Evalution- The Zombie Project

This is our final 2 minute title sequence of our project, The Zombie Project.

1.In what way does your media product us, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media productions?

In our group, we established the plot by putting ideas together about what our film could be about, and then decided on a film based on zombies. Knowing what our film was going to be about, we researched into the genre that would most fit our film, these were horror, thriller, and physiological.

This is a shot from "Zombie Land where we looked into research into similar genre.

We also looked at film similar to ours such as “Zombie Land” and “Shaun Of The Dead” where we had similarities in those films and ours films. Also thinking where we would film it, we thought of the stereotypical place where horror film would be set, for example the graveyards and deserted settings. The camera angles we used were shots such as wide shots, close ups, long shots and match on actions. We used a Close-Up on my characters face when at the lift, so that the audience can see fear and wheat emotion that character is feeling. Also we shot a wide shot so that the audience know where it was set and where they characters were. 

This is a shot of the zombies from "Shaun Of The Dead2 which we researched. 

After filming we edited our film on “First Cut”. In the editing we found that some of the scene had continuity error so we had to re-film some of the last scene. Editing our film in parts was easier than other, the reason of this because it was difficult to get a match on action so that everything flows from one shot to the next, we had some difficulty with matching the pace and rhythm. The use of sound was very important as in the first scene the music has to create a dramatic tension, whilst the chase scene was taking place. We also used silence to create tension when the director is watching the unedited footage back.

This is stairs where the chase sequences starts.
Also the Alley way where the actor is murdered.

Considering mise-en-scene we thought about costume, locations and props. We chose the deserted corridors of the college and a dark grim alley way which is next to a graveyard. The typography in the film was the credits which was the names and the name of our film.

The chase scene leads to this abandoned corridor which was the ideal setting

(www.zombieland.com/ - Click here for the Zombie Land offical website)
(www.universalstudiosentertainment.com/shaun-of-the-dead - Click here for the Shaun Of The Dead offical website)

                                                                                                                                                                   2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?


Our film represents age and youth. We used the stereotypical view on young people to create the characters such as the director and the actors in the film. Mise-en-scene helped us create this by the costumes the characters wore such as skinny jeans, darker tighter tops. We also used editing to represent age and youth, by editing the shots faster so that it represents the energy of the actors

This is the costume of the director when he kills the actor and her twin is acting in her film. 

As the director is gradually becoming psychotic the camera shots are from variety of different angles to show the audience she is confused. Another way we represented youth and age was at the end of the two minutes when the director had fully gone made to which he murders one of the actors. In this part the we used a high angle shot that to show the director has the most power and the most dominate in that scene as it is looking down at the dead actor. The use of sound in our film represents age and youth as it is dramatic, and high tempo so it matches the fast editing so that it shows the audience the age and youth of the actors. The typography represents age and youth because it is a younger style of writing, that shows the audience style they like.  

This an example of the costume being warn by the director.

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


Based on our research into distributors we have found institutions that would best suit our film. Our research suggest that our film would be a high budget film, which made us consider the Zom-Com "Zombie Land"which was distributed by Columbia (owned by Sony) which they had a budget for of $23.6 million.  
                     

This would be ideal distributor for our film because of similar films they have distributor to our, such as Zombie Land




Due to growing popularity of this genre, we feel that our film (if produced fully) would be best suited for cinema to raise awareness and to raise the profits. Films that have been realised in this genre (Zombie land and Shaun of the dead for example) have had great success whilst at the cinema. Again, with our wide mainstream audience and having a big budget there is many way that we can promote and market our film. We could promote our film through a website, trailers, advertising campaigns which would help boost the popularity of the film, by making the film look appealing to the mainstream audience, by advertising it with similar films. 

(http://www.sonypictures.co.uk/  - Click here for the Columbia pictures website)

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?
Our target audience would be 15 years old and older who have an interest in the horror, physiological zombie film. We made the certificate 15, because of the violence and the physiological theme throughout. Considering the certificate of our film, it is easy to associate the narrative and the style of our film with them. With the regulations in place with exam, we made the introduction less physically violent so that is matches with our target audience that we have chosen. We made the decisions to make it a 15 by the legislation about what makes it a 15 from the British Board Of Film Classification. We made it a 15 because of the blood where the director murders the actor.

This is where the the director murders
the actor.

 (Click here for BBFC website- www.bbfc.co.uk/)    

The research for our target audience started with relating it similar audiences to similar film that relate to ours. Also we created a questionnaire that we posted on facebook for people to answer about what types of films they like and whether if they would see our film if it was fully produced. We gained a lot from the questionnaire and learned about what the audience wanted from our film. Considering all the results we got from the questionnaire, we changed our target audience slightly to give people what the wanted form our film like changing of the plot in certain places after the title sequences. We used the information we gathered from the questionnaires that people would like the plot to be less complicated and to maybe change the story after the 2 minutes title sequence.

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

There are many methods that we tried attract and address our audience. Taking into consideration the audiences feedback we came up with ideas at get to get the audience attention to consider watching our film. I think we successfully reached our audience by posting our questionnaire on Facebook.

The majority of the answers came from teenagers; this showed that our research was correct and that we appealed to the target audience that we had chosen. In planning, we found out that the majority of the people that answered our questionnaire watched films of a horror, thriller and action genre so it was easy to use the codes and conventions on a horror films to catch the audiences attention that are more likely to watch our film.

This is our questionnaire for our film that we posted on facebook for feedback.

The less successful aspects were to film in a dark alley way to give a creepy effect, but some people suggested that it may not be as scary as they wanted. I think that our work could improve if we take everything the audience has said into consideration. They made very good points that would improve the audiences interest in our film. In my opinion i would suggest making the plot less confusing so that it would be easier to understand. The work could be improved by going into deeper research, asking the audience what storylines and plots they want to see brought possibly to the big screen.

6. What have you learnt about the technology from the process of constructing the product?

Final cut express Logo
http://www.apple.com/finalcutpro/

This the set out of Final Cut Express which
we edited our film on.

In feel that I have learned a substantial amount about the technology using while producing our film. Compared to the preliminary task that we produced first, we used more software such as Final Cut Express which gave it an realistic, professional look. We was able to make it flow from shot to shot which gave it continuity. We also learned how to change the effects and colours on Final Cut Express to make it fit with our film and the shots, for example when the director kills the actor we made changed to colour to make it more red so that it will stand out to the audience. It also made it easier to put music over it to fit the shots and the action on the screen to make it more dramatic. It also made it easier to compare shots because you could open as many clips as you wanted in the library. Realising that Final Cut Express had lots of different feature we began to play around to see what could make our film look better. Creating the scripted was done on Celtx, this software made it easier and quicker to write the script. When researching our film we used Facebook to put our questionnaire so that we could ask people what they want from our film. Finally to post the information that we have found we used Blogger to display the information

Digital video camera

We used 2 types of camera. The 2 cameras we used was very different the first one we used was a tape video which in relation to the second camera we used with was a HD digital camera, which filmed with a much better quality, this also made it difficult to hear any sound that may have been recorded. This raised the difficulty whilst editing because of the quality difference in enhanced colour in different shots. We also used a high quality tripod, which made panning and tilting easier and smoother, which made the result of our film a lot better.

7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you fell you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

The 180 - Degree rule

Match on action example 

The first task we did was the preliminary was a continuity task involving filming and editing a character opening a door, crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character where dialogue in exchanged and then exits the room. This task should have demonstrated match on action, shot reverse shot and the 180- degree rule, I felt the our preliminary task had all of these requirements.


From this first task I learnt that from the beginning be organised and understand what you are doing in your group, for example knowing what post each person if putting on your blog, also to allocate roles to people within our group (E.g Director, Editor). The thing that I have learnt is that planning in the most important so that we could see what our film should have looked like and what it should have contained. The research was easier when I had analysed the title sequence of a similar film, where it allowed me to identify filming techniques and ideas for our own film. Our research also involved brainstorming and coming up with ideas of how to bring our ideas to life, this made the research more in depth, which made me understand more how much work and times goes into producing a film, this meant that the end product was of a much higher standard than our group first thought.  




These are shot from my first preliminary task. 

Match on action

Establishing shot

                                                      

Dialogue with shot reverse shot 

Dialogue with  Shot reverse Shot

Walking out the run with match on action

Walking out of room with match on action

                                             

Comparing this task to the first we had to complete I took more of an editing role in the preliminary task, were as in this task I imputed more in to on the creating side for example filming the shots rather the editing. The last task involved a lot of independence and a lot more room to grow so that we could become more creative with our ideas, and for both tasks I feel that we met the requirements for both tasks. In our last project we have not done many things different, although we had trouble filming which effected the post production time we had we was still able to create a high quality piece of work because of the research we did in pre-production.

Theses are example of how to the 180 - degree rule and match on action.

The Zombie Project Evaluation.

1.In what way does your media product us, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media productions?


We started off by brainstorming different ideas about what sort of film we could make, we thought about films that we're already out in the cinema at the moment and which ones we found interesting, and also what films we found good in general. After having this discussion we came up with the concept of making a zombie film, this then expanded into a more twisted plot so that the film had solid content. Our final genres were horror, thriller and psychotic. 
We looked at recent films that had come out that were mainly zombie oriented. We came up with things such as Zombieland, and Shaun of the Dead, however we also looked at Hot Fuzz because of its chase scenes and sinister feel to it.

Still from Shaun of the dead.

Still from HotFuzz

Still from Zombieland

We included Long shots, Close ups and Medium Close ups, we made sure we followed the 180 degree rule. We involved close ups so that the view could understand what emotions were going on in the characters, for instance we had a close up of the zombie to show anger, and also to show it was a zombie.







Using final cut pro we edited the footage together, however we found that we weren't happy with some of the shots and sequences so we refilled some close ups so that the clips would flow better.

We tried to constantly think about how different zombie films used miss-en-scene in their footage to create a scary atmosphere, so we involved empty corridors, alley ways, and dark rooms to create a similar feel. We also used dark coloured clothing to keep the dark feeling with that was to be associated with the film.

Empty corridor.

Empty alley way and street.

Dark room.

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our product mainly represents angry rebellious youth. This is mainly a designated stereotype for teenagers, (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/hoodies-louts-scum-how-media-demonises-teenagers-1643964.html) so worked quite well. We used costumes to try to create this feel by using dark clothing, we mainly used the darkest clothing on the bad characters, and the more weak characters still were quite dark but wore greys. We also used a lot of fast editing to represent the ideas of energy, we also included a sudden science when the confusion began so that it gave a sinister feeling.

Zombie/good twin costume

Evil twin costume 

 

Human (beth) costume

We also represent the idea of teenage youth through other aspects of miss-en scene, for example, we use fast paced music throughout two of our scenes the music is fast paced therefore representing energy which is found in youth, also the sinister music throughout the middle scene helps represent societies views of teens being scary. Also we apply different camera angles so that we can show the dominance of teens for instance when Evil twin finds the note, the camera is looking up at her showing that she is in charge of what is going to happen next. The typography is simple so kind of represents the laziness of teens.

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

I think that our film is more likely to be distributed by an independent British company, such as the UK film council. I think this because they mainly aim to make sure films are seen by people that would be specifically interested in this type of film. 

http://industry.bfi.org.uk/distributionandexhibition

Another company that could distribute our type of film would by Metrodome. This is because the are very good with low budget independent films, also they recently distributed Juan of the dead, which is a low budget independent spanish film. This shows they have an interest in horror/ zombie films meaning that they would be good with our film.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1838571/

Although due to its history of distributing high profile zombie films, Universal could be a good distribution company as it would then be added to its already successful zombie creations, such as Shaun of the dead.

http://www.universalstudios.com/

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

The audience I assume would be appropriate for this film would be people who range from the age group of 15-26, either gender, and with a history of likeness towards other horror films such as zombie land, or people who enjoy mental illness stories like girl interrupted. Also film makers might want to watch this film as it is based on a psychopathic film maker, therefore they might find some sort of connection with the characters. Due to the extent amount of violence aimed to be put into our film we would rate our film as a 15 because of the guidelines specified by the BBFC.  

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/classification/guidelines/15-2/

Our research on the target market came mainly from the questionnaire we sent out. We did this so that we could ask regal people what the thought about our film, and also what the thought it would be rated as. Most of the people who responded to the online questionnaire responded by saying it should be a 15, meaning that out target age group was right.

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

We addressed our potential audience by sending out a questionnaire so that we could receive feedback and also so that we could see how people responded to our plot and if they though it was interesting enough for them. We posted the questionnaire onto Facebook so that we could see what people we knew thought about it.

The results of the questionnaire showed us that we we're right about our research, a lot of the people questioned preferred out genre of horror/thriller over other genres, also that quite a lot of them gathered zombies over other super natural creatures. 

After our film has now been edited i think that we should have listened to the people we questioned, a few people said that they thought it needed to be more violent, and i think that we have definitely not included a gory mess which is a main aspect of zombie films.  

6. What have you learnt about the technology from the process of constructing the product? 

The colour wheels to alter colour correction.

After using all the different equipment and software I have learnt a lot. Throughout the process of editing on final cut pro i managed to learn lots of different techniques on how to edit professionally. A few things i are, how to use a colour corrector on clips to add affects, or to bring out different colours. I used this on the last scene of our film mainly it was so that the clips looked bizarre, so that the audience would be able to tell that something was wrong, however i also did this because there was a mix up with the camera's. I also learnt how to put text over the moving image so that i didn't have to black out the footage to put in the names of actors and the movie act, which would have halted the suspense if it kept stopping and starting in a chase scene. Also i learnt how to import music over the footage and kept it at a level that was loud enough to be heard but also didn't wash out the essential background noise of the actual clips.

The edit windows on Final cut express.

HD camera.

Durning the filming of our project we happened to use two different types of cameras, this cause a lot of problems when editing due to the alterations in quality between the two. This is because we used a HD camera to get our extra shots in the alley however we had unfortunately been stuck with a tape recorder camera at the beginning of the project. Not only was the quality of the original footage shoddy, we didn't have to time or man power to reshot the entire film at such an imminent deadline. So we had to make do with what we had.

7. Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you fell you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product? 

Our Preliminary task was to create a scene that involved a person walking through a door sitting at a table, having a conversation, and then leaving. The task must include a match on action, dialogue and follow the 180 degree rule. We then had to edit the footage so that it had continuity. Our preliminary task did all this.

After our preliminary task i think that everything became a lot more serious within the group, we managed to plan and assign roles to each other and got a lot of the work done to a high standard at a fast rate. We all worked really well as a team i think, and managed to get along well enough to make sure the film was at a high standard. 

Our final task worked really well however if i could do it again i'd make sure everything was planned to a schedule so that we were't panicking to get everything filmed at last minute because it caused a lot of stress with in the group and especially with me, also i'd make sure we got a lot more shots then we needed so that we had plenty to work with during editing and didn't have to re-film bits.