In what ways does your media product use, develop or

challenge forms and conventions of real media

products?
Our media product has adopted many typical aspects of other real media
products. It includes many elements of the thriller/sci-fi genre. The plot of the
movie is driven by the disappearance of certain characters this is an
unexplainable supernatural occurrence which fits well into the sci-fi genre. It also
fits well into the thriller genre as the plot of the opening is certain characters
being followed or chased by something unknown which creates suspense. Since
the characters are male a certain convention and stereotype has been broken as
in many sci-fi films women are often the victims and men are the more dominant
gender. Our camera work was very typical of our chosen genre. We used many
long shots, high angles and medium angles. This is to show that the characters
are not in control of what is happening. Audio was also generic as we used a
creepy, eerie soundtrack because this best fit the opening. Finally, when editing,
colour corrections were used as well as fast paced editing and fades. We used
these because they were suitable for our final media product. These all fit into
the genre, as they are all the main conventions which are seen within the genre,
for example the sci-fi element, is conveyed through the unknown, however this
also fits the thriller genre. The editing and camera link with other real media
products such as Inception. This movie uses various angles and the editing is
mainly fast paced during action scenes.

How does your media product represent particular social

groups?
The social group we were representing in our film were teenage boys. This
particular social group is stereotypically seen as delinquents or trouble makers
and with our media product we both challenged and supported this idea. The
three actors differ in appearance and had different characteristics and styles.
This suggests that the stereotypical view of male teenagers is not all true, as
they cannot all just be generalised as being a certain way. An example of this is
the main protagonist Daniel, he does not fit the label of a typical teenage boy
as his personality is quite timid. This is shown through his costume and acting
style, Daniel wears typically fashionable clothes and he also wears glasses
which stereotypically portray a weak or feeble character. This was shown by his
acting style as he stuck with the group during their walk through the pathway. In
addition, all the characters in the media product are male. There are various
male stereotypes in media, one being that they are always strong; Our opening
challenges this as the male characters are all vulnerable as they disappear, with
the final character getting chased by something and being left helpless on the
ground.

What kind of media institution might distribute your

media product and why?

Before the production of our movie opening we had to choose a movie

production company that would be suitable to our movie. Out of the many movie
production companies such as 20th Century, Universal or Warner Bross we
decided to choose Summit Entertainment. It is an American company that has
been established since the early 90's, one of their most renowned productions
was the Twilght Saga, as they made the biggest profit from the production of
every film. They are also the producers of new series such as Divergent, Step Up
and one of the earliest American Pie films. Summit Entertainment is the company
that is mostly known for fantasy and science-fiction movies, as shown by their
production record. From doing research we found that their usual target audience
are teenagers and young adults which was the same as our target audience. We
also considered picking Warner Bross as they are also aiming for the same
audience, however they are more known for horror and family movies which did
not match our choice of genre. When we first decided on the genre of our movie
(thriller, sci-fi) we knew we would consider choosing Summit Entertainment as
most people recognise them for this kind of production.

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The target audience that we aimed for were teenagers and young adults, this is
because we thought they are more likely to watch science-fiction and thriller
movies. Furthermore, according to our survey results 8 people aged 15-17 and 1
over the age of 18 took our survey however, we noticed that not a single person
aged 12-14 participated in our survey. This helped us support our idea of creating
a movie aimed at teenagers. From our research we noticed that sci-fi and thriller
movies are more likely to be watched by male audiences, and this is why we also
choose to use male protagonists.

How did you attract/address your audience?

To reach our audience we decided to use actors of the audiences age to play the
main roles thereby making them more relatable and appealing to them. For our
movie opening we wanted to include elements that would be appreciated by the
younger audience so we thought that it would be essential to include elements of
suspense and action. Our final piece met the needs and expectations of our
audience because we made sure to include suitable music that created a buildup and sense of fear which most science fiction and thriller movies tend to have.
During the editing stage we decided to use special effects at the end of the
movie to make the audience feel engaged leaving them on edge at a cliff hanger.
Most science fiction movies dont spoon feed the audience with information,
however they usually tend to hint information and allow them to place things
together like a puzzled mystery. To follow this trend, we decided to end the movie
on a cliff hanger and minimise the dialogue as much as possible allowing the
audience to make their own assumptions.

What have you learnt about technologies from the

process of constructing this product?
Technology has had a massive impact on our movie in several ways and it would
have been impossible to create our opening without the use of technology.
Technology has helped us in four areas which are: research, filming, editing and
sharing.

Research:
Researching was one of the most important areas in coming up with ideas for our
movie. The research involved: finding real movie openings, searching for a
suitable genre, finding out more about camera angles as well as audio for the
movie, scouting for a suitable location for filming and for creating our audience
research survey. The research part of our movie process would not have been
possible without technology because to be able to access all of this information
we required access to the internet as well as a working computer. Our research
was made successful due to the fact that we had technology.

Filming:
To be able to film we used a DSLR cannon 700d camera of one of our group
members to shoot our movie. The use of a professional DSLR camera helped us
to be able to create our movie at a high quality. Some of us in our group only had
a basic understanding on how a DSLR camera works however, once we began to
film we began to learn more and more techniques. The camera we used was
quite advanced and was a piece of technology that was fundamental for our
movie as without this piece of technology we would not have been able to have
footage.

Editing:
This is where we really relied on technology. For our movie we used Sony Vegas
pro 13 which is a software that allows you to edit at a high quality with effects
and transitions. This was extremely important as it brought all of our footages
together and allowed us to add music, credits and effects. At first editing the
movie was difficult as we did not know how to use the software however, after
researching tutorials on how to use the software we were able to edit the movie
very well. We learnt how to cut and select relevant footage skilfully, how to
enhance footage, how to insert special effects and how to merge dialogue and
sound.

Sharing:
We had great appreciation for technology when it came to transporting and
moving footage from one computer to another. For instance, when we had to get
the raw footage onto the school computers we utilised cloud storage such as
drop box and google drive which helped us to access the footage from any
computer. In addition, when it came to transporting the final movie footage onto
different school computers we used a USB as it is much more reliable than online
cloud storage.
In general, we have learnt a lot about technology and without technology our
group would not have been able to have produced a movie opening. Before we
created our movie we didnt have much knowledge on editing or filming however
we have now gained much more confidence and experience.

Looking back at your prelim task, what do you feel you

have learnt in the progression to the full product?

A lot has been learnt from the creation of our preliminary task that lead up to
helping benefit our final movie opening product. Our preliminary task was to
create a continuity task involving filming and editing a character opening a door,
crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with
whom she/he then exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue with. The task should
have demonstrated match on action, shot reverse shot and the 180 rule. We
first delegated roles and one of our group members took on the role of filming
during the creative process. We chose him for the role as he had previously
filmed in GCSE Media before, and already knew some of the terms which were
needed for the task. After assigning roles we thought of an idea, which we could
integrate into the task, once that was decided a brief script was written then we
started our filming. When filming we talked about angles and movements we
were going to use and just had a slight run through of what we were going to do
just before we started. Once the filming was done, we moved onto editing the
piece. We just cut, corrected and put it together to create the final preliminary
piece.
The entire process of this was very beneficial for us as we had an idea of how
everything would be done during the making of the final piece our group had
learned the rules that must be applied when filming and the steps that would be
taken to reach the end goal. When we were making the final product, we tried to
replicate what we did during the preliminary task, however on a larger scale. The
decision making process was done very thoroughly. We had to make sure we
knew, and understood everything we were doing before we produced it. We first
started by talking about what genre we would like to base our opening on, we
chose thriller/sci-fi. During this stage we researched about the genre and the
conventions found within it. Once this was agreed upon we again then delegated
roles and tried to find the most efficient way to work. We split the roles into,
audience research, script writing and storyboard creating. We gave ourselves a
deadline and worked towards this quite well. We then scouted locations for
where we could film. We found a few pathways and decided on one, from this we
started to select actors needed and chose a day we were all free to film.
Once the whole creative process of filming was over we moved onto editing and
during the preliminary task we used iMovie which gave us a brief idea of how to
edit. However, for the final product we chose to use Sony Vegas pro 13 as it is
more advanced and professional. From the preliminary task we learnt how to edit
and made sure the rules (match on action, 180-degree rule and shot reverse
shot) were followed correctly. We knew where to cut the raw footage and piece
together to make a nice fit for the final product. We also learnt how to place
music over the top of film and a bit about colour correction from the preliminary.
Overall, the preliminary task taught us all the essential and fundamental skills
needed to create our final media product.