MAIN Post 12.7: Question 7

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

During our preliminary task a lot of the time the camera angles were not always straight. This made the overall look of the film looks very amateur which was not a look of which I wanted. 






For this reason when I was filming the opening sequence of 'Contamination' for the main fast I made sure to use the spirt level on the tripod every time I moved the camera, although this was challenging because we was outside and the floor was very uneven.

In my preliminary task it was the first time I had used the rule of thirds and we was only just getting used to it. For this reason I sometimes broke the rule of thirds during our shot reverse shot conversation of the two characters talking.

During our main task I made sure I used the rule of thirds the whole time as this makes the shots look a lot better and focused on the character.

Another thing that we have improved upon form our preliminary task is the acting skills. In our preliminary task the actor looks at the camera when he is talking which takes away form the realism of the scene as it does not look like he is interacting with the other character.

However in our opening sequence of 'Contamination' the acting skills had been improved and in the dialogue the actor does not look at the camera. This adds the realism to the scene and gives a more professional look.   

In the main task I have improved a lot on my editing skills as well. This time i was more familiar with the basic techniques needed to used Adobe Premiere Pro so became more adventurous with the editing techniques of which I used. In the main task I added in different transitions such a dip to blacks and cross dissolves, changed the level of lighting and sound and also changed the speed of some clips. This helped to give the eery look to the opening sequence that I was looking for. 

MAIN Post 12.6: Question 6

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

Adobe Premiere Pro
This is the software we used in order to edit our Opening Sequence and was provided by the school. We used this software to capture, rough cut and then edit our footage. This allowed us to be able to delete shots the we did not like, for reasons such as them being out of focus or bad acting, and use the best possible footage we could. This software also allowed us to use transitions such as cross dissolves and dip to black's when going from a moving camera shot to a stationary camera shot. We also used Adobe Premiere Pro to add the typography and music over the top of our footage. 

Blogger
Blogger was the first form of technology that I used within my AS Coursework. I used it in order to create a blog page to showcase my work. Blogger allowed us to join different technologies together by uploading photos, videos from youtube and sound clips.

Flip Camera
Throughout my blog posts I have upload various videos, such as audience feedback and a focus group, the use of a flip camera allowed my to be able to upload videos of these things onto the blog post with ease and saved us time.

PowerPoint
Within my blog I used powerpoint to be able to convert documents that I made on other programmes such as Microsoft Word and convert them into a JPEG format without having to print them out and then scan them back onto the computer, i done this by saving the file in the 'JPEG file interchange' format. 

USB
Throughout my AS coursework using a UBS stick has been vital in order for our group to be able to transfer documents between each other and between school and home. It also allowed us to back up our work incase something happened to a computer and it was lost. 

freeplaymusic.com
This is the website we used during the post-production stage to get music to layer over our opening sequence and preliminary task. We used this website as all of the music on there is copyright free. 

youtube
YouTube has been essential throughout making our opening sequence. at the start it allowed us to research into existing opening sequences and see the conventions of them and during post-production it allowed us to upload our own videos to youtube to showcase our own opening sequence. 

PD150 Camera
This is the high definition camera that we used in order to create our opening sequence. This camera gave a high quality finish to out film and allowed us to be able to film outside without the wind being all that was heard in the audio. 

iPhone 4s
The use of smart phones allowed our group to be able to communicate with each other and our teacher whilst we were filming and also at home, this made us be able to make more of the decisions together so we were all happy with the outcome of the film. 

HP Scanner
The use of a scanner allowed me to be able to upload written work and drawings, such as the story board, onto our blog. This also allowed us to have a scanned copy of our written notes incase the original paper copy was lost or damaged. 

Computer Editing Suite
The editing suite which was available for us to use in the media room in school allowed us access the Adobe Premiere Pro. Without the used of an editing suite it would of been impossible for our group to be able to complete the practical element of the course.

MAIN Post 12.5: Question 5

How did you attract/address your audience?

MAIN Post 12.4: Question 4

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The target auduiance for our film is males and females aged 15-30. We came to this conclusuon after out box office anaylise and pre pridcution questionsaire showed that this age group is the most likley to watch an Action Adventure film. This research also showed that these are the people that go to the cinema the most, especially with their friends. Action Adventure films tend to have a male dominated audience but in order to attract a wider range of people to see our film we could add in a slightly romantic element, such as a romantic interest for Jacob, as this would then attract more females to watch the film. 

In order to gather more information about our target audience and gain a greater understanding of what type of person they would be I spoke to my friend, aged 17,  who enjoys similar films to 'Contamination'. 



Favourite Films: The Dark Knight, James Bond, Iron Man

Hobbies: Motorbiking, sports, being with friends

"My film taste has been influenced mainly by my friends and what films we can watch together, after watching the opening sequence to your film it seems like something I would enjoy and me and my friends could go to the cinema and watch it together"

MAIN Post 12.3: Question 3

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

The production company makes all of the decisions about a film from pre-production to post production, however, after the post production stage, small independent film companies normally pass the distribution process on to on of the big 6 Hollywood film studios in order for the film to make the biggest profit possible and get the most publicity. These film companies are Warner Brothers, Sony, Disney, Paramount, Fox and Universal. 

I think Universal would be a good institution to distribute our film as it is a big company which is well known although it would be difficult to get them too as they have a choice of so many films they could distribute. This means that it can work in synergy with other companies to get the most publicity possible as well as using convergence between different marketing strategies. Universal distributes a lot of Action Adventure films so 'Contamination' would fit in with this. Also they own Working Title Films as one of their subsidiary arms. This is a British film production company, like ours, that use Universal Pictures to distribute many of their films so this shows that Universal have experience in distubuting small British films and making them get a big profit such as, Les Miserables.

MAIN Post 12.2: Question 2

How does your media product represent particular social groups? 

MAIN Post 12.1: Question 1

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

Style/colour of font- In our opening sequence we used a Black font though out because of how it would fit in with the dark atmosphere we were trying to create, we added to this by using a slightly gothic font style. For the word 'Contamination' at the end we used a different font as it was the title of the film and we wanted it to stand out. 

However, some of our audience feedback said they did not like this.

Genre- We established genre though the fast paced editing of Jacob running thought the trees. We then added to this by the dramatic and eery music that we layered over the top.

Introduction of characters - we introduced the character by showing various clips of Jacob running in different directions, this shows that he is scared and the fact that he is the only character shown shows that he is alone. The first shot of Jacob that is seen in the opening sequence is a close up of his feet, this adds some mystery to who the character is. 

Camera - Throughout the opening sequence we use various shot sizes such as medium shots, long shots and close ups. We also use a POV shot with a moving camera so the audience is able to see form Jacobs perspective and sympathise with him. We could of build on this aspect more by adding in more close ups of Jacob's face.

Sound - There is only a small amount of dialogue in out opening sequence which involves Jacob shouting 'is there anybody out there?' which gives the audience a hint toward what the film is about. We also have some sound effects such as panting over the point of view shots as this shows Jacob to be out of breath. We decided we wanted there to a eery atmosphere the the opening sequence to was added a dramatic soundtrack over the top of the video. 

Editing & Special Effects- whilst we were editing we made the shots of Jacob running fast paced editing so they added tension the the film. We also used  special effects such as cross dissolves to fade in and out our typograhy which gave a quite mysterious effect which is good because the audience does not get know why Jacob is running, we also used a 'dip to black' transition to make a smoother transition form stationary camera shots to moving camera shots.  

Mise-en-scene - we used the woods as the setting for out opening sequence because it added to the action adventure genre, we didn't use any props except ones which were already in the setting, such as the tree trunk Jacob trips on. The lighting we used was just the natural lighting which is why it varies from shot to shot, this is something that could be improved upon. The costume and makeup that we used is very typical of a male of Jacobs age because of the bight colours he is wearing.