Preliminary Evaluation Task

Jacob Harrey 

My groups Thriller Preliminary video challenges form of typical Thrillers in many ways. We decided that we were going to have the last shot showing my character (man in white shirt) to open the mysterious package that was given to him from Barney’s character who is shown to be the antagonist figure in this clip. This is different from stereotypical thrillers because they would never show what was inside the package, and drag out the scene for a long period of time. We also decided to have lots of speech in our Thriller piece, instead of it being minimal. I think this adds effect to the clip because it gives more detail to the two characters used. This also keeps the eeriness and tension going due to the low bass sound added in during the editing phase.

However, in more ways, we used many common Thriller features in our final prelim piece. A black suit is worn by Barney, the black showing connotations of evilness and death, fitting in well with his antagonistic character. My character is wearing a white shirt that is scruffy and not very well ironed. This shows the viewer that my character is meant to be run down and possibly stressed about the meeting with Barney. The white on the shirt shows connotations of purity. The location used is also a good factor that relates to the genre. Plain walls are shown in the scenes, making it so that the audience focuses on the characters and not as much their surroundings. We also waited until dark to shoot the scene. The use of this was to make the video seem more gritty and dark when the plot thickens.

Moving on, before we started the Preliminary task, the four of us created a 15 image story board to aid us in our filming process. We had images of exactly what we were going to do and what the scene was going to look like. Alongside the pictures, text was there to give us more detailed information on what Barney and I would be saying during the recording of this task. We also created a script, to develop the complete text so it would be easy to remember words clearly when filming.

We decided that we were going to make the film have large outlines and shadows. For this we brought a bright studio light and shone it at the front of the set. This created lovely shadows as we can see on the picture to your right. The shadows also made this shot in particular very eerie and dramatic, which is common to the Thriller genre. As well as adding shadows to the scenes, we decided in the editing room that we could make the video even more dramatic and effective by making it black and white. This made the use of shadows stand out even more significantly. However, it does make the character I play as seem less pure and more evil.

One of my favourite parts from the film we created was the use of camera angles. Tilted angles and over the shoulder shots were used for great effect, giving a disorientated feeling for the people watching. Another reason why I like this is because not all shots are exactly the same, using the 30 degree rule to make sure that the audience were not looking at the exact same shot every few seconds. We also broke the 180 degree rule slightly, that states you should stick to one certain side of the set, not letting the characters swap sides. We broke this in a way because the over the shoulder shot from Barney’s side is shot from the left hand side, making it go a little over the 180 degree line. However, this does not stand out massively in the final outcome.

 In my opinion, the best camera angle and shot we used is when Barney’s character in the black suit, placing his briefcase on the table. An over the head shot/ airborne that gets the whole of the briefcase perfectly in frame. The effect of this shot is that it makes the object more mysterious and intriguing, tormenting the viewers because they badly want to know what the character has brought inside the case.  However, I think that the worst shot we kept in the film is the shot where Barney slams his briefcase closed. I think that it could have been a great shot but it looks staged and makes me cringe slightly!  I think that if we could improve this task again I would fix the sound problem that we have in our final film. This is because it makes it seem less professional and it would be nice to have a piece of work that was completely perfect.

The editing of this video was very important to us, because we believe that good editing can change the overall quality of the film, even if that films initial shooting is not very good. Obviously the major change that we did in the editing room was the use of a black and white filter, but other important things were done in our prelim editing process. Cutting shots was very important as it made the video flow easier and quicker than before. Bridge cuts were used for example, making the whole task look far more professional and let it flow faster that it normally would. We also decided that we were going to make a black box outside our video, giving it a more old style look that is common in many Thriller films. I have learnt lots about technologies during this process, such as how to use the program Premiere Pro. I also learnt that editing is one of the most important parts of making a film, and it affects a large part of the final outcome.

Our video has two characters as stated before. The antagonistic character played by Barney is meant to be seen as the more masculine of the two, with his full suit that makes him look far more superior to my character.  He is also the person controlling the conversation, and that is often shown in famous Thriller films such as Bruce Wayne in ‘The Dark knight’. Moving on, the character I play as is skinny and smaller looking compared to Barney. This makes the character seem more fragile and easily scared. Both characters are meant to be shown as a similar age, and this yet again shows us that one is stronger looking than the other.