In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The genre of our film is a thriller/horror and we used conventions to suit our genre, for example we used black costumes for our killer which is how a killer is usually represented in horror films. We used different shots like our close up on our victim which was effective for our genre because it showed the fear in her face and this made the audience feel sympathy for her. Our film title was ‘No Escape’, and our film was about a girl that gets stalked, I think our title suits our film because it shows the girl has no escape from this guy. For our feedback we asked if our title suited our film and they said it did. Like all opening sequences, we made sure our film set up enough enigma for the audience to keep on watching, for example in our film we didn’t reveal the killers face or anything about him therefore the audience didn’t know who it was or why he was doing it.
Also we didn’t give any information about the girl he stalked therefore the audience didn’t know any background information. We asked a couple of people if our film set up enigmas and they said yes. I don’t think we used different things in our film but I think the idea of the pictures were rather different. We used a black and white freeze frame throughout our product which showed that the stalker was taking pictures of his victim. In our feedback questions we asked “do you think we have use any features that you haven’t seen in films before?” Both people we asked said the picture taking feature.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
In our film we used a teenager as the main victim, this give a sense of realism because a lot of stalking situations have happened to teenage girls. We used a man to be the actual stalker, men are usually represented as the main criminal. We dressed our stalker in a black coat with the hood up so it didn’t reveal his face. Black is a scary colour and usually represents danger and fear.
Also horror films frequently use black for costume of a killer. When we filmed the stalker, the lighting was low key lighting, this made the scene dull and frightening, this made the audience realise who the stalker was in the film. When we filmed the teenage girl, the lighting was high key lighting and the clothes she wore were usually quite bright.
In our film we used a teenager as the main victim, this give a sense of realism because a lot of stalking situations have happened to teenage girls. We used a man to be the actual stalker, men are usually represented as the main criminal. We dressed our stalker in a black coat with the hood up so it didn’t reveal his face. Black is a scary colour and usually represents danger and fear.
Also horror films frequently use black for costume of a killer. When we filmed the stalker, the lighting was low key lighting, this made the scene dull and frightening, this made the audience realise who the stalker was in the film. When we filmed the teenage girl, the lighting was high key lighting and the clothes she wore were usually quite bright.
Our film adheres to stereotypes that we usually see in the media and in our feedback we asked if our film was realistic and people answered yes, this shows our characters fit into the usual stereotypes in media.
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
I think American companies such as Alliance, Newmarket and Original films would be good companies to distribute our film because they are all production companies and have all distributed the film “Prom Night”. This film is a similar film to ours because it’s about a girl who gets stalked, however, a major difference in the films is that ours is a British film whereas this is an American one. I think these companies would be a good company to be distributed by because they distribute lots of films all different genre’s therefore I think they will be popular companies. Also, I think our film does have universal appeal but it can be debated because it is a British Film and universal often includes films that are American.
Who would be the audience for your media product?
Our film targets a teenage audience of both genders but I think it is more for a female audience because the victim in the film is a female and a female audience would have more sympathy for the victim than males would. Also our film targets audiences that like to watch horror and thriller films. In our feedback we asked, “what audience do you think our film best suits?” and people said young adults/teenagers. The socio-economic status of our film is E because it targets students. This was our intention because teenagers are a good audience to target because on average people ages 15-24 pay the cinema a visit at least once a month, therefore they are the main film lovers and spend a lot of money on watching films. However, we have to consider others groups, I think horror is a popular genre and people all ages enjoy to watch this genre but the reason we have chosen to target a teenage audience is because it is a teen genre and it appeals to teenagers more. The victim of the film is a teenager and a teenage audience can relate it to real life situations of their age. Also the setting in our opening sequence was a college and most teenagers attend college which creates a sense of realism.
How did you attract/address your audience?
We attracted our audience by using many techniques, firstly we used enigmas, this makes the audience wonder what is happening and makes them watch on to find out the answers. We didn’t give any information about either of the characters therefore the audience don’t know why the stalker is stalking this girl. Also we don’t show the stalker’s face so the audience is wonder who he is and what he looks like. We didn’t use narration in our opening sequence but the music we used was non-diegetic and it added to the tension of the plot. Even though we didn’t use narration, our film was simple to understand and easy to follow and the audience knew what was happening. We built up suspense in our opening sequence because we didn’t reveal what was going to happen to the girl and the tension makes the audience want to keep watching to find out the climax of the film, where the action happens.
We used binary oppositions to contrast both of our characters, the victim in our film was innocent and was a normal girl and college and the stalker was after this girl and had a weapon at the end which shows violence and murderous. Ideology is commonly used in films and it is to create a message to the audience, we tried to use an ideology in our opening sequence, stalking is a common thing that happens all over the world and we tried to show this in our film, this is effective in our piece because it will make the audience feel sorry for the girl and the pain she must feel if she finds out she is actually being stalked. Also to show the contrast of the characters we presented them at different times in the day. The victim was shown during the day where the lighting was high key whereas the stalker was shown at night where the lighting was very low key. This is a shot of the stalkers house or hide out and it is presented at night which gives a sense of mystery
What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
I think American companies such as Alliance, Newmarket and Original films would be good companies to distribute our film because they are all production companies and have all distributed the film “Prom Night”. This film is a similar film to ours because it’s about a girl who gets stalked, however, a major difference in the films is that ours is a British film whereas this is an American one. I think these companies would be a good company to be distributed by because they distribute lots of films all different genre’s therefore I think they will be popular companies. Also, I think our film does have universal appeal but it can be debated because it is a British Film and universal often includes films that are American.
Who would be the audience for your media product?
Our film targets a teenage audience of both genders but I think it is more for a female audience because the victim in the film is a female and a female audience would have more sympathy for the victim than males would. Also our film targets audiences that like to watch horror and thriller films. In our feedback we asked, “what audience do you think our film best suits?” and people said young adults/teenagers. The socio-economic status of our film is E because it targets students. This was our intention because teenagers are a good audience to target because on average people ages 15-24 pay the cinema a visit at least once a month, therefore they are the main film lovers and spend a lot of money on watching films. However, we have to consider others groups, I think horror is a popular genre and people all ages enjoy to watch this genre but the reason we have chosen to target a teenage audience is because it is a teen genre and it appeals to teenagers more. The victim of the film is a teenager and a teenage audience can relate it to real life situations of their age. Also the setting in our opening sequence was a college and most teenagers attend college which creates a sense of realism.
How did you attract/address your audience?
We attracted our audience by using many techniques, firstly we used enigmas, this makes the audience wonder what is happening and makes them watch on to find out the answers. We didn’t give any information about either of the characters therefore the audience don’t know why the stalker is stalking this girl. Also we don’t show the stalker’s face so the audience is wonder who he is and what he looks like. We didn’t use narration in our opening sequence but the music we used was non-diegetic and it added to the tension of the plot. Even though we didn’t use narration, our film was simple to understand and easy to follow and the audience knew what was happening. We built up suspense in our opening sequence because we didn’t reveal what was going to happen to the girl and the tension makes the audience want to keep watching to find out the climax of the film, where the action happens.
We used binary oppositions to contrast both of our characters, the victim in our film was innocent and was a normal girl and college and the stalker was after this girl and had a weapon at the end which shows violence and murderous. Ideology is commonly used in films and it is to create a message to the audience, we tried to use an ideology in our opening sequence, stalking is a common thing that happens all over the world and we tried to show this in our film, this is effective in our piece because it will make the audience feel sorry for the girl and the pain she must feel if she finds out she is actually being stalked. Also to show the contrast of the characters we presented them at different times in the day. The victim was shown during the day where the lighting was high key whereas the stalker was shown at night where the lighting was very low key. This is a shot of the stalkers house or hide out and it is presented at night which gives a sense of mystery
We used different shots to make the film effective. We used close up shots when the stalker was talking pictures. The last picture that was took of the girl was very effectual because it was extremely close up on her face and it showed the fear when she turned round.
Also we used a point of view shot when the stalker was looking at the photos on his wall, this was very effective because it showed his obsession with this girl. 
We used a long shot of the girl walking down the corridor, this was effective because it showed the stalker was watching her from a distance so the girl wouldn’t notice him.
The pictures on the stalker’s wall shows the obsession he has with the girl and the wall the pictures are on is a plain brick wall which shows dullness and coldness. This could represent the character of the stalker.
Also the black clothing shows a mysterious character and he puts gloves on before he picks up the knife which shows he is clever and cunning because this way, his fingerprints won’t be on the knife.
We used continuity editing and in our feedback, we found out that people had said our editing was continuous. We didn’t change the pace of our editing, it was at a constant pace but when the pictures were taken, we speeded up the freeze frame to make it more effective. We used a fade out and fade in the change the setting, after seeing the girl at college it faded out and then faded back in to show the stalker’s house. To make the pictures more effective we used a black and white effect to make it stand out from the rest of our film. Also when the picture was taken and the shot froze the music we used went louder and quicker, this showed that the picture taking was a main part of our film and that is was being used to build up tension.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
For our research we used many sites on the internet to get ideas for our final product. We used you tube to find clips of films the same genre as ours to analyse the techniques in it. Examples of the clips we used are ‘The Strangers’ and ‘Prom night’, these were both good examples because they both build up tension in the opening sequence. Using these examples from you tube was very useful because it give us ideas for our opening sequence. In our research we also looked at props that were commonly used in horror films and this helped us make our film more realistic because we used a weapon which is always used in a horror film. We used facts and figures of different genre’s and this helped us choose which genre to do. We thought filming this opening sequence would be easier but using the camera can be quite difficult to use because it was quite hard getting the angle right on the camera also the editing was quite difficult to get things right.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
Our preliminary task wasn’t perfect but it was useful to film so we could practice using a camera. We did make a few mistake whilst filming, I performed in it and I looked at the camera a couple of times. Also when we moved the camera it wasn’t very smooth. When we came to editing it, we didn’t make is completely continuous but we hadn’t had a lot of experience using the editing. We didn’t put sound on our preliminary task, we just used speech also we didn’t really take the lighting into account. When we filmed our final product we looked at all the things we could improve on and we improved on these weaknesses. We used the lighting to make our film more effective and we used sound to add to the tension in our film. Our editing was more continuous and our movement with the camera was smooth and not edgy. In our feedback we asked if we had improved since our preliminary task and we got the answer yes.
In conclusion, I think our film was a good piece of work and I think we worked well to put all our research together and our final product worked really well. Our editing was very continuous and it didn’t look like it changed from one scene to another sharply, it had a smooth flow to it. Also our idea of a freeze frame to make it look like the stalker had took pictures worked really well because it was different and it added to the tension. We did have one weakness whilst filming our final product, we had to avoid disruptions around college and people walking in the shot but it was hard so we had to cut the people out when we were editing it. I think our film was realistic and it included a lot of techniques used in actual films today. We tried to make our film as close to a real film and I think we did a good job.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
For our research we used many sites on the internet to get ideas for our final product. We used you tube to find clips of films the same genre as ours to analyse the techniques in it. Examples of the clips we used are ‘The Strangers’ and ‘Prom night’, these were both good examples because they both build up tension in the opening sequence. Using these examples from you tube was very useful because it give us ideas for our opening sequence. In our research we also looked at props that were commonly used in horror films and this helped us make our film more realistic because we used a weapon which is always used in a horror film. We used facts and figures of different genre’s and this helped us choose which genre to do. We thought filming this opening sequence would be easier but using the camera can be quite difficult to use because it was quite hard getting the angle right on the camera also the editing was quite difficult to get things right.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
Our preliminary task wasn’t perfect but it was useful to film so we could practice using a camera. We did make a few mistake whilst filming, I performed in it and I looked at the camera a couple of times. Also when we moved the camera it wasn’t very smooth. When we came to editing it, we didn’t make is completely continuous but we hadn’t had a lot of experience using the editing. We didn’t put sound on our preliminary task, we just used speech also we didn’t really take the lighting into account. When we filmed our final product we looked at all the things we could improve on and we improved on these weaknesses. We used the lighting to make our film more effective and we used sound to add to the tension in our film. Our editing was more continuous and our movement with the camera was smooth and not edgy. In our feedback we asked if we had improved since our preliminary task and we got the answer yes.
In conclusion, I think our film was a good piece of work and I think we worked well to put all our research together and our final product worked really well. Our editing was very continuous and it didn’t look like it changed from one scene to another sharply, it had a smooth flow to it. Also our idea of a freeze frame to make it look like the stalker had took pictures worked really well because it was different and it added to the tension. We did have one weakness whilst filming our final product, we had to avoid disruptions around college and people walking in the shot but it was hard so we had to cut the people out when we were editing it. I think our film was realistic and it included a lot of techniques used in actual films today. We tried to make our film as close to a real film and I think we did a good job.
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