Media EvaluationBy Hannah Lovejoy

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

The brief I chose was to create a short film with the following tasks:- Film review- PosterI felt that for me this would be the most challenging task for me to complete

because I have very little knowledge of the technology I have to use to be able to put these ideas forward to a visual culture.

My main ancillary task challenges forms and conventions not only of the media I am creating but also the audience. Silent films are normally one to be targeted at an older audience of 40+ however my silent movie is modernised but created in the same style as a 1920’s.

To gain further knowledge into silent movies and just how they were created I have looked at some directors to see how they use their own style to create an atmosphere and narrative to the audience. Sidney Lumet was one director I was particularly interested in as he tried to re-create reality and also led the first wave of directors into film from television. This knowledge helped me when I was filming as I wanted to follow in his footsteps and create a version of reality and playing this back to a contempary audience making my film post-modern.

Continued... My main ancillary task also develops the silent movie industry because I am

targeting a younger audience and creating a storyline that a young contempary audience could grasp and relate to. The type of silent movie I wanted to create was a murder mystery however this is then classed as youth as ‘boring’ due to the lack of colour and sound. I then made a questionnaire trying to comply with all of the expectations my target audience wanted to see and have seen before to keep some continuity. I asked questions that would help break down the questionnaires I received back as to what age group and gender were most interested in my proposed ideas and how they would react. I asked general questions about short films and what genre they had previously watched most of these turned out to be Disney animations which wasn’t very helpful although I then thought I could make this a comedy horror having a sense of danger mixed with funny scenes to lighten the mood and also have some light hearted scenes to add to the experience of a silent movie. Most younger audiences expect brilliant effects, clear cut sound and high definition colour however my film was about turning there expectations around and trying to get them to have an interest in more than one style of film that is 2012 HD surround sound action and drama but good old fashioned entertainment.

My short film...

I started the year with little knowledge of how to grasp a film and create one. I started with creating a film about a girl being bullied and making a home movie. The editing was very choppy and fast paced whereas in my silent movie I wanted it to be much more slow and precise. The amount of close-up shots I used in this editing task were very direct this was something I should have kept to whilst creating my final short film.

I wanted to also create some more effects in my short film to make it more visually appealing to a modern audience so I played around with certain dynamics of premiere pro to create a flash effect when the victim in my piece is being murdered.

I wanted to challenge myself and go the extra mile making everything very ‘Hollywood’.

Continued ...

Poster Analysis Charlie Chaplin

My Poster

This picture is very Cartoon-like and simple. The facial expression looks very stern even though this is a comedy.

I have tried to copy the way the Charlie Chaplin poster has been done to make it seem simple but effect as the shot is one of all the girls and the fact that they have a monotonous look gives off a sense of mystery as to why they look like this and one keeps smiling.

The Title of the film dominates the page and is in brackets suggesting that the child may not be the only ‘Kid’ in this film.

Looking back on my work I should have made the title stand out more and make more of an impact on the audience.

The font is different in each part of the poster this also catches the audiences attention as they want to read all of the text.

The text is all the same size and font which can make it seem quite plain to an audience member who is going to pay money to watch my film. I feel tat I haven’t captured what I hoped for in my poster which was to create a buzz and some mystery behind my creation.

Continued...Film

reviewM

y film review

The title of this film is quite similar to the background colours which makes an audience member think that the character does too.

The title of my film review stands out as I have put black text on a background of red.

This film review hasn’t spilt up the text and makes it very hard for an audience member to digest all the information.

My film review has the text split up in a more digestible manner making it simple for the mass audience.

I feel that the use of a screen grab from the film and placed behind the review was a good idea, it gives the audience a taste of what you are going to see.

This didn’t necessarily work for me because I wanted to just display a few tempting shots of girls being girls and talking about each other and fighting and also the mess of a party the night before.

After looking at some modern film reviews I now think I could have used some more modern techniques and had a better background colour and use of a colour scheme.

Camera, Editing, Sound, Mise-en-scene Camera – Normally in silent films

there are a number of close-up shots as you are trying to capture the action on the actresses or actors face in attempt to create meaning through body language. This was one convention of a silent film that had to be kept although it may not have shone through as well as I had hoped.

Editing – Stereotypically a silent movie has sped up actions which create a humorous side to the action. I again kept to this convention as it is something traditionally done within a silent film. I also made modern attempts at using editing to my advantage by putting in certain ‘pushes’ to get from one scene to the next or focus on a different point in the action within the same scene.

Sound – The sound I chose was purely based on acid jazz and the blues. Although in some videos I watched there were sound effects but I wanted to focus on the action and the music that was creating an atmosphere I thought that putting in sound effects would make it very tacky and cliché so I decided to just use the background music.

Mise-en-scene – I kept to the black and white conventions of the silent film as I wanted to create a version of reality made in a way that would be alien to youth. The girls I used for the piece were all 17/18 so this would relate to the younger audience watching people that are representing themselves. I also had very modern parts that were portrayed in my piece such as the alcohol consumption and the car scene at the beginning something that a teenager now feels they have the right to have to be able to be socially accepted.

Typography I wanted to go with something that my

audience would look at and engage with. I didn’t want to go with anything too bold and in your face but something much more elegant and pretty.

I used this font for all three of my ancillary tasks to create a relationship between them.

I feel that this font was very elegant and mysterious. Its flowing nature made it connect with my piece and what I was trying to create. It also has an eerie feel about it and looks very majestic.

Font was a crucial part of trying to break away from the codes and conventions although when I got to production I felt that this text was a very engaging piece of writing that really describes my piece.

How effective is the combination of your main and ancillary tasks?

In all of my ancillary tasks even though the colour scheme may not suit a modern audience I have tried to keep some continuity between all of my tasks set to make the audience realise that they are promotional for the same movie. Even though one big giveaway would be the title there would be some resemblance between the poster, review and film itself. Each of my tasks has pictures with distorted colours and also have a certain rustic charm about them making them feel as though they are from the 1920’s. The fonts used in all of my ancillary tasks are the same as this then connects them to each other.

Continued...

The fonts I have used is displayed in all of my tasks. I chose this font as I wanted to create a sense of reality even though it is not set in the correct time period getting the text perfect was a main goal as I wanted to make sure it had an elegance about it that would have been used in the 1920’s.

The photograph used is one that displays no affections.

I feel that my ancillary tasks are all entangled and are inter-textual with each other. I feel that my main task is reflected back to the audience through the use of many techniques and effects in the poster and film review. I wanted to create continuity within my piece as this is then vital for the mass audience to digest the information and refer back to past pieces of the film, review or poster.

What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

To get my audience feedback I used facebook as one of my main sources of feedback however this was not helpful as only friends are on the social networking site and did not give comments to further my production just pleasant comments of : ‘This is really good’ , ‘Soo Funny’ and so on. I then went on to make a questionnaire on all the three ancillary tasks and gave them to people to fill out and also a copy of the poster and film review and set up a preview of my film so that they could answer my questionnaires anonymously to get some results and critical feedback.

Continued...I have learnt from my audience feedback about my main task was:The music went well with the action and it complimented the film. ‘The music was upbeat when it

needed to be and then brought the mood down and changed it to a sound that was harrowing and even created tension during one of the scenes.’

Most of the audience felt that being led to the murderer was good as they wanted to find out during the performance and then have a certain emotional attachment with the murderer and how they acted once she ha committed the crime whether she broke under the pressure or carried on as usual.

The audience were happy with the effects and at one point in particular. “I loved the use of a flash as the girl is being murdered and then the flashing of her falling down the stairs, made it look professional and also very effective.”

The storyline was also one that the audience felt was very well-presented. “The story line was easy and directed well. The camera shots reinforce the storyline and the conflict between the girls when they are meant to be having fun and on holiday with each other and creating memories.

Overall the audience believes that it has changed their view on silent movies. “I now have a different outlook and respect for silent movies as I have been presented a storyline of which I can relate.”

The critical aspects of my film were:- The camera shots could have been more direct

- There could have been more of a gap between the murder and the start of the film.- The Car scene lasted a very long time this may be something that can be altered.

Poster QuestionnaireFrom the Poster Questionnaire Analysis I have learnt:The poster colour could have been better to attract the audiences attention. “To me the colour seemed

very old-fashioned and grainy” This was the overall aim of my poster to make it old-fashioned and suit the narrative of the time period.

The audience however did like the old-fashioned text – “ The text suited the film and the poster you can see some relation between all three of the pieces”

The photograph could have been displayed better – “The photograph gives a sense of what we are going to watch although there could have been some better use of Photoshop to centre the picture and also frame it in a better way” I feel as though this is a very useful point and will further look into making the poster more effective, on reflection I feel that maybe more time could have been spent looking at Photoshop and what I could do to play around with the tools and take a more creative approach to my film poster.

They feel that the text is enough for a movie poster and anymore would ruin it’s simple structure. I feel as though I could have made it more of a magazine poster with the day of the films release and some quotes from magazine’s and newspapers. This ancillary task I feel has been severely under done and not up to the standards I would like it to be at.

The audience however did like the title – “The title is very well though up and has a really nice ring to it”

I thought the title was good because it was resembled the film and what the story was about.

Review QuestionnaireThe review was appreciated by the audience however there were some critical parts that the audience noticed and commented on. They thought that overall the layout was easily structured and easy to read. They like the partition between all of the paragraphs this made it easy and they could focus on what they were reading instead of looking at a huge chunk of writing. The thought also that the text was very professional and they understood what they were reading. “Some of the words were very well used”The ratings I got out of 10 for this task were an average of 8.5 out of 10. I am happy but also displeased with this result as the audience comment more critically it made me think about the things I had missed and the audience were expecting. Out of all three of the tasks the film was the most favourite which was brilliant as that was the main and most important task to grab the audiences attention however one audience member commented: “I liked the review and the poster but they should have been shown to us in a direct order ending with the short film then we could of maybe looked at the film review and poster in a different light and not overshadowed by the main task.”I then asked if there was anything I could have improved on:- The text could have been larger at the top -Colours of text-- Smaller text to fit more information in -- Spelling mistakes occasionally

How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research and planning and evaluation stages?

I used a varied amount of new technologies such as:- Adobe Photoshop- Adobe Premiere- Mac Book - Facebook- Word Office- BlogSpot- Google Docs- YouTube- Blog spot

All of these technologies helped make each of my ancillary tasks and creating my coursework and research. Facebook and Word office helped me create my audience feedback and also display to my friends and family the coursework and let them comment on the video itself however some comments wee not useful. YouTube was a significant part of the film as it was uploaded to the site and the public could comment on the video and decide what they liked and disliked about the film.

Overall these piece of technology made my film and helped me research into my ancillary tasks and decide what my audiences wanted to watch and also put my film out there for the audience to comment on.

Continued... In the planning stage of creating my main ancillary task (short film), I looked

at many different clips on the internet of people such as Charlie Chaplin to find out how they were directed and presented to their demographic. Since I was targeting a different age group and a much more modern audience than those of the 1920’s I then looked at ways I could present this genre of film to the audience and it be successful within the market.

With such a vast range of movies genres and sub-genres and many more styles I looked at films that had kept to a more retro style in their modern films. At the time of producing my silent film a film came out called ‘The Artist’. A silent film directed at a modern audience even though it was directed at more of an older audience. I looked on YouTube at clips from the film and it was very old-fashioned the film was constructed around the traditional ideas of a silent movie and this is how I wanted to represent mine.

Blogger was anther type of technology which was an aid of my planning process because then it meant I could document all of my research online and organise it so that could look back easily at my targets and research.

Continued... My Poster was very easy to plan with the help of Google as I could find posters in

their archive that showed many murder-mystery and old-fashioned posters. With the help of this technology it made it easier for me as a creator and designer of a poster to look at how it would have been done and how I wanted to interpret my own movie in the style of a poster. This also made it easy to create my film review for the same reason I could relate it to something that has already been done and with technology being so accessible it was easy to gain a deeper understanding of the structure of a film review.

Photoshop was the piece of technology I Used to create my poster and film review, it was very challenging to use at first but as I settled down and started creating my tasks I found it a lot easier to get along wit it and make two piecesof media. I wanted to create synergy between my three pieces and make the audience recognise that they were part of the same media product. I wanted to also create an old fashioned look to keep withinsome of the boundaries of a silent film.

Continued...Corner designs

The construction of my piece took a holt when I started making the titles to go in-between scenes in order for the audience to get some written storyline of the piece. I started to make these on Photoshop which later had to be imported over to premiere in order to make my finished product and start editing the scenes around my titles. I came up with theses three titles to begin with, this was then whittled down to the one title.Photoshop was my aid in this specific part of the film construction as I was able to make parts of my main ancillary task and my other two tasks.

Overall EvaluationOverall I would say that technology has been a great source of research and

help that connected to my piece. I developed my piece around technology and the fact that we are now a more modern culture being brought up with High definition television and three dimensional television and films. I am taking something out of the old and in to the new and this is only possible with the vast technological advancement over the last ten years.

Throughout the process of making my ancillary tasks I have been trying to challenge myself and make my piece better than my first editing task and also better than last year.

I thought that my work was effective due to the response of my audience however I could have improved If I was to do this task again I would make my film more direct to the audience and also have a more secretive storyline where the murderer is un-masked at the end to make the audience keep guessing and assuming who the murderer was.

As a first attempt at a short film, poster and film review on my own I felt that I was very dedicated to the task and that I created a relationship between the three tasks.