Evaluation question 1

Question 1 - In what ways does the media product use, develop or challenege forms and conventions of real media products?

Over the AS year, we developed skills to film to a professional standard, this included principles such as match on action, over the shoulder shots and the 180 degree rule. In the A level year we used these principles to put together a piece that was more professional but also making a film flow smoothly. During the production stage of the film we encountered some continuity errors which were eventually fixed for example, the change in weather in some scenes showed the film in some parts being darker than others to combat this issue we used editing tools on Premiere pro to change the colour of the scenes . Another example of a continuity problem was the main character (Played by Liam) and how we had to wait for his facial hair to grow back in order to film the re shoots to achieve continuity throughout the film. During the film, we had to adapt to certain shots that we found to be more challenging than anticipated. e.g. Title sequence, this included a pan shot which had to run in syncronisation with Ross walking down the corridor , after numerous attempts we completed this and chose to edit this shot to make the typing of the title quicker so there was continuity with the main character walking. Another example of a shot that we found difficult to film and edit was the train journey, this was based on the external environment such as people on the train and also the sound of the train which effected the voices heard on the recording, to solve this problem we decided to record the voice of Ross on another day using a zoom recorder specifically used for sound which will be put into a film on a later date.

The film supports the conventions of the dark comedy genre. For the audience to understand and recognise the genre we used generic terms and ideas ususally shown in a dark comedy. An example includes the suicide scenes where Ross attempts to take his own life in different ways but they all seem to fail showing a comic element to the idea while it is also dark through trying to kill himself.  We also edited in contrapuntal music to these scenes, eventhough the actions on screen were dark, the music is the opposite of the situation where Ross is wanting to die but the jazz music in the background implies the scene is not negative in anyway and helps with the comical element. Throughout the film we supported stereotypical conventions of office workers in terms of what they do as a day job, what they dress and how they interact with one another. There was an effective ending as the main incident happened but the credits rolled before a final scene occurs showing what resulted from the incident.

During the film, some darker elements of the film were important in showing Ross plotting revenege on Hooper , such as his him being his boss, the affair with his girlfriend and also asking him to come into work earlier than ususal. However, it only becomes apparent when in a conversation with Dr Parkes when Parkes reveals a scheme, but it drops silent as the events occur. There were many references to other films, one being the punch in the face on fight club during the main scene, there was also a reference from the film Hot Fuzz, this happens when Ross is on the train and the sweets are offered to him, in comparison cake is offered to the main character.

A wide range of shots throughout the film show the audience the sort of filming we achieved during this project. Reframing many shots to place the main image in the centre was important in some instances such as the first interaction between Ross and Hopper the close up on his face shows that he dislikes his boss strongly.

Evaluation Question 2

Below is the second evaluation question

Evaluation question 2 from OwenG123

Evaluation Question 3

Below is the third evaluation question, what have you learnt from your audience feedback?

Pre Production
Before we decided on the storyline for our group we decided to create our own meaning we had four and we decided on one before adding elements of all the other story lines this allowed everyone in the group to get involved and contribute to the final film. After discussion we had created a storyline which we were all happy with, but we felt we needed more opinions do find out if the idea would be successful within the target audience we had selected. We did this by creating a video questionnaire where we filmed the audience answering questions based around the storyline we had developed asking a range of people we had 6 responses to 11 questions examples of the questions are below as is the video created in pre production.

Analysis of the audience feedback

When gaining feedback for the ideas of the film we believed that the questionnaire itself was pretty successful for what we wanted to receive when asking teenagers and young adults. From this the audience could understand the roles of the characters and what the storyline was, we also gained a number of responses for the settings we could use as well as a couple responses for the music we could use in certain scenes throughout the film such as tense music although we were still struggling to find any other music that would fit the film, the audience identified the dark comedy genre which is usually targeted at the age demographic of 15-24. Another positive to take away from the film was that the majority of the viewers would pay money to the film from only reading the storyline. We believed that our film was original and unique based on few responses to the question of whether they had heard or seen of anything similar, the only response we got was a likeness to 'The office'. To fill the gap where music was missing we decided to include contrapuntal music, the jazz song 'It ain't right' was used to compare the highs and lows Ross encounters in the film such as when he attempts to commit suicide. The chart below shows the responses to one of the questions.

















During production
As we did in the pre production we created a questionnaire to gain feedback, however this time we emailed the questionnaire to the respondents. This is important to identify if we were still relevant with the views of the audience and whether we were sticking to the genre of a Dark comedy. We showed them the rough cut and this included the music suggested by the previous respondents as well as the contrapuntal music we identified. In the responses to the questionnaire 18 out of 20 believed that the music was effective in portraying the dark comedy genre. The respondents were also asked what was our inspiration for this film some responses were irrelevant but 14 of the 20 asked said 'Hot Fuzz' this was effective as we had clearly taken time to research the director of this film and his editing techniques in this film this was important for us as the link between the film was huge and with that being a classic film we believed that our short film fit the audience and the genre just from the rough cut. All 20 respondents enjoyed the films storyline which we felt that this was a successful questionnaire.

Post Production
The final piece of feedback received was after the film had been fully completed and three respondents claimed they did not understand the final few scenes where Ross punches himself to get revenge on Hooper as well as Ross becoming the boss in the final scene with Simon. Other faults found within our film was the scene where Ross receives a text from Daisy, this included the wrong time on the phone as Ross walked into work in the morning but received the text in the afternoon, after changing this and adding in a sound effect for the text notification we felt we had improved our film based on receiving feedback. The final scene was needed in our opinion as it fitted within the dark comedy genre as it plays on the misfortune of Simon as he is clearly unhappy with the new manager.

Evaluation Question 4

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

Blogger

When Documenting all the research and planning a group blog was set up using Blogger. This allowed every member of the group access using a gmail account, the name of the blog was the enitials of each member of the group 'MOLA'.

Celtx

Celtx is a Pre-production software aimed at creating and organising media projects such as short films etc.To plan our film we required a script and the software we used was Celtx, this was the best programme based on our experience using this for writing scripts last year which gave us an added confidence in using it for the A level project. This was important in writing the lines for each character, the location and any other actions the characters need to do.

Premiere Pro

Premiere Pro is an editing software used throughout the project, with last years experience we felt confident in using the software again based on using it for other exercises such asa Journey Edit where we focused on eliptical editing to shorten a journey from one location to another. This software gave us many options in font choices, transitions and colours to improve our film. Features within premiere pro that helped in the editing of our film included features

Youtube

Youtube was an essential tool when posting all of our videos online and to blogger. Although , before we uploaded the films we had used Premiere Pro to convert the films into files which could be embedded onto our blog. Videos we uploaded to Youtube included the final film, audience questionnaires and rough cuts of our film during the production stage, this was seen as a feedback tool to gain opinions on the project and how to improve the film whether that be the storyline or the nature of the film.We kept all our content on one channel so we could keep track of the videos and also know where to find them through a youtube log in.

Youtube also was an important source of information during the research phase of the project as this website gave access to many trailers, radio trailers,  short films and example reviews of films.

Camera Equipment

The camera used to film all of our clips was a Canon Legria HF G25, this was a much better camera than the one used in our AS level film so we needed time to get used to this camer. When using manual focus, this helped to produce a high definition image when creating our short film. Having filmed multiple shots we also filmed back ups just incase we needed extra content for our film. The use of this camera gave us an advantage over last year based on the quality of the camera giving us more ability to zoom, pan and also try tricky shots such as a point of view shot.

H1 Zoom Recorder

 The H1 Zoom recorder was helpful in the making of our film. It was used to correct any sound we missed during the filming stage and also in the editing process as we used it to create the voice of the anouncement speaker, this gave us the ability to change a clearer sound to make it sound like it came from a train stop. This technology was very easy to use as it only use a few buttons therefore i would recommend using this again as we already had experience from using it in the AS project. In the radio trailer this recorder was used again to produce a loud and clear piece that can be edited easily before being added to our trailer.

Free music Sites 

To include music within our film, we needed to use royalty free music in order to enhance our project. To find the music we used freemusicarchieve.org and freesound.org these were also used for sound effects in the film and radio trailer. We did this by downloading the sound clips onto a computer before implementing it into the film. To select the type of music we wanted we had researched our genre to identify which sound was appropriate for each scene. The sound used within the film is important in putting across the genre in the film.

Onlne Film Database 

To undertake research many sources of information were required, IMDB was used to gain extrra information such as release dates, poster examples, storylines and box office figures etc. This website was always available to the group, as well as Rotten Tomatoes, this website was better for reviews on each film that i researched. Both websites had in depth information on each film which gave us added knowledge in the black comedy genre, also understanding the director and their own techniques which influenced some filming and editing during our project.

Photoshop 

To create a sophisticated film poster, Adobe photoshop was the most appropriate as it allowed the group to create their own posters but also included features that other image editing software does not include such as layering, this allowed us to add multiple background images such as the notes on the wall. This poster gives the audience a setting for the film as well as introducing a character. The brightness and contrast elements of photoshop allowed us to add more colour and depth into images used on the poster making it more life like.When using photoshop there was little experience within the group therefore after a few hours of getting to know the basics it allowed us to manipulate the images to fill out the poster with individual images of the charcters.