After Effects

We used After Effects to create the titles and the company logo. This is the result:

We added movement in the logo, by using the position and the opacity control buttons which caused the lighting to fade in and out and move towards the center of the screen.

Music Creation: Garage Band

We created our own music by using Garage Band. We connected a small piano to the device we used and created the music by using the apps' facilities, by choosing from a diverse library of realistic amps and effects. The effect that was mainly used was Percussion, which matches more the nature of thriller as it can be quite intense and eerie. This is suggested to create tension and make the audience feel slightly uncomfortable. We have used two different layers which go all the way with the clip. One of them is a shaker which is pretty fast paced and matches the intensity of the event happening to the main character and her feelings at that point of the film.There is also a part when the music goes to complete silence when the girl stops for a second and looks up then the music slowly builds up again as she starts running. There are also certain points of the clip when a different kind of sound was needed and I added a different layer each time, but I did not add a great number of layers in order to match the simplicity of the rest of the video. All this process was made easier by using the Tranform Pad, Smart Control which allows you to morph and tweak sounds to your liking.

Editing On Final Cut Pro

After finished with Pre-production and Production of our opening , comes the Post Production. This is usually the trickiest part of creating a media product as it has a huge impact in the work after the video has been captured and finished filming. This is now the part when we edit our thriller opening, which can include adding graphics along with the images, music, colour, correlation and special effects.

Now getting to the actual thriller opening 'Manor Way' , we used the pro editor Final Cut Pro.

We used different a few filters in order for the shots to have similarity with each other. by giving them an even tone in colour and lighting. The effects used are dark in order to make this clip as mysterious as possible and to match the nature of a thriller, based on a thriller conventions. For the shots transitions we used fade, in order to make them smoother and more natural. To put the shots together we first had to edit some of them separately by using Live Trimming, so choosing the beginning and the ending of each shot by cutting out unnecessary parts. Then we added every single shot together in one single clip creating a compound clip. We used a slow motion effect at the end of the clip when the scissors drop in order to make it more dramatic and make the audience question the following event. We also added text at the end of the clip '7 days before', which means the opening shows the main event of the film which makes the audience very interested about the rest of the film. We kept the fonts simple ,as well as the rest of the clip in order to not confuse the audience and try to not lose focus of the main character.

Production Logo

Behind the Scenes

Lighting and Film Technique

Lighting is one of the most important elements in a film. When working with lighting the director's main intention is to give and effect through lighting in order to bring a specific meaning to the audience.

The different kinds of lighting setup are:

• Three point lighting- This technique consists in as KEY LIGHT , a FILL LIGHT and a BACKLIGHT. The key light aims directly at the subject highlighting his importance , and is usually lighter than the two others. The fill light usually aims opposite the key light in order to cut down shadows created by the key light. And lastly the backlight shines behind the subject in order to separate him from the background, enhancing the depth of shot.

• High Key Lighting- High key lighting is when the producers use a high proportion of FILL LIGHT to KEY LIGHT. This is usually used in comedies or musicals to enhance a sense of liveness or dramas to emphasise the intensity of the situation.

• Low Key Lighting- The low key lighting is more shadowy ,because of the low angle of the key light. This kind of lighting has become a convention for thriller, mystery and horrors.
  
  
  
• Back lighting- Back lighting is the process of illuminating the subject from the back, which means the lighting object and the viewer face each other with the subject in between. This creates a glowing effect on the edges of the subject, while other areas are darker. The back light can be natural or artificial light.
  
  
• Top lighting- This is when the upper areas of a subject are lit by a source generating from

         above it.

• Under lighting- This is the approach of lighting a subject
  from a point below the subjects in the scene. This is used to    create a spooky effect.

First attempt

These are a few images of getting the protagonist ready for filming:

The main idea was to get her to look bruised and hurt as she is trying to escape from the unknown threat.

Once everything was done that's our character's final look:

Lara was the one filming ,Ellie took care of the makeup and also helped with filming and I was acting.

However we ended up not filming because we were missing the memory card of the camera. We managed to find another memory card but it did not work. We left and went back another day and managed to finish with the filming.