What inspires you most now?

At the moment, what inspires me most is Action, Political & spy thrillers. This can be seen in revelant work from watching films like Collateral in Class. However, outside of calls i have been watching thrillers such as Duplicity, Kill Bill II & The Sentinel. I one I like the most is Duplicity because not only is it funny and different, it incorparates the espionage part of thrillers; So that's what inspres me the most at the moment!

Skills audit: Filming and editing preliminary match cut exercise

For our Skills audit; filming and editing we asked to create a preliminary match cut. In ours, we had Julekha and Forida as actresses whilst I directed and Michael filmed. We wanted to practise using different shot types, so we used a variety of shot types to portray different things. For example we used SRS when the two were exchanging dialogue, and took advantage of this, so we could see the person’s expressions clearly. When Julekha walked through the corridor we were careful not to break the 180 degree shot rule, as we shot from two different angles. This was hard as it was difficult to know if you had broken it, but fortunately we didn’t. We used several match cuts within the clip, for example, when Julekha is walking down the corridor and she gets the door, it match cuts to her opening the door from inside the room. This was also a POV shot from Forida. We used a over the shoulder shot, to convey that Julekha has power within the two as the is looking down at Forida, from Forida’s face we can also see this. We experimented with tilts and close up’s within our clip, to see the effect. Also, we use two shots, to capture the two within the frame, this is when Julekha gets up to leave. In order to see Forida’s reaction to the ‘news’ we changed the shot and storyboard slightly so that we could hear and see the reaction better, this was expressed at the end we then used a MS and zoom which we timed perfected to when Forida looks up. We then went to edit the raw footage on Final Cut Pro. We used the in and out points mostly which helped us, piece together our shots better, rather than using the razor tool all the time. This saved time when editing, we used most of the skills that we had learnt and applied them to the editing. However when we edited, we found that the lighting within the room, made the clip look inconstant, and some of the action that Forida did, didn’t always match the shot of her after. This was an extremely useful exercise as it allowed to us explore different shot types and to use dialogue, to see the effect.


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Final Edit of Livetype and Sound Filming Practise

For our Final Edit of Livetype and Sound Filming Practise, we had to recreate a bag swap scene, just like in collateral. The scenes were shot inside of college and City Road. To make our clip look interesting we tried to film a variety of different shots.

However as we were beginning our camera work was really dodgy and most of our shots were shaky due to some shots being hand held. We did have titles but when we edited our clips the titles didn't render.

Overall I think this exercise was a big help, as it helped us to know were went wrong and how to improve.

Planning Preliminary Match Cut Exercise (Storyboard)

We were given a brief to follow:

Film the following sequence making sure to use at least one match cut, an example of shot/reverse shot and showing your understanding of the 180 degree rule (by not breaking it)

A character opens a door, walks into a room, sits down opposite another chanter and they share a few lines of dialogue.

We then had to storyboard by writing down the shot number, ext/int/, different shot types, action and the shot description.

SHOT No. /EXT/INT /SHOT TYPE /ACTION/SHOT DESCRIPTION

0/INT/MS/STILL Person1 sitting in room
1 INT LS STILL Person2 walking down corridor
2 INT CU TRACKING Seeing Person2 walk
3 INT LS TRACKING Person2 walking up to the door
4 INT POV STILL Person1 in the room watching person2 walking in
5 INT POV STILL Person 2 looking at person 1
6 /INT /TS /STILL/Person2 going to sit down, person
7 /INT /SRS/ STILL/ Person1 looking at person2
8 /INT /SRS /STILL/ Person2 Looking at person1
9 /INT/ MS/ STILL/ Person2’s face

10 INT OSS PANS Person1 looking at person 2 talking
11 INT MCU TITLS Person1 fiddling
12 INT CU ZOOM Person1’s face

13/INT/ POV/STILL/Person2 talking- telling bad news
14/INT/MS/STILL/Two people looking at each other
15/INT/POV (Person1)/TILT/Person1 looking at person2 getting up
16/INT/MS/ZOOM/Person1 looking at table, door closing, seeing person1’s face.


Person2 has bad news to tell person1

Rough dialogue:

Person2: got something to tell you
Person1: [looks confused]
Person2: there’s been an accident on the M6 and you’re parents have died
Person1: what!?

We changed the storyboard slightly so that we could hear and see more of person1’s reaction to the bad news.

Skills Audit: Livetype and Sound

We learnt how to use the basics of the following programmers on the Mac computers; livetpye and soundtrack Pro

Live type:
Skills audit;

We learnt how to use the basics of the following programmers on the Mac computers; livetype and soundtrack


Live type:
In livetype we learnt how to create titles using transitions ad effects, this was to enable us to create titles that suited our opening sequence.

We learnt how to use the following;
-Adding sound effects and music
-Layering sound tracks
-Changing length of tracks
-Fading sounds in and out
-Importing video into soundtrack pro

Soundtrack:
In soundtrack we learnt how to compose and put together sounds, enabling us to create suspenseful or dramatic music or any type of music we wanted.

We learnt how to do the following;

-Adding text to a still and moving background
-Adding different effects to text
-Changing fonts, colours and size of text
-Changing length of effects and text on screen
-Importing video in livetype
-Adding transition effects to text

Intro to Camera Health And Safety Tutorial

The intro to cameras and health and safety has helped us to understand how to use a camera and has enabled us to work safely with the cameras so they do not get damaged.

We were introduced to JVC cameras and how to do the following things:

• How to insert the memory card into slot A & B
• How to insert the battery
• How to turn the camera On and Off
• How to record & play back
• The Focus Assist function - which enbles you to focus
• User selection (1 & 2)
• Manual audio control - Auto shooting mode
• Zoom In & Out
• Tripod - to attach camera for steady use.
• Tripod base adapter
• Lock and unlock the camera on the tripod - it does not fall off and get damaged.
• How to steady the tripod using the meter – The tripod is evenly set on the ground no dodgy filming

Intro to Cameras and Health and safety.

Merisa's intro about the cameras was really helpful. The run through of how the camera works and all the functions made a huge difference and was a great help. Especially the focus button. Without this all our videos would have been blurry and a waste of time. Over all I think it was a compulsory lesson.

A very handy and much needed equipment is the tripod. However whilst filming at locations you must ensure the public are not walking near the tripod legs, to avoid anyone tripping. we must also make sure when we are moving the the tripod, the camera is not on it.

We must also ensure the battery is fully charged before we go filming. And have a second one for back up.

when we are not filming we must make sure the camera lens is closed so dust falls on it. Also we must NEVER directly touch the lens. finger prints will only ruin your film!

Preliminary Match Cut film

Planning Preliminary Match Cut exercise including storyboard

Final edit of livetype and sound filming practise

Skills Audit: Livetype and Sound

Intro to cameras ad Health and Safety Tutorial

Today we got to see the kind of cameras we're going to use for our thriller intro.

We have been given a lesson today on how to handle the camera's safely and how to use them during our filming. We are using JVC cameras and each group gets two memory cards to store our filming on.

We learnt a lot in one day:
• How to insert the battery
• How to turn the camera On and Off
• How to record & play back
• The Focus Assist function - which enbles you to focus
• How to use User selection (1 & 2)
• Manual audio control - Auto shooting mode
• How to zoom in & out
• Tripod - to attach camera for steady use and use the tripod base adapter
• How to insert the memory cards
• Lock and unlock the camera on the tripod - so it does not fall off and get damaged
• How to steady the tripod using the meter so the shots are even.

Soundtrack Pro

soundtrack allowed me to explore with different sound. I listened and selected the soundtracks which i thought would best fit with our bag swap sequence. i added different soundtracks at different points to give different effects to the viewer.

Live Type allowed me to explore and select different fonts and background effects for our title sequence.

There is various different types of sound to explore with. we can choose different sound effects, genres, instruments, discriptors and customs.

Similarly to LiveType Pro we mark in and out to indicate which section of the sound we require.

Skills Audit: Livetype and Sound Track Pro

Today we got to try and use Livetype and Sound Track Pro. Both are professional applications which are used by real film-makers.

Livetype:In Livetype we experimented with different styles and what we could do with them. We learnt about what kind of fonts and transitions suite what kinds of genres. This was very good practice it was amazing to see all the different kinds of styles available through one application.

Soundtrack Pro:

I enjoyed this even more as I feel I got to learn more about how sounds are put together for a film. After this audit i realised that sound plays a vital role in relation to the mood of the film e.g. suspense.

News and current affairs

One way to get ideas for our film is to look at recent news. This doesn't have to be our story however it can be a starting point for our ideas.

This is an article on the G20 Summit. After reading a few articles we have decided as a group that we want to do a action thriller that will also have an element of politics.

The G-20 Summit: Highlights
By: iStockAnalyst Saturday, April 04, 2009 1:46 PM

The much awaited G-20 summit fell short of being called a qualified success. It fell short of being called a failure.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain, host of the Group of 20 summit meeting announced at its conclusion that the leaders had committed to $1.1 trillion in new funds that would greatly increase the capital available to the International Monetary Fund. The goal would be a revival in trade, which is expected to contract this year for the first time in 30 years. But President Obama conceded that there were “no guarantees” that those measures would reverse the biggest global downturn in six decades.


This article is also very interesting:

Windsor firefighters bound for G8 and G20 summits

By Doug Schmidt, The Windsor StarMarch 2010

WINDSOR, Ont. — Hazmat-trained Windsor firefighters will be among those ready to respond to terrorist threats when some of the world's most powerful leaders gather this summer in Ontario's cottage country.
The 36th G8 summit takes place June 25 to 27 at the Deerhurst Resort in Huntsville, with Prime Minister Stephen Harper playing host to U.S. President Barack Obama, the government heads of Germany, Britain, France, Italy, Japan, Russia and other invited leaders. Immediately following that more intimate gathering, Canada plays host in Toronto to this year's larger G20 summit.

I think security will also be a big theme in our inroduction thriller film.

The Bag Swap

In media this week, we filmed the bag swap scene. It was the first thing we done in media with filming, and was part of out preliminary excercises before we are allowed to go filming. Using this can be a way to learn from our mistakes in this film, and make sure we don't use them in our next preliminary excercise, and our actual filming for the coursework. - Michael Lewry

Photo Words

Today we were asked to take photos in our groups showing certain things like depression. The reason we did this is so that we can practice to catch expressions on the camera and just practice. These are some of the pictures we have taken:

This picture looks unfilled and vacant. There is something missing in this picture and i think the unoccupied area looks lonely without it's usual sea of students that fill it.

London City. I think this picture shows the skies and city of London very well because this city is known for it's grey skies and sometimes boring skyline.

Paranoia. This picture is trying to show Michael looking paranoid because he feels everyone is looking at him.

Depression. This is tryiing to illistrate what someone might look like if they have depression.

Thriller sub-genres

But what is a genre?
The wikipedia definition given is:
'A genre is a loose set of criteria for a category of composition; the term is often used to categorize literature and speech, but is also used for any other form of art or utterance. Genres are vague categories with no fixed boundaries, they are formed by sets of conventions, and many works cross into multiple genres by way of borrowing and recombining these conventions.'

There are many genres that come under 'thriller'. This shows that there is a variety of thriller films. Thriller films cover a very long list of different sub-genres.


Here are some of the favorite sub-genres:

• action - usually contains guns, explosions, expensive sets etc. (e.g.James Bond)
• political - hero or heroine must ensure safety of government that employs them.
• psychological - often require deep thinking and in order to suss the plot you often have to look beneth the surface. Tend to have interesting twists at the ending. Not what the viewers were expecting. These are filled with suspence and plays with the viewers mind.
• horror
• disaster
• drama
• legal
• crime
• supernatural
• sci-fi
• spy
• conspiracy
• religious

At the moment I find the psychological and horror sub-genres most interesting. This is because I like the thought that we can make the audience think about what’s going to happen after our intro with a psychological thriller because they will have to think outside the box to figure out who’s behind what.

Also I think the horror genre is very motivating because I’ve watched a lot of horror movies and I believe thinking about a storyline will be easier; however I think it will be harder to create on the screen.

News and current affairs events

I saw a new article on Virgin Media, not only did the title catch my attention, but it was also somewhat disturbing to read.


"A US woman whose two young sons were found dead in their home told police: "I just killed my babies," officers said.

San Antonio police chief William McManus said the brothers, aged one and three, had been stabbed.

Their 22-year-old mother was calm as she greeted officers who were responding to an emergency call from the house on Tuesday.

Detention centre electronic records show that a woman whose address was on the same block as the home where the boys were found slain was in custody facing two counts of murder.

A police spokesman said the boys were found next to each other, dressed and on a bed. He says they "looked like they were sleeping"."


(Article taken from : http://latestnews.virginmedia.com/news/world/2010/02/03/mother_held_over_deaths_of_sons)

Universities To Cut Back on palces Due To Spending Cuts?!

Hundreds of thousands of would-be students will be denied a university place because of spending cuts, says higher education body Universities UK.
Universities' funding body Hefce will later outline how spending on teaching, research and capital will be allocated in England in the next academic year.
For 2010-11, cuts of £135m have been added to "efficiency savings" of £180m - with a further £600m to follow.
Higher Education Minister David Lammy said the fears were "scaremongering".
Professor Steve Smith, president of vice-chancellors' group Universities UK, said the cuts would impact on the quality of teaching, as managers prepared to cut teaching budgets for the first time since Labour came to power.

People agree that This is wasting talent needed for an efficient and successful economy and it's extremely short-sighted. General secretary of the University and College Union Sally Hunt said the higher education system was already creaking under the pressure of government efficiency savings and the planned cuts would be a devastating blow.

This is important to us as college students becuase it could mean that doing a course we want to do at University could be tharwted by spending cuts and not gaining a degree in a profession we want to do in life and be forced to work in minimum wage jobs, and because of a degree becoming more common, it affects what jobs we can get.

General secretary of the University and College Union Sally Hunt said the higher education system was already creaking under the pressure of government efficiency savings and the planned cuts would be a devastating blow.

General secretary of the University and College Union Sally Hunt said the higher education system was already creaking under the pressure of government efficiency savings and the planned cuts would be a devastating blow.

How Is suspense Created In Collateral?

Suspense Is created in Collateral through many different ways. for Example, the clip where Max Calls Annie creates suspense because Vince is in the Building, Max can See him Looking For Annie, but cannot find her, all the while Max is on the phone to her, telling her to get out of the Building. This creates suspense because the Search for Annie uses alot of tension and suspense because it is a heightened situaltion which trusn into desparation and desire to save someone that Max likes. It is a fight or flight situation, but neither can happen, because in this, both of them could be killed. Another example of suspense is when Max and Annie have the decision of taking which train to get on to be safe, but are followed by Vince. This creates suspense because it's a scary decision and cretes anixety & fear (espeically for thier lives. this is one of the may different genres of thriller.