Media Evaluation

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

My media product follows the conventions of the genre social realism. Generally, this genre includes contemporary social issues which my short film does i.e. racism. The purpose of the short film is to educate, it does this by raising debate in the classroom and giving students ranging fro

m 15 to 18 ethical topics 

to discuss. Usually when a film is about social realism it is based on violence and crime. My short film to an extent uses these conventions but I have focused mainly on racial/ cultural issues and stereotypes. This is evident immediately as in the opening title of the s

hort film wereby the title of the film 'Viewpoints' has a Union Jack in the background. 

In emphasising these issues I am illuminating the purpose of my short film, to arise discussion in citizenship for teenagers. As a result the students will feel as if they can become more involved in the discussion as the film relates to them and their everyday lives. Opposing to a mainstream film, my short film was created on a low budget and therefore does challenge many of the conventions you would normally expect. It was filmed with a digital camera, giving it a rather gritty overall look as opposed to celluloid which would provide a much more surreal and glossy effect. However this seemed ideal for my short film as it was about social realism, based in a London school, the realistic and

gritty effect suited it well. Furthermore, classic social realism films usually have open ended narratives, for e

xample; in the famous ‘This is England’ when the protagonists’ future is left undetermined. I thought it best to follow this convention and leave the short film at a cliff hanger as this suited the purpose a lot better, not only leaving the students with something to talk about but also to create their own solutions in order to prevent these things happening in their everyday lives.

My magazine review uses ideas from the magazine ‘Empire’.

I opted for a colloquial mode of address due to the adolescent audience my magazine is aimed at. In usi

ng an exciting colour scheme and typography, I achieved the look of a ‘young’ magazine. The review also includes an advertisement for a competition, which also makes it more appealing to the target audience. My magazine consists of the classic conventions e.g. it follow the left to right layout, there is a main image and main text with a breakout box. This is because readers look for an easily accessible magazine therefore they opt for what looks familiar. I did not want to challenge magazine conventions as I felt that this would affect the audience. For my poster I again opted for a classic conventional style, with a main background image and title with actor information at the bottom. However my othe ancillary task (poster) does to an extent challenge the classic conventions of film posters as generally film posters consist of pictures of the stars that act in the film. This could not be the case for my film poster as the actors in the film are not well known established actors therefore; it would not be appealing to the audience if I had simply used pictures of the main characters as the main image for my poster. Generally, from viewing a film poster, one can gain an idea of what genre the film will take on. As my poster includes a picture of a block of flats I believe it achieves well the genre o

f social realism. Despite this, it is easy to assume from the poster that the film could be about something completely different, furthermore some of the themes that have been explored in the film for example racism, bullying, inequality and British culture are not evident in the poster. Initially I had planned to include the union jack in the poster to emphasise the theme of britishness, however having experimented with this, I decided it was best to use an image that conjured more suspense rather than being too obvious.

Overall, the short film and film poster challenged what would generally be expected due to the low budget, limited time and equipment available etc. The film poster however could not be developed much as readers would expect classic conventions and to be able to read with ease. Whereas it is understandable with the film and film poster as to why I have not followed mainstream conventions as my film did not contain Hollywood stars and due to the limitations I had in terms of software etc.

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Throughout the three media products there is a common genre evident; social realism. The genre is mainly evident in the short film however it can be assumed by the fil

m poster. My magazine review highlights the purpose of my short film more so than the other media products as it states and develops the purpose and why I chose it etc. I believe that all three of my media products work well together as the magazine review confirms what the short film is actually aiming to achieve and the poster creates a more entertaining suspicion about the short film as it is not too blatantly obvious about what the film will contain. In terms of narrative it is pretty straightforward for the audience what the short film is about, the storyline is not complex therefore I do not think that it would be crucial for the audience to have read the film review in order to understand what the film is trying to achieve, however I feel as though the media products complement each other as on may not be fully aware of the purpose of the film having not read the poster. The themes explored in the short film show the gritty elements of Britain and thereby I though it was appropriate for the magazine review to follow a laid back and colloquial mode of address. The voice over in the short film is a somewhat common dialect and therefore to have a sophisticated magazine article would not have communicated the realistic genre effectively.

3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

When creating a media product audience feedback is crucial. Without it, you may not be aware of mistakes you have made or improvements you could make. You would also be unaware of wither or not your media product meets the expectations of its audience and if your target audience understand the narrative and the purpose of your film.

Having presented my short film to the target audience I was able to gather constructive criticism which helped to improve the product. One of the students claimed that; ‘there was one scene that was really dark, I couldn’t really see what was happening. This hindered my understanding of the film.’ F

rom this, my group and I were able to improve the short film by editing the ‘mugging’ scene and making it brighter. This was also the case for the last sene wer Mr Smith is viewing the fight on YouTube, again I was able to use editing to make the lighting in the sene clearer.

I presented my target audience with some initial ideas for my film poster; I was then told that using a photograph image for my poster as opposed to a copy right free internet image would add creativity and originality. It was also fedback that the poste

r was not clear and suggested that the image used was somewhat irrelavant to the narrative.

When I presented my target audience with another initial idea, I was told that ‘the main image could be a bit more entertaining, although it portrays the idea of British culture well, it is a bit boring.’ Taking this on board I decided that the idea of a union jack as the main image wasn’t a good idea this then lead on to the new and current poster including the image of the block of flats which I believe builds more suspense about the film. The final film poster as a finished product met the expectations of my target audience, it was satisfying to know thatI had produced something successful on the basis of their feedback.

I also decided to encorporate a colour scheme on my film review page after being told, 'magazines tend to use one or two colours throughout an article as opposed to many colours'. As a result I followed a colour scheme of blue and red which also emphasised the British theme which runs throughout my main product and ancillary texts. After having received feedback from my target audience I was happy to make the changes I made to my media products as they became more suited to their target audience. I disagreed with some of my audience feedback and felt as though some ideas that were generate

d were personal to one individual as opposed to being a collective idea, however some of my audience feedback I did agree with, in particular the ones I have mentioned above. I found them helpful and useful in improving my course work. I also trusted the feedback as it was given by the age group in which my media products are aimed at therefore they were able to state what they expected which helped in terms of meeting the requirements of the target audience. I believe that the changes I made in response to the feedback were good and did improve my work. Overall I found the process of gathering feedback from my target audience very helpful.

4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
In the planning stages of my coursework, I mainly used the internet. This was very useful when it came to researching about classic conventions of film, film posters and film magazines. I also used my blog to post up all the ideas that I had. I was able to import pictures and hyperlinks into my blog in order to expand on my research I was also able to scan initial ideas and storyboards to expand on the ex

planations of my ideas. I was able to use YouTube to provide a hyperlink and Google to include copyright free images on my blog. During the production of my short film I was able to use a DV camera to record my footage which I then uploaded onto a laptop to edit my footage. The camera was also useful for taking photographs which could then be uploaded onto my blog. With software such as I movie I could edit the footage to add in transitions and sounds were necessary. In creating the magazine review page I used the programme pages which allowed me to achieve the appearance of a magazine article. The software enabled me to experiment with different layouts and fonts until I found what best suited the themes of my media products. I was able to add text were necessary i.e. breakout box, strap line etc and I could easily move images around.

The overall look of my media products makes it evident that there were certain limitations in the technology available. An

 example of this is the voice over in the short film which is not as clear and concise as it should have been. This was due to the DV camera that I was provided with to create the short film, as the microphone was of a very low quality it was very difficult to ensure that the audio was right for the scene being filmed as certain ambient sounds were picked up i.e. the wind which would muffle the voices of the actors. 

This put me at a disadvantage as the film seemed of a very low quality making it hard for the audience to understand it fully as the sound was unclear. This problem was eventually overcome as I then had to re-record a voiceover and import it over the film 

 footage.  It was very hard to get the audio and the footage on screen to perfectly match together but after experimenting with it as a team we managed to do it. The technology used affected a lot of aspects of the coursework as it limited many creative ideas that were initially posed for the short film. The setting of the film is my school, which is not the most entertaining setting that my group suggested however it would have been hard to film in a public place without causing a disturbance and also picking up unwanted background noise. Although the gritty effect of the short film was intentional, the lack of lighting became an issue when it came to filming a scene in the dark. Originally having filmed the s

cene and viewing it I felt as though I had a big problem as the lighting was extremely bad, you could just about see what was happening. As a solution I was going to re film the scene however I was able to use I movie to add some light into the scene, as a result making it more visible to the audience. 

The fact that I was able to use non-linear editing software was good as it is much more advanced than linear. This enabled me to edit as I went along as opposed to having to start from the beginning every time something needed to be cut or changed. As a result I was able to film things were and how I wanted which saved a lot of time as if I had to film the footage in order, it would have taken a lot more time and effort. As I was able to film all the scenes that were in the school building at the same time and then all the scenes that weren’t in the school building it was convenient. Then, using the non-linear editing software I was able to re-arrange the footage as I wanted. My group and I decided that the internet would be a big part of our film with the theme of cyber bullying. With access to the internet we were able to import the ‘mugging’ scene onto the social n

etworking website, YouTube and bring this into our film at the end. This decision was I believe an effective one as it raises awareness about those being cyber bullied and the dangers o

f what is being posted on the internet amongst teenagers in today’s society.

During the evaluation stages of my coursework, 

again the internet was mainly used to upload pictures onto my blog. YouTube was also used to provide the link to my short film. 

I was able to use screenshots of my film to provide image to further develop the text. Imovie enabled me to break down the senes of my short film and include them in my evaluation were I felt necessary.

Evaluation - Filip Hazel

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

For my short film, I did research on the established conventions of short films to guide me on what makes a short film successful. I found out that many of the short films that I had viewed had very similar conventions, for example, two short films I viewed titled ‘Veronique’ and ‘Double Take’ both had a linear narrative structure, where the events were in chronological order. This linear narrative structure is a very popular convention, I feel that the reason a lot of short films use this narrative is because of the small duration of the film, there is simply not enough time to incorporate flashbacks and flashforwards without sacrificing a good storyline. I found out that having an underlying theme is a very popular convention in British short films, as the theme can act as social commentary and display the changes in society. Some shirt films also displayed a 3 part circular narrative where we end up in the same place we started and most of the short films had an ‘open-ending’. The genres I had viewed were romance, comedy and thriller, all equally related to British films. Short films tend to normally focus on one main character, this allows the character to develop and the audience can follow them easily. Short films rely on a gripping storyline or and interesting character rather than special effects and tend to have cliff-hangers or twists to keep things interesting. The short films I have viewed haven’t been over edited as things are best kept to the minimum and serve the purpose of them which is to entertain the audience and show what the director can do. The themes in short films tend to be realistic, you don’t see the mainstream blockbuster storylines of superheroes flying through walls or massive explosions, in short films you have more realistic themes that are common to life and happen daily.
My film had a classic example of following a typical convention of British film which was the use of the underlying theme throughout the film. The film had a message that it got across to the audience which was that not everything is as it seems and nothing is ever perfect no matter how perfect it may seem. Having an underlying theme is crucial as it adds more depth to the film, knowing that the audience could take something from it. The genre of the films was typically British-social realism. It displayed the struggles and complications of life. On the cinematography side, I wanted my protagonist to appear as some who is not in control and rather weal, I used conventional camera shots such as kinetic camera movement, which is common in the genre of my film, the kinetic camera movement puts out the feeling of the protagonist being watched. I also used high angle shots to portray the protagonist as vulnerable . In the finale of the film, I felt it was necessary to add a shock twist for the audience as they had just seen the protagonist being beaten up, the camera then zoomed out on his body and the audience were shocked to find that it was the protagonist watching himself, being beaten up on ‘YouTube’, I wanted to give off that shock feeling to the audience as it was not expected. This is also were the audience would remember the tagline, ‘ignorance is bliss’ as the character lived his life as nothing had happened.
I developed certain short film conventions to go beyond the classical types, for example, I gave the films narrative structure a twist as it’s a mixture of non-linear and linear as although the story progressed in chronological order the film relies on going into the non-linear with flashbacks acting as a major part of the story. I also attempted more spectacular shots, something that is not to common in short films due to the limited equipment available, however I wanted to try a more ‘brave’ shot that could mirror the ‘birds-eye-view’ shot and it worked, I had to climb onto the roof of a building but the shot was worth the height, the shot was of the protagonist walking into his school and such a high angle shot was oozing with the message that the character looks exposed. Another convention I developed was the time setting of the film, most of the short films I had viewed were all set during a set period of minutes or hours, my film started in the morning and finished at night. It let the audience experience a day in the protagonists life.
I challenged certain conventions of short films, for example, flashbacks are represented by a narrator to portray a second story which is rarely seen in short films, the flashback portrayed the a day in the life of a immigrant moving to England and his experience. My film also did not feature a score as I felt that the social realism genre should be raw.
After researching typical film poster conventions I found out that most follow a typical layout and have the following conventions: a title, name of the main stars, picture of the main star, tagline and billing block. Film posters try to create an element of attraction to the audience and the prime aim is to attract people and make them interested, the tagline is also used to make the audience ask some ideas. My film poster followed the 5 main conventions, however I opted for a landscape sided view instead of the more common portrait view. I wanted my film poster to stand out and have a ‘classic’ poster look, I thought choosing the right font was crucial to how many poster looked, I didn’t want to make it look to bland as I feel the font can tell a lot about the film, I opted for a ‘rough’ typewriter font, this tied into the gritty look and feel of my poster, I used a split screen effect to portray the 2 sides to my film and it looked very iconic, you could picture it on a big widescreen landscape billboard around city. I challenged many conventions of the film poster, for example, many film posters would feature some of the main actors as the main image, this is because the actor is a selling point itself, unfortunately my film did not star any a-list Hollywood actors that could sell the film alone so I opted for a image of an estate, which portrays the setting of the film. My film also did not feature the names of the star actors, usually at the top of the poster because of the fact the actors were unimportant.
In researching conventions of magazine articles I have found these common conventions: a headline, image subheading, pictures, strap line, graphics, introduction, by-line and breakout boxes. My magazine article met all these conventions, in order to give the audience the maximum information. I developed certain conventions by adding more information and mini-facts in order to give small ‘bites’ of information.

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Social realism is the main genre, which certainly comes across strongly in the short film and film poster and to a lesser extent, in the magazine. The film sets the genre and it becomes clear to the audience towards the end of the film what the genre is, although on second viewing the audience would notice certain features which hints at what is to come. The link between the film and poster in terms of the genre are very effective, as naturally, upon viewing the poster the audience would get an idea of what the genre could be. The genre is the foundation of the film and the poster effectively portrays this genre through the use of gritty setting that has been split into two views which reflects the film title. The film narrative is linear with non-linear aspects however, the narrative is not clear in the poster. I would say the poster is a bigger success than the article, the poster displays the theme and sets the setting. The poster is split into two ‘viewpoints’ which is meant to represents the main protagonist in the short film, one view point shows a perfect day while the other viewpoint shows a gritty, dark view and in particular the rain stained window effect is very effective. The posters font, a ‘typewrite’, effect has a very realistic genre. I don’t feel it is necessary for the audience to have seen the poster or read the article before understanding the theme or purpose, however they both set the tone by not revealing too much to spoil anything.
The target audience for the short film is around the male 15-25 age mark while the film certificate would be a 15, there are no drug scenes, scenes with heavy gore/blood or excessive swearing which would all bring the rating up to an 18, which would take away the main core of the audience. The product targets its audience through the genre of social realism, this is a rather sophisticated genre as opposed to rom-coms which are suited for women and ‘girls-nights-in’ or action thrillers which are more aimed at adults as they are full of fast cars, swearing and naked girls. The genre of social realism targets its audience as its very easy to relate to aspects of it as the target audience would have experienced crime and covering things up either through personal experience or from the news. Older audiences could use the film to see how times have changed while he middle-age man could see how its like during the ‘youth’ of today, which is well known for its lack of discipline and respect towards others. The poster draws in the target audience mainly through the image of the council estate as through the media portrayal, estates are filled with lower classes and are often associated with crime as opposed to a quiet village in a rural area. The split-screen effect makes the audience curious as to what could happen in the film, thinking of possibilities.
From an institutional point of view, the purpose of the magazine and the poster is to promote the film, they all work with each other to build up a base of views. People see the poster and get interested, the tagline gives hints to what the poster image is about, ‘ignorance is bliss’. The film poster and magazine are an important part of the films marketing and distribution, as essentially, these two products will be the deciding factor for the viewer to go and watch the film. The poster would attract the attention of possible viewers because it sets the scene of the genre it looks gritty and serious aswell as having questions un-answered, e.g.: why are there 2 different views to the same image, the tagline: ignorance is bliss leads on to the question, who is being ignorant? The audience then may decide to want to find out more about this film, they would want more information about it as the poster alone may not be enough so the magazine allows the level of information is enough to fill the audience with excitement to go and watch the film. The more people that see the poster and read the magazine, the higher the number of people will go and watch the film making the poster and magazine very important. A magazine article is desirable as it gives a neutral point of view and review of the film. It isn’t biased and it forms an opinion that could be the majorities views. It allows information about the actors and the film companies to be displayed which also attracts interested people to view the film companies website.

3. What have you learned from audience feedback?

Audience feedback is very important as it lets you know what went well/what could improve/what didn’t go well at all. It is important to follow up audience feedback as it was from my target audience, which the film is aimed at. Audience feedback also allows me to perfect my product by in cooperating everyone’s advice that seemed fitting.
In the my audience feedback of the film, I conducted a series of 6 questions that catered every aspect of my film, the questions asked where: 1) Is the theme of the film clear? 2) Does the film achieve its purpose? 3) Is the film suitable for its target audience 4) Is there anything that could be altered or added to make the theme, narrative or purpose clearer or to make it more suitable for the target audience? 5) What do you think about editing? What works well ? What needs attention? These questions enabled me to find out everything that I need and about 5 people viewed the short film and gave feedback. The responses I got were all very similar, the fact that they were all similar was a good thing as this indicated that everyone was on the same wavelength and it was a majority view. These were the average answers,:

1) ‘The theme is clear, the gritty setting and feel to the film indicates its evolved around social realism’. – This was a good factor as it meant my theme was clear and that no changes had to be made here.
2) ‘It seems the purpose of the theme is to imply that not everything is as it seems and that there is more than 1 side to a story’- This was another good factor, I made sure the underlying theme is pretty clear and the audience definitely agreed.
3) ‘The swearing in the final scene where the teacher is getting attacked seems abit to heavy for the target audience, its language that should be feature in an 18+ film’ – This piece of audience feedback indicated that we had to re-script that scene as the swearing was indeed heavy, the target audience would know what type of swear words they hear and have let me know that it needed changing.
4) ‘The classroom scene seems very staged when the students answer the question it didn’t seem very realistic, the narration was also slightly out of sync with the flashback’ – I agreed on these 2 pieces of feedback and addressed this issue, I edited the students responses to make it seem a much more fluid motion so it looks consecutive and realistic. As for the narration I simply moved the sound file a slight bit forward so that it would be in sync.
5) ‘Some of the editing transitions seem slow and not always in a fluid motion, the night scene seems abit dark’ I cut the shots slightly early so they transit fluidly, some of the shots were slightly to long and I found out that they could be cut earlier so they didn’t drag on too much.
6) ‘There seemed to be some background noise that distracted me from the film in the classroom scene, a score could fit in during the video scene near the end’- I reviewed the classroom scene and heard that there was a loud buzzing sound during some of the shots, these had to be re-shot as the noise was disrupting the actual speech of the character. I decided to go against the view of fitting in a score as I didn’t think there was any space to fit it in.
This feedback evidently proved to be very helpful to me, I was able to make changes and problems that I overlooked were corrected.
In order to receive feedback for my film poster I printed a copy of one of my draft plans and stuck it in a wall among other film posters, I asked randomly picked people to tell me what they thought about the poster and how it compared to the other posters. I asked them if they could identify the theme of the film through the poster and how effectively does the poster promote the film, appeal to them?
On draft 1 ‘ The poster seems to give off a cool, edgy thriller type theme to it, the bright lights in the background could suggest fast cars or a speedy chase, I like the steam glass effect it might suggest scenes of passion’
-This was the response I didn’t want to hear, evidently the poster was not gritty at all, it looked like a Hollywood action film poster and I had to shy away from the full steamed glass effect and the bright colours were not a good option.
On my final poster ‘The poster has a very cold feel to it, it seems rather odd that there are 2 different sides to the images, I would say it relates to the viewpoints, also the title of the film. I would say the theme is a dark thriller or social realism film however It would be hard to guess to any of the story as there are no characters on show. The film poster appeals to me and I would definelty try to find out more information about it.
-I was pleased with this feedback, it lets me know the average audience member can re-tract this level of detail from the poster.
In my final stage of feedback I wanted to know what my target audience thought of my film magazine. ‘ I found the magazine, ‘reader-friendly’ the article didn’t give up too much of the story but was enough to leave me wanting more, I particularly enjoyed the information box as it let me tell my mates the rating, website etc. One thing in particular that I didn’t like about the article was that it was lacking pictures, it could have had a lot more pictures to give a little idea to what the film is about
Overall I thought the feedback stage was very useful to me as I made some key changes that were needed to my work and was informed of what my target audience thought of my film. This stage allowed to make the most of my time by correcting any changes that needed correcting.

4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

I have come across many different media technologies during my coursework, all had served a purpose.
Starting with the research stage, I used the internet to create a blog, the blog was to be used to record all my work entries. Having a blog to edit with work has many advantages, as I can access my work from any computer as well as always having the ability to update and change my work, without having the use of a blog, I would have to record all my entries on paper which would be harder to keep organised and I would have to re-write things that went wrong. Most of my research had been conducted over the internet, I would use official short film sites as well as Wikipedia for statistics. I viewed a lot of short films over YouTube and those that I wanted to display onto my blog I was able to embed them easily. In addition, I also viewed a DVD that had a compilation of short films in good quality, however, the disadvantage of viewing this DVD was that I couldn’t upload any of the videos on the blog.
During the production stage, my primary use of equipment was a DV camera, which was used for filming. There came many disadvantages from using a DV camera, the battery life was very short which meant there was little room for error and take twos, the camera has not got a built in flashlight so I was only able to film in well lit conditions. In addition, I did not have any lighting equipment, I overcame this problem by filming in better lit conditions. However, it was very easy to transfer from the DV tape to the laptop by using a firewire cable, it took an average of 10 minutes to upload footage.
During the post-production stage I used a much wider range of technologies. In order to edit my film, I used a video editing software package called ‘iMovie’, this programme was simple to use, after I transferred my footage I had to cut it up and select what parts I needed, and what parts I could delete. Effects wise, this programme was very limited, there was a range of basic transitions and fades however nothing mind-blowing. This could be said to be an advantage as I focused on the quality of the film not the quality of the effects. To create my film poster, I used a programme that was new to me, it was a photo manipulation programme called Photoshop, this is a very complex programme and the things you can do on it are endless, however after reading a few guides I was able to comprehend it. Using this programme at times became frustrating because when things didn’t go your way it was hard to understand what to do, however the ‘history’ feature saved me a few times by allowing me to go back a few steps. My magazine article was created using desktop publishing software called Pages, it was simple to use and their were many templates on offer, however some of them were very basic, the features allowed me to create a professional magazine article.
During the evaluation stage, my biggest technologies use has been the internet, it has had a very big impact on my projects as I used it in every stage, for example, my blog, my research, guides to using Photoshop and magazine articles for using Page, the internet allowed me to find everything I needed to access.

Evaluation

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


Throughout the production of my coursework I have worked in various forms of media, such as short film, magazine articles, including film reviews, and film posters. All of which have as many forms and conventions as social realism, the genre I have been working in.

Short films have certain characteristics, which I had to incorporate into my film in order for it to be recognisable as a short film. For example a short film will usually be short in length ( about 4 to 6 minutes), meaning that there is little time for characters to be introduced. Therefore short films have a small cast, often featuring one main character. My short film meets many of these conventions and has an extremely small cast; only including one main character, a smaller principle character and a few small, unnamed characters.

Short films will also have an underlying theme, this is particularly a theme in British short films. A huge amount of short films act as social commentary, pointing out issues and taboos in society. My short film is not exceptions to this convention as it explores themes such as anti-social behaviour and the ignorance that comes with British national identity.

For example the film "Sold" (Nadia Attia) explores Britain's growing consumer culture and demonstrates this with very blunt symbolism. For example, the main character is attempting to use a television shopping channel to purchase things such as a girlfriend, a mother, a career etc. This imagery puts Nadia Attia's point about consumerism right in front of the audience and the main character. However the main character is oblivious this message.

This inspired me to create a scene where the main character, Mr. Smith would have the error of his ways bluntly put in front of him on a screen. In my film Mr. Smith watches a video of himself being beaten up by a gang of youths and the complete opposite of what e preaches to his students is right in front of his face. However Mr. Smith chooses to be ignorant to what he sees and convince himself, and his students, of the traditional ideology of Britain (fair play, stiff upper lip).

(The music, rule Britannia, contrasting with the images of Mr.Smith being beaten up highlights the contrast between his traditional beliefs and the reality of Britain which is right in front of him.)

My short film was highly influenced by other British short films I studied, such as “Gravity” which explored anti- social behaviour and violent crime among youths, as well as “Sold”, directed by Nadia Attia, which explored Britain’s growing consumer culture. I then noticed how in both films the main characters were oblivious of the negative aspects of Britain that they were displaying, inspiring me to make a film about ignorance to the true nature of the British people. This theme therefore fits into the genre of social realism.

My film is clearly recognisable as social realism and has many of the forms and conventions of social realism. For example my film has been filmed on DV film which gives the footage a realistic look and keeps any saturation of colour to a minimum. The film has a very gritty feel due to its urban setting and lack of bright colour. This allows me to accurately portray the gritty and bad themes of Britain, such as anti-social behaviour. British social realism films tend to make social commentary on the negatives of Britain, which my films certainly does. Examples of social realism can also been seen in the film poster for my film.

The film poster from my film represents the theme of the film as British due to the iconic images shown and shows that the film is about unclear vision due to the rain covered window (rain is iconic as British) that makes it difficult to clearly see the main image. The title of the film, “Viewpoints” is then written over that and is bold in order to attract the readers eye instantly t the name f the film.

Other forms and conventions of a film poster are displaying the names and possibly faces of the stars. However my films includes unknown actors so I decided not to use this convention. Our film is set in a variety of locations which is unusual for a short film which would normally have too little time to change location. However it allowed me to illustrate Mr.Smiths views, by showing Lukasz travelling through London. Photoshop was the software used to edit the poster and put together layers of images together.

Magazine articles and film reviews also have certain forms and conventions which were followed during the production of the magazine review. For example the review would need to be of a typical structure by including a headline, main image, star rating, break out paragraph etc in order to be recognisable as a films review. Also the target audience would have to be taken into consideration when choosing the correct language to use. For example a magazine aimed at a younger more casual audience, such as Empire would not include the technical language and writing that requires a prior knowledge of film, such as the language used in “Sight & Sound”. We didn't challenge many conventions of a film magazine as this may have alienated our target audience.



I have circled some of the codes and conventions of a magazine review. Such as the headline, star rating, break out paragraph and the main image.









I also followed the structural conventions, in order to make my magazine clear and easy to
follow. The structural conventions are something that anyone who reads a magazine will understand and allows them to navigate themselves through the review. Younger readers, which are magazine is aimed at, will be familiar with a star rating system due to film magazines such as empire and websites like You tube.

social realism and the media forms that they belong to. However I also had to keep it in line with my target audience of 15-18 year olds and insure that, the film in particular, is suitable for educational purposed in schools and colleges. Meaning that changes had to be made. An example of this is taking out he line “fucking pikey!” when the main character is being mugged, despite it adding to the gritty feel of the film which would reinforce the social realism aspect of the film.

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

My three products (short film, magazine film review and film poster) work together in terms of their genre, the narrative, the institution and their target audience. For example the genre of the film, social realism, carries through into the poster as the genre needs to be communicated effectively in order to attract the target audience and get across the basic themes and genre of the film. The social realism theme causes the gritty, realistic and urban feel to filter through all the work I have done and gave the writer of the magazine review a lot to write about in terms of theme and genre.

The narrative of the film is explained clearly throughout the film and prior knowledge is not needed in order to understand the narrative. The film article outlines, not only the narrative, but explores the themes and social commentary within the film. Therefore the magazine review is probably more successful in communicating the narrative than the film poster, which doesn’t give away details of the narrative except for some subtle signs, such as the unclear view of Britain and the title.

The audience will be able to understand the plot and narrative of the film without seeing the poster or reading the review but as the film is aimed at 15-18 year olds, the film review in particular is required to help the audience understand the theme and purpose, which is important for the film to be used for educational purposes and as something that provokes debate.

The main target audience for my products are 15-18 year olds but each product is aimed at a different audience also. The products all have educational value due to the themes of anti-social behaviour and British identity, allowing the film to be used as tool to provoke discussion among students and teachers. The themes within the film are relevant to current times due to violent crime among youths being an ever present topic in the media and our British identity is something which everyone can relate to.

The film poster can be used to reinforce this educational value as it contains it’s own themes and sums up the themes of the film. However the magazine review may be aimed at a slightly older audience as the it studies the film in depth and from an academic perspective. The magazine would act as a text book, outlining the key issues and themes in the film, whereas the poster would be open to individual interpretation and help the audience recognise the film’s themes themselves.You can see on the poster that we used the photo manipulation software, photoshop to put a rain covered window filter over the image taken of one of our homes. The effect demonstrates how British people have the "ignorance" of seeing the reality of British identity. This was done using an image of rain, which is an iconically British theme.

From an institutional point of view the magazine review and film poster are vitally important as they advertise a film and assist the audience with understanding deeper meaning to the film. They also contribute to attracting the correct audience for the film by using specific images and giving the film a gritty social realism film. The magazine and film poster assist with the distribution of the film as well as targeting the audience and they all combine together to help understand and promote each other. The magazine can also have an unbiased opinion from a third party point of view, which counters the film poster which is mainly an advertisement. People will therefore find the magazine review helpful, particularly from an educational perspective.

3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

Film was uploaded to Youtube (video sharing site) (click the link) and then posted onto facebook, the social networking site, in order to get the broadest possible audience feedback.

Audience feedback is important when creating any media product and essential in reviewing your product and making changes. I carried out audience feedback on my film in front of a group of about 20 people which allowed me to collect information on the first draft of my film. The most common point made among the audience was about the brightness of the picture, the language used and finding the film difficult to follow. The mugging scene of my film was filmed in very dark conditions with only one street light. Therefore the picture was found to be very dark, especially once it was projected onto a large screen. I used iMovie to increase the brightness and contrast of the footage to correct this.

The audience also found that, considering the target audience was 15-18 and to be used in schools, some of the language used (“fucking pikey!”) would cause school children to possibly react badly and distract from the seriousness of the film. Also the audience almost unanimously agreed that the language was inappropriate for the target audience and as an educational tool. The first draft of the film also didn’t include the voice over which was vital for guiding the audience through the narrative as it explains the story and narrates over the footage, which otherwise seemed irrelevant. The audience feedback shows me whether the film is successful in meeting the expectations of its target audience. I agree with the points made in the audience feedback and have made the appropriate changes.


4. How did you use media technologies in the construction and research planning and evaluation stage?

Different techniques and technologies were used in the production of this coursework and the products of these techniques can be seen in all three of my media products. The use of different techniques can be seen in the research and planning that was posted onto a blog. The blog allowed me to document the production process of the coursework by scanning drafts for the film poster. I was also able to post screenshots and links to other sites in order to illustrate the points I was making. The Internet is an excellent resource and very simple to use when doing research into any aspect of my coursework.

During the production of our film I did the filming and used a digital DV camera which allowed me to have instant playback on what I had recorded, allowing me to make judgements on what changes needed to me made before the editing process began. Digital cameras can also be used to alter the brightness of the footage as you are filming, which helps when filming in dark conditions, before the footage is edited together into the finished product. This software also meant that I was able to develop and add ideas during the editing process

During the post-production of the film I used iMovie HD, a non-linear editing software, to edit the film by placing the footage in the correct order and adding the appropriate sound and visual effects. IMovie HD can be used to split footage up into smaller pieces of footage to a very precise time, which helps with mach on action and when applying sound in the exact position.

Using the Internet I was able to obtain copyright free pictures to be used on Photoshop; the software used to create the film poster, as well as use some images taken by members of my group. Using Photoshop different images can be layered over each other and the manipulated to change the complete loo of the image. Photoshop was a very useful technology because it allows you to create virtually an image you want. Understanding the capabilities of photoshop influenced our initial ideas and allowed us to be very creative. W had the initial idea to layer a union jack over iconic British symbols and then fade this new image into the image of a graffiti ridden wall. All of our initial ideas would have taken advantage of photoshop's capabilities, as can be seen in this post (click the link)

The software used to create the magazine article was Pages. Pages allows you to create written work in different forms, such as magazine articles, newspaper articles, leaflets etc. Using pages the magazine article was created and all the necessary forms and conventions could be achieved, such as headline, billing board and images.

The use of technology completely effected the decisions that were made because due to the wide variety of copyright free images on the Internet available, I knew that I could think of any image I wanted to have in the poster and find it easily. Also the editing software meant that problems with lighting and a huge amount of mistakes made during production could be fixed during the editing process.

During the evaluation stage I have found that being able to post video clips and pictures very helpful when illustrating a point as I have been able to upload the part of the film I'm talking about. The entire evaluation is uploaded onto a blog, which makes it very accessible to anyone who wants to see it and lets me link to other websites and pages.

Daniel Richards' Evaluation

Advanced Portfolio-Evaluation

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

To a large extent my media product challenges the forms and conventions of real media products in terms of the ancillary texts in particular, as my main product is a short film these do not produce film posters to promote the film itself although it does use a traditional convention of real media product via a magazine review.

In terms of the film poster, the names of the actors in the film are not boldly displayed like the traditional main stream films do so in order to promote their film even further. However, I felt that as the actors in the film where not well known, it would be pointless to display their names although I think that besides the idea of placing images of the two main characters on

the poster so that the audience could immediately identify the leading characters but again I felt that as the actors were not illustrious actors it would not be as strong of images as what was used in the final poster. Short film posters often not too dissimilar too independent films traditionally display images that are either screenshots from the film plus the leading character or just a leading graphic or image which symbolises the film as a whole. Above all, a very clear and evident title is incorporated. This latter notion mentioned is the one I used and developed for my own film poster. It consists of a very a clear and bold title over an image which epitomises what the film represents. I came to the decision that the image used for basically what is the whole poster besides the title, essentially as a whole truly highlights the contrast and paradox to an extent, especially in terms of the underlying motifs (that everything is not as ‘rosy’ as it appears to be). The various ideas I debated over are outlined more strongly in the following link; http://ldgf10.blogspot.com/2010/03/these-are-initial-ideas-we-had-for-film.html

To a large extent the technical layout of the magazine can be viewed as ‘classic example’, taken inspiration from the leading film review magazines such as ‘Total film’ and ‘Empire’.

For instance it follows the conventional layout of film magazine reviews, consisting of the archetypal characteristics; main image, secondary image, break out paragraph, plus the typical typography. Nonetheless, these conventions were used as not only constant viewers of my magazine ‘Spark’ but also but the wider audience of readers who consistently read film magazine reviews are familiar with these conventions so rather than presenting to them an unorthodox and unfamiliar layout may turn them away from reading the review. So basically, by following the ‘classic’ layout of a magazine review was done in order to be appealing to as many readers possible.

Furthermore, my film project predominantly follows the traditional plotlines of short film, one of which is a short, sharp and effective narrative (essentially hitting the audience hard with the film’s intended theme and purpose). With the theme of British identity I had taken it to develop and deliver the classic purposes of a short film. Essentially, provoking the audience the question what they are viewing thus concluding the film with what should be the answer(s) to their question(s).

In regards to the conventions of a short film to which I met are the length; ‘anything sub 30 minutes narrative/non-narrative designed to entertain/challenge a theoretical audience;' Paul Swadel (short film producer) and the narrative structure. I followed the typical conventions of a mainstream film with a three part narrative structure, by the means of utilising the elements of non-linear narrative structure in addition. The comment made by Paul Swadel correlates strongly to the all overall purpose of my film. To some extent I had developed yet challenged at the same time the narrative structure of traditional short films, as short films predominantly follow a linear structure throughout the film probably due to the short length of the film. There is simply not enough time for the film to comprise of circular storylines, flashbacks and numerous objective narratives. Short films usually focus on one main character (subject narrative), this allows the character to develop therefore the audience can follow them easily, especially as there is not enough time to create larger plotlines due to the fact it is a short film. So short films have to be interesting immediately and throughout thus gaining the satisfaction of the consumers. This is done through the protagonist and/or the plotline (in correspondence to open ending and enigma).

Whereas, I my film had consisted of flashbacks plus an object narrative (with regards to Mr Smith speaking of his foreign friend over a flashback of his friend) thus developing but

challenging the traditional narrative structure of short films. I had noticed this reoccurring form of narrative structure in the short films I had viewed in my research such as, “Veronique” and “Double Take”. I learnt from the short films I had viewed that the ending to films is very much open ended in order to provoke question and discussion from the audience, of which was one element I hoped to achieve when I was producing my film.

In my film, to reinforce the theme of British identity the national anthem was put in the film to reinforce this theme but also highlight the underlying message of the film; ‘is the sense of British identity renown around the world actually in existence today?’ The poster also reinforces this notion, highlighting the contrast of British society, of which is aimed to be portrayed to the audience in the film.

The established forms and conventions of the media and genres I have previously worked in are short film sequences with the incorporation of the thriller genre, of which I did incorporate the feature of using the genre of thriller to a small extent in this short film having had previous experience with the use of it in I had felt confident to use it again with of course, correspondence to the overall theme of British identity.

2) How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

The context of the magazine (one of the two ancillary texts) combines very well with the main product as it is a magazine of which its principal audience is school teachers (particularly those within secondary schools); form tutors plus media teachers. Conversely, the other ancillary text (film poster) is effective combination of my main product but not as effective as the magazine review. This is because the magazine review reinforces the theme of the film a lot more evidently than the poster. I believe the magazine review emphases the communication of the strongly prevalent theme in the film but I do also acknowledge that film poster does not do this as effectively however that is not the preliminary objective of my poster. I think one ought to have viewed the magazine review or the film to actually truly understand the meaning of the poster. However, the poster is meant to entice question and discussion amongst one self and in groups thus effectively without knowing being persuaded to view the film in order to attain the answers to their questions. I believe that the strongest point of the poster is the overall image as it has no overall target market, its there catch the attention of anyone no matter what their demographic, again in order to provoke thought on the subject matter of the image they have viewed (that of the movie poster). Primarily, designed with this notion in order to gain a large number of audiences besides the foremost one (students). All of which was a key objective of mine I had outlined in the process of planning.

The two ancillary texts work very well together in achieving their purpose of promoting and supporting the main film albeit via different means, from an institutional point of view, the poster is to advertise the film. This allows for a far greater opportunity of attracting no the only the intended but also more so consumers who may not have been expected to view the film who were thought to be far greater to attracted into watching the film especially those outside the primary target audience; the consumers of short film or fans of film with theme of British identity.

Whereas, the magazine article is intended to recommending the film, to some degree in this context this makes it relatively weaker in comparison to the poster in gaining audiences as it has a far smaller audiences in which to capture due to its distribution (schools).

3) What have you learned from your audience feedback?

From my audience feedback I had learnt various weaknesses and strengths. For example, I had discovered that there were problems with my use of sound but I had also discovered how effective the editing was throughout the film plus whether the purpose of the film was clearly evident to the intended audience (students between the ages of 15-18). I conducted my audience feedback by constructing several questionnaires and giving them to my form class in registratration whilst they watched the film. I had only constructed questionnaires for feedback on the film although I do acknowledge that doing so for the other two media products would have greatly enhanced not only media products as separate entities so that I could develop them after audience feedback but above all my project as a whole. However, I was not able to do this due to the time constraints of the project.

As a whole I agreed with the audience feedback as it made realise how much of the actual film looked rushed and careless, especially in terms of continuity in particular. So, I took all the audience feedback on board and changed the film in response to the feedback I received. For example, there was frequent notations of how abrupt the editing and sound were throughout the film, there was limitations to the what could be done to the sound as there was bad microphones on the DV cameras used plus, the issue of time constraints on the film. I overcame the problem of the distorted sound by using a voice over. Although I do have to consider that there were positive points from the audience feedback, by the means of the purpose and theme were identified.

I acknowledge that audience feedback is very important when creating media products as one has to take into consideration specific criteria with regards to meeting the needs of the intended target audience; above all audience feedback gives me a greater understanding of what I need to improve in order to meet the expectations of the target audience. Otherwise the media texts I had produced would be very irrelevant and difficult to be targeted at particular audiences thus hard to entice people to consume these media products.

4) How did you use new media technologies in the construction and the research, planning and evaluation stages?

Throughout my project, in the various stages of production various technologies were used in order to support and enhance the work of the film project. For instance, in the research and planning stage, my work was documented on a blog via the internet, but even more so the internet had been initially used primarily for research purposes.

Besides that there was the use of DV camera and digital camera (to take pictures of locations of the settings of where I filmed my footage of which was documented on the blog) in the production stage. In terms of post production, a lot more technology was used, particularly, computer software of which comprised of Apple's I-Movie program (a non- linear piece of editing software), besides the music already featured on the I-Movie I used the internet to gain a copyright free music to incorporate to longer parts of the film as the music from the I-Movie software does not always have the necessary music that fits with my footage, that sets the right mood for the footage being played. So that it enhances the footage even further in order for the audience to understand the film better thus enjoy it. Additionally, the program Photoshop was used to construct the film poster; of which the screen shots of the initial ideas are on the blog. This piece of software really allowed me to highlight creativity however, as Photoshop was new to me I could not truly exploit the true capabilities of the software.

Nonetheless, I did learn quickly few of the many techniques to the image manipulation software such as being to layer and diverge images to my own ideas. For example, I had utilised the tool of layering two images together so that the overall picture did not look distorted (plus adapting the colours to do so in accordance to its purpose) thus realistic. Also, incorporating to the previous example was the use of the cropping tool to enhance and attain the desired image by grabbing and cutting the desired images for the final poster. I had downloaded the titles for poster from the internet plus the 'rainy window' filter affect aswell from the internet, to reinforce and highlight the underlying theme of contrast even further.

Moreover, another example of new software I had used was Desktop Publishing, this was used to create the magazine article, and it was much easier than Photoshop to use, although it is a simple amateur piece of software whereas Photoshop program that has far greater utilities. Desktop Publishing was very simple thus easy to use of which meant that it was not time consuming at all. The ways in which this was done was in which in for example the columns and the positions of the pictures were easily possible to move to one’s needs. It was too dissimilar to attempting to produce a magazine article on Microsoft Word although this is not intended to do so; it had similar elements, very practical for an amateur magazine producer like me.

There were numerous advantages and limitations to the technology I had used, for instance a key advantage of using the I-Movie software is that as it was a piece of non-linear editing software it meant that the

original ideas I had from the beginning of the project could be developed. However, there were numerous aspects to the project which I found very frustrating as most of the time I could not overcome these but rather deal with them and adapt my project (mainly the film) to these limitations, of which included the lack of lightening and sound equipment although I overcame the problem of the insufficient amount of sound equipment by extracting the audio and replacing it with a voiceover.

In terms of technologies which I had used in the evaluation stage of my research is the use of Mircosoft Word to produce the overall evaluation document plus the incorporation of pictures but above all; the internet it links into the document so when the overall piece of evaluation is accessed on my blog the links can accessed and images can also be viewed aswell. Plus, i had also posted my film on youtube:

I had also used screenshots in incorporation to the blog in corroboration to what I have stated in evaluation to support what I have mentioned.