Evaluation-Question 4

How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Throughout our whole project, from research and planning to evaluation, we were relying deeply on technology. First of all, in the research and planning stage, we were mainly using the internet to research the codes and conventions of existing short films.The use of the internet allowed us access to a full range of short films for further analysis and influences; we used web sites such as YouTube and the BBC Film Network to gather short films together. However, if we did not have access to the internet, these short films would have been very difficult to gather, as they are not meant for mainstream means, such as, cinema, TV; they are usually only shown at film festivals to promote actors or directors.

  Furthermore, we used the blogging site, blogger to document and organize our research and planning so far, therefore, this made it easy to access, and we could also communicate with our group, which helped with the production stage.At the production stage, we were using simple DV cameras which had many limitations which we had to overcome, for example, the built-in microphone had trouble picking up the sound clearly, this is why we needed a voice-over or scores,however, and this helped  minimize the dialogue.

 Also, the recorded image was not the best quality as it produced a‘grainy’ image, but this suited our film to an extent because it has a social realism theme. We also used digital cameras to take images for the poster and magazine, this was helpful because the images were easily accessible, as before, you had to get them developed and you could not see the image immediately after to see if it was good quality.

Moreover, the whole process of post-production was based on technology because first of all, to edit our product we were using i-movie HD,which is a very consumer friendly piece of software which comes free with Apple Mac, this software is non-linear meaning it is not destructive, which was extremely useful for audience feedback. As this software is free it is not professional, so there are limited functions, for example, effects and titles. Also, as we were using scores in our short film, we needed to find copyright free music; so again we were relying on the internet to provide us with a range of scores we could use.

Furthermore, we were also using a desk top publishing program called Pages to make our magazine film review; again this was a consumer product meaning it was relatively easy to use, so we did not have to learn any new skills. However, this also had its limitations to it, so we used Photoshop to design the different logos for the magazine. Lastly in the post-production process, we had to make our film poster, this was achieved by using Photoshop, and this program does cost money as it is industry standard, so as expected it is difficult to learn, allowing us to design and create more developed poster ideas.

The last stage of our project was our evaluation. Firstly, we had to use i-movie HD again as we needed to make a podcast for our answers, which is enriched with clips from our film and other parts of multi-media. We also had to use blogger again because we had to blog some of our  answers to the evaluation on here, which is again filled with relevant multi-media clips and photos. Lastly, to actually get our feedback to help us for the evaluation, we used YouTube and Facebook to easily show people, especially to our target audience, our three products, short film, poster and magazine review. Also, the internet and video sharing social networking sites are the most cost effective and realistic way for a short independent short film to reach a mass audience.           

what have you learned from your audience feedback?

There were many ways that I received audience feedback for my short film, film poster and magazine, for my film I had a group screening with a group of 20 people viewing it all within the target audience that we set for the film, I posted it on YouTube, and put a link up on the Facebook where my friends could view it and comment on it with their views, the majority of my friends on Facebook are within the target audience, with a couple being older or younger.

For my film poster and film magazine, I posted a picture of it on Facebook, I took advantage of the instant messaging blackberry messenger which comes free with blackberry smart phones and set is as my display picture for 100+people to see and text me their feedback, and I also printed out a copy of it and asked people what their thoughts of it were and if they could give me feedback.

One reason I got audience feedback was to see if my products were suitable for my intended audience, one reply from Nicholas Hobbs (25): ‘casting, score and narrative takes the issues to a younger audience effectively’ while put with another reply from Rachel Olubayo (17) ‘it is suitable for its intended audience as it’s the same as the enrolment age and of the age people get into serious relationships’ this shows that our film suits its intended audience well from many aspects of the film which means in terms of the intended audience, we don’t have to alter the film or alter our intended audience. I also wanted to find out whether the narrative was clear, understandable and effective, I was not sure whether the audience would understand the story of the film while watching without first having some insight of the story, however while talking to John Garcia (19) who viewed my film, he explained that the voice over really helped to understand the story and made it clear. From one of the people that viewed my film James Glynn (18) he said ‘the score could fade more gently, and lower the sound so the voice over could be heard’ I took his feedback into consideration and lowered the score and faded out so it was not a sudden end in the score however one problem I faced was that the voiceover was not loud enough even with a score that was lowered, so we re-did all the voice overs with a better microphone and when viewed again, he said it was much better, without this crucial bit of feedback, the voice over would have been hard to hear and people may have missed it or not heard it all which would have made it harder for the audience to understand. Nicholas Hobbs also made a comment about the editing, he thought that the film would look better if instead of fading out during the tilt up of the sky, we should dissolve it into the next scene, I decided to try it out and it did seem better.
A comment made by Gabrie Jey (20) on Facebook pointed out that the film needed some colour correction, I did agree that maybe it did some, however as I was only using a free software to edit our film I was at a disadvantage as it is simple and limited what you could do and so I wasn’t able to add colour correction. Alex Garlitos (20) also mentioned on Facebook that the main actress Shelby Yearwood was wearing the same costume throughout the whole movie even though we implied that there were many jumps in time(shown below) again we wasn’t able to change this due to practicality issues, we would have had to film it all again, and edit again for her to be in a change of clothes, plus she would have had to have many changes of clothes with her, with time restrictions, this is hard to do so we decided not to use  that piece of feedback although it is a valid point, we were unable to act on it.

For my poster, Drilon Djaka(18) said that ‘maybe there could be a change of picture’ I considered it, but it would have been hard to get the costume again so that we could take the photo, so we decided to just keep the picture that we had already. One change that I did make from audience was thanks to Tracey Abi-Khalil (15) who mentioned that the billing box was too ‘tight’ it was hard to read, so I decided to widen it, and cut out a bit of the background, this made it easier to read which is good as if it was a big poster on a billboard, it would be easier for them to read. John Garcia said that the poster did give indication of what the film was about, and he liked it, he could see money and bills and assumed that the couple on the right had money problems, this was a very positive feedback as he managed to correctly guess a part of the film which is what we wanted to do for the poster.  Nicholas Hobbs also gave feedback on the poster and said that maybe the second half of the title should be a different colour to the title, this was a valuable piece of feedback as when I looked at it again, I realised that it looked like the title and the tagline were part of the same sentence, so by changing it, the title now looks distinguishable to the title. I asked Diana Ilarde (17) whether she thought that the poster is appealing to the intended audience, she answered saying that the poster is good for any age but it will appeal more to the intended audience as the actors that are shown are in the age range of the intended audience.

 

For my magazine, I wanted to know whether it would appeal to my intended audience of the film, Kevin Jarin (21) said that he thought that maybe it would only appeal to half of my intended audience, he gave the reason that he didn’t think people under the age of 20 would normally read a film magazine. I wouldn’t be able to change this as it is not because of the film magazine, however we did decide that the intended audience of the film magazine would be between the ages of 20 – 35, and thought that as we I didn’t do a serious magazine review, the film magazine would probably appeal more to boys, so the new intended audience is males aged 20-35. I also asked Macoy Domingo (18) whether he found it easy to read, he responded saying that he liked it because it was short, he probably wouldn’t have wanted to read it if it was longer, I was pleased with this as he is part of the films intended audience which means that there is good.

Evaluation q2

Evaluation podcast-Question 1

What are the established forms and conventions of the media and genres you have worked in?