2. “In what ways does your media
products use, develop or challenge
forms and conventions for real
media products”
3. “Elle Aime Jouer”
which means ‘She Likes To Play’.
In the style of a ‘FRENCH NEW WAVE’
-
Relates to the narrative as the female character ‘likes to play’ with the males
emotions, giving him mixed messages.
We added a metaphor into our film of the female character playing the
xylophone, as she is playing an instrument the male character is waiting for
her. – Mise-En-Scene.
4. “Location”
• “Location”- The locations we used deviates against the conventions-
had to be English locations.
• Limited on locations
This was set in Eccles, • Worsley and Salford Quays for tracking shots, establishing scenery.
Ellesmere park area.
• ‘Greenland’ enhances the older styled era of the film.
This is our opening to the film on the left hand This is the opening scene to Breathless, you
side, a tracking shot going down the road can see it’s a tracking shot on the car. We
which has the mise-en-scene of trees and lights seen Breathless and got our inspiration for
etc. our opening from this.
5. “Salford Quays”
The images above are screenshots from our film from
Salford Quays area. As you can see its more of an
‘industrial’ area. Most of the shots we used here were
tracking shots, they had interesting buildings and also
symmetrical trees which I particularly liked about the area.
FNW convention have plenty of tracking shots in various
different areas.
The image on the right hand side is a clip from ‘Breathless’
(A Bout De Souffle) this also shows an ‘industrial’ type
area, with the similar buildings in a row at the back and
also there is a lake like the clips from our film. We had a lot
of inspiration from Breathless
6. “Manchester City Centre”
Two iconic places within
Manchester city centre, we
used these to make it clear
it was set in Manchester
and that is was a ‘twist’ and
our own rendition of a
French New Wave.
“Manchester big wheel” “Manchester’s corner house cinema”
“St.Anns Arcade” We filmed inside St.Anns arcade
in Manchester city centre, we
decided to use this location
because it had interesting
features, such as the squared
floor, and the glass rounded
roof. Which we used as a form
of ‘prop’ in our film.
7. “…Manchester”
We took these shots around
Manchester city centre, the ones
above are around a corner pub.
We used the bench as a form of
prop, seating her on the far right
we did on purpose to create an
unbalanced atmosphere. FNW
creates unbalanced films which
is why we decided to do this.
the ones on the left are from an
alley way around the Northern
Quarter.
8. “Flower Shop” and “Coffee Shop”
This is a small flower shop in the Northern Quarter of Manchester city centre and
the one below is a small coffee shop. We used this flower shop and coffee shop in
order to give the audience a clear idea of what was happening in the narrative, as
this shows the female character walking of on the male as he try’s to give her some
flowers and also in the coffee shop when she walks away from him. ‘Playing with his
emotions’
9. “Conventions”
The top image is a shot from
Breathless, which shows him
rubbing his lips with his thumb
with a cigarette in his hand, this
is shown in other French New
Wave films and more throughout
Breathless.
We replicated this shot and got
our male protagonist to do the
same. We did this to add more
‘French New Wave’ conventions,
as this is the convention of the
‘close up shots’ and also the
quirky style they intertwine in
the films.
10. “The Opening”
- The opening scene starts with the company name and who created the film.
- Leads onto the title and then introducing characters. (using cross fades)
- . Conventionally we have added important credits and the beginning of the film.
- Not clear its going to be a dysfunctional ‘love story’, although clear its going to be a older
styled film. – Black and white grain look etc.
- Jazz music, conventional
- -Fragmented story line- Conventions of French New Wave
- Artistic audience would appreciate our film
- The opening sets it up to fragmented also with all the different settings of tracking shots,
city centre to country sides
11. - We dressed protagonists in the style of French 1960’s.
“COSTUME” With the actress in a glamorous fur coat contrasting with
the casual but French iconic, nautical themed top, with the
We played to the conventions when black fared pants. This give her an attractive and
choosing our protagonists and also the mysterious look- which fits in with narrative of the film.
costumes, keeping to the ‘French’ look The actor wore the smart ‘suit’ look, although with a tweed
and theme. blazer with braces to add a ‘quirky French style’.
Head Scarf Tweed fitted
blazer
Fur coat Braces
Nautical
style top White fitted
shirt
Black High-
wasted flared Tight grey
pants pants
12. “Props”
“French Baguette” – iconicly
Convention- Smoking. French.
Seen in many FNW films, left image is a shot out of - Shows a metephor of couple
Breathless, the right image is our take on it. fights when they fight with
1960’s- one of the most popular and sociable the breadstick in parallel to
activities. the birds.
- -couples argue over ‘ petty
small things’
13. “Camera work and Editing”
“Tracking Shot” – CONVENTION IN FNW’ we used tracking shots to establish the scenery.
-operated the tracking shot in a moving vehicle to grasp a smooth but shaken long straight shot of
passing scenery
One of the biggest conventions in French New Wave is black and white.
-filmed it in colour and mantipulated it on Premiere.
-made it more fitted to the genre.
Added the characters names in a cross
fade on their first appearance.
-Audience can become familiar with
them.
- Only two characters, can build a
connection with the audience.
- Feeling of knowing the actors.
14. “Sound”
As our film is all silent and also set in the 60’s, we decided to have 60’s jazz
music featuring in the background to our film. The music fitted well with the
narrative as it starts of deep and slow when the tracking shots start and as the
pace within the film picks up so does the music.
“Diegetic sound”
The only diegetic sound we use
is when the female protagonist
plays the xylophone you here
her playing.
15. “How effective is the combination
of your main product and
ancillary texts?”
16. “Poster”
-My poster aim is to advertise our French New Wave film.
-I have researched French New Wave posters, such as Breathless, Les 400 Copes
and Jules Et Jim, to give me Inspiration and ideas for when creating mine.
-To reflect my film, I used the large image of them smoking, a convention of FNW’,
I also used three other Images from my film in the middle as a ‘story board’ format,
to give the audience an idea of the narrative.
This poster complements my main product, the film, as it highlights conventions and also a
narrative of the film, which is what i set out to do. These help make my film a finished
piece, as it has advertisement to promote my film and it will also have a magazine review
to create a more professional image for it.
< image used.
-Added a darker shading
and also a grain to give it
an older styled image.
My finished piece...
17.
18.
19.
20. “Magazine Review”
The magazine review is aimed at artistic film lovers, with plenty of text review, a synopsis
and credits. I have added 4 images and the poster within the magazine review to make it
more professional, and give more information about the film without telling the reader
what the film is about, it gives them room to guess and think about the film.
I have explored the use of highlighting quotes within the magazine.
I used this one underneath the image of the protagonists, and highlighted it
using italics and red colour.
- I have seen this being used in ‘Sight and Sound’ magazine reviews, it is a
convention within their reviews.
Adding credits onto the magazine review I believed created a
professional finished effect, as all films want to mention the
main roles in creating the film. I have mixed up some of the
credits so there wasn’t a repetitive trend throughout. As myself
and my partner completed every aspect of the film as a pair,
apart from the character roles.
“Sight and Sound” – I took a lot of
inspiration from this magazine, I
looked into the reviews, and I noticed
they had this at the beginning of an
article, I replicated it in my own style,
forming to their conventions.
24. “Focus Group”
Mary, Molly, Scott, Charlotte and James took part in the focus group.
Olivia(Myself): Thank you for taking part in the focus group, I would appreciate any form of
feedback you have to give.
Mary: Overall it was a very good piece; I really liked you kept it black and white, and also
adding a slight grain aged it really well.
Molly: I agree, although I did find it to be slightly blurred at some points, but i also fit with the
style of film.
Charlotte: I loved how you kept them looking French! They also would make a perfect couple
(Laughs).
Mary: (Laughs) I agree, they had a really good on screen romance.
Scott: I liked how you added humour to the romance of it, it made it easier to watch and enjoy.
James: I got a bit confused throughout the middle, I didn’t quite understand how you were
making it ‘Parallel’ until it got further to the end, but in a way it made me more interested and
made me think about the film more.
Molly: Yeah I agree, although I really liked how I didn’t quite understand it at first, it’s the style
of French New Wave.
James: That’s true although it could be improved, it could of been more clear to those who are
not familiar to French New Waves.
Mary: I liked how you used places which are iconic in Manchester, like the corner house and the
big wheel; it was good how you didn’t try to set it in France because I didn’t think that would
work.
Olivia: Thank you for the feedback, I understand it can be slightly confusing, although that’s the
effect we wanted to give.
25. “How did you use media
technologies in the construction and
research, planning and evaluation
stages?”
26. “Premiere”
To edit and put together our film once captured all of our shots we used the workshop
programme called “Premiere”. Before creating this film me or my partner had never used this
before, therefore we had to learn from the beginning. We had a short taster lesson on it
learning the basics, such as importing the clips and shortening them down to what we want
and then putting them on the timeline to create the film.
<Learning how to import The time line, which we
clips, to put in our drag and drop out clips
sequence film. onto once edited.
V
‘Render work area’ – once
happy with our work, we
would render the work
area to make our film clear.
27. “Photoshop”
I had to refresh my memory on Photoshop
from my AS level, on how to open files, open
new files, changing settings etc. I used
Photoshop to design and create my poster
and magazine review.
I used tools such as grain, changing levels
etc.
I had to refresh my memory on Photoshop from my AS
level, on how to open files, open new files, changing
settings etc. I used Photoshop to design and create my
poster and magazine review.
I used tools such as grain, changing levels etc.
28. Adding a grain to my images, to create and
older styled effect, I clicked onto filter, then
noise and added noise which added the grain
onto my image.
I have used YouTube to upload my video onto it
to gain feedback from the general public.
I have also used it for searching for French New
Wave clips, from films like Breathless.
I will be using sound cloud
to upload my voice
recording of my evaluation.
Slide share is what i will
use to upload my power
point evaluation onto,
so its an easier smooth
way of looking through
it.
Editor's Notes
TITLE: The title of the short film we have created is in the French language and when translated to English means ‘She Likes To Play’. We chose this title due to the narrative of our French New Wave styled film as the female character playing hard to get towards the male character, therefore she likes to ‘play’ with him and his emotions. We also used metaphors to get this acrossthrough the mise-en-scene, such as her playing the xylophone.
LOCATION: The locations we used deviates against the conventions as our film was based on the genre of ‘French’, although due to the limit on locations used I believe the ones chosen worked well. Keeping a ‘city’ in the film was ideal, and the older styled buildings and the iconic ‘Manchester Wheel’ made it clear it was a parody and a ‘Manchester take on a French New Wave genre’ Using Worsley area and also Salford Quays for tracking shots and establishing scenery worked well as we could get an industrial setting at Salford Quays but also in Worlsey we captured all of the more forest shots and ‘Greenland’ to help enhance the older styled era of the film.
OPENING: The opening scene starts with the company name who created the film leading onto the first scene which is a straight forward tracking shot setting the scenery. Whilst this is on screen the producer and directors name appears, after a few seconds a jump cut to the second tracking shot appears where the name of the film fades on and off. We also intertwined still shots within the opening sequence, giving the audience a stabilised shot of the scenery and mise en scene. Conventionally we have added important credits and the beginning of the film, blending them into the opening tracking shots, keeping the audience interested and more inclined to read them. As the opening begins I don’t believe its clear to the audience its going to be a dysfunctional ‘love story’, although that’s what we wanted to achieve, we want to audience to be surprised and excited to know what’s going to happen, rather than having a clear idea, although its obvious its not going to your average modern day love story, with the black and white and shaking camera, which are conventions of the genre French New Wave. I believe the opening tracking shots could lead to many different genres, although the jazz music gives it a more romantic ‘era’. The story as a whole is very fragmented although that is the conventions for French New Wave, I believe its easy. to follow but to appreciate every aspect of our short love story its more for an artistic audience. The opening sets it up to fragmented also with all the different settings of tracking shots, city centre to country sides
COSTUME: We dressed the actor and actress in the style of French 1960’s. With the actress in a glamorous fur coat contrasting with the casual but French iconic, nautical themed top, with the black fared pants. This give her an attractive and mysterious look- which fits in with narrative of the film. The actor wore the smart ‘suit’ look, although with a tweed blazer with braces to add a ‘quirky French style’.
PROPS: - Another convention of a French New Wave was having the characters smoking, therefore we used the prop of ‘smoking’ in our film. During research the majority of ‘French New Wave’ films included smoking, also in the 1960’s smoking was one of the most popular and social activities. As you can see in the left image this is the male character from ‘Breathless’ smoking whilst wearing a tweed jacket. In the print-screen on the right is our character from ‘Elle AimeJouer’ is smoking free held wearing a similar tweed styled jacket.“French Baguette” we used the baguette as its an iconic French food, although the main idea was to capture the characters fighting over the bread to show the metaphor of them not getting along, then parallel to this show the seagulls in the sea fighting over the bread also, which highlights the fact how couples argue over small things.
CAMERA WORK AND EDITING: “Tracking Shot” – in the opening to ‘Elle AimeJouer’ we used tracking shots to establish the scenery and mise en scene, as in my research I found this is a convention in the French New Wave genre. We operated the tracking shot in a moving vehicle to grasp a smooth but shaken long straight shot of passing scenery, some shots worked well and we used these in our film although some were too unclear. One of the biggest conventions in French New Wave is black and white. We filmed our film in full colour then using premier workshop we manipulated it to be black and white, watching our film in full colour to then changing it to black and white made our film much more fitted to the genre and in a whole, a much better film.Introducing characters we edited their names onto the screen when they first show their face to audience, using the same font and style as the title to keep a professional theme running through the film. This portrayed the characters introducing themselves to the audience, as they are the only two characters in the short film this give the audience the feeling of knowing the characters which enables an attachment to them, which is what we aimed for
I sent this questionnaire out when planning my film. Me and my partner needed to know what the audience would like to see before making final decisions. Asking the question to weather they are familiar with French New Wave films shown us if we needed to keep it simple or if we could keep it very artistic. The result was just over half hadn't heard of French New Wave films, although were interested in black and white films. Therefore we decided to keep in black and white and and easy following story line which everyone can enjoy. Romance came up as majority on genre, although as not everyone had seen French New Wave films, we decided to add comedy into the romance to make it more of an ‘easy watch’. As we were limited to locations we only had the choice of four reasonable places, Manchester City Centre was our choice on where to film to have a ‘city’ view on the film. This also was the publics favourite choice. We decided to set the majority in Manchester City Centre and have tracking shots around Salford Quays and Worsley area. Setting it in the afternoon, with using black and white it automatically give it an afternoon/evening effect. The public majority vote was to have a couple starring in the film and this fit in perfectly with the romantic comedy genre, we also chose the theme Valentines day to fit in with this. The public also wanted the couple to have a French look about them so when choosing our characters we looked for someone who could have the look as well as having an on screen romance with one another.We also decided to set it in the 60’s as the most popular choices were around that time, also we could create the female to have a promiscuous look as its in the era of the ‘swinging 60’s’
This focus group give me a good insight to what my audience think of my film. I believe the feedback was very good, as they understood the comedy and those who had seen French New Wave films recognised the conventions, at the same time those who didnt know of French New Wave films still enjoyed it. If i was going to change anything it would be to make the ‘parallel story line’ more obvious as a few were slightly confused with the narrative, although this is what we wanted the confusion we don’t want our audience to get bored, they need to be kept interested.
