October Half Term Homework Questions...

1. Outline briefly how your approach to your current production differs from your experience of pre-production at AS?

Within my AS piece I understood how crucial careful planning and research is to create any successful piece of media. I had never done any aspect of media beforehand, therefore all the technology from cameras to editing software was completely new to me. I therefore knew that in order to create a mark worthy piece I would have to do a lot of research into the different technological aspects associated to creating a film, also from other coursework relate art subjects I have previously taken I understood how I would need to plan carefully all aspects of my film, from the storyboard to the script, props to characters.
I feel that for my A2 approach I have taken a similar approach in terms of ensuring that although I now have the understanding of the technology and technological terms associated to creating a film piece, it is still vital that I carefully research and plan all aspects of my short film. Due to the fact that the task for my advance production is to create a short film lasting five minutes, I felt that unlike for my AS where I predominately concentrated on researching the opening to films that were in my given genre, for my A2 although from the start of being given the task had a rough idea of the type of genre and style of film I would like to create, researched a number of different short films from a variety of genres (such as comedy and documentary) and  resources (such as virgin media shorts and bbc short films) in order to gain an understanding on the typical conventions used within shorts.
Similarly to my AS piece I have spent a number of weeks thinking of a range of ideas and possibilities, and by looking at the strengths and weaknesses of each idea been able to choose one final idea that I feel I shall be able to work upon in order to create a successful short film. Although I have off course been thinking of the actual idea, and meaning behind my short film I have also taken on board the fact that within my AS piece although I had a strong concept of how the film would explore the nature v nurture debate within psychology I feel I focused to much on the concept and not enough on the exploration of shots within my opening, therefore my final piece for AS I felt that with a more variety of camera shots could of been much stronger. I have in turn for my A2 piece focused not only on the content and meaning behind my film, but also on how I can incorporate a variety of shot angles in order to make the film overall visually more interesting to the audience.
I have also ensured that this year, as I am not planning on using dialogue within my short film my storyboard is extremely detailed, this has allowed me to make sure that I have included enough within my short film to portray the meaning and grasp the audience's attention without the use of dialogue.

2. What decision have you made about the narrative structure of your short film. How had your narrative moved on since year 12?

The conventional narrative used within film is a linear narrative, that is one that portrays a beginning, middle and end. For my AS piece, I felt that I wanted to explore away from a conventional narrative, by incorporating flashbacks within my film, I feel that alongside the voiceover I was able to portray to the audience that the 'home videos' were flashback of the two adult males as children. This time however I felt that I wanted a piece that was set in the present rather than past tense. To start with I set out to create a more artistic film, that rather than following a specific narrative structure, was more a collection of images portraying a meaning, however after exploring with the camera and taking a bit of footage this half term I have decided that , my film needs more structure in order to ensure that it shall grasp the audiences attention for the whole five minutes. I therefore have decided to continue with my theme of shoes, but rather than following a number of characters focus on one protagonist character. This character also in contrast to my original idea will be fictional, the film shall follow a liner narrative to an extent, as the film portrays the character as she lives a day in strange pair of shoes that are not hers, she feels that it is the shoes that are meaning that throughout her day all good things are happening. Therefore my film shall take on the structure of a beginning where she wakes up middle her day and end. I feel that I have moved on from year 12, as I have the idea that if I took on a linear narrative than my piece would not be exciting enough, however I have learnt from my AS work that simpler is sometimes more effective and by using a more simple structure and idea I can focus on ensuring that I demonstrate technical skill and knowledge within my piece.

3. To what extent could the short film form be considered a discrete genre?

Questions...Questions...Questions...

Digital Technology 

1. How has digital technology helped you capture your ideas for your media production?
Firstly one of the technologies that I used throughout my production especially within the research aspects, where I could capture thoughts of previous pieces of work and develop from them my own ideas was the Internet. One website that was key to the development of my media production was the IMBD website this in turn helped me gain knowledge about existing films by providing key information  not only on the genre and synapse of the film but also which company produced and distributed the film, therefore in turn helping me capture an idea of what kind of company I could develop in order to produce and distribute my own media product. This website I therefore used alot during the research element of the production of a media piece, as it helped provide knowledge about many aspects of the film industry. I also used the Internet, when using google during the researching of my production piece, it allowed me to search the Internet for all aspects of the film industry, for example I used it when researching different title sequences via "the art of titling" in order to help me recreate my own title sequence for my opening. I also used google in the production stage to my film as it was a key source to researching copy free music. Finally I used YouTube as another key website, it helped me capture initial ideas during the research stage to my piece as it allowed me to view and analysing the positives and negatives of existing opening sequences.
Through the production and post-production of my piece, digital technologies helped to capture my initial ideas and visions and put them into reality, I especially focused on the use of 'After Effects' and 'Premier Pro' therefore an example of digital technology playing a key part.'After Effects' especially came in useful when it came to constructing my title sequence as it enabled me to create a text layer on top of a transparent layer, therefore allowing the titles to overlay my footage when it all came together in 'Premier Pro', whilst as 'Premier Pro' was the hub of my piece where all my individual components came together so I could from there construct my opening film, from the production logo, to the title, to the home videos.
Throughout the process, I have developed my skills for a range a digital technologies and hope to enhance this development further during my advanced production piece especially with the use of 'Photoshop' which I explored a little during in the creation of my production logo.

Creativity

2. What features of your work would you say are original to you?

Within the media industry, it is extremely difficult and therefore extremely unique for a completely original piece to be created, many pieces are based on basic subject matter and expanded through the use of a different angle or technique in turn creating a unique individual original aspect to the subject matter. I was inspired by other professional films that had incorporated home videos (example = Submarine) however I think by involving the psychological aspect of the nature-nurture debate I created a film that had its own unique twist.

All films are produced and distributed by a company, however I created a completely original company for my film both in terms of a production and distribution. The producer company I created was called 'Seaside Productions' and from this I had to create on 'After Effects' a completely original ident.

Research and Planning

3. How did you research into genre contribute to your production work?

Before developing my final idea, I firstly researched what is genre this in turn helped me gain an in site into what makes a film a certain genre therefore allowing me to portray genre in the correct manor in my production work. I had originally two initial ideas one of which was a documentary genre and one of which was a crime,horror genre I therefore carried out research into both areas, originally I did this so I could outweigh the positives and negatives of each genre and decide which one I would like to use for my final piece, this included reviewing pre-existing work in both genres (example = Fargo as an exemplar of crime horror). However after constructing initial research, I decided to create my final piece as a drama that involved element of a documentary style genre and also a detective, crime horror this in turn helped me to create a more original and unique piece, by similar to how Fargo went against the stereotypical traits of a crime, horror going against the typical norms and characteristics of one particular genre.

Post-Production

4. How much of your text was 'created' only in post-production?

For my film, I included a number of title's that came together to make my overall title sequence this was all created in post-production. I decided early on that I would construct my film first and focus on any text later. In order to create my title sequence I used 'After Effects' where I was able to create my titles on a transparent background and add animation to each title, I then imported each into my film on 'Premier Pro' the transparent background meant that each title could be overlayed onto of the footage. Overall post-production editing was an important part of my film, as I distorted some of my footage through various affects in order to create my own style of home videos, this was however constructed on 'Premier Pro'.