Media A2 Evaluation.

Seb Warren

24 Hours.

What ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media

products?

Film Poster After my poster research I chose to take some idea’s from existing film posters and put them into my own design.

The main part of this poster is the phone image that is visibly seen, seeing as an iPhone is the main prop in my short film is was necessary to include it on my poster. After taking some inspiration from other posters, I cut a small part of the phone off, but left most of the screen showing seeing as it’s an important part. Also I decided to put the phone at an angle because I looked into leaving it straight and creating the poster like a phone screen with the message covering almost half of it, but the angled effect is a lot better because it looks more appealing and it’s not boring to look at.

The message on the screen from Unknown, which says You have 24 Hours, this was extremely important to include on my poster because it is the first text that is seen on my film, and gets you into the story.

The placement of text on my poster is important because the audience need to see it, the actors names at the top is very key because they may want to know who is staring in the film. And the film’s title ‘24 Hours’ in top left and I like the effect of it going over the picture of the phone. And a small quote ‘Would You Believe It’ is located on an angle and it makes the audience wonder what my film is about.

I kept the use of colour in my poster very plain, the background image is Black and White effect, apart from the message which remains the same colour because having it stand out is very important for the audience to see. The text colour is White because it’s easy to read on the Black background, apart from the coming soon at the bottom which I decided to make red.

I was going to include some made up quotes from review websites, or get someone to give me an opinion, but I decided against including them on my poster because I feel that too much text would have clogged up the image and drawn you away from the important part of the poster.

Film ArticleFor my article I decided to not follow some of the existing articles I had found. This is because I wanted to go for something new, but also keep it very simple, but this meant it also became boring.

The main part of my article is the text, because this is what the audience looks for in an article, so my text was laid out in an easily readable area, which was on the left side of the page.

I decided to have the title of my film 24 Hours, located in the middle of the page, this isn’t usually what normal articles are like so I thought I’d go for something different, in some ways it works because with it being big it is easily noticed seeing as most people will see the middle of the article before the top, but then it means my text is all out of place and not in a line, but for my article I think it worked well.

The use of colour in my article was very much like that used in my poster, the main picture which is of my actor, is in Black and White, and the main phone images located on the article are in colour, this is because they are important parts and I want the audience to see them. The text like before is also in Black and White so it’s easily readable. And the main colour used on the part where the text located is also in White. So it’s nice and easy to read, but also I made sure the article was made shorter and split into two sections because looking at White on Black for a long time starts to cause eye strain and I wouldn’t want my audience to experience this. Some quotes were included and one of them was in Black, because that quote was an extremely important part of my film.

Technology and Equipment

When creating my film article, I used an program called Adobe InDesign.

I used InDesign throughout my AS Media Studies to create a similar product. So I am used to how everything works on it, I have become very familiar with everything on it, and it has not been a problem using it. Over the two years I have been this course I have learned a lot of InDesign, and how much it has helped me achieve some good pieces.

When creating my film poster, the programed I used was a Adobe Photoshop.

Much like with InDesign I used Photoshop during AS, I have become very familiar with Photoshop as I have used it on other occasions and I know how it works. Photoshop was also used to edit and cut out the pictures used on my article. And it gives effects such as Black & White which I used on my poster. Without Photoshop I wouldn’t have been able to create my pieces.

Creating and editing my short film was done on iMovie.

iMovie was used to make my film, It was the second time we had used it this year, we previously used it on our preliminary task. I have used iMovie before so It wasn’t a problem for me to get straight into editing my film, although adding sound and small visual effects was something that I learnt through this process.

Technology and Equipment

When shooting and creating my film I used a simple video camera.

To get all the necessary shots I need to create my film I had to use a video camera. A handheld point and shoot camera. I used settings such as zoom, and anti shake and I also used a tri-pod for some shots where the camera was needed in a certain place where hands wouldn’t reach. This is not my first time using a video camera, we used a video camera briefly at the end of AS Media. But for my preliminary task at the start of A2 we used a camera to shoot a shorter 1 and half minute film. But other than those two times, I had not used a video camera to shoot any form of film before, so this was a great learning experience.

After using these 4 technology and equipment, I have learnt a lot about them, and I think that I can use some of them for future use as I now know about each of them works properly.

Preliminary TaskFor the preliminary task we were told to create a short one and half minute, this was to get to know what we will be doing for our final piece, which was to create a longer five minute film, we were giving a camera and told to go off and shoot what we wanted, but it had to contain a chase scene. This was a great task to start the year off, as I learnt a lot about how shooting a film works, and the editing that is involved in it.

This shot here, was a zoomed in shot, me and my group experimented with this, as it was also a needed part of this film. There are quite a bit zoomed in shots and this was to get an idea of how the camera worked.

On this shot we edited it to be slowed down, so when the two met each other it was put into slow motion, this was just to add an effect to the film, it was needed and wasn’t anything major.

These few shots here, but put together during the editing process, we had it so the thief was running between the cars and as he was running it would change to a first person style few, this was shot from a distance, and with the running part, the actor had the camera in his hand.

This shot was slowed down to give an effect that the thief was on his way, and it worked well when we edited and put it together, because it was a good build up

Preliminary TaskDuring the second part of the preliminary film, we got into the chase part that was needed, this took a lot of editing and shooting because it was something important and that needed to be done right. It took a few tries and we many shots but we could only decide on one, before this chase though, there was some form of dialogue

The dialogue shot was very much shot like with the running between the cars, we firstly did it with Ausmit talking to Damian and then we repeated it with the camera focused on Damian and the back of Ausmit’s head, this worked really well and after doing this I decided to use something like this in my final piece, this was a good learning experience to do with shooting and editing.

This shot was the start of the chase, we edited it so that once they had finished talking a new scene would start where Jack takes the ball.

This was the shot straight after that and was focused on Jack taking the ball and he’s the only person in the shot.

The chase was shot via a tri-pod and at distance so everyone could be fit in, because it was on a tri-pod the camera was perfectly still, the part where Jack falls over was put in slow motion for effect because it was an important part of the story, and finally the film ends, with a first person shot from Jack of Damian and Ausmit walking away.

Preliminary TaskSo my short film for my preliminary task was called The Football Thief, the plot line we had laid out was very good because it included what we were meant to put in it, which was a chase scene, it involves someone’s football being taken, and after all the editing was completed and the film was ready, I was very happy with it’s outcome, it was a short task which taught me the basics about how cameras work and how the editing process, I also got to try some different shot angles to get the film to work better, and it gave me some idea’s of what to include in my final piece. There were some problems with this film, but that is to be expected on a first try, like some of the editing wasn’t very good which some scenes being jumpy and others cutting out very quickly, and with some effects that we included were not needed, such as all the slow motions, some of them could have been reduced or not put in at all. After sending this film around, the responses from a few people were very good they liked it and thought for a first go it was very good, and some other responses said that more time could have been spent editing it, and the chase scene should have been a little longer, and maybe an interrogation from Ausmit and Damian to Jack.

ImprovementsThere were numerous things I could have done to my 3 pieces, but either I ran out of time or I didn’t think they were needed at the time, here is a few improvements that I would make to my film, poster and article.

Poster- My poster was one of the pieces I was quite pleased with, because I had knowledge of photoshop I knew what to do so in my opinion not many things need improving, but firstly, the colour of my poster could have been a lot better, because it’s Black and White the difference between the phone and background it’s on aren’t very noticeable so the phone just blends in, I could have make the background slightly lighter because it’s not important and left the phone darker so it stands out more, also the only small part of colour I have is the message, I should have kept the whole screen the original colour which was a light blue, I think it would have worked because it would have meant it would stand out, and because it’s important part of my poster it’s something that needs too so people can see it, but other than that, nothing else needed changing, the text location was fine as it was in line with everything.