Opening Title Sequence 3

'Panic Room' Opening Title Sequence 

Columbia pictures presents this film and the producer is 'a hofflundapolone production' and an 'Inderlble picture'. Four actors are then listed:

• Jodie Foster
• Forest Whitaler
• Dervight Yoaleam
• Janen Leto

The title of the film 'Panic Room' is then stated. Each of the credits are written on the side of buildings almost like a billboard effect. The music behind this is very eerie and creates tension. There is not much action going on but different buildings this makes you want to carry on watching because you want to find out if these buildings have any conection to the story. When the title of the film appears it is much bigger then the others and sits in the middle of the air. This makes it more noticeable and striking.

The main roles in the film are then listed:

• Casting by Lary Mayfield
• Costume Desginer Michael koplan
• Msuic by Howard Shore
• Film Editors - James Haygood a.c.e and Angue Wall
• Produced by, Gabin Plone, Judy Hofflund, David koepp, Cean Chaffin
• Written by David Koepp
• Directer by David Finch

Opening Title Sequence 2

Opening title sequence of 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo'

The sequence starts with a blank screen and with music which sounds like someone tramping on drums. In white writing 'Columbia pictures and Metro Goldwyn-Mayer pictures presents' comes up first. We are then told that it is 'A Scot Rubin Yellow Bird production' and a 'David Fincher film' staring Deniel Graig and Rooney Mara. While this information is listed there is a dark background with what looks like either black ink or water. The music holds the same pattern throughout, this is good because it means the music does not distract from the rest of the sequence yet adds affect to the piece. The title is then shown after the main to staring actors and is shortly submerged by the water or ink.

More actors are then listed at this point. The action in the background is fairly graphic yet we can not quite see what is going on. There is not much colour, dark colours are used like blacks, greys and dark blues. At occasional point you see fire and at one point there the shape of what looks like a dragon coming out of the fire. This is significant because it links with the title. As the action does not really give any clues to what the story may be about we are inclined to watch more of the film to find out.

While this is happening after the actors have been listed we are told the other main roles in the film, such as:

• Casting by Laray Mayfield
• Costume Designer Trish Summerville
• Co-producers Berna Leunelle Crush
• Sound Desgin by Pen Klyce
• Editors - Kirk Baxter a.c.e and Angue Wall a.c.e
• Production design Donald Graham Burt
• Executive producers, Steven Zailian, Mikeal Wallen, Ani Faurbype Fernandez
• Produced by Scoot Rubin, Ole Sonderge, Soren Staermose, Cean Chaffin
• Director David Fincher

Opening Title Sequence 1

·Opening Title Sequence to Mean Girls

*Talking about the production details, and the story/action we get from watching the opening tittle sequence 

'Paramount Pictures presents' a 'Lorne Michaels production' staring 'Lindsay Lohan'. This opening title sequence before any of the action starts causes the audience to know the most important parts about the film. The director wants to audience to no who presents it, who the production is by and the main actor. The credits then launches into the film title 'MEAN GIRLS'. By Lindsay Lohan being the only actor named at this point gives the impression that her character is the main character and the whole film is focused around her. 

We are then set into the action - an extreme close up of a mother and a father talking down at someone, we expect this to be a young child. Lindsay playing 'Kady' in this film gives a small narration about her past life; she has been home schooled in Africa. The audience at this point get the impression that she is going to find it hard to settle in. We then see the school, yellow busses and the different'cliques' signifying that this is set in an American high school.

After a small amount of action allowing us to make judgements on the story line the credits of other actors appear again. These are introduced as she walks into the school seeing the different aspects of American high school. We know that already from her expression of the sights she sees that this is very different from her previous life. 

The opening title sequence is then closed by 'casting by Marci Liroff'. 

Semiotics

Semiotics:

Definition: the study of SIGNS

·      Examines how symbolic, written and technical signs construct meaning

·      Looks at how meaning is made and understood

Signifier & Signified

The signifier – the sign: a word, colour or images (i.e. The colour blue)

The signified – the concept/meaning/association that the sign refers to (i.e. BLUE is often associated with sadness or the sea ect)

Examples:

Signifier: red rose

Signifies: a symbol of passion and love – this is what the red rose represents

Signifier: Brown Rose

Signifiers: a symbol of religion, or it can be more specific this is a symbol of Christianity

Signifier: Heart

Signifies: a symbol of love and affection

With good signifiers you get the reaction you want out of the audience.

Mean texts ‘re-present’ the world to us

The media ‘mediates’ how we view the world and in many ways can dictate if we respond to types of ‘stereotypes’ of things in a positive or negative ways

Stereotypes – a stereotype is a simplified representation of a group of people normally based on one or two aspects of their character

Representation - Young people in hoodies are represented as wild, obnoxious, violent aggressive thugs.

However a picture taken from an advertisement for a PS3 game it is a media image therefore reinforces the stereotype.

Subverting Stereotypes – Media producers do not all construct lazy, simplistic representations that fit in with societies and the audiences existing misconceptions and prejudices.

Media texts can choose to present characters and events that challenge these ideas. These characters may subconsciously go against the stereotype, or just present a person as not being different to others.

DENOTATION LEVEL – what we actually see (the surface meaning)

CONNOTATIVE LEVEL – what you associate with this image (the deeper or hidden meanings and associations)

Our Prelim

Shooting the Preliminary Task

 We began by Adam our teacher giving us a storyboard and discussing potential ideas that would fit with the story board. After a discussion we came up with the idea thugs with spray paint. Mariella and Alexandra played the part of the two thugs. Mat the media technician gave the class a quick briefing on the best ways to shoot this sequence. We dressed them up in trakkies, hoodies and hats so the audience would know the stereotype and genre of the piece; we thought that these costumes would be a very good signifier for the modern day thugs. We were split into groups to do this task and followed the storyboard bellow:

We went into the studio and used the set that was available for us. We set up the camera in the right position and begun shooting. We did 5 different shots in 3 different positions and then at the end we did one panning shoot as an experiment as we had some time left. Our first shoot was the whole sequence in wide shot so we had four of the shots in one go but it is also a back up shot so we can go back to that shot at any point. Then we did two over the shoulder shots, one on the left and one on the right. We did an extreme close up shots on both sides so we see the reactions of the actor’s faces. These shoots are vital to bring the audience closer into the characters conversation and adds variation to the sequence. We then did an extreme close up of the spray paint can to create effect and to show the audience what is being passed between the characters. After all this was when we did the panning shoot to finish.

In our team we had:

Camera man – Me

Director – Louise SaintClare

Continuity girl, Assistant director – Toby Baring

Actors – Mariella Bailey and Alexandra Werner 

Preliminary Task Specification

Video

Preliminary exercise: Continuity task involving filming and editing a character opening a door, crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom she/he then exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue. This task should demonstrate match on action, shot/reverse shot and the 180-degree rule.

Main task: the titles and opening of a new fiction film, to last a maximum of two minutes.

All video and audio material must be original, produced by the candidate(s), with the exception of music or audio effects from a copyright-free source. Both preliminary and main tasks may be done individually or as a group. Maximum four members to a group.

Analysis of Sound in 'Kill Bill Vol 1'

:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxbpAoWtqjA

An eerie music sound is played from the beginning, this makes the audience feel anxious so we no something is going to happen. Suddenly we hear a loud banging. A loud squeaking scratching sound starts and we see a nail go into the wood. 

The sounds of the nail banging into the wood and the squeaking, squealy, scratching sound is carried on. Now we see the man in the box and we hear her breathing. This allows us to be able to hear her panic. When the nail is been fully nailed into the wood the squeaking sound is prolonged. This gives the effect that there is something coming to the end; perhaps her life. 

When the last nail goes into the coffin the screen goes blank and you can hear nothing but the groans and cries and the panic in her breathing. This is very effective and creates suspense. During this time of silence the audience are able to have time to think and wonder if she is going to get out and also allows us to fully understand her emotions. 

During this time where the screen is blank you can hear piles of soil being chucked on the lid of the coffin. This is very effective because we can not see what is going on but judging what is going by the sounds. The silence and the black screen makes creates suspense because we are sub-consciously waiting for the next sound of soil falling. At this point you also hear the piles of soil getting quieter and quieter as the pile gets higher.

At some point in near the end of the scene and light is apparent the music starts again we hear her frantically trying to get out and slowly give up as silence falls. 

2nd Camera Lesson

On our second camera lesson we went into the studio rooms once again but this time we were actually shooting sequences. A sequence is when you shoot the same scene over and over again but at different angles. Each time you re-shoot the scene you change the type of shot you use; a wide shot could be used to start with followed by an extreme close up and so on. Shooting a sequence enables you to edit the scene with a range of different shots. 

We had a team of 5, we spilt into the director, camera man, actor, consistence girl and finally the assistant or focus person. First, set up the white balance. We did this by holding up a white peace of paper and pressing the white balance button. Then the focus person stood in the set and the camera man would zoom into there eyes or a detailed part and focus the camera until the image was focused and sharp and then zoom back out, now the camera is in focus and ready to start shooting. Once we decided on a very simple scene and were ready to go the director would call 'stand by' and everyone would then called out 'standing by' to indicate that they were ready and everything was quite. Next the camera man would call out 'rolling' this means that the numbers on the camera had begun to turn and we were now filming. Once the scene was over the director would call 'cut' and at this point only the camera man would be able to stop filming. This process would be repeated over and over again at a wide range of shots. 

1st Camera Lesson

On Thursday 6th of September we went into the studio and got started. Matt, the media technician split us into 3 groups and handed us a tripod and a camera. First we got out the tripod so we had a safe place to put the camera. We set the tripod up by; 

• Putting the legs to the right hight
• Bubbling the tripod 
• Putting the handle on 

We then placed the camera onto the tripod and flicked the switch to lock it into the tripod to secure it. We then put the battery into the camera and switched it on. Matt then told us a number of things that needed to be checked and put into place before we got shooting. This consisted of;

• Setting up the white balance - This is done by zooming right into any surface that is white and pressing the white balance button. You do this to show the camera the colour white so the camera can work out all the other colours.
• Focusing - focusing is very important in any shot you shoot. We focused the camera by getting someone to stand in-front of the camera and zooming right into there eyes, this would appear blurry in the camera so we would then focus the lens and zoom out. Now the camera is fully focused.

The camera we used - SonyNX5 (a low grade professional camera)

Introduction to me...

Hello, My name is Eleanor Hemsley although I prefer to be called Ellie. 

I go to school at Hurtwood House. I am studying Media Studies, Photography and Art. I have never studied media studies before but have always had an interest in the media and creative side of things as you can probably tell though my A-Level choices... I enjoy watching films and going to the cinema. Already in my media classes I have learnt many things that are very new to me; I have learnt how to handle and set up a video camera and shoot a set of sequences. '
As a class we have looked at the previous years' thrillers, I found this very inspiring and I found myself wanting to get stuck in and shooting straight away. I am looking forward to the year ahead and creating our own title sequence of a thriller.