The Final Piece, A Soul's Redemption

I present to you, A Soul's Redemption.

Question 1 - In what ways does ypur media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Question 2 - How does your media product represent particular social groups?

In our media product we decided that our main character, Bertie would be young character who was of a school age. This we thought would seem good as his age may give of the idea that he is more vulnerable than say an adult. As Bertie was going to be possessed, we wanted him to be more vulnerable and less able to fight back; which I think we portrayed well in our production, the part in particular when Bertie was upset with what he had become. Another thing we aimed to make Bertie was to contrast with the idea of him being vulnerable, and was the typical ideology that males are dominant and often become heroes by saving someone or something from the antagonist. This made it hard for us to show both the vulnerability of Bertie as well as his ability to fight against the antagonist. This is because Bertie at times was both the protagonist and antagonist. Therefore we are sticking to a stereotype, that children are more vulnerable; but also challenging it as Bertie is both the protagonist and antagonist.


we tried to stick to usual scary locations in our thriller as we wanted to use typical conventions of thrillers with low key lighting. Therefore we chose a wood as our setting. As teenagers often go camping and walking in woods. Which is why we included Anna walking through the wood. This is why we thought this would be an appropriate location for filming. Additionally woods are stereotypically calming and relaxing to be in.


Furthermore we wanted our target audience to be able to relate too. This is another reason why we portrayed teenagers in our opening. Also us being teenagers ourselves we knew first hand how we wanted to represent actors in our film and what we would look for as a target audience. This is why we gave characters similar values to ours, which is a use of gratification we needed in our thriller opening.

Question 3 - What king of media institutions might distribute your media product and why?

Thriller film evaluation question 3 from connorsanderson

Question 4 & 5 - Who would be your audience and how did you attract them?

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

 

The main software we used to create our media product was Premiere Pro. Premiere Pro is a timeline-based video editing software application by Adobe. My group used Premiere Pro consistently throughout both my preliminary and the final production. We used Premiere Pro as we was already familiar with it and how to use it from our preliminary. Also we felt that it offered all the effects and adjustments we wanted to make our thriller opening right for us and how we initially wanted it.

This part of our thriller is an example of where we had to adapt ideas, at first we was going to use Adobe After effects to create the big, black eyes on Bertie. However due to lack of experience and also bad time judgment, we created this effect on Premiere Pro.

The only new form of technology we used in creating our thriller that we hadn’t already used in our preliminary was the Go Pro camera. Go Pros are cameras where you can attach them onto your head to show a person’s point of view. This was used in our thriller opening when we see Bertie’s view when running away when he sees Annie...  there was a slight problem with the use of the Go Pro, it was quite bad quality. However we overcame this by speeding up the speed of Bertie running which ae added to the effect that he was possessed.

 

Overall I think that my media knowledge improved through the use of technologies, especially in using the editing software, Premiere Pro. We were taught briefly how to use some parts of Premiere Pro but other than that me and my group played around with the software to try and achieve what we wanted in our media product. Also I learnt how to handle the camera more as I was camera man in my final piece as opposed to having a more active role in my preliminary. I conclusion I think that I learnt a lot of skills in both filming and editing footage afterwards. This I think showed in our final thriller opening.

Question 7 - Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the main task?

A Souls Redemption Title

This is our final titling logo. This is the logo we will be using in our production. Originally we had the idea of the titles appearing on the trees, however due to the alterations of our opening we have had to adapt our titling. Annabel made this title, she did it using serif draw plus photo shop, the same programme she to create the logo's, she the shapes tool and also 'Broadway' font which I thought when put together, looked effective.

Bertie's character profile

Story Board for A Souls Redemption

 This is our storyboard for our production "A Souls Redemption". This story board will help us when filming and also in post production.

Logo's

                                                                                                                                                                            Annabel made these two logo's using Serif draw plus. She used the shapes in order to create this logo and use one of our practice shots as a bitmap.                 


However we've decided as a group to use this logo as it looks more professional and you can clearly see the bitmap of the woods. We also liked how the letter symbolised all our names and interlinked together.

Location Shots

Movie Maker: Location for thriller opening - Slideshow

One Page pitch

This is our one page pitch, I wasn't here for this so the rest of my group delivered this to the film company.

IMDb A Soul's Redemption

IMBD Page for a Soul's Redemption

Risk assessment

My group and I completed the risk assessment, and thought of everything that may happen to any of the people who take part in our thriller film. Although we didn't write it on our risk assessment, we will take caution with our equipment as the floor may be slippery due to the fact we're filming in Widderson Spring Wood.

Uses and Gratifications

So I've decided to talk about the Uses and Gratification theory as its a very popular approach to understanding mass communication. Most of the theories on media explain about the effects media has on people, for example during the war media was used a lot for propaganda in order to inform and contact millions of people, this is why it is important for people to be careful how they use media as it is very powerful on people. This theory states what media does to people and not what people do with media. It is suggested that the uses and gratification theory has to fulfil one of the following when we choose a form of media;

• Identify meaning we should be able to recognise the product or person in front of you, role models that reflect similar values to yours and aspiration to be someone else.
• Educate by being able to acquire information ,knowledge and understanding.
• Entertain as what you are consuming should give you enjoyment and also some form of 'escapism' which enables us to forget our worries temporarily.
• Social interaction which is the ability for media products to produce a topic of conversation between other people.

Uses and Gratification can be seen as part of a broader trend amongst media researches which is more to do with 'what people do with media allowing for a variety of responses and interpretations.
Researchers, Blumler and Katz expanded the uses and gratification theory and published their own in 1974, stating that individuals might choose and use a text for similar purposes to the Uses and Gratification theory;

1. Diversion meaning and escape from everyday problems and routine
2. Personal relationships which uses media for emotional and other interaction which is similar to social interaction.
3. Personal identity which aims to help viewers find themselves reflected in texts, learning behaviour and values from texts this is also similar to the uses and gratification theory as they say one of the main purposes is identify 
4. Surveillance meaning information which could be useful for living e.g. weather reports or financial news.

Blumler and Katz's uses and gratification theory suggests that media users play an active role in choosing and using the media. Users take an active part in the communication process and are goals oriented in their media use meaning they have a reason to be watching it, to achieve a goal. The theorists say that a media user aka audience seeks out a media source that best fulfils the needs of the user. Uses and gratifications assume that the user has alternate choices to satisfy their need.

This is the two step flow model which also links to
mass media. The first step is the opinion leaders get information
from a media source, the second step is the opinion leaders then pass the
information, along with their interpretation to other e.g. friends or family.

Target audience

Target Audience

For our thriller production we need to have a target audience for the film. I think that our target audience from 12 years up until around 18. I think this as any younger ages may not grasp the plot of the film or have much understanding of what is happening in our production, "A Souls Redemption". even though our target audience is from 12- 18 I do think that people older than 18 would enjoy the film and I would still recommend it to people of ages over 18. however I just think that 12-18 year olds would be more appropriate for what happens in the film. As "Cabin In The Woods" is a film that we have kind of modelled our production on, we have based our age range on the ones from that, as we use parts of the opening from it as inspiration for our own film.


Gender
I don't think that there is asset gender that we plan on targeting for our film, as we think that the age s a more appropriate thing to base our viewers on. I think that our production will appeal to both genders from just looking at our ideas and thoughts behind what we want to establish. Also when you go to the cinema to watch a film of the same or similar genre as what we want to achieve. There are always a mixture of boys, girls, men and women; which we want to have a similar impact as.


What we want our audience to get out of our film
While watching the film, we want our audience to be involved and feel like they are in the same place as the characters in the production. We will try to achieve this by having a vast range of camera shots and movements to mimic a persons movements and viewpoints of the opening. We also want our audience to believe what they are seeing though and get the sense that, that could actually happen. so we want audiences to have characteristics from both a passive and an active audience.



as well as al of that I would like our audience to be of the mass audience. I feel that if they are our film would more likely to be watched, reviewed and recommended by more people and would seem more appealing to people if a vaster community recommended it. where as if we had a Niche audience, I think that it wouldn't get as much publicity or be viewed by as many people. instead it would have a cluster of people of the same interest. so may not become as popular.

The third man textual analysis

http://www.slideshare.net/connorsanderson/the-third-man-57325351




click above to read my other textual analysis :)

7even textual analysis

http://www.slideshare.net/connorsanderson/7even-textual-analysis-57323460

click above to read my 7even textual analysis

Lighting practice

My Lighting practice

Hello all, last week me and Alex were trying to show effect through different types of lighting. These techniques will help us in our final piece as we know how to get these effects just by using a camera. These are our practice shots…

Backlighting

Backlighting is shown here as the lighting is in the background of the shot. Therefore turning me into a human silouette! As you can see you can only see the outline of my body; you cannot see any of my face or clothes. This type of lighting effect is commonly used in romantic scenes where couples kiss with the sunset behind them.

Natural lighting

Natural lighting is when there is no artificial  lighting, as you can see this photo is of an outside location with the lighting source coming from the sun. This is used in most films asmostfilms arefilmed outside at some point of the film, although it isnt always natural lighting when a scene is filmed outside. Artificial lighting can also be used to enhance aspects of lighting.

 

 

 

Underlighting

Underlighting is when you have an object above the light source to present a contrast of light and shadow on the object. In this shot we have a torch under my face to show this contrast. This method of lighting is commonly used in horrors or spooky scenes of films, for example when someone is telling a ghost story.

Artificial Lighting

Artificial lighting is when the lighting source is                                                                                  manmade. In this example the light is coming from light                                                                       bulbs in the ceiling lighting up the room. This is used                                                                 commonly in most films as most films have indoor scenes.                                                                 

                                                                             

One Page Pitch

One Page Pitch

Working Title: A Souls Redemption
Tagline: Sometimes the kindest of hearts can be tainted
Film Genre: Paranormal thriller

Commissioning Editors: Conabel Productions
Length: 1 hour and a half. The reason our film is this length is because there is a lot of information which needs to be addressed to the watcher. This is proven with what I have written about the plot below.
Plot:  Bertie has been possessed by the devil when a dark part of his soul has been unlocked after witnessing everyone he loved being killed. This caused him to be possessed due to his soul being caught by the devil after the anger of seeing the murderer kill his family weakening his good will. This means Bertie is still in his body but trapped in the devils grasp.  But then a person comes and triggers a memory which keeps reoccurring meaning that Bertie begins to fight against the devil to return to his body.
Statement of intent: The main theme of our story is that even those who once had such innocent eyes can be changed simply by the devils hand. We want to tell this story in order to teach people how one event can change a person’s life forever and cause them to be someone they may have hated before. However Bertie gives out the message that it does not define you as a person but can simply just make you stronger.
Visual realisation: We will put black and white colouring  when editing and use high angled shots, tracking shots and close ups. Cabin in the woods slightly explored this with the use of dark lighting and basic colours like brown. Also the Blair witch project has also done it with night vision, a hand held camera and dark lighting.
Target Audience: We have chosen a target audience of 13-17 year olds. The reason we have done this is because anyone at young age may find parts uncomfortable to watch and agitating due to the way Bertie is acting. We were guided by Cabin in the woods for our target audience which is an inspiration for our thriller. 
Story synopsis: A young boy playing in the woods. Does he mean any good? Or does he kill just for fun. No one will ever know. All because the devil is in control. While Bertie fights in his mind, hoping that he will survive. 

Extra research: While telling others of our thriller I was told that Bertie was a parallel to Anaken Skywalker from Star Wars. The reason is because Bertie turns evil out of losing the ones he loves while Anakin does simply from the fear of losing his wife and unborn children. Therefore this shows the common theme in films with good against evil. 

Initial ideas for our thriller opening

Our groups initial idea is in a wood setting simply because it looks very creepy and edgy. We aim to give it a old fashioned effect with black and white tones,either by using dark lighting and actually doing the filming at dusk to give us a darker affect or we use after effects once we've finished filming. The Characters within the opening will be Bertie ( Elsie's younger brother) and Elsie, The plot of our opening is basically, Bertie is possessed and creepily skipping or running through the words. I thought it'd be affective if after each tree he runs past, we have the title sequence going on at the same time with names on the tree's. We would ideally start off this  opening with old fashioned news paper articles with 'Missing boy' on the front hinting to the audience who Bertie could be and that what he's doing could suggest is out of character, we initially will open with an establishing shot in order to show where its taking place and with Bertie first walking into the woods, We also aim to use a low shot when finishing the opening with Bertie pushing Elsie over and a low shot pointing to the ground to show the distortedness . During the title sequence,we will also overlay Elsie's cover of the song for non diegetic sounds to give it a more creepy affect and also use other non diegetic sounds such as owl sounds and leaves rustling.