Evaluation

In what way does your Media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of media production?

Se7en Titles

Canted Angle of captive room

Our Title

Our two minute film/opening sequence is called ‘Ebony’ it is a mystery thriller and we have incorporated many generic conventions; music, cinematography, mise-en scene and editing to develop the genre of a thriller.  Throughout we use a variety of angles and shots including; Canted angles used to create a suspicious atmosphere, as if something is wrong (also to create the sub-genre mystery), Low angles to highlight dominance in a character and High angles to suggest innocence. We chose to make our main captive room look realistic through using an old dark abandoned boiler room. Throughout the titles we use short, snappy clips of film to create suspense and mystery through revealing bits of the film without giving away the storyline; our film develops the norm of thriller/mystery films from doing this. As well as developing the norms of a thriller film (in the titles), it challenges it also through following the everyday life of three college girls throughout the rest of the film. Our two minute film is highly influence by the titles from se7en; they both use short, fast pace clips; never revealing any identity, throughout the first two minutes introduces main characters  and from using flickering/distorted titles and bits of film. 

How does your media product represent particular social groups? 

Nicole

Our film is based on three college students and their life experiences leading up to where they are now in their lives. We have particularly concentrated on our three characters and the different ways to portray them depending on what happens to them within the film. To present realistically what it is like in college we have tried to stick to stereotypical personalities. 

Lily

For example we have presented Lily as a new innocent college girl, we have done this through having her dress in floaty dresses, wearing a minimal amount of makeup also through her body language throughout. In comparison to Nicole who is portrayed as the popular girl in the group; we made the girl look very high-maintenance through an excessive amount of make-up, hair extensions and girly clothing. We used these representations so our target audience of 15-25year old girls perhaps boys would be able to relate to the story line. Our use of camera shots develop of representations further, for example; Ebony is supposed to be the ‘outcast’ of the group, we have portrayed this through the difference in shots we use when ebony is on camera such as the close up of her eyes to suggest her ‘weird’ character. 

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

Optimum Releasing Logo

We decided that our film would be best distributed by a British film company because the film creates a message for both teenagers and parents; optimum releasing was an ideal institution to release our film because it has released films similar such as ‘this is England’ which was popular with the audience we have targeted our film to. Just like ‘this is England’ our film would have a niche market, meaning it would be more appropriate to be produced with a small budget and distributed to independent cinemas across the UK. If the film was successful in takings at cinemas it would be suitable to be shown on Film4 or Channel 4 after a certain time with the film being for over 15’s because of the drama aspect to it; making the film more accessible to people around to country and potentially widening our market. The film isn’t the type to provide any sort of franchises or merchandise. We linked our production company logo with the British film institution through calling ourselves ‘Regal Pictures’ relating to the monarchy which is specific to Britain.  
(http://www.optimumreleasing.com/)

Who would be the audience for your media product?

Our film is produced to appeal to females aged 15 – 25, but it could also appeal to girls in that age range. We thought that our target market would relate to the storyline of our film, because its focuses on the lives of three teenage girls and their relationships; mainly how they can change due to bullying and bad upbringing. Our target audience are mainly in education I would have encountered some sort of bullying or similar situation, which would create an emotional connection between them and the characters in the film. We created a questionnaire and asked our fellow student to answer, both boys and girls which came into the age range for our film; from this we found that our target audience really enjoy thriller films and would watch one in cinema, we found that jumpy parts and intense music is the making of a thriller film. We took all this into consideration when making our film therefore making the film into something they would really enjoy. We look on the bbfc website to help us decide what classification to give our film; we thought that the certificate 15 was suitable for the film because it has imitative behaviour within it, without dwelling on any danger or pain and it could also involve frequent use of strong language.

How did you attract/address your audience?

Zoom into Lilys eyes.

We chose the specific age group 15-15’s because the film will particularly appeal to them as the storyline they will be able to connect with. At the beginning of the 2 minute sequence is a 14 second clip informing the audience of the main three characters, this was an intention to get the audience intrigued.  Throughout the 2 minute film we have incorporated camerawork to address our audience; we have shot the film in a way in which draws the audience into the film, such as the zoom into lily’s eyes. 

Lily's Point of view Shot.

We have put in certain shots which puts the audience in the characters shoes, such as the extreme close ups of ebony’s eyes, when we see that ebony is staring at lily in an uncomfortable manner and the high angle shot of Lily to show her vulnerability. Having the audience feel the same way the characters do creates empathy for the characters from the audience.

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

HDV1000 Camera

At the beginning of the course we started off with handheld cameras, as we started this project we upgraded to the big DV1000 HD cameras. The camera has an amazing amount of features which all enhance the look of the film; it has provided us with a clear image for our video (although the quality of the photo isn’t as good now uploaded onto YouTube). 

Final Cut Express

One major problem we had with the big camera is we found it didn’t zoom as far as we wanted it to when zooming from Ebony’s eye out to Nicole’s legs as we storyboarded it; we compromised a little with the zoom, and just stuck with zooming into the two eyes rather than just the one. We didn’t have any other problems with the camera equipment, everything ran smoothly and we picked up on how to use the camera really quickly, this was good because it allowed us to film quicker.I have learnt how to use the editing software Final Cut Express and it has been a delight to work with, it has never failed for us, and we haven’t encountered any problems. I have learnt how to put on transactions between clips for continuity, how to distort pieces of film/titles, how to overlap video with audio and make certain bits of film louder than others. 
  

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

Preliminary Task

Looking back to our preliminary task and the difference between that and our full product is clearly evident, these were the first ever things we did after we had a few lessons on cinematography, therefore we weren’t at all experienced enough to create something spectacular. The pre production stage was crucial for us to make a film to our full potential; storyboarding, shot listing and practice shots were the only main reasons that made the filming of our full product easier, we didn’t do any of this for our preliminary task.  When doing our final 2 minute film, we had much more experience with the camera, and the different shots therefore we felt more confident to do it on ourselves without having to ask for a second opinion, or having to ask for help on how to use the camera. 

2 Minute Film

In our full film we have a much wider range of shot types such as establishing shots, point of view shots and shot reverse shots indifferent to our preliminary task, where we just used over the shoulder shot reverse shots. Overall, I feel that our film has fulfilled the task brief as we have made our storyline evident in the 2 minute film without giving away any specific details. We have incorporated particular generic conventions to identify the genre of thriller and have done this to our full potential, we had pushed ourselves with the amount of work we had to do to make this the best project we had done so far and I feel that we have good job of it and I would like to believe that it would appeal to our specific target audience.