen Of Soundtrack Production)

Today, Izak is going to continue producing the soundtrack for the opening sequence of our thriller called Fraction. He decided to use the 'Thunder Roll's' for the build up of the soundtrack to create a tense atmosphere. Also, the soundtrack that I have created so far has a chilling and mysterious sound to it, which fits in with our opening sequence perfectly. However, when i asked my peers and my teachers for feedback, they said that the soundtrack sounded more like a paranormal soundtrack rather than a crime scene one. They suggested that I use more piano samples. I have not yet finished producing the soundtrack and so I will be using the time that I have in the lesson to perfect it. One problem I have with making the soundtrack sound more like a crime scene soundtrack is the fact that garageband has a limited resource of packages, and the piano samples that are available on garageband do not sound like something you would expect to hear in a thriller.

03/03/11 Log (Fraction Audience Feedback)

In the above clip is the 'audience feedback'. Tanika went around interviewing our fellow school friends asking them for their views and opinions about our idea for our thriller opening sequence 'Fraction'. The reason we did this was so that we could receive both positive and negative feedback, and take it on board so that we could improve in some not so good areas. The feedback overall was very positive and our school members really liked the idea of taking advantage of the fact that we have twins in our group and making two characters within our story the same character.

18/02/11 Log (Animated Storyboard)

In the above animated storyboard, our group tried as hard as possible to try and portray in detail how the opening sequence to fraction would look. We used a variation of shot types in order to make the sequence seem more dynamic and engaging for the audience. We used shots such as shallow focus, low and high angle shots, close and extreme close ups and point of view shots just to name a few. We also wanted to use shots that influence that actual camera that may not have come across clearly on the animated storyboard, such as tracking and panning. Izak Gordon creatively drew out all of the scenes and pieced together each shot in Final Cut Express to create the animated storyboard shown above. We decided to use to soundtrack from the film 'Dead Silence' which again, Izak added into the storyboard using Final Cut Express. Kadeem Gordon cleverly created the opening titles for the storyboard which Izak incorporated into the animated storyboard. Kadeem and Tanika Hibbert created the ideas for the storyboard.

Pros And Cons Of Our Locations

This is Tooting Bec Common. We have chosen this location as our scenery as we feel as a group that it creates a feeling of insecurity and reality. Because the location is outside and it well known, the audience are able to identify with the opening sequence which creates a suspense atmosphere and successfully makes the audience feel insecure about their surroundings. However there are limitations to the location that we have chosen. One limitation of our location is that the pavement and walkways are not completely smooth, and so when it comes to using a dolly, our filming may appear rough which will make our tracking look unprofessional. Together, we expressed many different ideas to try and overcome this limitation and we came to the conclusion that we would would try and find a thin sheet of wood or cardboard on which we will move our dolly on to try and make our tracking shot appear smoother. However, if we do choose this location to film our opening sequence, we will do it during mid day which will be easier as there will be less people walking around as most people will be at work, school, college, etc. This area will be ideal for us to use as there are loads of trees that we can tie our police tape too and there is concerete which we can draw on with chalk and rub off after we have finished outlining out victims body on the floor. There is also a local car park opposite the area of the common we have chosen which is also ideal as we wanted the detective to park up and walk to the crime scene.

 

The image above is a confined room within our school which we will be using in our opening sequence. This room will be the area in which the distorted man is in. The walls are yellow and the area is messy, however we will cover the yellow walls with white wallpaper and tidy up the room to give space for the camera and tripod. Being outside in an open space with the detective and switching to a very small confined space like this could be effective as it could go from a sense of reality to a feeling of restriction which could make the audience feel uneasy. On the walls will be blood splattered and dirt to resemble the character as the insane antagonist. The room is also very dimly lit which is is conventional for a thriller. We haven't tested out the room to see if it is big enough for me (the distorted man) to go crazy in. However, There is also a toilet in our school which is grimy and very dirty which we could use if we ask for permission from the caretakers.

18/02/11 Log (Target Audience)

18/02/11 Log (Audience Research)

View more presentations from therealswish.

Above is a presentation about our target audience. We considered the age, sex and gender and ethnicity of our audiences and came to a conclusion of what our target audience should be.

Narrative

View more presentations from therealswish.

Above is a presentation done by Tanika Hibbert which gives an overview of what our opening sequence is like and went into depth by describing the mis en scene.

18/02/11 Log (Final Logo)

Today, Izak accessed 'Abode Photoshop' and edited the logo for our production team. We changed the background of the logo to create a more suspenseful and chilling atmosphere as the colours are more dull. As a team, we felt as if the red/burgundy color stood out too much and wanted to create a bleak eerie feeling rather than a horror type atmosphere. We kept the sharp font of our production name but decided to mellow it down and make it seem more simple so we got rid of most of the effects we applied onto the font.

18/12/11 Log (Images Of The Cast)

                           The image above is a picture of Kadeem Gordon, one of the members of 'Tell'em Productions' who will be our 'distorted male' in our opening sequence of our thriller 'Fraction'. He is currently growing his hair for the opening sequence which will represent the character as a filthy and rough male.

Izak Gordon is another member of the team and will be playing the 'Detective' in the opening sequence. Izak and Kadeem are twins so we thought that we should take advantage of the fact that we had twins in the group and come up with the idea of the detective and the distorted male being the same person.

Tanika Hibbert is the final member in our production team who is in charge of the cinematography. Tanika also helped Kadeem think of the storyline and described the narrative of the opening scene in detail in presentations on the blog.

Editing Research (Overlapping)

In this music video titled 'Cant Be Friends', a specific editing technique called overlapping has been used throughout the music video to show that the artist; Trey Songz is not in the right frame of mind. I find the use of overlapping in this music video very inspirational and if our group could grasp the idea of overlapping and include it in our opening sequence for our thriller 'Fraction', then we could end up with a really admirable finished opening sequence.

I think that if we incorporate overlapping into the scene where the crazy man is sitting down in the room, that would really emphasize the idea that he is not right in the head. We want the audience to know that the crazy man in the room has a broken mind frame without the use of dialogue, and by using overlapping, we can successfully do so. We hope to do this by collecting different shots of the crazy mans face and overlapping them to show the opaque original face and a number of slightly transparent other faces in the background.

Treatment

In the opening sequence of our thriller titled 'Fraction', a forensic team and detectives are at a murder scene investigating the dead body of a middle aged woman found in a park. Initially, this will be a shot to show the production design, and we will use an establishing shot to do so. This creates a disequilibrium at the beginning of the film because we jump straight into a murder scene without any explanation or build up. The forensic team will be wearing white overalls which will cover the whole of their bodies, and the murder scene is surrounded by police tape or tape reading 'Do not cross'. There will also be a white outline of the victims body painted on the floor to help the forensic team piece together the investigation, which we will create by using white spray paint, duck tape or chalk. One of the detectives, who will be the main character of the story will then exit a car, which we will show by using a low angle shot to connote his superiority. We will then tilt the camera up slowly to reveal the detective identity. The detective will then walk towards the crime scene which we will shoot using an over the shoulder shot. High key natural lighting will be used to create a false sense of security for the audience.

The scene will then change to show a man who appears to be crazy sitting down in a room. Little does the audience know, the crazy man in the room is actually the detective. The detective is unaware of his alter self due to his split personality and memory impairment, making him both the protagonist and the antagonist. This makes the narration of the story restricted, as the audience have limited access to the storyline and know as much as the characters in the film do. However, his whole face will not been shown at this point, reason being because we don't want the audience to grasp the idea that the detective is the killer so early on in the opening sequence of the film. The production design will need to be as simple as possible. It will be a dirty, bleak, confined space to represent the alter ego of the detective who is sitting inside the room. The dangerous half of the detective will have blood around his mouth and hi hands, and will be wearing a white t shirt covered in blood, to add to his sinister appearance, which we will make ourselves. Artificial low key lighting will be used in this room to connote his dark personality.

The scene will then cut back to the crime scene showing a colleague lifting up the police tape for the detective. In this shot, we will use a point of view shot to make the audience feel involved in the story. Another detective who is standing inside of the restricted area surrounded by police tape will then hand the detective a case file, containing photos of the dead woman. At this point, we will use a eye line match to show the audience what the detective is looking at. The scene will then change again to show the crazy man in the confined room, hitting his head against the wall. However, this time we will see a photo on the floor of the dead girl found at the crime scene beside him. The photo will be slightly ripped and will be covered in blood. We will  use a close up to ensure that the audience can see that the photo is of the dead girl. Again, low key artificial lighting will be used.

The scene will then cut back to the detective back at the crime scene. The detective will be kneeling down over the dead body, which we will shoot using a low angle shot. This connotes he superiority over whoever is in the body bag. The detective will then begin to slowly unzip the body bag, which we will show by using a close up of the detectives hand on the zip. The top of the victims head will be revealed to show the hairline, and then the scene will cut back to the crazy man in the room again. We will use a mid shot to show the crazy man sitting in the room, but this time, we will use an editing technique called overlapping to amplify his distorted mind frame. We hope to do this by collecting many shots of the crazy mans face and overlapping them to make it look like there is more than one face in the single shot. We have decided to use a mid shot rather than a close up so that we are able to see the overlapping faces in the background. Using a close up would mean that the background would be restricted and there would be no space for the extra faces in the background.

The scene will then cut back to the detective at the crime scene. At this point, the detective will carry on unzipping the body bag. When the body bag is completely unzipped, the detective see's his alter self (the crazy man) inside of the body bag. The crazy half of the detective will have his eyes wide open looking straight up into the sky. His head will then tilt so that he is making eye contact with the detective. He will still have the blood on his t shirt and around his mouth at this point. This shot will be filmed with a point of view (POV) shot, to put the audience in the detectives shoes. The detective will then step back with a confused and frightened look on his face, which we will film using a close up. The detective doesn't know who this person inside the body bag is as he is unaware of his alter self, however, he can see that he looks virtually identical to him.

The detective will then look around to see if any of his colleagues saw the crazy man inside of the body bag. We will use an over the shoulder shot to show the detective looking around. However, no one was watching and when the detective looks back at the body bag, the body of the dead woman is inside it, which we will show yet again with a POV shot. We will then have a low angle shot of the detective standing above the body bag, which will then switch to a high angle of the dead woman in the body bag. The opening sequence will finish off with another low angle of the detective looking down at the body bag, however, we will be using overlapping again the combine the image of the detective and the image of the crazy man together in one shot.

17/02/11 Log (Titles for Animation)

Kadeem went on 'LiveType' and created some amazing titles that will be suitable for our animated storyboard. Tanika was absent to approve to our titles but Izak gave some positive feedback and told me that the titles have a real good thriller element. There will be our animated illustrations in the background so I will change the white text to a darker color. When it comes to creating the opening titles for the real opening sequence, we will make a few minor adjustments. We will change the position of the titles because if we place them in the middle of the shot, we will not be able to see certain things in the opening sequence. The titles will be in the way of the shots. Also we will change the colour red into the colour grey because the red text makes it look more like a horror than a thriller.

17/02/11 Log (Production Logo)

Today, Kadeem and Izak logged onto 'Adobe Photoshop' and worked on a logo for our production team. We went for a font which was bold and stood out and we wanted a bleak and eerie background to create a tense and chilling atmosphere within the logo. The logo is very basic but does appeal to the eye due to the red scratchy effect in the background. The colors also represent a thriller as they are 'cold', 'dark' and 'bloody' and the font is very sharp and strikes the eye of the audience. However, we may adjust the logo and make changes if we have time to make it look more certified.

We've also updated our treatment as we decided to change the title of our movie form 'Disambiguation' to 'Fraction'. We were not very sure if disambiguation was a word which appropriately suited our movie so we changed the the title to something more simple which relates to our film. Because the title is short and simple, it makes the audience question what the film may be about as the word 'fraction' could be used in different ways. During the process of changing our thriller title, Kadeem and Izak have also started to write out treatment of the opening scene of our thriller in heavy detail not only referring to the storyline, but also referring to the cinematography and camera shots, the editing techniques we will use and the mis en scene. Tanika finished writing the opening sequence shot list and in addition to that, Izak is expanding on the story and the shot types we are using within the opening sequence.


Izak also continued to draw out the story board and by tomorrow everything will be ready and sorted to film, animate and post onto our production blog.

Soundtrack Research for Storyboard

As a group we researched a range of different soundtracks of thrillers that we felt could fit in with our storyboard. We felt that the Saw soundtrack worked well with our titles and the pace of our storyboard. However we felt that as the soundtrack is so iconic it would not show our creativity as a group. We wanted to go for a soundtrack which creates suspense and this successfully creates suspense, however, this is a very common song and may be classified as a horror soundtrack more than a thriller.

This soundtrack was originally used in a horror film called 'Let Me In'. However, we decided as a group that this track conveys to a typical thriller soundtrack as creates a lot of suspense and tension within the audience. As the soundtrack comes to an end, it begins to loose its thriller meaning and jump into a different genre of music and as a group we were not entirely keen on this soundtrack.

We really did like this soundtrack from the film 'Dead Silence' and felt as if we could incorporate this soundtrack into our animation. Because is has an element of horror and thriller, we thought that using this soundtrack could be successful as it would build up more suspension within the audience when watching our animation. I feel that this soundtrack could go well with our story line as the first part of this soundtrack sounds like it could of been taken from a crime scene thriller (our thriller is a crime scene/psychological thriller) and when its half way through the soundtrack, the instruments become quite distorted and bleak creating a thriller effect. This will link into our thriller very well and we may consider using this.

As a group we also really liked this soundtrack from the film '28 weeks later' because it sounds calm and tranquil but also creates suspense. The instruments used within this soundtrack are expected within a thriller. It has an element of action to it but has a sense of thrill to it. Listening to this soundtrack created suspense without even watching the movie. As a group, we would need to consider whether using this soundtrack or using the soundtrack above would fit into our animated story board and create a sense of tension.

Daily Update

I Tanika Hibbert and Kadeem Gordon are currently in media studies working on a production logo and titles for our animated storyboard. We are using LiveType to create our titles and make them look as if they belong in the thriller genre as much as possible.