The document summarizes the student's process in creating a 2-minute opening title sequence for a horror thriller film. The student researched conventions of the genre to understand typical elements like title display times. Their initial title design used a red effect but they changed it to be more mysterious based on research. They learned animation techniques in After Effects. While their establishing shot initially broke conventions by using a close-up, research helped them structure the sequence better by sticking to genre norms.

1. Title Sequence Evaluation
“Dinner For Two”
By Prentice Johnson

2. In what way does your media product use, develop
or change the conventions of a real media product?
To create my final 2 minute opening I have had to develop, changed the conventions but also
used many in order to create my horror thriller. To achieve the desired out come I have had
to research other thrillers to fully understand the codes and conventions of a thriller and its
many sub-genres so I can use the key concepts that are incorporated in a thriller which
therefore has greatly helped me and my group to create my final piece and link in to the
standards of existing media products.
I started of by researching what a thriller was and by researching by analysing openings with the
help from my group looking at Camera, Editing, Sound and Mise-en-scene to help our group
understand the generic conventions for a Horror Thriller. We found the title of the producer
is usually shown for around 2-5 seconds and the films title around 4-8 seconds. The back
grounds a Horror Thriller is usually always black with a relatively bold text. For our first title
sequence we used a red blood like effect to symbolizes the danger and foreshadows the
future events. We then didn’t use this as our research shows that for a Horror Thriller that its
usually got more of a sense of mystery to it and is plain with tension building, strung
instruments in the audio layer. Our producers name was shown for 4 seconds and being
shown first keeping to the conventions of our genre and our title of the movie for 8 seconds,
this is to the longer side of the average but with the text animations and music it doesn't
completely brake the conventions and is clearly seen as a Horror Thriller opening.

3. From our research it was possible to make our titles more effective and use
professional looking animations on after effects. We were able to understand the
pace and genre of our thriller very clearly and I was happy with the turn out of our
titles as I kept to the conventions of a Horror Thriller. Some conventions we
developed thus breaking them but it helped us fit it in with our narrative
effectively.
We also found out, from our research, that most thrillers go straight into action or
even start at the end with the establishing shot usually being a slow zoom. This is
how we initially got our establishing shot, by finding this research it helped us
build structure by sticking to the conventions of the genre and allowed our
opening to flow smoothly. Although we decided to challenge this by using an
extreme close up and slowly zoom out using jump cuts throughout with slow
paced frames to build up tension to who our protagonist is.
In what way does your media product use, develop
or change the conventions of a real media product?

4. How does your media product represent particular
social groups?
From our previous research we had a good understanding of what race, gender, age and class we
wanted. Both of our actors must be young white adults ,preferably British and middle class.
The reason for this being was for the audience to be able to relate to the characteristics,
personalities and actions. Although as we where choosing gender it had to be more
structured. We needed the male to look stronger than the female and not quite as wealthy
with a mysterious look where as the female must be innocent looked and quite wealthy with
the mise en scene of her house to also emphasis this to represent her upper class social
group to clear show a binary opposition.
To further show this opposition we decided to incorporate parallel editing, with this we could
clearly represent the different characteristic stereotypically associated with the two genders
as the antagonist was elegantly getting ready in her large white bedroom with an on suite
where this is juxtaposed in the protagonist who is setting up a dark dirty looking room to be
used to hold some one hostage in.

5. What kind of media institution might distribute
your media product and why?
Our film would be distributed through a company much like Lions Gate Entertainment/Summit
Entertainment, Dimension Films, Hammer Film Productions or a institution with similar
presets of films distributed through them. These types of producers/distributers are
Hollywood studio film producers and have produced films like Sinister, Halloween II, Woman
in black and many other well known Horror Thrillers.
From our group research we found our that are target audience should be (15). Many of the
Horror thrillers above are (15) and so where many we researched and analysed. What we
found out you may see in a (15) rated film: strong violence and strong language, sexual
activity and/or strong verbal references to sex, discriminatory language or behavior ,drug
taking. As we where planning to incorporate many of these this was are chosen age rating,
many of the media institutions above produce and distribute this age rating of films.
I personally believe these types of media institutions would be the perfect companies to
distribute our film. From looking at many institutions I believe Summit Entertainment/Lions
Gate Entertainment would be the perfect media institution for our film.

6. Who would be the audience for your media
product?
From my questionnaire, it helped us display the average age
group that enjoyed thrillers. It was the 15-17 year olds.
Luckily this is the age we wanted as from previous research I
saw that the difference between 15 and 18 is that 15 is a bit
more restricted. This would work in our favour to create a
sense of mystery.
Here we could also see that from
The 15-17 year olds, the
Horror Thriller Subgenre was the
personal favorite for this age group
and this helped create our target
audience
From the results of the survey I was very happy as our target audience
was what we wanted. The Majority of them where 15-17 which helps us create
structure from our film.
Most of this audience where male. Personally I think both males and females would have an
Interest in our film ‘dinner for two’ and it includes both genres as the main characters and the
Protagonist was Inspired by the film 'The Perfect Host’ which was aimed at both males and females.

7. How did you attract and address your audience?
where you engaged in our title sequence?would you carry on watching our film?
The way we attracted in our audience was by creating a sense of Mystery. We did this by starting it at the
end and concealing the Kid nippers' face to keep the audience guessing. For further engagement we used
the mise-en-scene and sound in a particular way.
For mise-en-scene we dressed the male in stereotypical hoody and bottoms for setting up the room but
Made him wear smart casual wear during the scene where he asks her for dinner. The femal we dressed in
With a necklace showing her upper class symbolizing a seductive high class women. There for the audience
Feeling attracted to her and has an immediate connection to her.
The ominous music also helped us attract the target audience and it is very sinister and come on with harsh
sounds when danger is shown to build up tension.
100% of the people wanted to carry on watching
This is an amazing result shows how keeping
It realistic draws in and engages them.
Here almost everyone said yes.
We had one anomaly showing at some
Point one of the people felt as if they
Were loosing interest but the higher
Percentage where engaged.

8. What have you learnt about technologies of the
process of constructing your product
At the start I had very basic camera skills and had a good understanding of after effects and final
cut pro, when editing we had to use adobe premiere but the titles we were able to make on
after effects, luckily premiere isnt too different from premiere and It didn’t take too long to
know where all the levels where and how to access the tools which I showed my group.
After doing this me and my group could edit confidently with no assistants. I am very stable with
editing and correcting the level in colour and audio but I still find some camera work hard.
I understand the 180 degree rule in detail and now understand what angles works and what
doesn’t during a convocation. I knew how to use the tripod from previous experience but its
just getting the correct angle was hard, gee helped me with some of this and what to keep in
mind when shooting and now I feel more confident and creative when filming but still is
room for improvement.
I made sure to keep a copy on my memory stick so I could colour correct and make sure the clip
was not over exposed due to poor lighting and the cameras settings.
Overall the process of making our product I have gained new knowledge on camera work from
my peers and teachers and also have self learned a few basic text animations on premiere
but find after effects better for the animation side, I also learned timing is key and the sound
must fit and run along side the film perfectly making sure dips in sound whether its up or
down must be adjusted to where it compliments the clip and works with it to create
meaning.

9. Looking back on your preliminary task, what do you
feel that you have learnt from the progression of it
to the full product?
Looking back on the original preliminary task I can see the main elements gained from is the
planning and research, they are essential in success of the final piece, how ever the planning
was only helpful after the research of what is a thriller and what makes a good horror thriller
and what the codes and conventions of the film has to abide by. When we were planning to
shoot, it started with us doing many spider diagrams and shortlists which then took shape
into us forming the storyboard, which we changed about 3 times as the shots didn’t have
continuity with the music when they where put together, this could have been avoided by
having an animatic.
Continued research and readings have especially helped me in what shots to use and how
meaning is created more so through the camera than the person, I found out I have to
consider carefully what distance, angle to the sound and mise-en-scene have to all be linked
in together and carefully created which they was not at first leading us to change and
develop our idea.
Overall I can see that the research enabled us to produce a final piece that is shown as a horror
thriller using the correct generic conventions that are used in existing media productions
today that engage and draw in the audience of this particular genre.