Nobody Final Evaluation Finished

8/7/2019 Nobody Final Evaluation Finished

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NobodyNobodyFinal EvaluationFinal Evaluation By Toby LloydBy Toby Lloyd


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In what ways does your media

product use, develop orchallenge forms andconventions of real mediaproducts?


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Narrative TheoryNarrative Theories are ideas, similar to conventions, that media texts apply in order to put acertain message across. A narrative theory that my film applies is Propp s idea of there being

certain character types in every film. Our film has the classic hero, princess, donor and villain.However our film subverts this narrative theory in a way, as the hero in our film is also the princessand the donor is also the villain. Due to the nature of our film this was necessary and as we havethis subversion is adds to the effect and confusion of our film. This does not happen in many realmedia products, however a loose example comes from films when someone who is originallyviewed as an ally changes sides, this happens in many films a recent one of these is Indiana Jones:And the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Another narrative theory that we applied in our film is Levi-Strauss s idea of Binary Opposites, thisis the idea that inside media texts there are always opposites, for instance earth and space or goodand evil. In our film it is primarily a representation of good and evil. The character that alwayslooms in the shade and hides his face with his hood is the representation of evil, whereas thecharacter who still has his face covered by hair usually is the good character. This representation iscrucial to our films narrative.

So we have both applied and subverted classical narrative theories in our film. By doing this we willhave made our film more accessible to people as it has a general feel to it with the narrativetheories applied. However as we challenged and subverted one of the theories it allows for a morepersonal and confusing feel. This is what we aimed to do achieve with our film. This shows thatnarrative is essential to films, all films have a narrative structure and thus this is one of the mostessential principles we had to include, all films have at least one theory and this is Todrov s Theory

of Equilibrium, this is an essential idea which basically states that all media texts have a beginning, amiddle and an end. This was an essential narrative theory to follow as most real media products do.


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IntertextualityIntertextuality is the idea that people bring in their own experiences with what ever media textthey are viewing. So basically, people use other media texts in order to find meaning in the onethat they are watching at the time. This is similar to Barthes idea of negotiating the meaning of media texts.

My film features intertextuality in the sense that we have used teenage actors. Theseactors will enable people external to the film the ability to relate to the action, by doing this wecan play on the empathy factor for the characters, this will relate in a better reaction at the endof the film. This technique is used by many films in the film industry, the Thriller directed byChristopher Nolan T he Prestige used characters that could be related to very easily, while theactors were well known they were scripted and dressed in a way that was different to theirnormal selves or other films and thus this technique is effective. Our film doesn t do exactly thisas we are using the actors in their typical dress however the audience viewing the film will takefrom their past experiences and judge the characters in accordance to these.

However there is a problem with intertextuality to a degree, the people who know theactors in the film will see the characters and use their experiences with the actors to governtheir ideas of the action in the film; this is flawed as they will be using a relationship that is not

the character in the film and thus the representation we have wished to give may not comeacross.Moreover an audience that views the film without knowing the actors would be much

more successful and this is why big screen films maybe supply much more intertextuality. We donot know the actors personally and therefore find building relationships with the characterseasy. Another example of this can be seen in the fact when we see actors in one film and then ina completely different film we find it hard to relate to that character, however in films such as

This Is England , directed by Shane Meadows, most of the actors had not been seen before onthe big screen; this allowed for the audience to create relationships with the characters.


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Establishing ShotThe typical conventions of establishing shots in films are slow pan shots to give an idea of where the

film is located, additionally they usually show scenery or something that isn t particularlyspectacular.

However in Thrillers, non-linear structures to films are used and establishing shots can be importantscenes from the film. A perfect example of this is in Christopher Nolan s Inception , this film startswith waves crashing as the camera slowly pans. These shots link to the end of the film and areplaced at the beginning in order to confuse the audience, also when the film catches up with thisscene the message is made clear. Because the shot is placed at the beginning it causes theaudience to think straight from the beginning.

The establishing shot in our piece was a scene from the end of our film, alike to Inception . This showspaper flying down a street, we do not pan the camera, thus it subverts the conventions I haveobserved. However I believe the steady shot adds effect to the shot. There is the sound of rustlingpaper that gets louder until the scene fades into the opening titles, this sound builds tension,this is a convention of establishing shots from our chosen genre.

So, our establishing shot subverts conventions of general films, however it does apply the forms

and conventions of our genre. There are manyexamples of this non-linear structure and wefollowed this convention in order to add effect.

The mise-n-scene of the shot is very bleak, welowered the saturation a convention we applieddue to the depressive theme of our film. This

convention can also be seen in films such as T heBook Of Eli .


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Scene 1The primary convention I have observed for the first scene is to introduce the main character. Our main

character is introduced straight away in the second shot, with the use of a close up of his face. Ashe is the first character shown on screen one would assume that he is the main character. We havetherefore applied the convention to our work. An example of this convention can be seen in thefilm Inception; the establishing shot is of waves crashing, this is similar to ours as I mentioned onthe previous slide. The camera then pans to a close up of Leonardo DeCaprio s face. The use of aclose up is how we introduced our main character.

In the shot the camera is held still as most shots are in our film, we did this as this is a convention of most films. The camera is steady, maybe with a slight zoom or pan which we haven t incorporated.However we have still applied the convention of a still camera.

The shot is framed so the main character is to the side to instantly symbolise he is separated fromsociety, the following shot in this scene is of a bus going past as he has got on it, this then cuts to ashot of him on the bus, whilst on the bus there are two shots of him, one from the side one fromthe front. With both these shots the character is facing away from the camera so his face isslightly obscured by his long hair, this is aconvention we have applied. There is a voice overon the bus where the main character speaksdirectly to the audience. Talking directly to theaudience is a convention of Psychological Thrillers.

The shot features a bleak setting, the lighting was maybetoo bright for our film however we could not filmon another day; I changed the lighting effect whileediting in order to try and make the mise-en-scenebleaker than the original shot.


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Jump Cut SceneThis scene was used to emphasise how excluded from society our main character is. The scene

features two other actors who are talking to each other while the main character walks aroundthem. The shot is held still until the main character gets to the edge when there is a series of jumpcuts, while the camera pans, this follows the main character to a seat at the back of the room. Theuse of jump cuts is heavily used in film to show time passing and thus this is a convention we haveapplied. However in our film we flash to black between our jump cuts and this syncs to musicplaying. This therefore has more of a music video feel, we therefore slightly subvert the typicalconventions of films, we added the black flashes to add effect and make the film more visuallystriking.

The mise-n-scene is once again bleak, the saturation is turned down again in order to emphasise thedark mood of the film. The shot is framed so that the main character is at the other end of theshot to the other actors, this is once again used to represent his separation from society. Thistechnique is used in many films, we have therefore applied another convention of the industry.

The music we have used is a dance track it has a mysterious tone to it, we used this as it creates a niceeffect with the atmosphere. As I mentioned abovewe synced jump cuts to the track playing we didthis as it created a dramatic effect. The use of music like this and syncing it to jump cuts isprimarily seen in music videos, however it is seenin films but not often. We therefore subvert theconvention slightly as it is not a commonoccurrence in film.


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Over The Shoulder Shot ClassroomThis is one of the most key shots in our film, the use of an over the shoulder shot to introduce the other main

character. Firstly we were going to use this shot and then zoom it towards the dark character toemphasise the importance, but we decided against this. Over the shoulder shots are used in films tomake it seem like the audience are more involved with the action, another way of doing this is throughusing a point of view shot. We decided against the use of a point of view shot because we felt the overthe shoulder shot was more dramatic. The way we have used this over the shoulder shot applies theconventions that I have mentioned above. Examples of shots like this can be seen in real media productsin most TV dramas. And additionally in films in order to give the audience the sense that they are beingincluded in the action as mentioned above, this shot type would therefore be a key feature of our chosengenre Thrillers as it will help build tension and keep the audience involved.

The mise-n-scene is once again bleak and how we have framed the shot the main character is at one sidewith the dark figure at the other side. How we involve this shot into our piece marks the moment, as youdon t see that part of the room until the main character leaves. This is an essential part of the film and I believe we put this across by applying the conventions of over the shoulder shots. The lighting ispurposely above the dark figure so his face is obscured by the hood he is wearing, the fact his face iscovered is played on through the whole film. The lighting in the scene is similar to most of the lighting inthe rest of our film, it is naturalistic, coming fromthe lights inside the classroom. This is done inorder to represent where the film is being shot.

During this shot there is music playing in thebackground, this is the music featured in thejump cut scene, however it is slowly fading out.We could have possibly incorporated a voice overof the main characters thoughts during this shotin order to explain the shot better.


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Flashback SceneIn this shot as there were just the two of us filming and acting clever camera

work was involved. This scene sees the main character (front of shot)walking from the doors to where he is positioned now. In this shot the

dark figure had to appear behind main character as he turned round thecorner, as there was just the two of us this was pretty difficult to carryout, but we managed it; through the placement of flashbacks to split upthe scene.

This shot is once again held still on a tripod, following the conventions of film. The shot is framed so the maincharacter obscures the whole centre of the shot until he moves to the side, (which can be seen right). The mise-en-scene as with the rest of the film is bleak, this is done to represent the depressive nature of the film, thesaturation is turned down to further emphasise this effect.

The music throughout this scene is in a minor key and used to add effect, there is no dialogue or diegetic sound,through scenes like this our film uses conventions of music videos very strongly, we used a lack of diegetic soundsand dialogue to show how our main character was very different to the rest of society. So, this scene is verysimilar to something out of music videos, additionally shots like this are used frequently in horror movies in orderto build tension.

For the flashback we used a dip to white to represent the transfer into theflashback, this is a convention of film. The original flashback that we had

in our film was edited to have a glow effect, we this is seen in many filmsto represent the idea of a flashback, this however is not seen in filmsaimed at an older target audience, or films in our chosen genre. Wetherefore subverted the general convention and applied the onerelevant to out film. In the flashback the camera is held still on a tripod,the flashback is the show the main character receiving a reward forEnglish creative writing.

There is a sound effect of clapping to represent the fact he is at an awards evening, there is also a song going on in thebackground. This song is in a minor key to emphasise the depressive nature of the film. The use of flashbacks arealso very common in psychological thrillers as they extend the story and add to the psychotic feel of the film.


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Bus SceneThis scene shows how the main character and dark figure start seeing more of each other, I edited this

scene so there are jump cuts with the main character wearing different clothes after each cut. I originally intended the scene to be similar to the scene in Spiderman when Peter Parker isdesigning the suit, this however did not happen. Jump cuts are widely used to show time passing,therefore the way I have used them applies the conventions of film. The use of shots throughoutthe scene are mainly close ups of the main character, however there is one close up of the darkcharacter and the long shot shown below. This shot is framed so they are at different sides of theshot. Both characters are facing away from the camera, this symbolises there distance fromsociety, the dark characters face is once again covered up by the hood.

Over the top of this scene there is music playing that my partner composed on GarageBand, this is

piano music with a slow tempo and in a minor key, this is meant to emphasise the depressivemood of the scene and add dramatic effect when you see the dark character on shot. The way weshot it gives the viewer the idea that the dark character had been there the whole time, he wasjust hidden. This gives the impression that the dark character is always present, thus adding to hisenigmatic character.

The mise-en-scene of the shots is very bleak, thecolours are dim and the atmosphere of the shot

is dark in order to represent the depressivetheme of our film. The lighting is naturalistic, itis coming through the window, this casts ashadow on one half of the characters faceadding to their enigmatic identities.


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Second Person Comes and Paper FoundThis scene features an additional actor and is used to emphasise

the main characters separation from society. The shots usedthroughout this scene are primarily long shots showing bothof the characters, this is done so you can see the other actorsreaction to the main characters behaviour, this is the firstscene there are the use of pans, we have done this to widenour shot use and make our piece look more effective. Theshot used here, is from a high angle, earlier on in the pieceyou see the dark character stood where the angle of this shot is, and thus this is meant torepresent his view point and give the representation of him constantly looking down on the main

character. We have followed the conventions of film through the use of steady shots, duringconversation between the two characters we have incorporated such principles as the 180 rule.

The lighting is naturalistic and the mise-en-scene as with the rest of the film is very bleak. However inthis scene as there is the other character some extra colour is injected as they are wearingbrighter clothes, this represents how different he is to the main character.

This shot is in the following scene to the one above, the main character finds a small piece of paper

that is essential for the rest of the film. He does not read itand quickly places it in his pocket as he realises the part of hisstory he was stuck on has been finished. When editing thisshot I put it in slow motion in order to mark the moment, thisis a convention seen in many films. Another way I tried torepresent the importance of this shot is the fact it is a closeup. This will mean the audience are solely concentrating onthat piece of paper. The use of close ups like this is animportant convention of film.


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Dark Room SceneThis is the most key scene in our whole film, it is where the dark character can be understood;

throughout the whole film we purposefully made him strange in order to keep the audienceguessing. The shots in the scene are a mixture of long shots (seen below) and medium close ups of both the characters. The shot below is framed so that the characters are positioned on oppositesides of the screen. This paired with the dialogue shows how the main character is distancinghimself as he is confused. Through the dialogue in this scene we applied the principle of the 180rule. I believe the exceedingly bleak mise-en-scene further emphasises the mood of the film andas this scene is significantly darker than any other adds an extra focus on this scenes importance.Through the use of bleak mise-en-scene and the framing of our shots I believe we have followedthe conventions of thrillers, shots like these are scene and the shadows in the scene add to the

tension being created.


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Split ShotThis split shot has been remarked as the most key shot in our whole piece. This shot happens with the

realisation that the dark figure is actually in the main characters mind. We decided to do a splitshot as seen below to represent the fact that his personality is split into another person. Theaudience does not know yet that that dark character is in the main characters mind and wouldtherefore be confused, it is in the shot after next that everything is made clear. The use of a splitshot like this, I cannot say I have ever seen in a film. It is similar to what is seen in the televisionseries 24 , but we used it in a different way. Therefore we have subverted typical conventions of film, however I would say that through subverting the conventions we have made our film muchmore individual and visually dramatic. Through having two shots running at the same time itextends the story at a quicker pace, it may be confusing as there is a lot to take in, but this is the

idea of the film. I therefore believe that this shot is one of the most key in our whole film.The mise-en-scene is extremely bleak, we searched for a location that would be reasonable to shoot

this as we needed a dark room, we then closed all the blinds but one in order to cast shadows. Thedark character has his face completely covered for the first time in the film; he is completely inshadow. For the main character we used an over the shoulder shot while he goes through his storyto find the dark characters message. This shotof the main character is similar to one of Ewan

McGregor in T he Ghost Writer . We thereforeapplied conventions of film.

Throughout the shots leading up to this one there wasmusic playing in order to convey the fact that thisscene is a pivotal moment in the film. According toTodrov s Equilibrium theory it is the disruption.


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Two Main CharactersThis shot took the most time to edit out of any in the film, it shows two main characters, and to carry

this out I had to research tutorials on the internet on how to do this. The shot, I believe is veryeffective. How the scene is structured this shot is shown before the information is shown to theaudience, therefore the audience will be questioning what is going on only to be told in thefollowing shot. I believe how we structured this is clever, as it keeps the audience guessing forlonger and thus holds their interest longer.

The shot is framed so the two characters are sat at opposite ends of the shot, a running theme in ourwhole film, the copy of the main character on the left is sat in the same position as the darkcharacter is at the beginning of the scene. Prior to the shot above you see the dark character takedown his hood. There are only two times where the dark character is seen with his hood down

and both times he looks like the main character. I believe this is extremely effective and shows theaudience what we intended. Additionally this shot s mise-en-scene is very bleak, the saturation aswith the rest of the film is turned down and as the room is a blue colour it is very bland. The shotis messy with chairs and tables cluttered to show the school location and this additionallyrepresents how confusing the film is and the disruption of the scene.

I have not seen shots like this be used in any films, butI have seen it happen in music videos which areusing issues such as this. I believe this shot is veryvisually impressive because of the cloningtechnique as it is something that is not widelyobserved in films. This scene had music runningthrough it, as the music reaches a crescendo thereis the diegetic sound of laughter from the darkcharacter on the left had side of the shot. Thislaugh represents the dark characters mockery as

the main character finally finds out who the darkcharacter really is.


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Main Characters Stood Face to FaceThis is one of the last shots in our film. It shows the two characters stood face to face and a car

between them driving up the road. I believe this shot is very visually striking, we framed it usingthe running theme of the two characters at opposite ends of the shot, additionally there is thepath between them, this almost acts as a divide showing how their companionship is over.

We had to reshoot this scene multiple times as we didn t get it right, that is why it is slightly brighterthan the rest of the film. The mise-en-scene is therefore slightly brighter than other scenes whichwas partly unintentional and would have been better if we had shot the scene on an overcast day,however I think it is bleak enough and with the saturation turned down colour is drained out andtherefore the scene seems bleaker than it is. This desaturising is something we have applied allthroughout our film.

As the main character is walking into the road there is a song playing in the background in a minor key.The main character then runs off shot to the right and the car follows him- this is paired with thediegetic sound of the car passing, the dark figure then fades and the shot cuts to black. This cut toblack is meant to convey the fact the main character got hit by the car. When editing this I thoughtit best to leave out the sound of breaks squeaking and a thud as this seemed very clich andruined the effect the music has. This therefore subverts conventions of film as there wouldnormally be a thus to convey someone being hit, I don t think our film needs it and it would spoilthe effect it has on the audience.

The camera all throughout this scene is held still, there is onecut in this scene, and this is when the car goes past. Wedecided to keep this as one flowing shot so that the fulleffect of the cloning technique came across to the audience.I believe this lack of cuts, while it doesn t show a wide varietyit does show our skill with narrative as we manage to holdaudience attention through a long shot. I would say that this

subverts typical shots in real media products, however myaudience feedback suggests it works.


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Characterisation- Main CharacterThis is the main character in our film, he is seen as an outcast.

Throughout the whole film you see him talk to two people avoidsocial interaction at all costs. In the third scene where there aretwo fellow classmates in a class as he walks in you can see himspecifically choose to talk around them and sit in a corner. It is notexplained why he is outcast but left to the audiences imagination.

Throughout the film you see the main character gettingprogressively closer to another person, and you assume

that they have made friends, but there is more to thisother person than meets the eye.I played this character as I have the darker hair and wedecided to go against what people would think. Wesubverted conventions in the sense that lighter things

usually represent purity and the actor with lighter hairplayed the darker character. I believe that this iseffective and strengthens our films individuality.In order to make the audience connect with theexperience of the character we presented him at asimilar age and look as people who may be

experiencing the problems we address.


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Ancillary Task- Poster

-Actor names at the top.

I followed variousconventions forthis task, they arelisted below:

-Main characters present.

-Credits at the bottom.

-Title at the bottom.

-Dark character hanging overmain characters shoulder to givethe feeling he is always there.

- The Ghost Writerposter shows a scenefrom the film whereasI used a blackbackground.

However I alsosubverted someconventions:

- The Ghost Writerfeatures a bleedingimage, I chose not to

use this.


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How effective is the

combination of your mainproduct and ancillary texts ?


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Film PosterThe main aim for my film poster was to advertise the film, using symbolism to show the features of my film. I carried this

out in many ways. Firstly I used the primary colours red, white and black- this is also consistent with my double pagespread. The use of these colours meant the article was very simplistic and purposefully bleak. I used the colour redonce and this was for the title, as the title uses the most eye-catching colour present it instantly stands out and drawsthe viewer in.

Through my research of film posters I found that they nearly all feature tag-lines and they are predominantly placed in themiddle of the page. The actor names are always at the top and the film credits at the bottom, with the title usuallyslightly above them. I applied these conventions to my poster. My poster features to main images, these show themain character and the dark character out of my film, the dark character is hanging over the main charactersshoulder to symbolise how he is in the film. Out of these two pictures only one of the characters is looking out at theviewer, this is the dark character, as his gaze is facing directly out it could intimidate the viewer and draw them in, themain character is looking upwards, almost in the direction of the dark character which could give the impression herelies on the dark character. Between them is the tag-line Do you know what it feels like to be a nobody? This isalso the first line in the film, and thus adds effect if the viewer does end up seeing the film. The pictures I saw on filmposters when doing my research nearly all bled to the edge of the page, mine don t do this. As they don t bleed thisis a convention that I have subverted the convention however I believe that this was a good decision as it emphasisesthe difference of the characters in my film and represents their separation from society. Additionally nearly all theposters had a background from the film, I did not believe this was necessary as a black background symbolised the

depressing nature of my film.It also shows how the characters are pushed out from society; the lack of a backgroundshows that they have no attachment to their surroundings. Finally is could also convey that they are intricate,

confusing people- that literally have no background.The font I used on my article is all the same apart from the title which uses a different text, this is to make it stand out on

the page. Through my research of film posters I found that this was typical to them, I have therefore applied anotherconvention to my work.


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Film Poster Progression

I created a basic layout for my film poster,I edited a photo from the photo shoot of the dark character and placed him in thecorner (seen above) I created the creditsand placed the title and tagline in theirplace. I just needed to add the picture of

the main character.

This is the second draft of myposter, I have added the second

picture and edited it. There is aslight white glow around theoutside of the main character, thisis intentional, but I edited it out inthe final draft. I moved thetag-line to the side in order to fillin dead space. I however movethis by my final draft as where is

positioned at the moment doesnot work very effectively as youcan t see it very clearly. I justifythe text to the left rather than thecentre on my final draft so itstands out better and finally I move the picture of the maincharacter, as where he is

positioned currently, his whitetop makes the credits hard to read. I also need to change thepicture of the dark person as not enough of him is showing andwhere the picture is positioned on the page his head covers up thewhite writing at the top.


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Final Film PosterThis is my final film poster. I have followed the conventions of real media

products that I saw through my research, I have added the actornames at the top of the poster, this is a convention of all film postersthat I found another convention is the tag-line. I have placed this inthe middle I did this as I believe this is the most effective location forit on the page. When editing the photos for this made both of themfade out at the bottom, so they fade into the title at the bottom of thepage. In the last draft on the previous slide the main character had awhite glow around the outside of him, in this version I have edited outthis glow as it does not look very professional.

What I like about my poster is the fact that it has a fairly basic layout, I believe that this is really effective in accordance to the context of thefilm and what is seen in the film. I like the red title, against the blackand white colours that are featured on the poster, as this causes thetitle to stand out much better. Another part of my poster that I like isthe credits at the bottom, while I don t really like the justification of

themI

believe that they are more or less the same as those seen on a professional poster. Because of thisI think that they add a professional effect to my poster. As well as the tag-line that I mentioned above, there is

an advertising grab-line at the bottom right had side of the page, I like how this follows on from the tag-lineas it follows on it adds an extra depth to the poster.


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Film Poster ChangesFor my film poster I carried out extensive research of posters from a similar genre to my film. However if I was to

make a poster again I would research a broader spectrum of posters so I could get a wider range of ideas. If I was to change my poster I would add a background- possibly a shot from the last scene of our film. By havinga shot from the film on the poster the audience will know when they get to that scene in the film somethingimportant is about to happen. Also having scenes from the film in the background is a convention of filmposters, I chose to subvert this when making my poster but now I would follow it if given the opportunity toremake my poster.

A second change I would make with the poster is the photos. Firstly the position; my first draft in the previousslide showed the tagline in the centre of the poster and the dark character in the corner, if I could remake theposter I would keep this layout as I believe it is much more effective. However when I took the photos for myposter I did not get a good photo of myself (the main character) at a certain angle to keep the layout how I wished. An additional change I would make with the photos is having both characters looking out as the gazeof people on posters is an essential part of drawing the potential viewer in. In the photos I use one of thecharacters is looking out at the audience, I believe that it would be more effective if both of them were.

A final change I would make is the layout of the title and the credits. During the production of my poster I playedaround with their justification on the page. I came to the conclusion that the left justification was the bestplace for them, as this is similar to a book- you read from left to right, and our film features a book. However

looking over my poster not it is finished I think it would have been a better use of space if I had placed thetitles at a central justification.

So, overall I would change the pictures layout, the background behind the pictures and finally the justification of the title and credits at the bottom. What I wouldn t change is the position of the actors names at the top.


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Double Page SpreadMy main aim of the article was to give the people who read it an idea of what the film was about and give an insight into

the lives of the directors, I believe I achieved this through the part about a day on set and also the small part aboutthe film premier.

In order to create this I researched many professional double page spreads, I did this in order to find typical conventions of them. I compared various different articles in order to get an idea of what I would like my double page spread to belike. Did I want it to be an informal, less serious magazine? Or have a much more serious and adult feel. Due to themore grown up issues seen in my film I decided to have a more adult presentation, with friendly language so thereader can find their way through the article with ease. This is a technique I saw through my research. Whilstresearching film review articles, I also looked at game reviews as they have a similar layout, I looked at the differencesbetween the two layouts and concluded that the game review article had a more informal layout, thus I decided tofollow the conventions of magazines such as Empire . My double page spread had the white border on the outside,this was to give the article a more professional feel, when researching articles on Google Images , I saw examples of other student articles, not many of these had a very professional feel or the sense that they belonged to a realmagazine. I then realised not many of them featured the border on the outside, this border adds the effect that thearticle is from a magazine and not just a stand alone.

My original intention for the article was to use a large amount of text to use up the space, this however did not happen, I decided against lots of text due to the nature of my film. My film does not have much speech in it, the main story lineis put across through the shots, thus I thought the article should convey this minimalistic approach to language. Mydouble page spread therefore has multiple images on it. This is a convention observed in music magazines and lesserfilm reviews, however I believe it is better suited to my article. These images are a mixture between production shotsand also shots of the characters in our film. These pictures represent the content in the article, as it is roughly half about the day on set and half on the premier of the film. The colours on my article are all primary colours, red, whiteand black. I used these colours because of the depressing nature of my film- they all have dark connotations. Red isonly used three times; this use of red makes the article more interesting and as the rest of it uses such bland coloursthe contrast between the colour draws the reader in.


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Double Page Spread Progression

To begin with on my double page spread I created the border that I had observed throughmy research. Secondly I added the white line inthe centre- representing the fold of the page.Once I had done this I added the name of themagazine and the page numbers- I additionallyadded the review tab at the top of the page.Finally I added the two photos I was planning onusing, and I was left with a basic layout for mydouble page spread. I was planning on just usingthese two photographs and making the largerpicture slightly smaller so I could get text belowit. I then thought against this adding morepicture in my second draft

This is my second draft. I was originally going to use thisas my final production piece. But through audienceresearch I was given the advice that there was too littletext on it for a double page spread. The whole right handside is dominated by pictures, and there is the tag-lineplaced on the big picture. This goes over the centre fold,my audience feedback also showed me that I shouldrethink this and place it either side of the fold otherwiseit would be difficult to read unless this spread was in themiddle of the magazine. The text on the article is aninterview with the directors, I originally thought that thelayout I used for this looked good, however looking overit again it looked very messy and my audience feedbackdepicted that I should change it. As my magazine ismeant to be aiming at a more adult target audience, I

should therefore structure the article neatly.


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Final Double Page SpreadThis is my final double page spread, I feel I

followed the conventions of magazinesto a degree, while subverting some.

So, for my this production piece I have placeda large amount of text on the left handpage., whilst the right hand page ismainly dominated by pictures. The colourof the text that I have used is whiteprimarily, I have also used red for certainimportant parts of the magazine. This

colour scheme is consistent with my filmposter.

The font is consistent throughout the spreadand also with my film poster. Thenarrative of my article is mainly a reviewof the film, however there is also a brief interview with the directors.

As mentioned earlier the double page spread has a large amount of images on the right hand side. This is not aconvention of film magazines and I chose to subvert this due to the lack of speech in my film, I thought itwould be clever symbolism and link the film and the spread together nicely. To add effect and fill up deadspace, I used a grab-line on one of these pictures; as this is the only text on the page apart from the brief interview, the reader would be interested to find out what the whole article was about. This layout thereforeentices the reader to look at the other page.


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Double Page Spread ChangesFor my double page spread I would change the layout of the text, nearly all articles have columns for the text. I

did not use columns this is one convention I didn t follow that I should have. If I had used columns then I would have been able to fit more text into the article. Another point is that the text I used is quite big and it isalso in bold, this is never seen in real magazine articles so I would change this in order to give my article amore professional feel. A second change to the text I would make is a better text to picture ratio, the majorityof my article is covered in pictures and because of this gives the impression I was being lazy. There is a reasonfor this as my film has a small amount of language I thought it would be clever to represent that in an article,using a small amount of text as the majority of my film is through shots. This however doesn t really work in areview article as that is text based.

Another change I would make is having a bigger interview with the directors and asking questions that flowedbetter, how I used the interview in my article makes it seem like I used it just to fill in dead space, which I didn t. I would therefore like to change the size of the text- making it bigger, and adding more questions toextend the interview and link this back to the main article. This change would involve editing the layout of thepictures as the extra space would have to come from somewhere. If I had to change the layout of the picturesI would make the large picture slightly smaller, and I would remove two of the smaller pictures in order tofree up space, this would allow for a column on the right hand side as well. If I could have a column on theright hand side and the pictures in the middle the text to picture ratio would be sorted.

A final change I would make is having a box around the Conclusion: A* part, and maybe a brief synopsis of whyit is such a good film, that way the reader could see that and if they like the sound of it, they can read therest of the article, and even if they don t like it they still come away with some knowledge of the film. This is askill used by professional journalists all the time, especially in newspapers. If I had incorporated that myreview may have looked more professional.


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What have you learned from

your audience feedback ?


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FilmFor our film we received largely positive feedback from our research. We used a questionnaire and gave it to our

media class in order to gain an idea of how they felt towards our film. The last question was orientatedaround changes, we used this section of the questionnaire to address any issues that the people saw. Themain issue surrounding our film was the fact that one of the actors was hard to hear, as soon as I received thisfeedback I corrected this and re-uploaded the film. Another problem that was highlighted was the fact thatthe film was difficult to understand. While this would initially seem like a hugely undermining issue with thefilm it isn t; our film is designed to be hard to understand, it is designed to get people thinking and as only asmall proportion of the overall feedback said it was hard to understand I would assume that was from peoplewho are not overly interested in the genre of the film. However because of this feedback we did change thelast few scenes around in order to allow for a better flowing film, the original location for the second to last

scene did not allow for as much freedom as the location we shot the final product in.Another way we have received feedback is through the social networking site YouTube. I linked my film on there

and asked people to supply critiques as to what they thought I should change. The main issue pointed outthrough this was the fact that the last scene didn t cut together properly and flow well with the rest of thefilm. This was a huge issue that I was aware of, through audience feedback and advice I was enabled toaddress this problem. A final way we gained audiencefeedback for the film was by asking people in real life,

this allowed for easy, free discussion and as it wasn tover the internet nothing got lost in translation. Usingthis method allowed for the most helpful feedback, itwas largely positive but suggested issues anddevelopment that helped my film get to the quality itis at now.


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Double Page Spread and PosterPosterMy poster generally received very positive feedback from my research. The people who I showed it to liked the simplicity

and the symbolism of the dark character constantly looking over the main characters shoulder. The audienceresearch I used for this piece was asking people face to face, this method was helpful as it allowed me to change theposter whilst they were watching allowing for more help. Once I had finished my first draft the main issue people hadwas that the main character had a white glow surrounding the outside of his body, I did this intentionally so makehim blend into the black background better; however looking at it now it did not follow conventions and looked like ithad been very badly edited. From this audience feedback I changed the picture, making the edges black and nowwhite. Additional audience feedback for my poster included where to place the tagline, I was unsure of the positionat first because the research I did into professional film posters predominantly showed the tagline in the middle of the page. I wanted to place my tagline in the middle of the page with the characters surrounding it. However fromthe shots I had of the characters this was not possible, I therefore had to rethink the layout. I gave people examplesof the position and asked them of there opinion (this predominantly happened over Windows Live Messenger, aninstant messaging service.) Once they had given their feedback I took there ideas into consideration and was left withtwo possible layouts, this included the final one, seen earlier and one with the tagline more central on several lines; I then asked someone in person and they helped me decided the final layout.

Double Page SpreadMy double page spread was well received in most cases, the reoccurring critique most people suggested was that it

needed more text as it was a text article and it was mainly pictures. This feedback enabled me to produce my finaldouble page spread, this copy had much more text on it, the people I spoke to said that I should keep roughly thesame layout but make the text smaller. I did keep a similar layout and made the text smaller, however I removed onepicture which allowed for more text. Another suggestion I was given was that the grab-line should not be placedgoing over the centre fold of the page; because unless the article was on the centre page it would not work properlyas it would be in the fold. Also looking at the conventions of double page spreads suggests that this is somethingwhich very rarely happens I therefore changed the location of the grab-line. I found the audience feedbackextremely helpful and I believe it allowed me to develop my double page spread very nicely, into the fairlyprofessional looking end product I have created.


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How did you use media

technologies in theconstruction , evaluation andresearch and planning stages ?


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Internet

The biggest use of technology I had was the use of the internet, while this is a technology I use every day itcannot be overlooked as one of the most essential parts of my media production. Using the internet enabledme to use a blog, the video sharing website YouTube, get audience feedback through social networking sitesand download the programs I required to make my film. Without the use of the internet I would have had toupload my film to a memory stick or CD in order for it to have been marked, which would have been much

less convenient. Additionally I would have had to print all of my research and planning off in order foreverything to be marked. I would ve also had to research everything offline, this would ve meant spending a

lot of money on physical copies of magazines.

In order to use the internet I had to use internet browsers, the two programs I used were Google Chrome,and the Apple Inc. program Safari. These programs are handy as they have an in built spell checker they are

therefore helpful for blogging.


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Wordpress

One of the technologies I used was the blogging site Wordpress. I used this in order to present my researchand planning for the film, poster and double page spread. I found this website very easy to use and

extremely customisable. I had previous experience with blogging websites such as Blogspot and Tumblr,when using these I found them to be exceedingly overcomplicated for what I needed them for. Using

Wordpress was much easier, it is easier to use and much quicker and more appropriate for the task at hand.

The benefit of using a blogging website to put all of our planning on is that it saves printing off everythingand creating a physical portfolio, using blogs saves time and allows for greater customisation. Another

benefit of using blogs is the benefit of being able to link from websites such as YouTube (as seen above.) Thisis a huge benefit as it means people can find the film much quicker. An additional plus is the ability to add

pictures, this means sketches and written ideas for the film can be placed on the blog with little hassle.Additionally it means JPEG files such as the poster and double page spread could be uploaded. Finally usinga blog is beneficial as it is on the internet, this means that it has a large amount of exposure, meaning there

is increased opportunity for audience feedback.


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Scribd

I used Scribd in collaboration with Wordpress, I used Scribd to upload PowerPoint presentations as this waseasier than writing out essays into Wordpress and this would have been the alternative. So obviously using

Scribd was beneficial as it saved a huge amount of time. Using Scribd also enabled me to have a wider rangeof media forms on my blog as it allowed me to avoid essays.

A benefit of using Scribd is that, like the blog it is on the internet which allows for people to give youfeedback about what you post. You can also link Scribd to Facebook allowing for even more exposure and

potential feedback. For my AS media course I used Scribd and thus already had an account when it came tothis year and using Scribd added some depth and range in the work on my blog meaning it wasn t just stacksof text. The exposure some of my presentations have received since last year is more than I could have evergot without using the internet, one of my posts has over 1000 reads. This shows that the exposure from this

media form is extremely advantageous.


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YouTube

Another technology I used is the well known video sharing website YouTube. This is an extremely goodwebsite to use in order to upload video as it gives your video huge exposure. I used YouTube to upload

mock-up shots, rough cuts and eventually my final film, the use of such a well renowned website means thatthe videos I uploaded received a large amount of views without any advertisement. Without YouTube I couldhave used another video sharing website, however this would not supply such a large audience as YouTube

is the most used and widely known and therefore I would not have received as much feedback.

Another benefit with YouTube is that you can link the videos to other places, for instance the videos fromYouTube that I uploaded, I linked to Facebook in order to get audience more audience feedback, without the

ability to do this audience feedback would have been harder to collect. Having the ability to do everythingdigitally means everything is done much quicker. One issue with YouTube is that the upload time for our

video was a good 4 hours meaning we had to wait a very long time, in total after exporting and uploadingour video almost 6 hours had passed, so in order to upload our video we needed more or less a whole day.

This is an issue that can t be fixed in the short term and would be helped by quicker internet.


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iMovie

This is an Apple Inc. program, we originally used this to edit our film. The program allowed use to cut downclips and place them in the order we liked, additionally it allowed us to add titles and transitions to the film,

this allowed our film to look more professional. We uploaded onto the computer from our digital camerathrough the use of a cable which is a way how media has converged throughout our production. This

program was helpful to start off the editing of our film, however for the effect that we needed it was notadept enough. I had never used this program before and therefore had to extend my skills. The programtook some getting used to but I did have past experience video editing before, thus it was easier to grasp

how to use.

We were originally planning on making our whole film on iMovie, however we only ended up using it toproduce mock-up shots and rough cuts. This was because we did not have access to the program at all times

as the Apple Mac s were at school. Additionally our film took up a very large amount of space and thedrivers at school could not hold all of the files. Due to the fact that we couldn t do this I had to find another

program to use.


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Premier Pro CS5

After using iMovie as I mentioned before I had to search for different way of editing my film. To do this I found the Adobe product Premier Pro CS5. As you have to pay for this program I downloaded a free trial, this

trial enabled me the time to edit the film, as this is an Adobe program it is to a very high, professionalstandard and thus enabled me to edit the video to a good standard. Additionally as I was using my computer

to do the editing there was enough space meaning the space issue from before was no longer an issue.

This program was very different from iMovie and I therefore had to develop even more skills. Also as this isan Adobe program I had to get used to the complications, Adobe products are very high quality however

they also have the issue of being hard to understand. I managed to grasp the program after a few hours of playing around, however I could not use it to a very good standard, I played around with the program

creating a few rough cuts and this allowed my skills to develop. Finally in some of the last scenes in mymedia there is a cloning effect, this meant there were two main characters in screen. In order to do this I

followed a tutorial on YouTube. Without this program this effect would have been possible to do on iMovie,however it would have been harder to create and other effects and the lack of an ability to edit precisely

meant using Premier Pro was much easier.


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Photoshop

Another technology I used was the photo editing program created by Adobe, Photoshop. I used this in orderto create my poster, and to create the basic layout of my double page spread. The skills I used to create this

were mainly developed last year on the AS course, I spent a large amount of my free time also playingaround with Photoshop editing photos and trying to see what the program can do. Because I did this using

the program this year was much easier. The reason I only created the basic layout of my double page spreadwith Photoshop is because it is not very good for the addition of text, for the rest of the article I used Adobe

InDesign. Without this program the editing of photos would have been a lot harder as far as I am awarethere are no other programs with the extensive features of Photoshop. I was able to edit photos and create

the layout of my poster, Photoshop was a huge help to my A2 media course.

The skills I developed using this program were just further emphasised from last year, the maindevelopment of my skills came from general layout of the poster and double page spread.


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Digital Video Camera

The camera I used was a Panasonic HDC-SD5,this camera records in HD to an SD card this SD card can thenbe placed in a computer to transfer media or this could take place over a cable. The camera has 10x optical

zoom which was very helpful for catching certain shots and throughout all this it is very compact. This meantme and my partner could carry the camera around looking for places to film with ease. Additionally as it was

just me and my partner working together and we had to act as well as film this camera was extremelyhelpful. This is because it has a digital live view window that pops out and can rotate, this meant we could

be on shot and see what is going on, this meant we could frame the shot properly whilst being on shot.

In order to take the images for my poster and double page spread me and my partner used his Cannon550D, this is an extremely powerful SLR camera with 18 megapixel quality and with the lens he had

equipped 12x optical zoom. This quality was extremely helpful as it allowed us to create our double pagespread and posters on A3 paper size and the pictures weren t pixelated. Using a camera with this qualitymeant that I had to develop my photography skills as pictures blur much easier on higher quality imagesbecause there are more pixels present. I did already have photography experience from AS and through

taking photos in my spare time, I did however have to stretch and develop this skill.

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