Evaluation of AS Media main task

1. Incognito
Evaluation
Joe Candlin

2. In what ways does your media product
use/develop/challenge forms and conventions of real
media products?
 Our media product is representative of the common codes and
conventions of the thriller genre, however we have also tried to
hybridize our product with the horror genre. By looking at films
andTV series' such as 'American Horror Story' and 'The BlairWitch
Project' we decided to include some key horror motifs in our
sequence, one of which can be seen in the POV handheld camera
footage that is edited in.We took direct inspiration from 'The Blair
Witch Project' in this case as it was described as being one of the
films most gripping features because of the way it made the
viewer feel involved in the action.Our product follows the
traditional conventions of a thriller in that it has the main
character in some form of danger as well as there being an
ongoing chase/stalking.We decided to challenge convention in
the same way that the movie 'Se7en' did in that we did not reveal
the antagonist's face at first but instead using the reveal as a
climax of the events on screen. Obviously ‘Se7en’ was a full length
film so they had a lot longer to build up to the climax, whereas we
were only making a sequence meaning if we wanted to include
any interesting plotlines it had to be explored fairly quickly or at
least teased at them.This technique builds suspense as well as
making the villain more intimidating as people are known to fear
what they cannot see/understand.
Antagonist POV

3. In what ways does your media product
use/develop/challenge forms and conventions of real
media products?
 A large inspiration for our title sequence’s
more eerie scenes came from the movie ‘The
BlairWitch Project’. This is a ‘found footage’
style horror film shot entirely in the woods,
this means the only camera used was a
handheld being operated by one of the actors.
This is an extremely low budget technique
meaning that virtually anyone can make use of
it, we took advantage of this by implementing
handheld camera shots into our sequence.The
angle and motion of the shot makes audiences
feel connected with what is happening on
screen as it seems more authentic, therefore
making them engage more with the suspense
and tense atmosphere. Obviously we had to
make it a bit more clear that we were
intending to show the perspective of the
handheld camera so I added the ‘REC’ overlay
to each handheld shot.
‘The Blair Witch Project’
‘Incognito’

4. In what ways does your media product
use/develop/challenge forms and conventions of real
media products?
 Significance of font
When we began coming up with the initial ideas for
‘Incognito’ I made the title screen that can be seen on
the right, however we developed the idea further and
with that came a change in appearance for the title
itself. We decided to take a more modern approach to
the title and after researching popular thrillers we
found that a lot of them had large spacing between
characters and quite often had a very basic
background. Looking back at the transition we made;
the finished title is a lot easier to read, is more
memorable/iconic and also looks a lot more
professional than the original.

5. In what ways does your media product
use/develop/challenge forms and conventions of real
media products?
 Camera and Lighting
One of the main focuses of the sequence
was to get the portrayal of the antagonist
right.We wanted it to appear as though
the protagonist was effectively being
stalked by this mysterious character that
wouldn’t be revealed until the end of the
sequence.We achieved this through
combinations of low angles, POV shots
and prolonged shots that made the
audience expect something to come. In
terms of lighting we decided early on that
we would be shooting outside meaning
that we would be using mainly natural
lighting.The use of natural lighting meant
that a lot of the visual changes would be
done in post production, a lot of the shots
were increased in contrast and decreased
in exposure so that the sequence seemed
a bit darker but more crisp to look at.
 Sound
Sound was used in our sequence to
convey a message to the viewer. We
wanted the viewer to be able to establish
the situation just from associating the
sound/soundtrack with what was on
screen.The use of audio motifs e.g.
whispering whenever the antagonist’s
perspective was shown helped us to
establish how the viewer felt about
specific characters. The soundtrack
changed throughout the sequence; at the
beginning it was an ominous track that
was quite eerie but mysterious at the
same time and when the antagonist was
revealed it switched to a more sinister
track and immediately let the viewer
know which type of character (good or
bad) they were looking at.

6. In what ways does your media product
use/develop/challenge forms and conventions of real
media products?
 Mise en Scéne
It was important for us that the location was
somewhere ‘off the grid’, we wanted it to
appear as though the protagonist was in the
middle of nowhere.This helped to escalate
the tension as it gave the impression that no
one would come to help him. Having
researched popular thrillers and horrors we
noticed that a lot of films took place within
the woods; ‘The Forest’, ‘The BlairWitch
Project’, ‘Exists’. Even though these films
aren’t necessarily thrillers we still took
inspiration from their development of
tension through use of their setting. In terms
of costume we kept it very basic, the
protagonist was dressed semi-casual, he was
originally intended to be a detective but it
seemed more realistic if he wore normal
clothes (this also made him more relatable)
so instead we made him look like an off duty
detective.The antagonist was dressed fully
in black so that he was entirely mysterious
 Editing
Following on from the idea of isolation
that we were trying to convey between
the protagonist and any possible help,
another way this was emphasised was
through the phone ringing sound effect
which was edited in. Early on in the
sequence the protagonist is seen making
a call; the phone rings for a while, the
shot then cuts to him being watched by
the antagonist, the screen goes black and
the no signal effect plays.The sequencing
of these shots lets tells the audience that
he is being watched and no one is around
to help. A transitional effect was used
where multiple clips flashed up on screen
for a moment, these clips contained
mainly close ups on branches, twigs,
creepy trees etc. Although this was
creating an eerie transition it was also
subliminally emphasizing the setting the
events were taking place in.

7. How does your media product represent particular
social groups?
 We have two main characters in our sequence; the detective, who
represents the police and enforcement of law that is commonly seen
in the thriller genre and we have the killer, who is the main
antagonist of the sequence and portrays a mysterious villain rather
than the usual bank robber or murderer. We tried to create a sense
of the supernatural and an animalistic portrayal of this villain as we
felt it was more intimidating to the viewer. We achieved this by
using whispering audio motifs whenever the antagonist is present
which creates an eerie sense around the character. We also used
POV shots from the killer's perspective that make it look as if he is
stalking the detective like an animal; combining this with the heavy
breathing, the whispering and the sound effects it allowed us to
create an eerie and threatening antagonist. The detective is not
really in the spotlight, although he does hold a significant part of
the screen time the focus is mainly on the antagonists pursuit of the
detective. We tried to make him look like an off duty police officer
to give the impression that he is looking for the killer on his own
time, suggesting the killer has become an obsession of his, a lot like
the character John Luther from the TV series 'Luther'. A lot of the
time in thrillers the protagonist is a 'loose cannon' type of character
and we tried to reflect this in our protagonist as well.
 We were setting up our sequence to follow the conventions of
psychological thrillers. Our sequence also follows Propp’s theory as
it conforms with the traditional characters e.g. hero and villain
whilst at the same time challenging this as our hero turns out to be
another version of the villain, hence the psychological thriller.

8.  Our protagonist was based on various other main characters in
successful thrillers. One of our largest inspirations for our
protagonist came from the TV series ‘Luther’.
 After extensive research we found that the main character in a
thriller often followed these guidelines:
1. Male
2. Late teens – Late 20’s
3. Traditional masculine man; tough, physical, domineering
4. Significantly more white protagonists than black.
How does your media product represent particular
social groups?
Luther
‘Incognito’ protagonist
 When choosing our protagonist it was an early decision that we
would have a male actor playing the role as it was one of the most
prevalent feature in thrillers that we were happy to conform with
 The best actor available to us was Arthur who fit the description
well aside from being a bit young but it wasn’t too noticeable.
 Ethnicity didn’t really come into question, Arthur was the best
actor we could find so we cast him in the lead role. In the film
industry at the moment there is a huge conflict over black actors
being cast in lead roles.

9. • What kind of media institution might distribute your
media product and why?
 If the sequence were to become a full product I feel that it could be distributed by a variety of
media institutions. It wouldn't be in a documentary or educational style which rules out
institutions such as National Geographic. Because the sequence isn't nailed down entirely to one
genre or theme and the lines between genres in the current generation have been blurred (even
though we have labeled it as a thriller) it could be distributed by most companies ranging from
Netflix to the BBC, the product wouldn't be absolute on any themes and wouldn't have anything
unsuitable for viewers around the age of 12 meaning the product would have variety in who
would distribute it.The most realistic form of distribution our media product would have is on
social media, the product would be posted toYouTube and promoted through platforms such as
Facebook,Twitter etc. If we were to go an alternate route to social media a viable option would
be new line cinema who are known for distributing films such as ‘Se7en’, ‘TheConjuring’, ‘Into the
Storm’ etc. they are known to distribute thrillers, horrors and a wide variety of ‘non a-list’ films
which makes it a suitable institution for our product.

10.  Promotion Strategy
With such a low budget, if we had to promote our
product it would most likely be through social
media most likely through promotional videos on
YouTube,Twitter, Facebook.This gives the
product all the opportunity to expand its
audience as these platforms are used by such a
vast amount of people.
 Conglomerates (The Big 6)
“The Big 6” are the six largest media
conglomerates that have expanded to the point
that they control effectively all media. Our
distributor of choice – ‘New LineCinema’ belong
to the conglomerate ‘TimeWarner’ who also own
distributors such as ‘Warner Bros.’ and ‘HBO’.
New Line have distributed films such as ‘The
Conjuring’, ‘The Hobbit’ and ‘IntoTheStorm’.
• What kind of media institution might distribute your
media product and why?

11.  ‘Film 4’
 Another option for our distribution would be
with ‘Film 4’.
 ‘Film 4’ are supportive of independent films
as can be seen by their most recent
distribution of the thriller ‘Our Kind ofTraitor’
starring Ewan McGregor.
 If our product became big enough through
social media institutions would want to
distribute the product for us and ‘Film 4’
would probably be the best option outside of
‘New Line Cinema’ as they are known for
supporting “smaller” films that their
audience can still appreciate.
• What kind of media institution might distribute your
media product and why?

12. • Who would be the audience for your media product?
 The sequence was intended to be suitable for viewers from the age of 12 upwards,
this is why we rated it a 12 on the bbfc age ratings. When doing our audience
research a large majority of our audience feedback came from people around the
ages 12-18, with a few anomalies such as teachers, parents etc. We felt that this was
this audience was able to understand and the sequence whereas a younger viewer
may get confused by it, therefore making their feedback irrelevant.

13. • Who would be the audience for your media product?
 We didn’t believe that ‘Incognito’ could
have been placed into the 15 age rating
because of the guidelines on the BBFC
website. ‘Incognito’ wouldn’t explore
any controversial topics/themes and
would probably contain moderate
violence but not anything extreme.
 Because of this we decided to place it
in the 12 category.The 12 category
wouldn’t have any sexual nudity,
extreme violence/gore and would
instead have themes suitable for young
teenagers and upwards.

14. • How did you attract/address your audience?
 At the moment the traditional thriller e.g. 'Die
Hard' isn't necessarily the most gripping or interesting
thing to audiences, a lot of the most popular shows and
movies today have supernatural themes or something
that at least makes the viewer think e.g. 'Inception' and
'Interstellar'.The top threeTV shows on IMDB at the
moment are 'TheWalking Dead', 'Daredevil' and 'Game
ofThrones'; all shows with supernatural or fantasy
based themes. When creating our thriller
we didn't want to follow the basic and pretty much
outdated thriller template and instead looked at the
modern audience and what interests they had.This is
represented in the scene where our main character
confronts another version of himself. Originally we
hadn't intended for there to be a supernatural theme in
the sequence but after the first and second draft
seemed to be building up to an anti-climax we decided
to add the scene in.The whole sequence gave the
impression of someone watching the protagonist so
the supernatural theme fit in quite well with the
already established eerie atmosphere

15. Audience Research/feedback
 It was important that we asked the right
questions when carrying out our audience
research but it was equally as important that
we asked the right people. If we were to ask a
person below the age of 12 or someone who
was immature we would come out with
answers like this to open ended questions such
as ‘what draws you to the thriller genre?’. Not
only do we gain no information from this it is
annoying to receive responses such as this.
 However when we asked more mature
audiences we got better answers that aided our
production of the sequence. In this case we
asked the same question to a higher year and
we were able to find out that a lot of them
valued tension and suspense the most in a
thriller film.

16. Audience Research/feedback
 When looking at certain
questions from our audience
research it is clear that
audiences value sound/music
very highly in a successful
product.This made me realise
that I needed to focus on sound
a lot more than I had initially
expected. After this feedback
sound became one of the
strongest aspects of our
sequence.

17. • What have you learnt about technologies from the
process of constructing this product?
 When creating the sequence we had to learn to use and understand camera work, editing and
sound.Out of the three I think I am most confident with camera and editing whereas sound was
more improvised but still to an acceptable standard.We filmed on a CanonG16 and I edited on
Final Cut Pro X. I learnt that you don't need the best equipment to make a good product, its
more about the technique and the person using the equipment that makes good products.Take
the fact that we were using the built-in mic on the camera for the entire sequence, we didn't
have a industry level mic but we managed to create a sequence with decent sound that still
conveyed the right message through editing and improvisation.The camera we were using was
amazing but wasn't exactly built for the type of filming we were doing yet we still made it
look really good even if there are some shots that could be improved. I originally was editing on
Premiere then I moved over to Final Cut which I had to learn how to use but ultimately I ended
up having a better understanding of FinalCut than I ever did of Premiere. One of our main
research tools was SurveyMonkey, this was where we conducted the surveys that were
answered as audience feedback.YouTube was a main research tool in the production of our
actual sequence as we could research past students work and see what went well and what
didn’t for them.

18. • What have you learnt about technologies from the
process of constructing this product?
 Edit File
When looking back at the edit file I realise now that I could have saved a lot of time and made the edit a
lot easier for myself if I had organized the timeline better. On Final Cut to have something on the
timeline (clip, sound etc.) it needs to be connected to something else on the timeline which is what all
the thin green/blue bars are. When I started the edit the first thing I placed on the timeline was an audio
file which became the base of the timeline, meaning if I wanted to re-arrange any clip orders I would
have to cut the audio it was attached to and drag the two together, this is why there are multiple cuts
in the same audio file. If I would have placed a clip first, the main timeline would consist of all the clips
one after the other with the audio files above and below

19. Looking back at your task, what do you feel you have
learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
 The continuity task was a way of getting to
know the equipment, group and software we
would be working with. One of the main
things we needed to make sure we
illustrated knowledge of was the 180 degree
rule.The rule was essential to our production
of ‘Incognito’ and any further projects as it
allowed us to portray a narrative in the
clearest and most professional way possible.
 Another purpose of the continuity task was
to grasp an understanding of what
‘continuity’ in film actually was. We gained
understanding of how a film needed to make
sense to the viewer; cuts needed to be
smooth, nothing could be out of place,
sound and visuals needed to be up to par and
most importantly we needed to actually be
able to convey meaning through what was
on screen.
Preliminary Task

20. Looking back at your task, what do you feel you have
learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
Skills Audit Progression Continuity Task

21. Looking back at your task, what do you feel you have
learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
 Over the course of the two tasks I have learnt about various aspects of the four technical areas; camera, sound, mise
en scene and editing.When the production of the continuity task began I didn’t know how to film or edit to a good
standard but now I am confident in my skills in filming and editing.One thing that I need to expand on is my
knowledge of sound. There was an extensive amount of research and planning that went into the tasks (more than I
initially expected) however this research proved to be very useful in the long run as we began to realise how difficult
and time consuming the sequence was going to be. Even though our sequence didn’t stick completely to our original
shot list/animatic the fact we had a general idea of what we wanted before we went out and filmed was very helpful. In
the continuity task we were unprepared and because of this we ended up making mistakes such as clothing changing
mid sequence which we had to make excuses for such as “30 mins later...”The continuity task proved to be useful as it
allowed us to realise what mistakes we were making and iron them out for the production of the main task. After the
production of the main task was complete it was still not fully over as we screened it to multiple audiences to find out
what improvements we could make (which is why we ended up with around 3 final drafts).The first cut of the final
draft was over 3mins long and because of this we had to screen it to audiences to gain feedback on what we should
take out.We found that audiences felt the ending was unnecessary as we were feeding them information that they
already knew/needed to be interpreted on its own, because of this we removed everything after the scene where the
protagonist is confronted by his double to leave anything ater for interpretation (after all this was only the title
sequence and it was intended to tease at the plotline).
 Overall I am extremely pleased with the product of our task and audiences seem to be giving mainly positive reviews
of it, which lets us know that we have succeded. I felt that as a group we worked well and that we each fulfilled our
roles in order to create a professional-looking product.
Continuity Task