Evaluation 1- In what ways does your media product use, develop, or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

This video will contain information about our Teaser Trailer on the following:

·        Genre

·        Mise en scene (including lighting)

·        location

·        cinematography (camera angle, movement and position, sound effects and music)

·        Character representations

The Front Cover Magazine:

This Total film front cover magazine is a real model which influenced us for our final magazine production.

Total Film has a fairly basic masthead that is partly hidden by the cover star. They have already established a brand identity and therefore do not need to show the entire masthead for it to be recognised. In comparison to our product, the masthead isn’t partly hidden from the cover image. This is a new magazine name so the audience wouldn’t recognise it yet as we haven’t established a brand identity. We are developing a form of convention so therefore felt we still needed to show the whole masthead.

The masthead called ‘MOVIEMAG’ follows the forms and conventions of a magazine by taking up the full width of the page and being positioned at the top of the page so it can be seen. Because of this, the masthead is the biggest writing on the cover and draws in the attention of the reader which is similar to our influence, Total Film. The MOVIEMAG masthead is big, bold and straight to the point. Using the codes and conventions, we decided on giving masthead a unique look. We created it so there could be wholes in between the letters so the viewers can still see the background image, this giving its Brand Identity which many film front covers used such as our influence; Total films’ brand identity is the way the masthead has the word Total inside the letter ‘F’ from the word ‘Film’.

Except for the masthead ‘William Jewell’ is the largest serif font on the page, making it the focus point of the cover. This leads to the main headline ‘The Tweeters’ and then the sub headline ‘The best movie of the year’ which follows the codes and conventions by it being placed right underneath the headline.

Furthermore, using the forms and conventions of a film magazine, the placement and position of the barcode is displayed on the bottom right of the page tilted on its side along with the issue information and the price.

This magazine follows the codes and conventions of film magazines by displaying a few featured movies on the top of the front cover similar to Total Films’.

Overall our magazine followed the forms and conventions to make the viewers understand that this is a front cover advertising a new film which is coming out.

The Poster:

This film poster for the film ‘Once’ is a real model which influenced us for our final poster production.

Our poster, although it doesn’t show the genre straight away the two men shaking hands gives the impression that this is the decision that will change everything in the story line. The look on the actor on the lefts face shows that he is happy but the look in his eyes and the way he is standing shows that he is ready to exploit and use the other character to make money. The character on the right looks very happy because he has just made a deal that could make him lots of money and is clueless to the problems that lie ahead. The image has been made big so that it is very eye catching to the audience as they are walking past it which follows the conventions of a movie poster because it means people can see what film it is straight away.

The colour blue is used a lot here because it is the trademark colour of twitter which is what our film is about. This follows the conventions of a movie poster because it is meant to give the audience a big insight into what the film is about.

The theme of this poster is electronics which is a big part of the film. The fact that the boarder is an Ipad shows that this is a modern film and that the story line is all based on what happens on this device. This boarder is also linked to the picture within, as the character on the right is carrying an Ipad in his left hand and that is very apparent to the audience straight away.

The writing in the background is meant to look as though it is written on a computer screen which follows the theme of electronics and computers. This follows the conventions of a movie poster. We put some of the letters in blue to make them stand out. This makes them stand out more so we only selected the most important words to the story line and put them in blue.

The two characters in this poster are represented to be happy in this poster but for different reasons. The character on the left has a sinister smile on his face which gives the impression that he is evil and the character on the right looks very happy yet vulnerable to what is about to happen. The character on the right is taller so makes the audience think that he is the main character although this wasn’t planned we just chose Will to be the lead. From this picture the audience will automatically side with Will (right) as the other character looks shifty and evil by his body language. The fact that it leaves the audience leaving questions follows the conventions of a movie poster. In comparison to the ‘Once’ poster we both have our characters facing each other showing their relationship between them.

The institutional reference is placed at the bottom of the page just like our influenced poster to follow the conventions of a film poster.

This poster doesn’t really challenge and media conventions as it follows most of them by being eye catching and making the audience want to find out more such as what happens as a result of this handshake.

The poster from the film ‘ONCE’ is similar to ours because it has links between the character and the design of it. In the poster on the left the man is holding a guitar and also they are standing on a guitar so it is linked. In our poster the character on the right is holding an Ipad and the boarder is an Ipad so it is linked. 

Evaluation 2- How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

These are our 3 final products and 3 products for the film The Social Network, which is our real influenced, inspired product. You can clearly tell that the Social Network has an effective combination and link between each product mainly shown through its simplicity.

I believe the combination of our main product and the ancillary texts work very well together and are very effective. They are all produced to promote the film to our certain target audience.

How do our three products work together (the relationship between them) and how have we represented the characters?

Firstly, the most obvious relationship was the clear presence of the same characters in each product. We have shown the two main characters, which is the good character and his nemisis, at the heart of each production. Both ancillary texts have these characters in a medium shot as the focal image for the poster and magazine where this hints at the type of relationship they have between them.  The trailer gives most of the dialogue to these two characters, giving a sense that they are the most important.  Also having more screen time establishes a hierarchy and it seems that Will and Ed are high up in this scale,  giving them a sense of more privilege in comparison to the others in the teaser trailer.

All three productions gives a flavour, and a sense towards the relationship between the two main characters.

In the Poster, Ed the bad guy has dark lighting on him emphasizing he is the villain. In contrast to Will, he has bright lighting to show he is the good guy. They are both represented in a happy manner shown by the handshake. This seems they are uniting together. The character on the left has a sinister smile on his face which gives the impression that he is evil and the character on the right looks very happy yet vulnerable to what is about to happen. The character on the right is taller so makes the audience think that he is the main character.

In the Magazine, Will is represented that he is passionate about his new invention. This is shown by the way he is looking at his Ipad, creating Twitter. Ed is clearly represented as the bad guy as his face seems evil where he is just looking at Will. This suggests that he is only interested in winning over Will to steal the idea, just for the money. In addition, it represents that he is not even interested or aware of the product as he is not even looking at the invention.

These representations from the ancillary texts are all hinted in the trailer, especially towards the ending when Will and Ed are in the Cafe arguing. Ed is represented as the False Hero, researching after looking at a Media Theories of Vladmimir Propp. At first he seemed to be friends with Will; however towards the end he is trying to steal the invention.

Furthermore, another way in which our three products works together are the presence of various technology devices shown. This connects each product as it creates a similarity between them of a modern relationship.

How have we created a theme between them all and how have we targeted the same audience? 

We are targeting a young male audience who are into the latest technology. In all of our products we wanted to give this modern technology theme.

In the Poster, we decided to use an Ipad to act as a border, where the poster feels like a large sized Ipad filled with information about the film. In addition, Will is holding an Ipad with the word ‘Twitter’ written inside, which further creates this modern theme. We feel that the presence of the Ipad will interact with our young audience as they can relate to these types of technology. This created a unique futuristic feel; when researching we havent come across a Film poster like our one. We wanted to make a poster not just to promote the film, but also to give an aesthetic value as we believe this poster is creative, so our target audience can hang them up on their walls.

In the Magazine front cover, we decided to use an extreme close up shot of a keyboard as the background image to create this modern theme. We used a quote ‘Grab your Laptop’ which targets our audience as they will have this product and can relate to this. Furthermore, the presence of Will holding the Ipad creates a strong indication to our technology theme. The presence of these two characters helps to target our young teenage audience as they appaer that they are in their teens.

Throughout all three productions the colour blue is the main colour shown. The Film is called ‘Tweeters’ and the majority of our target audience uses Twitter so they can identify the colour blue as the colour for Twitter. This colour automatically is associated to viewers as a futurisitic colour as it has a fresh, new, cool feel to it. The presence of Blue gives all of our products a modern theme. In addition, we are mainly targetting a male audience therefore this colour appeals more to the males than females, though the light shade of blue can also attract some female audiences.

How is the film genre suggested and how have we used codes and conventions to portray the genre?

My trailer is a modern Drama Biography genre. I have put genre conventions to meet the audience expectations. In the trailer, I have mainly shown genre conventions using written white text in a black background between clips to inform the viewers and add an impact to the rhythm of the trailer.

Written text e.g. “at 16 he came up with an idea” and “from nobody” “to top of the world” gives a sense that this film is about this particular person (Will), hence the biography genre. This is because these texts indicate that the film is about Will making him the most important character. It tells some background information, portrays the characters experience and his personality; this meets the audience expectation of it being a Biography genre.

Written text e.g. “you don’t get to the top...”, “...without making enemies” and “but you find out who your true friends are” gives a sense that this film is also a drama genre. This is because these texts imply that there are going to be emotional themes, in this case it is Power, Friendship and Money issues. The main character Will seems that he is in conflict at a crucial moment in his life and it feels that he will have a tragic or at least a painful resolution but eventually will survive this hard moment. This is what a drama genre is all about. This is shown in the cafe seen deliberately towards the end of the trailer to create a stronger impact to the teaser trailer. This meets the audience’s expectation of it being a Drama genre.

Using these written texts is using codes and conventions shown from our genre specific research, especially The Social Network trailer.

Here is a comparison between the Social Network and our trailer The Tweeters:

In conclusion, We feel that the combination of our main product and ancillary texts have produced three effective productions where you can clearly see their connections between one another. We feel that these productions will successfully target our young male audience, who are into the latest technologies, into making them go and watch the film.

Evaluation 3- What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Audience Feedback is a very important part and a key aspect when creating media products.  I tried to improve my products based on the feedback I've learnt from. This was found by using a variety of methods to gain feedback and finding out who my target audience are.

This video consists of 2 people giving feedback on all 3 productions:



Here are the Audience Questionnaire and Results below:

Gender: Male (20) Female (10)

Age: 16-20 (22) 21-25 (4) 26-30 (3) 31-35 (1)

The audience has had a big impact on the production process of this trailer, movie poster and magazine. They were mainly impacted because we had to aim to products at them so it had to have things that they like in it. This involved giving them lots of feedback questionnaires to fill out as we progressed through the process in ways that we could improve it. They helped us change things in all 3 parts of our production and even gave us some ideas before the filming had even started to things they might want to see in this trailer that would make them want to go and see it. We asked simple questions which would mean there is something easy to change on the product for example if they liked the storyline or something along those lines. We made a few changes because of our audience feedback. For example we changed the positioning and colour of 'William Jewell' on our magazine front cover to make it stand out more to the audience and let them know who is staring in this film. Also we changed the pictures around because originally we were going to use the magazine photo for the poster but due to popular answering we changed it and I think it looks even better now. These changes were simple and quick to make as we already had a rough idea of which areas we thought needed improving but we needed a second opinion. As you can see from the video most of the feedback we gained was positive with some slight negatives. One of the main negatives we had was that in the trailer they couldn't hear the sounds very well in one scene which made them lose track of the storyline a bit but that was easily changed. We listened to our feedback and went on Adobe Premiere Pro using the setting 'Denoiser' to get rid of any background noise that might have been there. We gained continuous audience feedback from class mates and friends throughout the production process which really helped develop the productions. Every two weeks we showed the class our products and asked them to fill out a sheet asking what they thought of it with some other little questions for additional comments. We also got feedback from getting 70 views of our trailer on YouTube which means that not just our class mates have seen the trailer. This helped us with our productions because it allowed us to keep asking questions to people on what they think needed to change and how we could change it. People who commented on YouTube gave really encouraging comments and loved our teaser trailer ‘The Tweeters’. It was good that we could receive feedback from our target audience because if they liked it then we knew that the millions of other teens in the UK would like it so it was positive. The best feedback I think we gained was about the boarder for the poster which is the Ipad. They all said this is very creative and made the poster stand out from other they had seen which was a real confidence boost because the aim of a movie poster is for it to stand out from the crowd and grab people’s attention. In addition, one person said that it is good enough for him to hang up his wall, which is another key aspect to a good quality poster, giving an aesthetic value as well. The background to the poster was also partially inspired by the audience feedback we received from one person who said we should have a computer themed background. We elaborated on this and come up with the idea which is now our background on the finished product. The audience helped us meet the expectations by telling us exactly what they liked and didn't like so we could change it and then we would ask for constant feedback asking if they like it and if they saw the trailer in a cinema would they go and watch the film when it came out. We challenged their expectations a little by trying to exceed it by making the theme to all 3 productions very clear. We did this by creating an electronics and modern feel to them because of the use of an Ipad in the images and as a boarder for the poster! We also used such phrases as 'grab your laptops...' which gave a feel to what the film is about straight away. The layout of everything also challenged their expectations as they were expecting a basic looking production but we added effects and extras to make it stand out from the rest which is probably the best thing that came out of our audience feedback. In conclusion, if we didn’t include or take in our audience feedback I feel our product wouldn’t be as strong as the final productions are now. I feel that the feedback has especially helped to target our young teenage audience who are into technology.

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

Research:

IMBD

I used IMDB to look at all the trailers and film posters that I could analyze. This website has all the trailers of the most recent films and has it in sections which makes it very easy to find the trailer you want and the watch it and analyze. This was very beneficial because it gave me a wide choice of trailers to choose from and they were very high quality so could do in depth analysis on it but the only downfall was that you couldn’t upload it to blogger straight from IMDB so you had to find exactly the same trailer on YouTube to upload it from there. The impact of this technology is that I could analyze 5 teaser trailers in great detail and find out other information about the film on the same page. I don’t think I have become more creative because this stage was just watching videos which were already provided for us on a website and analyzing them. 

FindYourtribe 

 

I used find your tribe to do research into target audiences. This website asks you a series of questions which will then tell you which social group they think you belong to. This can determine which target audience we could aim our trailer at. We had to answer all the questions as we would because we are part of the target audience. This website was beneficial because it told us which groups we should aim our trailer at and then it gave us some information on that type of group (shown in the picture above). This has made me more creative because this has enabled me to find out some research and then develop it into something that we can use for example what age rating to give this film.

YouTube

I used YouTube to upload the trailers I had analysed to blogger. I did this because you couldn’t upload videos directly from IMDB so found the exact same trailer on YouTube. It was easy to use and easy to follow instructions on how to upload the videos to blogger. This was beneficial because otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to upload my trailer videos to blogger although sometimes I couldn’t find the same trailer so I would’ve had to start again. The impact of this technology has been that I can now have videos on my blog which give me credit for creativity and also makes it easier for the moderator to watch rather than having lots of hyperlinks. I don’t think this has made me more creative because it was just using the simple link between blogger and YouTube to upload a video to my blog.

Planning:

Iphone and Email 

 

 I used the Iphone and email to communicate with potential actors that could appear in our trailer. This was done by text messaging them locations, dates and what role they might be playing if selected. Once they got back to us we chose the select few to star. Using this was very beneficial because I have an Iphone so it was very easy to carry around and communicate with people and also using email was good because you could send one email to lots of people. The impact of this technology has been that we have become more organized in getting the actors to a certain place and at a time that can suit everyone. It also is light and portable to carry around so doesn’t mean we have to go out of our way to do anything. I don’t think I have become more creative because all I have done is email and text people which is what I do on a daily basis.

Digital Camera

I used the digital camera to take pictures of locations and actors which we could potentially use in the trailer. This was beneficial because it was easy to carry around and take quick pictures as well as being able to compare things afterwards when we put the pictures up on the computer. This let us look at them and chose carefully which scene looks the best to show the genre and set the scene of the storyline. The impact of this technology has allowed us to make the correct decisions in when to shoot the film and which actors to have in it. This has made me more creative but not because of the use of the camera just because of the way it let me use my creative side to choose locations and actors and see how they mix. I feel I now have a much better understanding on how to create the right type of mise-en-scene for a particular scene.

Indesign

I used Indesign to do the drafts of the magazine and poster front cover. This was beneficial because it gave it a professional look and also at the same time it allowed space for editing and anything we wanted to change to the picture to make it look like a real poster or magazine. The only downfall was that we didn’t know how to use it very well so had to receive help from the teacher. The impact of this technology has given us two very high quality and professional looking drafts of a movie poster and magazine. I think this has made me more creative because before this project I had never learnt how to use this before and now I know the basics, and feel that I will use this in the future when needed.

Production:

YouTube

 

We used YouTube in our production in order to be able to put our trailer up on the internet to load up to our blogs. This was also done so we could potentially get more viewers than we could, by just showing people in our class what we have done. We got our clip off Adobe Premiere and saved it into a special format so that it can be played in Windows Media Player and then set up a YouTube account and uploaded it before putting the link up on our blogs. Putting it on YouTube was a good idea because since we put it up there, it has had 70 views from friends and potentially others around the UK who gave comments on it and liked it. This added to our audience feedback that we got from our class mates. This was very beneficial to us as it made it easier to upload the video to our blogs and also it got more people to view it which was a bonus. The impact of this technology has been huge because without uploading the video to our blog, it would have been a lot harder to gain audience feedback. I think we have become more creative from using YouTube because this was the first time I have ever created an account and uploaded videos. I have gained further knowledge about navigating in and out within YouTube.

Digital & film cameras

 

We used these devices quite a lot in our production. The video camera was used to capture all the footage we shot for the trailer. This was easily done because the camera was light and portable and then when the trailer was completed it was easy to connect to the computer so we could upload the footage to Adobe Premiere. The simple touch play, view and rewind buttons made it very easy to tape over any out takes we may have had whilst filming. The digital camera we used was to take behind the scenes pictures which we needed for our blog and also to take pictures for our film poster and magazine. The camera made it easy to view pictures and zoom in for extra detail which is always important when creating a film poster. Having the video camera was very beneficial because without it we wouldn’t have been able to capture all the footage we want to and also if we had a big camera then it would have been harder to transport around all of the locations we shot at. It was beneficial to have the digital camera with us at all times as well because it meant whilst we were filming we could take some action shots which would look good for the front cover of a magazine or the poster. The impact of this technology is obvious because without the video camera there would be no trailer and without the digital camera we wouldn’t have any pictures to put on our poster of magazine front cover. I believe that I have become more creative by doing this because I have learnt how different camera angles can create different affects and also I have learnt what else you can do with a video camera e.g. editing.

Photoshop

 

We used Photoshop to add affects to the pictures that we took for the front cover of our magazine and for the movie poster. We did things such as change the brightness of the characters and also we took the characters off the background they were originally in and moved them onto the background that we chose for the movie poster. We also created the magazine front cover and film poster in Photoshop which was very easy to use and very quick and easy to correct mistakes. I think that using Photoshop has been very beneficial because it has added extra affects and giving a stronger look to the pictures. Without Photoshop our images would be seem very basic. It gave us a chance to try different things to the picture to try and make it unique and eye catching as well which was a bonus. The only downfall of using this is that it took a long time for us to get to grips with how to work it, because neither I nor my partner had used this software before so we had to ask for lots of help, which was very time consuming. Overall, the impact of this software has been very good because it has produced professional and unique pictures which we have used for the movie poster and front cover of our magazine which will make them more attractive and appealing to the target audience. I think that I have become more creative by using this software because before this project I had never used Photoshop and now I have learnt the basics, such as adjusting the levels, brightness, contrast and using filters. This will be very useful when I need Photoshop in the future.

Adobe Premiere Pro

I used Adobe Premiere to edit all the footage that we filmed and put it into a sequence to create a trailer. By using Premiere, we were also able to add a soundtrack to our trailer which added tempo and other effects. Placing all our footage onto the time scale allowed us to cut some clips down in length and then match it to the tune of the music. Using this was very beneficial because it allowed us to shorten clips that were too long and then add a soundtrack to it to make it follow the conventions of a teaser trailer. This also allowed us to put in short clips of writing to inform the audience of what is going on, which you can’t do on other software’s. The only downfall of using this is that it took a long time for us to get to grips with how to work it because neither I nor my partner had used this software before so we had to ask for lots of help. The impact of this software is huge because without it we wouldn’t been able to edit the clips so the trailer would be very long and basic which is not what we wanted. It would also not have a soundtrack which would make the audience lose interest in it quickly. . I think that I have become more creative by using this software because before this project I had never used Premiere and now I have learnt the basics, such as adding in titles between clips, adjusting the sounds and cutting down clips which all created a professional film trailer look.

Downloading sounds/music

 

We used the soundtrack ‘Vocal Slam’ from a website which provided free downloads which weren’t copyrighted. This was made very easy by the instructions which were clearly supplied on the website (AudioJungle.com). After downloading this it was very easy to upload it to Premiere and then match it to our trailer. We had to find one that was up tempo to make it apply to our target audience and also try and portray which genre the film is. This was very beneficial because without the music the trailer would be boring and also choosing this website, saved us a lot of time because it was very easy to use. The impact of this has been that we now have a very exciting trailer and a good soundtrack to go with it which was easy to download and sync with the footage we had captured. I believe that I have become more creative from this because I have learnt how to sync music with footage and where to find all this copyright free music to download. 

Evaluation:

YouTube

 

We used YouTube in our evaluation in order to show our creativity and we thought that it would also be easier to analyze the trailer if it was on a big screen behind us. We did a video of ourselves analyzing the trailer and then uploaded it to YouTube to make it easier to put onto our blogs. This also showed our creativity skills rather than just writing a long essay and putting that on our blogs because that is less appealing. This was very beneficial because it made it fast and easy to get our video onto our blog rather than having to wait ages for it to load to blogger itself. The impact of using YouTube has been that we have saved a lot of time by uploading it there first and we have also gained a lot of credit for our creativity in doing a video blog instead of writing a long essay. I don’t think we have become more creative from using YouTube because we already knew how to use it; we uploaded the video when previously using it for our trailer. Although it was easier to use this time round as I had experience of using YouTube by using it from the other production tasks.

Microsoft Word

 

We used Microsoft word in our evaluations to write some analysis for the questions and also to plan out the script for our video blogs. We wrote who would say what and then print it out. This was very beneficial because it allowed us to plan what we were going to say before the filming so we didn’t have to make it up and also it allowed us to write professional looking essays to evaluate some of our work. The impact of this technology has been really good because we have produced some good essays and a very good script for our video blog which we have recorded for our evaluations. I don’t think we have become more creative from using Microsoft Word because we already knew how to use it, but this was an extremely effective tool as it was simple and quick to use.

Video camera

 

We used the video camera in our evaluation to do a video blog of some of our work. This made it easier to present it as we could have the trailer and productions on a big screen behind us whilst we talked about it to the camera. It was then very easy to rewind if we read something wrong or there were any mistakes. We then connected it easily to the computer and uploaded the footage to Adobe Premiere where it could be edited. This was beneficial because it gave us credit for using creativity and also it allowed us to present our work instead of just writing about it which is less appealing. The impact of this technology has been huge because without the camera all our evaluation would be essays which wouldn’t give us any credit for creativity and would take a lot longer to do. I don’t think that I have become more creative in the sense that we used the video camera in previous production, but I think I have become more creative in making ideas because of the use of the big screen and using the touch screen features in our video to make it more professional. The knowledge of using the video camera for the trailer made it easier and quicker to work the video camera for the evaluation as we had a better understanding and experience.

Adobe Premiere Pro

We used Adobe Premiere to edit the footage we took of us analysing our trailer for the evaluation. We made some clips shorter and took out all the outtakes that occurred whilst filming. This was beneficial because it meant we could cut out all the mistakes we made whilst filming in order to make the evaluation look as professional as possible. Using Premiere also meant that we could change the volume of the sound where we used the ‘DeNoiser’ effect to make voices seem louder and the background noise less which really helped to make the audience hear what people are saying. The impact of this has made the evaluation look very professional and also gives us credit for creativity and knowing how to use this software instead of writing an essay. We used it for evaluation 1 and 3 which meant it was a lot quicker. I think that I have become more creative by using this software because before this project I had never used Premiere and now I have learnt the basics, such as DeNoiser.

Blogger

 

In conclusion, the most important media technology used was Blogger. It has enabled me to show and express my creativity throughout all of the productions. This was an excellent way to present the completed coursework as it is clearly layered out. The bad side about Blogger is that when you write on a post, there is no spelling check to look at, so I had to write up all my work on Microsoft Word before putting it into Blogger. However, the simplicity was a key factor as it helped upload the work quickly and easily. By using Blogger, I feel I have become much more creative in presenting work to others. Blogger helped by giving a sample of how my blog could look like, and after a while I made it into my own style which has impacted on the creative ways I can show my work in. This is reflected throughout my Blog.