A2 media evaluation

A2 Media Evaluation“Short Film”

By Benoit Ganesan

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

StoryDuring the early stages of developing the story, I knew that I wanted to produce a media product that felt organic within it’s definitive genre whilst providing audiences with a narrative that disrupts their initial fixations regarding the overall story. In order to achieve this I highlighted the basic forms and conventions regarding visual storytelling; then segmented them in order to then decide on which of these codes and conventions I wanted to utilise, develop or challenge to ultimately create a media product that provides audiences with familiar story with unique elements.

My initial approach to this project was figuring out the theme and overall message I wish to present within my media product. I knew that I wanted to develop the conventions surrounding the genre of my story by addressing a social topic such as; appearance, race, gender etc. I believed that this would help develop the conventions surrounding the thriller genre and in particular the psychological thriller sub-genre as they usually consist of characters dealing with an outlandish predicament that is neither grounded in reality nor relatable or providing a plausible depiction of our society. I made this decision to base my product round a social issue in hopes that it would automatically cause the audience to believe in the reality presented to them on screen as both the narrative and it’s characters would be grounded in world that deals within a realistic depiction of our social infrastructure. A form of convention I used but also wanted to challenge was through the characters within my media product, following Vladimir Propp’s theory on the typical characters found in stories; the hero, villain, the helper as well as the fixed stories following these conventions regarding script structure. I followed Propp’s basic ideas surrounding characters and story in order to deliver a cohesive narrative whilst subverting some elements in order to provide my media product with a different take on the traditional story of good triumphing evil. I have chosen to subvert the fixed expectations surrounding the lead character within my story; due to the audience’s fixed perception conjured from past media products that led them to believe that the lead character within the story is the protagonist, however I have challenged this convention as the lead within my media product is the antagonist of their own story.

TypographyTypography was an crucial factor to be aware of when producing my media product; as the typography within my product would be designed to represent the entire film regarding the film's genre and tone merely by the execution and presentation of the title.

During pre-production, I knew that I wanted a font that would convey the twisted and deranged nature of the story. Within these early stages of development, I looked at other real media products within the same genre as my own product and studied the codes and conventions they used within their typography in order to allude to their audience the ambiguous message yet sinister tone behind their font style. From these examples I learnt a great deal regarding the level of thought that has gone into the selection of colour and the font design; all working together in order to help foreshadow plot, tone and the genre.

This research informed by creative decisions regarding my selection of fonts, I gathered various fonts on the website “Dafont” and found a font style titled “True Lies” this immediately gained my attention as the name alone embodies the fundamental themes and ideas within my media product; but when I looked at the font design, it perfectly embodied the visual aesthetic my media product has. By finding the font for my media product, I could now further develop the typography within my product by using codes and conventions such as the colour of the font, thrillers tend to utilise harsh and dark colours in order for audiences to perceive their products in the way that the film-makers intended. This is ultimately why I made the decision to not challenge the conventions as the typography is what will represent my media product and will be used within promotion material that could dictate the overall success and attention of my product. Ultimately I found that this font style would have to specific impact towards the audience mental well-being by its harsh colour, a dark red that draw connotations for pain, blood and suffering.

My media product


Creative inspirations from real media products


CinematographyAs apart of the cinematography for my media product, I wanted to present a gritty and harsh aesthetic that would provide the audience eerie sensation throughout the film’s runtime. I was able to achieve this notion through the use of colour and framing, the two colours that were used as the main colour palette belong each in separate sequences in the product; within the sequences in the basement, I’ve chosen to emphasis a blue colour palette in order to emphasise the cold and discomforting environment the character “Max” is experiencing and therefore causes the audience to sympathise for the character in his struggle. As for the office sequence, I wanted to convey a dull and lifeless environment within the location in order to express the way in which the character perceives the world and the people around him. Audiences would ultimately be emotionally influenced by the film due to it’s use of colours and curtain visual stimuluses within the product; further engaging the audience.

In regards to lighting, I primarily used one lighting rig within the basement sequences as I wanted to fill the location with as minimal light without creating too much noise within the frame; this decision was made to connote at the overall darkness within media text and enforce the serious tone of the story whilst driving the audience’s attention on to the lead character as well as the objects being lit by the lighting rig.

Within the technical aspects regarding the cinematography of my media product, I utilised traditional elements used in real media products; I made the decision to shoot my product at 24fps and present in an anamorphic aspect ratio, a style used in traditional film making. A real media product that I used as my creative reference for cinematography was “The Matrix” regarding the ways in which the film-makers used two separate colour palettes to distinguish the real world and the matrix; by using the colours green and blue to represent this notion.

My media product

My inspiration


Sound Design/MixingFor the overall score and sound design within my media product, I wanted the sounds to reflect the dark and sinister nature of the narrative. Regarding the film’s score I wanted to follow the forms and conventions of the thriller genre by utilising suspenseful music in order to achieve the emotional engagement of the audience, I found a royalty free soundtrack that include the individual layers within each track; allowing more ability to customise my film’s score to be unique and cater to my specific vision. As for the sounds within the product, I incorporated sounds that would not only enhance the visuals, as the lack of background noise within the basement sequences help enforce the sense of isolation from the rest of the world; as well as sounds to help convey particular elements within the story such as bugs crawling within the sandwich. A creative decision I made was to imply certain actions the lead character “Max” makes through sound, within moments such as him eating the sandwich. By not revealing what‘s in the sandwich, instead implying it through sound as well as through Max’s facial expression; this will allow for audience to infer the contents of the sandwich from their own imagination which my hope would be so that they perceive it to be far worse than the actual extent. The overall impact behind these decisions regarding the particular sounds within my media product was to strengthen the audiences’ engagement towards the product as they are forced to focus on every aspect that can be heard within the film in order for them to follow along the story. Another prime example of how I have executed this notion was by having the secondary “The Caller” an entirely vocal entity throughout the film , this character is never seen but simply heard; forcing the audience to learn as much about the character all through their vocal performance. “The Caller” was as character I had full control over in post-production. I had a specific vision for this character meaning that in order to execute it correctly, I got the actor to audio dub the performance over the on-set voice. I added a deep pitched muffle to the tone of character’s voice in order to provide the character with a domineering presence; this was a particular decision I made as I wanted “The Caller” to act as an allegory for god punishing one of his sinful children.

The royalty free soundtrack I purchased for my media product.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?Postmodernism/Intertextuality One of the early concepts I had as I was developing the script for my product, was to infuse intertextual references to my media product. Not only would this make my film postmodern as I adopt styles and techniques from real media products such as “Matrix” and “Marvel’s Avengers” but also imbedding references to my own existing media products. The reason for this decision was to include my media product into a larger cinematic world, where characters from my past existing products can crossover and co-exist in the same world. The benefits of having my product apart of a shared cinematic universe is that it can potentially further immerse audiences in the story as they feel apart of a larger spectacle. This idea not only would benefit the audience but me as the film-maker as well. As both the director and writer, I have the unique opportunity to mix characters and stories between connected films; offering the chance to then convey the impact certain characters or events may have in a far larger scale which can then form an alternative perspective on the story. How I’ve decided to intertextually refer to one of my past media products “Downfall 2” was by having one the characters from that product acknowledged within “A Lost Soul”. As apart of the office sequence in “A Lost Soul” the name “R.Lockwood” can be seen on a certificate place on the wall; the name belongs to a character within “Downfall 2” which acknowledges his presents within the diegesis of “A Lost Soul”.

My past media product “Downfall 2”

The character “Richard Lockwood” (Right)

Intertextual reference to “Downfall 2” within a shot in “ A Lost Soul”


Creative InspirationsRegarding the real media products that inspired my vision for my own media product, there were various projects that inspired my short film for their own specific reasons. Some have already been addressed throughout my evaluation such as “Marvel’s Avengers” and “The Matrix”; these films have been justified for their inspirational contribution to my media product. This will ultimately summarise all of my inspirations and why I had chosen them.

• ‘Marvel’s Avengers’ - As both the director and writer, I was inspired by the ways in which this film infused intertextual references to other media products; producing a larger cinematic world, where characters can crossover and co-exist in the same world which ultimately allows audiences to feel more engrossed within the story as they feel apart of a larger spectacle.

• ‘The Matrix’ – This media product heavily inspired the ways in which I would use the cinematography within my media product and to manipulate colour within my sequences to convey the particular ideas or emotions I desire from my product.

• ‘Buried’ - This film is my prime inspiration for my own media product as it captured a sense of pacing and suspense towards the audience; a sensation wanted to emulate in my short-film through the mise en scene and overall tone.

Film Review


For the film review following my media product, I followed the general conventions regarding the layout a film review would have within a magazine. By utilising the contrasting colours and text, my review would be able to be accepted by the audience as it follows the initial codes and conventions regarding its presentation. I primarily analysed the layouts of reviews featured in “Empire” magazine; using the ways in which they incorporate various images from the media product into the text. Not only did I adopt their techniques regarding the layout of their reviews but also regarding the information they present within their pages; cast, crew, plot and runtime are the specific areas in which they tend to present within their reviews, this convention is one that I have utilised within my review of my own media product. How I intended to challenge these forms and conventions was the organisation of the information, placing it up along side with the primary image. I found that within my research, reviews tend to place the information along side with the review; however I found this to seem to clustered and confusing to read as two separate types of information are presented along side each other. This lead to the decision to why I decided to challenge the placement of my media products credits clear and on it’s own along side with the image, whilst placing the entire review along the bottom of the double page. This I believed presented a cleaner presentation as the two pieces of information are clearly distinguished.

My inspirations for my film review

Film Poster


As for the film poster representing my media product, I done research into the conventions of posters from real media products in order to not only understand the essential codes and convention of a film poster; but to also gain inspiration as to how I intend on designing my own. Not only did my research inform my ideas which would lead me to adopt the techniques used in posters for real media products regarding the information they present within their posters: cast/crew, release date and age rating; this convention is one that I have utilised within the poster of my own media product as well as the ways graphics designers merged images into one larger picture that conveys certain notions regarding the product’s story and characters. Another convention I used was the careful decisions to utilise a few different fonts and colours to draw attentions to particular areas in order to ensure the likelihood that the viewers consume the vital information such as: the title, release and actors. How I intended to follow these forms and conventions was through the placement of the information, placing it up above and down below with the primary image. Similar to my objective with the film review, was to present a image viewers would understand and consume as a promotional poster due to the conventional structure being utilised is something they’d be familiar with.

My inspirations for my film poster

How effective is the combination of your main and ancillary texts?

In order to ensure that my main media text and the ancillary texts are effective, I had planned to shoot my main product prior to any significant development on the ancillary text besides research; in order to gather footage and images that would be used within the ancillary texts. This also allowed me to be informed on the various areas of my media product such as: tone, colours, style and progress. All culminating for a far more engaging but ultimately effective range of texts, as these different areas will allow my different media texts to be highly effective as the continuity of the product itself follows through the poster and the magazine review as well. All of my ancillary texts have incorporated images and information that can be easily justified as it co-exists along with the main media text.


PosterWithin the poster for my media product, it has successfully combined itself along with the main media text as it incorporates images directly from the main product. This has ultimately allowed this ancillary task to effectively reflect all that my media product encompasses regarding visual aesthetic and tone. By finalising the main text, I was able to then ensure that the synergy across my ancillary texts were maintained as I was then able to develop the typography within my main media product; gaining feedback from my media teacher and friends on whether or not it suited the tone and theme of my media text. Once my media product had essentially been finalised, I could then utilise the typography within the main text and apply it across to the poster, ensuring continuity and synergy across all of my media text; justifying that each and every piece of text presents my vision relevantly and accurately as they all derived from the same source. Ultimately, this will ensure that the poster’s depiction and representation is accurate to the actual media product; conveying the themes of isolation and fear. All of these concepts are heavily emphasised through the repetitive use of the same character, enforcing the notion of loneliness; through his expression as well as the imagery conveyed within the poster, implies a great amount of fear and desperation.


Poster FeedbackThroughout the creation of my poster, after every piece of development made on this ancillary text; I’d request feedback from my media teachers regarding their thoughts on whether it allude the viewer expectations in the right direction in addition to critiquing my poster in relation to the codes and conventions being used within the text.

From their feedback, I learned my media teachers liked the layout of the poster, they found it highly effective as presents my product very well. However they found that particular conventions were absent on my poster such as: actor credits, release date and age rating. In order to ensure that my viewers can infer the connections between the poster and the main text, I must not only credit the product but to also provide the viewers with an ancillary text they can engage and accept as they will recognise it as a poster. By incorporating these traditional codes and convention I am able to channel the viewers perception to recognise my poster as a professional text; as it utilises and recycles forms and conventions from real existing posters but adapting those to apply within the theme and tone as well as the narrative of my media product.

Recycling forms & conventions


ReviewAs for the review, it was very important that the combination between the main text and this ancillary text had a persistent degree of continuity as well as accuracy. This was an absolute necessity simply because the film review will have to accurately depict my main media text; in order to provide a review that is reliable and reflect the main text, the review itself breaks down the film precisely. To achieve this, the review had to incorporate images and information from the main text within the review; this ultimately enforced a strong grasp of synergy across the two pieces of text. Within the film review, Typography wasn’t necessarily a major issue as the product’s font was not needed as the review consisted of the fonts used on the magazine and the magazine’s brand.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Feedback from test screeningsAudience feedback was a pivotal factor throughout the entire post-production phase as I was assembling my media product. This allowed various opportunities to host screenings of multiple drafts of my media product against a test audience; the feedback received from the test audiences would be highly constructive as it would not only allow me to validate what elements within the film are working as I anticipated and what simply doesn’t work. I found these test screening highly informative as it would allow me as the film-maker to re-evaluate my entire project in order to ensure that I not only can deliver a product of high quality but also one that meets the expectations of the audience.

The data received from the test screenings thought my the value of a second opinion, particularly an outsider to the project can pick out aspects that the film-maker usually wouldn’t notice. Another factor the test screenings taught me was the limitations to perfection, nothing is without flaws and particularly when creating a media text and despite all of the improvements one can receive; I had to learn when to let go of the project and ensure that all is to a sufficient standard influenced by the public. Ultimately, these test screening certainly had a major influence over the final product as it addressed flaws in the text that lead to the product being: trimmed, reshot or adjusted in order to strengthen my vision.

Based from my experience with this project, regarding the process of receiving feedback. I would certainly approach it slightly differently in future projects as I would create multiple versions of the same draft, each containing a different change to the edit in order to fully analyse how and what my audience respond to. This I believe will then allow me to enhance the specificity and range regarding the feedback I receive.

Examples of feedback from test screenings

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Feedback from Final screeningAfter I had released my media product onto YouTube, I gathered a small amount of feedback from those early audience members who viewed the final product.From these responses, I learnt information regarding my audience as well as they’re thoughts on various elements surrounding the construction of my media product.

The feedback the users provided me with was extremely informative as it provided me with the knowledge of whether or not I had achieved my intentions as the film-maker as well as if my project can be classified as a critical success or an unfortunate failure. All of this can be inferred from the particular ways in which the users have decided to respond to the following questions:

• What is your gender?• How old are you?• How do you gain access to films?• What genre would you classify "A Lost Soul"?• What would you rate "A Lost Soul" out of 10?• What did you like about the film?• What didn't you like about the film?• Would you be interested to see a feature length version of "A Lost

Soul"?

Within this opening question, what I wanted to learn about my sample audience was their gender. This was an element that I was certainly curious to know as I intended to create a media product that would entertain and satisfy both genders. Despite my intentions and based from this data, round 65% of my sampled audience was in fact male; contradicting to my belief that my product would be engaging for both males and females. This has led me to believe that there are aspects based on our social infrastructure has made my audiences that the content is more engaging to a male demographic. Ultimately, from these initial reports my impressions have been subverted. This could foreshadow what I can expect the audiences of my media product to cater to regarding the contents of film.

As for the second question, I wanted to delve further into understanding who my audience are in order to gain a better understanding as to which demographic my media product caters to and appeals to specifically. First and for most, from this data fortunately statistically all of the sample audience members were of age to meet the age certificate of the film being “15”. By analysing this data, one point that can be clearly noticed is that the majority of the viewers are in fact young adults; this emphasises an intriguing notion regarding how this demographic engage to a product that deals with the themes of bullying and the stress of adult life. This implies the idea that my product may act as a form of both an informative yet immerse narrative that could help provide them a greater understanding of adult life as well as the roles and responsibilities that follow.

Questions One & Two

Question three further fuelled my curiosity with my sample audience, baring information that was a particularly insightful as it allowed me to understand the ways in which my audience consume media. The reason as to why I found this information useful despite my media product being available on YouTube, is to gain research on popular platforms to reach out to in order to expand the attention my project is receiving; ultimately to reach the prime objective which is to have access to the largest audience possible. As seen in the data, Cinema and Netflix are the most popular platforms my sample audience access films; informing how I should approach this next venture of expanding the market of my media product and which of the two platforms will best cater to me achieving my goal.

Question four was created to justify whether or not I was able to successfully utilise the codes and conventions of the thriller genre. As for the results based on my sample audience, it shown that I was successful to create a product of thriller genre as the majority of the votes went to “Thriller”. However what gained my attention was a few of the subjects classified my product as a drama; implying that strong elements within my film bared strongly towards the drama genre which cause my film to be a form of product of genre hybridisation.

Questions Three & Four

Questions Five & Six

Question five was to gather data on the overall rating of my media product, my sample audience were asked to rate my film out of 10. The majority rated my media product an 8/10, some of the votes dwelling within 9 and 10 which is phenomenal news regarding the overall quality of the media product. What this data doing is ultimately informing me that my media product is being received very well .

In regards to question six, I gathered information in relation to what my sample audience liked about my media product. From the data, what I can infer is that the direction of the product was much enjoyed; stating that the audience found the execution of the story to be effective. As a whole this information informed me with a better justification as to what audiences seemed to highlight as to how the film was being presented; a notion I am happy to have gathered in order to help support as evidence to validate the rating regard the product.

Questions Seven & Eight

Question seven poses a similar statement to question six but instead is asking what my sample audience didn’t like about the film. From this data, I learned that the aspect audiences seemed to not like were the performances; however I couldn’t help but question if there may simply be an error with the responses given to this question as these responses do not correlate with the data gathered from early test screening. The only issue I can presume is the case with the vagueness to the responses as “The performances” can range from the support cast to the lead; as the only issues brought to my attention within the test screenings was regarding a supporting character. This is ultimately why this data needed to be further analysed as anomalies may arise and may result in insufficient information relating to the quality of my media product.

Question eight was relatively straight forward in regards to interpreting the data, the question asks my sample audience if they would like to a feature length version of my product. Almost all of the responses would be interested, meaning that there is a potential market for my product to expand and grow in it.

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

stages?Planning and researchDuring the planning and research phase, the most useful tool that I used was web 2.0 as it allowed be the ability to actively engage with the film-making community sites such as “No Film School” and the YouTube channel “Film Riot” all sources of free information circulating around independent film-making and address areas on; techniques, DIY trick as well as covering all the various stages of production and an insight to how to produce a cohesive story.

All of the research that I would have gathered from those sites as well as other sites would be recorded on my blog featured on the site “Blogger”. Through my blog, I am then able to interlink other multimedia content such as imbedding videos and images in order to help strengthen the quality of my research into my selected medium.

As for research regarding how to use equipment, I did very little as I have experience in making media products; in the past I have learnt how to frame a shot and capture what I needed from the shot. However I have learnt a lot in regards to how I approach a scene, as I learnt to plan a shot depending on whether or not it’s needed to tell the story. In the past, my work has contained a few shots that were included merely because it was visually pleasing but didn’t add anything to the telling of the story. An example of this would be within the early scripting phases of “A Lost Soul” I had written a scene when the lead actor tosses paper into the air in slow-motion; it had no real impact on the story beside substance over context, which lead to be cutting out the moment. Therefore this influenced my motivations to focus my attention to other short films and analyse the various the film-makers have told their stories through their specific shot choices.


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Evidence from the first draft of the script to show the “Paper Confetti” scene that was cut from the script.


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Equipment Once it was time to begin principle photography, I have to sort out all the tools I required in order to execute my media product. There was an array of equipment that I used in order to capture my vision which consists of:

• DSLR Camera – This camera was used as the primary unit to capture most of the footage for my media product as the camera would provide my footage with the correct technical elements such as; wide depth of field, 24fps and an anamorphic aspect ration. This would allow my product to follow the conventions of traditional film-making, making the footage appear cinematic and professional which will ultimately make it easier for audiences to accept my product as a film rather than a home video production.

• Go Pro Hero 3 – This compact camera was utilised as a secondary camera in order to capture alternative shots that would otherwise be dangerous to place a DSLR camera.

• Rode Microphone – The rode microphone is an industrial quality product designed to capture high quality audio; this was certainly a valued piece of equipment particularly with a dialogue drive film such as my media product. The audio is important or if not more important than the visuals as it will be how audiences will be understand and follow the story.


stages?SoftwareDuring the post-production phase of my media product, I had to utilise various software in order to complete different elements within my media product. I used the following:

• Adobe Premiere - This was the main piece of software that was used as the foundation for the entire project. This is due to the fact that it was used to assemble all the various clips and place them into specific sequences in order to deliver an engaging media product. I was very pleased with its ability to manipulate the colours in a frame by adjusting the levels of certain colour; this tool allowed me to gain the specific colour palettes I envisioned.

• Adobe Audition – This software was used to aid the sound mixing and editing for the film, it was used to mix the film’s; score, sound effects as well as to manipulate one character’s voice in order to create a low pitched voice.

• Adobe Photoshop – This was a significantly useful tools as it helped me to produce both my ancillary texts. Photoshop was used to edit and merge images as well as texts; this was most useful when it came to assembling my film review and poster. Within this software, it also allowed me ability to further adjust my content through the addition of graphics as it organises it through individual layers; having full control over the elements to produce the image I desired.

• Survey Monkey – During the evaluation stage, this was a pivotal tool as it allowed me to produce a survey regarding my media product. Due to the connectivity of the internet, I was able to gain responses at a rapid rate. Not only did it allow for me to produce it but also represent the data gathered and allow me to analyse them through various graphs.

Throughout this entire project, I have seen a great deal of progress with my skills regarding the different areas of producing this media product.

Pre-ProductionAs I was developing the project, I found that my skills regarding research and planning has progressed significantly as a film-maker as I have worked on media products outside of media as well as my AS project. Developing on areas regarding planning : shooting schedules, equipment, script breakdowns. All of these particular tasks during pre-production, aided me as the film-maker to confidently understand what it is I will need to execute my vision to the best possible outcome.

Principle PhotographyBased from my experience with creating media content; as a director my skills of collaborating with my cast and crew but most particularly communicating with my actors as to what my vision is, this has improved as not only I do understand the script and have a clear visionWhich ultimately makes it easy to tell my cast and crew exactly what I intend for them to do. I also have learned how to communicate to them, based of my experience I have learned to be more direct and firm with my directions but whilst remaining open to suggestions; this ultimately allowed for me as a director to seem clear on my objective but also be collaborative with my crew.

Post-ProductionIn regards to the editing phase of constructing my project, I have learned as an editor to understand the impact every decision I make regarding the sequences of my shots to the places I cut the scenes ultimately influence my audience’s perception of my product. In addition to this, I found it extremely helpful and insightful collaborating with my media teacher; acting as a form of producers on my project consulting me regarding their opinions on initial edits a of my product. Ultimately these skills have progressed to widen my perspective on how to ensure that the edit of my project reflects both my vision and my intentions towards the audience’s engagement to the content.


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Future AspirationsNow that my media product has now been completed, regarding my future aspirations for both myself as a film-maker and for "A Lost Soul" is to firstly enter my media product into short film festivals such as BFI, Cannes and Sundance. From these film festivals, my product will be able to reach a much broader audience which could benefit from the word of mouth; this could then lead to excelling my career by potentially gaining recognition from studio executives and producers in order to then gain funding to produce a feature film based on the short film "A Lost Soul“.

As for other future aspirations I have as a director, if I were to be granted the opportunity to revisit the material of “A Lost Soul” within a feature film; I would like to expand on the world within the story by increasing the visual scope of the film through the IMAX experience. If the studio granted my project an IMAX release, I would then be able to edit the sequences and the sound mix accordingly ensuring that my film will certainly be able to offer the audience the best possible way to be fully immersed within my story through the large format and extensive sound system that IMAX theatres can provide.


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Date post:	18-Jan-2017
Category:	Education
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A2 media evaluation

Education