Evaluation - Question 4

Question 4 – How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

At the start of our project we had to conduct a lot of research in order to plan our film. I did this research using the internet and more specifically, sites such as Google, Youtube, Blogger and IMDB. I used Blogger as a way of storing the information I had gathered from the research. All of the above has helped me to improve my research skills and also my level of skill when it comes to blogging. Blogger also enabled me to create and design my own blog. As I used it more and more, I found out ways in which I could personalize my own blog and make the design relevant to our film.

Whilst producing posts on our blog, I took various photos on my I Phone that we could use for our location photos and storyboard. I also took photos of some of the props that we used within our film, such as the fake money and the flour we used as a substitute for drugs. This has improved my photography skills and has also had a positive influence on my planning skills as we used the photographs to plan out which shots we would take for our film.

After conducting our research and planning, we then had to film footage that we could use for our film. We did this by using a Sony HDV camera and a standard tripod. Throughout my time using the camera I feel that my filming skills have developed significantly and that I now have a better understanding of what range of shots come together to make an effective scene. The camera was extremely easy to use and this was a big help in developing my skills as I was able to get on with the filming without any trouble. Whilst the camera was easy to use, it still produced excellent and professional results. The only problem I had when using the camera was due to the outside conditions. This was mainly down to the lighting of our locations which meant I had to spend some time in adjusting the camera so that no glare appeared on the footage.

After filming all of the footage, we then had to edit it all together and we did this by using the programme ‘Final Cut Express’ on a Mac computer. This programme was extremely successful in the editing process of our film and it has certainly improved my creativity. My editing skills as a whole have improved because of this programme and I am now able to use a wide range of effects that I wasn’t able to beforehand. Some of these effects are the ‘roll over tool’ that I used to smooth the transition from shot to shot and the ‘cross dissolve’ effect. The tool we used to smooth the transitions was extremely effective and made our film look far more professional. We did experience some difficulties in the editing process though as we lost our initial work because of the Mac we were using. The Mac crashed and in the processed lost our work. This meant that we had to re edit our footage and made the whole process take a lot longer than it would have.

Completing the editing process meant that we could then look at the ways in which we could advertise our film. The two ways we advertised our film were by creating a film poster and a radio trailer. I created my film poster by using the programme ‘Photoshop Elements 7.0’. I opened up a captured image from our film onto the programme and then used the programme to add effects to the image. The process of creating my film poster, improved my skills in editing and also helped in improving my creativity. 

Evaluation - Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?



PLANNING
After doing some research into genre we decided to go with the horror/thriller genre for our film. We then needed an idea of what would happen within our film. After looking at a number of ideas and researching other existing media products, we came up with our final idea. The final idea for our film was mainly inspired by the existing media product 'Strangers'. Having come up with an idea for the film, we then needed to have some feedback from our target audience and did so through a video questionnaire. The feedback we received was extremely positive which was encouraging. Our target audience particularly liked the idea of the ending in which we subverted the stereotype of girls being the weaker gender. The audience seemed to think that the age certificate of the film should be a 15 and this was helpful as beforehand we were unsure as to what we thought it was. Overall the feedback was positive and we felt that the idea was a good one for our film.

ROUGH CUT
From the feedback we had enough knowledge and opinions to film our first rough cut of our film.




Uploading the rough cut of our film was incredibly helpful as it enabled us to get some more feedback from our target audience. We uploaded it to YouTube and then created an online questionnaire in which the audience could fill out and send to us. The feedback was again rather positive and at the same time it was extremely helpful as we were able to take on board some of the suggestions. One of the suggestions we got from the audience was to add some background music. The audience was specific, saying that they though we needed something spooky, mysterious and the word 'eerie' was used. We definitely agreed with this and we felt that it would be a good way of building up tension within the film. There were also certain shots in which the audience thought we could remove and add to our film in which we agreed. The online questionnaire for our rough cut was a big factor in helping our final film to be successful and we as a group were very happy that we decided to do it.

FINAL FILM
Taking the feedback into account we were then able to start filming again. Unfortunately, the actor we used within our roughcut wasn't able to continue to act so we had to find somebody else. This was extremely unhelpful but we managed to catch up on the deadline after lots of hard work from ourselves and the new actress. We uploaded our final film and again made an online questionnaire for our target audience to fill out.



The questionnaire results came back and we couldnt have been more pleased with them. 9/10 people said that they understood the storyline and that they loved the concept of it. They also said that they really liked the background music that we added and said that it added a feeling of tension to it. Overall I am very happy with how our film was reviewed by our target audience and feel that it was a success. I also feel that the film goes well with the poster and the radio trailer, as they all have a feeling of consistency and professionalism about them.

Evaluation - Question 2

Evaluation - Question 1

Audience Questionnaire responses

Audience Questionnaire responses

Viral Advertising

This is a viral advertising campaign that was created in order to promote 'The Dark Knight'. This took a different approach to many viral advertising campaigns as this allowed the audience to physically get involved as a new game was created simulating that normal towns and cities were Gotham city. It allowed people to try and make themselves worthy of being part of the jokers team. Fans of the franchise found this an amazing way to advertise as they were encouraged to get involved.


This is one of my personal favourite viral ads as it allows people to get involved and experience the role of a character within the film. I like how tense it is and how the people really wanted to get involved to try and win the tickets.

Theory of Semiotics.

This is the study of signs or how certain things may signify something. This may include;

• body language
• gestures
• words
• letters
• visual illustrations
• pictures

Semiotics is a useful analytical tool in film as it allows for an explanation to be produced as to how visual images form a communication of meanings. A sign could be anything seen within the shot that may stand for something else. There are three main components;

1. the sign
2. the signifier
3. the signified

For example;

• The sign- a STOP sign
• The signifier- the letters within (S-T-O-P)
• The signified- the motion category STOP

In semiotics there are different levels of meaning, they are distinguished between denotation and connotation.
Denotation- what it actually stands for
Connotation- its associations
Signs are categorised into different codes.

• cinematic codes
• cultural codes
• generic codes
• aesthetic codes 

Questionnaire

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1JWiDSM78tcz4Ynl-cwq5lBMHfmyzYPoMYx9KxV6Mung/viewform?usp=send_form

Laura Mulvey Male Gaze Theory.

Male gaze refers to the idea that we are put into the perspective of a heterosexual man, focusing on the curves of a woman for example, and giving you the view from their eyes. It is known that the curves etc are highlighted by specific conventions such as slow motion, specific camera angles and the way it is edited together. The theory suggests that the male gaze denies women their identities, and making them objects rather than a person, used for their own entertainment. The theory suggests that women cannot watch a film from a secondary perspective but rather from a males perspective of themselves. It is known that the women in films only exist in relation to the male, and has no real importance themselves.

Mulvey states that there are two main functions of women in films.

• As an erotic image for other characters to view
• As an erotic image for the audience viewing to see

The characters that tend to look and objectify the women are known as the 'active' roles, which is typically a male. The characters that are looked at, the women are known as 'passive' as they are under control from the males view and only exist for visual pleasure. Women are used to slow the narrative down and give the audience someone to look at. Whereas the males push the narrative forward to make things happen which makes them the active characters.

Laura Mulvey discussed the term 'socophillia'. Which refers to 'the love of watching'.
Movie making and movie watching have been analysed as socophillia practices. She also argued that we live in patriarchal societies. Meaning that men dictate and set the majority rules  and construct ideal roles and dominance over women. People worry that a passive audience may be influenced by this representation of society and copy it, so that it would eventually become reality.

An example of 'male gaze'

Theories of Entertainment.

Richard Dyer
Richard Dyer argues that one of the functions of entertainment is utopianism.
The categories of utopian entertainment include;

• exhaustion
• scarcity
• dreariness
• manipulation
• isolation/fragmentation

However, there are utopian solutions to this. They include;

• energy
• abundance
• intensity
• transparency
• community 

Dyer suggests that these are temporary solutions to the inequities of society. This basically suggests that watching films is a way of escaping reality for the audience.

Herbert Blumer
 He suggests that there are ways to describe and categorise an audience;

• gender
• age
• culture
• education
• class
• region

In 1950, Blumer described  mass audience. The mass is very loosely organised and is not able to act with the unity of the crowd. Throughout the second world war, many leaders attempted to use media as propaganda as a way to try persuade a mass audience. However, in our society, this may not be as effective due to the way people now access media. For example, a lower class audience may not be able to afford computers/television and therefore may not experience media used to persuade a mass audience. The same thing applies linked with age, as a younger generation may not want to do things such as read a newspaper, meaning that they also wont experience the media suggested.

Theory Lesson - Laura Mulvey, Male Gaze

Laura Mulvey was a feminist film scholar who analysed Hollywood cinema and argued female characters were represented as passive objects of male desires. She believed there were 2 roles of a female character:

1. Erotic object for characters
2. Erotic object for the spectators

Richard Dyer draws on Mulveys work to argue that ways of looking reasurts male dominance.
Dyers Typography - 4 questions to ask of a representation:

1. What is represented?
2. How is this representitive of social groups?
3. Who is responsible for the representation?
4. What does the audience make of it? Responses not always the same

Audience Theory - Richard Dyer's Theory of Entertainment and Utopia

Richard Dyers Theory of Entertainment and Utopia

• Wrote about stars/entertainment
• Looks at aspects of entertainment
• Why do you choose a certain film?

Utopian Sensibilities
Utopian categories of entertainment >>>>>

Energy - action scenes/dance sequences/quick editing/fast paced music = gives energy to viewer
Intensisty - mellodrama lives - experiences of extreme highs and extreme lows. We dont get much in everyday lives.
Transparency - tell how characters feel to show you whats happening in the film = clear and open
Abundance - Entertaining to viewer as film shows someone starting off with nothing then ending up with an abundance of everything = nice to see/experience is themselves
Community - being with other people - If you are a lonely person and a film shows people being together, you are entertained and feel less alone.

If you lack something and a film gives you it = entertained

 

Richard Dyer, lecturer in film for the Universities of Keele and Birmingham in Britain, makes a case for entertainment as a utopian sensibility. He says:

 

“The notion of entertainment as in some sense utopian — expressing ideals about how human life could be organized and lived –is implicit in what the most widespread assumption about entertainment, namely, that it provides ‘escape.’ Entertainment offers the image of ‘something better’ to set against the realities of day-to-day existence.”

 

Dyers Utopia theory is also linked with the Uses and Gratification Theory as audience consume media products with a clear set of pleasures to draw from that experience. The Utopian theory includes gratification that allows people to escape from their real lives as their reality is full of negativity and unfullfilment, therefore the 'mediated' world represnts an escape.

Final Production Logo

I have already conducted research into production logos and created a blog post. The post I did includes the common themes of logos and the names of the productions from both Independent and Mainstream companies. 


Some companies like to use images or the name of the production. For example Hammer uses block red capitals which stands out and instantly connotes the film to be about horror/danger. Other companies like to use words or phrases to hint at their genre which is shown in 'Horror Films'.


 For our logo we wanted a logo which instantly connoted horror as well as name which did the same. We decided on using both an image and text, combined with colour. A member of our group, Abbie is studying Graphics therefore came in helpful when wanting to gain a professional looking production logo. Our genre is horror and the usual horror productions logos are screaming mouths, feel reels etc. Abbie used photoshop to create our group logo which included a open mouth and a film reel. We used these obvious connotations here as we wanted the audience to know from the outset what the genre was.

Final Production Logo

Individual Film Poster

After research into horror posters, I decided to take the usual connotation and embed into my own poster. I decided the colour scheme would stick to the usual black and red to connote the unknown and danger. I put our original image of Joel in a black and white effect to show that he is the mystery and the text in bold red to stand out to the audience and fit with the genre. 

The text font we used OCR A Std which looks like text on a old computer/laptop which links with the beginning of the the film when Loren is see on the computer. It links with how this all started and how the intruder found where the girl lived. 

Our production logo was made by Abbie as she is a graphics student. I decided to photoshop out the black background and use the 'Scream Productions' through the middle of the film reel to make the whole logo look more professional. 

Filming Issues

Various issues have effected our filming including problems with the computer and acting issues. The computer we edited our film on had suddenly crashed and shut down, leaving us with little footage left. This limited our time when meeting filming deadlines and set us back quite a bit. 

The second issue came down to our main actor being unreliable. The actor we chose to film decided to back out when we asked to film a couple of last shots to complete the film. This meant we couldn't fill in blank spaces in the film or use the actors house as a location. our group had to find another actor and another location to shoot in which set us back a lot and we became slightly stressed as we had to meet deadlines. We eventually found an actor who was willing to be reliable and we shot the whole film again. Even though this put us back and meant we had less time for editing, it gave us tips on how to improve our new film and ensured we didn't make the same shooting mistakes as before. The original film cut was used as our rough cut which we posted online to get audience feedback. We asked for opinions on what could be done to improve and we took these on board and applied it to out new film. 

Editing the new film is now complete and i believe our group have successfully worked well together to overcome there issues and problems. 

Location Photos

Our film opens with a drug deal that takes place in a local park. The first shot is a long shot of the dealer stood on the path in the park. Parks are a usual location for drug deals to happen therefore we used the park to open the scene as the audience will relate quickly to the situation. The long shot shows how big and lonely the area is, and the picture here is taken in the daylight to show the details however the film is shot in the dark to create the sense of our horror genre.

The second scene cuts to the drug dealer and the buyer meeting in the middle of the path. An over the shoulder shot is used to show the exchange of conversation and to show whats happening.

We chose to use a dark hoodie for Joel's character as it connotes a typical drug dealer outfit. It also adds mystery to the character as his face isn't shown, fitting with our horror genre.

Sound for films.

Because of the genre of our film, we needed to find something that would accompany our film in a way to further build suspense and the overall feeling we wish to get for our film.

There are many sites online where you can find free music which is un copyrighted and able to be used for your own use.

The site that we have been using to look at sounds is freesound.org which has a large variety of sounds which seem suitable for the genre of our film.

 

Editing Techniques.

When editing our film  we had to use certain techniques in order  to symbolise or suggest certain things. For example, a change in time or scene.
A technique that we used quite often throughout was a fade to black, this was used in many instances when we had no footage that would correctly follow on to give the same effect or when this sort of footage is not needed in that certain space of time. This is a technique which has worked really well within aspects of the film to build up a sense of tension and suspense.  Here i found a very basic example of a fade through black transition clip to illustrate the effect that we have used. 

The other main type of editing we did was jump cut. We used this mainly for the speed, as theres is a lot of tension/ scary moments in our film that needed to be further exaggerated. Jump cuts allowed us to do this. It is also a really simple, effective technique to be carried out. Here is a simple and effective  example of a jump cut.

Research into Viral Advertising

Viral Adverts are methods of advertising videos or messages to a large audience. It can be delivered by word of mouth or enhanced by the network effects of the Internet and mobile networks. Viral marketing may take the form of video clips, interactive games, images, text messages, emails or web pages. The ultimate goal of marketers interested in creating successful viral marketing programmes is to create viral messages that appeal to individuals with high social networking potential (SNP) and that have a high probability of being presented and spread by these individuals and their competitors in their communications with others in a short period of time. 

After viewing several viral ads on YouTube, I chose the viral ads shown above. These two ads for the films 'Carrie' and 'Devils Due' share the same horror genre of our film therefore i chose to look at them in more detail.Getting the public to take part can help create a viral effect, shown in the above ads and other examples such as T-Mobiles Dance Video. This was filmed in Liverpool Street Station where a flash mob technique got passers-by to join in a dance. This received 30m hits on YouTube and showed that getting public involved was successful.

 

Shotlist