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

1 - Costumes and Props - This frame shows one of the characters using the costume i gave him to wear in order for him to look like a monk. It also shows the torches and spades we used as props.

2 - Visual Effects - I used fire for the visual effects, as i thought it would look much better if i shot the scene in the dark using fire to add atmosphere and an element of mystery, as it doesn't really show anything in extreme detail.

3 - Typography - The text i used for the credits was a very boring, standard font. I decided to change this for the title of the film and enlarge it slightly, to make it stand out. i chose to use really boring text for the rest of the credits as it was more important to watch the film that to distract the audience with funky words.

4 - Transitions - I made a lot of the scenes fade in and out, while putting the credits in the space between shots. I decided to do this as beneath the music, there is a heartbeat sound that the movie originally faded in and out of to.

5 - Lighting - This film was made using natural light, and fire. I decided to use fire as it gave the film a more medieval feel, as that's the kind of thing they would have used back then, compared to nowadays.

6 - Settings - As the first half of my film was filmed hundreds of years ago, as the second part was set in the present day, people got very confused without the explanation. I figured putting something telling the viewer that the year had changed dramatically might be more helpful than hoping they would guess.

7 - Framing - Most of my shots are framed quite centrally, or both focal points are either side of the screen, like when the guy is digging at the start. This isn't exactly the most interesting way to film things but i think for the opening it works alright.

8 - Camera Movement - This shot has been zoomed in, and is taken just before it zooms out. I quite liked the close up, as the chest crashes to the ground just in front of the camera. I didn't use many camera movement, there are a few pan shots, but they didn't fit with the cuts between what was going on.

9 - Narrative - This shot shows them looking into the chest, after having found something interesting. This is quite a good shot, unfortunately i didn't get the close up of their expressions when they find it that i really wanted. But apart from that i think it's pretty good.

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

The characters in my film were clearly archaeologists it was the hat that gave it away. As you can see, Indiana Jones wears a vaguely similar hat, and everyone recognizes him as an archaeologist. the two images i have above are very similar, even if the position the characters are in, which really helps to show similarities.

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

Who would be the audience for your media product?

4. Who would be the audience for your media project?

How did you attract/address your audience?

Our films were shown to the level 2 group and they were asked to write some feedback for us. Here is what was said for my film:

"What kind of genre do you think this film belongs to? Why?"

Dark/Sinister/Horror/Mystery
Because of the music. And the fire makes the opening look like something sinister is about to happen.


"Who do you think the target audience of this film is likely to be?"

Target Audience = 14 - 20
Teenagers/Young Adults who like mystery


"What is your favourite image from this film? Why?"

Favourite image is the PP Productions with the logo. Artistic and cheerful.
Image - Big bold letters saying "500 YEARS LATER"


"If you were to borrow one idea fromt his film for your own film-making project, what would it
be and why?"

Music at the start
Because it sets the scene for rest of the film opening.

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

This is a picture of all the things i used to create my film opening. You can see what is there, a camera, a tripod, and a laptop. Other than that i didn't really need anything else. Firstly, there is the camera. We recorded our films in HD (High Definition) and it saves onto the cameras built in hard drive. Unfortunately, the camera only had an hour or two battery life, so we didn't have as much time as i would have liked to do multiple takes and stuff.

There is also the tripod, which i used to ensure the camera stayed still whilst filming, even though on the uneven ground it was hard hard to keep the shots flat.

There are also some headphones, which i needed so i could hear how much audio was being recorded on the camera, and could therefore tell people to speak up or be quieter, depending on what shot i was filming.

Finally, there is the MacBook, which i used for everything else. I used blogger to keep track of all my planning and thoughts on the sequence, and also general work was all saved on the blog as evidence that i had been doing some work.

I used Final Cut to edit the entire film, so i put all the footage onto Final Cut, and cut the 6 and a half minutes of footage down to about 1 and a half minutes. This involved watching all the footage, and deciding which shots i wanted to keep, and which were no good - then removing the bad ones and putting the ones i wanted in the right order to the film made sense.

I then had to create some music for my film. For this i used garageband. This took quite a long time as i am not very good with garageband, i can't make music, but i think what i ended up with worked quite well.

Despite not being able to hear it very well, i also have a heartbeat sound effect during the first bit of the sequence, that seems too quiet under the music, but that took ages to find. Many of the sound effect websites i tried. Other websites tried to make me pay for the sound effect, so after trying to find one for about 30 minutes, i eventually gave up and decided not to bother. I tried one last link and it gave me the one i used, it wasn't what i wanted, but it was better than nothing.

We also use YouTube a lot to put all of our videos on, our films are generally tagged CMDiploma, and whatever else people decide to put on. We do this so people can watch the videos shoudl they want to, it also makes it easier to show other people our work by having it on the internet, instead of having to carry a tape, or a DVD around with us simply to show people our work.

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

From doing the continuity i was able to practise cutting footage and editing it into the right place so it flows better. In the continuity task, we showed this by having someone walk up to the door, and start to open it, then a close up of his hand opening the door from where it cut before. In my film, I was able to use this simply to change the camera angle slightly. We did the shot twice, from different angles and cut it at about the same point, and it flows very nicely.

Feedback from Jim

Today we got some feedback from two film type people. They came into our lesson and gave us some feedback on our opening sequences. Jim looked at mine and here is what he said:

• Could the music be looped through the part of the film in present day?
• Different zooms and shots to make the film more abstract
• The "500 Years Later" thing should be in the same font
• Maybe change the present day footage so it is more abstract, maybe black and white? More contrast?

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Action Plan

Evaluation

My film doesn't exactly represent social groups, though i suppose the closest i can do is the Medieval type knights and the monk at the beginning, and the archaeologists at the end.The first character you see is the monk. He is shown to be a monk by the loose fitting brown robe, with a long hood coverring his face. Stereotypical monks all walk around in long brown robes, with hoods shadowing their faces so i think the image looks quite good. Along with the torch creating some very effective shadows on him gives the impression that he is quite old, perhaps not physically but time time period, as people don't tend to use flaming torches nowadays.

The next set of people you see are the knights. It is harder to see who these are, because it is quite dark, and whilst running the torches didn't give as much light as i had hoped - But they are wearing old style clothes, long white shirts, or plain brown tops - similar to what knights would have worn, obviously lacking any sort of armour as that stuff is expensive.

When it shoots to present day, you are introduced to 3 characters. They appear to simply be people digging, but they are meant to be archaeolgists. As the only time you really see archaeologists is on Time Team, i watched it for a bit to see what they wore. Generally, it was relatively casual clothes, so i told my cast to turn up in casual clothes. Many of the guys on Time Team also wore hats, so i gave two of the cast special "archaeology hats" to emphasise their rold as archaeologists. The third member does not have a hat, as he is in charge and doesn't wear one. Much like Tony Robinson rarely seems to wear one while presenting Time Team. While perhaps not as good as Time Team, i think my films has some strong links to that show and other shows due to some of the phrases and characters in it. One of the characters uses the -phrase "I think we should take this back to the lab" which is responded with "yeah, we can run some tests on it". These lines are very typical of most crime dramas shown on TV, especially ones such as CSI or Bones where they're trying to catch someone.


As it is meant to be a film (if i made the rest) the general idea would be for cinema's to show it, though obviously not my one as it was done with a budget of £20 and is only 2 minutes long, but if it was a proper film then cinema's may show it. Alternatively, independant cinemas or other industries such as channel 4's 4Film may show the films to give filmmakers a chance.


The audience for my product is very varied. While probably not suitable for anyone under 15, there is something in it for people of all ages over that. There are lots of gunfights and car chases for the teenagers to 30 year olds. There is also the historical element which is very popular among older people - which Time Team made very popular by filming and broadcasting their work on TV so people are now interested in archaeology. Although people going to watch it for the historical element are going to have to gwet over the hour and a half and seemingly unnecessary violence that would be in the film, as it is an incredibly action packed fast paced film when it gets into it, and the historical element is not quite so obvious.


I attracted my audience by initially pitching it by combining two popular thigns, that were complete opposites. "Time Team meets Die Hard" Time Team being the historical archaeology show, which would bore most teenagers, which Die Hard being the action packed intense films that would bore most older people. By bore, i mean not interest. These two combines could either produce the most amazing or most dissapointing film, and for this reason most of the poeple i told it to were very keen to see the final piece and help me make it.


Making this product has really helped my learn about different technologies including different cameras, editing programmes and generally making things work. First thing i learnt was that Kirk's camera is very annoying to use with the school's Mac's. They don't like each other, so i guess in future i'll just use the schools stuff. I also found out how useful Final Cut is for editing and finishing the product and how to overcome problems such as the image not being light enough by editing levels and ensuring the sound all sync's up with the video so it doesn't look stupid.

I have definately learnt about editing and continuity due to the continuity task we did originaly so cutting and editing all runs as smoothly as possible and ensuring audio and video sync up.