Evaluation

With the film done only one last step remains; Evaluation. This would be a great way to gather constructive criticism and would aid us if we were to make another film. Firstly we would discuss amongst ourselves what had to be done and then we would show the film to our respective audiences.

The Crew

Target audience

A Few Final Questions


1). In what way does my media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
I certainly wouldn't say our film challenged any forms and conventions. It did however rely on a logistical element which I am certain high end film productions also take into account. We had a shooting schedule, a list of props and locations and a storyboard. All of these came together to make our final piece.


2). How does your media product represent particular social groups?
We didn't actively go out to make some sort of political message. If you wanted to evaluate it though you could say our film was discriminative against the under-class as it portrayed them as over emotional wrecks who murdered people on a whim with little consideration. This all being said we didn't really know any humble actors and actresses so we instead enlisted the help of an Oxford undergraduate and a privately educated art student. Maybe you could twist this round and say everyone is equal or something.  


3). What kind of media distribution might distribute my media product and why?
Well one would hope a cinema, though as someone said it suited a TV drama more; then perhaps a television? One might say that we represented an independent film company as we worked on a low budget and it might be considered an 'amateur film'. 

4). Who would be the audience for my media product?

Our film was aimed at an audience aged 16-19. Of course it is likely that older viewers might be interested.

5). How does my opening scene attract/address my audience?

The opening scene was very important for us as it is designed to captivate an audience and get them 'involved' in the film. We thought if we had a dramatic, somewhat mysterious opener we would encourage verisimilitude as quickly as possible. As said it was designed to be dramatic, confusing, mysterious, energetic and sinister.

6). What have I learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

I have learnt about all the tiny technological details involved in making a film, from making sure angles don't look dodgy by implementing specific angles to the arduous logistical plans so that everything comes together as smoothly and efficiently as possible. My video editing skill has certainly improved.

7) Looking back at my preliminary task, what do I feel I have learnt from the progression from it to the full product?

The Preliminary was very basic and therefore simple, I have learnt that in order to make something a bit more interesting you have to think bigger and be prepared for the unexpected. This certainly applies for the outside scenes, clouds come and go, shadows move, birds start singing. Factors such as those are by-passable when filming inside as we did with our preliminary.

Final Product

This is the film in it's final form after following all steps.

Film Editing

 Marcus and myself undertaking this laborious stage.

RESEARCH: BBFC Certification

The BBFC (The British Board of Film Classification)

The BBFC is a non-governmental organisation in the UK that gives out certifications for media distributed in the UK. Unlike other international certifications it is a compulsory obligation for distributors to sell a game to a person of the right age. Where certifications issued by companies such as PEGI are simply advisory and are issued to advise consumers, BBFC targets the distributors.

History
The British board of film classification was formed in 1912 and was known as the British board of film censors this was because the film industry at the time preferred to manage the classification and censorship of their own films rather than have them enforced by governments, the BBFC do have power to fine and in extreme cases close down organisations who breach the regulations set organisation changed its name to the British board of film classification the BBFC were also used to prevent negative propaganda during the second world war, in 1984 the organisation changed it t to its current name the British board of film classification, in 1986 however the BBFC rated its first video game as a 15, video games are however video games are voluntarily submitted for classification, in 1997 the first game to refuse being rated by the BBFC was ‘’Carmagedon’’ however a later version of the game was rated and it received a 18 certificate, and in June 2007 the game Manhunt 2 was refused a rating and so deemed illegal to sell.


The video recording act of 2010
This act brought back into force some parts of the video recording act of 1984, this was because the European commission had not been notified in 1984 of this act which directly affected the classification and distribution of films in the U.K and therefore due to the lack of information provided to the European commission this act was deemed unenforceable and therefore on the 15th December of 2009 this act to revive the provisions of the video recording act of 1984 was presented to the house of commons, subsequently the second and third reading of this act both took place on the 6th January 2010 and so on the 21st January of that year the act received royal assent and is still in force today.

PLANNING: Marketing and Distribution

Here is our final film poster. We used the cigarette pack to represent the gritty and urban feel that the film has. The poster has been kept minimal so that it has a clean feel about it. The whole poster has been styled in way that nods to The Velvet Underground and Niko album cover by Andy Warhol.

RESEARCH & PLANNING: Production Logo

An important part of film production is a name. This allows people to recognise your company from others, and hopefully sets the company apart. The name of our company went through many different phases, from American sounding ones, such as Westroad Productions, ambiguous ones such as Tailor Film, and downright ridiculous ones, such as Imagico Film Productions.

After a few hours of arguing, and a trip to The Ward Arms, we decided to leave the name of the film company for a while, we decided to leave the name of the company to whoever made the logo, and thus, our film company was namedReelhaus Productions.

This name was chosen because it harks back to the German Expressionism movement from Weimar Germany in the 1920's, and because... it sounds good. Bit of German really adds a kick to the name, yes?

All film companies have a distinct logo, which is designed to embody the values that the company holds. That and... 

Well, you need a logo, don't you?

We began the planning of our company logo by first looking at some existing ones.

Looking at these, we deduced that film companies tend to use a form of symbolism with their logos for a number of reasons, be they for nature of film, values of the company, or just because it looks good. From this, four distinct logos were made.

Our first logo was made to be eye catching and practical:

Our second logo was made to hark back to Indie amateur film companies from the 1980's:

Our third logo was made to be eye catching, imposing, and drew influences from propaganda from Fascist Italy.

Our fourth and final logo was created to have a warm, social and modernist style to it.

We then put these logos up on SurveyMonkey, and asked people from sixth-form for their receptions of each, and used this to decide a final logo.

The Filming

Below is a montage film of us filming The Chase.

PLANNING: Props and Locations

Below is a table for locations and the props needed at them.

PLANNING: Shooting Schedule

We shot our film over a five day period (Ten, if re-shoots are counted). This required a shooting schedule to be made to ensure that we could shoot scenes at times that were convenient for our actors. We made the shooting schedule after having a meeting with our group and the actors we were going to use over Skype, which enabled people to check their availability for that day.

This is the finalised shooting schedule (With the re-shoot added retrospectively).

The scene had to be re-shot because the lighting for the day was too different to the proceeding shot of Stan running towards the car... that and...in a moment of genius, we forgot to have Stan in the Driver perspective shot.

PLANNING: Final Storyboard

After reviewing the storyboard results and sorting them into categories I came to two conclusions;


- Firstly, people wanted more dialogue, especially women so I've reviewed the phone call scene between MC and SC.

- And Secondly people wanted a bit of death. This was the hardest thing to follow out as there was no death planned in the opening two minutes. I therefore decided to have a brief shot of some person in the background being taken away in a body bag. Hopefully that will do. This can emphasise imminent doom or something to that effect. Likewise we won't do this, because it's an insane idea and would take up the best part of the two minutes to do properly.

RESEARCH: Storyboard analysis

We decided to continue audience research to find out what other people thought of our storyboard idea. We did this by going constructing a questionnaire and going round the 6th form and asking people who were in our target audience. We had discussed filming ourselves asking the questions but we thought this would take up too much time and that placing people in front of a camera (even supposedly mature sixth form people) could waste our time.

1).

The first question is designed so we can divide our results in half and so we can record what men and women agree and disagree on.

2).

Similar intentions as the first question; three age groups allows us to see what different ages agree and disagree on.

3).

Sound outcome here. Personally I was hoping more people would mark it down as average so we would have something to improve on. Then again one shouldn't complain at a lack of complaints.

4).

Interesting results and a good range of answers to choose from.. At least we know that people want some dialogue .

5).

People seem to largely agree that an urban environment is a fitting place for a gritty urban drama. Shame four peoples heads weren't screwed on that day.

6).

This question was asked to see if people thought our proposed film idea was achievable. We are creative individuals; we like to think big and this was just to make sure that we hadn't made our idea too unrealistic.

"Couple of snaps"

Thomas and myself questioning the bright and eagle eyed inhabitants of the common room.

Storyboard

i. Establishing shot - Heavy breathing is heard while the shot slowly fades to a man running. The shot will last aprox. 6-7 seconds and consist only of his feet.

ii/iii. The first of the opening credits. Currently debating on whether to keep the heavy breathing over these or not. The text will fade in.

iv. Similar to i, shot of man running, this shot will last only about 3 seconds.

v. More opening titles.

vi. This shot consists of the main character making a turn to the right and going up some steps. The shot will pan slightly as he makes the turn.

vii. Group names

viii. This shot will start with the character appearing from the right hand side of the screen. He will be walking backwards so the audience can see the front of him, he will have blood on his shirt and should give the impression that he is running from something. He will then jump over a fence behind him.

ix. During the same shot the camera will move forward with the character as he jumps over the fence. Then quite loudly (probably through use of sound effects) a car will appear from the right will collide with the main character. During viii and ix smaller opening credits may appear.

x. The scene will cut to a shot of a man getting out of a car, he will ask if the man on the ground is okay.

xi. The shot then cut to a POV shot in which our main character will appear dazed. He will then get up and begin to run to the right. Smaller opening credits will stop here if introduced.

xii. The scene cuts to the main character running off, possibly telling the man in the car he is fine.

xiii. The scene then cuts back to the same angle before of the man in the car. He will mutter something under his breath and look dismayed and then get back into his car. Upon the door slamming shut the scene will instantly cut to a room with a lady in it. Not sure what she should be doing in the room, it might be a good idea to avoid her doing housework, someone might complain for all we know. A phone will ring and she will walk over to it.

xv/xvi/xvii/xviii/xix. Brief conversation on the phone, it should be understood at this point that the main character and this secondary character are or were engaged in a relationship. MC as we shall now call him for convenience purposes will more or less force invite himself round her apartment. The shot will consist him running towards the camera head on while the camera maintains distance. Before SC can say otherwise, he hangs up leaving her saying "hello?" and then looking at the phone in confusion.

xx. Scene cuts to a birds eye shot of the MC running up a set of stairs.

xxi. Shot of MC coming through the apartment door with a brief shreak from SC, the camera pans right and MC exits to the left of the screen.

xxii. From the right MC walks towards a door and goes in.

xxiii. These shot will make use of a canted angle to represent confusion as nobody other than MC knows what is going on. He will turn the tap, take off his bloody shirt and then lean over the sink until he turns them off when the sink is full.

xxiv. Over the shoulder shot as he splashes water over his face and then he will begin to dunk his head in the water.

xxv. Shot shows his face entering the water following shot xxv. He then exits the water.

xxvi. Shot then cuts to the shown shot and SC appears round the door.

xxvii/xxviii/xxix/xxx/xxxi/xxxii. Contrary to the dodgy story board pictures the couple then engage in conversation. Something along the lines of what has just taken place. The two minutes of filming should at this point be complete.

RESEARCH & PLANNING: Preliminary Conclusions

All three of the films I deconstructed had completely different ways of entering the film. Evidently it seems that the genre and possibly the year are the biggest contributors rather than the director.

Starting with Harry Brown; it is an action thriller and throws you into the plot almost immediatly, the atmosphere is rushed and dramatic so you get absorbed into the genre. If you take a handful of other action titles such as Star Wars, Quantum of Solace and Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring you see the same dramatic opening. This is not necesserily a directors characteristic which is seen in other films he/she has directed but more of what we expect. So from that we can understand that if we were to do an action genre it should have a dramatic opening two minutes.

The Unborn is a horror and follows similar guidelines. It is not uncommon for horror films to begin with a calm 'ordinary day' feel. The reasons being so the plot can develop and/or the audience find themselves in their comfort zone. I think the chilling beginning is more of a modern filming style, older titles seem more natural but the majority of modern day horrors have a very surreal calm to them.

Directors Pitch

   Grit and action have become a winning formula in the film industry in recent years. Films such as The Dark Knight and Harry Brown are good examples of the application of grit in an action film. We intend to reflect this trend with our film.

   Set in Northampton, we will be working closely with the results from our questionnaire to develop a film that suits our target audience- the young adult demographic. This will be reflected in the characters used in the film. The central characters will be in roughly the same age band as that of the target audience, which will hopefully allow them to bond with the characters better.
   The results from the questionnaire have shown that a number of the sample found aesthetics to be important in a film. We will work to this by using high dynamic range imaging, gritty camera filters, and vignetting, seen in such programmes as Top Gear to add drama to each shot. The use of vignetting also makes the scenes become more claustrophobic. We will apply this with the planned scene in the bathroom.
   The first two minutes of the film itself with focus on the main character, a young man running through the streets of Northampton with a blood covered shirt. The establishing shot will be of the running feet on a pavement and heavy breathing. Opening credits play through this scene. More credits play through the following parts but appear on the picture rather than blacking out. At some point he turns round and this is the first time you see his blood covered shirt. He then will get hit by a car, this is mainly to show that his mind is on other things, at this point the credits stop. He gets up and continues running. We may have a phone call scene at this point to show the main guy and his girlfriend talking and asking if he can come round. The idea is that he then runs into his girlfriends flat essentially to hide and to cool down. At this point we want a gritty tearing off shirt/washing face/bloody water scene. We plan to use a fair share of camera angles and techniques so that the filming style relates to the atmosphere. I will create a storyboard for the film and then a questionnaire on it will be distributed by other members of my group.

RESEARCH: Target Audience

As with anything it is always necessary to perform some kind of market research as it helps to analyse the type of product which the customer would enjoy the most and by using the information you can innovate new products or in this case films to get the most viewers possible.
   In this instance we have handed out a questionaire to 20 students at guisborough 6th form the results are as follows:

1) Your gender
Male? [12]
Female? [8]
2) How old are you?
15 or under [1]
16-18 [17]
19-21 [2]
3) Do you enjoy films?
Yes [19]
No [1]
4) What is your favorite film genre?
Action [6]
Horror [5]
Comedy [4]
Adventure [2]
Science-Fiction [3]
Romance [0]
Other... [2]
5) What do you find important in a film? (Pick three)
Special Effects [9]
Acting [13]
Set pieces [5]
Pacing [3]
Aesthetics [6]
Dialogue [8]
Continuity [3]
Editing [4]
6) What attracts you to a film?
Specific Actor [4]
Critical Reception [5]
Director [2]
Genre [5]
Premise [1]
Word of mouth [2]
Unsure [1]


Pictures here.

RESEARCH: Indecent Proposal Deconstruction

Film: Indecent Proposal
Year: 1993
Certificate: 15
Director: Adrian Lyne
Genre: Romance

RESEARCH: The Unborn Deconstruction

Film: The Unborn
Year: 2009
Certificate:
Director: David S. Goyer
Genre: Horror

     The film opens up with an overhead shot of a snowy lake with a lane beside it, creepy twinkly music plays over it. The shot then cuts to a city also in the middle of winter. It all seems very quiet and the in the next clip you see hardly any cars on the road. You get the feeling of ‘it was just an ordinary morning’ and that the director is trying to catch you out while you are in your comfort zone by making the opening scenes peaceful and somewhat mundane. The scene then cuts to a lone runner on a park bridge the camera slowly moves towards her from above. There is then a full body shot from behind and then a mid shot in front. It’s all shot in slow motion and another overhead shot is shown and then another mid shot as she slows down to catch her breath. All the while the music continues to play. Something on the deserted pavement catches her eye and shoe moves in to see what it is. The camera focuses entirely on the object which happens to be a glove and you see her legs as she walks over to pick it up. This is done so you know that this glove is important in some way. You then see a full face shot and then she turns around and the camera stretches at the sides to see a boy with only one glove on. The camera goes to a mid shot and then an over the shoulder shot from behind the boy so you can see the woman. The camera then cuts to the boys feet and it slowly rises until you get to the boys face which is grey and dead looking. It then cuts to a full face shot of a woman who looks confused. Then with a beat the film cuts to an over the shoulder shot of her and instead of the boy there is a bulldog with a creepy mask on. You see a confused lady once more and then a close up of the crazy dog which appears to have blue human eyes and is breathing heavily. The dog then moves into the woods off the path and the lady follows like a crazy conquistador. You get a mixture of pan shots and POV shots and it's all very surreal which gives the impression that the whole scene is a dream sequence. Eventually she sees the mask on the floor, another low angle shot is done where the mask in in the foreground and the lady is in the background. It becomes clear at this point that it is a mask of the little boy shown area. She then kneels down to take a closer look.