1. In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Short Film
At the beginning of the short film process we had a research task. During this task i found a few inspirational films; A Deafening Story, Angry Bird, Love Sick and Believe. These four films gave me ideas like shot types and angles, narrative and sound to carry into my own group short film project.
The film that gave me the most inspiration and ideas was Love Sick. The subtle comedy factor and social realism i felt could be interpreted and developed into my groups short film as they were very effective. I feel that our short film 'Game Over' uses the conventions of social realism as anyone can relate to the opening scene of coming in from work/college etc and go through the routine of getting out the car, unlocking the front door, making tea/coffee and then sitting down and relaxing. The other aspect i thought we incorporated well was the subtle comedy, one scene in particular is the conversation at the table where Mario chugs a whole cup of boiling tea. Having Mario go back into the gaming work to save Princess Peach challenges the codes and conventions of social realism and it is obviously not possible to go into a game. I feel our short films blends the lines between reality and make believe by using social realism but in parts incorporating and developing make believe parts from Sci Fi films.
Narrative
Short films contain the most inventive and unconventional work to be found in film making, this is because they need to entertain,excite and maybe send a message of what the film is about in such a short amount of time.
The narratives in the three films above from a nine frame analysis all use a linear narrative. This means that the story line runs smoothly without going off into other directions like a non linear narrative where a flash back happens. An example of this can been seen in a film called 'Apricot' which can be seen HERE. Using a linear narrative gives the audience a better idea of understand what is going on without chopping and changing between different times for example. Our idea of having a character from a different time/place came from the film 'Apricot' where having a character from the past in a present setting. We developed that idea, but for our film we had a character from the virtual world come into reality.
Characterisation
Our main character is probably one of the most well know in the video game industry. Using Super Mario was a good way for our target audience to connect to this film as most of us know Super Mario from their childhood or from the present day. Not many film i know of have used game characters as their main characters, not any Hollywood blockbusters in the past few years anyway. This challenges the codes and conventions of characterisation as its very rare to see a game character in a film.
Themes
Short films contain the most inventive and unconventional work to be found in film making, this is because they need to entertain,excite and maybe send a message of what the film is about in such a short amount of time.
The narratives in the three films above from a nine frame analysis all use a linear narrative. This means that the story line runs smoothly without going off into other directions like a non linear narrative where a flash back happens. An example of this can been seen in a film called 'Apricot' which can be seen HERE. Using a linear narrative gives the audience a better idea of understand what is going on without chopping and changing between different times for example. Our idea of having a character from a different time/place came from the film 'Apricot' where having a character from the past in a present setting. We developed that idea, but for our film we had a character from the virtual world come into reality.
Characterisation
Our main character is probably one of the most well know in the video game industry. Using Super Mario was a good way for our target audience to connect to this film as most of us know Super Mario from their childhood or from the present day. Not many film i know of have used game characters as their main characters, not any Hollywood blockbusters in the past few years anyway. This challenges the codes and conventions of characterisation as its very rare to see a game character in a film.
Themes
One of the main themes in our short film was relationship. The relationship between Mario and the Gamer can be seen from little interactions like the 'high five' (pictured above) and at the end where the gamer has a tearful moment of remembrance from is now gone friend Mario. This idea of relationships came from the last film of the 9 frame analysis 'Love Sick'. We used and developed that idea of relationship to make it work as the audience would be able to relate to it is some shape or form.
Narrative
The narrative of our film is linear. within it, it has a resemblance of a circular narrative as you start and end in the same location. Todorov's theory 'the three stages' could in a way be applied to our short film. Todorov's theory involves three stages; Equilibrium, Disruption and Resolution. How this theory can be applied to 'Game Over' is as follows.
Equilibrium - Mario enjoying reality
Disruption - Bowser capturing Princess Peach
Resolution - Mario Going back into Game World
Genre
'Game Over' in terms of genre is a Hybrid, its a hybrid of comedy and social realism. Rick Altman wrote a paper which focused on two things. Semantic and Syntactic. A way in which your film can follow Semantic conventions of a genre is by characters, iconography, locations, props, music and so on. In 'Game Over' we have certainly covered this as we have used a big gaming icon which is 'Super Mario' which a lot of people would know. Not having the correct costume wouldn't covey the character of super Mario as he is recognised by his red and blue boiler suit and accent. A way in which a film can be Syntactic is by seeing which elements are used in a films narrative of that specific genre. For example in a romantic comedy you'd expect the two main characters meeting, a separation or falling out, they find each other or make up and then live happy ever after. For 'Game Over' you can see little elements of this as you see a persons daily routine which could mirror the audiences by when people make cups of tea, sit down and relax and play games for example.
Ancillary Tasks
Poster
We were set a task to analyse some film posters to see what content they had on and to comment on why they used certain colours and images. Click HERE to view a couple of poster analysis. (to view text on posters click on the image)
Poster Conventions
Title
The title of the film is always the biggest text on the page. The style of it sometimes gives away the vibe of the film. For example my film 'Game Over' uses playful text which can be linked toward the gaming style.
Image
The image is always the main focus of the poster, it's the first thing that attracts the viewers attention. It will relate to the genre of film, for example if it was an action film the character(s) will either be in action or striking an action pose. 9/10 the poster has the main characters on the front which sells the film to fans of the actors within the film.
Reviews
Reviews of the poster can tell who the target audience for the film is. Newspapers like the guardian suggest an educated audience and the Daily Mail could suggest a female target audience as the Daily Mails readership dominated by females. The reason we used 'The Guardian' and 'Empire' on our film poster is because they both suggest well educated audience. Empire was an obvious choice to put on the poster reviews as they are a film based magazine.
Production Company
Having the production company or director on the poster can add credibility, people of that company/persons fan base would be attracted to it. Similar to actors on a poster.
Website
Having a website link on your poster can advertise other 'special' features and tasters for the film. For example if we actually had a website for our film, the type of content we'd have on it would be; Trailer, Film themed games, pictures of set action etc.
Credit Block
The credit block tells you the most important people involved in the film. It includes the director, editors, actors etc. The reason why this is important to be on the poster is similar to previously said above, it tells the audience who's involved thus which would excite the fans of the director and actors.
Tag Line
Tag lines are sometimes used on posters to have something memorable to hook the reader. It is always linked to the film, may be a quote from the film or a short catchy hook.
Our Film
Poster Conventions
Title
The title of the film is always the biggest text on the page. The style of it sometimes gives away the vibe of the film. For example my film 'Game Over' uses playful text which can be linked toward the gaming style.
Image
The image is always the main focus of the poster, it's the first thing that attracts the viewers attention. It will relate to the genre of film, for example if it was an action film the character(s) will either be in action or striking an action pose. 9/10 the poster has the main characters on the front which sells the film to fans of the actors within the film.
Reviews
Reviews of the poster can tell who the target audience for the film is. Newspapers like the guardian suggest an educated audience and the Daily Mail could suggest a female target audience as the Daily Mails readership dominated by females. The reason we used 'The Guardian' and 'Empire' on our film poster is because they both suggest well educated audience. Empire was an obvious choice to put on the poster reviews as they are a film based magazine.
Production Company
Having the production company or director on the poster can add credibility, people of that company/persons fan base would be attracted to it. Similar to actors on a poster.
Website
Having a website link on your poster can advertise other 'special' features and tasters for the film. For example if we actually had a website for our film, the type of content we'd have on it would be; Trailer, Film themed games, pictures of set action etc.
Credit Block
The credit block tells you the most important people involved in the film. It includes the director, editors, actors etc. The reason why this is important to be on the poster is similar to previously said above, it tells the audience who's involved thus which would excite the fans of the director and actors.
Tag Line
Tag lines are sometimes used on posters to have something memorable to hook the reader. It is always linked to the film, may be a quote from the film or a short catchy hook.
Our Film
Our film poster follows many conventions of the film posters analysed above. One of which being that the main character(s) is a large image which makes them the main focus of the poster. The other major thing we found out by researching was that the tittle of the film was always the largest text on the page, this would be because they wanted you to see what the film is called. The other notable aspect to comment on was that a lot of posters had the name of the actors and sometimes the director, this would give the audience a chance to think. If they liked a film that the director made previously or the actor in it then they might give it a watch.
The most rewarding feeling about the finished poster product is that we unconsciously create an image which represents the jump from fiction (the background) to the real world. (the leap action)
One thing i would add onto the poster is a national lottery logo, this would suggest we were lottery funded. But not all short film are funded that way. Most short films are self financed.
The most rewarding feeling about the finished poster product is that we unconsciously create an image which represents the jump from fiction (the background) to the real world. (the leap action)
One thing i would add onto the poster is a national lottery logo, this would suggest we were lottery funded. But not all short film are funded that way. Most short films are self financed.
Here is our final version of the film poster. As you can see this follows the conventions of any film poster. The main character is a large image and the Film little is the biggest text on the page. Left of the page below his elbow you can see the two actors featured in this film which also features in a lot of big film posters. The quotes from newspapers and magazines on the right shows you what comments people have of the film and what you can expect from it.
Having a structured poster is vital for the presentation to look perfect. Using theoretical lines on the sides to align text to images makes posters look neet. For example the 'G' of game over is perfectly in line with his elbow on the left.
Review
The Little White Lies review structure and format is very specific, they have their very own 'House Style'. They have a word count of 550 words. Their traditional layout is featured above with a landscape screen shot of a scene at the top, title below with the director and others featured below. The main article is cut into two and a half columns The first letter of the review is bigger and bolder compared to the others. A quirky feature is a rating system out of 5 with a few comment on three subjects which are; Anticipation, Enjoyment and In Retrospect. We mirrored this layout and format and the finished products is below. Aside from the layout structure their language is full of adjectives. They use sentences that if you knew what they were describing from a scene of a film that you'd feel intelligent and in the know.
2. How effective is the combination of your main product and your ancillary tasks?
3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Our target audience is between 13-21 year old. Being in this age bracket it was very easy to get audience feedback. We did this by posting on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter and ask questions and then look at the replies. It's a shame Facebook took away their poll feature as it would of been very handy in this circumstance
The first question we asked was which film title they preferred. We had three names and one name we thought would fit but we put it down to our audience to finalise the decision.
'Game Over' got the most votes which was closely followed 'Mushroom Kingdom' then sadly last was 'Get Me Out Of Here'
The audience simple commented on the post with the letter they preferred. As i mentioned earlier it would have been great for Facebook to still have their poll application as it would have been better to use. We could have used a third party survey like 'Servey Monkey' but that would have been too many clicks for the audience to do.
To get some feedback on which poster to use we decided to use another Social networking site called Twitter. We posted images of the Two designs and waited for feedback which thankfully turned out to be the one we all loved the most.
Whilst in the final stages of the editing process we had a little disagreement on whether to feature some game footage at the beginning to give the into some kind of context before the title. we had a quick meeting and decided to go round our A2 Media class and asked for their opinion. One person asked whether the film needed game footage. After the results came in we still had the overall decision to make, but we all agreed that it would be in interesting opening to our film.
4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction, and research, planning and evaluation stages?
Will have to comment on yours on thursday. Apologies. Do you want written rather than blog comments?
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