Final Edit

Here is the final edit of our film, sadly we weren’t able to film any more shots as our actors were unavailable. However we still needed make our storyline more clear for our audience, and so we decided to record Huw talking about how he felt towards the two who were at the bar, I did this by using a ‘Zoom – Handy Recorder H4n’ and simply recording Huw in his room. I believe this solves our problem and has made the plot more clear.

Evaluation – 6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

To explain the key pieces of technology we used to make my film, I have put together a short video explaining exactly what we used and why.

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

Do complete this evaluation task… Myself and the rest of sleek productions decided to go and film outside near a field. The sound quality is sometimes a little poor due to wind but only momentarily.

Audience Feedback

A couple of days ago I messaged a few people on Facebook, sending them the link to the final edit and asking if they could give me some feedback on our film Other members of our group contacted different people which will be specified on their blogs. Here are the responses I got…

This first bit of feedback comes from about as close to my target audience as I can get, Louie is the same age as me and appreciates good quality filming and is similar to the target audience I have of the hipster.

The second is from Fin. Again, Fin is the same age as me but has more of a keen interest in media than Louie, and is a part of the tech service at school, meaning he is very sensitive to lighting and sound quality.

Here we have some feedback from Alastair, he did some acting in our film but has also been in a lot of other media films during his time at the school and has therefore seen many others.

The final bit of feedback is from my Auntie, who is very much into T.V. drama and watches a lot of films.

Evaluation – 5. How did you attract/address your audience

Recently I have been looking at how certain aspects of our film attract different audiences and whether we have done a good job of attracting my target audience. These are things that all of us in our group discussed before we began this project as we wanted to make sure we knew that what we did would attract our target audience. Here are some screen grabs I have taken from our film and annotated in terms of who they will attract and how.

 

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

I recently made a short power point which revises my perfect audience member, this is the same as I described when we first decided on which genre we were going to do, but this power point will relate that description back to final film.

Evaluation Question 3: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

For this evaluation task, I created a short prezzi, it explains our reasoning for choosing our production companies that we chose back close to the start of the process along with the name of our own production company and how that was built.

http://prezi.com/d3saft3t-lx3/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

 

 

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

I have created an annotated version of our film to explain certain aspects of our film and to show how our film represents the typical desires of an audience looking for an original, authentic film noir and for those looking for a more modern take on this classic genre, who would be my target audience of hipsters.

Evaluation question 1 – In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Above is a small collage of some of the shots which are in the opening to our film. Primarily, I think what we can deduce from these shots is that compared to other films of our genre, we follow many conventions and forms created by the history of film noir.

Starting with the photo in the top right hand corner, it shows the title of our film and how we presented it. It is very simple, with a simple fade transition to bring it in. Very similar to other Film Noir, as the title fades in, the music that goes along with our opening begins at the same time, showing how this title is key to the film.

The middle photo in the top row shows one of three settings that we have in our opening. It consists of a bar made of two benches piled on top of each other with a black cloth thrown on top, and a few retro style tables and chairs. We also used smoke to enhance the feeling of a 1920s speakeasy, in which smoking would not just have been permitted but advocated.

The photo in the top right of the collage is one showing variety of costumes we used in our production. On the left of the photo we have Alastair who played the protagonist of our piece, he is wearing a shirt, suit jacket and bow tie. This costume is standard for any middle to upper class man of the era our film is set in. In the middle of the photo we have Constantin who is acting as a bar tender, he is wearing a simple white t shirt with the sleeves rolled up. As a more insignificant character, we decided this simple costume would be appropriate, and fitted the genre suitably. Finally Esme, on the right hand side of the photo, she is wearing a rather elaborate red dress, an item of clothing which any women of any significant social or economic status would have worn. All together this shows how we certainly conform to the conventions of costume in film noir.

The first photo on the next line down represents our camera work in this piece, I would say that we mainly stuck to conventions which have been set by many other productions. Some of our shots however could be considered more modern such as the one in this collage as the focus of the shot is of centre, not too often scene in film noir.

The central photo of the second row, demonstrates our font that we used in our film noir opening. I think it’s appropriate to the genre being quite elegant and romantic, but remains clear about what the words say.

The right hand photo in the middle represents our story, typical of a film noir. It shows the antagonist, played by Huw, looking on in jealousy towards Esme and Alastair, who he is looking to get exact revenge upon.

The bottom left shot shows a section of one of our scenes in which the genre is quite clear. The shot is clearly in black and white, a tell tail sign that a piece is in a film noir style. However you can also see how Leonard, sitting down on the sofa, has slicked back hair and a shirt with a jacket. A look which would have been worn by people of power in that time. The smoke in the room also tells the audience about the era in which the film is set.

The central shot at the bottom of the collage shows a shot of Esme. In our film, Esme plays a crucial role in any authentic film noir, and that is the “Damsel in distress”. This character is essentially the centre of attention between the protagonist and antagonist. In our case, Esme is the source of anger between Huw and Alastair.

Finally the bottom right picture represents the very few special effects that we used in our opening as if we used special effects which film producers would not have had when film noir was in it’s prime then the film would not have looked right.

Third edit

Since the second edit we have extended our opening slightly, adding in more titles which reference our production companies and putting the title of our film at the start as well. We also sorted out some issues in which the camera wobbled or we lost focus in a shot, we did this by adding a cross blur from one shot to the next…

 

There are still a few issues we have, however, these are issues such as… we need more titles in the opening of our film, as at the moment it seems like it is a short film rather than the opening to a feature film. Another thing we need to do to make it seem more like our clip is the opening of a film is to add some more titles at the end this will be easy enough to do.

The narrative in our opening is quite confusing and although the opening of a film is meant to hook the audience so they can find out more, we also need to establish the roles of different characters quickly and their relationships with others which may not be clear from this current edit. To solve this, we plan to add in shots showing flashbacks from Huw’s character’s memory of the times when we was in a relationship with Esme’s character. These shots will probably be of them laughing together dancing, hugging or kissing.