Evaluation - Question 4

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

This clip explains some of our research;



This clip explains some of out planning, construction and evaluation. There are some mistakes I could not edit out because the editing program would not enable me too however there is not many mistakes.



In research for the poster we used film websites such as www.empireonline.com, www.imdb.com and www.lovefilm.com in order to see what films are popular at the moment as well as what drew us to certain aspects. The bright colours and bold text attracted us. This showed us that aspects like this need to be conveyed in our poster in order to entice audiences. The images on the websites also caught are attention. This showed us that the image we use on the front cover of the poster needs to stand out and make the audience interested and eager to find out more. We also typed in "horror film posters" in search engine google in order to see a variety of scary posters we would not necessarily have heard about. This enabled us to see the different style of posters existing and what worked and what didn't. This also helped us to see the basic conventions such as bold and large text, titles positioned at the top or centre and close up images. We also became aware that the images on the poster were often giving us direct eye contact or very mysterious.

Other technologies we used in research for our magazine was magazine websites such as www.company.co.uk and www.elle.com in order to see general conventions of magazines. We wanted our 'good' poster to fit the general conventions of magazines. We also looked at www.empireonline.com for inspiration for our 'evil' cover. We wanted to see how it differed from "girly" magazines such as company.

We also used youtube.com in order to research existing trailers to see what is popular currently and where there is a gap in the market. Also on youtube you are able to "like" and "dislike" films therefore we were easily able to see how popular the film was. Movies such as 'Paranormal Activity' proved popular therefore we tried to take inspiration from the film. We included the mystery and shock aspects. You are also able to comment on trailers on youtube which helped us see feedback on the trailers we watched, what the audience liked and didn't like. We also looked out for trailers on television. TV channels often show film trailers and teaser trailers. By watching these we were able to see what needs to be in a trailer and what needs to be kept from the audience in order to not spoil the plot. We also used social networking sites such as 'Facebook' and 'Twitter' in order to see what is popular. On 'Twitter' there is a function called 'trending topics' which allows you to see the most talked about subjects. Films are often most talked about. This showed us what was popular in the UK as well as other countries. You are also able to type in a search which will display everyone who has talked about a particular search and what they have said. This helped us to see positive and negative feedback on films we researched such as 'Let me in' and 'Hide and Seek'. A lot of comments were negative. Social networking is a great way to see a variety of opinions.

In construction we used programs such as Photoshop and Indesign for the magazine and poster. We used these programs because we felt that they were the best programs to manipulate images as well as layer text. Photoshop also has a filter gallery which we found very helpful. We used a 'diffuse glow effect' which helped us portray a 'spirtual' and 'ery' effect. We also made images look 'scary' by making them dark which is a common convention in horror films. We also decreased the contrast and brightness in order to make the poster look scary. We created layers in Photoshop in order to change and postion aspects so they looked correct. We briefly used illistrator but felt it didn't work as well for our products. We also used dafont.com in order to get fonts for the poster and magazine which fitted our genre and storyline. We used 'Friday13' as it was bold and creepy. We also used 'TX_love' because it had hearts and linked to the love theme.

When constructing our trailer we used Imovie. All group members were not familar with Imovie which proved quite a negative. We were quite unsure how to use it but once using it a few times we became better at it. We struggled with connecting the clips and sound effects together however we got the hang of it. We edited the clips together on Imovie adding in captions and effects. When collecting our footage we used a handheld camera as well as a camera on a tripod. We wanted to use a handheld camera in order to get a "raw" and "natural" variety of clips. We used a camera on a tripod in order to get footage of a near professional standard. We used a mix of the two but audience feedback proved that the handheld camera was a negative on the trailer. We were going to record footage on a blackberry mobile phone but decided the quality would lack.


In planning we used a blog (blogger.com) to note down all our inital ideas. Throughout the planning process our ideas changed rapidly so it was important to log our ideas so we could go back to them if we needed to. We also drew storyboards in order to write down our ideas and plan them how we imagined them to look. We put them onto our blogs using a scanner. This was so they were logged and we could go back to them and develop them at later stages. We also made mind maps on paper and on word in order to remember our ideas. We also used 'Twitter' to search for current and popular ideas. We also used youtube to do this as well as lovefilm.com. We also the internet to search pictures of locations as well as using our mobile phones and handheld cameras to go and take photos in specific locations in order to get a variety of ideas.

In evaluation we used youtube, facebook and twitter in order to get feedback from people we knew as well as people we did not.We thought this was a great way to get a variety of honest feedback. We also showed people our trailer on youtube and asked what they thought. We also used prezi in our evaluation in order to display the comments and feedback in an exciting and interesting fashion. We also sent links out on twitter asking people to watch and comment on the trailer. We also recorded some feedback from other people.

All blog entries are on the group blog which includes every group member talking about all three final designs ; http://a2media10.blogspot.com/