New A2 Media Studies Blog

This is the address for my A2 media blog- http://sadlerproductions.blogspot.co.uk/

Question 1

Question 1 from Nicole Manby

Evaluation Question 3

Lesson Update!

Today I looked at examples of how to answer question 2 and the technologies I could use for question! I looked at one example of question 2 that used images and footage from films that had influenced their choice of characters and the social groups they present. So I decided to look at the films we had looked at and look at how they influenced our main character. I also looked at the social group we were trying to present in our thriller, so I googled the social group to get images of them and compared them to our main character!

Past Student Evaluation

I really like how all the questions are in one place, making it easier and quicker to simply look through at all the questions. I also like how he has examples for both question, usually next to each other, making it easy to compare. However he doesn't seem very confident or prepared as he keeps saying 'erm'. There is also not a lot of technology used in the evaluation and takes a long time to get through each question, making it very boring to watch and listen to.

Past Student Evaluation

Created with Wallwisher

Audience feedback

Here is the audience feedback that helped make our thriller film. Please note: he first 7 minutes is footage of our respondents watching the opening. They're opinions are not shown until 7:14.

First draft

Project Update

Unattended lesson summary

Just a brief summary of what we did during our unattended lesson on Thursday, 29th November

Sin City title sequence

I really like the way the titles for Sin City comes across like a comic strip, with the cartoon images of the characters in black and white in the back ground and the name of the actors sliding across the screen in red. The way that the pictures are in black and white with the red writing reflects the effect used in the actual film.

I think the cartoon affect would be effective for our title sequence, however we wouldn't be able to do a complete cartoon strip for ours as we wont have enough time but we could use add an effect on some of our still pictures from the filming day to create a similar effect. Then add the titles over the top.

Film noir edit

Here is the first draft of our film in film noir. Enjoy and please feel free to leave a comment! :D

Sepia tone edit

Here is the first draft of our project in sepia tone. Enjoy and please feel free to leave a comment! :D

Soundtrack analysis

Now that we've started editing, I thought i'd start looking at how sound tracks effect the over all effect of a thriller film. I decided to look at the music and sound affects used in the opening of Inception. This is the opening sequence of Inception:



Instantly the music starts with low deep notes. Although it is quite a simple piece of music to begin with, the notes are slightly off so it makes the audience feel on edge and unsure.Then the music starts to layer and slightly higher pitched, shorter notes are added very subtly, which increases the off putting, unsure feeling. There is also an added eerie tone, like on note being held for a large proportion of the set up, this is typical of lots of thriller films as it adds suspense to footage instantly. As the actually footage starts, softer high string instruments are added in, lighting up the mood of film. This is also very off putting as the combination of the low slow music and high quicker notes confuses the audience. The string music quickly ends as the action starts. As the shot changes and they change  location, the music partly comes to a halt and a deep dong like noise plays for a moment. From this point, the music although it is still important, is over powered with speak.

In the first 1:08 the layering of music is very important in building up suspense and creating tension in the film. The layering helps to make the audience with uneasy and slightly off as they know something is going to happen but some of the layers hint something bad may or may not happen. Listening to the soundtrack from Inception and other thriller films, I'm starting to realise that layering is very important in creating the right feel/mood and tension within a thriller film and we should consider this when adding soundtracks to our thriller opening.

Shot List

Se7en, mise-en-scene

This is a scene from Se7en. On this sheet, I wrote about the costumes of the characters and what they show about the characters and their relationship. I also wrote about camera angles, lighting and location. Suggesting that the two characters do not like each other but are pushed together because of their work (work that puts these men in great power). Doing this helped me think about how the costumes, props, lighting and location can have a strong impact on the impression the characters give to the audience.

The Third Man

This sheet shows still shots from 'The Third Man' and which part of mise-en-scene they show best. I also wrote what the lighting/costume/props/location/camera angle could represent.

Organising filming!

We plan to film on Wednesday the 31st during the half term holiday. We are going to start filming early on so we can get enough light for the 'bedroom scene'. We have told our actors to get to the location at around 10 am so we can get there make up done and costume on and start filming around 11. We have all our props, costumes and locations sorted so we can concentrate on lighting and filming difficulties (:

Editing

As I did not do Media at GCSE Aidan and Nicole showed me how to edit using i-movie. He showed me how to cut parts of the footage, add music, titles and make sure continuity was okay. I had a few difficulties getting used to i-movie but managed to edit parts of our preliminary task reasonably well. I think I did quite well in getting to grips with this editing programme and would like to using more advanced editing programme, like final cut, for our final film!

Locations Ideas

Location photo's

Possible location for outside of warehouse

Second possible location for outside of warehouse

Wooden doors of the second possible location for warehouse

Different views of 'table scene' location

Flooring

The light in the room

Obviously everything will be removed from the room to make
it a blank empty space to put the table.

Different views of the bedroom scene. All non-essential objects will be removed, like boxes, clothes, bed covers and sheets, mirrors and wall art.

 <Space to put television, to complete the apartment look we wanted for the bedroom scene.

Window to let in natural light to  > this will complete the 'waking up'  in the bright light in the morning, but we will also use artificial light to increase this effect.

< Dressing table to put essential props
on- mobile phone, drugs etc.