Photos have now been uploaded!
(yey)

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

I have learnt a considerable amount by shooting and editing this preliminary exercise. I had almost next to nothing knowledge on the use of cameras and setting up tripods. This I learnt quite fast and got the hang of filming and using the tripod for pan and tilt shots. The footage I shot was reasonably accurate in the use of specific shot types.
The hardest aspect of the preliminary task was using the apple macs and iMovie because I had never used a mac before. Getting the hang of editing took a while. Choosing the right shots also took a lot of time as we had many takes to look through. At the end the film was all correct having chosen the right shots, titles and music but it still wasn’t amazing.

However I learnt a lot from this task from framing a shot to editing on iMovie. I will learn from my mistakes in the next task will hopefully improve on my weaknesses.

until the next time...

WATCH this SpaCE....!

How did you attract/address your audience?

the music and sound effects tie in with the tense aspect of the film that make it more interesting and attracting to the audience as they want to discover what is in the suitcase and at the beginning who is the P.A going to be meeting.
The editing is also very important to make people want to watch. Making sure the cuts looked correct and adding music and effects at the right time was all key to creating a final good looking film.
The use of props and costumes and actors were all carefully thought through to make the film look good and each actress like their character
-the P.A was very good at acting shy, scared and nervous
-Madame was very good at putting a scary condescending voice which made the poor P.A feel scared.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The audience for the product is anyone who would enjoy watching the film and can possibly identify with it. It can appeal to both genders and any ages beginning from teens because the humour would not be comprehensible or funny to those younger than that. It can also appeal to adults alike as the humour is not just aimed to teenagers. The genre of the film is spoof-action so anybody who enjoys action films and comedies would also be good audiences.

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

THE GENRE of ‘The P.A’ is action spoof. The gangster suggests the action side and that if the film continued there’d be more of it and the mystery with importing perhaps illegal cosmetics. The spoof element was the gangster stroking her evil looking teddy bear, (like some of the famous villains in action films) the menacing looking bubble gun and many other humorous qualities that take the ‘Mickey’ out of other action films.

THE DISTRIBUTER of the film could be various different companies or places. As this is a very short film made on a very small scale the closest it could get to ‘the big screen’ would be before a film as one of the many adverts or promotions.
The distributors could be school websites to show other media pupils examples of preliminary exercises and the possible grades it could achieve. Another possibility is a company who shows short films as part of a commercial basis. This being said a small cost may have to be charged to the audience as the film would have to bring in money if a company prepared to show it would be wanting to make money unless it was a non- profit company.
If there was a charge for the film it could be financed that way using the audiences’ money to fund various things such as hiring equipment or actors etc if the film was more professional. At the moment it is purely practising filming skills.

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

This film is made by sixth formers so (I hope) that we the producers can identify with out actual age group. It would appeal to mainly older students and perhaps adults. There is a slight element of humour in the film which I hope people will enjoy…

The film shows and unfortunate P.A coming to show her boss a new product and the film stereotypes mean bosses (similar boss; Miranda Priestly- ‘Devil wears Prada.’) Many sixth formers have jobs and perhaps not so nice bosses, so they can identify even a little with the poor P.A.

Diferent props used were to add humour (the teddy and the gun...) and mise-en-scene was also considered carefully to create a nicer film to watch and to make it as realistic as the The. P.A could seem.

In this film the P.A who is the closest representation to the target audience is a rather shy and scared person (no wonder with a boss like Madame!) But this does not necessarily represent the target audience just someone that they may be able to identify with say, if they were going to meet a particularly scary boss!

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

In ‘the P.A’ we used different camera shots and angles which is very important in making any film look good. We used a range of shots including;

Close-ups; which were really good to exaggerate expression for each character and also show the focus on one particular thing (e.g the lipstick)

Medium shots; these were good because most of the film takes place at a makeshift desk. A long shot would be silly as the audience does not need to see the character's legs, and a close-up would cut most of what's happening out (body language, opening the suitcase etc...)

Long shots; these were useful when showing the character walking (as it di establish someone was actually walking.)

180 degree rule; this was a quite important aspect to ‘The P.A’ because there was a lot of dialogue across a table. To make the film look correct and aesthetically pleasing the camera had to stay behind this one ‘invisible line.’ We achieved this quite well and both the characters were shown on one side of the screen. At one point Madame the gangster was shown on a close up closer to the middle than when she was normally shown on the right. This didn’t look very good and is a classic example of the importance to stick to the ‘invisible line.’ I have learnt something very crucial for future filming tasks.

Match on action; this was one of the main things we had to achieve in this preliminary exercise and this was done by a character shown walking towards a door on one side, then the camera shot changes to from inside the room watching the character enter. The shot leading towards the door was of the character’s point of view then from the other side it was a medium long shot to see the character walk in. It was reasonably easy to film and with the help of the editing programme the film could be cut short and the sequence smoother and less delayed.

Shot reverse shot; this was mainly used in dialogue as one character said something hen the shot switched to the other to view their reaction and their ‘retaliation’ to the comment.

please!

WATCH the film on youtube and COMMENT!!....

It would really help for the next time to have

CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM!

thankyou :)

here is the adress;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDSfJPxHn-A

The P.A << title of our preliminary film

some general things about the film....

LOCATION; gordano school- to be more specific the sixth form library, library staircase and store cupboard)

ACTORS; (well actresses;)
*Ellie; the gangster called 'Madame'
*Philippa; Madame's unfortunate P.A

COSTUME;

*Madame's outfit; jacket, black trousers, killer heels and the infamous gangster hat!
*The P.A's outfit; smart blouse & jumper, black trousers and sensible shoes...

PROPS; well there were quite a few....
* the suitcase- which is the main suspense of the film
* Madame's scary gun (which is a bubble gun by the way...)
* Madame's evil teddy
* the lipstick (the whole point of the meeting)
* various other objects kindly provided by the school (chairs, tables etc...)

EQUIPMENT; the technical things needed to create the film
* Camera
* tripod
* whiteboard (schools version of a clapper board)
* i-mac (which is seriously difficult to use if you dont know how...)

Now for the real reason I created this blog.... to evaluate my (and my friend Philippa's) mini film which we made as part of a preliminary task for media studies so here goes....

Good morning Bloggers!

I am currently in school awating all the teachers to come in and teach. The traffic on the motorway is horrendous and we are expecting them to come in v.e.r.y s.l.o.w.l.y.....

signing off....

Hello!

Good afternoon fellow bloggers and readers!
I have just created a new blog for the first time and I will be filling it up with all my media progress for my AS studies!

this is Maz signing off...