MY FINAL PRODUCT

EVALUATION TIMEEEEEE

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

Throughout this process, I would say that I have learnt a great deal and my knowledge began as very limited and lacking in any angle of professionalism and now it is to a much higher standard that I am proud of.
When we began the project I found that I struggled to come up with creative and successful ideas and when I was able to do this, I sometimes found it difficult to convey these ideas to my peers and to develop these into working products. Now, I would say that I am able to come up with ideas that challenge those that are currently existing within the industry and to develop them into a good film opening.
Our preliminary task consisted of a character walking into a room and having a conversation with another character. We went for the storyline of a girl being held hostage to try and make it more interesting to watch as the concept alone of the video isn't particularly interesting. We chose to not reveal to the audience what the girl was being held hostage for until towards the end of the clip to keep them intrigued and curious to watch more.
During this task, myself and Lily worked together to direct and work the camera which was quite effective because collectively we were able to find appropriate and fitting angles which benefited the piece most. Another aspect that was identified during the process was the difficulty of achieving good lighting and so when it came to filming my own film opening, I found that working outside midday was particularly successful and I was able to obtain the preferred final product.

I found that the tasks and lessons that I learnt prior to producing my own film opening were very useful when it came to actually producing it because I was able to utilise the different skills learnt and to develop/challenge these further.

Some things which I chose to develop and challenge were the ideas/themes/genres because this was not something that we had not done within our preliminary task.

EVALUATION TIMEEEEEE

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

When constructing this product I learnt a great day about technologies. I used a wide range of technologies such as Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects, YouTube, IMDb, Google and a Canon HD camera. When carrying out research prior to constructing my media film opening, I utilised YouTube in order to look at existing products within the film industry and also film openings that had been produced by previous Media Studies students so that I was able to gain an understanding of what is successful and what kind of things I would be able to create.
When it came to filming, I found that the camera was very well suited to our task set because we were able to achieve some great results, particularly down to the clear picture quality that we were able to obtain; having said this the camera was also easy enough to use that there weren't any prominent difficulties, especially because we had used the cameras before when filming projects in class and in our 'The Hangover' project which we completed in groups.

Not only was I able to learn about technologies during the construction of my project but also how to develop the use of them into producing a successful and well-rounded film opening.

EVALUATION TIMEEEEEE

How did you attract/address your audience?

My aim was to attract the audience by setting the opening as very much open-ended in the way that the audience does not know the full story yet and/or what has happened to Eliza. I also like the way that from the opening credits the audience has to pay full attention because the dialogue/voice-over/narration begins at that point. The narration allows the audience to connect with her character and so it comes as a shock to find that she has had an accident.

I would like to think that the opening really gives the audience a lot to think about and they have a lot of connections to make. Upon review of my initial audience feedback I found that they wanted to find out what happened next, which is the sole purpose of a film.

“-I thought the voice over was really good – both funny and emotional which presents the character really well. Her speech presumably lays down the gauntlet for the rest of the film. I think one of the downsides is the lack of revealing of the character, although I really enjoyed it and it was a great production.”

“-Really good narration, gives it all the effect, the footage is quite non-descript, which really makes the narration powerful. The titles are really good and linger long enough to be able to read them and still keep up with the voice over. Would be really interested in watching the full length movie of this.”

EVALUATION TIMEEEEE

 

When brainstorming and attempting to establish the genre and audience for my film I created an audience character profile that allows you to identify what kind of audience you want to target and how they will relate to the film. I decided that I would like to target the Mainstream Plus audience because they are primarily looking for good films however, they also try new things that aren’t similar to the more mainstream big ‘money-makers’.

Mainstream Plus? Genre: Drama, Romantic Comedy

Summer is a 24 year-old female with an English Literature degree. She likes mainstream films but also isn't afraid of watching crossovers and those which test the boundaries. She is quite girly but not soppy or pathetic. Her guilty pleasure is going to see rom-coms and dramas with her mum and younger sister who is at University studying Art Textiles. Summer likes films which are relatable to real life and which manipulate the audience's emotions through the use of music.

I feel that this is a fitting audience for my genre of film and it seems that the film would gain more of a female reception, purely because of it’s content however, it is down to personal preference and I believe that the film could take in a great audience.

EVALUATION TIMEEEEEE

Given that ‘A Day in the Life Of…’ is a low budget film and is my first production, I would say that it would not meet the high expectations that exist of high budget films which largely use CGI and consequently attracting a large audience and box office; therefore I think that it would be a media institution which also distributes independent and lower budget films. I feel that if my film was distributed by an institution like StudioCanal it would greatly benefit and a wider audience would also be achieved.

StudioCanal is a French-based production (as StudioCanal S.A.) and distribution (as StudioCanal Images S.A.) company that owns the third-largest film library in the world. The company is part of the Canal+ Group, owned by Vivendi SA. Studio Canal, formerly known as Optimum releasing, distributes creative films across all genres such as Bridget Jones’ Diary and many others; and releasing many independent films including foreign films. 

Bridget Jones’ Diary had a budget of $26 million and took $281,929,795 at the Box Office and was distributed by Miramax Films and Universal Pictures.

EVALUATION TIMEEEEEE

Given that my film followed the Rom-Com genre, my media product represents females and the older generation of youth, i.e. adult-teens.

Character profile: ELIZA NIAMH MURRAY

Age: 18

D.O.B.: 28th December 1991 (Film set in 2010)

Star Sign: Capricorn

Nationality: British

Hair colour: Blonde

Eye colour: Hazel

Hometown: Rural village in Norfolk, originally from Yorkshire

Hobbies: Reading, listening to old music, being outside

Other siblings: None

Relationship status: Single

I chose to represent this particular social group because they are very relatable to, in the eyes of both adults and teenagers and so the target audience is quite broad and therefore a better reception for the film would be met. Although not a great amount of physicality is shown of the female protagonist, the audience is still able to establish that she is not of a lower class because she is in a nice countryside and from what you see of her clothing, she appears to be well-kept, and so this is representative of a middle class lifestyle, which is both relatable to for the audience and something to aspire to.

In terms of the rest of the film, social class is an aspect that I would have looked closely at because when Eliza has her accident, her life is affected in a very extreme way and this will impact upon everybody involved in her life. This would enable the audience to gain an understanding how people from different social classes have to come together in order to help fix and rectify certain things. 

EVALUATION TIMEEEEEE

The genre that I chose when planning my film was a Romantic Comedy, more commonly known as a ‘Rom-Com’; they are typically light-hearted films with humorous plotlines that are centred on romantic ideals such as ‘that true love is able to surmount most obstacles’. Although I followed this genre, I wanted to challenge the concept by not displaying a possibly romance or even the female protagonist’s physicality to the audience within the opening two-minutes. My reason for doing this was because I wanted the audience to build up a rapport and understanding of Eliza’s character through her dialogue rather than establishing a stereotype or prejudgement of the character from just appearance alone; this also allows for some background to be established because it is her dialogue that captures the audience, this keeps them intrigued and interested to watch the rest of the film.

Another aspect that I chose to challenge was the range of shots that I used within my opening; I wanted to keep it simple, and so I didn’t use too many shots and when it came to editing I used effects such as a cross-dissolve in order to blend the shots together so that it flowed well as a transition and was easy to watch for the audience, rather than using snappy and fast-paced shots that would be typical of genres such as horror or action films.

Having said this, I have used and developed the typical forms and conventions of real media products within the industry by using non-diajectic audio within my opening; I did this in the form of music and Eliza’s voiceover. I believe that using the music allows emotion to be developed within the audience and this can strongly influence the effect of the film on the audience. A film that particularly influenced and inspired me was Bridget Jones’ Diary because within her dialogue and voice-overs she provides a very humorous and entertaining aspect and this fuels the popularity and success of the films.

One form that I chose to develop was the use of quotes from famous and well-known people from around the world within a film opening; a particularly effective example of this for me is Remember Me in which Robert Pattinson’s character has a fairly troubled lifestyle because of his father and he is able to gain inspiration and many life lessons from Gandhi. Remember Me is a 2010 American romantic, coming-of-age drama film directed by Allen Coulter, with the screenplay by Will Fetters. One particular quote is "Gandhi said that whatever you do in life will be insignificant but it is very important that you do it...". This quote relates to my media film because I am intrigued by the use of famous historical figures whose words are able to have a great and significant impact upon peoples lives.

“ In a typical romantic comedy the two lovers tend to be young, likeable, and apparently meant for each other, yet they are kept apart by some complicating circumstance (e.g., class differences, parental interference; a previous girlfriend or boyfriend) until, surmounting all obstacles, they are finally wed. A wedding-bells, fairy-tale-style happy ending is practically mandatory. ”