Evaluation, Question Seven

Looking back at my Pliminary task, I honestly feel I have progressed a lot since the early days on my course. When looking back at our group dynamics, I can feel the difference, as I feel it is more professional this time round as we weren't squabbling over who got to press record and so on so forth. I feel that our organisation improve massively since our first project because this time round we had created a plan in order to stick to, so we weren't running around last minute for the smaller details.

Although from our first task I was able to take some skills, for instance, my camera shots for our current task were more steady, compared to my shots within the first task. I was also able to gage how long a shot, or a set of shots would possibly last when at our location, due to experience, also we were able to use a variety of shots due to the experience we had first had, therefore allowing us to gain the best possibly mark we can within the module.

When comparing shots that were in products, we can see a full change in how we came to do them, for example, without our first task with the match on action, as you can see, our editing skills set us back as far as to say the shot(s) looked so unrealistic., when compared to our match on action in our film opening.  

Also from experience from the first task, I was able to work on my direction skills, for example, we see a very, 'subtle' costume change within the first project, therefore showing that we had filmed on more than one day, but also showing that I had no control on our actors, which was a problem that needed to be fixed.


I also think that my coursework film opening is a big improvement to that of my first task because I believe I took a big learning curve within the media course, in the sense that I learnt how to understand how to frame, that variety of shots keep the audience interested, and also how to edit on the mac, which at the beginning of the course, I could barely use the mouse let alone edit our film media products.  

Evaluation, Quesion Six

What I have learnt about creating a media product is that, no matter what camera or equiptment, you are faced with difficulties. For instance, one of the problems we faced when filming was 'shadowing' as in one of our shots you can see a faint shadow of my group member holding the camera to film. Also we found that, once connected to the tripod, it was hard to move the camera to the shots we wanted, as the tripod was rather big. However the equipment also had its positive qualities, for example, although the tripod was big, it also kept most of our shots steady, which allowed the product to look good with quality.

Yes we did face problems, but who doesn't when they are fiming, our problems weren't extreme in the sense that they stopped us filming, they were small errors within mise-en-scene, for example, the actor kept one of his rings on when filming, which he was asked to take off. Overall, with the equipment, I believe that, although there were minor bumps in the road, we got through filming successfully.

So when it came to editing, I think personally, it was harder for me at the start than for my group member, because I can't use a mac to safe my life. At the beginning of the year we were all taken in groups to be taught how to use the editing software, everyone got the hand of it, apart from me, I could barely get my hand around the mouse and the fact that the keyboard wasn't connected to the computer. Through out the year I did get a rough hang at the software, after my group member nearly threw me, and then himself after out the window, I believe what I have learnt is that editing takes a lot of time, maybe a lot more than what I expected. We did find an effect that enhanced the image, and we used that for the open road scene, as the original shot was rather dark compared to the other shots, which I think helped us keep continuity within our piece.


Blogger has become my best friend for the past few months, and I'm sure it will be such a sad Farwell when my coursework is done, but I suppose if you love something let it go. I think using blogger helped with my creativity within the subject, because as this course is mainly coursework, it was nice to have a change in layout and also format, compared to writing it out by hand with no creative take on it. So yes, I believe, although there was so much to do, that 'posting' my work, instead of handing in essays was better because it allowed us to also experiment with layout, and how we wanted our work to be presented to the examiner.
 

Evlauation , Question Five

Evaluation , Question Four

Evlauation, Question Three

The kind of media institution that we have chosen to distribute our media product is independent and would be shown within art houses. We have chosen this because, when looking at our narrative we believe that it is very specific to our chosen audience (aspirers and individualists, therefore we are aiming for a niche audience.)

Places that I have researched that we would, if the media product was to be distributed and shown to audience members, would be of such places as 'The Chelmsford Film Club' and 'Rooftop film club' which is based in London, and looks at 'under the radar' films of all genres and types, for example they show animation films as well as a range from horror to comedy.

 If our film was to be released, I think that if would maintain moderate success, so therefore possibly a marketing franchise could be created, for example, maybe not to the extent that 'The Hunger Games Catching Fire' has a marketing scheme, but maybe smaller objects such as posters, or even stickers/badges with quotations from characters.

Our media product would also mostly be made aware of by 'below the line' advertising, as being an independent company, we would have a lower budget compared to mainstream companies, and therefore all budget would be towards the actual making of the film.

Final Film (The Dead End)

Evaluation, Question Two

Evaluation, Question one.

Rough cut Three

Rough Cut 2

Rough Cut 1

Attracting Audiences

When considering our genre (Open Road) we also have to wonder how to attract our paying audience. Narrative is a good way to attract audience members, and usually the better the narrative the bigger the audience, for example, 'The Hunger Games Catching Fire' had the narrative that consisted of romance, action, sci-fi and plot twist, therefore attracting more audience members with it's variety.

Within our final idea on our coursework task, we have decided to attract audience members through narrative and characters. Seeing how we are independent we have taken the realistic approach that, due to a lower budget, our locations will not be so extreme compared to that of mainstream films such as Disney's 'Pirates of the Caribbean' therefore we have focused on narrative.

By doing this we have been able to create a character 'Alex' that audience members will have strong feelings for, for example, a strong emotion to the character could be pity or hatred as he runs from society. We have also added in a romantic sub-narrative which would of been explored more if we were to make the entire film, therefore still showing generic conventions of that of a drama film (Romance and aspiring for a better life) and also applying to audience pshpchographics (Those who are searching for romance or wish to run away from society and start again.)


When considering our coursework task in groups, by using the demographics and psychographics, we will be able to create our 'chosen audience', to which we will mostly wish to attract. A possibly ability for the audience we would like to use is rating between 'C2-E' because we  believe that within this group, they can relate to our lead character 'Alex' and also other characters later on within the film. We are also aiming for Aspirers and independents because character 'Alex' aspires to leave society and 'independents' because the character shows independence when leaving town to fend for himself for the first time in forever.


I will also be looking at the audience theory of,  uses and gratifications, so narrative would be a big decision on how we attract audience members. For example this theory goes along the lines of the audience member will watch the film for pleasure, so therefore we will be making our narrative as attractive as it possibly can in order to then attract as many audience members, using this theory.

Creating a Logo- Small Talk Productions

As a group we had already created our dominant logo, and therefore we decided to have another company as we are an independent film industry. We chose the name 'Small Talk' on mutual ground, and we have decided to create idea's for the logo solo, here is my idea for the logo.