Planning Cimematography

Camera shots are important to include in a thriller film, as they help portray the narrative of the story and build suspense and tension to improve the viewing  experience for the audience. The shots demonstrate different aspects of a films setting. Characters and themes are displayed via the camera shots and are important for the directors as the shots display and lead the audience into what the directors want them to feel and experience emotionally.

4 Different Camera Shots
Close Up - A close up shot contains only one characters face and only a fairly small part of the scenes fills the screen. The use of this camera shot allows the audience to clearly see the character which helps them to feel empathy for the character. Our own thriller will use the close up camera shot a number of times, at the end of our opening scene when the male villain pulls a knife close to the young girl. We chose to use this camera shot because we felt that it was important for the audience to clearly see the emotions on the characters face, displaying stress and agony. This show will help make our thriller  conventional because it allows the audience to build a relationship with the character and feel sympathy and empathy towards her, which is something the audience would expect to see from a thriller.
Mid Shot -A mid shot shows the character in the shot from the waist-up, with some of the background on display. This shot helps the audience to see the characters more clearly and shows there interactions with the other characters. In our thriller film we will use the mid shot when our character is running through the forest, this is because the audience need to see where she is and see clearly she that she is running from danger. We also will use this shot when she is in the room and the male character walks in. This is because this shot will show everything of importance in the room, whilst still giving the audience an indication of the females emotions. Being able to see the location and emotions all in the same show is conventional to a thriller film because it helps the audience to understand the situation the character is in which helps them build empathy and a relationship with her.
Long shot - A long shot shows the landscape, therefore giving the audience a more specific idea of the setting and location, There may or may not be a character within this shot. In out film, the long shot will be used when our character is in the room to show her as little and weak.  We shows this shot because it will tell the audience exactly where she is, and how isolated her location is in which she cant escape from.
Deep focus- This uses photography techniques of depth of field which is the technique that shows one thing in the shot in focus, and the rest out of focus. In our thriller the deep focus will be used when the male and weak female are in the room. This will show the importance of the male civilian and how his psychological actions are effecting the girl and making her panic. Zooming in on the man will make him be seen to the audience as mentally unstable and to have hidden mental problems. This is conventional to a thriller film as it shows characters raw emotions and show to the audience there hidden intentions, which build up a relationship for the viewer.

The shots we are using in our thriller film are all conventional of the genre. We have included the shots which we think will effect the audience the most. Our target audience will be able to build a strong empathetic relation with the characters as they can feel sympathy for the weak female character who is held hostage (her emotions and angst shown my the close up, and the frantic running shown via the long shot). The target teenage audience will also feel scared of the villain and the enigma of the scene will be guessing his identity and why he feels the need to inflict pain this is shown using the deep focus to home in the mystery of his identity and show him as being dark and powerful.