Media Evaluation- Draft

Introduction

For my AS Media Practical Project, I and the members of my group created an opening sequence for a hybrid genre of physco - thriller - sci-fi. The members of my group were Katherine Whittaker, Danielle O Hara and Polly Hindle. The film itself is based on a loved up teen couple and the girl is tragically killed in a accident. Due to the grieving from her father he irrationally decides to genetically modify his daughter and in result from the process, transforms her into a jealous, veangful cyborg. Once she escapes from this genetic tragedy, she seeks to destroy her ex boyfriend and later on finds out he has moved on and has got anorther girlfriend.  
As we were a large group we all had different roles:

• Myself - Costume and Location manager and secondary camera assistant
• Polly Hindle - Editor
• Katherine Whittaker - Producer
• Danielle O Hara - Director

Gary - Secondary Actor. Spencer

Above, Myself as Rose, below

Catherine as Ebony         

Q1. In what ways does your media product use,develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our media product challenges typical conventions as, generally a male is the central/ dominant character, where as we have used a female as the dominant character to show the audience she is powerful and in control. As the opening sequence was British, this made a contrast with Hollywood movies. Contrasts include:

• Locations and mise en scene - In comparison to glamorous sets, ours was Brit Gritty. For example, Football Factory. Were the locations are fairly average. Mise en scene included a normal average household, with a Christmas tree due to the fact we were filming during the Christmas period.
• Our characters are all down to earth, average people who live normal lives.

Below is an image of our house location in red lens mode to show the view of how the cyborg can witness the Mise En Scene.

The genre of our sequence is a hybrid of physco - thriller - sci- fi. We chose these typical genres and combined them with typical conventions so the audience could identify the usual aspects of horror movies, but are also captivated by alternative conventions. Our innovations are likely to be successful as our target audience and audiences in general gain pleasure and reassurance from typical conventions. In contrast they are also hooked by the continouous enigmas. For example, "Who is the girl?" "Why is she climbing out of the river?" "Why is she picking up a brick?" etc.

To the left is an image of our woods location which is where we filmed our cyborb character walking through.

 Q2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

In our media product we have represented two particular social groups. Rose is the girlfriend of Spencer who stereotypically represent the average teenage couple. This is determined by the following factors:

• Action and movement of the characters - within clips of the sequence the couple continuously hug and kiss.
• Spencer also gives Rose a necklace as a token of his appreciation for the start of their relationship.

In our clip we have used alternatives such as using a female as protagonist as an alternative to a male, as this adds an alvernative convention to the film and therefore separates it from other categories.

The second main social group is based upon Ebony. She is stereotyped as a monster/zombie as she is a veangeful cyborg. The audience can identify this by:

• She climbs out of the Lake - perhaps evil eperimentation? This provides enigmas that this speciman isn't human/or fully human.
• Her appearance - She is wearing a distressed dress which shows some amount of disturbance.
• Nearer to the ending of the sequence we see Ebony blinking and her eyes become a red, which indicated she is not human.

As the majority of our characters are average,normal human beings they dress in everyday clothing and so don't really acquire costumes in our sequence. Although we had costumes and make up involved with the character Ebony as we haad to create an effect which made her look distressed and not human. Our lighting slotted in with our British film as the lighting was natural, rather than using profesional equipement, for example Lighting rigs. All these factors combined well with the dominant mode of our representation, as the majority of our location was "common" which makes it Brit Gritty and two thirds of our characters are down to earth, common people who live average lives, alike to Kidulthood which was made with a low budget.

To the left is an image of the British Film, Kidulthood.

Q3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

At the start we all researched relevant institutions which would combine well with our initial ideas. Our beginning thought was that our genre was just going to be a thriller, until we researched the following:

Terminator

28 Days Later        
Kill Bill
Friday The 13th                         

 Opening sequence for Terminator

28 Days Later Trailer

Kill Bill Opening Sequence

Friday the 13th Trailer

Once this research was completed we realised that we'd need a combined genre and a different institution to develop from. From our research we found an institution that was British, Cypher Film.

Cypher Films Website

 We chose this as Cypher Film is more experimental with it's filming as it only has a low budget to begin with, so if a film they create doesn't turn out very well, it doesn't really loose out and also because we wanted our product to be unique. Here are some British Films we researched:

• Kidulthood
• Football Factory

Kidulthood part 1
Football Factory part 1


 Although these films didn't match with our genre, they helped us to determine British Independent Films and how they work in most cases.  We also established that a British Film can be a good quality without the big budget! (£3.5 million on average) This is in contrast with Hollywood Films which create multi million pound products as they contain A- Star celebrities and stunning SFX, were as out SFX manager was Danielle O Hara who created the red eyes on our cyborg.

Q4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

Before we commenced on with planning we thought about targetting our product at the age group of 16 - 25 year olds of both genders. We initially thought of this age group as then our audience can relate to scenarios progressing on through the sequence. In my opinion the film would appeal to the British, although anyone who is a fan of our hybrid genre would also become a fan and would make the audience viewings wider. People in the economic status of A-E would appeal to this because of the expense of the cinema/ merchandise. We also used "GRASS" to help us to conclude our decision of our target audience.

* Gender

* Race

* Age

* Socio - Economic

*Status

With this we was able to establish which age groups would be able to see our product as stated above.

Anorther popular thriller for our target audience would be :

* Sorority Row

This proved popular with the target audience as the budget was $12.5 million and the gross return for it was $16,336,990, over $3 million profit!

Movie Trailer for Sorority Row

Q5. How did you attract/address your audience?

Our initial point on attracting the audience would be the fact that our genre opens many different windows for more audiences to come and view our product. Instead of including the whole narrative, we only used disruption as this creates more enigmas throughout the sequence to keep the audience hooked. This is a vital part of our sequence as without it our sequence provide any excitement or questions to follow. One of the most vital parts of our sequence would definately be the music we added to relevant parts. We did this as a warning to the audience to emphasise danger and add tension. In terms of transitions, we used continuity editing. We used this to show the rate of pace which situations was occuring as this keeps the audience hooked. Our characters appeal well to our audience as they are a typical couple who represent an everyday couple in today's  society. Enigmas are created throughout as mentioned before to keep the audience asking questions, camera angles contribute to these questions as we used a bird's - eye - view shot when Ebony is picking up a brick. This brings up the questions of why is she picking up the brick, what is she going to do with it? One aspect which interested me and kept me focused to the clip was the red filter our Director, Danielle created for our audience to see through the eyes of our cyborb. These are used with Medium shots with a straight shot angle.
As shown below, this is how we wanted our audience to see the cyborg's sight be portrated. Below is also an image of the Cyborg's eyes once in mode.

 One particular message I recieved from the sequence is that females can also be dominant in certain situations. Chronology is used well, as from the start we get an indication of time as the lighting is very low which just about shows Ebony is climbing out of the Lake. And the sequence continous on like this. A major advantage with our genre is the hybrid genre, due to this, more of the audience is attracted towards the product, therefore enhancing profit.

Q6. Whar have you learnt about technology from constructing this product?

In the duration of creating our project, I have learnt how to:

• Use the programes on the MAC Suites, for example how to perform continuity editing.
• I have also learnt how to use the hand camera while filming scenes such as the knocking on the door.

One factor which limited me was techincal difficulties we encountered, such as computer malfuntions. During our second day of filming we had no tripod and therefore had to create our own tripod stand with household items.

To the left, we can see Katherine and Danielle creating our "invented tripod". Because we had lack of equipment, which was an interesting experience. This however, proved slightly more difficult with camera angles, for example canted angle shots. Fortunately, during the time of lack of equipment we used the following shots:

* Extreme Close (used with Ebony's red eyes)

* Low angle shot ( used in the woods)

* Medium Close up shots (used on shots like wood scenes

* Extreme long shot ( Ebony in forest)

The image below  (Ebony in the forest in blury mode) this is like     this as
                                            we zoomed in on Ebony walking through the forest to show the impact of her  

condition as she walked through the forest after previousl climbing out of the river. The image below on the right is Ebony walking through the forest using a low angle shot. We used this to show that Ebony is not in a normal state of mind and that she could be potentially dangerous.

Preliminary Task
Although I wasn't present in the filming of the preliminary task, I was however present during the editing of the task. Once the preliminary task was completed, as a group we came to the conclusion that the quality of the opening sequence had to improve on from the preliminary task. We cam to this decision as, while the group was making the task, they were just learning how to use the apparatus, hense minor shakes and jumping in the continuity editing. 
Through our editing period we had problems with the continuity. This is demonstrated below in the copy of the preliminary task. Although there were problems with the editing, there was only was major shot were this was jumpy and thanks to the learning through the preliminary task, we had little of these problems during the filming of the opening sequence.

Conclusion

In a summary, I personally think our opening sequence was very good and turned out how we intended it to be. I think the location and mise en scene was perfect for the Grit Brit Industry and would succeed well in the industry. I also liked how the continuity editing worked well with all the clips added. The part I enjoyed most was definately the clip from the couple exchanging hugs and then the camera changed to Ebony and her eyes flickered to red. This worked well as it provides a contrast of love vs. hate, so Binary oppositition is used well here. Although the majority of the tasks proved effective in creating our oppening sequence, we did however have some difficulties:

• We had problems getting the scenes in the appropriate lighting in the right timing, which meant that we had to create the scenes numerous amounts of times.
• Weather conditions - this prevented some of us travelling on certain days.

 

Media Evaluation

Introduction:For my project, I worked in a group of four to create an opening sequence, including Polly Hindle, Steph Bolton, Danielle O'Hara and myself. We all had roles within the group, Stpeh Bolton was costume and location manager, Polly Hindle was the Editor, Danielle O'Hara was the Director and I was the Producer. Our film was about a female protaganist which is un-human, trying to find her boyfriend, who she expected to wait for her. She soon finds out that he has found someone else. After, this she seeks revenge, and the opening sequence leaves that audience with a knock at the door.


Qn 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our opening sequence was a sci-fi, Thriller combined with a Horror. As we planned to produce an opening sequence to a British Film, the conventions were very different, oppose to the American Hollywood Movies. For example, we use a female protaganist, experimented with camera shots and angles, the set was Brit Gritty, used natural light instead of lighting rigs. By challenging the "unwritten rules" of Hollywood movies, we have created a hybrid of popular genres. We have viewed and analysed films that have inspired us Kill Bill, Friday the 13th, Terminator and 28 days later. Our whole idea was to stear away from the typical predictable ending and choose something new, for example, we use a female protaganist, she has been used as an experiment and left, before she went on this experiment, she had a boyfriend, but she expected him to wait for her return. When she comes back and finds out that he is with another girl, she seeks revenge.



Also, we just generally asked people what they preferred, they stated that they dislike the predictable ending. The group tried to stear away from this. During our production of our piece we kept referring back to the audience questionnaire.

Qn 2: How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Our target audience for our projects were 16-24 years old, white British male and female teenager.
Being a British opening sequence, conventional stereotypes were not included E.g. Costume and appearance, were just day-to-day look.

We have NOT used stereotypes in this piece as stereotypes are too simplistic and can't really relate to anyone as everyone is more complex than a stereotype. Facial expression - Throughout this piece the protaganist has a determined look on her face except from when she finds out that her ex-boyfriend is now will another girl (We emphasis the change in facial expression with an extreme close-up shot), the other characters have happy facial expressions throughtout the piece except when the human girl thought she saaw something at the window. As you can see, we have used real facial expression and shown what people would look like in that situation.

Costume - The protaganist is wearing a silver dress with tights and dolly shoes, this shows that she isn't a regular girl and no-one would go out wearing that in the freezing cold, the boy is wearing a T-shirt, Jeans, trainers and a Jacket and the Human girl is wearing a dress, tights, dolly shoes and cardigan. We have used day-to-day clothes except on the cyborg, this emphasises that she is irregular.

Location - As this is a £0 budget film, a natural location was picked whihc did have it's advantages, it was free and looked more realistic, with natural light. We wanted a woody location, but thats had a long straight path-way to show the protaganist walking straight towards the camera.

We have offered an alternative representation for the audience, including protaganist (female) setting (woods and "common" house). Our aim of producing a project that did not follow the typical narrative and conventions, were successful.
Our product was a £0 budget film which means, no money was spent on making it fancy, it was real setting, natural lighting, one camera and one tripod. We had to produce what we could with what we had. By following what other low-budget British films had done, such as, Adulthood. Towards the end of the film, there is a 360 degree shot, and we thought this was a camera on a rig, but we then found out that, the film-makers had built a little train track on the floor, for the camera to roll on.


(The 360 camera spin at 7:50 minutes in) Qn 3: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
During research on our chosen Genre, we researched Terminator,
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zT_lFIdN6qk
28 days later

Kill Bill - Female protaganist

Friday the 13th - Horror Thriller



We found after researching these projects, these institution that had produced our research pieces, weren't our ideal institution. On the other hand, we found that a British institution such as Cipher film, http://www.imdb.com/company/co0138244/ that would be more experimental, would more suitable for our opening sequence.

I believe that if a British film institution wat to back our productfor real, it would go for the characteristics that have reared away from the repeated conventions. As we have included a female protaganist, different settings, experimental camera angles, realistic camera shots, such as natural lighting, P.O.V shots e.t.c.


Qn 4: Who would be the audience for your media product?
We chose our audience specifically before the storyboards were created. Our opening seuence was intended to be for 16-24 year olds, white British male/females. This project would lie in the interest with a select audience taht enjoyed our combined Hybrid Genre of Thriller/Sci-fi/Horror.

An audience memebr which had a working cless (or higher) socio-economic status, simply for the reason that if this opening sequence and it's full film was made, the audience would be able to go to the cinemas and afford it.

As Thriller is one of the most popular genres and in this particular project, is linked with Sci-fi and horror, there will be something for a large range of audiences.

By using http://www.imdb.com/, we can see popular genres and which films have been box office success'...
Top 3 filmsQn 5: How did you attract/address your audience?

The Shawshank Redemption - 1994 Rating: 9.1, Votes: 480, 735



The Godfather - 1972 Rating: 9.1, Votes: 387, 118



The Godfather II - 1974 Rating: 9.0 Votes: 228, 646

5. For starters, the first thing that attracted the audience would be the Hybrid Genre, as three combined ganres have be used, there is already a wider audience.

In our project we don't offer a Equilibrium-Disruption-Re-equilibrium, weonly offer the Disruption, we planned to put the opening sequence as the end, so the rest of the film would tell the story that was leading up to this encounter.

All our opening sequence, is enigmas. This is another main characteristic that brought the audience in, no enigmasare answered, we leavethe audience to produce their own interpritation of the project, then they would have to watch the rest of the movie to see if their interpritation was our initial idea for the project.

Conflict or Binary Opposition was addressed to give the audience an slight indication of what the rest of the film would be like, For example, when the cyborg is standing at the window, staring into the house at the couple, this shows tension and gets the audience wondering, why? what? How?, again more enigmas

As music is potentially the most important component of a film or sequence, and the group realised this, we chose tenion building music, non-recognisable so the audience would link it with other things, as the cyborg and getting closer to the house, volume rises and creates suspense and tension for the audience.

The use of transitions in this piece was essential, so the project did not look cheap or rushed, transitions were used to lead the audience to the next 'scene', little transitions were used so they weren't overwhelming. Some interesting transitions were used. For example, the froest scene when the camera is on eye-level with character, as character is walking towards camera, a essential transition was used to show the character going through slow-motion walking to original walking speed.







Enigmas - Alot of enigmas were set, to engage the audience and make them want to watch more, enigmas such as Who is the girl with the red eyes?, Who are they? and Why is this happening? The effact of the enigmas have been proven,with our audience feeback.
Audience Feedback - When the audience were asked "What would make you  want to carry on watching it?", some audience members answered "Scary Girl", this immediately proves that intensional enigmas have been set and have had an effect.

Qn 6: What have you learnt about tecnologies from the process of constructing this product?A list of ALL tecnologies used, which were essential for our project:

• Camera, tripod, slip-disc, tapes, camera settings
• www.youtube.com - Embedding videos, Genre research, general research
• www.imdb.com - looking more into British films, institutions
• iMovie - creating our whole project, using this software, introducing effects, transitions, cutting and pasting
• CD and pendrives - introducing a soundtrack into our opening sequence
• Handheld camera - character pictures and forest research (some of these pictures were also edited on iMovie)
• Blogging was extremely essential as it was like a diary, recording all the stuff we had learnt. We split sections up so everyone had atleast four blog pages to record incluing, research, analysis, institution, audience and general planning on the opening sequence

All these tecnologies were highly used, for the production of our opening sequence, all were recommended and were extremely useful. Doing the project, I now have a higher tecnology awareness, especially in programmes such as iMovie,and what these tecnology are capable of.

I learnt how to use transistions effectively, so two shots are connected smoothly, I have also learnt how to use effects such as the red eye effect, this was basically the story teller, showing the audience that the protaganist is not human.

There were some bad points to the equipment including, we went out to shoot in the woods and the camera was not working, the tripod wasn't good in the forest scene, in the end we decided to do most handheld camera shots.

Qn 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progession from it to the full product?Looking back on the Prelim task, it really helped to see the technique that we have adopted, comparing the two, Prelim task and Opening sequence, our opening sequence has better camera shots/angles (we explored more handheld shots), settings, editing quality e.t.c  all the components needed to make a successful project like this.

Our editing has definately improved, as most members of the group wasn't the best at tecnology, we have practised used our new editing skills to create our piece.



At the end of the Prelim task, we realised that the quality of the whole opening sequence had to be better quality and improve on all aspects of the making of the opening sequence. The main problem with the Prelim task was the fluidity of editing, I feel that with the practise that we have gone through, has helped us create a more smoother link between two clips.

Conclusion -Overall, in my opinion, our opening sequence project was abig success, from knowing the tecnology to adding effects and transitions, the project including persistent work, and I am pleased with the outcome, especially with music as I think that is the key element of setting the mood and atmosphere and also gives the audience an emotion, just by playing the music with a specific piece of action.

As there is always room for improvement, there is only one thing that I was slightly dissapointed in, which was the red-eye effect of the cyborg, as it was only a one second clip, it was hard to copy it several times and then add the red-eye effect on, in teh end we decided to take a picture of the clip and add the effect onto a still picture, think that this made it look unrealistic, but we worked with what we had and that is the only thing that if we had more time, would improve.

Audience Feedback

This is a video of what reactions and feedback we got from and audience when we showed them our final project.
We also asked them some questions and here is a preview of what one person answered.
What did you think when you first watched the film?
I was actually quite scared as i did not know what was happening and why it was happening. Especially when the girl came out from nowhere.
What did the music make you feel?
I think the music was quite spooky and added to the spooky, scary afftect your film created.
Is there anything we can improve on?
I think that the lighting is not as good as it could be as in some parts you cannot fully understand what is going on, also i think the dialogue needs to be louder as it is hard to understand what is being said.
What genre do you think this follows?
I think it is sci-fi because of the girls red eyes.

Media Studies Evaluation

Introduction
 As a group we aimed to create a opening sequence to a film that was experimental, professional and one that challenged the predetermined roles of women in horror films. Our film was a bout a teenager who after a car accident her scientist father turns her into a cyborg to save her life, this is the backstory to our film and would be explored in the rest of the film. Our opening sequence was about a cyborg who wakes up in a forest then hunts down her boyfriend, who she then find with another girl. In the  group we all had different roles; Polly Hindle was the editor, Steph Bolton was in charge of costume and props, Katherine was the Producer and I was the Director. I was also the primary camera operator, in charge of applying Special Effects to the opening sequence, for instance the red filter POV shots and the red, cyborg eyes, and the Location Manager. To fufill my role as the Location Manager I found three out of the four locations that we filmed in; such as the Lammack Forest, my own house that we filmed the indoor shots in and the rundown shed in Revidge that where the protoganist found the weapons.

GenreFor our film we had to create an opening sequence to a film that belongs to the thriller genre. The main convention of the thriller genre is to, as the plot builds towards a climax, keep the audience at the 'edge of their seats' and they usually achieve this by ending the sequence on a cliff-hanger. We replicated this by placing in our opening sequence multiple enigmas, such as ‘who is that strange woman?’, ‘why are her eyes red?’ and ‘what does she want with that couple?’ We ended our opening sequence on a cliff-hanger, with the protagonist slowly, knocking on the teenage couples door, weapon in hand.
Thrillers are often hybrids; we chose to produce a hybrid genre that was a sci-fi/ horror/revenge thriller. We tried to incorporate the different sub-genres used into our film. For instance we incorporated the sci-fi element into our film through our choice of protagonist who is a cyborg, we demonstrated this by adding a red filter to the P.O.V shots, as well as a close up of her where, through the use of Photoshop, her eyes flash red. This is effective in telling the audience that something is not quite right, not human, about the protagonist. We also made sure we included some of the conventions of a horror genre such as the P.O.V shot or the 'stalker shot' which we was shot with a hand-held camera . We used a handheld camera throughout in order to give the film a gritty, British feel. Particular 'mise en scene' in the horror genre are dark clothing and fake blood, we defied this particular convention by dressing the villain in white. We also decided that fake blood was unnecessary as the red used in the P.O.
V shots would have connotations of blood.
Conventions of the horror genre are that they are set in isolated locations such as the woods or quiet villages. To incorporate the sense of being alone and isolated through the setting, we filmed it in a dark forest. Also films belonging to the thriller genre contain ominous music to build tension so we included an appropriate and relevant soundtrack. We also used naturalistic lighting throughout,but used low-key lighting to add a sense of danger and create a dark, sinister atmosphere. We created a contrast, through our use of lighting, between the cold, outdoors where the protagonist was and the warm indoors that the girlfriend and boyfriend inhabited. The warm colours of the lounge, such as reds, pinks and oranges, along with the bright orange/yellow lighting gave the setting a safe, cosy feel. This was then juxtaposed with the blues, whites and other cool colours that made the outside setting of the forest look cold, sad and lonely. This is a common technique used in horror films, along with the cross cutting between the safe world of the victims and the impending danger of the villain.
RepresentationsThe way our opening sequence will be 'the same but different' is changing the typical convention in the horror genre where the victim is female because in our film the villain is female. We also defied the horror movie convention of the villain wearing black, instead opting for a white dress, that typically represents purity and innocence, and covering it in dirt and making it look distressed. This gives the audience the impression that she has been through a traumatic experience, but her cold, blank facial expression is also s little unnerving as if she was the victim she would be upset and crying. Females are often represented as the ‘victim’ in horror films, so we defied this key convention by making the villain female and the chief potential victim male.
The teenage boyfriend and girlfriend are quite a stereotypical teen couple, this is shown through their actions and movements such as kissing and hugging. The male in the relationship also gives the girlfriend a necklace as a Christmas present. The media typically represents the teenager as shallow, sex-obsessed individuals. We have conformed to this stereotype by the fact that the present was a necklace, which could suggest that woman are superficial and all they crave are pretty things. Also when the girlfriend is worried when she thinks she may have seen something at the window, the boyfriend is unsympathetic and just tries to carry on kissing her.
Our choice of protagonist is a cyborg, we demonstrated this by adding a red filter to the P.O.V shots, as well as a close up of her where, through the use of Photoshop, her eyes flash red. The second main stereotype is loosely based on the monster/zombie stereotype that applies to the vengeful cyborg. This is shown through her appearance, as her red eyes are clearly not human and have connotations of love/danger/blood/passion. In addition, her red P.O.V shots show that she sees the world differently to us.
As we have made a British independent film, which do not use stereotypes, we have instead created a original, new character, adding interest to a familiar genre.

Representation of place is also very important to the feel of our film and as Location Manager I made sure that through the use of place the background to our film is sucessfully established. There where four key settings in our opening sequence; the brook at the very beginning of the film, the forest, the boyfriend's house and the rundown shed. The brook setting and the forest setting are actually different places, but as we forest where the majority of the outdoor shots are filmed did not have a suitable establishing shot we used two different settings. When we did an establishing shot of the forest, there where too many houses visible, which went against the sense of isolation that is found in horror movie settings. So we found a secondary location for the establishing shot and the scenes of the protogonist emerging from a brook. Also when we had filmed the establishing shot we discovered that in the background was a sinister looking factory and the bright lights that shone shone out of the darkness coming from the building had connotations of the sci-fi genre. The use of colour in our opening sequence is very important, in the forest scenes the cool colours, such as white, grey and pale blue created a sense of loneliness and also showed the cold, robotic nature of the protogonist. This juxtaposed with the warm coluors, such as orange, pink and yellows, that were present in the indoor shots create a contrast between the cold, harsh outside world that is dangerous and the indoor world of the secondary characters of the teenage couple, that is cosy, safe and warm.

In our opening sequence we set up stereotypes, such as the classic horror victim through dressing the protogonist in a white dress that connotates purity and innocence and initially using a high angle shot for her, that showed her as a victim. However then went on to break this stereotype through the use of mise en scene as the white dress was dirty and distressed that had connotations of corruption and that the protogonist has been through a trauma. You would expect the typical horror movie female to be crying or screaming so we had a close up of the protogonist's blank, emotionless face which is unsettling. Then we included a slow motion zoom shot of the protogonist, one that is commonly used for male heroes as explosions are happening all around them, this had connotations of her being a woman on a mission and  presented the protogonist as a 'kick ass female'.
Also in order to add mystery and enigma's surrounding the protogonist we had shots of her with her face covered by hair as well as the blurred shot.

Institution
We decided that we would like our film to follow the British Independent institution; we have decided this as our media text rejects some of the typical horror conventions, as we aimed for it to be more original. The British Independent film institution is a lot different from the Hollywood institution, this is because Hollywood institutions have very big budgets to make their films (100 million) whereas the British institution uses smaller budgets (5 million) as they are not broadcast as much as Hollywood films. We decided that our chosen film company will be Cipher Films. Other similar products from this type of institution are films such as ‘Kidulthood’ (Stealth and Cipher Pictures) and the sequel ‘Adulthood’ which even though isn't a thriller it is a British film. Their websites are: - ‘http://www.stealthfilms.co.uk/’ and ‘https://www.ukdata.com/company-credit-reports/CIPHER-FILMS-LIMITED.htmll’. We chose this film company because in the film it shows the characteristics of the institution such as, they use simple settings as they only have a small budget, but these simple settings work really well in the film. This taught us that you do not need a big budget to find a good location. Also the actors are not very famous, a common thing in most British films as they cannot afford a-list actors. In addition to this, most British films have quite original plots and the independent films made in Britain are even able to compete with Hollywood ones, because although the audience is niche it still attracts a lot of people to watch them.
We studied the Blockbuster film ‘The Terminator’ in order to get some ideas about how to successfully make a sci-fi hybrid film, it was from this that we got the idea to have a POV shot that reflected an abnormal character.
Hollywood films can also afford to have up to date special effects, we wanted to have some special effects in the film to conform to the conventions of the sci-fi sub-genre. However, as we did not have millions of pounds to spend on state-of-the-art effects programmes, I took a still close up photo of the protagonist then edited it so that her eyes would be similar to that of a robot. We then put the still photo in our film.
We conformed to the conventions of a british film by casting unknown actors, having gritty handheld camera shots and using natural lighting in our film.

Target Audience/ reaching the target audience
When we researched to find out the demographic for films similar to ours we discovered that 16-25 year old males were the ones who our film would directly appeal to. However, due to the including of a empowered female protagonist, along with the plotline that is about retribution against a cheating boyfriend, females would equally enjoy watching our film. Taking this into account, we made sure that the characters in our film were of a similar age to our audience, as this would allow them to easily relate to the characters. Our film appeals to all ethnicities to keep audience viewings wide, and the same applies to socio-economic status, though the people in the A-E field are the ones who would be able to purchase the film.
Learning about technology/ Skills you have gained
The main thing a have learned is how to successfully operate a hand-held camera as I had no prior knowledge beforehand. Being the main camera operator, I have learned the simple uses of a camera such as zoom, basic camera movement and inserting the battery. Furthermore, I have also learned how to execute more difficult shots, such as the high angle shot I took when up a tree, P.O.V shots, establishing shot and more. I have in addition learnt how to work a Mac and how to use the editing programme, as well as how to edit the media text to the best of my ability. I also learnt different functions on the Mac such as screen shot that is press the ‘command key, shift and 3'which we used when getting the still image in order to add effects to it. I have become more media-literate and can now blog successfully.
Preliminary TaskLooking back on my preliminary task I have improved in regards to the smoothness of operating the camera, I have also learnt to be more experimental with my shots and discovered the importance of lighting in a film. Since then we have also acquired more knowledge on how to edit, thus making the editing in our film smoother.There was one shot in our preliminary were the editing was not continous and smooth because we stopped the camera then started it again and the actors were in a different position. We learned a valuable lesson about continuity from this error, when we paused filming we made sure that when we started again everything was in the same position.
Conclusion
Overall, our opening sequence was successful and it turned out how we wanted it to. I think that the editing was smooth and made the film work really well. I think that our choice of locations was very effective in setting the scene as well as conforming to certain genre conventions. I was particularly pleased with the red filter POV shots, as they matched horror and sci-fi conventions and the colour red connoted both love and danger; something essential to our plotline. There were, however, things that could be improved. For instance, many filming days were ruined due to adverse weather conditions, and since we were filming at different times of day, the lighting continuity was not perfect.

 

Evaluation

Evaluation
Introduction- For our AS media coursework we had to create an openeing sequence to a new film. We decided to create a hybrid opening sequence because we thought it would increase our audience numbers because the different genres that we incorporated into are media text will appeal to more people. Our film was about a girl who is not human seeking revenge on her ex-boyfriend when she sees him with another girl. I worked in a group with three other people; Steph Bolton, Katherine Whittaker and Danielle O'Hara. Within the group we all had different roles, my role was filming some of the fottage and then editting our final project to our aspired opening sequence.

Q1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The genre of our media text is a horror, revenge, sci-fi thriller and we have followed some of the most typical conventions of this genre. The first convention that we considered was the genre and what conventions certain genres followed. By looking into different types of thrillers, there were many conventions for each sub-genre. By looking at these, we tried to in-corporate conventions from different sub-genres into our media project. It was vital for us to use typical elements because it helps the audience relate to the opening sequence and it will encourage them to keep watching because even though we used typical conventions we broke them as well so that the audience did not know what was going to happen and therefore they will keep watching to find out. The conventions that we did not follow for this genre was that the victim in the opening sequence was a male where as in typical media texts the victim is a girl as they are seen as the weaker gender. We took the typical conventions for each sub-genre and combined them together so that the audience was able to relate to the media text as a whole. I believe that once we had combined all of the conventions it would be successful because I think that our target audience would be able to recognise the conventions and get “hooked” onto the film making them eager to watch more. We also created enigmas for the audience by making the media text mysterious for example the very first shot was a girl emerging from a lake, this would confuse the audience at first but it would also make them question themselves because they do not understand what and why this is happening. We also created other enigmas because we wanted the audience to think about the film rather than them being able to guess what they think would happen. Some sci-fi films that inspired us were Terminator and a revenge thriller that inspired us were kill bill and when a stranger calls, these inspired us because they follwed typical conventions and they are also very good at keeping the audience in suspense by creating enigmas. Also most thrillers leave events on cliffhangers so that the audience would question what will happen next, and this is what we aimed to do at the end of our opening sequence by just having the protagonist knocking on the door so the audience would wonder what is going to happen next. When we researched what the most common genres were, we found out that horror genres are quite popular and we decided to use the sub-genres which were most popular so that our media text would appeal to our target audience. Another main convention of the thriller genre is the type of camera shots and angles used such as the point of view shot which we incorporated into our media text in order to make the audience feel like they were the character. The setting played a big part in our media text because in thrillers the setting is usually a dark, secretive place which is why we chose to use the woods which seemed eerie and matched what we wanted to put across to the audience which was, it was a dark place where dark things could happen such as the strange girl emerging from the lake. The music that we used was an omnious track and created a sinister effect which would make the audience think that something out of the ordinary was going to happen. The lighting throughout also matched the thriller genre because we used either natural lighting or low-key lighting to create the sense of mystery, we juxtaposed this with the lighting in the house that we filmed in whihc was full of colours such as reds and oranges which shows the contast between the "safe" and the "danger".

This is a location shot of one of the locations that we used for our media text. This contributed to the conventions because typically in thrillers the setting is usually dark and mysterious and we believed that this location fit the convention very well.

Q2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?
In our media text we did not focus on one particular social group or stereotype but we did show a typical teen couple, and we showed this by making the characters sit closely together, kiss and cuddle, the male also give the female character a present. The clothes worn were typical clothes that a teen would were and this was a casual dress. We did not follow the typical convention by making the female the most dominant character which is unusual because women are mostly seen as the weaker gender in the “real world.” The stereotype we followed for this was the monster/zombie. We did this by making the female character dress in dirty white night dress like she had come from a strange place; also by her actions and her appearance the audience would be able to recognise that this character was in fact not a “normal” person. Typically thrillers would dress their villians in black to show that they were the evil one but we went against this idea and dressed her in white which usually has connotations of innocence and purity The facial features of this character also made her seem surreal because she was upset distressed and she did not look like a teenage girl should look, we also made her eyes red to make sure the audience knew she wasn’t a human. Another stereotype that we tried to incorporate in our media text was the setting, we tried to choose and omnious setting such as the woods which would make it clearer to the audience that what we were trying to get across was not a romance film but because of the setting they were able to recognise that it was somewhat of a thriller film. We also tried to add to the conventions by using certain facial expressions, the teengae couple seemed happy whereas the "cyborg" seemed distressed and upset and we can tell this by her smudged make-up and her clothing. She was wearing a white dress which usually connotates innocence and purity but this girl is far from innocent and we made a contrast between the colour of her dress and her make-up which implied to the audience that there is more than what meets the eye.
This is a typical teenage couple which we tried to portray by their body language and making them close to each other.




Q3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?We decided to use the film company Cipher and Stealth pictures http://www.stealthfilms.co.uk/ because we had researched this and it seemed like the most appropriate company to follow as we wanted to create a British independent film and be able to reject some of the typical horror conventions. By researching this we found out that Cipher and Stealth pictures made films such as Kidulthood and Adulthood which were popular films in Britain, even though these films are not thrillers we thought it was an appropriate example to use and they represent stereotypes really well and they also break typical conventions of the genre that they follow. Also in these films the film company broke some of the conventions and created films which the audience would not expect. They create films on a low (3-5 million) which means they cannot incorporate as much CGI and special effects as films which are produced by Hollywood could. Also the actors in these types of films are not as well known as they cannot afford “big stars.” This is because the Hollywood films have a much bigger budget as they are broadcast more than British films and therefore are able to make more money. British films show the realism of life more and this is what we wanted to show, even though we had a character which was not human in our film we created a sense of realism with the other characters. We also used simple settings as this is what Cipher and Stealth Pictures would use, even though the settings we used were quite simple I believe that they worked well with our opening sequence, the settings we used were; a house; woods; brook. We chose the woods and the brook because they were isolated and we thought this would work well with the image we were trying to create. We also followed the British institution by making our plot seem complex so that the audience are interested as they do not know what the outcome of the media text will be.






This is a preview of the film Kidulthood made my Cipher and Stealth Pictures. We are able to recognise that this is a British film because the actors are not a-list as we do not recognise them and also the setting is not as "glossy" as it would be in a film such as a Hollywood film. Finally this scene also shows realism and what happens in some peoples everyday life. This film was aimed towards teens and we can tell this because the actors are teens and some of it is set in a school and therefore teens would be able to relate to the characters more.



Q4. Who would be the audience for your media product? & Q5. How did you attract/ address your audience?
We researched what age group of people would most enjoy our film and we found out that the most popular age group for our type of film would be 16-25 and this is because they would be able to relate to the film more than others. This is also the reason why we used teens for our characters because we believe that the audience would relate to the characters which are most like them and due to the age group of our target audience the ages of the characters seemed to work. We believe that our media text is aimed towards any ethnicity and nationality because most people would enjoy it we also have not aimed towards a specific gender as we think that both genders would enjoy it. But we think that females would enjoy the media as the protagonist is a female rather than a male but when we researched the genre we discovered that it was males were the most common gender who enjoyed the sci-fi thriller genre. The socio-economic status’ that we aimed towards was A-E and this is because these are the most likely people who will watch the film. We determined all of these factors by researching and using GRASS. We also used Maslow’s hierarchy to determine whether the opening sequence would interest the people it is aimed towards. We think that the media texts will fulfil the needs of; family; friends and relationships because it incorporates relationships of characters and people being there for each other.




Here is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs which we used to determine what needs our media text would fulfil.Q6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?First of all I learnt how to use a hand-held camera which was used to shoot all of our footage, i learnt how to use different features of the camera such as zooming and setting the screen to the intended view we wanted. I also learnt how to work a Mac and how to use the programme imovie which i used to edit the footage after it had filmed, in this programme i learnt how to cut certain parts of the footage and split scenes, apply text, music and transitions which were suitable to the project. I also learnt different functions on the Mac such as screen shot which is press the command key, shift and 3. This helped me as we needed a screen shot to incorporate into our opening sequence. Before we started our project I learnt about blogger and how to upload things such as videos which would help me to research the genre of the film, we accessed blooger by going to http://www.blogger.com/w.blogger.com/ which is where we posted our ideas about our media text and posted certain information which would be useful in our final media text. I have also learnt that when filming with a camera the light needs to be right because it is very hard to adjust once it has been uploaded and filmed. We also used the website http://www.dafont.co.uk/ which is a website that shows you all different types of texts which we could use when we were putting the name of the film on the media text. We chose a text that would relate to our media text like a sci-fi type font.This is like one of the cameras that we learnt how to operate:



Q7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full project?


Looking back on the preliminary task I have learnt about different camera shots and how different ones work well within the context of the film, I also believe that i have learnthow to use the hand-held camera more effectively and smoother. The biggest thing that I have learnt is about lighting and how the lighting is a key feature in perfecting the filming and how poor or good quality lighting can effect the way the media text turns out. The biggest thing that i have improved on is my editing skills, even though i had prior knowledge on how to use imove i was not fully confident about editing a project but by completing the preliminary task and becoming more aware of imovie i believe that the editing was very smooth.




Conclusion I think that overall our opening sequence went quite well and it turned out how we wanted it to. I think that the locations were perfect for the image we were trying to put across and we used them to the best of our ability. I think that the editing was smooth and made the film work really well. On the other hand there were a few mishaps, I think that if we had of had more time to complete this project we would have spent longer filming, but we could not do this due to lighting and the weather. As it went dark earlier on in the day it was hard for us to perfect the lighting as we never knew what to expect. I think that if we were to do it again we would spend more time on the lighting as in some parts of our media texts seemed too dark and this degrades the film.

These are photographs of when we were filming and we had to improvise by making our own tripod to get the height of the shot just perfect.