For my A2 Media blog, follow this link

www.chammonda2media.blogspot.co.uk

Feedback from Audiences

After showing our two minute opening on YouTube, here is some feedback we received: [to view a clearer picture, click on it for full screen access]

Evaluation

Whilst processing my evaluation on Final Cut Pro, I decided to use the 7 base evaluation questions and converge my answers together. The 7 questions are covered in the 'Evaluation Prep' blog post.

Evaluation Prep

These are the notes I initially wrote prior to processing my evaluation. I studied each question and wrote notes, evidence, links, reminders and ideas which I would use in the evaluation. Obviously I don't plan on evaluating every aspect of the questions but I will discuss what I feel are the key areas.

Q1) In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Q2) How does your media product represent particular social groups? 

Q3) What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Q4) Who would be the audience for your media product?

Q5) How would you attract/address your audience?

Q6) What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Q7) Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Final Film

This is our final 2 minute opening of "Anomalous". Enjoy!

Animatic Storyboard

We wrote notes on each shot regarding the Scene, Sound, Music and any extra notes. Splitting the task up between us, we each did voiceovers using different programmes. I used GarageBand to record my voiceovers. Using the notes we had, I scripted them onto a piece of paper and recorded myself using my microphone on my laptop. It was the first time I had used this type of software and using new technology has broadened my knowledge on various ways of interpreting media. 

Script

Short notes on each shot

GarageBand - Software used for voiceovers 

Changes In Post Production

The following video shows the changes we made during post editing. We used colour correction and added a blue filter????? to add a mysterious, ghostly feel to our video which really stresses the horror genre. You can also see the letterbox effect we have mounted on to our video too, this gives our film a professional, cinematic screen view. This is not finished by any means, we still have the audio track and various other tweaks and changes yet to make.

Editing

During the editing process, the four of us all sat around one computer and contributed ideas and actions to construct the shots, sound, transitions and general effects together to form our final film. We used Final Cut Pro for the vast majority of editing but also used programmes such as After Effects. Below is a sped-up screen recording of the many hours of post-editing we went through.

Final Film Shooting - Day Four

This was our final day of shooting at our key location of Fairfield Park in Stotfold, known as "Scarlet Hill" in "Anomalous". These shots were in my opinion, our best at instilling the role of the dice in the film and revealing sinister acts such as the stabbing of the other male actor. The sighting of Parker's younger sister also gives hints towards the narrative but without giving it away too much. 

Final Film Shooting - Day Three

Day three of shooting was to get the tunnel shots that represent the 'present' tense of our final film that signifies the flashback 'base' in the sequence of shots. Using a local tunnel pathway we knew about, we took a variety of shots of our protagonist Parker in different positions or doing different actions. We chose to represent Parker as stressed, confined in the tunnel, panicked and on edge to show his psychotic state of mind. These shots incline the audience to feel sympathetic towards him despite his deadly crimes, as he clearly feels confused as to why his mind is leading him to sinister acts. His unsettled presence also brings tension and uneases the viewers.

History Of Horror

Using both Microsoft Powerpoint and Final Cut Pro, I produced this video to show the history of horror from the 1900s to the 2000s

DVD Load Screen

As an extra, to add professionalism to our film opening and understand further the thought processes film production companies go through, Rhys designed a DVD load screen for us using After Effects and Encore. This is the screen that appears when the viewer puts the DVD into a player, and then has to press Play using the remote to begin the film. He used a pun of putting "PLAY THE GAME" as the Play button, to relate to our narrative of Parker playing a game with the red dice. 

Sound Research

The four of us sat on a computer together and researched on paper and form websites, various sounds we found or wanted to include. Although we definitely want to include some of our own recorded sounds, we also wish to incorporate trickier sounds such as a base track which includes instruments. We produced a rough mind map together and then I used iMovie to construct the following video. The words in quotations ".." represent sounds we found from the website Freesound and the numbers in circles represent the storyboard shot that this sound clip could go with.