Monday, 23 April 2012

Evaluation

Evaluation
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge conventions of real media products?
Our romantic comedy develops and challenges conventions in a diverse range of ways. We developed conventions more than when we challenge them. Firstly we used up beat music, ‘something for the weekend,’ that it shows the conventions of a romantic comedy because upbeat music is used in all romantic comedies. Whereas in the in other genres like horror they use instrumentals with a deep pitch and a slow tempo, with no vocals. Whereas in romantic comedies use hip-hop songs with vocals. The titles that we have used in our romantic comedy are fluffy and bubbly resembling the conventions of a romantic comedy. The colours that we have used on our titles are blue which shows the contrast of a boy and pink which shows the contrast of a girl, which is developing the conventions of a romantic comedy. We have used two main characters of the opposite gender and two major characters of the opposite gender. The two girls are best friends, and the two boys are best friends. The two main characters in our romantic comedy are appropriate to the convention because we have used opposite genders that are at the same kind of age. But at the same time we may have challenged this because we have used teens. Normally middle aged characters are typically used in this genre for the main characters.  The main characters that are in our rom com are Caucasian, which is showing the conventions because generally black characters are not shown as a main character in a romantic comedy. The major characters we chose to have in our opening scenes are also of the opposite gender. The best friends of the two main characters hate one another; this is where the comedy aspect comes from. Whereas with the main characters this shows where the romantic side comes from, this is a very predictable way of showing this because it happens in most romantic comedies. The two main characters show the contrast between the two major characters in the way that the main characters show cleanliness and are sophisticated, this is shown by the way that harry the main boy character is having a wash. And the major characters are much dirtier this is shown by bug the major character is on the toilet. This is also shown between the girls. Kate is straightening her hair which shows she is caring about her appearance, whereas Tina is on her phone chewing gum not looking very interested in going out. The studio logo that we have at the begging of our opening to our film is very bright and stands out. We used the clouds in the background of our studio logo because this is common for a studio that makes many Romanic comedies like ‘Dream works’ it makes it look very dream like.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Our romantic comedy represents a few different social groups, including class, age and gender. Our two main characters in our romantic comedy are very sophisticated and have good careers ahead of them. This is a very stereotypical view of what the two main characters should be like in a romantic comedy, it’s conventional to have the main characters to be in a good career path, normally doctors or lawyers. Whereas our characters are at university which is unconventional due to the characters ‘Kate’ and ‘harry’ do not already have a desirable career that people will look up to and respect them for having. The age of the characters in our romantic comedy is unconventional to the stereotypical romantic comedy; this is because our main and major characters are around the ages of eighteen and nineteen, whereas the ages are generally middle aged, there has been romantic comedies where the main and major characters are of an older generation. The class is easily shown in or romantic comedy. It shows that the two main characters ‘Harry’ and ‘Kate’ are slightly higher class contrasting against the major characters are lower class ‘Bug’, and ‘Tina.’ This is shown because of the way that Tina and Bug are both not very highly educated and are stereotypical eighteen year olds.  There all in social class as in bracket E, this is because there all studying for a profession and a career to go into. Except bug who is working class, because he is a full time bin man. Harry and Kate are slightly shown as to be upper class comparing to Tina and bug, because they are at university, and they are much cleaner, (this is shown in the getting ready scene) and there mannerisms are humble and not argumentative to one another, they both come across shy and timed compared to the major actors for the reason that, they’re very loud and disruptive, and in parts a bit crude, because of the jokes that are said, but that shows the comedy aspect of our romantic comedy.  The culture that is shown in a romantic comedy are conventionally are Caucasian and not of another race. There are never and black or Asian main characters in a romantic comedy so we went with the stereotypical view and used Caucasian characters, we could have been unconventional and used black characters to challenge this view. The way that we have used gender in our romantic comedy is very typical of a conventional romantic comedy. This is because of the way we have used one male and one female for the main characters and then the major characters we have used on male and one female. This is conventional because of the romance between the two main characters or even the two main characters. We could have challenged this convention by using two females or two males, for the romance part of our romantic comedy. The characters as a whole are all different, for instance the main character Kate, is a brunette and generally the main female character is normally blonde. Tina is a stereotype of a girl of her age who goes to college; she comes across a bit of a tart. When Bug is sitting on the toilet makes him seem crude and comes across simple. Harry comes across hygienic because he is having a wash in the mirror whilst talking to Bug.
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
Our romantic comedy, ‘Something for the Weekend’ would be distributed by working title films. We think this would be appropriate and yet the perfect institution for our romantic comedy. We think this because it is a British film institute, and our film is stereotypically an English romantic comedy, because it’s set in England and everyone has English accents. They also make films which are similar to our romantic comedy, for instance ‘Wild Child’ this is a “chick flick” that has been produced and distributed by working title films, and the main character is a teenager and it’s about romance and also has some funny aspects to it. Our film could potentially be made by these because they make similar films, and most of them are romantic comedy and are English based. They make some of the bestselling romantic comedies of all time. For instance they have made ‘Bridget jones diaries’  ‘love actually’ ‘about a boy’ ‘Notting hill’ ‘defiantly maybe’ and many more. They all have been big hits at cinemas. They all use one male and one female for the main characters. The main male figure in the films is normally ‘tall, dark and handsome’ this is normally, Hugh Grant. Whereas we have used someone who looks similar, this is because we want it to be stereotypical and have a conventional romantic comedy but in some parts change it a bit to become unconventional, so it’s a mix of the two.  The females who are normally main characters in romantic comedies are blonde and skinny. We challenged this convention because we have used a brunette. RenĂ©e Zellweger is a stereotypical actress from romantic comedies, mainly for Bridget Jones diaries, and this is because of the way she looks, also the personality she has in the films, she’s blonde and small this is a stereotypical      view. But there are some actors like Jenifer Anderson who do in fact have brown hair and is unconventional of an actor for a romantic comedy. The character that we have, who plays the main female role in our romantic comedy is a brunette which is unconventional, in some ways.
Who would be the audience for your media product?
We feel that the audience for our romantic comedy would be a wide range of ages. We have put a certificate of the age 12A on our film. This is because of some of the sexual innuendos that are said within the film. We have tried to make it so that all ages will find bits funny. So everyone will enjoy watching our romantic comedy. But our main age range for our film will be sixteen plus. We think this because people of this age will want to go to the movies and watch a romantic comedy with their boyfriend or girlfriend or even wife or husband. So the age that we will be looking for the audience will be sixteen plus. The gender that will interested and attracted to our film will be females because they’re more prone to watching, so called “chic flicks.” This is a stereotypical view of more females will want to watch it because it has romance and more women like a love story than males. Males normally like to watch thriller or action, because that’s the way people are brought up. The class of people who will be watching this will be mainly middle class, working class people, and even students. This is because of the characters and the humour that we have used in our romantic comedy and it will relate to the audience more because the character that is in the film is from that social class.  We have tried to make our romantic comedy enjoyable for any ethnic background to watch along as they can talk or understand English. The social grade of our romantic comedy would be mainly C, D, and E this is because these are working class people and students who will be interested and attracted to watching our film.
How did you attract and address your audience
We attracted and addressed the audience of our romantic comedy in many different ways. The first way was the characters that we used. The two main characters that we have used are very stereotypically what anyone would see as the main character in a romantic comedy, they are both around the same age, going down the same career path, there also both good looking and people that you would like to find in a romantic comedy. From the begging of the movie you can see that the two main characters are going to fall in love. Whereas the two major characters bring the comedy side to the romantic comedy this is shown in many different ways. The first way that we see the comedy aspect coming through is when harry walks into the bathroom and bug is sitting there on the toilet and the facial expressions that he pulls immediately make the audience see the humour. The other ways that it’s conveyed is the dialogue used. In some parts sexual innuendoes have been made but they have been made so not everyone for instance the younger generation will get so it won’t be seen upon them. But things like the comedy aspects will attract people to come and see it because its humours and will make people laugh. I think that the titles that we have used in our romantic comedy will show people straight away what kind of film this will be, the bubbly text will help people see straight away so people who like romantic comedies will be attracted to the movie. The contrast between the colours of the text are blue and pink which instantly shows the contrast between boys and girls within the movie and is conventional to the type of the genre of my film. The story line of the film will hopefully attract and show the audience what the film may bring later on, the story line shows a boy and a girl who went to school together, then they bump into each other at the train station, and the two major characters seem to like one another, and the two main characters dislike each other. Then it shows the two major characters asking each other to hang out together for that night. The music that we have used in our opening scenes, are very upbeat and happy songs. We chose to have something for the weekend, because it’s a song which matches the title of the film so they link together perfectly. Then the next song that we have on the film is a town called malice, which is very upbeat and makes the scene seem energetic and full of life. It makes the audience feel the excitement and makes you want to sing along whist this scene is being shown. But when speech comes into the song goes much quitter so you can hear the actors speaking. We would advertise our romantic comedy using many different techniques. Here are some of them. The first way we would use traditional ways of marketing, for instance magazine adverts, showing the characters and a bit about the film, along with newspaper articles. Then we would have interviews on chat shows where the actors would go to promote our film. We would also have trailers of the romantic comedy in cinemas so people can see a little insight of the film. We would also have a big premier (red carpet event) to get it the public eye. We would also use viral marketing, here we would send out little snap shots of filming, and then we would send out loads of different trailers showing different parts of the movie. This will all try and get people focused on the film and try and attract a wider audience for our romantic comedy.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
In this project I have learnt a lot about technology from the process of making my final product which is the start of a romantic comedy. I have now had a lot of time to play around with the Sony HD touchscreen cameras, so I have learnt to use it to the best of my ability, and getting the best shots using this camera. The first time I got to use the cameras was at the start of the year; this is when we did the preliminary task. This is when we had to make a short film using a match on action shot and the 180 degree rule. This went bad because the first time I used the camera when I thought it was recording it would stop recording, and when I thought that I had stopped recording it started. So I ended up with a load of footage that was no use to anyone, me or my group. This meant that we had to start all over again and re-record. But I had learnt from this mistake, and I know that I’ll never make this mistake happen again because I know the consequences.  After this I made sure when I was making the romantic comedy me being the director I had to make sure that everything was going to plan and working right. I didn’t want to make that mistake again. I also learnt how to use Adobe premiere pro, I have used it before but never really got to make an actual opening of a film. This meant that I did have some past experience using the programme so it wasn’t starting from scratch. But I did learn how to do some things like how to make the titles move on the screen. This meant I could make an effective studio logo with animation. I also learnt how to zoom in on some shots because when recording, they were a little bit too far away. I also learnt how to make songs get quitter when someone is speaking so the speech is clear this was key to our opening sequence because we needed to add a little bit of energy and make It more attracted to the film. I also think that I have learnt to make the cuts between the different camera angels are seamless and you can’t tell when it’s been cut one from one scene to another. Also I have learnt a lot from using things such as BlogSpot, which allowed me to do all of my work on and present it as well as I could.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
I feel that since the preliminary task I have learnt a lot about how to do many things when creating a production and all the hard work that has to be put into them. I feel that I have improved my editing skills because I feel that our romantic comedy runs through very smoothly and that all the camera angles are shown as well as they could be. From the preliminary task we had changed a lot mainly when filming because, when I was filming I tried to stick to the story board as much as I can, but when filming I realised that I needed to change and tweak a few things, because some of the shots didn’t look right. Especially in scene three when the characters bump into each other I feel that it was a good decision to make because some parts did need changing. The way I looked at making this production I did focus on the camera angles more and more, to make sure for each shot that we used was the best we could do as a group. I feel that from the preliminary task working as a group did mean a lot. We all got on throughout the production this was a good thing because we needed to make sure that the group was all fine and had no problems. If any of the group did have a problem or thought something needed to be changed on the production, we would sit down and have a talk about it, and then resolve it to the best of our ability. As a whole I think our group worked very well. This was because Ryan was good at the idea making, like what the story line would be and he was the main person making the script, this is because we played to our advantages because he had took drama and does a lot of script writing. Then I and jasmine was a lot more technical, I was good at using different camera angles and seeing if it needed to be changed. And jasmine was good at all of the writing that needed to be done, also she was good at telling the actors what they needed to do and when they needed to do it. I was also the main editor because I have had a little bit of past experience because I had done Creative and media at Torc.  Also from the preliminary task I had learnt a lot of making a production overall because of all the work that needs to be put into it. the main things that I had learnt from this task was the 180 degree rule, this made me realise and when filming that I couldn’t break this rule at all, which improved our romantic comedy, because if we didn’t know this it wouldn’t make a lot of sense. Also the match on action shot helped in our final product because passing something does normally happed on a movie so it was good that we learnt how to do this. As well as the eyeliner needs to be at the right high.

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