AS Media Studies
Welcome to my blog! I'll be detailing my trials and tribulations of AS
Friday, 15 January 2016
Question 7
In our prelim, the audio quality was not very good. This made the entire prelim look like an amateur piece which ruined some of the better quality shots. We overcame this by using more foley rather than relying on the camera's audio quality. This proved quite difficult as we had to ensure that it was perfectly timed to prevent it looking unprofessional. Linking with the audio issue, my group decided that it would be a better idea if we tried to film as much as possible indoors to ensure minimal audio problems.
We gained an understand of steady camera shots. We realised, from doing the prelim, how important it was to use a tripod or a moving device when filming, so that the shots were not static or jolted. From having this advice and information, we were able to improve our camera shots, ensuring that they were of a high standard, still and fitted well with each shot. Realism was a big part for us as a group, as we wanted to make our film opening serious and look professional, rather than comical and fake. Therefore, we learnt from our prelim, that in order to make the shots more realistic, you shouldn't incorporate slide transitions, because it isn't realistic, but more power point, which was not our aim.
Monday, 11 January 2016
Question 5
Question 5
This video includes annotations for our doubled film opening. We did this in order to explain the choices we made. For example, music choices, location choices and character choices. Within this video, we also explain how our film will attract and address the audience and why we did this. This links back to our target audience. When making our film opening, it was very important as a group to make rational decisions, to base it and fit it around not only our themes, but our target audience. This ranges from institution choices, to music choices, to title choices and to actor choices. We wanted to attract our audience by not only creating enigma and making it exciting and thrilling to watch, but to also make it relatable to our target audience, representing todays society and the twenty first century. Furthermore, in order to attract our audience, we went with the high and well known, Universal Studio's because we felt like our film would become a big blockbuster and felt that they could help with the appropriate advertising.
Also, another way of addressing the audience would be the violent props/icons that we used within our film. This clearly represents the violent and aggressive content within our film and also representing real life situations in our society today, making the audience not only feel frightened but apart of our film, which was one of our intentions. We not only wanted our audience to feel engaged with our costumes and actors, but our story line and theme also, as we show that it could happen to anyone.
This video includes annotations for our doubled film opening. We did this in order to explain the choices we made. For example, music choices, location choices and character choices. Within this video, we also explain how our film will attract and address the audience and why we did this. This links back to our target audience. When making our film opening, it was very important as a group to make rational decisions, to base it and fit it around not only our themes, but our target audience. This ranges from institution choices, to music choices, to title choices and to actor choices. We wanted to attract our audience by not only creating enigma and making it exciting and thrilling to watch, but to also make it relatable to our target audience, representing todays society and the twenty first century. Furthermore, in order to attract our audience, we went with the high and well known, Universal Studio's because we felt like our film would become a big blockbuster and felt that they could help with the appropriate advertising.
Also, another way of addressing the audience would be the violent props/icons that we used within our film. This clearly represents the violent and aggressive content within our film and also representing real life situations in our society today, making the audience not only feel frightened but apart of our film, which was one of our intentions. We not only wanted our audience to feel engaged with our costumes and actors, but our story line and theme also, as we show that it could happen to anyone.
Sunday, 10 January 2016
Question 4
Also, when researching who would our target audience be, we created a survey, asking over 100 men and over 100 women what they're preferred genre was. This allowed us to visually see and understand who is most likely to come and see our film, based on personal preferences. Here are the results:
As you can see, from the results, we concluded that men ages 16-28, would be our target audience. This was because the men clearly demonstrated their personal preferences and the types of films that they like to watch. However, although not as many women said that they preferred an action film, we also were able to gain the information, that some women do prefer this type of genre, style and theme. Therefore, we did not want to limit our target audience by only basing our film around men aged 16-28, which is why we felt it was important to bare in mind that there will be a lot of women and a lot of people of variety ages that will want to come and see our film. It just allowed us to gain a rough understanding.
Here are some typical profile screenshots of who we think will be the main viewers of our film. We think the average age will be teenagers and males and females between the age of 16- 28. We think this because those of that age are more likely to have the spare time and be exposed to gaming, films and social life that contain action and violence.
Saturday, 9 January 2016
Question 3
Question 3
What institution's would distribute our media project and why
Media institutions are companies that own a large amount of companies in various mass media such as television, radio, movies and internet. The top 6 media institutions are Comcast, Disney, News cooperation, Time Warner, Viacom, CBS Cooperation.





Our film is most definitely a block buster, this means that one of the big 6 movie institutions will be producing and distributing our film. Block busters are made to make lots of money. Blocker busters will be advertised everywhere and will pay a lot of money to be distributed into well known cinemas and to get advertisement on TV during big events such as the super bowl or the champions league final. Ideology is a world view, attitudes and beliefs which an individual, group or society holds to be true or important. These vary between cultures, but it is seen as the way in which the culture should function.
After deciding what genre our media project would be (action/Thriller) we looked to see which film institutions distributed the most Action/Thriller films. After looking for a while we found that Universals Studios has produced and distributed a lot of Action/Thriller movies. Universals product portfolio is full of Action/Thriller movies and is definitely their most common genre. I would say that majority of Universals films are aimed at teens e.g. Jurassic World, Fast and Furious, Kick Ass and Ride along. Universal Studios slogan is also "Jump into action", personally I think the slogan shows that universal wants fast paced films by saying jump into because jumping into something is usually a fast motion. Universal also use the word "action" in the slogan, the definition of "action" is the process of doing something, typically to achieve an aim. This shows me that Universal studies want to achieve their aims and objects as quick as possible and at a very good standard, this shows me that universal studios are motivated to work hard which would be good for us. Because Universal studios is well know to distribute films of our gene we thought that it would be a smart decision to use them to distribute our film. We also used Diamond production, they aren't mainstream but they believed in our film so we believed in them.

We did research into some other companies as well and found out that Paramount mainly does drama and Comedy, DreamWorks mostly does kids films and animations and Warner Bros does mostly comedy and drama. So are decision was that Universal studios would most suit our film because it was the most common movie genre that Universal distribute.
Below is the director of Doubled talking about institutions used in the film and why we used them.
Media institutions are companies that own a large amount of companies in various mass media such as television, radio, movies and internet. The top 6 media institutions are Comcast, Disney, News cooperation, Time Warner, Viacom, CBS Cooperation.





Our film is most definitely a block buster, this means that one of the big 6 movie institutions will be producing and distributing our film. Block busters are made to make lots of money. Blocker busters will be advertised everywhere and will pay a lot of money to be distributed into well known cinemas and to get advertisement on TV during big events such as the super bowl or the champions league final. Ideology is a world view, attitudes and beliefs which an individual, group or society holds to be true or important. These vary between cultures, but it is seen as the way in which the culture should function. After deciding what genre our media project would be (action/Thriller) we looked to see which film institutions distributed the most Action/Thriller films. After looking for a while we found that Universals Studios has produced and distributed a lot of Action/Thriller movies. Universals product portfolio is full of Action/Thriller movies and is definitely their most common genre. I would say that majority of Universals films are aimed at teens e.g. Jurassic World, Fast and Furious, Kick Ass and Ride along. Universal Studios slogan is also "Jump into action", personally I think the slogan shows that universal wants fast paced films by saying jump into because jumping into something is usually a fast motion. Universal also use the word "action" in the slogan, the definition of "action" is the process of doing something, typically to achieve an aim. This shows me that Universal studies want to achieve their aims and objects as quick as possible and at a very good standard, this shows me that universal studios are motivated to work hard which would be good for us. Because Universal studios is well know to distribute films of our gene we thought that it would be a smart decision to use them to distribute our film. We also used Diamond production, they aren't mainstream but they believed in our film so we believed in them.
We did research into some other companies as well and found out that Paramount mainly does drama and Comedy, DreamWorks mostly does kids films and animations and Warner Bros does mostly comedy and drama. So are decision was that Universal studios would most suit our film because it was the most common movie genre that Universal distribute.
Below is the director of Doubled talking about institutions used in the film and why we used them.
Friday, 8 January 2016
Question 2
Question 2- How does your media represent particular social groups?
Within this post, I begin to talk about the target audience. This is so that I gain a good understanding of who our target audience is, to understand the social groups we wish to aim it at. I then begin to talk and answer a variety of questions in order to establish the answer to this question.
Point 1) The social groups that we believe our media is targeted at.
Point 2) What were the survey results and how did this help you
Point 3) The results and how this helped us to understand the social groups, and then goes onto age, gender and race.
Point 4) The ages of our media and how this will benefit or affect the social groups
Point 5) Stereotypes and camera angles within our media
Point 6) The costumes that we chose, and why we chose them. How this benefits the social groups.
Point 7) The make up and hair within our media.
Within this video, I begin to say a little bit about the audience. This is so that, when learning about the representation, that it was not only clear what our target audience was, but also our aims in representation. For example, in the clip I begin to say about the ethnicities within our film. We not only wanted to include a variety of ethnicities to highlight equality, but to appear to a wider audience, creating the correct and appropriate message whilst doing so. I also speak about ages. The reason why our media representation is about ages, is because we feel like it is not only important to appeal to our target audience but to also encourage the idea of younger people being powerful. We felt as a group that many films, only have middle aged men and women playing the main and dominant characters. However, in order for our media to stand out, we thought we would make our main, dominant characters younger in order to not only be different, but so that our audience feels like they can relate to it. Futhermore, on the stereotyping subject, we also found that the typical vulnerable character is a white, young female. I also talk in the video about how we wanted to contrast this idea, by making our powerful main character a white female also, this is so that it stays away from this stereotypical film structure, but also giving the audience what they want by seeing something different but also familiar. I also go on to speak about the different costumes that we chose and why. We felt that this was important because the characters committing the heist, played a big part in our film opening. In order to ensure that all genders were seen as equal, we not only dressed them in the same colour, but the same outfits and props too. We didn't want any gender to feel weaker or stronger than the other, because as a group, this was not the message we wanted to create.
Thursday, 7 January 2016
Question 1
Genre Research
Our genre being action, gave us a wide variety of films to turn to for inspiration. We chose this genre because it was the majority vote in our group, we also had previously come up with a storyline for an opening that would fit with the action genre which was convenient. Action generally consists a person or group facing a number of different challenges. This means there are more likely to be chase scenes, fights, and life threatening situations, all of which have been included in our film opening. In multiple famous action films there is a villain for example Die Hard is an action film about a detective who encounters a terrorist and must take on a group during a heist. A typical stereotype of action films is that many special FX are used which highlights the impressive modern use of technology making it look new, different and appealing to a wider range of audience. Action films typically have the most enigma, leaving you feeling on edge throughout and leaving you wanting to see more.
Codes & Conventions
Commonly set in big cities, action films revolve around modernised areas rather than quieter places to give a busy atmosphere building up enigma and tension.
Sequence Development
- We initially had the idea of doing an army themed opening, basing it on a boy named Sam who grows up to be a soldier, which has been his dream since he was a child. We were going to show his growing up through a timeline style starting at age 3 of real footage of a child saying he wanted to be 'Soldier Sam'. All our group members liked this idea and we had thoroughly planned the shots we were going to take, the risks and how to overcome them however we concluded that the shots would've been too hard to shoot in the time frame we had. We appropriately went back to 'step 1' of our individual film pitches, having agreed we were going to stick with the genre of action, and discussed ideas and thoughts towards a new opening. This is when we discovered the Heist idea would turn out to look effective if we managed to pull it off seeing that the preparation time we had was shortened due to the change of storyline. We put in many extra hours so we had made up for missed time to ensure completion by the deadline. To begin with, with our initial plan of the Army storyline we were going to mainly focus on getting close up shots to show that the film was based purely on an individual. For shots that Sam was not going to be featured in, we would make it a long shot to show lack of importance to small detail.
Narrative
We decided we wanted some enigma rather than a lot in our opening to diminish confusion. The audience will be questioning why the characters are in the house, also they will wonder why at the end one of the characters say they are looking for their sister. Often in action films there is a lot of enigma throughout as the film is usually a constant cycle of enigma and solving enigma similarly in Luther and Sherlock. Audiences tend to sit on the edge of their seats when watching a film with a lot of action, spectacle and enthusiasm as it connects directly with their feelings. Film openings make it hard to show layer of meaning (Semantic code in Barthes' theory) however at the end where the scripted scene occurs and the character says 'What do you mean you haven't found my sister?' this could have a number of different interpretations therefore showing a layer of meaning. We have included the symbolic code by using props such as balaclavas to show the nature of our characters. Balaclavas symbolise danger due to the lack of facial features exposed creating a sense of unease to the audience and sympathy for the young girl in the house alone.9 shot grid
Wednesday, 6 January 2016
Codes & Conventions
Evidence of how planned opening fits with research into codes/conventions of genre and audience
In terms of audience we looked at the batman film the dark knight. We thought this would be helpful because of the age group they are looking at. They will be looking at mainly boys who are of 15 years old and above. Which also is the same target audience as us. This film is extremely fast paced which we think is why mainly teens in particular boys will like our movie opening because of the fast pace and action that it has. The whole idea of criminality adds an excitement to both the batman film and our movie opening which we think will attract the target audience.
The genre of our movie opening is like a crime/thriller movie so this involves research into other films that are similar and what makes those films the genre that they are.
The movie above known as the town was a big inspiration for us as it has scenes that replicate the effect that we want to create for our audience when watching a crime/thriller movie. In our opening we chose to use a big van at the start to show the criminal characters inside of the van. Although the van we used was fairly different it still creates the same effect. In terms of the actual characters in the town they are all wearing the same costume when engaging in their criminal activity. Although our characters were not wearing all of the same costumes we made sure that everyone was wearing black and most importantly were covering their faces with a mask of some kind. In terms of the genre crime/thriller i think that the hiding of the face is a very significant and key factor when fitting in with the codes and conventions of the genre. The whole idea of a criminal is to not get caught so it makes sense that both sets of characters in the town and our movie opening would conceal their identity as much as they possibly can.
In the town also the scene in the van is quite slow paced as their is a shot of one of the criminals looking out of the window in slow motion, but then all of a sudden it becomes much more fast paced as they jump straight out of the van and begin their criminal activity. We have kind of gone for the same feel, although we do not have any slow motion shots, when our criminals jump out the van the opening will gain a lot of pace as they then descend into the garden through the backdoor into the house. The use of weapons is also apparent in the genre, in particular guns. As seen in the image above the criminals have guns so we have also equipped our criminals with their own weapons.
Tuesday, 5 January 2016
Fonts for Titles and film name research
Titles for our movie opening
The titles in our movie opening are one of the most important factors in getting the highest mark possible. If the titles are wrong this can be costly as we could lose a lot of marks. Below are the following titles that we will use throughout our movie opening.
SM studio's presents
A Never Forgotten Production
Melissa Hariz
Spencer Stevenson
Max Duffy
Megan Thomas
Casting by Amanda Lee
Costume design by Lisa Moore
Music By Nathan Hall
Edited by Niall Waters
Production design by Willow Childs
Director of Photogrophy by Lucy Sapwood
Co- Producer Rachel Headly
Produced by Frankie Croft
Written and Directed by Archie Smith
A Never Forgotten Production
Melissa Hariz
Spencer Stevenson
Max Duffy
Megan Thomas
Casting by Amanda Lee
Costume design by Lisa Moore
Music By Nathan Hall
Edited by Niall Waters
Production design by Willow Childs
Director of Photogrophy by Lucy Sapwood
Co- Producer Rachel Headly
Produced by Frankie Croft
Written and Directed by Archie Smith
Audience
Audience
We are going to advertise our film in many different ways. The first way in which we are going to advertise our film is by producing a movie 'trailer'. The trailer needs to be of high quality because the trailer is what attracts most of the customers. The trailer will be available on youtube. This is a great way to reach our target audience because Youtube is widely accessed. The second method of advertisement are with posters. This is a more simplistic way of advertising the film and is more old fashioned, but it is still very effective. The posters will feature on the sides of busses, posters on train stations and on billboards at the side of the road.
The promotion that we are going to use are: Advertisement, Sponsorship, direct marketing and public relations
Sponsorships
In terms of sponsorship we have Paramount pictures at the front as they are going to be one of the main producers for our movie. The other sponsor will be SM cooperations which is our own producer that we will use at the start of the opening. We will also use product placement in our movie so we will basically be advertising other products to make more money.
Direct marketing ploy
In terms of a direct market ploy to help promote our film we will be going out and handing out our own 'little' posters to advertise the film and will also be doing questionnaires. In the questionnaires we will basically be asking people if they heard about the film and if not definitely telling them that they should go see it! Along with this we will also be doing some kind of sales promotion which is on the next slide.
Sales promotion
As we are conducting our direct market ploy we will also be offering a sales promotion. This will be that if they can get all of the questions right in a quiz then they will get movie vouchers for a discount on the movie or perhaps that they will get a free popcorn or drink when they buy tickets for the movie. This will be videoed and shown on things such as Youtube as an advert so it will help get the film a lot of exposure which will ensure that a lot more people will be willing and wanting to go and watch the movie but also that a lot more people see it in particular our target audience.
Monday, 4 January 2016
Shot list & Shooting Schedule
Shot List
- Shot of Melissa, Megan, Max and Spencer inside the van
- Individual tracking shot of each individual character moving
- Shot of them all leaving the van
- Shot of max jumping over the fence, shot of the others entering through the side gate
- Shot of Melissa and Spencer breaking through the door and unlocking the lock
- Shot of Megan on the phone whilst Melissa and spencer are entering
- shot of Megan running to the stairs, then hiding in the cupboard
- shot of Megan (other character) rummaging around the house, with gun
- Shot of Melissa and Spencer entering through the kitchen
- Shot of Max rummaging through the house
- Shot of Melissa, Max and Megan going up the stairs and checking the hallway
- Shot of Melissa entering Megans room
- Shot of Max walking around the room
- Shot of Megan walking out the wardrobe and out of the window
- Shot of Megan, Max and Melissa hearing something, running and checking the wardrobe
- Shot of Megan taking off her mask, revealing herself
Shooting Schedule
As a group, we have sat down and planned the best and most practical filming days. However, we not only had to take into account everyone's personal schedule's but also the weather forecasts.
24th November 2015- On this day we plan to film the Van scene. For this we will need Megan Thomas, Melissa Harris, Spencer Stevenson, Max Duffy and Mr Stevenson. For the props we will need to have a gun, black masks, black clothing, black shoes, Van, Camera equipment and Max Duffy's house. Within this scene we plan to film the van scene, lasting around 10 seconds, then the exiting of the van. We will film this between 10 am - 11 am. We chose to do this scene first because it allows us to get an idea of camera angles and so that we can work in chronological order to the rest of the film opening.
24th November 2015- Later in the day we plan to film them entering the house. For this we will need a rucksack, bag of tools, gun and previous equipment. During this shooting, we plan to get a range of camera angles, including high angle, close up, birds eye view and a tracking shot. We will also need all the previous people needed for the scene. The reason why we chose to film this scene later on in the day, was so that we could go back, download the previous footage and see where we could have gone better and whether or not we needed to reshoot scenes.
25th November 2015 - On this day we plan to film Megan's character Ellie, on the phone talking to her dad, then hiding in the wardrobe, then jumping out the window. The reason why we wanted to film this scene next was also to gain an understanding of chronological order, and because we still needed to film outside and we didn't want to rely on the weather any other day. This was successful because it allowed us to gain an understanding of all the shots we had already.
26th November 2015- This is our last day of filming and we plan to film the rest of the characters rummaging throughout the house. We wanted to do singular shots of the characters to add variation to the shots, and to gain an understanding of individual characters. This was also so that we could show a variety of shots in an effective way. This filming was all done inside Max's house, and we used the tripod and camera to gain good shots.
We found that using this shooting schedule, it was really useful because it allowed us to fully understand and organise when and where we plan to film and shoot the different shots we need. Without the shooting schedule we found that it would have been very difficult to understand and organise when we plan to shoot. This was also vital because we needed to choose appropriate dates that were suitable for everyone in the group.
The shot list did change because we needed to do more and extra filming, however we just continuously adapted the shooting schedule to make it easier to organise for everyone.
24th November 2015- On this day we plan to film the Van scene. For this we will need Megan Thomas, Melissa Harris, Spencer Stevenson, Max Duffy and Mr Stevenson. For the props we will need to have a gun, black masks, black clothing, black shoes, Van, Camera equipment and Max Duffy's house. Within this scene we plan to film the van scene, lasting around 10 seconds, then the exiting of the van. We will film this between 10 am - 11 am. We chose to do this scene first because it allows us to get an idea of camera angles and so that we can work in chronological order to the rest of the film opening.
24th November 2015- Later in the day we plan to film them entering the house. For this we will need a rucksack, bag of tools, gun and previous equipment. During this shooting, we plan to get a range of camera angles, including high angle, close up, birds eye view and a tracking shot. We will also need all the previous people needed for the scene. The reason why we chose to film this scene later on in the day, was so that we could go back, download the previous footage and see where we could have gone better and whether or not we needed to reshoot scenes.
25th November 2015 - On this day we plan to film Megan's character Ellie, on the phone talking to her dad, then hiding in the wardrobe, then jumping out the window. The reason why we wanted to film this scene next was also to gain an understanding of chronological order, and because we still needed to film outside and we didn't want to rely on the weather any other day. This was successful because it allowed us to gain an understanding of all the shots we had already.
26th November 2015- This is our last day of filming and we plan to film the rest of the characters rummaging throughout the house. We wanted to do singular shots of the characters to add variation to the shots, and to gain an understanding of individual characters. This was also so that we could show a variety of shots in an effective way. This filming was all done inside Max's house, and we used the tripod and camera to gain good shots.
We found that using this shooting schedule, it was really useful because it allowed us to fully understand and organise when and where we plan to film and shoot the different shots we need. Without the shooting schedule we found that it would have been very difficult to understand and organise when we plan to shoot. This was also vital because we needed to choose appropriate dates that were suitable for everyone in the group.
The shot list did change because we needed to do more and extra filming, however we just continuously adapted the shooting schedule to make it easier to organise for everyone.
Film Language
Film Language
Camera
Sound
Sound doesn't always have to match the image that we are seeing in a movie. A lot of the time the
sound will work perectly with wat we are watching but sometimes it is completely diferent
Frame- There are six different types of frame work,
- Extreme Close Up
- Close Up
- Medium, Shot
- Long Shot
- Extreme Long Shot
Angle- There are four different types of angles,
- Worms Eye View (From the ground)
- Birds Eye View (From the sky)
- Level (Level with whatever is going on in the movie)
- POV (Point of View)
Movement- There are seven types of camera movement,
- Pan Right to Left
- Tilt Up and Down
- Tracking Shot
- Steadicam
- Hand Held
- Zoom In
- Zoom Out
Editing
- Transition e.g. Cut in, Cut out, Fade in, Fade out
- Matches e.g. Eye line match
- Duration
Sound doesn't always have to match the image that we are seeing in a movie. A lot of the time the
sound will work perectly with wat we are watching but sometimes it is completely diferent
Script
Script:
*They sit in the van, loading weapons*
*They exit the van, max goes a separate way and jumps the fence, the rest go through the gate and begin to unlock the door*
*Once entered through the door- Megan goes and checks a room, Spencer and Melissa goes off and Max checks upstairs*
(Megan on the phone) - No, I definitely heard something. Dad....they're coming into the house
*Runs to the stairs- hides in wardrobe-
*Others check upstairs*
Megan goes out the window
*The others hear something- run inside the room*
Megan ( Jade) - I can't believe she's not here. I can't believe my sisters not here'
*They sit in the van, loading weapons*
*They exit the van, max goes a separate way and jumps the fence, the rest go through the gate and begin to unlock the door*
*Once entered through the door- Megan goes and checks a room, Spencer and Melissa goes off and Max checks upstairs*
(Megan on the phone) - No, I definitely heard something. Dad....they're coming into the house
*Runs to the stairs- hides in wardrobe-
*Others check upstairs*
Megan goes out the window
*The others hear something- run inside the room*
Megan ( Jade) - I can't believe she's not here. I can't believe my sisters not here'
Title research
Title research
OUR FOLLOWING TITLES WILL SAY:
SM studio's presents
A Never Forgotten Production
Melissa Haris
Spencer Stevenson
Max Duffy
Megan Thomas
Casting by Amanda Lee
Costume design by Lisa Moore
Music By Nathan Hall
Edited by Niall Waters
Production design by Willow Childs
Director of Photogrophy by Lucy Sapwood
Co- Producer Rachel Headly
Produced by Frankie Croft
Written and Directed by Archie Smith
Film title sequence:
Many movies have employed unusual and fairly elaborate title sequences since the 1930s.on, music,
still images, and/or graphics. In several movies, the opening credits have appeared against a
background of (sometimes moving) clouds. For example, The Wizard Of Oz. Since the late 1950s,
movie title sequences have been a showcase for contemporary design and illustration. In a motion
picture, television programme or video game the opening credits are shown at the very beginning
and list the most important members of the production. They are now usually shown as text
superimposed on a blank screen or static pictures, or sometimes on top of action in the show. There
may or may not be accompanying music.
We researched the film 'Spiderman' and focused on the titles that they used. The reason why we did this was because they include a similar genre of violent action, so we wanted to be correct with the titles that we chose. For example, these are titles from Spiderman's opening sequence.
OUR FOLLOWING TITLES WILL SAY:
SM studio's presents
A Never Forgotten Production
Melissa Haris
Spencer Stevenson
Max Duffy
Megan Thomas
Casting by Amanda Lee
Costume design by Lisa Moore
Music By Nathan Hall
Edited by Niall Waters
Production design by Willow Childs
Director of Photogrophy by Lucy Sapwood
Co- Producer Rachel Headly
Produced by Frankie Croft
Written and Directed by Archie Smith
Film title sequence:
Many movies have employed unusual and fairly elaborate title sequences since the 1930s.on, music,
still images, and/or graphics. In several movies, the opening credits have appeared against a
background of (sometimes moving) clouds. For example, The Wizard Of Oz. Since the late 1950s,
movie title sequences have been a showcase for contemporary design and illustration. In a motion
picture, television programme or video game the opening credits are shown at the very beginning
and list the most important members of the production. They are now usually shown as text
superimposed on a blank screen or static pictures, or sometimes on top of action in the show. There
may or may not be accompanying music.
We researched the film 'Spiderman' and focused on the titles that they used. The reason why we did this was because they include a similar genre of violent action, so we wanted to be correct with the titles that we chose. For example, these are titles from Spiderman's opening sequence.
Film Poster
Film Poster
and sinister. We then wanted to add scratch effects in order to make the poster stand out and create
the effect of beaten violence. We also put the suitable viewing age, in order to highlight how old you
have to be to be able to watch it. The title font also represents the scratches and violence within the
image, and makes it bold and stand out.
Target Audience, promotion, advertisement, marketing ploy, sales promotion
Target audience
The target audience for our movie is 15 and over. We have chosen this as our target audience as we feel that the film will appeal to all ages above 15 due to the graphic and action packed content. The reason why we chose the film to not be available to under 15's is because the content will include gore and action, which we don't think is visibly appropriate for that age group. It could also cause our viewers stress and anxiety.Primary: People who enjoy heist films
Secondary: People who enjoy action films
Action films are stereotypically associated to male audience, as it has been thought that males are drawn to 'violent' films. For example, Die Hard had figures of a mainly male based fan and audience, due the violent and action content within their film.
Audience
We are going to advertise our film in many different ways. The first way in which we are going to advertise our film is by producing a movie 'trailer'. The trailer needs to be of high quality because the trailer is what attracts most of the customers. The trailer will be available on youtube. This is a great way to reach our target audience because Youtube is widely accessed. The second method of advertisement are with posters. This is a more simplistic way of advertising the film and is more old fashioned, but it is still very effective. The posters will feature on the sides of busses, posters on train stations and on billboards at the side of the road.
The promotion that we are going to use are: Advertisement, Sponsorship, direct marketing and public relations
Sponsorships
In terms of sponsorship we have Paramount pictures at the front as they are going to be one of the main producers for our movie. The other sponsor will be SM cooperations which is our own producer that we will use at the start of the opening. We will also use product placement in our movie so we will basically be advertising other products to make more money.
Direct marketing ploy
In terms of a direct market ploy to help promote our film we will be going out and handing out our own 'little' posters to advertise the film and will also be doing questionnaires. In the questionnaires we will basically be asking people if they heard about the film and if not definitely telling them that they should go see it! Along with this we will also be doing some kind of sales promotion which is on the next slide.
Sales promotion
As we are conducting our direct market ploy we will also be offering a sales promotion. This will be that if they can get all of the questions right in a quiz then they will get movie vouchers for a discount on the movie or perhaps that they will get a free popcorn or drink when they buy tickets for the movie. This will be videoed and shown on things such as Youtube as an advert so it will help get the film a lot of exposure which will ensure that a lot more people will be willing and wanting to go and watch the movie but also that a lot more people see it in particular our target audience.
Risk Assessments
This is our risk assessments that we did as a group in order to identify the hazards that could take place within filming. We wanted to identify how these hazards could be overcome and solved. For example, in the first one we discussed how the camera equipment can be ruined and how we can prevent this from happening. We will then rate how dangerous the hazard is on a scale of 1-10.


Teacher Feedback
Teacher Feedback
our teachers had watched our first draft of the opening and they gave us their constructive criticism.
Wednesday, 16 December 2015
Institution
What is Institution?
A media institution is someone that owns a large number of companies in various mas media such as television, radio, newspaper, movies and internet. There are the big 6 media institutions that own 95% of the total media. The big six consists of GE, News Corp, Disney, Viacom, Time Warner and CBS.
These big six media institutions have been slowly buying other companies to own a bigger share of the overall media. In 1988 the media was owned by 50 companies and today it is all owned by six.
Monday, 14 December 2015
Mood Board
Mood Board
The mood board shows everything that will affect our opening as we will take inspiration from a lot of things that i will show below. We use the mood board to get a better idea of what our movie will look like and what we want it to look like. Our opening is based around some kind of criminal activity. The idea of it a heist/kidnapping idea so we want the start to be quite dark but also pretty fast paced. There are six characters, 5 criminals and one girl. The criminals will be wearing masks and will start off in a van.
This shot will show all the characters in the same shot from different angles showing clearly what is going on.
A view from the criminal to make the audience feel like the character.
Inspirational shots from real films
A view from the criminal to make the audience feel like the character.
A close up effective shot focussed on the gun showing that it is a major importance.
Titles
Titles
The titles in our movie opening are one of the most important factors in getting the highest mark possible. If the titles are wrong this can be costly as we could lose a lot of marks. Below are the following titles that we will use throughout our movie opening.
SM studio's presents
A Never Forgotten Production
Melissa Hariz
Spencer Stevenson
Max Duffy
Megan Thomas
Casting by Amanda Lee
Costume design by Lisa Moore
Music By Nathan Hall
Edited by Niall Waters
Production design by Willow Childs
Director of Photogrophy by Lucy Sapwood
Co- Producer Rachel Headly
Produced by Frankie Croft
Written and Directed by Archie Smith
A Never Forgotten Production
Melissa Hariz
Spencer Stevenson
Max Duffy
Megan Thomas
Casting by Amanda Lee
Costume design by Lisa Moore
Music By Nathan Hall
Edited by Niall Waters
Production design by Willow Childs
Director of Photogrophy by Lucy Sapwood
Co- Producer Rachel Headly
Produced by Frankie Croft
Written and Directed by Archie Smith
Characters
Characters
The first character will be played by Max who plays James - James is a henchmen for Jade who is in control of the group of criminals. He is independent as shown throughout the movie opening as he goes off by himself a lot. Whereas all the characters wear black, James wears a blue jumper to show his independence.
Next is Megan who plays Ellie and Jade - Ellie is a normal girl who is just at home. She is a typical teenage girl who is the innocent party in what is going on. She wears normal clothes. Jade is Ellie's twin sister who is involved in some sort of criminal activity. She wears all black but directs the others to show her authority.
Then we have Melissa who plays Rose - Rose is a loyal follower to Jade and specialises in working with tools and breaking into areas that they need to go to. This is shown when she breaks into the house in our opening. She is very tough and can definitely handle her own but likes being in a group. She wears all black with the rest of her crew to show she is a criminal.
Lastly we have Spencer who plays Tom - Tom is the guy who has anything that you need. If another member needs some kind of tool or weapon, Tom is the guy to get that for you. This is shown when he hands Rose the tool case so they can enter the house they looking inside. He will wear all black as well to fit in with the group.
Monday, 23 November 2015
Ideas For Our Movie Opening
Never Back Down 2
This scene is a little irrelevant because the whole scene is concentrating on UFC, but I still think the shots used are a good example of what we could use for our film. The shots are short, sharp and constantly changing. Also the music goes well with this scene because the music is very modern and American, so it suits the scene well. I've noticed that a good way to show that time has passed is by changing their clothes and changing from night to day . This makes it seem like days/weeks have passed of training.
South Paw This is my favourite training scene because you can really see the determination in his eyes and the editing is amazing. First off, exactly like "never back down" they have included all the small stuff e.g. Sweating, heavy breathing and intense facial expressions. But what I like about this one is that the music is quite dark, but motivating at the same time. But because the music is quite dark they have filmed in a dirty, run down, dark boxing club. This shows that thee character has an evil side to him. Secondly in the editing they have lowered the lighting to make the room darker, this links in with my last point. The editors have also made it a bit of a montage. A montage is short sharp clips that have been added together. This gives the audience a sense of action and that he has been training for hours upon hours. This is what we need to include in our film because we need to show him training over a number of years. This will then give our audience a sense of time
This scene is a little irrelevant because the whole scene is concentrating on UFC, but I still think the shots used are a good example of what we could use for our film. The shots are short, sharp and constantly changing. Also the music goes well with this scene because the music is very modern and American, so it suits the scene well. I've noticed that a good way to show that time has passed is by changing their clothes and changing from night to day . This makes it seem like days/weeks have passed of training.
South Paw This is my favourite training scene because you can really see the determination in his eyes and the editing is amazing. First off, exactly like "never back down" they have included all the small stuff e.g. Sweating, heavy breathing and intense facial expressions. But what I like about this one is that the music is quite dark, but motivating at the same time. But because the music is quite dark they have filmed in a dirty, run down, dark boxing club. This shows that thee character has an evil side to him. Secondly in the editing they have lowered the lighting to make the room darker, this links in with my last point. The editors have also made it a bit of a montage. A montage is short sharp clips that have been added together. This gives the audience a sense of action and that he has been training for hours upon hours. This is what we need to include in our film because we need to show him training over a number of years. This will then give our audience a sense of time
Storyboard (Old VS New)
This is our story board, to show what we plan to have and film within our movie opening. The reason why we chose colours and images to portray each shot, was that so we can be reminded visually of our goals. We want to make each shot the best it can be, and we do not want to settle for anything less. We put a rough time amount/ limit so that when we are filming, we gain a rough idea of how long we should do each shot for. This also gave us an overall idea of how long our film opening will be and whether or not we need to make certain shots longer or shorter. The only thing we could have done better is put on each box the types of shots that we aim to do for each one, a defined word, rather than just movements. However, we added just enough information to gain a good understanding of the overall aims for our film opening. The box underneath the images allow us to tick off each section as we do it. Meaning that we can keep it organised and planned, not falling behind. A big thing for our group is staying on track and doing everything we are physically possible to stay organised and get an excellent end product.
My group and I decided that we were going to completely change this initial idea.
This is our new story board, to show what we plan to have and film within our movie opening. The reason why we chose colours and images to portray each shot, was that so we can be reminded visually of our goals. We want to make each shot the best it can be, and we do not want to settle for anything less. We put a rough time amount/ limit so that when we are filming, we gain a rough idea of how long we should do each shot for. This also gave us an overall idea of how long our film opening will be and whether or not we need to make certain shots longer or shorter. The only thing we could have done better is put on each box the types of shots that we aim to do for each one, a defined word, rather than just movements. However, we added just enough information to gain a good understanding of the overall aims for our film opening. The box underneath the images allow us to tick off each section as we do it. Meaning that we can keep it organised and planned, not falling behind. A big thing for our group is staying on track and doing everything we are physically possible to stay organised and get an excellent end product.
Friday, 20 November 2015
Production Diary
Day number 1. 9/12/17
On day number one we had to think about the group we were going to be in. We also had to start by writing our individual pitch ideas.
Day number 2. 10/12/17
The second day of our meeting we each presented our presentations to the group in order to voice our initial ideas making it easier for us to expand our ideas.
Day number 3. 12/12/17
Today we have drawn a group mind map of all our ideas. We made our ideas anonymous to avoid having problems deciding which idea to go for.
Day number 4. 13/12/17
On day number three of planning we showed our plan to a random sample and got feedback. We discussed straight away the feedback and responses that we got in order to better our ideas and tweak them.
Day number 7. 20/12/17
Today we have continued to do our individual contributions to the film research process. I was finding titles from similar films to imitate and Aisha was doing a shot list.
Day number 8. 23/12/17
In todays lesson we had decided that we wanted to change the storyboard completely, this was when we were trying to sort out a shooting schedule and we realised that it wouldn't work. So we scrapped all our ideas and started from beginning. We re-showed each other the individual film pitches which is when we decided that a more simplistic but yet moving would be the best idea. We then did a mind map/plan of everything that we thought we would need in order to pull it off.
Day number 9. 24/12/17
Today we went over some of the authentic footage . We also planned to get Spencer's dad's van which by using hard-to-get props made the opening look professional. As a group we came together and decided to plan out a storyboard, once that was done in rough we did a real storyboard which we then filmed. We were also getting on with our individually allocated jobs as well. We also had planned costumes and props that we would need.
Day number 10. 26/11/15
In today's lesson we all worked together to complete a risk assessment. Megan and I did the shooting schedule whilst Max and Spencer began the shot list. After that, Max wrote a script and we all went over to the location in order to plan our shots.
Day number 11. 27/11/15
We started shooting today, beforehand we went door-to-door to warn the neighbours that we would be filming a heist and as the costume and props we were using looked very realistic, we did this to ensure that no one felt wrongly unsafe.
Day number 12. 30/11/15
Today, we continued to film any extracts that we had missed out, and we all agreed to overfilm in order to minimise any shortage of shots.
Day number 13. 31/11/15
Today, we looked through all of our shots and footage that we had and we agreed that we had enough, so we started the editing.
Day number 14. 1/12/15
In todays lesson we continued the editing process and also got together as a team in order to see what was outstanding that we needed to complete. Once we had allocated everyone tasks we all got on with it helping eachother.
Day number 15. 3/12/15
In today's lesson, Megan began creating our film poster with the help of Spencer and I doing research into similar genre'd film posters whilst Max was editing.
Day number 16. 4/12/15
We realised that we needed location shots, so Max went back to the location and got photos of all our locations whilst I edited the film poster that Megan had put together. We spoke to a Media student from a past year in order to help us with the titles of our opening. In our spare time we each decided to continue with the editing, film poster and any outstanding pieces of work that we had.
Day number 17. 7/12/15
Today we reviewed everyones first drafts in order to give them efficient feedback in which they could use as guidance to make their pieces better. Due to the whole lesson being psent on looking at everyones drafts, we were unable to do any more improvisation to our film opening.
Day number 18. 8/12/15
Today we continued reviewing our peers' film drafts.
Day number 19. 9/12/15
In todays meeting we received our teachers feedback and we got to improve our first draft based on that feedback. We now knew what we needed to change and improvise in order to make our opening good enough for a final piece so again, we allocated jobs to eachother and individually got on with them. We also later on in the day received our peers' feedback and got to work on improving our first draft film opening so it was successful enough for a final piece.
Day number 20. 21/12/15 After all the work had been completed and the video had been uploaded onto our blogs, we then decided as a group to have a blog day. We wanted to ensure that everything was there that was needed and to ensure that everything was in the correct order. Therefore, we all sat round as a group, and went through the correct order and dates of the work that needed to have been done, and then updated and changed certain pieces of work that wasn't the same or as finished as another member of the groups.
Day number 35. 4/1/16
Over Christmas, we carried on ensuring that our blog work was detailed and finished, we then began our evaluation questions. As a group, we decided what piece of work fitted who, due to their particular preferences. For example, I said that I wanted to do the question on representation and audience, because I previously completed work to a high standard, with these topics being the main criteria. We found this helpful because it looked at each individual persons strengths and weaknesses, we then set each other a dead line to ensure that everything was done on time, allowing us to individually tweak an other person in our groups work, to fit our own preferences.
Day number 39. 8/1/16
After spending a few days on the evaluation questions, we then decided to all come round as a group and show each other what we had so far. This allowed us to check that every body was on the right track and to give feedback to where was appropriate.
Day number 42. 11/1/16
This was the deadline that we had set each other to send each other their particular evaluation questions. We then all adapted each question to how we liked, so that we all had a particular say in the evaluation question, rather than just using someone else's work.
Day number 44/ 13/1/16
After all of the evaluation questions were now on the blogs, we then individually went through our blogs, ensuring that everything was to a high standard. We then ensured that all of the work and questions made sense and included the correct and appropriate title. We then made sure that all of the labels were correct and fitted the correct pieces of work.
On day number one we had to think about the group we were going to be in. We also had to start by writing our individual pitch ideas.
Day number 2. 10/12/17
The second day of our meeting we each presented our presentations to the group in order to voice our initial ideas making it easier for us to expand our ideas.
Day number 3. 12/12/17
Today we have drawn a group mind map of all our ideas. We made our ideas anonymous to avoid having problems deciding which idea to go for.
Day number 4. 13/12/17
On day number three of planning we showed our plan to a random sample and got feedback. We discussed straight away the feedback and responses that we got in order to better our ideas and tweak them.
Day number 7. 20/12/17
Today we have continued to do our individual contributions to the film research process. I was finding titles from similar films to imitate and Aisha was doing a shot list.
Day number 8. 23/12/17
In todays lesson we had decided that we wanted to change the storyboard completely, this was when we were trying to sort out a shooting schedule and we realised that it wouldn't work. So we scrapped all our ideas and started from beginning. We re-showed each other the individual film pitches which is when we decided that a more simplistic but yet moving would be the best idea. We then did a mind map/plan of everything that we thought we would need in order to pull it off.
Day number 9. 24/12/17
Today we went over some of the authentic footage . We also planned to get Spencer's dad's van which by using hard-to-get props made the opening look professional. As a group we came together and decided to plan out a storyboard, once that was done in rough we did a real storyboard which we then filmed. We were also getting on with our individually allocated jobs as well. We also had planned costumes and props that we would need.
Day number 10. 26/11/15
In today's lesson we all worked together to complete a risk assessment. Megan and I did the shooting schedule whilst Max and Spencer began the shot list. After that, Max wrote a script and we all went over to the location in order to plan our shots.
Day number 11. 27/11/15
We started shooting today, beforehand we went door-to-door to warn the neighbours that we would be filming a heist and as the costume and props we were using looked very realistic, we did this to ensure that no one felt wrongly unsafe.
Day number 12. 30/11/15
Today, we continued to film any extracts that we had missed out, and we all agreed to overfilm in order to minimise any shortage of shots.
Day number 13. 31/11/15
Today, we looked through all of our shots and footage that we had and we agreed that we had enough, so we started the editing.
Day number 14. 1/12/15
In todays lesson we continued the editing process and also got together as a team in order to see what was outstanding that we needed to complete. Once we had allocated everyone tasks we all got on with it helping eachother.
Day number 15. 3/12/15
In today's lesson, Megan began creating our film poster with the help of Spencer and I doing research into similar genre'd film posters whilst Max was editing.
Day number 16. 4/12/15
We realised that we needed location shots, so Max went back to the location and got photos of all our locations whilst I edited the film poster that Megan had put together. We spoke to a Media student from a past year in order to help us with the titles of our opening. In our spare time we each decided to continue with the editing, film poster and any outstanding pieces of work that we had.
Day number 17. 7/12/15
Today we reviewed everyones first drafts in order to give them efficient feedback in which they could use as guidance to make their pieces better. Due to the whole lesson being psent on looking at everyones drafts, we were unable to do any more improvisation to our film opening.
Day number 18. 8/12/15
Today we continued reviewing our peers' film drafts.
Day number 19. 9/12/15
In todays meeting we received our teachers feedback and we got to improve our first draft based on that feedback. We now knew what we needed to change and improvise in order to make our opening good enough for a final piece so again, we allocated jobs to eachother and individually got on with them. We also later on in the day received our peers' feedback and got to work on improving our first draft film opening so it was successful enough for a final piece.
Day number 20. 21/12/15 After all the work had been completed and the video had been uploaded onto our blogs, we then decided as a group to have a blog day. We wanted to ensure that everything was there that was needed and to ensure that everything was in the correct order. Therefore, we all sat round as a group, and went through the correct order and dates of the work that needed to have been done, and then updated and changed certain pieces of work that wasn't the same or as finished as another member of the groups.
Day number 35. 4/1/16
Over Christmas, we carried on ensuring that our blog work was detailed and finished, we then began our evaluation questions. As a group, we decided what piece of work fitted who, due to their particular preferences. For example, I said that I wanted to do the question on representation and audience, because I previously completed work to a high standard, with these topics being the main criteria. We found this helpful because it looked at each individual persons strengths and weaknesses, we then set each other a dead line to ensure that everything was done on time, allowing us to individually tweak an other person in our groups work, to fit our own preferences.
Day number 39. 8/1/16
After spending a few days on the evaluation questions, we then decided to all come round as a group and show each other what we had so far. This allowed us to check that every body was on the right track and to give feedback to where was appropriate.
Day number 42. 11/1/16
This was the deadline that we had set each other to send each other their particular evaluation questions. We then all adapted each question to how we liked, so that we all had a particular say in the evaluation question, rather than just using someone else's work.
Day number 44/ 13/1/16
After all of the evaluation questions were now on the blogs, we then individually went through our blogs, ensuring that everything was to a high standard. We then ensured that all of the work and questions made sense and included the correct and appropriate title. We then made sure that all of the labels were correct and fitted the correct pieces of work.
Thursday, 19 November 2015
Props Research
The reason why we chose the costumes at the very top was because once we had researched 'heist' clothing, we found these props and clothing. The reason why black clothing is appropriate was to disguise their identity and try to blend in and not wear bright and bold colours that could unmask them. The aim was also to ensure that the characters came across as intimidating and sinister, therefore if they are in all black, it represents death and darkness, which are the themes of our film opening.
We also chose gloves as a prop because it allows the characters to be able to break and enter without revealing finger prints and their identity. It is also what would realistically be included in a heist and our aims is to make the film more realistic than comical or a spoof. The mask would also disguise their characters and add to the dark and sinister atmosphere by scaring the audience.
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