The Evaluation

Misunderstood Evaluation

Decisions Strengths and weaknesses

There are various strengths and weaknesses in the decisions our group made in the construction of our film opening sequence. One of the decisions we made were allocating specific roles to each member of the production team. We obtained our roles by nominating each other.

Strengths

One of the strengths we had as a group was how everyone fit perfectly into their roles. We looked at everyone’s skills, strengths as well as personality traits to see what role would best suit them. For example, I am a creative person therefore I had a big hand in the direction of the film. 

Strengths

Other roles that were allocated worked will because of our ability to recognize one another‘s strengths and weaknesses and how that worked best for the team. For example, Krissy is generally organized which is why we gave her the role as a producer, her role kept us less stressed and made the shoot stuck together.

Weaknesses

One of the weaknesses we had as a team was taking up more than one role. This is because we had a small team and no budget. For example Krissy was an assistant director and a producer, this resulted in her becoming less productive because she had two roles. In future we will try to have a bigger team, doing so will mean that we can focus on our own roles since more of them will be taken. We will also try to raise a budget, this will allow us to use better equipment and use more props to make the film authentic. Finally, we will look into hiring people to volunteer and aid our production. This means we can have more people in the film acting or take up a role such as editing. 

Weaknesses

Another weakness we had was overlapping of responsibilities. This was due to lack of knowledge in the film industry. During filming I found myself sometimes directing some of the scenes. This responsibility was solely for Ellie-Mae however I felt strongly about it. Although it helped the film this can create friction in production teams if they feel undermined by their peers. Next time we will ensure everyone stay with their own job. This prevents people from taking over certain roles which prevents people feeling undermined and friction. We will also discuss any suggestions made by someone. Doing this means we can compare and give feedback and think of the best direction to take as a team. Finally we will look at more behind the scenes videos on film sets. This will give us a better knowledge of the film industry.  

Weaknesses

One other weakness was not completely sticking to the schedule. This was mainly because being in school meant that our time was also occupied with other lessons and revising for our GCSE exams, so we only had two hours of media lessons per week. Another reason was because some people were absent due to illness. People being absent prevented us from shooting scenes we needed. In future, to prevent this we will space out the schedule more to make it more realistic. This will also be suitable since we have other lesson to attend to. We will also find ways of working around people being absent. Doing this will make us more flexible as a team. One of the ways we can do this is by shooting scenes that does not include the person who may be absent.  

Strengths Representational 

We presented gender really well. Our film presents femininity as a sign of strength because when Ellie-Mae sees Ali talking to two other girls. She shows that she is strong and not affected. Also we represented femininity as strength because Erica’s character ends up killing Ali, in the media it would typically be a male who would commit murder however in this case it’s a female due to the circumstances and the representation of femininity. Masculinity is also represented as a clash of egos because my character tries to get one over Ali’s by stealing his girl.

Weakness Representational

One of the representational weaknesses was that we did not tackle the issue of murder as best as possible. This is likely because we did not do enough research linked to the topic of murder. Next time we will do more in depth research to tackle murder properly.

Strengths Genre

After looking at the codes and conventions of a thriller, we conformed to a lot of the codes and conventions in the recording and editing of our film. We used things such as tense music, point of view shots, and involved a killing based on the theme of revenge.

Weaknesses Genre

To make our film opening more interesting it would have been effective if we challenged and even subverted some of theses codes and conventions. For example, editing scenes smoothly rather than sharply, as it could create more suspense and shock to an audience.

Target Audience Research

It is important to know who will be most interested in our film. An effective way to do this is to research into target audience.

Target audience is a certain group at which a product such as a film is aimed at.

A demographic is a particular sector of a population. Target audience relates to demographic because it can be found within a population.

Upon my research I discovered that the key demographic in film is 16-25 year olds. They are the group that go to the cinema the most.

There are several reasons as to why this is, including:

-Young people living at home mean their expenses are minimal  and they also want to get out of the house at any opportunity.

-Young people get pocket money and enjoy media.

-Older people tend to have more responsibilities, such as children, therefore they consume media at home.

With this knowledge, we will ensure that our film opening appeals to the key demographic.

Strengths Research

Used YouTube as a method, it’s a good platform because everything was available to view.

Weaknesses

Research

I wasn’t sure what to choose from because so much was available. It was hard to select an appropriate film to analyse.

Next time I will:

Find a website that is dedicated to our chosen genre, so that there is less to choose from and more focused on the actual genre.

Strengths Target Audience Research

-Looked into key demographic of film audience, effective reasoning as to why that is the key demographic

Weaknesses Target Audience Research

-Carry out research into genre and the particular target audience of our genre.

Next time I will:

-Carry out my own research, so my findings are relevant to what I am trying to achieve.

-Look into the target audience of the thriller/horror genre, so I know who my film needs to appeal to.

Codes and Conventions

Codes and Conventions are used to determine a genre, in our film there is three examples of where these code and conventions aided the construction of our film.

Suspenseful music, this makes it a thriller/horror because it create tension and its intense which signifies the viewers that something horrific is going to occur.

POV shots this makes it a thriller/horror because we are looking at intense scenes from one person’s perspective.

Killing and theme of revenge this makes it a thriller/horror because these can be horrific and quite distressing.

Use of Audience Feedback

The audience feedback proved helpful because we knew where we needed to improve. It is hard to judge your own work because you tend to be biased and less harsh on yourself – but feedback from others who are in our target audience shows us where we need to improve.

-For example, after our first film we were told to work on the audio. During our second film we made sure our audio was a lot better.

-We were then told to use less close ups, less hasty cuts and better dialogue. By the time our final product was out, we generally got good feedback – showing that we have improved throughout our journey of production.

-We were still given areas of feedback but some were out of our control, such as avoiding the wind noise and not shooting inside school. This is because our target audience may not have a great understanding of production and are used to seeing high budget films.

How successfully have you met the details of the brief?

-The opening sequence from a film.

-Including titles, in any genre with story board and script.

-Maximum length - three minutes.

-All video and audio must be original, produced by the candidates, with the exception of music and audio effects.

-If candidates are working as a group, each member is expected to take a specific role.

I feel we met the details of the brief very well. We did everything that was asked of us. Although we exceeded the three minute length, this was because of the introduction titles and credits in the creation of our film.

How have you shown evidence that you understand the concept of institution?

One of the way have shown we understand the concept of institution is by looking at film openings and analysing them. By researching film openings as well as our target audience, it gave a good outlook as to how to produce media for certain audiences. As mentioned before, it would have been better if we looked at behind the scenes videos on film sets to get a better insight, but the fact we researched into the role help us understand the basics of each role.

Another way is how we worked as a group. Our group worked as an institution producing media. We would have probably understood the size of our production if our institution had a name and logo etc.

All in all, our concept of institution constantly improved as our production journey progressed. I know where to improve on next time and look forward to the next challenge I face in the media industry.