Media Studies: Research and planning Moving image.

Q1) what research did you carry out into similar products?

In your answer you need to refer to aspects of your case studies

that were useful as research for your own production.

For my case studies in AS, I searched into well-known

music magazines such as, Billboard, vibe and Q on

Google. This was useful for me developing ideas for

my film cover in A2. It was also useful in me

distinguishing the differences between a music

magazine and a film cover since additional content

such as, age restrictions and the duration of the film

are needed for a film cover.

For my case studies in AS, I also did research into

various camera angles and shots to figure out the

appropriate angles and shots for my music magazine.

Searching up camera angles and shots were

significantly useful in a2 as I was able to memorise

them more and also apply some new camera

techniques towards my storyboard. Such new camera

techniques I learned include: A tilt shot, a Dutch tilt,

pan shot, dolly zoom over the shoulder shot and a

worm’s eye view shot.

As I was producing my case studies in AS, I searched

into different technologies such as, Prezi, Stupeflix, Go

animate and Slideshare to find a creative technology

to use so that my ideas can be conveyed more

effectively. This was beneficial for me in A2 because I

could express my film ideas more imaginatively so that

my audience can gain a greater understanding towards

my narrative.

During my case studies in AS, I additionally did some

research into the genres of R&B and Hip Hop as I was

interested in using applying those genres for my

magazine. As I was researching into those genres, I

was able to learn the way in which R&B and Hip Hop

artists such as, Alicia Keys and Missy Elliot dress. This

was useful for me in A2 as I was inspired to search into

my genre of horror to gain a wider knowledge into this

particular genre as it is what my final film will be

based on.

How have your skills in researching real media

products improved since the AS course? Give specific

examples from your case study short films.

I’m doing more broaden research into my genre which is

developing my understanding skills and my interpretation skills.

This is emphasized through my detailed analysation of the

horror movie of ‘The Ring’ in my 3rd case study.

According to the

Verge, a good jump

scare is needed to

make a good horror

movie. In a jump scare,

a dangerous situation

is introduced to be

solved; when the

situation is solved

everything runs

smoothly for the

meantime till an

unexpected shock

occurs.

My decisive skills in researching real media products have

improved since the AS course since I was able to take the

leadership role in being the producer and the director in my

group.

Evidence of me taking the role as the producer through, editing in the Mac Studio.

Q2) What research have you carried out into your target audience?

I have produced a YouTube video which consists of the audience

feedback of my treatment.

http://youtu.be/pJdlGWWvC20 (Click for Youtube video)

1) People thought that our idea was creative particularly the

texting amongst Diana and Priscilla interested the audience in a

humorous way.

2) In response to the idea of Priscilla's best friend texting, a

male suggested that we should keep our original idea since the

genre of our film is horror and therefore, ‘unrealistic’ or

‘supernatural’ elements are expected.

Weaknesses 1) People thought that the idea of the hand at the end of the

scene was too complicated.

2) People thought that the ideas were too much so we should

therefore cut out some scenes including the hand scene.

3) People thought our plan was unrealistic because the actors

appear to look like characters off American drama.

4) People were confused with the narrative.

5) An individual thought that it should be Priscilla's best friend

texting as opposed to Priscilla herself texting.

6) The idea of the film being in a non-linear order is too

complicated.

7) People thought that dialogue was needed to make the

storyline easier to understand however, we still kept the idea

of having no dialogue as we thought that it would be more

effective in relating to our genre of horror.

Use of the audience feedback from target audience:

From the feedback I’ve learned that both genders are

interested in my horror movie as a mixture of boys and girls

responded enthusiastically to my horror movie. Additionally,

judging from the feedback I realised that my target audience of

young adults were very interested in the mobile technology we

were intending to use for Priscilla to communicate to Diana.

This may well be because young adults are more familiar with

mobile technology as it is becoming increasingly popular in the

modern society. Moreover I’ve learned that my short film may

well appeal to American young adults as a student quoted that

the characters of Diana, Priscilla and Rachel were

representative of how American people look. However, as the

short film will be set in London it would be relevant for the

short film to attract Londoners; this will be achieved because

our actors are representative of typical British youths through

the way they dress and speak.

Q) How does this initial audience research compare to the

research you carried out for your music magazine last year?

Locations: Very well- Me, Geneva and Asmaa as a team managed to

contact the owners of each location we chose. We contacted them

through emailing which shows that we have proficient organisation

skills as a team.

Moreover, I would say that we organised our locations very well as

we managed to take pictures of all the locations we will be using.

This is emphasized through my Reeces amongst my blog. Through

us taking pictures we were able to visually view our locations and

visualize the scene within each location. Moreover, through us

taking pictures of our locations our certainty towards our chosen

locations is portrayed. Additionally, we organised our locations

very effectively as we managed to evaluate each location in our risk

assessment which enables us as a team to assess the effectiveness

Screenshot of the interaction

towards the Hackney council

of each location. Through the evaluation, we were more aware of

the risks behind each of our chosen location which further makes

us more attentive towards health and safety issues such as, slippery

grounds, confined spaces and dirty surroundings.

Minor improvements that could be made

-Asking to use camera equipment to test scenes beforehand so that

we do not intervene with busy schedules.

We used a spare white

cover to put on top of the

duvet so that, there is

less chance of the blood

spilling onto the actual

duvet. This was another

risk in which we carefully

considered.

-Being more specific about the area of the park we will use so that

we assure that this is a definite location.

How well did I organise my costumes?

*Satisfactory- We managed to plan the types of attire each

character will wear however, we could have been more detailed

about these choices. For instance, we decided that Diana should

wear an ‘all black outfit’ however we have not made the decision

into whether Diana should wear a dress or trousers and a T-shirt.

Additionally, I would say that my costume choice for Priscilla (the

ghost) should be more realistic as we agreed that Priscilla should

wear a white gown but, we are unaware of the retails that the

actor can purchase the white gown from.

As a result of me

not being specific

enough about the

‘all black outfit’ I

have updated my

blog and applied a

picture of the type

of clothing needed:

a blazer/jacket,

tight jeans and flat

shoes.

How well did I organise my props?

I would say that we organised our props quite well as on the

morning of 18th of October, Saturday we as a team went shopping

to buy the properties of fake blood, red lipstick and a rope. As a

result of this, we were already prepared in terms of equipment for

our short film. Additionally, within our treatment we planned our

properties beforehand which emphasizes our commitment and

shows that we are aware of the properties we need for our film.

Other properties such as, a phone, a rope and make-up were easily

attainable as me and Asmaa already had these properties.

Improvements to be made:

*To reduce our pay towards such properties e.g. the red lipstick

was £3.50 in Claire when we could have purchased it at a much

cheaper price in Primark.

Class votes: Me and our group asked the class to vote between 3 of

our drafts of our film posters. .

Q3) How does this initial audience research compare to the

research you carried out for your music magazine last year?

Similar to the feedback I carried out on my film posters, I also

carried out feedback into the conventions of my music magazine

and people such as, Josephine Gyamfi and Stephanie Amaoko

responded positively to the colour scheme and the layout of my

music magazine. Stephanie Amoako quoted how she ‘liked’ the

MOST

POPULAR--

This was useful in me

getting knowledge into

what people think about

my film poster ideas.

Therefore, I can

effectively apply the

chosen idea to my real

film production.

colour scheme because it suited the R&B genre; Josephine quoted

how she “really liked” the red layout of my boxes because it made

my magazine look professional and stand out. This was useful as I

was able to assess the standard of my music magazine.

Likewise to the audience research I did in a2, I received open

responses for my music magazine in AS; this was useful as through

open responses I was able to gather up more information towards

my audience feedback since the answers can be extensive and do

not require a tick box.

Alternatively, different to my A2 audience research feedback in my

AS I only used the technology of the Blogger text b this had a

negative impact on my creativity skills. Moreover, due to this my

responses from my audience were unreliable as there was no

source to back up the information. However, in a way the

acknowledgement of this mistake has improved the quality of my

work for a2 as I was able to upload a video of my audience

feedback as evidence; also apply the responses on the Blogger text

box. (Upload YouTube video of short film treatment and evidence

of Microsoft word responses)

Q4) Logistics planning: How well did you organise your actors,

locations, costumes and props.

Actors

I would say that I organised my actors quite well as we managed to

check up on our actors regularly and arrange dates with them to

meet up. We arranged rehearsal dates with our actors through

email and how sociable and attentive of our actors we are as we

were able to keep in touch with them. Through our detailed

description of the actors of Diana, Priscilla and Rachel our interest

in the way our actors come across to the audience is expressed.

(Get images). Moreover, the fact that we were able to get

characters that look alike to the characters we produced counts as

a bonus as it makes our ideas more realistic. Furthermore, we also

hosted auditions for our actors on the 2nd of October, 2014,

beforehand to assess their performance. Through these auditions

we were able to keep in touch with our actors through Facebook,

hotmail and Whatsapp. (Get Whatsapp text) On the date of

16/10/2014 we as a team arranged to meet up with the main actor

at college to give her the details on our first shooting which will be

on the 18th of October 2014.

How does this compare to the logistics planning you did for the

music magazine?

In AS, I did not use any pictures to give a visual image of the

clothing, props and make-ups I chose. As a result of this, my

logistics ideas came across as less realistic as I was unable to display

my ideas.

Printscreen of my logistics in AS.

Different to A2, in AS I barely kept in contact with my actors;

because of this I had little updates on them. Furthermore, due to

this I was unable to book the dates in which they were all available

which led to disaster as on the day one of our actors was unable to

show up. My organisation of actors improved tremendously in A2

as, I produced a Whatsapp chat to keep in contact with my actors

regularly. Additionally, we also took pictures as a team and

frequently uploaded them on Blogger.

Print screens of conversations with actors/A2

Narrative planning: Evaluation of Story Board

Whilst producing our story board we divided our roles amongst each

person. For instance, I was the person who distinguished the camera shots

whereas, Asmaa was the drawer and Geneva was liable for editing

techniques. However, Asmaa had the least time on her hands as she had to

spend the most time on the story board so therefore we could have at least

equally shared the responsibility of drawing the scenes. Moreover, we were

in a rush at first which had a negative impact on the quality of our story

board since we had to produce a new storyboard on top of our previous

story board. Therefore, we should have arranged an available time to finish

the story board so that we do not have to rush because of busy schedules.

What made our second story board more effective was because we were

able to identify the mistakes we did in our first story board to avoid

repeating it for our new storyboard. For instance, in our old storyboard we

made the mistake of not putting enough detail on camera angles and shots

in each scene but, in our new story board we managed to put every detail

on camera angles and shots for each scene. Even though this took us hours

of our time, we were able to secure a good grade after which rewards our

effort and commitment towards producing our storyboard. Moreover, due

to misreading the instructions we did not notice that we had to add a script

on our story board. Without a script to on our story board, the audience will

be unaware of the message behind every scene so we therefore informed

by our peers and later produced a script later on. As a result of this, I would

say that our time management and negotiation skills as a group would need

to be improved so that we can get work done before deadlines. In

comparison to my time management in AS, A2 was better as I was able to

get the work done more quickly than working by myself.

In terms of organisation skills in producing our script, I would say that they

are quite effective as we managed to regularly keep in contact; share work

through Facebook. Through that way, members of the group can voice out

about what needs to be improved about our script and how our script could

be improved.

Evidence

Evidence of the script work me and

my team produced.

Evidence of the

conversation we made

about the production of

our script work.

1st story board which was

had less context.

2ND Story board which has much more

detail and colouring.

Is this an improvement on last year’s blog?

Yes- In AS, I barely kept in contact with actors hence the reason why, one of my

actors did not show up on the day however, within A2 I kept in touch with actors

more regularly through Facebook, Hotmail and Whatsapp. Moreover, in terms of

planning the layout for my Blogger in AS was disorganised as my teacher struggled

to mark all of the work. Alternatively, in A2 I improved significantly as I managed to

chose a simple layout and add suitable titles to my posts. Furthermore, in terms of

research for AS I did not frequently blog posts which were relevant to my chosen

genre. However, now in A2 I managed to regularly blog posts which are relevant to

my genre of horror such as, fake blood equipments, ghost costumes and horror films

e.g. One Missed Call.

How well have I presented my research

and planning?

Quite well, I was able to use creative features on Microsoft word to make

my treatment stand out. Such creative features I used on Microsoft word

included: soft edges on the picture effects, picture contrasts and

brightness, page colour on page layout, shape effects and captions added

to pictures. Moreover, in my Case studies I was able to use a variety of

layouts on Prezi which relate to my aspiring genres. For instance, for my

genre of horror I used a black and blue layout to symbolise something

sinister and mysterious. Whereas for my Shrek analysation I used the

background image of an audience watching a show to, relate to the film’s

genre of being a comedy. Furthermore, my research was quite effective as

different to AS I managed to produce V logs on YouTube so that my

audience can visualise the activities we do as a team. Through this way,

examiners are also aware that our team meetings are valid.

In terms of planning, I would say that my planning was quite well as I

managed to keep in contact with my team members through a range of

social networking apps such as, Facebook, Hotmail and Whatsapp. Through

the use of these social networking sites, I was also able to frequently blog

any team meetings during the process of producing the short film as

evidence of me and my team operating together.

Evidence

Conversations I and my team have.

Soft edges effect

which makes my

image look more

appealing as greater

focus is added onto

the image.

I decreased the

contrast of the

image to make

the image

appear bolder.

Evidence of some creative features on

Microsoft word

Shape effects of stars added to

make the title look distinctive.

http://youtu.be/Bze

JUTshGr0

Click to view Vlogs