Evaluation

Evaluation

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

How does your product appeal to the target audience?

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

What improvements could be made?

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

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


Film Poster- Using my analysis of existing romantic comedy film posters I can identify what I have kept the same and what I have changed:-My poster follows the convention of the line of the eye contains the actors names, the main image, smaller image and release date. So this key information is quick and easy to find.-I have also followed the convention of having feminine colours as I have used aqua-blue and red. The red of Tom and Nicole’s clothing also adds to this, as does the pink of Jack’s t-shirt. This pink suggests he isn’t a particularly masculine character, giving information to the audience which is another convention.-Having the film’s title in a hotspot is also conventional as it is a significant piece of information (‘Just My Luck’ and ‘Just Like Heaven’ show this)-Only having a short title fits the conventions as all three film posters I analysed had three-word titles.-My main image conveys information about the characters as you would think the couple have a perfect relationship, but the smaller image of Jack hints otherwise as he looks unhappy.-I have used the convention of having a background which tells people about the setting of the film, as the corridor and lockers signify a school environment, which also shows the characters are students. This way of conveying information was evident in the posters I analysed (e.g. the city landscape of ‘Just My Luck’)-Even though there are some feminine colours I chose not to have too much because our film isn’t a typical romcom as the female is the ‘player’ rather than the male. The brown and green of the background further show this difference to the usual narrative of this genre.


Film Magazine Front Cover- Using my analysis of existing film magazine covers, I can identify what I have kept the same and what I have changed: -I have followed the convention of having the name of the magazine in a large, bold font across the top of the page (as my analysis of two ‘Empire’ magazines show) This attracts attention as the red font stands out from the blue background.-I differ slightly from the convention of placing attention- grabbing details along the top, as I have mine below the magazine’s name.-My cover also has one main image with two smaller images either side, so conforms to the conventions also (as demonstrated in the issue of ‘Film’ I analysed)-The colours used are related to the main article (our film) as the aqua-blue and red are the same as my film’s poster to maintain a theme as the products are part of the same package. Also only four colours are used which is another convention found from my research into existing film magazines.-The contents along the line of the eye is conventional because there is the name of the magazine, main image and headings along with what else is in the issue. These are what was identified in my research and was evident in all three covers I studied.-Similarly to the existing front covers I have left empty spaces so the attention is directed to the main image and text, making the page easier to navigate.


Romantic Comedy Trailer- Using my analysis of existing romcom trailers, I can identify what we have kept the same and what we have changed: -One of the conventions we didn’t follow was the inclusion of a voiceover, and instead we used blank screens with text which told the audience the key information of the film.-The music we used (a song called ‘Amber’ by ‘The Haiku’ found by Laura on a copyright-free website) complimented the tone of the film well, as it’s romantic start mirrors the romantic opening of our trailer. Then the lyrics “should I hold my breath” relate to the situation of Tom’s character (Joe). The song is ironic because you’d expect it to show how Nicole’s character Amber (named to tie-in with the soundtrack) helps Joe, but our decision to stray from the typical romcom narrative creates sympathy for him, as we see this is isn’t really the case.-Our opening scene is similar to the ‘Love Hurts’ trailer I analysed, as you see a seemingly perfect relationship as Joe explains how happy he and Amber are. The speed up of the music accompanies the on-screen action of Amber with Jack, signifying things are about to change. It’s also similar to ‘500 Days of Summer’ where the couple are shown as happy together (sitting side by side).-We used over the shoulder shots to make the audience feel involved in the action, as that’s another convention. -The lack of music in the bathroom scene highlights what Amber is saying and her flirty nature, evoking the audience to react and see her in a bad light rather than the traditional male.-We have used jump cuts the most to follow conventions, but also used quick fades to show the progression of the storyline and a hint as to how fast the circumstances change.-The comedy element of our film (as we decided to focus more on the unorthodox romance side) is alighted to in the scene where Joe is studying and comically turns the page of his book. This insight into his character also creates sympathy for him as he is the vulnerable one not the female as typically represented.

How does your product appeal to the target audience?The age group of the target audience for the romantic comedy genre is generally above 15 and are mostly females. As my questionnaires have suggested, a new product should be aimed at both genders, so I decided to try and achieve this. It also should possibly be aimed at the younger end of the target group, as there is an opportunity for a new market there. I feel my poster, magazine cover and my groups trailer have addressed this audience in the following ways:

-The characters of the film are teenagers (aged 17-18) and are therefore within the target age group of this genre. This makes it easier for the audience to relate to them as the characters are likely to face issues which the people watching also face, creating a connection with the audience.-The costumes of all the characters are typical of the younger members of the target audience, again showing how relative the film is to them. The fact Nicole (Amber) is wearing a checked shirt rather than something typically girly emphasises she isn’t a typical female in a romcom. This also represents the notion that some of the females of the target audience aren’t typical girls either.-Likewise with the character of Jack, the pink of his t-shirt suggests he is different to Joe who’s wearing typically masculine colours. This too represents the male teenagers who are more in touch with their femininity, so a variety of people are represented in our film.-The inclusion of a party scene highlights the appeal of partying amongst teenagers, so those watching will be able to relate to what is happening and understand the situation of the characters. The consecutive tracking shots of Amber and Lauren meeting Jack outside the party, and then Joe going in (filmed by me) demonstrates the complications of teenage relationships and hooks the audience in as they will want to know what happens Joe sees his girlfriend with another guy.-The school setting also appeals to the target audience as the younger members will be able to identify with the character’s situations (e.g. Joe studying). The establishing shot of the front of the school (filmed by me) which zooms in and then cuts to Joe and Amber inside, identifies the film’s setting from the beginning of the trailer.-The camerawork which was handheld (such as Amber and Jack entering her bedroom, filmed by Donka) creates a sense of verisimilitude so the audience can relate to the action more. The party scene (filmed by Laura) further adds to the realism. The handheld shots of Joe outside Amber’s house (filmed by me) interspersed with stable shots of Jack and Amber upstairs demonstrates the difficulty of Joe’s situation (added to by the bright lighting of her bedroom contrasting the darker lighting of Joe’s scene)-The shot of Amber and Lauren (played by Linsdey) doing their hair and gossiping in the mirror (filmed by me) appeals to the younger audience as teenage girls are likely to do this also.

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

I feel that on the whole my poster and magazine cover worked well with my group’s trailer. The concept that the female character (Amber) is not a typical girl is evident in all three elements of the coursework, as she isn’t wearing particularly girly clothes and on the cover she is independent of the two males. I think I have managed to maintain a theme between the products by using the same colours (red, blue, white and yellow) to highlight the fact they are part of the same promotional package.The general feedback from the target audience has told me that these products are likely to be successful if they actually produced. The results of the questionnaire I carried out for the final trailer suggested people would want to know what happened in the end enough to see the film if it was released. Therefore I can conclude that the trailer was generally effective as the target audience were interested, as well as represented in the film.However, as my questionnaires also told me, there is plenty of room for improvement in different areas. For example the music in the trailer doesn’t play at the start as it should do, which deterred the audience slightly as they alighted to this problem in the feedback questionnaire.People have generally stated that the trailer has potential because there is evidence of a decent, possibly not often seen storyline, but the timeline of events perhaps put them off a bit as it caused a bit of confusion for some people.

What improvements could be made?

Film Poster

-If I were to make my poster again I would have included the film’s credits along the bottom so people were given more information.-I would also have changed the colour of the actor’s names as it doesn’t really stand out from the colour behind it.-I also perhaps could have used a different photograph which places Amber in the foreground, as this was a convention of two of the existing posters I analysed (‘The accidental Husband’ and ‘Just My Luck’) However, as our filming time was limited, because we struggled to find time when the four members of our group and all four actors were available, I had to use the pictures our group had taken during filming. -I may have added a tagline as my questionnaire results told me that I should include one if it was suitable. As I feel there is a lot of free space on my poster I think it would have benefitted from the extra details a tagline offers. (Where I could have had a tagline)-Perhaps the colour of the release date should have been lighter as black doesn’t suit the romantic comedy genre well. Maybe a light blue or yellow would have been better as it would have related more to my magazine cover and my theme colours of red, white, blue and yellow that my package has.

Magazine Front Cover

-If I made my film magazine cover again I would have maybe changed the red of the magazine details and some of the film names because it is quite hard to read.-I would also have experimented with different font styles for my magazine name, as it is quite plain. I wanted to keep the front cover simple to relate to my poster, but upon reflection I could have improved the look by using a different font.-The images of Jack, Amber and Joe I think would look better if they were moved up slightly, as the text which begins ‘Love is certainly...’ is too close to the text below it.-I would also like to make the three main images, in particular the one of Amber larger ,so that they filled the whole background like my poster. However due to fact I had to crop the original images I was unable to re-size them to fit how I wanted them to. -To make my cover more relative to the conventions I could have included a different prop (instead of just the books Joe is holding) to add more information about the characters and storyline. The existing covers I looked at all used a prop to enhance its effectiveness (e.g. bow and arrows, glasses and a sword).

‘Relationship Status’ trailer

-To make the sound quality better it would have benefitted from us filming earlier than we did, as we could have scheduled when to film to lower the level of background noise. As a lot of the scenes are set in school, we filmed during our frees, break and lunchtime. This was because we struggled to find the time when everyone involved could be together, so noise of other pupils disrupts our trailer.-In the bathroom scene between Amber and Lauren, they interrupt each other because we had a short space of time to film this (as we used the school toilets). We had also changed the time of when this scene would be used in the trailer, so the actors had to improvise their lines. Also with this I thought the idea to film their reflections in the mirror was good, but as the space we used was small I had to film them from the side which I thought we could have done better.-The scene with Amber and Joe on the sofa could have been better if I had included close-ups of the two, because as it is you can’t see their reaction or facial expressions. As we filmed at Nicole’s house at night and we had limited time so I used the tripod and zoomed in to make the most of the time we had.-I would also liked have to seen more of the comedy from the initial storyline we discussed at the beginning, because the trailer lacks the comedy element the genre has.-To make our trailer better we could have made it so the music comes in at the start, as when you watch the trailer you can’t hear the beginning of it. The music also makes it hard to hear what the characters are saying as it overlaps the talking. (as evident in the locker scene) This is because we couldn’t figure out how to lower the volume of the music without turning it off altogether, as we were all new to the editing software of the Mac laptop. If we’d filmed the trailer sooner then we would have had more time to adjust it in post-production.-I think we should have used more close-ups as the longer distance shots don’t allow the audience to fully connect with the characters. In general I feel our trailer would have benefitted from a wider range of camera angles and shots, as well as sharper editing and adjustments to the overlaying music.


Research

When researching and analysing existing romantic comedy trailers, posters and film magazines I was required to use a variety of technologies. I used the internet (primarily Google) to search for images of the posters and magazine front covers where I then copied these images onto Word documents to analyse them. After I applied shapes to construct the principle of thirds and line of the eye I print screened these into PowerPoint to present them more easily. In order to place them on my blog (at WordPress.com) I needed to use a format converter (I chose Scribd as it was a popular website for this sort of thing). I then used the share and embed feature to copy the link into a post on my blog so it was visible on my blog homepage.


Research

When producing my questionnaires for my poster and front cover and presenting my results I used more technologies.I used Microsoft Excel’s bar graph feature to present my results in a more accessible way than just saying what the conclusions were. I then copied these graphs into a PowerPoint presentation so it could be uploaded to SlideShare. I was then able to embed this into a post on my blog (in the same way as before) so it’s easy to see and find.


Planning

As I was planning and drafting my poster and magazine front cover I used different technologies.I used Microsoft Publisher for both products as there is a wide variety of ways to personalise your work. I used text boxes and WordArt the most to make it easier to get the look I wanted. The cropping feature I utilised to shape the images exactly how I wanted. I then had to print screen the finished images onto a Word document so I could upload it to Scribd so I could post it to my blog.


Use of my blog (a new media technology)

All of my coursework was uploaded to my own blog site, to utilise the capabilities of the internet and make my work easier to access. This was the first time I had created or used a blog so I found it quite hard to get used to at the beginning. There was a number of blogs sites to chose from but I chose WordPress because it looked the easiest to use for me, as a first time blogger. I liked the way you could categorise your posts as it made my work much easier to find. I used categories for each section of the coursework (including research, planning, production and evaluation)I also used one of the many side bar tools to personalise my blog’s appearance by choosing a different theme.


Filming and editing the trailer

-We used a Panasonic camera to film our trailer and a Kodak handheld camera to take still pictures during filming. (A selection of some of the stills we took which were potentials for our posters and magazine covers)We then used a Mac laptop (iMovie facility) to edit our film together, also to add our song and blank screens with text.

Evaluation

Education

Transcript of Evaluation