Evaluation Question 1 - In What Ways Does Your Media Product Use, Develop or Challenge Forms and Conventions of Real Media Products?

I have made a prezi to compare my film opening to real films that have made use of similar techniques as my partner and I did.

Certification

Classification of a 15 According to the British Board of Film Classification

• Must not endorse discrimination
• Drugs may be shown, but may not promote them
• Should not focus on how dangerous, harmful beavious such as sucide could be copied
• Very strong language is allowed
• Nudity is allowed if there is little detail when it is in a sexual context 
• Sex may been shown and referenced but not in strong detail
• A strong threat is allowed as long as it is not of an extremely dark or sadistic nature
• Violence can be strong as long as it does not linger on the infliction of pain

We had originally planned for our film to be a 12A, but it it is clear to us now after filming that the strong messages of threat and mugging conveyed would raise the rating up to a 15. This is actually beneficial to us as the majority of people in our questionnaire said that a 15 was their preferred age certificate.

Finished Film

Here is the final cut of our finished 2 minute thriller opening

Editing - Titles

We used After Effects to create all of our titles, using their built in track points so our titles followed the camera movement. We used the same font as for out end title, True Lies, in red, adding to the limited colour in the film, putting emphasis on them as they contrasted the black and white behind. We had several difficulties with the titles, such as with our main actor's name, as it is  "Ruby Ballantyne" which was far too long too fit anywhere in the opening, so after trying many places without success we were forced to make the decision to change her name so it would fit in. We also deliberately decided to not give a credit to the actor who played the following man to add to the feeling of uncertainty whether he is really there, or simply a figment of not only the young girl's imagination but yours too as the viewer.

Editing - Colour

My partner and I had the challenge of removing all colour except the girl's red coat and a few other chosen red objects. This proved to be far harder than we had expected because of all of the other slightly red objects such as buildings and skin tones in the background of nearly every shot. We counteracted these problems by having to use a series of multiple colour and shape masks in every shot, to restrict the red to only the few places we wanted it. This initial problem did give us the idea to leave in the occasional other flashes of red, for example leaving in the red bus and postbox. This adds to the style of the film and is a constant reminder of the imminent danger.

Editing - Soundtrack

My partner and I used garage band to create a soundtrack to our film, we imported a low resolution version of what we hope to be the final cut of the film into garage band then began to create the music, to match the edit. We first added two different bass lines which we looped throughout to create a base layer for us to work on, picking out two of the default built in loops. We then added a drum track which was once for looped. Finally we composed our own melody using a variety of string, brass and woodwind instruments, making sure for the brass to come in every time St. Pauls is revealed to the audience. We also used the music to pick out crucial parts of the film, by adding a key change when the follower is revealed to the audience. Finally we added a memorable jingle to go over our ident at the beginning and created a creepy, eerie sounding ending to go on top of our title.

Rough Cut 4

Here is our fourth and final rough cut

What have we done since the last rough cut?

We have focused mostly on the sound

• We have mastered it all, making it sound far more appealing to an audience
• As well we have synchronised all of the diegetic sound that was recorded after the main filming 

Also we added a large amount of shape masks into multiple shots to make sure the coat is the sole thing in colour, apart from a few carefully selected other things

This can be seen here...
Before

After


Finally we sorted the shot of Ruby's feet, deciding to make part of the shop in the background in colour, to ensure we had some red in every shot
Before

After


Final Things to Improve

The same as in the last rough cut we still need to

• Add the rest of the titles
• Fix the shade of the red