Storyboard

A storyboard is used to organise a motion picture or animation. Each shot is included within each scene in the correct order which displays illustrations or images that represent a character or object. A storyboard allows a motion picture or animation to be pre visualised before the animatic and rough cut is made. 

Here is our groups storyboard. This is where we have roughly planned out or 5 minute film, shot by shot, showing the positioning of characters and the locations that they are in. This will not be an exact representation of our final product but we are going to use it as a guideline so that we do not miss out any crucial shots and so our narrative is clear. 

storyboard new by

Props List

Here are our chosen props for within the film.

Props Research

We have used prezi to present our props research.

The following post will be our final props list containing the prop with he scene and character.

Costume Research

We have been researching a great deal of things for this project, and in this post we will be displaying what we have learned about costumes within thriller shorts.

Somewhat surprisingly, there doesn't seem to be any special types of costume worn in thriller films. Almost always, the characters will be wearing plain everyday clothing, no brands, no overly bright colours, etc. However, this is deliberate. The reason being that in a thriller, the on-screen action is fast paced and very important to the completion of the plot. Therefore, the director's do not want anything to distract from said action - so the costumes should be as bland/non-interesting as possible. This can be seen in the screenshots below:

Evan Treborn (The Butterfly Effect)


















Kale Brecht (Disturbia)




James Dalton (Road House)

These shots support my point that the on-screen action in thrillers is much more important than the character development (encompassing costumes). Costume is not something intended to be focused on, hence the unremarkable features of them.

FOR OUR FILM:

Despite Hollywood conventions, we are choosing at least somewhat specific costumes for our characters, purely for the fact we believe them to be relevant for our short. The drunken MAN who assaults our protagonist, Penny, will be wearing dark clothes, to signify him as being a shady and villainous character. In contrast, Penny will be wearing lighter coloured clothes or school uniform, to signify innocence and vulnerability. Examples are posted below.

Dark clothes

School clothes

We have also had to explore the use of colour within our film. As we know, different colours can connote different emotions and foreshadow the character itself. For example the colour red, can connote danger but also lust and even strength. We may include the colour red in Penny's costume to foreshadow danger. However, the colours black and white are binary opposites and would help us exemplify the theme religion to represent heaven and hell, good and evil. For example, in present day Penny could be wearing lighter clothes to show she is asking for forgiveness for her sins and suggest that she is the angel from the film title " Angel Born in Hell." In the flashbacks however, we may use black and red, to suggest danger and evil. 

Location research

For our film we only need a handful of locations. these are a church, a hospital, a house and a long wooded path.

Here we will compare the locations that we have chosen with similar locations in existing products. We have created a key frame document to exemplify our chosen locations. Then below are a few examples of similar locations used in existing films. 

Church 

This location is usually shown in horror and thriller films, and is usually set at night and probably with low lying fog which makes the whole place more creepy. The low lit areas also suggest the dark, thriller themed location and suggest a sense of mystery and the gravestones suggest hiding places for the villain within the story. 

Outside (1,2,3,7)

For our film we wanted a church that had the conventions of a thriller film, this means that we wanted a church with not too many wide open areas and we wanted a graveyard with a lot of graves, this will give it more of a thriller look but it will also foreshadow the fact that our protagonist kills her father.

Inside (4,5,6)

The interior of the Church, is grand and open with high lit areas around the large windows. However, we will be able to manipulate the light within the location because there are multiple lights within the church also. 
We want a church that has a lot of light, this is so it will show forgiveness. The wide open areas will also mean that the film will move away from the idea of repression.

Hospital (8)

This location makes you instantly think of bad news, and this is the message that we are trying to get across to the audience when they see the establishing shot.
We needed a hospital that looked like a  traditional hospital.  The hospital is a place of heeling which is the opposite t the church which is also seen by some people as a place of healing.

Wooded Path (9)

This shows a path covered by dead trees. It suggest that the subject that would walk along the path is suppressed and can not escape. Our photograph is similar to this, relating our film with the conventions of a thriller.
This is a location that is also associated with thrillers. The low key lit areas suggest darkness and the connotations that comes with the word "dark." 

Script

We have used Final Draft AV to write our script. It includes the scene in which the dialogue takes place and which character the dialogue belongs to. We have also included a rough idea of how the lines should be said- also known as stage directions. This script will be used when making the animatic and the final cut.

Script 1