1)In what ways does your media product use,

develop and challenge real media products?

Evaluation

How our product would appeal to the

target audience? Our media product is aimed at teenagers, more specifically, aged 16-19, therefore we used many

media conventions used in real horror films , in order to make our film appeal to them. Firstly, we

used two group members to play the protagonist(Niamh) and antagonist(Lilia). This is usually used

in real media products as if a product is aimed at young people, the characters are almost always

young people. Moreover, when we did our questionnaire, all the teenagers said they liked young

people in horror films, therefore, we believe we picked the right character that would appeal most

to them.

Like this, the audience would be able to like the film as they will see people their age are in it.

In order to have made it better, I could have made it clearer that the characters are young such as shot

close to a college or an area with many young people. Many horror films I have seen such as the one

used in my product research “ the ring” had the teenage girls dressed in a school uniform to show

they are like the audience and make clear they are teenagers and the film is aimed at them. This

could have been done in a number of ways in my film; in the flashback, she could have been

wearing a uniform or one scene could have been done with her in a school.

The Narrative Our opening sequence uses the typical elements a real opening sequence would use. Firstly, we have the

introduction of the main prop, which is the necklace as the actress is seen holding it in the graveyard. In the product research I had done, all films had an introduction of the key props at the beginning such as “tears”, which was the swing”. I believe we have done this correctly as the audience will understand that the necklace plays an important role in our film as it appears in two of our four storyboards. It also creates suspense as people wonder what is so important about it. I believe this was established well and the audience will know that that prop is key to the story,.

Also, we introduce the main two characters in the opening sequence which is Niamh, who appears throughout and than the antagonist, which is Lilia. Once the last storyboard turns to Lilia, we understand that she is the one speaking to Niamh and therefore the establishment of the narrative: she is haunting Niamh and the necklace triggered this as it has something to do with the person who died and she was laying flowers for. However, I do believe that our cliff-hanger could have been better and much more intriguing as it is not made clear that the voices heard by Niamh comes from Lilia the antagonist as when the camera cuts to her, she has already said everything. Therefore, this could create a bit of confusion whether she is the person haunting Niamh or a completely different character. For example, the opening sequence of “The black dress” has a cliff-hanger at the end of the opening sequence as to what the girls saw that made them throw themselves out the window and what would happen next.

We introduced the key location very well I believe. We started our film with an aerial shot of the graveyard, which shows it is important. The fact that it appears inn three of our four storyboards suggest it is the main location. Also, the voice over telling her to go back to it emphasises how important it is and the action will be based their. It is also the location of the flashback showing the beginning of everything was their, which means it is a location of extreme importance in the product.

Mise-En-Scene We were very careful in picking the key location as well as the others for our opening sequence. When we

had done the questionnaire in the audience research we placed much more emphasis on what the teenagers in our target audience liked and we saw that many of them liked graveyards in horror films. Therefore, we made sure that our main location would be that. This also follows real media products as many horror films are done in graveyards such as “A haunting”. Like this, our film seemed very realistic and appealing to our audience.

In our questionnaire, we also saw that quite a few people liked horror films in churches. Our group found the idea appealing so we decided to go to Saint Paul’s Cathedral to do it as it makes the horror film much more sinister. Many horror films such as horror film on possession make use of holy locations and objects such as crosses in their films as well as in other types of horror films, therefore, we thought it would make our film much more sinister as it does in real media products. So I believe that the locations chosen were good for our film as it is very similar to real media products.

The members who were taking care of mise-en-scene looked at our product research and tried to follow the conventions as much as possible. We thought Niamh would be a good actress as she had very dark hair; in real media products the bad or dark characters usually have dark hair, so this connotes that Niamh is quite dark as well as a negative character. The fact that she uses black throughout the opening sequence also emphasises that. In films such as “The Ring”, the evil character has dark hair as well as a dark blazer. The antagonist also has dark hair and dark clothes to connote the same things. Moreover, she has pale make up as antagonists such as in “Jessica’s Room” usually have, which makes it much more similar to a real media product.

The lighting used is quite conventional to what is seen in horror films. It is mostly dark as in most

horror films which makes it much scarier and increases tension. As we saw in the product research

and most questionnaires, there is dark lighting, therefore, it appealed to the audience as well as

resemble a real horror film. However, in the first two scenes it is daylight, which challenges what is

really used in real horror films and perhaps doesn’t make it as scary as a real horror film would be.

As mentioned before, there is one key prop in the opening sequence as well as a main location,

which is what is usually seen in opening sequences. Therefore, our media product does resemble a

real opening sequence as the main elements are established.

Moreover, in the flashback scene, Niamh wears much lighter clothes to connote she was much more

positive and good before finding the necklace. This is seen with most good characters in films such

as in ”the ring”, where the blonde innocent girl wears light clothes. Therefore, as in real media

products, we tried to create ideas about the characters through mise-en-scene as well as the other

various elements.

Editing In the flashback storyboard of our product, we decided to use a sepia effect on the scenes, in order to

show people that it isn’t reality, but something of the past as sepia has a sort of “old” connotation. This is

also used in real media products in order to stress something is in the past, therefore, I believe the

flashback scene follows real media conventions effectively as it is made clear that that scene is a flashback.

While making my transitions from one scene to another I didn’t use as many as in the horror films I have

researched, there wasn’t a great deal of transitions apart form cuts, so most of the transitions used are

simple cuts. For the opening scene we decided to use a fade in as it was also used in “tears” and it creates

suspense. Therefore we didn’t use transitions such as wipes as it isn’t used in horror films and wouldn’t

mach the sinister atmosphere. Therefore, our transitions try to resemble the ones of real media products as

much as possible.

The titling sequence diverts a bit from real horror media products. Firstly, the colour blue is used to

present people’s names. The light blue colour doesn’t really match the mood of the opening sequence and

is quite a happy colour to have and in real horror films white and darker shades are used. Therefore, some

aspects of the titling sequence challenge real media products. When the name of the film appears “ The

stone” it is in white, which resembles more a titling sequence of a horror film as white is quite ghostly.

The transitions used are slow which accompanies the slow and sinister mood of the film as done in media

products where the pace of the titling sequence accompanies the one of the film. Therefore, I believe that

that made it seem much more real and similar to a real horror film.

Sound In our media product, we decided to add many types of sound and music as we thought it would

create ideas about the characters as well as the atmosphere. Most films have a sound which is the main one and runs throughout it; we have done that in our film as it is the music that is most played unlike the others who are for particular scenes. Therefore, in terms of how the music is laid out, it is similar to real media products.

For the scene in St Paul’s Cathedral, we added a different sound at the end when she Niamh, the protagonist, suddenly disappears. A special sound of a violin was added to play exactly when that scary or sinister moment happened. We decided to do this as in all the media products we analysed which were horror films, most of them had this sort of sound such as in “tears”, when something scary happened. In our product it is when the protagonist unexpectedly disappears, similarly, in “tears”, it is when the zombie unexpectedly disappears. So it is very common to what is found in real horror films, so we tried to develop that and incorporate it into our own product to make it seem real as well as scary.

We went against a common aspect of opening sequencers, which is dialogue. Instead, we decided to use a voiceover of a group member’s voice to make it seem like it is the antagonist's voice and show only the protagonist can hear it. This isn’t really used and perhaps we could have made the fact that it is the antagonist’s voice much clearer by perhaps filming her mouth moving with the voice. Therefore, we made our media product much different than what real media products would use and perhaps it should have been made much clearer not to create confusion to the audience.

Storyboard In our film, we used a variety of camera shots. We saw that many real media products didn’t include

a framing shot, however, we decided to use it as we believed it would look much more sinister in

the cathedral, therefore, we used different camera shots that many real opening sequences do not

use, however we managed to explore them and make them match and add life into our film as well

as the high angle shots.

Many of the horror films we watched in our opening sequence contained a variety of camera shots,

which we also decided to use, such as wide shots, long shots and extreme close ups.

Overall, regarding the starboards, we followed what the real media products usually do , but added

to it to make it much more likely and interesting.

The end