Production Report: Main Task Evaluation

1. Sophia Kichou . Production Report: Main Task Evaluation This report will present evidence of carrying out research, planning and evaluation for the main task evaluation report.

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups? The genre of our film is a gritty British gangster film set in the ghetto along the lines of “Bullet Boy”. Our film begins with a close up of a group 15-25 year old teenagers hanging out in a park. All the characters in our film are black which was an attempt to be realistic but unfortunately is also stereotypical reinforcing negative images of Black young people because in many movies black people are portrayed as dangerous gangsters. Despite our film having only black characters, the film does try to do something new as the film begins to focus on sisters, Melanie, a 17 year old gangster and her younger 11 year old sister Kyle. This theme in our film is non-conventional because it focuses on two females instead of two males. Through the camera work, my film begins with a conventional way of opening a film. It begins with titles and music and then an establishing shot is given of the location and characters and then a close up is given of the main character. The use of a hand held camera work in our film makes the film more ‘realistic’ and also portray the unbalanced life of Melanie and Kylie.

3. How will you attract your audience? The target audience is from 15-30 year olds, it is through camera wok and excreta that our film attracts our audience. The camera work in our film, we track and give close ups of characters. There are also many establishing shots. In our film, Hand tell camera work is used which makes my film more rough Costumes and make up play carry an important effect in our film. Heavy eye make up is used on the female characters revealing them as older teenagers. Boys wear yellow bandanas signifying them being in a gang. Both the male and female characters in the film are depicted as being part of a crew, they wear track outfits and the boys wear baggy tops and balance there jeans. All of these aspects depict the ghetto genre of our movie. In order to attract a younger audience the editing in my film is fast paced like a music video.

4. What have I learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product? From the very beginning I found editing a huge struggle and found it very confusing using all the applications on the Mac desktop. From the beginning when we began to put our ideas together as a group, I learnt to research my work in relation to what ideas I want to include in my film. I also began to learnt as the making of our film progressed that film editing is part of the post-production process of film making. Because I found Final-Cut Express so complicated, before I began editing my film I took the time to write down what I wanted to do in my film and how could I do it. I then took it step by step by asking here and there and then eventually figuring it out to do it by myself. I did take me a while. However once I had mastered the key concepts of editing, I was able to combine the exact shots I wanted to include in my film by cutting out the ones I didn’t want to include to bring my film together. Whilst I was editing I learnt to make the cuts that I make in my film as an editor be the right emotion and theme that I am trying to portray to my audience. In regards to the camera, lighting and sound, we had a session on lighting and the different effects it has. From this, I learnt how to include light in places where it has a significant effect. I also learnt how to put the camera together. When we set out on location to make our film, we took different shots from different angles to create to exact position you want the character to be in your film. From having a depth of field shot in the 2 minute sequence I learnt that there needs to be a wide shot, followed by a zoom,followed by a series of close up’s of Melanie and Kaley. I also learnt that the characters Melanie and Kyle must have the same left/right relationship together (180 degree rule) and if they cross the line and if the camera passes over the imaginary axis, it can confuse the audience about unseen movement in the film. From following the 180 degree rule, I learnt in editing that from using the tool box,that I can insert a buffer shot from behind the characters to help the viewer understand the camera movement. This is shown in my film when Melanie and Kyle are speaking and I cut out the the sound pole in the background. In addition to this, I learnt how to attach the microphone to the fish pole. Using the form of continuity editing I learnt that it can make my film look more smooth over less discontinuity and can put together a more logical sequence of shots so that the audience is not baffled. From adding an establishing shot at the opening sequence of the film of Melanie in the park, I learnt that it makes the viewer less orientated and instead aware of all the space in which the action of the film is occurring. In regards to sound I learnt how to adjust and increase the volume that I want in my sequence. For instance the opening of my film begins with loud rap music and then it slowly decreases till the viewer begins to hear the narrative.I also learnt how to non-diagetic sound,music from a device onto the laptop using final cut. I also learnt how to leave continuous diagetic sounds in my film like the narration of the film whilst still having environment sounds in the background.

5. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression it to the full product? Looking back at the preliminary task, I feel very confident in bringing ideas together to make a film a reality. Whilst doing the preliminary task, the planning process was fast and many ideas were not included. However, from doing the main task, because a lot of time and research was put it, I think everyone in the group, let alone myself was able to at least include 1 or 2 of there own ideas. I have learnt from the progression that planning is a essential element in the post-production process. I have also learnt that organisation is a key factor when filming. Whilst we filmed the preliminary task, there was not a lot of organisation and we forgot a lot of equipment and did not take the time to decide our location of where we want to film, and so ended up picking a last minute location. However with the main task, we learnt to be more organised to save time. After thoroughly planning we took the time to decide a key location that everyone agreed with. And help each other out with bringing the equipment together that way we were able to save time. Job roles were also an essential element that brought our main task together. During the preliminary task, no one was given a specific role and so group members didn’t know exactly what they were doing. Whist doing the main task, everyone was given a specific role. The role I was given was sound and this helped me know what I needed to focus on mainly in our film. Lastly to conclude, I learnt that time management is important. Because there was a lot of disorganisation in the making of our film in the preliminary task, a lot of time was spent on filming alone. During the main task we filmed 3 days in advance to give us more that enough time to edit and polish up our films.

6. Final comment There are various improvements that can be used in our film to present particular social groups. In relation to the presentation of characters in our cast, I would have presented a group of characters with mixed ethnic backgrounds, for instance Indian and Japanese, British African and white. This would have created a less stereotypical/conventional view and instead , would have generated more interest in the film because the cast was mixed. I believe this would have also reached out to more social groups compared to a black cast only. This is because it will encourage a mixture of young people to watch our film. In addition to this I would have changed the costumes of the characters in my film as well. Instead of all characters wearing jeans and baggy track pants, I would have portrayed each character having their own dress sense. This is less conventional because instead of all gangsters in the film all looking alike, all characters in the movie could have had their own dress and sense of style and way of expressing themselves. This is significant because we are all not the same and what we wear says who we are as people. So, instead of everyone dressing the same giving the audience the impression that all characters are alike, I would have had different costumes in my film. One character could be a punk while one character could be sporty while one character could be gangster. In addition to this instead of including the narration of my own voice I would have liked Melanie to do the narrative of the story. That way its less confusing to the viewer because the main character is talking about her own life.