Genre vodcast exercise 25Jan2012

No matter how many openings you've looked at, you should keep refreshing your knowledge and awareness of genre conventions and viewing actual examples of how concepts such as final girl or even violence are actually handled on screen. You also need to be engaging in wider reading, and we will do an exercise on this later.

Today each of you will get a slasher DVD you haven't previously seen, and your challenge is to view the opening 25-30mins (depending on time) and take notes on how this media product uses, develops or challenges the forms and conventions of the slasher genre. As you go you will need to take notes, plus screenshots or screengrabs (stills from the film), taking care to note what each is of; in the second period today you will have an hour, in a pair, to produce a vodcast comparing these two. Details follow...

CREATE BLOG POST

Set out at the top, as follows (you can copy/paste and edit from this post for speed):

TITLE: Slasher X

YEAR: 2012

DIRECTOR: D Burrowes

BUDGET: $4.7m

BOX OFFICE: UK: £0m [no distrib] US $6.7m

DISTRIBUTOR: UK: n/a US: Warner Bros

IMDB RATING: 2.7
READ MORE ON IMDB

Add a poster or other image to right if you can find one.

And now you're ready to begin critical viewing...

REMAINDER OF PERIOD 1: VIEWING + NOTE-TAKING 

You now have the rest of this period to view around the first 25-30 mins.
Take notes as you go on how this film uses, develops or challenges the forms and conventions of the slasher genre, noting aspects such as:
CHARACTER TYPES: final girl/s. qn binary opposition (eg reflects Laurie Strode type; visual appearance of f.gl BUT not virginal; uses s.qn type as f.gl); figures of authority (traditionally hopeless, reflecting teen audience); main characters teen/20s; male killer; Propp's roles
LOCATION: rural or subarban usually; isolated; confined space (characters trapped)
SOUNDTRACK: non-diegetic music - denote what kind, and why/where used; exaggerated diegetic sound at key moments
NARRATIVE: narrative enigma; false scare; killer's motivation/personality disorder; binary oppositions
EDITING: any SFX?; fast pace (older films had slower pace than today's) for youth aud; PoV shots of stalking
REPRESENTATIONS: lack of non-Caucasian characters (or killed off early); lack of disabled characters (or killed off early); sexist gender representations? (arguments on whether this is the case

Distributors + UK releases in 2011

I've posted on this in several past posts plus a links list, but one of the things you need to consider (look at the Evaluation questions) is which company might distribute your work, and you also need to consider/evidence that there is an audience for your idea/production.
So, you need to be looking at actual past releases, their distributor, box office, critical reception, awards, DVD sales etc
There are some things to consider: films with no distributor listed presumably failed to find a distributor willing to risk money financing a marketing campaign ... as most UK film productions do in our Hollywood-dominated market.
Box office flops can be DVD hits - famously The Shawshank Redemption, but also the British eg This is England.
Its worth thinking of a US distributor as well as a (separate) UK distributor.

Use the links list to research this, with such sites as:
Wiki of 2011 films
FilmDetail.com weekly list of UK releases in 2011
FilmDates.co.uk list recent and upcoming releases
Launchingfilms.com weekly release schedule

YouTube ANNOTATION TOOL

The following (which, in terms of shot order, I slightly messed up!) is an example of how you can use the YouTube annotation tool to create effective posts which work in a similar way to a vodcast.

OPENINGS EG: The Lost Boys (J. Schumacher, 1987)

Can't find full uploads of this classic opening, but there are two clips which show parts of the opening. We get almost a double opening - a helicopter shot over coastal waters, eventually tracking and zooming in to a fairground, where some obvious badass types in long leather coats and with heavy metal hair stylings (simple but effective mise-en-scene to set them as the binary opposite of the ordinary innocent folk enjoying the carnival rides) cause havoc before being ejected by a security guard. With nice use of ellipsis we shift to later on and the guard is locking up the empty fairground ... and gets taken out by the now flying vampires (a second helicopter shot is revealed to be them, as the first presumably also was!).
We cut then to a second ELS helicopter shot, and hear voices and radio from within an unseen car - an audio bridge as we gradually cut in closer to a road, then a car and finally inside the car. YOU DON'T NECESSARILY HAVE TO INSTANTLY INCLUDE A SHOT OF CHARACTERS TO START USING DIEGETIC SOUND!!!
Here's the first part, tho' it cuts out before the killing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3l9ezm2tEp8&feature=related
This is a longer version, but seems to cut out the sequence with the guard: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7T-YG_6uMU

The following (which, in terms of shot order, I slightly messed up!) is an example of how you can use the YouTube annotation tool to create effective posts which work in a similar way to a vodcast.

OPENINGS EG: Trick or Treat (M. Smith, 1986)

A fun, inventive movie, as cheesy as it looks now a quarter of a century on. Fetauring Ozzy Osbourne as a televangelist. Most useful for the great example of using mise-en-scene for exposition: the tracking shots across the protagonist's bedroom tell us a great deal about him. This also delays showing us his face - that simple bit of narrative enigma is generally a good convention to follow yourselves.

We also see a classic convention of teen movies (which, furthermore, hints at the romance sub-plot [hybridity] which we see in so many horrors, as production co's are well aware of the importance of attracting a female audience; the book Blood Money centres on this): intercutting between the geek/outsider and a glamorous cheerleader type, with the outsider thinking she's looking at him ... only she sails past to greet a jock type.

We also see the diary used as a device for exposition, plus a good example of humililation of the outsider - which often appears in slasher movies as the cause of the killer's transformation into a psychpath (see Prom Night and Terror Train, both featuring Jamie Lee Curtis).

The opening contains one use of strong language 5:17 in, so I'll only provide the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqpSvOMykQU&feature=fvsr

OPENINGS EG: Halloween (J. Carpenter, 1978)

Contains nudity so I won't embed it, but you can view the classic opening, largely shot as a single take (there is a clever join), and featuring aspects of media language which became part of the genre (blue-filtered lighting, suburban setting, steadicam, subjective POV shots) and that classic soundtrack...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7oP_vLpLoA

OPENINGS EG: The Warriors (W. Hill, 1979)

Low budget, but a great example of inventive crosscutting and carrying on diegetic sound over shots of other scenes; a very effective soundtrack and distinctive titles font too.

Using YouTube for interactive quizzes

Nice work from Rob here:

Using YouTube video to pitch

If you've got a spare $45k you can get this into production...
The detail from the YouTube page is added below

thepaperboatman | Aug 30, 2010 | 4 likes, 2 dislikes

COST TO MAKE: $45,000
contact tyroneacierto@gmail.com
visit www.thegravebandits.com



Synopsis: Professor William Seabrook, an obsessed American researcher, uncovers what he had
been searching for the last five years of his life-- an ancient meteorite made of pure
diamond that landed on a desolated island in Zambales, Philippines a hundred years
ago. But the local pirates he hired to help him uncover the treasure want the diamond
for themselves and betrayed the Professor. Unbeknownst to the pirates, the diamond
contains microscopic alien virus. Despite the warnings from the Professor, the pirates
keep the diamond. The pirates die after contracting the virus and their body resurrect
into mindless flesh-eatiing creatures.

And so they remain on the island, undead, hungry for flesh, thirsty for blood...

In a not so distant town roam the Grave Bandits, Romy and Peewee, two orphan
kids wanted by the law for making a career out of stealing precious belongings from the
dead. As they try to escape the townspeople, they end up on the desolated island and
discover a greater foe: The undead, lots of them! The Grave Bandits hide in a cave
where they meet Maiya, a beautiful native girl and Professor Seabrook.

Trapped on an island and left with nothing to defend themselves, the Grave
Bandits formulate a plan to escape and battle the undead using
improvised tools. But a diamond the size of a tangerine is hard to resist, just
when things are going according to plan, they discover greater enemies
amongst themselves. Will the Grave Bandits become our unlikely heroes or will they
ulitmately succumb to greed?

The Grave Bandits is a feature length horror-adventrue film filled with twists and
dark humor. It's a film no horror fans can afforrd to miss!
Running time: approx 1 hr 45 min.

Researching recent genre egs: as vid

Cross-posted from my horror blog.

The following vids were compiled by a horror enthusiast; they contain both more and less detail than you'd need: there are so many films it must be close to comprehensive, and must have taken quite a while to research (and find the posters) ... but, on the other hand, provides zero further info on screen by way of titles, which you would (and/or via a voiceover).
The vid is essentially simple to create, once the research is done and images gathered.

Evaluation General Guidelines

You must employ a range of multimedia to access the higher marks
Evidence what you're referring to: screenshots, video clips etc
When writing, use specific media language and semiotic terminology - be precise
You can access existing examples from past IGS students and current students at other centres
Each time you sit down to work on any of the Eval Qs, re-read the assessment criteria first, keep this fresh and prominent in your mind as you work!
Critique your work - its no good saying its perfect; you get rewarded for discussing aspects you'd like to have been more polished/different in some way ...
But that doesn't mean you can't show off a little too!
Make links into existing texts

Being Human

(cross-posting this from the Horror blog as it has wider use beyond the genre...)
The BBC show is very useful to look at as an example of the contemporary horror production. Postmodern to its core with characters questioning all the traditional cliches of horror roles even as they live them, aimed at a broad 15-34 (despite the post-watershed timing its 15-rated by the BBFC) youth audience, with characters and plotlines to attract both genders, infused with humour to leaven the horror, and with its own online-only spin-off or companion series, it truly is 21st century horror.All the episodes from the latest season (S3) are available on iPlayer as I write.
You will see that moral issues and debates are rehearsed through the issues and disputes; the situations (dis-equilibriums if you like) the protagonists get themselves into, and the efforts and attitudes of the antagonists they face. Horror has always been a platform for exploring moral codes and issues, not just a means to shock and appal; titillate and terrify.
In S3 Ep2 we see a great example of the representation of age - a teen vampire who starts out as the amoral teen thug of tabloid headlines but, through the episode's narrative arc, is transformed when given a chance by initially dismissive adults.
In S3 Ep3 we see a great exploration of the zombie - worth looking at for various reasons. Watch it to see how vital a role sound plays; the zombie is only made truly disgusting and horrifying with the overdubbing of bones cracking and rotting flesh 'sloshing' - strip these away and even with the effective music the zombie lacks verisimilitude; fails to convince let alone scare. Furthermore, as always with zombies, the character is a metaphor for part of the zeitgeist (the spirit of the age; common features or values of our time): the wealth-obsessed WAG, and the focus on celebrity culture and material goods/brands in the 21st century Western world. Critics of globalisation (an issue we look at in A2) argue that our media, from hip-hop videos to the various national editions of Hello magazine, are a conduit for spreading these vacuous, empty values across the globe.
As a UK TV drama, looking at and applying the semiotic terminology and framework of analysis is useful for your AS exam, and work into A2 Media (this technique lies at the core of all Media Studies work across the 2 years).
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00ydq2b/Being_Human_Series_3_Type_4/

Call sheet + production logs

You can download and modify these, or simply print off

Sample Call Sheet2

Db Production Log Details of Shots Taken Quality of Outcome and Follow-ups

YouRTube

have added a number of rough cuts, vodcasts and behind-the-scenes from both AS and A2 today to playlists on the IGSMediaStudies channel
I'll try to arrange some feedback from students elsewhere in the UK for the week back after half term, but it would be good to see you commenting on each other's work!
For curious AS, you can get a snapshot of what A2 folk have been working on, and for curious A2 you can compare the crop of 2010-11 to your prestigious selves (and maybe pass on some tips from your own experience filming for AS)!
There are many, many examples of top-notch work; two are embedded below:


There are more rough cuts etc on music vids for Gorillaz, Doors, We Are the Ocean and more, plus a range of material on the AS slashers, psychological thriller, zombie and rom-com productions!

Rasam Productions' new blog

Excellent example of an idea raised in your coursework guide, lessons and this blog: Rob, Asa and Sam P. have set up a sep blog for their production blog, packed with behind-the-scenes features!
See http://rasamproductions.blogspot.com/

Issues with filming in darkness

There are of course health and safety issues to consider!
What I want to flag up here - and I urge you to get some test footage to test this out and show you've done so - are problems with the cameras as regards shooting in darkness.
If you look at several of the past examples of AS coursework you may notice shots at night seem to blur, and movement, whether walking or running, seems odd or unnatural. This is because, without natural light levels, the camera - digital remember - is struggling to both capture and process the footage, giving the effect of skipping frames.
If you have some footage shot at night, try shooting something similar in daytime, so you compare the two versions side by side. You'll likely see the quality greatly improved in daytime.
While nighttime may be the ideal for your ideas, think about the consequences of shooting in darkness (and/or innovate a lighting rig!).

CHANGING POST DATES!!!

I've realised there IS a way to change the publication dates of posts; its a little cheeky but...

Here's how: if I clicked PUBLISH now on this post its date would be 3rd Feb 2011. For ever!
BUT ... I can click in POST OPTIONS and change the default setting at POST DATE AND TIME to SCHEDULED AT and type in the ideal date!

See pic below

Word doc not printing as we designed it

Working on the treatments, many of you had issues with the design you'd worked on being altered once I received it (other than me making various changes!)
Typically this comes down to a font you've used not being on the Macbook I use, or another computer you've tried to access. 2 egs: Hannah/Rebecca used Chiller font for a nice large heading; my computer doesn't have it so replaced this with a font which, as its a different size, destroyed the positioning of every single image in the 8-page doc! Hattie/Maddie used a font called HfW cursive in theirs - my Macbook doesn't have it and substituted the loathesomely ugly Courier font instead!

The solution?

When saving, go:
FILE
SAVE AS
[make sure its as Word doc, NOT Word 2003 etc which saves as a .docx and NOT the universal .doc]
TOOLS
SAVE OPTIONS
[check the box for] EMBED TRUETYPE FONTS
That means that the Word doc contains the font files too, so it wouldn't matter if another computer didn't have these installed.

The image below shows how this works.

I haven't yet checked 'Embed TrueType fonts' here; doing so ensures my formatting and design will stay in place!

Treatments - update + probs with formatting

Now have most of these in, and generally they're rather splendid! When time permits I'll be creating a display from these which I think will represent yourelves, the subject and indeed the school for any visitors really well..
I hope you've each learned a few useful pointers about using Word to create attractive documents, but I'd also be interested in your thoughts on the concept of treatments - did you find doing them useful? did they help to organise and bring together your thoughts/plans/ideas? above all, I'm thinking of bringing these in at an earlier point next year, with class time set aside to work on these - would it have been useful to work on these earlier?
In three years the way we've done Media coursework has been substantially different each time; your feedback is listened to and does influence planning for the subject, so your general thoughts are also welcomed at any time, whether by email, blog comment or informal chat!

I'll add scribd links to all the treatments when I get time.

Many of you had probs with your nicely arranged text/images jumping around - I'll outline a solution in a sep post

Treatments - VERY overdue!

Can you all look again at the original post: http://asmediafilmopening.blogspot.com/2011/01/creating-treatment.html

I've updated the eg on there and added more on the basic design aspects I'm after.
This one aside, I need all the rest to be revised and re-emailed with ALL the details above, including group pic, URLs, ident/logo pics etc
ASAP!!!

Comments

Still a couple of you who have yet to take word verification off your blog settings, as repeatedly directed to do! Please sort that out.

A word on YouTube comments

Keep checking your own YouTube channels for fatuous/rude comments. When logged in you can delete any comments and block the users who made them.

Various vids from blogs

Some excellent stuff coming in! I've added a playlist for the vids you're doing on your blogs - rough cuts, idents, discussions about ideas etc etc - to the IGSMedia channel.
So far, that various rough cuts/sample rushes or draft scenes/behind-the-scenes/ident drafts etc
Please pass on full quality copies of these to me!!!

TRY TO MAKE SURE YOUR POST, AND TEXT ON YOUR YOUTUBE CHANNELS, MAKES IT CLEAR/PUTS INTO CONTEXT WHAT WE'RE SEEING - YOU KNOW WHAT IT IS, WHATS MISSING etc, BUT YOUR BLOG/YOUTUBE AUDIENCE DOESN'T!!!!!!!

Here's a nice eg of a group doing a post highlighting their group dynamic, and showing the creative process - and the role of aud feedback in this - at work. Some suspicion the 'feedback' was a tad rehearsed, but then what reality shows these do show actualite/reality?!
http://harrytheknight.blogspot.com/2011/01/rh-hk-gg-video-discussion.html

DON'T FORGET TO REFLECT ON ANY FOOTAGE YOU UPLOAD - 

1. how did the shoot for this go?
2. what lessons did you learn from this?
3. make any changes to idea/storyboard/cast/roles/production schedule etc?
4. have any behind-the-scenes vids/photos of the shoot?
5. what do you intend to add/change/re-do now?
6. what works and what doesn't?
7. what aud feedback have you received, and what influence has this had?

Idents in progress

Good progress on these by some of you - don't neglect these! Make sure you get time booked in with John BEFORE the last two weeks when the real time pressures kick in, and F6 is constantly filled with AS and A2 production groups frenziedly editing!
Here's an initial ident draft from Alex, SamB and Kyle (working on a zombie flick):

It would be good if you could leave comments for each other, including constructive advice and opinion! All your blogs are linked through the http://asmediablogs.blogspot.com/ blog remember!

Nice eg of behind-scenes vid

Good work here by Will, Jem and Tom (when they're not creasing up!) giving us an insight into their production plans. Simple, but comprehensive and informative! Whether for AS romcom, slasher or zombie, or A2 music video or teaser trailer, this kind of 'walk through' video would be absolutely spot on, and a great addition to your blog.

POST TITLES IN GROUPS

Very important you start following this format:
if sharing ANY posts preface the post title with initials of post author, or ALL if co-created by all of you in a group
So, lets say its Kenny Dalglish analysing High School Musical 4 in a group of 3, a post copied onto Ian Rush's blog too; the post title WOULDN'T be Opening Analysis5: HSMusical4
It would be:
KD - Opening Analysis5: HSMusical4

TREATMENTS - new eg added

see orig post for an eg which shows some of the design aspects you should follow - a links list on the right lists key posts for your convenience!

Embed not working

Some of you have had problems embedding docs, vids etc ... and I've realised why!
At some stage you've randomly clicked to change a default setting...
The options in the image below appear when you click on POST OPTIONS when creating/editing a post

Blogger recognises that some blogs are about IT issues and so some users will want to include HTML (the 'hypertext markup language' that enables your browser to know what to put on the screen and where) in the body of their posts. To enable this you can set your post/blog to recognise HTML (what you copy in as an embed code) as simple text rather than interpreting it as code.

So ... check yours is set to INTERPRET TYPED HTML!!!

General principles of blogging

some useful pointers on the practice and purpose of blogging...
Some General Principles of Blogging

10 Steps of Rsch+Planning

Course Work as 10 Steps

Nice eg of post on an opening

Will has done an excellent post on Halloween, worth sharing as a good example! It combines denotation with wider analysis, and evidences his wider reading whilst also incorporating some multimedia aspects and reflects on how this might influence his group's production. See it here.

Good as it is, there is scope for yet further development! What could enhance this already excellent post?

• specific stills from the opening to demonstrate some of the detailed denotation of shots, effects, characters etc - I've included 2, from googling (don't have the DVDs to hand), showing how the blue tint was employed in the original and remake
• a YouTube vid linked to this topic
• even more additional reading/further resources hyperlinks
• set out points on 'how this film influences our production' in some combination of a different font/colour/indenting etc (Will has already denoted the quotes by both indenting AND changing the font)
• an individual or group commentary recorded over the footage of the opening (I've embedded an example of this below)
• discuss the remake, and the idea of film as 'franchise', comparing box office/budgets and sampling some reviews
• also worth mentioning here how good the feature-length documentaries, both available to you, American Nightmare and Going to Pieces are on this film, with director John Carpenter featured prominently in both

Let me stress, nobody expects you to go to such lengths with every post; these are just ideas on how you can make your posts so damn good future students will be finding them from googling, and quoting from YOUR analysis!!!

Its also a good think to reflect a little on HOW you found your information/resources. When I looked for images, my first search was "halloween blue tint" - this didn't bring useful results. One brief ponder later I extended this to "carpenter halloween blue tint" and, hey presto, lots of useful results!
When I looked for YouTube vids, I tried "halloween opening scene", which immediately brought good results ... and some unexpected but useful links too.

So, here's the opening of Halloween (and more) with a fan commenting over it:

This one is a fan's own version of the iconic titles

The remake's opening is in there too; here's the link, but I'll skip embedding this given the language included!