anaylsis of the opening of women in black.

  ** This was taken from Emma Liard **

Below show some snap shots from The Woman In Black. I'm analysing the opening to help me get ideas and see what is appropriate in this type of film to help me produce the opening of a thriller
 

This is the first snapshot that you see in the film. By using a close up it allows the audience to see clearly what the camera is focusing on. As well as this, the lighting is very bright and clear allowing a very clear view which makes it easy for the audience to watch. This is appropriate for the film as it represents the time of day in the film (mid day). Furthermore, even though a lot of horror films like using dark lighting, it creates an eary and quite sinister setting which in some cases makes the film even more scary. 

 

The film uses parallel sound in the opening. It does this because the image is being played in slight slow motion. This matches the sound as they play a slow and childlike song thus being parallel and adding to the sinister affect that is created

 

 

This camera angle helps to show the location. It does so because you are able to see that the girls are playing in a sort of house and in particular a bedroom. Furthermore, from this image you can see the time period in which this film may be set as you can see the props used (very old fashioned toys with no electronics) and the costume that is worn (all of the children have dresses on that suggest it is set in the past).

This part of the opening breaks the fourth wall between the film and the audience. It does this because the girls are seen to look I to the camera and it's made to look as if they are looking at you or something that is behind us. This helps to show the genre as the audience is scared to see what they are looking at and so it fits in with the horror/thriller style of film.

After the film breaks the fourth wall, the film starts to turn quite dark and more scary. This is shown in this image as you can see that the girl steps on and breaks one of her toys. This contrasts with before because before this, the children are very delicate with their toys.

 

This snapshot suggests that these three girls are not particularly the main characters in this film. It does so because it shows them dying which means that they have no further involvement in the film. Because of this, it then draws our attention to the last character shown in the opening of The Woman in Black:

 

This image creates a sense of mystery towards this character because we are unable to see her face and it only shows us a small area of her. Because this woman is in black it suggests that this woman is a main character as the title of the film is of course The Woman In Black.

Billy elliot Textual Analysis

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B2evZV0wKHEBLVh3UTE0MnltSnM/edit

Opening analysis of It's a boy

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B2evZV0wKHEBbkJqTTRKdDlGQ0E/edit

Lighting practice

 Here I played around with lighting. I used different sorts of lights to show different effects which may be useful for my Thriller. Showing different shadows and different characteristics of the micky mouse. This helps with the effects of a thriller being known to be scary and more mysterious.

Moving titles

Still Titles

Here I started practising with titles, learning how to fade them in and out and putting them infront of the video. I started with still images.

Preliminary piece analysis

Preliminary piece analysis.

For my preliminary piece, our group was made up of 4 people: me(laura), emma, liam and correen.We was briefed on the 180 degree rule and match on action etc before getting into the groups to do our preliminary piece. Also being shown how to use the editing system on our computers, playing around with different practice pieces to help our understanding on how to use the system correctly. We also watched various films such as sliding doors in which helped us gain knowledge on how to use different camera angles, shot and movements.We also looked at still shots so we could establish how they took the shot.

Before filming(preproduction) we did a storyboard of the event still shots in which would happen during the filming. This then made it easier for us to remember what happened next and what sort of shots we wanted on the short movie. This also helped us gain time to film as we knew where at what was happening at each shot. After this we then assigned roles of each person in our group. Everyone in the group had the role of filming so we all had a chance.I (laura) was the main character in the piece as a late student. Emma took the role as the teacher and liam and correen took characters of students. We all shared the role of director and editor. 

The production process.

We started filming outside of the school in the car park in which we used the car as a prop. While using the car we used shots such as worms eye view, medium shot. In which the main character arrived in the car and got the bag out the boot. With getting out the car we had to use match on action in which took a few attempts to get correct.after this we used an long shot to show the character running down to hill to the school,zooming in to give the shot a blurred effect. We then use a low angle Shot. This shows the quickness of the feet.

The shots are which are used after this is match on action, over the shoulder shot long shot and close up shot. These are used throughout the piece. Everyone on the group all had goes in filming and in choosing which shots suit best for the action.

Post production.

  The editing system we used was premiere pro. As just a guide we put all parts of what we filmed together. We then cut out the parts in which was unnecessary and began to match each parts of the piece together merging them so it is a continuous piece. We matched the match on action and made the movement fluid from one piece of the movement to the other. We them speeded some parts of the piece up such as the car pulling up and the feet  running down the hill. The editing was discussed by the whole team and was changed to the majority of votes, such as which parts needed speeding up and cutting. On the programme we learnt a lot of editing skills such as cutting,adding and taking away sound, speeding up and adding titles. We didn't occur any problems while editing our piece.

Evaluation

   Overall I am pleased with the end product, as for a first try we stick to most rules such as 180 degree rule and match on action. However we did break the rule at one point when showing inside and outside the car in which we didn't use the 180 degree rule. Another error in which is a learning point is that we haven't put much conversation In to fill the brief conversation.  The shot in which I believe was the best and most successful is the worms eye shot from the boot as it gives a good effect when the boot is shutting on the video.

From the main piece I have learnt many things such as match on action,180 degree rules, what types of shots and camera movements and the best place to use these shots/movements. 

our overall preliminary piece

This is our overall piece.

Camera angles and setting

We took a few photos of the camera angles in which we want in the video and also settings so when we came to filming it was easier for us to find the correct angles. 

 

We took a low angle shot, in which we wanted to put in out video. This would help show the quickness of the feet moving to show how the character is rushing.

With this photo we wanted to create the effect of running down the hill. Again showing that the character is in a rush. We use a long shot to show the whole character and to show the school in the background to set the scene.

In this photo we took a photo of the car which is going to be in the beginning of the video. This was showing how we wanted to get the whole car in as well as doing a match on action shot. 

Practicing showing emotions through light and angles

These photos show how I practised taking photos of others to show the emotions using camera angles. I did the emotions of happy, loved up, frustrated and lonely. The lighting also helped show this. 

Storyboard

    

Camera Angles

Here I began to play around with different camera angles these help show different part of the action and to help emphasise what is happening in the shot. Here i used long shot to show the establishing shot of my bedroom and also a close up to show whats happening with the photo of me with the timing, showing hoe my morning begins.

 

Preliminary Piece Research

This showing her journey to work and opening/shutting doors and helping us understand the 360 degree rule and match on action.
We looked into different camera angles, different camera actions.
We also learnt about match on action and the 360 degree rule.
We spent time looking at the beginning of sliding doors to help us gain this knowledge.