The art of storyboarding, sound and colour

Storyboarding
M. Night Shymalan director of films such as Sixth Sense, The Village and Signs.
Shymalan believes in thorough storyboarding, he likes to plan and understand every shot to keep costs of the filming to a minimum, this eliminates mistakes and decisions to be made on set and in theory could speed up filming and keep costs of staff down. Shymalan prefers to keep camera angles more realistic he does not believe in "acrobatics" unlike other big Hollywood directors. He believes thriller films should have emotion, keeping realistic camera angles allows the audience to feel more connected to the film itself, building emotions like fear and intensity key conventions of the thriller genre.
Storyboarding is said to be visual screenplay "making the movie before you make the movie". Shymalan refers to the storyboard as a continual point of reference. A storyboard is shaping the movie it reveals the movie when the storyboard is completed it can be the worst version of the film.

Sound
In the sixth sense the sound editer and creater experiments with sounds, he layers different sounds whether they are breaths, general sounds or dialogue to create mysterious and eary effects. In part of the sixth sense he got many people to breathe, cry, groan and scream into a microphone then layered them all over eachother to create a ghostly mysterious effect that was quite chilling to hear. Sounds are very important to films, films from the thriller genre especially as they help to create an emotional and spiritual feel to the film.
In The Village film the main character is a blind girl so sound is very important as it's all she can recognise. The sound in this film helps to tell the story and in this case the sound represents the main character. For understanding of the blind girl the musicians and editors took a small part of the chime of a bell and replayed it and edited it to make a sound like the girl would here, this would have taken alot of presicion and focus to create.

Colour
Based on In the Mood For Love, Wong Kar-Wai
This film is a chinese film based on a love affair, the woman featured in this scene was the woman often left by her husband as he was having an affair with another mans wife, this man was falling in love with the beautiful woman based in this scene.
She wore a green dress and held a green/blue flask this denotes envy and jealousy, the feelings of this woman at the current time of the film, the same green colour is used through out the scene reinforcing her feelings, this is once again reinforced by the music. The colour blue used through out the scene represents her sadness, sorrow and depression, a blue luminous light acts as a spot light on her, this once against reinforces her feelings. This scene is controlled by the use of colour and lighting.

Continuity Task

We were given a task in which we had to film two people having a conversation, focusing of keeping good continuity between shots. We were given a shot list in which we had to abide carefully by. As a group we drew up a story board based on the shot list, our story board was good but in parts needed more detail, especially when showing what shots were which. When planning our filming we had to think of the 180 degree rule, we had to plan different places for the camera to go without breaking this rule. Our filming was sucessful and we had lots of shots to work with, however not all were right for the final film. Some shots had others talking and laughing in the background, some shots had minor views of others in them and some of the scripted conversation was interupted or wrong. We over came these issues during editing using cutting to get rid of parts of the shots we did not want or need and we also used adobe after affects to edit out the reflection of the camera and a person in the dark window. After alot of editing and tweaking our film finally and sucessfully came together.

This is the first part of the storyboard, it shows the opening of the door (close up), the shot of the door knob then the character in the background (extreme close up of door knob then extreme long shot of sofa), the shot of the character in the mirror (mid shot) and the shot of the character sitting down on the sofa (mid shot).

This is the second sheet of story boards it shows the character in the background and the other character walking over to the TV (long shot), the other character talking (mid shot), low angle shot of the other character (long mid shot) and a shot of both characters (extreme long shot to long shot).

This is the third sheet of the storyboards it shows the shot reverse shot of the two characters shouting (mid shots), the shot of both characters (long shot) and the shot of the head with the character in the background slightly out of focus (close up/ long shot).

The fourth sheet of storyboards show the characters expression (close up), the shot of the character exiting the location (long shot) and the final shot of the cats face (close up).

Targets: Set framing to foreground point, one part in the clip the actor lurches forward out of shot. Use of mid close up and close ups may be more effective in this clip.

Feedback: Effective use of sound both diegetic and non-diegetic, it is said to be "well mastered". Framing was mostly good but more close ups and mid close ups should have been used. Good continuity is the clip however there were some errors towards the end. Effective use of shot reverse shot. The 180 degree rule was abided by well. Use of after effects were acknowleged and approved of.

The grade we received was 32/60 putting us near the peak of level 2, I think this is an appropriate grade for our peice of work.

Ideas

Here is a mind map of our ideas, as a group we combined ideas, shared our own ideas and created an idea.

Exploring thriller openings

Mind map:
Here is a copy of the mind map we drew as a class whilst exploring thriller openings. You can see we looked at all aspects in detail.

Rules of a thriller opening:
Whilst looking into thriller openings we concluded that these are common rules amongst thriller openings; slow paced to begin with lots of dissolves, the text of the titles are usually white against a dark background being just a colour on the location, low key lighting is used through out to create fear and a dark mood, there is usually only one location this keeps the pace slow and classical music is usually used to keep the mood dark and eary.

Camera Practice

As a group we were given the oppetunity to gain experience with cameras. We were given a task each to film different angles such as; high angles and low angles. Different shots; long shots, extreme long shots, mid shots, close ups, extreme close ups. Views; birds eye view, worms eye view. Movements; panning, tilting and zooming. This task allowed us to get comfortable with the cameras and tri-pods however a little more experience is needed before actual filming.

BBFC

What is BBFC?
BBFC stands for British Board of Film Clasification, it has been around since 1912, they are a non-goverment organisation in which classify cinema films then videos since passing the Video Recording Acts in 1984.
Although BBFC have alot of power of classification of films there are council members who occasionally over rule the choices made by the BBFC.

15 Certificate
Suitable for only 15 years and over, no one younger may see a 15 rated film or rent or buy a 15 rated film. There may be strong violence however the film is unlikely to have pain inflicting scenes and gory scenes. Vague sexual nudity is allowed and non-sexual nudity however strong sexual scenes are prohibited. It is unlikely that a 15 rated film will have constant use of the strongest language, however strong language may be used throughout the film. Dangerous behaviour like suicide and hanging is only allowed to be vague and weapons like guns are not allowed to be seen as glamourous. Minor horror is allowed like a threat however if it is sexual it is prohibited. Drug use can be included in the film however not promoted or glamourised. No discrimination will be acceptable this means language and behaviour.

18 Certificate
No one younger than 18 may see, rent or buy an 18 rated film. When a film is at certificate it can show almost anything, however the film can be banned in some cases such as; if the film is on the breach of criminal law and has commited a criminal offence whilst making the film. Serious violence or sexual violence, serious drug use, if these aspects can affect the viewer or their morals then the film could be at risk of banning.

There is also a certificate called R18, this is mostly seen in USA, this is mostly used for pornographic films, films rated R18 can only be shown in specially licensed cinemas and sold in licensed sex shops to no one under the age of 18.

To produce this post I used the BBFC official website; http://www.bbfc.co.uk/general/index.php

My survey

This is a link to the survey I am conducting as part of my research into the thriller genre;
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=Om_2fEa2GbiO6tZV2e_2f1la9A_3d_3d

The results
42 people took my survey, I would rather have had more however not many people chose to respond.
Firstly majority of those who took my survey were female and between the ages of 16-20. I think this is a good age range to target as it is our age range allowing us to think of what we would want in a thriller as well as those who are older.
Majority of people watched films weekly which proves that majority of those who took the survey could be experienced viewers who know what they want and what they expect. However the majorities favourite genre is romance although the next highest is thriller which means that some may not what many thrillers but hopefully they can still give good advice.
Thankfully majority prefer films of the 15 certificate, I think this is good because I want our film to aim to be this certificate as I have not watched many 18 certificate films and I do not know much about them.

Most said "suspense" "action" "mystery" "crime" "an exciting twist" "horror" to this question. "For AS Media I am researching the thriller genre, in you own opinion what is a thriller genre?" I think this gives me a good idea of what to put into our thriller film to make it appealing to the audience.
Majority expect action and intensity in a thriller film as well as a gripping story line and murder.

Over all the survey has been a success in helping me with the start of planning my thriller, I think the target audiences will be young adults from the age of 16 maybe to about 25. My thriller has to include suspense and intensity and perhaps a murder but in this murder I have to be careful because too much detail could put the rating up to an 18 certificate which would effect the target audience.