Evaluation

By Sophie Aldridge

Plot overview of my film YESTERDAY...

My short film is a stop motion and is an animation comedy. It starts off with a normal person going to bed, little do they know what's about to go on in their kitchen. Just after 12 an apple wakes up and in a flash back he shows the events of yesterday. Angered by the carrot the stole his date yesterday, he seeks revenge which ends up with a huge scale food fight. However... In the end it all pays of for MR apple, when the alarm clock goes off to warn them its 6.00, when the person awakes. All the fruit and veg run back to their original places, unfortunately the carrot does not make it and when the person come in deciding they want a snack Mr carrot is ideal.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
My main production and ancillary texts both challenges and conforms the forms and conventions of real media products. For example....

STOP MOTION Stop motion is an animation effect that creates the illusion of moving objects through the use of photos. I used stop motion to create my short film, as most films are created with film. Therefore I wanted to challenge this idea and make a film that was different and entertaining. To produce the film it involved taking thousands of images of each small movement, using my Samsung camera. These pictures were then uploaded onto windows live movie maker and edited together so that they all had a duration of 0.10 seconds. This allowed them to play smoothly together, which created the effect of movement with inanimate objects.

These are my stop motion experiments http://youtu.be/GsZbUc_K_Hw http://youtu.be/EJQ9-7IPziU

Animation
Animation is conventionally used to make inanimate objects appear to come to life and to give then human characteristics. I conformed to the convention by making fruit and vegetables come to life though stop motion animations. I also used clay like Nick Park to create human characteristics thought the facial expressions as well as through sound and actions. Today animation is more commonly used to create entertaining films which as Branston and Stafford stated let you forget reality and get lost in the film. My film allows people to forget reality with the use of animation. Using animation allowed me to make inanimate objects come to life which would not happen in reality, thus entertaining people, making them forget reality. The are a number of popular animation films that my film conform to. One Animation film creator is Nick Park. He was responsible for creating Wallace and Grommet, Chicken run, Shawn the sheep and creature comforts. In all his creations he gives animals human characteristics like voices, facial expressions and makes them act in human ways. I conformed to this by making the food act in human ways, like fighting and dating.

Narrative
Most films as Todorov stated start off with an equilibrium. this equilibrium however gets destroyed and The character realises this and attempts to repair it, thus creating a new equilibrium. In my short film I have used the forms and conventions of Todorovs narrative theory, however I have used it in a different order than what he suggested. At the beginning of my film the equilibrium is already destroyed as you see in the flashback which shows the apple and pepper on a perfect date where the equilibrium is intact. However it then gets destroyed when the date leaves the apple. When the flash back fades out, back to the present the equilibrium is still destroyed, however I purposefully made the apple try to repair the equilibrium by fighting to get his girl back. In the end the equilibrium is restored when the carrot is eaten leaving the apple with the pepper all to his self.

Scene 1
The first scene was important as this scene set up the story. It showed a person watching TV before getting up, switching it off and going to bed. Digetic sounds were used to accompany the actions, like when the TV was played and switched off, walking and the light being switched. The sounds are what the audience expect to here when seeing the action and help the audience make sense of what's happening. This scene I mostly used a wide shot. I used this as it showed the character in the lounge perfectly and got in the TV and surroundings. When the character walks out the lounge and into the kitchen. I then used a variety of different shots and angles to keep it interesting. These shots included an extreme close up, medium shot and close up. lighting was artificial as it was shot inside and it was meant to be night which meant closing the curtains to block out the natural light. The artificial lighting came from lights above and some lamps I set up around the room. This conforms to most films which when shot use artificial lighting so that they can control entirely how the scene looks.

I made the character were PJs to show it was night and she was going to bed. If she wore different clothing the audience would not be able to tell that she was going to bed as its pyjamas that we associate with bed.

Scene 1 takes place in the lounge, which is the ideal place for watching TV and showing that someone is relaxing. The scene props included a TV, sofas, and objects that made it look homely and like a lounge. These props help create the scene.

The date
This scene conforms to dates in other films I have watched like love actually. In these films it's the man and woman on a romantic date and there are roses and wine. In my date scene I conformed to this through the mic on scene, Lighting and music.
The lighting is bright and warm as they are outside. I also edited the photos on windows live movie maker so they appear lighter. This contrasts and challenges other date scenes I have viewed like love actually, which feature dates with a candle lit dinner and low A small Tripod was used to capture close wine and a rose are used as lighting. up shots and so the camera was stable props. The red rose connotes In most date scenes there is the use of romantic music which sets the scene. In love and my date scene I chose to challenge this by not using the obvious romantic romance. The music, but nature sounds at the beginning to set the outdoors scene. The music wine indicates then swiftly changes to fun and happy music to reflect how the characters are they are on a feeling. However when the equilibrium is destroyed by the pepper leaves the date having fun apple, the happy music is quickly replaced with a sad song to show the audience

how the apple is feeling.

The date continued

The camera shots conform to romance films as I've taken wide shots of the couple sat together and a number of close ups which show there facial expressions so the audience knows how they are feeling. These types of shots are typical when filming a date as you want to focus on the characters.

My wide shot used here is similar to the shot used in toy story of Barbie and ken. My shot conforms to the toy story shot as they are both wide shots, show a male and female attracted to one another. The female is on the left hand side and the male it on the right. The characters also have similar expressions, the males is very smiley whilst the female is flirty. In the toy story shot there hearts to represent love whilst in my shot there is a rose to represent love. Both the hearts and rose are red as this connotes love and romance,.

In this scene it shows a number of fights taking place so the apple can win back his girl
This scene uses upbeat music with drums and crashes, so that it builds up the tension during the fight and conforms to the dramatic music that normally accompanies a fight or battle. I also used sad music to accompany the lemon getting stabbed as its funny yet you feel sorry for the lemon. There are a lot of different shots in this scene as the shots kept switching to capture a different part of the fight. The fight shots cut fast so that it adds to the chaos of the fight. In this scene I used a bit of text in speech bubbles that This conforms to other films which during a told the audience what the characters were thinking or fight also have fast cutting, like in Bridget saying as there was no dialogue in the film. Not having Jones diary when the men fight over her. any speech in the film challenged the conventions of most The lighting during this scene is artificial films as normally they are heavily reliant on speech to get however the brightness does vary a lot it was across the storyline. However some of the funniest films filmed at different times of the day which use no dialogue like "the circus" which starred one of the affects the colour of the light and the best silent film actors Charlie Chaplin brightness

lighting
During my film I used a mix of mostly artificial and natural lighting. The shots
that took place inside like the first scene and most of the fruit and veg scene (excluding the date) was also done inside using artificial lighting like lamps and lights which I could position where I wanted. This I feel allowed me to make sure that each picture had consistent lighting which made it appear as if a film when the pictures were put together. Using mostly artificial lighting conforms to all film productions as they use artificial lighting to control how there footage looks and what mood they want to achieve in a shot, for example dark, grey light may represent unhappiness or depression. The date scene was shot outside meaning that all lighting used in this scene was natural. this gave a nice glow to the photos which gave the impression that it was a nice warm day. On windows movie maker I made the photos brighter so that they looked very bright. I done this purposefully so that it appears very bright as if he's looking back at a happy memory. However when the pepper leaves the apple the warmth and light goes out of the photo which connotes sadness. By changing the level of brightness it is possible to create a mood or feeling which helps tell the story, which is very important in my film as there is no dialogue.

Facial Expressions
In my film I have used a variety of different expressions that tell the audience how a character is feeling. The foods expressions are made using clay so that they could easily be changed. Some are drawn on with sharpie as they were only used once. Using clay looks professional and conforms to clay motions like morph.

DEAD!

ANGERY

SAD

http://youtu.be/GCcZZ6jrGfQ

HAPPY

poster

This is some text I tried out but decided that it was to cartoonish and unlike the text on any posters I had seen.

The film tile is the largest text as so people remember the film name. I used this font as its well spaced out and not too formal but fun. Underneath in smaller text is the tagline which leaves the audience wondering why food wont be the same again.

The picture was taken landscape as this got in all the main characters and challenged most posters which are portrait. I chose to use this photo as it is in focus and looks at the objects face on which makes it attractive to look at. Originally this photo had some black background in it, however after cropping it down to size and painting over the black it was appealing to look at and the text went nicely over the top of the photo.

The text is large and bold and has an interesting font which attracts people to read it. The text is wrote in black so it stands out from the white background making It easy to read. This conforms to other posters I have looked at like the poster on the next slide.

Listed at the bottom of the poster is who created the film and the date it comes out. This was important as people may be tempted to watch the film if it was made by a well know director or company.

Original photo

My poster compared to...

Below is the toy story 3 poster that inspired my poster. I conformed to the poster in various ways, however I also challenged some of the forms and conventions.

My poster conforms to the toy story poster as it is landscape, the picture shows inanimate objects and features all the main characters with the key characters in the middle of the shot. Both backgrounds are plain so the pictures and text stands out whilst the tiles are place at the top of poster. My picture challenges the toy story image further as mine has more meaning to it. Instead of placing any characters wherever in the photo I purposefully placed the pepper in the middle. On one side is the apple with a group of fruit behind him and the other is the carrot with a veggie gang behind him. This shows the viewers that there is a bit of conflict between the two groups over the pepper who sits helplessly in the middle. The red pepper connotes love which could be a clue for the audience what this conflict is over. I also put the film tagline underneath the film tile instead and the director/production company at the bottom as this is not as important.

Double page spread

At the start of the text I have made the first letter larger than the rest of the text so that its clear to see where the film review starts. It also conforms to the double page spreads I have looked at and makes it look smart and professional.
The double page spread features a review of my film and a short interview with the director (me!). Its wrote in a fluent style that is not formal, but as if a friend was talking to you. This method of text I felt was more inviting to read for youths and families who don't want to be board. This style of writing conforms to most film reviews I have looked at, however it challenges the film reviews in well established film magazines like empire who use very formal language. I did not use formal language as that I did not feel would capture my target audience or reflect my funny film well at all.

photos are different types of shots taken at different angles so that they are interesting to look at. They in focus and are bright and colourful which links to the film.

Bold heading , tells the audience not only what the pages is about but also top shows that this film is highly recommend so they might want to go see it. Underneath the heading is the film title which clearly states the name of the film like in most magazines. Underneath is a fact box that lists information on the film. This conforms to a double page spread I looked at on pirates of the Caribbean

The pictures are stills from the film which give the audience an idea of what happens whilst not giving to much away. The pictures anchor the text which talks about the apple date and the fight. In the corners of the photos I chose to conform to other photos I had seen in magazines where they write what's going on in that particular photo so the readers know what its showing.

My double page spread compared to...

This is one of the double page spreads l researched from Empire magazine. You can see how my double page spread conforms to certain aspects of the WALL.E, whilst it challenges others.

The bold headline conforms to the in cinemas headline which is also placed at an angle, is bold and has colour in the background. They use orange for the text box as it links well with the rust colour of the robot, whilst mine is red as it connotes love and links in with the pepper. Before the review starts on my first page I have the film information between two lines, this was inspired by looking at the WALL.E pages. I chose to use this as it gives out important film information and advertises the film more by listing the director and actors who were involved in the film, this may attract people to see it. Above the info box I have also conformed to the large film title. However mine could have been a bit bigger so it stood out more like WALL.E. However my double page spread does challenges the empire pages as my images are kept to one side of the magazine whilst the robot picture takes up the whole page and goes over the gutter. Challenging this form I think worked as it provided more space for the text.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
when I produced my main product the film, it was important afterwards to make sure that the ancillary texts linked with the film. My ancillary texts I chose to produce was a double page spread and poster . I feel the poster and double page spread both reflect what the film is about in a number of ways that link them to my film.

The font used in the film is also the fount used for all the poster text and the tagline and heading in the double page spread. This creates an identity and people start to associate the style of text with Yesterday. I chose to use this font on all my media texts as its simple and i have not seen another text used like this before.

The font used in the film is also the fount used for all the poster text and the tagline and heading in the double page spread. This creates an identity and people start to associate the style of text with Yesterday. I chose to use this font on all my media texts as its simple and I have not seen another text used like this before.

In the poster and double page spread I used the tag line "food will never be the same again" this links both of my ancillary texts together as both display this.

In my film the colures of the fruit and vegetables are mostly greens and red. two of the main characters in my films are also these colours, the pepper and apple. so I carried the colour of the fruit and veg through to my poster and double page spread so the colour scheme in all of them linked together. In the poster I made sure that the photo included these colours in the from of the fruit and veg. In the double page spread I used red and green for the quote, headline, tagline and lines.

Green can connote jealousy which the apple feels towards the carrot who stole his date. Whilst the pepper is a bright red that connotes not only anger, but passion and love. Jealousy and love are the main emotions in the film so by using the colours that reflect those moods- green and red this will be linking my main product and ancillary texts together.

How does my film and ancillary texts target my audience?

My target audience is families and youths as I found out in my animation questionnaire that these were the two groups of people that watched animation films more.

DOUBLE PAGE SPREAD

The double page spread attracts my target audience as its fun, bright and colourful like the various fruit and veg. The text is fluent and funny, it talks about the aspects of the film a family or youths may be interested in like the comedy, and what others have said about the film.

FILM
The characters are funny as they are fruit and veg moving around which will appeal to all my target audience as its not normal. the fruit and vegs expressions are comical and the story during the film is made to be humorous, especially the food fight where you see food fighting which is very funny to watch.

POSTER
The picture is funny because there are food with faces which is appealing to families with children. It simple to understand and read for children and the shortage of text make it more appealing for children who prefer pictures. It also has a lot of bright colours that make the poster stand out among the other dark and dull posters.

What I like/dislike about my film

My film I think is good as it's made up of good quality photos that are in focus, and all play well together so that the otherwise inanimate objects appear to move around. The music and sound in the film I think has good timing so that when a certain picture or action plays the sound happens at just the right time. I also feel that the sounds helps create scene and reflects how the characters are feeling which was important as my film contained no dialogue. In the film I think I could improve the quality of some of the pictures as some of them during extreme close ups are blurry where I have gotten so close. this affects the quality of the film and makes it look less professional. In my film I think I should have used a different ending to the film so that at the end when the carrot is eaten instead of the apple going "yippee" instead we see another hot guy veggie walking in which suggests Mr. apple is going to have to go through it all over again. This would have made a better ending I think and would have left the audience on a slight cliff hanger as there is no true happy ending.

what I like/dislike about my double page spread

My double page has a good layout that is easy to read and attractive to look at. The film review and short interview tell the audience everything and more they would want to know about the film, with the pictures anchoring the text so that the readers have pictures to view of what their reading. The double page spread also interests people in the film by giving them a short overview of what happens and a few pictures that gets them interesting and wanting to know more.

I think I could have placed the pictures more attractively on the page so that they bleed off the edge like other pictures do in magazines. I also think that I have could of made my film review a bit longer by describing in more detail the personality of the main characters so that the audience when reading it feel like they know them all ready and have a bond with them. I think I could have also used a better font for the heading of the page so that it was interesting and stood out more as the text I used is quite boring .

what I like/dislike about my poster

It has bold text that stands out and gives clear information about the film. The image looks funny and interesting it also attracts my attention as its bright, colourful and different from most film posters images. The picture is also unlike most poster pictures which makes it unique.
I think I could have made the text bigger so that it stood out more, in particular the date that the film came out so it stuck in people's minds. on the poster I also. I think If I had put the characters names on the poster, like staring Mr apple, a hot pepper and a cool carrot this would have added to the comedy of the poster and would have conformed to other posters I viewed. However since I don't have any famous actors in my film normally they done get put on the poster as no one knows them.

What have you leant from your audience feedback?.

After I produced my film and both ancillary texts I asked my target audience what they thought of it so that I could see what the good aspects were and the parts that needed improving. Did you enjoy the film?
I made a questionnaire based on the film as this was the most important production piece I wanted to get the most feedback on. For the double page spread and poster I simply asked my target audience two simple questions, What do you like and dislike. Receiving audience feedback was very useful as it allowed me to see the aspects of my media texts that needed improving and what people thought was successful.
It finds out if people enjoyed my film. Question 4, asked people to rate aspects of the film. These were the aspects I was most interested in seeing if they worked or not, like telling the story without dialogue. What do you think could be improved? This question allowed the audience to give there suggestions on how my film could be improved. This gave me the chance to make changes.

Animation questionnaire
When deciding what type of film to make I decided to produce this animation questionnaire to find out if people enjoyed animation films and in particular who -what age and gender.

Who do you watch animation films with? This question told me who people watched films with so that I could aim it at a particular audience. In this case it turned out to be families. What do you expect from an animation film? This told me what people like best in animation films so that I could do this in my film.
I also gave a short sample of my storyline so people could comment on if it was a good idea or bad.

The film
These are my questionnaire results, Mostly everyone enjoyed my film which was pleasing. The only person who did not was my gran, which is understandable as I targeted my film at the younger generations and families. When asked what could be improved people said the sound and picture quality which was exactly what I thought my self. So I went back and changed some of the sound timings so that they played precisely at the right time and deleted and sharpened some of the photos that were out of focus. However once done and showed the edited version people did not like it as much because they felt the music was not as good, so I decide to use my original as the music is more dynamic, exciting and shows what the characters are feeling.
When rating the film my target audience rates the comedy, facial expressions and effectiveness to tell the story without out dialogue. This was good as these were the aspects of my film I was most anxious to find out if worked well or not. For this I also found sounds could be improved as well as the quality of picture.

Did you enjoy the film?

10 5 0 male yes no female

What could be improved?

Easiness to follow Speech bubbles Comdey characters expressions Quality of pictures The sound The story line
0 2 4 6

Series1

Average ratings for different aspects of my film (5 being the higest and 1 the lowest)
6 5 4 3 2 1 0

Series1

Total film views:

Not only did I use the questionnaire to get audience feedback but also YouTube which is a site where people share and upload videos to the public. I uploaded my short film onto YouTube so that people could watch it and by doing so I could see from the video statics what age/gender group was mostly watching my film, where it was most popular and what media device people are using to watch it.

Most people who are watching my video via YouTube are from England as this is where I have released my film. I am surprised to see that it's also being viewed in Australia and brazil which I did not expect. If it was not for YouTube then my film would have not reached these audiences around the world or here in England.

This video is most popular in:

As expected my film is mostly being watched by young people as its mostly the younger generation that have YouTube and they enjoy comedies as I found in my animation questionnaire. I am surprised by the older generations that are watching my film as in my questionnaire most people over 50 said they did not enjoy them. As for gender, more females are watching it, perhaps because they enjoy the romance and how the apple plays for sympathy.

Audiences This video is most popular with:

Gender Female
More Less

Age 13-17 6518-24

Male Female

As part of audience research I provided a link to my film on my Facebook page, and got my family to share the link so it reached lots of different people. Putting my film on Facebook turned out to be useful as people from my target audience posted on how the film was and even what part they like best as above.

Poster and Double page spread

For my audience feed back regarding my double page spread and poster I simply asked my target audience what they disliked and liked about the media text they had seen. From the feedback I found out that most people thought my poster was very funny and like other posters, however it needed some more text so I edited it and added who it was by. The double page spread was commented as very interesting and makes the film appealing however the tag line was not attractive at an angle. I did not change this however it worked well and it was only one person that did not like this.

These links take you to the audience feedback on my blog.

Less text

http://sheldonschoolsophiea2.wordpress.com/ 2012/01/30/poster-feedback/ http://sheldonschoolsophiea2.wordpress.com/ 2012/02/27/double-page-spread-and-editedfilm-feedback/

More text

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
During my media project I have used a variety of media technologies to plan, evaluate, research and produce the media texts. Some technology used I had never used before, like the free sound sites or a converter which once my film was produced I used to turn into a different format so it was compatible with most computers. This allowed everyone to see my film.

Using PowerPoint and Microsoft word helped me also write up my research so it was organised and easy to understand.
http://sheldonschoolsophiea2.wordpress.com/2011/10/18/g ulp-the-worlds-largest-stop-motion-animation-set/ http://sheldonschoolsophiea2.wordpress. com/2011/10/13/examples-of-stopmotion-short-films/

Research
I used the internet to look up different films and what stop motion was and to create a stop motion.
YouTube played a huge part in my research as with out it I would not have been able to view stop motion clips that helped me produce my own. The links show some example of stop motion films I researched.

I used a programme called word press. this is a blogging site where people can publish posts and share videos and pictures. I used word press to blog my research and update my progress. Word press I found was a effective way of presentation my work as I could easy post each day how my work was progressing, share photos and analysis of films, posters and double page spreads. It also allowed me to upload power point presentations and word documents which contained my work regarding the film so people could easily view it.

This is some research on stop motions I put on my blog.

http://sheldonschoolsophiea2.wordpress.com/2011/10/17/stopmotion-animation-advice/ http://sheldonschoolsophiea2.wordpress.com/2011/10/13/stop-motion/

Planning
when I was planning for my film I done some experimental film piece with stop motion and expressions, for this I practised using windows live movie marker which gave me the skills for making my film later.
http://youtu.be/GsZbUc_K_Hw http://youtu.be/EJQ9-7IPziU

Using Microsoft word and my blog I was able to plan out my shooting script and scene locations which I took photographs of using my camera. I also used PowerPoint to create a profile for each of the characters, this helped me get each characters appearance right. http://sheldonschoolsophiea2.wordpress.com/2011/10/24/shooting-script/ this is my shooting script.

when planning my production pieces I created sketches and plans which I scanned into the computer using a scanner. With the images I put them on my blog.

Construction
To create my film I used my Samsung (PL70) camera to take the photos to create the stop motion effects. I used my own camera as it takes quality pictures, has macro features so that I could take up close pictures that were focused and clear. It also 5x optical zoon which was particularly useful for up-close shots.

During the process of constructing my film and ancillary text I constantly updates my blog with screen grabs and analysis of what I had done so it was clear what progress I had made and the before and after product.

I took the stop motion pictures for my film using two tripods-one very small for up close work and a large one, mainly used for the person shots.

Construction of film
With the photos, I opened them with windows movie maker and made the duration for each picture 0.10 seconds so that they all played together to create the illusion of movement. I found windows live movie marker an affective and simple programme to use, however editing in sounds was a problem as it pushed the timings put which was frustrating. On windows live movie maker you also could not overlap sounds due to its basic functions I found the sounds to construct my film on two sites, partners in rhyme and freesounds.org. As these were free sites it allowed me to download sound effects and music easily for my film. It was good as some sounds I did not expect to find on there like the winking sound to accompany the carrot winking and a stick falling to the ground. Without these free sound sites I would of had to buy music and would of had to record all of my own sounds which would have been very time consuming as I found out after recording one or two.

To record my own sounds I used a basic microphone plugged up to the computer which meant I could only record sounds done within the same room. This was slightly annoying as I could not record what I wanted, yet I saved me time going online. These are some sounds I recorded my self. For the person sounds I recorded my family.

These are two examples of sounds I downloaded of freesounds.org.

Construction of poster
To produce my poster I used a number of different technologies

I used my camera to take the wide photo of the fruit and veg for the poster. Later on I did not have to edit the photo to get it in focus as I ensured I took the photo properly at the time. I used Photoshop to crop the photo, then used the paint tool to go over the dark areas. This made all the background white. I also used Photoshop to create the text around the poster as there was only a small amount of text to be put on. If there was too much then I would have used in design as this programme is much better for text, due to the layout glides and the variety of effects you can add to the text, like writing on the line for example.

Construction of double page spread

To produce my double page spread I used the software In design. This program was perfect for creating the double page spread gridlines, inserting lots of text and pictures in place. I liked using in-design as it helped me line up images and text on my page. It also allowed me to create different effects with the text, for example at the beginning of the film review I done a large letter that all the text around it, which made my page look professional. The only aspect I did not like about in design was the fact that the page outline and gutter did not show when printed, so I had to insert these in.

Evaluation
To evaluate my work I used PowerPoint to produce this final evaluation. I chose to use PowerPoint as it allowed me to present my work in a professional and smart manner. It also allowed me to provide links, pictures, sound and videos to the slides which makes it interesting for the audience watching and allows me to show my media knowledge by using different forms of media.

I uploaded my PowerPoint onto word press once finished so that it was viewable to people and the public

THE END