5/03/2015

Evaluation

Question 1:
Here is the link to the issuu I made for question 1
http://issuu.com/sgerlach97/docs/question_1.pptx_3effe6ed68c884/1

Question 2: 
Here is the link to the issuu I've done for question 2
http://issuu.com/sgerlach97/docs/question_2.pptx

Question 3: 
What kind of media institution might distribute your media products and why?

Our film is a special genre of thriller, it is a supernatural stalker thriller and because of that I think it would be quiet popular and people want to see this film. There are a lot of stalker films and thriller out there, but no stalker film is crossed over with the supernatural horror genre. This could be really good for us, because then the magazines could write about our film and talk about the crossover of thriller and horror and how we done it. I also think it would be definitely a film on youtube, because it is a short film and also an interesting topic and we done a lot of good work with this film and spend a lot of time doing it. The magazines can also write about the own written music, because we said we don’t wanted to take some music from the internet and steal or copy from another film so we sat down and started to think about our own music for the film. This was also helpful, because then we could build up the music where and when ever we want to.

I also think this film has some cinema and DVD qualities, because of the special genre and the storyline. Because the storyline build up tension in the audience and a thriller and a horror film should do that and the audience can also think a little bit into the victim, because it happens at a normal day at a normal open place, so they can think that it could happen to them too. But also the camera optic shots are special and make the whole film more interesting than other stalker film, because in the end every stalker film has the same story. So we put the camera optic in it that the audience can also feel like they are sitting in a CCTV room and watch the whole situation in real life. It would be really good to see our film in the cinema or on DVD, but the thing is why I think at this moment I would be better as a youtube film, is that we had completely no budget and not a as high technical  equipment as they have in the cinema films. So I think if we could film it again with more budget, big equipment and a qualified team behind us we could make a cinema film out of this little short media film.


And the biggest point is, that it is just a film opening, so it isn’t the whole story of the film. The film would go on after the turning into a ghost and for that we need again more money, better equipment and a qualified team and especially more people who help us with everything. If we could have all these things and our film is coming in the cinema and we can buy it as a DVD then I think it should cost between 10 and 15£ and it should have the age distribution 15. The age distribution should be 15, because it is still a thriller with a little bit horror and it is building up tension a lot. And also because of the killing scene and the turning into a ghost. Also the understanding of the film is easier for people over 15 than under 15, because we have the voice over in German so they need to read the subtitles and concentrate to the storyline together. The film should cost between 10 and 15£ at the beginning, because if we do a DVD we also want to see it in the cinema and this all cost money and if we get the stuff to film it again in a higher quality and make it longer we want to have the money we put into it back. 


Question 4&5
Here is the link to the issuu I made to the questions 4&5


Question 6: 
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing the product?

In this year media we learned to work with a lot of different technologies. Especially for me it was really a new experience, because I and the other group members of my group we’re all exchange students from Germany. In Germany we don’t have the opportunity to do media as a subject in school so it was completely new for all of us. The beginning was quite hard for us, because most of the British students done media for GCSE and knew how to use the filming equipment and how to edit a film. So the first month meant for us just learn to use the equipment, learn to edit a film and learn the name of the different shot types and angles. Our teacher was here also a good help, because she showed us what we need to do and explained us many times the different shot types. For the films we done in the first few month we just used a camera and the editing program final cut pro. We focus really on learning the different shots and angles and how to use the school equipment. We also started to work with all the other things, like the dolly or the track. So we helped each other and made sure that everyone could do all the things, like filming and editing. But at the end each of us was responsible for one part in the final film. So my part was to edit the film and make the music and I also was the director of our film. Because I haven’t done editing before I used the whole time the same program ‘final cut pro’. This was easier for me, because I don’t needed to learn a second program. Final cut pro is a really good program where you can work with the different shots and put them together to a good looking film. This program is also really easy to understand and easy to handle. So I think if I would be here a second year I would use it for my year 13 again. It was really easy to load up the shots into this program, because you just need to plug the camera into the computer and then the program is opening by itself a window where you can just the shots you want to upload to the program. Then you could click on one and put it into your working line and work there with it. You could for example put a filter over it or just put a fade between two shots and many more things. Sometimes I needed to wait a long time till I could do something, because there are still a lot of films on my computer so it took sometimes a few minutes to have everything loaded. This sometimes was not really helpful for the editing. Final cut pro has some many opportunities for editing a film and each time we used it we find some new things we could maybe try and use. For example at the end of our film, when the antagonist is turning into a ghost. This was an idea we had when we talked about our story before we even started filming, so we went to a teacher and asked if it is possible to do something like that, and he told us that it is quite simple and showed us how to do it with final cut pro. So we done a practise shot and then we found that it is working really well so we used it a lot of times in our final film. It is in the end just putting two shots over each other and let them fade into each other. After this year now I can say that I can work with final cut pro without any problem and that it is a really good program and without this program our final film wouldn’t that good as it is now. This program is definitely a good choice to work with for media and if you want to edit films really easily and I would definitely used it in the future more often.

And for my blog I also used some technologies I have never used before. There are two websites and they give you some good opportunities for make good looking and interesting documents for example for our media blog we needed to do this year. I really like these two programs, because they are really easy to handle and it makes every single presentation more interesting if you use them. The first one is prezzi. It is a website where you can do some slideshows about any topics you want. I used this program really often, especially when I don’t my film analyses, because you can use them really easy and it is like Microsoft word, but looks so much nicer. Without this program my blog wouldn’t be that good looking and varied than it is right now. You can handle it really easy and you can put pictures and videos into it. This was really helpful for the film analyses I’ve done, because I could show a clip from the film and then write something to it and put also a picture in tut. You can’t do that with word or the other Microsoft programs. The only not so good point about it is that you need to sign in with your email address, because some people don’t like to sign up for something, but it is still without paying and I think this is helping me so much in my school life now. This website I will definitely also use at home in Germany for some presentations. Because it is as easy as Microsoft word and PowerPoint but it looks so much nicer.

The second one is issuu. This is also a website and you need also sign up with your email if you want to use it. There you can upload some documents you’ve already done. It is really fast in uploading the document and you can also still change things on it if you uploaded it. The only really bad part about it that you can’t upload normal word documents, because all the text would change the place and it wouldn’t be in the order you want to have it anymore. That’s why you always need to look that you’re not doing a word document instead you need to do a PowerPoint presentation. But otherwise it is also a really good program to use for presentations in school or analyses.

The other programs I used are just Microsoft Word and PowerPoint. These programs are on my laptop, because I have a Microsoft system and I used these two programs for many years now and everyone knows these programs and is working with them. And because I work with them for many years now it is really easy for me to handle them and I know exactly where everything is and also the schools in Germany are just working with the Microsoft programs.

So in the end for me and my group was it hard first of all to learn how to use the new programs and all the equipment. And next to learning these things we also needed to decide who is doing what in the final film and think about a story. But the hardest thing for us was first of all to find a group name, we sat down together and thought about some names and found one, but after a few weeks we found a better own and this one we thought is fitting better together with our group so we changed the name again. And after we found the name we had to think about a group logo and then we needed to think about an intro where we needed to put the logo in. I think the problem with the logo was in every group, because it’s always hard to find something everyone likes and then it also needed to fit together with the name of the group/production. But we draw in the end a really good logo and it is fitting together with our group name and we constructed a perfect intro for it.

The latest difficulty was to find the music for out final film. Our teacher told us that it is always better not to have a really famous song or to take one out of the internet. So we thought about other opportunity we have to get music for our film. We decided that we write our own music for our film. We came to this idea, because I’m also doing AS Music and we are doing right now our final composition with the program Sibelius 7 and so I said I could compose the music with the piano and write it into Sibelius 7 and then export it as a music track and upload it to final cut pro and use it as our music for the final film. Sibelius 7 is a program were you can write note papers for every kind of instrument. This program was also new for me at the beginning of the year, but with the help of my teacher and some practise I know now how to use it and can work really easily with it. So this program rescued us for stealing or copy music from another film or the internet.

At last I will talk about the web side I used for my media blog. I used not like all the others tumblr I used blogspot. I changed from tumblr to blogspot because I had before I came to England a blog on this side so I decided to work with this side again. And I think personally blogspot is easier to handle than tumblr, because you can do more options and change more things and you are more flexible with your posts. Because I used this side now the whole year I can work really easily with it and I also found out some new things I haven’t known before this year. We found out that you can do more different sides on one blog and you can put links into a post really easily. The used different sides on my blog because then I have a better view over everything and the people who visit my blog can see the different topics easily and then find the things they want to read or see really easy.

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

Our primarily task is our short film 'Gossip', you can find the film in the sections FILMS on tis blog. In this film we used as much different shot types as possible. As I said in question 6 we four are exchange students and never done anything like that before. So it was all completely new for us. With help from out teacher and just trying some new things, we learnt to use the program to edit the projects and to work with the camera and different angles and shot types.
As the director and editor in our group I'm normally just behind the camera and responsible for the storyline and the editing. So I learnt in this year to use final cut pro and I can edit films now really easily and know how to direct a film. We also learnt how to plan films and to plan the whole filming and editing time.
Since the primarily task I learnt a lot more, like how to make special effects in final cut pro and how to overlap two shots, for example.
In our final film we improved a lot. We improved the different shot types, because we learnt that it is important to have many different shot types that it is not boring for the audience. Also with angles, in the primarily task we haven't got any angles, but in our final film we worked really often with different angles to make a different effects and the film more interesting for the audience. We also get rid of the whole camera shaking. At the beginning it was really hard to think about the right shot, a good angle and to look that the camera is not shaking. But with the time we improved it, because we had a lot of practise and get used to the whole process of filming a scene.
In the primarily task we just used the easy editing techniques, but in our final film you can see that we used more difficult techniques and try to make the film looking better and more interesting for the audience by using different fades or overlap two different shots.
I can say at the end, that my group improved very well in this year and that we can see our improvement through the films we made. I'm really happy with what we done this year in media and I can say that we as a team helped each other and tried to put everyone in our group up to the same level. Because we wanted that everyone knows how to film a scene with the different equipment and how to edit a film. So we can be proud, that we learnt so much in so less time.
I really enjoyed this year in media and I will definitely take the whole experience and the new knowledge in the future.


5/02/2015

Our final film - 3 DAYS


This is our final film 3 DAYS. It is a stalker thriller with some horror genre in it. Please have a look and I hope you enjoy our work. Thank you!

4/14/2015

Our locations

Elisa was writing about the locations we used in our final film. And she done a document and uploaded it. Have a look on the pictures down here please.



Detailed timeline for '3 DAYS'

Here is the second detailed timeline for our final film '3 DAYS'. In this timeline I describe the different shot types and angles we used and why we used it, so please have a look at the issuu document! The link to the issuu document is below. Thank you.


http://issuu.com/sgerlach97/docs/presentation1.pptx_26c7694c04b9aa/1

4/05/2015

Introduction of our 2 actresses

Here we see the introduction of our 2 actresses, Elisa and Manjana. They will talk about their role in our final film. So please have a look. The link is down there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVMJFQQqRho




4/02/2015

survey monkey analysis


Initial ideas prezzi from Toni

We thought about 3 different film ideas from 3 different sub genre and compared it to our market research. So we choose on of this 3 ideas for our final film. Toni wrote that done and done a prezzi for us with the 3 ideas. So please have a look and click on the link down there. Thank you.

http://prezi.com/5ctmlpu1una5/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy&rc=ex0share

3/30/2015

Final idea

Toni analysed our final idea. She talked about for example the sub-genre and the BBFC quotes. To see the whole work click on the link below, please!
http://prezi.com/qwtoxvwvlvsy/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy&rc=ex0share