Wednesday, 21 April 2010
Friday, 16 April 2010
media evalutation
question 1:-
For our genre of movie police action/comedy we used several key conventions that are usually used in a number of different ways
The first and most crucial convention we used was the dysfunctional ‘bad ass’ American police duo, a common convention used in films such as bad boys and starsky and hutch. This convention is crucial as these characters are what generates comedy and actions through their dialogue and actions. We develop these characters by having them in major portions of the films so that the audience can become more familiar and comfortable with these characters.
Another key convention we used was the ‘angry police’ seen in almost all films of the same genre; starsky and hutch, Beverly hills cop and bad boys. We chose to develop and work this character into our character because usually in this specific genre these character helps to generate the comical elements and usually offer them a challenge and their a key convention our audience would expect to see.
We also developed on the use of criminals as they are a key convention in our genre of film and without any criminals there would be no need for the police, we developed these characters as they add to the plot and allow action to generate.
We also developed the idea that the cop duo were American and lived in America as traditionally these films are set in American cities; Beverly hills cop, starsky and hutch, die hard, bad boys etc and we felt them being American allowed them to be developed with a certain attitude about them which allows them to be developed as more loose cannon.
Our film doesn't really challenge any of the traditional conventions as we found they work well with this specific genre and changing an element such as having the police chief calm and relaxed takes away certain elements from the genre such as humour or if we made the police duo functional that takes away the action from the film.
However if we were going to challenge something I would challenge location our film is set , we decided to have our characters as Americans and be set in America because that's the traditional convention but we could of set it in England similar to hot fuzz to show that not all action has to be American.
question2:-
Our film represents American cops as being bad ass and high action, it also represents people in power being angry and stressed out like the police chief because their job and also represents criminals as being people who live and work in seedy grimy environments
Our heroes of the play : CJ and Smoke
CJ is represented as a bad ass cop figure similar to that of bad boys , this kind of character is usually a traditional convention that is used in cop action movies there is always a cop who breaks the rules. we shall represent him through the use of camera angles, costume, dialect and action. cjs costume will be very informal hell be wearing a leather jacket and a hoody, baggy jeans. his dialogue is very informal to and uses violent or vulgar language his actions are also fairly aggressive which will be show through camera angles and props he will have a gun and the use of midhsots and long shots will show him attacking a character.
smoke is also a cop who doesn't play completely by the rules by tries not to break them unless its the last resort, the 'good' partner is another traditional convention used in cop films as the two main characters are binary oppositions which adds a comical element to the film. smoke will be show through the use of costume, he wears a parker jacket which is slightly more formal than smoke but he also wears jeans and casual clothes in the office scene, he dresses allot smarter than smoke but still informal, his actions and dialogue tend to be allot more calmer than CJ, this is shown through the use of camera angles such as a high angle shot in the office scene which shows him as a more submissive character.
the criminal is a key convention in cop action films as the scenes involving the criminals are usually action packed, the criminal in our movie is from a mafia crime family who CJ and smoke have been trying to capture but the manages to get the wrong guy. he will be represented through the use of costume wearing a leather jacket in the chase scene and the final scene of our opening he will be represented through the use of setting, props, lighting and camera angles. the setting is a dark room with a light just focused on the criminal the use of midhsots and close ups will allow us to see the criminal traditional conventions of crime; a gun, alcohol and money, we shall also represent him as a traditional mafia criminal as hell be wearing a suit and shirt.
this a major convention of the genre of movie the angry police chief who takes the cops badges which follows our story line. we will show that he's angry because he's under a lot of pressure through the use of props such as a messy office and desk which will be shown through the use of camera angles and dialect. his costume will be very formal, a shirt and tie and he will be shouting close ups of his face will allow us to see anger. By doing this we may have traditionally stereotyped Americans as being action packed all the time we used this short cut because of the media our audience would see a major part would have been an American and so by stereotyping we offer a short cut to create characters our audience can immediately relate to and expect to be action packed.
question 3:-
The type of company that would endorse our film would either be Columbia pictures or 20th century fox. because they have made films of similar genre and would have enough money and knowledge to be able to advertise and distribute the product correctly so that a large proportion of our target audience will be able to see our movie
Columbia pictures:
Columbia pictures would be suitable for our film because they have been institutions for other films to a similar genre such as the 'bad boys' films as well as S.W.A.T. both of which were quite successful films. Columbia had a sae target audience with bad boys as we do with our film and decided to advertise through hotmail as most of our target audience has a access to internet and a computer our film would be able to be advertised in similar ways because Columbia have the knowledge of our target audience and funding to do allow this
20th century fox:
20th century fox would also be suitable for our film because they are associated with big action packed blockbusters that are audience would expect from an action film, they would expect a lot of special effects etc because of the genre of the film and 20th century fox are associated with using lots of special effects. they have been associated with the die hard films .
however we would have a bigger company as our distribution company as we realised many of these film such as Beverly hills cop have quite a cheesy feel to them and for this to be tangible we would need it to be produced by a low budget production company but to be distributed by a larger company who has dealt with the film genre and know how to advertise and can afford to advertise correctly
our independent film studio was bullet spoof productions
question 4:-
The genre of our movie is action/comedy and attracts a certain audience.
demographically this type of films would attract males between the ages of 15-24, for the 'younger' range of our target audience they would usually be in education such as Gcse, A-levels or college and for the older range of our target audience who would be working would usually be in a wide variety of jobs from managerial possessions to positions such as working in an office. our target audience madrigal status can vary usually it would attract allot of single men however it will appeal to married men who would like an 'escape' from the wife or a night out with their friends. if we took a more psychographic approach to our audience they would tend to attract people who are socially conscious and want to be in with the crowd and up to all the latest trends, also the whole action plot of trying to bring down criminals their own way would also attract people who are power wielding who like to watch people in positions of power doing things their way. our action cope film would also attract people who are into the law and order aspect of it which would appeal to them. using the 3 c theory our target audience would be an aspire and would mostly be materialistic and care about their image.
after establishing what are audience want form their action movie we can then find ways of advertising so that our target audience would see it since our target audience is 15-24 as well as using traditional advertising techniques such as posters trailers etc another big place to advertise would be on the internet as a large percentage of our target audience will regularly use the internet using websites such as msn or hotmail giving us maximum advertising for a large population of our target audience.
question 5:-
We made our work interesting by using a number of traditional theories so our audience could relate to our film but we also added our own changes.
The first change we made was the story line, we had it alternating between a past event(the chase scene) and a current day event( the office). This non-linear story line attracts our audience as it generates the idea of Barthes action codes through the chase scene but also generates enigma codes because the audience are left wondering who the police are chasing and why they are chasing the criminal. Enigma codes are also generated at the end of the scene when the mob boss is killed as we are unaware who killed him.
We also developed Levi-straus’ idea of binary oppositions into our main characters CJ and Smoke, they are complete opposites of each other by doing this it allows humour to generate but also helps in the build up to action codes due to the actions of the se characters because of there oppositions
We also developed the use of prop's character roles but added our own twist to some of the traditional roles;
Hero: CJ and Smoke and crucial part to our movie as it allows the viewers a character to relate with our twist on this idea was that there was 2 helpers.
Villain: the mob boss allows for action to be generated and enigma codes
Helper; CJ to smoke and smoke to CJ
Princess; being welcomed back on the police force
Father; police chief as he allows the duo back on the force for saving the day
Dispatcher ;CJ as he initiates their mission
We developed the idea of todrov’s idea of equilibrium because it allows action to generate and offers a problem for them to overcome. Their original equilibrium was them being police officers, there disequilibrium is loosing their badges and their new equilibrium is fighting crime in their own way.
The use of music was key for attracting our audience as it creates an atmosphere of intensity in the chase scene and adds a sense of mystery and intensity in the final scene where the mob boss is assassinated.
question 6:-
I have learnt that technology used can seriously effect the outcome of our final product. We used basic hand held recording camera and a tripod for filming this caused a few problems. Ideally we would liked to have used a professional video recorder and other equipment such as a boom microphone as a major problem we found was that the cameras didn't pick up sound very well so we had to re-record a lot of material in different rooms to allow sound to be picked up. Another problem was the actual quality of the cameras as they were only 2.3 mega pixel the final outcome was very poor quality.
We used imovie to edit our movie this was a good piece of equipment as it allowed us to trim and cut shot, add titles and effects. However this was a basic piece of equipment and was limited to the amount of effects you could use and it was hard to add titles from other software such as Photoshop to our movie. Ideally we would have liked to have used a more professional software like Sony Vegas and adobe after effects which ahs a range of different effects and would allowed us to have ore creative control.
We created our music on garage band another limited piece of software as it uses primarily sound loops so we were restricted to how we could manipulate our movie, we did try to use a software called Reason but because we used Mac computer we were unable to upload our music onto the computer as it was not compatible.
question 7:-
looking back at my prelim task i think we havelearnt and improved on quite a few differetn techniques.
firstly the pace of editing to create an atmosphere that we used in scene such as the chase scene had improved drastically compared to our prelim it was a lot more fluid. and becuase we story boarded our fianl product the shots worked better and didnt seem to be thrown together.
we also learnt how mis-en-scne and setting can be used in comparrison to our prelim where we didnt put any real thought into our costumes or setting in our final product we specifically designed sets such as the mob boss lair and worked on costuem such as CJ's very informal loose and baggy clothing to give our product a more authentic feel.
i have also learnt that to create a product which works adn to be at a good level it requires a lot of time and effort such as story boarding and set creating, had we jsut threw things together with no real care it defiantly would hav affected our final out come.
inconclusion i beleive that i have learnt a vast majority of skills that have helped my overall ability at media production.
For our genre of movie police action/comedy we used several key conventions that are usually used in a number of different ways
The first and most crucial convention we used was the dysfunctional ‘bad ass’ American police duo, a common convention used in films such as bad boys and starsky and hutch. This convention is crucial as these characters are what generates comedy and actions through their dialogue and actions. We develop these characters by having them in major portions of the films so that the audience can become more familiar and comfortable with these characters.
Another key convention we used was the ‘angry police’ seen in almost all films of the same genre; starsky and hutch, Beverly hills cop and bad boys. We chose to develop and work this character into our character because usually in this specific genre these character helps to generate the comical elements and usually offer them a challenge and their a key convention our audience would expect to see.
We also developed on the use of criminals as they are a key convention in our genre of film and without any criminals there would be no need for the police, we developed these characters as they add to the plot and allow action to generate.
We also developed the idea that the cop duo were American and lived in America as traditionally these films are set in American cities; Beverly hills cop, starsky and hutch, die hard, bad boys etc and we felt them being American allowed them to be developed with a certain attitude about them which allows them to be developed as more loose cannon.
Our film doesn't really challenge any of the traditional conventions as we found they work well with this specific genre and changing an element such as having the police chief calm and relaxed takes away certain elements from the genre such as humour or if we made the police duo functional that takes away the action from the film.
However if we were going to challenge something I would challenge location our film is set , we decided to have our characters as Americans and be set in America because that's the traditional convention but we could of set it in England similar to hot fuzz to show that not all action has to be American.
question2:-
Our film represents American cops as being bad ass and high action, it also represents people in power being angry and stressed out like the police chief because their job and also represents criminals as being people who live and work in seedy grimy environments
Our heroes of the play : CJ and Smoke
CJ is represented as a bad ass cop figure similar to that of bad boys , this kind of character is usually a traditional convention that is used in cop action movies there is always a cop who breaks the rules. we shall represent him through the use of camera angles, costume, dialect and action. cjs costume will be very informal hell be wearing a leather jacket and a hoody, baggy jeans. his dialogue is very informal to and uses violent or vulgar language his actions are also fairly aggressive which will be show through camera angles and props he will have a gun and the use of midhsots and long shots will show him attacking a character.
smoke is also a cop who doesn't play completely by the rules by tries not to break them unless its the last resort, the 'good' partner is another traditional convention used in cop films as the two main characters are binary oppositions which adds a comical element to the film. smoke will be show through the use of costume, he wears a parker jacket which is slightly more formal than smoke but he also wears jeans and casual clothes in the office scene, he dresses allot smarter than smoke but still informal, his actions and dialogue tend to be allot more calmer than CJ, this is shown through the use of camera angles such as a high angle shot in the office scene which shows him as a more submissive character.
the criminal is a key convention in cop action films as the scenes involving the criminals are usually action packed, the criminal in our movie is from a mafia crime family who CJ and smoke have been trying to capture but the manages to get the wrong guy. he will be represented through the use of costume wearing a leather jacket in the chase scene and the final scene of our opening he will be represented through the use of setting, props, lighting and camera angles. the setting is a dark room with a light just focused on the criminal the use of midhsots and close ups will allow us to see the criminal traditional conventions of crime; a gun, alcohol and money, we shall also represent him as a traditional mafia criminal as hell be wearing a suit and shirt.
this a major convention of the genre of movie the angry police chief who takes the cops badges which follows our story line. we will show that he's angry because he's under a lot of pressure through the use of props such as a messy office and desk which will be shown through the use of camera angles and dialect. his costume will be very formal, a shirt and tie and he will be shouting close ups of his face will allow us to see anger. By doing this we may have traditionally stereotyped Americans as being action packed all the time we used this short cut because of the media our audience would see a major part would have been an American and so by stereotyping we offer a short cut to create characters our audience can immediately relate to and expect to be action packed.
question 3:-
The type of company that would endorse our film would either be Columbia pictures or 20th century fox. because they have made films of similar genre and would have enough money and knowledge to be able to advertise and distribute the product correctly so that a large proportion of our target audience will be able to see our movie
Columbia pictures:
Columbia pictures would be suitable for our film because they have been institutions for other films to a similar genre such as the 'bad boys' films as well as S.W.A.T. both of which were quite successful films. Columbia had a sae target audience with bad boys as we do with our film and decided to advertise through hotmail as most of our target audience has a access to internet and a computer our film would be able to be advertised in similar ways because Columbia have the knowledge of our target audience and funding to do allow this
20th century fox:
20th century fox would also be suitable for our film because they are associated with big action packed blockbusters that are audience would expect from an action film, they would expect a lot of special effects etc because of the genre of the film and 20th century fox are associated with using lots of special effects. they have been associated with the die hard films .
however we would have a bigger company as our distribution company as we realised many of these film such as Beverly hills cop have quite a cheesy feel to them and for this to be tangible we would need it to be produced by a low budget production company but to be distributed by a larger company who has dealt with the film genre and know how to advertise and can afford to advertise correctly
our independent film studio was bullet spoof productions
question 4:-
The genre of our movie is action/comedy and attracts a certain audience.
demographically this type of films would attract males between the ages of 15-24, for the 'younger' range of our target audience they would usually be in education such as Gcse, A-levels or college and for the older range of our target audience who would be working would usually be in a wide variety of jobs from managerial possessions to positions such as working in an office. our target audience madrigal status can vary usually it would attract allot of single men however it will appeal to married men who would like an 'escape' from the wife or a night out with their friends. if we took a more psychographic approach to our audience they would tend to attract people who are socially conscious and want to be in with the crowd and up to all the latest trends, also the whole action plot of trying to bring down criminals their own way would also attract people who are power wielding who like to watch people in positions of power doing things their way. our action cope film would also attract people who are into the law and order aspect of it which would appeal to them. using the 3 c theory our target audience would be an aspire and would mostly be materialistic and care about their image.
after establishing what are audience want form their action movie we can then find ways of advertising so that our target audience would see it since our target audience is 15-24 as well as using traditional advertising techniques such as posters trailers etc another big place to advertise would be on the internet as a large percentage of our target audience will regularly use the internet using websites such as msn or hotmail giving us maximum advertising for a large population of our target audience.
question 5:-
We made our work interesting by using a number of traditional theories so our audience could relate to our film but we also added our own changes.
The first change we made was the story line, we had it alternating between a past event(the chase scene) and a current day event( the office). This non-linear story line attracts our audience as it generates the idea of Barthes action codes through the chase scene but also generates enigma codes because the audience are left wondering who the police are chasing and why they are chasing the criminal. Enigma codes are also generated at the end of the scene when the mob boss is killed as we are unaware who killed him.
We also developed Levi-straus’ idea of binary oppositions into our main characters CJ and Smoke, they are complete opposites of each other by doing this it allows humour to generate but also helps in the build up to action codes due to the actions of the se characters because of there oppositions
We also developed the use of prop's character roles but added our own twist to some of the traditional roles;
Hero: CJ and Smoke and crucial part to our movie as it allows the viewers a character to relate with our twist on this idea was that there was 2 helpers.
Villain: the mob boss allows for action to be generated and enigma codes
Helper; CJ to smoke and smoke to CJ
Princess; being welcomed back on the police force
Father; police chief as he allows the duo back on the force for saving the day
Dispatcher ;CJ as he initiates their mission
We developed the idea of todrov’s idea of equilibrium because it allows action to generate and offers a problem for them to overcome. Their original equilibrium was them being police officers, there disequilibrium is loosing their badges and their new equilibrium is fighting crime in their own way.
The use of music was key for attracting our audience as it creates an atmosphere of intensity in the chase scene and adds a sense of mystery and intensity in the final scene where the mob boss is assassinated.
question 6:-
I have learnt that technology used can seriously effect the outcome of our final product. We used basic hand held recording camera and a tripod for filming this caused a few problems. Ideally we would liked to have used a professional video recorder and other equipment such as a boom microphone as a major problem we found was that the cameras didn't pick up sound very well so we had to re-record a lot of material in different rooms to allow sound to be picked up. Another problem was the actual quality of the cameras as they were only 2.3 mega pixel the final outcome was very poor quality.
We used imovie to edit our movie this was a good piece of equipment as it allowed us to trim and cut shot, add titles and effects. However this was a basic piece of equipment and was limited to the amount of effects you could use and it was hard to add titles from other software such as Photoshop to our movie. Ideally we would have liked to have used a more professional software like Sony Vegas and adobe after effects which ahs a range of different effects and would allowed us to have ore creative control.
We created our music on garage band another limited piece of software as it uses primarily sound loops so we were restricted to how we could manipulate our movie, we did try to use a software called Reason but because we used Mac computer we were unable to upload our music onto the computer as it was not compatible.
question 7:-
looking back at my prelim task i think we havelearnt and improved on quite a few differetn techniques.
firstly the pace of editing to create an atmosphere that we used in scene such as the chase scene had improved drastically compared to our prelim it was a lot more fluid. and becuase we story boarded our fianl product the shots worked better and didnt seem to be thrown together.
we also learnt how mis-en-scne and setting can be used in comparrison to our prelim where we didnt put any real thought into our costumes or setting in our final product we specifically designed sets such as the mob boss lair and worked on costuem such as CJ's very informal loose and baggy clothing to give our product a more authentic feel.
i have also learnt that to create a product which works adn to be at a good level it requires a lot of time and effort such as story boarding and set creating, had we jsut threw things together with no real care it defiantly would hav affected our final out come.
inconclusion i beleive that i have learnt a vast majority of skills that have helped my overall ability at media production.
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