Shot locations

Titles - My house (kitchen / hall way / stair case / bedroom)
High streeet scene - Portishead high street
Close up of Lola - School media room

Evaluation

In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge form and conventions of real media products? 

Shot reverse shot - We used this technique regularly in our prelim task, where as not so much in our title sequence as it wasn't incredibly relevant as we were going for a 'montage' look. 

180 degree rule - We kept to the 180 degree rule, making sure we didn't make any continuity errors.

Match on action - We used match on action with the titles where Lola takes the ketchup bottle out of the fridge and places it on to the side, with the directors name on. This technique zooms in on detail to the ketchup label, and also shows how we have developed camera skills. 

Correct framing - Framing shots was hard as we needed them to fit together right, especially the shot where Lola takes Jack's dirty boxers out of the wash basket. This was a combination of 3 shots put together, so the framing was key. 

Camera angles - We tried to use many different camera angles for variation in shots, like the ed scene when it is film above Jack and Lola in the bed. This was hard to film because of balance but gave the shot a better effect as you can see the whole bed and both Jack and Lola. 

Camera shots - We tried to vary camera shots to show how we have developed our skills, and to show close ups for emotion and long shots to set more of a character understanding, as you can see what they are wearing etc.
Non digetic sound - We used the song Pack it up by Eliza Doolittle, that is fun and upbeat suiting the genre and showing the audience the fun nature of the film, instantly showing Lola's personality.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzY0-I4Gq5w
(Link to Pack it up - Eliza Doolittle)

 

How does your media product represent particular social groups?

It represents mostly women, as well as anyone in a relationship most likely in their 20s to 30s who are beginning to move in with their partners and take relationships further...
Also it could represent the arty / creative social groups as that's how Lola particularly is portrayed. It obviously represents an arty culture including art students and teenagers, in college and university, as Lola has a young and 'clingy' persona, who is maybe to mature enough for a relationship. 
The film is definitely aimed at straight people, of any origin but would mostly be watched by White British people, as that is the culture represented in the film. 
Mostly aimed at middle class, people who would go to the cinema as a social event etc.. or for a girlie DVD night in. 
Our film may be watched by 6th formers and teachers alike, mostly females though as men tend to like a little more action and so on, and this film is more aimed at a women audience with its hilarious love story and sadness the break up brings for Lola. 
We have tried to portray the social groups by giving Jack some charm and arrogance to represent a ego centric male that woman would be familiar with, and as for Lola we choose her to be rather kooky and different, but totally lost in love to show how sometimes you can be helplessly lost in love but you cannot control how the other person feels about you. Woman would therefore sympathise with Lola and begin to love her, especially as she isn't in the wrong and had good intentions. 
We achieved this by her acting quite naive and sensitive but loving and caring of Jack. We also dressed her in quite a hippy style, giving her wild, care free hair to match. We also payed careful attention to detail and painted her nails different colours, to show her creative side. 
We tried to show how Jack strongly disagreed with her colourful style by him saying strongly "Go change" as if he is mad at her for making him look bad when they are together. 
We used close ups to show Lola's emotion on film, this is a common feature in similar films such as Brigett Jones' diary. 

(Briget Jones Diary DVD cover)

(Arty style 19 year old, shows demographic)

(Example of audience / simular to main character)

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Love actually was distributed by united international pictures (UIP) along with many similar films, this would be a great media institution to distribute our film as then it would be trusted as a Romantic Comedy, up to standard with previous films that people love.
It would also be advertised in the cinema before the start of another Romantic Comedy, so the target audience can watch the trailer and will hopefully be intriuged to watch the film next time they vist the cinema.

(Love Actually DVD cover)

Who would be the audience for your media product?

The audience would typically be women 20-30, as they can relate to the heart break of a break up and how they may desire a man to be in their life. Also women who have also dated an ego-centric man, and have been hurt as they would understand who Lola feels in the film and they could relate with her. It also would attract people who enjoy light hearted comedy, as the genre is Romantic Comedy. Teenage girls may also be included in the audience or 6th formers as they could watch the film on a girlie night in to have a laugh. It would be a typical film women go to watch at the cinema, where they have to drag their boy friends along.

(Women 20-30 - Target audience)

(Teenage girls at a sleepover - Target audience)

How did you attract / address your audience? 

Our audience would mainly be women, We have aimed to attract our audience by showing how an everyday relationship can end, relating to a lot of people, which includes emotion so they may sympathise with Lola, but also a funny side to have a good laugh at. Many people like comedy in films, so this is a good feature to use to make the film more attractive to a wider audience. It would be simular to other Rom Com films, so an already wide audience of other films such as 'Monster in Law' would be intereseted in watching a simular film. 

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Personally i have learned how to use imovie to edit the film and to cut and edit shots to shorten them so they fit in well with our film. Also using different camera shots has helped me develop camera skills and i have been able to vary shot types and zoom in and out. Also in lessons we have learned about different camera angles and shot types, causing us to develop a wider knowledge of how to achive certain effects in our film, making the shot types and angles more complex so we can improve from our original prelim.

Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the procession from it to the full product? 

In the Prelim task, we weren't familiar with the imovie programme or how to film to perfection on the cameras. We had to practise with different shots to get the hang of it and also practised editing on imovie.  I got one of my friends in another media class to help me figure out how to edit properly, then watched all the shots through, cutting them appropriately to reduce the seconds per shot. in the prelim we only did this slightly, making the majority of shots too long for an opening scene, especially because it was a conversation between two girls, and didn't really have much mise-en-scene, which we really tried to focus on this time.


(All images from Google Images search engine)

Simular films...

Bridget Jones diary is very much simular to our film as it is about a woman who doesn't have much luck with love, simular to Lola in our film where she is comical because of her heart break and a lot of women can relate to what the character is feeling in the film. Romantic Comedies are a typical womens genre, where they cuddle up on the sofa with their friends watching their favourite films eating ice cream. This is what i aim for our film, as then it can become a household favourite, and will be known long after it's left the cinema.

(Bridget Jones Diary DVD cover)

Audience and Targets

The audiences we were aiming for would be the typical stereotype females who watch Rom Com's.

this means we needed to create a title sequence what would suit this audiences and intrigue them to watch the film to the end. 

romantic comedies are known for their funny love stories which entertain their audience as well as bringing in an element of comedy. This element of comedy is usually shown through the love sick character being a bit useless or metaphorically blind, this image is what we have focused to portray through our titles. 

Using quirky painted writing to reflect the main character Lola, and the coldness of Jack on camera we have tried to create this theme throughout our titles to represent the romantic comedy genre. 

Our main target was to show this in our film which i personally think we have achived quite well through the mise-en-scene and the titles. 

Changes we have made so far...

After filming for a whole day for a large part of our footage, we realised that making slight changes to our story board was needed. we realised we needed to show a lot more closeups to show Lola's emotions come through on camera, and re shoots were essential, to make sure the story fell into place.

We realised whilst shooting we needed to show a scene of her waking up alone, confused on where Jack is and then her finding the note next to her flowers.
This would therefore make more sense as he would have left the note then left.

Our titles needed slight tweaking, as we wanted them to all reflect Lola's arty style and to be house hold objects to create a 'qwirky' theme. So instead of putting the Producers name on the wall in digital text, we want to spell it out in spaghetti letters across a plain plate, so it fits in well with the rest of the titles.

(Picture used; from another blog to show idea.)

As we planned everything before we started any filming it was obvious we would make some changes to make our titles look right.

We still also need to film our 'High Street' scene, where Jack and Lola are walking along together and embrace in a hug, but Jack looks over Lola's shoulder at an attractive woman passing by. This then showing how he's loosing interest in Lola, at how more sophisticated woman are more his type, rather than quirky Lola.

Music and Sound

The song we are using throughout our titles is Eliza Doolittle - Pack up, which fits in well with the genre of our film (Romantic comedy). The upbeat lyrics and tune fit well with the titles, showing off the personality of arty Lola, as well as giving it a more comical feel to go alone with her sadness about the break up.
 We play this along with the titles, where Lola picks up Jack's dirty boxers not caring as shes besotted with him. Also where shes tiding the kitchen and unpacking the boxes, seeming really happy before Jack leaves the note saying sorry, next to the flowers he gave her.
We chose this song as it seemed to fit well, and as its well known it will get the viewer interested to watch as its likely they will already be familiar with the song.
This also comes in with use of non-digetic sound, as its being played over the top of the shots of Lola.

Pictured: Album cover for 'Pack Up'

Props and Titles

We decided to show our titles on house hold items as Lola began unpacking in her new home. The items also show off her personality and her arty style we thought up different ways in which we could present the titles, so could fit them all in different ways whilst Lola is unpacking her kitchen. 

The edited version of the Heinz ketchup bottle is one of my favourites for the titles as it looks quite realistic and gives a further edgy look on our title sequence. 

Morgan and Amber decided on the costume for the titles so we painted their names in acrylic paints, also showing off the creative feel. 

My name was typed on a clock face and printed out and cut into the shape of a clock we borrowed from our Media room. I helped with a lot of the sound and effects so this is where i appear in the credits. 

We drew Ed's name with mud and fabric pen in men's white boxers to show his masculine care-free side, getting Lola to pick them up and look at them, not minding he's skid marks are all over them as she 'Loves' him so much. §

This picture of Lola and Jack is placed on the microwave where Lola places the clock in the titles, before she puts it away. This shows how much she likes him, putting pictures of them around her new house. 

The paint palette represents Lola's arty style as is hand painted with acrylic to give of an authentic effect. 

Pictures taken and edited By Emma Leigh Smith and Amber Kew.