EVALUATION QUESTION 1

IN WHAT WAY DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT USE, DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE FORMS AND CONVENTIONS OF REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS?

One of the first tasks i did was look into codes and conventions of short films so i could apply them to our film. It was important that i understood the codes and conventions of short Horror films as this would determine whether our film would turn out good or bad.

To gather these codes and conventions i searched for short films on google where I was able to find a very useful channel 'Future Shorts' which has lots of short films made by directors all over the world and with many different genres . The company Future Shorts is a well known distributor of short films whose main aim is to further the short film industry by promoting the films at Film festivals they host. For more info on Future Shorts click HERE.


After watching and analysing some of these films i was able to create a list of codes and conventions i could apply to my film:

• There are usually only about one or two characters in a short film.
• Short Films tend to have a very low budget.
• The central protagonist will always remain center screen when possible.
• Short films always have a twist to them, by having a immediate narrative change at the end to shock the audience.
• There is not much dialogue in short films.
• There are lots of camera angles used, a popular camera angle choice is point of view.
•  Usually short films use the cheap option of black background and white font for titles
•  Voice overs are a popular method of sound in short films.
•  Mainly the narrative is centered around a central protagonist.
• Short Films usually last about 1-5 minutes.
• .The point of view angle shows the world from the central protagonists view.
• A lot of short films simply show real life with one change that is then portrayed as normal.

Here is how we tried to apply these codes and conventions to our short film:

• There are usually only about one or two characters in a short film - We only use four characters in our movie,two which are dead bodies so the characters of Norman and the tied up girl are the main ones the audience should follow.
• Mainly the narrative is centered around a central protagonist - The Narrative revolves around the character of Norman who is the central protagonist of the film. We use his name as the title and keep him in the center of the screen at all times to connote the importance of the character to the audience.
• The central protagonist will always remain center screen when possible- Our central protagonist remains center screen when possible at all
• Short films always have a twist to them, by having a immediate narrative change at the end to shock the audience -Our short film does this as it signifys all the way through that Norman is innocent by implying that he only just finds the bodies when the audience sees them on the screen but when it goes to the house scene the audience immediately puts the pieces together in their heads and realises that Norman is the killer. He changes his clothes and his attitude to connote the narrative change.
• A lot of short films simply show real life with one change that is then portrayed as normal -We did not include this convention in our film as we believed that having our film set in reality would be more appropriate and make it more scary due to the fact of it being set in reality. The voicover radio broadcasts anchor this fact of reality too so the audience knows that the film is not set in another world.
• There are lots of camera angles used, a popular camera angle choice is point of view-We used this in an intertextual reference to the movie halloween at the start when he walks into his house but also we used it a bit to show the central protagnists point of view as he was moving around so the audience could see what he was seeing and try to connect with him.
• Voice overs are a popular method of sound in short films- We used voice overs in the form of radio news reporters in my film. They were designed to put the audience into a false sense of security like this guy cannot be the killer and anchor the preffered reading of the film that he is innocent.
• There is not much dialogue in short films- We used this convention as we felt that if the character said to much it would give away too much of the plot which would create an oppositional reading and that sense of mystery like who is this guy and whats going on would also be lost.
• Short Films usually last about 1-5 minutes- The film lasts just over 5 minutes but this did not happen to challenge the conventions. We felt that when we were editing the film needed more time to build up tension but if we decide to re submit our coursework we may end up shortening the film.
• Usually short films use the cheap option of black background and white font for titles- We decided to ignore this convention by using Red coloured Font from Livetype for our title, This signifys that violence will occur in the movie which fits in with the theme of our film. Also we felt that the black and white titles were boring and would not fit well with our film.
• Short Films tend to have a very low budget- We had a very small budget for our film as we borrowed cameras and equipment to film from school. the most we spent was about £15 on the props for the house scene and Normans costume.

Genre Research and Intertextual References
As we developed our ideas we looked at many different Horror movies to find Codes and Conventions of the genre and get some Inspiration. For more detailed analysis into the Horror Genre Click HERE.
Here are the two main Intertextual refernces we used in our film:

• We made an Intertextual Reference to the Film 'Psycho'. We Based the character of Norman on Norman Bates from the film as he is seen as an Innocent throughout but at the end of the film 'Psycho' it turns out that he is the killer and not his mother. We have used this idea in our film as it turns out Norman is the killer at the end too. I also made another Intertextual Reference to Psycho when making the film poster as i overlayed a skull over the top of Normans face to get a more evil look which has been used in this picture too. (see above)

•  We made an intertextual reference to the Blair Witch Project. Most of our Camera Shots were quite shaky and we used a lot of point of view shots which are used in the Blair Witch Project to make the whole movie seem more real and disturbing.

EVALUATION QUESTION 3

What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

The Audience Feedback is Crucial if you want to make a great film.

After we had finished each cut of the film we showed it to a target audience to see what they thought could be made better:

• We could not understand why the Central Protagonist wanted to go to the house - We added the Clip of the crow to show that the characters eye was drawn to the house by the crow  so he decided to investigate it. Also the Crow signifies death so it linked into the Genre of our Film.
• Why does the character run away from the house for no reason? - We added the Sound of the Dog and the farmer to show that The central Protagonist was running away from this and not from nothing. It also gives a preffered reading to the audience that Norman is innocent as they could think that the farmer is the killer.
• The Preffered Reading (he is innocent) is not anchored enough - We added the Radio Station news voiceovers to strenghthen the preffered reading that the Central Protagonist is innocent as he is finding the bodies so he cant have killed them.
  

EVALUATION QUESTION 2

HOW EFFECTIVE IS THE COMBINATION OF YOUR MAIN PRODUCTS & ANCILLARY TEXTS?

For some of the tasks we had to create a set of media products that linked into our production. The Products we had to create to go with the short films were a Film Poster and a Review Page of the film we were making. We did these two tasks alongside filming the Product so we could get photos too and help link  them together to make the final product feel much more real. We tried to keep our narrative enigma in all of the texts we made so that it was obvious that they all went together but obviously in the real world these products would all be made by different companies so they would not be directly linked together only through business unless these companies were owned by the same conglomerate e.g Twentieth Century Fox or General Electric.

For the film poster we placed the central protagonist in the center of the poster to connote the importance of this character to the films plot, to signify hes the most important person in the film. The poster promotes our film by attracting our target audience and peaking there curiosity, making them want to watch the film. The film poster anchors the genre of the film as its quite a scary image showing the charater standing over a dead body but this also helps appeal to the target audience as it connotes that it will be a horror movie.

Our Magazine review relates to the target audience by using quite formal language but its easy to understand so a fifteen year old could read it. The article is aimed more at Boys/Men as this is the Sex that mostly watch Horror movies but there may be features that appeal to Women too. We intertextually referenced the Film poster from Friday the 13th when we made ours as we felt it was quite relevant to our film showing that he is a mysterious figure.

EVALUATION QUESTION 4

HOW DID YOU USE NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES IN THE CONSTRUCTION AND RESEARCH, PLANNING AND EVALUATION STAGES?

To create the Final Product we used a variety of New Media Technologies to help us Plan and Create the Final Cut and now im using one to help me Evaluate the Film i have created. Here is a List with Notes on how i used these Technologies to help me:

• Blogger - Blogger was the main Technology i used as i stored all of the Research and Planning i did over the period of time that we were doing the Project on here. It was very useful as if there wasnt this facility available i would probably have ended up having to write it all down on paper which can be lost/damaged compared to the blog where it can be saved directly online so others are able to access it. Also with the fact that its an internet based program meant that i can attach media to my posts to give an example of what i mean and show something relevant to my project. For each Pre-production task i made a seperate post (where relevant some posts were joined together) with the research i did or planning on that specific point making it much easier when it came down to filming as we new exactly what we had to acheive. This is a Link to my Blog.
  
• Final Cut Express 4 and iMovie 06 - Final Cut Express was the main Program we used to edit our Final Cut. Its a very useful piece of software as you can do so much more with it compared to iMovie. For instance Final Cut Express 4 has 99 video tracks with support for nesting sequences whereas imovie HD has only 1 video track. Just small things like this meant that we could achieve so much more with this program in terms of editing and other technical adjustments like tweaking the Brightness/Colours of some shots and also the Audio for the clips could be removed and changed appropriately. Due to Problems with temperamental Macs we ended up having to upload the basic footage onto iMovie 06 then Importing it across to the Final Cut program. This did not take long but it was quite frustrating and annoying as sometimes the uploading straight from Camera to Final Cut worked and sometimes it didnt. For more detailed Info on this visit my Software page.
  
• Dv Camcorders and Tripods - These were provided by the School and we used them to film the footage that we used for our Final Piece. They were quite basic cameras compared to some of the other cameras available on the market but they were very reliable and did the job. We acheived quite a lot with the cameras and they were fairly easy to use but in certain cases a bit more research on the internet was required for instance with how to use the white balance and how to turn the camera from auto focus to manual focus. The Hardware page on my blog has more detailed information on these pieces of equipment.
  
• Mac Computers - We used the Mac Computers which are owned by school and housed in the school buildings to do most of our blogging (split between home and school) and all of our editing as they contained all of the appropriate programs to do this. I dont think there is many advantages of using a Mac over a PC but it was easy to use anyway after using a PC for so many years. If we hadnt had the Macs or the Computers we basically would not have been able to create the films as no editing would have taken place so we would just be stuck with the raw footage with no soundtrack and the scenes would not fit together properly. Using the Macs gave us access to the internet to via Safari so we could look up any problems and also blog too. Some Specifications and Features of the Macs.
  
•  Social Networking Sites (Facebook) - We used Alex Jowett's (my partner in the Project) Facebook page to advertise for Actors/Actresses and Audience Feedback. This was very useful indeed as we didnt have to ask lots of people individually, we just made one group which people could reply to if they were willing to play the part and with audience Feedback we simply uploaded the Film to the Site and left a message asking for Audience Feedback which people could comment on with helpful criticism on how to improve our film.
  
• Photoshop - We used this program to create the teaser poster and the Ancillary text movie poster. It was a very useful program to use as it enabled us to select certain parts from photos we had taken cut them out and arrange them onto one poster in the correct positions. We then changed the colours or added effects to make the posters look proffesional like something that would be actually used to advertise a Blockbuster movie being released at the cinema.
  
• Pages - We used this program on the Mac to create the basic Template for our magazine article (Ancillary Text 2). It was a fairly straightforward program similar to Microsoft Publisher but the Mac Version. We basically made a template then added pictures and appropriate text to it that we had prpared beforehand. If we hadnt had this program we would have probably had to use photoshop or make it by hand but both ways i dont think it would have looked as good as using Pages.
  
• Scanner - We used the scanner just once to scan our storyboard so we could post it onto blogger. The scanning machine was very straightforward to use, just place the sheets into the scanner and press the button then they appear in your computer. Without this i dont think there would be any way to display the storyboard on blogger other than creating it somehow on the computer.
  
• Search Engines and Information Sites - We mainly used google and imdb.com for these. Google beause it has links to basially everything on the internet so you only need to type in a search term and lots of pages will appear that are relevant. Imdb.com because it has an extensive library of information about film from the past, present and future and lots of information about them suh as who direted them and what the budgets were etc. I used google mainly for tutorials on how to use or do things ranging from on the Camera to Final Cut Express whih helped a lot with technical difficulties. I used imdb.com to find information about films that i was intertextually referencing and about the short films which i was finding codes and conventions for. Its a very useful sites as it contains a lot of detailed information about any film you can think of and was very useful as a source. Without these websites i think we would have resorted to using books more but this would have taken much, much longer.
  
• Document/Audio/Video Hosting Sites - The sites we used were Scribd, Photobucket and archive.org. Scribd is a useful website for uploading documents such as powerpoints and word files and then embedding them onto my blogger pages. It sets everything out much clearer and you can print it out much easier if you need it quickly. Photobucket i used to upload Film clips to help out with my intertextual references. It lets you host videos and pictures on its site for free which is useful. Archive.com i used to upload audio files which i then embedded into my blogger page. We uploaded the podcasts onto this site.
  
• Portable Digital Audio Recorder - We used this to record Podcasts and the Voieover for the movie. It was basically a Microphone with a built in recording device which we talked into, recording our voices and transferred it to the computer as an mp3. Without this equipment we would have had to use the camera and take the sound from the recording to make the voiceover and podcasts but this would have taken much longer.