Evaluation.

I feel my final media product was successful, although towards the end of the project many problems arose which caused difficulties. The shots I used worked well at causing the audience to get an understanding of the underlying emotions in the story. I feel my casting was good as the two characters in my opening worked well together and were very co-operative throughout the filming process, as well as portraying the desired qualities I was looking for in my characters. The locations I used for my film opening worked well in creating the atmosphere I aimed for. For example the use of the graveyard when Rosie was mourning made the scenes realistic, and the new-looking headstone meant that it was believable for it to have been recently put there. A common media convention is to use titles at the beginning/end of a film, which is one of the things I chose to add to my media product. I created the titles on media, using a simple font in red. Red is frequently used as a signifier of violence, danger, horror, however in my media product I used the colour red in the titles to signify romance and love. I made the titles for my media product using iMovie, adding a simple fading transition as I felt it wasn't appropriate to having anything overcomplicated or exciting.

-In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
My media product uses some of the common codes and conventions of existing film openings, such as an introduction of the central protagonist immediately in the first frame. This allows the audience to automatically form an attachment with this character, and therefore experience the emotions used throughout the film. However this opening challenges common conventions because often in the first two minutes of a romance, a happy or uplifting atmosphere is created to represent the general feeling of the film. Instead of this, I included a death which opposed the audience expectancy and caused the audience to feel shocked and therefore want to carry on watching the rest of the media product.

-How does your media product represent particular social groups?
My media product represents teens in a mature way, showing that not all teens follow the stereotype, which is often thought of as badly behaved, immature (particularly about sexual issues) and irresponsible. My media product shows that the teenage characters involved are mature and can take on responsibility, by things such as the fact they are in a long term relationship and attend formal events together, and mature gifts are seen to be given to Rosie, such as a necklace and roses.

-What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
A distribution company which mainly focuses on females of a similar target audience to which my media product is aimed at.

-Who would be the audience for your media product?
The audience for my media product would be mostly females (however, the film could be enjoyed by couples) who are aged 12-19. The BBFC rating for this film would be a 12. This is because the themes of the film may not be appropriate for children under 12, however there is no involvement of sexual activity/violence/nudity/swearing which means the film can be made accessible to an audience under 15. The fact that my media product is a romance rather than a romcom means that the audience is narrowed because romance has quite a niche audience.

-What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
I have learnt that in order to create a successful media product you must incorporate many different types of media, for example to make mine I used iMovie, iTunes, Sibelius, Audicity, Scribd and Microsoft Word. To make something work you cannot rely on only one piece of software or one programme as they do not have the ability to do all the functions needed.

-Looking back at your preliminary task, what have you learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
The preliminary task made me realise that smaller groups work better as there are less contrasting ideas which makes it difficult to settle on an idea, also in a large group it's more difficult to allow each person to use the filming equipment equally. I have also learnt that planning is key when it comes to actually filming, as if you are trying to make up the shots as you go it is sometimes less successful than it would have been if each shot have been decided previous to shooting. Having a finalised storyboard is crucial, as this can be easily followed to make filming more straightforward; especially if framing is chosen first as it makes cinematography much easier on the day of filming.

Improvements
If I was to start from scratch, there are many things I would do differently in order to improve my final product. Firstly, I would spend much longer defining an original idea, as I have realised my film is similar to some existing films, such as P.S. I Love You (Richard LaGravenese, 2008). I would also have a more detailed storyboard which gives more precise detail of what each shot should be like, as this would have made filming a much easier process and meant I didn't have to spend as long setting up each shot to get the framing right.

Software.

The software I used was mostly iMovie 06. I feel I gained a vase knowledge of this programme from doing the prelim task, but massively expanded this knowledge when doing the editing of my film opening. I used the guide book for iMovie 06 to help me to work out how to do different things using the programme. This was helpful because while reading the book I also found simple ways of editing the footage to make it effective.

Feedback.

I have shown my finished media product to various people and asked them what they thought of it. The majority of people who gave feedback were in my target group (12-19) and mostly female. This gives me a good idea of whether or not my media product would be successful with my chosen target audience.

Sophie, 17
'An effective opening. The use of black + white for the flashbacks helped the understanding of the opening two minutes. Some shots towards the end dragged on a bit, however overall it was enjoyable to watch. I would like to watch the rest of the film.'


Sam, 17
'The music and voiceover were successful. Some good shots used which created a good atmosphere. There was some ambient sound from the camera but as there was nothing that could be done about it it isn't too much of a downfall.'

Tom, 17
'I thought it was very emotional and the feeling were well portrayed. There was a good use of music which added to the atmosphere and the letter used and read out was effective. The zooming into the letter was really good, and the close up of Rosie as it was nice to see her emotion and see she was so happy to get a letter from Adam. The only negative thing was some of the lighting wasn't quite right.'

Joel, 19
'It's a bit too girly for me, I usually only watch action films. If it included some comedy it might be better. I'm impressed at the quality of it though and how it's all come together.'

Jeni, 17
'Overall really good! The voiceover was awesome and really made the film more believable and emotional. The flashbacks worked well, especially 'cause they were in black + white. It actually brought a tear to my eye, and made me say 'aww' out loud twice. Very impressed. The only think I think would have made it better is if there has been more flashbacks and less time spent looking through the box.'

Jodie, 17
'Wow, well done! I love the flashbacks, and the guy reading out the letter is really cute. The graveyard bit is really sad, and I feel it's effective because it really made me feel sad. In general it was good to watch. Might have been even better if there were a few more characters involved. I'd also have liked to see the couple doing more together.'

Chris, 19
'I don't usually like stuff like this cause it's a bit too cheesy for me, but this opening was actually really good. I started to feel really sorry for Rosie and wanted to find out what was going to happen to her. Thought the bit where they took a photo of themselves was a bit boring, but nice that she was looking at that particular picture.'

To ensure that the target audience I have chosen was close to the age range who would actually enjoy the film, I have also screened the film opening to an audience of different ages.

Vicki, 25
'over all I think it was credible and engaging. I felt empathy with the characters, particularly Rosie. The death of Adam was upsetting and stirred emotion, and the music was also a great touch. My favourite bit was the titanic scene as i thought it was cute despite beng a little cheesy. I'd probably have preferred a proper song with vocals rather than plain music'

Elaine (Mum)
'I would probably want to watch this film actually! The characters are a bit young but if there were a few older characters in it too, parents maybe, it would be more appealing. I'm surprised at all the different techniques used, it all works very well and made me a bit sad when Adam died.'

Christina, 10
'It was very sad. Didn't really know where the boy was going, but I thought they were a nice couple. I was just wondering what Rosie was going to do afterwards.'

The above feedback suggests that maybe the target audience should be a little wider. I originally thought that the only people who would be interested in the film would be people of a very close age range to the majority of the cast. I feel that if I included some older characters in the film too then it would widen the possible target audience.
Some of the main things I got out of the feedback was that the sound was good (voiceover and music) but that some of the shots of Rosie looking through the box were too long, and would have been better with more flashbacks.

Final cut.

The above is a version of my final cut, but before the music has been added. It contains the footage which has been edited to have smooth continuity, sound effects and the opening titles.

I have now uploaded the final version of my film, including music, which can be seen below.

Sound and Music.

In order to create the right sound effects for the scenes in my film opening, I did an internet search to find websites which enabled me to download sound effects which i could then add to the footage on iMovie. The website i used for the doorbell sound at the beginning was www.soundjay.com which allowed me to download the sound effect as an mp3 file onto iTunes, which I could then transfer to iMovie.

To create the music, I requested the help of the Head of Music from school. I then had to change the format of my movie and take it to him, at which point he then used Sibelius to pruduce music with effectively ran alongside the footage. This was then saved as an audie file which could be put on iTunes, and then added from iTunes to iMovie.

The voiceover was recorded using the same video camera as the filming. I then imported the footage from the camera to the computer, where I was then able to extract the sound to use as an audio clip.

Problems Encountered
The audio was a major problem when trying to compress my movie to put it onto a disc and onto the web. Once the voiceover had been put alongside the video footage, it didn't quite fit into the places it was supposed to, so I had to replicate the voiceover and then use both to create the correct voiceover. I did this by turning the volume up on the bits I wanted to be audible, and down on the bits I wanted to be silent. This then meant that I had 3 separate sudio clips, and therefore when I came to compress the movie to different formats, the audio became out of sync and wouldn't play correctly. With the help of an IT teacher at school, I tried out various ways of trying to make the audio work. We tried saving the section of the film which included the voiceover separately to add back in, however this left the same problems. Eventually, we ended up making it work by playing the film at a high volume, and recording the entire audio using the programme Audacity. I then had to save this file in a different format which i then put onto iTunes, and then onto my film as a single audio clip.