Skills Audit: Live Type and Sound Track Pro

To make our thriller opening look professional we were shown how to use Live type, a program on macs which enables you to create very effective tittles using different fonts, backgrounds and special effects. It helped us a lot to have the tutorial as there is such a variety of things which you can do on this program. The thing I especially liked about Live Type was it's clear laid out manor and the ability to manipulate the text.

We were also shown how to use Sound Track pro another programme on the mac which enables you to create music from a wide range of beats and different instruments or special effect sounds.

Intro to Cameras/health and safety tutorial

Before we could use the cameras it was necessary that we learnt how to properly handle them and all the things we could utilise to get the best film possible.
After learning all the different buttons, such as how to turn the camera on, and an excellent feature called 'Quick Review' which enables you to quickly view what you have just recorded, and all the menu buttons.

We were then shown how to properly insert the memory cards into slot A and B and how to transfer memory storage between the two.

Then we were shown the basic functions of the camera, such as zoom, how to focus etc.

Once we ad become familiar with the camera we were shown how to correctly attach it to the tripod and how to move the camera while there, also how to correctly and safely de-attach the camera from the tripod.

Skills Audit: Editing, sountrack and titles

After we had filmed our clips for the our thriller opening we moved onto editing the clips by using final cut pro. While editing we played around with many effects to see if it would look right or go with our film sub-genre.

It was not an easy task as we all had different ideas and different sort of styles we wanted to do to make the thriller opening as professiional as possible.

In the end we edited the thriller opening to a reasonable standard to which we all agreed on.

After we did that we used soundtrack pro to create a very eerie and mysterious music to go with our thriller opening. At first we played around with the sound trying to see which one's would fit to our sub-genre. While we were sorting out the soundtrack we decided do the tile using live type. We created our title by using different styles and putting them together, the title was the hardest part as we could not find a design that would go with our thriller opening.

Below is an screengrab of the title of the thriller on live type.

Skills audit - Editing, titles and soundtrack

After filming we then spent days editing our film, we did this using final cut,by now we were comfortable with final cut as we had used it twice before however somethings were new to us, for example the effects we could apply such as rewind, and cross dissolve which merged two images together.

Also we has to add titles this is a shot of us in the process of making a title:

It took a long time as we could not agree on the right effect or style of font but luckily we eventually did, we decided to use a simple font and medium shaped letters to make the titles more mysterious and less eye catching so the eye was not drawn away from the film. Soundtrack was hard to use at first however after a while i eased into it, we decided to go for loud noised mixed with subtle ones for example with the soft eerie piano sound playing with the loud scraping noise.

Technical Audit of Bait Tutorial

In todays lesson we experienced using Bait for the first time. We were given a set of short video clips, which were out of sequence and were asked to cut, and rearrange them into the right order, while also adding sound and titles, using Final Cut, Live type, and Soundtrack Pro.


This will help us greatly when it comes to editing our thriller opening as we have already experienced editing with guide from a proffesional.

Pitch for Final Cut.

This is the pitch for our film "Final Cut" there are many differences between the pitch and the piece of work we have created as we had many restrictions however the core ideas are present in both.

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In today's lesson we learnt how to use final cut pro for the first time. We were given some clipls to put into a sequence. I found it quite challenging as we had to do this without sound.
Although i struggled with this task which is understanding as it was my first time uusinf final cut, i knew that it would be helpful/an introductiion to what we are going to use when we come to making our final task which is the thriller opening.

News and Current Events

Model fights for life after bus horror

A model was left fighting for life after being dragged for 500 yards under a bus. Latishia Brazier, 23, has punctured lungs, fractured ribs and a broken neck. She was in hospital last night after skin grafts, still too ill to speak. The shocked driver of the double-decker has been suspended while the bus firm and police investigate.

Thousands of bikers in Afghanistan war veterans tribute

Thousands of bikers ride through Wootton Bassett yesterday to raise £75,000 for Afghanistan war veterans. Up to 15,000 motorcyclists, who donated at least £5 each to the charity Afghan Heroes, paraded through the Wiltshire town, famous for the emotional tributes it pays to fallen heroes when they return to the UK. Biker Colin Ainsworth, 62, who travelled from Derby, said: "It's crucial we show our support for our soldiers in Afghanistan."Today's also a chance to thank the people of Wootton Bassett because they attend the repatriations on behalf of us all."

David Beckham's Achilles injury in Italy to surgery in Finland

David Beckham's World Cup dream came to a sudden end last night while playing for AC Milan against Chievo. During the game 'Becks' greatly damaged his Achilles tendon and required a stretcher to get off the pitch. After being checked over my medical staff he flew to Finland for surgery to correct his injury, although he will not playing for England in the Cup.

Thriller Sub Genres

So what is a Thriller, how can it be defined?

Many people find it difficult to distinguish where the line is drawn between a thriller and a horror, and the line is pretty thin.

The term thriller refers to a film which is full of suspense, often with mini cliff hangers throughout which are added to engage and entice the audience. Also, thrillers tend to leave the audience scared or uncomfortable in some way.

The genre that is 'Thriller' is also very versatile, here are some examples of Thriller Sub genres:

-Horror/Thriller

-Psychological Thriller

-Action Thriller

-Religious Thriller

-Political Thriller

-Comedy Thriller

and many more.

Skills Audit Live type pro + Soundtrack

In this lesson we were taught how to use live type which allows us to create and add credits and titles to the match cut excersize, the bag swap and our title sequences. First you simply typed something into the box then chose a font, size and Colour . Then you could choose effects such as fade and barrel jump in order to make the text more exciting. It was also possible to move letters around and resize individual letters. In addition it was possible to insert backgrounds for example smoke.





We were also introduced to Soundtrack this allows us to incoporate sounds into our footage and allows us to create our own soundtracks as it would be illegal to use copyrighted music. There are lots of sounds to choose from, sounds can also be played at the same time. In addition the sounds are split up into lots of genres, so it is easy to find the kind of music/sounds you need.

Intro into Cameras & Health and Safety Tutorial.


In order for us to begin filming, we had a tutorial

where we were shown how to operate the camera
in order for us to use it safely. The tutorial showed
us how to insert and remove a memory card and
battery safely,how to focus the camera and how to
playback video footage etc. They also told us that
the camera must be protected from rain as this could
damage the camera. In addition we were informed
that in order to borrow a camera we had to fill in a
yellow slip with our details about locations etc which
has to be signed by our teacher, as well as giving the
technicians one of our Media cards.

We also learnt how to place the camera safely

on a tripod by locking it in place to prevent it
from falling. We also practised using the handle
on the tripod which allows us to angle the camera
and pan more smoothly.

Bait Tutorial

Today we were taught how to use Final Cut which is the programme which allows us to edit footage which we will use to edit our title sequence when it is created. To edit we had to first choose the clip we wanted to use, we then watch the clip and put an in and out point, to choose however much of the clip we wanted. After that we dragged the footage with the in and out point to the bottom. We then continued the process so that all the clips built up into one long piece of footage that flowed easily.




I found this lesson hard, as it was difficult to make the footage flow effortlessly like it does in films and tv. After a while it became slightly easier as i got more practise. If the file became unrendered it was very frustrating as we could not carry on and had to render the file this could take up to 5 mins. However the bait tutorial was very important as we are going to need to use it a lot when editing footage.

Intro to Camera & Health and Safety Tutorial

Before we were allowed to go out and start filming we had to have a lesson to introduce us on how to use the camera. We were shown how to put the battery in; how to put the memory cards in; how to turn it on and off; how to record, pause and stop recording and also taught how to look at what you have filmed.

We were also taught how to place the camera on the tripod. We were shown how to lock the camera securley so it does not fall off while we were folming. prior to this we were told not to use the camera in bad weather conditions as it could damage the camera and therefore we will end up paying around £3000 to replace it.

Skills Audit: livetype and sountrack pro

In this lesson we were taught how to use sountrack and livetype pro. With soundtrack we were shown how to use this in order to produce our own music as it is illegal to use music produced by other people.
we were shown hoe to get the diffrent types of music for example 'classical and jazz'. we were also shown how to get different sounds like screams etc.

Livetype is used to add credits and titles to our filming.

For livetype we were showm how to change the font, colour and of course where to write it so it appears on a bigger slide.
We were also shown how to add different textures and effects to make it look more professional. Some of the effects that were there was 'fade and barallel jump'.

Thriller Opening Storyboard

Skills Audit: Filming and editing preliminary match-cut exercise

The Bag Exchange

Preliminary Match Cut Exercise

Technical Audit of Bait Tutorial