Evaluation- In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our own media product uses techniques and conventions from real film openings.

Our first design for a typical opening sequence is the Production Company opening.

Every Film will open with a Production Company appearance before the start of the film. To make our opening appear more like a real film as possible we decided to create our own Production Company. We chose ours to be called "Unique Productions" Normally the logo of theme would move in some way or make a sound. So with this in mind I created this 8 second appearance of the Production Company. This immediately made the beginning of the opening sequence feel more like a film. I used a sound and an effect over the top of the logo to make it more interesting than just starting with a basic still frame of the logo.

The next design technique we chose was the very beginning credit over our film that introduces the film presented by the Production Company. So in our case this was “Unique Productions Presents...".

Whilst researching film opening I noticed that this was a recurring technique. So we thought it necessary for use to do this as well. The above two pictures show our one next to an example from the Film Forest Gump.

The next convention that we had to consider was how film opening start with an establishing shot. We took inspiration from Bricks establishing Shot of Emily. This gave us the confidence and purpose to create our own. We needed to create an establishing shot as this is what many films do. We needed to set the scene like a real film that would draw our audience in.

All films will introduce their film title at the start of the film. So this was a vital aspect to consider when creating our production. We first needed to come up with a name and execute it in the opening sequence. Like Brick our film opens with a dramatic scene. So with this in mind we wanted a simple title that didn't distract too much from the film. We decided that a title on a black background would be suitable and the font to be very simple. Although our font was very simple it was really effective as the shots from behind the background were visible through the outline of the letters. I really liked this technique and felt that it worked really well.

Like any film we decided that having opening credit would make our film a lot more professional and feel like a real film. We developed our credits and thought a lot about their style and appearance. We really liked the credits we chose on Live type as they had this wispy appearance that faded away with the smoke in the beginning shot. Credits for a film are a very important aspect so it was important for us to consider this.

Another aspect that we had to consider and develop was our variation in shots. This is also another very important aspect when making a film. Film producers and directors will spend hours making a scene flawless so its important to have the right shot, make it effective and execute the take with out any flaws. It was important to us that we thought of a variety. It would be very plain and boring to have just one shot throughout a whole film.

We also challenged our film by finding creative and exciting ways to edit and cut from shot to shot. Like any film they would have transitions and special effects to make the film more interesting. We challenged this technique with the resources that we had to create a more interesting film for our target audience.

Final Piece - Beth Marwolaeth

I have really enjoyed creating our opening sequence. I have learnt lots of new skills along the way. I have learnt how to use new technology and I have learnt how to use a Mac computer as I have never really used one before. I am now more confident with using the camera and tripod to create professional shots. I am now more aware of not just the subject matter being filmed but the outer frames and locations which is a vital part in filming. I have really enjoyed coming up with ideas for our piece and watching them take shape. I really enjoyed featuring in the film as it was an interesting experience for me and good fun. I have really enjoyed updating my blog and creating prezi's for the progress of the opening sequence. I feel that the film has turned out really well and I'm very pleased with what we have produced. Although being relieved to have handed it in, I will miss the production very much. I look forward to another challenge such as this one.


Here is our final production.

Feedback Lesson

In our media lesson we sat down and watched every ones final opening sequence. Whilst watching them we had to fill in feedback sheets for the other groups. I really enjoyed watching other people’s films it was really interesting to see what the other groups had created. It was interesting to see what they had done and their own storylines. When it came to our opening sequence I felt really nervous I didn’t really know what to expect it was the first time that I had actually sat down and watched it all together as a whole piece. Because when we were editing it there was always one thing we were focusing on, one week it would be the shot, or the camera movement, the credits or the music. So it was really good to watch it in fresh as if it wasn’t my own and it was another group. When it started I was really nervous. I had mixed feelings I was wondering whether it would making sense to people and more importantly did they enjoy it. After our being shown I was really pleased. It was a lovely relief to have finally have finished it.

Here is some feed back from a member of you tube:

Here is the feedback from our lesson :

Feedback: Harry Jackson: Just watched your media, the ending goes on for too long because its just a black screen fro like 15 seconds, and the only other things, is you can only just about see your names when they come up, but the rest is really good.

Finalising Our Film

During the week up until the Friday of our deadline, we spent time just finalising the position of our credits and music and just making sure that everything was in place. We got our Unique Productions Company bit imported to Imovie. Although we did have some complications along the way: The last week up to handing our film in was very stressful by this time we just wanted to hand it in and concentrate on other things. By the time that it had all started to come together we had watched it so many times and for us as a group it was losing its feeling for us. At the time we had problems with Imovie where it kept crashing every time we opened our film. When I made the “Unique Productions” it had been saved as a windows computer file so that meant we couldn’t put it into the Mac computer. After this problem my hard drive broke so that meant we were delayed getting things that we needed for our film into Imovie. When we were working with live type we found that live type sped up the duration of the film and the credits so when we exported it our film was in fast forward mode.

After planning our film schedule there were only a few changes that were made apart from that everything was really successful. This schedule was really helpful for us to know what we were meant to achieve and shoot.

Here you can see there were only a few minor changes that we made. These weren’t problems but we just decided to change them. As you can see all of our filming went very successfully and didn’t pose us any problems. This was good for us as it meant we became more confident with the camera and filming. This meant that we could easily film one scene to the next without hesitating or having any complications.

Title/Text- Development

Over the past few media lessons we have been working on the opening titles for our film.
We looked “Brick” for the font that they used for their opening sequence.
We decided we didn't want anything to fancy or distracting that would distract from the effect of the opening. We wanted something that was very plain but also effective.
we decided to use live type as it had some really effective fonts that we could chose from it also had a list of effects to chose from which we found really useful. The advantage of using live type instead of Imovie was that you could chose the position of the text within the frame of footage, whereas
Imovie you had limited options.

Filming Changes

During the production of our film there were some changes made. Some of the changes were made due to the deadline approaching, but some were minor changes that we thought would make the final film better than we had planned.
The first change we made to our film was that we had planned to have a voice over though out the opening sequence this was going to be scripted over some of the shots. After completing our footage and putting it into Imovie and watching it back. We noticed that when played with the music, the power of the shots and music together was enough on its own. We thought that the voice over would be too much and too distracting to the dramatic shots of Beth and the music.
The next change was that we decided to change the location of the bathroom scene. The reason behind changing the location was that we had planned to film it at Becky’s house. However we found it quite hard to film all that was necessary in the time that we had during our media lesson. As the deadline was approaching we decided that the best thing was to do it at school. So that if we needed to re-shoot the footage it was practical for us to do so.

The next change we made to our filming was the opening scene. In our plan we had decided to film Beth lying dead with a note in her hand. We decided to change this as we thought that it was too distracting from the pure shot of Beth.

When we had watched our animated story board and associated our shots with the actual footage. We started to put the footage in the right place. Whilst going alongside our animated story board all the footage was in its correct place but we noticed that to have all the shots of Beth at the start was too much. We felt that the power of the establishing shot lost some of its effect. Then of course came the remaining footage of the other characters. We felt that the link between Beth and the other character wasn’t clear enough, they didn’t really fit in and as an audience we would have been asking our self what is the association with the characters and Beth.
With this problem we decided to open with a brief shot of Beth in the river, and then cut to the shot where Dave is burning the pictures. After this shot it cuts back to Beth and then back to another shot of Dave, and so forth. We thought this would be a good technique as you are constantly reminded of the dead body and the association of these characters and what they are doing.

Another change we had to make was the bin used when Dave is burning the pictures of Beth. Unfortunately the bin we had planned to used was plastic and because the pictures were being burnt, the fire would melt the plastic, so instead we decided to use a metal wheelbarrow. It still gave the same effect, just was a lot more safer and appropriate.

Last but not least the change to the shirt we had previously agreed that the featured shirt that Jack would be washing would be covered in blood and he would be washing it. Whilst filming this shot we found it increasingly hard to find an alternate to using real blood. Everything that we tried either looked to fake or just wasn’t working in our favour. As a result of this minor dilemma I came up with the idea of Jack washing Mud of, of the shirt instead of blood. This was more practical for us and also looked effective because the association was still there as Beth is featured lying wet and muddy. This was a successful change and made our shot look more realistic and believable.

Music Studio

On Monday I went to the music studio to have a go at putting lyrics to our music piece. I wanted to try the music with lyrics because I thought it would be effective. After listening to the song in the "Brick" opening and other songs with lyrics they felt really powerful. I wrote some lyrics that I thought would work well with our footage of Beth for our opening sequence. Then I asked permission from my mum if she would sing the lyrics. I asked my mum because I knew she would be capable and it was practical for me and Alex as we didn't have to rely on someone else. We practiced singing all together and trying out different notes and styles of singing. After some practise Alex recorded the singing in. We listened to certain bits to see if it worked. We re-recorded any bits that didn't sound right or were out of key.

Below is the music that we have pre recorded a few days back with the lyrics.

 I have included some pictures and lyrics of the song to add some interest.