Evaluation Question 1- In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and coventions of real media products?

Title of Film
The title of our film (the chase) appears at the end of our first scene in the forest. The title is shown in a bank gothic font, in a white colour and a back background. This has more effect than if we used just a plain white background with white writing as it makes the title more bold and interesting, as it follows with the convention of the film. The main title appears over the close up of the characters face, this creates associations with the character, showing that she’s the main star and there’s the possibility that she’s the one that’s going to be chased. When the titles fade to black it creates tension about what will happen next.

Setting and Location
Our first scene is in the forest. Action/thriller films have a large association with forests, due to the mysterious/dark nature to them. Although when filming, the sun was going down so it was appearing through the trees, causing the scene to be bright. This led to the scene not having the correct atmosphere, but when editing we filtered the chosen scenes and lowered the brightness. The following scene is set in a library; it was a place where people go every day, expecting nothing to happen to them. Also when the letter fell out of the book, the library seemed quite an eerie place.

Costumes/Props
In our opening scene our actress wore a simple t-shirt and jeans to represent a mature teenager.  The props we used were a letter, we originally made 2 letters saying different things one saying `we’re watching you` and `don’t go down to the woods`. We then asked people’s opinions on which one they preferred and which would work best with our opening. Most people preferred the `don’t go down to the woods` so this was what we went with. We used a book in the library and a chair.
These are the two costumes our actress wore in the forest and library


Camera and Editing
To film our film opening, we used a film camera and a tripod. The tripod was extremely useful as it ensured we had a steady shot and avoided camera shake. To edit our opening we used final cut express. We used other programmes such as livetype and soundtrack for the credits and soundtrack.Title font/Style
Our title font was Bank Gothic, this was a squared shaped font which appealed to us the most, as we felt it went with the genre of our film well. We used the same font throughout the entire opening and used similar font transitions to make things flow smoother.Story and how opening sets it up
Our opening starts in the forest with the main character being chased. The title fades to black and reveals `2 weeks later`. So the forest scene is seen as a flashback. This is then followed by the library scene, of an establishing shot of the library. This creates the story already, as you have to find out what happens after the library to find out why the main character was being chased.Genre and how the opening suggests
The genre of our film is action/adventure. This is suggested in the opening by having the main character being chased through a forest, this creates a mysterious atmosphere as you wonder why she is the one getting chased and who’s chasing her. How the characters are introduced
Only one character is shown during the first two scenes. This shows she is an extremely important part in the film (main character). Obviously later on in the film more main characters will be introduced. Special FX
We didn’t use any special FX’s in our film as we didn’t have the opportunity too.  Special FX’s are mainly used in films like Avatar or Harry Potter. In our film, we could of used a green screen, so we could easily chose an environment for our actors to be in

Evaluation Question 2-How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our film opening represents women. As our main character is a female. Women are beginning to get stronger parts in action/adventure films, meaning that our character could become a strong main character and becoming a hero. We didn’t over dress our character. We asked our actress to dress in every day wear, so for the library scene she came in skirt and top with a black long coat over the top. Then in the forest scene, we asked her for something extremely simple, so she arrived in a t-shirt and jeans. You see females like this in an action/thriller as if their being chased they’re not going to be that bothered about her appearance. Whereas if we did things differently and over dressed our character, it wouldn’t have the same effect and she would be open to stereotypes. Overall we represent women as a strong social group.

Evaluation Question 3-What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

A production company is a company who are responsible for producing new media, including films. They also may be associated to the funding of films. Production companies vary in size, depending on whether it sells its products to a film studio or a cinema. However a film can be made with multiple companies/conglomerates.
If our film was made as a Hollywood blockbuster, it would be produced either by Miramax films, Paramount Pictures or Warner bro’s. These companies have been around for years, and have produced films such as Kill Bill, The Godfather, Superman and Pulp Fiction. These are all large scale films which have created a large profit at the box office.
If our film was made on a small budget; it would be ideal to choose an independent film company like working titles. Although our film may only screen in picture houses or specialized cinemas, due to the high demand on Hollywood films our film has a lower chance of making it into the cinemas. If we filmed the entire film in England, we would receive a tax deduction, making it cheaper to film. We could also apply for funding from the national film council or the national lottery.
A popular choice from completely new film makers is YouTube. This is a free service, where anyone can upload a video. A short film can be uploaded onto YouTube in a matter of minutes and distributed to millions of people. Social networking sites, helps film makers share their films by posting a status about it, or just sharing the link with someone. The release date of our film would be during the summer holidays where alot of 16 plus are on holiday, this would attract a greater audience.

Evaluation Question 4-Who would be the audience for your media product?

This is Georgia Brown. She is 16 years old, and lives just outside of Banbury. She dresses casually normally wear jeans and a top. She enjoys spending time with friends and going to the stables to see her horses. She enjoys shopping when she has the money. She shops in places like H&M, Republic and Primark. She enjoys a variety of  films like Mean Girls, Angus Thongs and Perfect Snogging, Kick Ass, I am number four and Inception. She enjoys watching them at the cinema and also buying them later on DVD and watching them with her friends or by herself.

She likes to listen to chart music, varying from pop, hiphop. r 'n' b, indie music. She downloads a lot of songs from itunes and is a regular listener of radio 1. I think our film would appeal to her as shes not necessarily a stereotypical girly girl, as she enjoys active activities and enjoys films like inception. Therefore i can imagine if our film came out at the cinema, she would go watch it with a group of friends a similar age and if she enjoyed it, she would more than likely download/buy the film.

Evaluation Question 5- How did you attract/address your audience?

We attracted our audience by going straight into action of the film. When it started with the gate opening and closing it creates tension of what’s going to happen next.  It features a young actress, so people can relate to her. The soundtrack creates a great deal of tension, as at the end of the first scene in the forest, the sound levels increase and then the titles suddenly appear, this creates a surprise effect with the audience, also again it makes them watch on as they don’t know what’s going to happen next.

Evaluation question 5

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Evaluation Question 6- What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

We used a Mac computer to edit our film opening.
The video camera was simple to use and the picture quality was higher due to using a tripod
Final cut was the main editing software we used. It was simple to use, although sometime temperamental. It was effective to use when we had imported all the clips as we were able to cut them to the time scale we wanted, added transitions to make the opening flow and Removing the sound from the clips to avoid distortion with the soundtrack.
We used live type to create all of the titles in the opening. We did this so all of the titles were consistent. This was an extremely simple programme to use.
Finally we used soundtrack pro to create all of our soundtracks as it had a variation of sounds we could use.

If our film was being made many years ago, it would be edited by analog editing. Meaning after filming, we would have to take the film, use a razor blade and stick the film together one by one. This would be extremely time consuming and really expensive too. Digital editing is a lot better, as you can do one section, then come back to it, not necessarily in the right order. Although technology cant correct every mistake.

Evaluation Question 7- Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

I feel that our preliminary task has helped us to be alot more confident with our ideas and filming. Creating the preliminary task was extremely helpful, as it let us experiment with final cut before we went into filming our final idea. We kept with the 180’ degree rule, although in the library scene we broke that rule, but managed to make it flow with our opening as we used a fade in and out transition. We also thought our continuity throughout the opening was good and flowed well.
Even though this was our first time editing or taking any footage at all i feel we did extremly well.