Blog | thriller

18/09/13

We have successfully created our website, our A1 analysis has been created. We each chose a thriller film we liked and analysed the key features of that film.

T.K

23/09/13

Analysis' improved by Tom, our group is still struggling to come up with a good opening to a thriller. Lots of arguing, the group can't decide on a pitch and when they do there are many faults, Jack comes up with an idea but we decide against it.

T.K

29/09/13

We finally decide on a plot contributed by Tom. However, sir believes that this plot does not create enough suspense. We decide to go back to the drawing board again causing arguments in the group.

S.K

4/10/13

Seamus writes a good plot. It is a good story line and has the potential to create suspense. The group decides this plot is the opening that we are going to film. Tom and David look for mistakes in the plot and correct them. Jack works on his film analysis.

T.K

12/10/13

We begin to work on our storyboards, the drawings are not clear, but we have the shot list that we required. Seamus does a lot of writing, David provides clever ideas.

D.M

15/10/13

The storyboards still require a lot of work, we should be finished writing them up by next week. I write up around twenty shots with the help of Tom and Seamus.

D.M

19/10/13

The story boards are finished. What we did not realize, after finishing them, is that we didn't have enough shots for a good, pacy thriller. We scrap these storyboards. We will start the second set next lesson.

T.K

26/10/13

The second set of story boards are almost finished, Seamus draws and writes up about 25 shots, David does 20 and Tom does about 12. We write up our pitch again, this time we are free from mistakes and plot holes.

T.K

3/11/13

The pitch has some flaws, we re-write it it finally makes sense. When the pitch was presented to the focus group we assembled, they understood our ideas. We will probably have to film our focus group again, due to the members of the group mucking around.

T.K

8/11/13

We re-shoot the focus group, there is considerably less mucking about. Tom tries to practice his panning and zooming skills which leaves the focus group film littered with camera shake.

T.K

12/11/13

We upload the focus group video to YouTube. We film the first 30 seconds of our film in class. It goes well.

D.M

16/11/13

We film everything today. The area selected is too open, this is questioned by Tom and David. Seamus believes the filming will be fine. Once we get the footage we need Tom and David head back to school. They discover that the film doesn't deliver suspense. Everything needs re-doing.

T.K

23/11/13

We decide that we should re-locate to the wooded area of Roundshaw. Seamus and Jack find an old shack, which is perfect for the scenario of our film. The recce report photos are taken.

S.K

29/11/13

Yet again we re-do the story boards, however this time they actually make sense and will be of great use to us. Seamus contributes thoroughly to this activity.

T.K

5/12/13

Tom updates the site with all the Analysis, Focus group and Pitch and adds all the stuff missed to the blog, today is pretty in-productive.

S.K

12/12/13

We film in the new location. We gather many good shots and could possibly be onto something. Tom is only present on camera for parts of the film, he only has a small role in the film due to being the camera-man.

D.M

16/12/13

We film part of the antagonists scene. It turns out okay, though there are a few continuity errors that need to be addressed.

T.K

19/12/13

We try to film again, the weather conditions are poor and we are forced to return to school. We edit the clips we have and see how they work together. Things are looking up.

D.M

14/01/14

We film part of the antagonists scenes which had bad continuity and we have a new idea for where jack appears from in the film and we put it into use. the scene now looks more like a thriller.

S.K

17/01/14

Today we were unable to film as jack was feeling ill. this was inconvenient as filming was a problem last week aswell due to exams. but me David managed to do some editing.

S.K

21/01/14

Today we filmed the protagonist noticing the suspicious behaviour of the antagonist. There were some good ideas put forward from Seamus and David and Tom put them into effect well with the directing.

S.K

28/01/14

Unfortunately today we were again unable to film due to Tom being ill but on Thursday we edited what we did last week and today we applied the finishing touches to that editing.

S.K

04/02/14

Today we could not film as our teacher kept the whole class in to do some exam practice although we are nearly finished filming we know it will be hard now to find the time because we are no longer allowed to miss lesson.

S.K

11/02/14

In the past week we have done a lot of editing and touched up on the title sequences thinking about where to put them in the film.

S.K

15/02/14

The filming is completely finished, it is now time to go back to the macs and work on the titles, post-production and score.

T.K

18/02/14

Problems with continuity, Tom and Seamus try to solve the problem through post-production, we'll find some-way to solve the problem.

28/02/14

We add the Recce Report photos to the website, still trying to find a way to get rid of all continuity errors. The holiday was a needed break.

T.K

03/03/14

We have been working on our exam practice in lesson, the film has been put on hold for a few days to catch up with the work missed.

T.K

07/03/14

The film is almost done, we aren't completely happy with how it has turned out and changes definitely need to be made.

S.K

15/03/14

We decide to cut out pats from the film, this helps increase editing pace and allows more room for post-production.

T.K

17/03/14

More exam practice halts the films proceedings, our timing has been really off, more time needs to be spent on the film in our own time.

D.M

21/03/14

Tom and Seamus have both made changes to the website, adding more detail to both the pitch and costume page.

T.K

28/03/14

Today we have encountered a slight problem, upon receiving results from our January exams, Jack, the fourth member of our group has decided to drop media studies and take BTEC business. This has resulted in our group having to cope a larger work load and we had to take on all of the work that he was doing for the group. This was tough on the group but we will cope.

S.K

17/04/14

The Easter break allowed Tom, Seamus and David make big changes to the website, all pages have been modified, we feel that any points lost on our film can be made up for in our planning.

T.K

21/04/14

After the Easter holiday we have all caught up on the work left behind by jack, we are now back up to date but we still have work to do.Tom adds in all the effects to the film, creating suspense, this makes up for the acting quality.

T.K

25/04/14

We all work on the evaluation questions, we should be all ready for the final deadline, Tom and Seamus will work on the website at home. also we showed the rough cut of our film to a few other people in our class. their views are on the website under 'rough cut feedback'.

S.K

30/04/14

Tom edited the site, it is almost finished, we now need to add our story-boards and shot-list, after those two are added the website will be finished.

T.K

02/05/14

Today we decided to re-film the ending of our film just to give it a wider variety of shots. However, the content we filmed in the morning dod not upload to the computer. We then had to go out and film the footage again during the lesson, returning after school to add the finishing touches. we stayed back after school until 6 pm to improve our film, as we have had many technical difficulties and other random unexpected issues with our film.

S.K

05/05/14

The film is finally finished! The whole group put in around 2 hours work after school each day in order to finish the film. This has resulted in a much better and easier to follow narrative.

T.K