How did you attract/address your audience?
We attracted our audience in a fair amount of ways. We did this by using a similar clothing code to what our target audience would be interested in (mainly teenagers). We felt that this would automatically draw in an audience, as it projects the age group and also sets a standard for what the film is going to be. We have also used issues that people of this age are grown into dealing with on their own, such as violence, bullying outside of school, victimisation, and a lot more. Obviously, these could be viewed from two different opinions (covering every person of the age group), either seeking a sense of humour from the bullying, or feeling an understanding and being able to relate to the issues portrayed within the opening sequence.
A small niche intended audience of our film also included bike enthusiasts, and I felt we attracted these from the very first minutes of the opening sequence. After the film starts to the protagonist waking up and leaving his house, it soon cuts to a choppy and fast moving bike race, we also thought that not only will this attract bike enthusiasts or people who are interested in this area, but anybody really. We felt that the speed of this opening clip will draw people in, as it is to an extent; intense, drawing in potentially anybody, and leading them on to a curiosity felt for knowing the rest of the story.
I think we then address the audience in a way that keeps them interested and fully drawn into the film. We addressed our audience by acting styles; we made these acting styles relatable to our target audience. This was quite easy because our actors were the same age as our intended audience, so we didn’t have to do any major changes on how we were in front of the camera, and followed our instincts; using our knowledge we already knew from teenage behaviour and bullying.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
I think our film is built up of two different social groups. One of these are bully-victims, and the other being bullies basically. They both chain into different groups, like, bully victims fall into the unpopular, underdogs, losers etc, and the bullies are put in a stereotypical charactership, drawing an automatic representation of violent, threatening, thuggish. We portrayed this with a style of dress, and also I think this representation is built a lot by the first clip of the bully in the opening sequence.
He wears dark colours and obscures his face and identity with his hood; obviously this is a key convention of a thug, carrying a threatening appearance. He is also holding a brick, and hiding round a tree. This puts him into a state of authority, and the dramatic irony of this shot, emphasizes on the innocence and weakness of the bullied characters, and reinforces the power and authority one holds over them. This clever use of different representations creates juxtaposition between the two groups within the opening sequence, bringing interest to our audience (especially our intended audience).
Who would be the audience for your media product?
When looking at demographics, I built an idea of whom our audience were going to be. I think we focused a lot on our target audience, almost to the extent where we based our film around them. We wanted our audience to be teenagers and perhaps younger. I think they would be our audience because this is what we made the film for; it has all the conventions of the age group 10-18 year olds. It is full of action, comedy, and issues that they can relate to. I think maybe even an older audience could watch this and relate, but not to the extent of the children growing up right now, because have based our story around what is happening right now, with teenage bullying, and victimisation, and violence. I feel like this is a privilege the other generations fail to understand, not through lack care, but from never experience this change in modern day society. In conclusion, I think anybody could watch this film and enjoy, however, the use of modern day issues will make the film more effective to this age group.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what d you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
From looking back at our preliminary task, we learned quite a lot from this. We learned how to use adobe premiere pro 1.5, this was very helpful, as when we came to editing our main task, we were already quite experienced with the program, and knew what to do, and how things generally worked on the program. These things took us a lot time when first experimenting and discovering how to use the program, and this time was crucial when we were editing our final piece, so this helped a lot.
We also learned a lot of filming techniques, and how to film a lot quicker. We worked out better ways of lighting, filming, and also, became more experimental with shots. We because more skilled at using the camera, and confident in how it worked. We also became a lot more used to each others working styles when filming and editing, and I think this built our group and our knowingness of how we all work. This lead to us working better around each other, and feeling more open to criticism, and also generally just helping one another out with certain aspects of the film. In conclusion, the preliminary task gave us the experience and knowledge we needed to complete our main production at the level it was.
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
We used ideas from conventions found when researching similar films of this genre, and also films in general. We created an enigma of what’s going on in the opening sequence, this is to draw people into the story, and build their curiosity, so they want to find out what happens, or what’s going on, and so watch on, and stayed fully focussed on watching the film. We also made the opening sequence quick and fast moving to attract our audience (teenagers who we thought this would work with). We saw this in other films, and decided that it needed to be fast moving to draw people into it. From watching and researching more films, we also found that it was vital to challenge certain conventions that build interest and curiosity of the storyline. Giving little information on the matter, and also creating unknowingness for the viewers can do this.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Throughout the duration of making our opening sequence, we all learnt a lot about the technology we used. I used how to use a lot of programs when editing, and I also learnt how to use the camera, because this was the first time we’d ever used this model. It took us a while to get used to, but once we picked up on basics, our knowledge of this technology quickly evolved and expanded.
Adobe premiere 1.5: We used Adobe Premiere 1.5 to edit our opening sequence. At first, we didn’t know much about this, and had only briefly used this for our preliminary task. However, for our preliminary task, we merely cut and put the clips together, and for this main task, our ideal opening sequence required: effects, sound effects, a soundtrack, better cutting, transitions, opening credits and more. So although we had practiced before on Adobe, we still didn’t feel as if we had learnt enough to use the program to our full potential, however, during the editing, we slowly improved our knowledge of this program.
Blogger: To present our work, we used Blogger. At first, we were puzzled about the site, and it took a while to get used to it. Once studying some other blogs on the Internet, we slowly improved our ‘blogging skills’. I learned how to change the layout, and also make my blog look generally better. Uploading pictures were a trouble at first, and so was the font size, but now, after using this for a while, I could go back on my older posts, and edit them to the standard of my new ones. I think this is a very good way for presenting my work.
JVC GR-D860: We used this camera and learnt how to use it throughout the process of making our opening sequence. We had already done quite a lot of work with this camera during our preliminary task, so this was good practice. By the time we started using it for our main task, we were able to transform our mediocre skills, and turn them into more advanced and complicated ways of using the camera, this lead to a better performance from the filming side of our production.
When editing my work, and also some of the extra scenes, I used other programs to help make our work as best as possible. These programs included: Final cut pro, Soundtrack pro, Aperture, Motion Compressor, DVD studio pro, and Live type. Although we mainly used Adobe premiere 1.5, I used these programs to create some extra clips, such as the scene where the bully throws the brick, and also Alex’s dream.
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
I think an independent local cinema could be a possibility for distributing our film, although I do believe our film has the potential to be well advertised, and put across the Internet, and our television screens. I think we have built strong and funny characters, and also have created fast and interesting shots, that could well be used for a trailer, and with the clips being mysterious and quick, perhaps even a teaser trailer. I think distributing our film on an independent local cinema would hold back the potential to really put our film out to the UK. However, pushing ourselves onto this bigger scale of distribution would maybe require the include of an American Actor – our film has been planned in a way that’s now difficult when thinking about it, to include a foreign film stars, as we based the film around UK schools, teenagers, and issues. I think this holds us back from pushing our distributing of the film onto a world wide scale; limiting us only having a main audience in the UK. This could lead to support from the UK film council, and could perhaps progress onto becoming a digital release, although this idea seems again like it could limit the scale of our distribution, as I feel our film has, due to the film’s storyline and characters, a great distributing opportunity.
We attracted our audience in a fair amount of ways. We did this by using a similar clothing code to what our target audience would be interested in (mainly teenagers). We felt that this would automatically draw in an audience, as it projects the age group and also sets a standard for what the film is going to be. We have also used issues that people of this age are grown into dealing with on their own, such as violence, bullying outside of school, victimisation, and a lot more. Obviously, these could be viewed from two different opinions (covering every person of the age group), either seeking a sense of humour from the bullying, or feeling an understanding and being able to relate to the issues portrayed within the opening sequence.
A small niche intended audience of our film also included bike enthusiasts, and I felt we attracted these from the very first minutes of the opening sequence. After the film starts to the protagonist waking up and leaving his house, it soon cuts to a choppy and fast moving bike race, we also thought that not only will this attract bike enthusiasts or people who are interested in this area, but anybody really. We felt that the speed of this opening clip will draw people in, as it is to an extent; intense, drawing in potentially anybody, and leading them on to a curiosity felt for knowing the rest of the story.
I think we then address the audience in a way that keeps them interested and fully drawn into the film. We addressed our audience by acting styles; we made these acting styles relatable to our target audience. This was quite easy because our actors were the same age as our intended audience, so we didn’t have to do any major changes on how we were in front of the camera, and followed our instincts; using our knowledge we already knew from teenage behaviour and bullying.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
I think our film is built up of two different social groups. One of these are bully-victims, and the other being bullies basically. They both chain into different groups, like, bully victims fall into the unpopular, underdogs, losers etc, and the bullies are put in a stereotypical charactership, drawing an automatic representation of violent, threatening, thuggish. We portrayed this with a style of dress, and also I think this representation is built a lot by the first clip of the bully in the opening sequence.
He wears dark colours and obscures his face and identity with his hood; obviously this is a key convention of a thug, carrying a threatening appearance. He is also holding a brick, and hiding round a tree. This puts him into a state of authority, and the dramatic irony of this shot, emphasizes on the innocence and weakness of the bullied characters, and reinforces the power and authority one holds over them. This clever use of different representations creates juxtaposition between the two groups within the opening sequence, bringing interest to our audience (especially our intended audience).
Who would be the audience for your media product?
When looking at demographics, I built an idea of whom our audience were going to be. I think we focused a lot on our target audience, almost to the extent where we based our film around them. We wanted our audience to be teenagers and perhaps younger. I think they would be our audience because this is what we made the film for; it has all the conventions of the age group 10-18 year olds. It is full of action, comedy, and issues that they can relate to. I think maybe even an older audience could watch this and relate, but not to the extent of the children growing up right now, because have based our story around what is happening right now, with teenage bullying, and victimisation, and violence. I feel like this is a privilege the other generations fail to understand, not through lack care, but from never experience this change in modern day society. In conclusion, I think anybody could watch this film and enjoy, however, the use of modern day issues will make the film more effective to this age group.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what d you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
From looking back at our preliminary task, we learned quite a lot from this. We learned how to use adobe premiere pro 1.5, this was very helpful, as when we came to editing our main task, we were already quite experienced with the program, and knew what to do, and how things generally worked on the program. These things took us a lot time when first experimenting and discovering how to use the program, and this time was crucial when we were editing our final piece, so this helped a lot.
We also learned a lot of filming techniques, and how to film a lot quicker. We worked out better ways of lighting, filming, and also, became more experimental with shots. We because more skilled at using the camera, and confident in how it worked. We also became a lot more used to each others working styles when filming and editing, and I think this built our group and our knowingness of how we all work. This lead to us working better around each other, and feeling more open to criticism, and also generally just helping one another out with certain aspects of the film. In conclusion, the preliminary task gave us the experience and knowledge we needed to complete our main production at the level it was.
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
We used ideas from conventions found when researching similar films of this genre, and also films in general. We created an enigma of what’s going on in the opening sequence, this is to draw people into the story, and build their curiosity, so they want to find out what happens, or what’s going on, and so watch on, and stayed fully focussed on watching the film. We also made the opening sequence quick and fast moving to attract our audience (teenagers who we thought this would work with). We saw this in other films, and decided that it needed to be fast moving to draw people into it. From watching and researching more films, we also found that it was vital to challenge certain conventions that build interest and curiosity of the storyline. Giving little information on the matter, and also creating unknowingness for the viewers can do this.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
Throughout the duration of making our opening sequence, we all learnt a lot about the technology we used. I used how to use a lot of programs when editing, and I also learnt how to use the camera, because this was the first time we’d ever used this model. It took us a while to get used to, but once we picked up on basics, our knowledge of this technology quickly evolved and expanded.
Adobe premiere 1.5: We used Adobe Premiere 1.5 to edit our opening sequence. At first, we didn’t know much about this, and had only briefly used this for our preliminary task. However, for our preliminary task, we merely cut and put the clips together, and for this main task, our ideal opening sequence required: effects, sound effects, a soundtrack, better cutting, transitions, opening credits and more. So although we had practiced before on Adobe, we still didn’t feel as if we had learnt enough to use the program to our full potential, however, during the editing, we slowly improved our knowledge of this program.
Blogger: To present our work, we used Blogger. At first, we were puzzled about the site, and it took a while to get used to it. Once studying some other blogs on the Internet, we slowly improved our ‘blogging skills’. I learned how to change the layout, and also make my blog look generally better. Uploading pictures were a trouble at first, and so was the font size, but now, after using this for a while, I could go back on my older posts, and edit them to the standard of my new ones. I think this is a very good way for presenting my work.
JVC GR-D860: We used this camera and learnt how to use it throughout the process of making our opening sequence. We had already done quite a lot of work with this camera during our preliminary task, so this was good practice. By the time we started using it for our main task, we were able to transform our mediocre skills, and turn them into more advanced and complicated ways of using the camera, this lead to a better performance from the filming side of our production.
When editing my work, and also some of the extra scenes, I used other programs to help make our work as best as possible. These programs included: Final cut pro, Soundtrack pro, Aperture, Motion Compressor, DVD studio pro, and Live type. Although we mainly used Adobe premiere 1.5, I used these programs to create some extra clips, such as the scene where the bully throws the brick, and also Alex’s dream.
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
I think an independent local cinema could be a possibility for distributing our film, although I do believe our film has the potential to be well advertised, and put across the Internet, and our television screens. I think we have built strong and funny characters, and also have created fast and interesting shots, that could well be used for a trailer, and with the clips being mysterious and quick, perhaps even a teaser trailer. I think distributing our film on an independent local cinema would hold back the potential to really put our film out to the UK. However, pushing ourselves onto this bigger scale of distribution would maybe require the include of an American Actor – our film has been planned in a way that’s now difficult when thinking about it, to include a foreign film stars, as we based the film around UK schools, teenagers, and issues. I think this holds us back from pushing our distributing of the film onto a world wide scale; limiting us only having a main audience in the UK. This could lead to support from the UK film council, and could perhaps progress onto becoming a digital release, although this idea seems again like it could limit the scale of our distribution, as I feel our film has, due to the film’s storyline and characters, a great distributing opportunity.
- Freddie Meade
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