TASK 1

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

Our product both upholds conventions of film sequences and challenges/ subverts audience expectation.

1. in the first shot, one can see how our film doesn’t conform to the regularities of title sequences. You would expect to see it on full screen, yet we decided to use only a section with shot filmed on a camera phone, which is unusual by today’s standards compared with Hollywood films, which would be shot on a high resolution camera.
2. Introducing yet another screen breaks conventions completely. It asks the audience to take in two different pieces of action at the same time. This is unusual as title sequences are mostly simple credits and a gentle introduction to the film.
3. Adding 2 more screens asks the audience to take in too much at a time in any detail, so the audience points out the parts which are important to them. This means that the audience start to care about the characters. We chose Film Four as our production company. All title sequences have the Production Company in the titles.
4. The actual titles in the sequence conform to the regular order, introducing our main actor first, but we decided to keep the title font simple in so as not to overwhelm the audience.
5. Continuing with split screens- usually the action would concentrate on one full screen, but continuing on several screens means that the audience doesn’t lose concentration and keeps engaged with the different characters. It also lets the audience focus completely on the action without being distracted by the titles. And gives the audience a chance to realise its one coherent moment filmed from different angles.
6. Audience are introduced to the director of photography
7. this screen shocks the audiences, and the tension that is built in the period before the shooters are introduced is released. When the screen is introduced it changes the action so suddenly the audience will be horrified at the realism of the events. This further subverts the normalities of title sequences. Usually it gives you some warning to what’s going to happen, but in our film, the audience is dropped straight into the action.
8. The end of the title sequence both conforms and subverts audience expectations. Though it shocks the audience with its brutal realism and unexpected horror, it brings an end to the title sequence when the two girls are shot at the end, and leaves the audience wanting more, and leaves questions to be answered. the fact that the dead bodies are left on their own screen after they die leaves the audience disgusted and horrified by the realism, yet encourages uncomfortable voyeurism.
9. The last part of the sequence conforms to the tradition of cinema today, by showing the title of the film in the last shot. It leaves the audience asking questions and builds tension and drama regarding the film to come.

TASK 2

How does your product represent particular social groups?

Our product represents one major social group, young people (teenagers). Our main target age that we are representing is 16-18 year olds. However, we are specifically representing two groups within this social group; specifically victims of violence from their own peers and the young people who inflict this violence on their peers. We based the events in our film on the Columbine High School Massacre. Two senior students, Eric and Alex, embarked on a massacre, killing 12 students and one teacher. They also injured 21 other students directly, and three people were injured while attempting to escape. The pair then committed suicide. Therefore in our product we hope to represent the young people involved in a non-glamorous way to reinforce the horrific events. Currently there has been a rise in violence affecting teenagers involving gun and knife crime, our product reinforces this and makes people aware that this violence does happen.

Eric and Alex are ordinary and very much a part of the fabric of the high school and its array of student actions. In fact it’s hard to distinguish them from all the other students. The school is filled with various students discussing each other, playing sports, and learning about Science and Civics. Alex plays classical piano and Eric plays video games and they are interested in seemingly average things. They calmly watch Nazi programs on TV and purchase and demo automatic weaponry that they buy over the Internet. They seem just as ordinary and interesting as any of the other students. They analytically draw up plans for their killing spree, indicating that they have enough bombs and ordinance to last the afternoon. They walk through the school killing their school peers and there is no rescue from the authorities. Another example of a media product that represents violent teenagers is Kidulthood. Kidulthood is a British film which follows a day in the lives of four poor youths living in an impoverished neighborhood in West London, where the pressure and desperation of poverty propels each of them towards the choice between a life of bleakness, violence, and crime.

The media (newspapers, magazines, television) tells us there are various reasons for the young committing violence on their peers. It could be a lack of education, poor mental health, poor parenting, drug problems, bullying and abuse which they therefore inflict on others; some argue that a fascination with violence (computer games, Nazi history etc) leads to influencing young people to commit violence. Influence of their

peers (gang violence) also leads to young people being peer pressured into committing crimes. The media reinforces this, if the media tells a person they are a criminal it le

ads them to act like one for example wearing a hooded top.

Skins is a British television drama set in Bristol purely based on young people. It explores themes of violence, death, love, drugs and substance abuse, bullying, sexuality, friendship and personality disorders. Skins explores perhaps exaggerated (to create entertainment and set it apart from soap-operas) situations that teenagers in reality face but also the consequences of ‘living the fast life.’ On the whole Skins represents teenagers dissimilarly to our media product as we focus specifically

on two teenagers who choose to commit violence on their peers. The rest of the teenagers in our product are portrayed as happy, ‘normal’ young people up until the actual shooting. Cook, a character in Skins is perhaps a similar representation to the characters in our product. Cook represents a violent teenager who cannot control his emotions and therefore lashes out and causes harm to his peers. However Cook is less extreme as we do not witness him committing murder in Skins.

TASK 3

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

A media institution refers to the organizations that provide media content and supply the context within which media products are produced. They represent how media is financed, generate profit and the processes of media production themselves. There are many different film industries through out the world such as paramount picture, Sony, 21st century. The kind of media product that would distribute my groups media product would be “film4 productions”. Film4 Productions is a British film production company owned by Channel 4. The company has been responsible for backing a large number of low budget and ‘indie’ and ‘alternative’ films made in the United Kingdom.

Our film is low budget and therefore Film4 is good for marketing and promoting our thriller as they will be able to advertise it on their film and TV channel. They also have links with European distributors which will help sell our film in Europe. Due to that our film would be a platform release due to its low budget, it would only need a short release window between cinema and Film4 TV channel. This could benefit us as advertising through its television appearance could benefit our DVD sales. 'Indie' and 'art house' films tend to provoke the audience to ‘think’ more than a Hollywood blockbuster would and have deeper and more intricate plots. Therefore the film institution that would be appropriate for my product would most likely be Film4 as it is not appropriate to glamorise the violence shown in the film as it is a sensitive issue and based on true events. There are not lots of large scale, violent scenes with extensive special effects and explosions, which therefore indicates that it is not a Hollywood Blockbuster. The film requires a low budget because it does not need many special effects, ‘what you see is what you get.’ The opening sequence is shot on mobile phone, throughout the film a large amount of equipment is not needed making Film4 the clear appropriate institution to distribute the product. Gus Van Sant’s film Elephant is also based on the events of the Columbine High School Massacre which was produced by HBO and Fine Line Features (which was the specialty films division of New Line Cinema. It produced, purchased, distributed and marketed films of a more "indie" flavour than its parent company) this reflects the subject. The film’s budget was only 3,000,000 million dollars which shows that it is unnecessary to be produced by a large Hollywood institution. Eden Lake was produced by the independent film companies Rollercoaster Films and The Weinstein Company. It is also a low budget film containing actors that would be appropriate for my own film. This indicates to me that it is most appropriate to have a low budget for my film and an independent film company like Film4.

TASK 4

Who would be the target audience for your media product?

The target audience we have chosen is 15 and above. This is our target audience because this age has the most disposable money and have more free time than any other age group. Teenagers would be interested in our film because it is based around people their age and they can relate to the situations that go on in high school. It is mainly aimed at the male gender because it is rather graphic piece with strong use of violence and this would appeal mostly to the male gender. However, because of the content of the sequence and the issues raised, we thought that it may to appeal to older audiences, mainly around 25 and upwards as everyone knows about the fear of terrorist attacks etc. The film plays on the natural human instinct to give things a reason and make sense of things that are apparently senseless and is designed to encourage uncomfortable audience voyeurism. The film asks deep questions about life perhaps questions that everyone asks themselves but would never speak aloud. The film would also show how easy it is for a young person to be influenced to commit a sick and twisted crime, the difference between right and wrong and perhaps the flaws in society today. This shows that everyone over the age of 15 would be able to relate somehow to the film. Therefore 15-24 year olds is the most suitable target audience as they are able to relate best to the plot; however there is no reason to suggest that people older than 25 would not enjoy it and relate to it. Because our product takes place and essentially centers around a sixth form boarding college, it is logical to say that male/female students aged 16-18 who enjoy Thrillers and who are inquisitive about Columbine and the other high school shootings are the main demographics for our audience. However anyone who has an interest in these events and why they happened would find the film interesting. Therefore because of the content of the sequence and the issues raised, we thought that it may to appeal to older audiences, around 25 and upwards as everyone experiences the fear of terrorist attacks etc. The main target audience is 16-25 year olds as they would be able to relate best to the plot; however there is no reason to suggest that people older than 25 would not enjoy it and relate to it. This due to that our secondary audience are people who are interested in 'indie' or 'arthouse' styles of film as it deals with serious issues. The secondary audience are therefore educated with an interest in current affairs as well as art and music therefore giving them an independant taste in film. The film plays on the natural human instinct to give things a reason and make sense of things that are apparently senseless and is designed to encourage uncomfortable audience voyeurism. The film asks deep questions about life perhaps questions that everyone asks themselves but would never speak aloud. The film would also show how easy it is for a young person to be influenced to commit a sick and twisted crime, the difference between right and wrong and perhaps the flaws in society today. This shows that everyone over the age of 16 would be able to relate somehow to the film. When reviewing Elephant (which is a similiar style of film to ours) a critic said ‘Van Sant adapted the script from a young-adult novel by Blake Nelson. Though not necessarily the target audience, teenagers will doubtless find a great deal of truth in how these characters talk, interact and lead their thorny lives.’ This is indication for the appropriate audience for my film.

TASK 5

How did you attract/address your audience?

task 5- stereotypes, location and use of shots

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TASK 6

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

TASK 7

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

The sophistication of the planning and preparation from my basic preliminary task has improved dramatically and this is shown in my thriller. In the prelim, our group had the advantage of being in the studio which meant we had a setting laid out for our use, which meant that the lighting was in prime position. We were given our own storyboards to work from however for the thriller we had to start from scratch. We had to come up with all our own ideas and constructed our own storyboard. We had to find a suitable location and include lighting, costumes, actors, different shots, props, and edited the sound and footage for the thriller. In the prelim task we were given basic shots to use whereas in the main task we used a variety of shots such as close-ups, tracking, medium shots, long shots, wide shots and over the shoulder shots to create the right effect and add a sense of realism to our finished product. For the man task, we filmed all day however for the prelim task we only had a couple hours to produce something. The main task was far more in-depth and required much more time and effort in comparison to the prelim. We used tracking in our sequence to make particular shots effective, the tracking created visual imagery which added sophistication to the product. Because we had all day to film for the main task I was able to use the camera and work throughout the day constructing various shots. In our editing we use special effects such as the "Bang Bang" sound of a gun and the smoke that comes with it, which added a sense of realism and suspense to our thriller. This was done in soundtrack pro which we over layered and added to our finished product. From the main task my group found it easier telling the basic outline of the story visually rather than with dialogue. Therefore having a storyboard helped point us in the right direction.
Over time my camera skills have developed, in the sense that I know how to capture a variety of shots in comparison to when I filmed the prelim task and knew little about camera techniques. In our main task we stuck to the 180 degrees line at all times and made sure we always got the framing for eyeline matches right. I’ve developed my camera skills dramatically since the prelim. In the main task we worked on completely different scales and the main task enabled me to get more involved and get used to the camera, thus making the sequence of good standard. With my camera phone in hand, I filmed all that went on in front of me, from the minute the conversations of the students in the canteen started, to the end of my life. By using the zoom on my blackberry curve, I was able to capture important factors for my thriller such as facial expressions, the use of teenage language and behaviour. Therefore my skills have improved from my basic prelim brief 0f wide shots, medium shots and close ups to a sophisticated sequence with a visual narrative.

In our prelim task we only used sound from the recording and ambient sound to the use of Foley work. This contrasts to my main task as the music and sound that we used in our main task was diegetic and non diegetic sound. We found our music from sound track pro and edited to make our thriller unique and interesting. The music fits in with our thriller perfectly and creates an unsettling atmosphere through various different tones. We used a vast amount of ambient sound from the shoot day. This included sounds such as people’s footsteps, people talking, glasses and cutlery clinking on tables etc. This enhanced realism and as part of our diegetic sound we also used a drone as non diegetic sound. We researched other horror films and found that many used the drone sound in their soundtrack. Therefore my use of sound and knowledge of sound has developed as you can see there are many differences, between both the prelim task and main task.
I learnt how to master new technology in the programme final cut pro and final cut server. In final cut server we check in our thriller and check out. I learnt how to use special effects in final cut and how to cut all shots together in order to make the narrative effective. I learnt how to apply sound into our narrative.