The group has created a promotional package for their thriller/drama film titled "Offline" that includes a trailer, magazine cover, and film poster. The story follows Abigail, a 22-year-old university student who accepts a friend request from a mysterious man named Marcus on social media. After being stood up on two dates, Abigail realizes she is being stalked. She discovers Marcus is actually Tyler, a boy from her past who has become obsessively fixated on her. The package includes details on the characters, settings, and generic conventions employed to create tension and suspense. Feedback from test audiences noted improvements needed for the magazine cover to better match the film poster and promotional materials.

1. Pitch Presentation- Offline
BY FATIMA MOHAMED, ELAY RAHMANY AND SALMA EL-SAYED

2. Brief
 Our group decided to produce a thriller/drama promotional package which includes a trailer, magazine cover and
film poster. All ancillary texts surround the concept of thriller/drama and they are the medium that will be used to
promote our thriller/drama product ‘Offline’.
 Storyline- Abigail, a studious warm hearted 22-year-old loving girl, in her final year of university decides to head back home and relax
during her winter break. She receives a friend request from a stranger. Marcus. After accepting Marcus’s friend request, their conversations
turned intimate as Abigail starts to develop feelings for Marcus. His personality was the cherry on top of the cake due to his good looks.
Abigail eager to meet up with Marcus convinces him to meet her at a coffee shop for a date. After long hours, Marcus reluctantly agrees to
the coffee date. However, Marcus did not turn up. Abigail has been ‘stood up’ or so she thought. Whilst gazing dolefully out the coffee shop
window, she notices a man in dark mysterious clothing openly staring at her. After sincere apologies from Marcus, his excuse of being with
his terminally ill sister which prevented him from turning up to the date. This reassured Abigail and she decided to meet up with him again, but
this time in a park. Similar to the last date, there was a no show from Marcus. On the other hand, Abigail recognises the mysterious man that
was staring at her outside the coffee shop. Once more, the mysterious man has his eyes fixed on Abigail. Abigail paranoid, realises that she
is being followed. In a fight or flight situation, her instinct tells her to run. She finds herself entering an eerie alley way, trying to hide from the
mysterious man. She calls her best friend Amanda and heads straight to her house. Amanda attempting to calm Abigail down by persuading
her to try a bag of cocaine. Without much thought of the drug, Abigail abandons the bag of cocaine into her coat pocket. Due to the
heteromorphic events, Abigail is afraid that Marcus might not be who he claims himself to be. In order to find out, Abigail confronts him. After
disputing with Marcus, he finally reveals who he really is; a boy from her past, once upon a time an outcast called Tyler, isolated and
victimised. She was his saviour and that had imprinted on him since secondary school. Manically obsessed with Abigail, Tyler frantically starts
following her. With too much too stress to handle, Abigail surrenders to the drugs that she was given by Amanda and overdoses.

3. Brief Continued…
 Characters- We have 4 main characters in our film and their names are Abigail- the protagonist
and she is the victim in this case because she is being horribly stalked/harassed, Marcus- the man
she meets over the internet but is Tyler in real life (he’s catfishing her), Amanda- the Protagonist's
friend and Tyler- the antagonise who keeps stalking Abigail. We wanted to follow the basic codes and
convention of a thriller/drama genre by having a goodie and a badie.
 Setting- The film will be shot is different places such as her bedroom, a coffee shop, the park and an
alleyway and lastly at her friends house.

4. Generic conventions of Thriller/Drama
 The genre for the film Offline is thriller/drama. This means that our film has lots of dramatic scenes where
the atmosphere is very tense. There are also thrilling bits in the film where the audience anticipate what's
going to happen next in the film. The normal codes and convention of a thriller/drama genre is the main
character and the antagonist character have a dispute and its very dramatic, we are trying to involve this
in our film Offline, where the prodigious Abigail and the antagonise Tyler speak on the phone.
Furthermore, Thriller/Drama Codes and conventions involve:
 lots of tense music,
 diegetic sound of breathing and montage of shots in a fast pace.
 Low key lighting Quick cuts Shadows Changes in the angle of shots
 Black and white shots Protagonist is in the mercy of the Antagonist
 Mobile phones, alcohol and drugs
What makes a Thriller/drama different from all other genres is due to its specific genre conventions that allows
the tension to rise and drop and intrigue the audience and draws them in.

5. Generic Conventions
The generic conventions of our thriller/drama film is filled with:
 High rising tension
 Violence
 Protagonist
 Antagonise
 Isolated dangerous setting
 Drugs
 Low key lighting
 Tense music
 Shadows

6. Initial ideas

7. Audience
research
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19Emo0CFGD
U#t=31
0.21
From reading the storyline, he picks up on a moral
message of 'the consequences of social media and
staying safe'. He finds it weird, maybe its because
the storyline is very one-sided (as it doesn't show
the positives of social media). However, he
understood the impacts of social media depends on
the person using it (how they use it.) "There are
good people using it and there are bad people using
it."
When we asked the question about what he
would change, he said that it was a little to
dark.

8. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6X7FeA
nEzvA#t=89
1.20
His opinion of what makes a good opening sequence is by far the
most helpful response out of the other interviewees. He
suggested the idea of showing a computer screen that says
hello/how as a first opening shot. It correlates with the whole
social media aspect (Facebook) of the storyline, "sums up what
your film is about." We will be ensuring the social media aspect
by featuring the computer screen in the trailer.

9. Target audience - Demographic
 We have chosen our target audience to be 18 and above to 45 due to our film rating and
the violence and foul language that we have in our film. We got to the final decision after
we interviewed a couple of people.

10. Target audience - demographic
 We have decided to target male and females because we want to break away from the codes and
conventions of a thriller/drama genre where male are normally the target audience. We believe that
this will help us generate more profit for our film.

11. Target audience - demographic
 Our target audience are middle class because we believe that they will be able to afford our film price.
Furthermore, we also believe that people who are upper class can also afford our film but we are
targeting middle class people who consist of young adults and working class people.

12. Target audience - demographic
 We are targeting people in the UK because we are funded by independent film companies and
can not afford to play it in other countries.

13. Target audience – psychographics and
summary
 Due to the film being based on a thriller/drama background the demographic we are targeting are male and
female aged 18 and over. The reason that we chose male and female in our demographic is because we
believe that they could enjoy the suspense and there is no essence of blood and gore so the female wouldn’t
have to feel squeamish. Although males are stereotypically known to watch thriller type of films we have
decided to break that convention and target female’s audience as well. The reason we rated our film 18+ is
because our film has essence of drugs (hard drugs) and it has to follow the guidelines that are set by the
BBFC. Furthermore, the psychographic target of our film are the mainstreamers and quirkies, since
thriller/drama genres are the new craze and we believe that it would suite their taste.

14. Treatment 1st Draft
Our first draft had too much descriptive writing which a lot of people
did not like. They thought a story line should not bee to informative
and that it should only have the basic important information that
would help people understand the initial film idea. We also change
our film name from Never ending to Offline because people thought
that Offline would suite our thriller/drama genre based film and
would be better linked with the internet/technology theme.

15. Final Treatment- Unique selling point
This is our final treatment. We had shortened it to fit in to about 300
words and had edited out many words. We have also now have actual
actors for our cast list and have got pictures of them instead of
celebrities. The reason that our treatment and film idea would have a
unique selling point is because its based around a true story and
people generally like films that are based around true stories.
Furthermore, we have young attractive actors/actresses and this
attracts in lots of people because they are good looking. We also have
people from different ethnicity involved in our film. We also shooting
our film in urban well known area so most of the audience can relate
with the film and its location. Our last most important selling point is
the fact that many people are catfished so they can relate to the film
very well and would more likely watch the film.

16. Story board
We tried to make our story
board colourful and
professional. We also tried to
make our story board as
descriptive as we can with the
setting, camera movement,
camera shot. We also talked
about audio with in our film and
how we would incorporate the
audio. We would add extra
sound affects to build up the
tension in our trailer/film.

17. Music
 The first track I had chosen is called Iron Man from the copyright free music website called audio network. This
track is very fast paced and would suit well with our film trailer because it sounds daunting and exciting at the same
time and it would suit the codes and conventions of a thriller/drama film genre.
 The second music track that I had chosen is called Eliminated from the same copyright free music website that i
had mentioned in the top paragraph. The reason that i had chosen this track is because it starts of slow and very
sinister and as the track continues it builds up the atmosphere. This track would be suitable for the film trailer
because in the middle of our film trailer is where we want to build up the tension and this track is perfect for it.
 The third and final track I chose is called Secret Lives from a website called audio network. The reason i have
chosen this track is because it starts out really slow then the tempo increases and builds up the tension that the
audience would feel if. Furthermore, this track would suite the thriller and drama genre of the film trailer that we are
making. I chose this to be the final track that I had chosen from the three track that i had. The reason that I chose it
is because it would suite our film trailer with a slow calm/scary beginning to an action packed middle that builds up
tension and atmosphere. This would help the audience enjoy the trailer more because the atmosphere is high and
low not the same.

18. Audio
I have also downloaded a audio of heartbeat
incising which we can use when Abigail is running
away from the stalker Tyler. This would be
beneficial because it would help increase the
tension of our film/trailer and it also follows the
codes and conventions of a thriller/drama film
genre.
Furthermore, we will recorded the fast breathing
audio our self as a voice over because the ones on
the internet seem to superficial and would not suite
our characters style of breathing.

19. Cast list
Abigail Tyler/Marcus Amanda
The people we chose for our
cast are people we thought
would fit in on our character
descriptions. We believed that
an innocent blond girl would fit
the description of Abigail. We
also believed that Tyler/Marcus
would be a tall, rough looking
antagonist and would fit our idea
of Tyler. Some of them also
have acting skills and that
benefits our production and
increase our film quality.

20. Abigail
 Abigail is the main character of our film/trailer. The whole stalker story revolves
around her. She is a 20 year old university girl who goes home for the winter
break and is trying to have some fun during the holidays. She is a girl with blond
hair, Caucasian skin and brown or blue eyes. We want the actor who is playing
Abigail to look innocent because in our mind Abigail has always seemed innocent.
Our actor can wear any casual clothes that’s in fashion now, we really don’t mind,
we just want her to look casual and fit in. Her motive in our film/trailer is to have
fun during the holiday and she starts that on by logging back in to her Facebook
because of all the spare/free time she has. That’s where she meets Marcus and
also where the trouble starts.

21. Tyler (pretending to be Marcus)
 Tyler is also one of the main characters in our film/trailer. He's a young 20 year old
who lives with his parents and is unemployed. He’s Abigail's past and has not
really moved forward since leaving sixth form. He’s a tall, rough looking, chocolate
coloured boy with black hair and brown eyes. He also wears casual clothes but
his reason on wearing casual clothes is due to the fact that he wants to blend in
and not get noticed. He's a quite guy who's had a violent upbringing and horrible
school life. The horrible school experience had put him off the whole concept of
university and education. His only hope has always been Abigail and his fixed his
trance on her when she came back home for the holidays. He motive in this
film/trailer is to get the girl in ‘Any way necessary’ which involves cat-fishing and
stalking.

22. Amanda
 Amanda is Abigail’s best friend who is also 20 years old. She is also on her winter
holiday from university and loves spending her time partying. She is Caucasian
with brown hair and brown eyes. She takes pride in her appearance and likes to
keep in touch with the latest's trend and fashion. She's a really outgoing girls and
plans to introduce Abigail to her favourite hobbies which is partying. Due to her
increase of partying she now has connections with people who supply drugs and
she uses the drugs to have fun. Abigail does not have a huge part in the
film/trailer but she is still important to the film/trailer. She is the one who influences
Abigail to take drugs.

23. Risk Assessment

24. Risk Level of risk Possible hazards Solutions
Filming equipment’s
(Video recorder,
microphone, Tripod
and camera)
Losing the school’s
expensive filming
equipment’s on our
journey.
Dropping the
equipment where the
screen could smash or
break the equipment.
As part of the crew, we will all double
check that our equipment is safe with us.
But to take extra cautions, we will write
the school address and put it inside the
equipment bags to be found.
The crew will take extra care when
handling the equipment and we will
follow the instruction sheet about using
the equipment’s i.e. we will detach the
camera to the tripod when adjusting or
moving the tripod.

31. Ancillary task
For our ancillary text we aimed to produce a magazine cover and film poster for our thriller/drama film.
 We had made the film poster sketch which includes an eye with the main character inside the pupil. This highlights
the stalker that is watching her and how she is soul to his life i.e eyes are the windows to the soul. We also made
the title of the film curve with the eyes so that it matches and does not look odd. The site for the questionnaire
results is:
 As you can see from the graphs most of the people we asked did like our film poster but most had criticism over our
magazine cover. They said that our magazine cover has to match the film poster so that the similarity can be
distinguished and people can relate the film poster to the magazine cover. Furthermore, many people wanted to
change some features of the film poster such as; making the title more bold so that it stands out from the page,
making the eye bigger and adding more characters from the film in to the film poster and improving the magazine
cover.
 Most of the people we asked thought that the priority should be making the magazine cover and the film poster
similar. Everyone who had answer out questionnaire had said that they would watch our trailer based on the
magazine cover and the film poster, this gave us some hope because even though people criticised our magazine
cover they still would watch the trailer.
http://www.polljunkie.com/poll/bozias/questionnaire/view

32. Graph for film poster and magazine.

33. Our magazine cover and film poster
Our film poster - It stands out with
the eye and the main character in
the pupil of the eye. Its very bold
and links with the whole concept of
stalkers, how they watch your every
move.
Our magazine cover has images of
the two main characters facing each
other, like a face off. This is quite
effective because everyone can see
the tension that exists between the
two characters.

34. Elay

35. Distribution
IFC films is the chosen company to distribute the movie ‘Offline’. It’s
parent company is the AMC network. Although IFC films is an American
company (based in New york), it has boost the success of British films
such as Chalet girl, Fish tank and Hunger. Hunger in which managed to
win the title Best film in the British Independent Film Awards 2008. Thus,
there’d be a high chance of Offline in winning an award.
In addition, the genre of Fish tank is Drama and their target audience are
teens and young adults. Both similar to Offline. Therefore, by knowing
that IFC films have distributed similar films to Offline, IFC films would
seem like a trustworthy company to guarantee the success of Offline.
Since Offline is an independent film, it will hugely benefit from IFC films
as they primarily focus on distributing independent films. With their
expertise in majoring independent films, Offline would prosper in the
hands of IFC films.
The formation of IFC films started in 2000, till then, IFC films holds a
renowned status of being a leading U.S. distributor of independent film.
“Its unique distribution model makes independent
films available to a national audience by releasing
them in theaters as well as on cable’s Video On
Demand (VOD) platform, reaching nearly 50 million
homes.” -IFC website.
IFC films would ensure that Offline is to be viewed by a
large population as it access video demand and in iTunes,
Netflix, amazon prime and in the theatres for the public to
view. Thus, profits will be high.

36. Independent Production Company
 The independent production company
that we came up with is called
‘Innovation Studio’. The name is quite
unique because innovation means
making something so it ties up with the
whole idea of the film/trailer that we are
creating.