In what ways does the media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
With our film, we tried to use the conventions of thrillers and of films with similar content. Before we started the project, I analysed a short film called "delayed diagnosis" which was about a girl with bipolar disorder. I tried to use similar features in our film to help our film to fit in with the genre. One main similarity between the two are the opening titles. These are the titles from our film
While the opening titles from "delayed diagnosis" look like this
Both sets of titles are in white, fade in and out, and appear on the screen while the film is playing, rather than having a separate frame for individual titles. We decided to do this as when i was researchin opening titles, I found that titles running adjacent to the film kept my attention more than ones that were framed seperately and detracted from the action of the film. Another reason we did this was because it is only a five minute film, we didn't want to spend too much time just showing opening titles as there would be less time for the plot.
Another convention we used in our film was the use of colour. When analysing "Delayed Diagnosis", one of the main features I noticed was the use of colour, going from colour footage when everything is normal, to black and white in a flashback, and even using a red filter when the protagonist is angry.
We decided to use colour in our film to help show the protagonists (Scarlett's) feelings, and to show how she sees the world. We decided that any footage before the death of her father should be in colour, showing how everything is normal. Then once her father died, we decided to make the footage black and white as a metaphor to show how Scarlett's happiness had been drained away. To show this metaphor, I used key framing while editing, so as Scarlett is being told about her father passing away, the colour image slowly desaturates, showing how these two events are linked.
Finally, when Scarlett sees Jester the clown, we decided to pick out the red hair, showing that something about Jester is not right, and suggesting that Jester is a figment of Scarlett's imagination. We decided to pick out red particularly as it has connotations of danger. This concept was also used in Shindler's List, where a girl was wearing red to convey an important message in the film.
Another convention we used in our film was breaking the 180 degree rule. We did this to show Scarlett's mindset, and how confused she feels. This is also a feature that appears in "Delayed Diagnosis" and the "Saw" series, both of which use this effect to show confusion.
We also decided to use jump cuts in our film for the same effect, to show how Scarlett is confused, although this seems to challenge conventions as I havn't seen jump cuts in any other short films.
In our film, we also decided to use similar titles to the ones used in "Delayed Diagnosis". Again, we did this to try and keep to the conventions of similar films, and to help the product fit it's genre.
These is a screenshot of our end credits.
And this is a scrennshot of the end credits from "Delayed Diagnosis"
We decided to make our credits slightly bigger, so would be easier to read from a distance, especially as our film would be shown in an independent cinema.
Moreover, we used cantered angles in our film, again to show that something is wrong, and to continue building up tension, although this is used more in horror films rather than thrillers, but we thought it was appropriate to use in our film.
Our film should fit in with the thriller genre. When researching thrillers, I learnt that they focus on building up tension before the pivotal event, and usually end with a twist. I think our film does that as the majority of the film is explaining Scarlett's condition, and from the audience feedback we have been given, many people feel that the end was a surprise and that they didn't expect it.
In terms of audience pleasure, we looked at different media theories before creating our product. We started by looking at Vladimir Propp's Theory of Narrative. Propp came up with seven different character types that appear in media products. We looked at these character types to see if our character ideas matched these, however none of them seemed appropriate to our story or plot. We then looked at Modular Narratives in Contemporary Cinema by Allan Cameron. Cameron identified four different types of narrative: Anachronic, Forking Path, Episodic and Split Screen. We were originally going to use the Forking Path idea, but due to the time limit on the film, decided to only use the perspective of the protagonist.
Finally, we looked at Richard Dyer's theory of entertainment. In our film, we used the theory of energy, as our editing is quick-paced and is likely to make the audience more energetic, and some intensity, but rather then having both great highs and lows in the film, we concentrated mainly on the lows.
How effective is the combination of your main product and the ancillery texts?
When creating our film, the main aims were to entertain our target audience, while both sticking to and challenging conventions of thrillers. I think we managed to do this well in our film as we used many conventions of popular thrillers, whilst trying to challenge some conventions such as breaking the 180 degree rule. This is similar to our poster, but when making our poster we decided mainly to stick to the conventions rather than challenge some of them, therefore attacting a large audience to our film as they would know what to expect from it. We had a slight problem with our audio trailer however, as when I looked at thriller trailers, they all used mens voices and made them sound deep and dramatic. This was our original intention, however could not be carried out as we only had a limited time to record our trailer, and could only use a female voice. We tried to alter this when editing our trailer, but when changing the pitch it affected the sound quality, and made the voice sound heavilly edited and unrealistic.
Whilst we had several problems, I think the ancillery texts sell our product quite well.
Firstly, I think that my final poster is effective as it doesn't give away too much information, yet tells the audience enough about the film to make it interesting. I also like the fact that it is mostly in black and white, which if displayed at a cinema would probably make people look twice as it would be different in comparison with posters for childrens films and comedies which tend to use bright primary colours. One thing I would change about my final poster is the font used. I prefer the "Scramble" font I used on my first poster design, but unfortunately could not find or import that font into Photoshop Elements 8. The main problem I had with my final poster was that although i emailed my half of the group poster several times, the other half wasn't completed as of a couple of hours before the deadline, so I had to change my second poster design into the final design.
The radio trailer also sells the product well as the sound clips and music we took from the film make the trailer sound intriguing, and the voiceover gives the listener all the information they would need to know about the film.
What have you learned from your audience feedback?
When asking for audience feedback we decided to ask people via the internet, We did this to make sure the feedback would be varied and the film could be accessed by any age group, gender etc. I posted the film on youtube to gain comments and then posted links on twitter, facebook and yahoo answers to try and gain a large number of responses. These are the comments we were given.
Most comments we received were positive and expressed that they enjoyed the film and the plot. Some people left feedback saying that there was a good variety of camera angles and good editing techniques. A few people strugged to understand the mid-section with the clown doll, but I think that was because we had a scene missing when we needed to gain feedback, so with the added scene, I'm confident the film will make sense to our target audience. The only negative comment we got was regarding the acting in the film, but I think that the acting doesn't hold back the plot or film in any way.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
When planning, I learnt how to do call sheets, as I have never filled one out before. This was useful as it let everyone in the group know when we were filming, where, and what euipment we would need. I have also learned how to use a blog. Before this project, I have used a blog before, but I had never used pictures, videos or other multimedia functions. However, one problem with blogger was that on the run-up to the deadline, Blogger blocked my blog and threatened to delete it due to me editing and adding too many posts. The blog was eventually unblocked, but I was unable to post for two weeks, and it caused a lot of stress. Other problems I have encountered during the planning and research include other group members not completing work on time, not completing work at all so I have had to do more than my fair share of work.
When we began filming, we were using different cameras and tripods to the one's we used for our AS media project, so I learnt how to set up the new equipment, and how to use the menu functions, such as the sound settings, white balance and resolution settings. We also used new digital cameras when taking our location and props photos, and I learnt how to transfer these images from the camera onto a computer.
I had to learn how to use the computers too, as I usually use a PC but for out project we had to use Apple computers.
We then started editing and I learnt how to use both Final Cut Express and Final Cut Pro. After only using IMovie last year, these programmes seemed complex at first, but i soon managed to work out how to apply extra features to our film, such as key framing, colour correction, reframing and desaturating.
< Desaturation
< Colour correction < Key framingWe edited the majority of our film on "Final Cut Express" but to acheive the black and white footage with red picked out, we also had to use "Final Cut Pro"
When using "Final Cut Express" I decided to have a look at other features we could use on our film, and I found a zoom feature. Instead of using the camera's zoom in one scene, I decided to use the zoom whilst editing to gain more accuracy and to make the zoom more steady and at the same pace. I did this in the below scene. (STARTS AT 19 SECONDS)
This is the editing I am most proud of, and I think it looks very effective in the film and helps to explain the plot to our audience.
When filming this, I had to make sure everything was in the same place, which was difficult as the actor had to get changed between the two takes, however I think the match on action works very well.
When trying to gain audience feedback for our project, I learnt how to upload videos to youtube and embed the videos on other websites, such as"Facebook". I have also leaned how to use Yahoo answers, again asking for audience feedback.
When making my poster, I learnt how to use Adobe Photoshop Elements. I had never used photo editing programmes before, but I was given a tutorial on how to use the programmes and some basic effects that were useful when creating a poster.
When making the final ancilley text, the radio trailer, I learnt how to use a H4 Zoom Recorder and was given an instruction leaflet to help me use it properly. I then learnt how to use Garage Band properly. I used it last year to create a short composition for our project, but I had never imported my own sound clips before.
During the course, I went on a trip to the set of a short film, where I watched some scenes being directed and learnt about different important aspects when creating a film.
One of the most important aspects was the continuity, so when filming our project, I made sure a made a note of any variables, to make sure there was continuity in the film.
This is an example of continuity in our film
These are some of the notes I made on each take
