When teenagers star in films, it is quite often that they have the sterotype representation. In films teenagers are usually the ones who are causing trouble, caos and haning around the streets, just because this is what the teenage generation are expected to be like. In my opening sequence, I wanted my characters to look like normal teenagers, ones who do not cause trouble but just usual teenagers you seen on a day to day basis.
I did not want them to have the sterotype representation because that wasn't want I wanted to opening sequence to be about. To get this image for my characters, it was important on what costumes they wore and what they looked like. To do this, I looked at myself and others around me, and observed how they dress and how they acted. Many people I saw dressed casually, so I thought this was a good way to go and kept it simple. My characters wore very basic clothes such as plain T-shirts, jeans, Converse trainers and jackets, I chose these costumes because these are the type of clothes that I see teenagers around me wear, so by doing this I was keeping a true representation and realistic appearance. It was also a good way to show what time period that the film was set in as the clothes they were wearing were quite modern, so it looks like a new film.
The first picture is of a character from Paranormal Activitiy 4 and on the second is a image from my opening sequence, 'The Following'. The first image is a teenage girl from Paranormal Activity 4, as you can see she is just wearing basic clothing, just like i described earlier on. I chose this image because firstly I thought it was relevant to take an image from another horror film, and secondly I thought it was a very appropraite image because it shows the same representation of a normal teenager, just like I wanted. I also thought that choosing this character to compare with my characters was suitable as they play similar roles in their films, in paranormal activity, this girl plays the character that is being chased by the demon and is trying to get away, which is very similar to the roles that my characters play.
The costumes in this image and the ones I chose for my opening sequence are very similar, they are both wearing basic tops with a jacket over the top, and normal jeans. Another similarity is that neither the characters in my opening sequence or the girl from Paranormal Activity are wearing lots of make-up, this is good because then they would older than the characters they are playing and would not suit the teenage role as well.
The only difference is that the character from Paranormal Activity is wearing her hair up, where the characters in my opening sequence are wearing their hair down, however, it is still very obvious that she is an ordinary teenage girl.
In our preliminary task, the main focus was on the continuity of the sequence and making sure that we got the right shots to be able to edit it together in a way which flowed and wasn't jumpy. As of this reason, there wasnt a very big variety of shots included in the sequence, it was quite simple and basic. However, in our opening sequence, we were very keen to make it quick and choppy with lots of different shots but still have a good flow. 
To create the opening sequence that we wanted, we used the skills we learnt from when we made our preliminary task and advanced them and used them to help us achieve the same continuity at a better level throughout our opening sequence. Our opening sequence is made up of lots of different shots such as close ups, long shots, high angle and low angle shots. All of these shots work well together because it creates an interesting flow and gives the opening sequence a quick, fast pace.
In our preliminary task, we used a the match on action skill, this is what creates continuity and makes the viwer think that something happens all in one take and the character only does the action once. When really it is made up of lots of different shots taken in different angles and edited together to look like one movement. Since we had dialogue in our preliminary task, we used the 180 degree rule. This is where we used an imaginary line, and the camera had to stay on the same side of the line, we just moved the angle in which it was facing to film different shots. This was used so the characters conversation flowed well and kept the characters eyeline match so it looks realistic. We also used the 180 degree rule in our opening sequence so it looked like the characters were always running in the same direction.
When it came to editing our opening sequence, we had to do similar things to what we did throughout editing the preliminary task and cut down the clips lots and make sure that they begin and end in the correct places so each clip flows into eachother well without it looking jumpy or unprofessional. For example, there is a shot in our opening sequence where the characters are being filmed running from a long shot and it goes to a close up of their feet, we had to make sure that the characters feet were in the same position in both clips so that it looked like it happened all in one movement, this is another example of the developement and improvement we have due to filming and editing our preliminary task.
To add interest to our opening sequence, we used background music which was slow and low beat and we also added voiceovers of the characters speaking throughout the sequence. I feel as this creates the tension and atmosphere of a thriller/horror film and I think that if we had added appropriate music to our preliminary task it would have made it much more interesting and exciting to watch.
I feel that from creating both our preliminary task and opening sequence that my filming and editing skills and greatly improved. We were able to use skills that we had learnt and apply them to our opening sequence which made it become a much higher standard of quality. I do not think that if we had not done the preliminary task, we wouldnt have thought about the framing, shots, composistion or location of filming as well as we had. I am very pleased with the outcome of the final cut of our opening sequence, I feel that it is successful and reflects what should be involved in a thriller/horror film very well.
