Thursday 28 March 2013

Website Address (ANCILLARY PRODUCT)

http://ellieparke5.wix.com/subsidencefinal

Media Evaluation: Question 1

http://prezi.com/okkgsbpa1dqw/question-1/?kw=view-okkgsbpa1dqw&rc=ref-36014605

The link above is our response to the Evaluation- Question 1. It's for our A2 Media Question.

The question was: 'In what ways does your media product use, develop or challlenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Media Evaluation: Question 2

http://prezi.com/uctjuxl97dpm/untitled-prezi/?kw=view-uctjuxl97dpm&rc=ref-36014605

The link above is our evaluation question 2 for Media Coursework (A2).

The question was 'How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Evaluation: Question 3

http://prezi.com/4u9gao5g7bjd/untitled-prezi/?kw=view-4u9gao5g7bjd&rc=ref-36014605

The link above is the Prezi powerpoint we created in order to answer question 3 of our Media A2 Coursework.

The question was: 'What have you learned from your audience feedback?'

Wednesday 27 March 2013

Evaluation: Question 4

How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Technology played a key part in the development and construction of our planning, research and evaluation stages. All the websites we used on the Internet offered different skills, and were used at different stages of the project, some in the creation of the poster, website and trailer, others in offering information in our research.

    

We used You Tube to help gain an insight into other social realist films. You Tube offered showings of other social realist trailers such as 'Shifty' and 'Trainspotting' which are two famous social realist films. This helped us to learn more about how to construct and develop a social realist trailer. After viewing these, we could then identify certain social realist conventions that appear in the successful films and adapt them to our trailer in our own unique way and were relevant. These were areas such as the brick wall covered in Graffiti (which we used for our poster image) and the block of run-down flats (which we used for the website and in our trailer). We also used You tube to help upload our film, and transfer it over to the website, and although the downloading process was prolonged, it worked well and we were happy with the transfer.
 
In our project, Google was effectively the hub of the information. We used Google to search for all our programs, these included Pixlr, Scribus, Dafont, Blogger, OCR and many more. Google opened up so many options for us in the making of this project and give us access to many useful sites that contributed to the final product in the website, trailer and poster.
 
Pixlr is a photo editing program that allowed us to edit photo's we had taken in a poster format. This was a vital program in relation to the making of the poster as it allowed us to upload the photo in poster format, in original and in-depth focus quality. We found it easy to use, and very useful in the development of the poster. This combined with Scribus was the two programs we used to make the poster. Pixlr is an Open Source Software which allowed us to carry out complex manipulations to the important assets of our poster, the image and layout.

Wix was a website that helped you design your own website. This give you the basic template and guidelines of building a website, and it was down to you add the content of your choice. We used the template to help set up our website, and moving the text and uploading the image was our initial move, and developed the rest around this basic start. On this website, we was able to use the tabs at the top to create drop down boxes that acted as headings, this allowed us to give it a basic and simple layout, easily used. These added to the construction of this particular ancillary task. We then used Wix for a different reason, which linked with our research. Using this program, as a website creator- allowed us to gain audience feedback as we asked 10 people to view our trailer from the website, and feedback. These ages varied from 15- 20 which fitted into the target audience bracket, and one older member of the public who wasn't apart of the target audience bracket, just to vary the feedback and gain an insight into an older interpretation of the film.
 
Scribus was a desktop publishing program installed into the school PCs which allowed us to edit a photo (add text and effects). So we uploaded the photo we had created from Pixlr on to Scribus where we could add text through creating layers, as explained in the blog. This was useful due to the fact it helped finalise the poster with text on top, this text was the title, billings, ratings, certificate and release date. This was done through layers, that were added on top of each other, as demonstrated in the blog; which then meant there was no image collapse or overlay on the poster. This combined with the image was the making of the poster, and a prime example of how we used two areas of technology together, utilising each to there capability to form the poster, our other ancillary product. With Scribus also being an Open Source Software, it allowed us to carry out text manipulations on the poster, that at times were complex in regards to positioning and size.
  
To edit our trailer, we used a program called Sony Movie Studio Platinum. This allowed us to edit the trailer, and add effects and graphical shots. This was the stage where we pieced together our movie, finalising the shots we wished to add to form our movie. This was very helpful, complicated at times but useful in the end. This is also where, we uploaded the Tascam sound and edited it in sync with the movie and soundtrack, overall leading to the final main product, our trailer for a film called 'Subsidence'. The complication with this program was in areas of the editing, in terms of uploading the footage, as the files at first didn't want to copy into the box where we could drag the clips around and order them. In terms of our preparation to editing, this helped us a lot. We initially planned to upload the footage onto the program, and start to assemble the footage, and bin what was useless, or an out-take. Then we started to order the shots and clips, adding graphical shots and using sound affects of the Internet (not copied)- and by this stage, the trailer was starting to come together, will slight adjustments needing to be made to the Tascam sound which was out of time, but soon adjusted back in sync. This program allowed us to all of this in time, and was efficient and a success.

We used the OCR website to help understand where we can pick up marks in the coursework, and to help give us some guideline in to what we need to get a good grade. It was useful, and we followed advice and used previous examples they offered in order to get the better marks. This was the website that helped structured our three projects, and we closely analysed the grade boundaries and previous examples in order to combine our feedback from them and apply it to our three media products.


Dafont was a website that offers a variety of fonts for you to take away and add to your design, for us we needed one to use for the poster, and the general one for our overall text for 'Subsidence'. We chose one called 'Brain Flower' which was under the handwritten section of the website, and we chose this simply because it give a realistic effect and linked to idea of social realism.


In terms of the filming itself, we used the Canon 55OD camera (similar to the above model). It offered good light settings and good effects that helped make the poster picture. It filmed well, with good battery use and a simple and effective layout. This allowed us to film at different shutter speeds and adjust the settings to suit what we wanted in our film, which was a general 'low light' scheme in order to reflect the realism the characters face, in their brutal working class lives and the impact the drugs has on them. The camera, due to it's technical ability, allowed us to carry out manual functions such as the focus, zoom and exposure. These contributed to the film in different ways, zoom helping to show a close up on an object- expression of emotions, the exposure helped us set an atmospheric scene in which the characters could be feeling low so the light in the scene was low and negative. In terms of the focus, this camera was excellent, with a very tight focus that allowed us to blur background and give good, effective character focus.

 

Blogger was used for the blogging part of the coursework. We used blogger to upload our process of making the three products, by putting it in to text format. We have blogged over 30 different times, all relevant to one of our products, if not all three. This has helped us to understand the development we have made from the beginning when we made the first blog. It has also helped us in the evaluation stages of the coursework, as it offers a large space for text to be filled with images. This helped us to complete questions of the evaluation and be able to share our process by making the blog open to anyone who comes across it. It also helped in the planning stages, somewhere we could upload the questionnaires and other sources of research, comparing and contrasting between primary and secondary.


Prezi is a unique way to process information, through clever PowerPoint's that are easy on the eye. We used this to be creative in our evaluation stages, by using the templates offered we added the information in questions 1, 2 and 3 of our coursework evaluation. This helped us to note our process following the questions set, and was vital in relation to us explaining 'step by step' how we made our three products, and all the research into them that went on.




Overall, it was the combination of these media technologies that formed our three media products, all contributing to different areas of the task. Due to these technologies mentioned, our products were much easier to make and were a more successful end product. This was because of the information they offered, through examples and text we could base areas of our project on templates and previous identical tasks that were on offer for us to view. Each individual piece of new media technology we used had it's own independent quality, and some combined to form our media products.

Graphics

The graphics we used in this trailer add a deliberate effect of introducing the director and responses to the film; this all helps to not only promote the film, but help break the film up from just a 'solid block' of video.

We promoted the film in the trailer buy adding the reviews and rating of two worldwide names in the media industry to try and persuade the viewer to follow the bigger names into liking the film and taking further interest in it, and watching the full film. This shows we have considered the promotion aspect to the project.

As for the graphics breaking the film up, it simply helps the film flow, and the cut and fades into and out of the graphics help it to gain pace and drama. This is good on the naked eye and very appealing along with helping the story flow. The overall effect then removes the solid block of video and also explains the producers and actors involved which is also key in promoting films- as we found in research into other social realist films and trailers.

As for the colour scheme, we kept it black and white deliberately to break up the film from the dominant colours of the film (environmental colours). Also, it stood out and give the effect of emphasising the text. The colours helped it easier to read and also, due to the fact they had to be short to keep the flow of the film moving pacey. This leads on to the final point on the graphics, the way we ensured the text on the graphics was short and easy to read as it was vital for the audience to read this quickly and understand, along with keeping the quick atmosphere the movie has and needed.