Unrequited Final

Critical Evaluation - Jordan Cockles

SECTION 1

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

Throughout our film, we tried to make use of a variety of shots to convey the meaning of our film. However we had to think about how using a variety of shots would conflict with the continuity of out film. There are some parts of our film that are relatively slow paced but there are faster paced sections such as that in the library which required a lot more thought concerning continuity. An example of us ensuring the conventions of continuity was where we had the eye-line-match from cutting to the female character, then back to the male character, then back to the female character again. This kept the pace of the particular scene and conveyed the implied meaning as effectively as possible which was that the male was watching the female. When it came to filming rather than filming just the shots we needed, we shot the entire scene each time with the camera in a different location, this ensured we could edit our film effectively because we wouldn't have parts of each shot missing.

Eye-Line Match: Taken From: 2:10 - 2:23

We also followed other continuity conventions such as shot reverse shots in the park where the male is returning the females diary, this was to make the audience know that the film is still in the same location and highlight which character is talking and showing the reactions of each character avoiding confusion which happens if the camera stays behind one character for the entire scene.

Shot Reverse Shot: Taken From: 4:12 - 4:14

Because our production is designed to be in a multi-media environment with the internet and cinema, we had to put a lot of thought into the genre of our film and what genre was doing well in the film-making industry. After researching we found that dramas were doing progressively well with audiences enjoying films which depict real life situations, contemporary drama films which have done well in the box office are as follows:

From Left to Right: Gran Torino, Slumdog Millionaire, The Social Network

The main and most obvious way our film is similar to the drama films that are mentioned above is that they all depict real life events. Drama films often make use of close ups to show the characters feelings and emotions  so we have added some close-ups in our film. We have also added a psychological twist in our film by adding a melancholic soundtrack which makes clear to the audience that our film is not meant to be happy but rather depressive and sad, similar to the serious tone depicted in Gran Torino.

Close-Ups
Left: Shot taken from Gran Torino Trailer: 0:38
Right: Shot taken from 'Unrequited' : 4:21

There is also a subliminal pastiche through our film where we used the diary as an iconic part of our film. The diary is involved with showing the truth about our films character and bringing to place the twist at the end. The inclusion of the diary into our film is supposed to pay homage to the film Se7en which was discussed in our planning stage for ideas.

Pastiche: The book from se7en represented by our diary scene

Overall our film was trying to use the conventions in the psychological drama genre to attract the audience with their interest in watching films that depict real life events which some of them may be able to relate to. The psychological part of the genre should also help keep the film in the viewers head ensuring the idea of our film stays in their head, being careful to avoid the hypodermic theory where the idea is planted into a viewers head, although our film doesn't necessarily view stalking as a positive past time, it doesn't necessarily show it as bad either meaning our film is a 15.

SECTION 2

How effective is the combination of your main product with the two ancillary texts?

We created our media production for the purpose of entertaining a teenage audience who were 15+ to the late twenties, although our film is suitable for anyone over the age of 15. The film could be seen as suitable for a younger audience but taking in the hypodermic theory of audiences it could be possible for a less experienced audience to see the stalking in our film as an acceptable method of seeing another person, so to avoid this we made the certificate 15. 

With our ancillary texts we got ideas from the other drama films mentioned ins section one. We used the close up of the main character in our film similar to that of the social network. The only main text we used was the title of our film so we didn't give too much of our film away before the audience watched it which is similar to the design of the gran torino film poster.

Our radio trailer is similar to most other radio trailers where it takes out bits of dialogue and has the films soundtrack playing silently in the background. It gives more of our film away than the poster however audiences around the country use radio for times when they are commuting to work or college, or doing work therefore it expands our films reach so the combination of our production and the ancillary texts is fairly effective.

SECTION 3

What have we learned from our audience feedback?

Section 3: What have you learned from your audience feedback? on Prezi

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During the planning stage of our production we handed out questionnaires to the general public to find out the current view on films in the psychological drama genre and find out if they would find our film plausible and enjoyable. After doing our audience research we altered our films idea to make it more contemporary and more interesting for the audience to watch.

Whilst filming for our film we needed to think about making the meaning obvious to the audience. We made use of several long shots of the area we was filming and tried to keep the camera in the same area so the audience would not get confused of if they are in a completely different area. We also used point of view shots as well as over the shoulder shots to show the stalkerish meaning side of our film. We also utilised the fact we had a male and female actor so we used the voiceover to ensure the audience knew who’s thoughts they were actually overhearing in the end.

The title of our film immediately gives the audience an idea of someone having feelings for another person without the feelings returned, this coupled with the poster and trailer shows the audience it is a psychological thriller with stalker elements. The main voiceovers and the diary writing scene would make the audience interpret the events of the film from one of the actors point of view and because of the stalker elements and minor piano music would make the audience view the voiceover character as antagonistic. One interpretation that the audience may have is one where instead of feeling that the voiceover character is the antagonist, they may feel sorry for him and essentially view the innocent character as the negative one. The test film should clarify any doubt concerning this.

After putting our film up on the video sharing site youtube, we requested a few peers at our college to comment on the video. We also showed it on facebook. The overall comments were good saying the storyline twist and idea was good.

Because the film received generally positive reviews we didn’t believe it was plausible to make any major changes to our film in case it made it worse.

The audience understood the plot of the film and who is supposed to be bad and good.

SECTION 4

How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Research:

Before we began planning our media products we needed to research specific things that relate to the genre of our film and the audience we were aiming at, we also needed to research specific shots and techniques we could have used in our product. The most obvious research tool we used was wikipedia, however we only used wikipedia to gain basic knowledge due to the extensive and often complex way in which information is presented on wikipedia. So we extended the research we found on wikipedia using video tutorials and video lessons for more research into camera shots and angles. The main website we used to gain knowledge on camera shots and other film ideas was youtube. Youtube contains many videos and the ones we used were other short films produced by small media groups. For information on what our genre is and what age classification we should use for our film we looked on the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) website which documents a lot of information about age classification and genre, it would also be advisable to look to the BBFC because they are the UK classification board that would have to review our film. The main technological devices we used for researching these topics were the apple macs based in the college media department but we also made use of smart phones with internet access and also home PC's to find research pretty much whenever we wanted.

Planning:

After researching for our media product we began the planning stage. We needed to make use of storyboards and scripts. A piece of software we used for scripting was celtx which allows any media company small or big to produce a professional looking script for a film. It allows you to differentiate between scenes and characters effortlessly without using word documents. We also made use of a blogger website called blogger where most of our planning was documented. It allowed is to organise our storyboards, photo storyboards, shooting lists and what equipment we would need each day. We also used blogger to document our character profiles.

Production:

For our film we always planned to have the film in HD because it gives a much more professional finish, so the main camera we used for filming our shots was a HDV-1000 which we used last year in our media production but this year we used a lot more features available to enhance our film such as blur effects and using the focus wheel a lot more, we also used exposure settings to help with later night filming to gain a more clear picture. We uploaded our shots as we progressed through the construction of our film to make sure we had what we wanted using a fire wire cable. For editing our film and putting all the shots we wanted together we used Final Cut Express, this allowed us to use professional editing tools such as effects to give our film a finer finish and gave us a customisable publication setting for HD, so we could optimise our film for show on our desired showing site youtube. It also allowed us to edit the sound of our film so there was a right balance between the actual film sound and music we wanted to use. When we finally produced our film we uploaded it to youtube which allows millions of people to watch our film and leave comments and likes should they find it and wish to do so, essentially giving our film the best opportunity for more reviews and exposure even though we wouldn't make no profit from the production unless we was partnered with youtube.

 

Evaluation:

When we came to evaluating our film we had our video placed up on youtube as a draft which we then used to get suggestions for improvement to finish the final construction stage. The finished film is now on YouTube waiting for people to watch and review it. When we come to a final evaluation of our film we shall use blogger to document our thoughts and put the video over a wider area such as facebook and tumblr to get more feedback and get our film watched by as many of our teenage audience as possible.

How did digital technology enable you to develop creatively and are there examples of the technology obstructing or preventing your creativity?

Digital technology allowed to create out own film using our own ideas and using all our own shots and ideas. It developed our creativity because we tried to make use of artistic shots and shots which would tell the story of our film the best. However technology does have disadvantages with it being unreliable and sometimes tricky to use the settings on the HDV-1000 meaning it took time and could sometimes have been very frustrating to use.

Final poster

Library Scene (Flashback) Storyboard

In preparation for filming this scene I drew a out a basic storyboard to guide us when filming so we know exactly what point we are and if we are being efficient when we film and keeping to the story.



Click to enlarge.

February Shooting Plan

This is a shooting plan to organise what we will be filming to finish the filming stage and do the editing to meet the final deadline.



Click to enlarge.

Research into film posters

All of these movie posters have certain editing techniques in them that could be used in my own film poster idea to ensure my poster is to the correct theme and in context of our film. The first thing I would consider using is the long shot featured in the film 'Cloverfield', this instantly lets the person that sees this know this is an iconic location of the film and in fact the only location, I would emulate this onto my poster taking a long shot of the park which is where the iconic twist in our film will be based so the audience will have their attention based on this part when it arrives in the film because they would recognise the location from the poster. Much like 'Cloverfield' had all the audience interested because it had a shot of Manhattan in flames and the statue of liberty decapitated.

A technique I am definitely going to use in my poster is the close up of the main characters face featured in the poster of 'the social network'. This shows a great emotional link and highlights the importance of this character, I may use both of the characters eyes for close ups but I prefer to do one half of the poster with the close up of the male character because he is featured in the whole film and the other half is the long shot of the park.

The tearing apart effect in the poster for 'fatal attraction' could be used on my poster to show the seperation between the two characters.

Research into Soundtracks

The analysis in these videos are to look at the sound used in psychological dramas.



The sound in this video is mainly minor tone and has several long tones which rarely changes from a specific chord range. There is not much variation until the main characters voice changes. The females voice also echoes and her mouth is not moving giving an interesting tone to the females voice, which is all in her mind. The music also builds as she speaks faster and more emotion is revealed through her thoughts.



The music in this video is similar in that it is mainly long minor tones in the beginning and builds when a major outburst occurs, the music links into the characters emotions when it changes. It also builds towards the final scene then after the climactic revealing that the male character is dead the music fades to silence.

Audience Feedback

After telling several people the idea of our film and showing them the script, we asked them a series of questions:

Practice Shots

This is a compilation of practice shots which were mainly for experimenting purposes. We wanted to test out the camera as well as test what shots we would use in our film. The video contains mainly humorous clips of the crew.



We used extreme close-ups on the mock diary entry which had out of focus shots which may be used in the  5-minute film in order to indicate something is out of place or unusual. We also used extreme close-ups on the male's (Jordan C's) eyes which will be used in the film. We used Jordan C's room to film practice shots as we admired the dim lighting which gave a distinct atmosphere which also allowed shadows to be cast on Jordan C's face. We will use this room as the male's bedroom as it this effect is misleading and would cause the audience to make negative assumptions about the male's character, when the female is the one to wary of. In contrast, we will use Jordan H's room to film the female's bedroom scene as the room is a lot brighter.

Slow panning shots were also used, similar to the short film, 'Hello Again'. We also used a zoom shot of the female (Jordan H) in this clip to signify that this is an important character. The clip where the image fades out and the sound continues was used to give an example of the voiceover which will be recorded then attached to the film as non-diegetic sound. The titles used in the practice montage are very simple and won't be like the ones we'll use for the finished film. They were simply used just to give an example of titles within the compilation.

The POV shots of the female character in the library will be used in the film. We will also use over the shoulder shots of the male looking through the bookshelf. This makes it clear that this is a POV shot from the male's perspective. Placing the camera almost inside the bookshelf gives a slightly claustrophobic effect which relates to the uncomfortable feeling someone gets when they feel they are being followed. In addition to this, it causes the audience to focus solely on the female - which the male is doing.

Shooting Plan: Library Scene

This is the shooting plan for the library scene, it details what shots we will use and other important details.

Viral Advertisement

Viral marketing, viral advertising, or marketing buzz are buzzwords that uses marketing techniques to increase brand awareness, the typical type of viral advertisement in film is usually a very short film or simply subliminal images in related films that show a website relating to the product. They are generally used to increase brand awareness and create hype for upcoming products, similar to the way the viral video was used in 'Cloverfield' which depicted the stature of liberties head disrupting a party by being propelled down the street. This created a lot of hype for the cinema release because the question of what happened sparked the audiences curiosity so the film did very successful.

Idea:

My viral advertisement idea revolves around the world of social networking. The idea is of a person looking at another persons facebook profile, going through pictures and comments. Then finally zooming in on the cursor over the poke button, the clip then abruptly ends leaving a cliff hanger style. This relates to our film because it links into the stalkerish style theme and also leaves the ending open. I also intend to use pictures of the cast so it is directly associated with our film. The film will be around 10-20 seconds and shall be for the internet for an advert that interrupts videos, such as on youtube. I may have to use some censoring to hide peoples personal details which may impair the quality of film because I do not have the skills or software to edit the text to a high level.

Inspiration:

The idea of my film stemmed from this video of life being documented via a social network, though not similar in comparison to a film I still found this kind of media representation inspiring as a fresh idea.

Software:

I intend to record the screen footage using a downloaded software on my home computer called Camtasia, this allows me to record exactly what i'm doing on screen and edit it into a decent advertisement.

Treatment - 5 minute film (Final)

Title: Unrequited

Synopsis: At first glance of the short film the viewer is given the idea that the film is yet another cliched stalker film, but there is a twist that is least expected. The idea for our short film involves two characters and possibly one or two very small extra roles. Having a small number of characters allows us to more easily acquaint the audience with the characters which are mainly involved in the storyline, this will allow them to be more easily understood as to why they do certain things; although a sense of enigma must be maintained so that the twist at the end is a shock. The film revolves around the idea that the male character is constantly stalking the female character but as it turns out the female is actually the stalker. (UPDATE: This idea is depicted through several scenes in different locations including a park and library. The film ends with the male not actually having anything to do with the female however the audience realises that the entire film is fictional and is made up by the female and written into a diary, this is shown through the final shot where the male picks up the mis-placed diary and hands it back to the female.)

Audience: The film will be a 12A as there are infrequent, if any expletives, and there is no usage of drugs. There are mature themes in the video, but these will be acceptable for viewing by a younger audience. Although we should take imitable behaviour into consideration as the audience could copy the acts in the film, although this is very doubtful. The audience will be aimed at the majority of cinema goers; the age range will be between 12-28 primarily, although the film will also be viewed by people older than that. This short film could attract both male and females, giving us quite a large target audience.

Summary: We are looking to produce a short film that is both enjoyable for the viewer and technically a good film, consisting of a variation of shots and a storyline that can hopefully be fully understood.

Duration: The length of the film should be 5 minutes, or as close as we can get to that length. 5 minutes is the time we have been given for the film's length. This is an acceptable amount of time for our short film idea but careful timing of shot length should be carried out to avoid excessive over-running. We may go over the 5 minute mark, but it isn't a set limit, just an idea of how long it should last.

The new treatment is an update on our previous idea.

Risk Assessment

Independent Distributors - Research & Ideas

Momentum Pictures

Momentum Pictures is one of the leading independent motion picture distributors in the UK and Ireland and releases approximately 20 theatrical films a year. They have produced several successful drama films such as PS I Love You and The Kings Speech. They are also known to produce and distribute films with a darker theme, so our short film would fit right into the ranks of films produced and distributed by momentum. It is however part of a small Canadian conglomerate knowns as Alliance, this sense of it being part of a company would make it difficult for us to convince them to distribute our short film.

Example Films:

- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rr9ccD5H3Q

- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNmT_dLeSao

Diffusion Pictures

Diffusion Pictures is a very small very young independent distribution company based in London that mainly distributes indie films. Although they haven't released many films the ones they have are similar to our short film because they are based around the relationships of two people, much like the relationship between our two characters.

Example Films:

- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwyaexHA9tk&feature=related

- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl6oqjT85eM

Studio Canal UK

StudioCanal UK (formerly Optimum Releasing/Home Entertainment/Classics) is a film distributor company working in the UK and Ireland. The company releases many films, including foreign language films, anime releases such as Studio Ghibli's films and independent British, Irish and American films in the UK and sometimes Ireland. It has produced a film that has a similar theme to ours called Tyranosaurus. A mans life gets ruined and as he begins to turn it around he meets a woman who has a dark secret.

Example Films:

- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvyqXFmV-LI

Location shots (Unfinished)

Male's bedroom

The view of the bench from a tree in the distance.
A general image of the scenery where we will be filming, another shot could be filmed here.
A view of the bench from closer than the other tree.
A close image of the bench and where the potential 'Stalker' will watch the girl from.
When the girl leaves the bench she will be followed by the male.

Click the images to enlarge them.

Research Into Genre

After reviewing our film idea, we found that our film could came under the genre of psychological-drama rather than a thriller. Research into how psycho-dramas are conveyed has and will be conducted. Elements and/or techniques of some films of this genre may be applied into our film because they are more suitable for the story and plot to our film

Some examples of psychological dramas are on this website that show a list of the top twenty in that genre.

http://www.flickchart.com/charts?genre=Psychological+Drama

After looking at these films the most common way the film is structured is how there is one focal character and the audience follow their life over a period of time, usually at a time where their life changes such as Mark Zuckerberg in the social network; the film documents the rise of Zuckerberg as he creates the popular social networking site facebook. Similarly in the wrestler, the film shows the fall of the focal character as his life descends into a mess of health problems and loneliness. Our film is similar because it documents our focal characters life as he stalks his love interest and also has a twist in the film as the feelings are shared by the girl but no one else knows it.

This short film is a psychological drama which focuses on 'Angel' and her struggle to cope with losing her boyfriend/husband. It uses many close-up and extreme close-up shots. In our film, we also plan to use many of these shot types as it creates tension and suspense. The lighting used is quite dim. The use of dim lighting creates shadows which create a tense atmosphere. There are several out of focus shots used in the beginning of the film, these shots then go into focus on particular objects and things such as the doorknob. This is used to indicate something is about to happen as well as creating a distorted atmosphere - the audience become aware that something is not right. The mood is also set by the non-diegetic sound - music - which is quite at first then slowly becomes louder. This also indicates something is about to happen as tension is created.

Storyboard

This is our hand-drawn storyboard in video format. The music used for this won't be used in the film but I thought it was a suitable song for this particular showreel.

Script - Unrequited

Click the images to enlarge.

Short Film Analysis - "Stalk"

Stalk, Campus MovieFest 2010

This short film was made for a movie festival hosted in the United States. Although the film quality isn't as up to scratch as most short films I believe the theme and several of the shots used could be beneficial to revise for use in our film. It depicts a young female character, probably in her late teens, depicting stalker like behaviour towards a male character at a park, the film plot is odd and has little sense until it begins to repeat and shows a sense of routine.

The film starts with a cut-in shot of an empty jar and the pace is immediately set by jump cuts of a female adding bread, peanut butter, brown letter and a pen into the shot; it is not known at this stage but these items become symbolic in the film showing a constant routine of the character and the passage of time. The jump cuts then continue as she puts a pebble into the empty jar, triggering the major toned music which strangely gives positive connotations, for the story of the film this doesn't really give a happy theme to the setting but rather a strange tone that gives off a delusional image, similar to the personality of the main character. The same song is played throughout. The character then writes the day on the brown bag, places a peanut butter sandwich into it and then leaves the house; this routine seems planned and so it is implied that she has been doing this for some time, all the time the jump cuts are often used to show the strangeness of the character. The main bulk of the shots in this part are close ups and mid shots set from eye level to high angle; This shows a neutral eye level view throughout this part of the short film.

The next scene is where the plot begins to unfold, it depicts the female character sitting on a bench and watching the male character who she is "stalking" avoid a hole filled with pebbles and then takes a picture when his back is turned. She then takes a pebble from the hole and puts it in the jar that was empty in the first scene. This plot line makes the audience think what is going on because it is unclear as to why she is doing this. The characters confidence in doing this could also indicate that the storyline has gone on before the film even began, her body language and frequent smiling shows this confidence. Her smiling doesn't give off a nice aura for this particular style of film but instead gives a creepy aura which fits in well with the "stalker" theme. The thing that changes in this scene is it's all shot from one shot, a long shot of a park bench looking in on what's going on. This makes the audience believe that they are actually stalking the character because there is little camera movement it is in a fixed spot.

The next sequence mirrors that of

the first scene giving it a sense of routine because she is doing the exactly same thing again, the audience know it is not the exact same twice because the character writes Tuesday rather than Monday so it is implied that a day has gone by since we last saw the character. A certain part of editing starting at 1:17 is used to shorten the time on the screen but it is the same time as last time for the main character. The editing used is where they split several shots onto the same screen in a split screen fashion, creating parallel timeframes, this keeps the viewer ensnared into the film, similar to that of the main character being ensnared to the person she is stalking, because there is so much happening on the screen at once. She then repeats the same as Mondays scene by sitting on the park bench, watching the male step over the pebbles, taking a picture, then taking a pebble, all the time with the same smile that shows she is strangely getting pleasure from what she is doing.

Character Profiles

Connor Stenton - A 17 year old male, born 27th March. He's currently studying English literature at college, his love for books, poems and philosophy motivate him to attend college although he is sometimes unable as his parents are financially troubled and had to move into a smaller house quite far away from college, but close to the girl who he has taken an interest in. Although Connor himself isn't a mentally unstable person, his naivety and inexperience with the opposite sex leads him to doing things which isn't socially acceptable, the audience can feel a sense of sympathy with this character, or they may just portray his actions to be perverted.

Lauren Heigl - A 16 year old female, born 17th of July. She's currently studying in college to become a vet. Her shy nature leads to her not making many friends at college and her attendance begins to deplete as she feels less and less motivated to go. She starts to become distant from her friends and parents and spends the majority of her time with her books. Although this character holds a sense of mystery as we do not follow her steps in the movie because the film is focused on the male; the female only becomes the focal figure in the camera in the final scene.