Changes To Rough Cut

We made a rough cut for our thriller project so that we could look at it after the first edit and make changes to improve the final product. We showed our first rough cut to our teacher to see what he thought we can improve, we also reviewed our first cut as a group and planned possible changes that we thought that we should make.

Here is our Thriller Rough Cut:

Changes:

• Opening- there is a slight pause before Chloe opens the bathroom door. This can easily be rectified by cutting of a fraction of the clip so it begins when Chloe is moving rather than when she is still standing still.
• Add a close up shot of Chloe opening the door. This will have to be done when we film the ‘pick up’ shots as we do not have this footage at the moment, although this is a quick change that can be made.
• Flash back periods to be made longer. This is important as it will make it more obvious to the viewer that Chloe is having a flashback.
• The Use of titles and director names. We need to add in titles to the opening sequence as this is a convention of a film opening and we need to follow certain conventions in the opening.
• Cut the first flashback where Chloe is sitting on her bed and the lights mysteriously go out. We made a group decision to cut this first flashback out completely from the opening because we felt that it was an unnessesary section that was not aiding the plot in any way.
• Add in other noises over the top of the soundtrack. This will aid to the production as it will make the viewing more enjoyable and add to the thriller experience.
• Cut a few frames off of certain shots in the beginning of the sequence. Some shots are too long, to change this we will just drop a few frames off of some shots which will make the production flow better.
• Enhance Flashback. Add shots of random memories in between the flashbacks as this will make the flashback more believable, also make it clear that Chloe is having a flashback –  for example show her looking at the object that forces the flashback so the audience are aware that this is the trigger.
• Remove fade at 0.32. This fade was unintentional and is not needed as no time has passed between the two shots.
• At 0.42 add in jump cuts and zooms to speed up and also enhance viewing. This should create more tension for the viewer.
• Frame Chloe’s face at 0.45. We will need to re-film this part to create better framing of Chloe, this will allow the viewer to focus more on Chloe’s heavy breathing and therefore increase the fear.
• 0.48, remove Chloe’s first head turn. Chloe turns her head twice which makes the second time less effective.
• 0.55, speed up Chloe turning her head. This is important as we need to create a sense of urgency for the viewer which at the moment is not there as it is too slow.
• When Chloe turns off the radio, there should be complete silence as this will add to the editing through the absence of sound- will add suspense.
• Move Chloe’s shocked eyes to after she turns the radio off. Re-film to make an extreme close up.
• 1.16, remove taps. Here we break the 180 rule and also the shot is not needed as we already see Chloe washing her hands, it is insignificant.
• 1.17, cut out speech. Somebody is talking in the background of the shot, we need to cut this sound out from the thriller.
• 1.51 add close-ups. Here we should add in some close-ups of Chloe’s hands on the wall, Chloe’s hand in her hair etc, this will create a wider shot variety.
• 1.56, when Chloe gets into the bath her legs are jumpy, we will need to sort this out before our final edit.
• At the end, we need to turn up the volume of Chloe’s heartbeat. In the rough cut it is too quiet so we need to make it louder and more pronounced.
• Overall we need a wider range of shots- we need many more close-ups as at the moment most shots are mid shots so we need more variety.

These changes above will be made for our final cut as they will improve the project and make it more enjoyable for our target audience.

Editing Process/ Programs

To edit our Thriller Opening Sequence, the main program we used is Serif. This is because it is the only editing programme that everyone in the group is familiar with. However to create the titles we also used Sony Vegas 9, this encouraged us to use different effects that we aren’t able to use on Serif. The special effects offered by the programme helped us produce an effective title which ties in with the meaning of our title and storyline.

The main features of the program that we used is cut, fade, text, audio properties and pan and zoom. {Click picture to see larger.}

These properties helped us create the mise en scene we wanted which we weren’t able to create when filming. Also using these effects created new ideas for us, changing the perception of the film in some way, for example zooming into a part of the picture on screen helped emphasise the importance of it to the story.

Being able to add sound to the film increased the atmosphere. Sam created a soundtrack which added the extra ambiance to increase the obviousness of the genre. On serif we were able to cut the soundtrack when needed, also to change the volume on parts of the film where the sound wasn’t needed. Finally we were also able to mute the soundtrack when organising the other sound included in our film for example; sound effects and the diegetic music from the radio.

Thriller Shooting Experience

In preperation for filming our Opening Thriller Sequence, we arranged a date that all group members could attend. The way in which we organized ourselves varied in different ways:

• Risk Assesment: First of all, we decided on different risk assesments that we would take into account when flming. As a group, we discussed what risks we would have to think about and we wrote them down and put the ideas onto our blogs. Our risk assesment ensured we would be safe during the process of our shooting experience.
• Costumes: We discussed what costumes we would need for the characters in the Thriller. We assigned each person with an item of clothing to bring with them on the day of filming. We also made sure we had back-up costumes prepared just incase there was a problem with the costumes.
• Props: In terms of props, we worked out everything i already had at home as this was the setting we used for filming. We wrote down everything that i didn’t have, within the group each person bought different items we were using for the props.
• Setting: We had decided that we would be using my house as the setting, as my bathroom was very minimalistic and this was what we needed for the setting. We made sure that my house was ready for use for the filming. 
• Storyboard: We made sure our StoryBoard was planned out perfectly and that our whole group agreed on the shots we would be using.

During filming, we faced a few problems:

• Our actress was late as she had other commitments. The way in which we solved this problem was we decided to plan what order we would film and set up the background, so it was ready when she arrived.
• One of our camera’s ran out of battery so we had to waste time waiting for it to charge. If we’d of planned it better we should of made sure they were both charged.

Apart from a few little things that went wrong, the majority of the filming went really well.