(Evaluation) last three questions
- 1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? After first discussing the concept of our product, my group and I decided that we would cast Aayush as the main protagonist. The age of Joseph, 17, is not typical of most reported terrorists who are often older; allowing the audience to associate terrorism with people of young ages instead of just adults. This also enabled us to shoot scenes in the school where the actual act of terror would take place, a location that most people consider to be safe for kids to go. In addition to this, news in Britain reports there is a high terror threat, in effect, schools have increased security measures. Therefore the level of fear striking the audience is amplified as the idea of children inside of schools being a terror threat to each other is being established.
- 2. Another convention we decided to change early on in the filming/editing process, was the music. By choosing a fairly unconventional track we were able to represent Joseph as a more disturbing and deranged character. We played around with this idea for a while, researching into other films which had used this, such as 'Reservoir Dogs' and 'American Psycho'. However, we were aiming for something different, a track that no normal teenage boy would listen too, hence the song 'A Horses Soul' in our early drafts. Despite this idea, we decided later on in the project that this track did not fit the opening as well as we anticipated, resulting in us changing the track to a more conventional thriller track. We trialled various songs and scores, eventually settling on a more upbeat drum & bass type track, similar to soundtracks of action thrillers. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
- 3. How does your media product represent particular social groups? The protagonist of our thriller is Joseph, played by Aayush, a brown British male. We firstly decided to cast Aayush as the terrorist because he is a good actor as well as being brown, which audiences may associate with a terrorist due to the common stereotype of of terrorists being brown Muslims. However, we later decided to make Joseph a Christian, hence the name 'Joseph' which is typically a Christian name. We thought that challenging this convention may relieve the stereotype of people of certain religions i.e. Muslims being associated with terrorism. This also creates the idea that anyone could be associated with terrorism/radicalism, not just the stereotypical idea that only Muslims are terrorists. We believed making this change this was similar to what thriller/horror film-makers have done in the past- making an audience scared of a new threat, creating controversy and therefore publicity. This technique is apparent in horrors and thrillers all throughout the 20th century, but seems to have diminished after the slasher craze, despite horror films moving onto teen horror flicks. In the final 30 seconds of the opening, Joseph is shown walking into a classroom and sitting down amongst his fellow pupils, each of them white British males. Contrasting to my previous point about moving away from the stereotype of terrorists being dark-skinned, this sequence presents Joseph as separate from the other people in the scene. I believe that if we were to re-do our product, we would cast a white British male to emphasise the fact that anyone could be a terrorist, as stereotypical terrorists are dark-skinned.
- 4. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? As our product is low-budget and the full length film would not feature many expensive practical or special effects, we would most likely publish our film as an independent movie. Most likely, this film would not attract a fairly large market unlike blockbusters, and therefore be published on either YouTube or sold to a cheap publisher such as Film4. As we have been focusing very heavily on changing conventions and aiming to create something original and independent, we would aim to show our product at film festivals such as Cannes film festival and Moscow international film festival. Although this type of film typically makes less money, as passionate film-makers, we would rather create a quality underground film that doesn't make much money as oppose to a large generic blockbuster which earns a lot more. Furthermore, the market for British independent films is niche, attracting a smaller audience and often not achieving success on a global scale. The main goal of this film is to send a message to the British public, raising awareness of the terror threat all over the country which is very apparent in todays society.
- 5. Who would be the audience for your media product? Our audience for 'Oblivious' would be the British public, as it is a British independent film. It would be marketed towards all ages and genders interested in thrillers- most likely teens and young adults. Previous to our research survey we believed that males would dominate the thriller audience, however in our poll we discovered that there were actually more females. Therefore the film will be marketed to both males and females equally. Parents, teaches and people in education would be the people most affected by the message of terrorists being apparent within schools. As a result, we would push the idea that the terrorist is in a school when marketing the film in order to create controversy and build up the hype around the film. We also screened the introduction to peers including most of our classmates, who seemed intrigued by the introduction- reinforcing them as a good potential audience.
- 6. Who would be the audience for your media product? We would also give the product a 15 rating due to the strong violence that would occur post the opening. Therefore the film would only be legal to watch for over 15's, which is in range with target market we wanted to aim for. The only other barrier which could possibly make in a 15 and not 12a, is the use of mild discrimination against race. It is also not viable for a higher rating (18) as there is no very strong violence, sexual scenes or very explicit language. By avoiding these criteria the product is therefore available for a wider audience; gaining more publicity, revenue and awareness.
- 7. How did you attract/address your audience? In order to introduce our audience to the character and the plot, we used a threat video at the start of the introduction. The video featured a close-up shot of the character ‘Joseph’ behind a threatening mask. Through the dialogue we established the characters intensions, emphasising them with the sound editing Benoit achieved on his voice. The low and aggressive voice connoted anger and threat- giving a tone of danger and violence. Also for the shot we focused on mise-en-scene by ensuring the room was dark and the background was barely visible. This enabled us to draw more of the audiences attention towards Joseph as he was centred in the shot as well as being the only real visible figure. The audience therefore focused more on his movement and voice which brought the tones of danger. By adding a border and the word ‘streaming’ to the shot; the shot looked more homemade and authentic- further signifying that it is a threat video shot at home. In addition to this, we wrote the script in order to entice the audience- the threat suggests there will be lots of action later in the film. We achieved this by mentioning an explosion in another setting. Therefore, later in the opening when Joseph and the bomb are in school, the audience is aware of what is going on.
- 8. Continuing on from the threat video, is a sequence of Joseph building the bomb and getting ready to go to school. Dialogue of a man, presumably Joseph’s father, tells Joseph ‘it’s time for school’ which informs the audience that Joseph is a student. Therefore the audience is more aware of what the story will entail, as typically a terrorist is a grown adult. This fact of the radical only being a child is disturbing to most audiences as young teens/children are often associated with innocence and kindness. We believe this change is similar to that in Alfred Hitchcock's ‘Psycho’ as audiences would possibly be more disturbed and afraid of this character- creating controversy around the film; bringing in a wider audience. Furthermore, the costume design of Joseph whilst in school implies he is a nerd, therefore his fellow classmates; they will not suspect his intentions. This emphasises the fact that Joseph is a disturbed character, and brings forward the idea that even the most unlikely and innocent of people could be a threat. We use a medium shot featuring Jospeh placed in between two classmates. This mise-en-scene suggests that Joseph is just like any other classmate, blending in amongst the crowd. How did you attract/address your audience?
- 9. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing your product? From our first lessons of planning to the editing of our final piece I have learnt a lot about the production of a film. Whilst first planning out how we would film the piece, we discussed and researched different methods of shooting. I gained my first experience with using a camera during the filming of the continuity edit in which I helped film some shots; learning how use a video camera. After looking back at the footage and deciding on how we could improve it, I learnt that the most important aspect of controlling a camera was to keep the camera steady as well as keeping the subject in frame. Lighting is also a very important aspect of film-making which I previously did not anticipate to be so important. We used two cameras whilst filming our piece- a GoPro and a Nikon. Unfortunately the GoPro, which we used for the threat video, had a very high exposure, therefore the lighting for that sequence was darker than we wanted. The Nikon however had a lower exposure enabling us to film the other sequences with the lighting we were aiming for.
- 10. However this was not so much of a problem because during the editing process we were able to lower the brightness and add a filter in certain shots. As co-editor, I had a fair amount of input in a few of the editing sessions, and had a say in what changes were needed in the editing. During editing the drafts I learnt a lot and was guided mostly by Benoit as he had previous experience in editing. Therefore research on how to edit our footage was minimal, and we focused more on the mise-en-scene. We were able to colour-correct the whole opening to give it a look that represents the tone, as well as dimming/brightening some shots which we were unable to get the wanted lighting when filming. In addition to the colouring, we added titles during the opening which would fade in and out, lasting four seconds. This was possibly one of the hardest tasks in editing as we had multiple drafts of different fonts and had to decide where to position each one. Eventually in our final draft we were happy with how it ended up. However we did face problems such as the font being too dominant over the footage and being too spread out or close to each other. One way we could have combatted this problem early on would have been to plan out where titles would go during the storyboarding stage. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing your product?
- 11. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product? Our preliminary task was my first experience of working on a film set, although it was not as professional as the set for our final piece. Despite this, I still learnt a fair amount about how to use a camera, direct, and edit. During the filming of the continuity edit, my group and I each communicated fully and ensured we got the most out of the task as we could. Personally I feel the most important benefit of this task was understand what was important in order to get a good grade. On our first draft of the task our teacher gave us feedback, telling us that most of the shots we were using were unnecessary and ineffective. Prior to this we each believed that the shots we had used were okay and only the script and sound may need improving. Therefore, we were able to focus more on camera angle choice and timing of shots through planning the final project. This was extremely beneficial for the group as we acquired this feedback fairly early on so were able to re-plan most of what we had for our final project. Another piece of learning we took from the continuity task was learning how to achieve match-on-action. This is a fairly simple mechanic that we use throughout our final cut, however in the first drafts of the continuity edit we were each unaware of how important it is. Therefore when filming the final project we made sure to film shots leading into one another, then we had enough footage to smooth continuous transitions.
- 12. One aim of this task was to ensure we did not break the 180 degree rule. We researched this rule before shooting and did not break it once throughout the task, and reflected this in out final project. However, we did discuss whether we should break this rule in our final piece as it can be used to give a disturbing and distorted tone, similar to this dialogue scene from the Shining: However we eventually decided against this idea as we thought it would be unnecessary and may possibly reduce our final mark. Therefore we looked at other conventions that could represent Joseph as disturbed and creepy. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?