Blog Finished!

I have extremely enjoyed these past 6 months and I have learned so much about different media technologies, but this is the end of my AS Media Blog.

Repost of my final piece

This is a repost of my final piece to finish off my evaluation and to mark the end of my AS blog.

Question 7: "Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?"

Looking back at previous tasks, I feel as though I have drastically improved my knowledge of media technologies, media terminology, my ability to use different camera shots and angles, and my widened ability to use different softwares to edit my pieces. Also, I now post a lot more on my blog than what I did at the start of the course, and I am a lot more creative and descriptive with my posts.

Before studying Media at AS, I had never used Adobe Premiere, and I wasn't very confident when using it towards the start of the course. However, I am now able to confidently use this software and I know a lot more features and hidden features than I did before.

When filming our first project, we were given a camera and a list of shots to use and we were told to 'do our own thing', which is why they weren't very high quality. However, this helped me to become familiar with the technology we would be using over the next year (and the year to come) and I feel this is why my knowledge of above listed is so broad. It also gave me the confidence to experiment with different camera shots and angles, but also with different editing techniques.

After being given several different tasks and projects to shoot in the past 5/6 months, I have been able to use these newly-learned skills and use them when filming and editing my final project - False Impressions. The small tasks building up to the final project were very helpful as each taught us a small part of how to put together a full film - a continuity task, a script task, a storyboard task, and a few more.

Just as a few initial points as to what I would do differently if I reshot my final project are:

• I would use actors of the correct age for the characters as this would help the audience to distinguish between the two, and it would make the representation of them a lot more obvious to the audience.
• I would take more shots of each scene so that I had a wider range of clips to choose from when editing my project. This would allow me to change the clip I use at last minute if I need to improve my piece.
• I would also use a wider range of shots and angles in my camerawork, and make my shots more steady. This would give my piece a more professional look and I would be able to 'show off' a bit more with what I've learned over the past 6 months.
• I would also make my sound a lot more clearer, possibly by using a microphone or holding the camera closer to the actors.
• Finally, I would update my blog more in the lead-up to the reveal of the film, possibly with more behind-the-scenes footage for the audience.

However, overall, I am very happy with my final piece and I have put a lot of time and effort into the filming and editing and I think it all payed off.

Question 6: "What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?"

Below is a powerpoint I have created to answer the above question. I have researched several different methods to make my camerawork look more professional.

Question 4 and 5: "Who would be the audience for your media product?" and "How did you attract/address your audience?"

When making a film, you always have to keep the target audience in mind; from the production team to the distributors, everyone needs to target the specific audience which the film is being marketed at.

For 'False Impressions', the target audience was young adults, which allows us to have a wide enough audience to get enough money at the box office, but also allows us to use specific representations which our target audience could spot and possibly relate to.

As our film is now a 15, because of the BBFC regulations, our target audience has narrowed a little, but not drastically. By using themes in our film such as violence, crime, thriller, and drama, we are widening our target audience just that little bit more, but also allows us to distribute the film accordingly.

In relation to this, as we have a well known and trusted distributor for our film, we are able to reach people we would not be able to communicate to without 'Momentum Pictures' distributing our film.

For example, below are some posters of films, similar to ours, which 'Momentum Pictures' has distributed. They are all examples of how powerful a distributor can be when targeting a film's specific audience in order to encourage them to go and see the film.

The simplicity of these posters show just how little information you need to give about the film in order to make it succeed at the box office.

Each poster has the title of the film, the name of the main actor(s) and a tagline on them.

For example, the poster for 'The Woman In Black' has the tagline 'What did they see?' written in small font on a picture of a very eerie and spooky looking house. This creates a very dark and mysterious setting for the film, and makes the audience feel like they should go to see the film to find out what they saw, and possibly see it for themselves.

All of the film posters do the same for their film, as it intrigues the audience and encourages them to go and see the film, which is why we are using Momentum Pictures as the distributor for our film.

Question 3: "What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?"

Below is a video I have edited together of me talking over pictures and screenshots of films, to answer the question "What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?".

Comparison of Opening Titles

As a response to my teacher's comments on my 'Target Audience' post, I am going to analyse the openings of 'The Woman In Black' and 'Insidious' and compare them to my film's opening.

In the opening sequence of 'Insidious', the titles appear on a black background and then fade out into a smoke-like effect.

Similar to the titles in 'Insidious', the title of my film appears on a black screen and is in a smokey-style font, and then fades out again. This effect is used to contrast against the black background, but also to give an imperfect look.

Contrastingly, the titles for 'The Woman In Black' fade in with a smokey effect, rather than fading out. I used the effects of titles from 'The Woman In Black' and 'Insidious' as an inspiration and an idea for the title of my film, and I thought it would create a similar effect, as they all belong to a similar genre.

The first scene of Insidious is in the bedroom of the young boy. The room is extremely dark and the only light in the room is the light you can see in the picture above. This is use to create a mysterious and eerie atmosphere and an uncertainty for what is ahead for the character.

Just like in the Insidious opening sequence, the room in my film is only lit up by the fading sunlight peeping through the curtains, and some tea light candles above the fireplace. Again, this creates a mysterious atmosphere for the audience.

In the 'Woman In Black' screenshot above, you can see the black outline of the back of a woman, the 'Woman In Black'. This creates mystery and sparks a question amongst the audience as to who she is and what role she will play in the film.

Just like in 'Woman In Black', we only see the shadow of a woman and, again, this is in the first minute of the opening sequence, so it creates an eerie atmosphere but also appears in the opening minute of the film so it leaves the audience wondering who's shadow it is.

Just like how I used the effects of titles in both films as an inspiration for my film, I used the fact that both main characters in 'The Woman In Black' and 'Insidious' are hidden until the very very end of the film as an inspiration for my film, but I shortened down the time it takes for the hidden character's face to be shown, as he is one of if not the main character in my film.