EVALUATION QUESTION 1

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

The name is reflecting the races that will happen in the film such as in the first part of our film opening, and so is reflective of the narrative.

I used illustrator to design the title and decided to use a black background and white text so that it would stand out more.

TITLESWe chose the name ‘First to fifth’ because the film is about racing and they are aiming to be first and when the car is in fifth gear it is going fast and is generally the top gear in many cars and would be used in race cars in a race.

The font we chose for the title is what we thought was conventional of car film as they usually have slanted writing to connote speed.

For example “Need for Speed’, ‘Fast and Furious’ and ‘Rush’ have slanted writing and in these films there are car races in the narrative which is reflected in the font of the titles.

The title in our film opening appears in a cross dissolve towards the end of the sound of the crash after the tension has been relieved and it would allow the audience to focus on the title.

CREDITS AND IDENTThe idents for film companies are either animated or a static picture. We decided to look at idents that were animated as we wanted to do an animated one for our film opening as we thought it would look more professional. We looked at Paramont Pictures, Warner Brothers and 20th Century Fox for ideas on how we could animate our ident.

We liked the idea of Paramount Pictuers using stars to create a circle. We used this idea to create a triangle made up of smaller triangles and we created it using powerpoint. We included the name of our production company as the ones we looked at for research all included the names rather than having just a logo.

The conventions of credits in the opening of films is to have the names in order of importance. I have looked at the opening credits of one of the fast and furious films to see how they have ordered it.

Name of the production company

Co production company name

Main actors

Name of person that cast the actors

Name of person that sourced the music

We used the name of our production company decided to make it a different colour to the rest of the credits. We chose red and white for the name of the production company as it was filmed at silverstone track and their colour scheme includes red as a main colour. We also changed the colour as this is an important credit and we wanted it to stand out.

The rest of the credits we chose to do in white but we kept the same font to keep it consistent.

We used a different font for the credits as to separate them form the title of the film. We made the writing slanted to keep the connotation of speed for the audience, like other motorsport films have done such as fast and furious.

We decided to to have the production companies before the scene with the car building up to the crash and no credits whilst the car was on the scree so that the audience could focus on the narrative.

CHARACTERSWe only had one character in our film opening so that the audiences’ focus would be on that one character who is the protagonist, and if the film was to be made, would be the main character. The focus is on this character and we do not show his face until the end so that the audience is interested and wants to find out who this person is.

The beginning of the film builds up to the crash and this is important as it establishes what the film is about. The crash is the main point of the film because the narrative is about his son and how he is carrying on with racing and doing what his father once did.

SETTINGS AND LOCATIONSThe conventional settings for a motorsport film is a race track and stands. For example in the film ‘Days of Thunder’ the opening of the film is made up of many establishing shots of the track and the stands. We also used some shots of the stands and track to set the scene and support the conventions of a motorsport film.

We originally planned to film the car scene on the race track but we later were told that we did not have access to this. We had access to the paddock only and this meant that it did not look like the car was on a track. Also on the filming day we only had twenty minutes with the car to get all the footage we needed and we did not get enough that was able to be used in post production. If we had longer we would have been able to get more useable footage.

We also planned to film the scene when the boy is getting ready in the pits to make it more conventional. For example in Days of Thunder’s opening credits there are shots of the cars in the pits which follows conventions of motorsport films.

We did not have access to the pits and had to film that scene in the changing rooms at school. We had to do more close up shots so that we did not have the lockers in the background in any of the shots. This meant that we could follow the typical conventions of motorsport films.

If I was to do this again I would have found another track location that would have allowed us to use the race track and the pits so that we could follow the typical conventions of motorsport films.

COSTUMEThe conventional costume in a motorsport film is a race suit and a helmet, and ‘Rush’ and ‘Days of Thunder’ include these conventions.

In these ‘Rush’ the protagonist and the antagonist are both wearing race gear and so it fits the conventional characters. We wanted to follow this convention of the race suit and helmet and so we sourced that costume.

We wanted to follow the typical conventions of motorsport films with our costume. We sourced a race suit, gloves and helmet for our actor to get dressed in and we wanted a blue suit to stereotype the male gender.

CAMERA WORKIn film openings at the beginning there are usually a few establishing shots to set the scene. In ‘Rush’, ‘Days of thunder’, and ‘Need for Speed’ there are one or two establishing shots of the conventional locations for a motorsport film. We have also included establishing shots of the track and the stands to set the scene

In the scene where the boy is getting ready we used close up shots to show the audience what he was doing and to construct questions for the audience about who this boy is. We also did not show the boy’s face until the end to create intrigue the audience and make them interested about this person is.

We used match on action to show the boy getting the gloves out of the bag to again create questions for the audience such as what is in the bag and then it is revealed when he pulls out the gloves. This sequence of shots also draws the attention of the audience to what he is doing.

We also used close up shots to show what the driver what the driver was doing in the car. We did this so that it would be more interesting for the audience rather than just shots of the car going past.

In ‘Fast and Furious’ they also used interior close up shots of the car .

EDITINGTo show that time had passed from the crash to when the boy is getting ready for his race we used a darker filter on the first scene with the car to show that that happened in the past. This is later confirmed when the commentators talk about the crash. Editing was used to piece together the narrative and we used mostly used cuts and cross dissolves to do this. The crash was at the beginning followed by the black screen which we had to have so that we could portray that there had been a crash without actually showing it as this would have been very difficult to film with the locations and props we had access to.

The second screen shot is brighter

In the film ‘Fast and Furious’ the opening begins with a car chase and they have used editing to put together a sequence of shots and have used a fast pace of editing.

They have done this to build up tension and suspense in the narrative and also to imply that there is energy and action happening.

We used this idea to create the feeling of energy and suspense for our audience.

The speed of editing for the film is quite quick as to build up tension and to emphasize the speed of the car. It is also fast in the scene when the boy is getting ready because it creates suspense and intrigues the audience.