Evaluation Question 1

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

• Our media product 'Abduction' in the form of a two minute opening sequence to a thriller uses and adopts various codes and conventions of other traditional thrillers by using representations, continuity location and music. Our group decided to try a different idea and go along the line of stereotypes and a twist that fools the audience into thinking one person is the antagonist based on stereotypes of ethnicity and the twist surprises the audience as in fact a white female is the antagonist. This is designed to create suspense and tension to keep our audience on the edge of their seat. We knew that this could also be a possible risk as we didn’t want to totally confuse our audience at the same time as they wouldn’t be able to understand the story line, thus creating an unsuccessful opening to a thriller. The sub-genre of Abduction is action or psychological thriller. The idea of a women being kidnapped into a human trafficking gang is a concept from a real media product in the form of ‘Taken’ a notable thriller which revolves around the storyline of somebody being kidnapped (see fig 1) . However I thought the idea was very basic and we wanted to expand that idea for the opening sequence. So we entwined that with a concept of stereotypes as in many typical thrillers the black male would be perceived as a thug/criminal, so when a black male is chasing a white female you would immediately think he is a mugger. When he hands her the book . We did some research and found out that the antagonist found in Thrillers are generally young to middle aged men. Abduction conflicts with gender because women are not normally seen as the antagonist. This is because men are portrayed as being more powerful and dominant.

• Another media product that had an influence on our thriller was ‘1 Day’ (see fig 2). 1 Day is a British gangster thriller, we used this as an influence when thinking of costume ideas and stereotypes when creating Jerome’s character. In the thriller it uses the stereotypes of young black males and portrays them as criminal, thug-like vandals. We wanted this conception of Jerome at the beginning of the thriller so the audience will follow the stereotype based on his clothing, mannerisms and ethnicity and throw them off of the real antagonist in Betty. Being a thriller we still tried to stick to some of the typical conventions you would associate the genre with. In all thrillers you find there are plenty of close up shots to convey emotion and build suspense and tension. We used close up shots in abduction to create the same affect, you can see a close up shot on the protagonist Sophie (see fig 3) when she is being chased down the alley.

• The reason why I chose to use the alley as the main location, is because we could have easily filmed our opening to a thriller in and around the college but the alleyway gives a connotation of isolation and dangerousness which are widely known conventions of thriller locations. If you look at many thrillers they use isolated locations to add to dramatic effect and the vulnerability of the antagonist. Also as, Sophie is being chased into the alley it adds to the audiences expectation that she is going to be hurt.
  
  
  
  Figure 1
  Taken is a thriller which uses a similar concepts to ours as a young female is kidnapped and put into human trafficking by big gangs and organisations.
  
  
  
  Figure 2
  1 Day is a British gangster thriller/drama based in Birmingham. We wanted to create the same preconceptions for our character Jerome that are created for the characters in ‘1 Day‘. They used costume language and mannerism to create stereotypes of the gangs, this helps to lead the audience into thinking these are the antagonists.
  
  See '1 Day' trailer.
  
  Figure 3
  This is a close up shot of Sophie, this shows how we have used close up shots which are typical conventions you find in a thriller.
  

Question 2

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups and how does it attract your audience?


Above shows the social group represented in 'Adulthood' and how this was replicated in the charcter of jerome in our media product.

Our media product 'Abduction' represents particular social groups such as ethnicity and gender. This is represented in the character creation and cast selection. As the scene starts you see a teenage white female leaving the college. This helps to connote to the audience her vulnerability as she is still in adolescence and as a girl as a stereotypical view of girls is that they are more susceptible to danger than the
more dominant males.

As the scene carries on, and Jerome is introduced into the plot, the audience would immediately associate him with violence as his representation is created through the choice of clothing skin colour and social class. We decided to choose peter for the role of Jerome as he is of black ethnicity, Tall (which creates dominance) and can also be threatening which fits into the stereotype of a criminal. We got this idea from youths in '1 Day' and 'Adulthood' they have the same stereotypical qualities. They are both black, wear baggy cloths and also use threatening behaviour.

Jerome represents the social group of a gangster. ‘1 Day’ also fits this social group that are stereotypically perceived as the majority of black people who steal, deal drugs, use weapons and are a menace to society. But in our thriller we have created a different outcome to what the stereotype of Jerome would lead you to believe as instead of mugging or hurting Sophie he gives her the textbook she drops and by doing this we are creating a different perception of the social group that is the 'thugs'.

Question 3

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

In my opinion I feel that our thriller ‘Abduction’ could be produced by large Hollywood studio company as the plot and the action style reminds me of successful action thrillers like ‘Taken’ and ‘Bourne Identity’

A distribution company would deal with the marketing and circulation of movies in theatres, and for home viewing in DVD format they would release the film and get it out there to the consumers on a large scale. Some companies like Sony, Paramount Pictures and Twentieth Century Fox would be the best candidates as they are a globally established company for many years and have films still in production. Also in Britain, companies like Pathe(see fig 4) would help to get our film distributed in the UK . The nature of the plot means that the film can be easily marketed in both Europe and America.

In order to acquire big distributors like these as a independent production we would look to putting ‘Abduction’ in film festivals around Europe like canes in France and British festivals like Leeds and London film festivals. Also Sundance in America

Funding would be possible through the national lottery funding scheme and the UK film council to help with the costs for script development, film production, film export and distribution, cinemas, and audience support to up and coming British film companies like ours.

Looking at our target audience age of 16 - 25, this category usually watches films in multiplex cinemas like Vue, Cineworld and Odeon. These would be perfect cinema choices to distribute our product in order to reach our target audience.

Another positive from using an institution like this is that films similar to this like Bourne Ultimatum and Taken have created a string of merchandise along with the film, thus creating a franchise of our media product, through video games, t-shirts and action figures.

Figure 4
Pathe is an established european film distrubutor originating from France. They would be perfect for 'Abduction' as they support independant projects and have been distributors to many films such as 'Resident Evil', 'The Descent' and 'In the Cut'.

Question 4

Who would be the audience for your media product?

• We decided through research and also the feedback from are questionnaire that our primary target audience would be both men and women between the ages 16-25. Therefore we would expect Abduction to have a bbfc 15 rating in the UK as there is action and violence that would not be suitable for younger viewers. We feel this is the right target audience age as they are old enough to understand some of the issues raised in the film and they are also young enough to still enjoy the action and adventure.
  
  
  


• Example of target audience -
  
  
  
  
  This is Daniel Summers. He is 17 years, 5months old, and lives in Brentwood in the suburbs of London.
  He dresses fairly average with a polo shirt and jeans. He enjoys going out to party’s and socialising, and also enjoys watching films and playing videogames. He enjoys films like Mission impossible, Taken, James Bond, Blood Diamond and Déjà vu. He like trips to the cinema and also buying films on dvd.
  He enjoys programmes like CSI, 24 and Lost. Dan primarily watches programmes on Sky 1, E4, Five and sky movies action. He plays videogames such as call of duty, grand theft auto and heavy rain.
  I think Abduction would appeal to Dan as he likes action and violence also he is over the rating age of 15. He likes thrillers like James bond and taken that are similar to our media product.
  


• As our media product is not soley limited to one target audince we have found a secoundary audince that could possibly watch Abduction.
  
  
  
  The brainstorm above shows the audience for abduction can be broad. The film would hopefully target a global audience from all segments of life.

Question 5

How did you attract/adress your audience ?



In order to attract or address our audience we needed to establish what attracted the them to the thriller genre. We included some of the questions in our questionnaire that would help us in determining what codes and conventions the audience like best in a thriller. As the feedback we received was positive it allowed us to use stereotypes to create a twist as the feedback showed us that the majority of people thought that a twist and violence is a better element to a thriller. In order to attract our audience we needed to create an enigma as suspense is vital in keeping the viewer intrigued. By changing the antagonist from the obvious stereotypical perception of Jerome to the white female of Betty it helps to create an enigma. We also added some action and violence in the form of a punch to help dramatise the abduction of Sophie.
In our thriller we created a character that the audience can identify with. Sophie is your typical college teenage girl as there’s nothing unusual about her. In many thrillers the typical girl is commonly used as the victim because the audience can relate and sympathise with her.







We attracted the audience by using the scenario of a schoolgirl walking home from school and being abducted. This is based on real life cases that happens to young girls across the globe. An example is Milly Dowler a famous case were a young teenaged girl was abducted on her way back from school and later murdered.



BBC News Milly Dowler








Also our media product touches on the issue of forced prostitution, human trafficking is a problem around the world and we touch on this in our thriller it raises the seriousness and brutality of sex trafficking. This shows how we have linked reality to our media product in order to attract and address our audience.

We also addressed our audience through advertisement and promotion. To do this I created a group page for our production company on the popular social networking site facebook. So that our audience can connect with our media product over the internet. This inadvertently creates viral marketing which will attract a wider audience and also free advertising. Above is a print screen of the Ikonic facebook fan page through this our audience can receive updates on the film release dates and general information. Users can join the group and also invite their friends.







Also our film is uploaded on to you tube a user generated site where our opening sequence can be accsessed by anyone. Also at the bottom they can leave feedback which will aid the evaluation of our product.



We created a poster for our media product it clearly displays the name of the film, the production logo and the certification age. This is a marketing ploy in order to attract and address our audience this is a widely used advertisement form for films.

Question 6

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



During the creation of our media product we had to encounter various types of technologies both software and hardware alike.
Firstly we was introduced to many types of software to make our blog as presentable as possible and function better for visitors to our blog. The format would enable viewer to see our progression from research to planning and then production. Some of the software was unfamiliar to me so we had to learn how to use them in a short amount of time.


As the Apple Macintosh’s were the only computers in our college with software that was adequate enough to finish our media product to a high standard i had to use them for the majority of work. As i use a Microsoft vista at home i was unfamiliar with the format in which Macintosh operates in. I struggled a great deal at first with locating many of the programmes as they were completely different to Microsoft although the programmes on the mac were of a higher standard like Photoshop and final cut pro . I struggled with basic tasks and it took longer to perform the tasks than it would on Microsoft. However as time progressed i got used to its interface mainly through trial and error. I was able to see the quality it added to my work and through using the mac for my media product i can now us the apple Macintosh effectively in general use.


The first piece of online software we used was ‘bubbl.us’, it was our first time in using the software which created our brainstorm for our thriller, we mapped out the cast/setting/music/props etc. It enables viewers to our blog to navigate through our mind map in an informative and highly presentable way.






I then used a programme called ‘scribd’ this was the first time i used this software but it was very easy to function. I put all of my word documents and my graphs on there and later imbedded it on to my blog this helped to make my blog look more presentable and easier to scroll up and down. The format allows viewers of the blog to view the document. We did have some problems initially when uploading the scribd documents to our blog, but they were shortly resolved with some adjustments to the html coding as i increasingly used the program it became easier to use.


During the production phase, as i filmed part of the opening sequence i had to use the camera equipment which i was unfamiliar with to start.
The camera we used was a Sony Pd170p it had many functionalities and can record in high picture quality. As i was new to using the software i had an induction on using the cameras by our media teacher. This helped me in order to keep the cameras safe and functioning properly. Since we started filming to when we finished i feel that i have learnt a great deal about using these cameras. Firstly at the start i made silly errors like leaving the leans cover on and had difficulty locating some of the functions like playback and zoom, But after various re-shoots and getting used to the camera i was able to use it sufficiently by the end, as you can see in our end product.


Along with the camera, the tripod which is the stand for the camera needed to be used during our production. Although I was also new to using this piece of equipment it was fairly simple to use as i had an induction on using it from my media teacher. It has various leavers to adjust the camera angle and height and also to maintain the cameras stability. As the camera is an expensive piece of media equipment it was important we knew how to adjust it properly to the camera in order to not damage it. I felt that i managed to use the tripod affectively during our production.


In all, through the process of research, planning and production I have come across various new technologies which I had to encompass into my media product although I am not 100 percent efficient in using all of the new technologies I have embraced. I feel I can use them to an adequate standard compared to when i started.

Below is a video tutorial on the camera which helped me in getting familiar with the equipment.

Question 7

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

• I feel that my transition from preliminary to main task was successful as i understand the importance of research and planning in pre production. As the preliminary task was just a test of our camera skills, in creating a media product all of the elements had to be right for it to be a credible thriller. Through textual analysis, studying narrative codes and theory’s i found that the smallest of errors can have a dramatic effect on the audience. This opened up my scope as a director as i knew everything needed to be in place in order to make a good production that challenged thriller conventions in a way that would not be confusing to the audience.
  
• The preliminary task had no real pre-production, whereas our opening sequence had a story board, shot list, production brief, prop and cast notes etc. This made the process easier as it stopped us from wasting time filming shots we didn’t need and we had a plan on what types of shot we would use to help in creating a realistic opening sequence. It helped me as a director because i had a set plan on shots so that we wouldn’t stray to far exploring other shots whilst filming.
  
• We also had a progression in using the camera as in the preliminary task we broke the 180 degree rule (see fig 5) this was a problem for us but luckily we had time to film again. We knew that in our main task we could not make the same mistakes again as it could cost us valuable filming time and could possibly ruin our whole production. As you can see from our preliminary to our final piece our camera work and shot continuity has improved vastly.

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Overall the process of producing the preliminary task and two minute sequence was interesting. I learnt a great deal about the filming process, and it has also made me broaden my understanding of what it takes to not just create a film but all of the elements that are required to make it realistic. I feel i also have learnt a lot more about the film industry as a whole from research and production right through to marketing and distribution.

Figure 5
Below is a video demonstrating the 180 degree rule in film production.