Evaluation - Question One

In What Ways Does Your Media Product Use, Develop or Challenge Forms and

Conventions of Real Media Products?

1. Close Ups

In these two films they used close ups to highlight the emotions, or lack therefore of, on the faces of the characters. For example in the film The Ring the girl, Samara takes up a majority of the screen and is the only thing in focus in the shot behind what appears to be an out of focus building, this is significant as otherwise the pale girl would have not stood out as much among the pale surroundings. It is also strange that the girls hair is in front of her face hiding most of it with exception of an eye, her nose and her mouth. This goes against the purpose of a close up but it is still possible to make out the expression of the girl and that she is facing the audience that makes it more unsettling and .

Similarly in The Shining a close up is used but this time it is a fully focused shot and the face of the character is framed between two pieces of the wooden door, drawing more attention to to it. The strong facial expression clearly show up and are evident to the audience.  

                       

My group and I also decide to use close ups in our, we did this in order to proper convey the emotions that the teacher felt to the audience because the teachers motives are as a result of his emotions.

2. Over the Shoulder


The over the shoulder shot is take for behind a person, it usually frames the head, back or shoulder. It can be used when characters are having conversations, it can also be used to show a individual's features and details while showing where they are moving, as well as that it can be used to show a individual, group or even a scenario from the shoulder of an individual, this can allow the individual's reaction to the goings on

                                  

I used over the shoulder shot of the teacher walking down the corridor, the walk of the teacher is very slow and eerie and gives off a very strange, even sinister vibe and it also gives a view of the scenery as the teacher walks down the corridor. The over the shoulder shot also reveals the back of the teacher and the teacher is position very strangely, even ominously as he has his hands in a very awkward and sinister position, the camera also zooms in on the hands, this gives of an odd and tense feel to the audience as a result of the body language. I also used a over the shoulder shot of the student walking down the corridor, but this time in the opposite direction, but this time the students walk is faster and has more of a natural feel to it only to be stopped by the teacher

3. Mystery



To give my opening a sense of mystery and therefore suspense, I tried to achieve this via the use of shadow, In the scene where the teacher and student meet, I positioned the teacher against the lighting in order to naturally give a silhouette of the teacher hiding any detailed feature which would give away the mystery. However I could have done this more effectively as it is still quite clear who the silhouette belongs to. The shadow also give off a sense of danger and fear which tells the audience that something is not right

4. Black Screen

In my opening I use a black screen in between two seen in which action is implied to have taken place. This built up suspense because as the tension ramps up the audience is then 'starved' of the what could be happening but the sinister, eerie music we used allow for the tension that was there to transfer and also be added upon as the audience then waits to see the result. Audiences can also come up with the own ideas as to what happens during the blackout, this means the audience may resonate more with the film as they will imagine, in conjunction with the result, what satisfies them most. Black Screens can also be used to fill in two scenes that may not have footage that bridges them naturally.

5. Establishing Shots



In my opening I used establishing shot to set the location as well as that I used establishing shots to convey what the atmosphere is like in a location, this is usually the way establishing shots are used, for example the establishing shot of the outside of the school was used to show the inactivity of what is otherwise very busy. In other scene, for example the classroom was set up via an establishing shot, in this circumstance, it was used to build realism. It can be used to also allow the audience to relate as using a particular location could be more relateable, hence why our film was set in a classroom as our target audience is teenagers. I used out of focus shot when using establishing shots of location, to subtly tell the audience that something is not quite right and that things are not as they seem here, but it comes back into focus when it says "KEEP OUT", which is a clear sign of danger.