Media Studies A2

4. How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Without the media technoligy that we used our film would not be made to its highest standard, without any technoligy the film would also not be able to compete with other films with a similar genre.

One key piece of technoligy that we used was the computer, we could use the internet for research and use youtube to watch similar films to our own, we also used youtube frequently to import files to and from our computer. On the internet we could also use other programmes which helped enhanceour blogssuch as 'Prezzi'. Without the computer we would not have been able to show our progress on 'Blogger' which showed all of our research and planning in making te film. The computer also came with programmes such as 'premier pro' and 'photoshop'
which were key programmes when making the film and ancillary tasks. To communicate with eachother via computers we used email, which is a very quick and simple way of sharing information with the rest of the group.

When searching for other films similar to our genre we used google search, google search gave us the highest rated information about the horror genres and related films. Youtube was used to get inspiration from other phcological horrors e.g. we watched the trailer for the film 'Pi' on youtube which helped us with a few shots within our film. We also used a website called freesound.com which we used for all the sound effects e.g. the screem when the man in the mask is revealed.

During the filming ad editing procces we used adobe premier pro, this programme was perfect for editing as it let us put in the required effects to show our characters mood and state of mind. It the main proggramme for our film and without it we would have found it very hard to put all of the shots together. Premier pro also let us put in titles and headings which was usefull for our final peice. Adobe photosop was very usefull to for the making of our ancillary tasks (poster,magazine review) as we could create different colours and layouts to show the genre and meaning of the film. For the filming progress we used a standard digital slr camera and tripod which we obliously used to film the final product. The slr camera was very easy to use and the footage was easily transfered on to the computer via a memory stick.

For the evalution stage ofour project we used proggramms on the internet such as 'prezzi' and 'vokki'. Prezzi is a service which liks texts, youtube videos and images together to make your evaluation look more interesting as their are many features to play around with e.g. background colour. Vokki is a funny service in which you type what you want the on-screen cartoon to say and they will voice it out for you,it makes you blog look that bit more exiting instead of using just text all of the time.

Overall using technoligies witin your project is very important, in the making and planning of the film and to show your proggress in a tidy and fun way. ]

3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

After creating our film we have received lots of audience feedback to see if it achieved what we set out for it to do. most of the feedback is on a positive not and contains valuable criticism to help us see the Film from the audiences perspective. Some of the feedback is from a director that our media course teacher has been in touch with. This gives us a perspective of someone that is a professional film maker as well as our target audience.

"The camera work, acting, directing in general. Kept me watching. 95% of shorts dont!I will plug it out there a few times tomorrow, Took a note to do that. :) "

"If uneasy, disorientation and sudden fright were goals, then, mission accomplished, I say. Nice editing, sound placement, believable acting, nothing seemed to lag.

Pretty impressive work!

The only thing that stood out, was that the film seems to have been flipped horizontally in one shot as the steering wheel appears on the wrong side. "

"really un-settling, the audio works to stellar effect w/ the minimalist'ish vid... bravo sir, bravo!!!"

"Really nice work from your students there, Andy, I liked the use of sound especially.
I agree with klawful about the final image being unnecessary - better to leave things on the black screen I reckon."

"Truly impressive stuff. In my day teenagers made films about playing football and getting off with girls, not sure what's up with the youth of today!

I kind of agree with the comments about the last shot, but having said that it is a great shot, and sometimes it isn't a bad thing to give closure. I think it's been in vogue a lot in recent years (or maybe just films I tend to want to watch) where dour endings, or loose end endings have been flavor if the month. Sometimes I just want to be uplifted at the end of a film goddamit!!

I hasten to add I was in no way uplifted by this film though!"

"It is indeed impressive work. The kids did really, really well! And yes, it's really nice to hear the attention paid to the audio... it's so often relegated as an afterthought or secondary element. I do also agree with Klawful that the final scene is unnecessary.

Top work."

"This is really very, very good dude. My 7 years teaching at an FE music college meant I had to be encouraging to people a lot less talented (relatively) than it seems your students are. Massive kudos to them.

I had expected the significance of the number to be explained in some way, and it was nice that it wasn't that literal - leaving an empty feeling, similar to psychological disorders, so quite evocative as a piece. Well done to them.

I know that it's always important to get some critique back to students though so here's a couple of criticisms if I HAD to have some:

1 - Those gasmasks are very 'done' as a prop, and a little too trendy if you know what I mean. I've seen them so much that they're less freaky to me now if that makes sense. Something a bit 'quieter' would have been more edgy in my opinion.

2 - The choice of Radiohead was nice but that Portishead tune, although extremely appropriate, is also very over used. Almost anything else would have been better simply for the sake of originality.

The main themes from the feedback are mainly positive with people liking the editing and the sound. All the feedback is extremely valuable as it also contains criticisms that we can learn from. Getting audience feedback has been helped us see the film for what it is as a final product as opposed to what we have created through shooting and editing. We have both watched the film so many times in the creation process that it is harder for us to gage what works and what doesn't. Im happy with the feedback we have received as it has helped us analyse the film.

All of the feedback above has been received after we made the film, however we also received feedback for the film during the process too. This was important to us as we wanted to get a feel for what people thought of the film before we finished it to give us some improvements etc. We showed a 3 min roughly edited section from the film and showed it to our media class consisting of around 25 people aged between 17-18 in a focus group style. We gained lots of feedback about what people liked and didn't like about the film. For example their was lots of criticism of the sound not quite fitting the images and therefore we were able to change and polish it before the final edit. There was also different opinions about shot sequences which we were then able change due to the feedback and to try and create a more seamless piece of work. Receiving feedback during the creation of the film meant we were able to make the film you see today and was a vital part of our creation.