The document discusses how the student's short film adheres to and challenges conventions of real media products. It keeps to conventions like having 2 main characters, as is common in short films due to limited time. It depicts a scenario teenagers can relate to rather than everyday life. The film is categorized as a drama genre focusing on character development and realistic themes. It uses conventions like dark lighting and heavy breathing to create tension and intrigue the audience, as seen in thriller films. Overall, the short film both follows genres like drama/thriller but also develops conventions in some ways rather than going against them.

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

2. Our short film keeps to several
different media conventions.
When looking at characters, the
majority of short films stick to
around 3 main characters because
of the fact the film is short, it
cannot build up a background on
each character. Therefore the
characters are kept to a minimum
allowing for the audience to relate
to them. In the case of our short
film, we have 2 main characters
which complies with this
convention.

3. Another convention of a short film is that it generally
follows a basic structure of everyday life situations, however
with some form of a twist. This is an effective method as it
keeps the audience intrigued and allows them to relate to the
position. Our short film doesn’t exactly relate to the average
everyday person but more so to young people and teenagers
which shows we haven’t exactly followed this convention but
have created a scenario that people can also relate to and
have sympathy for the character.

4. When looking at the conventions used our film would be
under the genre of a drama. Drama film is a genre that
relies on the emotional and relational development of
realistic characters. While Drama film relies heavily on this
kind of development, dramatic themes play a large role in
the plot as well. Often, these dramatic themes are taken
from intense, real life issues. Whether heroes or heroines
are facing a conflict from the outside or a conflict within
themselves, Drama film aims to tell an honest story of
human struggles, which relates to our film perfectly.

5. The opening 10 seconds of our film consists of a blank black screen with the added non-
diegetic heavy breathing sound we put in for a dramatic effect, having the audience on edge
from the very beginning. This fits the convention of a thriller as they typically keep the
viewer on edge throughout.
Another shot that resembles a thriller is the interview scenes as the room is very darkly lit,
having only the main characters outline in focus. This builds tension making the viewer
wants to know who this person is raising questions about his background and the scenario.
The audience is able to pick up the nerves of the main character creating sympathy for the
child.

6. In conclusion, I think our media product uses the
conventions of real life media products based around the
genre of a ‘drama/thriller’ as well as developing them in
order to change convention instead of completely going
against it.