By James Taylor

Evaluation 3

What Kind of Media Institution Might Distribute Your Media Product and Why?

JJJ MEDIAWe decided to give our production company the name ‘JJJ Media’ because each group members name begins with the letter ‘J.’ We felt the use of alliteration and repetition will be appealing to the audience as it is not confusing and is very memorable. We added ‘Media’ to this as it shows what the company is about and also will be easily understandable for our target audience, teenagers, as this is a subject at school which they will see and recognise. The idea of a production company name is to be recognisable and also tell the audience what the company does. We believe our chosen name meets these requirements.

OUR LOGOOur logo is a clapperboard which is always associated with film. This is because this prop is often seen before a scene or a clip in a professional film is shot. This immediately tells the viewer what our group does and so the simplicity to our logo is effective.We decided to have JJJ Media written in the centre in large writing as this is the main aspect of our logo, to be recognised and remembered. The colour red makes the group name stand out from the white and black of the clapperboard. This way the audience know who we are and what we do.We included our establishment date to our logo because we believe this gave it a professional feel. This is because the establishment date, in time will show how successful we have been to have been around for a certain amount of time.The colours black and red are normally linked to thrillers and this is what we aim to specialize in.

WHAT DOES A PRODUCTION COMPANY DO?Helping to create films is typically the role of a production company, such as Warner Bros Pictures. This includes helping out in terms of scripting, scheduling, casting, budgeting and more. This means they see the idea all the way through to a completed film.

The production company has to look after areas such as finding a director and also actors to star in the production. The more established the production company, the more established actors and directors will feature.

On the other hand, these companies also have to deal with any problems or queries which may occur in the creation and completion of the film. This includes actors being injured, property being damaged or financial injection if need be.

WHAT DOES A DISTRIBUTOR DO?

A distributor, such as Universal, takes care of the marketing of a film. In basic terms, this means sending the film out around the world for people to see. They promote the film using resources such as posters as well as choosing when and where the film will be shown.

One responsibility is deciding how many copies of the film will be created. This is a huge responsibility as if they predict to create too many copies to surpass demand, the company will make a loss. On the other hand, too little copies created will mean potential revenue and profit will be missed out on. Prospective buyers such as cinema owners then view the film and decide whether or not they wish to purchase the film. The distributor then sends the film off to the cinema before it opens.

People then go to the cinema, view the film and then the film is sent back to the distributor. The payment is then agreed.

EXAMPLES OF PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION COMPANIES

FINANCEAs we are a new up and coming business we understand we do not have the financial power to create a full film with full affects and top quality equipment. We therefore believe we would need financial backing from an institution such as ‘KICKSTARTER.’

This description has come from www.kickstarter.com and from it we can see it meets our companies needs. Underpass fits into the ‘film’ category which therefore means we are liable to funding from this website. With funding from ‘KICKSTARTER’ we believe we will be able to purchase a top quality camera to replace Joe’s phone which we had to record from. It could also open the door to purchasing rights to play copyrighted music which could address the audience in a more affective way as they recognise and connect to it.

TITLESWe have named James Taylor, Joel Guest and Joe Alborough in our credits at the start as we are the only people that contributed to the production and editing of Underpass. As we decided to act and film ourselves their was no need to ask anyone else to come along to the filming day and therefore we are the only names to feature in the titles.

We have decided not to put our jobs in the titles because James and Joel also contributed to the filming and directing of the film as well as acting, we found this took up too much of the screen and so we found just using our names was much more efficient. Also this gave the film an unprofessional feel as when watching films such as Scream actors were designated only to that job as was the director etc. We therefore found it would be more professional to just use our names without extended job titles.

After watching other thrillers we saw that the main headline actor always features in the titles first. This therefore influenced our decision to use James’ name first in the Underpass titles. Secondly comes Joel's name. This is because he is the only other actor in the thriller and therefore if Joes name came next viewers would think he was the second actor simply because the first name to appear was an actor. We avoided this issue by using Joel's name when he first appears in the thriller so the viewer makes an immediate link. As Joe was the director we decided to use his name last as he does not feature in the film and it is normally the case for actors names to appear first.

SIMILAR FILMS ‘INSTITUTIONALLY’

We believe our film would be released in an institutionally similar way to Scream. This is because we believe the story line of the films are very similar. Both follow the stereotypical conventions of a thriller as very dark settings are used along with a mysterious, scary storyline. Also both films are aimed at a similar age group and so this immediately makes a link to the way they will be released.

Silence of the Lambs would be released in a similar way as this is regarded as one of the best thrillers of all time. The start to both thrillers are very similar as the camera appears to be following the main character. Films are often released focussing most on the opening scenes as they do not want to give the storyline away before the film has been watched. This means that The Silence of the Lambs and Underpass’ release would be very similar.