Evaluation Questions

1. Evaluation Questions By Tom Kerr

2. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? • Our film opening is called The Afterparty and it is a horror film, with thriller elements. It involves a masked killer (taking inspiration from films like Friday the 13’th) at an afterparty getting revenge on his co-stars for losing him the part in a film. I believe it’s different to other films in the genre like Scream as the killings start straight away and it goes straight into the action. • It uses many of the same elements as other films in the genre, such as murder, revenge and the use of blood. The film doesn’t feature an equilibrium, as the murders and action take place straight away. The main character is angry that he hasn’t got the part in a film, and he takes his anger out on his co-stars. • The main location is the train station underpass. We did this because it’s grimy, dark and secluded so it would have a good effect on the mindset of the character. The characters are dressed in casual, normal clothes. The killer however dons a blazer and tie, and wields a hammer. This isn’t typical of the genre and is somewhat a surprise to the viewer, as they won’t realise that he is the killer the way he is dressed. • Our film features no diegetic sound, the soundtrack and sound effects create the atmosphere of darkness and impending danger. The main editing effect used was ‘fade to black’ and we created moving titles and also added sound effects.

3. How does your media product represent particular social groups? • The main character type we used was a ‘frat-boy’ who is arrogant and overly confident. He is probably around 21, but doesn’t act that age. I think this is quite typical of the type of films my age group sees. The killer is the opposite. Calm, collected and ready to kill. He is quite aggressive and will do anything for revenge. I believe this film is for the middle to lower class male, as I think this is the demographic that sees these kinds of films. Also, the first killing is of a male character which is a change from other horror films where a female is typically the first to die. • The mise-en-scene gives a good idea of the type of character. The dark, grim and small area of the station underpass is an enigma for the audience, making them wonder what’s going to happen to the character in the scene, and suspect something bad to happen.

4. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? • I think the main film company that would distribute our film would be ‘Dimension Films’. They have released many films of the same genre such as Scream, The Prophecy and the later Halloween films. • Depending on the budget, we would release the film to major cinemas to maximise profits and audience potential. I think the studio would market the film virally over the internet as the target audience is the age that mainly uses the internet, with such things as Facebook and watching trailers on YouTube. • Looking at box office takings, we would like our film to perform similarly to Scream, as it is the same genre and it gave us a lot of inspiration. The film made $173,046,663

5. Who would be the audience for your media product? • I think the core audience for our film will be 18-25 year olds. This is because it will most likely receive an 18 rating from the BBFC so that will be the youngest demographic applicable. Also, similar films with the same age range have fared well at the box office. Fans of death, bloody violence and swearing will enjoy our film as it includes plenty of everything horror related. We also think fans of films like Scream, Tormented and Halloween as the plot features many of the same ideas and the same structure. It will mainly interest men, and those who enjoy alcohol and parties as this links in with our film idea. • We think that making a more action heavy film as opposed to one with complex dialogue will help broaden the audience as there are plenty of moviegoers who are mainly interested in the action rather than the story. This is generally the male audience as females may prefer more drama and emotionally driven films. In terms of cast and director, I think that people may see the film to see upcoming talent. We don’t want Hollywood A-listers as we want it to be as gritty and realistic as possible, without seeming overdone and manufactured. There is a niche audience for people who watch films like that so hopefully we can appeal to them.

6. How did you attract your audience? • We feel that to attract a large amount of our target audience we should use a viral marketing campaign. Using sites like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter we can interact directly with our audience and get them interested in the film (something like a “follow the killer” campaign on Twitter to raise interest). As the large majority of our target audience use the internet, specifically those websites, we feel we are missing out on a large chunk of the audience if we don’t take advantage. • We could also hold various media events to promote the film. As the film is set at a party, an idea we had was to hold similar real life parties where one person is posing as a killer, and has to be found out. This will be a very fun event and will get people talking about the film and what happens in it. • As we think fans of alcohol would like the film, we were thinking of partnering with a beer company to create merchandise based on the film, a type of beer. If it tastes good, it will sell well and more people will see adverts for the film. • We think that our unique selling point will attract a larger audience. As the killings take place at a party, this is a situation that hasn’t been done before as the main plot so people will go to see how the killings take place and how the party unfolds. • We would also host test screenings in various locations in the UK. This will most likely be in the weeks leading up to Halloween, and in various villages that look eerie in the night time, to fit the atmosphere of the film.

7. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing your product? • I have learned a lot about technologies from the process of constructing our product, especially in the pre-production area. A large amount of time was spent on the preparation which was good because it allowed us to have a firm idea of what our finished product would look like before we made it. We used various sites to help and inspire us in the writing process (script writing) such as ‘Script-o-Rama’. That website allowed us to see what a professional script looked like so we could try and emulate it. • The preliminary exercise was also a good base for planning as we could see any mistakes or areas for improvement there in terms of technology (camera, microphone etc.) and solve the problems for our finished product. We had just learned how to use the equipment for the first exercise so we had a lot of new things to learn in terms of camera angles and timing. • We also used the editing suite for the pre-lim (Adobe Premier) which was helpful because we could take the basics we learned first and apply and improve them later without having to spend time learning much more. • Using the camera in a small space was difficult as it limited what we could include in the mise-en-scene and any movement had to be precise and planned. The same can be said for framing and continuity which in my opinion we were successful on. The only issue was white balancing which we forgot to do for the first few shots, but it isn’t too noticeable. • We managed to access a site that offered royalty free music (Incompetech) and the music there is of high quality and fits well in the film. We also downloaded a few sound effects from a similar site and they fitted into the film well, with no issues. • In the editing process we used a lot of ‘fade to black’ effects to switch between shots which worked well. We cut our shots precisely, without the use of keyframes. This, coincidentally fitted in extremely well with the soundtrack which ends at the perfect moment to create suspense. • A main part of post production was the creation of titles. As we hand-created our titles, we needed something to fill in the space while the scanner is moving across the screen. For this we looked at other films and made titles such as ‘a Hammertime production’ and ‘Varndean College presents’. These were made in the editing software and compliment the spooky style of the film. See next slide.

8. Our titles.

9. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product? • From the preliminary task, I have learned a lot and applied it to my finished product. With our pre-lim we had a few problems with continuity shooting, so to make sure we didn’t have the same problem we had to plan each shot better and how we were going to film it. Also, there was a bigger emphasis on teamwork for the actual task, as we were aware it was actually worth something. We had to be prepared at all times and be ready to start filming on cue etc. • With the soundtrack, some pre-lims made their films seem comedic with the choice of music. In the final task we had to make sure the soundtrack fit the eerie atmosphere and was in sync with our shots. • -- • Overall I think the planning was very useful. We planned in depth, and although a lot of our ideas weren’t used, we had a good idea of what to strive for nonetheless. • In our film, we realised that some parts may be hard to explain and justify for the examiner so we decided to re-shoot. Also, the lighting and overall feel of the clips we cut weren’t very good and seemed quite rushed. We had a lot of time to re-shoot the parts we wanted and so the finished product benefits this.