I have ansared the following 7 questions in my blog
1) In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions(repeated pattern over time) of real media products?
2) How does your media product represent particular social groups?
3) What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
4) Who would be the audience for your media product?
5) How did you attract / address your audience?
6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
7) Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
1. In what ways does your Media Product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The brief was to construct the opening or a title sequence to a thriller for a 15 classification. The sequence was to last 2 minutes. Our aims whilst constructing our psycho-thriller “snapshot” were to organize as independently as possible the successful construction of our first media text from concept to product. We wanted to achieve the look and concept of the film that we were planning and to competently use the camera, edit and introduce sound effects in order to achieve a standard of work that would match a similar text produced by a genuine industry institution. We aimed to study in greater detail the function and conventions of opening sequences. We put together a PowerPoint of available thrillers which enabled us to research them and see which films linked with the different types of thrillers. We therefore obtained useful influences that linked to our media product. We were inspired by “exorsist” “The omen”, “mirrors”, “the uninvited” and “pitch black”. We took aspects of these well known films: the convention of the fact there is another world as in religios power-that there are forces more powerful in this world that humans cannot understand or control. This uses the ‘individual against mass’ convention. However, “snapshot” differs from the PowerPoint thrillers as it stays very low key for a lot of the thriller then jumps at a certain point but not to much and waits a little longer than normal thrillers. Our product has, therefore, both used and challenged main conventions of conventional thriller.
2 How does your media product represent social groups?
Snapshot tries to represent one dominant social group which is a white male in his 30’s. This might be affective if we are trying to make the audience relate to and identify with this particular social group, as many heroes in films are represented as males as the “norm”. We tried to get the camera to make the audience uncomfortable by making the editing pace faster when it came to a realization in our film - e.g. when the guy realized that a horrific element or spirit or force was greater than even him – one of the dominant forces in society. This created tension as the audience waited to see how he would cope with this realization. The lighting in our project was all a red wash, which was authentic for a mise-en-scene of a dark room, but also signified the danger the character was in and how we should be scared for their life – at the hands of something more sinnster. I think that it was better to use a white, middle class man than a group in society that is not the mainstream, because more people can relate to it because that’s what they are used to doing in films anyway. IN another film though, we could consider different funding options and try to make a point about the social groups represented – and perhaps qualify for more funding like BULLET BOY did.
3 What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
We were thinking of a company like Revolver to distribute our film in the UK, or perhaps FILMFOUR – who can distribute low budget films in the U.K. My imaginary production company SAVAGE Productions worked on a very low budget by using a lot of our school’s equipment. If we were a real company, we would be similar in style and ideas to what WARP films works on.
The main target audience for our thriller/horror would be for the ages 15-24 in the first bracket, and also 25-34. They would mostly be male and range on the JICTARS and JICNARS from A, B and C categories (as previously posted on in TARGET AUDIENCES) This film would not suit an audience of any younger because it would be too complex, and also it might be too graphic or gory, depending on how much of a budget we got to show the scenes where the spirit or force is disturbing the natural order of the main character’s world. We think its an African spirit (as hinted in the opening titles with the prophetic use of the mask) so if possible we would include something about Africa and a tribe there sending evil through images. This might tap into old fears in England about foreigners being untrustworthy, and might suit the current climate of politics in the UK. On the psychographic scale, this film might be suitable for mainstreamers or reformers, depending on the overall message e.g. would this film be seen as racist by portraying evil spirits from overseas or other cultures? Or would it be read as seeing what is going on in many parts of our society in the UK – fear being built up for non – “British” things.
5 How did you attract/address you audience?
We attracted the audience to our movie by putting a handsome man in the male lead and an intriguing mise-en-scene that makes people stop and look. The colour scheme is very important because it screams danger to our viewers. We also chose our music carefully from a composer that was going for a horror element in his songs – he let us use it for free to promote his work – and then we were able to cut our film to the music to create maximum impact. The frantic shots and increased editing pace when our main man realizes there may be a threat to him and the natural order of the world helps to build tension and suspense. We took the ideas and colour scheme of our opening and brainstormed together as a group to come up with an ideal poster to promote our film in tube stations and around major urbance centres. Our poster used the taglin “Say Cheese…” which does not finish the sentence and leaves you in suspense wanting more. The red on the poster is intimidating and the butterfly is supposed to work like the poster of “The Blair Witch Project” did – so that just as people were supposed to be afraid of those little bundles of sticks after a while – they would also be scared of the butterfly outline symbol that we made in black and red, after they’d seen our movie.
This would be affective if we look at the sort of t shirts and other advertising products we could use to promote the film by giveaway free before it was released. A website on myspace or something similar would help to get across our film to a wide audience – and promotional trailers on youtube and other sites would also (like FACEBOOK which most of us use) We have done audience feedback on youtube already which is covered in another blog post. It would be hard to get an international audience at this stage with such a low budget and relatively unknown actors that we have.
6 What have you learnt about technologies form the process of construction this product?
I have learnt tons about the different sorts of technologies used in film production. When we were deciding on what we would do for our individual roles, I wanted to be part of the technical crew mostly behind the camera if possible. We used different cameras, lighting and editing styles and techniques along the way and picked up information about how to focus and why exposure is important on the still cameras before moving on to a moving image with the school’s SONY PD170 video camera that uses miniDV digi tape that you can tape over. In real films it is far more important to get things perfect technically before you shoot because of the cost of film stock and developing actual film. Our prelim task was done quickly, with one or two takes for all the set ups. We had about 5 or 6 set ups to do as a minimum, but everything had already been planned out for us on a storyboard that was provided by the school. Complex Lighting set ups were too difficult to worry about for our main task and student production – we are not a professional crew but tried !! We stuck with one main light with a red wash over it (which was shone from outside into one of the small windows at the top of the room) as well as the smaller light globe that someone brought in to show it was a darkroom where you would really use a red light. Editing was difficult, but we enjoyed this bit because we could see everything coming together like more of a real movie. We were glad that our teachers made us plan and shoot so many different angles and aspects of our actor and our small location. We were also glad that we planned out different elements of the mise-en-scene to dress the set and ensure there were enigma codes present for the audience to wonder about, so they would watch on. We used a program called Final Cut Pro (or FCP for short) to edit both our prelim and main tasks. We also could have used something called Adobe After Effects if our project had required any special effects, but in the end we decided to use a standard font on FCP to do our titles. We also thought the overwhelming red gel that gave a red wash lighting effect to the project was enough, and that in 2 minutes, we had adequately introduced what might come after in the main feature film. When we were editing, we made sure we cut on the action and movement a lot so there was a feeling that things were flowing along. We also held shots more on some elements that were close ups, like a skull and a photo and made sure that the focus pull ended with a title so it felt neatly resolved at the end. We quickened the editing pace to create panic of the character finding something out. We only used the ambient sound on a light being switched on at the start, and then let the sound of the non diagetic music create a tense, dramatic atmostphere.
7 Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression form it to the full production?
On reflection, it is clear to see what a big difference in quality there is from our preliminary task to our main completed task. One example of the difference from one to the other, was that we only used the overhead lights in the room for the prelim tasks. This made a difference to the kind of colour that all of our finished prelim tasks had. They mostly looked cheaper and much lower production values than our finished tasks, which had more thought put into the lighting setups. When we edited our prelim task, it was very simple because things had been mapped out for us and there was no music or titles to think about. Also, the prelim task did not have to be very long, and did not require any great thought to be put into lots of props etc. We took the open ended script and interpreted it as a group as being a phone call that had to be made, but the script could have meant a range of different things if you put in different props or sexes of actors. At the time, people who were watching our finished sequence were interested in seeing their friends perform but if you didn’t know the actors it would not have been that interesting. I think that my main task, SNAPSHOT has turned out very well and that it is suitable for many people to be interested e.g. not just people at our school, but for a much wider range of people. To test this, we asked people to give us some audience feedback on our work in classrooms with people aged around 16 – 19 years old, and also amongst teachers around the school. Mostly, their feedback was very positive, with people really like the music and the fact that the main guy looked freaked out when he found the clues to the puzzle. We also posted our work on youtube under 2 different names, one through the Hurtwood Media Channel and one through a made up name that represented some of our Media classes. We then asked people to comment in a constructive way on our project. The live feed of comments from one of our postings on youtube is on this blog, so we can be updated with feedback as it comes in about our project. I have analysed some of the comments specifically in another post on this blog, by posting the comments and then how useful I felt this feedback was underneath it. In a real situation, it might be useful to get audience feedback in this way, but then again, there are a lot of people who don’t have to be constructive which can lead to harsh or unfair comments sometimes. Overall I think that people liked our work and appreciated what we put up because they could see we are just starting out. I enjoyed making all of these media products and they have helped me to understand part of the film industry and why it is so difficult to work in it.
I think if I were to do this again the I would take more time to really research the place in which I was shooting because that I what burdened us the most we were not efficient in the planning of our shots and also most of our time was lost due to the lack of shoot day planning so I would be more carful next time about how I go around doing thisgs the day before.
OUR FEEDBACK FROM YOUTUBE MEMBERS
We posted our work on youtube when it was done, with the following note on it – asking people to leave constructive comments for us.
Our request on youtube:
Hi, please leave comments!!!!
Do you think this sequence is effective? Why, why not?
What category/genre of film would you say this opening is?
Do you think there are any elements that need to be added?
Would you get rid of anything or change anything?? Why, why not?What primary target audience do you think it's appropriate for?
What secondary target audience (if appropriate)?? e.g. Psychographic profile -appealing to any particular personality type (like reformers or mainstreamers etc), values, attitudes, interests, or lifestyles?
What about in terms of demographics - age and gender? Socioeconomic background?
After this taster... DO YOU WANT TO SEE THE REST?!??!?!
When our work had been on youtube for 2 weeks (at the start of May 2009) the audience had rated it 4 out of 5 stars and we had a total of 15 comments from either Hurtwood House media students or random Youtube users. I have put some of the comments below.
tuncelg (1 week ago)
not bad but editing could be better. too many transitions. font/typography and placing also has a room for improvement.
I agree with this one. In future I would work on fonts more.
SabretoothStitch (1 week ago)
Horror thriller aimed at 15-30 both sexes. Aimed at the middle ground. Really like the music and it is a really effective idea, but you are left thinking where do we go from here rather than what happens next. The plot needs to open up more before such a fantastical thing can be found - unless you are going to kill him in the next sequence and bring in a detective.
jiahui5555 (5 days ago)
I think this project is brilliant! Altough there are some space for further improvement.Well done guys!!
justskiptotheend1 (5 days ago)
Hasn't your psychopath GOD A F****** DIGITAL CAMERA WITH PHOTOSHOP?????much more fun, believe me darlings....
justskiptotheend1 (5 days ago)
This makes me want to photograph winter trees and kill them. Live with that you irresponsibile young film makers...
goncharovnik (5 days ago)
i really like the intence music !!! and the red colour in the back ground !
GraceChadwick (5 days ago)
i think that the music really working in you film and the overal camera angles that you have used. i like the red filter that u added i think it adds another level to a simple yet effective film i like guys x
Many of our audiences liked the red gel lighting and music, but some thought the editing had room for improvement.
I don’t like some of the comments, but can see that using youtube definitely allows for a range of people to see and feedback on our content.
