Audio Feedback

This is our audio feedback video were we have received positive and negative criticism. This included such criticism as location, editing, sound and camera work.Here are a few points we received.







POSITIVE

• Matt: I thought the music in the background had a really good theme to the genre of the film by how the music managed to build suspense to the film and I thougtht that worked well.
  
  Mr Oswick: I like the use of the music, setting the scene and genre and how the film builds suspense. I've watched the opening two minutes of films over the last few years and they haven't looked like an opening two minutes of a film of any particular genre but you have clearly set the genre out which is a horror.
  It looks like an opening two minutes of a film rather than a trailer, and that all comes down to the editing which is what matters. Lots of horror films start with pre-credits with the first murder and end with the title and then the film will go back to the beginning of the film, which shows you have clearly managed to do this well.
  Also building up with suspense slowly to something going to happen shows you have achieved that certainly. I like how you managed to use a whole range of shots, such as close ups, long shots, low angle, high angle shots etc which shows that you have really made an effort to try and do this. I think my favourite bit about the film was the use of editing, I like how some shots faded into other shots, you didn't having it al fade into black and then into the shot again which meant that the editing was kind of invisible, which is what you want to achieve, and I liked that I thought it managed to work nicely.
  
  
  Zoe: The use of editing techniques and the contrast in the colours makes it look something like in a dream which makes the film look effective.
   Anna: I really like how you ended the film, that really makes the audience feel tense by the way it ends with a loud fear scream and then cuts straight to the title of the film 'Paranoid'. 
  
  Hannah: I thought it was really good, how the first few minutes is incredibly built up with suspense, by the use of music throughout the film and especially right at the end which i thought worked really well and you achieved the suspense successfully.
  
  Kieran: I liked the close up shots of the face, it added more depth to the film which makes it look effective.

NEGATIVE

• Zoe: In most horror films they manage to show the scene whereby they show the victim looking in the mirror and the killer standing behind them, perhaps you could have tried a away of trying to do that to make it look more effective.
  
  
  Mr Oswick: The only thing that didn't quite work for me and i'm not sure why is possibly the effect. To continue this effect throughout the whole film, it might be quite off putting towards other audiences.

Final Film

Audio Feedback

During today's media lesson, everyone in the class had to show their two minute opening of the films that they has produced. My group was the first chosen to show what we had produced, Mr Oswick (teacher) filmed everyone's individually, whereby before showing the film each group had to give an introduction of the film, explaining the film 'title', the 'plot' and any other aspects of what the audience should know before watching the film. After each film had been shown, the audience would then have to give feedback as to what they thought worked well, for example, specific things that represented the genre e.g horror and each group would then have to take in the feedback which will then be produced in our evaluations. The audience were then asked to give feedback about any weaknesses, such as music not fitting right at certain points in the film and lastly each group had to explain what could have been changed, or if we had to do it again what would we do differently.




Tomorrow in my media lesson i shall be making improvements to my final film, which my group and I have taken on board, such as adding music to the credits right at the beginning of the film, possibly changing the affect of the film depending on how it looks on Adobe and lastly any last minute changes that my group and I decide to make.

Photos while filming

Here are some pictures that I have taken during filming over the past few weeks;

This photo is of the killer (Sarah), Sarah is dressed in black leggings, a black top, black cardigan, Black scarf and a knife.

In this photo it is showing the setting (bathroom) where the film is set for half of the film, to the right it is showing Sarah setting up the filming equipment.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

I have chosen Emma's character from our opening product as Emma is the main character. There are many similarities and differences between Emma and other similar characters in real film products. I have chosen a similar character that I would base Emma's character on, this actress would be Shannon Sossamon who plays the main girl in One Missed Call.

The two characters are similar in the way that they are both displayed in similar causual clothing e.g carigan, top, trackies/pjamma bottoms and that they both wear a little amount of make-up to show their vulnerablity. This gives the idea that both characters like to be comfy in what they are wearing when they are lounging around the house which represents the type of character they are. Also, by making both of the characters wear femine clothing, this implies to the audience that they are not masculine and are not stereotypically strong. However, they are vulnerable. 

Both characters play the victims in each of the films, they are both similarly portrayed as being the vulnerable, innoncent, and scared victimn characters who show emotion which is stereotypical to how most main vulnerable girl characters in this type of genre are portrayed.

A character I have chosen to look at which is similar and different to the killer in my own film is Michael Myers, there are many similarities and differences between the two characters.

 The appearance of both characters are similar in ways but also different. The clothing that both characters are wearing tries to hide and cover up themselves, for instance Sarah who plays the killer in our own film wears a balaclava and Michael in Halloween wears a mask and they both wear gloves to cover up their finger prints. The killer in my own film is dressed in stereotypical black whereas Michael is wearing bright colourful clothing, which suggests that both characters are, scary and frightful but in different ways of how they are presented.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

These nine screengrabs I have chosen to evaluate and write about how they are similar or not of opening sequences of the same genre (horror). 


1 (Title of film)- The screen grab for our Title of the film is similar to the other Horror films that I have seen and analysed. We used a plain, lower caps font. My group and I wanted a nice clear font that was easy to read and that stood out clearly to catch the audience's eye. By choosing this type of font we indicated to the audience that the film is not going to be a comedy, romance or action film. We chose to use the colour red for the font. Researching into other Horror films it is clear that in their film titles red is a popular colour as it represents blood and danger. So our red writing fits in nicely with the black background as it stands out big and clear. It is a typical horror film title and I would say that we have used graphics to imply the horror of our film. 
The music fades out just before the last scene, whereby the title then comes straight onto the screen after the last scene has finished, we have also made the title stay on the screen for 4 seconds, so the audience are able to focus on the title.

2 (setting/location) - The location of our film was introduced by using an establishing shot. I chose this screenshot as it is clear to the audience where the film is taking place, and usually in Horror films the film will start off with an establishing shot, as the audience need to be clear where all of the action is going to be taking place. The location is set on a street with other houses, and right by woods, which shows the audience that the film will be set outside not just inside. Quite a lot of typical Horror films are set in a location where there are woods right near by, and I think the setting and location we have used is quite typical and realistic for this type of genre.3 (Costume/Props) -I have used this image as it is one of our only props, the knife is key to the film as it helps develop the story, and it keeps the audience aware of who the killer and who the victim are in this film, by showing the knife to the audience this makes it clear to them that some action could be about to happen. I have also used this image as it shows the killers costume, wearing all 'black' which is a stereotypical colour of what a killer would usually wear, usually the killers clothes are casual, dirty and scruffy and are not very appealing. I would say that we have shown the contrast in different costumes with the two characters well and clear, like in typical Horror films. 

 4 (Camerawork and Editing) - Throughout our whole film we have used editing, we used the 'old film' affect, to give a different vibe to the film and because we were trying to base our editing similar to paranormal activity and by how successful the film is. The 'old film' affect created movement on the shots, and making the film look realistic for this type of genre as many horror films in the old days had the 'old film' affect, due to them ownly having 'black and white' and 'old film' affect, not colour. However some horror films do not use editing in the way, though some do reduce the comount of colour in shots to give a dull feeling to the film.

5 (Title font and style) - For our opening credit titles, we used a different font to the title of the film 'Paranoid'. We chose to have the titles in bold to make the titles stand out which would catch the audiences eye. We kept the font colour the exact same to make the credits look effective and continuous throughout the film and as the colour red stands out bright and clear against the black background and also by the red portraying blood and danger. 

6 (Story and how the opening sets it up) - I have chosen this screen grab for showing the story because it is of the killer holding a knife to the victim, which is what the opening sequence is based on. The prop (knife) that is used in the story is a stereotypical prop that is used in horror films and is usually used for the victim, which gives the audience the feeling of innocence towards the victim, meaning that she is more than likely to get attacked with the knife in this stereotypical horror film. 
The story in the opening sequence is based on a young teenage victim called Emma who is alone in the house whilst she is sleeping, Emma wakes up from a bad nightmare, and still has the nightmare going around in her head, thinking that she can see/hear things. The nightmare consisted of a 'killer' walking towards the house and then gets into the house somehow, whereby the killer finds Emma upstairs in the bathroom, and Emma is then held hostage by the killer.

7 (Genre and how the opening suggests it) - The genre of the film is suggested by the 'killer', by the way they are represented, through the use of costume and props (black costume to cover the face and identity and prop being the knife).

8 (How the characters are introduced) -The two characters are introduced by identifying Emma as the victim in bed, who wakes up from a nightmare and the killer is introduced and indentified outside the house in the woods carrying a knife, which is typical in a horror film. By using this technique it does not give away the identity of this character, therefore adding suspense to the film.

9 (Special effects) - We used a range of different transitions to make our opening sequence look like a realistic horror film.

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

For this evaluation activity I have made a 'director's commentary' style voiceover explaining some of the key features of my opening film, I have included features such as:

• Discussion of my production company name and logo and the role of such companies
• What does a production company do
• The idea of a distributor and who that might be and why
• Where the money might have come from for a film such as yours 
• Why the various people are named in the titles - which jobs appear in titles and in what order and how have I reflected this
• What my film is similar to 'insitutionally' (names of some films which would be released in a similar way)
• Refered to actual company names and processes 

This is our script that we had written out before hand for our audio commentary:

Me- Our production company is ESK Productions . We simply used the initials of our first bames and added them together. Even though it was a simple way to choose a production company name we thought it fitted in well with our titles and provided a believable name for our company.

Emma- A production company is a type of company which is in the business of performing arts. This company aims to develop and physically produce performing arts, film, radio or television programmes however, in our case the production company will be producing our two minute opening.
The production companies profits or losses are entirely dependant on the quality of the film. We think our film would provide profits as it fits in with steroetypical, successful horror films.

Sarah- A good distributor for our film would be Summit Entertainments. The reason for picking this distributing company is that it distibuted the film Sorority Row which has a similar target audience with a similar storyline. It would therefore be successfull like that of Sorority Row.

Kate-The various people who are named in the titles are the actressess, directors and producers. We made sure that each characters name appeared whilst the person was on screen to ensure a link was made between the two. The order that the people are named in the title, is the ESK Productions company name, 'Working Title Presents' and the name of the actressess and then the director.We didn't want to make up other names to make the credits go longer, we only used specific information that was needed.

Emma-A film that is simillar to ours institutionally, would be a film like the Blair Witch Project. The Blair Witch Project is a 1999 horror film ( same genre). The narative is presented as a documentary, pierced together from amateur footage. The characters in the film are of a similar age, pulling in the same target audience as we wish to appeal too. The budget for the film was only $500,000 which is a very small budget compared to all the Hollywood, box-office hits. We therefore think the film would be extremley similar to ours institutionally.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

• This is our target audience member, stereotypically they would be males as this would reflect someone who likes horror films. This image reflects that our target audience would be aged between 15-24 where they are at a mature young adult stage. From my research that I had done previously, showed that this was the age group that enjoys horror films more than elderly people and young children. Children usually can't watch horror films because of certificates on films and parents not allowing their child to watch it, therefore young children do not have an opinion wether they like or dislike horror films.

•  The target audience for our film are most likely to shop in places like Superdry, Topshop etc, they like to dress smart/casual clothes. The types of music they would listen to would be drum and base, Dubstep, R&B etc. The types of Tv programmes that they would watch would be, Vampire Diaries, Eastenders etc. Our target audience would watch our film as it is a horror/thriller, and this target audience like the horror genre.

• This target audience would go and see our film in the cinema with their friends, whereby they would all be able to share the same experience together, feeling scared and tense. This target audience likes to be kept in suspense and to be on the edge of their seat when watching a film. 

• From what we can see, our target audience is male aged 15-24 however,it is likely that females would want to watch this type of genre too, from my opinion I know that I like watching horror films and I am also between my target audience's age range.

How did you attract/address your audience?

I used Youtube's annotation tools to add notes, speechbubbles, and links to our video. These annotations highlight the ways in which our Film Opening links to the other similar films in order to attract the particular Audience. The annotations that I have made refer to genre, music and similarities with other movies and why I have chosen these particular shots to relate to.

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

 To make our final media film, we used different technologies and software to make our film successful. Here is a list of what we used:

•  Camera and Tape- These two were the most important as we used this to film the footage for our final product.
•  Tripod - This was used to steady each shot.

•  Camera and Tripod bags - These were to carry all the equipment in, and to make sure it was all kept safe.

• Adobe - This was the software that we uploaded our footage onto and what we used to complete and edit our final film. 

•  Audio LGFL (free non - copyright music) - This is where we found our music for our final product.

•  Youtube - This is where we found our Universal Studies and the Working Titlte Logos.

• Blogger -  This is what we have used to write out our research, planning, film diaries and evaluation.

•  Horror DVD's - My group and I watched and evaluated Horror films to show we had researched into our film genre before we made our film, which gave us tips as to what kind of shots needed to be used for there effectiveness and how. As well as music etc.

•  By using a video camera we learnt how to use it and how using a tripod can make the video look a lot more effective. We learnt this from attempting to film by holding the camera, but obvioulsy the footage looked jolty so we decided to include the tripod, and from then on the footage looked a lot more effective and realistic.

•  By using Adobe Premier as our editing software, it made the footage look affective as there were many transitions and different affects that were available to use. We used a dissolve transition between each shot to make each of the shots look affective, which made the film run smoothly instead of each shot cutting from one to the other. Adobe Premier has many effects that are available to use, my group and I chose to use the 'old film' effect as this created a sinister and disturbing feel, which is what we were hoping to achieve. Adobe Premier is very useful as the audio can be edited easily and separetly from the actual audio itself, this was useful throughout our film as we wanted to fade in/fade out parts of our audio throughout our film for example, my group and I lowered the audio at some points so you could hear individul aspects such as, the scream at the end and the killers footsteps as they are walking towards the house.

• I have learnt from using Adobe Premier,that the editing is a very long and hard process, the software at first can be very complicated to use as we struggled to add sounds and credit titles. I have now learnt how to film footage and then edit it onto Adobe, and then add transitions and titles to make an opening sequence.

•  For showing our film and the progress of it we have used Youtube and Blogger. We used Youtube because it is a useful software for showing our film as it is an easy website to access and use, and easily uploads files. We had a couple of issues that we had at first for example, we had to convert our film to an MPEG which took quite a long time, before putting it onto Youtube so it would upload succesfully, this was easily solved quickly where we could then upload straight onto Youtube. Another benefit of using Youtube is the fact that we can easily show the film to other people such as family and friends and are able to get their feedback on our film through the use of comments.

•   We also used Blogger for our research and planning whereby it showed our progress of making our opening film, we did this by including animatics, photographs, and explaining any idea changes etc. I have found that Blogger is an effective and very handy website as it is able to show all of the aspects easily. Overall, I have learnt many different techniques to use when constructing, researching and planning a film.