Evaluation activity 4 - Who would be the audience for your media product?

• 15-30 yrs old
• The film will have a 15 rating because this will mean that it can have adult themes and content, but does not alienate some of the audience, which an 18 rating would
• Mainly males would enjoy this film, but some females would enjoy it if they are fans of the crime genre
• The target market will be people who enjoy a mystery and suspense as the film will centre around a police investigation
• A film that ours is similar to is Se7en, as it has the same blend of being a crime film, but including some aspects of the horror genre. Therefore, fans of this film may enjoy ours.

Evaluation Activity 3 – What kind of media institution may distribute your product and why?

Film festivals are often an important place for smaller independent films, as they can be seen by studio executives who may buy the rights to distribute the picture. Two of the biggest festivals are Sundance in Utah and Cannes in France. If the picture was picked up, it would lead to more money given to the filmmakers and also enable more people to see the film if it is shown in cinemas. 

If no film companies wish to buy the film, it could be released straight to DVD, where income would be generated by people buying the DVD or renting it from DVD rental companies, such as Blockbuster.

Another option would be to attempt to sell the film to a television company so that it could be shown as a TV movie. Companies that it could be sold to include the BBC, Channel 4 and Sky. There would be more viewers if the film was sold to a terrestrial channel, but Sky and other satellite channels would be more likely to buy the film as they have channels devoted to films.

Another option would be to upload our video to an internet site, such as Eyesoda and then  people who are registered can watch the films and this will enable us to build up a fan base and for more people to be able to watch the film. The money that people pay to watch the film is split between the filmmakers and Eyesoda.

Why have we chosen our genre?

For our media coursework, my group has decided to make the opening sequence of a film in the crime genre.

The reasons that we have chosen to do this genre are:

• We all enjoy watching this genre of film
• We felt that we would be able to create an effective scene which would engage the audience
• By doing research, we discovered that more people enjoy watching films in the crime genre than any other genre

Evaluating our preliminary task

For our preliminary task, we were asked to create a short film of a character walking into a room, having a short conversation, and then leaving the room. The sequence had to include match on action and shot-reverse-shot and it had to observe the 180 degree rule.

My role in our group was as the director and cameraman. For this I had to make sure that all of the shots were framed well and that they made sense so that they could be edited together to create a coherent narrative.

We succeeded in a number of instances of match on action, editing shots so that the transitions coincided with one of the characters performing an action. We did this by cutting between different camera angles as a character walked through a series of doors.

Our shot-reverse-shot was less successful as we only had one instance of the two characters being the focus of the shot, so we only had a shot-reverse. If we were to do this task again, we would have put in a second shot over Amy’s shoulder showing Tim’s reaction to her behaviour.

We observed the 180 degree rule as the camera did not ‘cross the line’ during the conversation between Tim and Amy.

Overall, I was happy with the final result of our preliminary task as we succeeded in carrying out our brief and the cinematography and editing of the sequence made it look more professional by controlling what was in the frame of the camera and removing elements that we thought were detrimental to the quality of the film.

How do blogs give us an insight into modern life?

Blogs are useful for discovering about the modern world as they enable us to easily see the thoughts and feelings of a range of different people with different expertise. This can help us to have more informed opinions on a topic because we are more able to see the different points of view. The fact that professionals in a certain area, instead of journalists, often write the blogs may lead to a more reasoned opinion and one that is more reflective of the truth instead of just the more sensational stories being picked up on for the news and for public consumption.

Also, the fact that blogs exist tells us about the modern world and how people are open with their feelings as they write them down for complete strangers to read. This is a sign of a trusting community, although it can also lead to potential dangers as people are anonymous on the internet, so may do or say things that they wouldn’t in real life. This may lead to people feeling victimised.

On the other hand, it may be that blogs are only written by certain groups of people, such as people with strong opinions on a subject and are good with computers. This may mean that we get a skewed viewpoint if we rarely see a moderate viewpoint on issues or if whole groups of people who are not good with computers are ignored. Also, people may pay more attention to blogs of people who they like or who write in a style that they enjoy, so this can lead to people making up their opinions based more on the person who has the opinion or how it is presented, instead of how they should by weighing up the different points of view and then making an informed decision.

Insomnia opening sequence

The opening titles in Insomnia help to set the claustrophobic atmosphere of the film. This is achieved by a combination of the opressive score; the contrast between the small plane and the wide open vistas; and by how Nolan gradually teases the material through which we see the blood soaking. At first when the viewer sees the blood, they are struck by the strangeness of the shot, but as it is repeated multiple times, the viewer tries to work out where the fabric is from until near the end of the scene when it is revealed that the fabric is from the sleeve of a shirt.

Memento opening sequence

Christopher Nolan uses the opening sequence here to create curiousity in the viewer. He does this by playing the scene backwards, with the polaroid photo disappearing and the bullet going back into the gun. This make the viewer wonder why it is being done, which sets the tone for the film as the viewer spends the whole film trying to work out what is happening. This air of mystery is also added to by only showing part of the tattoo on Leonard's hand, so the viewer becomes curious as to what it means.