In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? - Question 1

Foundation portfolio evaluation

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

In an opening sequence of a thriller film the conventions that need to be included are: slow paced editing, this is used to give the audience a hints towards the film, where as if you was to have fast paced editing you would be dropped into a middle of an action scene, which wouldn't make sense to the audience members, this is why opening sequences usually consist of having slow paced editing. Another convention of a opening sequence would be consistent use of close ups or tight shots, in an opening sequence, this is so that the identity and location doesn't become to obvious to the audience members, it is also use to generate questions in the audiences mind. Below you can see a clip from Tube Chop of the Sixth Sense.

 

In this short clip you can see that there is a close up on the ladies face or a tight frame, this is to show her facial expressions, also you can see that because we have a close up of her face, the director has decided not to give too much information out about the setting and to emphasise that she maybe feeling confined in the basement where she feels uncomfortable. This then leads onto the point that the use of close ups are made so that the audience will ask questions and want to find out more therefor hooking the audience in and making them want to continue watching the film. 

Another convention of an opening sequence would be that you have to include titles, these titles have to be in a specific order which is as follows:

• Distribution Company Logo
• Production Company Logo
• Distribution Company' Presents
• A 'Production Company' Production/Film
• Most Important Actors Name
• All Major Characters in that Film going down in importance (sometimes 2 or 3 show up together)
• Casting by 'Insert Name' (starts with the leader(s) of the 'behind the scenes' staff, starting with least important going to most important)
• Costume Design 'Insert Name(s)'
• Music by 'Insert Name(s)'
• Edited by 'Insert Name(s)'
• Production Designer 'Insert Name(s)'
• Director of Photography 'Insert Name(s)' (usually has ASC, which is a credit they receive, after their name'
• Executive Producer 'Insert Name(s)'
• Produced by 'Insert Name(s)'
• Written and Directed by 'Insert Name(s)' (these can appear separately on the screen

The order goes from least important role to the most important, this is a vital convention of any opening sequence to a film because it tells you who the main actor maybe and also who helped make the film. When using titles, the person who has edited normaly adds an effect on such as a fade, this is made to create tension or anticipation when you are begining to watch the film, having titles means that it needs to fit within the opening, this means that they need to be positioned correctly, and in time to the soundtrack.  Here is a screenshot of  the following films and their opening sequence titles: The sixth sense titles, sherlock holmes titles and The hunger games. They all have a similar opening titles in the same order.

The sixth sense opening titles

Hunger games opening titles

Sherlock holmes opening titles







 As you can see from the examples I have given that titles are used through out and in different fonts depending on what the movie may be about. In our sequence we decided that we want to have a simple font with a fade in and out. We chose to do this because it would look professional and not to complicated, as you don't want the sequence being to crowded with titles and taking the audiences eye off of what is happening.

        

Here is a clip of the titles from our opening sequence, we decided that we wanted a simple font that appeared on a black background which eventually went on top of a moving image. I think that it worked well, however we can work on the positioning of the titles, as they're slightly to the right. Also the colour blue contrasts with the black background which makes it hard to read the titles, there for we may need to change this.     

Another feature that is common in opening sequences particularly thrillers which is the genre that I am doing, is that there is a vulnerable character, who is potentially put at risk, this is shown in a number of different films based upon the genre of thriller. An example of this would be in the film Sherlock Holmes, in the opening sequence we see that he is running from people. We encorporated the idea of having a vulnerable character, because it puts the audience on edge, with them knowing that the main character is at risk. Also when you first begin to watch the opening sequence if the audience know this they are more intised to continue watching. In my opening sequence we wanted our main character to be vulnerable and represent depression we done this through our main charcater having anxiety, in our clip we have him as getting pushed around by the school bully and wanting to keep himself away from other people. 

 

As you can see our main character is getting pushed out of way from a boy of a similar age, who is the schools stereotypical view of a bully and being what is considered in soicety as normal. I think me and my group done well at representing our character as being vulnerable,because we have shown him as an out cast to society.

Also in opening sequences in many genres as well as thriller they also use long shots, this is used to hide their identity, this is used mainly if they are a antagonist, this is to keep the audience from knowing who they are to early on in the film. Again this is done to create a sense of mystery and could also be creating a cliff hanger. This is done in many film another few examples would be in The Sixth Sense  and Sherlock Holmes as they mainly use low key lighting to remain secret. 

A long shot from the film Brick.

Me and my group have incorporated this into our work by having our antagonist walk out from behind a tree, however you couldn't see his face clearly enough to get a full identity of him. We done this purposely so that the audience won't know what the antagonist looks like they will only be able to relate him to a suite therefore knowing he may be a business man. I think this worked effectively in our opening sequence because it is a well known convention of film opening not just under that category of thrillers. 

The long shot of our antagonist.

In an opening sequence to any films it is important they set a mood for the film, this is important so that the audience understand what is going on in the film, and what it may be about. It also gives you an idea if the film may have high action or a romantic. This is the main focus of what a films opening sequence must do.  An example of this is the opening sequence of momento, it set the theme as though it will be an action fulfilled thriller: 

In our opening sequence we set the mood firstly by having our opening titles on a black background, with sound effects on it, this not only settles the audience, it sets the mood that it maybe a thriller film with action possibly set around a normal town, however I believe this could of been done more effiecently, as we didn't angle the shots in the classroom correctly, as it party cut off the top of our main characters head, this needs re shooting, and maybe a change of angles, to make the mood more specific to what we want it to be. 

Here you can see the classroom shots, this is the shot that we to re do as the main characters head is ourt
of the frame, however it sets the mood for the audience because it's a quiet classroom.

For our props, in conventional films such as thrillers you would expect to see sea a lot of blood and possibly weaponry. However we attempted to challenge this convention for the reason that we didn't want to much given away and we wanted to make the audience think about what has happened. We challenged this convention by using as though what see like everyday items, such as: A mobile phone, earphone and a school book. This was to so that we set a neutral atmosphere to our opening sequence, there for the audience know it would be based around a normal life of a teenager, however later on in the film there maybe slight use of guns, and violence (blood). 

The prop that we used, showing that he is a normal teenager.

The shots from memento, showing that the character is more powerful compared to my opening sequence.


Overall i believe that we mainly developed the conventions of an opening sequence, this is because we knew what was needed to make an effective opening sequence to a film, however we wanted to push ourselves and may of challenged some aspects, such as not being to obvious that a murder or death has occurred, and making the audience think early on it the film. However we did develop ideas such as making use of long shots and tight framing to make an effective piece of work.