Student's opening sequence analysis - Anbish

From viewing at one of other student work, I have noticed some of the positives aspects that were implemented in the opening sequence of their chosen genre. For example, after looking few seconds of the opening sequence, I could immediately tell the genre of the opening scene was drama aimed at 13 – 18 teenagers. The hint that it gave way the genre was though the use of costumes, the choice of the characters and the settings. As you can see from the costumes worn by the characters were school uniform which signifies that it is aimed at teenagers and also it was set in school which connotes that the target audience are who goes to the school. This hooks the teenagers to keep on watching it, as it may have content that relates to them, such as school problems. Secondly, the props used in the opening sequences were nerd glasses, a book, a guitar and a lipstick. They were effective as it used Walter Lippmann’s theory of stereotypes. For example, glasses were used to portray the character as being a nerd who likes to study books. The stereotype helps to differentiate the character from each other and have different image in our head towards them. As soon as I saw a character wearing glasses I assumed that she must be intelligent and get straight A’s. Also, close up shot of eyes and lips were used which goes with the theory of Laura Mulvey of male glaze .The male glaze shows close up of a women’s body part to attract male audience as they might find it attractive. Various camera shots and movement were used which I really liked. For example, the opening sequences starts with a panning on axes at high angle. The panning was a creativity way of starting the opening scene and the fact that it was taken from a high angle, it gave the power to the viewers and the characters looked small and weak. Also when revealing the characters by tilting the camera up from legs to face made me curious who the character was. It was well edited as it had transition such as cut and fade which complimented the scene as it gave it more inside about the character. However, the opening sequence looked more like music video rather than opening sequence due to the fact it lacked in having an Ident and distribution companies at the beginning of the opening sequence. Also, the credit did not look professional as it did not have specified member such as Director, make-up artist ,producer and etc. They could have improved by adding voice over when the characters were being introduced and adding ident and the distribution company at the beginning of the opening sequence.


  2) The following clip's genre is also teen drama genre but it has other sub genres such as thriller. Variety of camera angle and shot types were used. Editing was effective done as they used cross cutting to build tension to show two scene happing at the same time. Again the costume were appropriate for the teen genre because the character wore costume what teenagers would normally wear e.g. jeans and converse. This suggests that the target audience are teenagers and also the characters were teenagers this helps the opening scene to be aimed at teens.Also, the non- diegestic of keyboard playing helped to create a mood of sadness which compliments the genre of the opening scene. However, the lighting was poor specially the shot that was taken at night. It was extremely dark which made it hard to see and know what was going on. Maybe they should have used different light in the dark or filmed it during the day time.The camera was not steady in some of the shots and as being a viewer it gave me a headache.They could have improved it by using a tripod. Finally ,they could have added shot reverse shot when the characters were having conversation .

Conclusion
In conclusion, All the mistake I found in those opening sequence will help me prevent mistakes they have done.Also, it helped me understand more about our genre and some of the positive aspects will be carried to our video.These analysis has helped me to extent my knowledge on how the music is used to create mood and changes the feeling of the audience. For example, keyboard playing may create a mood of melancholy. Also, I found out that props and costume are highly important and that they can be used to represent a character in a certain way. For example, big glasses may imply intelligent. Also, I have learnt that ident , distribution companies name should be in the beginning of the opening scene as it will make it look like a real movie opening.