Background Music- This technique is used in the film ‘Into the Wild’ (2007) by Sean Penn to affect and create emotion amongst the audience during the scene. The background music is very soft and slow melody music. This type of background music is only two instruments playing only a couple of slow notes which drag on. This has been used to make the scene seem sad and emotional with a repeating soft tone. The effectiveness of the background music is to bring out your emotions and so you start to feel and experience just what the main character and his sister is going through. Also the soft melody makes you think more about the character and his life; you begin to want to know more because you are feeling sadness inside because you’re not sure on his outcome. Without background music you would not feel those sad emotions that the filmmakers want you to experience, otherwise the audience may not feel as if they are part of the story and may not think that it is an important part in the scene which talks about the main character. The impact on the audience from the background music is that they feel the characters emotions and thoughts because with the soft music running through your head you think about the film more and what’s happening. The audience is also able to concentrate more on the scene because their emotions are fixed on allowing them to be able to relate to the issues being stated by the voiceover.
Natural Light- This technique is used in the film ‘Into the Wild’ (2007) by Sean Penn to avoid heavy shadowing which causes the audience to not see the characters face and also can create a flat appearance in the shot. Natural light is used to increase visual appearance through the scene, allowing the audience to clearly see the character and the environmental backgrounds and attractions which the main actor travels through during this scene. The element of natural light has also been used to portray emotion, like the sky really light and blue with puffy white clouds or the dull and grey light in this rocky mountain. The natural light has also been used while the main character walks in the dark; the natural light comes from the lamp posts and shines on him allowing him and his actions to be seen clearly. The effectiveness of natural light gives an impression of hope, freedom and sadness. Like when the main character is climbing down the waterfall into a half cave area the light fades but when he looks into the distance the light shines brightly as it seems to have done mostly throughout the scene. Natural light also draws the main attention towards the moving object which in this case is the main character because during the scene he is being spoken about. The impact on the audience through natural light is they are able to fully experience the wonderful and vast environments that the main character goes through. This also allows the audience to see emotions and gestures clearly as well light also represents happiness. So even through sadness the audience can still experience happiness. This can be seen when the main character (Christopher) is by a lake throwing rocks in, the light is strong representing his freedom which the audience is able to see.
Panning- This technique is used in the film ‘Into the Wild’ (2007) by Sean Penn to swivel the camera slow or fast to give a sweeping view of an area or place. Panning is used to make a shot less boring and make a shot more interesting by giving the viewer more to see and showing more of an area in one shot. Panning is also used to flow with the pace of the scene by taking a small area and making it longer in a shot. The element of panning has been used as a follow technique as the main character walks across the vast countryside. We see panning being used to show the audience the large environments as the main character walks on. It has also been used as a flow between shots allowing for shots to fade in slowly and easily. This is shown when we notice the main characters family pictures, we see close up panning first to the right, then fading into panning to the left. This is a great use of panning during the scene as it is not too slow or fast, just nice and smooth keeping pace with the speaking and the cutting between shots. The effectiveness of panning is to drag out a shot as long as possible, like the waterfall shot, the camera pans from high to low then back across showing every inch and detail of the environment. The panning is mainly slow because it’s going with the music and how fast the speaking is. Panning also helps to create emotion in the audience by taking an awesome shot and seeing how long you can make that shot last and that emotion last. An example of this is when Christopher is walking down in this open cave with the river flowing, the panning moves around a lot as if to make the experience feel longer and with the voiceover, light and background music all connecting means that panning holds the audiences emotions longer.
Background Noise- This technique is used in the film ‘Into the Wild’ (2007) by Sean Penn to create atmosphere in the scene and to let the audience know what kind of area the character is at. For example when Christopher is burying his books, a train passes by which tells the audience that he is near a railway, otherwise if no train passes the audience has no idea where he is and it just becomes a random part in the film. This element has been used to show the audience what is happening in the background of each shot and also allows the audience to know where the character is and the location/ environment in which the characters are placed. An example of this is when Christopher is by a lake and you can hear the bird’s chirping and the buzzing of bugs then the splash of water as he throws a rock. This all lets the audience know what season it is, most likely summer and his location which is somewhere in the forest. This element has also been used to make the audience feel as if they are in that environment themselves because everywhere you go there is always background noise, like cars driving by in town or cicadas buzzing loudly in the bush. The effectiveness of background noise is also to capture the audiences emotions like happiness, I mean if you hear cars in the background during a shot of a lake and bush it kind of defeats the purpose because then the audience could change moods. Also in the half cave we hear the waterfall gushing down and the soft flow of water going downstream in a quiet tone, not overpowering the speaker. This creates relaxing feelings so you are able to understand clearly what is being spoken and the audience does not become distracted.
Depth of Field- This technique is used in the film ‘Into the Wild’ (2007) by Sean Penn to make an object in the front or back of a shot in focus and the rest out of focus. This is only used very quickly in a shot but can be switched multiple times in a shot between characters to give either suspense or to make a shot more interesting. This element has been used so the audience focuses on the main character rather than the background, which could be a distraction. For example when Christopher is swinging between these poles at night, the pole is in focus and Chris is out of focus. This technique has been used as a guide for our eye, our eye always focuses on the in focus image first but with the main character moving we look in that direction. This has also been used as an effect to show the main characters mind wandering. The effectiveness of this element is to show a sense of mystery and suspense in the shots of the scene. It shows suspense and mystery because when we first see a shot with this technique being used all we see is part of the shot out of focus, whether the character, or for example when we see the main characters family photos the shot start off out of focus but quickly becomes in focus. This is done to portray what Christopher’s life uses to be like; by using that in/out focus technique we get suspense which captures the audience’s attention. The impact on the audience is keeping them focused on the story and the main character. If everything is in shot and in focus then we tend to look at everything first and then come back to a characters conversation. Our minds wander so keeping an audience’s attention can be difficult unless you use the depth of field technique to show important parts of a scene.
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