Planning: Character Representation- Miss Gibbins

Character representation is very important within films simply because it allows the audience to understand the narrative of the film better. Also relationships between the audience and the characters can be built.

For a film to be conventional and effective It's important for it to have a variety of representations and characters so that it meets the audiences expectations of the characters personalities that should be within the film.

Main Characters within my thriller:

• Amy- young girl 9 years old
• Sarah (Amy's Mother) 35 years old
• Frank (Amy's Father) 37 years old
• Shadows- mysterious character(s)

Roles within film, Facial expressions, Body language, Costumes and Impact on the audience:

Amy is a 9 year old girl who lives with her mother and father. She enjoys spending time with them and they have a fulfilled and happy life together. One day Amy starts to see shadows moving around her house which is the start of the main story line. Her role in the thriller is to be the most innocent of all the characters, she will become emotionally attached to the audience. This in turn will create suspense and tension among the audience as they will start to feel care for her safety. For the character representation for this character we have decided that she will wear casual everyday female clothes such as a skirt with leggings and a top. Also by doing this the audience will think of her innocence and may feel sympathy for the character which will create a relationship between the character and the audience. During the thriller, the audience will see Amy at her very lowest, while she tries to understand the moving figures around her formerly safe home. Her body language will make her seem fairly innocent and open, until she is confronted by these shadow characters.

Sarah is Amy's mum and is 35 years old, she is loving, intelligent, caring and beautiful. Her role in the thriller is to be the one who looks after Amy the most, she is more like a comforter for Amy and her father, however as the audience will become emotionally attached to Amy due to her innocence Sarah will act as a comforter for the audience, to tell them that everything will be fine when infact it won't be. For the character representation for this character she will be seen wearing formal clothes a lot of the time to show she works a lot. Her body language will be able to tell the audience that she acts as a comforter for the family and the audience, however they will soon understand that she isn't as strong as she makes out to be. Her facial expressions will change dramatically through out the thriller as one point we see Sarah comforting her daughter and husband

Frank is Amy's father he is a business man who is busy but still finds time to be with his family. His role in the thriller will be the 'hench man' and the inquisitive character, this is becaus ehe is the character who tries his best to protect the rest of his family using brute strength. Throughout the thriller we will also see Frank venture off into his own home to find the intruders. he is the man t For the character representation for this character, we will see him wearing a suit to show he works, he will have a clean shave and a classy hair cu to show he is a business man. Frank will try to flout his strong and inquisitive nature around in order to show his authority within the film. The facial expressions will show that Frank is not vain but does admire himself to be a man that has done well for himself.


The Shadows are the mysterious characters in this film, they are presented to the audience as the intruders of the household and they add and build suspense and tension among the audience as their faces are completely white. They won't have body language/ facial expressions but their presence will be felt.

Conclusion:

 Due to me analyzing the characters within our thriller film has helped me understand each characters purpose and it has made me think more about the background for each character. From looking at the description of each character my group know how each character should look, act and how they will be seen by the audience. The character representation helps the audience relate and understand the film easier.For my group to help them do this we must think about each character thoroughly.

Post- Production: Audience Feedback: Miss Begum

What is audience feedback?:

Audience feedback is where we had to ask the people who watched our production what they thought of it and did they find it conventional to the thriller genre. Doing this is very important due to the fact that my group as a production company are able to see if our production was in fact successful or not, furthermore, it is used to see if we could make money from distributing the film. If the feedback we get back is negative then we are able to rethink where we went wrong and develop our abilities to improve our thriller production.

Before creating our thriller film we had to run a questionnaire in order to gather some research on the likes and dislikes of our target audience. We created a questionnaire in order to help my group with the creation of our thriller film. The questionnaire helped us do this as we were able to make the film relate to the public’s responses. Furthermore, the questionnaire helped us to make our thriller film conventional to the thriller genre as we are able to use the questionnaire as a base line to create our thriller around; for example: the theme chosen was psychological; due to this we have based our thriller film around the theme of psychological trauma. When looking at the response from the questionnaire, it was clear to my group, that our target audience was 15-20 year old people of a mixed genre who all wish to see a thriller film containing suspense, tension and surprise. This information was essential to our group as we then knew who our target audience is and what they wanted to see within our thriller film.

After taking the audience feedback on board and creating our thriller film, we then decided to screen our finished thriller production. This was done so that the audience can see how there feedback has helped our group; but most importantly, we would be able to ask them for more feedback once they had seen our thriller production, this feedback would help my group to see if our thriller film was successful and conventional to the thriller genre. Screening the production and getting feedback on it was beneficial to my group as we were able to get a good  understanding 

(images from my production to go here)

POSITIVE COMMENTS:

Tom aged 18 said “the setting was really good as a house setting makes the film more conventional to the thriller genre".

This comment was beneficial because it showed that my group and I had successfully picked a conventional location that the audience could immediately respond to, which is something we were hoping to achieve.

Jim aged 20 said "The transitions between each clip worked effectively as it helped me to understand the narrative easily".

This comment was also beneficial because it made my group feel as though we had made a successful thriller due to us utilizing the research we had gathered from analyzing other successful and conventional thriller films.

Jane aged 16 said "The thriller film was great because i felt a heightened sense of suspense and tension throughout".

This comment was beneficial because it told my group that our overall production along with the sound track worked well and we were able to effectively create a thriller film that worked well with our created soundtrack.

CONSTRUCTIVE COMMENTS:

Lilly aged 18 said “at least two of the transitions were either too long or too short”.

This was a good comment to reflect on as I was aware that maybe two or more transitions needed a little bit more work, this has helped me as now i know i need to check over my finished production more than once.

Jane aged 15 said "at times it was too predictable on what would happen next"

This was also a good comment as my group now know that if we are to create another film then we need to work on our element of surprise as we now know that we need to work outside the 'norm'.

Mark aged 20 said "some of the sound effects didn't match the film"

This comment was good because it told our group that we needed to think about where we placed the sound effects and if we could have made the soundtrack work better in coherence with the actual film.

Looking at the feedback we had received, it was clear that my group did follow our brief and results that we had gathered from our questionnaire that was carried out before the creating of our thriller film. Now that we have all this feedback, my group now feel as though we have been able to create a conventional and successful thriller film.

Conclusion:

Conclusively, the audience feedback that we had gathered  was beneficial to my group even if we had already created our final product. This is because, our group are able to see if we were able to make a conventional and successful thriller film. Furthermore, the feedback received tells our target audience that we took their questionnaire answers into consideration and tried to implement their thoughts and ideas into our film creation. The last thing that the audience feedback helps us with, is that it tells our production company if we could make money from distributing our film or not. This is good as my group would know if we should add more to the film or edit it in anyway.

Post-production: Soundtrack of the thriller production: Miss Begum

Sound is one of those most important elements within the creation of films. This is because it sets the whole mood and atmosphere of the film. It is very important to plan out the sounds we will use simply because the sounds cause the audience to either be connected to the film or be vigilante in knowing that what their watching is a film with actors. For example if the audience see a gun being fired but hear an alien zapper sound they will become disconnected from the film, realising that it is make- believe where as if they hear a gunshot they will develop a relationship between the characters thinking the situation is a real one.

In order to know what the conventional soundtrack is within a thriller film, we also have to think about what that thriller may be; for example, it could be a thriller opening, a trailer or an actual film. This is why I would need to describe all the different sounds that could be used within a thriller film to make it conventional. Firstly, there are Non-diegetic sounds such as voice-overs. These can be used to explain an event within the scene that wasn't shown to the audience. This is used to give the audience a better understanding of what happened/ what is happening within the scene. Also it helps to create a suspense filled feeling as the audience are then able to determine what will happen next in the scene e.g. someone is going to die etc.

Secondly, there are Diegetic sounds such as the sounds from the TV or a radio which allows the audience to understand what is going on in the scene clearer; this is because the audience are subject to realistic sounds which makes the scene intriguing for the audience to watch.

Finally, there are off-screen sounds such as footsteps which are used to build suspense and tension e.g. creaking floor boards or a window smashing etc. All of the different types of conventional sounds used within a thriller film make it conventional to the thriller genre whether they are placed in the same film or they are used throughout.

In order to create the soundtrack to our thriller, my group used the programme entitled ‘Garage Band’; this program was used due to its wide selection of instruments that it allowed us to use and dissect sounds from. The program was simple to use which was why it allowed us to create a successful and conventional soundtrack that merged perfectly with our thriller film.

 

(image of where sound was used effectively within my own thriller to go here)

 

 

 

 

 

 

The soundtrack we created was somewhat eerie for the audience to listen to, this was done by using garage band in order to find other spectral-like sounds that could be merged together in order to have a desired impact and effect on the audience. The reason why we decided to create a thriller that had an unearthly feel to it was because we was inspired by the soundtrack used within the film ‘Sinister’, within this, the soundtrack makes the audience feel a heightened sense of suspense and tension throughout the film. Furthermore, because my group felt that the soundtrack used in ‘Sinister’ we decided to imitate and utilize some of the sounds they used within the film. My group’s soundtrack sounds as though a super natural being has been recorded during a haunting as the audience hear a low murmuring sound throughout until the film reaches certain climaxes where the sounds heard burst into a fleet of screams and sharp noises. This was done because we thought that the low murmuring sound would help to build tension and suspense while the sharp and louder noises would help to add surprise and shock among the audience.

My group thought that the most effective thing with my thriller was its ability to make the audience feel surprise/shock, suspense or tension at any given time within our thriller. This was due to the way we created our thriller; firstly we used a low murmuring sound throughout until the film reaches certain climaxes where the sounds burst into a fleet of screams and sharp noises. This was done because we knew that the low murmuring sound would help to build tension and suspense while the sharp and louder noises would help to add surprise and shock among the audience. This was the most effective thing about our soundtrack.

Conclusion:

Conclusively, the soundtrack that my group created has helped our overall production to create a suspense/tension filled atmosphere that surprises and shocks the audience at many times. Without our soundtrack, our film by itself would not have the same desired impact/effect on the audience. The impact our soundtrack has had on the audience is that they feel as though they have watched a successful and conventional thriller film, our overall production, along with the audience has been able to create a heightened feeling of suspense and tension among the audience. Lastly, I believe that my group’s thriller film was conventional to the thriller genre due to us following our target audience’s feedback on what type of thriller films they like to watch and feel the most affected by. Furthermore, we have merged the soundtrack with the film in a way that lets them both work in coherence with one another in order to inflict our desired impact on the audience, in turn making our thriller film conventional to the thriller genre.