Evaluation Question 1

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

We answered our question in video form.

Audience feedback on thriller

So once the thriller was screened to an audience, we had to get their feedback on what they thought about the story, editing and he general feeling to the opening.

Firstly they said that our opening was very suspenseful. This is great feedback as our main aim was to successfully create a feeling of suspense. This is because one of the main conventions of a thriller is this feeling so therefore the opening is on its way to being a successful thriller. Also if the audience think the opening is suspenseful, then this means that we have correctly used the conventions that we needed to.

Secondly the audience commented that the cliff-hanger at the end was very good and exciting. They wanted to watch more as they have a general idea of what could happen and they thought hat it would be really fun to watch. This therefore tell me that the opening of this thriller was successful because if the opening creates this sense of mystery to come then it will make the audience more inclined and excited to watch.

Thirdly, they said the opening was intriguing. This is because the audience somewhat understood what was going on; therefore they are intrigued to find out more and understand the death of these girls. This also means there is a sense of mystery and suspense. Furthermore they thought it was intriguing as the storyline was not boring and the editing was not sloppy which helped them to concentrate more on what was happening.

However some negative feedback was the acting. This is not something that can't be changed or helped as this is a skill that can only be possessed by some people. But the acting still ruined the opening as the audience thought it was funny. For example when Lucy falls on the floor, the audience laughed when it was supposed to be dramatic. Also there was laughter when Chloe was running as people thought she runs funny.

Other negative feedback was when Chloe runs off (when she realises Lucy is missing, calls her name then runs off), we can hear a slight noise of someone sniffling, this was either me, Sarah or Kelvin and this was because the weather was cold. The audience said that this ruins the scene as its not professional and it "breaks the realism". When filming in the future we all should try to stay as quiet as possible so this mistake won't repeat itself.

Screening

As our thriller is completed, we now need to screen it to an audience and find out what they think. Firstly, our thriller was posted onto YouTube and then shared onto Facebook. This way our thriller is open to the public so if they do give feedback, they wont be bias and also have a fresh ideas on what it is about. As its on Facebook, friends and family may watch it and also give feedback. Furthermore we will be showing it on a monitor and gather some people. This way we have some guaranteed feedback on what they think of the story, editing and the general feeling.

The reason why we need to screen our thriller is because we need feedback to know if we done a good job but also if we need any improvements. This critical feedback is essential and our projects cant become better and higher marks if we don't recognise and explain our mistakes. Therefore making other people watch our work means they will just see the finished product without feeling passionate like we do. This means they will be honest.

Here are some pictures of the screening

Completed Thriller

Here is our finished thriller. This includes the ident, titles sequence and the actual opening.

Editing 2

This post is about towards the end of when we was editing our thriller. We started by putting the titles, ident and the candidate introduction in. From there we started to edit the titles and footage around it so all of the beginning run smoothly. After this i done a few tweaks to make sure that the two halts of editing (first few minutes and the last few) fit together; this is because we edited all the footage in chunks (first half then second half) so we must make sure they go together well. When this was done there only needed to be a few more tweaks like fixing up the last couple seconds so it was as perfect as it could be and then we was finished.

Below is a screenshot of the finished thriller. You may notice that one section towards the beginning is not rendered and the media is offline. The only reason for this is because i took this screenshot on a different computer to which i originally saved that one piece of footage. Therefore the media is offline on the current computer i used. There is no technical issues. 

Editing 1

The first time we started to edit, we successfully created our rough cut and then started to add transitions, effects and other sounds. This was the start of our thriller that was slowly coming together.

So to start of with the rough cut, i collected all of the footage and imported it in. Then scenes that were not good enough (first takes) were deleted so they were not confused with the good footage. Once all footage was imported i individually cut them down so they didn't have any dialect that was not needed and so scenes were correct. All clips were then put together with no effects and transitions so we just had a simple running sequence that was our rough cut. This was exported and put onto our blogs.

After the rough cut was finished i started to add transitions, effects, music and messed around with the order of some clips so it was ready for the titles. This was the starting point of the actual thriller as in this one editing session, the final half of the thriller was complete and just needed a few tweaks later on. The first half of the footage was split up so the titles could be slot in-between later on and so the story could fit together better to make a little more sense. We done this but repeating some clips, reversing some and moving them to other placed.

below is a picture of me editing

Filming 2

After filming in The Chase we moved onto filming at our second location which was at Shelby's house. We was able to film successfully as we was inside so weather was not an issue and lighting could easily be manipulated. However some issues with filming inside is tight spaces, therefore we had to move the tripod to a suitable place were it could fit.

A problem we had to overcome was background noise, as there were other people in the house at the time they occasionally made noise which could be picked up by the sound mic.  At first we told them to keep quiet but they didn't. So we needed to find a solution and we ended up unplugging the sound mic and using the cameras built in mic. As the built in mic is not as good, it was only able to pick up noise in the room we was filming in and not any other noise.

Firstly, we filming Chloe walking into her house so the audience knew what the new location is. Next we filmed her walking in the hallway to her bedroom door. She walks through the door and we see her on the other side were she turns the light on to find her friend dead on the floor. we then filmed the stalker coming from behind her and stabbing her. The very last shot we filmed was of a picture and the girls faces being crossed off with their own blood.

her is a picture of us filming -

and here is a picture of what the scene looked like -