Director's commentary

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Location- In our opening sequence we used establishi

ng and close up shots to show that our film is set in Manchester by including key features of the city such as the shops in town, th

e Printworks and The Big Wheel. This is in similarity to ‘Confessions of a Shopaholic’ as there are many shots

to show New York. We used Mancheste

r as our location in our film as it is very similar to New York as it is a lively and exciting city with a great night-life and many designer stores and shops. American programmes such as 90210 and Ugly Betty also use many establishing shots to show the location. Furthermore in the first few seconds of our opening sequence we included a shot of stores such as Selfridge's and Louis Vuitton in order to hint at the story in our film.

Title- After a group vote we chose the title 'In your dreams' for our opening sequence. We chose this as it perfectly represents exactly what our film is about especially as the first part of our film is about the character dreaming. We decided to use a bubbly font for our title as it looked dreamy and therefore symbolized the story in our film. The title and credits were written in the colour white on a black background as it would make the title and credits stand out, furthermore the colour white connotes a dream. 'Sex And The City' and 'Mean Girls' which have similar themes to our movie also have used similar fonts and colors in the title of their films.

Costumes- The costumes in our media product represent girls from ‘Confessions of a Shopaholic’ and ‘Bratz.’The girls in these movies are trendy and fashion conscious which is exactly what we wanted to portray through our protagonist. However the clothes worn by Hollywood females in American films and programmes are usually from a summer collection but we had to clothe our protagonist in clothes according to the weather in Manchester. The days we filmed it was cold but sunny outside. The sun was ideal but we had to ensure the actor was clothed appropriately as it was cold and we therefore had to put a coat on the actor instead of a dress.

Lighting- The lighting in our opening sequence is similar to many Hollywood type films or programmes as we wanted to convey a Hollywood type of feel in our movie. Programmes such as 90210 use exactly the type of lighting we attempted to create. The brightness of the lighting gives the programme a sense of summer and happiness which is what we wanted to create. This was difficult however due to the resources we had and the weather too but we tried our best.

Camera work and editing- We wanted to keep the editing and camera work as simple as possible to make our opening sequence look professional and also to look similar to the real media products we took inspiration from. We used a varied number of shots in order to keep our audience interested and to avoid boredom. We also included a fade and slow motion in our media product to again increase interest by the audience.

2. How does your media product represent particular social group?

Our opening sequence introduces a protagonist who is a shopping addict and she dreams about shopping from very expensive shops where in reality she is in debt due to her shopping addiction. However it is not clear to the audience that’s she’s having a dream until the blackout. We picked a very pretty female character who is a young adult to fit in with the story line. We chose a female character because in society it’s stereotyped that women like to shop more than men and usually shopping is seen as a woman’s hobby.

The film represents the social group of young females because usually they are associated with a fashion obsession as well as being clueless about money as we have seen in many films like ‘Confession of A Shopaholic’ and ‘Sex And The City.’ Men are often seen as the more practical and careful with money whilst women are more impulsive with money and shopping. We also see that in the media such as magazines shopping is always linked to women. According to a survey, women aged between 14-45 think about shopping every 60 seconds.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1025582/Women-think-shopping-men-think-sex.html

This shows that younger women are more interested in shopping and that’s why we chose a young female character. Our opening sequence also highlights consumption and materialism in a time when many people are facing financial struggles which is relevant now due to the recession.

The character is dressed up with trendy clothes, high heel boots, hair and makeup also done which implies that she cares a lot about her appearance which is linked to why she’s a shopping addict. In this film the protagonist is from a white background that’s because she’s from Hollywood and usually in films like that the main character is more likely to be presented as a “dumb blond”. These kinds of films are usually set in America. She’s also from the middle class as we assume that she would need the money to buy that amount of shopping even though we know she’s currently in debt but that’s due to her shopping addiction.

3. What kind of media institutions would distribute your media product and why?

Our film has been greatly inspired by ‘Confessions of a Shopaholic.’ This movie is a big budget Hollywood film and is a Jerry Bruckheimer Films and is distributed by Touchstone Pictures. Touchstone Pictures was established in 1984, and is one of several alternate film labels of The Walt Disney Company. The company typically distributes more mature themes than those that are released under the Walt Disney Pictures banner. Our film however is going to be of a much lower budget therefore we can’t expect such a huge and well-known company to distribute our film. After doing research we have decided that Working Title would be a much more appropriate distribution company to distribute our film.

Working Title is a British film production company in London and produces films with lower budgets. Bridget Jones Diary and Wild Child are examples of films by Working Title and also they are of similar genre to our film. We believe Working Title would be the most interested in distributing our film.

Also we have decided to distribute our movie via social networking sites such as Facebook. This is because the main target audience film is teenagers and young adults and our specific age range regular ly use Facebook. This is ideal to spread trailers and news on our movie.

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

The main audience for our media product is teenage girls and young female adults. We have specially chosen this target audience because the protagonist is a female and the movie is based around her life and the troubles she faces through her addiction of shopping. However men may also be able to relate to the comedy element of the film too.

The genre is a romantic comedy and we have decided to rate it as PG as ‘Confessions of a Shopaholic’ is a similar genre to our movie. PG means Parental Guidance, which means that some of the elements in the film may not be appropriate for all audiences and it is up to the parents whether they let their child watch it.

We think our film can only be shown at chain cinemas because we have taken inspiration from many Hollywood films and programmes such as Mean Girls, 90210 and Desperate Housewives as we intend our opening scene to look glamorous like Hollywood films and dramas. Moreover our target audience is more likely to visit a chain cinema than an independent cinema, as any young teenager does not often visit an independent cinema. We would also want our film to be enjoyed by both an American and British audience.

5. How would you attract/address your audience?

The genre of the opening sequence is a romantic comedy and we used varied methods to portray this genre. Firstly we deliberately targeted the film at a specific age range, which are females 15-25. We then chose the title to be ‘In your dreams.’ We brainstormed a few possible titles and we chose this because it relates to the target audience and the genre of the film.

There are quite a few aspects in this opening sequence that relates to the target audience. Females can relate to the opening scene of our movie as some women aspire to be independent and also women enjoy spending a lot of money on shopping for themselves.

At the beginning of the film, we start by showing different shop windows and brands. This gives a clear indication of what the film is based around. The mise en scene is particularly important in attracting the audience. We filmed mainly around town that shows the theme of shopping and most females enjoy shopping. We used many long shots and close ups whilst the female protagonist is in town. This was done to show off the female’s clothes and hair and make up. The protagonist was appealing and attractive so she could relate to other females of a similar age.

We also filmed in a bedroom, the bedroom is important because it’s a personal space in which many women spend a lot of their time. We also had naturalist bright lighting to replicate a Hollywood type of film. Luckily on the days we were filming the weather was dry and sunny. Also in our opening sequence, we used upbeat music to ensure that the viewer knows from the very beginning what genre the film is.

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

From the preliminary task we were confident about the use of the camera equipment and we developed an understanding about how to undertake different shots with the tripod and camera. We experimented with different shots and angles, including high and low angle, over the shoulder, close up and establishing shots. Also we filmed many scenes numerous times to ensure we had enough good footage to edit and work with.

To edit our film we used Final Cut Pro which is a professional editing software application developed by Apple.

Before beginning to edit our movie we had to connect our camera equipment to the computer and transfer all the footage we needed onto the computer. The footage was then altered and cut using the 'mark in' and 'mark out' buttons on the keyboard on Final Cut Pro. We then selected the scenes needed and added them to the timeline. Once we had our timeline done we could then add effects and transitions.

Here is a screen shot of our timeline:

We also chose upbeat music that was perfect for the theme and genre of our movie and imported and added to the timeline too.

The text tool then let us input credits and the title into our movie.

We used ‘Blogger’ to create an online blog to present our planning and preparation for the preliminary task and the main task.

Our online blog shows all the steps we took from the beginning until the finale of our movie. On the blog we have also included location and costume pictures, ideas for the title of our movie and exclusive behind the scenes photographs.

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

From our preliminary task we have learnt to enhance our planning skills. All of the members in our group sat down and discussed any ideas we had for our main task; we also made notes and then had a vote on the best idea.

We then discussed locations and it was evident that a shopping location such as Manchester town or The Trafford Centre would be ideal for our theme of our movie. We decided to film in Manchester town because we wanted to do the filming in an outside location as we felt the lighting would be much better.

We filmed during our media lessons, as it was the ideal time for when we were all available.

We researched into our main character. In our preliminary task we didn’t do much research and we actually discovered that research was very effective and helpful. We wanted to portray our character as an independent woman who is pretty and rich.

We then created our storyboard, which was the basic outline of our opening sequence. We had to decide what order the scenes would go in and what was going to happen in each frame. However during the filing we added more scenes especially during town when we added the entertainer to add a comedy element and the scene where the protagonist is walking with the big wheel behind her. We particularly liked this as it establishes the location and represents Manchester.

We learnt how to make our own soundtrack with Garage Band as we were not permitted to use an existing commercial song as we were planning. However we decided for our final product we decided to use a copyright free tune from YouTube.

Through the editing we learnt how to use the Apple Macs and Final Cut Pro. Initially we found it difficult and thought we would not be able to familiarize ourselves with this new technology, fortunately we learnt how to use Final Cut Pro and this should be evident in our final product.

From our preliminary task we also learnt how to use the 180° rule. If we had not taken this rule into account the film would not have smoothly and the footage would look odd.

Overall the preliminary task was incredibly useful as it helped us to be cautious during our main task and it enhanced our camera skills too.