This document summarizes a creative critical reflection project by Nikoleta Wu and Ada Dzamic for their media studies class. They created an opening film sequence about a music teacher dreading a music lesson with a typical teenager. Through their research and planning, they aimed to represent stereotypes in a comedic way and examine the elements of an effective opening sequence. Their target audience was music lovers, teenagers, and teachers. They are proud of their work developing characters, incorporating music, and following film techniques in their opening sequence.

1. AS Media Studies
Creative Critical Reflection
Nikoleta Wu & Ada Dzamic

3. We have decided to deliberately play on stereotypes to represent a
geeky music teacher, dreading a music lesson with a typical teenager,
with whom she would have challenging encounters during the film,
until they become friends.

4. Our brief is to present the best visual
experience to the audience, which includes
introducing the audience to the genre of the
film, establishing the setting, indicating the
mood and visual aspects of the film, amongst
other elements.
Also we aimed at examining and exploring the
film opening sequence. Our opening sequence
title is “Music lesson from hell”. The opening
sequence is about the morning before the
music lesson which turns out to be funny and
surprisingly satisfying. The sub genre is musical
drama because basically every single scene
include classical/rock music and drama
elements. We are proud of the opening
sequence that we made.

5. Our prediction is that the film would be particularly interesting to more urban audiences, as well as
teenagers, because of the main characters and the typical situations presented in the film. We are
aimed at music lovers, teenagers, young people and teachers. The genre would attract young people
because young people’s consumption dominate a huge part of the drama film marketing. Also we put
a lot of trails of music in our opening sequence so the audience who loves music would be more
interested in it. The characters are a teenage girl and a female music teacher, it would attract students
and teachers in some level because they can relate to the story. Females are more easily attracted as
our characters are females.
We used the Pre-production research as a reference for our opening sequence, we decide what
feature we could include based on that. For example, music, costume, characters’ personality….
We also sued questionnaire so that we could know the audiences’ preference and we could work on it.

6. I think we have reached our target audience. Our storyline and theme
was about music and we used a lot of music trails in our opening
sequence.
Audience pre-production research involved sharing the script with
friends and relatives, who are the typical representatives of the film, as
well as observing and listening to their reactions and feedback. We
wanted to see whether the script is going to engage them or even
make them chuckle- which luckily happened a few times. This gave us
confidence to proceed with the project. Given the audiences reactions
to more stereotypical characterization, we have decided to give it a
shot and make it an obvious, popular comedy.

7. Music institution distribute my media
product because we want our targeted
audience --- music lover, easily related to
it.
For example, Gilbert Films, Whiplash and
Sony Pictures classics and stage 6 Films.
La La Land is kind of inspiring us, even
though it has different genre from us, we
could try to explore the advantages.
As far as distribution goes, we were
largely aiming for one TV station,
followed by the film’s availability on
Youtube. Given the competitiveness of
the modern film industry and the very
low budget nature of our film, we didn’t
think it credible to count on proper
professional film distribution.

8. My teammate Ada is a music student, we use her real life experience as the
story. The genre is drama and comedy, the characters’ personalities and body
languages are the comedy elements. The relationship between our two
characters are funny and relax, create relaxing atmosphere.
We use hand held shot in order to create the realistic and we use tracking
shot in order to track the characters’ behavior. We are trying to present the
personality of the character by using camera movement and shots.
We are proud of our cutting and editing. 180 degree rules and shot/reverse
shot was used. Also we used match on action so that it would bring a better
view experience to our audience.
Our film opening sequence included diegetic sound and non-diegetic sound,
ambient sound and dialog.

9. At the Pre-production stage, we planed to use a phone to film, then we
decided to film with a camera. The decision was made by us because
we think the camera would produce high quality video. In my opinion,
camera is more professional than phone, we could use tripod to hold
the camera, and it would be much more smoother and easier for some
camera movement, for example, pan and tilt. As we want to bring good
visual experience to our audience, we decided to use a camera.
At the Post-production stage, we used a computer to do editing instead
of using a phone. It’s much more easier for us to download an editing
software on a computer than on a phone. We have to admit that using
a computer to edit is way more professional than using a phone.
Pre-production Production Post-production
Technology / Camera Computer

10. We used slideshare to upload our videos and powerpoints to
wordpress, we uploaded videos in youtube. We search material and
terms for more media information. Those uses of internet and website
really helped us to present our work formally.

11. Strength and Weakness
We only spent a small amount of time to manage the storyline and we chose the
music which could perfectly fit in our video effeciently. What's more, i am pround
of my initial film ideas, even though i have to give them up at the end but it was
creative. Our research and planning also went very well, we chose the location
and the costume which is most suitable for out script. We present the
personalities of our two characters by establishing their behaviour and life style,
and this is quite successful to outline the conflict between two characters and
insert comedy elements and create the relaxing atmospher.
However, the digital technology was less successful, the quality of our camera is
not good, therefore, we were not able to manage the camera movement and
shots well, we did not know what kind of shots would present a better visual
experience to audience, therefore we wasted a lot of time on discussing about
the camera movement and shots.

12. Look back at my preliminary
task,realistic. We improve and
change some of the ideas on the
spot, when we were filming, and
this has led our process to a
productive way and so that our
project and opening sequence
look more professional and
satisfying.
Our technique and skill got
improved by exploring and
examinating the rule of fim
opening sequence. We are
satisfied with our final work and
we will keep working on exploring
the mystrey of opening sequence.