evaluation questions

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our film challenges the foms and conventions of real media products in terms of the characterisation, this means thatall of the characters look authentic, realistic and how they would look in a real film, for example, in our ainal piece, Jess is wearing a long grey coat, which gives her a mysterious look, that fits well with the genre of our film. We also took the setting of  real psychological thriller and developed the ideas into our own, for example, we chose to use a park as our settign as we thought it was an ideal and sterotypical spot for a pedophile/ kiddnapper to spy on small children, i feel that our chosen setting fits welll with the chosen genre as it made the clip wysterious like it would in a full film. The visual style of the opening sequence is very dark, with black cloudy sky, this represents an idology of a dark, dingy and controversial subject matter, this is ussually the case in films that invlove the kiddnapping of children, or any other film that involves any harm  to a chil, this is because this is a very contravention subject matter.

The colours in this screen grab of the opening credits of the title from our film compares to to the opening title of this psychological thriller film 'M'. The colours red and black create a frantic and frightening atmosphere to the clip. This comparison also shows that we have taken into consideration the films that already exist in this genre, this therefore means that we too have looked at the type of audience that are interested in psychological thrillers, as we have used similar ideas, which mean people like this effect and so by using it we have ensured that we have pleased our audience right from the start, and if the start of the film is appealing and grabs the audiences attention, meaning they are more likely to give the film good ratings.  Our media product also develops the forms and cnventions of real mada productsin terms of the characterisation, we have looked at exising media products and analysed their characters, take for example the textual analysis stated previously that helped me to see a film clip in terms of the shots, angles and character representation, this helped to understand the types of character we needed. In our final media product we analysed the film 'M', looking at the characters, we used alittle girl like the film has. Also many films of this genre cast characters and shoot the from an angle where you cannot see their face, this creates an air of mystery and susspence ot the clip, which creates anticipation an the mystry of not knowing, for the audience.

 These two pictures show the comparision between  the comventions of characterisation in pur media producte and that of a real media product. This therefore shows that our media product challenges the forms and conventiions of real media products, in terms of the characterisation and development of the streotypes of the particular genre, psychological thriller.

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

In our opening sequence we chose to use actors that were our own age, this is because, we knew that when it came time for the audience feedback that the majority of the audience that we showed it to would be our age, so by using actor's of our age group, we have attempted to communicate with the audience, as they are seeing people their own age and so can hopefully relate to the happenings on the screen. We chose to doa major role reversal, in that the mysterious and mean ccharacter is played by a girl,Jess, whereas it is sterotypically played by a man as they are normally seen as more domeneering than women. Similarly we changed usually female role of caring guardien of the child, to a male. We chose to do this role reversal because, we thaught it would reach out to the audience in a way te noo other film would, as it shows a sensative and careing side to the male character and a miliciuos and mean side to the female, which is not typical. This thereofre relates back to our reaserch into Myra Hindly's killings and the fact that the pupilc were more outreaged because she was a woman and could do such things. The characters hairstlye and clothes are rlevant to the time period we intened it to be set,in the moder day, this also helps the audience to relate better with the film. The film we created targeted the audience, teenagers, young adults and adult, through the age of the actors, the clothes they wore and the harsh subjact matter that is contained within the opening sequence we have filmed, the background storyline may reach out more to the few older opeople in the audience as they may be able to remember the actions of Myra Hindly and Ian Brady We targeted both men and women who ar intrested in watching psychological thrillers as their preferred choice of film, again the controversial subject means that the cilp can reach out to the audience on a personal level, any perent or family member watching the clip will go through the same emotions as Olly, as if it were someone they kew themselves, therefore showing that our film connects with its audience well as allows the audience to be int the characters shoes throughout. Due to the content and graphic background ocntext, we feel that the BBFC would rate our media product at age 18, for the safty of anyone below this age.  

This picture represents the audience that we hoped to adderss. It shows a picture of olly, who featred in our product as the little gilrl, April's, brother, who is worried and looking for her in the park where the kidnapper has taken her from his care. This also represents thge socil group that our media is aimed at, people 18+, and although Olly is not eighteen he plays the character well and looks the part. This is backed u by  the clothes that Olly is wearing in the film, he looks as though he iod just a normal boy out for the day with his sister, this too helpes the audience relate to it as they can put themselves in his place.

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

Our film would come under the title of a low budget independant british film, this means that i scompletly different to a high budget hollywood film that is distributed all round the world. Our film would only air in the UK, and would be in association with film4, on channels such as, film4, channel 4, more 4 etc.

Our film would be in the same catagory as other low budget film that fiml4 hae distributed, such as 'Bullet Boy' and 'Slumdog millionaire'. The fact that this is low budget ma give theimpression that the films that are distributed by fim4 are not good enough to win awards, for example, like the big and expensuve Hollywood blockbusters. However this is not the case, the proof is the hit of a film, 'Slumddog Millionaire' which won countablle oscars and various other awards for is outsatanind perfomance. This shows that films do not have to be on a hight budget or be made in Hollywood for the audience too like it and for it to then go on and win many big awards. This therefore shows that all a film has to do to be successfull is to appeal and connect to its audience, and i feel the our media product has done that. (through the character representaion, for example)

Our film is on the same level as the other low budget picture 'Bllet Boy'.  this is mainly ue to the fact that they both deal with contravertial content. 'Bluuet Boy' deals with the inner city of London, and the gang toruble that is so often the cause of many deaths.

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

The audience at whom our media product may be aimed at, could be anybody rangeing from the age of eighteen to 50+. The film cannot be seen by anyone under the ege of eighteen due to the horrific nature off this film genre, psychotic thriller. It would most likley appeal to men more as it is common that men go for films that have violent or graphic scenes, all of the above generally feature in films rated 18, this shows that films use genre conventions to appeal to its target audiences. Our film has used its genre conventions to appeal to the audience, as involves scenes that imply stalking, this appeals to the age range 18+ because, from fresearch i have found out that this is the kind of film people would like to see on TV, a psychotic thriller that grips you right from the start and has a controversial topic, all of which our media product has. Sterotypically films become more gory and horrific when they reach the 18 age bracket, this pleases the audience as when they turn 18 this is the type of film that they want to see as they were restridted on what they could watch before, now they can watch whta they like and the majority prefer it to be gory, horrifis or contraversial in content. Our prouct may alslo appeal to people who have young children, parents off children. This is bbeacuse thre is a child that goes missing in our clip, this means theat the audiencs can relate to the characters, in that they would know what the actirs are feeling as they would be feeling the same thing if their chil had gone missing or been kiddnapped ad the child in our media has.                                          

  this picture shows April looking vulnerable and innocent, which makes the audeince fell more sorry for her later in the clip.    

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

We attraced/ adressed ou raudience mainly through facebook, this is because between all four of us we could get hundereds of poeple to watch it and feedback their thaughts on what was good and possibly how to make things better. Overall our audience feedback was quite possitive, in that most of the audience liked the final product and wanted to go on and watch more, if it were available. I feel that we attraceted the audience through the actors. They were all of a similar age to our target audience. This is attractive to the audience as it allowed them to be involved in the film because they can easily relate to the actors and their circumstances and emotions in the clip.

From our first lot of audience feedback we found that th eaudience didnt like our piece very much and so we decided to change the majority of it to please our target audience, i feel that this was the best decision to make as the data that came from it was outstanding in relation to oue first attempt at creating an openingsequence.
Form the data results that we collected from place such as facebook  we have created two bar charts and a pie chart the ahows our collected data in a more clear ans precise way, this means that next time we intend to make ans opening sequenec of this genrre we have the satistica and data that will help us to determind whatr peopl like and what they dont like within the film and therefore genre.

 

The graphs and pie chart show the results from the audience feedback that we got form facebook and from questionaires we asked people to fill out that , This represents what the target audience thought of our piece, it is clear that many of them said that they would want to go on and watch the reat of the film if there was one ever nade, as they were intrigued and hooked by the first small bit that we showed them. They were also able to put the film into the correct genre catagory, this means that we portraied the sterotypes of the genre well, meaning the audience got what they were expecring to when they heard the genre of the clip we were going to show them.

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

During the process of filming and editing our piece i have learnt a lot obout many different technologies. Firstly i lernt hoe to use a camcorder and how to make all the effects, for example, changing the focus and the mode to make the foreground clear end the background blurry i also lernt how zoom in and out on the camera, which can be used to give a wide angle shot, that is ussually used as an establishing shot to help set te scene for the audience. I also lernt that the brightness of the daylght effects the camera, and the camera must be adjusted before ues in an innapropriate lighting, the light can also be manipulated to give  brighter effect on a dingy day, for axample. From using the sony vagas editing ssoftwhere i have learnt a vast amount of knowledge on how to edit and add post-production effects to an existing film, i was able to add effects such as fade in, fade out and  the crackle effect at the end of the sequence. We also used technologies like facebook to post our video to get audience feedback, this hekped as it ment we couldd reach lots of people ina short space of time. the vagas softwhere also helped, in that i learnt how to construct two minuite film, which before starting  iwouldnot have been able to do. i managed to put the audio clips with the visual ones with no faults in the end. However my existing intrest in photography helped a considerable amount. The editing softwhere is the technology that i feel i learnt the most about whilst completing this tast. This is due to the fact that i had never used it befor and it was a whole new experience for me, and this i liked. I also feel that the technologies that i have used were very usefull, in that they completed the job that we wanted them to, and to, what i think, is a good standard.  
From watching films with directors cuts we i was able to learn the shots tht were used and for what reason in the given cirsumtanes. i also learnt alot from the textual analysis that i did at the begining of the cores they helped me gain greater knoeledge of the range of shots , amgle and movements avaliable to use when filming.
Also in the process of making the media cilp, we used technologies like Sony Vagas editing softwhere that helped tremendously in that it hepled us put effects like blurring onto the film.below is an example of this

7. Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Looking back i feel that i have learnt a lot in progression for the preliminary task to the full product. I also feel that the progression that i made was a big one. This is because the two are completly different, in therms of the gender and the camera work. In the preliminry piece i did not use a tripod which ment that lost of it were shakey and out of focus. Also the first task was a very basic story line and now, looking back, i can not seeany possible way to take it any further, whereas this final task is different, i, and the audience, can imagine the film that would follow shouldd our film ever feature in film4. one weakness of the preliminary task is that we did not use a tripod in some bis, resulting in shaky footage, this porblem was resolved when it came to filming the final film as we borrow a tirpod from schoola dn used it to steady the camera in the bits that needed a steady hand, however, we didnt use a tripod fro allof the filming. When in the tripod the camera was easy to focus which ment that the film became less blurry than the preliminary task. In the final piece we have managed to show different point of veiw, we have flash backs fro the future to the past, that i have applied a black and white transition to, to show the two different time zones/flashbacks. We also had to make sur ethat the final piece was more consistant than the first one as in the first task, after editing, we found some inconsistancies, so we ensured that all of the props in the locations used stayed the same throughou the filming process, this made the end result seem more authentic and realistic for the audience.

I also found that foro the final task we had to stick to the story board and the shooting script alot more, i thnk this is because the last task had to be so precise and consistant. In the end all  of the big and small progressions payed of and with the addditions of thing, such as a tripod, the finish material had benefited and we had a much better end result.