In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forns and conventions of media products? (Continued Evaluation)

Evaluation Video

Evaluation Script For Film

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Final Cut "Education Education Education"

Explaining my choices for my magazine review

More Feedback.

I showed my rough cut to a few more people and got them to verbally give me some feedback, again there were reoccuring things that they all said, and one of them was music. They all thought that perhaps adding music would aid the emotion of the film, especially because it is a very emotional topic.

After this feedback I decided to add in music. I am glad i've done so. After making those changes I got another person to watch it and give me feedback. Here are some comments made:

"The music makes it 100 times better. It adds a whole new dimension"

"The use of believable actors helps, compared to a lot of other peoples it makes it far more realistic and relatable"

"The way the music stops just before the final type-writer sequence is really effective and helps to mark the ending"

"There is a random bit of black in the middle, maybe add something in there for impact"

I am really happy with all of those comments. They are the most positive feedback i've had since the beginning which makes me think i've nearly got my final film! yay!!

Feedback on film poster and the Final Draft

After showing my poster to various people, I got a few comments about the layout etc of the poster, for example:
-I shouldn't have "Starring" at the top of the poster
-I should ensure I only use a maximum of 3 different fonts
-The information at the bottom of the poster should be relevent

I reviewed these points and realised that they are all valid, therefore went on to ammend them. Here is my final poster:

Post Feedback Changes..

One of my major pitfalls in my work at AS was not taking audiences feedback into consideration. This year, instead of getting offended by the comments made, i've taken it on board as constructive criticism.

Many of the comments were concerning the very beginning of the film, where its purely just sound and the only think that appears on screen in the titling and some credits. I used the same font for the credits as the font in the type-writer scenes, I originally thought my using the same it would make the whole thing tie together, however now I see that it just looks a little bit boring. Equally many of the comments were regarding how perhaps there were too many type-writer scenes, this lead me to decide that I definitely should change the opening.

Because I have created the first draft of my film poster, I was able to take some of the idea's from there. So I swapped created a blackboard background (the same as my poster) and the writing on lined paper, again the same as my poster. This, in my opinion, looks a lot more creative and also ensures that it links in nicely with my film poster.

Also, some of my other criticism was that there wasn't enough footage of the protagonists and that my shots and angles weren't varied enough. This issue was slightly harder to address as in reality re-filming at this late stage isn't really what I want to be doing. Instead, I had a look at some of my originally disregarded footage to see if there were any shots at all that I could perhaps use. To my luck, there was!
I've added in some of the more varied angled shots for example in the 'girl in the toilet scenes' i've added in a low angled shot and some medium shots. This gives a little contrast because I realised that the majority of my shots were actually close up, or extreme close up.

Secondly, I also had to ensure that the continuity was correct in the later scenes with Jordy. Part of his action is rolling a cigarette and I had to ensure that this was done in the right order (something I had to research, because I dont have a clue about that sort of thing). I tried to ensure that the continuity was perfect, concerning him inhaling and exhaling as I didn't film them in one  take.

One of my other comments was about having music over the top the narration, It's an idea that I've been toying with throughout the process, and after receiving this feedback its made me wonder again whether it would be a good idea. However then the arduous task of finding music that fits had to begin.

Education Education Education Rough Cut

Audience Response

Obviously a key part of any film is ensuring that the audience understands the meaning and concept behind the film. After airing our rough cuts each member of the class had to write a summary in two sentences or less describing what the short film was about. I was slightly worried because it occurred to me that my actual concept is quite long winded and complex and seeing as my film has limited dialogue and actual footage of acting, I wasn't sure how the audience would interpret what was going on. 

Here's what people thought: 

I was incredibly surprised to find out that the majority of people did actually pick up on the message behind my film. This and my feedback gained has given me  the confident to go and tweak certain aspects to try and fill in the gaps and make the whole thing better! 

Feedback

After showing our rough cuts to a group of people, we were given the sheets of feedback that they'd written. This was a really helpful tool because after working on my film for such a long time, you begin to get far too familiar with it and miss  out imperfections etc. It was really good to have a fresh pair of eyes watch and give their own opinion. These are some of the comments I recieved:

I got all Level 3's in my peer marking, which I am really happy with. However I am definitely going to take on board as many of the comments as I can.
I am now considering having some music over certain parts of my film because after receiving this feedback and watching other peoples short films music is such a good emotive tool and I hope my piece is quite emotive. So maybe having some music would push that through even more.
I am slightly concerned about some of the comments about the lack of footage because the reason I left footage with actors in minimal was because I wanted to create something a little bit different. However I will think about what I can do and if I can add in anything else.

First attempt at Film Review.

Changes with my film poster

First Attempt of Film Poster

Thoughts on my own magazine review

Worries about my background image.

few feelings on post production

Photoshop work so far..

This is as far as I've come with my film poster so far. I edited my original image of the blackboard heightening and lowering the saturation and the contrast to distort it slightly.

The centre that's been rubbed out is where I want to layer an image underneath, however I am undecided as to what I'm going to put in. Ive thought about putting some old fashioned books on one side and having them merge into the plastic folders we now use to store our work at school. This would be to emphasise the change in society, the education system, time and the government. This would help to reinforce the fact that in my film I'm trying to display a difference in time, as it begins with interviews with Princess Diana from the early 90's and then a quote from Tony Blair, in the mid 90's to early noughties who of course was leader of the labour party, then the quote about David Cameron at the end our current Prime Minister, who of course is a Conservative. So if I was able to merge two connecting images together this would really aid my film. Its just choosing my images is the tough bit.

Obviously I am aware that the most important thing is the titling, I'm hoping that by putting the white on top of the black stripes makes the title more prominent. Also like I said in earlier in the absence of images I'm using my tag line to evoke curiosity.

Screenshot images

During my research I found that some of the less imaginative films and also a lot of A Level films have just incorporated a screenshot or image taken directly from the film. I don't think this is at all to be recommended, I think it just comes accross lazy.

However I thought it would be interesting to explore what the images are that I would use if I was going to add them to my film poster.

I watched my film and the most emotive shots I have are shown to the left, I think its important to
have the images capturing the emotion because this doesn't give to much away, however it leaves the audience being curious about how the character got the point and what has happened and so on.

Although, I'm pretty sure I wont be using these images!

Potential images for my film poster

If I do choose to go with using a school blackboard as my background image then obviously I had to use an original image. It was actually a lot harder trying to find a blackboard then I originally thought it would be, there werent any at school and I thought we had quite a big one at home, however all I could find was this small one. Im hoping that it will be okay to use once photoshopped, and cropped etc!

The other images I want to use it by creating the effects of the little black sticky labels that are often used to name and title things on folders to be a small background for the writing.  This again ties in with my font being in Courier New, which is has been all a long on my film. Im hoping it will look quite effect.

If I can I want to try and blurr out some of blackboard and layer an image behind it. This will signify the corruption theme within my film. However i'm not sure what image to use yet.

Film Poster Ideas

Mind Map Idea's For Poster

Radio Times

Although of course the Radio Times isn't specifically a film magazine at all. Its main purpose is to list the radio and television listings for the week. It was originally commissioned by the BBC which meant any articles had to be unbiased and 'politically correct' however it then later merged into the Intermediate Media Company.
My family and I religiously purchase the Radio Times every week, and although arguably its main audience is more the middle aged, I actually find the articles it has to offer very interesting.
Every week films that are being currently shown on television over that next week are reviewed in different styles, since the technology has revolutionised and there are now thousands of TV channels obviously not every film can be reviews in depth. Often the Radio Times has a short paragraph reviewing the film, it just gives the reader and articulate, pithy response helping them choose whether or not they should watch the film or not.
Also the Radio Times often does full articles on current films. Just yesterday I was reading an article about the new Les Miserables film, the review isn't specific to the technological language and specialist terms which can be found in Sight and Sound magazine. It takes more of a casual conversation tone, focusing on the actors and locations, things that are more likely to interest a 'normal' person ( someone that doesn't have an intricate knowledge of film). In a review like this it really varies how much space they take up, sometimes they focus more on the image than the writing, or vice versa.
When thinking about my own magazine review I like how versatile and varied the structure of the reviews can be, and there never seems to be a 'bitchy' or 'cut throat' feeling about them. The language is descriptive yet pithy. It just seems well written, and aimed at an audience that doesnt need to be dummed down, yet we dont need a thesaurus to read it. It has a nice family, almost cosy feel, rather than magazines that are specifically focused to film such as Empire.

Film posters say more about the actors/characters than we think..

There are undoubtedly some actors that we categorise playing certain parts e.g Colin Firth playing the English gentleman having some sort of awkward affair with a woman, or Helena Bonham-Carter playing a crazy woman (obviously there are some exceptions). One of the key conventions of a movie poster is to inform the audience of what the film is about, and what the characters are like and the genre of the film.
I've done some research into the same actors in different films and there are some hilarious comparisions. I found the lack of imagination of some of the poster designs in some of the top Hollywood films.
It was the case that in the old days where Hollywood cinema starring Judy Garland and Marilyn Munroe that the production companies actually owned the stars, therefore there way of advertising was by plastering the names or pictures of the stars all over their film posters. This seemed fair, if you have the likes of Marilyn Munroe in your film you may aswel show off your assetts.
However it seems now-a-days that there are only about 10 actors in the world, and in every film poster they seem to be doing the same thing:


 Colin Farrow is always staring into the corner of the poster....




Jim Carrey has an extravigent expression on his face and very flexible arms!




Johnny Depp doesn't appear to like the top of his head..




Jennifer Anniston is always with a man and looking very glum..


Looking at these posters has made me realise that its not hard to create an eye catching poster, Personally I didnt want to have any actors on my posters because I dont like that way big Hollywood blockbusters drive the sales of their films by utilising the actors fame.

Film Poster Fonts..

In my previous research I have delved into what makes a good film poster, and one of the main things was an eye catching font, which is clear for the audience to read and understand.

Avatar's huge budget of 150 million dollars, and the hype over the revolutionary special effects and graphic design you would expect the poster to be flawless. If a production company has all this money to throw at an advertising campaign, then you would think they would utilise all their sources to the maximum. I'm not slating the design of the actual Avatar poster, because in most parts it has the right conventions, but after researching on the Internet many people have a problem with the font that has been used.

The font is said to be "Papyrus". Its speculated that there are two fonts that are universally hated by designers and these are 'Comic Sans' and 'Papyrus'.

To the eye of the normal person, and even myself wouldn't notice unless I couldn't actually read the title. However I just found it very interesting that just the use of the font has caused a huge controversy between graphic designers. This reinforced my thinking into my own font, which is something I haven't really thought about in great detail. Luckily personally I find fonts like 'Comic Sans' incredibly annoying too so that wont find itself anywhere near my poster.

In my film i've used a lot of writing already, so I planned to use the same font to try and tie it in together. The font is Courier New, its not a font I would normally use, however I wanted it to look like a old fashioned type writer had written it. I'm currently unsure as to whether i'm going to use this font in the poster, or perhaps have the writing looking as if it's been written by hand. However my photo shop skills will have to be brought up to scratch.

Original Movie Posters

Definition: A poster that was issued for a movie by the National Screen Service (NSS) or by the movie studio or by any of the other company authorized by the studio for the display in an actual movie theatre at the time of the original release.

There are also "Studio Issued" original posters, these are printed at the same time as theatrical display posters, although they werent actually meant for theatrical display they are still considered original. They were distributed to the "insiders" and those who worked on the film.

Posters are made to be sold to the public aren't original posters. Really popular are usually have kinds of reproductions, licensed and unlicensed and  they can be found in eBay. Sometimes its really hard to tell that they arent originals, because the quality is so good.

Often people confuse DVD posters as they original posters, these are not. These are just purely to adverstise the release of the DVD etc. They may have the same value as original movie posters  to some people because they have been released at the same time as the release of the film. Some of them can be quite  collectable and  valuable, but mostly not.

There are cases that original movie posters can be incredibly valuable and be worth a lot of money. This certaintly isnt the case for reproduction posters.

Empire Magazine

Empire is an incredibly successful film magazine, the way it reviews isnt quite as technical,as the likes of sight and sound, however still uses a lot of detail and some specialist language. Clearly the reader of the review in this particular magazine do have some interest in the film world (otherwise why would they buy this magazine)?

If we look at the front cover shown above this magazine doesnt actually really resemble that what you would imagine a film magazine to look like. There's a picture of Katy Perry splashed across the front, who is undoubtedly a sex symbol. At first glance is looks a little more like a mans magazine, however this is contradicted slightly by headlines such as "Guilty Pleasures" which makes one  think of woman's magazines such as cosmopolitan etc. But so far, after looking at first glance there isn't really much hint of it being a magazine about film.

Its only until one reads the subheadings and headings that you get the idea of what the magazine is actually about. The use of the provocative image of Katy Perry is a very good marketing ploy to entice readers that wouldnt usually read this magazine, woman want to be like her, men want to be with her. It's an interesting concept and it highlights that fact the magazine is aimed more at the mainstream audiences, with a hint of mainstream plus and maybe a few afficienado's, in any case the magazine is for everyone.


In earlier posts I showed how the sight and sound magazine has a double page spread pretty much filled with writing. In Empire magazine it vary's the way it presents its reviews, sometimes they do shorter more snappy reviews, but then again sometimes they are longer, more detailed and intricate. This again compliments the way that Empire magazine tries to appeal to a wider audience. As shown in the picture above on the right hand side, the review is still a double page spread, however there is a big picture and the writing is broken up with other little subheadings and so on.

One of the main strengths of Empire Magazine is that it appeals to such a wide audience, there is something in there for everyone whether you have a expert knowledge of film or you just want to know whether you should see a film or not.