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Final evaluation of my A2 MEdia Studies coursework.
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- Nobody Media Short Film
by
Alex Allin
Final Coursework Evaluation
- In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge
forms and conventions of real media products?
- Forms and Conventions
Filming and Editing Techniques
- Establishing Shot
- Establishing Shot
The typical conventions of establishing shots in films are slow pan
shots to give an idea of where the film is located, additionally
they usually show scenery or something that isnt particularly
spectacular.
However in Thrillers, non-linear structures to films are used and
establishing shots can be important scenes from the film. A perfect
example of this is in Christopher Nolans Inception, this film
starts with waves crashing as the camera slowly pans. These shots
link to the end of the film and are placed at the beginning in
order to confuse the audience, also when the film catches up with
this scene the message is made clear. Because the shot is placed at
the beginning it causes the audience to think straight from the
beginning.
The establishing shot in our piece was a scene from the end of our
film, alike to Inception. This shows paper flying down a street, we
do not pan the camera, thus it subverts the conventions I have
observed. However I believe the steady shot adds effect to the
shot. There is the sound of rustling paper that gets louder until
the scene fades into the opening titles, this sound builds tension,
this is a convention of establishing shots from our chosen
genre.
So, our establishing shot subverts conventions of general films,
however it does apply the forms and conventions of our genre. There
are many examples of this non-linear structure and we followed this
convention in order to add effect.
The mise-n-scene of the shot is very bleak, we lowered the
saturation a convention we applied due to the depressive theme of
our film. This convention can also be seen in films such as The
Book Of Eli.
- Jump Cut
- Jump Cut
This scene was used to emphasise how excluded from society our main
character is. The scene features two other actors who are talking
to each other while the main character walks around them. The shot
is held still until the main character gets to the edge when there
is a series of jump cuts, while the camera pans, this follows the
main character to a seat at the back of the room. The use of jump
cuts is heavily used in film to show time passing and thus this is
a convention we have applied. However in our film we flash to black
between our jump cuts and this syncs to music playing. This
therefore has more of a music video feel, we therefore slightly
subvert the typical conventions of films, we added the black
flashes to add effect and make the film more visually
striking.
The mise-n-scene is once again bleak, the saturation is turned down
again in order to emphasise the dark mood of the film. The shot is
framed so that the main character is at the other end of the shot
to the other actors, this is once again used to represent his
separation from society. This technique is used in many films, we
have therefore applied another convention of the industry.
The music we have used is a dance track it has a mysterious tone to
it, we used this as it creates a nice effect with the atmosphere.
As I mentioned above we synced jump cuts to the track playing we
did this as it created a dramatic effect. The use of music like
this and syncing it to jump cuts is primarily seen in music videos,
however it is seen in films but not often. We therefore subvert the
convention slightly here as it is not a common occurrence in
film.
- Over-The-Shoulder Shot
- Over-The-Shoulder Shot
This is one of the most key shots in our film, the use of an over
the shoulder shot to introduce the other main character. Firstly we
were going to use this shot and then zoom it towards the dark
character to emphasise the importance, but we decided against this.
Over the shoulder shots are used in films to make it seem like the
audience are more involved with the action, another way of doing
this is through using a point of view shot. We decided against the
use of a point of view shot because we felt the over the shoulder
shot was more dramatic. The way we have used this over the shoulder
shot applies the conventions that I have mentioned above. Examples
of shots like this can be seen in real media products in most TV
dramas. And additionally in films in order to give the audience the
sense that they are being included in the action as mentioned
above, this shot type would therefore be a key feature of our
chosen genre Thrillers as it will help build tension and keep the
audience involved.
The mise-n-scene is once again bleak and how we have framed the
shot the main character is at one side with the dark figure at the
other side. How we involve this shot into our piece marks the
moment, as you dont see that part of the room until the main
character leaves. This is an essential part of the film and I
believe we put this across by applying the conventions of over the
shoulder shots. The lighting is purposely above the dark figure so
his face is obscured by the hood he is wearing, the fact his face
is covered is played on through the whole film. The lighting in the
scene is similar to most of the lighting in the rest of our film,
it is naturalistic, coming from the lights inside the classroom.
This is done in order to represent where the film is being
shot.
During this shot there is music playing in the background, this is
the music featured in the jump cut scene, however it is slowly
fading out. We could have possibly incorporated a voice over of the
main characters thoughts during this shot in order to explain the
shot better.
- Flashbacks
- Flashbacks
In this shot as there were just the two of us filming and acting
clever camera work was involved. This scene sees the main character
(front of shot) walking from the doors to where he is positioned
now. In this shot the dark figure had to appear behind main
character as he turned round the corner, as there was just the two
of us this was pretty difficult to carry out, but we managed it;
through the placement of flashbacks to split up the scene.
This shot is once again held still on a tripod, following the
conventions of film. The shot is framed so the main character
obscures the whole centre of the shot until he moves to the side,
(which can be seen right). The mise-en-scene as with the rest of
the film is bleak, this is done to represent the depressive nature
of the film, the saturation is turned down to further emphasise
this effect.
The music throughout this scene is in a minor key and used to add
effect, there is no dialogue or diegetic sound, through scenes like
this our film uses conventions of music videos very strongly, we
used a lack of diegetic sounds and dialogue to show how our main
character was very different to the rest of society. So, this scene
is very similar to something out of music videos, additionally
shots like this are used frequently in horror movies in order to
build tension.
For the flashback we used a dip to white to represent the transfer
into the flashback, this is a convention of film. The original
flashback that we had in our film was edited to have a glow effect,
we this is seen in many films to represent the idea of a flashback,
this however is not seen in films aimed at an older target
audience, or films in our chosen genre. We therefore subverted the
general convention and applied the one relevant to out film. In the
flashback the camera is held still on a tripod, the flashback is
the show the main character receiving a reward for English creative
writing.
There is a sound effect of clapping to represent the fact he is at
an awards evening, there is also a song going on in the background.
This song is in a minor key to emphasise the depressive nature of
the film. The use of flashbacks are also very common in
psychological thrillers as they extend the story and add to the
psychotic feel of the film.
- Bus Transition Scene
- Bus Transition Scene
This scene shows how the main character and dark figure start
seeing more of each other, I edited this scene so there are jump
cuts with the main character wearing different clothes after each
cut. I originally intended the scene to be similar to the scene in
the film Spiderman when Peter Parker is designing the suit, this
however did not happen. Jump cuts are widely used to show time
passing, therefore the way I have used them applies the conventions
of film. The use of shots throughout the scene are mainly close ups
of the main character, however there is one close up of the dark
character and the long shot shown below. This shot is framed so
they are at different sides of the shot. Both characters are facing
away from the camera, this symbolises there distance from society,
the dark characters face is once again covered up by the
hood.
Over the top of this scene there is music playing that my partner
composed on GarageBand, this is piano music with a slow tempo and
in a minor key, this is meant to emphasise the depressive mood of
the scene and add dramatic effect when you see the dark character
on shot. The way we shot it gives the viewer the idea that the dark
character had been there the whole time, he was just hidden. This
gives the impression that the dark character is always present,
thus adding to his enigmatic character.
The mise-en-scene of the shots is very bleak, the colours are dim
and the atmosphere of the shot is dark in order to represent the
depressive theme of our film. The lighting is naturalistic, it is
coming through the window, this casts a shadow on one half of the
characters face adding to their enigmatic identities.
- Dark Scene
- Dark Scene
This is the most key scene in our whole film, it is where the dark
character can be understood; throughout the whole film we
purposefully made him strange in order to keep the audience
guessing. The shots in the scene are a mixture of long shots (seen
below) and medium close ups of both the characters. The shot below
is framed so that the characters are positioned on opposite sides
of the screen. This paired with the dialogue shows how the main
character is distancing himself as he is confused. Through the
dialogue in this scene we applied the principle of the 180 rule. I
believe the exceedingly bleak mise-en-scene further emphasises the
mood of the film and as this scene is significantly darker than any
other adds an extra focus on this scenes importance. Through the
use of bleak mise-en-scene and the framing of our shots I believe
we have followed the conventions of thrillers, shots like these are
scene and the shadows in the scene add to the tension being
created.
- Split Shot
- Split Shot
This split shot has been remarked as the most key shot in our whole
piece. This shot happens with the realisation that the dark figure
is actually in the main characters mind. We decided to do a split
shot as seen below to represent the fact that his personality is
split into another person. The audience does not know yet that that
dark character is in the main characters mind and would therefore
be confused, it is in the shot after next that everything is made
clear. The use of a split shot like this, I cannot say I have ever
seen in a film. It is similar to what is seen in the television
series 24, but we used it in a different way. Therefore we have
subverted typical conventions of film, however I would say that
through subverting the conventions we have made our film much more
individual and visually dramatic. Through having two shots running
at the same time it extends the story at a quicker pace, it may be
confusing as there is a lot to take in, but this is the idea of the
film. I therefore believe that this shot is one of the most key in
our whole film.
The mise-en-scene is extremely bleak, we searched for a location
that would be reasonable to shoot this as we needed a dark room, we
then closed all the blinds but one in order to cast shadows. The
dark character has his face completely covered for the first time
in the film; he is completely in shadow. For the main character we
used an over the shoulder shot while he goes through his story to
find the dark characters message. This shot of the main character
is similar to one of Ewan McGregor in The Ghost Writer. We
therefore applied conventions of film.
Throughout the shots leading up to this one there was music playing
in order to convey the fact that this scene is a pivotal moment in
the film. According to Todrovs Equilibrium theory it is the
disruption.
- Two Main Characters
- Two Main Characters
This shot took the most time to edit out of any in the film, it
shows two main characters, and to carry this out I had to research
tutorials on the internet on how to do this. The shot, I believe is
very effective. How the scene is structured this shot is shown
before the information is shown to the audience, therefore the
audience will be questioning what is going on only to be told in
the following shot. I believe how we structured this is clever, as
it keeps the audience guessing for longer and thus holds their
interest longer.
The shot is framed so the two characters are sat at opposite ends
of the shot, a running theme in our whole film, the copy of the
main character on the left is sat in the same position as the dark
character is at the beginning of the scene. Prior to the shot above
you see the dark character take down his hood. There are only two
times where the dark character is seen with his hood down and both
times he looks like the main character. I believe this is extremely
effective and shows the audience what we intended. Additionally
this shots mise-en-scene is very bleak, the saturation as with the
rest of the film is turned down and as the room is a blue colour it
is very bland. The shot is messy with chairs and tables cluttered
to show the school location and this additionally represents how
confusing the film is and the disruption of the scene.
I have not seen shots like this be used in any films, but I have
seen it happen in music videos which are using issues such as this.
I believe this shot is very visually impressive because of the
cloning technique as it is something that is not widely observed in
films. This scene had music running through it, as the music
reaches a crescendo there is the diegetic sound of laughter from
the dark character on the left had side of the shot. This laugh
represents the dark characters mockery as the main character
finally finds out who the dark character really is.
This is one of the last shots in our film. It shows the two
characters stood face to face and a car between them driving up the
road. I believe this shot is very visually striking, we framed it
using the running theme of the two characters at opposite ends of
the shot, additionally there is the path between them, this almost
acts as a divide showing how their companionship is over.
We had to reshoot this scene multiple times as we didnt get it
right, that is why it is slightly brighter than the rest of the
film. The mise-en-scene is therefore slightly brighter than other
scenes which was partly unintentional and would have been better if
we had shot the scene on an overcast day, however I think it is
bleak enough and with the saturation turned down colour is drained
out and therefore the scene seems bleaker than it is. This
desaturation is something we have applied all throughout our
film.
As the main character is walking into the road there is a song
playing in the background in a minor key. The main character then
runs off shot to the right and the car follows him- this is paired
with the diegetic sound of the car passing, the dark figure then
fades and the shot cuts to black. This cut to black is meant to
convey the fact the main character got hit by the car. When editing
this I thought it best to leave out the sound of breaks squeaking
and a thud as this seemed very clich and ruined the effect the
music has. This therefore subverts conventions of film as there
would normally be a thus to convey someone being hit, I dont think
our film needs it and it would spoil the effect it has on the
audience.
The camera all throughout this scene is held still, there is one
cut in this scene, and this is when the car goes past. We decided
to keep this as one flowing shot so that the full effect of the
cloning technique came across to the audience. I believe this lack
of cuts, while it doesnt show a wide variety it does show our skill
with narrative as we manage to hold audience attention through a
long shot. I would say that this subverts typical shots in real
media products, however my audience feedback suggests it
works.
- Forms and Conventions
Media Theory
- Narrative Theory
Narrative Theories are ideas, similar to conventions, that media
texts apply in order to put a certain message across. A narrative
theory that my film applies is Propps idea of there being certain
character types in every film. Our film has the classic hero,
princess, donor and villain. However our film subverts this
narrative theory in a way, as the hero in our film is also the
princess and the donor is also the villain. Due to the nature of
our film this was necessary and as we have this subversion is adds
to the effect and confusion of our film. This does not happen in
many real media products, however a loose example comes from films
when someone who is originally viewed as an ally changes sides,
this happens in many films a recent example of one of these is the
latest instalment in the Indiana Jones series The Kingdom of the
Crystal Skull.
Another narrative theory that we applied in our film is
Levi-Strausss idea of Binary Opposites, this is the idea that
inside media texts there are always opposites, for instance earth
and space or good and evil. In our film it is primarily a
representation of good and evil. The character that always looms in
the shade and hides his face with his hood is the representation of
evil, whereas the main character who nearly always dresses in
lighter clothes and covers himself up less, is the good character.
This representation is crucial to our films narrative.
So we have both applied and subverted classical narrative theories
in our film. By doing this we will have made our film more
accessible to people as it has a general feel to it with the
narrative theories applied. However as we challenged and subverted
one of the theories it allows for a more personal and confusing
feel. This is what we aimed to do achieve with our film. This shows
that narrative is essential to films, all films have a narrative
structure and thus this is one of the most essential principles we
had to include, all films have at least one theory and this is
Todrovs Theory of Equilibrium, this is an essential idea which
basically states that all media texts have a beginning, a middle
and an end. The beginning of our film being the sense of
equilibrium where the main character is stuck in the monotony of
spending every day alone, the middle being the introduction and
development of the second, dark character and the development of
the relationship between the two, and finally the ending being the
surprising and unexpected revelation that the second character is
not in fact real, and the main character is once again returned to
being constantly alone. This was an essential narrative theory to
follow as most real media products do and I think that it was in
fact easier to follow this through in a short film as there is less
time available for variation in the scenes and a more distinct
beginning, middle and ending.
- Intertextuality
Intertextuality is the idea that people bring in their own
experiences with what ever media text they are viewing. So
basically, people use other media texts in order to find meaning in
the one that they are watching at the time. This is also similar to
Barthes idea of negotiating the meaning of media texts.
My film features intertextuality first of all in the sense that we
have used teenage actors. These actors will enable the ability for
people external to the film to relate to the action, by doing this
we can play on the empathy factor for the characters, this will
also result in a better reaction at the end of the film. This
technique is used by many mainstream films in the film industry.
For example the thriller The Prestige, directed by Christopher
Nolan, used characters that could be related to very easily, and
whilst the actors used in the film were all well known they were
scripted and dressed in a way that was different to their normal
selves or characters that they had portrayed in other films and
thus this technique was effective.Our film doesnt do exactly this
as we are using the actors in their typical everyday dress however
the audience viewing the film will take from their past experiences
and judge the characters in accordance to these, and the fact that
they are dressed like stereotypical modern teenagers will also
allow some of the younger members of the audience to relate more
easily and more readily accept ideas put forth by the film.
However there is one problem with intertextuality, those people who
know the actors in the film will see the actors behind these
characters rather than that the characters themselves and use their
experiences with the actors to govern their ideas of their actions
in the film rather than the character developed throughout the
film. This is a major flaw in using intertextuality in this
particular film as an awful lot of the initial audience will be our
fellow classmates and students and thus they will be using a
relationship that is not actually with the character in the film
and the representation we are trying to give may not come
across.
Because of this an audience that views the film without knowing the
actors would be much more successful and this is why big screen
films maybe supply much more intertextuality. We do not know the
actors personally and therefore find building relationships with
the characters easy. Another example of this can be seen in the
fact when we see actors in one film and then in a completely
different film we find it hard to relate to that character, however
in low budget films such as This Is England, directed by Shane
Meadows, most of the actors had not been seen before on the big
screen; this allowed for the audience to create brand new
relationships with the characters.
- Forms and Conventions
Ancillary Texts
- Film Poster
The names of the actors in the film are shown at the top, this is a
very common convention of film posters as it allows people to
relate to the film because they might recognise the actor from
something else or might be a fan of the actor and watch this film
as a result. The surnames are also shown larger and in higher
contrast as actors are often recognised this way more
commonly.
As opposed to the dark character who is dressed all in dark
inconspicuous colours the main character is in a white t-shirt and
has very pale skin, which cause him to stand out from the
background and make the audience notice him first, this also
creates a sense of contrast between the two characters and the
light colours of the main character lead us to believe that he is
the good guy whereas the dark, shady, covered up appearance of the
dark person makes him the bad guy.
The dark character is looking directly at the camera and therefore
at the audience and engaging with them, giving him a sense of a
stronger more powerful character, despite the fact that he is in
the background.
The dark character is in the background behind the table and also
smaller and therefore this shows that he is not the main character
and is less directly important.
The title of the film is in a bright red colour as opposed to the
more plain black and white of the rest of the poster and is also in
a much larger font size so that it stands out more and sticks in
the viewers mind.
A possible release date for the film is mentioned at the bottom
giving the reader a sense of anticipation and adding to the
suspense of wanting to find out more about the story and explain
the mysterious characters depicted here and their equally
mysterious relationship.
Credits at the bottom of the poster are in very small print
denoting that they are less immediately important than the images
and larger text which are placed further up such as the title,
tagline and names of the actors, but is still included as it still
may cause some audience members to go to see the film based on
recognising the name of a famous director etc.
- Double Page Spread Article
Three images of different sizes have been used to represent the
film. The largest one shows the main character, connoting that he
is the most important figure in the film, and making sure this is
seen first. The second largest then shows the second, more
conspicuous dark character, who plays an equally important part in
the film, however is not focused on so much. The final image then
shows some behind the scenes footage which is mentioned in the
article text but does not take up much of the article and therefore
this image is the smallest as it is the least important in
relevance to the article itself.
The small header section at the top of the article summarises all
of the most important information that might be required by someone
who is just skimming through the magazine and does not wish to read
each individual article in depth. This includes such important
information as the director, actors and other more mainstream,
famous films of a similar genre and with a similar style of
storyline for fans of these particular titles.
The five star rating given to the film is shown here in a bright
red colour and as a result stands out from a distance. This is done
because the star rating system is very widely recognised and anyone
who sees the five stars here at the end of the review will
instantly know that this means that the film has received a very
high overall score and therefore must be very good.
The text for the article is arranged into two equally sized
columns, one down each side of the double page, this gives a good
balance on the page as a whole between the amount of the page taken
up by the text and the amount covered by the images, making sure
that there is not too much of either.
- How effective is the combination of your media product and
ancillary texts?
- Ancillary Texts
Film Poster
- Film Poster
The purpose of my film poster was to advertise the short film in
the same style that a theatrical release poster would for a
mainstream film, through using the forms and conventions of these
existing posters such as symbolism, I did this in a number of ways
to appeal directly to my specific target audience.
First of all I decided to start with a completely plain black A3
sized page and decided to work my way up from this. The colour
scheme for the overall poster design was to be black and white with
a bright red used for the title to create a sense of the dark
nature of psychological thrillers, whilst the red was to represent
the shocking hidden messages often found within this genre of film.
I also then used images which had been purposely desaturated
firstly as the images were taken and then in more detail to match
the lighting in the post production stage using the image editing
software Photoshop. I did subvert some of the forms and conventions
of mainstream film posters significantly as well as I decided that
instead of having one background image and building the poster from
there upwards and adding further images and text/titles on top of
this I would instead start with a plain black background and the
text. I also completely removed the background from all of the
images which I decided to use individually before they were
imported into this main poster design file, because first of all
this meant that there was not unnecessary mise-en-scne in the shot
which would distract viewers from the impact of the images of the
characters, and also because this blank space also connotes the
sense of emptiness and abandonment present throughout the film, and
which can be directly related to the films title of Nobody.
With regards to the images which I decided to use I chose to keep
it simple and stick to images of only the two main characters in
the film upon a plain black background. The image of the main
character has been placed at the front to show his importance and
this image is also generally slightly more central to the pages to
show that he is the central character. He is dressed in a white top
and has pale skin which in a way could represent that out of the
two he is the good guy. He is also sitting at a plain white table
which covers the bottom portion of the page and bleeds to both
sides and allows for a subtle variation in background colours with
no defined edges. The second character however, who is not named at
all during the film, and who my partner and I refer to simple as
the dark character is standing as opposed to sitting which could
represent the fact that he is more powerful than the main
character, although in a subtle and mysterious way as the way that
he is stood behind the table and behind the main character shows
that he is not such a central focus. Because he is in the
background he also appears smaller which further backs up the idea
that he is a less important figure. The character is dressed in all
dark clothing and has nearly all of his skin covered which directly
contrasts with the main character who is all in light colours and
pale skinned and this dark feel to him is representative of the
fact that he is more the bad guy and the main characters opposite.
This dark character is also looking directly at the camera, and
therefore at the audience and this combined with the dark and
sinister expression on his face further leads leads the viewer to
believe that he is dark and menacing and is warning you of
something dangerous that he may be capable of. The main character
however is pictured staring absent-mindedly off into the middle
distance ahead of him, and this lack of eye contact with the
audience and the more peaceful blank expression on his face leads
us to believe that he is not dangerous at all and is a much more
pacifistic and peaceful character overall. He is also looking
directly in the direction of the dark character, although you can
clearly see that he is looking forward and the dark character is
behind him, giving the audience the impression that he is maybe
vaguely aware of this other persons presence although either not
directly able to see him or chooses not to for some unknown reason,
and this forms questions in the viewers mind about the relationship
between these two people. All of this together along with the
catchy tagline and then mention of a possible release date causes a
sense of anticipation in the viewer about the film, as well as the
list of actors which may further entice a the viewer to go and view
the film create an overall image which quickly and effectively
grabs the attention of anyone who sees it and instantly forces them
to begin to ask question about what is going on and when they can
find the answers to these.
- Progression
This is the first draft of my film poster, this design simply shows
a possible layout of the text for the title and the names of the
actors at the top of the page, as well as including a tag-line and
the words coming soon showing that this poster is for a film which
is yet to be released. the background for this image is simply a
solid plain black as I have not yet decided on the layout or design
of the background, however I do know that it will be a dark colour
and so I decided to use black so that the light coloured text would
stand out well. I also think that the plain black and white fits in
well with the general style of the poster and the images which I
will eventually use will be in a desaturated sort of style similar
to the film and this will fit well with the black and white colour
scheme.
In this second draft of my film poster I have decided roughly how I
would like the background image to look for my poster and I have a
couple of ideas for layouts and how this will be arranged, however
I have again decided to set the poster on a simple plain black
background here to show the rest of the elements of the poster such
as the text styles, sizes and position and layout. Here I have
added a few more actors names to the top of the poster and arranged
these in a different way which I think is more professional
looking. The title text and size has been kept the same, but has
been relocated to the centre of the page instead of being over to
one side, as I am thinking of using a central image of the main
character. I have also added a series of credits at the bottom of
the page, as well as changing the coming soon to something much
more specific, as I think being able to give potential viewers a
date to focus on will help to build anticipation for the film
better. Finally I have resized and redesigned the tag-line for the
film, and whilst I prefer the new tag-line I think that the
position and size of this on the previous poster was better as here
it looks too larger and so I will probably change this again. My
second draft is unusual in the fact that it still contains no
images at all and this is because on my blog I decided to show the
development of images separately.
- Final Film Poster
- What would I change?
Overall I think that out of the film and the two ancillary texts
the film poster is the one that I am most happy with, and the one
that I think has turned out exactly as I wanted it to, if not even
better than I had originally envisioned. Because of this, even if
given the chance and more time available to me I dont think that
there would be much that I would change and the new finished
product would look very similar.
One thing which I would definitely like to at least experiment with
changing is the fact that I did in the end decide not to include a
background image to the poster and all of the popular posters for
existing psychological thrillers which I have looked at during the
research stage did include this in some way. The reason we decided
not to include this was not because we were unable to but because
we wanted to experiment with something different and the film
itself already was and so we purposely decided to subvert this
particular convention of psychological thriller film posters, and
while I am very pleased with the end result and would most
definitely consider this little experiment a success the
traditional forms and conventions are there because they do work
and I would like to try and achieve just as good a result whilst
following this particular one.
The rest of the poster, the titles and other text is perfectly fine
and I am very pleased with how professional looking this has turned
out and so would not change any of it apart from maybe the
positioning of maybe the tagline to accommodate different images
and backgrounds.
- Ancillary Texts
Double Page Spread Article
- Double Page Spread Article
For the double page spread article I decided to design the page
layout and write the article both in the style of a film review,
the sort which would be found in a magazine which catered
specifically for this kind of review. I decided to go for a more
sincere professional looking feel to the article as well as opposed
to the flamboyant and in-your-face kind of article which I had
created for my AS music magazine production. For the article I
hoped to try and create the sort of article that was written to a
standard and in a style that it would be believable that had been
written by a professional journalist and the purpose of this
particular article was to give the audience an insight into what
the film was actually about and to make them want to go see it for
themselves, but also to give them an insight into what it was like
for my partner and I being the directors as well as the actors
whilst creating this film.
I chose to keep to the exact same colour scheme as the film poster,
using the black and white with the very small amount of red as the
base the entire piece as this helped to create a sense of unity
between the two pieces, and also the bland and mostly dark colour
scheme is representative of the dark nature of the psychological
thriller genre and the emptiness and monotony of the main
characters life in the film and the sense of being alone which he
feels. I also decided to use the exact same editing technique here
for the images which were again taken with an initial picture style
which increased the sharpness of the images and reduced the colour
tone and saturation, and the photos have all also been darkened and
had the saturation reduced during post production to give the same
atmosphere as the poster and also to match the reduced saturation
effect used in the film itself.
With the layout of the page I decided very early on that I was
going to use a layout that had two solid columns of text and
instead of positioning these alongside each other I would place one
on each side of the article. The rough layout from which I got the
inspiration was from an article I saw in the A3 magazine supplement
of a daily newspaper rather than an actual film magazine (although
I did also look at plenty of these for inspiration on other
aspects) and was part of an article which actually spanned four or
five pages, the key, central double page spread containing two
columns of text down each side as imitated here, and then also with
a series of smaller columns spanning the bottom of the page between
these. As I have produced this article as an A3 sheet in total,
meaning that each side of the page is in A4 size, I was simply
unable to fir this many text columns onto the page and seeing as my
article could only span the one double page spread I decided to cut
this down to the two basic columns of text. Each of these columns
in exactly half the size of the side of A4 which it is on and so
this meant that there was an exact equal balance of text and
images, a convention of more professional looking magazines as
opposed to the one-third text, two-thirds pictures approach to more
colourful and visually centred magazine articles.
For the images used here I chose the majority of them from the
exact same shoot as I had done for the poster and edited them to
fit with the faded, desaturated feel of the film which they were
representing. I also again chose images which were almost identical
to the ones on the poster and I know that many of my fellow
students actually used the poster itself for one half of their
double page spread. The third image however is from an additional
photoshoot which was planned especially for this production piece
and to make sure this this fit in with the rest and gave the
desired look the exact same picture settings were used when taking
the image and I made sure that my partner, who was the model here,
was wearing very plain shades of clothing which were different to
when he was playing the main character in the film, so that this
did not disrupt the overall colour balance of the page.
Again I have managed to create a piece of work here of which I am
extremely proud and I think that I have successfully managed to
create a very professional looking magazine article which clearly
gives the audience an idea of what our short film is about as well
as an insight into our lives as directors and actors of said
film.
- Progression
This second draft of my film review double page spread now shows
the final layout and positioning of all of the elements of the page
which I will be using including the two columns of text and all of
the images. I have also now added the finished images which I have
edited and captions to go with two of the images, as well as a
quotation which I will include in the review when I write it. The
only things which I have now got left to do to the article are to
write the text for the actual review which will be pasted into the
two black text columns along each side, and also create the logo
which I am going to add in the small space at the bottom between
the images. As you can see this is still very lacking in colour and
the images which I have used are all very desaturated as this both
fits with the film and also gives the sense of the article being
from a more serious, professional looking magazine.
I created this first draft of my double page spread film review in
order to show the layout of page, including the text boxes, titles,
images and quotations. This is a very basic draft and so does not
actually show any of the images which I will be using yet, simply
the places where they will go. It also shows a basic overall colour
scheme of the page and will be very helpful when I am selecting and
editing my images to make sure that the page stays balanced colour
wise and that the images are the right sizes to fit onto the page.
I have chosen to use three images as this allows me to show a
selection of both characters from the film as well as previews from
within the film and possible also exclusive behind the scenes
images.
- Final Double Page Spread Article
- What would I change?
If I were to have the chance to do the double page spread article
again with the experience I have gained from doing it the first
time round I do not actually think that there is anything which I
would wish to change. As with the poster I am extremely pleased
with how the finished product has turned out and I have followed a
lot of the forms and conventions of the existing film reviews which
I have looked at in magazines to create a very professional looking
review for my short film which I think give the audience a perfect
idea of what the film is about and reveals just enough about the
storyline to get us interested enough to want to go and see the
film for ourselves, without actually giving away any of the key
elements of the film which are designed to make the audience think,
and are the most important elements of a psychological
thriller.
If I did have to mention things which I thought could maybe be
improved I think that if given the chance to redesign the page or
possibly to present it as either more pages or as a larger double
page spread I would also include a wider variety of images of
myself and my partner on set as we only used one of these from the
shoot. I would also possibly include another section separate to
the article itself in the form of an interview with the directors
of the film, as I think that this would provide more variety of
reading to the audience as well as a better insight into the minds
of my partner and I as directors as well as actors, as this is one
of the initial points which I wanted to address in the article but
in the end did not get quite as much coverage as the film
itself.
- What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
- Short Film
For the film itself we have been collecting audience feedback right
from the start of the course before we even began the filming of
the initial mock up scenes. The first feedback which we received
was when we had just decided on the genre of our film and we
decided to design a questionnaire to hand out to a large number of
people who were in the age group which we had specified for the
film, those of a similar age to us. This first questionnaire was
designed to collect basic information about the possible content
for our film before we finalised the script. The first questions
were about the age and genres of film that the person in question
watched so that we would easily be able to rule out any results
from those people who did not choose thriller or psychological
thriller as one of the genres, and therefore the rest of the
results would relate directly to our film. The questions included
such things as whether or not elements such as gratuitous violence
and sexual activity were necessary in a good film and about whether
or not things such as good music improved the viewing experience,
and if so what kind. The results from this were mostly positive in
the sense that they only helped to support the ides we already had
for the basic story line and script of the film. The thing I
personally think that this questionnaire helped the most with was
deciding what kind of music to include in the soundtrack to our
film and in the end we decided to go for quite a mix of genres but
to only use each track in short clips where appropriate.
The next significant bit of audience feedback which we collected
was when we showed the first, finished cut of our film to the rest
of our media class and asked them to fill out a sheet which asked
questions about their own personal opinion on a number of various
different aspects of the film. This included such vital questions
as to whether or not the plot of the film was easy to grasp and how
high the overall quality of the editing was. The final question
then asked each of them what changes they would advise us to make
to this rough version of the film to create a high quality finished
short film. Some of the problems were simply to do with minor
technical issues such as sound clips being missing and for example
one of the actors being too quiet to be heard in relation to the
rest of the film and so these were quickly sorted out and the film
was re-uploaded. Some more pressing issues however included the
fact that the film was difficult to understand. While this would
initially seem like a hugely undermining issue with the film it
wasnt at all; our film is designed, not necessarily to be hard to
understand, but to get people thinking, and for the twist in the
story not to be obvious until right at the end. As only a small
proportion of the overall feedback said it was hard to understand
however I would assume that was from people who are not overly
interested in the genre of the film, as whilst asking the members
of our media class did allow us to get more technically accurate
and useful feedback, not all of them were at all interested in the
genre.
Another way in which we asked for audience feedback was through the
use of the internet. The first way in which we did this was though
the video sharing website YouTube which we uploaded the film to in
order to embed it in the Wordpress blog. This site allows other
users on the site (of which there are millions each day) to post
comments about the video or more simply vote the film either up or
down to state whether or not they liked it. The other website which
we used for getting audience feedback was the social networking
site Facebook and we did this by both my partner and I posting a
link to the video on YouTube on our wall on Facebook, which then
allowed an of our friends to either watch and comment directly on
the link on Facebook or follow the hyperlink to YouTube and watch,
rate and comment on it there. Again this feedback was for the most
part positive although we did receive a reasonable amount of
constructive criticism which allowed us to continue editing the
film scene by scene and asking for feedback until it was at the
stage it is now.
- Film Poster
In order to collect audience feedback for my film poster I decided
to go with the more traditional method of asking people face to
face what they thought of it as this allowed me to have a two way
discussion about the topic rather that simply reading statements
about it as I would have done had I used the internet for my
feedback in the same way as the film, this also meant that nothing
got lost in translation as it could have done and often does on the
internet and I could not accidentally take a piece of constructive
criticism the wrong way.
The first comment which I received from a number of people and
which led me to try and experiment with changing around the layout
of the poster was that the tagline was in the wrong place and did
not look as effective as maybe it could be. This feedback also fit
in with the information which I had learned from looking at
existing posters as one of the most common conventions which I
noticed with regards to the tagline was that it was nearly always
in the very centre of the page at the top in order to be noticed
quickly and to give the most impact. Because of this I decided to
open my poster back up in Photoshop and spent a long time
rearranging everything to tray and do this. In the end the only way
which I was able to achieve the desired effect (the tagline in the
middle) was to significantly shrink the image of the dark character
so that I was able to stretch the tagline out onto a single line
across the page, but the only way I could do this with enough space
above and below the tagline left the image of the dark person far
too small and as a result left me with far too much dead space in
the centre of the image. In the end, and based on some further
audience feedback it was agreed that this was not as effective as
the original position and so the tagline was moved back to the
left, and as it is still also at the top this did still work very
effectively.
Only one other point was continually brought up by people whom I
asked about the poster, and that was to do with the fact that I had
chosen not to include a background in the poster images and there
were quite a few people, who thought that the poster would look
more professional if I did and that I should even if only to
completely eliminate the dead space. I did however decided to leave
the background as it is because as I mentioned before this was done
on purpose to subvert that particular convention.
- Double Page Spread Article
The audience feedback which I received for my double page spread
was also very positive as it had been for the film and the poster
previously. I again collected the majority of the feedback by
showing people the finished product printed out onto A3 and then
folded as it was designed to and as it would be seen if it were in
an actual magazine, and then asking them to look over the design
and read through the article and give their views on the piece as a
whole.
I have to say that I think the feedback for this was more positive
than both the film and the poster as I did not actually get a
single comment about a problem or a significant change which they
thought that I should make to the layout of the page, and neither
did I about any of the images used or the quality of these. The
only advice which I did receive from a couple of people who I asked
about this was that they said that the quality of the article would
possibly be improved if there was more variation to the actual
article text, and the most popular suggestion on how to achieve
this was to also include an interview with the directors, something
which I would definitely have done if I had the chance to create
the article over a larger area, as all of the best articles which I
looked at covered a minimum of three or four pages and I was simply
not able to do this.
Overall I think that because of the amount of positive audience
feedback (and also the lack of negative!) received, that the double
page spread has been a huge success and in the end I have not
changed anything from the original design.
- How did you use media technologies in the research and
planning, construction and evaluation stages?
- Use of Media Technologies
The Internet
- Wordpress Blog
We were required to use a blogging website called Wordpress
for
the research and planning side ofthe coursework and also for
uploading hyperlinks to videos of the various scenes of the film
and
also images showing all of the various stages of the production of
the
ancillary texts.
Before this I had never had any experience with any blogging
websites of any kind and so this entire process has been a learning
experience for me.
The preliminary task of creating the short film Cookie was also
very useful in regards to this side of the coursework as it not
only helped us toprepare for creating the actual final film and
ancillary texts, but also gave us some much needed time to grow
accustomed to using the blog on a regular basis to record and
document the progression of our research and planning.
Overall I think that my experience in using this website has
increased more than with any of the other programs or equipment
used during this project, even if only because of the fact that I
had no previous experience at all. I have learnt to keep my work
up-to-date with regular updates to the blog and also to make sure
that I do all of my work in the correct order so that everything
flows together better and is uploaded to the blog in the correct
linear fashion.
Using this blog as opposed to a more traditional method such as a
simple portfolio orcoursework folder has also provided a great
advantage because of the fact that it is accessible from any
computer I may be working on and which has an internet connection,
which prevents the risk of any forgotten or lost work. Finally it
also means that I was able to include videos or other such
influences which I would not have been able to use at all
otherwise, and seeing as the main task this year has been to create
a short film this has been the most important part of the blogging
process.
Wordpress also allows each of its users to customise their blogs
and this has been another thing which my partner and I have used
extensively and we have adjusted the layout of our blogs to conform
to the genre of our short film.
- Wordpress Blog
This Screenshot shows some of the behind-the-scenes workings of my
Wordpress blog. Here you can see the clear well structured and
organised layout of the sites user control panel or dashboard as
its known. It also shows an example of some of the HTML code used
by the site to insert images and format text, and while some of the
basics are easy enough to learn, everything can be fully automated
and done using the sites more friendly visual interface. It also
shows how it is possible to edit the actual date a post was created
on, a feature which can be extremely helpful in organising posts
and inserting things you maybe forgot or decided to include at a
later date.
Another very useful feature of the Wordpress blog is the ability to
categorise each post into a series of custom categories and
sub-categories, which can then in turn be used by readers to filter
out information when reading the blog. I decided to divide my posts
into Music Magazine, Student Magazine and Research and Planning,
with sub-categories within thee for each of the magazine cover,
contents and double page spread.
From this page you can also access the customisation options for
the blog through the appearance tab in the left hand column. This
allows you to choose from among hundreds of layouts and also choose
which tabs and additional features you want to include on your
blog, making it as personalised as possible.
- YouTube
YouTube is a well known video sharing website which is used
all over the world by millions of people every day. It
allows you to create a free account and then upload
videos up to 10 minutes long and so was the perfect
choice for us to upload our short film. It then allowed us to embed
these video clips into blog posts on Wordpress by using simple
preset HTML coding.
We also used the site to upload a video of every single one of the
draft copies of each of the individual scenes as we filmed and
edited each one, so that we would be able to embed these in
individual posts on the Wordpress blog and then write about each
one and thus show how the short film was progressing.
We decided to use YouTube over any other video sharing website as
this is by far the most famous and has the highest amount of online
user traffic meaning that the possibility for our video to be seen
by a wider audience was much higher. For this project we decided to
create a new account which we would use to upload all of the video
clips to, instead of using already existing accounts, despite the
fact the both my partner and I had one, as this new account would
make it easier for us to organise the videos, and could be
specifically customised to advertise our media work.
We were also able to use this website in numerous different ways to
collect audience feedback as other users are able to vote the
videos either positively or negatively and also leave comments. As
this was all online we were also able to post a hyperlink of the
video to the social networking website Facebook and receive
audience feedback in that way.
One issue which we did find with using YouTube however was the fact
that the videos did take a long time to upload, around four hours
and this combined with the time taken to export the videos from the
editing program we were using brought the total time up to around
six hours, meaning that we had to devote a lot of our own time to
this as we did not have this much time during lessons at
school.
- Facebook
Another website which I have used extensively
over the course of this project is the widely
famous social networking site Facebook. I
think that out of the key websites which Ive
used during this project this is actually the only one with which I
have any previous experience, and this was of course very useful
considering the way in which I used the site in relation to my
project.
I used this website mainly as an easy way to receive audience
feedback in a relatively short space of time and without having to
actually go out and ask lot and lots of people in turn. Doing this
also made the process of gathering my results to be able to analyse
them a lot easier, as with a questionnaire I found that a lot of
time was spent collating the results and manually typing them up to
be able to use them on the blog or into tables to create graphs.
However by using an online social networking website such as
Facebook I was able to simply copy and paste the information into a
Microsoft Word or Excel document in a matter of minutes.
- Scribd
One final additional website which we used during the
process of creating the film was a website called
Scribd. The site can be described as a web based
document-sharing site and the website is linked with
Wordpress in some way, allowing you to upload
documents to a personal Scribd account and then insert them
directly into a post on the blog for viewing.
It is possible to upload any kind of document to Scribd for
sharing, from Microsoft Word (or other word processing software)
documents to PowerPoint Presentations and Graphs. As we are however
of course already able to insert and format text directly using the
blog itself there was not need to use Scribd for this and I have
only found the site necessary for slideshows (in fact you might
even be reading this right now through Scribd!), and also for
uploading a blank copy of the questionnaire used for my audience
feedback.
Again, similarly to Wordpress this was a website which I had no
previous experience with at all and so every single time I have
used this right from creating an account and uploading my first
document, has been a learning experience and my knowledge and usage
of the site has inevitably increased.
Scribd can also be used to acquire basic audience feedback as other
users can view and rate your work and let you know what they
thought of it through leaving likes and comments on each
piece.
- Use of Media Technologies
Software
- Apple iMovie 9
The first program which we decided to use to edit together the
clips which we had
filmed into scenes which could be comprised into a finished film
was a program
created by Apple Inc. Called iMovie. As this is an Apple program it
was available to
us only at school when we had access to the Apple Macs there. The
school also
owned a newer version of the program called iMovie HD, which was
able to work
with full HD video such as that which we were able to film using
the video camera,
however due to some technical difficulties in importing the first
files and compatibility errors between the software an the camera
we were only able to use the older iMovie 9 and were not able to
produce clips in full HD
This program did still allow us to produce clips up to a resolution
of 720p however and did still contain all of the necessary basic
tools which we needed to cut down and adjust the clips to place
them in the right order, as well as other features such as adding
titles and transition and fading in and out or cutting out sound
completely which allowed us to make the film seem more
professional, it was also linked to Apples sound editing program
GarageBand as well as a readily installed library of basic
background music tracks and sound effects.
Whereas my partner had quite a bit of previous experience in video
editing using a very high end program called Final Cut Pro, I was
far less experienced and the only knowledge I had was the very
basics from previously messing around with a couple of programs
which I owned or had access to in the past. Because of this, we
decided that for the editing work during the film my partner would
focus his attention slightly more on the video editing side of
things so that we could get things done quicker, and doing the
actual work however we would both give equal input into what he
actually did.
We were originally planning on making our whole film oniMovie as
this was at the time the only program available to us, however due
to the fact that we became constantly frustrated with how well the
program was running and constant errors we decided to discontinue
use of it after we had produced the initial first drafts of a few
of the scenes. We also encountered other much more pressing issues
such as the fact that were only actually able to access the program
for a few short hours each week as it was installed only on very
few Apple Macs which were located at school and we only had access
to these during lesson time. Furthermore the school is not well
equipped enough in terms of hardware for editing large amounts of
video footage, and so the computers which we were able to use
always ran very slowly and often lagged and crashed and this slowed
production even further. The school also did not have anywhere near
enough hard disk space for us to store all of the unedited footage
and we filled up our original disk quota after filming footage for
only the first couple of scenes.
- Apple iMovie 9
The two columns to the left hand side of the page shown here both
allow you to very easily keep all of your video footage organised.
The topmost one is for organising different projects and allowed us
to keep each scene within its own project within the main file
meaning we did not have to have a lot of individual files, just the
one. And the bottom window allows you to easily browse through
video footage on the computers hard drive without actually having
to import the clips into the program itself, only onto the
system.
The video window in the top corner allows you to see exactly what
youre doing by showing a reasonably sized video of the selected
clip allowing you to edit footage visually by stopping it wherever
you want rather than having to rely on knowing exact timings, all
part of Apples tradition of making everything smooth and easy to
use.
The icons over to the right hand side allow you to easily switch
the bottom half of the page to a window which allows you to insert
custom titles as well as using pre-installed sounds or importing
your own custom tracks from GarageBand
Please note:
The screenshot shown here is not from my own version of iMovie and
the scenes shown are not from our own media film, the image used
was found on google images as I was unable to access a Mac with
iMovie at the time of making this presentation. All the video
footage and images shown here are copyright of their respective
owners.
- Adobe Premier Pro CS5
After iMovie we decided that we were going to try and find a
different,
and a better program for editing our video clips and so we
decided
to try out Adobe Premier Pro CS5. Both myself and my partner
have
previous experience with using programs published by Adobe
Systems
and we have always found them to be of a very high standard.
I have briefly used a trial version Premier Pro CS4 before myself
and found that the professional standard piece of software did not
run very well on my own laptop due to it not having the required
system specs needed to perform properly. My partner however has a
far more up-to-date laptop and so we decided to download a trial
version of the latest version of the program.
We instantly found that the program was of a much higher quality
than iMovie and that despite only having the trial version of the
program the time period for which it was available to us, a total
of two months between us using one trial each, was more than enough
to finish off all of the rest of the scenes and complete the film
to a very high standard.
There were initially a few problems in getting to grips with the
program as while it is of a much higher standard, it does have a
more complex professional looking user interface. We did however
learn the basics very quickly through a combination of my partners
previous experience in other professional programs such as Final
Cut Pro, our joint experience in using iMovie and my brief forage
into using the previous version of Premier Pro.
Because we were now also using my partners personal laptop as
opposed to the school Apple Macs we were able to access the program
at all times and able to make the most of the two months of free
usage we had. This also completely solved the issue with disk space
which we had previously encountered as the hard drive on the laptop
as well as my own external hard drive had over 1TB of hard disk
space between them, thousands of times more than was available to
us on the school network.
- Adobe Premier Pro CS5
This screenshot showing our film under production in Premier Pro
highlights some of the more important features of the program such
as the easy access to the files stored on the computers hard drive
and the multiple channels available for editing multiple video
tracks simultaneously as well as the separate track for
audio.
- Adobe Photoshop CS4
The main piece of editing software which we used in the
construction of our ancillary production pieces was an image
editing program called Adobe Photoshop. This program allows
you to do an extremely wide range of things to multiple
images
at once and can even be configured to perform certain processes on
a large amount of images automatically without the user actually
having to do anything.
I was already at quite a significant advantage when we started the
project in this respect as I had already been teaching myself in
the use of this program for the past couple of years and I also had
a lot of experience from my AS level photography the previous
year.
I decided to use this particular program as opposed to others which
were available at the time for a number of reasons, first of all
and the main reason why I chose Photoshop was because I had a large
amount of previous experience with this particular program and have
not actually ever used any others. It was also extremely useful
that the both Apple Macs which were available for us to use at
school during lesson time, and also my own personal laptop, had the
exact same version installed and so I was able to quickly and
easily transfer files between the two via my USB stick.
Since the beginning of the project my skills in using Photoshop
have again improved even further and I enjoyed being able to use
the program for a much wider variety of processes, as I did in fact
use the one program for the production of my entire film poster and
double page spread, as opposed to using it for only the film poster
and then using another program, Adobe InDesign, for the double page
spread as many other people have done.
- Adobe Photoshop CS4
2.When using the computers available to us at school we were unable
to install and use custom fonts and so having the same version of
Photoshop installed on my own laptop was invaluable in the creation
of my production pieces, as the fonts were a central point of all
of my work.
3.I used an extremely wide variety of editing techniques in my
production which were not taught to us, for example the use of
masking, custom brushes, filters and ready stored actions, all of
which helped to greatly speed up a series of complex procedures and
this allowing me to spend far more time on the other less familiar
aspects of the production.
4.When using Ps I always like to keep all of my work as organised
as possible, with each different part of the complete image on its
own layer. This particular piece had around seventy layers in
total, far more than I had ever previously worked with on
Photography or personal projects, and so this experience has
reiterated the importance of organisational skills when working on
such a large scale project.
1.As we were only taught the function of the most basic tools in Ps
(lasso, selection, marquee, crop etc.) my previous knowledge
allowed me to easily and professionally use more advanced tools
such as the dodge / burn, clone stamp and healing brush right from
the offset with no technical difficulties at all which allowed me
to get everything done a lot quicker in the end.
2.
3.
4.
1.
- Apple GarageBand
Another additional program which we decided to use during the
production of our short film was a piece of Audio software
available to us on the Apple Macs which allowed us to create
our
own music tracks by combining various different premade audio
loops of varying lengths. We decided to use this to create a series
of
basic soundtracks to some of the scenes in our film.
In the end we only used the program to create two different audio
tracks, one which was used at the end of the film and another
calmer, piano piece which was used at various stages throughout the
film, each version differing slightly in background sounds and
length.
The program also allowed us to add in sound effects such as the
ones which we had used in iMovie and the finished tracks were also
able to be exported directly into iMovie. When we did switch over
to using Adobe Premier Pro instead this did make the process
slightly more complicated as it meant we now had to export the
tracks to .mp3 or .wav format and then transfer them to the laptop
via a USB device but this could all still be done very quickly and
was merely a minor inconvenience.
I myself did have some minimal experience in using this particular
program before we decided to use it for this project, although I
had only used it in the past for messing around and creating
experimental music tracks by trying out each of the different
instruments. Whilst this did not really give me much experience in
creating technically professional sounding audio tracks even what
little prior experience I had proved to be very useful as I did
indeed already know my way around all of the unique features of the
program and its layout.
The tracks we decided to use in the end consisted only of loops
from piano tracks and while we did have the possibility to connect
a real electric piano to the computer and input our own sounds we
stuck to using the premade loops to create the tracks. We did also
experiment heavily with synthesiser loops and trying to create a
track using these, however we decided in the end that it would not
fit in with the overall feel of the film.
- Use of Media Technologies
Hardware
- Panasonic HDC-SD5
For this project we were given the option of using video cameras
available to us through the school by means of loaning them out
whenever we needed to film scenes and a lot of the other groups did
this and still managed to do very well. My Canon DSLR also has the
capability to shoot film in full HD however my partner and I
decided that we would use our own purpose built video camera
throughout this project.
The camera which we decided to use was my partners Panasonic
HDC-SD5 HD video camera. We decided that this would be the best
choice because it was able to record film in full 1080p HD and it
saved the video clips straight to an 8GB SD card which we could
then either insert directly into a laptop or leave in the camera
and transfer the data via a cable to one of the Apple Macs which we
were also using.
As well as the extremely high quality the camera had a reasonably
good built in microphone which was more than good enough for our
film as only a few of the scenes required us to record sound. As
well as this it also had 10x optical zoom which allowed us to film
the same scenes from a number of distances, whichever was practical
for the location, as well as shooting a few shots which actually
included the zoom within them, although we did try to limit the use
of this. The camera did also have digital zoom although we decided
not to use this at all as it reduced the quality of the video
footage and was not ever necessary.
This particular model of camera was also particularly useful
because it was so small, light and compact and as it was only the
two of us doing both the filming and the acting we did not want to
be carrying a large amount of equipment everywhere. The only other
equipment which we did make sure that we always used was a basic
tripod to hold the camera in place and to stop any movement which
would occur if the camera was hand held during filming, this was
also a compulsory piece of equipment for when we were filming
scenes which involved both us acting at the same time as it was not
actually possible there for one of us to hold the camera. Another
feature which helped with regards to the scenes where we were both
on shot was the live view screen on the camera which we were able
to pop out and then rotate to face us, meaning it was easily
possible for us to both be on shot and still able to see exactly
what was going to be recorded, rather than having to get up and
position the camera without us on shot.
- Canon EOS 550D DSLR
For the production I was also required to take still images which
would
be used for the production of the film poster and the double
page
spread article. We also took a series of photographs near the
beginning of the planning stages of the film in order to help us
to
decide on possible locations to use, and a couple of the
final
scenes were actually developed from these images.
The video camera which we were using was able to take still images
as
well as filming video clips, and we also had video cameras
available to us at school, however both of these were only able
to
take pictures at around one or two megapixels and I knew that
this
would not be anywhere good enough to create a high quality,
professional looking, full sized poster and double page spread.
Because of
this I decided to use my own personal camera for all of the
photographic work
during the project, a Canon EOS 550D DSLR, a camera which is able
to take images at a resolution of 18 megapixels, which was
perfectly acceptable for editing and reproducing at a large
resolution.
One of the other A-level subjects I am currently studying is
Photography and I have taken a keen interest in this for quite a
few years now, and as a result I was already at a considerable
advantage when starting this project in terms of actually taking
photographs.
Overall my technical knowledge in terms of the use of cameras and
the hardware itself has not improved a significant amount as the
photography was not a major part of this project and I already
possessed all of the skills required for taking the photographs
themselves. One thing which I have however improved quite a bit on
is the ability to work as a Photographer alongside the production
of a video, as we often took the photos at the same time as filming
scenes for the film so that we would be able to produce images
which realistically documented the process of creating the film,
which would then in turn be used in the double page spread. Both
myself and my partner also significantly improved our skills in
setting up planned photoshoots over the course of this project as
all of the images had to be carefully set up to fit in with the
video footage. I also heavily relied on using certain settings for
the picture style setting on my camera in order to take images with
a certain colour balance and saturation to them rather than leaving
all of this to the post production work. This is something which I
do not usually try to do in Photography as you are unable to undo
this once the photo has been taken without retaking the photo with
neutral settings, however I think that this really helped here as
it allowed me to match the atmosphere of the images to the
lowered-saturation effect of the film.
- END
Thank you for your time.