Evaluation Activity 7

Looking back at your preliminary task (the continuity editing task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

This is a embedded link to the presentation on activity 7, in which I compare my skill, ability and understanding between the Preliminary Task and our Final Film Opening

http://www.slideshare.net/zachnicholls123/evaluation-activity-7-34045293

Evaluation Activity 6

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
 
Drop the image onto your PowerPoint and annotate it, adding all the programs and other technology you have used as screen grabs and what you learnt about it/from using it. You could include reference to all the online and computer programs you have used such as iMovie, garage band you tube


During the filming of our film opening I had the role of camera man and thus used a tripod and camera as my main equipment
 
Before using the tripod, as a photographer and having experience filming, I already had a knowledge of the equipment and correct use of the measurement and angle readers located on tripod. This is one of the reasons why I was the camera man.
 
I feel that by repeated use of the camera and tripod I could correct the angle and height of the tripod with less use of the angle reader.
 

 Alongside the tripod I used the handheld camera, although already having knowledge of the technology and how to use it, if felt that I learnt how to use it more effectively and with greater speed allowing for quicker filming a no misfortune of deleting work or missing parts of the shot.



After filming and during the editing process I played a large role in the more detailed editing. We edited our film opening using IMovies on a Mac.

During the editing on IMovie my understanding and knowledge of the technology greatly improved not only in the simple techniques but also in more difficult ones such as clip smoothing.

I have leanrt much about IMovies, how it works and how best to use set tools through editing our As Media Film Opening.

Evaluation Activity 5

How did we attract/address our audience?

"Old Habits Die Hard" is a modern "Social Realistic Thriller" aimed at all ages above 15, but mainly in the range of 15 to 25 year old middle class adolescents, we used and based our film around similar plots to other big hitters of the social realism genre such as "This Is England" and "TrainSpotting" who got their vast viewing figures from lifelike relate-able plots and connectible characters.

We used a similar technique of both the plot line and characters in our film because we felt that by doing so we could attract not only fans of social realism's but of other genres to, this was added to by our use of many conventions seen in thrillers, by doing this we hope to attracted fans of thriller genres as well. The thriller aspects of our film, I feel, are relate-able best to films such as "Reservoir Dogs", without the huge body count, explosions and hijacking. In my view the two relate because of the non-linear story lines and the overall scene of confusion that is caused, as well as the issues of betrayal and hatred.

As far as editing and filming we tried to sick to the conventions of both Thrillers and Social Realism's whenever possible in hopes of not deterring the fans, although that's said, due to the differences between the two genres we often challenged the conventions to achieve the other, for example challenging social realism to conform to thriller this is shown in our use of music during the opening scene, the use of music in social realism's is normally kept to the minimum unless used within a story line for example, "a rave" but we felt that introducing the thriller aspect was important as the story on the whole is heavily influenced by realism.

The final aspect of our film is it's uniqueness, not often is the social realism genre mixed with the likes of action or thriller genres in the way that we did, although they more than often use action or drama within their films, its within the means of the original genre where as we challenged that, in hopes of attracting more viewer, by fulling using the thriller genre to further our films plot and to keep the viewers second guessing the story while connecting to the characters.  

Evaluation Activity 4

Our film opening is a Social Realistic Thriller and in being so we have somewhat limited the audience as although we hoped many would be attracted to the film, some may be turned off by its social realism aspect. However we aimed our film at young adults (Being 15 to 25) as that is the age range of characters in our film.

This is our Target audience

Dan Messenger

Age = 20

Gender = Male

Occupation = Florist

Hobbies = Skateboarding, Listening to Music, Gaming

Likes = Pizza, Rock Music and his cat "Munchies"

Dislikes = Rain, Maths and practical jokes

Favourite Movie = A tie between Trainspotting and Bourne Supremacy

Favourite TV show = Skins



Why would we aim our film at a similar target audience?

The target audience would be people such as Dan Messenger who can relate physically and mentally to the characters of "Old Habits Die Hard" and may even relate to some of the issues raised during the film.

Why would they watch our film?

We feel our target audience would watch our film due to their similarities with the characters, weather they are the same age, are having or had a similar experience, look the same or even have the same feeling as the characters

Evaluation Activity 3

What type of media intuition might distribute your media product and why?

Our As Media film opening is a hybrid genre of both social realism and Thriller, we feel that due to the genre and the overall plot of our film, being drug related, a production company such as "Film 4" or "Warp Films" would likely distribute our media product.

A distributor or Film distributor is responsible for the marketing of am film. This includes such things as setting the release date and the method by which a film is to be exhibited or made available for viewing.

This is a clip in which we use a "directors commentary" to speak about the film opening, the roles we played and distributors we feel are likely to distribute or film.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UN9jY-C4Y9Y

Evaluation Activity 2

How Does Your Media Product Represent Particular Social Groups?

I feel that our media film opening successfully represents a segment, be it a small segment, of young adolescents. Mainly this segment refers to the small group of drug effected teens to young adults ranging between 15 to 25, this will there for be the target audience for our film.

Toby Scott (protagonist)

Toby Scott is the protagonist of our social realistic thriller and we created him to slightly challenge the conventions of normal social realism's, although looking, speaking and from the external view act "normal" he does have his differences, not only in the fact he is a drug addict but he also deeply suffers from social awkwardness, making his character unlike most as he is not easily relate-able to most. However in terms of his addiction and separation from the "average" person he is much like, and was greatly influenced by Mark Renton.

Both characters, although suffering from drug addition and their own unique outlooks on life, have been portrayed in ways which not only make the viewers sympathise with them but end up feeling connected to them by sharing deep and often dark events that shape them.

Similarities

Both Toby and Mark are protagonists in films that related their addition into everyday terms and surround their lives in darkness. Toby much like Renton is a social outcast and other than his similar surrounding friends who all suffer their own daily problems he has no one in his life.

The Mise-En-Scene in both "Trainspotting" and "Old Habits Die Hard", in my opinion, relate to the characters in more than just personal tasted but in wants and hopes, Renton in my view deeply wants to be "normal" or at least in the way he perceives it and Toby greatly needs to be noticed thus their styles match who they hope to become.

Differences

Although both play a similar role in similar film Renton is much more visibly damaged by the long term use of drugs where as Toby is more mentally effected by the drugs. Another difference between the two is the age both of them are young adults but from the opening its clear Renton is older than Toby and this is partly shown in Toby's fear around Creegan and compared to that of Renton who is very confrontational

Evaluation Activity 1

"In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions or real media products?"

  Scene 1
The opening scene of "Old Habits, Die Hard" are designed to prolong the wait, to what viewers know will end in danger, whilst making it appear as a "normal" location. This is a form of foreboding, to make the viewer on edge and wait for the action, which however doesn't come in a form which would be expected by the audience. During the first scene of the opening we use a range of master shots to close ups to best show the viewers, without being completely clear, the situation the protagonist is in.

During these shots we show "Toby" walking from a public suburb to a seemingly abandoned building. Both the techniques and filming of this scene is often very typical of thriller films as it prolongs the drama and builds suspense and we decided the locations on what we felt like were realistic for the plot of our film, we did this to conform to the realism needed in social realistic films.

We used sudden cuts and short, black transitions in addition to the shots to create a feeling of anxiousness in the viewer. We added to the feeling of anxiousness because, although the shots were fast, we drew out the sequence to seemingly last longer than needed. The way we introduced our protagonist "Toby" challenges the conventions of many social realisms as we do not tell the audience about the character but like "Train spotting" and some thrillers we quickly try to forces the viewers into questioning the protagonist's actions which make them more aware of any small details of the character. 

We decided to add a sound track over the starting scene as even though it is less seen in social realism's we felt that by opposing the expectations of the genre we could add something extra to the scene. While not necessary to the genre of social realism, it added an atmosphere and conforms to the expectations of many thrillers.

Scene 2

In this scene we showed "Toby" using a variety of close and mid shots to clearly show his appearance for the first time, we used this scene to show the viewers "he is our protagonist" and this use of shot types to show the main character is very often used in social realisms as it gets the viewers close, sometimes uncomfortably close, to the person so that they feel more aware of the person being "Human" rather than a actor.

During the early parts of this scene the music fades out alerting the viewers of change, we did this partly to allow for easier hearing of the dialogue but also so viewers can tell something is about to happen.

The location we choose to film in had two major advantages, one it was a realistic and likely setting for such a meeting but also because of it's practical use at blocking wind, rain and having reasonable low levels of external sound.

We decided to have Toby dressed in unique clothes, partly to distinguish him from others but to also show his personal uniqueness as a character. Toby on the whole breaks the average conventions of both thriller and social realism as he is nether relate-able or put in a place of admiration. We felt that although it broke the typical stereotypes as the opening progressed Toby would become more relate-able to the audience and his personal problems, mainly his social awkwardness would become a "loveable" point or one used to explain his downfalls.

Scene 3
In this scene "Toby" meets "Creegan", both characters are distanced from the viewers due to the lack of personal detail leaving the viewer to brewed over what is happening, this uncertainty is what we aimed for in the opening scenes as it creates a mystery between character and viewer, and although this isn't often used in social realisms it does occur in thrillers and, we hope, that it will makes the viewers want to continue watching, this is typical in action or psychological thrillers but really breaks the conventions of a social realism as it leaves the viewers uncertain, something most "social directors" ovoid.

Later in the scene we used a large segment of dialogue to give the story plot and to develop the relationship between audience and character. This use of dialogue based story is often found in social realisms as it builds the plot without excess action. Partly this was to develop the story itself, but it was also used to match the codes and conventions of which we didn't want to greatly challenge. As most social realism's use character to audience connections as a means to then later add to the emotions and understanding the viewers feel towards the characters.

This is the first scene in which "Creegan" is shown and unlike "Toby" he has a more professional appearance, although unshaven, he has a shirt tucked in and clean yet appropriate "cottons" with clean trainers. Compared to that of "Toby", "Creegan" is clearly more in control and that is true as "Creegan" is not addicted or taking drugs, he simply prospers off selling them to others.

"Creegan's" appearance was used for more than just showing his power over "Toby" as we wanted viewers to connect with him, only later realising his darker side.

 

Scene 4

The second part of the dialogue which took place between "Toby" and "Creegan" basically built the whole story line into one scene of ; understanding, misunderstanding, aggression and conflict. This is often seen in social realisms during key or defining moments of the film and we wanted to use a similar "sum up scene" so the audience quickly understand the overall emotive plot of the film. This scene would be repeated later in the film after back story so the viewers would better understand the events that lead to the overall outcome. 

During this scene we stuck mainly to close, mid, over the shoulder and two shots to put the viewers within the scene, again this very much fits the conventions of social realisms as the viewers are directly involved with the story line.

During this scene we removed the soundtrack and left in the diegetic noises to add to the life like effect we desired, alongside the sound we used multiple editing techniques such as cross dissolves and motion blur to add to the viewers sense of presences within the scene, we hoped and feel like the techniques allow the audience to better feel Toby's pain although not put in his position with a POV shot.

Scene 5
This is the final scene of the large block of dialogue in our opening, this scene is full of aggression and is used mainly as the "turning point" within the film. The scene is very gritty and I feel technique-wise similar to that you would see in a Shane Meadows film.

I feel this scene conformed to the average conventions of social realisms in the whole as not only is the fight done mainly verbally and rather than a out right fist fight they attempt a stare off, unlike the blockbuster action fights, in my view, social realisms focus and the impact of the fight rather than the fist to face scene that occur all to often in action films.

The editing in the scene was mainly simple cuts with a few cross dissolves at a reasonable fast pace, the editing of this scene didn't play a large part as the physical actions of the characters attracted attention directly them.

Scene 6
This sequence was the beginning of the chase scene in which "Creegan" runs after "Toby" as he tries to escape, the scene leads through two locations, from the urban warehouse to the rural forest which is nearby. This scene uses a range of shots often found in thrillers to build drama and make the viewer worry for a character, this is something we wanted to achieve as due to the hybrid nature of our film (A social realistic thriller) we wanted to conform to the thriller and social sides.

While creating and editing the chase scene we used a much faster speed than previously used in the opening and alongside the match on action and shot reverse shot that we used to show the shrinking distance between the two characters, we used repeated POV shots as we wanted to get the viewers heart pumping and fear for Toby.

Scene 7

During the chase "Toby" escapes from Creegan's rage and runs towards the forested area, in hopes of evading any violence, we felt this scene of "escaping" really fits to the profile we created of "Toby", we feel that although this scene is action filled it conforms to the conventions of both thriller and social realism extremely well.

We used a fast pace sequence of shots during the start of the chase and increased it again during this later part of the chase, we felt this added to the drama of the scene and made the characters fear even more for "Toby".
 

Our main aim during this scene within the opening was to grab the audience into the turmoil that surrounds Toby's life and make the audience want to learn more about the event before and after the collision, when repeated later in the film, it would be to really push the bond formed between Toby and the viewers

 

 

Scene 8

This scene is the "Title" scene and although social realisms often don't use titles or billing to maintain a feeling of realism, we felt that although it challenged the conventions of social realisms and didn't completely conform to that of a thriller it helped to sum the story as a whole and build viewer understanding of the past scenes, we got the idea of this technique when creating the title as we felt the location, style, font and text of the title would add to the overall audience understanding.

 

The title it's self was "Old Habits Die Hard", this title really sums up "Toby" as a whole, in feel personal like "This Is England" the title can greatly help the viewers not only start to watch a film but also understand what it is about in terms of, "This Is England" being about a "Young English Lad" during a politically tough time during England's history, our film, "Old Habits Die Hard", being about "Toby" struggling to deal with his drug addiction.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Scene 9

The final key scene was filmed in the style of a Vlog (Video Blog) it contains a dark confession by Toby and really shows his longing to be understood by others, during the scene we used a off-scene audio, which would later be explained, partly to confuse the audience and partly to represent the social awkwardness that Toby is plagued with. I believe this scene perfectly conformed to the conventions of the average social realism.

 

All the shots are a plain close up shot as Toby delivers his dialogue, we did this as we felt that what he was saying was important and using excess shots would distract the darkness of his dilemma and might avert the attention to less important things.

Our film opening sequence is heavily influenced by the Social realism genre so therefor we would be aiming our film towards people between the ages of 15 and 40, these people would not have to be fans of the genre itself but we hope it will attract both the fans and a wider audience selection due to its effective representation of issues that many face, in a way that others can understand..

Our Finished Film Opening !!!

This is the link to our finished film opening sequence which we uploaded to YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OS4F7-6iYt0

Once again we would like to thank our actors for volunteering their time to help us.