Final Evaluation

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

Our film has stuck to generic conventions held about Gangster films, people can tell our film is a gangster film from some of the iconography we have included. The audience can tell straight away the genre of our film as our first shot shows the main characters in suits (Black trousers, shirts and tie) which are commonly linked with gangster films. A good example been Reservoir Dogs where the main characters all wear suits giving the audience the impression they are an organized gang.

Other gangster conventions we include is the sleazy, urban poker game that doesn’t look totally legal, then we have old style guns and cars in a modern setting these often feature in classic gangster films.
One thing we do differently to most conventional gangster films is that we have a first person narrative where the character Joe Porello introduces the characters then as it gets to him he talks directly to the camera. Apart from the film Goodfellas (link below) this isn't common in gangster film so using this challenged some of the common conventions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ2RofOEAEU

The conventions we have used indicate some of the films that have influenced us and our work. The costume been suits is very much like Reservoir Dogs like the pictures above show. Also the edited screenshots of our main characters showing the characters face and telling the audience their name is similar to the screenshots used in the opening sequence of Snatch.

Our opening sequence is very similar to the opening sequence of Snatch as they both use a narrator and the screenshots of the characters, Snatch was a big influence on our film and that is portrayed in our film. The opening title sequence to Snatch can be seen in the link below. You’ll notice the character screenshots coming up is very similar to the way ours comes up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlMtolxdcEE

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?
The characters in our film are aged between young males and it doesn’t have any women in. We do use a stereotype of gender they are very powerful males, we also use a stereotypes of gangster, and they are dressed like stereotypical gangsters. Another stereotype of gangster films is that they contain a hierarchy of dominance as a character builds up his power only to have it taken away from him. In our film this is Chad Dawson as he looks like he is going to win he ends up losing everything. This is a common theme in gangster films.
The characters in our film reflect our target audience, we have a target audience of young males aged 18 to 30 very much like our characters. This gives our audience characters they can relate to as they are also more aware of gang culture.

Our characters above are very similar to those in Snatch (shown left) as each character has there own purpose and each one has a different background behind them. The screenshots used tell the audience who they are and that they are going to be the main characters.

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

If our film was to be produced it wouldn’t be a big Hollywood blockbuster however it wouldn’t be a small budget film. It would have a moderately large release because it is a popular genre of film and uses some very original ideas which make it more unique than other films. After doing research into distributors we decided a good company would be Metrodome Distribution who distributes smaller budgeted films to cinema and DVD although they have distributed some cult films such as Chopper. We would look at having a moderately large cinema release although the style of our film (black and white with colour in graphics) may also appeal to the art house audience, much like Snatch and lock stock and two smoking barrels did.

As our film is for an adult audience and contains a lot of language and violence there isn’t really an opportunity for merchandising unless we looked at gambling side with cards and suits etc. However the classy style suits, and gambling theme would be good to use as advertising for the film. As it is aimed at young males it could be advertised in men’s magazines and also have cinema and tv trailers

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?
We carried out a lot of research to find out our target audience, the questionnaire was most useful at this. We decided our target audience was males aged 18 to 30 much like the characters in the film. Similar films such as Goodfellas, Snatch and Reservoir Dogs have an 18 age certificate rating the same as ours, and the audience is very similar. These films have also gained a cult following as they have been so popular so our film may appeal to that kind of audience as well.
After looking on the BBFC website we resolved that our film would be classified as 18 as it contains strong language, violence, drugs and sex references. As well as a criminal theme that could be seen to promote crime and gambling. Giving our film this certificate means that we are aiming at the adult audience and males aged 18 to 30 are likely to watch our film and similar films, we also found that they are less likely to be offended by any of the content we have said we would include.
Here is a link to the BBFC website that includes the different types of film classification:

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

We attracted our audience by doing something that isn’t common in all films and making ours more unique. The use of the stylish titles for character screenshots is different and eye catching to the audience. Also the use of black and white with the colour of the images makes it different and more original. The target audience of young adult males are used to watching this genre of film so this gives a different and new style to the genre.

We used a lot of shots that we hoped would include the audience and make them feel more involved in the storyline. A good example of this is the garage scene where they are playing poker. In this we use a lot of point of view shots to put the audience in the point of view of the man looking across at the other character.

We are put into the point of view of both Ricky Sykes and Chad Dawson. This helps to build up the tension as both characters keep putting in chips.

In the same part we also use close ups to give an impression to the audience, we give close ups of Chad Dawson's cards and then a tilting extreme close up of his face where we see a slight smirk. This leads the audience to think that Chad is going to win but in the end this is not actually the case.
Using these different types of shots gives the audience a different perspective and involves them into the film.

6. What have you learnt about technology from the process of constructing the product?
The camera we used was a HDV-1000 video camera which gave us a much better high quality picture, allowing us to film in HD and widescreen. There is a much better zoom feature than with previous cameras we have used, giving us 20x optical zoom, we also had more control, you can use auto and manual focus which allowed us to do pulling focus. The on ly disadvantages are the sound recording is on the camera so this isn't good for distant sound however this didn't affect us because we recorded our sound separately.

One problem that we did encounter whilst recording was bouncing focus, where the camera would keep going in and out of focus, this was due to the colour and the background of some objects been too close to the camera, This could be resolved by doing the shots in manual focus however we altered the shot slightly so that this problem didn't happen.

The camera really enhanced our film as we have got to shoot a much better quality film, another thing that enhanced our film was using the flash recorder (or zoom recorder) which allowed us to record sound separately and match it up with the video in the editing process. Recording sound separately meant that speech didn't have to be right up close to the camera to be picked up and also reduced the risk of getting background sound such as wind. This was also good for recording our narration separately for each character.

For the editing process we were able to use a more advanced kind of software than we had used p reviously and used Final Cut Pro. This was quite easy to get used to and gave us more features we could do with our film. To start with we just imported all the clips we had, gave the ones we wanted to use names and then created a rough edit. this made it easier to alter bits and make it perfect. This software allowed many effects such as colour correction and sound bridges as sound and video were separate. It also allowed us to import files such as the music we used as a soundtrack and images from photoshop for the character screenshots. Photoshop is good for image editing and allowed us to create professional looking screenshots that you would see in a film such as this.

7.Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
Here is a link to our preliminary exercise:

http://www.youtube.com/watch#%21v=khliel9iOnk&feature=related

When we were given this task we had to put a lot of work into the planning stage, we all came up with film ideas and eventually decided on a gangster film. From this we were able to research into the genre and find out about the iconography and conventions of gangster films. Things such as suits, organized violence, gambling and crime were common themes and features of the genre. We all analysed a film each that we thought was similar to our film and gave us inspiration and ideas of shots we could use. Then we had to plan our filming, we came up with a storyboard of what we wanted our film to look like and a shot list of all the shots we wanted to include. This meant that on the day we came to film we were prepared and organized and we didn't have any problems. We filmed some shots that weren't used in the final cut but it was better to film to o much rather than not enough.In this project during filming we have used a lot wider variety of shots than we have before, such as establishing shots for the setting, match on action shots to show specific actions and point of view shots to involve the audience. We have also experimented with using slow zooms and tilts which helped to add more of a range of shots. Overall I think because we have become a lot more confident with the equipment it gave us the confidence to experiment with our film by including these shots and also by doing something original with the black and white effect.

Comparing this project to our preliminary task I am a lot happier with this project, I feel we have produced something that is a lot better quality and flows a lot smoother, this is due to more experience and much better equipment to work with.
Overall I feel we have been very successful at fulfilling the task of producing a 2 minute opening sequence to a film, I feel the ending opens it on for the rest of the film and after posting the video on Youtube (link below) and Facebook we have had a lot of positive feedback from people who have watched it they have all seemed to enjoy it and wanted to see the rest of the film. We got some people around our target audience age to view our video and give feedback, we recorded this using a webcam and some of the comments they gave were:

• Good stylistic editting.
• Liked the black and white feel with the colour of the titles.
• Liked costumes, shirt and tie.
• Good story.
• Props and setting very good.
• Good music
• Very much like gangster films such as Snatch. Guy Ritchie feel.

They gave us a lot of positive feedback and the target audience feedback video can be seen below:

Overall I am incredibly pleased with the project and the two minute introduction we have produced, I am pleased that we have achieved everything we aimed for and after hearing the feedback from our target audience I am convinced we have produced a film that meets the criteria of a modern gangster film. I feel we have produced something better than I could have imagined it to look so I am very pleased with the project, I am really looking forward to carrying this on in A2.

Here it is our final finished two minute introduction. What Goes Around...

Final Evaluation

1. In what way does your media produce use, development or challenge forms and conventions of media products?

Our film undoubtedly incorporates generic conventions based around Gangster films. Iconography such as guns, gambling, cars and vast amounts of money, all reflect similarities typical to this genre; for instance Guy Ritchie’s ‘Reservoir Dogs’ or Quentin Tarantino’s ‘Snatch’. Other similar aspects such as the narrative voiceover (similar to that in Goodfellas), the identifiable urban environment, and the distinctive character profiles (i.e. clothing, body language and verbal language) are all recognised uses of conventions within this genre. Our film developed and challenged these conventions by reintroducing the black and white video, and allowing the main character to address the camera/audience directly, techniques which have long been outdated, and additionally by introducing unique and original ideas into it by using a non-linear narrative and having an omniscient main character.

Our use of conventions indicates what other films have influenced our work. For instance, we have adapted opening title character images and used small amounts of dialogue, similar to Snatch, as well as utilizing connotative introduction music and clothing from reservoir dogs.










2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our media product represented males, primarily around 17-20 years of age. I feel this does not necessarily represent that particular group in a stereotypical way. For instance, they possess guns; they’re formally dressed and are involved with large amounts of money and obvious violence/crime. I think the video portrays an obvious hierarchy of dominance, allowing particular characters included in the screening to have supremacy over the other characters, which is certainly a typical feature from this genre. I feel this links to our target audience as the characters involved in the production are of similar age to our target audience, are all male, and (which may seem slightly stereotypical…), could perhaps relate to the alcohol, cars and card games that are included.








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

Based upon our distributor research, we have very clear prospects of what would be the ideal media institution would be best suited to distribute our product. Our treatment and research suggest that our budget for the film would be incredibly low; consider the urban-thriller ‘Shifty’ by Eran Creevy. It was produced, and then distributed by Metrodome Distribution for only £100,000. Metrodome Distribution specialises in low budget films, and favours new and upcoming British directors and producers.

(click here to be taken to Metrodome Distribution's website)



Due to the popularity of this growing genre, we feel that our movie (if produced fully) would be best suited in a Cinema to maximise awareness and profitability. Films that have been released in this genre (Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels for instance) have had enormous success whilst at the cinema, and it is certainly possible for a low budget film like ours (As Metrodome Distribution put Shifty onto the big screen!) Again, due to our broad range of target audience, there are infinite ways in which the film can be promoted and marketed, some of which were researched involved Men’s Magazines (Maxim/FHM), Men’s Websites (Askmen.com, Maximonline.com… utilizing interviews, trailers, advertisements…), and more obscure yet adventurous methods such as Casinos/Men’s TV, as we would share similar target audiences.



Due to the stereotypical attraction that our target audience may have to props that we included in our film, franchising and merchandising may certainly be an option.
(click here for prop list), for example marketing and promoting our own playing cards, poker chips, sunglasses and formal suits




4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

Considering the age and gender of our target audience, it is easy to associate the narrative and the style of the film with them. Whilst the narrative of our production has been softened for the introduction (obviously due to exam regulations), it is obvious that, considering our target audience, they would be able to relate to the language used and how it was delivered via the film. The style of the film would (and does), include references to crime, violence, money and drugs, which is certainly characteristic of this film genre (take for instance films such as Goodfellas, Casino and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels who all share it).

I feel the early development of the questionnaires allowed us to thoroughly and properly develop our project to better suit our audience. We found that a high majority (of 50 people), admire this genre of film, and films such as the ones listed above. They rated our particular genre of film very generously, and around 96% said they would watch a film based upon our pitch (click here for pitch). Most importantly, around 11/12’ths of the people that took the survey said they did not mind strong language, violence or drugs and a large majority said they would watch the film in the cinema (based upon the pitch)



Click links to see: questionnaire, results, analysis


Upon completing the questionnaire, we were able to develop and expand our ideas even more. We chose films such as Bronson and Rock ‘n’ Rolla, and briefly analysed the techniques used throughout the films compared that to their film certificate. After careful research into film classification (Through websites such as the bbfc.co.uk), we opted for a film certification of 18 (Must be 18 years of age or older to view), which was due to the strict regulations of how films were categorized with regards to certificates. Whilst we were not attempting to glamorise crime and gambling to produce imitable behaviour (although this isn’t necessarily reflected in our initial 2 minutes), we found that 18(s) contained strong language, drugs, violence and possible sexual references



(click here for the BBFC website)




5. How did you attract/address your audience?

There are several methods in which we tried to attract and address our audience. Taking into consideration our target audience, we each came up with innovative techniques we could possibly consider to intercept out audiences attention. Initially we decided upon exporting the video in black and white to show originality and boldness, followed by a strong idea for easily distinguishable character introductory images, which would be completely different and saturated with colour. We decided to incorporate unusual editing techniques that our audience may find intriguing, such as switching from scene to scene to show different characters (whilst based upon the same timeframe), and regulated continuity as precisely as possible

We also used innovative techniques, which involved careful camerawork; containing point of view shots to involve the audience much more (We noticed due to the analysis of film introductions, that these were unusual, seen here, here and here) and used an omniscient narrator to allow the audience member to feel like they know what is happening. Additionally, we allowed the characters to point the guns directly at the camera, and have the protagonist speak directly to the audience, which creates an unfamiliar and unique atmosphere. Finally, we used techniques such as contrasting indoors/outdoors, and white shirts/black shirts to differentiate the ‘good’ characters from the ‘bad’ ones, allowing the user to understand the early introduction of 8 (in 2 minutes), more easily. We also used generic conventions to attain the customer’s attention, which involved having subtle background music, different locations and plenty of iconography typical of this genre to create a sense of familiarity.






6. What have you learnt about technology from the process of constructing the product?

I feel that I have learned an incalculable amount about the technology used whilst constructing this product. Unlike our preliminary task, we used more technical hardware and software. An HDV-1000 was used to film the entire production, which had superb video quality, incredible features (adjust exposure/brightness/colours… whilst filming) and a high-quality tripod, which meant smooth tilts and pans (to name a few strengths). However, one problem we found was a problem with recording sound from a distance (More our novice knowledge, rather than the camera fault). This enabled us to use a ‘Zoom Recorder’, which was an independent sound recorder separate to the video, which enabled us to record high quality sound without the need to talk excessively loud so the voice could be heard. A larger, more expensive camera, allowed us to film better quality/sharper shots, and larger tripods allowed more stability for panning and tilting of the camera whilst filming to enhance and maximise our footage



Admittedly, during the filming process we did encounter an error, which we were able to resolve. The third scene (in the garage), gave us problems as we attempted to get a closeup of cards moving closer to the lens in a closeup shot. This made it difficult to record the shot that we wanted to how we would have liked, but was easily fixed (once we found out), as we changed the focus from auto-focus to manual. Once we had imported our footage onto the system, we noticed that our film was slightly under-contrasted (This was fortunate, as we would eventually increase the contrast settings anyway)



The editing software that we used was Final Cut Pro HD, which our College provided, as opposed to iMovie that was used for our preliminary task. We quickly realised that Final Cut Pro HD had tons of features, and was extremely advanced software; we were effortlessly able to convert to black and white, and adjust the contrast. More advanced software also meant that we learned more about the editing process; it is important to name your clips and organise them properly (Considering we imported around 100 individual clips) and doing a rough cut before fine tuning anything is essential! Final Cut Pro HD was also very efficient at importing, for instance importing our Photoshop PNG’s that had been made for the character profiles, and an MP3 that would be out movie sound track. Once imported, we were easily able to adjust the media, which included recolouring and resizing, and adjusting the volumes/fade-ins/outs of our soundtrack.






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

As we found out from our preliminary task, considerate planning was essential to providing as little complications for our coursework as possible. Right from the very start, we have carefully prepared every step of the way, adding posts to our blog such as gangster crime research, which allowed us to identify the history of gangster crime, films involved with this genre and typical storylines and attributes of a good gangster crime film. Later on we included shot lists and storyboards, which was to keep confusion to a minimum on the day of filming, creating a stress-free filming process as we know what we needed to do, and in what order. Additionally, we had posts such as film ideas, expanded ideas, film introduction research, questionnaires, film classifications, filming locations and treatments (to name a few). The most important post in my opinion, which was the key ingredient to our planning, was the analysis of the film introductions (I chose Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels) as it allowed us to identify common techniques once all three members of our production team had compared them



We attempted more elaborate and courageous camera shots throughout our film. We had the traditional shots such as static medium shots, medium long shots and match on actions, however as our confidence grew with testing the camera (before we did the shot list), we decided to be a little more adventurous with them, including shots such as point of view, subtle zooming and high-angle close-ups. This has developed my confidence with the camera equipment greatly, I feel much more self-assured about my abilities to use the recording and editing equipment and think it has been reflected in the quality of our work.



Looking at the final product, I am extremely satisfied with the end product, a result of months of planning and countless hours of work. Upon completing the video, we submitted it to social networking sites such as Facebook and Youtube, showed our peers and teachers, and gave it to friends and family to review and rate. Overall, the results were incredible.

People were delighted and excited that we had produced something that looked so professional and skilled, and assured us that producing the whole film would be a good idea (we laughed!), for instance “WOW, thats pretty awesome guys, well done :D” and “THATS MINT !!!!! WELL DONE BOYS”. Some of the constructive points that were made from peers from our AS Media class, involved positively commenting on things such as…

• The black and white editing
• The stylistic character images that were in red
• Continuity of the entire scene
• Genre identifiable by costumes, props and music
• The omniscient narrative
• The interesting shots that were captured
• The actual storyline and ‘ending’

Overall, I am extremely happy with our blog and the final product I feel shows all of our dedication that has gone into the project, and hope that I can continue studying Media at A2

Final Evaluation

1. In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of media product?


Our film incorporates generic conventions of gangster crime movies since we have used guns and fast cars in the start and end of our media product and also we have a poker game going on in the middle of our game which is classic in many gangster crime movies. Our film develops these conventions by having an old car in a modern setting and also old revolvers instead of modern hand guns. The conventions we used are taken by inspiration from such films as Snatch for the and Oceans 11/12/13 for the poker scene. Our film has the sam sort of characters and their roles as the film snatched, like in my 15 minute film analysis of Snatch i point out that there is a lot of non-diagetic sound from one of the characters explaining the backgrounds to other characters that are on the screen. Also with the freeze frames in the opening sequence showing a short clip with a brief insight into their role in the film, then the short clip is followed by a freeze frame with and edited colour background along with the characters name and/or nickname.

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?
In our media product, we have no women but this does not mean we are showing them as passive, but we are trying to represent a hierarchy of males showing that the four males who are sat inside the garage are lower down the hierarchy than the other males who are outside.

Our target audience is males above the age of 18 (since the age cerificate is an 18) so our representation of the males in our media product link together with the target audience since we are aiming this at males.

Characters from our opening sequence -




Characters form the opening sequence of Snatch -

Since we took our inspiration from the film Snatch we attempted to do our character introductions in our opening sequence similar to the ones in Snatch. Both are similar with a freeze frame of the character with and edited colour background including their name and/or nickname. The purpse of the freeze frames is to emphasise the character and show something about the character that is related to their role in the film. In both of the opening sequences they only have males as the main characters which shows male dominance in both opening sequences of the films.

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
Our media product could be produced by a major Hollywood studio eg 20th Century Fox, Warnoer Bros ect, since it has many similar films in the genre that have been made and are successful. If it was produced by a major studio it would most likely be released by as a blockbuster film since there is a large audience for this genre of film. Our distribution company as it is stated in our research will be Metrodome Distrubtion.

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

Considering the narrative and style of your media product and including that our age certificate is an 18 the age would be 18 and above and the target gender would be males as we have found out from our questionnaires that we have produced and sent out. Other films that are similar to ours are Snatch and The Departed both of these films have similar target audiences as our film does.

As i have just stated the most suitable ceritification criteria for our film would be an 18.
(http://www.bbfc.co.uk/)

5. How did you attract/address you audience?

Since our target audience are males over the age of 18, there are point in our film that would appeal to them. In our 2 minutes there is a poker scene that many people can refer to and also there are cars and guns involved which can be considered as a more male icon. In our ideas for the rest of the film if we could have filmed it would be more action sequences including robberies and possibly shoot outs between the police and our team, which would also appeal to a male audience.

We use a shot from inside the garage which is from the point of view of the poker players as the first 4 main characters open the garage and draw their guns, pointing them at the poker players and Chad Dawson and then we cut back to the poker players to see the expressions of them . We use this effect to show how shocked the poker players are to see the 4 main charcters.

6. What have you learnt about technology from the process of constructing the product?

The camera equipment we used was very advanced so there was a lot of strengths and only a few weaknesses, the strengths were mainly 20x optical zoom with high quality footage that can be recorded in HD and widescreen. Some weaknesses was that because it was an advanced camera it was very large which made it harder to transport to different locations. Some difficulties we had, besides the size of the camera, since we was doing outdoor and indoor scenes and a mixture of both, lighting and white balance was difficult to get right, we rsolved them by doing multiple takes on the same part untill the lighting and white balance was right, trial and error method. The editing software we used was Final Cut HD which allowed us to easily edit our film together and cut bits out that were not needed. The main efct that helped us create the overall look of our product where, black and white and fade in/fade out.


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


During our planning stage to what we wanted to do in as our media product we had many ideas on what to film, so we wrote down all our ideas and short listed them and then voted which idea we thought would work the best and would have an easier flow of filming and editing. Before we filmed we had plan out the whole story of our 2 minutes before we filmed including sound, types of shots and locations, we had also planned out when to edit it and to edit what shots together. All of this made filming and editing our 2 minutes easy and it all ran smoothly. We used specific shots like, we have a few match-on-actions and shot reverse-shot, we also used wide angled shots close ups when we was introducing the characters at the start of our opening sequence. I feel that my end product will fulfill the task of the 2 minutes opening to the film since we have done everything that is needed of us and made the film the best we could we the equipment and time we had available to us. We have shown our 2 minute productions to a selection of our target audience and after they watched it we filmed them so that we could recieve feedback on their thoughts and comments of the introduction. A few things they said were:

• Good stylistic editing.
• Use of black and white effect was good.
• Good costumes - Shirt and tye etc.
• Good story.
• Use of props and setting was very good.
• Character introductions was good.
• Music brought the introduction up to date.
• Smooth transitions.

This is the video of the footage of the feedback that we recorded: