Question 7

Question 7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?


Here is our preliminary task:

Firstly, from watching our preliminary task, the first thing that stands out to me is the image quality, more so, the lack of it. Looking at this video and then looking at our final media product you can see a vast difference in image quality. The preliminary tasks image quality is very poor, the video has a great lack of detail in the picture and the overall video looks blurry and slightly distorted. However looking at our final media product you can see that the image quality is much better then that of the preliminary task, as the image is much clearer and crisper with much less degradation in detail and crispness. The camera we used to film the preliminary task  was an old and outdated JVC camera which was standard definition, this camera was the cause for the poor quality of the video. However for our final media product we used a new JVC camera which our school recently ordered in. These camera's are HD (high definition) meaning that the image quality is much better than that of the old camera we used for the preliminary task. The difference between the two videos show the difference in the image quality of the two camera. From this process we learned that the camera used for filming is extremely important and that being a high definition camera is crucial to creating a professional film. 


The second thing i feel that i have learnt from looking back at our preliminary task is lighting. From looking back at our preliminary task you can see that some of the scenes were ruined by the lighting, most notably the scene where Luke and Aimee's character are seated at the desk talking. The natural light coming from the windows causes the scene from the camera's angle to be very dark, loosing detail which is crucial to tell what facial expressions the characters are making, causing the audience to miss out on potentially crucial information. Also, from the scene where Aimee's character walks from the corridor which is well lit by unnatural light, she then walks into this poorly lit room with unnatural light, showing inconsistency. From looking at the preliminary task compared to our final media product you can see that all the scenes in our final product are all very well lit when needed and darkly lit for the scary scenes. This makes for a much more professional looking film and a better viewing experience for the audience. From this process we have learned that lighting plays a very important part in creating a professional and entertaining film.


The third thing i feel that i have learnt from looking back at our preliminary task is editing. From looking at our preliminary task you can see that the editing is not the most professional it could be. We can see this by the way the different camera angles and shots are not well put together, for instance when Aimee's character walks through the door, it looks like two completely different shots were merged together, ruining the feeling of continuity. There is also a long pause where Aimee's character sits in front of Luke's character, this could have been cut down a lot to reduce the awkward feel of the scene. From now looking at our final media product, you can see that our editing skills have vastly improved, with better camera angles, editing and cutting, all to create a much better product and a much more polished film, entertaining the audience more.


Another thing we have learnt from looking back at our preliminary task is the improvement of  the use of sound. In our preliminary task there was a severe lack of any non diegetic sound and hardly any diegetic sounds. This lead to quite a boring film with no tension building or any sense of atmosphere. However, in our final media product we used a non diegetic soundtrack throughout the opening to create an atmospheric scene and to also help build tension. This was very effective as it created these two emotions for the audience very well, unlike the preliminary task. Therefore we have learnt and progressed with sound.

Question 6

Question 6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

While constructing our media product we have used many different forms of technologies. Through this process i have learnt alot about these technologies, from how to use them to how they work. These technologies were essential for us to progress and create our media product to the standards that they are at. 
Here are some of the different technologies that we used to create our media product:


www.wix.com 

This website wix.com was one of the most used softwares we used for our project. This is because we used it to create our website in which we would showcase different information about our project such as research and other vital information. This website also was used as a link to our media group blog where, as a group, we updated the blog daily with new information about the goings on of our project such as filming schedules and location scouting. On wix.com i have learnt how to create a website and customise templates to fit my preference. From this website i have also learnt how use a blog and how to update it with information and up to date data. I found this software to be a great asset to creating my media product because from this website we could advertise our media product and group to anyone who is interested on the internet. I also found it helpful because from noting down things like filming schedules and location scouting i could refer back to the website to remember this information and monitor our progress as a group. Before starting this project i was clueless to how to create a website or blog but with the help of teachers, fellow peers and online tutorials i quickly became acustom to using this tool and started to progress swiftly with it. 

iMovie 

This software iMovie played the biggest part in the creation of our media project. This is because iMovie was used to edit our media product. Without iMovie our project would not have looked at all professional or entertaining as the editing plays a big part in the tension building and scary scenes in our film. We also used iMovie to create special effects such as the montage shot. For the montage shot we edited many clips of film to make them very short and to create a very quick slideshow of different scary images, we then added filters to give the film a gritty, spooky look and feel. At first i was slightly confused about how to use this software as the amount of information displayed on the screen can be a bit daunting, however, like wix.com, i quickly became acustom to using it with help from teachers, fellow peers and online tutorials. Within a few days i was editing, uploading, adjusting and importing our film with ease. I found this software to be a great addition to the softwares we used to create our film and without it i don't think our film would have been to as high of a standard. A tool i found very useful to use on iMovie was the clip trimmer tool. This tool enabled continuity of clips and it allowed shots to flow from one to another much more easily. The shots in which this tool was most particularly was the scene in which we created and showed the montage shot. With this tool i could cut the scenes down to very short segments so that it would become a montage/slideshow of different scary scenes that happened in the film. We also used iMovie to overlay a soundtrack onto our film. This soundtrack was very vital to the film as it was a very scary soundtrack in which played a big part in building the tension in the scenes and keeping the audience at the edge of their seat. The soundtrack was very easily over laid onto the film by just dragging the soundtrack from iTunes and simply places it on top of the film. However we needed to edit the soundtrack slightly so that the most uptempo and loudest parts were when needed, like when Luke's character was spotted in the window.

Camcorder 

For our media project the school equipped us with a JVC Everio camcorder to film with. This is a small, compact and light camcorder with great picture equality, a good choice for an amateur filming group such as ourselves. The camcorder has a built in hard drive disk (HDD) which can store hours upon hours of filming. This was useful because it meant we didn't need to fiddle around with memory cards and have the risk of loosing them and it also meant that we could film for hours on the camcorder without running out of room, making it more convenient then keep exporting the video files to the iMacs. The picture quality on these camcorders are good, but no exceptional. They are good enough to make a film out of but in my opinion they lacked detail and depth to create a professional looking hollywood type film. But keeping in mind that they are very cheap compared to a professional camera i think that they were the best choice for our group. The lightness and compactability of the camcorders meant they were easy to take to location as they fit in any conventional bag or the carry case provided. This also meant that they were easy to hold, convenient for me as i was the camera man. 

Being the camera man meant that i, out of anyone in the group, would have to get most familiar with this technology. Having already used a camcorder before this project many times meant that i was already very familiar with using this technology and had no problems with using it whatsoever. However i learnt that i could take still images using the camcorder, this is something i never knew before. I also learnt how to use the interface of the camcorder as it is partly touchscreen, this is something i havnt come across before and was excited to learn how to use, which took no longer than a day. The camcorder was a very vital part of our project because without it we wouldnt have been able to film our project.

I did not particularly understand fully the difference between HD cameras and normal cameras before, not knowing how much the quality of the two differed, our group firstly used a non-HD camera for our first filming session because a HD camera had not been available and we were eager to begin the filming process; however when we uploaded our footage onto the Imac we discovered that it was of very poor quality.  We had dimmed our shots to add to the gritty and spooky look of the opening however we found that this made the quality even worse and the image became very grainy.  It then became apparent that we would have to use a HD camera to re-film the footage. This had a great impact on our filming because it meant that we had lost a weeks’ worth of filming, it set us back greatly. Once we had a HD camera we re-filmed the forest and house scenes, and the original footage we had filmed worked as a test shot source and we were able to film the scene much more effectively adding in shots that differed from ones we had originally filmed to make it look more effective. We successfully re-filmed the footage, improving it with new shot angles and better picture quality.

www.youtube.com

To distribute our media product and our other videos we used Youtube. Youtube was a great website to distribute our videos because it is such a popular website, with millions of people watching millions of videos every day. This therefore means that our video has the potential to reach millions of people around the world. This would give us great recognition which is perfect for a new and upcoming media product such as ours. Youtube also gives the viewers a choice to give feedback on the video. This is very helpful to us as we can see the positive or negative feedback and act upon it to progress and improve our media product. 

We also used Youtube to look at films that might inspire us. The film we looked in depth at was ‘The Ring’ because our initial idea was similar because of the fact that our opening scene is about a character falling into the psychological trap of the antagonist. We also used YouTube as a source to get our soundtrack from that we played throughout the film. We also used Youtube to find, simulate and manipulate certain diagetic sounds such as the scream that comes from Aimee's character when she is killed at the end of the opening. We also found the swoosh sound, which is sounded every time Lukes character appears, in the same place. 

Here is a video of me and Luke demonstrating and explaining the different software's we used to create our media product.

Question 5

Question 5. How did you attract/address your audience?

When making our media product we set out to make our horror film opening watchable and accessible to as many people as we could. However when making a horror film you realise that it is a genre that only appeals to a certain type and amount of people. In my opinion, i think that horror movies only appeal to film watchers who are thrill seekers and like to be shocked by scary things when watching a film. I also think that it is a younger audience that enjoys watching these kinds of films, usually teenagers who are looking for this thrill from a movie. Therefore i wanted our media product to provide this thrill that teenagers are looking for in a horror film by adding scary scenes and jumpy moments. From the results of the questionnaire i think that we were successful in addressing our audience because the majority of the audience that viewed our media product thought that there was a particular scariest part to the opening, this shows that a certain part of the film actually affected the viewer by causing them to remember that it was scary. Also, the majority of the audience that viewed our media product checked either the 'Very' or 'Yes' option box for the second question which asks if they found the opening scary. The most common age group of the audience member which watched our film and filled in our questionnaire was the age group of 16-21 which is the young adult/teenage group, making the questionnaire even more effective and the results more useful to us as the film was aimed at their age group.


We wanted to attract our audience by the cast of the film. We used Aimee as our main character as she is a young blonde girl which would attract the teenage boys to the film and also give teenage girls someone to relate and empathise with. In fact our whole cast is of the age group of 16/17 so this means any teenager can relate or empathise with them. You most commonly see teenage groups in horror movies and this is because of the reason i just stated of teenagers relating with them, teenagers being their main targeted audience member. Also teenagers are most commonly picked to be the cast of horror movies because they are of the most adventurous age and are adapting to new lifestyles such as drinking, going out, holidays, etc. This makes them prime targets for an antagonist such as Luke's character.


We also attracted our audience to our film by the title 'Psychoptic' which is a title i made up by fusing two words together 'Psycho' and 'Optic'. Psycho being Luke the antagonist who only has an  aim to kill, being the main aim of most horror movie antagonists. The word optic relating to Luke's characters eyes, which are unusual as they have no colour to them, they are only white with a pupil. Optic also relates to the fact that Aimee's eye captures what was viewed on the camcorder, causing her to have migraines and hallucinations. From having an unusual title such as 'Psychoptic' we attract the audience because after reading the unusual title they are intrigued to what the film is about and how it links to the title.


Here is a video displaying the locations we used and us commentating on the reasons why we chose these locations.

Question 4

Question 4: Who would be the audience for your media product?

As a group we created a questionnaire to hand out to people who have watched our film opening. This is so we could find out many different aspects about our movie, the people who watch our movie and what they thought about our movie. This questionnaire would answer the question of 'Who would be the audience for your media product?' because from these questions we could then evaluate the data and see what kind of people watched and liked our movie and what they thought about it, therefore showing us the preferred audience. 

Here is the questionnaire we produced:

The first question asks: 'How old are you?' from the answers of this question we can see what the age range of the audience is that we are showcasing our movie to, therefore giving us an idea of what the age range of the audience would be of the people who would watch our media product.

The second question asks: 'Did you find our opening scary?' from the answers of this question we can see if the audience found our media product scary, therefore completing the aim of our film, seeing as it is a horror movie and that it what they are meant for: scaring and shocking the audience for entertainment purposes.

The third question asks: 'If you had to rate our film out of 10 what would you give it?' from the answers of this question we can see what the audience of our film thought about our film, therefore leading to improvements.

The fourth question asks: 'What age rating would you give our film?' from the answers of this question we can see what kind of age range we should rate our film depending on what the audience think it should be.

The fifth question asks: 'What did you think of the acting?' from the answers of this question we can see if we need improvements in the acting of our film and if we need to replace any of the actors with better ones, therefore creating a better film.

The sixth question asks: 'What did you think of the editing?' from the answers of this question we can see if we need improvements in the editing and maybe reevaluate some of the techniques used to edit our media product or maybe change the film editing program we used.

The seventh question asks: 'Would you want to watch the rest of the film?' from the answers of this question we can see if the audience truly enjoyed our media product and if the opening played its part in enticing the audience into wanting to watch the rest of the film.

The eighth question asks: 'What part did you find scariest and why?' from the answers of this question we can see what part of our media product was most scary and effective on the audience, showing us what parts were most effective in our media product, therefore we can learn from this and use some of these techniques further on in the film at crucially scary scenes.

The final question asks: 'What age group do you think would watch this film?' from the answers of this question we can see what the opinion of the people who watched it think about what age group the audience who are watching the film should be, therefore we can give the film a suitable age rating.

From handing this questionnaire out to 10 different people who have viewed our media product, i collected the data and analysed the data. Here are the answers of all 10 participant who watched our media product: 

Q1) ¦ Under 15 - (2) ¦ 16-21 - (3) ¦ 22-35 - (2) ¦ 36-50 - (2) ¦ 50+ - (1) ¦

Q2) ¦ Very - (2) ¦ Yes - (5) ¦ A bit - (2) ¦ No - (1) ¦

Q3) ¦ 1 - (0) ¦ 2 - (0) ¦ 3 - (0) ¦ 4 - (0) ¦ 5 -(0) ¦ 6 - (1) ¦ 7 - (3) ¦ 8 - (3) ¦ 9 - (2) ¦ 10 - (1) ¦ 

Q4) ¦ U - (0) ¦ PG - (1) ¦ 12 A - (4) ¦ 15 - (3) ¦ 18 - (2) ¦ 

Q5) ¦ Positive - (5) ¦ Negative - (2) ¦ Both - (3) ¦

Q6) ¦ Positive - (6) ¦ Negative - (2) ¦ Both - (2) ¦

Q7) ¦ Yes - (8) ¦ Maybe - (2) ¦ No - (0) ¦

Q8) ¦ When Luke first appears ¦ The montage shot ¦ The ending ¦ When Luke is shown in the mirror ¦ The montage shot ¦ The ending ¦ When Luke first appears ¦ The ending ¦ The ending ¦

Q9) ¦ Under 15 - (1) ¦ 16-21 - (6) ¦ 22-35 - (2) ¦ 36-50 - (1) ¦ 50+ - (0) ¦
Here is an interview of Steve, a fellow peer in our media class, being interviewed about what he thought about the film. Steven was a good person to interview as he is a teenager, which is the age which we are trying to attract with our film. He has watched many horror films before so he is well knowledged on this genre, making his opinion on our film important to us.

Question 3

Question 3: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Media institution: A media institution is an established, often-profit based organization, that deal in the creation and distribution of advertising, entertainment and information services.

By media institutions we usually mean the people who have a role in the production of media texts. This covers a vast part of the media, including:

• Companies/organisations
• Producers
• Distributors
• Marketing.

So we're talking editors, directors, producers, scriptwriters, screenwriters and so on.

Therfore this list of important people from the media institution  would be the type of production company that would take on our story line and film opening and create a full horror film from it.
I therefore went and researched other horror films which are similar to our film and found out what companies produced these films and are specialists in this field of work, giving me an idea of what kind of media institution might distribute our media and why.

From my research i have come to a conclusion of a few film production companies which would suit our horror film and would best produce the final product because of previous films they have made being similar to our film.

These film production companies are:

• Orion Picture Corporation
• DreamWorks SKG 
• New line cinema
• Fox Searchlight Pictures
• Lions Gate Entertainment

Here are the reasons for why each of these film companies would suit taking aboard our film and producing it into a full horror movie:

Orion Picture Corporation

Orion Pictures Corporation was an American independent production company that produced movies from 1978 until 1998. It was formed in 1978 as a joint venture between Warner Bros. and three former top-level executives of United Artists. Although it was never a large motion picture producer, Orion achieved a comparatively high reputation for Hollywood quality.

I think they would suit to producing our horror movie because they have created films such as The Silence Of The Lambs which is in a similar genre to our film and is also quite gory and horrific like our film is set out to be. Also not being a large motion picture producer but still making high reputation Hollywood quality films show that they produce great films without huge budgets, being very convenient and essential to the production of a small film such as ours.

DreamWorks SKG

DreamWorks SKG is an American film studio which develops, produces, and distributes films, video games and television programming. It has produced or distributed more than ten films with box-office grosses totaling more than $100 million each. I think DreamWorks SKG would suit to producing our horror movie because they have created films such as The Ring, which was the main inspiration for our film and moved it forward in its production by taking ideas from the opening of the film. We took many ideas from this film and as DreamWorks SKG produced this film, i think they could produce our film very well and create it into a high quality horror movie. Being a big budget company also means that they would create our film very professionally and being high budget would mean our film wouldn't be limited by money so we could have many expensive effects, editing etc.

New line cinema 

New line cinema is an American film studio. It was founded in 1967 by Robert Shaye and Michael Lynne as a film distributor, later becoming an independent film studio. It became a subsidiary of Time Warner in 1996 and was merged with larger sister studio Warner Bros. in 2008. I think New line cinema would suit the production of our horror movie because they are famous for producing some of the most well known horror movies ever produced such as A Nightmare Of Elm Street and Friday The 13th. These films are so well known for shocking the audiences with their blood and gore, and they always have the famous antagonist, in which our film would be Luke. These films are in the same genre as our film meaning New line cinema would be a great production company to distribute our film.

Fox Searchlight Pictures 

Fox Searchlight Pictures, established in 1994, is a film division of Fox Filmed Entertainment alongside the larger Fox studio 20th Century Fox. It specializes in independent and British films, alongside dramedy and horror as well as non-English-language films, and is variously involved with the production and/or distribution of these films. I think Fox Searchlight Pictures would be a great suit to producing our film because they have created films such as 28 Days Later which grossed a lot of money at the cinema and is also a horror/thriller like our film. Therefore i think Fox Searchlight Pictures would be a great producer of our film.

Lions Gate Entertainment 

Lions Gate Entertainment Corporation (commonly referred to as Lionsgate) is a North American entertainment company. The company was formed in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1997, and is headquartered in Santa Monica, California. As of 2011, it is the most commercially successful independent film and television distribution company in North America. I think Lions Gate Entertainment would be a great producer of our horror film because they have created films such as Saw and American Psycho. Both of these films are in the same genre as our film meaning that Lionsgate will do a great job with producing our film because they are experienced and suited in this field of work.

Conclusion

From looking at all of these film production companies i can conclude that i think that DreamWorks SKG would be the best company to distribute our horror film because they produced the film The Ring which most inspired us out of any movie to create our horror film opening the way we did. Therefore this company will be best suited to producing our film because they are the most experienced and suited in this field of work.
Here is the opening scene from our main inspiration, The Ring. Produced by DreamWorks SKG: 

Question 2

Question 2: How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our media product is successful at conveying the different social groups that we set out to convey. We tried to include a number of different social groups by representation. Representation is essentially an image plus a point of view about what they portray. A key issue centers around how some representations of people or issues become generic and attitudes of values and beliefs become widespread. However representation can be damaging as they can challenge and become stereotypes. Aimee's character "Ella May" was stereotypically a popular,outgoing and 'bitchy' girl. These characteristics and traits were shown in Aimee's character by the way she talked, acted and dressed. However the main way we represented these characteristics were through the choice of outfits. We decided to take inspiration from a character similar to Aimee's character in a teenage soap 'Hollyoaks'. This character wears a large fur coat and  has long blonde hair down. We tried to imitate this through the way we dressed Aimee in her characters outfit. This meant the audience can empathise with this character as it is a realistic real to life character. Stereotypically in a horror movie the blonde girl is killed first as they are seen as vulnerable. Therefore to follow the stereotypical conventions of horror movies Aimee became the first victim because she is a young and blonde girl who could portray the character best so we wanted to use this convention purposely. 

In horror films young people, another social group, are conventional characters as they are seen as free spirits, usually looking for adventure and enjoying life so they always seem to find themselves in inevitable trouble or in the grasps of the antagonist of the film. For example in films such as 'Final destination' , 'House of Wax' and 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' a young group of boys and girls go away or out for summer adventure and find themselves in circumstances such as camping in the woods or lost in the dark somewhere when something  such as an antagonist like a murderer or in the case of Final Destination: death. Also young people are used in horrors as they are the main target audience. This means the audience can relate to the characters and empathise with them as they go on through the film and get in all sorts of mischief. We tried to show our young characters through the outfits, actions and small dialogue.

This was shown through Aimee and Chantelle's outfit choice of wearing wellies to demonstrate their fun and young bubbly sides and that they was walking through the muddy woods. Also Aimee wore a big fur coat to show her character was very out there and stylish with a bright coloured scarf to show a bright personality as young people try to stand out, especially the character that Aimee was playing.
Accents and language play a big part in the expression of social groups. Our media product is filmed in England and the cast are all British therefore you expect them all to have British accents, which they do. Also the accents and slang used in the dialogue of the film show that we are from South East London.

Another way the social group was highlighted was by how Aimee's character 'Ella may' picked up the camera she found and put it in her bag, as you can see from her actions this could be seen as being nosey or stealing which is typical 'stereotypical' misconceptions of young people.  

Question 1

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

As a group we created mind map to group together of all our ideas and discuss how we thought we used the conventions of horror films, how we developed these ideas even further and even how we challenged the normal conventions to make our film unique.

Our media product uses forms and conventions of real media products in various different ways. Our media product is the opening of a horror film; therefore it uses forms and conventions of a horror film. One of the uses is the general casting of the opening of the film. The characters can be seen as stereotypical to the genre and follow the usual conventions of a horror movie. The stereotypes we used for our media product was the protagonist being a young attractive blonde girl. This is stereotypical to the horror convention as young girls are seen as being vulnerable and the blonde hair is stereotypically thought of as a dumb or ‘ditsy’ girl, more likely to get in trouble and be caught by the antagonist. This vulnerability and dimwittedness of the young blonde girl adds much to the film as the tension for the audience builds as they watch the girl and predict her outcome, in this case, being killed by the antagonist. This convention has been used in many films before, one being the opening of a horror film we analysed: The Ring, where a young blonde girl in school uniform is the protagonist and gets killed by the end of the opening. We also used a stereotype for the antagonist in our horror opening. Luke is dressed in all black, this colour symbolises darkness and death and is widely used in the horror convention. This makes a Luke a good antagonist as the audience can see just from his costume that he is not a normal member of public and symbolises some sort of evil. This leads them to believe that Luke’s character will in some way harm the protagonist: Aimee.

For the filming of our opening of a horror film we used a variety of camera shots. From using a tripod, to the camcorder being placed on the ground, to the most conventional to horror movies: handheld. We used handheld shots because they add many aspects to the film. Firstly, they create a sense of realism to the movie because it’s almost as if you are looking through the characters eyes or looking at the scene through an amateur camera mans eyes. This adds a personal feel to the scene and makes the viewer more engaged and immersed in the scene. The handheld shots also add confusion and a sense of delusion to the scene, showing the characters physical state and mental state depending on the steadiness of the camera and the various movements. A film called Cloverfield used handheld cams in this way to create a very effective immersion of chaos and confusion for the audience. The final reason we used a handheld shot is because the plot of our film is based around this camcorder and to truly depict the feeling of holding the camcorder we used the handheld shot in some of the scenes, like when Aimee picks up the camera in the woods for the first time.

We included a montage shot in the opening of our horror movie. We used the montage shot when Aimee looks at the camera. In the montage flashed different scary images of the antagonist; Luke, and Aimee covered in blood. This gives a sign to the audience of what to expect throughout the movie and what’s to come. We took this montage idea from the horror film opening we analysed: The Ring. We found the montage to be very effective in The Ring opening and to disorientate the viewer causing more of a shock factor in the scene. We also used a swoosh sound when the antagonist Luke appears or is about to appear. This builds tensions in the scene and the loud swoosh sound shocks the viewer and theoretically outlines the antagonist for the audience.

The main sound we used for our opening of a horror film is a score from a soundtrack we found on Youtube. This soundtrack is very dramatic and intense and it slowly increases the suspense of the film with the sudden change of amplitudes and pitch’s. It fits well with what is happening on screen, with the tension building and the sudden changes of pitch when certain things appear on screen or take place.