Results of the tally

Here are the results of the short tally I took from ten people.

IIIII A short documentary
An interactive video
IIIII A directors commentary over the trailer with extra diagrams following it for the poster and magazine cover

I received an equal tally on both the documentary and the commentary. This got me thinking to create a short documentary with a quick commentary over the video, pausing parts and explaining what I hoped to achieve with that mise-en-scene.
I now need to write a script/plan the documentary. I needed to look at some commentarys. Here is a commentary on Chadvaders on Youtube:



This next one is almost exactly as I would like to compose my evaluation!:



It begins with a trailer and then goes on to explain how it was composed (admittedly with almost deliberate humour which I will not be doing!) with clips from the unedited production.

Short Tally

I am creating an evaluation of my product, a film called The Misogynist with a trailer, poster and magazine front cover to promote it. I now wish to show people what I wanted to achieve with certain questions to answer. Which method below do you see best fit for me to do so? Please ring.

• A short documentary
• An interactive video
• A directors commentary over the trailer with extra diagrams following it for the poster and magazine cover

With this information, I will be able to establish which method will be most watchable and interesting.

Planning the evaluation

I created a short presentation to summarise possible ways to answer the questions for it. Here are my notes:

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Comparison to similar products.
Directors commentary on the trailer, video slideshow with commentary on my magazine and poster with comparisons to real products, i.e. Similarities and differences.

Challenging and Conforming
Public interest – horror is popular genre
Murder is popular convention of horror
Stalker is not
Mostly in point of view of killer – not typical
Woman as the protaganist
Using an institution logo at the beginning
Length of film typical of film teaser trailers as researched
To relate to the audience, I integrated technology and young adult interests (target audience): Mobile phone, laptop...
Used creepy music
Didn’t have an overhead voice

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
The trailer with the magazine and the poster
Promotional purposes of the latter two
The poster enhances different ideas about the trailer, backing up certain ones: horror, blood, being watched, fear etc.
Magazine reveals the misogynist and so this brings it back to being fictional
Has the effect of reveal certain details about the film with each product: Main story in the trailer, genre and action (such as murder) in the poster and reality, focusing on the stars of the film, in the magazine

3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?
Questionnaire's
Tally’s
Feedback gained along the way of processing my product
How did it help me?
How could it be improved?
Do they feel it achieved what I was trying?
Without telling the audience, ask them to tell me what they expect the storyline to be? To cliché?

Good or bad? Different or samey?

4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
Camera, boom mic (for audio tape to integrate into film), set lighting (for creating moonlight effects etc.)
iMovieHD for creating my film
Adobe Photoshop for creating my title, manipulating images and making backgrounds
Adobe Fireworks for manipulating images and titles
Blog for recording my progress and evidence of planning and research and construction
Publisher for creating my magazine

I will now produce a short questionnaire, asking what people believe is the best way to evaluate my film, trailer and poster.

The last stages of my magazine

<--- PENULTEMATE VERSION (SEE BELOW FOR FINAL)

I decided to make my magazine cover as minimalistic as possible so that the main focus was on the image in the middleand the name of the actor and film. During the process of making my magazine, I found that the image and titles had the best effect when broken up by similar colours between two different shades or hues. When adding the titles saying the actors name, the film title and the subtitle, I wanted to use black, edgy and crumbled block writing in black with a red background. I felt that it looked a little bit block and cut off. I thought that putting a transparent rectangle behind the titles would break it up from the background a little and help it blend a bit more. I made them off line behind a couple of the titles so that it wasn't too constructed. The second picture is what it looked like after doing this. I also added a barcode and a small website name and price below the title in its conventional position. I then added 'January 2010' next to the barcode as this is also a conventional of film magazines. I also added the subtitle 'Role: Woman Hater' for a bit of explanation and to target the audience unaware of the film purpose or unaware of it at all. Now it was finished and I was happy with how it looked.

<--- FINAL MAGAZINE COVER

Process of creation of the image

Image in front of the black background. The white edge around the image influenced me to cover it.

I used a big paintbrush of a dark grey colour (slightly lighter than black). This had the intention of creating a glow of darkness.

I used a rough edge paintbrush to surround the image. This colour was slightly lighter than th 2nd colour of grey (above) and was rough to give the impression that he was a little rough and distorted himself.

I again used a rough edge brush with white to make a rough border around him. It was the smaller border to give the impression of little light or hope around him. It also covered the little white outline around him. I then added splatters of blood with a splattery brush in dark red and dotted this around randomly. I covered some of the white and broke up the edge of the grey borders so that they wouldnt look too artificial. I then used the same splatter brush but in dark grey to break up the blood and the borders a little more and to make the white less bright.

I added more blood splatters on a seperate layer to make it look more menacing and creepy.

This is the title I created in fireworks. I used silver colours and a pre-made swirl effect on the original title so that it would stand out against the black background.

I then imported this image of the title onto the cover in photoshop below the layer of blood and the man and really liked the effect of the splatters on the title. This was the final version without the other parts typed on.

Starting on my magazine cover

After choosing the picture I wanted for the front page, I decided to use Microsoft Publisher to create the magazine cover as this was a suitable program when creating my magazine for last year in AS. I entered the picture and began creating a title. I had chosen the name 'Flicker' for the magazine title as it was cinema and film related (noise the film reel makes) and created a few different versions of Flicker in different fonts. I then showed them to various people, mainly my target group of young adults, and received good feedback.

Tally:

Option 1 - IIII

Option 2 - I

Option 3 - (void - not planned and not part of options!)

Option 4 - IIIII

Option 5 -

Due to popular demand from 5/10 people, I began to manipulate option 4 to make it look more like a magazine title. I chose red, mainly taking inspiration from Empire. It would represent 'hot' new news on films, love, anger, action... covering a few genres of film. Here is what the first cover looked like with the title (manipulated in Fireworks) and the image on Publisher:

I really didn't like how it was starting out. I never planned to have a white background, I wanted it to be black to denote fear and death, but I realised now that this title would not stand out, let alone show up, in front of a black background. The image of the man would not show up either, he would just sort of dissolve into the darkness. Therefore, I decided to start again. I drew up a more complex plan of the front cover (soon to be scanned onto the blog when I get home!) and start again.

I went into Photoshop so that I could do something with the image of the man. I put this image onto a black background. SEE NEXT BLOG FOR THE PROCESS OF CREATION OF THE IMAGE.

Final version of The Misogynist Poster

I was happy with the way the final version of my poster looked. I gave the message of panic and fear appropriately and, as I planned, the reflection in the eye worked as I wanted it to as I found after audience feedback:
'The more you look, the more you notice. I didn't even notice that knife at the beginning but I do now. That's scary!'
'Eew. Thats horrible. It looks really real, the shadows are creepy.'
'The name of the film and the dark eye are the first things you see, and then you start noticing other stuff, like the knife in the eye.'
'She looks really scared. It's like he's inside her, like possessing her.'

I achieve the messages of:

• him getting inside her mind
• a gory and horror filled film
• shadows meaning a creepy film
• evil closing in on her