Friday 30 March 2012
Our Ident
Each member of our group made one Ident for our film opening - we ended up choosing my Ident as we felt that it had the right mix of bold animation and some understatement which tied in with the more independent aspect of our film as a whole. I applied the idea of using a gold colour scheme for the one we chose which we all agreed would be a good idea as it would help it stand out, and I feel that we have been successful in this aspect for the particular Ident we used. To create all of our Idents, we used Final Cut Pro X - for the one we have chosen, we used a 'fold' title effect. We also added an audio clip which Sam performed on the ukelele.
Thursday 29 March 2012
Wednesday 28 March 2012
Evaluation Question 4
Who are your audience?
Above is a sample survey carried out by a seventeen-year-old male that is a privately educated student, in their penultimate year of secondary school. Having questioned a fairly broad age range of people, I think it is safe to deduce that our target audience will be someone similar to the person questioned above. We aimed to dress our character in clothes similar to those of people our age, and his behaviour and dialogue were also supposed to be relevant to our audience.
Based on our collected data, I think that it is safe to deduce that our target audience fits comfortably into the 15-25 year-old category. They are most likely a student or young adult, probably either currently in higher education or entering/leaving higher education. Of the people that we sampled, the most complimentary and excited by our piece were most definitely people of a similar age to us. Although the themes of our piece would most likely encourage the diversion use and gratification, the actors we used were relatable to teenagers, meaning that personal identity could also be a reason for viewing our piece.
Although several films of similar genres to ours can be classified as 12 or 12A's, if we were conforming to the guidelines of the bbfc, we believe that some of the themes that we chose to include in our piece could be too violent for viewers younger than 15. When asked, the majority of our audience associated our piece with films such as Drive, Collateral, and The Bourne Identity. These films are all classified as 18’s or 15’s, suggesting that our original predictions were correct.
Above is a sample survey carried out by a seventeen-year-old male that is a privately educated student, in their penultimate year of secondary school. Having questioned a fairly broad age range of people, I think it is safe to deduce that our target audience will be someone similar to the person questioned above. We aimed to dress our character in clothes similar to those of people our age, and his behaviour and dialogue were also supposed to be relevant to our audience.
Based on our collected data, I think that it is safe to deduce that our target audience fits comfortably into the 15-25 year-old category. They are most likely a student or young adult, probably either currently in higher education or entering/leaving higher education. Of the people that we sampled, the most complimentary and excited by our piece were most definitely people of a similar age to us. Although the themes of our piece would most likely encourage the diversion use and gratification, the actors we used were relatable to teenagers, meaning that personal identity could also be a reason for viewing our piece.
Although several films of similar genres to ours can be classified as 12 or 12A's, if we were conforming to the guidelines of the bbfc, we believe that some of the themes that we chose to include in our piece could be too violent for viewers younger than 15. When asked, the majority of our audience associated our piece with films such as Drive, Collateral, and The Bourne Identity. These films are all classified as 18’s or 15’s, suggesting that our original predictions were correct.
Evaluation Question 6
What have you learnt about technologies form the process of constructing this product?
Blogger.com – This was very useful for displaying our progress, planning, constructing and evaluation.
YouTube.com – We used this to research thriller openings, which helped inspire us. It was also used to display our preliminary task and our final piece.
Google.com – Arguably one of the most useful forms of technology, as it allowed us to search for and access images, music, and information about similar films for our research section.
Final Cut Pro X – This was used to construct our film, our recce and preliminary task, and also to edit them using things such as filters, titles, colour balancing, and sound balancing that were available with the software. For example, we used an expander to make sections of our dialogue clearer, and we used frame matching to equilibrilize the colour of certain shots. It also had a built-in automatic save feature, meaning that our work was less easily lost.
Apple Macintosh iMac desktop – I found this computer extremely easy to use, and the display was very clear, making editing easier, as we could see problem areas that required correcting.
Sony HD Camera – We used this to film our piece and our recce. We learnt how to use it whilst shooting our recce, and I found it easy to manipulate in order to achieve the necessary shots.
Tripods – We used this to steady the camera, and this in turn helped achieve key shots, such as the wide-angle opening shots of Tower Bridge and the surrounding areas.
Microphone – These were most definitely essential, as even though we had minimal dialogue, the lines that we did choose to include were very important for the audience to hear, therefore we used microphones.
Kaiser Video lights – We decided to include these, as some of our locations were badly lit and therefore required lights, but we also used them in naturally well-lit shots, as it created a better atmosphere, and helped reduce graininess.
Imdb – This was used a great deal to acquire information about directors, films, and production companies, it therefore contributed the most to the research and planning sections of our piece.
DaFont – We found the font that we chose to use in all our titles and the main title of our piece from this website, it was called ‘Bank Gothic’ and we felt it was distinguished from any of the fonts that could be found, both on Microsoft Word and Final Cut Pro X.
Free play music – We obtained the majority of our sound from this website, most importantly, our main music track, called ‘Ascension from the well’ by Peter John Ross. It was useful because it had a wide range of copyright free music.
I feel as though the thing that I have learnt the most about the technologies that we included is how to manipulate them in order to achieve the desired effect. In some cases, such as with Final Cut Pro X, I found it slightly harder to be fully confident with using it, but once I was competent enough, I felt as though it was a lot easier to create the final product that we had envisaged.
Thursday 22 March 2012
Evaluation Question 5
How do you attract/address your audience?
Narrative + Genre
From the questionnaire, the clearest things established to us were the similar media products to ours – three titles repeatedly cropping up were Drive, Collateral and the Bourne films. It was also suggested from the questionnaire that most people seemed to understand the story behind our film and they saw it as either a suspense thriller or a crime thriller – which we also saw this film as.
The fact that the crime and suspense aspects of the story were the main aspects that reached through to our audience suggests that they saw it mainly as a genre film like, for example, Drive and Collateral. Both of these films are notable for not using exposition in their opening. The opening of Drive, for example, sees the main character beginning a getaway mission while in our film it sees our character beginning his assassination mission. In Collateral, the film begins with the main character as he is leaving LAX airport without an explanation – our film echoes this in the sense that when our main character moves from A to B it is not immediately explained why. Both these films also have strong stylistics and aesthetics – in the opening scenes of both, wide shots of the Los Angeles skyline are frequently used to establish the location as they focus on immersing the audience in the location rather than following generic plot conventions – and our product followed suit, introducing the film with a river view of London. In this way, we have blended escapism – as we follow a suspenseful and dramatic narrative – with realism, as we are immersing our audiences in what are most likely to be familiar locations to them.
The general narrative of the opening scene is straightforward though one or two of our viewers felt that it moved quickly and they were pushed to keep up - this feedback is not totally worrying to us, however, as it was our intention to put the audience in the middle of the story and not focus on story exposition. The possible consequence of this – that the audience have found the film simply confusing – has, we feel, been avoided, as the majority of feedback to our film was positive in the narrative aspect.
We drew upon the influence of actors such as Ryan Gosling when it came to casting and creating our main character, feeling that an actor like him would have widespread appeal to the age bracket that we were marketing this film at.
Our story mainly involves fairly young characters who would appeal to audiences within the 15-25 age bracket as we wanted our audience to be attracted to it through personal identification. Feeling that the personal identification theory would be a good way of appealing to our audiences, we also casted an actor to play the girl who is killed who is the same age as the people we are marketing this film to as we felt that we wanted the characters to be relatable to a teenage/young adult audience. Part of our opening relied on a shock factor to draw in viewers, and so we felt that killing of a girl of a fairly young age would be an adequate way of doing so. This is the aspect of the story that we feel may have led to all the comparisons our film received – to Drive, Collateral and the Bourne films – as the violence/action in each of them is generally unexpected, surprising and shocking. In Drive, one of the main female characters is one of the first people to be killed in the film, while in Collateral the entire third act revolves around a woman in danger. In The Bourne Supremacy, the main female character of the first film in the series is killed in the opening scene.
We believed that our choice of location would appeal to our target audience of 15-24 year olds as London Bridge is very urban and high-tempo and thus appeals to youths who want a familiar, modern, busy setting. They are therefore attracted to the film as it seems like it will be full of action as opposed to a more rural environment in which one might expect a slower-paced film. Furthermore, a great deal of cinemagoers are city-dwellers as there are many more cinemas in the city than in the countryside so said cinemagoers will be attracted to the city-based setting. The urban setting also reflects many other city-based thrillers such as Drive and Collateral so viewers may see the film hoping to have the same experience as with those films.
We chose our actor (Callum Ruddleston) because one could certainly say that he is attractive so would attract young girls and possibly older girls too to the film. We had also modelled our main role on Ryan Gosling's role in Drive and Callum looks quite like Ryan Gosling so this degree of familiarity may further draw audiences in.
The visual mood of the film opening and its cold colour palette suggests a steely, serious, gritty element to the film. The close ups of the main character makes the audience focus on the main character and sympathise with what he's going through and the decisions he has to make.
The synth-based soundtrack suggests that the setting of the film is modern and possibly dystopian. It is slow and brooding and slowly builds tension. The modernism of the synthy soundtrack should relate to our young target audience and connect with contemporary music trends.
Here is a focus interview I conducted to gain some feedback on how we attracted and addressed our audience:
Wednesday 21 March 2012
Thursday 8 March 2012
The Film Industry Questions - Exhibition
1. How important is the appearance of a cinema in you returning? Use examples from your own cinema visits.
On one hand, it could be argued that the appearance of a cinema is important in one returning. Geographical factors are not necessarily the most important ones for deciding which cinema to choose as many cinemas are easily accessible by means of public transport or other methods of travel. For this reason, the appearance of a cinema can come to be the deciding factor on whether or not to visit it. After all, the appearance of a cinema is what makes the first impression on someone going to see a film at the big screen meaning that they will be strongly influenced by it and it can come to determine the viewer’s outlook on the whole event. Furthermore, cinemas nowadays can have more features than simply a foyer – some have, for example, cafes, meaning the features of an individual cinema are becoming more and more important regarding people’s choices of cinema.
On the other hand, however, the deciding factor of going to the cinema altogether is almost always where films are on. Due to film marketing, most people will go to cinemas with an idea of what they want to watch already in their head – it is simply a question of which cinemas are showing it at the most convenient time. Most big films are now booked online which show how cinemas themselves are not as important as what they show.
All in all, the appearance of a cinema is becoming more important in convincing viewers to return – however, it will never be a deciding factor over the question of which cinemas show which films.
2. How significant do you think 3D and digital projection facilities will be to exhibitors? What will it allow them to do?
The use of digital projection facilities will allow exhibitors to create more screens as using digital technology is cheaper. This as a result will lead to cinemas making a bigger profit out of showings, firstly because they will have more cinemas and secondly because the showings cost less for them now. The use of 3D is also considered to be a strong turning point in cinema which will draw more people into cinemas on the basis of watching a film in 3D given its relatively new transfer into the mainstream. Furthermore, ticket prices are more expensive with 3D showings meaning that cinemas will make even more profit out of them.
3. Find out more about Vue, Odeon UCI and Cineworld cinemas - who owns them?
Vue are owned by the private equity firm Doughty Hanson & Co.
Odeon UCI have come under various ownerships in the last 10 years, firstly to Cinven in 2000, then to a group of private investors in 2003 and then to Terra Firma in 2004 where it was merged with United Cinemas International.
Cineworld is privately owned, though the Blackstone group invested in it in 2004 and currently hold 20% of its shares.
4. Although audience choice was a central part of the success of the multiplex what actually have multiplexes allowed exhibitors to do?
Multiplexes have allowed exhibitors to make more money out of individual Hollywood films - despite the amount of cinemas in many multiplexes it is usually the case that most of them show the same 8-10 core titles which are usually Hollywood films - barely any of the films shown at multiplexes are arthouse. The increase in multiplexes has led to an increase in aadmissions - they doubled in little more than 10 years - between 1985 and 1997 admissions went from 72 million to 140 million.
5. The main arthouse cinema chains are the Picturehouse and Curzon chains. One of the main differences between these cinemas and multiplex cinemas is in the films they show - Curzon and the Picturehouse cinemas often show independent films with Curzon favouring European or world cinema. Hollywood blockbusters are rarely present in these cinemas and arthouse, world cinema films are rarely present in the multiplexes. Furthermore, these chains do not only show modern films but re runs of old films as well, popular or obscure ones.
Arthouse cinemas also often have less screens than multiplexes sometimes only 3 or 4. They are not made with the intention of making as much money as the multiplexes (of course they do hope to seek profits as well) meaning they have less screens.
6. What are the BFI doing to help promote niche films to UK audiences?
Funding niche products in order to secure their creation and large scale release.
7. Exhibitors are the route to customers. All film makers think carefully about how their production decisions affect the exhibition sector. What do you look for in a cinema?
In a cinema I do not look for anything in particular - it is usually the case that I go to see films based on what films are on in which cinemas. However, since I watch a range of films from major Hollywood films to more independent productions I tend to look for cinemas which show a reasonably wide range of films. This is not always easy, however, as there is an increasingly strong divide between Hollywood productions and independent productions.
8. Exhibitors are increasingly involved in promoting independent films locally - where personal appearances by cast and crew can generate good press. How might this affect the production of low budget British films?
This will allow more publicity - particularly good publicity - of low budget British films reaching local audiences, which may in turn increase the production of low budget British films and secure larger scale exhibitions of them.
9. The exhibition sector in the UK has grown rapidly but now is a period of some consolidation. The advent of digital technology is raising some interesting issues for the relationships between producer, director and exhibitor. What do you think might happen in the future?
I believe that in the future, digital technology will be increasingly used by exhibitors due to the fact that most major productions which are making money are being made using digital technology. Even directors who make their films using film rather than digital may find their films being exhibited using digital technology as they are soon to be in the minority of directors using film - due to the increasing use of digital to film, digital to exhibit may become the norm.
10. Do you think independent cinemas will survive in the future?
I think that independent cinemas will survive in the future, as there is still a reasonably strong market for independent, foreign and old films - particularly in the wake of this year's releases. The Artist, for example, was a European production that went on to win Best Picture at the Oscars. This may open more windows for European cinema altogether - being a silent film and a throwback to the golden age of cinema it may also convince more people to see the old black and white classic films shown in cinemas such as Picturehouses. The Tree of Life and Drive, both arthouse films (Drive being an independent production by a European director), also recieved major releases, critical acclaim and the former was nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards.
On one hand, it could be argued that the appearance of a cinema is important in one returning. Geographical factors are not necessarily the most important ones for deciding which cinema to choose as many cinemas are easily accessible by means of public transport or other methods of travel. For this reason, the appearance of a cinema can come to be the deciding factor on whether or not to visit it. After all, the appearance of a cinema is what makes the first impression on someone going to see a film at the big screen meaning that they will be strongly influenced by it and it can come to determine the viewer’s outlook on the whole event. Furthermore, cinemas nowadays can have more features than simply a foyer – some have, for example, cafes, meaning the features of an individual cinema are becoming more and more important regarding people’s choices of cinema.
On the other hand, however, the deciding factor of going to the cinema altogether is almost always where films are on. Due to film marketing, most people will go to cinemas with an idea of what they want to watch already in their head – it is simply a question of which cinemas are showing it at the most convenient time. Most big films are now booked online which show how cinemas themselves are not as important as what they show.
All in all, the appearance of a cinema is becoming more important in convincing viewers to return – however, it will never be a deciding factor over the question of which cinemas show which films.
2. How significant do you think 3D and digital projection facilities will be to exhibitors? What will it allow them to do?
The use of digital projection facilities will allow exhibitors to create more screens as using digital technology is cheaper. This as a result will lead to cinemas making a bigger profit out of showings, firstly because they will have more cinemas and secondly because the showings cost less for them now. The use of 3D is also considered to be a strong turning point in cinema which will draw more people into cinemas on the basis of watching a film in 3D given its relatively new transfer into the mainstream. Furthermore, ticket prices are more expensive with 3D showings meaning that cinemas will make even more profit out of them.
3. Find out more about Vue, Odeon UCI and Cineworld cinemas - who owns them?
Vue are owned by the private equity firm Doughty Hanson & Co.
Odeon UCI have come under various ownerships in the last 10 years, firstly to Cinven in 2000, then to a group of private investors in 2003 and then to Terra Firma in 2004 where it was merged with United Cinemas International.
Cineworld is privately owned, though the Blackstone group invested in it in 2004 and currently hold 20% of its shares.
4. Although audience choice was a central part of the success of the multiplex what actually have multiplexes allowed exhibitors to do?
Multiplexes have allowed exhibitors to make more money out of individual Hollywood films - despite the amount of cinemas in many multiplexes it is usually the case that most of them show the same 8-10 core titles which are usually Hollywood films - barely any of the films shown at multiplexes are arthouse. The increase in multiplexes has led to an increase in aadmissions - they doubled in little more than 10 years - between 1985 and 1997 admissions went from 72 million to 140 million.
5. The main arthouse cinema chains are the Picturehouse and Curzon chains. One of the main differences between these cinemas and multiplex cinemas is in the films they show - Curzon and the Picturehouse cinemas often show independent films with Curzon favouring European or world cinema. Hollywood blockbusters are rarely present in these cinemas and arthouse, world cinema films are rarely present in the multiplexes. Furthermore, these chains do not only show modern films but re runs of old films as well, popular or obscure ones.
Arthouse cinemas also often have less screens than multiplexes sometimes only 3 or 4. They are not made with the intention of making as much money as the multiplexes (of course they do hope to seek profits as well) meaning they have less screens.
6. What are the BFI doing to help promote niche films to UK audiences?
Funding niche products in order to secure their creation and large scale release.
7. Exhibitors are the route to customers. All film makers think carefully about how their production decisions affect the exhibition sector. What do you look for in a cinema?
In a cinema I do not look for anything in particular - it is usually the case that I go to see films based on what films are on in which cinemas. However, since I watch a range of films from major Hollywood films to more independent productions I tend to look for cinemas which show a reasonably wide range of films. This is not always easy, however, as there is an increasingly strong divide between Hollywood productions and independent productions.
8. Exhibitors are increasingly involved in promoting independent films locally - where personal appearances by cast and crew can generate good press. How might this affect the production of low budget British films?
This will allow more publicity - particularly good publicity - of low budget British films reaching local audiences, which may in turn increase the production of low budget British films and secure larger scale exhibitions of them.
9. The exhibition sector in the UK has grown rapidly but now is a period of some consolidation. The advent of digital technology is raising some interesting issues for the relationships between producer, director and exhibitor. What do you think might happen in the future?
I believe that in the future, digital technology will be increasingly used by exhibitors due to the fact that most major productions which are making money are being made using digital technology. Even directors who make their films using film rather than digital may find their films being exhibited using digital technology as they are soon to be in the minority of directors using film - due to the increasing use of digital to film, digital to exhibit may become the norm.
10. Do you think independent cinemas will survive in the future?
I think that independent cinemas will survive in the future, as there is still a reasonably strong market for independent, foreign and old films - particularly in the wake of this year's releases. The Artist, for example, was a European production that went on to win Best Picture at the Oscars. This may open more windows for European cinema altogether - being a silent film and a throwback to the golden age of cinema it may also convince more people to see the old black and white classic films shown in cinemas such as Picturehouses. The Tree of Life and Drive, both arthouse films (Drive being an independent production by a European director), also recieved major releases, critical acclaim and the former was nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards.
Sunday 4 March 2012
Evaluation Question 7
Going from our preliminary task, which involved filming a short, 30 second sequence with very few actors, a simple set and no major editing requirements, to our actual opening, in which we had to juggle several actors in a complicated location, I feel that I have learned a great deal about the filming process.
Firstly, I developed my skills in the planning process of film making due to the logistical issues we faced and needed to overcome. We created shot lists and storyboards for our openings which we felt were important to go through meticulously and rigorously as we originally intended to film some of our sequence on the DLR – for this, we felt that an efficient film shoot was highly important as there were a number of problems we could have potentially faced filming there. We faced one such problem – we were not permitted to film on the DLR train when we arrived at the station for our recce. We felt that we could not subsequently film in our other location which was near the DLR station as there would be location continuities. After performing different recces on different locations, we finally settled on the one we have now – London Bridge and the bank below it.
When we came to filming our film, I found that I progressed a great deal. For one thing, having to transpose our idea into a different setting meant that we had to make some on the spot directorial choices about how we would shoot the scenes and I feel that the decisions and changes we made were adequate and cinematic. This may have come from our research into similar media products of the thriller genre.
We also managed to improve our technical understanding of the equipment far beyond our original knowledge of it when we filmed our preliminary task. I found that I was unsure about how much of the technology worked for our prelim despite the fact that it did not require as much technology as we used for the final shoot. Due to the amount of recces we did however – approximately 3 in total – I felt significantly more confident with regard to using the equipment.
I feel that the area I developed in most, however, was film editing. When editing my preliminary task I had little knowledge of the editing software we were using. Furthermore, we were not required to do much sound editing at all and what continuity editing we had to do was simple and minimal. In our final project, however, the sound of our film – which included cars going across a bridge, church bells and plenty of wind – required much sound editing which I was personally appointed the task of. During the course of the sound editing, I learnt how to detach audio from video clips, how to match audio levels and reduce background hum – each of these tools I used frequently to make our sound seamless. Our continuity editing also improved substantially with the creation of our final product - we successfully managed to use eye line matches, match on actions and shot reverse shots.
Overall, I feel that I have learnt and developed the most in the planning and editing stages - most importantly, I have learnt the importance of these two stages of production as we faced challenges during our production which to overcome relied on the strength of our planning and our skills in the editing process - neither of which we developed a great deal in the run up to our preliminary task.
Firstly, I developed my skills in the planning process of film making due to the logistical issues we faced and needed to overcome. We created shot lists and storyboards for our openings which we felt were important to go through meticulously and rigorously as we originally intended to film some of our sequence on the DLR – for this, we felt that an efficient film shoot was highly important as there were a number of problems we could have potentially faced filming there. We faced one such problem – we were not permitted to film on the DLR train when we arrived at the station for our recce. We felt that we could not subsequently film in our other location which was near the DLR station as there would be location continuities. After performing different recces on different locations, we finally settled on the one we have now – London Bridge and the bank below it.
When we came to filming our film, I found that I progressed a great deal. For one thing, having to transpose our idea into a different setting meant that we had to make some on the spot directorial choices about how we would shoot the scenes and I feel that the decisions and changes we made were adequate and cinematic. This may have come from our research into similar media products of the thriller genre.
We also managed to improve our technical understanding of the equipment far beyond our original knowledge of it when we filmed our preliminary task. I found that I was unsure about how much of the technology worked for our prelim despite the fact that it did not require as much technology as we used for the final shoot. Due to the amount of recces we did however – approximately 3 in total – I felt significantly more confident with regard to using the equipment.
I feel that the area I developed in most, however, was film editing. When editing my preliminary task I had little knowledge of the editing software we were using. Furthermore, we were not required to do much sound editing at all and what continuity editing we had to do was simple and minimal. In our final project, however, the sound of our film – which included cars going across a bridge, church bells and plenty of wind – required much sound editing which I was personally appointed the task of. During the course of the sound editing, I learnt how to detach audio from video clips, how to match audio levels and reduce background hum – each of these tools I used frequently to make our sound seamless. Our continuity editing also improved substantially with the creation of our final product - we successfully managed to use eye line matches, match on actions and shot reverse shots.
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