Evaluation Question 1

IN WHAT WAYS DOES YOUR MEDIA PRODUCT USE, DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE FORMS & CONVENTIONS OF REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS?

Trailer:We researched the history of britsh social realism to help us establish the codes and conventions of our genre. We also deconstructed the trailers of existing social realism films. The films that most influenced us were:
- This is England
- Fish Tank
- The Kid
From researching trailers we found that to create a successful trailer it should involve an ident, the title of the film and the release date. We also noticed that there is also some form of disequilibrium that is displayed.

We wanted our film to seem new and modern, so that a young audience can relate to the protagonist. We developed the conventions of real media products as we decided that we wanted the mother to be young, similar to the mother in fish tank as Britain is associated with teen pregnancy.

We also developed the idea of an unexpected friendship of an elderly man and a teenage boy. This was partly inspired by the relationship between Kevin and his foster father in The Kid.
                                                                                 

 From researching The Kid we decided we wanted to use a transaction of age from a pre-adolescent boy to him in his late teens. We only reveal this at the end of our trailer and it is the very last shot coming after the title. This acts as an enigma and makes people want to watch the film as the trailer has only revealed parts of the narrative involving the boy when he was young, which is different to the trailer of The Kid which constantly switches between the three different ages.
                                                                                 

Our teaser trailer uses the narrative of Todorov, although there is not much equilibrium shown at the beginning, as we show the protagonist's mother poking him in the face when he comes home. We wanted to develop the codes and conventions of social realism to create sympathy towards our protagonist therefore we used an echo effect over the mother's dialogue. The repitition  echo effect suggests that everytime he goes into the house his mother is abusive towards him. We decided to go for a more subtle form of abuse, rather than extreme violence as our film is certified 15. The echo also shows how he is disconnected from his home, which is juxta positioned with shots of him with the elderly man where the character Jacob is shown with a happier expression. We also used a slow motion effect to show the significance of abuse in the shot where water is thrown and in the face poke shot in order to create sympathy towards the protagonist. The trailer then has a cliffhanger ending as it has no complete resolution, but there is a new sense of equilibrium as the walking in the sunset creates a sense of hope, similar to the ending of Fishtank.

Poster:From researching other social realism posters we established they usually contain:

- Clear, easy to read font is used

- Protagonist is on poster

- Title is in the center of the thirds

- A tag line is used

- The clothing the characters wear in the poster gives away their personality

- Background usually shows a feature of city life/film location

- Other films created by the director are sometimes mentioned
- The first item the eye is usually drawn to is the title 
- White is a dominating colour commonly used

 The shot is taken at an angle so the we see the protagonists profile, his expression is important in this poster as there is not a lot going on else where in the composition. His body language is relaxed but his expression more relieved. Because his eyes are closed it gives the impression that he is trying to shut out the world which relates to our narrative. The wall that we used in the poster is white which, after research of social realism film posters, we found often used, it also appears gritty and worn adding the working class element to the poster. Although this poster follows codes and conventions of a social realism poster we decided not to use it. Instead we decided to subvert the conventions by choosing the sunset as from our feedback we discovered people found it more intruiging as the identity of the protagonist is a silhouette. There is no sign of a working class or an urbanised location, which is usually established in a social realism film poster, we felt that by showing an urban location it would suggest our film is associated with gang culture, which is not what we wanted to portray. The bright colours of the sunset would suggest an element of hope.

From researching other social realism posters we found ours was similar to Tyrannosaur

Website:

When researching other social realism film posters we were particularly inspired by This is England and London to Brighton

We really liked the layout of the London to Brighton film website as the pictures were links to different areas on the website. However were unable to create something similar at the same quality. We also like the ratings and film awards which we decided to include in our own website.

We decided to conform to the convention in which the majority of film websites have the trailer displayed on the home page.

Unfortunately we were unable to use the same font which we had used in both our trailer and film poster.

We chose to use a black and white background so that the writing and the trailer would stand out, we also wanted it to contrast with the bright poster to show a more serious side to our film.

The background picture is taken against a brick wall and there is graffitti on it. Although we did not want our film to promote gang culture, we felt this would be a good background for our website as it may help attract a younger audience who constantly use the internet.

We would have liked there to have been music playing when you are on the website, similar to This is England, but unfortunately we were unable to do this.

We have links to our twitter, facebook and blogger page which we found were on other film websites.


Overall we believe our media products follow the main conventions of a British social realism apart from the poster which subverts the conventions of existing posters we looked at.

Evaluation Question 2

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

To create a successful combination between our main product and ancillary texts we needed to ensure they all had a central theme that enabled them to link together in a way that made it clear they were promoting our film. To make this effective we used several motifs throughout our poster, website and trailer.

To start with we used the same typography on both our poster and in our trailer. The font was important to our poster as we felt, although our poster is a good representation of our film, it did not fully fit the conventions of a social realism poster and perhaps signified a drama more; However the typography we chose is faded and cracked, we thought this showed corruption and fragmentation which helped to portray social realism more as it connotes hardships. We used the same font on a shot in a film trailer, however we struggled to put the font onto our website because of technical difficulties.

This is our second to last shot in our film trailer. It is clear from the juxtaposition of our poster and this shot from our trailer that there is a strong link and the two combine well. Not only have we used the same font but also the colour scheme is very similar. The use of oranges and yellows resonates throughout our texts. We used the sunset and it is a memorable shot in our trailer as it stands out against the dull colours of the rest of the shots. We used the sunset to create the image of hope, but the action of our protagonist walking as a silhouette into the sunset and away from the camera evokes emotion and leaves mystery in the ending such as the ending in Fishtank, this connotes the social realism genre as there is not a happy ending, in fact there should be no proper conclusion as it needs to convey real life and reality as best as possible. We also used the silhouette in the poster using our protagonist however he remains unidentifiable so our film does not come across as a film about a singular boys 'sob story' but about a type of boy that many people can associate with.

On our website we used the colour orange to link it to both the poster and the trailer even though we used a blue font in the trailer the sunset creates the orange colour scheme. We also placed the Jury prize on the right hand side making the website look more professional, advertising the award even more and creating another link between the trailer and the website as we place the award in our trailer.

We placed the credits shown above on both the trailer and the teaser trailer. These credits are exactly the same on the both and include the same information successfully combining the trailer and the poster. These credits give information such as indents, certification, actors and directors etc. They also contain the website thus linking all of our texts together. This makes it all seem professional and works as a marketing device.

Our website uses the picture to left as its background. Once again we have used our protagonist as the focal point. Although he is a silhouette on our poster which hides his identity and in this picture we see him front on, the hood acts as a barrier and the idea of blurring his identity is continued. It keeps the character as an enigma.

Shows same costume to what is
being worn in website photograph.

The website probably has less correlation to the other two texts purely because the poster and trailer use almost identical images and we were able to use the font. However they still work as a combination because we have used the same costume in this photograph and in parts of the trailer and we have continued the idea of our protagonist wearing a hood which we were inspired by after watching Fishtank and deconstructing the poster.

 A tagline is important in the advertisement and marketing stages of film. A tagline is a form branding slogan in which the aim is to create a memorable phrase that will attempt to epitomise the product, in this case our film. The tagline, if successful should reinforce the audiences memory of the film and in some case a tagline can be so successful it is used as a saying in popular culture, for example 'Be afraid. Be very afraid." (The Fly) and "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away." (Star Wars). Our tagline is, "It takes a lifetime to gain an old friend" referring to the unusual friendship formed between our protagonist, Jacob, and the old man character. We placed our tagline underneath the title on the poster in a slightly darker colour, we also put the tagline on our website underneath the title also. This should make the tagline more familiar and acts as a marketing device.


                  

To combine our ancillary texts and main products together not only do we create the same tone using colour, typography, actors and a tagline but we used Facebook and Twitter to act as a form of advertisement. We placed Facebook and Twitter links on the website which allows for audience feedback and participation, we also put these links on our blog. We also used YouTube to circulate our finished product and put links on the website also, this allows for feedback to so we can learn what we did wrong and what bits we did right. The blog also contains these links and the website links back to the blog also, this is important for our media project as it allows people to understand our direction and see the planning and research behind our finished product.

Conclusion:

Overall the combination of our main product and ancillary texts seems to work effectively. The poster and trailer are clearly linked as they use the same font and colour scheme, this is important as it sets the tone for our film, the poster picks out a aesthetically pleasing part of our film but it also subverts the social realism genre which why at first we debated whether to use it or not. We finally decided to chose the poster as we felt it was a good signifier of our narrative that did not give too much away but set the tone and mood, it also attracted our audience and after asking people to pick their favorite poster they were drawn to our final one. Our website does not fit in with the theme of the sunset as much however it does include a picture of our protagonist and the costume remains the same. I believe we effectively created a combination however we would have liked to have carried more elements through onto the website and the blog such as the font.

Film Posters

                                

               

- Clear, easy to read font is used

- Protagonist is on poster

- Title is in the center of the thirds

- A tag line is used

- The clothing the characters wear in the poster gives away their personality

- Background usually shows a feature of city life/film location

- Other films created by the director are sometimes mentioned

- The first item the eye is usually drawn to is the title     

- white is a dominating colour commonly used    

                     

Sound Examples

This is the soundtrack to This is England. It is simple as only one instrument is used. The music is sombre and melancholic. The music is used as a motif throughout the film to signify traumatic moments in the narrative, it also acts as contrapuntal sound over the top of violence. We first considered using music similar to this however for a trailer we thought it was too morose and might give too much of the narrative away.

This music is an acoustic version of a mainstream piece of music by skrillex. This music is simple but effective. The use of guitar only as a soundtrack works well with a Social realism film as the films depict real life and everyday characters and this kind of music does not distract from the onscreen action and does not glorify working class life. 

    

After looking at many social realism trailers, such as somers town, Fishtank and The kid we noticed the music was primarily acoustic guitar or mainstream  music from the time, for example in This is England. As we cannot use copyrighted music we decided to use an original acoustic music. This piece is simple yet memorable, for these reasons we feel this would make a suitable soundtrack for our trailer.

Fishtank poster deconstruction

• Heroic- proportionally she is filling the majority of the poster, this suggests a need to overcome her background and economic struggles. small buildings in the background: tower blocks, flats connote council estate and working class.
• Weather behind is blue sky and clouds as well as sunshine gives a sense of hope and happiness, however, this is contrasted with her serious and distant expression, suggesting this happiness is faced with trouble and disruption.
• The font/text is bold- orange font contrasts with blue sky. this represents the girl contrasting with her lifestyle in society.
• The light shines from the left creating shadow on her face, connoting a side of darkness and unhappiness within her character.
• She is wearing a hooded jumper, portraying the "hoody" stereotype- associated with having to act tough and stick up for herself. The media represents "hoodies" as intimidating and are typically referred to as ASBO's. Her hood acts as a form of identity, the wind appears to inflate the hood as if to show her true identity.
• Small white font informs the audience of actor names, awards, success of the film and ratings. This text is positioned at the bottom of the poster because is it a social realism film and so actors are not famous.
• Fishtank as a title demonstrates the idea of captivity and a sense of claustrophobia within society. This shows the idea that we are all fishes trapped in society and cannot escape however hard we try.

Inspirational Films.