Finishing Post

We have finally reached the end to our blogs, evaluation questions - done!, planning - done!, research - done! and overall all pieces of the blog have been finished. It has been a relatively long year, and task, however I have thoroughly enjoyed what i've learnt and the people i've worked with. I have learnt a lot that I hope will aid in the future weather it is in future media lessons or even outside of school. I am very thankful to my teachers, Mr Coppard and Mrs Jones, for helping me in the journey I have taken in this media coursework. I have learnt about technologies, such as the use of Camera's, media software and more. I have also learnt of a variation of websites that I can use in my work to add diversity and differentiation to my work. In total I feel I have learnt a large amount in the course of this planning, research and production work and further look forward to working on future projects and our examination skills and preparation in relation to our AS Media exam in May. This closes my blog for this year.

    “In every end, there is also a beginning.” ― Libba Bray

Evaluation Question 7

• Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product.

Evaluation Question 6

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

Click to view Technologies on GLOSSI.COM

Evaluation Question 5

• How did you attract/address your audience

Above is a reaction video to my opening sequence production. He is a neutral person that hasn't seen the opening before and has given his comments on the opening. From the video it is evident that the opening sequence includes a lot of styles and themes that attract the audience (due to their seeing of similar styles in other media products), but also includes parts that can be improved upon.

Furthermore the video shows how the video has attracted my audience. The person is someone that meets the psycographic profile of my audience, and therefore will be attracted to watch the opening sequence and henceforth the film.

We have attracted this type of audience by using stylistic themes and intertextual references from other films that the audience is likely to have watched, such as styles and effects, similar to that of film openings such as "catch me if you can".

We also targeted an audience that we knew would have a relatively large secondary audience, in order to appeal to a greater audience. This was down by including a range of styles and themes, and by omitting factors such as crude violence, in order to attract a wider range of age groups.   

Evaluation Question 4 Part 2

• Who would be the audience for your media product

Evaluation Question 4 Part 1

• Who would be the audience for your media product

Evaluation Question 3

Evaluation: question 3 | Create Infographics

Evaluation Question 2

• How does your media product represent particular social groups

Evaluation Question 1

Evaluation Question 1

Grifter - Final Opening

Editing: Day Six

Today the group met up, off the school timetabled day, to try and get the opening sequence done. It was a long day that I know the group will be unable to forget. I added finishing touches to the sound in order to fully prepare it for the part that we had now added to the film. Othman and Ja'van then got to work with the editing of the footage on final cut pro and tried to work out how best to get the graphic match done. It took a while but we found that it would be best to do the graphic match by using key frames in order to zoom in and zoom to create that professional looking match. Once we had got it looking neat, we added the sound to the opening and checked that everything was now fully flowing good and smart. Once Finished, we uploaded the film to YouTube and added it to the blog, finally bringing to an end the production of our opening sequence.

Evaluation Planning

The first question I plan to do is:

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

There are 4 ways that i believe would be best for answering this question; doing a prezi presentation, pop up video, side by side comparison and 9 key frames.

However i feel that the best one to use would be a 9 key frames for the evaluative question. This is because with the 9 frames i can see where in the opening we have challenged or conformed to conventions of real media products while still being able to do it quickly and easily.

Furthermore, from the question i can gather that it is necessary that i pick from our opening sequence where we have challenged and conformed to conventions of similar media pieces. In order to do this i will look at similar genre movie openings, to that of our film opening and make key comparisons.

Some of my main points will include, analysing where we have stuck to the conventions of real media products and where we have steered our own way. I will also show how we have used conventional themes and styles in our opening, when analysing the question. I will also look to explain how our decisions to conform and also divert from some conventions has helped aid the narrative of our film, intrigue the audience, the links to the institution, where it has led to an understanding of the genre and how the people and aspects of the opening are represented in relation to conventional sways.

After doing some added research on examples of 9 key frames I also found a tumblr page that used 9 key frames to show how a film developed, challenged and conformed to conventions of typical media pieces, relative to that genre.

The next question is:

• How does your media product represent particular social groups

For these question i think it would be best to create, either a pow toons cartoon or pixton. This is because in these i can easily, but creatively show how social groups are represented in my media piece.

It is most likely, however, that i will use pixton to answer the question, where i will talk about: stereotypes, counter-types and refer to common social groups depending on - gender, age, class, culture & ethnicity, e.c.t.

Below is a snippet of an example of a pixton: 

The next question is: 

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

This is a question that i have already similarly done on my blog in a v-log. However i plan to use another creative software to answer the question.

It is most likely that i will use an info-graphic from "infogr.com" in order to answer the question.

My main points will outline how the media institution would be good in terms of finance, marketing and in relation to my audience and why i have chosen the distribution company in the first place. I will also link to the key concepts of how choosing this media distribution company will relate to the genre of my film, its relation to the film's narrative and how it links to the audience.

• Who would be the audience for your media product

For this question i plan to create a voki, explaining who my audience is likely to be, their profile, the secondary audience and more in relation to who the audience for my media product would be.

I will outline the psycographic profile of my audience, their demographics: (age, gender, culture, ect) and also their socioeconomic class, in order to thoroughly explain who my audience is likely to be and what they are likely to look like.

The next question is:

• How did you attract/address your audience

The plan for this question is to do a reaction video, where an audience or person will view my media product and give feedback as to what they thought about the product, where it was good and where improvements could be made, and overall what appealed to them, to attract them to the video.

The video will include the audience being shown as they watch my product and the video in the top corner so that people watching the reaction video can also see my media product.

From this video I will also be able to further explain the sort of audience that my media product will attract.

Below is an example of what my reaction video will look like:

 

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

For this question I will need to outline all the pieces of technology that I have used, that have helped me in producing my final media product and explain what I have learnt about the technology in the process of creating my media product.

In order to do this effectively and yet still make the answering of the question look attractive, I plan to create a magazine, listing each piece of technology I had used, with pictures, and stating what i've learnt in using them and how I have improved in media as a result of them. These technologies will not only include devices, but also websites and program softwares.

Below is my plan for the magazine, answering the question.

The final question is:

• Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product.

For this final question I felt that the best way to answer it would be to do an interview, however I decided that I wanted to add a twist and therefore planned to interview myself in a podcast, stating what I have learnt in the progression from the preliminary task to the full product, the different pieces of technology I have had to have used, where I have improved since the preliminary task and more.

Evaluation Questions

Below are the evaluations questions that we were told we would be answering in order to gain the 20 marks necessary for the evaluation task:

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

• How does your media product represent particular social groups

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

• Who would be the audience for your media product

• How did you attract/address your audience

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

• Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product.

Above is a picture of how me and my group ordered the questions in value of importance, in our opinions.

The question we valued as most important was: looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product. This is because we felt that it was most important in our film opening production, to learn from the mistakes we had made in the preliminary task and also, learn new techniques that we would help us get the best marks in our production.

We saw: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why, as the least important question, simply because we didn't see at as the most important and relevant to our opening sequence production.

However we realise that each question has equal importance and relevance in relation to our production.

Filming Day: Day Four

After believing that we had finished our filming towards the opening sequence, we stumbled upon a dilemma. After watching and analysing our opening our teachers realized that since there were no visible characters and a lack in a strong narrative, the audience would/might struggle to work out what the overall film was heading towards and what it might be about. They suggested that we add a little bit of the beginning of the film to the end of the sequence so that the audience would be introduced to one of the settings and the characters and what they represent in the film. In the end we collaboratively thought of adding a graphic match to the end of the film to match an item or object with the bullet whole. So as a group we headed towards the studio again ready to film something that we had a rough idea about, but were struggling to envisage. However in the end we decided that we would line up items that the main character had taken on the table and use one of the items for the graphic match and get a shot of the character walking in while adjusting the depth of field. It didn't take long to film and we were thoroughly pleased about that.  

Rough Copy: Grifter

Grifter (Rough)

Editing: Day Five

Today was the last day we had before we had to have a rough copy of the opening sequence. I was feeling pretty positive as we had covered a lot in the lesson's we had had and were on course to finish on time. All we had to day was bring together the soundtrack, institution animation and edited footage. It may sound like a lot of work but it is relatively simple. Othman got to get the background colour on and adding the text, I finished of the soundtrack and Ja'van went in search for a suitable soundtrack for the institution animation. 

However as with these things we did encounter some problems. After exporting the video we began to see shadows and patches on filming that needed touch ups that would take more time. On the better side we completed the institution animation and all but finished the soundtrack however, it was likely we were going to have to make it longer to suit the titles we were adding in. So all in all the day promised much and we got much out of it, however we did not manage to finish the whole “rough edit” as planned. 

“Whatever it takes to finish things, finish. You will learn more from a glorious failure than you ever will from something you never finished.”
― Neil Gaiman

Editing: Day Four

Today was more basic. After finishing the text I sent it to Othman so that he could add it to the opening and get an understanding of their placement.

After finishing with the text I started again with the sound and learnt that it would be better to edit the sound with an application called “audacity” due to the depth I could go into when editing it.

Also after talking as a group about the anchor image from last lesson, we collectively felt that the institution animation would look both more slick and professional with the image. So we added it with the descent movement. It didn't take as long as we thought it would and below is what the finished animation looks like.

"If you do not believe you can do it then you have no chance at all."
Arsene Wenger

Editing: Day Three

Day 3 was yet again another step forward as we finally seemed to get to grips with our roles and managed to finish more as a result. Othman had been editing with the footage through final cut express and had inverted the colours, making the characters know black and coloured. This allowed us to have a preview of what the final edited footage would look like, which was important. We also managed to integrate our Saul Bass inspired animated lines into the edit. From this we had assistance and learnt that we could use a slug and crop and shape it into a bar that we could then key-frame to move both down and up.

I took to managing the text for the opening sequence. For this I used photoshop and created a list of credits we were to have in opening. After knowing the exact text we would use, creating it was a simple matter of typing the credits and adding the desired blending options to them, for example drop shadow and colour. The hardest part was selecting the colour we would use for the text. Initially we decided to use black, but then realised that both the characters and slug bars were black and the text would therefore not stand out. I then decide to look at the “iPod advert” that we had learnt was quite similar to our own opening and viewed the text they had chosen. They had used white text on their backgrounds and we felt that this was the best option for our text. We felt that the colour was bold enough to be seen on the background and also smart.



Finally to Ja'van who had the task of creating the institution opening and logo. We collectively decided that we wanted to have the title of institution “Anchor Films” on the animation and a ocean background (in relation to the anchor), we also wanted to add a descending anchor image but were halted as our teacher thought that it would take to long to do and was unnecessary, however the thought still lingered in our minds. We had a decision to make on our hands.  

“You can't make decisions based on fear and the possibility of what might happen.”
― Michelle Obama

Editing: Day Two

Today we managed to get quite a lot done with the editing, but learnt that the soundtrack that we wanted to use was too short to match our opening. This presented another problem and meant that we would have to somehow extend the soundtrack. We also learnt how to create an institution logo animation in after effects. Nothing complicated something simple.

“There Are Two Typos Of People In This World: Those Who Can Edit And Those Who Can’t”
― Jarod Kintz

Editing: Day One

Today we started editing our footage. We also assigned roles for who would be doing what for the majority of the editing. The editing of the footage would be largely done by Othman Abdul Ghani. Graphics and Animation in relation to the institution logo,e.c.t, would be covered by Ja'van Kinghorn and Text and Sound would be covered by me. Although we had given each other roles, we were in no way relying on one person to completely do each task, but instead we would work more collaboratively, looking over each others shoulders and making sure that they could get all the support they needed.

Although i was used to using Photoshop (where we would edit the text) and Final Cut Pro (for editing), i had never personally edited sound and this presented a challenge on its on, Finding a program/software that was easiest and best to do the sound on was hard enough.

“Happiness is not the absence of problems; it's the ability to deal with them.”
― Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free

Filming: Day Three

Today drew the close to the ending of our filming, something i was somewhat surprised about. I expected the filming to take much longer than it did, but i am in no way disappointed that we were so quick to finish. I think it showed both strong cohesion between the group and the skills that we as a group excelled in.

This time as soon as the lesson started, we began filming. We were therefore much quicker when it came to actually filming the footage. At the end of the previous lesson, we marked on the floor where we had positioned the camera, so that today it would be a simple case of placing the camera at the markings, rather than struggling to place the camera. This allowed us to keep the flow and continuity of the filming. The finer details of clothes, fortunately enough, were not an issue as when editing the footage we were going to colour out the people.

We again made slight adjustments to the script, but only slight ones. Such as changing the direction in which the characters came in.



So today marked the end of our filming and in general i am very happy with the footage we caught and how we worked as a team.

“Ends are not bad things, they just mean that something else is about to begin.”
― C. JoyBell C.

Itunes Advert:Eureka

You would think that after all the research and editing that we have done that we would realize that the large majority of iTunes adverts are almost exactly alike to what we are trying to create, in terms of the super-bad opening effect which involves colours and the use of a green screen. If not for our teacher almost jokingly relating our opening to that of the iTunes adverts we would have never known the great similarities between them and our opening sequence idea.

This was a large boost and really helped us as it meant we had even more videos to look at and could learn, make comparisons and take ideas from the adverts.

“Eureka .. Eureka!”
― Hergé

Filming: Day Two

The second day was more productive in terms of filming. Having booked the room the previous day we were given the time and space to get a large majority of our filming done. Although we were delayed in our filming as a result of another group pleading to use the room, we still managed to get a large chunk of our filming done. We firstly unveiled the green screen (right) and began setting up the area in order to prepare for our filming.

As we prepared to film we realized that the green screen was slightly smaller than anticipated. This meant we going to have to modify our opening to suit the scene. We firstly decided that we weren't going to be able to film the full long shot that we had planned and decided to use a mid long shot instead. We then also realized that weren't going to be able to pan up into an open area when showing some titles, so we instead zoomed into an open area.

After this realization we all gathered the props and costumes we had brought so that we could get “suited and booted” ready for shooting.



We then prepared the camera by zooming in to the appropriate shot and setting up the white balance. As soon as this camera preparation was down we were ready to start shooting. In the lesson we managed to shoot about half the footage we needed, resulting a very productive session.  





“It is always the start that requires the greatest effort.” 
― James Cash Penney

Filming: Day One

As we planned to film on the first day we stumbled upon our first problem, one we as a group have learnt from. As we went towards the room in which we were going to film we found that another group had already booked it. Unfortunately this meant we would be unable to get any filming done that day and would have to settle for filming the next day. This was because in order to film we would need the green screen and didn’t want to use the portable one as it was too small and we wanted to keep continuity in our filming.  So after learning from our mistakes, we booked both the room and the cameras for the following days, in order to ensure that we would have all the time and equipment to film in future and avoid a scenario like this one again.

So instead of filming we took the opportunity to look for a royalty free soundtrack that we could use to complement our opening sequence. As we had not filmed anything nor finished filming, we could only grasp a rough idea of what we wanted the soundtrack to be like and where editing the sound needed to be made. As a group we felt that the best style of music for the opening would be fast paced jazz. This was based on the research we had done on other crime fiction film openings and the music’s relation to our opening. We used the website ‘incompetch.com’ because we felt it had the best range of music and was an easy website to both search and download music from.  After looking for a while we came upon three possible choices for our soundtrack. After finding our three choices we reached the end of the lesson and although the day had not gone as planned we had found that we made a lot of progress in the making of our film opening.  

Storyboard