The document discusses conventions used in the psychological thriller genre that are incorporated into the student's media project. It summarizes specific shots, techniques, settings, and characters commonly seen in psychological thrillers that are present in the student's film plot and trailer. These include changes in personality of the main character, use of close-up shots, quick cuts, over-the-shoulder shots, eerie music and sound, and scenes set in suburban areas involving spirits/ghosts. The student analyzes how their media product challenges conventions by adding elements of drama and hyperlink cinema through interconnected plots and characters.

1. Media evaluation
Question 1
Alex Tannatt Cook

2. In what way does your media product
use, develop or challenge forms and
conventions of real media products?

3. Plot
Our products genre is a psychological thriller where the storyline is about a photographer who
finds an old camera on a photo-shoot and when he finishes his shoot he decides to use it for the
first time. Attached to each shot that is taken by this camera is a spirit that is trying to get out and
as the photographer takes more and more photos using that camera the spirit gets closer and
closer to the lens. The photographer has his own developing studio where after using the
camera on a few separate occasions as as he goes to develop his first set of photos when
looking over the images he notices that there is someone else in every shot that has been taken
by the photographer. As he looks through the photos he sees that the spirit passes his model
that is in the images then moves towards the camera. He then stops looking and goes home to
tell his girlfriend is shock of what he has seen. When telling his girlfriend she doesn’t believe him
and thinks that he is crazy. He then has to try and prove to his girlfriend and others that he is not
making it up. Whilst trying to prove this he discovers that this spirit that has been affecting him is
the spirit of the person that he killed as a young adult.

4. Conventions
Suburban / remote areas
Middle class
White male/female
Confused character (unbalanced mental state)
Change in personality
Low lighting (create fear/tension)
Music genre (creepy/disturbing or silence)
Spirits/Ghosts/Stalkers
Specific shots (-over the shoulder-extreme close ups)
• Suburban / remote areas
• Middle class
• White male/female
• Confused character (unbalanced mental
state)
• Change in personality
• Low lighting (create fear/tension)
• Music genre (creepy/disturbing or
silence)(sound)
• Spirits/Ghosts/Stalkers
• Specific shots (-over the shoulder-extreme
close ups)
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
yes
yes
Out of the conventions that I have looked at when doing my research on psychological
thrillers these were the top conventions that came up when is came to my genre. Out of the
9 that I have put down our film follows 8 of them and this therefore shows that out film fits
the category and genre that we have chosen. The only one that we do not meet is the one
about being (Middle class) which we did not feel linked to our film because the photographer
that we are using lives in a small flat with his girlfriend.
Psychological thriller is a specific sub-genre of the broad range thriller and horror genre’s.
However, it often incorporates elements from the mystery and drama genre, in addition to
the typical traits of the thriller genre.

5. Change in personality
One of the conventions that we have used is strongly in our film is the (change in personality) where we have
shown footage from the photographer’s home, when he is trying to explain to his girlfriend about what he has
just seen in the camera that he found on a shoot and how what he has seen is not normal. The girlfriend
doesn’t believe him so he starts to get annoyed and from that on you can notice how his character changes
and how he then doesn’t feel like he has anyone that he needs to tell about what he is seeing and just
decides to explore it on his own.
The change in his personality has been altered after the seeing the spirit and his girlfriend then not believing
what he has seen. e then starts to become inconsiderate, self obsessed and detached from the rest of the
world. This is a strong change to before where he was a creative , caring and understanding.
Our trailer has element of psychological thriller and also an element od drama. This element of drama is not
common in the type of film that we targeted. But the use of this added another dimension to our film and
therefor has added another type of audience that could be attracted to our film. With this included in our film it
allows another storyline to be played through our film with the interest of the audience also being drawn
toward that struggle of the relationship between the photography and his girlfriend. This adds a term called
hyperlink cinema to our film. This means that when plots and characters of the film cross over in different
characters and ends up being linked in places that you wouldn't’t expects.

6. Specific shots / techniques
The specific shots that have been used as part of the conventions of psychological thrillers are
over the shoulder shots that show what the person is looking at and give the viewer and
understanding of what is seen in the eyes of the character. Another shot that is commonly used
is the extreme close up that would either be of the characters face or hand to show either the
emotion or the nerves of the character in that specific moment in time.
A technique that is commonly used in these genre of film and other genres of film that surround it
is quick cuts and fast paced editing. I took this technique from Donnie Darko where the quick
cuts where used to add to the pace of the buildup of the power that he had. I am using this
technique for the finding of the old camera which is the turning point in our trailer. This is always
effective because is increases the speed and tension in the film. A lot of this is featured in trailer
to ramp up the tension for example these three shot were all quickly cut so that it built up tension
and suspense to set the tone for the next clip which is a slow panning shot of the spirits face
mixed in with some trees.

7. Specific shots / techniques
Another that we used a lot in our film is the over – the – shoulder shot which is a conventional
shot that is used in our genre of film and most films that are shot to show activity's or multiple
characters our was used when we had Sean (photographer) taking photographs of the model. I
took this shot from Black Swan when the main dancer and dance teacher where talking about
and practicing the dance, this shot allowed me as the viewer to see both characters views and
what the dance is about. I will be using it to film what both the the photographer and model see.
This shot allows the viewer to get the view of the photographer, camera and model as well, this
shot allows the viewer to get an overall understanding for the situation and setting. The shot on
the right isn’t a traditional over the shoulder shot it has been done slightly to the right of the
shoulder which we decided to use so that we could capture the two characters and the
photography equipment. As this was at the beginning of the trailer we needed to use it to set the
tone of the trailer and show the viewer that the photographer is a professional by showing the
equipment that he has at his disposal to confirm to the viewer that it is a a professional situation.

8. Specific shots / techniques
These two shots that we have used here have been put into my film to add effect and give the
viewer something to read and mentally engage with. Both of these quotes are quite strong and
would put a certain thought into the head of the viewers. It also sets a tone for for the trailer and
gives the other scenes more powerful and makes the rest of the scenes more relatable. The
simplicity of the shot also breaks up the trailer and helps put time in between scenes and build
up tension with the time gap and quotes. The use of the quotes where based off of the trailer for
The Butterfly Effect where they have small quotes in between scenes to add impact. The only
differences from the ones in the Trailer is the ours are done in the same font as our film title and
we obviously used quotes that were relevant to our film.

9. Specific shots / techniques
These are the final shots from my film where we have decided to film the differently to the rest of
the film because we wanted to be able to separate the this short scene from the rest of the
scenes. We did this using a different cinematic screen as seen on the right image. We also used
a feature where we where able to lower the quality of the of the film to try and give off an
impression of a first person view from the character that is unfortunate enough to come into
contact with him. We purposely didn’t show the face or voice of the character so that we didn’t
give away the identity of the person who came in contact with him. My inspiration for this shot
was from paranormal activity where they filmed all the scenes with a camera at first hand. In
Paranormal Activity they use this technique to bring the audience closer to the action of the film.

10. Music genre / Sound
A convention that is often used in psychological thrillers is high tension music or spooky music. Some parts of the films
can also go the complete opposite end of the spectrum and have silence or a small bit of nervous dialog. It is the use
of techniques like this that can make that audience tense and sit on the edge of there seat.
Music is usually used to be able to add to the understanding between that character and the setting or situation that
he/she is currently in. This links well to our film because through out our trailer we used and eerie soundtrack with voice
over so that the viewer can understand what the genre of film could be before they even see any sort of visuals from
the film. The combination of diegetic and non diegetic sound has strengthened the understanding of the viewer when it
comes to them watching our trailer.
A specific technique that we have used in our film is the use of a voice over from our main character (Sean Sturrock)
who is talking about the spirit that he has seen. He is describing what he has seen in detail and given the audience and
idea of what he is being stalked by.

11. Music genre / Sound
In the final scene of my trailer we decided to cut all the non-diegetic sound and just leave in the
sounds of the characters heavy breathing and the surprise in his voice when he sees that he has
come into contact with the spirit. The extremely heavy breathing shows the audience that the
character involved is scared. During this scene we also had diegetic sound which was the
opening of the door which we made sure was included because the shots themselves are very
dark and hard to work out what the setting is. The door allows the viewer to create an idea in
their head of what the setting is like and each viewer has a different idea in there head.