Research and Planning
Opening sequences
What is an Opening Sequence ? (Google Definition)
"A title sequence (also called an opening sequence or intro) is the method by which films or television programs present their title, key production and cast members, utilizing conceptual visuals and sound."
An iconic example of this is the classic James Bond which uses cinematography, sound, editing and Mise en Scene to create an exciting and engaging which is typical in the 007 franchise.
Analysis of three Opening Sequences
The opening sequence begins with the famous marvel ident in order to ensure the audience knows is is a marvel film, which might excite its already pre sold audience. The sequence then brings up the main production companies associated with the film. it the moves on to a cartoon; animated sequence of the characters in the film, showing a brief image of each character using shots such as zooms and crediting each actor next to their character. this opening sequence is engaging and as it is animated it tells a part of the story and is almost like a small preview of the film before it starts. The small amount of the story being told makes the audience feel more engaged in the film and may be used in order to give small hints about action which occurs later on in the film. No movement or action shots are used in the opening in order to build more tension and excitement and the only moment in the scene is the camera. through this the film is able to engage its audience before the film has even begun and hint at different characters and events which may take place i the film. i feel as if it is a very effective opening sequence as it uses animation, which links to Marvels original form of comics, and makes the film feel more authentic and liked to the companys roots. it also engages the audience through its ident and animated image from the start and gives a rough idea about the film from the start swell as crediting its production companies.
we are initially presented with a closeup shot of a camera to quickly start the opening scene. Throughout the scene we can see that animation has been used to tell the story of two characters, which hints to the film itself. it gives us some backstory and context about the film and allows the viewers to understand the actually film and characters in more depth. a number of quick shot sequences are used to represent the passing of time and the variety in scenery keeps the audience interested and wanting to know more. No vocals are heard throughout the opening scene, only non diegetic sound in order to ad to the dramatic effect.the scene is used to get the audience more involved in the film. Medium and close up shots, with quick cuts are used to ensure the entire story can be told in a short space of time. The opening scene has a montage type of feeling as it is a series of clips and has been formed to show the passing of time and the effect people can have on your life and portrays a powerful story. The mise en scene is used to explore the mans emotions throughout the small montage of his life. No info is provided about any production companies allowing the opening scene to focus on the story.
quick film moves straight in to the first thing we are presented with in this opening sequence is the 20th Century Fox ident which advertises the production company straight away, and the LUCUSFILMS LIMITED production. The film is clearly represented as a a sci-fi film from the beginning through the rolling piece of text which is iconic to Star Wars. The rolling text is in a bold sans serif font giving is a more youthful and exciting look in a yellow colour which connotes possetivity and the future which links to the Sci-Fi genre, and the black background includes stars which also helps to link to the genre of the film. The opening sequence moves straight into the action aspect of the film, quick cuts are used to build tension as the action begins, and CGI is used to create the lasers which are shot. Special effects and typography are used to give the opening sequence a futuristic feel.
Thriller Opening sequence- Genre specific
Thriller- a genre of film which includes and exciting and gripping plot which is usualy based around crime or mystery.
Seven opening Sequence Analysis
Analysis:
Inception opening sequence analysis
Analysis:
Red Lights opening sequence analysis
Our Target Audience
- We are aiming our opening sequence towards an audience of around 16 years and up; so both teenagers and adults. we have decided this is a suitable age range as the story behind the sequence might be more complex due to its genre. thrillers usually include exciting and gripping plots which really get their audience involved in the film. Our target audience will include a relatively wide target audience including both adults and teenagers
Through the use of a questionnaire we have decided as a group that it would be a good idea to ask a group of people who are within our target audience questions as to what they want to be included within our opening sequence and the types of things they would expect to see in order to make the final product appealing to them.
Through the use of a questionnaire we have decided as a group that it would be a good idea to ask a group of people who are within our target audience questions as to what they want to be included within our opening sequence and the types of things they would expect to see in order to make the final product appealing to them.
Initial Questionnaire
This questionnaire was designed to ask a group of people questions which we thought were relevant and important to the production of our opening sequence. however after asking the people who answered the survey what they thought we found that they believed it should go into more depth and include several more questions, and after looking through our survey we agreed this would be important for the development of our production.
You-Gov Research
in
I have decided to look at the popular thriller 'Se7en'. I wanted to look into what typical audience member of the film may be. The film itself is part of the 'crime' Thriller genre and would relate to my chosen genre for my opening sequence. Interesting info:
Overall the website gave me a basic overview as to what a typical audience member for a film similar to mine would be like. It allows me to further understand the types of people who will be viewing my opening sequence and helps me to develop my ideas of things which i should include in the final opening sequence. After looking through a few profiles on the You Gov website based around things linked to my opening sequence's genre and style I was able to develop and improve some of the question included within my questionnaire so that i my understanding as to how it should be shot would be improved meaning my opening sequence may be influenced by what i have found out and what i am going to find out through my questionaire. |
Final Questionnaire & Feedback
Questionnaire Feedback
The information above is what we collected from our final survey. The information collected through this will ensure we create an opening sequence which will be appealing for our target audience and will help us create a opening sequence which our audience will enjoy.
Through this we found out that the most popular type of thriller which our target audience enjoyed was crime thrillers which 60% of our survey voted for. This was the majorly voted for over the other options such as Sci-Fi thrillers and Psychological thrillers etc. One important Question we asked was 'What would you expect in a thriller genre?'. From this we received answers including 'excitement', 'Fast' and some common words used were violence and jump scares. These will help us when creating our opening sequence as they give us things to think about when thinking about location,shots and mise en scene. From this feedback we have decided we need to include some form of suspence and fast passed cuts in order to give the sequence a type of on edge feel.
Another question included in our survey was about colour, we believed this was an important question and would really assist in our production as colour has a major effect on the audience and can completely change the way they view things. Through our feed back we found that 'red', 'black','blue' and 'grey' were colours our audience expected us to use. all these colours relate to the thriller genre for different reasons. Red usually conotes some form of danger, blue often represents mystery, grey is quite neutral and mysterious and black is usually perceived as dark and mysterious and we believe all these qualities link to our Thriller genre.
Overall i believe that from our questionnaire we have to maintain a fast passed feel with a sence of mystery and suspence. The sequence should have fast cuts and include most of the colours we were told would be expected to be used.
Through this we found out that the most popular type of thriller which our target audience enjoyed was crime thrillers which 60% of our survey voted for. This was the majorly voted for over the other options such as Sci-Fi thrillers and Psychological thrillers etc. One important Question we asked was 'What would you expect in a thriller genre?'. From this we received answers including 'excitement', 'Fast' and some common words used were violence and jump scares. These will help us when creating our opening sequence as they give us things to think about when thinking about location,shots and mise en scene. From this feedback we have decided we need to include some form of suspence and fast passed cuts in order to give the sequence a type of on edge feel.
Another question included in our survey was about colour, we believed this was an important question and would really assist in our production as colour has a major effect on the audience and can completely change the way they view things. Through our feed back we found that 'red', 'black','blue' and 'grey' were colours our audience expected us to use. all these colours relate to the thriller genre for different reasons. Red usually conotes some form of danger, blue often represents mystery, grey is quite neutral and mysterious and black is usually perceived as dark and mysterious and we believe all these qualities link to our Thriller genre.
Overall i believe that from our questionnaire we have to maintain a fast passed feel with a sence of mystery and suspence. The sequence should have fast cuts and include most of the colours we were told would be expected to be used.
Shooting Script
This is a video we created in order to discuss our shooting scrips and the reasons we made the decisions to shoot and produce the opening sequence we did.
Location Rece
In this video we discuss our locations for shooting and why we decided to shoot in certain locations.
Prop list
Initial Story Board
Animated Final Storyboard
Made using storyboaardchat.com
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This is the final version of our story board. we decided to draw up our story board on the computer as we thought it was a more creative way of presenting our story board in a more professional way. both colour and more detail are used in this version of the story board and it helps to represent the narrative of our opening sequence much more clearly. I believe this story board is much more effective than our initial one.
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Story board's Analysis
Through creating both versions of our story boards we were able to create a clear narrative for our opening sequence. this allowed us to understand where to start when filming and gave us a good idea s to which shot types we were going to use for each scene. The initial storyboard was simple and made by hand however this was just a basic outline for our narrative and was in scene a 'rough copy'. However after deciding on a closing shot we were able to move on to creating the animated version of our story board. This allowed us to really bring the sequence to life through the addition of colour and the extra detail which was added to the imagery. We were all happy with the outcome of our final storyboard.
Our Pitch
Casting
Ident research
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20th century fox is probably one of the most well known and globally recognised company Idents. The ident itself is very simple and consists of a simple panning shot however the whole animation is very well recognised due to its music which was composed in 1933 by Alfred Newman and has been used ever since by the company.
this is one of the most iconic company Idents and is recognised on a high scale and majority of people would recognize it in some way or another. |
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Warner bros is another globally recognised ident with their famous gold logo. The company was created and formed in 1923 and the ident itsself was created by Hal Geer.
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when initially discussing ideas for our ident it was challenging to come up with a design we all agreed fitd both our chosen genre and our opening sequence itself. After a long discussion and a few rough sketches we decided to call our company 'Innovative Productions'. We looked through YouTube at already existing dents which massively helped us and inspired us when creating our own ident. When creating our ident we decided to use Adobe After effects to create our animation as we thought is was relatively simple to use and we had a all had some previous experience using the software.
Our Ident+ company logo
After creating editing and finally creating our ident we were very pleased with the outcome. We felt that the movement of the logo and the grainy effect really fitted our company identity and fitted the genre of our aim itself. We created the ident using Adobe After effects and it took a long time due to the need to add key frames and move the positioning of the title in order to create the shaky effect and then it needed to be sped up to make it move at the speed it does. Overall we are pleased with the final product however e felt it could be improved by adding its own iconic music in the background of the animation in order to add to the effect and feel of the ident.
Company Logo
We chose to use the name Innovative Productions as the work Innovative is a word which means introducing new things or being original and we believe this is how we want our company to be seen and represented, as something 'original'.
Sound Track
Come Out and play- DesperateMeasurez
Murder of Crow - Ben Hansen
Seeking the Truth - Ryoko
Murder of Crow - Ben Hansen
Seeking the Truth - Ryoko