Technological convergence notes and examples

Evaluation

 

How does your media product represnt particular social groups?

My film represents the average teenagers life, it touches on the situations all teens will encounter at some point in their life. It follows an ordinary person placed in an ordinary setting. She is dressed in normal clothes and has a very calm attitude. My character is then thrown into trouble and struggles to over come the situation. Although teenagers may not experience such an extreme case it shows the struggle teens face in everyday life.




What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? 

I would like lions gate to distribute my film. I would like my film to be distributed by a quite big well known institution, lions gate are responsible for distributing some of the most loved and successful horror films, Saw, Horns and The quiet ones. Supernatural horror is one of the most popular horror genres, although lions gate is a huge institution Instead of releasing it straight to cinema I would like to release my film online first and then DVD. I feel like this would be better as a lot of people enjoy watching horror in the comfort of their own home and as lions gate is well known online release would be very successful.

How did you attract/address your audience?

https://youtu.be/jsYKM8JhnRs

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

In a stereotypical paranormal horror you have a group of teenagers being terrorised by the unnatural source but for my horror i have only the one character through out the whole film, not many films like to use just one character as it can be hard to keep your audiences attention, its important to capture your audience in the film especially in horror as some can be hard to follow or might have jump scares, if jump scares are being used you want your audience captivated in order for them to be effective. In horror films the characters tend to show the norm which is why the audience can relate so well, that are normal teenagers being thrown in to difficult unnatural situations, everyone has had experience in situations that may not paranormal but that do pose a great difficulty or even danger to the individual.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The target audience for my two minute opening will be young adults, I feel that they will have more connections and will relate will to the main character in the film who is a young adult herself. The genre of my opening is paranormal horror. Horror is appealing to pretty much all age groups but the questionnaire results show mainly a younger audience, 16+ and for that reason my films rating will be 15. From the research that I have done I have found that most horror films have a age rating of 15. Age ratings on films are decided by the bbfc. They put age ratings on films based on what they believe suitable for the age group. We are able to guess the 'maturity' of the film by just looking at the DVD box.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing the product?

I have learnt that backing up footage is very important, I learnt this from the preliminary task as the films kept on corrupting and I struggled massively to get them to work. I have also learnt that it's important to make sure you have a video converter just in case. I have also learnt that you should not leave editing to the last minute, I left it on my preliminary task resulting in me rushing the editing process meaning that it was not done to the best of my ability. Leaving it to the last minute also meant that if I needed to gob act and re-film any bits I either couldn't or I could not get people to help out as they were busy themselves, due to this point I have also learnt that in future to not always count on the people helping you to be there all the time as they themselves might have other commitments. For future editing for me I would not use movie maker again as it kept crashing and losing my files when trying to edit my preliminary task. It also would save my files in the wrong format meaning I could not upload it to You Tube dispirited converting.Although i am not new to media and I had a slight advantage over new students I do feel that I have got a better understanding of the different shot types. I have also learnt about making my surroundings work with the camera, and how I can use list and dark to show and portray different emotions.When it came to editing and uploading my opening i encountered a few issues. I edited my opening on imovie and i had little to no problems at all but as soon as i attempted to email the final edit to myself i was unable to open it on my laptop due to the format of the opening. This was quickly resolved after converting the file. The next problem happened after placing and saving the opening in Movie Maker. Movie Maker saved my video as an unknown format to You Tube causing me to convert the file time and time again until You Tube finally uploaded it.

Looking back at your task, what have you learnt in the progression from that to the final product?

When filming my opening I did not use a video camera as every time I'd go to use it the camera would freeze up or run out of battery after 5 minutes, so instead of a camera I used my IPhone, surprisingly my iPhone gave a smooth and clear picture and was easy to use. I did not use a tripod when filming so my goal was to keep the phone as steady as possible, i think I managed to keep it still for most of the filming process. I had to film my opening in a school setting meaning I had to rethink my plan but fortunately I made the setting work in my favour, having to film it in school also meant that I had no access at night so I had to film during the school day, that presented me with two difficulties, the first one being background sounds from other students and the fact it was light, as my film is a horror light doesn't always work well but when I edited my film I dulled the lighting with a filter which gave the opening a spooky feeling.
Next time when it comes to editing i will need to make sure i fully research into the best video editors for PC and also invest in some easy to use converters. I will also need to make sure that if I were to do horror again I think about location and times I film.

Media studies As Level opening scene

https://youtu.be/rLya7HL7LIE

I am unable to upload preliminary task at this moment due to lost files. I will upload as soon as they have been retrieved...again. -_-

Story board

I filmed within school and got all filming done in a week. I had no problem with Queenie and Abbie not being able to help as we used free periods to get filming done. I plan to edit in the Easter holiday, this give me two weeks to evaluate my 2 minute opening.

Target Audience and research

The target audience for my film will be mainly teenagers. I have done research and i have found that most modern horror films are viewed mostly by a younger (teenage) audience. Found footage is also popular with teenagers. Films like Paranormal Activity and The Purge are very popular in the way of modern horrors. Most horrors have a rating 0f 15 although viewer's of a younger age will watch and enjoy these films. My film will be for both males and females as i don't want to stick to stereotypes that males are most likely to watch a horror. As my film is set in current time and is set in a natural environment it will  most likely appeal to everyone. The character is a teenager so people watching it are more likely to buy into the character and connect with them.

Pie Charts of results.

 I asked both males and females to take part in my questionnaire. Overall out of everyone i asked females enjoy watching horror more than males. This goes against the stereotype that girls get scared easily and that boys are more likely to enjoy gore and jump scares.

 Found footage and Comedy horrors are more popular compared to Slashers and Psychological Horrors. This suggests that people either like to watch a horror and not have to pay too much attention and also enjoy a laugh or it suggests that people like the 'realistic' aspect and enjoy the feeling of somewhat being in the movie themselves. 

*correction in pie chart, psychological.

When it comes to qualities of horror film people prefer to watch the film based on the plot, setting and will pick their film based on its sub-genre. People care slightly less for directors or characters.

The most favourable characters when it comes to horror films seem to be the victim and the psychopath. This can suggest one of two things, either the people watching the film enjoy seeing a poor and innocent character getting manipulated and controlled by a psychopath who's more than likely a killer or that people are routing for the victim to turn things around and become the hero, which is also quite a stereotypical quality of a horror film.