Media language

Happy Christmas!!!

Today I am going to go over how the Media presents it's signals and messages in its very own language to the audience, some of it is very discrete however some of it is very obvious to the audience here are some examples.

Signs: Signs in the media can come in many different forms such as...
-Colour: Colour can be used as a sign to the audience by indicating certain characteristics about a character or setting for example the blonde hair colour indicates innocence within the character as it is very bright where as a character wearing all black and red would be considered evil as Black is very dark were as red signifies blood. 

Blonde hair usually is a sign/symbol for beauty

or innocence

Semiotics: Shows various signals and signs in media. A lot of people accuse it of propaganda with hidden messages in films. They are usually difficult to see and usually indicate the personality of the character involved or something that the audience can relate to.

For example in this scene of he film Avatar 

in the background you can quite clearly see the American

flag symbol on the window as if its a hidden message 

Risk assesment

In this risk assessment I am going to outline the various risks in this task and how we can avoid them.
A Risk assessment is important as it outlines the various dangers that could be faced during filming our film introduction. This can be related to the weather or location of filming

1. Camera/Microphone poking people in the eye
-We will need to be careful when operating the equipment and only move it when we need to.

2. Tripping over tripod legs
-Look where we are walking NO RUNNING around set. Make sure that when tripod is not in use that it is folded up and guarded by an individual so people ca see it easier so they are less likely to trip over the legs and injure themselves.

3. When filming around water electronic could be dropped into the water causing the breakage of the equipment and an electric shock.
-Avoid water altogether or if need be very careful around water. Equipment could be damaged by water even if not electrical as if metal gets int contact with water if its ferrous then t can rust or just clog up joints in a tripod leg for example.

4. When filming by the road dangerous Driving or a slip could cause a car accident.
-Be extremely careful when filming by the road, avoid filming when cars are driving by. We my even need to avoid filming near roads or footpaths as people could come into shot when they are not supposed to, this would distract the audience when watching the sequence as they may feel tht they need to look at them instead of Jack.

5. In bad weather (Heavy rain, high winds, lightning).
-Equipment must be protected well or not used at all to prevent any damage as equipment is expensive. We don't want any equipment that is electrical getting wet either.

Weather and Setting

For this task the conditions outside are very important.
As our character played by Jack is on his way to his first interview into the so called boring Office world. So the weather can be used to  display the characters emotions as a Semiotic or a sign. For example if it were raining then Jack would have to look sad as rain can symbolise tears as if the entire world around him is making him sad. If it were sunny however then Jack would be happy and lets face it probably dancing everywhere he goes. As the sun is very bright it represents a bright future and a happy day to the audience. So as our character will be very nervous and probably in a rush we will preferably need it to be overcast to show that the character is trapped or under pressure as the clouds could represent a natural roof over his head as if to force him down not able to climb in confidence.

 

For our actual setting we will start from inside Jacks Bedroom-around his house-down his driveway-along the road-and stops at the bus stop where the title of the film is displayed and the opening of the film ends. We will need to make sure that when we are inside that we get more close up images on jack and the objects around him that we will use to display the titles similar to the title sequences of Fresh Meat. Where as soon as we step outside we include Long shots and Extreme long shots to show where Jack is and where he is going. We will need to be careful that when we are fling for the opposite side of the road that not many cars come past in one shot or else we will not be able to see Jack for long and the image will become cluttered, confusing and will ruin the Mise En scene. 

Further costume ideas

Due to the change in our theme we have decided that for the sake of our Mise en Scene making sense in our film opening we have made some changes to our main characters costume.

We need to make the costume as plain as possible as it needs to just look normal like the average teenager would wear. So we were thinking along the lines of something as simple as a white T-shirt with black trousers to show how plain and boring life is for the some people as black and white are the blandest of colours. 




Here is a photo of Jack during some of the filming that we have begun of the chosen outfit

As you can see the costume is very bland to look at and allows the user to take in the scenery around Jack so that they can guess what kind of area he lives in. We also added a rucksack which would indicate that he goes to school and needs to carry his study...stuff. He is also using his headphones to listen to music which shows that he has an interest in music and we thought some background music (non-diegetic) sound could indicate what he is listening to.

Genre

For our 60% task the genre we are planning to follow is a Comedy Drama. It is important to have a Genre as it allows the audience to understand the point in a film for example if the genre of a film was a romance it wouldn't make sense if it suddenly switched into a action film sense unless the style of film was an action film. It also attracts a certain audience depending on the genre for example people might only go and see a film if they like that particular genre however if they don't know what the genre is then they might not go and see the film as they don't know what to expect. 

Examples of different Genre's

1. Action 



2.Romance  



3. Comedy


4. Drama


5. Documentary
 

As our film is a Comedy/Drama we need to make sure that the acting is good will high quality filming and camera angles (Lots of close ups to read the expression on actors face) however at the same time it is a comedy so we will need to see what the actor is doing and see the things that he is doing from a distance so there would be quite a few medium to long shots involved.

Music for Task

For our 60% task we were thinking of adding a backing track to help establish a rhythm in the sequence. In order to get the right piece of music we need to get into the mindset of when we wake up and get ready to work. We either wake up in a happy mood ready to get on with your day. So this piece of music we need it to be happy and fast to make it sound like the beat is encouraging the character out of the door. This would have to be in a major key so that the song makes the audience feel happy as it allows them to relate to the good (rare mornings) they have.  A good song that we could use here would be Mr Blue Sky as it is happy and upbeat, plus the term blue indicates a happy day because the weather is good. another good song would be "I feel good" as it is a happy song and the title expresses this. It is also well known so some people are more likely to enjoy it.

However we are more likely to have that kind of morning when you don't want to wake up and smash your alarm clock... so thats nearly every morning so we would need to have music in a minor key so the audience understand that the character is in a bad mood. It would also need to be slow to emphasise how the characters mind is moving slowly as they are tired or sad. A good song to use here for example would be any music that is slow with a piano in the background that is slow in a minor key as it represents how tired the mind is when you wake up in the morning.

     







We also need to link the music to what is actually going on in the film. So we need something that a teenager would listen to such as electronic, hip hop or rock. Something along those lines hat could link to his personality and how he is feeling. Its a good way of showing how the main character is feeling without him speaking.
When it came to actually choosing a song we originally went with "Sex-machine" by James Brown, we liked it as it was upbeat with a good consistent rhythm. However right as we juuuussstt finished editing all the clips in time with the music we realized that we had to and couldn't get copyright as the song was just to far well known. So we had to scrap that idea and look for a non copyright piece of music to prevent haste. In the end we were able to reedit this track into the clip in time with all the cuts in the editing.

Film maker Logo

For our media studies 60% task we were given the option to create a film production logo and we decided to go through with it.
The actual logo we realised had nothing to do with the story of the film so we figured that we were not really going to be restricted in what we did. So we decided to go with something a little weird, creative but simple for the audience to read. So here it is. The reason why we have a penguin is because... well I can draw penguins quite well and lets face it penguins are pretty awesome so that's what we went with. The Mise en Scene in the image shows the penguin stood up in front of a prison line up holding its name in front in the centre so people can read it. The hair and black eye also shows quite a reckless personality but it also shows the character to be quite a risk taker which is something as a group that we like to do so this fits in quite well. 
We also decided that our character should be a bird as in our preliminary task our Mise en scene was very poor and for some reason in some shots we could see a duck holding the door open which made no sense.
The company would not be independent and would be linked to a larger distributer e.g. Universal so that bigger funds can be used and more famous names in movies making them easier to promote and attract bigger audiences.

Mise en Scene for opening sequence

From our last task we learned that Mise en Scene is one of the most important things in a film and... well we really messed it up. For one my house was a mess, there was to much clutter in every shot like family photos or clothes this created confusion for the audience as they didn't know where to look. This time round we need to be really careful with what is in every shot and how much "clutter" we have in every shot to make the environment seem believable to the audience because we don't want to just film in an empty room or else the film will not make sense.
So what we need to do is lay everything out in an organise easy to read fashion without distracting the audience from the film so this would mean only having a few things on sideboards that don't distract the viewer like a toothbrush or a clock of sorts.

Costume ideas for main character

For our main character we need to show his personality through what he wears in order to communicate to the audience. So our main character is a young man of our age right now (so that's around the 16-17yrs of age) This is around the time when people get there first jobs and go for interviews. Of course this is a big moment in all of our lives and we want to demonstrate this event honestly with a little bit of comedy involved as well, similar to Simon Pegg's work.
So we are going to need to combine the organised smart business man that this boy is likely to become and the reckless clumsy stereotype that he his today.
We would therefore need a smart suit to represent the characters organised smart side but with a few noticeable imperfections like a partly untucked shirt or a dodgy tie.

Smart suit

Baggy badly done up tie 

 

We would be looking for something inbetween these two examples as we want to show that he has tried to do well with his appearance but he still needs to learn how to do some things.

Class feedback for pitch idea

So today we gave our pitch of our idea to the class for some feedback on what we could include in our 60% task.
With our idea of the titles appearing behind objects and following people in the film, we were immediately linked to the opening of fresh meat which featured titles appearing on every day objects like TV's or Book Shelves or even your speaker display as shown below.

We were also linked with the Mr Bean opening titles as they seem to swoop in as the character is walking along which is something similar to what we want to. But we must be careful not to copy Mr Beans style as we are going for more of a Simon Pegg sort of film.

Our Pitch consisted of us talking about the general idea of our film and then showing our 25 word pitch and story boards all in one Power point.  







Updated Storyboards

Due a recent change of decision with the subject of our 60% task we have had to update the storyboards with our new idea which consists of a young man rushing to work early in the morning.

Storyboards are very important as they allow the Director to continuously go back to there original ideas to see if anything needs changing. It also gives a direct order I what order each shot/scene is in so different scenes can be filmed at different times.

Timeline of openings

We have now devised our roles for our 60% task as of below.
I am in charge of Directing so that means helping put everything together without everyone falling apart (like last time), sound as we will need good audio when filming outside where wind is an issue and I should also be acting.
Jack will be in charge of editing as he is the best at it and we want to get the best marks and he should also be acting.
Chris will be in charge of the camera work so that would be camera angles and shot lengths.  And as he is the best actor shall also be taking part on the other side of the camera.

Me: Director/Sound/Acting
Jack: Acting/Editing
Chris: Camera/Acting