Evaluation- Charlotte Hudson

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

For our advanced portfolio we made a 5 minute long film, a film poster and a film review. Whilst preparing our short film 'False Witness' we had to do a lot of research and planning to create the most effective short film. This was a challenge as short films contain some of the most incentive and unconventional work to be found in film making. However, we have been able to make some common features with our film and other short films. 

·         Narrative organisation and the short film format:

·         Characterisation:

·         Camerawork:

·         Sound:

·         Mise en scene:

·         Use of genre conventions:

·         Themes and issues:

·         Editing/post production: 

9 frame analysis of a variety of films- explaining elements of narrative structure, camerawork & characterisation- all shots explained throughout question.

9 frame analysis of film- showing narrative structure, characterisation & camerawork- all shots explained throughout question.  (used when speaking about 'False Witness') 

Narrative Organisation & short film format in the short film:

• Our film ‘False Witness’ is a very complex narrative structure as it is a circular and multi-strand narrative structure. 
• (Frame 2 & 3)- We use a multi-strand structure as we are showing the truth of Rebecca and Louise’s friendship, through flashbacks, whilst Rebecca is lying in the interview room. We have the past and present parallel, so the audience can see the truth and see that Rebecca is lying and therefore not charged at the end of the film. The multi-strand shows two points of view on the antagonists murder as the audience is able to see the truth and the lies.

• The film is also circular as we begin and end at the grave yard (Frame 1 & 9). We used a circular narrative so the beginning becomes more shocking as the protagonist Rebecca is at the grave at the end, and the audience goes back to the time frame at the beginning showing that Rebecca was released and not charged with murder at the very beginning of the film- this shows that in fact the grave yard scene is the real present day and the rest of the film was technically in the past. The audience are then aware at the end why we started with the grave yard scene as the audience see the story unravel in front of their own eyes and the story is all tied together at the end.

• The narrative is an unrestricted narration as the audience know more than the interviewer in the film, we did this so that the audience could see why Rebecca is in fact a ‘false witness’ as she is lying for freedom, it also makes the plot of the film more complex, as the audience are jumping back and forth between present and past. 

• This therefore makes our five minute short film very complicated, as many short films are at least 10 minutes long and have a simple narrative structure consisting of one narrative style. However we have put in two and also made our narrative non-linear. Our narrative is non-linear as we are jumping back and forth between the present and the past- the present being the grave yard, and interview room and the past being the flashbacks of the protagonist and antagonist, however also the interview room.

• When looking through all the short films I had researched i thought that our film was most like the film 'Two Laps' as this film also uses a non-linear narrative structure as it jumps from the present race to the past races that the narrator speaks of. Also like our film it is circular as it begins and end with the present race between the two swimmers. However, unlike our film it has very limited dialogue as it is one man narrating the past races, and is therefore not a lot of complex dialogue- the narrator is just telling a simple story. Whereas our whole film uses complex dialogue to explain what has happened to create the end result (the murder of Louise). 

Todorov’s theory

Todorov’s theory can’t fully be applied to the plot of our film as we jump around frequently and don’t have a simple narrative of a 5 element structure. However, it can't be used when describing the story. 

1. Initially the story has an equilibrium as the relationship between Rebecca and Louise is seen as a good friendship by Rebecca insisting that they are best friends and that she didn't murder her friend. 
2. There is then disequilibrium because there is disruption as it becomes known that Rebecca is bullying Louise behind her back. 
3. When Louise works out that Rebecca is bullying her this is the 3rd stage 'acknowledgement' 
4. and this rapidly leads onto solving the problem (which ends in Louise's murder as Rebecca is scared about her telling her mum that Rebecca is a bully). 
5. As a result of Louise's murder there is a new equilibrium as their lives are no longer the same and Rebecca isn't charged for her murder. There is no resolution as Rebecca isn't charged for her actions and the murder of Louise.

Levi Strauss Theory

We’ve also used the levi theory as we are showing the two binary oppsoties of good and evil primarily- Rebecca as evil and Louise as good. The film also unravelled the characters, it shows that Rebecca is the more dominant character and Louise as more submissive and passive – therefore showing another binary opposite. (This theory is shown in Frame 4 & 5)

Bordwell & Thompson Theory- plot & story

The story of 'False Witness' is about the antagonist Rebecca being accused of the death of her friend Louise, which results in Rebecca being held for something she says she never did. 

But the plot shows the unfolding of the interview resulting in Rebecca's release. It also shows the bullying leading up to the murder, the murder itself and Rebecca leaving the police station after her release, then watching Louise’s mother at the grave. 

Characterisation:

• Characterisation is very important in any film as it helps the audience instantly make a viewpoint on the characters within the film, as it helps to create the type of genre you are trying to portray as a result of your characters and the characterisation. I looked at the short film 'Silent things' as it was very effective at characterisation as a result of being a film about people with disabilities and suffering with asperges. 

• In 'Silent Things' instantly the characters are shown as having disabilities as their body language is very reserved and the diegetic sound is much quieter (therefore working with the title), they camerawork focuses a lot on close-up and extreme close-up shots of the characters body parts to show their disabilities. Straight away the audience can make an opinion on the characters, feeling sympathy for them as abuse is shouted at them by strangers etc. 

• Initially in 'False Witness' Rebecca is seen as an innocent character as she is persisting that she did not murder her 'bestfriend'. We use lots of close-up shots to show her facial expressions when trying to convince us that she did not murder her bestfriend. However, the flashbacks throughout show the audience that she isn't an innocent character at all, instead she is very controlling and a bully. Unlike 'Silent Things' the audience aren't straight away fully aware of the kind of character Rebecca is. 
• Similarly in 'Silent Things' our more passive character in 'False Witness' is instantly shown (Louise) as she is is pressured to drink- again we used close-ups to show how she is mocked and laughed at when coughing etc when she does drink. Her facial expression shows that she is doing something she dislikes and is therefore victimized amd made an outcast like in 'Silent Things', as the two main characters are straight away shown to be passive and an outcast to the rest of the world. 

• In 'Silent Things' there is a very strong close relationship between the two characters with disabilities, whereas 'False Witness' does not show a typical close friendship. 
• Rebecca is presented as a nasty and vindictive character though the flashbacks, her body language and the things she says and Louise is presented as the passive, sweet and innocent character. 
• And like 'Silent Things' this film suggests the genre of social realism. In 'Silent Things' the story is of two people with a disability and showing what life is like for a person with a disability and bullying they face and being an outcast. In 'False Witness' the audience is being shown bullying and how jealousy can cause issues in a friendship. 
• However our film does take the idea of jealousy to the extreme as she murders her own friend. But showing the jealousy and bullying causes the audience to feel sympathy towards Louise, and hate towards Rebecca- it also causes anger towards Rebecca as she is freed at the end as the audience know the truth but the interviewer and police don't know the truth- the unrestricted narration means that the audience knows more about the two main characters and therefore have a stronger opinion on them. 

Camerawork:

• Camerawork is very important in a short film as it helps to highlight the characters and helps to portray them in a specific way (good or bad for instance). Whereas in hollywood films they have more time to present their characters whereas in a 5 minute long film you have a shorter amount of time and therefore camera work is very important.

• When looking at how effective camerawork is in short films to help portray the characters I found the camera work in 'Silent Things' was very helpful as they use a lot of close up shorts to show facial expression and body language to portray their characters. Which is very similar in 'False Witness'. 

Highlights the character lying, also creates atmosphere- audience become scared of her.

• In 'False Witness' many effective close up shots are used to show that Rebecca is lying in the interview. (Frame 6) We used an ECU of Rebecca's eyes when she is explaining the events on the day Louise died, this is a very powerful shot as it shows Rebecca looking around as she is nervous and lying. So this shot helps to enhance the flashback, as the audience are already fully aware that she is lying as the ECU highlights her body language. 

Highlights characters disability, the close up focuses on the body language.

• In 'Silent Witness' similar shots are used to highlight their disabilities, for instance with the death female character there is a BCU shot of her from the side showing her body language and highlighting her ear, highlighting the fact that her hearing is impaired- this is also a very strong shot as when placed with muffled sound it really highlights to the audience her view on the world with impaired hearing. 

CU to show Rebecca's jealousy.

• In 'False Witness' we use many ECU, BCU and CU shots to show Rebecca's thoughts and feelings towards Louise. It instantly highlights Rebecca's body language and facial expression when she is with Louise as it highlights her jealousy- for example the CU of Rebecca as she is watching Louise do her hair in the mirror highlights her anger and disgust as she is jealous of Louise. With such a short amount of time to create the character as jealous the close-ups work effectively to instantly highlight her jealousy with a minimal amount of dialogue. 

Contrast in angles shows the characters power in the friendship.

• When Rebecca pushes Louise down the stairs we then used a low angle shot (Frame 7), with the camera looking up at Rebecca to show her authority and power over Louise. Then when the audience look at Louise dead on the floor (Frame 8), we used a high angle shot from Rebecca's point of view to highlight Louise as being the victim and very powerless as Rebecca is looking down on her. This helps to highlight the powerful character Rebecca is. 

• Many short films use a small amount of dialogue, however as our film was so complex with many different narrative structures etc we had to use a lot of dialogue. But we made sure that we used a wide variety of shots to portray Rebecca's character as dominant and also jealous, as we thought it was more effective then using dialogue to tell the audience that she was a jealous character etc. We found it made the film more interesting to watch, instead of her character telling the audience she was jealous etc. 

Shot 1 & 2 are establishing shots from different films. Shot 3 is our establishing shot from our film.

• Like most films, Hollywood or Independent, they use an establishing shot, this a successful and interesting way to tell the audience where the film is set and to create relevance within the film. In 'False Witness' we used two establishing shots- at the very beginning of our film at the grave yard and at the end outside the police station when Rebecca is being released from the station. We chose to use two establishing shots as these settings are both two key settings within the film, as the grave yard links the beginning and end together and it also shows that there has been a murder (which is the disruption within the narrative- Todorov's theory). The police station also is important as it links where Rebecca is being interviewed throughout the film and it also shows the audience that she has been let out by the police. Establishing shots help to place the audience within the narrative.

Mise en Scene: 

Mise en Scene is very important within a film as it creates the character. Without mise en scene films aren't as convincing as you need the right props, costumes and lighting to create a convincing film. When creating a thriller film mise en scene is extremely important. The main aspects of mise en scene we considered are: 

• Costume
• Lighting
• Facial Expressions & Body Language
• Props 
• Make-up

Lighting

• Lighting was extremely important throughout our film as dark low-key lighting helped portray the idea of dishonesty and that there wasn't 'happiness' throughout the film. Whereas if we used bright lightening throughout it would of suggested something good not something bad. 
• We especially used low-key lighting in the interview scenes as Rebecca is lying and she is an evil character (low-key lighting is mainly used around the evil character to reflect their mood) and the low-key lighting in the interview scenes reflected her lying and deception. 
• The low lighting also meant that there was always shadow on the one side of her face, this then highlighted to the audience a darker side to Rebecca and that she was secretly vindictive etc. made the audience aware she isn't a nice character. 

Costume & Make-up

• Costume was secondly very important as we had to make all our characters seem convincing. The character that was the hardest to portray was the interviewer as we had to use a teenager (as our adult actor cancelled at the last minute, so Mae, who is also an A level Drama student had to step in instead). This meant that we had to make our interviewer look like an adult woman and not a young girl. We also had to make sure she looked middle-aged and therefore had to dress more upper-class, so we dressed her in a blouse with a broach (we felt this helped to age our character), a black blazer, a long black skirt, glasses and with her hair back in a simple bun- nothing to vibrant or teenage like. We kept her make-up to a minimum with a simple touch of red lipstick. We felt in the end she was a convincing interviewer.

• With Rebecca, she was dressed in a multiple of outfits as the flashbacks were meant to show all different days and times of days. But on the day of her release we had her dressed in all black with a hoodie. The use of the hoodie was so her presence in the grave yard at the end was more terrifying as she is watching Louise's mum from a distance and comes across more scary to the audience. The black at the end was also very effective as helped to highlight her as an evil character and reflected her personality as being dark and nasty. 

• Louise's costumes throughout were also different as they had to reflect a change in time and days as well. Her costumes also had to reflect a change in seasons as we were showing the audience that she was being bullied by Rebecca over a long period of time. We also thought hard about her costumes as we wanted the costumes to reflect her characters personality as being innocent, bright and sweet. We also wanted them to contrast Rebecca's as they were presented as being 'binary opposites' (Levi's theory). We also kept her make-up subtle to show her innocence. 

Sound

Sound is also another important element within films as it helps to reflect a mood and make moods.

We left our sound to the end as we had to think about it for a long time as we wanted to make them as effective as possible as we had many different moods to express within the film. 

• As our film this year was a more advanced and developed version of last year we used the same non-diegetic sound as last year as we found it was very effective as we used a similar idea and target audience and genre. 
• However this year we also added two other non-diegetic sounds on top to have a contrast- we added a piano for the scenes in the grave yard this meant the non-diegetic sound is parallel to the image on the screen as the sound made the grave scenes more emotional and a lower mood as it's showing Louise's mother at her grave.  The sound and the image worked together to make the atmosphere more upsetting.
• The piano sound is loud at the beginning and then quietens as diegetic dialogue starts then we moved onto more thriller style non-diegetic sound. 
• We used a darker non-diegetic sound with a contrast in notes to create more suspense throughout the rest of the film. We kept the non-diegetic sound relatively quiet throughout the rest of the film, so it created an eary atmosphere throughout.
• We used a few sound bridges throughout the film to link scenes together, for instance when switching between a flasback and the present day we have used a sound bridge to link the truth and lies together. This meant the audience were aware of how 'Rebecca' was lying her way to freedom when really she was guilty. 
• By having sound bridges it also meant that we had to use less shots within our film and it meant that we were able to save time and have the more important shots within our film. This meant that our film wasn't full of 2 people talking in an interview room and it meant that we had more action being shown, to keep the audience interested.
• Then at the end of the film we made this non-diegetic sound louder as we return back to the grave yard as there is no longer diegetic dialogue. By making the sound louder it highlights the danger of Rebecca being in the grave yard watching Louise's mother. It really creates a tense and dangerous atmosphere.

Facial Expressions & Body Language

Again this part of mise en scene is very important as it helps to portray the characters feelings and thoughts towards/about other characters. This was very important in 'False Witness' as we are highlighting jealousy and the extremes it can cause. 

To highlight the importance the characters facial expressions and body language we used a lot of close-up shots throughout. We use many ECU, BCU and CU shots to show Rebecca's thoughts and feelings towards Louise as it instantly highlights Rebecca's body language and facial expression when she is with Louise as it highlights her jealousy:

Bullet point 1, 2 & 3 in order underneath.

• for example the CU of Rebecca as she is watching Louise do her hair in the mirror highlights her anger and disgust as she is jealous of Louise. 
• the extreme close up of Rebecca's eyes in the interview room when she is explaining the events on the day Louise died, this is a very powerful shot as it shows Rebecca looking around as she is nervous and lying. So this shot helps to highlight that Rebecca is indeed lying, this is a simple way of the audience seeing that she is lying just through simply body language, which is very effective with such a limited amount of time. 
• Many of Rebecca's facial expressions help to portray her as a nasty and heartless character, the facial expression of her laughing at Louise when she is coughing after drinking alcohol instantly highlights her as a nasty character as she is mocking her- shows she see's Louise as weak and pathetic.

Louise's facial expressions show more of feeling hurt and let down, she is presented as being much weaker and pathetic compared to Rebecca.

Bullet point 1 & 2 shown underneath.

• For example the day she isn't allowed to go out with Rebecca, her facial expression and body language show the audience that she is upset and hurt, showing that she is weak and lonely without Rebecca. 
• When she drinks alcohol, she looks humiliated and made to look pathetic as she is coughing, this also shows the audience that she is innocent as she hasn't drank alcohol before. 
• This facial expressions and body language helps to make the audience sympathise for Louise as she is made to seem much weaker and look younger than Rebecca as she has more sad facial expressions. Whereas the audience feel anger towards Rebecca as she is just nasty. 

The sad and lonely facial expressions and body language of Louise is very similar in 'Silent Things' by the female with disabilities as the female looks concerned and alone when the male is with another female- this suggests that like Louise she is lonely without her male friend. This therefore makes the audience sympathise for her. 

Use of Genre Conventions
'False Witness' has two genre conventions- Thriller and Crime. Our main genre style is thriller, however within our film we have a sub-genre of Crime (this is shown with the interview scenes and it being set in a police station). 
As our film is more than one genre, it is therefore a 'hybrid' as it isn't one genre type. This means our film can't be categorically placed in one genre section. 

Our film is a thriller as it follows many conventions of a thriller as we use:

• low-key lighting- to create atmosphere and mood, by making the darker characters have a shadow on their face to suggest they aren't a good character etc. Also to show that it isn't a 'happy' 'bright' film but a dark and emotional film

The mirror fits within the genre convention.

• mirrors (when Rebecca is stealing Louise's jewellery, there is a mirror showing her from another angle looking through her draws and jewellery)- mirrors are very common in thrillers as it helps to show another perspective, show a different viewpoint as well.

• The use of flashbacks throughout also make our film a thriller as these are also common within a thriller to show truth and reasons for actions taken later on in films. 

• Steve Neales theory says that 'genre are instances of repetition and difference' he also says that 'difference is absolutely essential to the economy of genre' suggesting genre however, does not attract an audience fully by repetition of specific genre conventions. This therefore supports the hybrid film we have created, as we have used two different genre styles- mainly making our film a thriller so using the typical genre conventions but also making it different as a result of also making it about being a crime and following ideas involving a crime genre.

The Ancillary Tasks

Film Poster

To create a successful film poster, there are many conventions and rules that you have to follow, so that your poster grabs the audience attention and is also relevant to the film so that the audience know if they will be interested in the film or not. 

Initially we looked at a wide variety of film posters:

• The most relevant poster style to ours is the 'Violet & Daisy' poster as it uses a lot of low-key lighting and dark colours- which is what we used to make our poster relevant to our film.
• Like the 'Violet & Daisy' poster we used a black background and white writing on top to make the poster stand out and so the poster writing was easy to read.
• However we aligned our characters differently on the poster, so that Rebecca was further in front of the poster to show her character as being more powerful and dominant than Louise's.
• The font on our poster is also different to 'Violet & Daisy' and more like 'An Education's poster writing, as we used a 'sans serif' font to suggest to the audience that although the film is about girls it isn't a girly 'pretty' style of film. It also makes the poster easier to read.
• With our font we also kept it the same on our poster and in our film, whereas in 'Violet & Daisy' they use a sans serif font for their film, this is perhaps used to try and grab the female audience better by their poster as the poster is released before the film. Whereas we kept the same font, but changed the colour in the film as we had a green background (as we used the grass in the grave yard) and therefore we wanted the font to look dark and tense in the film.

• To make the poster look convincing like an actual poster, we added in the essential conventions, such as:

• The use of 'dead space' has been very important as you don't want the actors covered up by writing and titles, everything has to fit neatly and aligned correctly. 
• Most of the font on our poster is aligned to the left, but the billing block is aligned to the right, to make the poster have a bit variety also as as its not the main text the text doesn't have have to be aligned the same. We also decided it worked better being on right because of the colours the character is wearing, you could read it easier on the right.

• The billing or production block as this is needed on a film poster, to make a film poster the billing block is a legal requirement as it is used to name the correct people starred in the film and helped to produce the film etc and is usually placed at the bottom of the poster. We have made our block white so it is easily seen on our black background and to fit in with the other text. 

  

  Billing block taken from our poster

  

  Billing block taken from another film

• Reviews and ratings are important so that the audience can be grabbed by who has rated it and see if it is their type of film. It usually gives a small suggestion of what the film is about and the genre of the film. We chose to claim a review from 'Little White Lies' as this is a magazine that is most likely to review our film as they are a magazine that review independent film companies so we used them to make our poster more convincing.

  

  reviews and ratings from our film.

• However as we haven't used well-known actors we haven't placed their names on the top of the poster as it is relevant. This isn't relevant because we aren't attracting our audience by the people starring in it. Whereas many films mention their actors as a way to interest audience's that like those specific actors. 

Our Final Film Poster

The Film Review

We were only taught about the 'Little White Lies' magazine and had no choice in other magazine reviews. This meant that our film review is an exact replica of the 'Little White Lies' review magazine. We've used 'Little White Lies' because using their magazine means that the review is as realistic as possible and 'Little White Lies' is the type of review magazine that reviews independent film companies films, therefore it was the most effective. We were taught only about 'Little White Lies' because it's a film magazine that that would be an interest of our target audience as well

To create a successful review we had to follow a few guidelines so that it was a perfect replica, such as:

• Using specific font, as they use 3 different font styles- 'Century Gothic' for the title and review numbers. 'Aparajita' for the main text, and the actors, producer and release date (they vary between bold and italics with this font). Finally they use 'Microsoft Yahei' for the the word 'Review'. Therefore we had to make sure we used these particular fonts on our review.
• The document size had to have a Height of 245 mm and Width of 195 mm
• Column Lengths had to be around 100 mm and a Width of 52.4 mm- there also had to be 3 columns of writing and a word limit of 500 words. 
• The image of the top of the text varied depending on if you hit the word limit or just a little bit under
• The columns had to be justified to the left, but the simple reviews and rating at the end for 'Anticipation', 'enjoyment' and 'retrospect' are justified to the right. 

A full annotation of a 'Little White Lies' review.

We therefore had to follow a lot of rules and layout requirements to make sure it was an exact replica and therefore was convincing to the audience reading the review and would be interested in the film itself. 
We didn't only follow the layout conventions, we also had to replicate the language conventions. This meant using similar paragraph starters and endings, have a tag line or a quirky review ending and using the similar language style. We had to use a wider variety of vocabulary and not just similar vocab that we would use every day within a group of friends. 

Our film review of 'False Witness'

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

This is because firstly the poster reflects the mood of the film well by using the black background- the black background means that the film is portrayed as being dark and not light-hearted whereas if we had bright colours etc the film would be portrayed as not looking so intense and dark. We use key close up shots of both characters to instantly highlight the type of characters they are portraying. We show Rebecca as being powerful and Louise as being weak and below Rebecca. We showed this by placing the two characters differently on the poster- having Rebecca infront of Louise and this meant that we were showing the control and power Rebecca has over Louise- this little detail meant that the audience were aware of the weaker character just by looking at the poster and this meant that they were getting an insight into the film.

Footage from film

This highlights the fact that our film and poster work well together because we haven't had to take separate shots for the poster we were able to take actual shots from our film. This therefore shows we have been able to present our genre style well.

Title in the short film

 Another way the poster has worked effectively with our film is because we have made sure we used the same font on the poster that we use in the film to create the same atmosphere in both pieces of work. But like a real film poster we have changed the font colour on the poster so it isn't the same as the film- we have done this because many real film posters use different colours and images and this may not be the same as the images used in the title sequence of the film. Therefore the poster has to use colours to highlight genre whereas in the actual film it uses the film footage. Real film posters keep the same font but as the colours are different on the poster they contrast the colours and we therefore did this with our film poster.

Our Review

LWL review

The review was an exact replica of a 'Little White Lies' review and would therefore fit within the magazine. We made sure that the magazine would fit with the layout conventions and the language conventions to make the review as successful as possible and work within the real commercial context. By using the 'Little White Lies' magazine it meant that we were actually making a review for a magazine that would review our work as they review Independent film companies unlike making a review for a big film review company as this wouldn't be realistic at all and therefore wouldn't be a successful review. 

The key elements on review

Like their review we also mention key elements of the film but don't create a plot spoiler, this means that we keep the audience engaged as they want to watch the film to know the main event. As well as these things we mention the 3 key reviewers elements- anticipation, enjoyment and retrospect. therefore making the review as realistic as possible.

Main image on top of review

Like little white lies we have used an image at the top of our review focusing on the main character, to make it more like the magazine. we have made the image an extreme close up to reflect the mood of the film and create an atmosphere. This means that film is becoming more appealing to the readers of the review as our image makes the film look very dark and a definite thriller genre. 

Variety of shots on poster & review

ECU on review & kept writing as realistic as possible

In conclusion we have been able to portray our film as being dark, a thriller, and given the film an atmosphere. This has been shown by the images we have used on both the poster and review- by using an extreme close-up of Rebecca (the evil character on the review) and then using close-up to medium shots of the characters on the poster. But with main character Rebecca we have made sure we used shots with similar facial expressions to make sure we portray her as an evil character. With the review we had to keep our style of writing exactly like the actual review but we have also tried to make it as realistic as possible and so it actually would attract an audience and not be exaggerated. We haven't made the review biased as we wanted to make sure that it would work well with the film and painted a better image of the film- we decided that to be the most successful we had to be honest and write with an open view on the film. Therefore we made a convincing replica of the review and therefore would work well in a real commercial context.  

 

3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Our target audience is between 15-20, as we have used an older actor as well as teenagers. This is also because of the story and plot is very complex and needs a lot of concentration as the narrative structure is so dynamic, hence why we based our target audience as a higher age. 

Again we used facebook to gain feedback so we had a wide variety of comments from a wide variety of viewers. 

Audience feedback has been useful this year, and has helped us know that we hit our target audience well because of the amount of feedback we got. 
The feedback was also helpful for our review as we made sure that we asked the 3 main questions used in the review: Anticipation out 5, Enjoyment out of 5, and retrospect out of 5. this was so we could gain as much real feedback as possible.

Younger female audience feedback

• As we used an all female cast we were aiming mainly for a female audience as we made sure females were also able to play the evil character. 
• The feedback taught us that the flashbacks were effective as it made the audience want to keep watching. This was helpful as we also used flashbacks last year and wanted to make sure they were more advanced then last year. This shows that we developed our editing and ideas well. 
• The idea of using the same non-diegetic sound as last year was also seen as being effective as the audience were able to see our film as mainly being a thriller film- which is the genre we wanted to show. 
• The close-ups were also seen as being effective, and this was important in our film as it was only 5 minutes long so we had to be able to create the necessary emotions (jealousy) as quick as possible. Therefore we used a lot of close-ups and this was seen as effective and a good technique by the audience. This shows that the audience were able to fully understand our film.

Older female audience feedback

Male audience feedback

• Grabbing the older audience also worked well as older females didn't want to be in their homes alone. So we created the right atmosphere.

• Although our main audience was the female audience, the film also grabbed the attention of males. This was very helpful and interesting as they made lots of more in-depth comments about our filming and sound etc. They gave a lot of different ways we could have filmed some of our shots was interesting and helpful to read to see a different approach we could have taken and tweaked a few shots. 
• One main negative comment was about our actor that played Louise's mother, they thought she didn't look old enough to play the mother and this therefore wasn't clear enough for our audience. I agree with this comment, and we had planned for an older actor but again we couldn't get someone older so our actor was the best we could get in a short amount of time. However we felt that she was a good actor as she listened well and let us do whatever we wanted. 
• Although the actor that played Rebecca got so much good feedback, which was really nice as we thought she was perfect for the part (as she is an A level drama student) but they said she made the film very convincing and she 'plays the part well' which is 'very hard at this level'. 
• Another comment about the acting was about Louise when receiving the hate messages. They felt she needed to show some more emotion which is understandable as there did need to be a lot of emotion in these scenes. Although again we had to film in a very short amount of time and so we had to make more priority for the more difficult shots (such as the pushing down the stairs scene). 
• Some of the audience thought the film was quite simple as we only had one suspect for Louise's murder and didn't have any miss direction. Therefore they knew from the beginning that Rebecca was the murderer. Whilst watching the film back, I see what the audience is saying as it would have been more interesting and shocking if there was some miss direction. If we were able to do the film again we would have a more diverse plot by creating miss direction. However the narrative structure was already very complex from the beginning and in a short amount of time with so much dialogue and time changes, our filming and editing would have been even more stressful and complex. The film we created was already quite difficult to produce, and we felt it was already at the highest level possible that we could produce effectively without making our shots weak. 

  

  Another male audience feedback

• The audience liked the fact that Rebecca didn't get charged with murder and was free. This was because it gave the idea that there could be a sequel and see her victimize another character in the future. This was a good and useful comment as if we wanted to ever carry on media at university we would have a possible story to develop even further. It also means that we are also able to follow all this feedback and apply them into another film.

 The audience feedback has given us a clear understanding about whether our product has been successful because we used the 3 key elements that are also in the review which are: Anticipation out 5, Enjoyment out of 5, and retrospect out of 5. Asking the audience these 3 questions was a good and easy way of working out whether our film was successful because it meant that we could have a quick and simple way of knowing whether it was enjoyable, and this meant that audience members that didn't want to be very descriptive could simply give an opinion with about being very detailed and this was important as not every audience member liked being really detailed.  

As you can see quite a lot of audience members gave us feedback and this meant that we were able to get an overall mark out of 5 for each key element needed in the review. Enjoyment we got 3 out of 5 which means that we managed to hit our target audience quite well as enjoyment was over 1/2. However it does suggest that if we got 5 out of 5 for the other two areas we may have been able to heighten the enjoyment mark. But overall i feel that we hit our target audience pretty well. 

Anticipation: 4+ 5+ 5+ 5+ 3+ 4.5+ 4+ 4 = 34.5 / 8 = 4.3   4
Enjoyment: 3+ 3+ 3+ 3.5+ 3+3 +5+ 4 = 27.5 /8 = 3.4    3
In retrospect: 4+ 4+ 4+ 4+ 4+ 4+ 3+4  = 31/ 8 =  3.9    4 

Overall we got a wide range of feedback, many comments telling us how we could change a few shots by simply creating more emotion. Mainly our problems was with the actor's as in some shots there wasn't enough emotion or their age made the character not fully believable and not easy to understand. However, these are all simple tweaks that we could make if we had to develop our film again. Also because of the time we had to film we had to work with what was available in a short amount of time. But I think we worked very well with what was available for us.

4. How did you use your media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Blogger 

• Throughout we have used ‘blogger’. After last year’s portfolio we decided that blogging was essential throughout as it really helped to show how we were able to create effects and specific shots we have used etc. This year we did lots more posts, so our planning and pre-production was much clearer and presented easier.
• This year our blog really showed our journey through making our final film and ancillary tasks. The blogger was used so we could look at a wide variety of films before planning our own film, the blog meant our whole group could look at each other’s work and see what we liked about each other’s found films and if we liked the ideas some of the films had. 

Social Networking

• We used social networking mainly to get our feedback from our audience- this was a risky way of gaining feedback as many audience member's could/do write comments that are simply "yer man, it was really sick"or "good" etc and therefore isn't very helpful and doesn't tell us how successful our film is. 
• However, social networking was important within the research and planning stages as it helped us grab our audience easily as our audience was our friends age and therefore we could get their opinion easily. 
• When posting our film on ‘Facebook’ we were able to find out how popular our film was within our age group and we were able to receive really helpful comments and simple ‘likes’ which gave us confidence about our work and made us see we did a good job to create a successful thriller/crime. 
• It also was useful to us as we as a group were able to communicate easily throughout the planning process, quick group chats where we could all give our own opinions and were easily readable. We could also speak to our actors quickly and easily as a group. Therefore social networking was useful to us in many ways. 

Camerawork

• We used the same camera as last year (and HD camera given to us by the media department). Again we had to remember to white balance before filming when being in different lighting and different locations- however we forgot at times to set the white balance and therefore affected some of our shots. However we managed to save a couple of the shots with poor lighting by adding a ‘record’ effect on top of the footage when editing with ‘Final cut pro’. 
• With the camera we also used a ‘tripod’ a lot to make sure we had steady shots and only used hand held for some extreme close up shots as a result of our props (e.g. the table in the counselling room, the table was circular and therefore we couldn’t get close enough for a BCU and ECU and therefore had to hand held the camera). 
• Our use of the dolly was very minimal as a result of the ground we filmed on- the grave yard scene was muddy grass and graveled ground so was not easy to move the camera along without the shots being shaky and out of focus. The police station was also on un-even pavement and lots of acorns around so again shots weren't smooth- Therefore these shots had to be hand held but also using the tripod to create an effective height and distance (also we tried to use the tripod to make the shots as steady as possible whilst walking).

Final Cut Pro & Garageband

• Final cut pro and garageband were both used again. 
• Garageband was more effective this year with some of the sounds (for example our protagonist being pushed down the stairs, we found a successful sound for that shot. Also when the protagonist is in the classroom we made it sound like she was in a room full of students (when really she was alone). 
• We also used the same non-diegetic sound as last year as we found it was very effective, and as we had also made this year’s film a longer and more advanced version of last year’s film- Using a similar idea and target audience and genre- so this music was most effective. However this year we also added two other sounds on top to have a contrast- we added a piano for the scenes in the grave yard as it made these scenes more emotional and worked well with the shots being shown. 
• We edited more of our shots this year (changing the lighting- making it brighter and darker etc, as a result of our camera work not always being very effective because of using too much natural light etc).

  

  After editing our lighting

  

  Before editing our lighting

    

• We again used white fades and cross dissolves, so we just took our knowledge further this year. 
• We also used final cut pro to cancel out a lot of our sound as a result of having signal interference within our shots and therefore had to create other sounds over the top and change the volume of our shots. 
• We also had to edit a ‘record’ image on top of some of our shots as a result of lighting- however we found this effective as we were able to put the record image onto our poster so gave the audience more understanding of the film.

  

  Editing record on top of our shots

Photoshop & Indesign

• We used Photoshop and Indesign for the first time this year, at the start both were difficult to understand. However after a lot of fiddling around we were able to create both the ancillary tasks effectively. 
• With the review, our main problem was making sure our image was the correct width and height and that all the sections of text were equal and placed correctly. 
• Photoshop was tricky as each image placed on the poster was a different ‘layer’ and all had to be moved separately and changed separately etc.

DaFont

• Again we used ‘dafont’ for the title of our film and the credits, so we had to download that into final cut pro again. We decided to get a font from ‘dafont’ as we wanted an individual font and that worked well with the genre of the film. Plus we wanted a font that would stand out on the poster- we contrasted black and white (the font being white on the poster), and used black font in our film. This helped to reflect the mood of the film as it was a hybrid thriller and crime so the white on the black worked well. As the black suggested a dark mood and atmosphere around and therefore the white made the poster stand out as it grabbed the audiences attention over the black.