Thriller - Storyboard

Oliver, Jonathan and I created the storyboard after we decided what the plot of our thriller was going to be. We spent quite a lot of time on the storyboard making sure that was accurate and easy to understand. As Jonathan is the best artist out of the group and is also taking art at AS we decided to let him to the drawings and writing for the storyboard so that it will look as good as possible. Me, Oliver and Jonathan all came up with ideas such as camera angles, editing techniques and sounds whilst creating the storyboard. Some of the ideas when it comes down to creating my thriller may be changed slightly in case they are too hard to do or we have found a better idea to do instead. We created the storyboard shot by shot so that it was easier for us to understand and clearer to look at. Each shot which has been included in the storyboard has little description next to it describing what is happening in the shot and it also says whether it is being filmed in colour or whether we are going to film it in black & white.



The first shot we decided on using is an extreme close up of the kettle being turned by the murderer which is followed by a mid shot of the victim slowly and carefully opening the gate. The next couple of shots are close ups and extreme close ups of which involve the murderer taking a mug in preparation for creating a cup of coffee for himself. The next shot show the victim walking towards to the house which is a low shot and this shot is followed by a close up of the gate slowly squeaking shut behind him. The next shot is an overhead shot of the coffee being placed and stirred in the coffee mug which then cuts to a side tracking shot of the victim walking closer and closer towards the house. This is similar to the side tracking shot used in the opening sequence of ‘The Silence of the lambs’. The next shot used is another over head close up shot of the coffee being stirred which then cuts to a close up of the victims face which allows the audience to see some of his facial expressions and the background. This then cuts back to a close up of the kettle being boiled which again cuts to an extreme close up of the victim’s face which shows his eyes and this shows the characters emotions and expressions. Another cut is then used which shows a close up of the murderer pouring boiling hot water from the kettle into the coffee mug. This is then followed by a tracking shot of the victim and the camera is following him from behind watching him getting closer and closer to the house, again this tracking shot is similar to a tracking shot used in the opening sequence of ‘The Silence of the Lambs’. This is then followed by an extreme close up of the milk being opened by the murderer. The shots used so far in this sequence which involve the murderer are shown in colour and the shots used so far which only involve the victim are shown in black & white to make it seem more like a thriller and also to create effect.




The next shot we decided to use is a mid shot which is a tracking shot which again is showing the character getting even closer to the house. This then cuts to a close up of the murderer slowly pouring milk into the coffee mug. This then again cuts back to the victim however this time a close up is used to show the victim opening another gate slowly which is followed by a long shot of the victim walking towards to front door. The long shot is used to show the characters appearance and also the setting of the scene which is followed by a mid shot showing the victim knocking on the door. This then quickly cuts to a close up of the murderer stirring his coffee and he immediately stops and beings to approach the door. This then cuts to an over the shoulder shot which is used to show the victim looking at the murderer and this cuts to a point of view shot from the victim looking closely at the murderer and the murderer says calmly “Hey, come on in, man.” This is the only dialogue used in the opening sequence because we didn’t want to reveal too much in the opening sequence. Again the shots used so far which only involve the murderer are in colour and the shots so far which only involve the victim are in black & white. The next shot we used is an extreme close up of the murderer licking his licks whilst looking at the victim. This shot shows the murderers facial expressions and emotions. The next shot is and editing technique we want to use where it cuts to black and this is used to show a short passage of time has passed. The next shot used is an establishing/long shot of the murderer drinking the cup of coffee he made and this shot shows the setting which then pans across from left to right to reveal more of the scene and a gun on the kitchen work top and this then cuts to a close up of the gun. A point of view shot is one of the final shots used, which shows the murderers point of view walking into the lounge slowly and looking at the victim’s dead body lying on the couch, this is a long shot because it shows the setting and also the character. This then cuts to a black screen and the title appears which is “HIRED HELP”.

Overall I believe that the storyboard is a good planning method and it has been very successful in helping me, Oliver and Jonathan develop our ideas for our thriller. This is because it has given us an idea of the camera angles, props and different editing techniques that we want to use in our thriller, which we can then develop further. However once it comes to filming our thriller we might have changed some of the ideas slightly to improve our thriller.



This is another mind map that me, Jonathan and Oliver created whilst planning our thriller to give us different ideas for the location, idea, plot and different camera shots that we could use for our thriller.