Question 1 - In What Ways Does Your Media Product Use, Develop or Challenge Forms and Conventions of Real Media Products?

The first evaluation question I was set was to look at our short film and ancillary tasks, my postcard and film review. I then had to state whether develop or challenge forms of conventions of a real media product. 

I first looked at my short film Synchronicity. I selected 16 screen shots from my film and made a grid to show them all in. Below I will explain whether they challenge, follow or develop media conventions.   

My 16 screen shots can be seen below:

  

1. The first shot I have chosen follows media conventions. This is because we have put our titles at the begging of our film. This is where generally you would expect to find titles in a film either over shots all on in one go like our group has done. This was common in many of the short films I watched before we began making Synchronicity.

2. The second shot shows the name of our film. This follows conventions as you would expect to see the name of the film you are watching at some point at the begging of the film. This was common in all the short films I watched for examples. 

3. Shot three uses forms and conventions of real media texts. This is because it sets an establishes the scene for the audience. For example the audience will see the house when the camera pans round with Isabel skipping across the patio and be able to locate to the location. 

4. Shot 4 challenges real media texts conventions as straight away the audience is thrown into the storyline and usually you would get the main characters story built up. But in Synchronicity Isabel's story is built up as the storyline goes on. You can see a two shot of Isabel and Lisa the followed by shot-reverse shot when there is dialogue. 

5. Shot 5 shows Isabel being ignored by her father Simon. This challenges conventions as you would usually expect to find parents playing with there children. But in Isabel's case you can clearly see she is being ignored.  This links to the story when she eventually destroys the train set. 

6. Shot 6 does follow conventions of real media texts as it shows the main character Isabel isolated from her parents as she is shut away to play in the living room with just a train set and teddy bear. In my research I did I found out the main character usually has a problem and this usually relates to the overall message of a short film. 

7. Shot 7 shows the clock that links each scene together after Isabel has been turned away by her parents. This challenges real media conventions as you would no usually expect to find something like this in a film but it clearly links each scene together very well and is easy for the audience.

8. Shot 8 shoes a close up to Simon's reaction after hearing that his train case has gone down down the pan. We have used conventions by showing a close up of Simon. This is because you would usually show someones reactions by using a close up shot.  

9. Shot 9 shows Isabel playing with her train set. We are following conventions by showing Isabel is being ignored by her parents and the train set is showing that Isabel has had it for a long time and is continued to be ignored.

10. Shot 10 is showing the clock-face. It showing a different time to shot 7 and we have followed conventions by using the same shot size and used a cross dissolve to show the differences in time.

11. Shot 11 shows Isabel throwing her teddy bear at the train set. We have filmed it from under neath the table and the train set for effect. This challenged conventions as it was a difficult and dangerous scene to try and film.

12. Shot 12 is showing Isabel pulling the train set of the table. We have followed conventions by using a medium close up to film this. In other examples of short films such as Wasp it showed mediums close ups to catch important parts of the films so audiences do not miss them and it is clear to see. 

13. Shot 13 shows a two shot of Simon and Lisa watching the T.V screen. We have followed conventions with the two shot and also with the shot-reverse shot when they are talking in dialogue.

14. Shot 14 shows a close up on Lisa to show her reactions to Isabel going missing. We follow conventions by using a close up to show her reactions.

15. Shot 15 shows Isabel hiding in the shed. We have not followed coneventions by not using any light or gels. But with her reactions we have used a close up which follows conventions.

16. Shot 16 shows our credits. We have stuck to conevntions by having them all at the end of a film. This is usually where you would expect to find them. This is common to all other short films I have watched for examples.

Film Review:

Below I have re posted my film review. I will explain below how I have used, developed or challenged forms and conventions of real media texts. 

      

I decided to base my film review like an article from the Sight & Sound magazine we looked at when researching into film reviews. It was important when making my film review that I stuck to conventions in order to achieve a good mark for it. 

I stuck to conventions by using the big picture of Isabel at the top of my film review. This adds visuals for the reader and in any film review you would expect to find a picture of the main character or a key point of the film. I also used conventions by placing other film reviews on the side of the page. In the article we looked at you had other film reviews down one side of the page. 

An area where I have broken conventions and challenged them is with the overall text in the film review. Sight & Sound is a very formal magazine for people who are in the film industry. With this in mind I was finding it very difficult to write one for my short film in this style. I decided to break conventions as my film was a short film and you would only expect to find feature films in Sight & Sound. So I decided to base my article as a short film special page and write it out in my own style. 

POSTCARD:

I have re posted my postcard and below it I will discuss how I have used, challenged or developed forms of conventions.  

FRONT:

BACK:

I have stuck to conventions on the front of my postcard by having a main picture of the protagonist (Isabel). In the research I did in Post 16 I found out that you would usually have a main picture of the main character on the postcard. I decided to stick to conventions with this. The picture also was intriguing and this would make the audience be interested in watching the short film. I have also stuck to conventions with a slogan on the back and small synopsis along with the cast list an production logo.         

Post 20: Final Products

In Post 20 I have all of my finished products. This includes my short film, postcard and film review. 

POSTCARD:

Posted below is my finished postcard front & back. The front of my postcard shows Isabel playing with her train set and the teddy bear. I choose this image as it has many key points of the film in the image. On the back it has a picture of the teddy bear with the opacity taken down for effect and the production name with a slogan "they wont find me in here". 

FINAL FILM:

This is our final finished film Synchroncity. 

When we uploaded our short film onto YouTube we experienced a few problems. Firstly the sound has lost its sync and it has changed its format from 16:9 to 4:3.

Film Review:

This is my final short film review page. I decided to go with the Sight & Sound layout that we researched in post 16. I decided to stick with it as it was something I new well . 

I have chosen a picture of Isabel to put at the top of my film review then put the text down the left hand side. On the right hand side I have put a cast and crew list. On the right strip of the film review page is other articles of short films I found on the Sigh & Sound website.  

Post 19: Post-Production Report

Once we had finally finished filming we began to edit in the edit suite.

Our first job was to log all the clips. This was a long tedious task but between our group we each took turns logging in sets of two to keep concentration. This helped and it also got logging done a lot quicker.

We did not really experience much difficulties when logging. The only real problem that we had was mistakes on the clapper board which led us to ponder about which shot it was. This lead to us working it out and eventually we got on top of it and marked the mistake in our logging rushes. I can admit that the mistake on the clapper board was an unfortunate mistake of mine. 

We also had a random unknown footage of a coffee cup in our footage. We did not know how to log this footage so it became a bit of a problem for us. We decided to log this footage as unknown footage and this overcome the slight problem we had. 

We selected all the clips we wanted by marking a yes in the table of our logging rushes and then imputed all the codes of the wanted clips ready for capturing. 

This whole process took us about 2 weeks. 

Once we had finished capturing we started piecing all our clisp together. It did not take us long to piece our film all together. This was because when it captured our clips it pieced it them together like a film. All that was needed was to cut to clips to the length we wanted them. 

Like with the logging we each all took turns to edit. Me and my fellow group member Timothy spent the best part of a whole school day editing our film to give it a good start and to ease the pressure of workload from our director Anton and fellow group member Nicola. Me and Timothy cropped and pieced our whole short film together so that every clip was in order and it was just about ready for us to start editing sound levels and adding titles and any effects.

Before we could add them we still had a few problems to deal with. We had continuity error with the clock when it changed time. Because on the day of filming we used blue tack to keep the positioning of the clock correct but we did not think about the place mat that was next to it. When we filmed the other clips this had somehow moved and left us with continuity error that we picked up during editing. This frustrated the whole group as it was an important part of our film. To overcome this problem we tried adding a cross fade in. We felt this worked as when you watch it through we hoped the audience would only focus on the the clock and not the place mat. 

Once we corrected this we decided to start adjusting sound levels. We made sure everything in the film sounded good and we did not experience any real problems with doing this. 

Once we had all the sound levelled correctly we then added the universal counter leader and the universal indicator. This was to make our short film look realistic. Once this had be done Anton had found some unlicensed music to add to our short film. He wanted the music to be at the start of our film. The music he choose added great tension and overall I felt it gripped you into wanting to watch the film.  

Once this was done Nicola spent some time in the edit suite as it was her turn. 

After Nicola spent a morning editing she was eager to show me and the rest of the group what she had done. When she showed us the group was very pleased with what she had done as it was pretty much completed. Nicola also had written down a list of what she felt the group needed to look at when we was all together.

This list can be seen below:

Nicola wrote a fantastic list and lead a great group meeting about the points she had on it. 

Points we had to think about: 

Points to pull out from the list are. We had to add cross dissolves on the clock on scenes 2 and 3 because of the continuity error of the place mat. In scene 4 the camera had pulled focus because it had been focusing more on stuff in the background. 

One of the main points to bring out of the list was that no one had noticed the camera had changed to 4:3 from 16:9. So we had to zoom in and this made the shot go slightly out of focus. 

Also there was no copy right of ring a ring of roses so we had to record kids and put echoes in. 

Once we had sorted out the problems we had finished editing. The whole group was pleased with the outcome and sighed a great bit of relief as it was all finally finished.      

Post 18: Production Report

We planned to begin our preparation for filming at 10am at Anton's house. We all arrived safely and on time. We planned for the actors to arrive on set at 11am this would give us a good hour to set up our set. Our first group meeting happened as soon as we arrived. As a group we discussed the jobs that needed doing and planned out the best possible strategy to get it all done before our actors arrived.

The Plan can be seen here:

We began by getting our sets ready. As we was filming in someones house it was vital that we made sure that after we had moved all there furniture, personal items and changed any lighting. We got it back to the way we found it when we finished filming. With this in mind we decided we decided to take pictures on the SLR camera of anything we was planning on moving. This would help us get it back to exactly the way we found it.

Posted below are pictures of the office how we found it. We then used these to help us put it back after we had finished filming:

By looking at these pictures you are able to see how it looked when we arrived. This allowed us to get it back to the way we found it after we had finished filming.

The first main difficulty we had to deal with was the news that our actors were running late. After arranging for them to arrive at 11am and for them to tell us they are unable to arrive for a few more hours you can understand how frustrated we all were. With this news we decided it would be worth having a group meeting and talk about what we should do. We came to the decision that we would use the time to set up to the best standard we could make it then have a lunch break to refuel ourselves knowing that because of the actors we would have to stay longer. 

As my job in the production group is to deal with the lighting my role during setting up was to make sure all our lighting was correct. This included setting up all the lighting equipment, cutting 1/4 and 1/2 blue gels, sticking the gels over the lights and making sure the sources and the colour of lighting was correct. 

I began with the lighting in the living room. The first difficulty I was faced with in the living room was with how yellow it was in there. This caught us out as in the location reccee photos we did not pick this up. With this drama in place it was my job to be able to bring the lighting back to how we want it. I decided that we would stick 1/4 blue gels over the lights for scenes 2 and 4 to begin with. Using an 85 filter we hoped to block out all the natural lighting in a hope that it would darken up the room and bring a more colder feel to it. 

After cutting out the blue gels I experienced another problem. The problem I encountered was very frustrating as the gels I was placing over the spotlights were not staying up with the crocodile clips we were using. This lead to me becoming very frustrated and becoming angry with myself for not being able to perform such a simple task. I took a short break to find something else to use to use to help keep the gels up. I eventually came to the decision that changing the direction of the lights to keep the gels up and switching different sizes of   crocodile clips helped and they eventually stayed up.

Posted below are how I had the gels over the lights:

     

After finishing the lighting in the living room I moved onto the lighting in the office. The lighting in the office caused me even more difficulties than in the living room. This was because when looking through the camera from each end of the room the lighting colour was different. This lead to me enquiring some thinking time. I took the time to think how I can solve this lighting dilemma. I decided that if I add an extra light and place it in front of the office desk out of shot and direct it against the wall then the office would warm up. I then looked back through the camera and noticed that it had in fact done that.  

This how I directed the light:

Once I had completed the lighting in the office and Anton, Tim and Nicola had finished there jobs we were almost ready to film. As we were beginning to film in the living room me and Tim decided to set up the train set. It was important that we got the train set out properly and with great care as it was not ours. It was borrowed. 

Me and Tim set the train set out not fully completed as this was a reasons for our actor Isabel's frustration in our story before she runs away. 

Posted below is me and Tim setting up the train set:

   

Once the Train set was out we were ready to film. 

The next problem we had was our actors were not on time and we could not get in contact with them. Anton continued to phone them and we got no answer so we decided that we would have to put a back up plan in place. We decided that we would use Anton's girlfriend Jemmas younger sister as Isabel and Anton's Mum and Dad as Lisa and Simon if our actors didn't turn up by 3pm. 

Just before 3pm our actors eventually turned up. We was now in a rush to get filming as we did not want to take an extra day to film. We knew it was going to be a late one so we all decided to put the shift in.  

Nicola got the actors ready for there roles. This included making sure that they was all correctly dressed in there costumes, making sure all make-up was right and making sure all hair was correct. Isabel caused the most difficulties as she had to have her hair re-done and change her clothing to make her look more like the Isabel we wanted to show in our short film. We also made Simon put wax into his hair as it made him look more professional. 

This video shows Nicola getting Isabel ready:

We finally started filming. We started filming outside and it did not take long at all. We got both scenes of Isabel skipping up the patio done with only a few takes needed. 

We then went onto filming in the living room. With Isabel settling into her role nicely we felt that we could get the scenes with just her in done very swiftly. But how we were wrong. We came across a problem with Isabel continuing to look at the camera whilst filming so we had to take several shots for her to finally get the hang of acting whilst on a set. 

Another difficulty we had was with the parents Simon and Lisa. They struggled to keep composed throughout shots and it lead us to become very frustrated. This is because we had to keep re-filming scenes just because our actors were not composed. Also in between shots they keep moving so this led us to become worried about making continuity errors so it made us re-film shots.

As the day went on it started to become very late as a result from our actors not turning up on time, lighting and actors not staying composed. We decided to ask our teacher on advice on what to do. Whether to stay on and stick it out for the night or arrange another filming day.

We decided to have a group meeting, which would hopefully be our last to discuss these possibilities. We decided as a group to stick it out for the last two scenes we had to film. 

We got on with our preparation for filming the last two scenes. We had to change all our lighting gels to 1/2 gels as a result of the atmosphere in the film changing. This lead to more frustrations with the gels and the clips. Once we had completed this we set about filming our final scenes. We got them done all in about an hour. 

We had a difficulty with filming our final scene outside in the shed. This was because it was pitch black in the shed. We had to use extra lighting and be very careful with shadows from the camera, cameraman and the director. 

We eventually finished filming after a long day at 11PM.      

   

Post 17 Ancillary Task 2 - Film Reviews Part 1

As well as the postcard another individual task we have to complete is a film review. In order for us to create a well designed and written film review it was vital that before we do so we looked at a few examples.

In class we looked at the film industry magazine Sight & Sound. Although we will be writing a film review on our short film "Synchronicity", Sight & Sound focuses on more long feature films. But it was still a great example to get ideas and apply them to our own short film review. The film review that we read over and used as an example was a film called Frozen. Frozen was a film released in 2004 and was directed by Juliet Mckeon. Juliet Mckeon went on to feature films after previous success with short films.

Posted below is the film review on the film Frozen we were looking at:

Reading it through we broke the film review article down paragraph by paragraph and in groups we talked about the key points and conventions the film review had.

- We started with the overall layout of the film review. We noted that it had a clear synopsis of the film and was layed out into paragraphs with the key information about the film posted at the top. The article also had a picture of the main actor to give the review some visual context.

- It also talked about the casting and how good the actors were. one of the main points that it said about the actors was that the overall storyline was not the best butt the casting allowed it to be a enjoyable watch and talk about how Shirley Henderson brought it around. 

- Also the film review used exciting phrases and words in order to attract to the reader to want to carry on reading it. such as "magical, impassive and cinematic". 

- Also it compares Frozen to other films.

After we had read Frozen and analysed it we was set some independant study to go off and read some other short film reviews to get ideas to help us with ours.

I looked at two different film reviews on The Kings Speech which is a British Film tipped to be big this year. I read through The Guardian's interpretation of the film and then The Independants.

The Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/jan/06/the-kings-speech-review

The Guardian differs hugley to Sight & Sound. This is because The Guardian is a newspaper. Therefore readers of The Guardian would not only be reading The Guardian for film reviews but also for general news and devlopments in there everyday life. Where as Sight & Sound is a formal film magazine so therefore readers to this magazine will only be intrested in reading it for reading about film reviews. When reading through the film review there was a clear diffrence in language between the two different styles of reviews.

Overall I found The Guardian's review of the Kings Speech written by Peter Bradshaw a very enjoyable read. I feel that this it the type of film review that I would prefer to read as when I read the Sight & Sound one of Frozen the language was a lot harder to understand. 

Below I have pointed out some of the key coneventions and points about the film review:

- The overall layout of the review allows it to be very visual and easy on the eye for the reader. You have a picture for good visuals. It also has a information about the film half way down on the left giving information about the film certificate, running time, cast and director. This I feel is very interesting as it gives readers the key information they need about The Kings Speech.

- The Guardians review of The Kings Speech also keeps readers entertained throughout with comical phrases and words. Example being "and who pronounces the word "promise" as "plwomise"

- It also talks about the main cast and how fantastic they are, along with supporting cast and how they gave a crucial supporting role

- Peter Bradshaw also talks about the main storyline throughout The Kings Speech this gives readers a burning edge to want to watch The Kings Speech. This is one role a film review is crucial to supporting a film.  

The Independent 

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/the-kings-speech-tom-hooper-113-mins-12abrthe-next-three-days-paul-haggis-128-mins-12a-2179616.html

The Independent's film review on The Kings Speech was written by Nicholas Barber. Comparing it to The Guardians review it was a lot less heavier to the reader. This is because the film review was a lot less in formal. Using more common language and slang for the less educated reader. 

Below I have pointed out some of the key coneventions and points about the film review:

- It gives the film great reviews and speaks about The Kings Speech is in encouraging manner. It begins by saying The Kings Speech is a definite for UK's best hopes of an Oscar. This gives it a powerful opening to the review as it talks about it positively straight away.  

- Similar to most other film reviews it has a picture of the main actor. This gives readers good comfort with visuals as they can familiarise there selves to the actors before going to watch the film.  

Post 16: Ancillary Task 1 - Postcards

One of our independant tasks during making our short film is to create a postcard for our short film. A film poster is usually used to advitise big budget films but in our case a postcard would be more suittable. This is because it is easier to distribute the short film.

Although we are not creating a film poster we are still required to know about the key conventions of them. So in class our first task was to write down a list of things we would expect to find on a film poster.

Below I have listed what I would expect to find on a film poster:

-  Name of the Film
-  A picture from the main characters or something to symbolise the main point of the film
-  A Slogan or tagline to catch the atention of people
-  A short stynopsis of the film
-  Name of the production company
-  Name of the director
-  Release dates for the film
-  Actors/ Actresses names

In order for us to get to grips with film posters I decided to independently study a few examples of some. I decided to look at one example from a Hollywood film and then one from a British film to see if there is any differences between the two and whether a film budget can have any influence on how a film poster looks.

Due Date Film Poster:
(Hollywood)

The first film poster I looked at was from the 2010 big hit film from Hollywood "Due Date". Due Date was made on a budget of $65 million. Therefore "Due Date" would have no trouble distributing there film posters to a wide audience across many different location as they would be able to make the profits back up in the cinemas. Also Due Date has well known actors that can cross the audiences and the director of Due Date also made one of the most popular films in recent times The Hangover. This is why big budget Hollywood films can have the ability to make well designed and distributed film posters.

The Conventions of the film poster are clear. It is a good visual film poster in my opinion because a nice clear big picture covering the whole poster of the two main characters. It shows them to be looking rough and looking like they have gone through a lot. This straight away gives the audience a sense of wanting to watch the film as they will be eager to find out why they are like that. It also has the names of the two main characters at the top. This will comfort audiences if they know who the actors are and will help them to getting to the cinema to watch the film. It also has the name of the film in big capital letters at the bottom of the page with other films that the director of Due Date has created above it and then the release date beneath it. It is also very colourful and catches your attention

Lock Stock & Two Smoking Barrels Poster:
(British)

The British film poster I looked at was Lock stock & Two Smoking Barrels. Comparing this to Due Date, Lock Stock will be harder to cross to a wide audience as it was the first film to be made therefore not a lot of people would no much about it. Also it was made on a lot smaller budget to Due Date so therefore would not be able to produce as many film posters and distribute to as many locations.

The conventions of the film poster also differ to the Due Date one. For a start there is a lot less colour on the Lock Stock poster. This may be  because it is more expensive to produce as many film posters with big graphics on them like the Due Date one as Lock Stock is made with a smaller budget. Or they are trying to create a dark eerie gangsta effect through black and white. You have a main picture of Vinnie Jones the main actor in the film being the dominant thing on the poster holding guns. This will straight away give away that this film is full of fast paced action. The title is in large lettering in the centre of the poster catching the audiences attention. It also has a review on the top left saying "This years best British movie" This will help the film get more viewings at the cinema as people will be eager to see if it lives up to its review.

Postcards:


After we had understood about film posters and why they are produced and what inflicts them. We started looking at postcards and analysing them. We looked at a few examples of postcards from short films produced by Becky Knapp who helped us with our script.

Divine

From this postcard on the short film called Divine you can see that there is a main image dominating the whole  main side of the postcard. This straight away draws the audience into it. It has the name of the short film at the top in white lettering and this goes well with the black background as it creates a sense of eeriness and engages the audience. It also has a slogan saying "Let's go to church" this is also engaging the audience as it adds to the eeriness. On the back is all the information about the director, cast, costume designer, edited and sound by and an e-mail address about any further queries.


On A Life's Edge

The postcard for On a Life's Edge differs in many different ways to the postcard for Divine. The front side of the postcard is actually quite similar to Divines one with a main picture dominating the front side. But differs as it has three more images up the left hand side of different filming locations. It also has the name of the film at the bottom. On the back it is completely different to Divines design.  It has less information including a synopsis, the casting, directed by and produced by.











My Designs  

Posted below are my postcard designs:

Post 15: Reflecting On Theory

In previous posts I have talked about three different theories. These were Genre Theory, Narrative Theory and Audience Theory. In this posts I will be reflecting on these theories and applying them to the short film that I am making. This post is also important as it prepares us for our exam in the summer.

The first theory we looked at was Genre Theory in Post 4. We looked at Robert Altman's, Neales and Hartleys views and opinions on Genre Theory.

Robert Altman believed that "Genre are defined by producers and are easily recognised by audiences. Applying this to my short film. It is key for our audience to know what genre my short film is as throughout previous posts I have talked about how important it is for audiences to understand what genre a short film is.

Ways in which we could relate to Altman's views in our short film is with our set design and lighting. For example my short film Synchronicity is a Drama film. So for audiences to understand the genre of our short film easier we need to make sure we show a drama film. With changing the atmosphere in the lighting audiences could relate to the drama that is going on in the film.