Evaluation

Evaluation

1.       In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our media product ‘Pyrophobia’ is a horror/thriller which follows many original codes and conventions however challenges a few. The opening of the film is a series of various angle shots of Tamworth joined by a stylized transition called film burn. These establishing shots are not scary or alarming in any shape or form. In fact the film burn makes the footage more fluid and calm which is not what the film is always about. Despite this opposite in codes and conventions our media product instantly changes by combining the establishing shots into a chase scene which has been heavily edited and manipulated to create a darker atmosphere. The harsh colour correct has been used to create the gritty dark effect that many thrillers have been known to create and Pyrophobia has been edited to create the same effect.
The titles come in one at a time at a slow pace which was also visible in the opening of Candy man as the titles would each come in individually and was a generally long opening using a Birdseye shot of a city as an establishing shot. The font used in the title is purposely bold and block-like to further adapt to the urban street atmosphere thrillers have and Pyrophobia will certainly have this.
A common convention is the use of one main antagonist which our media product definitely follows as there is one main villain (pyro) who will be terrorizing the other cast within the film. This is very common and all though directly not a Thriller convention, it is definitely following the generic style of a horror.
We also challenged the conventions of eerie music being used within certain scenes.
Our opening consists of videos of Fire to match the title “Pyrophobia” with the simple sounds of fire flickering with a slow creepy sound. It creates an uneasy atmosphere which is common in horrors however you have to develop the sound in your head for it to actually be creepy. This scene gets cut to static which is a loud harsh noise and can leave you pretty shocked And will then suddenly change into a fast-paced song as the chase after the opening begins. The surprise is a common method used in horrors and thrillers and in joint with a chase scene is a very common sight within horror and thriller films alike.

2.       How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our media product “Pyrophobia” will certainly represent the teenage ‘rebel’ population that all places have. The characters David & James are your typical teenage boys you expect to see. They are quirky, cocky and funny which will appeal to the teenage population we have now. The product shows the friendship teenage boys have and the friendly jokes and conflicts best friends have which I believe would appeal to the teenage crowd. Also the title and villain would appeal to Young adults and teenagers as Horrors are incredibly popular between these people and the use of Fire effects will increase the enjoy ability of the film as some young people resemble Fire with Anarchy and rebelling represents the teenage boy state of causing trouble which is common in today’s society.
The two characters also come from lower-middle class families. With James’s room being very messy and living in a derelict environment (where the film was filmed) the film represents these type of people which increases the target audience in turn. So our media products represents your average middle class 16 year old which enables this group of people to further enjoy our media product.

3.       What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Pyrophobia is a small lower budget film with horror in mind. This makes it unsuitable for Media institutions such as Warner Bros who create one massive budget film which is then followed by still expensive budget films but not with the publicity.
After looking at a few institutions I think Lions Gate Films would distribute Pyrophobia as they have distributed many horrors such as “Alone in the dark”, “The Last Exorcism” And “Saw”.  Judging by the movies Lions gate films have distributed I believe Pyrophobia would fit in as it contains scenes of gore and mystery which keeps the audience on suspense. You could say Pyrophobia is a horror flick and I cannot see it being a massive film which everyone will know about it. I can see it being more of a cheap film which is underrated but still enjoyable.

4.       Who would be the audience for your media product?

As stated before in question 2, the films main characters are two 16 year old boys who think they are rebels and act cocky. For this reason I believe it would appeal to young adults and teenagers into horrors which aren’t popular and well known. The Horror aspects and Fire Effects would appeal very much to teenagers as Cool effects and interest sfx are very common points which teenagers wish to see and Pyrophobia involves a lot of Fire as the name would suggest, Pyrophobia which is the Fear of fire and ultimately being burnt to death. Mainly however I think the main characters and the villain which is only seen when fire is around would appeal to Males between the age of 15-25 as some of the scenes involve pretty bad gore and boys between this age come across horror and gore as Cool and interesting which is why I believe this would be the key audience.

5.       How did you attract/address your audience?

Before we started developing the actual film we created a questionnaire to create an idea of what people enjoyed within the thriller & Horror genre. My partner Anthony researched about specific phobias and created a question on phobias and fears people may have. The initial research of phobias is where the title Pyrophobia came from. We also asked questions such as what scenery to find more creepy in a horror situation and what time of the day is more efficient at creating a horror atmosphere. When filming we could not address all the popular opinions and included scenes which weren’t based on the audiences idea.

I also researched into methods films use to create a fast paced tension scene. First person shots of the actual villain and high advanced editing were popular choices which made a film more interesting. I tried to incorporate this into our film. The villain is never seen and when a killing is committed you see it through the eyes of the murderer. The flame overlays were to show how the villain is something to do with the fire and that has a meaning to the film.

(Flame scenes to be placed here)
If the title wasent an obvious give away fire is a common sight in the film. 
We tried to use sounds which were realistic in all parts of the film. A lot of editing went into the scene in which James was knocked out in his sleep and faded back in reality. Sound Phasers and a lot of Pitch change was changed via Premiere Pro Cs5.5 and Cs6.

(Dream scene ending to be placed here)

The product was heavily edited and we used the information we researched to make it appealing to our audience after we addressed them.

6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

To create our media product we used a Nikon D3100 with an 18-55 VR (Vibration Reduction) lens which is a suitable standard lens for close to medium shots. For scenes in tight spaces we used an Opteka Fisheye lens which gave the camera  a wider field of view to film which was a great help in the bedroom scene.

(Bedroom scene placed here)

We filmed in a format of 720p which is HD and 30fps which made slow motion scenes more fluid and smoother when the clip was played at 40 % of its original speed. Any % lower and the frames became jumpy and very noticeable and I learnt that to slow down clips I should avoid %40 and lower. If I filmed with a Canon 550d which can film in 50fps then it would be possible as it has higher frames per second to a Nikon D3100.

We edited the clips we gathered using adobe premiere pro Cs 5.5 and Cs 6. The reason we used two versions is because I edited the last of the product at home and I have Adobe premiere pro CS 6. We used a lot of Colour Corrector both in Production and Editing. White balance on the Nikon was set manually as was Aperture And ISO to get the best settings, colour and brightness when filming. I further refined the colouring via APP (Adobe Premiere Pro) using the 3-way colour correcting to have more control over the video and the colours in parts which needed a lot of correcting due to shadows, sunlight and focus points interfering with the cameras white balance and the 3-way colour correcting allowed us to manually change each point within the video. While in the editing of this image I learnt even more about colour correcting and the broadcasting of colour. I also experiment with the Leave colour effect which makes every other colour apart from the one you chose into black and white. This is hard to use and has best effects when used on an object of bright colouring such as a Bright t-shirt or Prop. We didn’t actually use this effect as none of the scenes demanded it and looked much better without it involved. However I did learn how to use this effect.  Being involved in videography and editing for 4 years I was able to use this knowledge into this product and was also able to help my partner Anthony a lot to.
I used an Apple iMac and a Packard Bell laptop which both had the required software I needed so editing was not a problem it was just tedious and long-winded process.

7.       Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

Judging by my preliminary task I much prefer working in a pair or by myself. I find it is easy to sort out dates and events and choices are easy to settle as there are only 2 of you.  Editing was also easy being as there was more space around our working space as there was only I and my partner.

I am not able to say a great deal about what I have learnt as I used my own equipment within this production and within the preliminary task we used college equipment. In product ion however I find using your own equipment is much more efficient if you know a great deal about your camera and software.  Learning Camera Angles were also very important and was able to incorporate what I had learnt much more within my own product. From what we learnt from the preliminary task we really tried to have a fluid continuity in the film. We carefully changed and planned the shots so the viewer understands where the characters were without being confused. Also all uniform and lighting were maintained in the best of our ability to maintain continuity and made a fluid effect throughout the whole film. Not all of the photos follow the 180-rule. We challenged and broke the 180 rule a couple of times however the tempo of the film is in a slow state to avoid confusion and location of the characters which would decrease the continuity of the film. So using the knowledge from our preliminary task I was able to incorporate what I had learnt such as the 180-rule into my final project and we effectively used our knowledge within Media.