4. How did you use media technoligies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Photoshop

I didn’t have too much trouble when using photoshop due to the fact that I’d had a bit of experience form using it for my AS production and at the beginning of our course we had some training. I had to use it when creating my film poster and magazine cover and the large range in tools meant it was preferable to other image editors. 

The layers feature means its perfect for this type of project as it's easier to edit each image separately and move them around individually, which made the creation of my film poster a lot simpler as I had a number of different images and pieces of texts.

In order to create the same sinister, foreboding atmosphere present in the teaser trailer I needed it to be very dark, I did this by painting the background black and creating a shadow-like effect with a large black brush with very little ‘hardness’ over my protagonists face. I also lowered the brightness and saturation in order to give it a more gritty, realistic feel.

In order to make it a more conventional poster I used the spot healing brush to get rid of any blemishes or spots on her face as posters and advertisements are known for having no imperfections.

To create a sense of danger and threat I resized my images so that the school children running would appear at risk. In addition, I came across a spotlight effect which I placed behind them to further the sense of threat and panic.  

I-movie

For the creation of my teaser trailer, I-movie was not the ideal program to use. This is because the cutting tool is not as precise as other programs and as a teaser the shots should be incredibly quick. Also I wanted to create a panic-filled atmosphere towards the end and it was incredibly difficult to do so. However, as I used it last year I didn’t have any trouble with how to use it overall.
It also allowed me to upload images, which is used for the first three shots with the institutional information. The ability to add in title slates meant that it was incredibly simple for me to create my slates, title slate, date and tagline.

When adding in the sound, I had trouble with editing to make it build up in the same way the shots do. To overcome this I split a section of it, copied it and added it to the other layer so both were playing at the same time, creating a busy, more intense sound, which was more in conjunction with the shots.

Blogger

For recording the progress of my coursework, I used blog site- ‘Blogger’. This is a perfect use of Web 2.0 and is relatively easy to use, allowing me to quickly post updates of my research, planning and final products. However, when using a lot of text and images in a post it makes it difficult to layout correctly which can be quite time-consuming.

 

Facebook

I used Facebook when getting audience feedback as it was an effective way to reach my target audience of teenagers and guarantee more replies than a paper copy which I used for the audience research.

 Freeplay music/Free sound

When finding music I was incredibly inspired by the theme from ‘28 days later’ as it build up tension in the way that I wanted. However, due to the copyright restriction I couldn’t use it. The use of freeplay music gave me a place to search for similar un-copyrighted music, it took me a while to find one that I could use, and resulted in music which was not completely what I was looking for but made the whole process of finding non-diegetic sound a lot simpler.

Freesound allowed me to find the gunshot sound which I needed at the end which otherwise would have be difficult to get.

Cameras

When taking my images I had to use a DSLR, I had never used one before but they are extremely easy to use so I didn’t have a problem. I had a bit of trouble when taking the images of the students running as I found it wasn’t quick enough and didn’t know how to change the shutter speed so I made them run from further away to overcome it so I had more time to take the photo.

For film shooting I used a Sony HDV, which I used last year so I was used to it meaning that I could use a large range of camera angles and shot types. The display screen allowed me to look back at shots and re-film if needed and the use of auto-focus meant that whilst filming I didn’t have to worry about what was in focus as it was done automatically. However, my lack of knowledge and ability regarding the sound and microphone meant that avoided using dialogue in order to keep the overall sound of the teaser good quality.

Prezi

I used prezi, a presentation editor, for question 3 of my evaluation as it allowed me to layout my question in an interesting way and show the links between each of my pieces. 

3. What have you learned from your audience feeback?

When doing my audience feedback I chose to use facebook to collect my answers.

This is because of my teenage target audience as they would be likely to answer and it was less hassle then using printed questionnaires.

I also chose to mostly ask questions which produce qualitative data as I think it gives me a better understanding of how audience’s opinions. 

Overall, I had very good feedback, all my respondents said they would go and see the film and all seemed to be intrigued and interested. 

2.What are the best/most interesting elements of all three?

The most popular elements seemed to be the build up of tension, close-up shots of my protagonist and the quick editing. This tells me that I effectively created an intense, intruiging atmosphere.

3.What could be done do improve any of them?

Five people said I could do with cutting it down in some way, with shorter or less shots. I agree, as for a teaser trailer it is several seconds too long as decreases the effect of the end as it drags on slightly.

4.Is the trailer intriguing or just confusing?

This tells me that I achieved the creation of enigma and intrigue, crucial when promoting a new film.

  5.Are the images effective and why?

Each respondent said the images were effective for reasons such as; drawing attention, creepy and well-shot. This again tells me that I effectively managed to create the right effect and chose the right images.

6.Would any of them catch your eye and make you want to know more?

This question told me that my trailer was the most effective but my audience seemed to find them all eye-catching and successful. 

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts? on Prezi

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Film Narrative

Genre-Dark drama/social realism

Independent

 As my film is a drama I researched into the conventions of the genre:

·         “Dramas are serious, plot-driven presentations, portraying realistic characters, settings, life situations, and stories involving intense character development and interaction. Usually, they are not focused on special-effects, comedy, or action, Dramatic films are probably the largest film genre, with many subsets.”

                  -http://www.filmsite.org/genres.html

• “There is usually a struggle going on that is wrought with hardships, difficulty, and pain”-http://encyclopedia.jrank.org/articles/pages/3080/Film-Genres.html#ixzz1CFK8yROn

My film very much follows these conventions, I have an intense, realistic and serious character and narrative, and I depicted this by making my character the focus of each piece.  Furthermore, in order to prevent it being to similar to a horror/thriller the narrative focuses on the characters growing isolation and anger and the lead-up/planning of the attack rather than the attack itself. This is suggested in my trailer, with the only hint of the chaos and attack being the shots of people running and gunshot sound at the very end. The music also supports this as it doesn’t start until 0.25 seconds in and builds up slightly as the shots quicken.

My narrative deals with the relevant social issue of high school massacres as I took into consideration the socio-historical roots of the narrative in order to cause interest from the audience and the ability to relate and understand.
 Also, as my character is similar to the central protagonist in teen sci-fi drama ‘Donnie Darko’, with problems regarding mental health, isolation and taking part in violent acts, I chose to use similar shots to those used in the film when presenting my protagonist.

Trailer

The conventions of a teaser trailer include:

·        Fast pace – quick shots

·        Short duration time (generally no more 1.30)

·        Soundtrack/use of voice over rather than dialogue

·        Wide shots to establish setting

·        Release date

·        Intriguing/hides information

·        Title slates

·        Intro to character/setting, etc.

·        Institution info.

·        Tagline

I made sure that I used quick shots which built up towards the end in order to follow teaser trailer conventions and because I was influenced by the teasers for A Clockwork Orange and Requiem for a Dream as the tension created causes a lot of intrigue and curiosity. Both build up to very quick shots towards the end which I used in order to create the sense of urgency and imply the structure of the narrative. The Requiem for a Dream teaser uses repeated shots which forms a manic, crazy mood-similar to what I am attempting to create. I used title slates in order to add meaning to the shots and generate a sense of the narrative, again inspired by the A Clockwork Orange teaser. I used the necessary information for a trailer such as institution info, title, tagline, etc.

Film Poster

The conventions of a film poster include:

·        Image of main character(s)

·        Golden triangle/rule of thirds

·        Attention gained (through humor, shock or surprise, etc.)

·        Institution info.

·        Release date

·        Credits

·        Tagline

·        Rating

My film poster focuses on my character which follows the conventions of the Drama genre. I chose to use the rule of thirds rather than the golden triangle when creating my film poster in order to make the focus point the top image as well as the title and make it appear more independent as it less widely used but still incredibly effective.

I included all the conventional information about my film (date, title, credits, rating), despite it being independent as I wanted it to still appeal to as large an audience as possible.

Film Magazine Cover

The conventions of a magazine cover include:

·        Masthead

·        Puff

·        Date/Price

·        Barcode

·        Main cover line

When creating my magazine cover I had to take into consideration the fact that I chose to create an independent film. I found that generally, independent film magazines use a very different layout to the easily recognized layout of mainstream ones such as Empire and Total Film.  Simple, uncluttered covers for Vertigo and Little White Lies were closest to what I wanted to achieve. I liked the look of the Little White Lies cover but didn’t have the technology to be able to achieve the carton effect so I took a close-up image of my characters face, similar to the one from my poster, and made it the focus of the cover which created a similar look. The rest of my layout was similar to the Vertigo Cover, with most of the cover lines all together at the bottom of the page as I like the simplicity of it as it allows the image to become more effective.

Teaser trailer

FIlm Poster

Magazine Cover