Evaluation Q2 : How does your media production represent particular social groups?

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

Our sequence opens up with an establishing shot of the setting, which is a dense forest. The shot pans downwards to display the denseness, which also may connote the feeling of entrapment and being lost. The text which is displaced has a shadowy outline, so it can be seen better seen. We went for a simple font over something more elaborate, as if it were more elaborate, it may not have set such a calm opening



The next shot that is seen tracks the main character,who we later discover is a murderer. However, the way the shot is placed, it makes him seem as the victim, as a long shot use used to show how isolated he is. We also have titles placed among this with opening credits. We keep the font consistent throughout the opening. We keep these to the side and out of focus to not distract from what is happening elsewhere in the shot. We have also placed a darker tint over it, similar to what is used in other horror films.


The next shot is the murderer standing up and walking towards another part of the woods. We tracked up to a certain point, to establish the direction he is heading and how isolated he is. We next go into first person, so show the scene through his eyes, while he is still walking towards his destination. Similar effects are used in Horror films, such as the opening sequence to Halloween.

The next shot is a low angle shot looking up from the dead body, which what is suspected as the murderer walking towards him. The focus swaps from the murderer to the bloody hand. We used a low angle shot to display power in the murderer. This is followed with a high angle shot, which is used to show the domination over the area. It might also symbolize something else is in play, something we cannot see.

During the flashback shots we used a completely different tint on the shots, to differentiate these shots from the shots in the present. We included eerie sounding music and mismatching dialog to try to create a unorganised effect for the flashback.  The facial expression in this shots of the killer are expressionless and cold. This would create discomfort.

Risk Assessment During Filming

There were not so many risks over all during our filming, as we only encountered only one or two major issues. The main being encountered during our second filming session in Hopwas woods. It had rained a few hours before and it was rather damp in the woods. One risk could have been one of us slipping with some of the equipment and causing it damage and damage to ourselves. The way we avoided this was to make our way to the filming location carefully.

Storyboard

This is the original storyboard. Though we have along its lines, various changes have been made in the final cut of our film.

Conventions of Horror Films

In the Horror genre there are many different conventions which are common in films from The Hammer Horror Dracula to more recent films such as the Saw franchise. These conventions have changed very little if not unchanged at all. Many of these conventions are very simple  and easy to reproduce.
One convention is the use of a forest like area as a setting. This is used in films such as Cabin in the Woods and Blair Witch Project. This sort of setting creates an isolated feeling of

December feedback

Your blog posts are limited and need to be improved. 

Research your target audience and apply theories.

PLanning needs to be made clear on your web-log.

Storyboards, role allocation, production schedule.  Ensure that these are thorough and detailed.

You are making steady progress with your edit. You now need to put the edit together and think about continuity.

Keep exploring the codes and conventions of the genre and reproduce these in your narrative.

Manage your time to hit the Christmas deadline.

Audiences

Audiences are identified for what they are watching, and why, this is known as uses are gratification theory. This looks at the idea that people watch different media texts for certain gratifications. An example of this is people watching horror films to be thrilled, as an example.
Audiences can receive media in different ways, and according to Stewart Hall's Coding Theory, there are four categories :
Preferred Reading: How the media is intended to be seen
Opposite Reading: Opposite to what it intended to be seen as
Negotiated Reading: That it is understood how it is intended to be seen, but is not agreed with
Aberrant Reading: When there is no understanding of how it is suppose to be seen

In this day and age, this is heavily applied to adverts, who often produced surprisingly simple adverts which often do viral. It is more likely entertaining adverts go viral. And example of this is a T mobile advert which was launched during the Royal wedding in 2012. The advert was satirizing the royal wedding. This gathered a lot of attention as people found it amusing and it rapidly became viral. However, there was a small minority of people who mistook the advert as real. This shows that media such as adverts have great sway over people

 Audiences are generally categorized into different stereotypes for the purpose of marketing and generalization. One stereotype that has emerged in the past 20 years has been metrosexuality which over time has become more and more normally for the average person to pursue. During the time it first emerged, it was parodied in various forms of media.  

Applied to horror films, audiences are great and varied, are there are many different types of horror, such as Hammer Horror, as an example. The opening sequence I am producing is a more modern take on horror, it being more mysterious than more straight to the point horror films such as Friday the 13th. The sequence we have produced however is aimed at a similar if not slightly older audience, as it does not flow completely as a traditional horror would do. However it does keep the convention of that there is often a murder in the beginning of the film, such as in Halloween.