Final Cut

FINAL CUT

Due to technical difficulties our final product could not be exported.

AS Media Studies Production: 2nd Edit Feedback

2ND EDIT FEEDBACK

The progress from our first edit to our second has been huge, we have done alot more filming and have been able to make the opening scene make alot more sense and be the full two minutes. Although the progress has been good we still have got more to do. The type of shots that we have is good, we have been able to use the holding shot alot and when we have used it, it has been very effective. When framing the shot we ave been able to get everything that we need to into the shot and cut out what we don't need. This creates better viewing for the audience because they are not being distracted by what is in the background and what isn't meant to be shown. When filming we have been able to hold the camera still, by using a tripod this really helped us.The outcome of the still shots were that the film wasn't distorted and hard to see what was happening. In the feedback we were told that our film was appropriate for the task that was given, this means that we have been able to film shots that are needed in our film and the content is accurate to the genre that we have decided.
We thought alot about the mise en scene and we tried to put as much as we could into the opening shots the props that we used added affect to the types of emotions that we are trying to get across. At the start we used the brick as the murder weapon, the main prop that we used was the sign saying ' CCTV in operation', this added some suspension to the opening scene and it is showing that there is a potential of then getting caught. The costumes that we used are showing a more modern side to this social realist type of film. All of the films that I have seen like 'Dead mans shoes' and 'This is England' that also are in the genre of social realism are more along the lines of 1980's up to the 2000's. Because my film opening is more modern it shows a twist to the genre and I think that it will attract more people like 'Kidulthood' did.
Our editing is mainly good but in the feedback we have realised that there are a few dodgy edits where the screen goes black in between shots and the sound sometimes cuts out. We need to sort these out before we move on to the next stage. From the feedback we were told that more transactions cand be used to make it more exciting in the post preduction we were able to add more but not loads.
The use of sound can really change a mood or create an emotion. A great example that sound can really change a mood is in 'Shawshank Redemption' during some parts of the film a certain tune plays. This tune really indicates a kind of mysterious feeling and we start to feel an emotion of not knowing whats going ot happen next. After the feedback our group realised that we want to create the same type of affect. We could do this by adding smaller background sounds like heavy breating during the quiter scenes and then and small bits of foley during the running.
The final feedback that we recieved was to put the titles in, consisting of all the names in our group and the main title of our film. To make these as effective as possible we are going to use different fonts and different sizes to make the different texts more visable and then this will create different amounts of attraction.

Product Evaluation Q1

Evaluation Question 1

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

Example and Description	Explanation of how it uses, develops, challenges conventions
Title of Film	The title of our film is ‘It never happened’ this title suggests that the two characters in the film didn’t want people to know what they did and they wanted to keep their murder a secret. We decided to do this so that the audience had a slight knowing of what the film was about. We decide to use the same convention from a film that we were influenced by. The film “I’ll always know what you did last summer” was an example of the type of film we wanted to create. The title suggests that something bad has happened like in our film title.
Location/ Setting	Our film starts off in the forest, like in most murder films this is a typical setting. To get the feeling we wanted we decided to use the same setting as in the other thriller films that use that similar scene. The film ‘The Hunger Games’ is a great example of what type of setting we were trying to create. The woods we are using a quite dark and mysterious, we decided to use the same type of setting that was used in the ‘Hunger Games’ as it would work well with our genre of film.
How the characters were introduced	We wanted our characters to be introduced after the title sequence; we wanted this because it would be able to add more effect for the viewer. This gives the viewer more suspicion to who the boys are. We got the idea to do this from the film ‘Hot Fuzz’. We were influenced by this film because they had a murderer that was not known and you had to guess who they were. I our film we decided to introduce the characters quicker so they audience were only wondering who the killers were for a short part of the film.
Genre	Our film has been based around the thriller/ social realism genre. We had been influenced by other films like ‘Kidulthood’ and ‘Seven’. Both of these films are surrounded by murder and lying. We felt that this would best fit our film. In seven there has been a murder and the film is about covering up the murder. Then in Kidulthood it is an extremely social realism film. The film is showing the day life of a London teenager. We decided that these two films really highlighted our film and could come out in the opening scene.
Costumes	The costumes that we got our actors to wear were really influence by recent television series. We really wanted to make our film suitable for a social realism film. To do this we needed to make our characters look as much like modern teenagers as possible. The two TV programs that we decided to get our costumes from were ‘Misfits’ and ‘Skins’. These two series are the most modern that we could find. The costumes that the characters wear are really up to date. The clothes that they wear are the type of clothes we want our characters to wear.

Product Evaluation Q2

Evaluation Question 2

 

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Before we started film our opening scene we thought a lot about who we wanted our characters to be. We were thinking of a lot of different social groups that they could be from and for each group we would have a different costumes and the film would be different for each one. The first group we decided to use was a low class group at the low end of the socio-economic table. Their costumes consisted of tracksuit trousers and a black jumper or jacket. We got this idea from a film like ‘Attack the Block’ (top picture) because they have got the older fashioned clothes in their film.  However just before we started filming our opening scene we decided that we wanted to go for a more modern look and to have our murders higher up the socio-economic scale. By doing this we haven’t followed a stereotype, we have taken the costumes from a different film like ‘Green Street’ (bottom picture) where their costumes look more in-line with modern fashion. By giving them this costume change we have completely changed the socio-economic group they would be seen from. We have challenged the normal way of making the lower end socio-economic groups look bad, we have made the higher classed groups look bad this time by making the murderers look like they are from the wealthier groups.

Product Evaluation Q3

Evaluation Question 3

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

During the production of our film we did some research on the companies that would be willing to distribute our film under their name. To find out the types of film companies that would do we had to do some reseach on the films that are in our genre. After a lot of research we found some distribution companies that would be willing to have our film under their name. the first one is 'Revolver entertainment', this distributer has been involved with our genre before and has had films like 'Kidulthood' and 'The Imposter'. We decided that this company would be good for our film because they are involved with the thriller genre. The second distributer we thought would be good to cover our film was 'Pathe' we decided to go with this companie because they are quite a well know company but still take on low budget films. They would be able to do a lot of funding for our film, however they do not particulary fund thriller films. We decided to go with these companys because of their background and the type of films that they have distributed in the past. We felt they were the two distribution companys that were the best suited for our film.

Product Evaluation Q4

Evaluation Question 4

Who would be the audience for your product?

The audience that we have decided to target our film at is teenagers, mainly male teenagers. The genre of our film is thriller and social realism. We have decided to pick this genre because this is the genre that our target audience would want to see more. The film has been targeted at this audience because of the type of characters that we have got in our film. The two murderers are typical teenage boys, you are able to see this because of the clothes that they are wearing. The age group that we would expect to see our film and have targeted our film at is from 15-18. We also targeted our film at the middle class and working class social groups. We decided to do this because in other films the murderer comes from a lower class social group and we wanted to challenge that. The characters that we have are normal boys that live a normal life. They go to school, have friends and do other normal teenage boy activities. The reason we wanted to have the characters like this was so that they could relate to them and then when they relate to them the film become much better and they would enjoy it more.

Product Evaluation Q5

Evaluation Question 5

How did you attract/address your audience?

Our target audience has been brought forward by the type of characters that we have created in our film opening. As our film is a social realism it means that it is able to really interact with  the audience of our film. Because our film has been based on a stereotype of a teenage group coming from a well off family it is not normal for this stereotype to be used. The stereotype used is normally of a poor family. This is attracting the audience more as they would want to know what these boys have been perceived as. We wanted to make our audience of the film the same as the characters in the film because we felt that this would be the most interesting for the audience. We also decided that our teenagers were going to be modern than in other films, we did this because we felt that this would also attract our audience more than if they were wearing old fashioned clothes. By doing this we are challenging the conventions of poor family's that have raised murderers and thief's. We wanted to stop that stereotype by making our murderers come from well off family's.
To address our audience with our film we wanted to be able to tell them about the film in ways that they would see the most. We decided to go with most social networks and to put up posters promoting the film in areas that teenagers would visti the most. These places are like gyms, supermarkets and other social areas. As a low budget film we couldn't do as much advertsing as the blockbuster films but as our audience are teenagers we flt that the social networks would be able to do the same affect. We used most social netwroks like FaceBook, Twitter and YouTube.

Product Evaluation Q6

Evaluation Question 6

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

Planning

During our planning and research stages I have used Blogger to keep and see later all of my information and research that we have found about what we can do for our film. I have also use blogger to be able to show all of my stages of production like when we choose the music, do more editing and change the shots that we want. I also used a social network, Face Book, to keep in touch with my other team members and organise when we will be filming and editing. I used Google and IMDb as my research engines to be able to find other films that were similar to our film and I could make comparisons to. To find similar films I researched thriller films and horror films. I also got ideas of different filming techniques and methods from YouTube that we could use in our film. We used a Canon camera to take pictures of the different locations that we were going to film in.

Production



During our production we used a Canon legria FS200 which is a handheld camera to capture all of our shots. To capture the sounds we used a Rode Microphone. The camera is a good quality and is able to capture all of the movements that our characters created. The microphone was also able to keep up with the camera. Even though quite a lot of our film has got a quite sound of just the background noise in the forest. We then used a Camlink tripod to capture the still shots that we needed.

Pre-Production

After all of our shots had been filmed there have been a whole lot of programmes and websites that we used to edit and make our production the best it could be. To do all of the editing we used a programme called Adobe Fireworks. With this we are able to do all of the editing that we needed to. We were able to make our film the right lenght and to make all of the approprate cuts.

Product Evaluation Q7

Product Evaluation Question 7

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

Looking back at my preliminary task I have noticed a large change in the style of filming and being able to notice when the different types of shots are needed. I think I am able to realise when a cretain shot is needed. I think during the editing I have learnt a whole new set of skills that are able to help in futrue editing. I feel that since the preliminary task I have been able to use editing tools alot easier and quicker. I am able to notice more mistakes in my work and I am able to make changes to that.

The biggest difference between the prelimenary task and the main task was the amount of shots and length they would have to be. Unlike in the prlimenary task the main task needs sound, mise en scen and more editing in it.

 At the start of making the main product we created a storyboard and on that story board we had created our entire 2 minute opening scene for our film. What we soon realised was that to make the full length opening scene there needed to be alot more shots and they needed to be longer aswell. From here we went on to make more clips and do alot more filming. Our first cut was average and we hadn't filled the full 2 minutes. So we quickly learnt that there needed to be alot more than what we had. After the second draft we started to look at music and editing in more detail. We soon found that the music needed to be a bit quieter than i was so that we could still hear the footsteps and the noises around the boys. From the editing I learnt that you constatly need to check through what you have done so that you know it flows and runs smoothly. After a lot of shooting and using different shots we noticed many different things going wrong with the camerawork. These problems were because of lighting and the area that we filmed in. We soon learnt that we needed to dot he filming at similar times so the lighting was right and the continuity was correct. We couldnt have it daytime in one shot then darker in the next.

AS Media Studies Production: Day 7

Filming Day 7

On Sunday 27th of January we all tried to get together and do the final peices of filming that we needed to do, we decided to do it then becasue the snow was clearing and we fet that the forest would be clear and able to use. When we all arrived at the forest we soon realised that their was still alot of patches of snow where people had made snowmen and piles before it had started to melt. This was a problem for us as we did not want small piles of snow in our shots. We decided that the best thing to do is to wait until the next week when the snow will defiently be gone and we will be able to finish off all of our shooting.

AS Media Studies Production: Production Logo

 Production Logo

 This is the logo we are using for our own production company. "Trouble Productions"

We decided to do a logo that is very simple. We did some planning before and decided that the sling shot is the best thing to do that is connected to trouble.

AS Media Studies Production: Day 6

Filming Day 6     

Weather Problems

On Sunday, 22nd January we all tried to get together and film some of the last clips that we needed to film. These consisted of the new clip where the two boys are standing over the dead body and their is also a scene where the boys have split up and we see them go their separate ways. There is a massive problem with us filming some of it in the snow and using other clips without snow there. The problem is that their would not be any continuity and the film would not look professional. As seen in the bottom picture the ground has got a lot of leaves and can easily be seen that if we were to do a scene in the snow it would not have any continuity and would be very unprofessional.

AS Media Studies Production: Filming new scene

Filming a new scene: Wed 9th Jan

After our first cut we found that our opening scene was too short. To be able to make the opening longer we decide that we would add more on to the end. The scene that we filmed was after the title of the film had been shown. The parts of this scene we were able to film today was the separation of the two boys, the redoing of the texting scene where one of the boys texts the other with the title of the film, both of the boys washing their hands, one of the boys putting their jumper into the washing machine and having the washing machine on.

This part of the opening scene is starting to give you more information about the two boys. It is the part of the film where you really start to get introduced to the main characters.The picture here is the first scene that we are going to re-do. We are going to have the same layout but have the two characters standing above the body holding the murder weapon.


We also decided to add a scene to the end of our first draft. After this scene in the picture on the right is going to lead onto the two boys running past the camera and then splitting and one boy going one way and the other going the other way. This is then going to lead on to one of the boys in their house and will show their reaction up close and introduces the viewer to them.

AS Media Studies Production: Music update 9th Jan

New Music

After our first cut we all decided on the new or updated parts of the opening scene we are going to add in or redo. One of the major changes that we are going to make was the music that we had playing in the background during the scene of the boys rnning away. The reason that we decided to change the music for this scene was because the music we had before wasn't suited to the feeling we were trying to get. The music was too happy and excited and it didn't fit in with the genre of thriller. The new music that we have found is more suited to our genre. It has got a deeper tone and it has got more of a thriller feel to it. Max was able to find the music on youtube, he made sure that the music wasn't copyrighted s that we wre able to use it in our movie opening.