Evaluation Post 1: In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our Film Plot:

My film opening uses, develops and challenges the forms and conventions of real media products though its form, genre, narrative structure and style. Some of the real film opening that we used to influence our ideas included, 'The Blair Witch Project' and 'Contagion'.

Our film is an horror-thriller film revolving around the multiple disappearances of locals within a north London suburb in a menacing forest and then how a group of teenagers from the area enter onto the scene in an attempt to uncover the 'being'/reason behind the suggested attacks. As the film progresses the group is slowly cut down to a single girl who survives the ordeal in order to tell her story and reveal what she went through.

Form:

I think that our film opening is typical of the horror/thriller genre as it's features all contribute to its purpose of 'hooking' the audience and make them want to keep watching.

In terms of title placements our opening sequence is quite similar to that of 'The Shining' as all the credits are super-imposed onto the screen in order for the tension to continually build up without any lapses- which could be caused by cutaway titles.

The base/majority of our opening sequence is based upon dialogue within a news broadcast. We were inspired to take on this idea by the film 'Quarantine' which, in it's opening sequence, had the a news reporter talk into a camera whilst introducing her surroundings. Similarly, our film opening has a news reporter introduce a crime.

The setting of the 'Blair Witch Project'

A screenshot of the film opening of 'Quarantine'

Genre conventions for horror/thriller films:

Our setting was inspired by the 'Blair Witch Project' as we thought that the use of a desolate forest to create suspense was ingenious and would therefore work perfectly in our sequence. Furthermore, the 'Blair Witch Project' is one of the most well known horror/thriller films due to the use of footage being captured on a characters camera which is then seen though the eyes of the audience. We took inspiration from this in our hand held falling scene in our sequence (as seen in the table above)  as we thought this would immerse the audience even further into the film.

Narrative Structure:

Style:

The style of the film helps to connote its genre and support how we want it to look and feel.

1) Grading

Our grading was very similar to that of 'Quarantine' as the saturation and contrast is low, thus reflecting the lack of hope in the scene. Moreover, the low brightness also helps in symbolizing the dark nature of the film and its antagonist.

2) Titles

For titles we took inspiration from a very successful independent horror/thriller film, 'Sinister'. This film's opening credits not only influenced our title styling, but also how the titles appeared onto the screen and the order at which they do.

In 'Sinister' the titles are as sharp white in order to contrast the dark surroundings, we thought this was a great idea to help make them stand out without having to enlarge them- which could take away from the action. Moreover, in our title sequence we had titles come onto the screen letter by letter in a random order; this was also inspired by 'Sinister' as in that credit sequence the letters fade in, also in a random order.

Evaluation Post 2: How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our chosen social group is males between the age range of 16-24 year olds, in turn our film openings representations mainly focus on age and gender. We have used casting choices, camera/editing techniques and mise-en-scene, such as costume, to help create representations of the young male adults.

After researching how the different genders were portrayed in successful films, I noticed how the male gender was very strongly represented, as shown below.

As successful thriller/horror films usually have at least one male character taking a leading role, we thought that following this convention would help our film opening appeal to the male audience even more.

In Sherlock, 'Moriarty' also gives off a laid back vibe which helps further his representations as an antagonist in control of his situation and his actions.

Moriarty from 'Sherlock'

In the shot above you can seen Moriarty being put at gun point by Sherlock; instead of displaying the normal reaction of being afraid he seems very comfortable, with him even giving off a vibe of patronizing Sherlock by making think he's in control. The costume of Moriarty is of a very similar purpose to the costume of our antagonist. A suit is usually associated with a formal event, so the idea of it being worn by someone at gunpoint would never be thought of and this is what makes Moriarty a great psychopathic villain. Hence-why we wanted to emulate him within our antagonist.

As well as this, we used the news team to help be a representation of the ethnic diversity in London and therefore help our audience better relate with them. We chose a white male to act out the role of the news anchor, and we also chose an asian female to act the role of the news reporter.

The news reporter

These roles are arguably the most important in an actual news team, which is therefore the reason why we chose to actors of both different gender and ethnicity; this we believed was the best way we could give an accurate representation of the social make-up within London.

The news anchor

Evaluation Post 3: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Our production company is Hammer Film Productions, known for making iconic films within the horror and thriller genres.Labels

We chose Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. as our distribution company as they are a fully integrated company who would likely buy the rights to our independent film. Moreover, Warner Bros. are responsible for some of the worlds best grossing films and therefore we though having them as our distributor would bring the same sort of success.

Top grossing films distributed/produced by Warner Bros.

We also chose Warner Bros as our distributor as are known to have worked on films with Hammer Film Productions before, in turn we wanted to capitalise on this synergy. Some of these films can be seen below:

'Crescendo'

'When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth'

Our marketing plan is very similar to that of other independent films as it has a mix of both traditional methods, such as posters, and social media, i.e. twitter.

We also looked at other similar independent films, such as 'The Hunger Games' in order to create our release plan. Click on the picture below to enlarge.

Evaluation Post 4: Who would be the audience for your media product?

Due to the horror/thriller genre being wide in its scope for audience appeal we ensured our film had many different aspects which could target specific groups, such as 16-24 year olds and fans of the genre. Below is a presentation going into more detail about the audiences we are targeting:

Evaluation Post 5: How did you attract/address your audience?

Using the uses and gratifications theory we were able to appeal to and attract audiences effectively. Click the table below to enlarge:

Audience feedback:

In order to get a gauge on how successful our film opening was and to receive further feedback on it I interviewed 4 people- 2 boys and 2 girls. Below are two videos of some of the people I interviewed during this process:

The students interviewed in these videos were either 16 or 17 and are therefore a apart of one of out primary audiences (16-24 year olds). From these interviews I was able to get a good reflection on improvements we could make and also some of the things we did well. 

Pros:

1. the cliff hanger moment at the end was done well, due to its clear purpose and good timing
2. the effect on the titles was chosen well as it fitted into the style of the opening
3. the low-key lighting was effective as it created a dark theme around the film opening
4. the build up of suspense created throughout meets the aims we wanted to achieve as it made them feel anxious

Cons:

1. my acting could have been more convincing in order to portray the characters purpose clearer
2. we could have revealed more about the antagonist or showed him doing more action in order to show more of him to the audience.

My thoughts:

In my opinion, I think we could have adjusted sound levels a little bit in order to reduce the size of some of the spikes, such as when I open the computer to see the news report; the news ident is a little too loud in comparison to the sound levels which preceded it and this might unsettle the audience, thus affecting their experience when watching it.

Overall, everyone who watched our film opening said they would continue to watch if they could. Furthermore, they were all originally fans of the genre, meaning they fit into another one of our primary audience groups, and they all agreed that our film opening was a thriller/horror film. In conclusion the feedback we received proved to us that we did meet the demands of the brief and the aims we set ourselves.

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

Throughout this process of constructing my film opening I have learnt and developed many skills regarding the technology we have used. My prior experiences were definitely helpful, however I believe that all the knowledge I had about this equipment has been enhanced due the constant use of it in a positive manner. Below you can see a presentation with more detail on this learning curve.

Evaluation Post 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

I feel that my progression from the preliminary task to the full product has been vast. I have honed and developed not only my technical ability, whilst in post-production and production, but also my ability to plan and keep my work efficient.

Our Preliminary Task

For this task we had to work in groups or in pairs in order to create a 2 minute continuity sequence for a fiction film which contained a short dialogue between 2 characters. My group consisted of me and Meera.

Whilst capturing our footage we had to bear in mind the basic continuity principles, such as the:

• 180 degree rule
• 30 degree rule
• Match on action
• Shot-reverse-shot

Pre-production:

The planning for the prelim was not very extensive as we only used one tool to help us when shooting, a storyboard:

Our storyboard for the prelim

When looking back on the prelim I thought that using another planning tool, such as a shoot board, would have been much more helpful in the production stage. Upon this reflection I decided that pre-production had to be different when creating the full product as it's benefits would be worth the time it took to create them. Below are some of the additions to pre-production that I made when planning the full product that I did not entertain during the prelim:

Production:

Me acting in the prelim

Me acting in the opening sequence

When it came to production I feel that the actual filming process in the prelim was extremely helpful as it helped different group member acclimatise to different roles and specialise in them - ready for the real thing. 

For example, I acted in the prelim and I then carried on this role into my opening sequence as that is where I felt I could benefit the sequence and the group the most due to the prior experience. 

In addition to this, when not acting in the prelim I helped with adapting the mise-en-scene; I then carried over this skill into the shooting of the opening sequence.

Post- production:

During the post-production of our prelim, our focus was mainly on just editing the footage into a basic continuity sequence. This meant that we paid little to no attention to sound levels or grading, whilst we didn't add a soundtrack or even rename the rushes. In my opinion the renaming of rushes was the big thing to take out of the prelim post-production as it made editing our full product much easier and more efficient; mainly due to the ease at which we could decide on the best takes and also switch them out in the future if needed to as we could easily locate them.

Our edit suite

Overall, I think that the preliminary task was a very beneficial process as I learnt a lot of skills and ideas which I could carry over into my opening sequence production.

Construction Post 30: Looking back - reflections on our final outcome

Our Film Opening:

My group and I recorded our reflections on the final outcome of our media product in the form of a podcast. This be be accessed below:

Construction Post 29: My technical learning curve

Through the creation of our film opening we had to delegate roles; this therefore caused each of us top develop certain skills in the different aspects of  production and post-production. For example, during production  I mostly acted and prepared the mise-en-scene of the set-pieces, whilst during editing I was mostly responsible for continuity and music/sound.

Construction Post 28: My personal contribution to the Edit Sessions

Within the post-production stage I really enjoyed the editing as I mostly took on roles which I felt I had the most experience with and therefore produced the best possible work. For example, I took the lead when it came to editing all the best takes to the correct length and placing them on the timeline in order. This job sounds simple but it did take quite a long time to edit the shots for continuity and still ensure the whole sequence flowed well and was in the time limit set by the brief.

Me editing the film opening sequence 

I also took responsibility for the changing of sound levels to what the group thought was best for the film opening, i.e. what sound levels needed to be high or low at different points to help contribute to the atmosphere of the sequence. Below you can see a short video of me editing sound levels on the soundtrack:

As well as all this, I also helped with the editing of the titles and their effects. However, as this was my first time working on the software, LiveType I had to experiment with effects in order to find the best ones. This was actually quite fun as it helped me gain confidence in my ability with title editing and in turn helped me produce titles which all of the group and our teachers approved of.

Me experimenting with titles on LiveType

Construction Post 27: My Personal Contribution to the Shoot Sessions

I served in many different roles within every location.

Location 1: My house

I acted within this location during every shoot as I played the role of the antagonist. This meant I had to follow the director's commands as well as rehearsing my shots whilst not be filmed in order to reduce the number of takes needed for it to be as good as possible. Below is video of me preparing for a shot during the test shoot:

Location 2: Enfield Island Village Forest

At this location I helped direct the shots as our main director, Sailesh was occupied with cameraman duties and therefore needed some aid with arranging mise-en-scene, such as the placement of the microphone when the news reporter is taken, as well as encouraging the actor and helping her with her lines and her positioning on the set. Below is a video of my group filming the news reporter scene, whilst I watch over the scene and look out for anything that may mean we have to re-shoot.

Location 3: Classroom

For this location I took on the role of director and cameraman due my increased knowledge of the set in relation to my other group members as I was the one who arranged the classroom into the best format possible. Moreover, I had time before the shoot to plan out the shot and experiment with framing, thus I thought I would be the best person to direct the shot and go on camera. Overall, I believe that this was one of the main contributing factors of us only taking 2 takesto capture the footage we needed.

Construction Post 26: Reflections on Edit Week 2

Throughout this edit week our aim was to complete our film opening. The first step was to add in all of our new shots from the back-up shot onto our basic timeline, then we went delegated roles within the group to ensure we maximised efficiency. For example, if a couple of us were grading and adding special FX to the shots then the third group member would be editing the effects on our titles. As edit week 1 went so well, we repeated the use of an edit schedule. However this time we added in a lot more editing slots as we didn't want to waster any time that we had at our disposal.

The schedule for edit week 2

For grading, our intentions were to darken our shots, especially the ones which had the antagonist in them as we thought this were add to the atmosphere of the sequence as well as obscuring some of his facial features. By obscuring some features we were able to make the identity of the antagonist a little more mysterious. This was done by increasing the contrast of the selected shots and decreasing their saturation as well.

A graded shot in our film opening

Construction Post 25: The Back-Up Shoot

Our back-up shoot was scheduled on Sunday 5th March in the time lot of 9am to 4pm. As we wanted this shoot to flow as best as possible we made as many preparation as possible, such as a shootboard, a revised script and better communication with our actors. This transpired in our shoot finishing early that anticipated as we were all very happy with the footage we had shot in a highly time-efficient manner.

The shootboard for the back-up shoot

As mentioned in our reflections during edit week 1, we re-shot the news reporter scene with our actor Aisha learning her lines prior to the shoot day and her changing her costume in order to look more professional and in turn make the scene more believable to the audience as a real news broadcast.

News reporter after

News reporter before

As well as this, we also shot some reaction shots of the antagonist watching the news broadcast as this gave a clearer message of his intentions.

Overall, I believe the back-up shoot went very well as we manged to get all of her intended shots at a higher quality than what they were shot at in the main shoot.

Construction Post 24: Reflections on Edit Week 1

Our groups target for this edit week was to have all our chosen shots onto the editing timeline in the correct order and cut down to the correct length. We also aimed for them all to be edited for proper continuity and mixed well with the soundtrack and sound effects. As well as all this we wanted our titles to all be in the correct positions but with basic effects, i.e. not done on LiveType. The reasoning behind this was because we needed to find out if any of our shots needed to be redone for reasons such as incorrect framing, bad lighting or acting which could be improved upon. Any shots which we thought needed to be re shot were noted and then planned as part of the back-up shoot on the following weekend. To make sure the group's organisation was high we designed at edit schedule so everyone knew when to be editing and to ensure the workload was fair.

Our edit schedule

There were two main issues which we flagged up that we felt took precedence over the rest:

1) Throughout the entire news reporter scene, the actor can be clearly seen looking to the left of the screen in order to read her lines; this is not normal for a professional news broadcast and therefore disrupted the immersion of the audience. Thus, we agreed that the actor needed to learn her lines in advance so this issue would not arise again in the back-up shoot.

2) Another issue we encountered when looking back on our footage was that is was not obvious for the audience that the antagonist was watching the news broadcast due to some continuity errors. To fix this we thought it was best to add some reaction shots of the antagonist during the broadcast as this would make it clear to the audience that he was watching it.

In spite of these issues which needed to be corrected, I believe that this edit went very well due to the high efficiency that everyone in the group worked at as well as the fact that we felt our sequence was meeting the demands of the brief.

Construction Post 23: Our Post-production Kit

Our post production kit consisted of two different types of equipment, hardware and software.

Editing Hardware:

Dual monitor computer                                                                    MacBook                             

This is the PC on which we used Adobe Premiere Pro

This is where we used LiveType on

Headphones                                  

These were connected to the Computer

                                

Editing Software:

Adobe Premiere Pro      
                              

This is where we did all of our editing

  LiveType

This is where we made our titles

Construction Post 22: Reflections on our Main Shoot Session

I think our main shoot was very effective and useful as it showed us any last problems we need to correct before we finished editing. From this reflection we made a revised shoot board, of which shots which we wanted to re-do could be found on. This shoot board would be for the back-up shoot we decided to schedule on the following weekend.

Construction Post 21: Our Production Kit

When it came to taking out our kit for the shoots we were given an in-depth tutorial on how to use the equipment by the technician. She informed us on how to use what we were given safely and efficiently. To confirm that we had taken out the equipment we signed an 'Equipment Release form' which represented us taking responsibility for it.

The kit that we had asked for

Our 'Equipment Release form'

Key Equipment:

Canon Legria HF G30 Camera

This camera was small, easy to use and portable. This made it very helpful when we needed to switch from standard tripod shots to hand held action shots. Also it made positioning the camera in our set-pieces much easier and therefore help us keep to schedule with high efficiency. 

  

Canon DM-100 Directional Microphone

The microphones quality really stood up during times in which the weather was not perfect. For example, its ability to pick up dialogue to a high standard enabled us to still capture good quality footage in the windy conditions.

  

Libec TH-650 HD Tripod

The tripods retractable legs and light frame enabled our outdoor shots to be completed with high efficiency as we could easily transfer between shot types whilst also allow us to make alternative shot, i.e. different heights, with more ease.