G321 Fry Ellie

Monday, 21 March 2011

Evaluation Question 4 - Who Would Be The Audience For Your Media Product?

Name - Rachel Harrison

Age - 16

Status - In a relationship

Studies/Education - I.G.S, 6th form

( history, sociology, biology, psychology)

Interests - Going to cinema, partying with friends, shopping

Favourite Genre - Horror/Slasher

Rachel is a 16 year old teenager from Burley in Wharfedale, a typical member of the audience for our film " No Hiding Place". She enjoys going to the cinema and even better her favourite type of movie genre is Horror / Slasher, which is the genre of our film. She is within our inspired age range for our film,which will help increase the audience for it. She enjoys hanging out with her friends which relates to our opening scene of the birthday party and she may also having a close group of friends sympathise with the main girl with her feelings towards loosing a best friend in the film, she is also in a relationship which would give her more of an insight and understanding into our main girls feelings with her relationship at the start.

We aimed our film opening at a primary audience of 15- 21, because our film is about typical teenage lifes and the things they should be enjoying with life and all of a sudden things go wrong, we chose this audience because as directors and producers found it easier to relate to the characters being teenagers and in the age range ourself, we found the story line easier to build on.

Our secondary audience was 22- 35, we chose this age range as it is not a huge gap between our primary audience, people of this age who watch this film, i think will mainly be people interested in the horror genre.

Our BBFC rating is 15. In order to be a 15 and not an 18 we had to make the violence less gory and graphic, avoid repeated use of strong swear words, and not use any sadistic or sexual violence. The graphic shown in the film should also not appear to the BBFC as harming towards others or breach any criminal laws.
Below are Films of our genre, that have taken a 15 rating and consists of fairly young actors and actresses :

Evaluation Question 5 - How Did You Attract/Address Your Audience ?

After completing various rough cuts, we asked people of our audience age range both male and female to express their thoughts on our film. Any criticisms they had about the film we then explored and if so changed, in order to develop our film to fit our audience. We filmed audience feedback given to us about our Second Rough cut, which is also on my Blog. We asked both male and female in order to get gender perspectives.

Untitled from katie mallows on Vimeo.

Untitled from katie mallows on Vimeo.

We then filmed our thoughts on audience feedback given to us :

Untitled from katie mallows on Vimeo.

After the feedback given for our Second Rough Cut from our audience we then went on to slightly change our idea and re- film, which then went on to be our finished product. We hope our final cut will engage our audience more.
Below is a rough cut of our Final Cut :

Untitled from katie mallows on Vimeo.

We hope that when more sound is added, this version of the opening will interest our target audience more.

Evaluation Question 6 - What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

From the beginning the product used were basic, were were introduced to :

In Media firstly one of the most important software we were introduced to was I Movie, because without I Movie we wouldn't of been able to create or edit any of our Micro Drama, Prelim's Or Our Film Openings. I Movie has many functions to use to help you edit your film to the best it can be, it was difficult to use at first, but as you develop your understanding and skills you find it a lot easier.

Another useful site we were introduced to was the IMDB Movie Database. This helped us when we were de-constructing our variety of films, and also we used this as part of our research and planning. This website allows you to look at past, present and future films, of a certain genre or even an upcoming film starring a certain actor/actress or being directed by a certain director. It allows you to look up Budgets a film had and how much your film made.

Another key technology we were introduced to was the Blog Spot. This is where we input all our drafting of openings, research and planning, cast, basic development, pod cast, and vod casts. The blogger was the main part of our Media Product. The Blog is where everything we did is marked. We have relied initially on the Blogger in order to present our coursework. Below is an outline of the Blogger :

During the first week of school we were introduced to camera and tripods, which we used to make our film, the process was fairly easy and didn't take long to grasp. The camera and tripods we were aloud to borrow were the schools, so we had to make sure we booked them out long before we needed them to make sure we had them. I am looking forward to using the HD cameras next year which will hopefully make our next production more clear.

To make our Idents for the Opening, we used Live Type, Our Media Technician John helped up use Live Type. When using Live type we developed and designed moving images, and backgrounds, for our Idents.

Our first ident ' Keltic Distribution' was made using the background and font from Live Type, we did 3 drafts of this and eventually on our third try were happy with the result, so we used it on our Final Cut. Our second Ident ' Secret Productions' we made again in Live Type but instead of using a background from there, we filmed my lips whilst I said sshhh. We then used the font from Live Type to go over our background.

Then to develop sound on the film, we used Garage Band, again John taught us the basic steps on how to use the technology. We developed the music on Garage band by using the keyboard on the programme, we wanted the sound to feel like a heartbeat to the audience so we used a variety of instruments sounds, and pitch changes to create the sound.

Evaluation Question 7 - Looking back at your preliminary task what do you feel you have learnt in the progressing from it to the full product?

When filming the preliminary task we conducted, we had to film again due to us not getting the 180 degree rule correct, however unfortunately when we re- filmed i was not present as I was in hospital, but I did help with the editing of the prelim. So below is the prelim I helped edit.

When completing our prelim task, we learnt the 180 degree rule, when doing the prelim task our group found it rather hard. Since our prelim task and beginning filming our opening, i have learnt and realized how hard it is to create a film, having such a low budget whilst still trying to give of a sense of verisimilitude at the same time. Also i have learnt that having such a low budget can effect which institutions would distribute your film. Also we have now learnt the element of shot reverse shot, which we experienced first hand in in the prelim task. Using shot reverse shot in our film helped show the reactions of the audience more fluently.

When beginning media, i didn't understand any of the semiotic terms used, now i understand them fully, after having to use them in when deconstructing media texts.
After doing our Preliminary task and our Micro Media we now as a group and individuals we know that storyboarding, developing ideas and pitches for our plots, were not enough, we needed to do a lot more research into our genre and films to help us with our production. Without research and planning the film will not work, if you know nothing about the genre you are filming. When doing our Micro Drama we focused more on Vladimir's Props character archetypes and trying to fit things like binary opposition and shots into one short film, shorter than our opening.
Below is the Micro Drama both Me And Katie Starred And Produced:

When we started our production on " No Hiding Place" which is our opening, we watched various horror/slasher films to help us develop the characters and their personalities, by watching these films we learnt the typical stereotypes of the genre in the form of your 'Scream Queen' and 'Final Girl' which we then included in our opening. However to change things slightly we challenged the Horror Convention, by changing the image of you typical Scream Queen. To help us more we looked closely at the shot types, misc en scene, editing and sound, when deconstructing these films. We also looked at distribution companies in our research and planning. We filmed our audience feedback and took their views into account which helped a lot.

Below Is Our Third Rough Cut, Close To The Final Cut But With A Little Bit More Sound To Be Added.

Untitled from katie mallows on Vimeo.

We Completed Our Final Cut & It Will Be Uploaded Shortly.

Semiotic Terms i have learnt are :

Binary Opposition - This is two opposite charcters shown in a text together which can be shown in shot reverse shot for example a scream queen and a final girl. We used an example of Binary Opposition in our Micro Drama, where we used your typical geek stereotype and the binary opposite was your typical chav. We also used the names to connote, the typical stereotype.
Polysemic - Polysemic means the media text or things used in the media text could have several meanings to it. Although there would be a preferred meaning intended by the produces to the audience, however the audience may take a different view.
Versimilitude - This is creating a sense of realism to the audience through your film, trailer or opening.
An example we used of this in our film opening was the home video at the beginning for our flashback.
Intertextuality- Meanings from another text being tied into a newer one to show a similar meaning or imply the same thing will happen again. We used an example of this as we included Stephen Kings IT, as a film Sophie And George were watching in the beginning, we also included quick flashes of the IT clown, in our more tense moments.
Signifier- This is a detail the audience pick out and see as a significant and having a certain meaning. An Example we used of this is the clown in our film.

Wednesday, 16 March 2011

Re-Casting & Re- Filming

Due to feedback from teachers and pupils we chose to change our film idea slightly again, but keeping the same title. After filming our third rough cut we are finally happy and are very close to a final cut, our editing is nearly complete and we are now working on the soundtrack to go with it. ( To complete our soundtrack we will be using Garage Band).

Our film has a new setting, and new cast, we changed the lead girl from being your typical blond scream queen, to a brunette final girl. We added more of a mysterious feel to the new footage, with more shot variation and false scares included.
We began our film with what we hoped to look like a home video of someone's birthday party, but also staged as a flashback for the beginning of the film, to hopefully help the audience get the idea of the following parts.
We changed the name of our lead boy from Jimmie to Sam.
We changed our cast, we are now using Sophie Dixon as the lead girl and George Scaife as the lead boy.

G321 Fry Ellie

" Secret Productions"