Final Poster Design
Thursday, 31 March 2011
Monday, 28 March 2011
Ancillary Task: Poster; 3rd Party Feedback
In order for third party feedback, I posted my two poster drafts onto the popular web2.0 site Facebook whereby I asked people for comments on which poster they preferred and why:
From this, it can clearly be seen that there are mixed opinions. Some poeple stated they preferred the poster on the left due to the composition of the characters whereas others commented that the poster on the right seemed more aesthetically pleasing and conveyed a tone which linked in strongly with the narrative of my short film. One comment, made by Laura, was that which poster I choose to use depends more on the message I am trying to convey to my audience. Reading this, I deemed this to be quite a valid and thoughtful comment since this does indeed make a huge difference. Considering this opinion, I have therefore decided to use the poster image on the right as my final poster design since, as Kenny and Laura state, it appears to display the idea of competition much better which relates deeply with the narrative and moral of my own short film.
Friday, 25 March 2011
Ancillary Task: Improved Poster Drafts
From my poster draft ideas, I had to narrow down my ideas to two improved poster drafts. The above two posters are the results. Although they do differ slightly in terms of layout compared to the original poster drafts, the concept is still the same; in terms of composition of the characters and overall image used.
Wednesday, 23 March 2011
Ancillary Task: Magazine Review Text
The text for the magazine review is as follows:
After last years miserable attempt of a film "10 Year Reunion", Nafeesah Ali is back. But is she just back for a laugh?
Refreshed, renewed, reformed. Young up and coming director Nafeesah seems to have taken on board a whole new style with the release of her new short film "Stastics".
Set in Copleston High School, full of your stereotypical school teenagers, watch and learn how the simple minded Maia Rogers, who has an IQ of 93, evolves into the smartest kid in class.
Filled to the brim with comical one-liners and catchy, melodical music, Statistics is the perfect light entertainment film for all the family. But this short film should not be taken too lightly, for there is a deep underlying moral to this little firecracker.
"When there's a will, there's a way - this proverb is what drove me to write this short film" said director Nafeesah Ali. Hoping to spread the message that in hand with hard work definitely comes success, Statistics conveys this idea in a rather unrealistic way. But without doubt, it works.
At times, there are small trip-ups with the raw acting talents of the recycled cast from her previous film 10 Year Reunion, and the debut of child actor Maia Rogers, but what does this matter? It doesn't.
Nafeesah Ali's second attempt as director and editor is by far, much better than the jumpy, serious, school-teen horror that was 10 Year Reunion. And who knows, perhaps we'll see more of this young, flourishing director in the years to come. Hopefully with a better camera too. Fingers crossed.
Anticipation: If you don't find yourself laughing, there's something wrong with you. (4)
Enjoyment: Classical, every time. (4)
In retrospect: Could do with a bit of brushing up in the acting but humour is clearly more important here. (4)
After last years miserable attempt of a film "10 Year Reunion", Nafeesah Ali is back. But is she just back for a laugh?
Refreshed, renewed, reformed. Young up and coming director Nafeesah seems to have taken on board a whole new style with the release of her new short film "Stastics".
Set in Copleston High School, full of your stereotypical school teenagers, watch and learn how the simple minded Maia Rogers, who has an IQ of 93, evolves into the smartest kid in class.
Filled to the brim with comical one-liners and catchy, melodical music, Statistics is the perfect light entertainment film for all the family. But this short film should not be taken too lightly, for there is a deep underlying moral to this little firecracker.
"When there's a will, there's a way - this proverb is what drove me to write this short film" said director Nafeesah Ali. Hoping to spread the message that in hand with hard work definitely comes success, Statistics conveys this idea in a rather unrealistic way. But without doubt, it works.
At times, there are small trip-ups with the raw acting talents of the recycled cast from her previous film 10 Year Reunion, and the debut of child actor Maia Rogers, but what does this matter? It doesn't.
Nafeesah Ali's second attempt as director and editor is by far, much better than the jumpy, serious, school-teen horror that was 10 Year Reunion. And who knows, perhaps we'll see more of this young, flourishing director in the years to come. Hopefully with a better camera too. Fingers crossed.
Anticipation: If you don't find yourself laughing, there's something wrong with you. (4)
Enjoyment: Classical, every time. (4)
In retrospect: Could do with a bit of brushing up in the acting but humour is clearly more important here. (4)
Monday, 21 March 2011
Ancillary Task: Magazine Reviews on the Internet
When analysing magazine reviews, there was a problem in the sense that since there are different types, it was difficult to understand which was to be used for my ancillary task; one can get magazine reviews from an actual magazine itself, or online magazine websites. There is a major difference in a graphological aspect in the sense that compared to print magazines where the layout has clearly been designed for the context of the reviews production, with magazines online, the layout is less complex and layout is not so much an issue. Take for example the following three magazine reviews found online from websites http://www.empireonline.com/, http://www.totalfilm.com/, and http://www.bfi.org.uk/ respectively:
Another difference between magazine film reviews and internet film reviews is the style of writing in the discourse. Since these reviews are online, it means the audience would be much more vast compared to printed texts therefore the writer (whom may or may not) take this into account and therefore not uphold as much of a formal register as opposed to magazines which, although contain a high frequency of colloquial lexis, are in a way still formal through the tone conveyed. To further support the idea that internet reviews are more informal is the fact that as it is online, this medium is taken into account and so hyperlinks are, sometimes, integrated either in or around the text whereby the reader can click for further information. An example of this is in the Empire magazine reviewing the latest Harry Potter film where under the image in the review, there is a "view image gallery" which one would not find in a magazine review.
Another difference between magazine film reviews and internet film reviews is the style of writing in the discourse. Since these reviews are online, it means the audience would be much more vast compared to printed texts therefore the writer (whom may or may not) take this into account and therefore not uphold as much of a formal register as opposed to magazines which, although contain a high frequency of colloquial lexis, are in a way still formal through the tone conveyed. To further support the idea that internet reviews are more informal is the fact that as it is online, this medium is taken into account and so hyperlinks are, sometimes, integrated either in or around the text whereby the reader can click for further information. An example of this is in the Empire magazine reviewing the latest Harry Potter film where under the image in the review, there is a "view image gallery" which one would not find in a magazine review.
Saturday, 19 March 2011
Hear Me Out
The final script after adjusting of scenes and lines is as follows:
---
Maia: I can't believe I got the lowest in my class again.
Jo: What is this? 13 percent?! My dog could do better than that. I don't even have a dog.
Maia: Give it back!
Jo: What would I want this rubbish for? It's not even worth looking at.
Jo: How completely and utterly rubbish. 13 percent!? But then I'd expect that from someone like you. How dumb.
Maia: I'm not dumb!
Jo: Hah! I'll believe that when I see it.
Maia: Fine! You got yourself a deal!
Jo: Whatever. You'll never score better than me in anything, no matter how hard you try. Why? Because I'm me. And I'm fabulous.
Maia: Oh god. What did I just say?! There's no way I'm ever gonna beat her.
---
Jo: Study harder my friend. You're gonna need it.
---
Maia: I can do this!
---
Jo: Hope you studied hard. Let's see how we do.
---
Amy: Good morning class. I have your results from the test. Some of you have done very well.
Fran: Some of you have not done very well.
Amy: I can see that some effort has been put in.
Fran: And some hasn't. Clearly.
Amy: So, when I call your name I would like you to come to the front, collect your paper, and then sit down. Okay, first name.
Amy: Joanna Dolan.
Amy: Very well done. Congratulations.
Fran: Maia Rogers.
Fran: Well done, very much.
Maia: Thank you.
Amy: Very well done to most of you.
Fran: Some of you not so much.
Amy: Resit forms can be found on my desk if you wish to resit.
Fran: And that will be most of you.
Amy: The forms must be handed in by next Friday. Thank you very much. It's been a pleasure teaching you.
Fran: Some not so much.
Amy: Goodbye.
Fran: Bye.
---
Jo: So what did you get?
Maia: I don't know. Tell me what you got first.
Jo: 86! Try beating that!
Jo: WHAT?!
Maia: Yes!!!
---
---
Maia: I can't believe I got the lowest in my class again.
Jo: What is this? 13 percent?! My dog could do better than that. I don't even have a dog.
Maia: Give it back!
Jo: What would I want this rubbish for? It's not even worth looking at.
Jo: How completely and utterly rubbish. 13 percent!? But then I'd expect that from someone like you. How dumb.
Maia: I'm not dumb!
Jo: Hah! I'll believe that when I see it.
Maia: Fine! You got yourself a deal!
Jo: Whatever. You'll never score better than me in anything, no matter how hard you try. Why? Because I'm me. And I'm fabulous.
Maia: Oh god. What did I just say?! There's no way I'm ever gonna beat her.
---
Jo: Study harder my friend. You're gonna need it.
---
Maia: I can do this!
---
Jo: Hope you studied hard. Let's see how we do.
---
Amy: Good morning class. I have your results from the test. Some of you have done very well.
Fran: Some of you have not done very well.
Amy: I can see that some effort has been put in.
Fran: And some hasn't. Clearly.
Amy: So, when I call your name I would like you to come to the front, collect your paper, and then sit down. Okay, first name.
Amy: Joanna Dolan.
Amy: Very well done. Congratulations.
Fran: Maia Rogers.
Fran: Well done, very much.
Maia: Thank you.
Amy: Very well done to most of you.
Fran: Some of you not so much.
Amy: Resit forms can be found on my desk if you wish to resit.
Fran: And that will be most of you.
Amy: The forms must be handed in by next Friday. Thank you very much. It's been a pleasure teaching you.
Fran: Some not so much.
Amy: Goodbye.
Fran: Bye.
---
Jo: So what did you get?
Maia: I don't know. Tell me what you got first.
Jo: 86! Try beating that!
Jo: WHAT?!
Maia: Yes!!!
---
Thursday, 17 March 2011
And I Dub Thee.....
The title I have decided to call my short film is 'Statistics'. I have chosen this for a few reasons whereby the most simplest justification is because the students are studying maths, where the unit in which the test falls under in the short film comes under the statistics aspect of A level maths.
The other reason I believe this naming is fit for my short film is because it fits neatly in hand with the narrative of the film. Where the storyline revolves around the idea that working hard leads to achieving successful results, this can be turned into a maths equation in the sense of: hard work + will to learn/study = successful results. And in many cases, this relates to my audience in the sense that for many of those who watch my short film, they would be able to relate and understand how Maia achieves her goal in the end through first-hand experience themselves.
The other reason I believe this naming is fit for my short film is because it fits neatly in hand with the narrative of the film. Where the storyline revolves around the idea that working hard leads to achieving successful results, this can be turned into a maths equation in the sense of: hard work + will to learn/study = successful results. And in many cases, this relates to my audience in the sense that for many of those who watch my short film, they would be able to relate and understand how Maia achieves her goal in the end through first-hand experience themselves.
Sunday, 13 March 2011
Ancillary Task: Magazine Review Draft
For the layout of my magazine review ancillary task, I have tried to take into account the coventions and features of an ordinary film review I had formed whilst analysing that of past film reviews seen in already existing film magazines. The style of this particular draft is based around that similar to the Little White Lies discourse and graphology as, after analysing the LWL magazine, I decided that the context in which my own magazine review would be published would be in an edition of the LWL magazines. The reasons for this choice have already been covered during my magazine review analysis section, which can be seen here - http://ryokeichi.blogspot.com/2011/03/ancillary-task-magazine-review-analysis.html.
In this design, it can be seen clearly how I have adhered my design to the LWL magazine since firstly, the layout of the page is extremely similar:
-it consists of a large picture taken from the film itself
-there is a subsection where the important details about the film go (director, running time, title)
-the text layout is in columns
-the text is on a plain white background
-there are subsections at the end of the review acting as the verdict
-star ratings have been given
-the overall layout looks extremely similar to the LWL film reviews which I analysed in my research
Of course, since this is but just a draft of how I intend to lay out my magazine review, there is still a likeliness of the final design being slightly different from that which is displayed in the above image.
In this design, it can be seen clearly how I have adhered my design to the LWL magazine since firstly, the layout of the page is extremely similar:
-it consists of a large picture taken from the film itself
-there is a subsection where the important details about the film go (director, running time, title)
-the text layout is in columns
-the text is on a plain white background
-there are subsections at the end of the review acting as the verdict
-star ratings have been given
-the overall layout looks extremely similar to the LWL film reviews which I analysed in my research
Of course, since this is but just a draft of how I intend to lay out my magazine review, there is still a likeliness of the final design being slightly different from that which is displayed in the above image.
Tuesday, 8 March 2011
10 Year Reunion
As mentioned earlier, the guest appearances were in fact main characters in my AS coursework. Since the evaluation questions include the work produced and techniques learnt during the AS year, I have to decided to post my AS coursework to help show my improvement in the creation of media texts as I believe that there is a clear difference between this piece of work, and the A2 work in which I am currently working on and editing.
From watching this video, it can clearly be seen that my filming and editing skills from last year were not that great; the editing was very jumpy, there were sound glitches every now and then, the lighting on some scenes were so dark that the faces of the actors or the surrounding could not be seen properly. In all honesty, part of this was also due to the camera and technology faults - it was not known until after the whole recording process that the camera which I was using had to be recording for at least 5 second beforehand until it would capture what I wanted, otherwise it would cut off the beginning of the scene. Furthermore, when uploading the footage, there were problems whereby the camera tape in the camera crashed and footage would be messed up, and when playbacked on the computer, the footage either did not work at all or it was covered in lines. This meant some parts had to be recorded again and thus rushed in order to meet the deadline.
Furthermore, from watching this footage again a year later, I have realised that the narrative within this film is not as clear as expected. In actuality, the film revolves around a single student who is bullied by a trio of friends, and this continuous bullying eventually drives this poor girl to her death. However, there is a twist in the sense that at the end, it is discovered that all that was seen was in fact the dream of the main bully. Since it is supposed to be only the opening of the film, the audience watching does not find out that what they also see right at the beginning of the footage before the establishing shot of the school is an event which occurs near the end of the film.
From watching this video, it can clearly be seen that my filming and editing skills from last year were not that great; the editing was very jumpy, there were sound glitches every now and then, the lighting on some scenes were so dark that the faces of the actors or the surrounding could not be seen properly. In all honesty, part of this was also due to the camera and technology faults - it was not known until after the whole recording process that the camera which I was using had to be recording for at least 5 second beforehand until it would capture what I wanted, otherwise it would cut off the beginning of the scene. Furthermore, when uploading the footage, there were problems whereby the camera tape in the camera crashed and footage would be messed up, and when playbacked on the computer, the footage either did not work at all or it was covered in lines. This meant some parts had to be recorded again and thus rushed in order to meet the deadline.
Furthermore, from watching this footage again a year later, I have realised that the narrative within this film is not as clear as expected. In actuality, the film revolves around a single student who is bullied by a trio of friends, and this continuous bullying eventually drives this poor girl to her death. However, there is a twist in the sense that at the end, it is discovered that all that was seen was in fact the dream of the main bully. Since it is supposed to be only the opening of the film, the audience watching does not find out that what they also see right at the beginning of the footage before the establishing shot of the school is an event which occurs near the end of the film.
Sunday, 6 March 2011
The Sound of Music
Being a short film, music is needed for a number of reasons such as for an impact factor to support emotions or for an entertainment factor to reflect the genre of the short film. However, where choosing the music can be an easy task to perform, there is the issue of finding royalty free music so as to not use copyrighted material, and therefore abide to the rules of the law. It is for this reason that for my short film, I have used Youtube to find covers of the musical arrangements which I wish to use. Videos of the music used have been listed below with their respective Youtube accounts usernames:
takeman2911 - Gonna Fly Now
Katekyo Hitman Reborn OST - Tsuna Kakusei
drongovids - Countdown Clock Theme Midi Sequence
2gutierrez- Also Sprach Zarathustra (Keyboard Cover)
takeman2911 - Gonna Fly Now
Katekyo Hitman Reborn OST - Tsuna Kakusei
drongovids - Countdown Clock Theme Midi Sequence
2gutierrez- Also Sprach Zarathustra (Keyboard Cover)
Wednesday, 2 March 2011
Short Story Cameo Appearances
In regards to the adapted results scene of my short film, I mentioned that there was the introduction of new characters. The roles of these characters were to be the teachers who handed the results back to the competitive students. The actors which I used were my friends Amy and Fran, who were in fact featured in my AS level coursework, whereby Amy was one of the main characters (a bully) and Fran was featured as one of underlings.
Since these two individuals have a rather humourous personality anyway, I decided using them as the roles of the teachers would be a good idea to boost the comical aspect of my short film; which I feel they have achieved pretty well. The fact that I had actually also asked them to ad-lib their lines during recording (since my decision to include them in the scene came to mind at the spur of the moment) also helped with this comical factor since the lines which they came up were rather sarcastic and humourous - the way in which they spoke as teachers reflected exactly that in which an actual school teacher is not supposed to act.
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