Evaluation: Question Four

Research

In my research i used youtube a lot to compare different trailers, therefore i set up an account to manage all the trailers and make them easily accessible.

http://www.youtube.com/user/a2mediaskrilla?feature=mhum

This is also where we uploaded our animatic storyboard and final teaser trailer.

As a group we also used googlemail as a way of communication between us, and it also helped with contacting actors to arrange for filming.

We also used Facebook as a means of gaining audience feedback.

Planning

New media had a major impact on the planning stage as i used it for many different means. Using Google as my search engine i was able to find the available images for my props and costume designs. Google also came in useful when used to create our mock-up poster for our film. To further make the poster we used Photoshop CS3, which enables us to have full control over how our poster would take shape.

The fonts we used throughout the course were all taken from www.dafont.com, a free font database giving us many styles to choose from which was useful.

I was given the responsibility to make the animatic storyboard for our project, and i put this together using Final Cut, which is video editing software. This helped to key in our story and to link it with music. This gave us a realistic idea of how our trailer would pan out.

Linking with this i was also in charge of producing the music, and did this on Logic Pro. This was useful to do early, so we could use the music as a base for our trailer.

Once we had picked our location, we decided to do a location recce to see how the filming would pan out. The photographs were taken on a samsung tocco light, producing images of good enough quality to use. This gave us an idea of the surroundings for filming.

Construction

For the actual construction, new media types were used heavily for our filming and editing. We used two cameras, one borrowed from the college and the other from one of my friends. This enabled us to achieve different looks within our trailer. The cameras we used were the:

Sony A1E

Sony HVR-V1E

After the filming occurred, i uploaded from tape our filming, and converted and rasterized the video to work on the mac. I then joined it on final cut with our music track. Using final cut i was able to use transition effects to take it from one shot to another. I feel that my use of transitions in conjunction with the video work really well together. Here are some screen grabs of our work with the trailer:

Importing the music track onto our trailer.

Using different transition effects.

We also used two different DSLR cameras to produce the images for our final ancillary products. For the shoot in the studio we used Grace's Nikon D40x camera, which is renowned for better quality images inside, and we used Ellie's Cannon 450D for the outdoor shoots, because of the better equipment we had to use with this camera.

Nikon D40x

Cannon 450D

The magazine design was done by Ellie, with input and feedback from the rest of the group. She used Adobe Photoshop CS5 to make the designs, and started by creating a basic layout for the piece.

Poster

Magazine

she then began editing the photos and bringing them into Photoshop and into a layout we all felt was most aesthetically pleasing. Here are a few screen grabs of Ellie editing and layering our work:

Evalution

To analyse our work we created our audience feedback sheets on word, and scanned them in and uploaded them to blogger. This helped us to clearly see what aspects were needed for improvement, and what was good about each individual product.

Overall, the work we have created has been heavily influenced by new technology, and this has been showcased throughout the project. We also used blogger to consistently showcase our work.

Evaluation: Question one

I feel that our final product is a good representation of a professional one. we incorporated similar conventions, used in different films i have studied, and applied it to our own story. Upon studying these other media products i have been able to deduce what aesthetically works withing print media, such as the poster and the magazine. From the three trailers and posters that i studied in my initial research i found the reoccurring themes across all of the films. i found that in todays society, young people are attracted by people their age who can bend the rules. Across all of the films generalization and stereotyping are two massive factors that occur. This is taken account through the subtlety's like haircuts through to costume, posture and attitude. However simple changes can manipulate an audiences views on certain character. Through the use of current street fashion, we were able to make our actors look convincing, and everything down to their shoes was accounted for. This helped contribute to the overall success of how the film looked. The location was also a key example of how we planned to replicate the conventions of the films we studied. We decided to use an urban backdrop to act as a canvas for our all of the film and promotional purposes. We also looked into how modern society is shaping these changes within society. Gun crime is on the rise alongside drug crime, so therefore with that being prominent within the media we decided that was an attractive storyline for our film. Reality is the main thing we wanted to keep within our film. We wanted it to be exaggerative and more exciting than most of society, however we didn't want to lose the sense of realism, making it a hard hitting drama.

Breakdown of ancillary products:

Poster

Magazine Cover

Skrilla teaser trailer

The music within the trailer is really important, and coincides nicely with the research work i did at the start of the product. following my research from shank i really like how the bass in the song "dropped" as the action intensified within the trailer, therefore i wanted to recreate this technique within our project. Me and a friend created a song that would fit with the theme of our film and audience. across the other trailers they use Dubstep as their soundtrack so straight away we started to create something within that genre of music. Then through my own knowledge of the music we developed a final piece that incorporates everything the film is about.

when i was editing the trailer i decided that to add maximum impact to the opening of the teaser i needed to incorporate the main themes within the film as quick as possible. The opening of the trailer shows Skrilla cut into cocaine, immediately making the audience aware of the sort of film Skrilla is about. it also puts the audience onto the back foot, because most trailers do not have this sort of opening.

I also decided that the other main theme was about gun crime, so therefore i included the shot of George looking in the mirror with a gun.

This is important because it shows the character, showing some of the characters personality. it also uses the same sort of shot as in AdULTHOOD:

This shows how we used our research to replicate themes in which we used in our final product.

throughout the project i feel i have developed my skills to a high level. I enjoyed working in a group alongside working on my own. My creative side was harnessed when i was put in charge of doing the directing and all of the editing of the trailer. This was an outlet i hadn't discovered before and i was able to teach myself a lot of skills within final cut, a piece of software i hadn't used before. Given more time and planning, i feel we could have developed our trailer further adding more shots at a quicker pace to add the sense of action. Also i would also change the way that trailer follows a narrative, it both works and doesn't at the same time. It works because it shows what a day is like for these people however, it replicates a short narrative as the story is shown evidently throughout the trailer. As for the ancillary products we produced i feel they were a success, with more time i would have worked into more detail with the typography, and i would have like to have used a more urban location. With better time management we could have achieved more, however we often had to work around time periods where everyone was available to do the work.

Evaluation: Question Two

I looked into Sin City for cross media advertising. They did it really effectively and this was through their continuity. the fonts, colours, lighting, and effects where the same across all three and that what something i was keen to implement on my own work. On our project we used the same font and colors on everything, which became a logo for the film, making that font instantly recognizable with our film. Also the protagonist is the main feature on the poster magazine cover. So therefore it pushes the actor at the audience, and his pre-determined audience will also bring a certain audience from previous work. This continuity helps the audience to link all three together and helps to make it more memorable, therefore starting a buzz around the film.

this is the font we chose. we chose it for its edgy and slightly urban look, because it fits the genre and will be seen as attractive to our target audience. there was no point using decor typography or anything to graphic heavy because it would detract attention from the main subject which would not be effective. We wanted to look into using a graffiti font, however they were often quite difficult to read and we wanted people to be able to catch a glimpse and be able to see what the film was about, and i feel that it is effective through this font. We came to this conclusion from looking at the the other posters and they all have similar fonts.

This is our cross media campaign. It is effective and links across all the media. However 1 issue is that in the poster it uses the word "one" instead of the number. Therefore it lacks continuity however, with time to improve this would have been changed.

overall i think that it is effective referencing across different media types, and by comparing them it is easy to see that they are from the same. the use of the protagonist as the central character for all three products also shows the effectiveness.

Evaluation: Question Three

Collectively as a group we decided that hosting our questionnaire upon the social networking site Facebook would be a convenient way of getting a wide audience to give us information. This also helped us to recognize whether or not we had reached our target audience, and to see if there was a secondary audience that liked the genre.

We also asked people for feedback on our three products to see what response we would get and to understand whether we were successful or not at creating them. we handed out one feedback sheet for each product.

Magazine Feedback:

The feedback we got on the magazine seemed positive. The majority of people would read the article and few said they wouldn't read it. From this we can take that it is aesthetically pleasing to our target audience. however through their comments i feel that there should have been more text and brighter colors on the front cover to draw readers in.

Film Poster

From this i can see the majority said that the poster was eye catching and suited the theme well. however people again wanted more graphics. If we had included more graphics we would have been going against the research we did and so played safe and replicated the style from these. Everyone said that they understood what category and genre the film fitted into through the poster. Also the majority said that they would go and see the film from seeing the poster.

Teaser Trailer

Finally, i have drawn the conclusion that the trailer was a great success. Only four people said that after they saw the trailer they would not want to see the film. however there has been a consistent four across the board that would not want to see the film and this is understandable because it is such a niche genre. I am pleased that they could see the genre through the trailer because this shows that my research was effective and helped me to develop a product that people would like to see.

Through my research i have found that all of our products were effective, and drummed up interest surrounding the film. The lack of comments for improvement gave me confidence, however i feel that if i could redo the work then a i would adhere to comments made, and hopefully create something that everyone liked.

Audience Feedback

As a group we got some audience feedback on our work by asking 15 people what they thought of our teaser trailer, film poster and magazine cover. The 15 people consisted of actual target audience and also people who did not fit into that category. we the asked them a series of questions to help determine their true opinion on our product, and whether they deemed it as successful. This feedback would enable us to be able to analyze our work from a different perspective.

To further this feedback we decided as a group to record what people thought about our products, and felt it would give us a more detailed response as to what worked. we recorded these on grace and ellies phones and uploaded them to audioboo:

http://boos.audioboo.fm/attachments/998443/Recording.mp3?audio_clip_id=301109

http://audioboo.fm/boos/301354-leah

http://audioboo.fm/boos/301359-liz

http://audioboo.fm/boos/301361-greg2

http://audioboo.fm/boos/301363-jenny

http://audioboo.fm/boos/301921-laura-products

http://audioboo.fm/boos/301922-cyrus-products

http://audioboo.fm/boos/301932-melody-products

http://audioboo.fm/boos/301934-luke-products

From the feedback we got from the interviews we found Melody's (8th on the audio list) to be one of the most interesting because unlike the feedback we had collected from the questionnaires and other interviews she questioned our film poster and the lack of information given. At 0.25 she said she 'wasn't sure what it was about..whether it was a gang?' which gives us the impression that the genre is clear and that our poster has got her asking questions but it is not as clear as we perhaps thought. Greg was one of the interviewees that fits into our target audience profile and the feedback he gave us was positive with constructive criticism on the choice of colour on the magazine front cover and the positioning of our tagline on the film poster. Overall we are pleased with the feedback and believe we have used the codes and conventions successfully to gain the interest of our target audience and as some of the interviews show we have also targeted at an accidental audience too.

Ancillary product - Magazine Cover

ancillary product - magazine