Evaluation Feedback

I know you have been working on your responses - make sure they are uploaded as and when so I can support you further!

In your responses to your final production make sure you are clearly referring to choices and outcomes in an evaluative way - make sure you are addressing the areas outlined by me below:

What did you do? Explain a transition or effect you opted for in the editing process.  What effect did you achieve?  Explain how the choice you made was intended to make the target audience think or feel.  How does this show progression in your use of skills? Explain how this is better than your AS production's outcomes by linking to what you did in your portfolio last year.

These choices are really important for you to reflect on to show you fully understand how you have developed your skills - and make sure you evaluate the comments made by the test audience (the class) using specialist terminology.

We do not have long until the deadline for this final stage of your portfolio - so make sure you are pushing yourself and achieving the marks your efforts this year deserve!

Evaluation 1

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (i.e. of teaser trailers/poster/magazines)



The title of the film is conventional to a horror film trailer as it is expected by the audience that are aware of what the film is called, making it easier for them to research the film for later updates. We decided to have a hidden eye in the wall to show indication of the antagonist of our film, which is more personal to our film. It creates this suspension for the audience as it come out searching for the protagonist, however, has direct contact with the audience, making them feel apart the trailer, making them intrigued about what will happen in the film. The stencil font that we used is called Adobe Caslon Pro Bold size 7, but when putting the titles together we did adapt the size so that it would look more prominent in the trailer looked more self centred and noticeable for the audience. We also thought that decreasing the brightness and contrast of the background on Photoshop to create a more darker atmospheric look, which connotes a mystery for the audience to figure out by watching the full film. We have also kept this consistent throughout film poster, by having the same background image but we have changed it slightly to show a more darker transitional effect, showing the most powerful side of the antagonist. By having this allows the audience to remember distinctly about the film as this is the unique selling point which the audience will be able to remember.This is conventional to the horror genre as usually it shows how the antagonist is lurking around to get rid of the protagonist and hints the audience about the antagonist personality.

For the location of the film, we decided to film in an abandoned house where most of story happens in there and is usually where the protagonist tends to be more eager about the house and investigates. The antagonist is also quite prominent in this location as it usually lurks inside the house, torturing the protagonist at the same time making it more difficult to complete her investigation. Also the woods is another main location for our film as this is where the antagonist will be introduced and the dark lighting also 

contributes to the convention of a horror trailer as this creates more scare and tension for the audience about how the story will unfold.

We used a variety of camera angles and shots including establishing shot of the wood location, shot reverse shot with the medium shot between the sisters as they are talking about doing the investigation together. And the trailer begins with a lot of quick close up shot of the photos where one of the girl has been killed, we also use close up shots of the newspaper to show the plot of the film, giving the audience an insight into what to expect in the film, we also used angle shot at some of the more intense moments to show the protagonist being tortured and being alone fighting the antagonist. Also there is a clear sight of who is given more prevalence with the over the shoulder shots of the protagonist researching about the history of the house. This allows the audience to have a main focus as this would immediately show that they would side with her and follow her as she investigates. Alongside as the camera pans around the protagonist whilst they set up for there overnight stay at the forest, suggests that we have presented the protagonist as quite fearless, but yet vulnerable to which she is unaware of the consequences that causes the antagonist to go after for revenge. This adheres to the conventions of a horror film trailer as usually the protagonist is the more confident, but yet target harshly towards the antagonist and this is effective as it starts to builds tension, as this puts the protagonist at danger. But this leaves enigma codes to which the audience would continue to watch to find out of the protagonist would survive in the film or not.

The trailer begins accordingly which meets the expectations of a typical trailer as all trailer have an official start showing the age restriction for the film, which has been provided by the film rating website as they watch and judge the suitable audience for this trailer. So we thought that by adding a this would make the audience aware about the age of which this film can be view, so for our film we have put that there needs to an accompany adult for people under 17, as 

there are some some language used throughout the film, which the audience should be aware about. Then the green screen fades out and we are introduced to the production title which to created on Photoshop and added it to our trailer, alongside it we also used some special effects such as adding the additive dissolve to the title and the picture to go from black and white to colour making conventional to a trailer as it shows that the film has been created by a highly budgeted film.

Some of the other titles that we used allows to give the audience some information and some background information about the film, as this would make them more intrigued and interested to find out about the storyline. Having one of the titles as "BASED ON A TRUE STORY" adheres to the conventions of a horror film trailer as this makes the trailer more believable to the audience knowing that it has happened in real life, and this is a key element of which will grab the audience's attention towards the film. We also added some quotes from magazine, to show the popularity of the film, by having well known magazine helps to promote the film by sharing audience bases across both the magazine and the trailer. We decided to have the cast names in the film trailer as this allows the audience to identify who is in the trailer, and may recognise them from provided films. We used the same font style, but we changed it by having the white font then fade into another title or scene as we wanted to keep a them going and it makes the trailer seem more serious for the audience to gain a sense of what is going on in the film.

AS Production Reflection

Digital Technology

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

We used a video camera that a family member had let us borrow for the duration of the filming process. This was a Sony Handy-cam DCR-DVD92e camera. This was the only technology that was used in our opening two minutes. We thought this would be good because it had a built in microphone and an option to zoom if we wanted it. This would have been good because it enabled us to have wider options to use if we wanted to.

What software was used?

We used Adobe Premiere Elements 10 to edit our footage. When we first started out using it, it was extremely hard to come to terms with but eventually we managed to find our way around the editing software and therefore our production time became a quicker process. We found editing to be particularly difficult when dealing with rendering as some of our footage was out of focus but we didn’t realise until we looked back on it recently.

We also used Adobe Photoshop for editing our production titles on because this enabled us to save the document as a picture and uploading this was a lot easier than trying to do it straight onto Adobe Premiere Elements 10.

What equipment was used?

We used the camera as mentioned previously as well as props including a school bag, school equipment and settings such as a sixth form college and roads leading to the college. We found that the props helped establish the setting of the opening two minutes; however we could have use more technical shots to make sure we enhanced the audience viewing. We could have also used an additional microphone last year to make sure the sound was a lot clearer. This was a drawback from last year because of how our sound was the main issue raised. The sound should have been re-recorded because of how we had to deal with the muffled background noise and the soundtrack was too loud to hear what the characters were saying.

What were the technical pros and cons of the software and hardware?

Some of the pros we had with the production were that it fitted well and some of our shots that were edited together worked particularly well with how they flowed. However, I found that there were more cons. One con was that the quality of the footage was very poor and it was not as clear as what it could have been. This made it seem like the footage was shaky and that it was out of focus. We also had difficulty in getting the sound right, which is something I feel would have improved our mark. We also needed to edit our film better because we had a lot of jump cuts which were obvious to the audience. We should have spent more time trying to fix these because it made some of the shots not work as well as what they should have.

In what ways was technology used to create the production?

We used a camera that was particularly old which is why the footage was not as clear as what it should have been. We also used Premiere Elements to edit our film. This was something that became easier with practice. We found that by the end of editing our production, we knew the different areas of the software such as adding effects and transitions to the opening two minutes.

In what ways did the technology constrain or enable the production to be developed?

The technology constrained us in the production of our opening two minutes because of how we were not able to directly play back what we had recorded. This therefore made it harder to know if we had to re-film some scenes. We also felt that not having a tripod constrained us because it meant that our footage was shaky and out of focus a lot of the time. If we had invested in one, our production would have been better because the quality would have improved.

How have you developed these skills at A2?

We invested in buying a new camera and a tripod this year because of how we wanted to improve the quality of our footage the most. Our new camera had a playback option so we were able to see if we needed to re-film some of the scenes. We also used a tripod for most of the scenes in our trailer to ensure that we had a steady image throughout. We quickly were aware of the improvement in the quality as soon as we came to edit the footage. Another area which we wanted to perfect this year was the sound and therefore we re-recorded the dialogue and were able to research ways to lower the soundtrack volume. This helped dramatically because of how clear the speech was. Researching how to lower the soundtrack volume also helped us because it meant we could play around with it to make it the volume that we wanted. It also enabled us to not have it as loud as what we did with our AS production. As this year at A2 we were producing a horror film we wanted the soundtrack to be quite low to build tension. Regarding editing, we used the same software as our AS production because we knew how to use it. We found it easier this time because we knew what worked and what didn’t. For example, we were able to know what transitions and effects worked well and for what time in the trailer. We used a fade to black for when it was a change in time or scene which also helped the production not seem as jumpy. We used the effect additive dissolve for our production titles, which is the same effect for what we had at AS, because we knew this made it the titles seem dramatic.

Creativity

How did you use media forms to come up with something new and original?

We were able to use media platforms such as YouTube to research our genre and gain ideas of what we thought would work well. We looked at some examples of romance opening scenes to identify any common features that were shown. This helped us to gain knowledge of what we should include. We had an idea of what we wanted to do when we started and we developed this idea to fit with the conventions of romance films.

Where did ideas come from?

We thought about doing a school setting so that our target audience could relate to the opening two minutes. We thought about where we could do this and the storyline behind it. This worked well because our ideas fitted with our initial plans of what we wanted to do.

How did you work collaboratively to share ideas?

We both added in our ideas and found that they would fit with each other. We discussed every detail together to make sure that our ideas would incorporate what we both wanted. We did find that some ideas didn’t fit which meant that we would talk over another idea and replace it.

How did you change things?

We made sure that we were constantly showing each other different ideas and if something didn’t quite fit we would make sure to plan something else together and overcome the obstacles. We also ensured that we were discussing any changes the other thought there needed to be which was good because it meant that we were collaborating ideas.

How did you use tools like Adobe Premier Elements etc to achieve something imaginative?

We used this software to create our production and found that it helped hugely once we gathered how to use it. It took us a while to know how to use the program but once we got the hang of it, we were able to sufficiently produce or opening two minutes.

What was the intended outcome of the production? (assessment objectives, preferred readings, promotional purposes?)

We intended for the production to have clear indications of a romance film but found that it seemed more like a drama. We found that doing a romance film was particularly hard because of the limited time we had to indicate to the audience the genre.

How were these outcomes achieved in terms of page layout and camera shot choices (codes and conventions)?

We used a voice over which was a common feature of romance film openings and used some light music, mainly piano based. We also used a range of shots, but mainly long shots and medium shots which was conventional of a romance film. As we only had two minutes for the production length we found it hard to show the genre of the film but succeeded in these areas.

How have you developed these skills at A2?

At A2 we developed these creativity skills because we knew what worked well last year and what didn’t. We changed the genre to something which allowed us to be more creative in the sense we could explore more shots and different editing techniques. We found that a horror film may be slightly easier too and with the trailer it made editing a lot easier as shots lengths could be varied. We found that we were able to use a quick pace for the trailer to help build tension for the audience. The sound therefore worked better because we were able to use a range of soundtracks for different parts of the trailer.

Research and planning

What real media and audiences did you look at?

We focused on the audience we thought would watch a romance film and made the production around this age range. We found that many romances were rated at 12 and so we thought a school setting would suit this range because of how the audience would be able to relate to it.

How did you record all that research?

We uploaded everything we found onto our blog page as this is what we referred to the most. It also meant that if the other person was to miss out on something then we could easily share ideas through our blog pages.

What primary research was undertaken?

We used some questionnaires which we handed out to different people to gain an insight into what sort of films people watch and what they expect in a romance film. This helped when trying to plan the conventions of a romance film because we could conform to what the audience wanted and expected to see. We also used interviews for the actors in our opening two minutes to find out their experiences with acting and what roles they prefer. This was interesting to do because we were able to see their ability in acting.

What secondary research was undertaken?

We primarily used secondary data for our research. We used this to gain an insight in different opening two minutes. We were able to use websites such as YouTube to see what other film openings included so we could gain some ideas based of these. This was particularly hard because we did not want to copy some of the ideas that were already around.

What quantitative and qualitative analysis methods were employed?

We used both qualitative and quantitative data in our research to gain statistical and written research. We found that our questionnaires were what gained quantitative data because of how we used mainly closed questions but our interviews gave us qualitative data because of how we used open questions.

How effectively were storyboards/shot lists/script followed?

We didn’t really stick to our shot list or our script because we never really looked back on these but our storyboard was quite similar to what we were trying to achieve.

How have you developed these skills at A2?

These skills have developed at A2 as we were able to include more in-depth research and spend more time planning what we wanted in our trailer. We found that we stuck more to what our ideas were at A2 because of how we wanted to achieve better. This is shown in the quality of our production this year compared to our production at AS.

Post-production

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

At AS our audience feedback mainly showed the issues with the sound and lighting. We knew that this was already an issue but we learnt that for future productions that we may need to re-record things to make sure they are to the best quality that they can be.

What editing decisions were made? How did they inform the production?

We made sure that all our footage was edited together well so that we limited the jump cuts. Unfortunately this didn’t work out as well because we have a few shots that could have been cleaner. There was one point in our production where we had a big jump cut which most of our audience did pick up on.

How did the post-production process enhance the overall production?

It made us aware of our areas in which we need to develop and therefore our next production we would be able to focus on these areas to make sure we get it right. We made sure that these areas would be better next time by discussing what we could have done better, such as buying a new camera.

How have you developed these skills at A2?

We made sure we took our audience feedback from AS into consideration at the start of A2 to make sure that we would better ourselves in our trailer. We found that buying a new camera and investing in a tripod made our quality of footage better. Also by re-recording some scenes and our dialogue made a huge improvement in our sound which is one of our successes this year.

Using conventions from real media texts

In what ways have your products challenged or played with conventions?

We changed the romance conventions by introducing the male protagonist at the beginning. This was something we wanted to do because it would mean that the audience could connect with the characters from the beginning, however we found that this could be a drawback because the audience had no enigma code of too who the male could be.

Is your work generic or experimental, or both?

We found that we were mainly experimenting with our AS production but it didn’t work out as well as we had hoped because the scenes would not fit together. It was also something that the audience picked up on.

How have you developed these skills at A2?

We made sure we stuck to the conventions of a horror film to ensure that it was clear to the audience. We found that these conventions were easier to conform to and so our production was better. We found that having a plan was better as well because we were able to follow it and our production benefited from it.

Film Trailer

Analysis of Magazine cover

Analysis of Poster

Planogram

The magazine planogram shows the following features that we will be including in our magazine as we have planed what we want to include and exactly where to put it making sure that we adhere to the convention to a horror magazine. When researching ideas for our magazine we looked into how most of the horror magazine were very busy and overcrowded, so we though of adding a main central image on the top and will be the biggest part of the magazine as it the main point of selling this film, as this will introduce the film to the audience giving them the first preview of what the film will look like. Below we have created the plan we intend to follow when creating our magazine cover.