Question 5

Q5: How did you attract/address your audience?

I attracted an audience of people who liked fantasy films through using the conventions of established films, this included the use of as many genre signifiers as we could. These included details such as makeup and costume, music, fantasy characters, location, and storyline.

Firstly are use of costume address the audience and ensured the fantasy genre this can be seen through the character Abor’s beast costume, seen here:

this make the viewer interested as it’s a new character they haven't seen before. Music was one of the biggest genre signifiers as fantasy film audiences recognise soundtracks and their importance in setting the tone and genre of the film. We wanted to create that outcome with our soundtrack so it was made to reflect the characters by having each one associated with a motif which was added at the same time when the character is introduced. The soundtrack also builds to an end when all the characters are together, this build up also helps to draw the audience in as they want to wait to see what it leads to and why.

We hoped the location we used would also help to engage the audience as we hoped it looked similar to that of the Hobbit because of this the audience would want to watch and appreciate the scenery. A section of our location can be seen here:

Although we have a narrator giving the audience some context to what’s happening in the opening, they’re still left with some narrative enigma as they are unaware of how the characters are going to fulfil the task which they have given themselves- which is described by the narrator.

In terms of attracting an audience we have created a Facebook account which goes under my team's joint production name of Outhaul Productions. Here we have posted updates on cast members, filming days, and links to our blog posts, a few examples can be seen here:

Throughout our pre-production and production journey we have been able to spread the word of our film opening because we were in contact with a lot of people. For example when I embarked on making the costumes I was conversing with a lady who used to be in charge of costumes for films and TV shows through this I was able to get tips and suggestions on where to buy fabric from, I was also able to promote our film opening at the same time.

I also showed people of our target audience the rough cuts of our film so that we could publicise it as well as improving the opening. We aso promoted it through word of mouth.

Question 4

Who would be the audience for your media product?

Question 6

What have you learned about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

My answer can be seen on Prezi here

Question 7

Q7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

My preliminary task was to create and edit a short piece of drama that could be used as an opening for a piece of media. It was a short task in which I acted in an improv dialog between two characters then edited it.

Since this task I have learnt a lot that can be separated into headings these include:

Planning and time management:

I have learnt how to manage my time better when creating media and learnt how to manage multiple shoots by communicating with Amy who I was working with and the cast, this was important as we had to re shoot and take many trips to our location to film as things would go awry or plans would change such as the constantly changing weather, and rain.

Use of organised planning was built upon as we had to make lists for things to bring in for filming days, and ensure organised storyboards, scripts, and other joint documents. This is in contrast to the Prelim in which none of this had to be made or organised since it was improvisation and filmed in school.

Research and audience feedback:

Researching for our film opening along with getting audience feedback was also something I learnt, since for our preliminary task this wasn't needed as we didn't have to researched anything since it was improvised. We also didn’t need audience feedback as it was just a preliminary task and there wasn't much need to re shoot. We actively gained audience feedback for our opening scene by showing people the rough cuts of it and then making the necessary changes. As part of overall research we also learnt how to send out a survey to find out what people appreciated or wanted most in a film. A lot of research also went into looking at other fantasy film openings and requiring knowledge about the correct mise-en-scene to use. Research also went into the location, music, shot variations, and characters as detail needed to be built up to make this a believable film opening.

Pitching:

I also learnt about pitching because in our prelim their was little choice over what we could do however for our film opening we all had ideas on what we wanted to do and thus needed to present them to the class via a presentation to be able to let people have a choice on what opening idea they wanted to work on.

Individual roles and working as part of a cast:

Development on group work was acquired as a lot of important decisions had to be made fairly between the both of us in my team. It was also a learning experience to help manage a cast as this was not needed in the prelim, I was able to run through the screenplay with them before filming and assisted them on the roles their characters would play. It was also difficult finding our cast as a lot of people were not available. It was important to encourage each other and keep up moral when we faced difficulties such as forgetting the SD card in our remote location, or there being very heavy rain. I also learnt to research the character I played to ensure it followed the role.

Idents:

I also learnt a lot about the production of idents as our prelim didn’t call for them. I was able to research idents and then film my own short clip to illustrate my production company name of Breakfast for Dinner Productions, i then added the title onto it to explain and complete the ident.  

Location scouting, sample shoots, and rough cuts:

Since my prelim was filmed in school there was no need to search for the correct location, however because for our opening the location was a large genre signifier we had to go out and search for the best location we could find. This was difficult as the location we wanted couldn’t include paths or other man made things such as houses in the background or else this would challenge the validity of our film opening being of a fantasy genre.  Our location also had to fit in the correct areas that we wanted our characters to come out from- this would give the audience some narrative to the character and their personality. Once we had the location sorted we made a sample shoot, of where the characters will come out from and how the opening will play out, this helped us to identify issues which allowed us to negotiate how we will deal with things such as costumes. We also learnt the best way to gain audience feedback would be through rough cuts we learnt that gaining information on how to improve them was helpful which meant we could respond to what the audience wanted.

Sound:

I learnt a lot about sound and foley- the addition of sound put in after the film had been made- because our preliminary task didn’t include any sound in particular but just our voices. I learnt how to use different objects as foley for our characters footsteps walking through the moorland, for this we used dried ferns and crushed them with each step a character took. We also included sound from final cut pro such as lightning and rain sounds.

FX and Mise-en-scene

For the preliminary task we didn’t have to think about mise-en-scene and FX as it was just a basic dialog to edit. I learnt and improved skills regarding this by creating costumes from scratch along with creating the makeup for the characters, and ensuring everything looked the way we wanted it to look. I also learnt about FX as we wanted to add visuals of a storm along with sound FX of the storm.

Overall, the lesson I would say I learnt the most would be resilience and perseverance with creating this to the standard I wanted. This was difficult to keep up as we faced many obstacles, however we were able to use hard work and teamwork to complete this task.

Question 3

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

My answer can been seen on Prezi here

Question 1

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

Question 2

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

My film opening represented our secondary target audience of females from the age of 12 - 25 who were the usual viewers of fantasy films, because of the female protagonist used.

To replicate the genre correctly and then thus the social group of our target audiences, we used detail in location and costume to give the opening to the film verisimilitude, in this the mise-en-scene of the film was built up for instance the location we used was the most similar to the look of the Hobbit Location that we were able to achieve, and the costumes were as Fantasy like as we could make them.

Our film does represent other social groups through the characters we used in opening as we used females and males, along with a female protagonist, thus we represented both male and female. Within this mix some characters represent other social groups.

Anidone -the protagonist, would be stereotypical of other characters like her from other fantasy genres such as Arwen who gives up family and immortality in order to save Middle-earth from the threat of Sauron along with Galadriel, the elf queen who singlehandedly wields power over Lothlorien in the Lord of the Rings however much less developed the hope for our character would be that she would also be representative of a strong female character, this is momentarily seen through

the explanation of the narration also the look of the protagonist was representative through the costume.

This can be seen here in this comparison of costume, obviously the costume I made for this character isn’t as professional, however it was the best to my ability.

This is also a positive representation on women has a whole as the character isn’t portrayed in negative light.

The next character in the opening is our pixie like character Phex.

As a female character she too represents women, however because this character isn’t necessarily human, it can’t fully represent social group, this is the same for all the other characters. That aside the character Phex is stereotypical to pixie characters, this stereotype of mischievous and ditsy is applied, subsequently projecting it onto the wider group of females, which conveys a harsher sense of representativeness. Thankfully this isn’t disclosed fully in the opening.

Following the Phex character we are joined by Trehsarck,

This is also a stereotypical character for a warrior as this character is depicted as a strong male. We wanted him to be a typical warrior that would be comparable of characters from the TV program the Last Kingdom, some are shown below:

This appeals to our male target audience.  It also appeals to an ethnically diverse audience along with representing them.

Agor is also a warrior like character however this time they are a beast as well, seeing as this is anthropomorphic and not human, therefore it is not representative of any social group. This too goes for our last character Zosil, it’s creature like personality doesn’t fit in to any social group known. However both are representative of characters like them in fantasy films, for instance inspiration came from the Beast character in the live action version of Beauty and the Beast, he can be seen here:

A similar comparison can be made between Zosil and Gollum from Lord of the Rings

Our film opening also represents class as other characters arise to join the protagonist who will lead them in an army, and the leader is depicted as being regal with others below her following, this could be interpreted as classism as the leader isn’t one of a lower class.

However our film opening does not include representation of other social groups. For example sexuality isn’t being represented directly -as the audience are yet unaware of the character’s sexuality. Thus it may not attract a full wider audience.

Region and Nationality is also allusive as the viewer is not informed by the region the characters come from but are able to guess from their ethnicity. However the voiceover gives indication to a region with the accent used, this is representative of our target audience since other fantasy films use similar male accents to narrate.

Lastly it is not fully representative of our target audience or a wider social group as the age range of characters isn’t wide. To be fully representative some characters would have to be of different ages, it would also have to include characters in their 20s to further represent our target audience. This however may not be the biggest problem as our characters defy age in their roles.

Final cut

This is our final cut, it includes our idents and the soundtrack.

Foley

This video highlights Amy and I and our production of foley for Anidone, we wanted to do the sound for the footsteps on the moorland, Agor's growls and maybe snippets of the Phex's voice.

Behind the scenes video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjfsaRv7OXQ

We decided to make short interviews with some of the cast members and display it in a video along with shots showing the actors off camera behind the scenes.

Rough cut 3

In our rough cut 3 we added the audio voiceover, along with the sound effects and the foley we made from the moorland. The final steps we need would be to add the soundtrack and colour correction along with the storm visuals.

Rough cut 2

This is similar to the first rough cut however we improved the order of the shots, the sound and soundtrack along with the audio still needs to be added

Rough cut 1

This is the first rough cut of our film opening Anidone, to create this we arranged the scenes in the order we currently wanted, we still needed to edit in the effects and sounds along with the soundtrack and voiceover also including colour correction.

Emergency production meeting 28/03/17

Emergency production meeting 28/03/17 

Today Sophie and I held an emergency production meeting to discuss the reshoot of missing footage. Despite shooting the first scene some time ago it has since being wiped from the SD card, due to this we will reshoot tomorrow. 

Unfortunately the weather is poor, so we will use towels to protect the camera. 

Update 29/03/17

Amy was unable to film today as she was busy tonight in a last minute meeting, we have rearranged to film tomorrow morning instead when we are both free, the weather is also better.

Update Filming

Update of filming 

Saturday the 25th March Amy and I went up to film on the moors with her younger brother who plays the character of Zosil. We got our characters costumes ready and painted Zosil's body and face along with Amy's face, it was perfect weather, the sun was golden and the location looked great. However when we started filming we realised we had forgot the SD card much to our annoyance. We had the idea to barter with walkers so that we may be able to borrow their SD card if they had one and in return we'd give them something of ours to exchange back with in the future, however we didn't see many walkers with cameras and by this time we didn't have much time with the light left. In the end I had to run to tesco to buy a new one and come back up again.By the time I got back up the location the sun was going down, however we still managed to get some good footage. 


Update 23/3/17: the footage that we took from this day is the best example of how we wanted the shots to turn out, the shot types used along with the lighting and colour were what we hoped for, however we will now try to match the colour of the other shots for continuity.
      

First shots

First shots 

 We went to our location to film the first character being mine, with Amy, and a friend. We were able to film the opening shots in costume and managed to get all that we could without any other actors.


Update 22/3/17: When going to edit the footage we had we couldn't locate it, so we are going to have to re film at a later date.

Screenplay

The screen play is the script along with shooting directions for a film. Their purpose is to briefly outline the film, so they don't connote emotion. They are written in 12 point courier font, they are economical with words so they are read quickly, therefore a page equates to approximately one minute of film,
They start with a "slug line" which is a master scene heading quoting whether or not the scene is filmed internally or externally.


Here is our screenplay

ANIDONE

By

Sophie Ferreira and Amy Spence

1. EXT. MOOR. NIGHT.

The sound of thunder breaks on a lonely moorside. With the crack of thunder, a female creature, an ANIDONE, lies shivering in the scrub. Heavy rain cascades down accompanied by flashes of light. She lies partly covered by the undergrowth. Slowly she wakes.

DISSOLVE TO:

  2. EXT. MOOR. DAY

The ANIDONE begins to walk.

NARRATOR

It was foretold, that in the once thriving kingdom of Izlave, a corrosive group of beasts should arise from a storm. This group would be known as the Grezlik. Their indifferent set of morals policing a new nation; these five beasts would upturn the court of Aldar, ending the Monarchy. This tale was cursed to end in inordinate turmoil.

  3. EXT. MOOR - DAY

PHEX, an elf-like creature, appears from behind some rocks nearby. They join and begin to walk with Anidone, navigating rocks and following behind.

A face appears in a nearby stream, ZOCIL, gasping for air. The creature   clambers out of the stream, shrugging off the water like a dog. He proceeds to walk alongside Anidone and Phex.

TRESHARK, a man of the trees, comes bursting through the forest in order to follow behind the other characters.

DROAK, a well built beast clambers out strongly from behind a rock joining the line of walking characters.

4. EXT. MOOR - DAY

Characters walk together in a line. The Anidone slightly forward leading the line. Characters stop, standing at the edge of a clip/waterfall.

Final Ident

Instead of my original idea for the ident I decided to film a medium birds eye view shot of a set dinner place along with a diner's arm. In this shot an arm would be seen delivering a plate of typical breakfast food, the diner would go to take a bite, then realise it's not what they were expecting, push the plate away and go back to their original position. The title would then appear underneath the plate.
I was given assistance to make the title appear just as the hands move down the table, meaning the diner reveals it.

Filming continued

Yesterday (Sunday 19th of March) Amy and I went up onto the moors to film the scenes with her character Agor. We were planning to film the sections of the opening which included the both of us, however no was was available to help, Therefore we only filmed the parts with her character, this included some close up shots of the characters hand and some medium shots of the characters upper body, with the costume. We also got some shots of the scenery showing where the characters had come from. 
        This was followed by point of view shots from my character Anidone, these shots looked up and around and went in and out of focus to show confusion and a state of just waking up. We also got the shots of the branches we needed for the tittles to grow out from, however, it was extremely windy and rainy, the branches were moving and thus we had issues maintaining focus. 
        The rain also affected Amy's costume as the glue she used to stick the for onto her hands and face was water soluble. After filming the storm had taken a toll on us as we looked a sight, Amy still had her face paint on her which made her looked like she had rubbed her face in the mud, the patches of glue that were left on her skin looked like a mysterious disease. We were also dripping wet and had knotted hair, this lead many parents to physically move their children away from us and for us to be turned down from the public toilets. Even though it was an ordeal we managed to get some footage done and no cameras were harmed in the process.

production meeting 2

Amy and I had our second production meeting where we discussed when we will finish filming and complete our costumes.

We created a document so that we could keep on track of our deadline.

online production meeting

Today Amy and I had a meeting to discuss the first draft of filming, we communicated through FaceTime and iMessage.

Shot types -Opening

The shot types we will be using for the opening

The opening shot is a close-up shot looking down on a characters face in a storm 

Titles will grow 

soundtrack in a minor key,

The camera zooms out from above, showing the character in by lying unmoving in the dirt. 

The camera stops moving and she starts shuffling as if wakening. 

New camera at medium shot goes from looking down on her to looking up as she clumsily stands (as if dizzy). 

The camera is handheld and clumsy at the start of the following shot, however becomes more steady as the characters walk does.

A medium-long shot follows a character walking, whilst other elaborately decorated faces* appear from out of shrubs and bushes.

introduce "Zosil" into the scene. A medium close-up shot shows a face erupts from a near stream, gasping for air.

character proceeds to walk alongside the protagonist.

The camera zooms out to a long shot, whilst which characters join the protagonist to form a straight line of walking creatures. 

The protagonist is centre and leading the other characters. 

The camera cranes up to show the group of characters stood overlooking a valley, the music is triumphant and ends with the shot. 

Ident

One of the ideas for the ident for breakfast for dinner i was thinking of shooting a small scene using actors. In this scene there would be a dinner table setting with people sat around the table eating breakfast for dinner.
A birds eye medium close up view of a dinner plate with breakfast being cut up by the actors, the shot will then cut to a watch with the time displaying a typical dinner time, however I hope to only make it last a few seconds so not to bore the audience. 

Production meeting

Amy and myself have met together to discuss production so far, here are the notes from our discusion;

• The costumes; with filming dates approaching, we should look into more costume facilities to complete the casts costumes, perhaps West Yorkshire Playhouse. Two of the costumes are underway. 
• To create an accurate vision of our production, we are planning to go up and film a short mock of the film on Ilkley Moor, on Thursday 9th February. 
• Still to do; create the idents for our film opening. 
• Still to do, complete the story board.

Location & Cast

In preparation for filming, Amy and myself took a trip to Ilkley moor to scout for a place to film. We found multiple possible sets, and made changes to the script as we were inspired by our fantasy accommodating surroundings. 

Here is a video explains what we found

Here is were we have decided to film, (pin on exact location). We will film in a reasoble wooded area, remote but not too far from the road (in order to carry props to the set). Because of the set we now have we will have to make some minor script adjustments to account for the placement on rocks etc.  

For our cast we will need 5 actors for the different characters, a secondary cameraman -for when Amy and I are both in shot as our characters- a set member to fix costumes and ensure people are in the right place after takes. 
We currently have 3 actors and the set members, we're currently looking for more actors, with an advert on our Facebook page.

Treatment

A treatment is basically a scruffy of a screenplay, outlining the storyline, however its exact definition, and complexity, varies across the industry. A treatment should sell the film, and is sent to potential producers.

This film has the fantasy aspect of Lord of the Rings, but sinister aspects (in the titles), of a Tim Burton creation, Alice in Wonderland for example. It contains a variety of creatures capturing Peter Jackson’s Hobbit audience, but sufficient narrative enigma to entice more psychologically enthralled Burton fans.

The sound of thunder breaks through the sombre soundtrack, as a storm erupts around the protagonist. With the crack of thunder idents break through the shot. A creature's character, (an “Anidone”) lies shivering in the shrub, heavy rain cascading down accompanied by flashes of light. She lies  partly covered by the undergrowth,  slowly she awakes. This character dressed in an elaborate costume. The shot then shows  the character clumsily standing  (as if dizzy).

Weather starts to resolve as the protagonist begins to stumble forward, the gravity/

sturdiness of walk increases. Sturdiness of walk increase and rain has stopped, light is increased and  the characters costume becomes cleaner, they walk grandly as the soundtrack supports the sense of power and authority. Leaves fly from the character

A the character  is walking, numerous other elaborately decorated faces appear from out of 

shrubs and bushes and more characters join the The camera cranes up to show the group 

of characters stood overlooking a valley, the music is triumphant and ends with the shot.