Sarah's Images

Actor playing killer has to remain annoymous until showing at the end. To show they are the same person, they have to wear the jacket so the audience don't get confused.

At the beginning of the film, the character doesnt' look as strong as he/she could be, this was because i had to keep my face covered in order to keep my identity, this was difficult crossing a busy road, whilst keeping my face covered up.

When the package is being swapped over, the compoisiton works perfectly as there is a street, urban feel with the graffiti.

We wanted a company such as film 4 to back our film as they have taken on films that have the same genre as we have.

Sarahs Evaluation

In our group, we decided to make a film about a killing that created many enigmas called “D Tour”. For this project, I worked with Karl Buckel and Rob Maclean. In our group, I was in charge of casting and production, also costumes and I helped when editing telling Karl which angles worked best when putting the transitions together as someone looking upon the film as if I was a fresh eye.
Our genre for the film is British drama and the sub-genre of teenage gun crime. The conventions of the genre we used are gun, shady characters, murder as these are associated with a teen, gun drama. It was vital to use typical elements that associate these conventions to a drama such as this so the audience know exactly what they are watching so they wouldn’t get confused. It is also necessary to add something new to the genre to keep the audience hooked so films that are similar to this genre have their own elements to make their film different from others. These ideas we thought would be successful as we have created enigmas into the opening sequence which hook the audience in from the start. The audience liked our ideas as we added our own twist onto the drama. Again, we wanted to make our film different from others to add our own character on it. For example the ending where it turns out that the girl is the killer. Because the characters face wasn’t shown till the end the audience was convinced that the killer was a man, and the close ups made the scene more intense and more exciting.
For our film, we have represented teenagers who think it is right to get back at someone by murdering them or harming them in any way. This is a dominant representation of teenagers as they are known as trouble makers. The costumes were pretty simple, being that the main character wore tracksuit bottoms and a zip up hooded jacket to hide their appearance. In every scene that the killer was shown, he/she wore the hooded jacket to show that it was the same person. The appearance of the killer was not shown until the end but the man giving the gun to the killer looks intense and looks like he means business. All the lighting is natural, but we have darkened the scene by adding an effect to make the time of day look as similar as it can be and also to show how shady the character is. I think that all this has worked well as the audience have said that the effects have worked well. We have represented teenagers here to be violent and aggressive as they are stereotyped to be like this everyday in the newspaper just because two teenagers have been involves, they automatically think that all teenagers are the same way. The editing was quite simple. Each scene flows into one another so you cannot tell we have filmed little bits at once, this is the invisible editing.
As it is a gangster/ action film, one setting we have used to film our production was down a back alley in Blackburn. It was quite dark and dirty and had graffiti, so it set the right vibe and it looked right when filming.
I think that a British production company would think about backing our film as for one it is a pure British film. Another reason is that our film is all about action, and it starts that way from the beginning. It creates enigmas that will hook the audience in so they would want to watch the film till the end to find out the questions that are asked all the way through so you can find out all the answers. Enigmas are questions created that are usually answered during the course of the film or created at the end to then make another film leading on from it.

Film 4 company would be a very good example of someone to distribute our film as they would be a realistic target as they are well known and have released films such a “this is England”, which is what we initially researched to make our British film.
The audience that we though would want to watch our film would be the ages between 12-16 although our film would be a 15 as the violence and language incorporated in the film would not be suitable for 12 year olds. We also thought 16-25 year olds would be interested in our film also as these ages like watching violent and action films which our film is. I think the British public would be the group that would be interested in our film, but not only white British people, all people would be invited to watch our film if that is the genre of film that they have an interest in. This is a good target audience because young males like to watch this sort of film and find action thrillers a good genre to watch. They all are a very large market so it appeals to the whole range of British males, even females when they realise that the female is a killer as women are stereotyped to be soft, gentle and kind so they wouldn’t expect the ending to our opening sequence so this is an alternative representation of women.
Our opening sequence is in order and we created a sense of time by adding the times when the scenes are meant to take place. We have created many enigmas in the opening sequence, these are:
· Who is the person in the hood?
· Why have they swapped over a package?
· What the package is?
· Who has been killed?
· Why have they been killed?
This means the audience would be glued to the screen to find out the answers to the questions. We used a voiceover to create atmosphere, it sets the scene and shows the social standing of these people, it is of the young maybe lower class people. We have built up tension and suspense by adding music to our film as it is beaty and a sort of garage music and creates atmosphere and you can associate with youth and the pace of the film.
I have learnt that you don’t always have to use your past experiences of films to know everything about them, using the internet to look up certain films can help you recall it and maybe make a certain bit clearer for you. By using the blog on the website, we have shown everyone reading it why and how certain decisions were made. This is better than verbal communication as all of our work is I there so no questions would need to be asked.
From the preliminary task we did, I learnt that it took many times to film a scene to get different angles, different points of view in the scene. This made it easier for our final project as we new what angles worked well and close up showed a sense of the place and what is happening, especially with facial expressions. The transitions we used on the new project ran much smoothly than the old one, with not much speech involved, it hides who the characters are, which also adds more enigmas.
Audience Testing
We created a questionnaire for the audience to fill out after they had watched our film. Their response was vital as we needed to know how clear our sequence was and if it was right for the kind of audience we were hoping to aim it at. The questions we asked and the responses given back to us.
Question 1) What is the genre of the opening sequence?
The audience we tested on had said our film was a gangster, thriller, action, crime, although only one person didn’t no which genre the film was. Nine out of ten of our audience understood which genre our film was so it must have been clear.
Question 2) What do you think of the story line of the opening sequence?
The audience’s response was that it was about a killing, revenge, wanting respect, Again this response was perfect and was obviously clear to the audience.
Question 3) Who is the main character? And what is their function?
The audience’s response was that someone (girl, only revealed at the end) was sorting out some business by shooting someone.
Question 4) How does the music create atmosphere?
The audiences response was that it adds pace, builds tension, matches with the pace of the film, upbeat and matches the genre, tense gritty feeling.
The audience feel that the music works well with the film and that we have chosen well.
Question 5) Does the music work well with the sequence?
The audiences response was that yes, because it was fast paced.
Question 6) Was there much pace In the scenes?
The audiences response was that it had varied pace when the film needed it e.g. when the running occurred in the film, there was a lot of pace.
Question 7) What do you think of the enigmas created?
The audience’s response was that there was enough enigmas created although some were solved at the end of the clip.
Question 8) Was the sequence clear?
The audience’s response was that yes the sequence was clear and the narration added to how the clear it was.
Question 9) What would make people want to watch the film?
The audience’s response was that the upbeat action tempo, the female lead character, the popular British theme, if the film was left on a cliff hanger, the enigma of who the killer was and what was going to happen and the action created would make the audience want to watch our film. This is a lot to go on, so all of the audience would watch our film.
Question 10) Would you watch the film?
The audience’s response was 100% that they all would want to watch our film.
My overall thought of my media product was really surprising as I didn’t think it would have turned out so well.
Its key strengths were camera angles and the voiceover. I think its weaknesses were that a few more close ups could have been added such as the close up of the gun being swapped over or the grab of the arm before the killer walks away with the gun. I have learnt a lot about the technology whilst making them film. The Apple Mac computers had the programmes we needed to make our film a success. It also helped to make our film look more authentic and making the editing invisible. It also helped us to edit the lighting and balance the scenes to make them look as real looking as they possible could. We also used I-Tunes to find which music to add to our film, this was the non diegetic music you hear from start to finish.
As the opening scene was two minutes, I think the pace of the film turned out quite well, better than I expected. When I watch films, I look and think I wouldn’t be able to do that, but with a little experience, you learn how they do things and it becomes quite easy. In my opinion, our film turned out well, and after audience evaluation, they think it is easy to understand and they know what it is all about.

Sarah Fowler

Robs Analysis Images

The scene involving the gun deal shows how youth violence is a part of the business. Concerns the audience.

Sporty hooded attire creates fear and the threat of youth

Example of teenage violence in an urban setting

Low-key lighting created by IMac editing

Example of time headings assists audience understand time/settting

Shot during shooting creates scenic shot during violence, raises enigmas.

Example of opening scene, weak posture doesn’t make the character seem violent/ threatening.

Evaluation

Our project was to produce the opening sequence of a British Film that is in the gangster genre. Our film ‘D-Tour’ has a beginning that is designed to create many enigmas for the audience. The beginning lasts about 2 minutes and in this time a gun trade occurs, an unseen shooting and the unmasking of the criminal. The product ‘D-Tour would have a young target audience hence, why we used youthful attire and realistic youth sets, a good example is the deal scene were the set is a bright graffiti shaded back alley.

I worked with Sarah and Karl who both made big contributions to the film. Sarah acted in it and posted many blogs and Karl did all the editing and filming to allow Sarah and I time to blog. I think the group worked well together and this is shown in the quality of our film. I posted blogs and did most of the acting, also my house and area is used in some of the film, which was an exciting fresh set (as the area we filmed was quite smart and affluent, which challenges stereotype) that worked well with the gangster genre. Collectively, the jobs were separated at the start, which caused minimal conflict; also all ideas were put forward to the group before making any changes.

The genre we used was a realistic gangster type film about the youth culture in Britain. In this filming we used many conventions in order to propose the genre of the film to the audience without confusion. I think that the most obvious conventions we used were both the costumes and dialog. The costumes were usual youthful wear however in the murderer’s case it was more sporting and easy. The dialog in particular the narrating gives away many answers to the genre and direction of the film, with his cocky accent and his references to ‘the business’ adds the desired gangster feel. In many ways this opening sequence was perfect because even with answering many questions and making the films direction obvious, we were still able to raise many vital enigmas.

We believed that by using some typical conventions in the film (storyline of murder) it will be easy to watch for the audience and not to confuse them completely. We did vary the film slightly in places to the classic British approach (the cockney voice-over is quite typical of this genre). The main difference is the fact that the murderer was female which challenges the stereotype of women. This is a massive change in a usual film of this genre and will hopefully both surprise and intrigue audiences. This section is vital to the film, as it doesn’t leave the audience to feel in control (e.g. know were it is going, expecting things to happen) and allows them to be lead into stereotypes but be tricked, and therefore stimulate interest in the film. Overall I was pleased with the success of our opening sequence as it wasn’t just the same as every other film of that genre but wasn’t so different it ended up being a completely different genre.

Our media product is very much based on making representations of social groups. We aimed solely at youth culture and their representations. I believe that we did follow recent youth stereotypes that all youth are dangerous and all follow this supposed ‘ASBO culture’. The scary reality in our film is that the female is able to purchase and handle fire arm with relative ease which should shock most audiences. Also the fact that the dealer is just an average teenager, and he is dealing weapons is also a gritty realism to people. Although this stereotype is emphasised in this sequence, it does confirm many views that people have of the youth culture.

The costume, appearance and actions of the characters also fit into the stereotype. The dealer seems edgy (when he looks behind himself a few times) but cocky at the same time which make people believe that he is a typical cheeky teen, however his aggressive side is shown (holding the arm of the killer) and his ability to handle a weapon will both shock and surprise the audience. The murderers costume again is typical however is quite sporty which gives a view that the murderer is an active woman. The way the murderer moves in the chase scene is aggressive (dark lightning and free hand shaken camera), this again adds to the cocky hostile teen image.

I feel that the Channel 4 Film Company would be a realistic target to distribute our film. Channel 4 have previously released films, which are of a similar genre to ours, for example ‘This is England’ a film that is based on Youth Culture and movements. Another film that follows the British murder idea is ‘Dead Man’s Shoes’, as this also is coarse and dark. Our film, like a Shane Meadows film, is gritty and realistic with similar vocabulary and shot types.

Another similarity can be between this and ‘Eden Lake’ a recently released film which focuses on the violent youth culture in the UK. This film is the first from the Rollercoaster film company based in the UK and they may wish to follow this adolescent crime genre.

I feel that its language and violence will appeal to Channel Four Films, as they are keen on violent British films.

I think that the audience we have aimed this at is the young (15-25) culture, as they will enjoy a film about their own people. Its violence and realism will attract younger people as they like cool action films. I feel that this age group is the best to aim at as they are the most regular group to attend the cinema. However I also believe that some elder people may like this film also as to give them an interesting insight into the youth of today. I don’t think that a person will have to have a special interest in this genre in order to watch it as it an action-driven escapism entertainment and nothing that requires no previous knowledge of events. I believe that this film will appeal mostly to the English however if another nationality were to watch it, this would be based truly on intrigue into British society and culture.

I felt the best way we addressed and informed the audience was via the voice over. It quickly and freely informed the audience of the reasons why the person was killed, the character who killed him/her and some background information into the people she is linked to. I believe that the narrator was extremely useful as it influenced the audience and informed them into what was happening. This was the best way to unify the direction of the shots without confusing the audience.

I have learnt a lot about technology whilst doing this product. I helped edit with the I Macs which helped me learn how to edit lighting and cutting of the film, I enjoyed learning this. I feel that we used the Mac to the best of our ability as we constantly changed lighting balance in order to make the scene darker. I also used the camera often and advised shot angles, which helped me, learn how to film a movie. Lots of these technologies were used for the first time for me so it obviously helped me learn from it.

We also used ITunes to add the non-digetic music a programme have used in the past and I used this knowledge to select and edit the best possible composition to the scene.

In think that we have improved massively since filming our first product. We took more time in writing the script, which did help improve the direction of the film and made it easier for us to edit. I believe our changing of lighting and sets were our biggest improvement as this made the film a lot more authentic.

Also we took more time in using different shot angles as in the preliminary task we used to main shot angles however in the end product we used multiple different angles for single scenes.

Questionnaire Results

1) What is the genre?

Crime/ action x5, Unknown, Gangster x4,

2) What is the storyline?

Revenge on a respected person x4, Just Revenge x4, Respect x2, Chain of murder

3) Who is the main character?

Hooded girl x8, Narrator x2

4) How does the music create atmosphere?

Creates tension x3, Pace x7

5) Does the music work well with the sequence?

Yes x10

6) Does the scene have pace?

Yes x9, No

7) What are the enigmas?

Why was the person killed? x4 Who she killed? The girl being the killer? x2 What happens after the murder?

8) Was the sequence clear?

Yes x10

9) What would make people want to watch this?

Enigmas x8, Girl lead, Being British

10) Would you watch this?

Yes x10

Pros of the film

I feel that our film had more positives than negatives for example the main influence of the film, editing/ shot types, were extremely strong and helped the scenes flow freely and were extremely affective. The voice over was another of the main attractions of the film as it was accurate and enormously helpful and making the scenes more clear. Another good feature was the time notices in different parts in the film, which again makes the opening simple to understand. The enigma’s we aim to achieve are clearly well thought out and do challenge the audience. I was also a massive fan of the shots changes of scenery when the killer fires at the victim, it just seems to fit in well and give the film more mystery.

Cons of the film

The very start of the film is quite poor in my opinion. I don’t like the movements or image of the killer as I feel that she looks quite weak which is not the image we wanted to achieve. I also no longer prefer the musical score as much as it is not the hip-hop beat we were aiming for.

Rob Maclean

Media studies evaluation

The project we did was a opening sequence to a film, the film genre was a British film. I worked with 2 other people in the group, there was Sarah fowler (actor) Rob Maclean (actor and Director) and Karl Buckel (voice over, camera man & editor). I did mainly all the filming and editing of the film. In are feedback the editing section was responded really well as people said the editing and camera work was good

The Genre of our film is a British crime, realistic drama. We have represented two categories of people, a working class culture and the youth. We did his by setting the films in run down areas were there was little housing with back allies round every corner. This gave an edge to our film. We also represented the youth as stereotypically the youth is represented by crime, violence, knife & gun crime. We did this by setting 16 year olds n the film, also by using gun crime. The costume designee we choose was a hooded jacket so the person could not reveal there identity, this is again stereotypically connected with the youth. We also had a voice over with a common London accent giving the representation of the working class. We also darkened the film to give it a more working class town effect also to represent the darkness of the film. We asked people what genre of the film is and they responded how we would like with most saying what we hoped the genre to be






The dealer looking casual in designer gear where the main character in a hooded jacket, stereotypical of today’s youth.



The film is a British realistic film, using youth and working class background. Films similar to this are, this is England, kidlthood, the bank job, football factory. This film represented the youth and the working class era, the costumes of hooded jackets and tracksuit bottoms gives it the real British feel. Also with the appearance of the darkened track and also with the fast paced camera movement following the running person. In the speech we went for a cockney accent due to most realistic British films adopt this method e.g. football factory. The use of lighting was all natural that we had darken up through editing, this was only done on the scenes that we proposed to set in the evening time. These are all stereotypical of a British film staring male roles, as gun crime, dealing and fighting is all masculine features but we flipped it to be a female who was taking on all these actions so it fit the stereotype for the film genre but didn’t fit the stereotype of the characters roles.

This sowing the main character being a woman and not fitting with the stereotypical role of the woman



The style of films we have made are mostly backed with independent film makers e.g. film 4 that are rarely made or made to achieve extremely high box office Figures. The Company that would back our actual film would be film 4, they have back small British films for a long time with small budgets but with a big message. The type of films film 4 put money into are not films that will be worldwide but that will only make an impact in this country as it is a film people can relate to. There is a good chance this film could be made as there is not many films like it in the market, in our reassures 100% of people said they would go to see the film, this is because it has a good edge and a lot of

The most gender age that would watch our film would be the teenagers (12 – 18) as it represents them in today’s British culture. It would also be mostly males that will go to see our film as stereotypically it is a masculine film but some female may want to see it due to the twist of the gangster being a female. The film will probably viewed by mostly British working – middle class as it represents them and people who see outside the stereotypical sector will not understand the street language etc. This market is a good one to aim at as more teenagers are independent have there own social status and money to spend and this film is right up there end of the market. The secondary target audience will be the 20 – 29 year olds as these people are still in there youth and most films like football factory were brought out when they were a teenager.








Dark ally way, secluded and tight giving sense of being trapped and grim. Contrast between the two different types of day, this was done in editing by darkening the scene.


This opening sequence the story was set straight away with the deal taking place at the start of the sequence, the characters motions are set with the big time drug dealer and the dodgy person who he was selling a suspicious item to. We created a sense of time by shooting the early morning part in the early morning, it was also a very clear day which gave the sense of early morning. We also had time texted into the sequence which showed the audience exactly what time it was. We had a lot of enigmas in our opening sequence from the beginning, it started off with the deal, you don’t actually see what was been given to the person so it leaves a open mind. Also with the end part of the sequence where it is a woman who has shot a person who we don’t know who it is and why she shot him. We had a voice over in our film, it was done in a cockney accent which gave it a more British street feel. This also set the story as the person was telling he audience what was happening in the sequence as it is quite fast and the audience might not be able to keep up. This also keeps the audience involved. We built up tension by the fast tracking cameras and the constant running, the question of why is she running and where to keeps the audience on edge. Also we used the typical stereotype for a female and flipped it upside down to be the dominant, masculine character.

Looking Back on the first task I feel the final product is much better as we spent more time and effort on it, the editing was done much better due to knowing how to edit a lot better when we came to the final task. Also the camera angles and shots were much better as we planned them out as well as with the script.

The key strength of this production was the teamwork between us in the group as we made time to find spots to shoot and camera time. Also the editing was good and we got a lot of shots in so the angles would work well together. The weaknesses of the production was the camera, as it was only a small scale the screen picture was not good and the battery pack kept running out but overall the production was a success.

Karl buckel

Script

In the opening sequence we didn't have much of a script and therefore most of it was improvised. 

The line from the dealer to the murderer was just said on the spot.

Dealer: You didn't f*cking get this from me, alright!

The Narrator's lines were written by Rob and the group decided that it would fit in with the film. Karl says the line in a cocky gangster accent.

Narrator: In this business it's about respect. Respect is earned, respect is to admire, respect is f*cking golden. People confuse fear with respect, but in this business we don't fear, we make it! People get hurt thats part of the f*cking game, people get killed thats part of the business, thats f*cking respect. On this day some business was going down, some nasty business, we call it revenge. Killing the killer of a respected earns respect, and giving that respect to a bird, well we aint used to that round here!

Rob Maclean

Group Evaluation

Our film worked well as a whole although there was a few things we thought we could have done to improve it. The music works well with the film as it is a beaty and adds tension to the film. The voiceover we used fits in well with the theme of the film as it adds character. The beginning part of the film is not to our liking because you can see that it is a female when that is meant to be the twist at the end. The next part we like is when the killer meets the dealer, the angles we used were to a good standard and the transition we used was good. The only thing we could of improved here was that we could of added a close up of when the dealer grabs the killers arm. This was because it didn't look right and we wanted to get the bit where the dealer speaks which we wouldn't have got all of the conversation if we had added the close up. the graffiti in the background adds character to this scene and gives it the street feel that we wanted to get. The next seen is where the killer goes on his way to find the persons house. We like the free hand camera as its shaky and it is more edgy and gritty and just gives the film that feel of intenseness. When the killer arrives at the persons house, we have a close up shot of the gate and the killer opening it. It makes it look better as you get the transition of the push open of the gate and the knock of the door.  Our original intention from the next scene when the gun shots were being fired was to film a tree with birds flying out, to get that more shocking feel to what has happened, but we didn't have time to wait around so decided to film a bit of environment around us to show for each gun shot being fired, so we filmed three scenes, one of a tree, one of the church and another one of some trees. The last scene is when the killer runs away from the killing, the ending is good as it shows the killer is actually a woman and as a medium shot, reveals it.

The enigmas created make the film really good as you don't know what is happening at the beginning, who the killer is, why the killer has killed someone, who has been killed. This is just in the opening two minutes of the film, so over a period of time all these enigmas will be found out and others created.