Evaluation Notes

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
I chose to produce an opening sequence to a film that meets the hybrid genre of; psychological thriller (PT).
- Atmospheric music is a generic convention in a PT because it is a recognised signifier to the audience that something is going to happen. I chose to include periods of silence in the non diegetic music because our research and textual analysis clearly showed this to be a tension builder. In place of the atmospheric music we chose to use the stereotypically ‘creepy’ little children’s lullaby music because it relates to the proposed pyschological background of our antagonist (Obsession with a lost child)- I illustrated the scenes using a combination of natural lighting (evening) and constructed lighting. The night time, dark setting of the school plays to tension building conventions that are evident in many other media productions of the same genre. The use of character controlled lighting that the antagonist and protagonist use also builts towards our intended tense atmospheric conditions. This is because the audiences visual hold on the film is restricted to what the characters can see on screen. This combonation is conventional for films of the thriller genre. 2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?
　
　-It represents the characters in a manner that both holds and breaks convention. The choice of having a female protagonist breaks convention as the normal stereotypical view of a film normally means that a male character would be chosen for the position of protagonist. However in this scene it portrays the female character as a victim or ‘damsel in distress’ of a male antagonist which is a scenario that is evident in many films.-It also has a stereotypical view of a hierarchy of power in a school, with the more ‘powerful’ profile of a teacher being similarly more powerful than the protagonist who takes the place of a student. This mimics the conventional antagonist > protagonist representations.
　
　
3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
My research identified that our target audience of traditionalist males and females between the ages of 15-35 were likely to consume films in the following ways
 On DVD at home with friends after a night at the pub
 At a local mainstream cinema or smaller outlets such as cinema city
 On a video hosting site such as YouTube or official internet player for TV channels such as BBC iPlayer
-The film is likely, considering its status as a low budget amateur film would likely be not shown in a mainstream cinema because it has neither the money nor the actors to compete with a Cinema released film. It is more likely to be a directly DVD released film or viewable in an open cinema such as Cinema city. There is also the possibility it may appeal to a TV channel like Channel 4 as they often invest in presenting amateur movies or television shows that are produced locally. That said it would be shown past watershed if presented on TV due to its intended audience of 15’s.
In the local area, if this train of thought applied then it would be likely to be shown in the Cinema city, as there is one near the city centre or on a television channel. That said DVD release or Tv showings are not swayed by location with the UK whereas some towns have more access to broader ways to consume media products
　4. Who would be the audience for your media product?audience type – hedonist etc…
-　　　　　　　　 I think the audience type this would relate and attract to would be a traditionalist thriller audience because it lacks hedonist or modernist features like camera experimentation (cloverfeild, Diary of the dead) or ground breaking special effects or storyline (The Matrix), and it　provide very PT　conventions in setting, character roles and base storyline.
-　　　　　　　　 If a rough estimate at a specific age group it would address I would think it would likely to appeal to students between the age of 15 to 18 due to the setting and how it would be something, due to the scenario, that could happen to them, or aspects of, which would trigger their own actual ideas about what they would do, involving them in the storyline.
　5. How did you attract/address your audience?
　
-　　　　　　　　 The narrative is pretty understated through deliberate lack of dialogue so it will mean that the audience will look to understand the story though the flickers of narrative in this OTS
-　　　　　　　　 The enigma will shock the audience as he is revealed early on however no real explanation is given to why he is disturbing but still it will increase tension through later scenes,　as they know he is the eventual antagonist and will advise the naivety of　　protagonist in their minds. This　unique stiuation, created via deliberate unrestricted narritive at the beginning, but restriction later　is evident in several productions such as Law and Order: Criminal Intent in a similar manner, however minor occurances of manipulating narritive is common in action thrillers　 to create tension.
-　　　　　　　　 Traditionalists will know the setting as conventional in that it is a school at night, something which has been covered in plenty other films and media productions. This will appeal to them as they can　recognise the techniques and representations applyed to the film while being pleasantly surprised at the more diverse smaller, slightly hedonistical techniques (ie: Circular narritive,　antagonist being present through most of film, POV heavy shots.)　
-The characters are not depicted in a manner that strains the suspension of disbelief as the shots and way that the film is shot means there is little room for over acting by the characters if the acting was poor. However in comparision both characters are almost understated through lack of dialogue in the scene, meaning they cannot overexpress themselves and even express some of their characteristics besides the audiences own judgements.
　
　
6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing the product?
Technologies that I’ve used that my understanding of has improved:
i-movie
Blogging
Intranet
i-photo
sound technologies
lighting technologies
firewire
　
　
-　　　　　　　　 I have learned much from constructing the film. Previous to the continuity task I had no experience with any video recording software, editing equipment and had never done a blog so it was an incredibly steep learning curve over the past months.
-　　　　　　　　 In terms of this in relation to the actual filming, early on in class we covered basic storyboarding using digital cameras, which then had to be translated into an actual storyboard using the software iPhoto
-　　　　　　　　 After a bit of a struggle I worked out some aspects of lighting and how difficult it is to construct well to perform simple tasks that require single point light (newspaper scene)
-　　　　　　　　 Editing was tough but I got to use both final cut, which is much more detailed and offers more broad range of options both visually and sound-wise, and iMovie, which is much simpler and user friendly but has the drawback of not having as much functions as final cut
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And finally the blogging itself has been something new to me. But to be honest it has been relatively smooth and quite easy to work.
　
　7. Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
- I have learnt that POV (point of view) shots can be used really well to build tension
- When filming a movie to chose both actors and location on ease of use, to shape the idea around them rather than the opposite, which is something that I succumbed to throughout the filming unfortunately
- Time management is majorly important when it comes to getting filming and editing done. All the way through I had allocated time to get certain areas of filming done, but needed better planning because on occasion I only did half of what I expected.
-Sound and lighting have a similar importance to camera shots and visual acting as they can create mood and feeling in characters that can otherwise not be conveyed by visual alone.　This was probably one of the hardest　points for me to achieve but in the end it was sufficent. However it will be something I will place much more　work into research and execution of.