Evaluation

As a group, we have been working for a while on our thriller opening. As we wanted it to look like a professional one, we used some of the conventions that a real one would supply. This essay will look at the conventions that real thriller openings have used, and how I have applied these to my thriller opening. An example that I will be using to look at the conventions that the real media has used, is 'The Shining'. As in 'The Shining', my thriller has suspenseful music, because of this suspense the audience would want to watch more of the film to overcome this emotion. In addition, I think that the music makes the audience feel sympathy for the characters involved.

Another convention I have used is the lack of identification of the perpetrator. The person who is following Elaine is not shown. This creates suspense, as the audience cannot identify the villain, by not showing this persons face it adds to the suspense. We see an excellent example of this in 'The Shining' when the camera is following the little boy, riding on his bike, along the corridor.

I have also used the convention of using the camera shots as if it is in the point of view of somebody watching the character, which there is nobody actually watching at all, for the audience it feels like they are following this vulnerable person. When Elaine is walking out to the road, she is not aware of anything and she does not know that somebody is following her until the camera is in the point of view of the real villain, which is in the car. Also in 'The Shining', there is nobody following the little boy but because we are behind him it feels like there is somebody there.

In my media product, the character that we have used represents itself in a vulnerable way. The character that we have used is a female and straightaway the audience may suggest that a male is inside of the car that is following her. My media product represents the females as vulnerable and very scared of the opposite sex. Usually we see examples of this in real thrillers.

Because my media product is not professional and the top directors and software did not make it, I think that if we did spend so much money and distributed it internationally then I do not think that we would make much money. Therefore, I think that if we first released it over the internet via YouTube then we could get a rough overview of how many people will view it at the cinemas before we make any expenditure. However, if it was professional I think that the distribution company that would most suit the media product will have to be The Working Title.

The demographic descriptions that my target audience fit are the achievers. My character, Elaine looks like a businessperson, and they would consider her as themselves. I would think that they would also be of middle class females who are aged 25-49. As an example I have here, Elena, who is 28 years old and works in a tourism agency, she loves to socialise with friends and often goes to the cinema with them. I think that she will be a perfect candidate for an audience for my thriller.

The best way to advertise my media product will be to use the face of my main character, which is Elaine. Because the target audience for my thriller will be middle class business women, when they see the face of my character they might want to consider seeing my film. I would want to advertise my film on the internet for a start because many business women use the internet nowadays for lots of different reasons. If they watch the trailer on YouTube then they can decide to watch the whole film.

In the process of constructing my media product, I had many opportunities to widen my knowledge about using technology. I have firstly learnt how to use the camera. I now know how to record, change a tape and how to change a battery of a camera. I have also learnt how to use a few software’s; Final Cut Pro was the one I used to do the editing of my thriller. Another software I now have knowledge on is Sound Track Pro, I have used this software to construct a very suspenseful piece of music.

Another level of technology I have learnt to use, in the process of making the media product, is the internet. Obviously, I knew how to use the internet previously but I did not know how to blog and did not know what blog actually meant. This has opened a completely new step for me about the usage of the internet, and I am now very familiar of the website blogger.com.

From now when I look back at the preliminary task that we were assigned to complete, I feel that I have learnt a lot more. I also think that I did not know much about the 'match cut' exercise when we were told to do it in class, before the media product was briefed to us. After having this experience to do a thriller, I now feel that I know a lot better in doing 'match cuts', storyboarding, planning, filming, editing and post production, (which is my evaluation that you are now reading), If I were to do this kind of task again then I would try to plan better and try to stick to it. Some of the feedback I got from other classmates who watched my film at the cinema said that it was very suspenseful and they wanted to watch it more at the start because they wanted to know where Elaine was going to go. I now also think that practising is the key to success.