Evaluation Question 7

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?


I do think that my preliminary task wasn't the greatest media product ever to begin with so improving it wasn't hard, but we have come a long way. When i first turned on a mac i hadn't a clue how to use soundtrack pro, but now i can cut, edit and change the sound to how i see fit.


On the preliminary task camera angles and shots were always askew, and never accurate but now due to increase in practice and better understanding of rules to do with framing, we can create a professional looking film.


continuity was a huge downfall in the preliminary task(see below) we made sure this mistake didn't happen again.





Lighting techniques were extremely important in our film and we managed to use them effectively here is one technique i learnt.


I have learnt many things on this course;

• Learning to use new and upcoming technology like blogger, you tube or final cut, to easily and effectively create films and media products.
• Time managment is really important in media industries.
• Working together to get an awesome finished product!

Evaluation Question 6

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

To create our media product i had to use some really interesting and awesome new technologies. With these new technologies we can create media products much faster and efficiently.

Digital video cameras.

The use of digital video camera's is now a must in creating films, this is because before films had to be spliced and cut so careful and once something had been cut there was no going back. But when we created our film, we could move things about and try them in different places, add in new scenes and now store it on a hard disk. Some cameras now even come with internet connectivity so that films can be shot and instantly uploaded to the web.

Apple mac.

Apple macs are an excellent choice when it comes to film creation, because of less computability issues and better software than windows computers. However a lot of the software isn't third-party so there isn't as many options.

Final cut.

Final cut is the leading brand in all movie creation software, it can read almost any digital video camera, edit in HD, transitions, sound, brightness and contrast changing, animation, video splicing, cutting and cropping videos too. it is used in almost every film company to edit movies.

WEB 2.0

WEB 2.0 is the future creating media products, whether its uploading your films to youtube, sharing them with your friends on facebook or even sharing your projects and thoughts using Blogger or prezi, none of this would be possible without it. it helped me share my ideas and in fact easily and securly keep all my notes in one place.

Evaluation Question 5

How did you address/attract your target audience? 


In the pre production of the film and writing the plot, we found it quite easy to target our audience demographic mainly because, its us! Our audience is the same age as us and ideas were developed by us. I believe that to attract an audience you have to relate with them, below are some examples that appeal to our target audience.

The girl in the red dress is something our demographic can relate to, partying and living life to the fullest. Going out drinking can relate well to our 18+ audience. Below i have embedded a song which includes teenagers having 'fun' partying. although it is quite cheesy.



The couple arguing is also something our audience can relate to. Young love. And because they can relate to this they enjoy almost re-playing it on screen.

The use of modern technology, we thought would appeal to anyone who came to watch our film, but particularly our younger audience because they are digital natives. We wanted to show that although technology is a good thing, you also need to be careful with it because situations can get out of control. The use of a mobile phone targets anyone with a mobile because the storyline which we integrated into our thriller held a message of being careful who you talk to and give your number to, so we wanted to try to get that across and appeal to the target audience at the same time.

Evaluation Question 4

Our target audience was 15-25 mainly because of the characters in our film relate to the audience, but also because this is the mean age of majority film go-ers and most film companies target this audience.

Here is our target audience.


All the people in this photo age from 16-18 and enjoy thrillers, (our chosen genre) however there is a gender imbalance, this is because, statistically men would rather watch a thriller than women, we have challenged this in our film by making our lead character a female to make interest for female 15-25 year olds.

The person on the right would like to see the dark knight, however person on the left would rather see the hangover, and no matter what we cant please everyone and it generally comes down to personally preference.

Evaluation Question 3

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?


Our film was funded independently, and was only shot with 4 crew members and a voluntary actress, so a small british independent company would most likely distribute our film. Most likely starting with a straight to DVD feature and download via itunes e.t.c.


Itunes
Distribution using itunes is a really popular method to sell films, it is apple's creation and is now global. They also distribute many independent films and have made small companies big bucks. due to its accessibility and popularity


Shorts international
Shorts International is based in London, however, also has offices in New York Los Angeles and Paris. I gather from their website that they have links to iTunes, which would mean that the films are distributed to a wide range of people. Their submission form gives the option to state whether it is a student film and if so, what school you attend. I think that this would mean that this company would accept our film and would distribute it for us, definitely as a finished product and possibly also as a 2 minute beginning as it is.


Omni film distribution.
 Omni Film Distribution Inc is based in California and distributes films and sells them on DVD. The description of the film can be found on the website and can also be purchased on the site. They accept films of all genres and lengths so I think that they would accept our film. This would be a good option for us as it would be a way for us to distribute our film on DVD.


I believe that Omni, and itunes would be our best way to go to distribute our film, itunes popularity and direct download system will be a great way of quickly getting our film our around and it is very simple. Omni also a great company because the majority of film audiences still use DVD video to access media products, and due to our length they would gladly accept our film.

Evaluation Question 2

How does your media product represent particular social groups?


In our film i believe we represented 3 social groups, typical teenage party animal, mentally unwell and a shady stereotypical teenage hoody.

As you can see this character is clearly unwell as shown by her messed up hair, white gown and black eyes.

She was both the killer and victim in our plot  and that mental illness can affect anyone of any age, and especially young people due to the amount of stresses they have to deal with.
Although not shown in our first two minutes, the idea was that it would be revealed that the girl had had her drink spiked which is what caused her to go on her killing spree and black out.

Here is an screenshot of a girl, of similar age (18-25) from Jennifer's body, and as you can see from her expression and the bars behind her she is also mentally unwell.









This is the girl in the red dress from our film, she is presented to the audience as a party girl, the dress is symbolic to the plot-line of the story and a convention taken from sin city, she is dressed somewhat provoctively, as if she is enjoying her life and also being quite flirtatious like stereotypical teenagers, for example E4 show Skins.

Here we can see, ryan same age as the girl, he wears a hoody and his face is obscure, and his costume and character is taken from stereotypical british teens. This character is seen driving away from his girlfriend who he has kicked out of the car, and not stopping to pick her up until she has screamed her lungs out trying to get his attention.  I think that this would allow us to tackle a mild form of domestic violence in our film. The music which is played by this character also shows how angry he is for such a young person and could suggest that his anger stems from a previous point in his life, which is very common in many young people. 

A screenshot from kidulthood. Another film containing obscure violent teenagers.














We tried to use characters that our audience could relate to, with teen life built around stress, work, school and of course partying. we made our female character someone who our target audience (15-25) could empathise with.

Evaluation question 1

In what way does your media product challenge, develop or use Forms and conventions from real media products?

Here is a video in which we talk about our developed challenged and used conventions, and why we used them.



Here are some existing conventions, that are taken from different real media products:

As you can see here we have several murderers (Hannibal lecter), scenes from the dark knight, and sin city.

Here are some of the conventions we used in our film:

Final cut of our film- Withheld

So here it is, the final cut of our film, this was an extremely enjoyable yet stressful process with many bumps along the way but it has turned out to be an awesome experience, one that I will never forget.
You will find the films has been tweaked ever so slightly to see fit.

rough cut of our film - Withheld

Here is our rough cut of our film withheld, all round the film turned out successful. However, there are quite a few tweaks we can do to improve the film.

I felt these shots needed some serious tweaking:

• The introductory shot i felt come in too soon.
• The rest of the media class didn't like the shaking on the camera during the scream, however we have explained that it is purposeful.
• The lighting changes were way too dramatic, the volume of sound was also way too loud overpowering any background noise.
• The last call also had to be taken out as it was way too long.

Construction-day 2!

Todays attendee's:
Everyone!

Well today was interesting day of filming, because of how real we made the car chase we in fact had people pulling over asking if Sophie was okay. Because of our test shots we mad today's filming went very easy. However we had a few small problems having to re-shoot some shots due to bad framing but thats all.

Construction- day 1

Today's attendees:
All of our group!

Today we conducted our indoor shots, at matt's house. Sophie (our actress) Fitted her costume perfectly and even though She was nervous, she was extremely easy to direct and worked really hard.

I was artistic director on set today and told sophie where to stand and positioning in the frame, I also told her what her motivation was and help her act the scene out. Sam was on continuity and clapperboard. Holly operated the camera. Matt was directing, telling us what shots to use and kept everything running as smoothly as possible.

The main issues we had today were problems with natural lighting continuity and the tight space of the bathroom, which made it really hard to pan. But after 7 takes we finally got a perfect shot. We may have to sort the lighting continuity in final cut studio, using exposure, brightness, contrast.

Possible problems encountered through shooting.

We Are more than likely going to encounter some shooting problems and setbacks throughout me and my group decided to plan ahead And be prepared for the problems we may face.

Lighting.
For the night shots we may have trouble gaining focus and have trouble seeing what's going on clearly, so we will have to make sure we take appropriate lighting and test the shots beforehand at night.

During the day the natural light may change, between shots, the only way to avoid this is to get filming done in a certain time frame check the weather and if we still have trouble change the contrast and brightness in final cut during editing.

Camera.
If the camera were to break we would have a backup, so we can carry on filming.

If the equipment were also to break make sure we have spares.

If we film for a lengthy amount of time we would require a backup battery and charger.

We have to shoot a shot in a bathroom where it will be very steamy, we must make sure not to get the lens steamed or else it would ruin the quality of the shot.

Actress.
If there were several circumstances where our actress couldn't make it to the set e.t.c. We needed an understudy.

Also make sure the actress didn't change her appearance during filming periods, which would affect continuity.

Props.
If the car broke down and wouldnt work we needed a backup.

ANIMATIC-WITHHELD + music research

We have a created an animatic for the opening of our film. We have used the same images from the storyboard in order to link the two perfectly. This animatic has given us the chance to truly imagine what our final film will look and sound like and how it is going to come together. 
The music we will use will be ambient, climax music aswell, we will also use diabetic sound of rock bands: ella carrera, the after party and the blackout.



Here is some music provided by Ella carrera and it is high in energy and highly associated with today's youth. The song uses double kick bass drum beats and constant crashing over symbols, which give the song it's tempo and energy, the guitar riff is complex and deep, alongside the bass, the vocals are very aggressive and fierce but eventually it settles to quite emotional during the chorus. We would more than likely use this song while the girl is running after car as non diabetic sound, or perhaps coming from the radio inside the car.

props list

During the filming of Withheld we will need several props along the way. Below, I have created a list of these props, a description of who uses them and when, and a corresponding shot number from our storyboard.

MOBILE PHONE

• A mobile phone, most likely an iPhone or HTC HD7
• Used by the GIRL during the second half of our film, in shots 19-32

SHOES

• A pair of high-heeled shoes worn and then removed by the GIRL
• Removed in Shot 12 and carried until Shot 14 (when she gets in the car)

CAR

• A car (Ford KA in silver-green) driven by RYAN
• The car will be driven from Shot 15

KNIFE

• A knife removed from a knife block
• The GIRL will remove the knife from the block during Shot 6

Ideas conjured up from the entire group, actually post taken from mathew wallis

A lot of these props are also part of costume or mise-en-scene, so they may appear during other shots but won't necessarily be interacted with by a character. We have already collected all of the props that we need, so it will be a simple case of placing them in the correct place during filming.

Location Research and test shots.

We had agitation's into thinking would the driving shots work?

what would we change?

how would we change it?

whats the reasons for doing it?

This test shot, was to check that the side view mirror would work. originally the shot was going to be done in the rear view mirror, but required change because we could clearly see the character and the camera being in the way prevented this.




This shot was taken almost perfectly except the main character would be too far away. too overcome this we slowed down the car.and tried a back window shot.

Make Up Test Run

Our group felt the need to use some makeup to show the protagonist in distress and being hurt. The main problem is we cant make it look cheesy and stupid but realistic to add to the effect of our genre, so technically they go hand in hand.






Using the ideas and techniques taken from these videos, holly our cameragirl decided to test it on herself. as you can see the bruising is a little dark however i believe it provides a gothic feel and looks like she is badly beaten.

Our group and test shot crew!

Since we went filming test shots on Sunday, we took the opportunity to take some photo's in order to introduce the team. The test shots will be uploaded soon, but for now, for the first time ever, here's Cam Raw...

summary of ideas-WITHHELD

Summary of Ideas on Prezi

Here are are final summary of ideas, this post contains many of the ideas we are to use in our film as well as the ideas that we now not feel suitable.

Location research - bedroom

We thought that the typical teenage bedroom, using research obtained from several other teenagers that we know, using stereotypical stills from films, and using photo sharing websites such as flickR. we have arranged the 9 of the best bedrooms to be displayed on this Jpeg and which will help us arrange our set for our film WITHHELD.

scribd post - Final storyboard

Withheld - Storyboard

Scribd post - script.

Withheld Script Final

Scribd post- Our media treatment: Withheld

Media Treatment

Treatment research

Every film requires a treatment and is much like a story, placing the writers and directors concept into an easy to follow, quick, snappy narrative creating a mental image of how the film will be shot and constructed.


(TAKEN FROM WIKIPEDIA)

A film treatment (or treatment for short) is a piece of prose, typically the step between scene cards (index cards) and the first draft of a screenplay for a motion picture, television program, or radio play. It is generally longer and more detailed than an outline (or one-page synopsis), and it may include details of directorial style that an outline omits. They read like a short story, except told in the present tense and describing events as they happen. There are two types: the original draft treatment, created during the writing process, and the presentation treatment, created as presentation material.


Treatments are widely used within the motion picture industry as selling documents, whereas outlines are generally produced as part of the development process. Screenwriters may use a treatment to initially pitch a screenplay, but may also use a treatment to sell a concept they are pitching without a completed screenplay.

Our film concept: The girl in the white dress

We are going to create the first 2 minutes to a thriller movie, containing titles, interesting camera shots/angles and techniques as-well as some new editing ideas e.t.c. But mainly to show the conventions of a thriller and our interpretation of one.

As you can already see I have been looking at some thrillers and analyzing them for conventions and the sub genres they contain (refer to previous blog posts.) The most common and widely used thriller conventions I have found are:

• Mise-En-Scene props such as guns, knives, cars, dark colours, law e.t.c.
• The weather and time of day is different dependant on what genre of thriller the film is. For example psychological thriller or a thriller containing the sub-genre Horror would tend to have bad weather and be set at night most of the time, whereas a political thriller would tend to have good weather and be set during the day.  This is because of pathetic fallacy which changes the mood and atmosphere by changing the weather.
• Crime thrillers tend to have car chases and illegal activity such as mugging, drug smuggling, murder but many thrillers use this as a sub genre so in many cases a film doesn't need to be based around crime to include these conventions.
• In many thrillers there is tendency for them to have a conspiracy and mystery
• Music tends to be dramatic and based around action or Horror
• Conventions taken from other genre's e.g. fast rapid camerawork and editing from action, frights, blood & gore taken from horror, mystery and conspiracy taken from crime and adventure, which in my opinion makes up a thriller. 

We are hoping to use the following conventions in our film:

Car chase(in a fashion)

fast rapid camerawork in the intro

Mystery

A bathroom scene
Tense developing music
Bus/car/loudnoise that goes past and the person disappeared out of shot
Graphic novel features perhaps?
knife
Wounds(bruising on 'said girls' face)
Graphic matches

Here are some pro's and con's of our film idea

• The ideas are simple enough however the film on a whole will require some heavy editing, good camera-work and an excellent script to go by, this is to stop any 'cheesy-ness' that will prevent the film from living up to its genre.
• The criteria to create the film is in reach but will take a lot of work.
• The graphic match we hope to use will use a noise as well as the scene change e.g. she screams and then her screams transform it her shouting wait as a bus goes by.
• towards the end of the first 2 minuets of the film we will have to make sure the camera doesn't see her the whole time.
• There will be no room for continuity errors
• The make up and costume will have to be closely looked at and watched to simulate as much realism as possible.
• The titles will also require much thought and attention whether to use 'real' titles, use livetype alongside an image or to use photoshop.
• The locations are well planned out e.g. using a unisex bedroom, enough space to film, the usage (if its public use)
• Hopefully we shall be able to challenge a few conventions for example, the main protagonist also being an antagonist. The main character being a girl.

Genre: Psychological Thriller
Sub genre's: crime, mystery

Please listen to our film pitch and give us a feedback response. Any advice would be much appreciated as would criticism.

Genre: action, comedy, sci-fi

Here are some clips of films from other genres, they reinforce my points from a previous post on thriller genre's on how budget, special effects, and subjectiveness have affected our genre choice.

Step Brothers:
 Genre-comedy
Sub genre: romance
Conventions-Offensive jokes, rude behaviour, slapstick humour
Indy and comedic sound/music




Were Were Soldiers:
Genre-Action
 Sub genre's-Romance, war
Conventions-Guns, helicopters, Jet planes, fire, bombs, shouting, Fighting, blood & gore.
Music-Formal percussion 'army' music, sad.



2001: A Space odyssey:
Genre-Sci-Fi, Sub Genre- Adventure, Mystery
Conventions-Space, High Tech computers, Space suits/Ships, AI, Alien tech, Zero gravity
Music/sound-Very instrumental and quite loud

Kill bill vol 1 opening sequence

This is the opening sequence for kill bill volume 1. Conventions used are blood, gunshot, footsteps, heavy breathing, very plain opening credits leading off from a gunshot and person speaking's face, we do not see with music in the background related to the opening video also it is quite thriller.

The Shining

The music used really adds the tension and is classic thriller but also also horror conventions. The mountains symbolises isolation and then the characters talk about cannibals, which is rather strange and has horror elements. The music used is non- diagetic and is very 'creepy' and thriller like and sounds very insane. There are opening credits, common in a thriller also note that Stanley Kubrick is the first title to come up, this is because of his films being famous and him being an excellent director.

link to sin city opening

In these open titles you can see the graphic novel style it is in aswell as the conventions used in a thriller; such as; Guns, desaturation, blood, the music used is that of a crime thriller and is in comic book style.



The narration and footsteps are very classic thriller conventions, but also the suits and glamorous dresses are also classic thriller conventions used in classic thrillers such as the Godfather. 'Care for a smoke?' again, another classic crimey, thriller based convention.
The camera directly looks at the packet of cigarettes, emphasising there impotance. Again this time this a camera shot of the lighter. And again the rain adds pathetic fallacy showing us that something bad is going to happen, then in mystery he holds her as if they're in love and then shoots her with a slienced pistol which again is an important convention. But challenges conventions by unexpected murder as he kills her. then the reverse shot out zoom, is almost science fiction.

thriller examples

During the Pre production of our film we need to think of some ground-breaking films in the thriller genre, the examples listed below contain some interesting conventions and ideas we could include in our film. This list will help us analyse what makes a thriller and what a thriller basically is.

here are three examples of thrillers:
The Shining
Released 1980
leading role was played by jack nicholson
directed by stanley kubrick
sub genres- mystery, madness, horror
conventions- isolation, 'heres johnny', 'all work and no play makes jack a dull boy', axe wielding maniac, mystery, frights, random

sin city
Released 2005
directed by frank miller, robert rodreguiz and guest quentin tarrantino
sub genre- crime, action
conventions-set at night, shootout, comic syle, 9mm pistol, police chase, murder

kill bill
released 2003
directed by quentin tarrentino
sub-genre- crime, action
conventions-waking up from comas, matrix style fighting, samurai swords, elemenf of confusion, whistleing

GENRE: Thriller

During my media course I was set with the task to construct and evaluate a film of 2 minutes in length. We decided to create a thriller, this is because action typically requires a large budget and special effects. Horrors require excellently developed costumes and special effects. Comedy is subjective and what some may enjoy others may despise and the same goes for romance.

The thriller genre main aim (other than making money) is to freak out or thrill the target audience. I believe the target audience is aged between 16-30 (however obviously younger people and older people do watch these films) and social classes range from D-A this because the 'damsel in distress' and protaganist characters are mostly likely rich 'white trash' american teenagers that drive lambo's and ferarri's, thats a pretty good convention, dont you think? But also in thrillers, because of the sub genre's it contains sometimes it can be quite a mystery and sometimes very creepy.

Mise-en-scene: The main use of guns and weaponary as props, shocking music and sometimes quite intsrumental. The music then bodes well with the visuals, adding that 'tension' that is needed in a thriller.

Sometimes desaturation and changes in colour are nessacery and are almost a convention themselves. An example of this is in Sin City which wouldn't be the as good of a film if it weren't for the desturation or as it is now known as 'the Sin City effect' which also is used to make a piece of film look like a graphic novel.

Obvious conventions are used aswell, such as the motel manager who is not all that he seems, or the the loving father and husband who slowly goes insane, but the use of sub genre's like action or horror make the thriller.
These elements are blatently seen like the action genre's car chase or shootout and matrix style fighting, and horror's axe wielding maniac and the serial killer that is really a ghost, but rather than these conventions being seperately classified i believe that they are a hybrid of both that makes up a thriller.

CAM-RAW Pictures

Formerly 'i'm always right' production and previously TIAB productions now CAM-RAW Pictures editing team now consists of Holly Sandford, Matty Wallis, Sam Beckett and my myself Josh Clarke.

Doctor X. Our group Cam-Raw pictures preliminary task, Match On Action.


In this task the main priority was to perform a match on action shot. We had no trouble during filming aside from a few continuity errors, however some editing techniques didn't give the effect first thought. For example the desaturation was meant to provide a dark and different feeling much like in kill bill, and conform to a thriller convention which we thought may work. What this task did teach us however is to give us a feeL for the editing controls on final cut, and we learnt to perform some new and interesting shots, such as over the shoulder shot(used more than likely during conversations) and match on action, used for walking through doorways and action scenes.

Hello there,

Welcome to my blogger, here you shall find all my AS media work, which contains embedd youtube videos, scribd posts and much more.