Question 3

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

I have learnt so much from various technologies throughout the process of constructing my opening sequence. I believe that it has helped to developed my skills, to the point where I feel as if I have the necessary understanding and experience to do a similar project with high levels of confidence.

Question 2

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

My thriller uses representation for most characters in different ways, firstly character outfits where essential in helping me to portray each individual character. I chose to use outfits which would be considered normal as I did not want the characters to stand out; also I wanted to show them as being ordinary people. The acting was also key in helping me to represent each character, for the main character (jack Renshaw) I tried to make him come across as mysterious, aloof and withdrawn from society this was shown by him being very separated from everyone else around him. Sean Gordon the character seen delivering the gun is shown to be represented as a someone who commits criminal and illegal activity this is clear from his behaviour during the exchange he is very careful to keep himself hidden by having his hood fully covering his face and not staying longer than necessary, the gun is also a massive indication that he is a criminal.   

Question 1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

During the production of my thriller I tried to replicate the themes and conventions used in the opening scenes I watched for research, I tried to make it obvious from the start that my film was a thriller by opening with a high intensity scene with one of the characters being shot, this straight away tells the viewer what the nature of the film is going to be like and also raises many questions such as; who were they? Why was he shot? What did he do? These are the sorts of questions that the viewers will be thinking while watching my thriller and this will make them want to continue watching to find out the answers. A few of the conventions of thrillers I found difficult to include or was unable to use this is due many reasons for example I was unable to use plot twist as I was only making a opening scene not an entire movie and you would rarely ever see a plot twist within the opening scene of a film, other conventions I was challenged by was sound, sound is a key part in creating and building tension in a thriller and if done properly can be very effective, this was difficult as all music and sound had to be non-copyrighted and free so I had to search through the vast selection of music and sound to find the ones that matched the thriller genre and was of high quality.

Final Edit

First Draft

First Draft

This was the first draft for my thriller, I uploaded it to you tube and then Asked members of my class for their initial thoughts on my opening. once they had time to think about what they thought i then asked for feedback, this was so that if there was anything that could be improved i would be able to go back and redo it. they also gave positive feedback and highlight what i did well, this was helpful as i could try and use the positives to improve on the negatives.

Potential Improvements

• Re-film certain scenes with a camera stand
• change the text used for "a Richard turner film" as it does not match the theme.
• trim down video between 1:05 to 1:45 as there is a lot of unnecessary scenes that take up a lot of the video.
• Aim to get the opening closer to the two minute mark.

Shot types

when filming I set out to try and challenge my photography and filming skills, i did this by this by trying to include as many different shot types as possible.This was to see if i was able to capture these shots and it would also give me a better understanding of how they are used. this would also give much a much greater range of shot types enabling me to select the best to use in my production. 

This is an over the shoulder shot. This is when a shot is taken from behind the shoulder and is used to show you the perspective of the character. It is also frequently used in shot reverse shot as it helps to establish who is talking and who they are talking to.

This is an establishing shot. used to show the location were the following scene is going to take place.

This is a POV shot. POV stands for point of view and is used to show exactly what the character see. once a POV shot is shown it will often show the character after to show it was the perspective.

This is an extreme close up, this has been used to show an object of high importance and is supposed to make the viewer focus on it.

risk assessment

Risk Assessment 

there were not many risks to consider during the construction of my media opening sequence. although the few risk the were present i had to take into consideration and try to prevent and reduce them.

risk	Description	prevention
Weather	Equipment becoming damaged through rain or other weather.	There a number of ways of reducing this risk first being to plan around the weather and select specific days to go out and film. Also if I was had to film on a day was there was going to be poor weather I would cover the camera so that it does not get damaged.
BB gun	A prop that was needed For the production of my film was a BB gun. These are very dangerous and can be very painful when fired.	On the BB gun there is a safety switch witch when put on will block the gun from firing this means that you will be unable to accidentally fire causing an injury or damaging any of the equipment.
Roads	The filming was based outside and require a lot of travelling by foot and so it was important that we were cautious near main roads.	While this may be a very obvious risk it still needs to be considered, firstly make sure that you cross at lights and zebra crossing when they are available. And we also made sure that we were careful when near roads .