Linking to previous questions - Task 5 and 6

As a small theory task as a group we had to answer some questions separately and all together. On my own I answered 2 questions about how society affects our views on the media. This relates to our work because we need to know what the audience want to see. As I answered in the question, some people prefer to go to a cinema to see a film because it has a bigger dynamic. However, we need to make sure we can capture the audiences eyes just with our O.T.S. Basically what we need to do is make sure that society doesn't influence our film in a bad way. They need to see it for themselves and decide whether to like it or not themselves. We won't be able to influence their views on it but we could help change that by drawing them in to watch our film. (I feel like I'm writing a campaign!)

FILMING

Today we finally got sorted and filmed for our O.T.S. I emphasise on the finally. So overall I think it was a very productive day. We re-recorded shots if we had doubts and all worked together to make sure it was great. Being camera operator I felt very pressured to make sure I held the camera straight (as we forgot the tripod ERGH), also I wanted to make sure that I recorded each shot for long enough. Personally, I think I did alright. We wouldn't have been able to do it without Lauren Newby and Thomas Wilson, they're acting was spot on. I am proud of what we achieved but now it's up to Melissa to be in charge of editing. We're on a roll if I'm honest!

Dummy Run

Untitled from Ellen Lowe on Vimeo.

This is the dummy run that we completed to get an idea of what we needed to do on the actual day of filming. This helped us get an idea of shots, angles, the lengths of shots and basically the overall mise-en-scene. There were plenty of mistakes in this and we are fully aware of it. However, this is the point of a dummy run and we are very ready to film the real thing.

15/01/2011

On Saturday Kieron, Jessie and myself went to our location (Elm Hill) to rehearse angles and shot layouts for our film noir O.T.S. Unfortunately, Melissa was unable to join us as she was at work (work ruins lives, fact?) Anyway, we found this a great way to get a clear idea of what we wanted to do and how we could run the filming quickly without few mistakes - but we all know that would be impossible. We plan on filming the real thing tomorrow morning so fingers crossed it will be a huge success!

Google Forms and Questionnaire

Jessica has made a post about how the group created the questionnaires. She got up Google Forms and from there created the questionnaire (simple!)
Here is a screenshot of Jessica starting the questionnaire..

And here is the link to the detailed post she made.

[CLICK HERE]

RESULTS

Here are the results to our questionnaire. After lots of feedback from our chosen target audience: 18 - 25 we were are now able to conduct the project even further. Jessica has all the details of our results on her blog.

Questionnaire

FACEBOOK questionnaire has been posted and the results have been taken. Jessie has posted this so on her blog you will see this.

Here is the link to the hand outs we did -  Initial Hand-outs.

Mise-en-scene while filming. How do I do that?

Basically my two roles are camera operating and sorting out the mise-en-scene. Camera operator is pretty simple, I'm doing what it says in the name. But mise-en-scene seems slightly more confusing. But to make sure that I do my job right I have done some research on it. Basically, I will be making sure everything in the shot is okay. If something is out of place then I will sort that out. It stands for 'placing on stage' Mise-en-scene consists of everything in the shot, lighting, props, clothing etc. Obviously as Melissa is doing lighting I will work fairly closely with her on that one.

Questionnaires and Research on Audiences

As a group we thought it would be best to do a few questionnaires to really get a feel of what our audiences would like. Look on Kieron's blog to see the results of our hand out questionnaire.
Facebook questionnaire will be done soon. Watch this space.

Task 6

Think about this honestly - are your opinions about television, films or groups ever influenced by other people?


Ask a family member on their views about how media has been influenced by other people.


Do you think a friend's ideas about a media text could ever effect your behaviour in a way? This is what some people have suggested happened in the James Bulger case - that one of the two children talked about a film he had seen and influenced the other's behaviour. How could you present these findings in your blog?


Answering the first part of the question in my own opinion, yes I do think that sometimes I am influenced by the views of other people. For example, if there was a film at the cinema that I wanted to see but someone had told me it wasn't very good, I wouldn't risk going to see that film. Our thoughts about media are based around critics and reviews. We wouldn't buy a book if a critic has said it was rubbish. I know I wouldn't.

As the task said, I was to ask a family member on what they thought about a certain media text. So I asked my Dad what he thought about people influencing each other e.g. television. His answer surprised me as he said that people don't necessarily influence each other about what we watch on television, television influences us. "What we see on the news really happens. Yes people can sometimes influence what you want to watch but that would be contradicting what I'm saying. What we see influences us." This was a very helpful answer because not only does it widen the range of answers but it is also so relevant to the James Bulger case referred to in this question. One of the boys had seen a film, as a result he acted out what he saw. In conclusion, I think that we are influenced by what we see and hear around us. Society and the World in general influences us.

Task 5

So as a group we have designated some tasks from a booklet to each other. Some we have even done as a group. I have been signed task 5 and task 6.

Task 5: Think about this for yourself - are there any forms of media that you think society gives greater status to. For example which do people see as "better": films or television, soaps or detective dramas, opera or britpop. Do you have any feelings about the kind of audience these different forms of media attract - are some likely to be more thoughtful and more intelligent than others? 


This is a hard question to answer, as it relies on my opinion and assumption as to what kind of people like what. It's like stereotyping. Personally, I like films and television, I prefer soaps and I hate opera so I would have to prefer britpop. But these are just my opinions. Everyone is different and likes different things. Society may give greater status to films because they can be viewed on super sized screens - and anyway, film actors seem to be more famous than tv actors. Soaps and detective dramas are both in television so it's whether people prefer to be stuck in the reality side of a soap (passive) or be thrown in to a mystery in a detective drama (active). Truthfully, I have never seen opera on a popular music channel like MTV or 4Music. In my opinion, I know of no opera singers, but that might just be me. Britpop is widely known by everyone so I think it's not society's fault there. It's the media. It depends what and how a media text gets broadcast. The best way to find out what people like is a questionnaire. This way we find out exactly what people like and don't like. There's no point in assuming.

Roles

As a group we need to designate certain roles. However, we have decided it would be best not to sign a role just to one person. The main 4 roles that we should concentrate on are lighting sound cast and editing. We would also need a director - organises the whole film schedule. A producer - the person who makes the film, technically. The mechanics - responsibilty of cast (co - producer). Also we will need someone to look at mise-en-scene, sound, lighting and location. Furthermore, who is the camera operator? Who will concentrate on cinematography? These are all roles in which we need to designate and really think about.

...

After a lot of thinking and talking we have come to a rough conclusion that I will be camera operater and I will concentrate on mise-en-scene. This means that I will be mainly filming (simple), and I will be focusing on what looks good in the shot. If something or someone looks out of place I will be able to decide whether to change it. Being in the roles that I am, I will be working very closely with Jessica as we will both be focusing on what looks good.
Kieron - Director and Sound
Jessica - Styling and Cinematography
Melissa - Editor and Lighting

Detailed Costume Idea

Femme Fatale:

Our female lead (Lauren Newby) will be seductive, mysterious and glamorous. She will have a dangerous class to her in which will show in the way she presents herself. Make-up will be based around the classic red lip and smokey eyes. We want to emphasise on the lash as there will be a lot of significance about her eyes. Clothing will be mainly black. We want to have a simple black dress with some fishnet tights, heavy and expensive looking jewellery and hopefully we will get hold of a fur coat (fake of course). Heels are also an essential for any girl. We have got hold of a cigarette holder so this will had the old fashioned class to our femme fatale. Also, we have got a small zippo lighter which will be dropped from a high height. This lighter doesn't have much relevance to the femme fatale but it does show the era very vaguely.

Anti-Hero:

This character (played by Thomas Wilson) will also be mysterious aswell as the femme fatale. He will come across as slightly common but he has a certain light to him. His clothing will be very simple as we want him to be wearing baggy jeans, a vest top and possibly a flat cap with some ragged boots. As a male character make-up would not be needed but he will be covered in patches of oil. Every girl falls for a bad guy. His hair will preferably be messy. There will be a significance to class aswell as while the femme fatale will be smoking with the cigarette holder and the anti-hero will be smoking without it. He doesn't really care about much but when it comes to meeting the femme fatale, you see his soft and polite side.

Location

Location from Kieron Marchese on Vimeo.

During the holidays, Kieron and Melissa went out and filmed around our location to get an idea of lighting and where our characters would look good. Also, we could get a clear idea of our angles.

Our Continuity Task

Continuity from Kieron Marchese on Vimeo.

Evaluation of Continuity Task

So looking at our continuity task, I felt that for our first time of filming as a group, we did pretty well. We each had a chance of operating the camera and watching the short film, we did very well. Shots and angles were varied and personally I think that they were used appropriately - especially at 00.58 seconds. We thought about angles very well and I think we were very creative. We had a mixture of close ups, long shots and over-the-shoulder shots. As for the editing, I think that we did very well in terms of making the black and white picture look old and used. We added the letterbox effect on iMovie so that it would create that effect of an old camera. At the end of the short film we added a hint of neo-noir as Jessie walks out of the room. This was a way of rehearsing for our real O.T.S in the future (now in editing process). The only problems that we faced was the sound. We filmed on the sixth form site and as we could not help the fact that children were walking around, you can occasionally hear them in the speaking parts. Also, as we wanted a mostly silent film, when some sound for voices was needed, there was an annoying buzzing in the background. We were aware of this and made sure that in future filming we will find a way to prevent this.

Continuity Task Script

This is the final script for our continuity task. We created this so that we knew exactly what we were filming, what the actors were doing and if the shots and angles were correct.

Our Plot Anamatic

This is a storyboard to our film noir. Each member of our group did 8 different shots each so we could all be part of it.