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. 

MAIN Post 12a: Evaluation - Audience Feedback

Part 1 - Audience feedback on rough cut.


We screened our rough cut to a group of 3 people from our target audience to see their opinions on our opening sequence so far, what they thought we should add in, take out or change and what they believed to be the strong points of it.

Here is the list of questions we asked them while getting their feedback.
-What were your initial thoughts after watching?
-What was the best part?
-What improvements would you suggest?
- Would you do anything differently?

We filmed their feedback



After we had received this feedback form our rough cut we summarised what had been said in this feedback video and what changes we needed to make in order to make our video the best it could be and impress our target audience. We decided to change around a few point of view shots so that they didn't go back on themselves, added in a dramatic but eery soundtrack over the top of the opening sequence and changed some transitions so the different shots flowed more smoothly into each other.

Part 2
After we had completed these changes we then screened out final copy to some more people from our target audience and got their opinions on their initial thoughts on 'Contamination'. We asked for positive and negative feedback so that we knew the strengths and weaknesses in our production, this will help us improved our coursework for next year and make sure we don't make the same mistakes.

Here are a list of questions we asked out target audience whilst getting their feedback on the final cut of 'Contamination'.

-What were your initial thoughts after watching?
-Where do you think the film would go from here?
-Would you do anything different?
-If so what would that be?
-Does this look like it would be and effective film?



After hearing the feedback from the target audience I would say that most of them managed to guess the main theme of the film and could defiantly tell the action adventure genre from it.

MAIN Post 11: Final Opening Sequence

Below is the final version of our opening sequence.

MAIN Post 10: Post-production

During post-production we used Adobe Premiere Pro to capture, cut and edit out footage into the correct order that we wanted. During the editing process we were unable to stick to the storyboard and shot list as we felt that the shots would be more effective in a different order. We also had to add some transitions in which we hadn't planned as it made the transitions of shots smoother when it moved from moving camera to stationary camera shots. 

During the post production process I noticed a continuity error, this is because in some shots Jacob's hood is up and sometimes it is down. This could have been prevented if we had payed more attention but it has taught me to pay more attention to the mise-en-scene next year when i film again. Below I have added a few screen shots of the editing process. 

While editing we realised we did not have many close ups of Jacobs face while he was running. This meant that it was harder to see his emotion and the audience can not identify that he is the protagonist in the film. To improve our film we could of added in a few shots like this whilst he was running or fallen over. 

MAIN Post 9: Production

As a group we decided that the best time to film was during the day because then we could use the natural lighting and this could give a good effect of it shining though the tree leaves. We had to go out filming a few times because of factors such as the weather, which was a disadvantage of filming outside, wrong equipment and poor planning, this meant that we missed some shots out and had to re-film them slough this wasn't too much of a problem and allowed us to have the highest quality footage we could instead of having to make do with what we already had. Below I have inserted a few photos that were taken of our group while setting up the equipment and filming on location.