Evaluation - Part 7

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

A big problem we found when editing our preliminary, was that we were entirely new to using Sony Vegas and therefore the skills shown were incredibly basic and didn't look very good when we actually made them into the final prelim product.

We had no use of titles or non-diagetic sound (or any sound for that matter) in the preliminary task as we didn't know how to incorporate that as yet. To help us use Sony Vegas more effectively in the final two minute opening product, we used tutorials and help from our peers to use it more efficiently.


We learnt to use tools such as cropping and adding music and different fading techniques and colour enhancements, as shown in our final film. Also how to develop the cropping and cutting skills to make the product flow more to make it a nicer experience to watch.


If i were to use the program again I feel I would be a lot more confident and capable to do an even better job of what we did on our finished opening two minute product.

Evaluation - Part 6

What I have learnt about technologies from the process of this project's construction?

View more presentations from alicebuckingham.

Evaluation - Part 5

HOW DID WE ATTRACT OUR AUDIENCE AND ADDRESS?

TARGET AUDIENCE: Young people, female (between 13-25)

SETTING - We chose a local setting (Hastings) to attract local audience members who would want to watch a film, as well as in areas surrounding (East Sussex)

PROTAGONIST -

The protagonist is an attractive female which may appeal to the male demographic, even though this is not a big demographic for our film. Also it is appealing to our mainly female demographic as the age of our protagonist is similar to our audience, therefore relateable.

CAST - Our cast consists of a seventeen year old girl and middle age adults, therefore it does have a wider range of age in the cast appealing to more age groups.

SITUATION -

The situation in the film is quite a 'taboo' one and is addressing a problem that not many films do. This may attract an audience that enjoys watching films that arent so conventional and that portray situations that are not the nicest, but do emulate so aspects of real life. 

Evaluation - Part 4

Audience for our media product on Prezi

Evaluation - Part 3

EVALUATION on Prezi

Evaluation - Part 2

Evaluation - Part 1

1) In what ways does my media project use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media productions?

In our opening two minutes, it is not immediately clear of the genre of our film, and throughout the two minutes, it does remain slightly difficult to distinguish the genre that our film belongs to. This can be seen as different to mainstream media productions, as usually the genre is easily worked out early on in those films. 

With our hybridization of genres, (such as attack the block) between realism and drama, it adds to the difficulty for the audience to work out the genre as it is not a common genre in mainstream films. This has been done deliberately to wider the appeal. Although it may be difficult to decipher, the opening is true to the two genres as the protagonist is a very typical seventeen year old girl, and the setting is a very typical place where many of the audience members would perhaps live. This almost develops the conventions of real media, as it means the audience can relate to the film more than, for example blockbuster action films, therefore may gain a larger audience and appreciation for the film. 

We chose to use completely natural lighting which is due to the fact that we wanted to keep the realism of the situation intact and figured that with lots of special lighting effects that the film would loose its realistic feel. In a way this challenges the conventions of real media products as normally a real media product would look glossy and as clear as possible in the lighting front, and we have gone for the opposite effect.

In our use of music, our film has been very true to conventions of real media, as the music emulates the genre well, and mirrors the protagonist's mood, which is similar to what a genuine film would do. 

Music and sound in our film

Once Keeley and I had finally decided on our storyline and had filmed our footage, I immediately had a song in my mind that would fit well for our opening.  

Above is a copy of an email that I sent to the composer of the song I had in mind for our opening two minutes asking for permission to use her music in our film, because due to copyright laws I could not use it freely without permission.

Due to the fact that this artist is not very well known, I thought there was a greater chance of her getting back to us with a reply.

I got the sound effects (such as the sea) off of websites that distribute music and sound clips that are free of copyright called stonewashed.net

Audience Feedback

I showed our film to four people, my Mother, my Father, my Brother and a friend. I thought this would be a good variety because they are of all ages, and are two of each gender.

MOTHER:

- My Mother said how she enjoyed the film and thought that it had a fairly good storyline to it, although wouldn't wish to pay to see the full production or own it on Dvd. This is beacuse she felt "she couldn't relate to the character being a seventeen year old girl" and "wasn't the sort of film that she recognised and generally would watch." 

- It would appear that my Mother's age has a lot to do with the fact that she wouldn't be inclined to purchase it, as she didn't feel that the character or the storyline could relate to her in any way because of the age and life situation difference. Also my Mother is not a keen 'art house' type of film watcher and prefers mainstream blockbuster films to the kind of film our's would be. 

FATHER:

- My Father is only a year older than my Mother  and he said that he "likes the reality of the opening and the storyline" so far, and enjoyed the fact that it was set in his own town. He didn't however feel he could relate to the character at all or to the film overall. 

- It is clear that the gender difference as well as the age difference between my Father and the protagonist of our film  sets them even further apart than my Mother and the protagonist in being un-relatable, which would be the reason why he wouldn't wish to pay to see it.

- Having said this, my  Father is a  fairly keen 'arthouse' film type watcher and often attends screenings at the 'Kino' cinema in Hawhurst and 'Electric Palace' in Hastings old town, therefore did appreciate the 'reality' and 'gritty' feel to the opening.

BROTHER:

- My 20 year old brother's view differed massively form my parent's as he dislike the opening completely. He said he found it "boring" and is in need of more "action to speed things up". He also found it "completely un-relateable" to him and any situation he has ever been in. 

- Although my brother is of a fairly similar age to the protagonist, he didn't like the film at all, as his usual choice of film would be one that contained lots of action and usually a mainstream blockbuster that would be screened at cinemas such as 'Odeon' or 'Vue'. He disliked the genre as he found it difficult to decipher it and was "too much like hard work" having to decipher the situation and what was going on with the characters. 

FRIEND:

-  My friend absolutely loved our film and appreciated the discreetness of the storyline. She is the same age as the protagonist and gender, therefore found it relatable which she said what was the thing that "drew her in" as well as the realism of it all. She felt she didn't know what to expect in the film and the genre conventions were unusual, but remained true to the different  genre that we had chosen.

Whole story of our film

The opening of the film, is very slow and in a tranquil setting. The scene where the father's body is revealed on the floor, we see the Mother look at him with a bag full of luggage and a look of dis concern, and almost disgust on her face before exiting the house. 

The audience does not yet know this, but the Father has abused the Mother and Talulla (protagonist) for years, and this day it finally became too much for Talulla's Mother and she killed him. Whether it was accidental or not is unclear. She then texted Talulla saying "come home now please" then exits the house with the bags. 

This is as far as the audience sees in the opening two minutes

OUR FILM CONTINUED...

Talulla's (nameless) Mother will then wait in the car for Talulla to arrive home and explain to her the situation, before leaving to a better life. The rest of the film is a story of survival of a mother and daughter and shows the way they have to live in order to never be caught by the police. They hide for years, change their names, they change everything about themselves and they are happily settling in to normal life again. 

10 years later curiosity gets the better of Talulla, and she decides to visit her old home / the house her Father was killed in. The house is completely abandoned with the same furniture and everything remained as it had been when they had left. As she looked she remembered all of the horrific times her and her mother had to endure here. She gets caught looking in the house by a police officer who had been head of the murder case of her Father, and the police officer recognizes immediately Talulla's vibrant red hair, which had changed scarcely since she was a child, from photos of the family in the house when the murder investigation took place. 

Talulla is immediately taken in for questioning, although she doesn't tell them anything and sticks to a quickly made up sorry throughout the whole questioning period. She has her one phone call and obviously phones her mother, telling her of the situation. What will her mother do to help? she obviously doesn't want her daughter to take the blame so she decides to turn up and give herself in to the police, confessing the murder, and subsequently setting Talulla free, giving her the life she had always wanted for her daughter. 

Names for our film

When Keeley and I discussed film names we had to take into account the plot and storyline of the film and what would suit it best. Obviously it had to give people a slight insight into the film and a taste of what they would see if they were to watch it, although it is important to Keeley and I that it doesn't give the film away too much as we want it to be surprising all the way through, and in particular the ending.

Also we felt it necessary to choose a film title that would appeal to our target audience, ie - non mainstream, perhaps teens who like to watch a film that is gritty and fairly similar to a real life scenario, and something they can relate to as well as enjoy watching. 

We first decided that we would choose a fairly objective name for our film rather than a name of a character

EXAMPLES:

Distributors likely to touch our film

I will be using my own distribution company that Keeley and I created ourselves. This means that if our film were to be published, We would own all rights to our film. 

The distribution company is called 'Keeylal Productions'.

 

Distributors likely to touch our film would most likely be smaller companies looking to distribute a lower budget film than something that would come out of Hollywood, as our film would be incredibly low budget and our experience in the film industry is very limited.

Examples of distributors that would perhaps distribute our film are: Optimum releasing (distributed Submarine 2010) and IFC (who distributed Fish Tank 2009) These are distributors who deal with lower budget films rather than big Hollywood blockbusters.

How I created 'RAPUNZEL' in the titling

After watching the draft of our film, Keeley and I thought it was a bit boring and didn't involve too many technical editing skills, so we thought we would extend our editing when we came to do the titling.

I used paper to write the letters on so it looked more 'real' which is essentially the theme or genre of our film, so it didn't look too technical and more gritty and real. 

This title takes up around 10 seconds of our opening two minutes so we will probably put it at the end of our film so it rounds it up quite nicely.

Preliminary

This is our initial preliminary task and the first time we had used Sony Vegas so the editing is particularly amateurish. Keely and I have vastly inmproved our editing skills since editing this short video.

With the preliminary task Keeley and I decided to show the simple passing of a 'Parkwood' prospectus from myself to Keeley. It also shows Keeley walking into a different room to where i am. It is obvious that in this preliminary video there is not sound, so to improve on our editing skills we will keep the sound in our main task. Another improvement that needs to be worked on is the cropping of the clips, because in some parts each clips runs a bit too long and it looks a bit out of kilter. Also there is no sound to the footage so in the main task we will need to work out how to add sound to it otherwise, althought we didnt actually want any dialogue, it would be completely silent which is not what we want.

Our Film Classification

We used the website 'bbfc' or The British Board of Film Classification which is the national company for classifying films. It is an independent, non-governmental body which has classified cinema films since it was set up in 1912 and videos/ DVDs since the Video Recordings Act was passed in 1984.

To classify a film, you must look at the criteria a film needs to cover before it can be passed for a certain category, ie PG, 12, 15 etc.

After looking at our film and the content of the storyline, we felt that it would be a '15' as it contains quite an adult storyline that is not particularly nice for a viewer under 15. Also there is a fair amount of death involved and the whole fact that it is very relatable to a typical teenagers life that gets turned upside down, and addresses sensitive issues like domestic abuse, it is not suitable for an under 15 year old. 

’15′

Suitable only for 15 years and over

No one younger th

an 15 may see a ‘15’ film in a cinema. No one younger than 15 may rent or buy a ‘15’ rated video work.

Discrimination

The work as a whole must not endorse discriminatory language or behaviour.

Drugs

Drug taking may be shown but the film as a whole must not promote or encourage drug misuse. The misuse of easily accessible and highly dangerous substances (for example, aerosols or solvents) is unlikely to be acceptable.

Horror

Strong threat and menace are permitted unless sadistic or sexualised.

Imitable behaviour

Dangerous behaviour (for example, hanging, suicide and self-harming) should not dwell on detail which could be copied. Easily accessible weapons should not be glamorised.

Language

There may be frequent use of strong language (for example, ‘fuck’). The strongest  terms (for example, ‘cunt’) may be acceptable if justified by the context. Aggressive or repeated use of the strongest language is unlikely to be acceptable.

Nudity

Nudity may be allowed in a sexual context but without strong detail. There are no constraints on nudity in a non-sexual or educational context.

Sex

Sexual activity may be portrayed without strong detail. There may be strong verbal references to sexual behaviour, but the strongest references are unlikely to be acceptable unless justified by context. Works whose primary purpose is sexual arousal or stimulation are unlikely to be acceptable.

Theme

No theme is prohibited, provided the treatment is appropriate for 15 year olds.

Violence

Violence may be strong but should not dwell on the infliction of pain or injury. The strongest gory images are unlikely to be acceptable. Strong sadistic or sexualised violence is also unlikely to be acceptable. There may be detailed verbal references to sexual violence but any portrayal of sexual violence must be discreet and have a strong contextual justification.

Original Storyboard for our film

This mine and Keeley's original storyboard for the opening two minutes of our film. We began to use pixton.com to produce a storyboard but we then decided to do it on paper as we couldn't express the exact camera angles that we wanted to use on pixton.com. We also decided to draw the storyboard because it will be easier to change it, if needed. 

In fact, we filmed most of the film and have decided to change the storyboard as we found that viewers will find our film boring as we weren't 100% on it. We estimated the times on each scene, so most wont be definate until we have edited the final film. We also need to include the times as to when the production logo and the actresses name comes up, so the storyboard still needs improvement.

Casting / Props / Make Up / Costume

Film Name - Rapunzel 
Actress - Talulla McNeilly
Genre - Thriller / Realism / Drama

CASTING : We cast Talulla as our protagonist as she takes drama as an A-level and also is a close friend so she wouldn't feel embarrassed to act for us. Also she has very outstanding long red hair, and has quite an 'innocent' look about her which was ideal for what we wanted in our protagonist.

The idea for the film to be called Rapunzel was because the fact that Talulla's hair is red and long which adds a very symbolic feel to the opening. Also with the story line being that her mother is the villain and in the story books tale the step mother locks her away in a castle, well our modern twist to the tale is that she is trapped as she is forever looking over her shoulder, very wary of her Mother.

There are very little props other than Talulla's phone as we wanted the opening to be simplistic with much of the focus on the protagonist and for the audience to figure out what is going on via her expression.


The costume is just Talulla's own clothes, and Talulla did her own make up also, which we thought appropriate as we want it to look as authentic and realistic as we can. Our audience will most probably be around the same age as Talulla if slightly older, therefore this way, they will be able to relate to her and her dress sense.

CHANGE - Alternative Ending

After veiwing our footage, Keeley and I decided that our film seemed a little boring and didnt contain a lot of footage that would really capture and entice the audience.

After thinking on it we decided to film an alternate ending in which our protagonist returns home to find a dead body in her living room, (which later in the film we find out is her Father.) We thought this was a good idea as it added a shocking factor as the audience would not expect this to occur.

This is our alternative ending in storyboard form which I created on the website ToonDoos -

The only problem that this new storyline brings is that it shifts the genre and style from being Realistic / Drama, to being realistic thriller - therefore we will need to reaserch some more films of this genre.

Shooting Schedule - 2nd January 2012

On January 2nd 2012 Keeley and I went to Hastings seafront with my video camera and our storyboard for reference to film. We asked a friend Tallula Mcneilly to be our protagonist and we showed her our storyboard and general ideas for our opening and told her a little bit of background on our character. We managed to film the majority of the footage that will make up our two minutes, although there are some scenes that are filmed in a house and we require another actor so we have decided to finish this part another day.

Film Setting - 2nd Januaray 2012

Keeley and I decided to shoot our film in Hastings, East Sussex - in the town and along the seafront, as it is a local area and it contains many places that would be ideal for the type of filming that we wished to do, i.e walking, train station filming etc. Also the placement was ideal as it represented a very average town in Britain that would happily home a girl of that age and background, aiding our realistic style that we want the film to emulate.



We filmed our protagonist sitting on the beach at the start and then walking along the beach and along the seafront with the sea and pier in the background. The seafront was a good place to start off our filming as the beach often symbolises tranquillity and escape and that is exactly what we wanted to be apparent that our protagonist went there for.



We also used Robertson Street as a shooting location as when it was busy and people were all out together and in groups around our protagonist, it made it more obvious how alone she was and how she doesn't want social communication at the minute.



One of our final scenes was at Hastings Station in which we see our protagonist look at train times and travel via train to St Leonards Warrior Square. This was a good location as it provided a variety of shots that were necessary to make our opening more diverse.

Drama / Realism Film Opening Reaserch IN DEPTH - 'Fish Tank'

We decided after extensive film opening research and storyboards, that our two minute film will be of the drama / realistic genre therefore here we only researched the openings of drama / realism films. I analysed the first two minutes of Fish Tank in greater detail as this opening was similar to the opening that we hope to accomplish.

FISH TANK:


Titles - White font, no music, black background
Background noise - girl heavily breathing.


FIRST SCENE :
titles cut to girl crouched over, breathing heavily in casual - perhaps sports clothes - suggests she has being doing sport, or something physical has been going on. (a chase?)


Cuts to the back of her, showing that she is inside a building - view proves she is high up so possibly a flat? Camera pans around her while she picks up her phone showing more of the environment and view out of the window - phone kicks into answerphone and she leaves a message (camera still panning around her).
"Keeley its me - what is going on... I said sorry didn't i?!"
Shows how shes had an argument with someone - badly spoken "pi**ed off" shows the type of back ground she is from - rough?


Picks up her bags and leaves flat. (Doesn't show her leaving)


Protagonist walks to outside a different flat block: (showing she has left) looks like London, she throws stones at window - young girls sunbathing outside on the grass (doesn't greet them) addresses one of them -"What are you doing?!" shows she knows her well? younger sister maybe?


Man comes out of the flat that she had been throwing stones at - "F*ck off Mia, Keeley ain't here" - same accent, no respect, abusive language. Again, must know him well.


Obviously a relative of Keeley's... protagonist replies with "tell Keeley i think her old man is a c*nt" - very disrespectful language for adults, showing the norms of their lifestyle and how they react and their relationships with one and other is very informal and they don't really have any respect for each other.


 

After watching these first two minutes of 'Fish Tank' it appears to the audience that the director introduces the protagonist to the audience for the first time and gives a slight insight to whats going on in her life currently, (ie, her dancing, and the phone call she has with her friend making it apparent that there is a strain on that relationship.) This is a very similar approach to how we want to open our film, as we want the audience to have an idea of the protagonist's current situation and how she is feeling in regards to this situation. in order to achieve this, we could take ideas from 'Fish Tank', such as the phone to show the strain on a relationship.

So that we don't just copy the phone shot in 'Fish Tank', we will differ it, in that instead of an actual voice mail being left by the protagonist, there will be no dialogue, but only the view of 7 missed calls from her Mother to show to the audience how it is her Mother pushing the contact, rather than the protagonist.

We can take from these two title minutes of Fish Tank that it is very possible to establish some sort of a beginning to a storyline in the first two minutes of a film opening, as before we were not sure of how we could do this effectively, but using ideas from 'Fish Tank', we now feel that we can.

Drama / Realism Film Opening Research - Albatross

FACTFILE

Genre - Drama

UK Release Date - 14th October 2011

Director - Niall MacCormick

Writer (Screenplay) - Tamsin Rafn

Staring - Felicity Jones

              Jessica Brown-Findlay

              Sebastian Koch

Production Company/s - CinemaNX

                                      Isle of Man Films

Special Effects - Rushes Post Production

Camera Equipment - ARRI Media

Stationery Supplier - Media Services pre-production

Sound Post-production - Zound

STORYLINE 
The story follows Emelia, a rebellious, seductive and intelligent teenager played by Brown-Findlay. Taking a job as a cleaner at a guest house, Emelia befriends the teen daughter of the house, begins an affair with the husband and gets scowled at by the wife and mother of the family who live there.

Alternating between comedy and drama, the film has an awkward tone. The writer Tamzin Rafn claims it was written as a comedy but there are only occasional really funny moments. Instead, it is the drama that is more gripping with a range of characters who are trapped in miserable lives in a beautiful but dead-end location. Filmed with a great eye for scenery on the breathtaking coast of the Isle of Man by director of photography Jan Jonaeus, the narrative takes in the kids on the beaches, the family in the guest house and most notably Emelia and new friend Beth. But these disparate people all appear confined and resigned to unfulfilling and disappointing existences.

RELATION TO OUR FILM

This film is fairly similar to the film we wish to make the opening two minutes of, as it has that 'realism' tone and includes dilemmas revolving around family and friendship and one girls journey into finding herself, which is very similar to out protagonist. A major difference is that Emelia is an incredibly different character to our protagonist, in that she is an enormous tearaway and she is the main cause of the problems within the film, wears our protagonist is very shy and just happens to have been born into problems that are not any fault of her own. The fact that Emelia is a very colourful and outgoing character has a large impact on the audience as they grow fond of her and her tearaway ways. We would need to establish a different way of making the audience respond to our protagonist and relate to her as she doesn't have these traits.   

Drama / Realism Film Opening Research - The Arbor

FACTFILE

Genre - Drama / Documentary / Biography

UK Release Date - 22nd October 2010

Director - Clio Barnard

Staring - Manjinder Virk 

                 Christine Bottomley

                 Natalie Gavin

Production Company/s - Artangel Media

Filming Locations - Bradford / West Yorkshire - England, UK

Distributors - Strand Release

                         Verve Productions

STORYLINE + REVIEW
Andrea Dunbar was something of a child prodigy growing up on the underprivileged Buttershaw Estate in Bradford. Dunbar wrote her first play The Arbor, (named after the street on which she lived Brafferton Arbor,) at the tender age of 15. The play, which debuted at the Royal Court Theatre in 1980, depicts the turbulent life of pregnant teenager with a father who is an abusive alcoholic. In 1982 Dunbar wrote the follow up Rita, Sue and Bob Too! which was later turned into a film by the director Alan Clarke. By 1990, at just 29 years old, Andrea Dunbar was dead, killed by an apparent brain haemorrhage the talented author left behind three young children. Artist and filmmaker Clio Barnard's new biopic, also entitled The Arbor, attempts not only to tell Andrea's story but also that of her eldest daughter Lorraine, who was imprisoned in 2007 for the manslaughter of her son Harris.


Life has been particularly difficult for eldest daughter Lorraine growing up as a mixed-race child a predominately white estate she was racially abused on a daily basis for having a Pakistani father. Just 10 years old when her mother passed away Lorraine would later turn to prostitution to feed her drug habit. As her life quickly spiralled out of control she fell pregnant by one of her clients and struggled to bring up her child.

RELATION TO OUR FILM

The film 'The Arbor' has less similarities to our film than 'Albatross' as the protagonist in this film is a world away from the protagonist in out film, as this protagonist is a grown woman and a playright meaning she is of higher social class to our protagonist and of a different age. The main similarities between our film and 'The Arbor' is that it is a biographical storyline following the life of one person ie the protagonist. It also portrays the troubled relationship between a Mother and a Daughter, which is similar to our film as it portrays a dis-equilibrium between a mother and daughter which is precisely what happens in our film. The only difference is that the protagonist who leads 'The Arbor' is the Mother, wheras our protagonist is the daughter.