Evaluation

Question 1
1.      In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

One way in which our production not only develops but also challenges the codes and conventions of its genre is by using aspects of the Mockumentary genre and including it into a short film. It adopts the direct addressing, comedic script, and filming style of a Mockumentary however rather than a complete narrative it only depicts a certain aspect of the 'culture clash' this makes the scenes being represented a short film as it shows only a "part of the life" rather than showing the wider, more entire, picture.

Another way Culture Clash challenges current codes and conventions is by using instead of using direct addressing as used in the Mockumentary genre, the production utilizes it in a way where it is not a narrator interviewing the characters but rather the character is addressing himself alongside the audience. This gives more personal, uncensored thoughts about situation and allows audiences to create a stronger bond than they would watching something using the traditional method.


Question 2
2.      How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

The film's emphasis was about portraying the difference in culture between America and Britain in a way that appeals to all general audiences and does so in a comedic sort of way. I believe our ancillary texts link directly back to the film in terms of not going away much about it but at the same depicting the clear narrative that is of the production. 
Specifically, the poster does a good job in so by directly portraying the two flags being split down the middle and coming together so as to represent a clash between two forces that counterbalance each other and may or may not belong together. It also represents a friendly 'standoff' between the two characters in a way that may represent conflict between them. One important feature in the poster is that it displays no bias, everything is split down the middle. This discourages any controversy that could potentially be caused by the production.

The review article that was created is mainly aimed at British audiences as it is based on the portrayal of the American character, Austin(myself). It gives his direct opinion on the situation presented by the narrative and gives insight into further personal thoughts about the plot and how it reflects reality. 

I believe both of our ancillary texts have a clear direct link to the main production and help in terms of advertising as well as encouraging audiences outside of the potential target audience to view the production.

Question 3
3.      What have you learned from your audience feedback?

The feedback received first informs me that our film is seen as average by the majority of the audience and a smaller proportion saw it as good. To me this suggests that people see the idea and concept being good but the execution of the initial idea is not reflective of the concept. This is partly down to the fact the initial idea for location was different and would have been original as it would have had a variety of locations. Despite the fact I do agree that in principle it is average and for me this is down to the restricted locations we used I do think that the use of the green screen is why some see it as a good production because I feel that it is an original idea that has been executed well, it is similar to the mockumentary sub-genre but takes the twist that the character is talking to himself in his mind. This has therefore showed me that I need to focus on the whole films continuity rather than individual aspects of the film for it to be seen as either a good or excellent film.

With this help I was able to create a strong target audience using yougov.co.uk which helped to form a narrative around the personality traits of our target audience and because of this we decided that the film should be about cultural differences because the target audience being young adults they would fit the category of adventurers who are people who want to see the world and experience new things so I thought this would be a selling point of the film because it is an example of how cultures are different and exciting. However the feedback has showed me that I need to focus on planning the production carefully and researching the conventions of my genre in more detail.

As for the film itself, 80% of the feedback suggests that the editing is of a good quality, this is mainly down to the use of the green screen where I edited the background to fit with the characters mood and in one scene added a dissolve to change the background half way through. This gave a good quality finish as it did give the effect that the character was in his own mind as the audience were able to see what he was reacting too. The reason 20% of feedback thought the editing was weak is to do with the fact that other than the green screen there is very little editing required and the majority of it is continuity editing so that the narrative falls into place so most of the editing will not be noticed by the audience but the fact remains that the editing stage was mainly cutting down the videos to the exact points that I needed and then fitting them into place to create the narrative.

One criticism from the majority of feedback was the lighting with people saying that certain scenes were hard to see and this was a problem because we had filmed scenes with extra lighting but it caused part of the scene to be too bright and blocked out part of the scene and because of this I used the slightly darker scenes as it was clearer than the brighter scenes. Due to the fact I did this I had to keep each scene consistent so therefore the same lighting was used throughout filming. In the future it would be beneficial to add a filter to highlight darker areas of the scene and therefore make the scene clearer.

There have also been suggestions that the introduction is not clear and that the narrative begins with the audience not understanding what is happening. However in my research short films such as ‘Gasman’ or ‘Wasp’ tend to do this and begin with something vague that then builds up to the main part of the narrative. However I could make it simpler to understand by having the first scene where the two characters meet and then cut to the green screen for the main character (Austin) to explain the context rather than for the first scene to explain why the narrative is about to happen and ignore why there is significance to the narrative.

Question 4
4.      How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

The use of a variety of media technologies for the making of our production is what made it possible. For my research and planning I analyzed current examples of shows that fall under the mockumentary genre through Netflix. This assisted me in understand the level of comedy that is expected out of my production. It also aided me in developing use of the camera in similar ways to provoke a similar effect that a show as big as “Modern Family” would. 

Another use of Media technologies was the use of online magazines such as Media Magazine to further expand my knowledge on the subject of Media Studies to further understand what audiences are actively searching for and thought me to implement the Young and Rubicam theories of psychographics to find out the target audience most suitable for my production. 

Blogger was utilized to keep track and post researching and planning throughout the process. The planning posted included documents containing production schedule, script, and storyboard. Once my research and planning was complete and recorded onto my blog, filming was commenced. 

To record we used a Sony HDR CX450 due to accessibility and minimal design of the camcorder itself. It allowed us to film my production in 1080p resolution and upload it directly to Adobe Premier CS5 to begin the editing process. Once the editing process was complete, the production was then exported and uploaded directly onto YouTube in a QuickTime format. 

For our movie poster I made use of a Nikon D3300 as this camera was far superior to the other in its ability to take still shots. From there it was imported into Adobe Photoshop CS5 and edited through use of a green screen to replace the background while maintaining the foreground. To create the production’s critic review I made use of Microsoft Publisher and created a webpage familiar to that of an online magazine and Publisher had all the features needed to do this readily available.