Thursday 6 March 2014
Evaluation Task 4
How did you use new media technologies in the construction, research, planning and evaluation stages?
We had either a choice of genre which our film trailer was going to be. The choices were teenage angst or crime drama. We decided as a group to go with the crime drama. We decided as a group to go with the crime drama because we watch crime drama TV programmes and films and thought it would be best suited to us. When we were researching our film trailer, our source was YouTube because it is easy to access and there are a variety of videos to choose from. We needed to find inspiration for our film trailer from key concepts such as; mise-en scene, editing, sound, camerawork and storyline. We used trailers from Breaking Bad, Dexter and Luther because these TV trailers were very good and well made, which can inspire us for our film trailer.
Dropbox is a file-sharing website which is free to use. It is very useful for sending files such as pictures and documents to yourself wherever you go. For example I imported some location photos from my phone onto Dropbox and then it is instantly saved onto any other device which I can access, whether that is a tablet or computer. I found this easier to do it this way rather than E-Mailing myself.
Freeplay Music which had thousands of free songs with categories so it is easy to find the music we wanted and to have it featured in our film trailer. We chose carefully because a lot of the music we wanted turned out to not be suitable for our film trailer, so it took some time to find a piece of music that worked.
To create my magazine cover I used Adobe Photoshop to manipulate the photos, for example I took the original photo of Peter Collins and removed the backgrounds by using the tools 'magic wand' and 'lasso' so it'll just feature what it is necessary because the audience may recognise his face from the trailer. I used the magic wand to remove the body and background for just the antagonist's head and used the lasso for a finer touch on the edges. Photoshop has many tools and features which are useful to get the definitive picture for the magazine cover and mess around with it until it looked like a conventional magazine cover like for example changing the layout so it took up enough space of the magazine cover without obstructing the main picture. After doing research of other magazine covers such as Empire and Total Film, I noticed for some magazines it just one or two pictures and a lot of text to take up the page because this is what you would see on a conventional film magazine cover. This is what I've done with the reviews, cover line and tagline. The masthead's font is 'Perpetua Tiling MT' because I've felt it looked professional and also the massive font size will catch the attention of the audience and title of the main article 'Payne' is written in 'Trebuchet MS' to emphaise its importance on the magazine. The dark red lettering is to connote blood and danger to signify that it is a dark drama film. I used blending options such as stroke to catch the attention of the audience and also makes it easier to read with an outline around the lettering.
I again used Adobe Photoshop to create my film poster. I used the antagonist for the film poster because the audience may again recognise him from the film trailer and also the magazine cover. We chose this photo because the gun in his hand connotes that it is a crime film. In comparison to my film poster draft I turned down the brightness of the image to make it look darker, which is again to signify that it is a crime film and can connote danger which may occur in the film. The title of the film is written in bold red lettering to emphasise its importance and the colours are the same as it was in the magazine cover, therefore showing synergy. The font is the same as well, 'Trebuchet MS'. The social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter are at the bottom of the poster to tell the audience about up-to-date information and photos about the film which they can connect to. On the top right I had our AS film saying 'The makers of The Trophy Room' written in the same font as I did previously which is synergy because the audience may recognise that film and may want to see their latest installment. The oval is overlapped by the text and it is highly contrasted so the audience can see the background and also the lettering.
We had either a choice of genre which our film trailer was going to be. The choices were teenage angst or crime drama. We decided as a group to go with the crime drama. We decided as a group to go with the crime drama because we watch crime drama TV programmes and films and thought it would be best suited to us. When we were researching our film trailer, our source was YouTube because it is easy to access and there are a variety of videos to choose from. We needed to find inspiration for our film trailer from key concepts such as; mise-en scene, editing, sound, camerawork and storyline. We used trailers from Breaking Bad, Dexter and Luther because these TV trailers were very good and well made, which can inspire us for our film trailer.
Blogger is essential for our coursework because it shows our research and evaluation to our teachers. Blogger can be referred to as technological convergence because it is accessible on other devices such as a tablet or a smartphone. There are other websites such as Google and YouTube that are linked with Blogger which is also part of technological convergence. Anyone can post feedback on the blog which is useful to help improve our work. All of the work that we've done is on the blog, so it is all there ready for the user to look through.
Dropbox is a file-sharing website which is free to use. It is very useful for sending files such as pictures and documents to yourself wherever you go. For example I imported some location photos from my phone onto Dropbox and then it is instantly saved onto any other device which I can access, whether that is a tablet or computer. I found this easier to do it this way rather than E-Mailing myself.
Freeplay Music which had thousands of free songs with categories so it is easy to find the music we wanted and to have it featured in our film trailer. We chose carefully because a lot of the music we wanted turned out to not be suitable for our film trailer, so it took some time to find a piece of music that worked.
For filming we used a Panasonic HDC-SD80 which records footage in HD 1080p so it allowed us to film in brillant quality. This quality is at today's standards because the majority of video cameras and even mobile phones can record at this quality. Computers and TV's are eligible to be shown at this quality clearly. On the computer, the better the broadband speed the better quality of the video and also speeds up loading the video with minimal buffering. This may appeal more to a younger target audience visually because they are stereotypically associated with technology and the quality has to be up to this standard of the films now these days. After doing a bit of research on the camera we used there is a Frames Per Second (FPS) of 29.97 which is what most films record in. Plus it will give the trailer a smoother image.
We used our mobile phones to take location photos for our research as to where our possible locations can be so we can develop our story and tell the audience the locations where the film is set in. Our phones provided exceptional quality so it gives us enough detail to have our shots. We also used one of our phones in a scene for the film trailer where 1 of the characters receives a text message. This is an integral part of the narratives so it was very handy.
The computers we used for editing was the Apple iMac. The Mac was very easy to use and it is also powerful therefore it was quick to load which saved us time waiting and also there are many features on the Mac such as the editing software we used for our film trailer which is called 'Final Cut Pro' which is known to be a professional editing software which therefore gave our trailer a professional feel. There are also many features on the Mac such as the transitions, which was very useful in our film trailer as it helped to increase the pacing of the trailer by using the; (jump) cut, dissolve and the fade to black. Because our film has a serious tone and to connote that it is a crime drama, we learned how to configure with the lighting by making it darker to connote for example that our antagonist is dangerous. We imported the selected music on to the film trailer and it was useful to change the volume of the music so it is not too loud for the audience but to keep that suspense along we tried to edit it in sync with the editing in the clips so it could catch the attention of the audience.
We used a Philips voice recorder to record the voiceover for the first half of the film trailer. This was deemed very effective as the audience can understand the narrative a bit more. The quality of the recorder was very good as it prove in the final film trailer that it can be heard clearly by the audience. I used the voice recorder as well to complete Evaluation Task 2 which is to discuss the effectiveness of the combination of your main product and ancillary texts. The voice recorder was easy to use and to import onto the computer and into the film trailer.
To create my magazine cover I used Adobe Photoshop to manipulate the photos, for example I took the original photo of Peter Collins and removed the backgrounds by using the tools 'magic wand' and 'lasso' so it'll just feature what it is necessary because the audience may recognise his face from the trailer. I used the magic wand to remove the body and background for just the antagonist's head and used the lasso for a finer touch on the edges. Photoshop has many tools and features which are useful to get the definitive picture for the magazine cover and mess around with it until it looked like a conventional magazine cover like for example changing the layout so it took up enough space of the magazine cover without obstructing the main picture. After doing research of other magazine covers such as Empire and Total Film, I noticed for some magazines it just one or two pictures and a lot of text to take up the page because this is what you would see on a conventional film magazine cover. This is what I've done with the reviews, cover line and tagline. The masthead's font is 'Perpetua Tiling MT' because I've felt it looked professional and also the massive font size will catch the attention of the audience and title of the main article 'Payne' is written in 'Trebuchet MS' to emphaise its importance on the magazine. The dark red lettering is to connote blood and danger to signify that it is a dark drama film. I used blending options such as stroke to catch the attention of the audience and also makes it easier to read with an outline around the lettering.
I again used Adobe Photoshop to create my film poster. I used the antagonist for the film poster because the audience may again recognise him from the film trailer and also the magazine cover. We chose this photo because the gun in his hand connotes that it is a crime film. In comparison to my film poster draft I turned down the brightness of the image to make it look darker, which is again to signify that it is a crime film and can connote danger which may occur in the film. The title of the film is written in bold red lettering to emphasise its importance and the colours are the same as it was in the magazine cover, therefore showing synergy. The font is the same as well, 'Trebuchet MS'. The social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter are at the bottom of the poster to tell the audience about up-to-date information and photos about the film which they can connect to. On the top right I had our AS film saying 'The makers of The Trophy Room' written in the same font as I did previously which is synergy because the audience may recognise that film and may want to see their latest installment. The oval is overlapped by the text and it is highly contrasted so the audience can see the background and also the lettering.
Evaluation Task 3
What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Before we can start filming our draft, we had to present a pitch to our class and teachers about the initial ideas for the film trailer. This would includes conventions such as; plot, characters, editing, sound etc. After filming for our draft they all had to watch it and provide us with feedback about how to improve the footage for the final draft. Another source was through our questionnaire providing questions for our target audience to additionally improve on the feedback. In our initial pitch they were pleased with the amount of detail
In the first draft, we did not have any music at the time because we were still searching for a piece of music that will be appropriate for the style of filming and pace we intended. The music is medium paced which went along nicely with the trailer's pace. In the final draft presented to the class, the general reaction thought that it provided the trailer with suspense, which is what we wanted to hear. It was at the right volume as well so it wasn't too loud for the audience so they can hear the voiceover in the background. We also tried to sync the music with the editing of the clips and transitions to the catch the attention of the audience as well. We added the voiceover in the background to ask the questions in the interrogation scene for the first half of the trailer. This helped speed up the clips as the question was heard in the background before the interrogation scene started. This also conveys the narrative to the audience as the suspect is being questioned for being at a crime scene which connotes that it is a crime drama film.
We originally intended for our film trailer to be aimed for 16 -24 year olds of either gender because it is common for the audience as these ages to be watching crime drama film and TV programmes. In our initial pitch we decided for our film to have a 15 certificate therefore indicating to the audience that it is not appropriate for anyone to watch it under that age. We introduced more characters including our main character 'Payne' to be teenagers to encourage our target audience because it could relate to them.
Before we can start filming our draft, we had to present a pitch to our class and teachers about the initial ideas for the film trailer. This would includes conventions such as; plot, characters, editing, sound etc. After filming for our draft they all had to watch it and provide us with feedback about how to improve the footage for the final draft. Another source was through our questionnaire providing questions for our target audience to additionally improve on the feedback. In our initial pitch they were pleased with the amount of detail
In the first draft, we did not have any music at the time because we were still searching for a piece of music that will be appropriate for the style of filming and pace we intended. The music is medium paced which went along nicely with the trailer's pace. In the final draft presented to the class, the general reaction thought that it provided the trailer with suspense, which is what we wanted to hear. It was at the right volume as well so it wasn't too loud for the audience so they can hear the voiceover in the background. We also tried to sync the music with the editing of the clips and transitions to the catch the attention of the audience as well. We added the voiceover in the background to ask the questions in the interrogation scene for the first half of the trailer. This helped speed up the clips as the question was heard in the background before the interrogation scene started. This also conveys the narrative to the audience as the suspect is being questioned for being at a crime scene which connotes that it is a crime drama film.
- Was the pacing appropriate for the trailer?
- Did the audience understand the narratives?
- Who is your target audience?
Evaluation Task 2
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZTzy1DKI_A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZTzy1DKI_A
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