MAIN Post 12.7: Question 7

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

From looking at my preliminary task and looking at my final opening sequence I feel I have learnt quite a lot and have been able to develop my skills sccessfully. In the preliminary task I didnt use very many different shot sizes or camera angles, for example we mainly used shot reverse shots as it was a conversation between two people. However in the opening sequence we decided to use a lot more variety and we filmed a lot more shot sizes and used more camera angles. For example we used some close ups to show the characters emotion and we also used some low angle shots.



This screenshot shows an example of one of the
low angle shots which we used in our opening
sequence.





This screenshot shows an example of one of the
close ups that we used.

 



















Another way in which I feel I have developed my skills is on the editing suites. I have used the suites previously for other tasks however this time I did a lot more and we used a lot more different tools. For example we brightened some of the shots as they were too dark to read the writing for one of our titles, and I hadn't done this before.




This screenshot shows some of the effects and
tools we used whilst editing our opening
sequence.



















Also I have learnt about expanding our first ideas. For example adding in titles which are not necessarily written in, for instance we used fridge magnets to write out one of our names. This we feel portrayed our genre more clearly to the audience and it was quite conventional within the romantic comedy genre to actually include the titles within the sequence.


This screenshot shows the fridge magnet shot.



MAIN Post 12.6: Question 6

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


These are some pictures of examples of some of the equipment we used during the pre-production, production and post-production stages of our opening sequence.












 

As we were filming outside of school grounds we all had to understand that we were fully responsible for all the equipment that we had with us. We all had previous experience and knowledge of using the camera and tripod safely and correctly from other previous media tasks we had done within the school. When it came to using the editing suites we all did have previous knowledge of how to use it however we did need some help and we each developed our skills throughout the editing process. We learnt skills like how to slow down and speed up clips and how to add the music over the top of the clip. Creating our focus group also helped us to develop our skills of the equipment further as we had never used a flip camera before so it was a new experience of learning how to use it properly and safely when filming each of our focus groups.


We also used many programmes to help us create our opening sequence. for example we used YouTube quite a lot. Without YouTube, we would have a lot of difficulty being able to watch our final sequence as well as all our focus groups and also we would not have been able to upload them onto our blogs. 

We also used Blogger. Without Blogger we would not have been able to save all our work onto one place. Blogger was where every piece of work we did in class relating to our project was uploaded. I think it was a good idea to use Blogger as it meant that all our work was on one place and it made it easier to edit and view all the work that we had done. 

Another programme we used was Google. We used Google to do all the research part and find images from other romantic comedy films. If we didn't have Google to do our research it would have taken a lot longer to find all the information we needed and we would not have been able to get some of the pictures that we needed.

We also used Microsoft Word. We used this programme to help us when writing up our work before we put it onto the blogger. Another Microsoft programme we used was Powerpoint. This helped us to save images and screenshots ad save them as JPeg files to put them on our blogs more easily. 

Another important programme which we used was DivX. This helped us when uploading our opening sequence to YouTube. Our opening sequence was too big a file to put onto YouTube so we used DivX to make it smaller so it could be on YouTube for us to watch and put on our blogs.

 

The last thing we used was unsignedbandweb.com. This website helped us to search and find uncopyrighted music. We were able to search and select specific genres of music which we wanted to find and were able t download them to our computer to listen and decide on them. This is where we found our first piece of music, which ended up being on our final opening sequence. If we didn't have this website we would have probably picked a song which would have been copyrighted, which we later found out we actually had as we didn't get it from this website.

MAIN Post 12.5: Question 5

How did you attract/address your audience?

In our opening sequence we used a range of ways of attracting audiences so we could try and attract a wider audience as possible. The whole of the opening sequence is an enigma as the audience will probably wonder where she is heading to and they will probably guess that she is running late so will want to find out whether she gets in trouble or what she is going to be late for.
This screen shot shows her running down the street, showing that she is obviously in a hurry to get to where she is going.

Another way we attracted our audiences was by the way we created our titles. For example we used a bangle to show the title L.O.V.E and we wrote the directors name on a piece of paper and put it in with the post the character ruffles through. We also used fridge magnets to write out another name.
This screenshot shows this.

To get an audience feedback on our opening sequence, we gathered 3 girls from the sixth form, they were all 16 and 17 years old, which was the lower end of our target audience. They all seemed to enjoy our opening sequence and I think they would have enjoyed to see the whole film.

From looking on the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) website and reading through their guidelines I would say that our film would probably be a 12A. I think this because we only have moderate language as she does swear at one point in the opening sequence. It has no sexual scenes, no horror, no drugs, no nudity, no violence, no drugs and no imitable behaviour. This rating would help attract our audience as they would know that it is a young and calm romantic comedy and and they will know that they can enjoy watching it, especially as older people watching like 20 year olds would know it would be alright to watch as it is a 12A.

MAIN Post 12.4: Question 4

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The main target audience we was aiming to approach with our film was women around the ages of mid-teens up to maybe early 30's. This is because our main character is a young female and so hopefully the majority of our audience would be able to relate to our character quite well. I think our target audience would probably be interested in fashion as our characters job is at a fashion magazine. Also it would be aimed at people who are generally interested and enjoy watching romantic comedy films. Also we are mainly aiming towards female audiences as generally males tend not to watch romantic comedies unless they are with their girlfriends.

This is the average kind of girl we would be aiming to target with our film. She is 20 years old, and has probably been to university or has got herself a job. She looks as if she could relate to our character and maybe she has a romance going on in her life which could help relate to the romance happening in the film.

At the other end of the scale of our target audience we would be aiming to attract women in their late 20's, early 30's. This picture here shows a typical woman which we would hope to attract with our film.



This woman is the older side of the audience which we would want our film to target. She looks like she has got quite a good job and looks as if she would be dressed quite smartly and take it seriously. She could also possibly be single, meaning she could relate to our main character as she is also single. This would also mean that this audience member would probably enjoy the romance side to the film. This woman probably lives in her own house.

MAIN Post 12.3: Question 3

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

The production company have quite a big role when it comes to making films. For example they are generally responsible for creating the funds for making the film and actually producing the film. Their role is to create the idea of the film, shoot all the footage and then edit the footage to create the finished film. The companies however, do usually have people in the crew who will specialise and help in things like writing the script and editing the footage together. They will then usually pass over to a ditribution company to help them promote and advertise their film.

There are many different ways in which the production company could raise the funds for creating and making a film. One way is that there are a number of charities which help to fund the production stage of new films. Also there is the option of going to the UK Film Council and apply or a fund. As well as these tw options there is the option that once the film has been finished you can take it and screen it at different film festivals, which could help to fund you some more.

If i was looking for a distribution company to distriute our film L.O.V.E I think i would choose SONY. I would choose this company because they are quite well known with the romantic comedy genre which we went for in our film. Also they have a wide range of products which could help increase our advertising and allow our film to reach a much wider audience than if we went with a different company. For example SONY have a big range of video games, so they could advertise our film within those games. Also they have converged with other big companies which would also help reach a wider audience. A couple of examples of films distributed by SONY are Just Go With It, Fun With Dick and Jane and Made of Honor.

However to be more realistic, as our film is a British film we thought another company which would be good to distribute our film would be Universal. Universal are a big company which covers many areas. This would help our film as it means that it could reach a wider audience meaning that more and more people could enjoy our film. It is also the second longest lasting Hollywood studio. This shows that they are a good company to have working on our film. Some films which Universal have distributed in the past include Billy Elliot, Meet The Parents, About A Boy and Love Actually.

MAIN Post 12.2: Question 2

 How does your media product represent particular social groups?

This screenshot shows our character dressed in her pyjamas.

 This screenshot shows our character dressed in her smart work clothes.




This is a screen grab of a comaparable character from a romantic-comedy.

This screengrab is from the film The Break Up, this is the main female character in the film.This relates to our character as she works for a fashion magazine and so her job is quite serious. She dresses quite smartly in high heels a skirt and blazer. This character here relates to our character as she is also dressed quite smartly in a shirt and a skirt and this shows that she also probably has quite a good job and takes it very seriously.

This screengrab is from the film In Her Shoes. This shows the character in her pyjamas. This character is also around about a similar age to the character we had in our opening sequence. This character is also good to link with our character as they are both young single female adults, both are quite clumsy and we showed this through our character falling over the magazines on the floor and running late. 

Main Task 12.1: Question 1

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

We tried to make sure we used normal conventions of a romantic comedy. For example for the style and colour of all the text we used bright colours and we had a girly style. We used this because from previous romantic comedies we had looked at in our research we had found that the majority of them used bright colours that stand out and the style was always quite girly. 

This shows one of our titles which we included into the action. We used the white pillow case so that the bright colours of the text would stand out more, which conveys the conventions of the romantic comedy genre.



We decided that only one of our main characters would be shown in the opening sequence so we introduced her as getting up and ready for work. We tried to portray her character through her actions rather than dialogue. For example we showed her rushing around and falling over, showing that she is quite clumsy and she's running late. We used our research again here to help decide this, from other films we had looked at most of them only showed one character, mainly the woman. We also thought that it would be best to not have a script for our opening sequence as we thought we would be able to show the characters personality a lot more through her actions and the way she lives rather than her speech.

This screenshot shows our character falling over on her magazines. This shows her clumsy characteristics and shows that she's quite messy as she has left all her magazines on the floor.





We decided on having some upbeat music playing all the way through the opening sequence, which also links to the normal conventions of a romantic comedy as upbeat music gives a feel for the film and portrays the genre through its sound.

From watching other romantic comedies we had found that usually the characters have every day looking clothes on with natural hair and make-up. We decided to try and keep to this in our opening sequence. Our main character started off wearing pyjamas as she had just woken up, she then got changed into her work clothes which was a plain black skirt, a patterned top, blazer and tights. We also put her in some heeled shoes as we thought this would help to portray her job as a magazine editor a little more.




This shows our character in
her pyjamas.



 



This screenshot shows our character
wearing her work clothes.You can also
see her natural hair and make up.



We tried to keep the editing quite natural and we didnt use any special effects. This keeps with the conventions of a romantic comedy as special effects usually give a feel for adventure or action, and thats not what we was aiming for in our opening sequence. We used a couple of jump cuts to show the time moving on, however we think they worked quite well and fitted in with the sequence. We also used a range of camera angles and shot sizes. For example one of our shots is from under the bed and another is from in the mirror. We used some close ups to show the characters emotion for example when she looks at the clock and realises she is going to be late, we used a close up on her face to show that she is shocked.

This screenshot shows one of the low angle shots that we used in our opening sequence. We filmed this from underneath the bed. We used this because from looking at other romantic comedies some of them use shots quite similar to this one.

This screenshot shows one of our shots from the mirror. We had to try different camera positions so that you couldnt see the camera, but we found a good spot and we were pleased with the result.

The two pictures above show one of the jump cuts that we used. the first picture shows her standing at the mirror and then it cuts to the second picture which shows her doing her make up. We felt this jumpcut worked quite well as it still flowed in the sequence and it didnt seem as if she'd move too far.