How Effective is the Combination of Your Main Product and Ancillary Texts?

Our main product and our Ancillary tasks work well together we have had feedback on all aspects from our class, teachers and also other friends. Our main film has worked better than we could have imagined as we were told the humour would be very hard to achieve using the conventions of a documentary. In all the viewings we have sat in on we have received laughs and positive comments. Linking the film with our collection of poster was easy as we used a simple background drawing the audience’s attention to our main character Simon. Using him in multiple funny poses with the vital prop of his oven gloves enabled us to maintain the mise en scene with our film as you are not laughing at his phobia or his problems instead at his beaming smiles or even the ‘serious quotes’ from celebrities. These are all used in a serious way but allow humour as if you take a step back and think of how ridiculous the phobia is then the more serious we make it the funnier it seems. Completing the package is our magazine review again having a piece of serious writing about our piece allows the humour to continue as although the review gives a good detailed analysis of our film it also by talking about it as a serious film again continues our feel of a serious theme about a very humorous topic. The research we did into reviews helped us to realise that pictures were key and our choice of our two pictures were very important. The one we use showing the group of people with social difficulties is subtle but also links into the film by showing one of the funniest parts without giving the reason behind it away therefore enticing a magazine reader to want to watch our film.
All in all I believe our combination of ancillary tasks and our main film work terrifically and the idea that the film is a mockumentary can be felt throughout all of them. The humour in all three of them is not forced and all the conventions and themes needed for them are there though underlying all of this stays our ridiculous phobia which when made to be serious people have found hilarious.

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

Evaluation media

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teaser posters.

These are the 3 teaser posters we have designed. The use of a blank background reflects simons' solitary nature, and the high angled shots connote a vulnerability within his character; similar to the Borat poster we analysed in our research. Feedback throughout has been very positive; we felt it was important to inform the viewer yet also leave a lot to the imagination. Very few of the other students in our group were aware as to the true meaning of 'chirophobia' - therefore a touch of ambiguity is added to the themes of this poster. The appearance of a small review from 'the news of the world' heightens the seriousness of our product and fits the conventions of a typical teaser poster, attempting to draw in viewers with positive and respectable reviews. the use of a facebook site creates a vague target audience and allowers the viewer to research the film further if they wish to. Overall i think that the cartoon style of our teaser posters are very effective fitting with the upbeat nature of our product.

hands on production.

This is the new sting that we designed for our latest production.the use of bold black and white create an ambiguity to the particualr nature or style of our production team. It is only when combined our actual film 'chirophobia', the humorous coinsidence is realised. The use of an oxymoron between our production company and our product creates an irony for comic intent. The feedback we haved recieved has been mostly positive, regarding the comedic intent of our production name. Another fellow student commented on how the detail of the hand, contrasted to the unspecific ovengloves we present in our film - perhaps as a group we should have considered maintaining the ovenglove theme within our sting, creating an obvious link between the company and the actual product. I feel this would not lose the humour within this sting, as it remains within the name 'hands-on productions'. This sting was produced on 'adobe aftereffects'; to begin with it was a difficult program to understand, however after viewing multiple tutorials, it became easier to understand and use. Other students suggested 'photoshop' and 'paint' however, we felt it necessary to include a wider variety of media types, having used both these programs for pre-porduction needs. overall, i believe this sting appropriately fits with the general themes of our product, it achieves humour whilst still maintaining a serious and professional image.

review.

This is our review plan. It is a variation of a 'total film' review of 'your highness'. The photo's are appropriate as they introduce the 2 main actors 'danny mcbride' and 'james franco'. they also give a sense of the medievil mise en scene of the film. the text is in an appropriate position, easy for the viewer to read. The small captions add humour to the review, fitting with the theme our final piece. The fact that the title goes into smaller size font enforces the unnecessary length of it, again adding to the humour of the review.

animatic

This is the animatic for our short film we have used a voice over on the animatic to explain and describe what occurs within each slide and how we hope toe to produce them.when putting the animatic together in adobe premier pro we haven't kept the transitions of the slide the same they are different in each transition this was a learning curve as it doesn't look as professional if we stuck to one type of transition, however it did give us the chance to experiment.

scripting.

Within our film we hope to depict real life, and real people. We were worried that if the dialogue was heavily scripted the sense of the characters being natural would be lost. Originally we intended on completely improvising the entire film. however, after one morning of filming we came to realise that this method was unproductive and not time effective.

Here are several examples of the loose scripts I have written. The questions are clear and structured, as would be expected from the presenter. for the character answering the questions, i have merely devised potential answers for them to use. This way, the joke or point is not lost, but it is also not said in a unnatural or structured manner. I feel this method gives me and the other actors a chance to develop our characterisations, including personal idiosyncrasies, aware that the scene is natural and most importantly productive as long as the organised point is made.

Within these scripts, I have also provided a rough outline as to how these scenes would look. I felt this was effective as it allowed the character to visualise the scene. Once they became accustomed to the mise en scene, they are able to acknowledge the characteristics necessary to create a convincing portrayal.