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

Our film is a British Drama called "Consequences" which features Matt as the male protagonist (Dan) and myself as the female protagonist (Lucy).

As a group, we made several informed decisions regarding the use, development and challenging of the conventions within our genre of British Drama. Our sequence includes a fairly even balance between the conforming to and challenging of these conventions.

Genre Conventions

As well as movies of the British Drama genre, as a group we found several British TV Dramas which were significant in the research and planning process of our film opening. These TV Dramas were just as inspirational as our movie references when researching genre conventions. I have therefore made reference to both movies and TV Dramas in the mind map below.

Out of the British Drama conventions in the mind map above, we chose to incorporate:

• Teenagers getting into trouble - the protagonist (Dan) is involved in some kind of encounter where Lucy's brother, Ryan, is fatally injured.
• Urban locations - our sequence is set in Walthamstow
• Crime & violence - Dan is involved in violence which is not directly shown in out opening sequence
• Relationships - Dan and Lucy 
• The independence of teenagers - no authoritative figure 

Lighting

British Dramas tend to be naturally lit to create a gritty feel. We wanted to imitate the lighting used in 'Skins' as we found that it best suited the style of our film. 

A scene from Skins

The scene is well lit with natural light

Shot Types

British Dramas contain lots of varying shot types. We mimicked this in our sequence.

The Prezi below shows examples of the range of shot types in our sequence compared with similar shots from other real media products of the British Drama genre.

Titles

Our titles are simple yet effective as they do not draw away from what is occurring throughout our opening sequence. We went with a simple font because, after researching real media texts such as This is England, Misfits, Kidulthood etc. we noticed that British Dramas don't tend to use overly elaborate fonts in their title sequences.

This is England

• The titles are in capital letters which makes them stand out. 
• The font and colour of the titles do not detract from the shots within the sequence.

Kidulthood

• Although the titles are placed in extremely noticeable spots within the sequence, they are fairly small so do not distract the viewer from the animations. 
• The titles are in capital letters and the chosen colour is grey which makes them easily seen but they do not detract from the sequence. 
• The font is simple.

Misfits

• The font colour is white which makes them stand out from the background
• The font is fairly simple and the letters are in capitals

Consequences

(our own titles)

• Each title sequence which we researched used capital letters for their titles so we did the same
• We chose to use white as the colour of the titles as it made them easy seen however this colour does not detract from the shots
• The font which we decided to use is similar to that of Kidulthood as it is simple yet effective and each letter is easily readable

Narrative Structure

One of our options was to follow Todorov's theory:

However, we decided against using this and instead went for Barthe's theory of enigma codes. This theory was much more well-suited for our opening sequence as we wanted to begin with a flash-forward. The use of Barthe's theory resulted in the creation of excitement and suspense within our opening which is exactly what we wanted.

Our opening sequence is a flash-forward which consists of the male protagonist running to his girlfriend's house where she is, at first, very confused as to why he has arrived in such a panic. He eventually informs her that he has been involved in some kind of group/gang related incident where her brother, Ryan, has been most likely fatally injured. 

• The beginning of our sequence is inspired by the opening of the British Drama, Trainspotting. Although our opening is a running sequence and Trainspotting's is a chase sequence, we shot and edited our sequence in a similar way to how Trainspotting is shot; with lots of different shot types cut together using choppy editing.
• Our running scene is very enigmatic as the audience doesn't know what the protagonist is running from. Enigma codes are also present in Trainspotting's opening.

Trainspotting

Consequences

• The disruption in our opening sequence is caused by 'Lucy' discovering that 'Dan' has been involved in a serious crime. British Dramas often include some kind of dispute between two characters. 
• We looked at the way that Skins portrayed teenage couples, e.g. Nick and Franky, arguing and used what we learnt in our argument shots.
• The argument between 'Dan' and 'Lucy' follows the classic narrative pattern of an argument. It begins calm, then 'Lucy' gets very angry and the scene develops into a heated argument however by the end the pace of the argument slows and Dan manages to silence Lucy (even if it is by telling her that her brother has been fatally injured).

Skins

Consequences

• There are only two characters (a boy and his girlfriend) in our opening sequence however these two characters are present in countless British Dramas e.g. Finn and Sam (Waterloo road), Alisha and Simon (Misfits), Effy and Freddie (Skins), Nick and Franky (Skins)

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

As a group of teenagers, we are well aware of the way that young people are depicted within the world we live in. Therefore we decided to deal with both the stereotypes of teenagers and gender stereotypes within our media product.

Overall, our opening sequence conforms to the conventions of youth culture whereas it challenges many gender stereotypes present in modern day life.

Age
Misfits and Kidulthood present young people as trouble makers. We used these film/TV references to create the plot of our opening sequence which consists of the male protagonist being involved in a crime which leaves the female protagonist's brother fatally injured. Misfits and Kidulthood also portray young people as very independent and, in Misfits in particular, we are never introduced to any of the characters' parents, in the same way that 'Lucy' and 'Dan' appear to be very independent.

A scene from Misfits

A scene from Kidulthood

Gender

We wanted for our female protagonist to challenge many of these stereotypes to create a new take on a female character. Whereas, we wanted our male protagonist to conform to several of the male gender stereotypes. This would mean that both of our protagonists were strong-willed and dominant, creating a relationship of equality.

Female protagonist: 

We wanted to incorporate a teenage female character in our opening sequence. Rather than conforming to all of the stereotypes of British teenage girls, we wanted to challenge some of these stereotypes. "Lucy's" strong-willed and almost aggressive character challenges the stereotype of females being weak and vulnerable.

Examples of the type of character who inspired our choices regarding the character of "Lucy":

Mini McGuinness (Skins)

Bossy, independent, determined but still girly

Alisha Daniels (Misfits)

Has a lot of attitude, doesn't listen to orders but has a feminine appearance

Lucy (Consequences)

Dresses casually, has a feminine appearance, 

independed, strong-willed

Male protagonist:

We wanted our key focus of the opening sequence to be a teenage boy who conforms to almost all of the stereotypes of this kind of character. Our protagonist is a troublemaker, athletic, masculine and lacks much emotion.

Examples of the type of character who inspired our choices regarding the character of "Dan":

Nick (Skins)

  Has a good sense of humour, likes to go out partying,

  gets into trouble, likes girls, likes to impress his friends

Bolton (Waterloo Road)

Ladies man, gets into trouble, sociable, into stereotypically

masculine activities e.g. football

Dan (Consequences)

Athletic, has a girlfriend, dresses casually, 

good sense of humour, likes to go out with 

friends.

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

Production

Our production company is called GEMM Productions. GEMM productions is a UK based, British independent production company who distributes filmed aimed at the biggest cinema-goers (16-24 year olds). This production company is similar to Film4 who also produces many British independent films such as This is England. GEMM Productions is very different to studio production companies as it aims to produce films which rely more on an interesting plot than on special effects and impressive star names. Therefore, GEMM production tends to produce films of the drama or comedy genre. 

Distribution

After researching several different distribution companies, we found that Studio Canal was a highly suitable company to distribute our film.

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

As a group we made the decision to target British16-24 year olds.

• This was an obvious age group to go for because all of our group members are British and within this age group so we have first-hand experience of how to best target this audience.
• Also, after extensive research, we found that people within this age group visit the cinema most frequently. Therefore our film would have the highest chance of doing well if we targeted the biggest cinema goers. 

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

Addressing our target audience as best as we could was one of our key aims when researching, planning and producing our final sequence. In order to find out just what we needed to include in our opening sequence, we looked into real media products which are targeted at our core audience of 16-24 year old males. We used and developed key aspects of these media products in our own opening sequence. 

How the narrative attracted/appealed to our audience

• We found that running/chase sequences are regularly incorporated in British Dramas targeted at 16-24 year old boys. Therefore we created our own running sequence.

• We incorporated an argument into our sequence in order to draw in our secondary audience of female 16-24 year olds as well as our core audience. We found that arguments between couples are present in almost all British Dramas targeted at both male and female 16-24 year olds. This is because young people can relate to these kinds of arguments. We therefore incorporated the heated exchange between 'Dan' and 'Lucy' into our opening sequence. 

I feel that we attracted and addressed our target audience very successfully because, as a whole, the sequence is very relatable. The exchange between Dan and Lucy is particularly effective when targeting our audience as it mirrors the structure of many arguments which take place between young couples and so it is particularly relatable:

How our characters appeal to our audience

Dan

Dan appeals to our core audience as he represents the typical teenage boy so 16-24 year old males can empathise with him. 

His typical male qualities include:

• Enjoys sport
• Likes to spend time with his girlfriend
• Sometimes gets into trouble
• Has a good social life (lots of friends)

Our core audience can also empathise with Dan when he finds himself in a sticky situation during our opening sequence because 16-24 year old males are often faced with difficult situation.

Lucy

The Voki below explains how the character of 'Lucy' appealed to our secondary audience.

Music

Our target audience of 16-24 year olds are extremely up-to-date with current music trends. After researching different genres, we found that three of the most popular genres of music listened to by young people at the moment are drum&bass, house and R&B.

We chose to go with the drum&bass genre as we felt that, not only would it appeal to our target audience, but it also suited the running sequence most our of the three genres which we narrowed our research down to. 

The song which we chose: 

We decided that a good way to evaluate how well we attracted our target audience was to carry out a feedback survey. The survey revealed that, overall, audiences showed a good understanding of the plot, target audience and production type. Despite the majority of our feedback being positive, some results suggested that the story line was occasionally misinterpreted and the correct genre was not identified.

All of the answers from the example above are correct. This suggests that we successfully addressed our audience.

This graph shows who our audience thinks that our film is aimed at. The graph demonstrates how we have managed to make it clear that our film is targeted at both our core audience (16-24 year old British males) as well as our secondary audience (16-24 year old British females). It is interesting how, although males are who we were mainly aiming to target, those who took our survey have revealed that our film opening seems to be targeted just as strongly at females.

This example shows a good understanding of production type and target audience however the genre has been misinterpreted. This suggests that we should have made the genre more clear.

The two examples above support the suggestion that we were not clear enough about the genre of the film within our opening sequence. If we were to remake our opening we would take these results into account and alter sections of the sequence to ensure the genre was made very clear.

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

Technology and equipment which we used to create our film opening sequence:

• Pre-production - the internet (research, draw inspiration from real media products, social networking used to create group chats for planning meetings etc.), Sony DSC H50 (to make our animatic sequence)
• Production - Canon Legria HV30 Mini DV (used to film footage and record sound on set), three-point lighting system (to light the shoot), tripod (to steady stationary shots) 
• Post-production - Adobe Premiere Pro (to edit our sequence)

Pros and cons of the technology and equipment which we used:

1. The internet - free, easily accessible, quick and easy to use, wifi connection sometimes slow
2. Sony DSC H50 - handheld and light which made it easy to use, autofocus made the shooting process easier, the battery life was not very long
3. Canon Legria HV30 Mini DV - also handheld and light, good quality, viewfinder made it easy to view footage, autofocus made the shoot easier, recorded on tape so it took a long time to transfer our footage onto a computer
4. Three-point lighting system - created a natural lighting effect, fairly easy to set up, the lights became very hot after a while so we had to handle them with a lot of care
5. Tripod - light so made it easy to transport, easily adjustable, it sometimes got in the way during the shoot
6. Adobe Premiere Pro - lots of different aspects made it easy to edit specific parts of our sequence e.g. we were able to adjust the volume of the sounds within our sequence, we were able to grade each individual shot etc., rendering slowed the editing process

If we were to do the shoot again I would...
...make sure that we charged both camera batteries to save time-wasting
...watch back footage on the viewfinder to ensure we had several successful shots to choose from when editing our sequence
...switch of the lights more often to prevent the shoot becoming very hot
...wear the gloves at ALL times when operating the lights as they get extremely hot
...save every few minutes when using Adobe Premiere Pro to prevent losing any work
...render at the end of each editing session rather than during editing to save time

Skills which I have learnt

• Grading

We used Adobe Premiere Pro to grade our shots. Within this program, we used the three-way color corrector to adjust the colouring of each shot. At first it was difficult to know what tones worked well in which shot but after a while I got the hang of it and I really enjoyed the grading process. 

As well as three-way colour corrector, we also used procamp to adjust the brightness, contrast and saturation of each individual shot. I had a similar experience using this tool as I did when using the three-way color corrector tool as, at first, I found it difficult to use however after a while I was able to use it effectively.

Here are some examples of ungraded and graded shots:

• How to use LiveType and Adobe After Effects

As a group, we had no experience in using both LiveType and Adobe After Effects prior to this task. Therefore creating titles on these programs was a very daunting challenge however we managed to use both programs to our advantage and we created some very successful titles using these programs.

We used Adobe After Effects to create the interactive 'Matt Romo' title at the beginning of our sequence:

We used LiveType to create the 'Consequences' title at the end of our film opening:

In addition to all of the technologies which we used in the pre-production, production and post-production of our film opening, we used Facebook throughout to communicate with each other:

This proved to be extremely successful as Facebook is a quick method of contacting people. We created a group chat which saved us asking each individual group member if we had a question about the task.

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

Preliminary Task
The aim of our preliminary task was to create a sequence which included a character opening a door, walking across a room, sitting down in a chair  opposite another character, and exchanging a few lines of dialogue. The sequence had to follow all of the rules of continuity.

Our preliminary task is similar to our film opening sequence in the sense that we had to consider all aspects involved in pre-production, the shoot itself and in post-production. We also had to consider the style and narrative when creating both our preliminary task and our film opening sequence.

Film Opening Sequence
The aim of our final opening sequence was to create an opening to a new fiction film which could last up to 2 minutes and included titles.  

Essential skills which we learnt from our preliminary task and applied to our film opening

• Match-on-action

Preliminary match-on-action

Film opening match-on-action

• 180 degree rule

• 30 degree rule

• Shot-reverse-shot

Preliminary task:

Film opening:

As a whole, our preliminary task resulted in less errors during the pre-production, production, and post-production of our film opening. The development from preliminary task to our final film opening has helped me develop as a film maker. Before the preliminary task I felt extremely under confident when faced with the challenges involved in post production. However, after having completed both tasks, I feel extremely confident in my skills in post-production. My ability in post production and production have also improved significantly. I have learnt the importance of working in a team and how to work well in a team. Before I completed these two projects I preferred to work independently as I like to feel in complete control during an important project like this. However, I have found that having several different minds working together is extremely useful as everyone has different ideas and thinks in different ways which results in a better quality, more interesting final product. Working well in a team in a very useful skill to have and I feel that, through the preliminary task and the film opening I have learnt how to work with people and I feel that if I had the choice now of working alone or in a team, I would choose to work in a team.