question 1

1. In what ways does your media
product use, develop or challenge
forms and conventions of real
media products?

2.  The genre of our film that we decided on was
social realism
 to show this onscreen we found that a range
of different things aided us to do this which
were:
 The location
 The actor we used
 Our use of digetic sounds and original score
 The narrative that we created
 Our use of independent production
companies, making it a low budget
production.

3.  The house that we chose to film in and around I think
shows the usual feeling of a typical social realism film
and the reason for this is that it looks very dark and
dull, giving the impression that its not the nicest place
to live and it shows that not everything is always
perfect as it can be seen to have its problem as you
go inside. Then on the outside it still look very run
down and almost unfinished with many things that
need to be fixed and adjusted which kept to the
genre convention that not everyone is rich or has lots
of money.
 Due to the quality of the house and the visible age of
our character it shows the audience the reality that
life isn't always going to better instantly with a higher
education and it represents that things don’t just
happen instantly like in the Hollywood narrative or
films that are part of big conglomerate, demonstrating
that you have to work for luxury and the nice things in
life.

4.  Laura Wilson the Actor that we had has had precious
experience of acting within local theatre productions and
so she would be considered by many to be a future or
up and coming actor.
 However she had no/ if any experience with making a
film.
 We met this convention as we used someone that does
have experience in acting as this was very important to
creating a good and believable narrative. Which the use
of a good actor helped to make the story more realistic,
she was then also able to bring the character to life and
gave an authentic and original feeling to the production
much like many other social realism films.
 Often in social realism films the actors are selected if
they feel that they can relate to the role as this then
gives them the ability to out across more of a realist
emotion to the role, so considering that I feel we did
slightly challenge the normal conventions and I believe
we should have experimented with an actor that may
feel the same in some ways.

5.  Digetic sound is sound that characters would hear in reality like a phone going off, or the
alarm go off. However they will have been placed in to the production during the editing
stage of the production. They are used within this genre of film because they are very likely
to be what the audience would actually hear if they were to be in that situation.
 In our production we use mostly soundtrack One reason for this is because we felt that
since in our opening scenes we haven't used any types of dialogue or voice over that can
be heard from the main character, we thought that the use of music would be able to gain
the interest of the audience as long as it was some sort of melodic atonal sound.
 Another reason for this is because we felt the use of score would help to convey the
emotion that the character is feeling at the time. We discovered this when looking at our
animatic as we fitted the high pitched moments within the music to important bits, that
should be noticed within the opening sequence.
 Although we did think that we would use the Foley method at some point, we went against
this in our production even though it is a convention of our genre. The reason for this is
because we didn’t really use any form of digetic sound that needed to be of better quality or
re-recorded. Also because we didn’t feel a need to use this at any point when looking at
opening scene or even our animatic, instead we used a score of music.

6.  By using the independent production companies we were
meeting the a typical convention of our film genre of social
realism.
 We also et the conventions of our genre by creating a low
budget production and distribution with the support of the of
these companies.
 This can be shown by the fact that our film is using a form of
below the line marketing of web 2.0. this is the use of online
websites, different accounts of social media and the fact that
these will be easy and free to access on converged devices,
giving a wider range of people more notice of the film

7. Looking at the opening sequence within
our film the conventions that can be seen
are:
Credits
Our use of colour within shots
Animation
Flashbacks
Planning of landscape/establishing shot
Narrations/narrative content

8.  When looking at our credits we have decided to place them in
the order of which we have seen them placed on other films of
a similar genre to ours i.e. social realism.
 Therefore we have placed them in the order of:
 Actors( in order of appearance)
 Casting
 Music
 Editing team
 Director of photography
 Production team (writer and director)
 We feel that this replicates the professionalism that we have
seen within the films, therefore we have shown that we have
adhered to the typical styles and order of text within other films

9.  The colours at the beginning of our opening sequence are very dark
and blue, we did this to indicate how monotonous and dull her life is.
Also to connote the fact that she is feeling alone and uninspired by
the things that are surrounding her. This connotes also that she
hasn’t really got an idea of what she is going to do with her future
and also that she is slightly lost, confused and full off anxiety.
 Towards the second half of the we begin to show a lot of yellows and
oranges. As yellow is seen as being a happy colour and to also
represent some kind of hope. The idea that she has hope is what we
wanted to show and the reason for this is that at the end of the clip
when she find the artwork and supplies it connotes that these
particular things are something to do with her new future and that
something positive is going to come around.
 To make sure that we got the right sort of colours to represent her
different feelings to the audience as it is important that they do not
get the wrong idea. So we looked at a lot of different colour charts
and the psychological meaning behind them.

10.  Animations are used to portray the beginning of the film in a
creative way, which can visibly show the difference between
the film itself and the opening sequence.
 We did not conform to this convention because to have
animation at the beginning of our film would look completely
different to our film and they are not used in the opening of
films that are indie films or social realism films. So to me the
film would not look fluent and the credits would just look out of
place as a result.
 Instead we kept the credits towards the bottom of the screen
in a bland white colour and so they were not concentrated
heavily on and did not divert the attention of the audience as I
feel like animations would do this. Therefore we did not
conform to this convention.

11.  This is when a key part to the narrative in the past is shown to
the audience at the beginning of the clip.
 This is done to highlight a key piece of information to the
audience that is important to know from the beginning of the
film
 Therefore their attention is immediately attained, as they are
left to question things like who, what, when, where and why.
 I feel that we didn’t meet this convention as we wanted to
concentrate on the future of our character and not her past.
Also this type of opening sequence is used in a film that is of
the action genre to help to create tension within the audience,
also to get the audience to question what is going on and why
this particular section of the narrative was so important.

12. This is shown to set the scene within the
film, informing the audience of where
abouts the film is taking place and what it
looks like.
We decided to use this in the opening of
our scene. The reason I felt that we used
this type of shot is because it highlighted
our audience the type of world that our
character is living in.

13.  At the beginning of many films it is often to hear
someone narrating over the film and what can be seen
within the opening scene.
 Narrations give the audience insight into the
background information on what is happening, who the
characters are so that then the rest of the film makes
sense.
 We did not conform to this convention, the reason for
this is that we wanted to focus on the future of our
character and what will happen to her, and the use of
narrators usually are to establish the background of the
character and I feel that to use this in our opening
sequence would therefore be unnecessary.

14. • Looking at the Auteur theory in detail, this is all
about the director of the film making his mark on
the film to show people that this is part of their
work and this is done by them watching over
every aspect that goes into the making of the film
and making sure that everything is done the way
that they want it to be done, this includes all the
visual and audio affects of the film production.
This then gives each production its own vision and
identity.
• I can see that when considering the Auteur theory
within our genre and looking at our film

15.  Todorovs theory states that most plot line or story lines follow a circular structure, so a
pattern then occurs. Within this pattern there are 5 different stages
 1)Equilibrium- the plot line begins with a happy clam start and all the characters are
content, and everything is the way that it should be in the world.
 2)Disequilibrium- so there is a disruption that effects the characters and is a problem
for them
 3)There is then the recognition of this disorder.
 4)An attempt to fix the problem is then made.
 5)Creating a new equilibrium which is then carried out at the end of the narrative.
 This type of narrative is often seen within ‘mainstream’ films and so it is not something
that is recognised within more individual films. We have shown this as in our opening
sequence it starts with a disequilibrium and there is never really an equilibrium to start
with. However the character is still shown to have changed within the opening
sequence as she finds the art equipment which shows the stage of fixing the problem.
As Milly is an introvert and it is not a physical problem that can be fixed it takes a
while to reach a new equilibrium but it will never be quite right.

16.  Propp suggested that a narrative can have around 8 different character
types which are:
 The villain- Milly
 The dispatcher
 The helper-the person that left the art supplies and easel
 The princess/prize
 The father
 The donor- Art supplies and easel
 The hero- Milly
 The false hero
 From looking at our opening sequence I would suggest that some of these
roles have been taken. Milly is shown as both the hero and the villain and
this is because she is her own worst enemy and critic which as an introvert
is one of biggest problems. She is also the hero as she is making an effort to
try and save herself and make herself into a better person. What helps her is
the person who left all the things behind as without them doing that then she
would not have had the confidence to try something new, or express herself.
Finally the art supplies can be seen as the donors as they are the specific
objects that enable her to complete her task and they were given to her by
the person who left them behind

17. A binary opposition is a pair of related
terms or concepts that are opposite in
meaning.
Within our media product we show the
binary oppositions of
Happy-Sad
Introvert-Extrovert
Monotone- Colourful
Alone-Together

18. This is England was set in the early 1980’s
in England. The film is about a young boy
who becomes friends with a gang, this
relationship continues over the course of
the film and they soon become very close.
However this is going to be challenged.

19. Shane meadows was the director of this
film he wanted to use his experiences as a
young boy growing up and show them
within theis film.
This is england was also produced by
Warp films and film4, which is similar to
our film.

20.  A convention that meadows stuck to was the use of unknown
actors, that would be used to going to workshops and being
inn small scale local productions. This is exactly the same as
out film as we chose an actress that is unknown and very
inexperienced in film , but had previously been in a few
theatre productions, so she still had the ability to act.
 Unlike our film meadows wanted actors that had experienced
the same sort of life that the characters had i.e inner city
people of the working class that were finding it hard to survive
in Britain's economy. This is unlike our actress who is not and
introvert so it became harder for her to get into that sort of
role.
 So when looking at put actress we could have looked at
someone who could familiarize themselves with the character
and would be able to give a more realistic performance and
point of view.

21.  Before this is england began filming they made
sure that they did extensive research into britain at
the time and its politcal and economic state which
meant that they were then able to produce
something that was very close to the truth showing
that it is a social realism film.
 We also did a lot of research into the character as
introvercy was not something that any of us knew
a lot about and so we felt it would be essential to
the production to create something that was as
close to the truth as possible as it is something that
can be very personal to a lot of people.

22. The locations used within this is england is
in the suburban inner city areas to
represent the struggle that people were
going through at the time.
 whereas in our production our character
was not of working class so we felt that the
location of a rural area that was fairly
isolated suited the character and what her
issues were that we wanted to represent.

23.  The protagonist within this is England is a young boy who is
just getting into a new friendship group, So he is very
immature when around his friends which represents any
young boy. He is seen to be quite sociable due to the large
group of friends as well. The boy is wanting some sort of
social interaction judging by the group of friends that he gains
for himself
 Compare this to our protagonist milly who is not wanting to be
apart of a large group and even avoids face to face contact
with her mother. She is also a lot older however she also acts
older than her age which shows how mature she is in
comparison with the boy. Then Milly is shown to be a calm and
reflective person who doesn't’t need much input into her life
from anyone else, again unlike the boy.
 So the two main protagonist are completely different showing
different types of people that exist within society.