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

Our product research help us create ideas about how we wanted out media product to look like. We watched openings like Se7en and Cape Fear and they gave us an insight about the themes in the thriller genre; being unkown, uncertainity and fear. in out thriller, we used the same themes in order to create a mainstream thriller.

Special effects:

The special effects gives the overall product a very distorted atmosphere, it help links the shots together through cutaways in postproduction. The use of cutaways makes the dream look more realistic to make the audience think that the protaginist is having flashbacks. She has no control over her mind yet she is trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together as she is in shock.

We used a fast-pace edit and a glowed effect in order to precieve the view of her dreaming.



Setting:

The setting of the thriller, uses the conventions as, because from our product research, films like Donnie Darko, the setting of the film uses the protaginits house. This makes the film some what more distressing, as you don’t know what will be around the corner in your own home.We also used the protaginists house as our setting in order to make it more realistic, showing the daily routine of the protagonist. The settings within the house are the bedroom, the bathroom, hallway and kitchen. We gave these rooms quite an intense feel with the way we set up the lighting, for instance in the bedroom it has low lighting, with a slight glow to show the girl. Also in the bathroom, it was very white, harsh light, quite clinical, this is challenges the conventions as in thrillers they usually have very dull and dark lights.

The bedroom scene is dull ,but it has a slight glow from the lamp in order to let the audience see the protaginist and her expressions. 

The hallway scene has a normal atmosphere, yet the high angle creates fear. as the girl walks past the camera into the kitchen, it shows her as powerless and vulnerbale, not really knwoing whats going on. Also the high angle makes it feel like someone is watching her.

The flowers in the kitchen scene, symbolise purity and innocence of the girl, the happenings have caused her to become a strange character as we dont really know whats happening to her.

Character:

The character is a convention of the genre, the audience pity her as she has no idea what is going on in her mind. She sees the future in her dreams and then she comes back as if 

she has no recolectiona about her dream.

She is introduced to the audience, through a panning shot and is shown sleeping. It then cuts to her having a bad dream and we can see this through the use of cutaways and voiceovers. this uses the conventions because the opacity of the shots create fear and anxiety for the audience, because you cant really tell what is going on.

Throughout the introduction of the character, her identity is hidden for the majority of the shots. This is conventional of the thriller genre as they hide the identity of the person in order to make a much tense atmosphere for the audience and they dont really know who the person is.

Titles:
Our titles in our thriller use the conventions of the genre, for instance the title ‘precarious’ is revealed when the vase falls onto the floor. The letters smash at the same time the vase falls, they link together, showing the link of the title, precarious meaning unstable, the girls doesn’t have a lot of control over her mind, she feels insecure of what she will see, what her dreams will show her. The use of black, contrasts with the white floor, this is used in thrillers, as it is dull colours, nothing eye catching, but enough to notice. Black symbolising fear, white symbolising health.