Evaluation Question 4. How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
I have used many different media technologies to produce my construction, research, planning and evaluation during the course of my project. Both computer programmes and media equipment have came into use; video camcorder, tripod, Adobe premiere elements, photoshop, youtube, audacity, wordpress, publisher, powerpoint and ’scribd’. To show my research into current media products such as trailers I copied links from youtube and pasted them into wordpress. I then carefully analysed each selected trailer to showcase how I unpicked conventions that I would like to use in my own product. After analysing different trailers I decided to write up a rough storyboard, scan it and publish it on wordpress to display some of the conventions I will be using from the horror genre and trailers I had looked at.
I also displayed my research into posters using the internet search site google to find posters with conventions in which I wanted to follow. I found it incredibly simple to find the type of poster I was looking for with the hundereds on display in googles picture galleries. Whevever I had made some progress on my trailer I used wordpress to publish it and so it was very easy to track progress in the development of my product. Some teacher comments on my work aided the construction of my trailer. For example, when my raw footage was posted I was given a hint to add some creepy music and titles, in doing so this really helped the development of my final product as I feel the non-diagetic music is a huge part of my trailer.
Using the digital camera, I managed to get some photos of the location of my trailer before filming. This helped me to decide on whether the location suited the genre of my film, which I decided it did. Having previously made a practice video using Adobe Premiere Elements 2.0 I felt confident using the software as I began the making of my trailer. However, as I progressed my skills became more sophisticated, I learned how to make use of crawling titles, editing soundtracks and time manipulations; making clips either faster or slower to adjust the pace of the trailer. As my skills progressed I feel the quality of my work did too.
I did have some issues with the video cameras in creating a conventional horror trailer. Horror genre trailers make use of low lighting and dark scenes to add to the fearful atmosphere. However, I was unable to accomplish this due to the equipment made available to me. I was forced to film in the full light of day although this is where my skills using the film editing software increased further. I was able to manipulate the saturation and brightness of certain clips to create a mood and atmosphere closer to what I was looking for. Adobe Premiere Elements 2.0 did crash occasionally which sometimes halted my progress, I could overcome this problem by saving my work regularly to make sure none was lost. I was able to easily add in an appropriate music soundtrack using audacity to record and convert the file. I could then simply add the file into Adobe Premiere Elements and place it where appropriate.
I made good use of the programme Photoshop to create my poster and magazine. I was already fairly confident with the use of this software due to much practice in my year 12 media project. The poster was fairly easy to make as I was able to alter the colour scheme of the main photo to create a pleasing effect. I was able to place my film title in the desired position and create some writing at the bottom to make the poster look more realistic. However, there were some extra skills that I needed to master. In the creation of my title I wanted to create a fade effect on the word ‘Burying’ to make my title more relateable to the photo beneath. I achieved this eventually, but photoshop made this simple looking process rather difficult and complicated to do. I further modified my title giving it a more rugged and creepy look by using tools on photoshop with ease. The creation of my magazine cover was fairly simple using photoshop, just a case of inserting text where appropriate and manipulating the main photo to make the mask stand out more.
To obtain audience feedback, I used a video camera and tripod to easily set up a recording situation for me and my peers to discuss my trailer. Powerpoint was a very reliable programme to use when approaching part of the evaluation stage. It was useful to add screenshots from my trailer, poster and magazine to display where my ideas had come from. To publish this on the blog I used a website called ‘scribd’ which I had no problems what so ever with. Publisher was also used in the evaluation of my product, the programme made it easy for me to add the necessary images and text where I wanted. Overall, the use of media technologies in the creation of my product helped me immensely and I came across very little problems.
