Evaluation: 7. What have I learnt in the progression from the preliminary task to the full product?

Since starting to prepare for the production of the opening sequence I have learnt many new editing techniques on the apple mac. I have also learnt a lot about filming and many of the camera shots and angles and what they are used for. Foe example you would use a low angle shot if you wanted to make a character seem strong and superior or an establishing shot would be used at the beginning if you wanted to give the audience an idea of what location the characters may be in.

Example of an establishing shot

I have also learnt that:

• Shot lists
• Screenplay
• Storyboards
• Scripts
• Audience research

are vital if you want to produce a good quality and very organized film. The screenplay tells you of any dialogue and the order in which it is said, it also gives you the location of the character speaking which can be very helpful. In doing research into filming before starting to produce our film i found out that Me-En-Scene is very important as it can help to create the right atmosphere for your film and the props and costumes can help to portray characters as you want. Foe example in our opening sequence formal clothing is used to represent the seriousness of the character and the situation.

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

Through constructing this film i have learnt:

• How to film using digital cameras, rules about filming and how to use the cameras special effects.

• I have learnt new editing techniques including transitions and special effects.                                          
• I have learnt how to use new modern software and technologies such as garage-band and I-movie which helped in the composing of the music and the sounds for the film and the I-movie helped in putting the film together in correct sequence.
• I have learnt how to use the site Blogger which is another social network similar to Facebook. I also now know how to use scribd which is very helpful as it can hold work files making it easier for on-line transfer especially when transferring to Blogger.

Evaluation: 5. How did we attract/address our audience?

One of the main ways our intended audiences found out about the film was through word of mouth. Another way how are film was advertised to the target audience was through social networks such as:

• Facebook
• Blackberry messenger
• Twitter

As the target audience was intended to be people both male and female varying from the age of about 16 to people around the age of 40. The audience research was vital in finding out what the people would want too see if they were to watch a thriller and what would attract them to it. The audience research that was gathered through questionnaires was put into pie charts so that it was easier to use when deciding how to make our opening sequence.


The feedback we gathered from the audience which was on Facebook, blackberry messenger and twitter was from people of all ages both male and female which makes are feedback results more generalisable to a wider population. Although most of the feedback was positive there was some constructive criticism which we have taken in and will bare in mind when making future productions.

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

The audience for our product would be quite good as it would mainly be aimed at people from the age of about 16 up until the age of about 40 for both men and women. This is good as out of all the people that go to watch films in the cinema a high percentage of them will be teenagers and younger adults. Hopefully the audience would be people who like thrillers as some of the main characteristics of our film our tension, excitement and suspense.

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

The type of media institution that would distribute our film would be a small British film institution. This is as it is a very low budget film that is looking for digital distribution. It would be distributed by an independent film company however a problem with this is that as there funding comes from the UK film council they only get the funding if there films cover a certain quota of specialized films.

As there is a low budget for the film and it is not available to the best technology we are unable to use distributors such as 20th century fox which have global ownership meaning they don't have to pay for exhibition of there film in other cinemas and can advertise there films on fox run television channels whereas we would have to pay for exhibition and advertisement.

Evaluation: 2. How does your media product represent particular people and social groups?

In our film as there is only really one main character as the other character involved in the opening sequence can not be seen.we have portrayed are black adult male character as quite serious and his character also give the audience the impression he is quite smart through the way he talks which is formal and also through his quite serious and formal clothing which would maybe lead the audience to believe he is a business man due to the Mi-en-scene and costumes and props on set. We have represented are character to the audience in a way which will make him stand out. The way in which we a portrayed the character may not be a clear representation of all black middle aged people however it does allow us to create more suspense and excitement. The costumes used again may not be what all people wear but help in making the situation more serious which is what we were trying to do.Also the characters body language, as he is standing upright with his chest out would signify to the audience that he is reasonably confident and has quite high self-esteem which is the sort of character we are trying to create although this representation may not be generalisable to a wider population. Throughout the opening sequence the main focus is always on the main character which shows maybe that he is in power and makes the audience feel like he is superior. The use of a camera angle such as a low angle shot was also used to suggest to the audience he is in power and superior and if we wanted to portray are character as weak and inferior we would of used a high angle shot which would make the audience feel they are in power.Although are representations may not always be applicable to all people in the real world it fits in with our plot very well. The black middle aged character which we are trying to represent as powerful, authoritive, clever, strong could easily be compared to people such as Curtis Jackson(50 cent)who has appeared in films such as get rich or die trying and Gun.He inspiration for are character as he is strong and is looked up to by many people as he has made it big growing up in a poorer part of America where there is a lot of crime however are character may not have exactly the same background but the way in which he is represented may suggest similar characteristics.Above you can see our character and below you can see Curtis Jackson and it is clear they are both strong,superior and you can see how powerful they are.All in all I believe we were quite good at giving representations of certain individuals as we took are time as we did not want to stereotype which has been done which has had a negative effect on films in the past.

Evaluation: 1. In which ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our opening sequence can be compared quite easily to real/actual opening sequences as it is a genre that uses suspense,tension and excitement as some of its main elements which are common characteristics which are seen in thrillers and have been used to attract the audiences.Our opening sequence does not really challenge the forms of thrillers as we believed are film would be better if we made it as realistic as possible.Generally in thrillers the main sub-genre that is most used is psychological thrillers and although our opening sequence does not involve many psychological aspects people however we still believe it gets the audience excited and makes them want to watch on.As it is only an opening sequence we believe our opening sequence takes on some of the characteristics of both crime thrillers and mystery thrillers as we have left it quite open meaning a range of things such as heists,captivities,ransoms and kidnapping which are generally seen in crime thrillers and also even an investigation which would be seen in a mystery thriller.As we have left the identity of the characters left out in the opening and a very mysterious voice over is used only revealing nationality all make our opening sequence seem like a mystery thriller.All of the me-en-scene and the costumes used has also helped in the production of making our opening sequence more like a crime/mystery thriller.

DVD Extra: A commentary over the opening sequence

This is a DVD commentary and explains to the audience the camera shots and angles that have been used and why for example a high angle shot has been used to the character to seem week,inferior. A basic summary of the plot is also given to help the audience understand what is going on. Explanations of why certain props and costumes are used are also given in the DVD commentary. Editing is briefly explained and also the audio used as it plays a big part in allowing the audience to know what is going on.

Preliminary Task

This is the preliminary task that was done at the start of the year. It helped us in understanding basic filming rules such as continuity. It gave us good practice at getting use to using the rules which meant we did not make as many mistakes when actually filming our opening sequence.

Audience feedback video

Audience Research Results

These are some of the audience research results we got at the start of the year and helped us to decide how we were going to be making the film and are done by many film production companies so the makers of the film can include what the people want to see.

Audience research results

Audience Research Results

Audience feedback

This is some audience feedback that our group decided to collect on face-book and will be very helpful in helping in the evaluation of our opening sequence. Overall including other people in the groups face-book the feedback was quite positive however there was some constructive criticism which we think could easily be changed when making another opening sequence or short film in the future. You tube and blackberry messenger were also used to collect feedback which can also be useful in the evaluation.

Powerpoint analysis of 'The Case'

The Case ppp

The Case: Our opening sequence

Editing

Recently me and my group have been taking turns and also sitting down as a group to discuss how we are going to edit the film and editing together. As the voice over at the beginning is quite important to our film we recently spent a whole day getting the voice over perfect and it took us a few trials before it could be edited in perfectly over the opening credits with perfect timing. The editing was done using i-movie and garage-band.

Filming

This week we have finally finished and edited our opening sequence despite the fact we have had many setbacks over the last couple of months. We have begun to talk about plans for the audience evaluation of our opening sequence. We our also discussing how we are going to do are DVD extra which will give a commentary over the opening sequence and another one of the DVD extras which will give the audience a directors chair interview about the opening sequence.

Filming and editing idea: Inspiration from Salt

In our film we have decided to use for one of our voice-overs a Russian voice which we feel is very effective. The voice used by Orlov in the film although only some of it is in Russian the part which is in English is very mysterious and gives the audience the idea that there is something quite mysterious and interesting about the character. We as a group have decided that the Russian voice is going to be heard over the phone which will make his character even more suspicious and will make the audience want to watch on to see the identity of what we have portrayed as a very interesting character. We have also done research into the Russian language and have decided that we are going to use a Russian word 'Dasvidaniya' which is a formal way of saying bye in Russian. We believe that this will leave the audience in suspense as they will want to know what the word was meaning and also helps to emphasis just how unknown his identity is even to the other characters maybe.Thanks to the film Salt which has given us this great idea we were able to begin recording the voice voice over which is crucial in helping the ability of the audience to understanding the opening sequence.

Screenplay for 'The Case'

The Case Screenplay

Storyboard: The Case

The Case Story Board

Shooting schedule

Schedule for Filming by George Robinson