Evaluation
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our media product uses most of the conventions that horror films have, for example we have used a red title this is a convention of many famous horror films like, Insidious. We have also edited in a scary piano horror music, which is a convention of horror films we did this to add tension to our film opening. lighting went against conventions because we only used diegetic light, if we had used non diegetic lighting then it could have helped with the constant purple glow in the second half of the film. We followed the costume convention that surrounds horror films, for example Alex is dressed in very casual clothing showing that he is the possible victim in the film, the villain in the film is dressed in very dark clothing and has a balaclava on showing he is the villainous character in the film. There was very limited props used in the film opening and noticeably there was no weapons shown, from the start me and my partner said we didn't want to have death in the first 2 minutes of the film, we were also thinking about the rest of the film and building up tension and surprise. We followed the conventionsof characters as in we had the strong protective male figure and also the female you saw briefly would have been brought into the film later on. we also had the disturbed evil villain. we also stuck to the convention of setting by having our film opening set in a house at night. we also left our opening on a cliff hanger which again is convention of many horror film.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Our media piece represents the following social groups, youth with a focus on age and gender. We have made sure that the representations used were realistic and positive as the actions were not violent, this however can go against the stereotypical representation as the majority of youths being aggressive towards others. We are aiming at the audience of 15-30 year olds and with the actors we have chosen I feel that it will help capture this audience because all the actors are within that age bracket. This means that the audience will be able to relate with the film and therefore views will feel more tense because they will gain a connection with the characters. We didn't have a specific gender that we were aiming at and this is why we had both male and female actors again to try and establish a connection between the audience and the actors.
Who would be the audience for your media product?
Our film is aimed at primarily a male audience, this is because through research we understood that a male audience is more likely to view horror films compared to females. the age we are trying to appeal to is between 15 and 30 year olds, horror movies are a way for this age group to get a thrilled and excited. We are also aiming at the working class, this is due to the level of thrill and excitement which is gained from horror films and its at a low cost.
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
The type of film institution that would distribute our film, could be Institutes like 'Warp Films'. Warp Films have made films like, This is England and 4 Lions these are not very well known films and they both have small budgets in the hope that they will make a larger sum of money. Typically with these smaller institutes they allow smaller production companies or individuals to produce there films. We wouldn't be able to have a distributor like Disney because we don't have very limited experience and we don't know any well known actors or directors therefore Disney wouldn't distribute our film.What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
I have learnt a lot about various different software and also different cameras and how they work in different situations.
Firstly I learnt how to use blogger, before I started this course I hadn't even heard of the site but after using it I found it was really simple website to use and to keep a full record of all my coursework. I also found that it was very simple to upload videos and images I had taken to use as evidence. I also got to use 'Adobe Premiere Pro' which is a great piece of software to use it was very easy to use and made editing simple, I'm also looking forward to and hope to use this program a lot more and try to discover different features with thin the program. I also got to use the software YouTube I have already had experience with this its a very simple and easy tool to use, I used it as a bridging tool so I could take the edited videos and upload them on YouTube then from YouTube put them on my blog. The other piece of technology I got to use was a DSLR Canon Camera I learnt how cameras react to different lighting and how cameras look and record with different focuses one thing I did learn was that to get the best possible quality from a camera don't just rely on diegetic lighting I need to add artificial lighting. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
Looking back on my preliminary task, I have learnt various new technical skills as well as how to create a successful product. I've learnt
Camera: in the preliminary task we were given the basic filming equipment a camera and a tripod, with this we were able to produce a short walking scene, going into the main task I've learnt that the camera needs to be fully focused to get the best possible quality film opening and you can only get the best quality if you add artificial lighting because diegetic lighting isn't enough. With getting use to the basic equipment we were able to use different more advanced shots to improve our main task. The main issue we had with camera work in the preliminary task is that we broke the 180 degree rule, this was a main thing we focused on in our main but unfortunately because of the layout of the house we had to break it luckily its not that noticeable.
Editing: Premiere Pro is an advanced editing software so from the preliminary task to the main task we didn't need to change the editing software. the only thing that changed was our understanding and knowledge of the software this allowed us to edit our clips to high quality.
Mise en Scene: In our preliminary task it is clear that we have not considered everything within the scene. the costumes we very basic and the location had no thought. The Mise en Scene only improved when we actually did research into our chosen genre and we found out that a house a night was a good location, and that dark black clothes for the villain is a convention of horror.
Soundtrack: In our preliminary task it was clear that we didn't worry about a sound track, this was clear because in the preliminary task we had no non diegetic sounds added in we only had the two actors talking. we have progressed in main task because we have a continuous music track playing the whole way through and we added extra sound effects in.
