Once we had completed titles, we moved on to adding sound into our thriller and began our sound research. We were given a sample of music to listen to called ‘Panic music’ and we began to draw inspiration from this and think about the type of music that would fit with our thriller for example the tone but also sounds of the instruments. We did our first bit of research by making notes, as we listened, of any words that came to mind to do with the music, this is the process of synaesthesia, when the senses are stimulated by music and sound, and created a  soundscape wordle, displaying these words in collage form.

Here is the music we gained inspiration from:

And a copy of a wordle is below:

This task gave us some inspiration to begin looking at sound which is a vital part of the thriller which can have a great impact on the tone of the film and how it is conveyed to an audience, the music is what evokes the emotion from the audience and that is what ultimately makes it thrilling or scary. The keywords that appear most in this wordle seem to be chase, tension and panic, which gives us a starting point of what our music needs to convey.

To begin incorporating sound into our own thriller, we created a soundscape running order of all the sounds we thought we might need and a few details about them, for example, are the diegetic or nondiegetic, the moment in the film they are needed and whether we need to record them ourselves, in order to make sure we know where to source them from and if we actually need them.

A copy of the soundscape is linked below:

We were then lucky enough to have a short workshop from sound producer Nick Windsor, who provided us with sample sound effects that we could look at to use in our thriller and we were also provided some by our school.

Here are some of the sounds we need for our thriller and some options we’ve found that we could use:

• We need a camera sound effect, the sound of someone taking a photo which we can repeat throughout the sequence, here is one I found on YouTube of different types of  camera flashes which we could experiment with and see which we like the best : several camera flashes
• Here is a sound effect of a variety of different female screams which we can use for our ending shot, we would obviously have to edit this in audacity and see which scream sounds more authentic:
• squeaking swing – This is a possible sound effect that Ellie found that we could use for our swing squeaking in the wind however, it was recorded as a Foley sound and we will have to alter it on audacity to make it more realistic
• We also found this effect of a windy forest which w could use to add depth to our film as the setting throughout I a windy, eerie forest and this sound effect will help bring that to life:

   

• We need a sound effect of someone walking over ground to emphasize footsteps of Hannah, we found this one however may need to record our own Foley sound as we need the ground to sound more like crunching leaves:

   

  We will now begin to look further at recording our own sounds and also thinking about any music we might add in.

The next step to our final product was to add in our titles and once we had done this, we uploaded it to YouTube as our draft 2. Below is our second draft:

We were the  given audio feedback from some of our peers Nick and Kieran on our titles and whether they thought we could make any alterations. They commented on all aspects, the font style and colours, the length of each title and whether they thought the positioning worked. Their feedback was useful as it allowed us to evaluate our titles and again gain another perspective. From this, we went on to set targets for ourselves to improve our titles:

• The main movie title needs to be bigger and more prominent which we will achieve by enlarging it and moving it to the centre
• Some of our titles can’t clearly be seen against the lighter background therefore we need to change the font colour or move them to dark places on the screen
• Our titles need to last longer in general.

Here is our feedback:

For this task, we moved on to looking at fonts for our own thriller and we picked  a few that we thought would be appropriate and fit with the themes of our piece, but also with what we wanted to convey. We wanted our titles to look quite simple and professional, however still convey the uneasy, tense theme throughout our thriller. We looked for fonts from several sources including dafont.com, documents provided to us over google docs and some of the  after effects which is where we would actually create our titles but fonts could be imported.

Below are some of the fonts that we were considering for our thriller, however we ultimately decided that the last one was the most appropriate as the first two were a bit too over the top and didn’t give us the refined professional look we wanted, which we feel the last one does, and we decided it creates a more tense atmosphere as everything is very simple and clean-cut as if it has been produced professionally or by the stalker (antagonist) herself in a way as the font looks official, like a documentation and upon actually creating the titles, we decide to give a capital letter to the start of every word and make the actual name bigger than the rest of the title, emphasising the importance of the people.

We used after effects to achieve this font and create the titles, the font and animations we chose reflect our theme. The font we chose was Nirmala UI in after effects, this was a simple, bold font which was what we were looking for, we also made it white so that it would stand out against our dull background colours, showing significance. Following on from our titles research, we put our titles in the same order, that you can see below starting from the bottom, as the professional productions did, starting with the production company and working our way through.

For our animations, we decided to use random shuffle in, to animate our titles in, which means that the letters appear slightly delayed on the screen in a random order, adding to the enigma and confusion on the situation where the vulnerable character doesn’t know who’s following her, the delay of this animation links with that. Then for the animate out, we used fade out by character, in which the letters fade from the screen one by one, which again, adds an atmosphere of tension with the delayed fade of the letters but also contrasts well with our animate in which is a lot more fast paced and then the letters slowly fade away.

The next step for our thriller was to add titles, but first we had to research into the construction of titles in a film. We were given a sequence to watch from artofthetitle.com, Ellie and I chose to look at the opening credits of The thing. We were looking at the positions and placement of the titles but also the physical style of the titles such as the font and design, whether they followed a specific theme. We also analysed the transitions and any other animations or effects out in place.

The titles of ‘the thing’ are unusual in that the transitions and animations in are different for each title however, the titles reflect slightly the themes of the film as they are animated so it looks as if all letters are latched onto each other, which hints to the film which is about deadly bacteria that infects people in the north pole. We created a timeline of the title sequence noting down things we need to know such as the order of titles and details about the style of the titles.

We also wanted to do a bit more research into the titles and the order that they appear in so I watched another sequence, The Conjuring, to get a second reference to see if the titles were in the same order but also to look briefly at the typeface. The titles within the conjuring were rather simple in typeface and transitions however, they give the film a very serious feeling as the letters were large, bold and white, reflecting the font used within the images of newspaper headlines, representing the true elements of the story and showing how hysteria was created, the simple font contrasting well with the chilling images; My analysis of this is linked below.

Ellie also did an analysis document of the opening of Deadpool which is linked below:

From this research, we then compiled a list of a production team for our film and allocated names to each job in the order that we saw appropriate after researching other films:

Above is our draft one of our thriller. After adding effects and transitions, we uploaded our first draft up to YouTube. Some of our peers from other production groups gave us  feedback in the comments, giving us positive comments and constructive criticism on what they thought we could improve.

Here are some of the comments we received:

We used this feedback to then come up with a list of targets, things that we need to add in or change in our thriller to improve it. This form of feedback was very useful as we got another person’s point of view on what worked and what didn’t and we can now take the feedback and work on improving it. Our list of targets is below.

In order to edit our thriller, we used the professional editing programme, Adobe Premiere Pro. After uploading all of our footage to premiere, we began to refine it from all of the clips we used to complete the narrative outline, working towards our  final product. We’ve started to play around with some of the tools available such as colour correction to see if we can improve the quality of colour in some of our shots and reduce the brightness. We have also been thinking about adding in transitions to make our shots run smoothly together.

As we filmed on two different days, the lighting was extremely different on both days, one being very sunny, therefore, we experimented with the colour correction tools to see if we could dull the brightness of the colours in some clips, as colour correction is able to change the tonal range within the clips and here we were aiming for more of a cool tone. Our thriller is set in a dark  forest therefore we used the colour dial and turned it to the cooler toned colours such as greens and blues. We additionally attempted to dull some of this sunlight by editing the Hue and Saturation.

We’ve also learned to use tools to specifically edit the duration and position of our clips, such as set in point and set out point, to set where are footage will begin and select where it will end. Other applications being the snip and razor tools to cut out sections of footage and to cut a shot in half in order to add transitions or just edit it separately.

Exactly the same as the first time round, we had to create a shot list for our filming day 2, including any shot we had missed out on the first day or that we wanted to re shoot for any reason. We included the same detail as last time, the framing and the action in each shot, to help ourselves as much as we can, to guarantee another successful filming day. We had to double check that we had noted down everything that we needed as this would be our last opportunity to film on location.

Below is our shotlist for shoot day 2:

After our successful filming day, and once we’d managed to upload all of our footage from the camera to the computer, using the guidance of our storyboard, we put the shots together in the correct order, creating a narrative rough cute, without editing, just to make sure we had all the correct shots in order to make sense of our narrative.

We were then able to see if there were any shots missing or that were not up to standard, that we needed to re-film. This then enabled us to be able to write up a new shot list for a second filming day.

Here is our rough cut uploaded to youtube:

On the first filming day, we gathered our group at Mrs Cobb’s house and then went up to Perelle forest to film. We filmed the majority of our shots on the paths and lanes in and around the forest, for example, our running/chase shots and the others within the forest. Filming in the forest was the perfect location for our thriller however, it was extremely windy and cold on the day, which made things a little more difficult. However, the actual filming went as planned and we seemed to gather the majority of shots we had planned in our shot list. Ellie and I filmed here in the morning and then in the afternoon, we acted in Caitlin and Hannah’s thriller, filmed at Mrs Cobb’s house.

High points of the day:

• We manged to capture and repeat each shot within good time, leaving us a bit of time after to check them
• Ellie and I worked well together and equally shared the filming responsibilities
• We were able to successfully test out more difficult camera skills such as a swoop which extended our skills
• Our actors cooperated and were willing to do what we asked

Low points of the day:

• The weather was extremely cold and windy therefore at some points we felt rushed and pressure to film quickly so that we could go back inside.
• We were not particularly experienced with a DSLR therefore, when we looked back at the footage some shots were a bit out of focus
• Our camera battery ran out near the end, luckily someone was on hand with another one
• The ground being rough terrain made it quite difficult to get the camera in position for the correct framing

Targets for future filming:

• Allow for more cropping time in editing when filming by leaving a gap before the action begins and maybe after as well
• Also, although we managed to repeat shots that didn’t go well, make sure you repeat all shots, more than twice so that you have options when it comes to editing
• Allocate more time to difficult shots and less to the establishing shots.

I really like this low angle shot of Hannah as, when put in our high pace cross cutting sequence of shots , it looks extremely effective ad creates the desired effect of Hannah being watched and preyed on by something. Although low angles are typically used to display the superiority of the person in frame, I believe this shot demonstrates her isolation.

Also really happy with this close up shot of Hannah taking her phone out of her pocket. We weren’t really sure what we wanted from this shot, we just wanted to establish the phone as a distraction however, it ended up being really effective, with the background being out of focus and as she walks into shot, the camera focusing directly on her on the phone. I also like how this shot is from the side, to get a different perspective to her other walking shots.

I really like this pan of Hannah running through the trees. You can’t clearly see her as she’s behind the trees and the sun is flaring, however, I believe that is what makes it so effective, as you see a blur of bright red passing through the trees, to create the essence of her running frantically to escape her follower.

A risk assessment is vital to complete before we go out to film our thriller so we are aware of any danger or problems that could occur. Seeing as our filming location is a forest, there are several risks that we should be aware of. We’ve identified as many risks that we can think of and in our risk assessment, for each one, thought of and noted down a way we could avoid each risk.

One of our main risks being identified as tripping due to the uneven grounds of the forest path and the rough terrain, this could easily harm us or on of our actors when filming a running shot. For this one we came to realise that there’s not much that can be done about this but to prevent the risk as much as possible, we decided that we would check the ground for anything particularly dangerous and remove it where possible. This takes enabled us to be aware of the dangers when filming on location and try to reduce any harm that could be caused.