http://www.scribd.com/doc/74899309/Film-4-Fact-File
Click on link.
Tuesday 6 December 2011
Thursday 1 December 2011
Skins: Exam practice examples:
Skins paragraphs on representation.
Teachers example:
'The mise en scene of the protagonists bedroom challenges and conforms to stereotypical views about youth culture. The establishing shot suggests that the series targets a teenage audience and it will follow the life and experiences of a teenager. The duvet cover shown is of a double bed with a naked man and woman, suggesting that this age group is sexually charged. The protagonist is positioned in the middle of the two bodies suggesting that he is sexually inexperienced. It could also be suggesting that he is alone and confused about his sexuality, which conforms to teenage sterotypes.In this shot natural lighting is used to give a sense of realism so the teenage audience identifies with the life of the protagonist.'
My example of mise-en-scene:
Mise-en-scene in the opening scene of the teenagers bedroom actually challenges the stereotypical viewpoint of a typical teenager. The protagonist is shown to have a bedroom which is displayed as very neat, tidy and well organised. This challenegs the stereotype that teengaers are all dirty individuals with poor skills of keeping tidy. When the protagonist is seen working out, many shots of the room around him are seen. You can see that the room is not very untidy as there is a large space where no dirt or misplaced clothes are in the position of the room that he is working out in. This is a demonstration that the protagonist keeps his room very tidy for various purposes. This is a further example of how the stereotype based teenagers beoing untidy is challenged. When it comes to what is there, there is a drawer placed in the room as seen in the opening scene. It is shown to be very nicely kept and arranged correctly. This and the fact that all items such as the bed itself are nciely organised to look very tidy are visual example of how the protagonist challenges the messy-teen stereotype.
This actually contrasts to the deutragonist in which his sister conforms the stereotype as she is dressed badly and is very messy from the night before.
The deutragonist (teenage girl) actually conforms to the stereotype that all teenagers are messy as she is seen with messy hair, clothes from the night before, and make-up that has been wore for a while. She is shown as someone who does not take care of herself, an interesting contrast to the protagonist who is shown to be more concerned about physical appearance, hence the weight lifting. This contrast shows the mise-en-scene both conforms and challenges the dirty-teen stereotype with alternate examples.
Camera angles:
An example of how camera angles show representation of teenage stereotypes is through the example of when the protagonist is in his bedroom and the teenage girl or deutragonist is seen via a high angle shot, so the audience is looking down at her. This shot portrays the teenage and general stereotypes that males are the more powerful gender and that females are dependent of them. This is displayed as the low angle shot of the protagonist in his bedroom is looking up at him, like he is the dominant individual in the situation. This contrast of high-low angle shots between the male and teenage girl show that the male is in charge and has the power to either help or not help the female. So these angle shots, related to the content of the plot in the scene, conform to the stereotype that females are dependent on the more powerful males as the male protagonist is represented as the one with the power in the situation due to contrasting camera angles.
Another example of this in the scene is the portion containing front view shots between the male adult (possible antagonist) and the protagonist. these front view shots cutting between the man and teenager in the scene with loud music protrays and interesting confrontation. These shots show the anger and fustration that the adult has to the teenager, and represetns the intensity of that anger. This conforms to the stereotype that adults and older people view teenagers as very annoying and are fustrated with them. The front view shots also portray eyeline match (editing) which shows that the teen is as tall as the man. This challenegs the traditional stereotype that adults are bigger, more dominant, and in control of the younger ones.
The track shot from behind the bushes towards a front view of the teenage girl when first seen shows us that she is a deutragonist as she is seen second, only after the teen male. This track shot and front view portrays her visually as a messy, rebellious teenager with responsibility issues. The shot shows how she is dressed and gives us the impression that she is badly behaved. This conforms to the stereotype that teenagers are bad and misbehaved.
The over the shoulder shot when the protagonist looks at the woman from across the window shows us how he is looking directly at her. He does this while she is naked and this suggests that the guy is sexually charged. This conforms to the stereotype that all teens are crazed with sex. The camera is over the shoulder and hand held, this is done to give the audience an experience as if they are holding the camera and they are actually there. This supplies a sense of realism to the sense and makes the representation featured seem to be more accurate and realistic.
Sound representation:
An example of how sound was used for the representation of the scene was the inclusion of the repetitive sound. This was non-diegetic as it was a soundtrack not caused by actions on screen. This sound implies that the events which occur during this are part of a routine. This implication of a routine challenges the stereotype that young people are wild and unpredictable as the protagonist takes part in a continous process which involves doing the same stuff. Also, this routine demonstrates how the protagonist is organised with daily events. This also challeneges that stereotype. The routine demonstrated by the repetitive soundtrack also portrays the idea that the teenager may be bored and somewhat unhappy. This conforms the stereotype that some teenage groups have minorities of lonely and sad individuals.
The magnified sound when the girl walks down the street with the boots on and you can hear it portrays the idea that she has been out all night and she is walking home. This is supported by her appearance. The magnification represents the significance of the sound, and in this case, shows how the boots and her walking is an important factor in the continuity of the story. It implies she is an important character and what she does in this upcoming scene will be significant to the plot content. It basically supplies the audience with an idea that she is important in the show overall.
Editing techniques;
The Cuts and cutaways themselves manage to portray binary opposites in the scene. For instance, take the cutaway scene between the teenage protagonist and naked girl. These cutaways protray the idea that teenagers are crazed with sex, it also challenges the stereotype that older people actually react to this, as the older woman did very little to stop him from looking. The cuts between the male protagonist and female deutragonist are also very useful to presenting the binary opposites between the two characters. This works through parallel editing as the cuts keep changing from one scene to the other. On one hand, the boy is concerned with his appearance and is generally mature and well behaved. On the other scene, the girl is shown to be badly dressed and irresponsible. The two sides of parallel editing cut from eachother to represent the contrast until the point where they meet and the parallel editing becomes the continuity. The binary opposite principle is then conformed even more as the boy has the power to either help or not help the irresponsible girl, as she relies on him. This whole representation of binary opposites between the teenage boy and girl support the theory of Levi Strauss.
The fact that real time is used when it comes to the concept of narrative time is interesting as it provides a feel of realism to the scene. This means that the representation displayed in the scene will appear to be realistic and more reliable. For instance, the representation of the bad girl and mature teenage boy will seem to be more accurate and truthful than if the narrative time used when something such as time manipulation which would indicate a fictional representation to the audience. Real time, in this case, suggests that the content displayed in the scene is typically real, for instance, the representation that the teenage protagonist and teenage girl are binary opposites appears to be more convincing and truthful to the audience since the time is realistic. Basically, the real time gives an approach that other representation included is truthful as well. In contrast, there is a small amount of compressed time used to display shots of the workout, relating to camera shots, and this is an exception of the scene based on narrative time.
The mere inclusion of the eyeline match in the scene also helps to represent several stereotypes. For instance, the eyeline match between the protagonist and the female who is naked shows an eyeline match, meanong they are literally at the same level. It also portrays how his eyes are connected to the sight of her body, and this conforms to the stereotype that all teenagers are sex crazed. As well as that, the eyeline match between the father and son, provided with the assistance in the inclusion of the close-up to the fathers face, protrays that the teenager is annoying to the adult and in general that adults are fustrated with the irreseponsibility of teenagers. So this conforms to both the stereotype that adults are angered by teens and that teens are irresponsible.
Teachers example:
'The mise en scene of the protagonists bedroom challenges and conforms to stereotypical views about youth culture. The establishing shot suggests that the series targets a teenage audience and it will follow the life and experiences of a teenager. The duvet cover shown is of a double bed with a naked man and woman, suggesting that this age group is sexually charged. The protagonist is positioned in the middle of the two bodies suggesting that he is sexually inexperienced. It could also be suggesting that he is alone and confused about his sexuality, which conforms to teenage sterotypes.In this shot natural lighting is used to give a sense of realism so the teenage audience identifies with the life of the protagonist.'
My example of mise-en-scene:
Mise-en-scene in the opening scene of the teenagers bedroom actually challenges the stereotypical viewpoint of a typical teenager. The protagonist is shown to have a bedroom which is displayed as very neat, tidy and well organised. This challenegs the stereotype that teengaers are all dirty individuals with poor skills of keeping tidy. When the protagonist is seen working out, many shots of the room around him are seen. You can see that the room is not very untidy as there is a large space where no dirt or misplaced clothes are in the position of the room that he is working out in. This is a demonstration that the protagonist keeps his room very tidy for various purposes. This is a further example of how the stereotype based teenagers beoing untidy is challenged. When it comes to what is there, there is a drawer placed in the room as seen in the opening scene. It is shown to be very nicely kept and arranged correctly. This and the fact that all items such as the bed itself are nciely organised to look very tidy are visual example of how the protagonist challenges the messy-teen stereotype.
This actually contrasts to the deutragonist in which his sister conforms the stereotype as she is dressed badly and is very messy from the night before.
The deutragonist (teenage girl) actually conforms to the stereotype that all teenagers are messy as she is seen with messy hair, clothes from the night before, and make-up that has been wore for a while. She is shown as someone who does not take care of herself, an interesting contrast to the protagonist who is shown to be more concerned about physical appearance, hence the weight lifting. This contrast shows the mise-en-scene both conforms and challenges the dirty-teen stereotype with alternate examples.
Camera angles:
An example of how camera angles show representation of teenage stereotypes is through the example of when the protagonist is in his bedroom and the teenage girl or deutragonist is seen via a high angle shot, so the audience is looking down at her. This shot portrays the teenage and general stereotypes that males are the more powerful gender and that females are dependent of them. This is displayed as the low angle shot of the protagonist in his bedroom is looking up at him, like he is the dominant individual in the situation. This contrast of high-low angle shots between the male and teenage girl show that the male is in charge and has the power to either help or not help the female. So these angle shots, related to the content of the plot in the scene, conform to the stereotype that females are dependent on the more powerful males as the male protagonist is represented as the one with the power in the situation due to contrasting camera angles.
Another example of this in the scene is the portion containing front view shots between the male adult (possible antagonist) and the protagonist. these front view shots cutting between the man and teenager in the scene with loud music protrays and interesting confrontation. These shots show the anger and fustration that the adult has to the teenager, and represetns the intensity of that anger. This conforms to the stereotype that adults and older people view teenagers as very annoying and are fustrated with them. The front view shots also portray eyeline match (editing) which shows that the teen is as tall as the man. This challenegs the traditional stereotype that adults are bigger, more dominant, and in control of the younger ones.
The track shot from behind the bushes towards a front view of the teenage girl when first seen shows us that she is a deutragonist as she is seen second, only after the teen male. This track shot and front view portrays her visually as a messy, rebellious teenager with responsibility issues. The shot shows how she is dressed and gives us the impression that she is badly behaved. This conforms to the stereotype that teenagers are bad and misbehaved.
The over the shoulder shot when the protagonist looks at the woman from across the window shows us how he is looking directly at her. He does this while she is naked and this suggests that the guy is sexually charged. This conforms to the stereotype that all teens are crazed with sex. The camera is over the shoulder and hand held, this is done to give the audience an experience as if they are holding the camera and they are actually there. This supplies a sense of realism to the sense and makes the representation featured seem to be more accurate and realistic.
Sound representation:
An example of how sound was used for the representation of the scene was the inclusion of the repetitive sound. This was non-diegetic as it was a soundtrack not caused by actions on screen. This sound implies that the events which occur during this are part of a routine. This implication of a routine challenges the stereotype that young people are wild and unpredictable as the protagonist takes part in a continous process which involves doing the same stuff. Also, this routine demonstrates how the protagonist is organised with daily events. This also challeneges that stereotype. The routine demonstrated by the repetitive soundtrack also portrays the idea that the teenager may be bored and somewhat unhappy. This conforms the stereotype that some teenage groups have minorities of lonely and sad individuals.
The magnified sound when the girl walks down the street with the boots on and you can hear it portrays the idea that she has been out all night and she is walking home. This is supported by her appearance. The magnification represents the significance of the sound, and in this case, shows how the boots and her walking is an important factor in the continuity of the story. It implies she is an important character and what she does in this upcoming scene will be significant to the plot content. It basically supplies the audience with an idea that she is important in the show overall.
Editing techniques;
The Cuts and cutaways themselves manage to portray binary opposites in the scene. For instance, take the cutaway scene between the teenage protagonist and naked girl. These cutaways protray the idea that teenagers are crazed with sex, it also challenges the stereotype that older people actually react to this, as the older woman did very little to stop him from looking. The cuts between the male protagonist and female deutragonist are also very useful to presenting the binary opposites between the two characters. This works through parallel editing as the cuts keep changing from one scene to the other. On one hand, the boy is concerned with his appearance and is generally mature and well behaved. On the other scene, the girl is shown to be badly dressed and irresponsible. The two sides of parallel editing cut from eachother to represent the contrast until the point where they meet and the parallel editing becomes the continuity. The binary opposite principle is then conformed even more as the boy has the power to either help or not help the irresponsible girl, as she relies on him. This whole representation of binary opposites between the teenage boy and girl support the theory of Levi Strauss.
The fact that real time is used when it comes to the concept of narrative time is interesting as it provides a feel of realism to the scene. This means that the representation displayed in the scene will appear to be realistic and more reliable. For instance, the representation of the bad girl and mature teenage boy will seem to be more accurate and truthful than if the narrative time used when something such as time manipulation which would indicate a fictional representation to the audience. Real time, in this case, suggests that the content displayed in the scene is typically real, for instance, the representation that the teenage protagonist and teenage girl are binary opposites appears to be more convincing and truthful to the audience since the time is realistic. Basically, the real time gives an approach that other representation included is truthful as well. In contrast, there is a small amount of compressed time used to display shots of the workout, relating to camera shots, and this is an exception of the scene based on narrative time.
The mere inclusion of the eyeline match in the scene also helps to represent several stereotypes. For instance, the eyeline match between the protagonist and the female who is naked shows an eyeline match, meanong they are literally at the same level. It also portrays how his eyes are connected to the sight of her body, and this conforms to the stereotype that all teenagers are sex crazed. As well as that, the eyeline match between the father and son, provided with the assistance in the inclusion of the close-up to the fathers face, protrays that the teenager is annoying to the adult and in general that adults are fustrated with the irreseponsibility of teenagers. So this conforms to both the stereotype that adults are angered by teens and that teens are irresponsible.
Thursday 24 November 2011
Tuesday 8 November 2011
Paul: Printed review:
Printed review from the Rottentomatoes site:
5 reasons that why you know your watching a Working Title film:
* The characters, are they known British stars?
* The setting is either a typically well known English area or an American journey in lots of famous locations if the story requires it, like in Paul.
* Is the film bot British made and associated with Universal?
* Working Title is in the credits.
* The genre is either comedy, romance and/or drama.
5 reasons that why you know your watching a Working Title film:
* The characters, are they known British stars?
* The setting is either a typically well known English area or an American journey in lots of famous locations if the story requires it, like in Paul.
* Is the film bot British made and associated with Universal?
* Working Title is in the credits.
* The genre is either comedy, romance and/or drama.
Monday 7 November 2011
My boy Jack editing techniques:
* Close-up shot of clock at beginning of the scene, then a cutaway to the vehicle. This suggests the driver is late as time progresses.
* Parralel editing, two scenes keep cutting from eachother, boy in room and man in car.
* Eyeline editing when boy is seen at camera height while the man handing letter is above him. Also when other boy looks down on him.
* Dissolve when the boy takes off his glasses and the word board disappears.
* Continuity when the king is waiting for man and looks at watch.
* Visual effects when the boy shows an expression which seems to display his compressed fear.
* Fade in and out with title shown above car.
* Different screen shots of car to display its value, thereby representing the man's view.
* The superimpose effect is used when the boy and the letter board are both shown on screen at once, then when the boy takes off his glasses the letter board fades away.
* The different screen shots of the car could also be considered as a montage, showing time passing by. This makes sense as clocks are associated with this scene.
* Long take is when car drives under title towards building, the car is shown on screen for a long duration at that point.
* Shot/reverse shot is when the boy is speaking to another boy who is looking down at him. A series of shots occur as they have a conversation.
* Jump cut when as boy walks into room for testing scene cuts back to man in car. When we see the boy next, he is already in the room waiting for testing.
* Not quite a graphic match, but close as the boy with glasses in a close up shot almost transfers over to the man with the glasses in a close shot while driving. Only a shot of the car moving is inbetween the two.
* Related to parallel editing, parallel action occurs. Both the man driving and the boy tested occur.
* Many cutaways occur between the man and boy due to parallel editing and action.
*
* Parralel editing, two scenes keep cutting from eachother, boy in room and man in car.
* Eyeline editing when boy is seen at camera height while the man handing letter is above him. Also when other boy looks down on him.
* Dissolve when the boy takes off his glasses and the word board disappears.
* Continuity when the king is waiting for man and looks at watch.
* Visual effects when the boy shows an expression which seems to display his compressed fear.
* Fade in and out with title shown above car.
* Different screen shots of car to display its value, thereby representing the man's view.
* The superimpose effect is used when the boy and the letter board are both shown on screen at once, then when the boy takes off his glasses the letter board fades away.
* The different screen shots of the car could also be considered as a montage, showing time passing by. This makes sense as clocks are associated with this scene.
* Long take is when car drives under title towards building, the car is shown on screen for a long duration at that point.
* Shot/reverse shot is when the boy is speaking to another boy who is looking down at him. A series of shots occur as they have a conversation.
* Jump cut when as boy walks into room for testing scene cuts back to man in car. When we see the boy next, he is already in the room waiting for testing.
* Not quite a graphic match, but close as the boy with glasses in a close up shot almost transfers over to the man with the glasses in a close shot while driving. Only a shot of the car moving is inbetween the two.
* Related to parallel editing, parallel action occurs. Both the man driving and the boy tested occur.
* Many cutaways occur between the man and boy due to parallel editing and action.
*
Thursday 3 November 2011
Evaluation of Working Title website:
What must be considered:
* What info does it provide?
* Who is it for?
* Uniqueness?
* Surprised to find or not find?
* Purposes of images?
* Heading site adverts?
* Why is stuff there?
* Layout of the website?
* Messages hidden?
* Overall website?
Who information does the website provide:
Information within the homepage consists of latest installments within the company's production history, such as Johnny English information and dates on the left hand side based on dates for premires and stunts. These are probably added on the website in order to make information based on upcoming and latest events public to the fan base. The home page consists of many coloured boxes which show basic information of all the latest big hits such as Contraband and Senna, providing basic information on each movie product. It's there to portray the movies and display their uniqueness (relates to a later topic) and good standards. I think this is a good idea as it generates publicity to those products this way, by featuring it in a main section of the website. This is a good method to generate publicity and therefore, success via distribution methods. The navigation bar leads to seperate pages which provide information based on films, trailers, news, features, theatre, action and TV pages. All of these are important branches of the working title comapny and the icnlusion of both the bar on the top of the webpage layout (relates to another point) and the content in the website is a good way to gain more success via successful marketing procedures.
Who is it for:
As a major company for UK standards, Working Title has many different audiences, all ranging in both age and taste in genre. The website presents news, updates and features whcih vary to all audience portions. For instance, the Johnny English advertisement feature will be aimed at both kids and young adults who have a specific taste and action and comedy genres. However, something such as Contraband would be aimed at an older audience which prefers thrillers. The many featrues within the website also help to relate to all parts of the audinece. For instance, the inclusion of games and youthful activities is a method of relating to young audiences, whereas paragraphs and news updates are a good emthod to attract older, wiser audiences. Overall, the features and inclusion within the website put together can relate to any part of the audience for Working Title, whether it be young comedy lovers, or older drama fans.
Uniqueness:
Games were soemwhat unique in this case. While games appearing on websites is not uncommon, not all film company sites have them, and even of they do, not many featured comedic feels to the games featured. Games such as Pig chase and Mr Bean were unique as they provided by excitment within the gameplay itself, and comedy via inclusion of sound, characters (or pigs) and how the game appears visually, like with Mr Bean's expressions. In general, this was just one of many unique factors, ones such as the TV feature, production pages to website notifications and others. These particular features are not common and are a great way to present the stand-out factors of the website.
Surprising elements:
I was surprised to see games with comedic feel to them as that is uncommon for must huge title film production companies. Not extremely rare, but not commonly featured to this extent, either. Another surprise I witnessed was the fact that there was a list called 'choose film' at the bottom of the webpage. This gave out a basic glossary based on all of the major films produced by Working Title such as 'Nanny McPhee' and 'Johhny English' and gave you links to their main pages. It was a good inclusion to feature a basic glossary to most major films that the company has produced, though some arguably big hits were missing from that list. Nonetheless, that is a good thing to do as it makes it easier for the users to locate those pages.
Purposes of images:
As far as the homepage goes, the purposes of the images at the top of the page are used to advertise latest hits. The heading image constantly changes to advertise a different product. AS total of 5 films are advertised at one time with this heading feature. This is a good way of not taking up too much webpage space while still maintaining a large amount of advertising going on in one page. The images furtehr down the page beside the coloured boxes are used to show intense screenshots of the movie that it is applied to. It shows stunning images while the text on the side displays the content of the film in writing. The images being included this way are good as they portray the products in a positive way and they are effective as they make the users of the website see lots of ads in one page and raises awareness ultimately.
Heading ads:
As previously discussed, these ads are used to advertise 5 products at once, it does this via an images change every few seconds. The position of this image changing advert heading is effective in the sense that it raises publicity for many different movie products at once.
Why are things included used:
The images are included simply to advertise the products or projects that they are applied to, such as Johnny English reborn promotional pictures actually being applied to the new movie. They are also added in to amke the website more visually attractive, as a non-stop text site is boring to view by human eyesight. The text is inserted in for either promotional purposes or for the sake of notifications of the company or its products/projects. The games, news and other features are there to supply more enjoyment to the experience of surfing this site. These features are included to get the users interested in the content featured. Thi process may then help to draw ina fanbase purely based on internet popularity from the website success, so the inclusion of the features is effective.
The website layout:
This layout is effective as it shows the heading image/s at the top and of a large format,so it instantly gains attention, sicne the heading features large successful projects, it is useful for publicity methods. Then what's new news notifications and updates are included on the left sideof the webpage. This is good as it gives the fans updates on what's coming up, so they can prepare to watch it. Further down the page is the coloured boxes mentioned earlier, with text and images based on the big hits made by WT. This is a good place to put them as people interested in surfing the webpage will spot these as the search. This is a good way to attract more interested fans into the marketing procedures.
Messages hidden:
Though a subtle example, the bar underneath the heading image is not a row a images, but rather clips. For those interested enough, they hover the mouse over those images and they are revealed as clips. These are important clips as they reveal key content towards the main products produced by the company. These clips are only discovered by those interested enought to search. this inclusion is good as it shows the interested fans more previewing and spoilers towards the product content.
Overall website:
The overall website does a good job in promoting company aims, via techniques such as Games, which relates to fan interaction, and Action which supplies extra additional features to the company. The layout, images and text all relate together to successfully create a website with relevant content which can attract and draw in fans who view the site.
* What info does it provide?
* Who is it for?
* Uniqueness?
* Surprised to find or not find?
* Purposes of images?
* Heading site adverts?
* Why is stuff there?
* Layout of the website?
* Messages hidden?
* Overall website?
Who information does the website provide:
Information within the homepage consists of latest installments within the company's production history, such as Johnny English information and dates on the left hand side based on dates for premires and stunts. These are probably added on the website in order to make information based on upcoming and latest events public to the fan base. The home page consists of many coloured boxes which show basic information of all the latest big hits such as Contraband and Senna, providing basic information on each movie product. It's there to portray the movies and display their uniqueness (relates to a later topic) and good standards. I think this is a good idea as it generates publicity to those products this way, by featuring it in a main section of the website. This is a good method to generate publicity and therefore, success via distribution methods. The navigation bar leads to seperate pages which provide information based on films, trailers, news, features, theatre, action and TV pages. All of these are important branches of the working title comapny and the icnlusion of both the bar on the top of the webpage layout (relates to another point) and the content in the website is a good way to gain more success via successful marketing procedures.
Who is it for:
As a major company for UK standards, Working Title has many different audiences, all ranging in both age and taste in genre. The website presents news, updates and features whcih vary to all audience portions. For instance, the Johnny English advertisement feature will be aimed at both kids and young adults who have a specific taste and action and comedy genres. However, something such as Contraband would be aimed at an older audience which prefers thrillers. The many featrues within the website also help to relate to all parts of the audinece. For instance, the inclusion of games and youthful activities is a method of relating to young audiences, whereas paragraphs and news updates are a good emthod to attract older, wiser audiences. Overall, the features and inclusion within the website put together can relate to any part of the audience for Working Title, whether it be young comedy lovers, or older drama fans.
Uniqueness:
Games were soemwhat unique in this case. While games appearing on websites is not uncommon, not all film company sites have them, and even of they do, not many featured comedic feels to the games featured. Games such as Pig chase and Mr Bean were unique as they provided by excitment within the gameplay itself, and comedy via inclusion of sound, characters (or pigs) and how the game appears visually, like with Mr Bean's expressions. In general, this was just one of many unique factors, ones such as the TV feature, production pages to website notifications and others. These particular features are not common and are a great way to present the stand-out factors of the website.
Surprising elements:
I was surprised to see games with comedic feel to them as that is uncommon for must huge title film production companies. Not extremely rare, but not commonly featured to this extent, either. Another surprise I witnessed was the fact that there was a list called 'choose film' at the bottom of the webpage. This gave out a basic glossary based on all of the major films produced by Working Title such as 'Nanny McPhee' and 'Johhny English' and gave you links to their main pages. It was a good inclusion to feature a basic glossary to most major films that the company has produced, though some arguably big hits were missing from that list. Nonetheless, that is a good thing to do as it makes it easier for the users to locate those pages.
Purposes of images:
As far as the homepage goes, the purposes of the images at the top of the page are used to advertise latest hits. The heading image constantly changes to advertise a different product. AS total of 5 films are advertised at one time with this heading feature. This is a good way of not taking up too much webpage space while still maintaining a large amount of advertising going on in one page. The images furtehr down the page beside the coloured boxes are used to show intense screenshots of the movie that it is applied to. It shows stunning images while the text on the side displays the content of the film in writing. The images being included this way are good as they portray the products in a positive way and they are effective as they make the users of the website see lots of ads in one page and raises awareness ultimately.
Heading ads:
As previously discussed, these ads are used to advertise 5 products at once, it does this via an images change every few seconds. The position of this image changing advert heading is effective in the sense that it raises publicity for many different movie products at once.
Why are things included used:
The images are included simply to advertise the products or projects that they are applied to, such as Johnny English reborn promotional pictures actually being applied to the new movie. They are also added in to amke the website more visually attractive, as a non-stop text site is boring to view by human eyesight. The text is inserted in for either promotional purposes or for the sake of notifications of the company or its products/projects. The games, news and other features are there to supply more enjoyment to the experience of surfing this site. These features are included to get the users interested in the content featured. Thi process may then help to draw ina fanbase purely based on internet popularity from the website success, so the inclusion of the features is effective.
The website layout:
Messages hidden:
Though a subtle example, the bar underneath the heading image is not a row a images, but rather clips. For those interested enough, they hover the mouse over those images and they are revealed as clips. These are important clips as they reveal key content towards the main products produced by the company. These clips are only discovered by those interested enought to search. this inclusion is good as it shows the interested fans more previewing and spoilers towards the product content.
Overall website:
The overall website does a good job in promoting company aims, via techniques such as Games, which relates to fan interaction, and Action which supplies extra additional features to the company. The layout, images and text all relate together to successfully create a website with relevant content which can attract and draw in fans who view the site.
Wednesday 2 November 2011
What to refer to and discuss within exam:
Mise en Scene - everything within scene: Characters
Body Language
Props, costumes...
Colour
Setting
Denotation-Connotation
Inconographic essence
Stereotypes
Lighting inclusion
Camera:
Angles
Movement
The framing
Focus of camera
Editing:
Transitions
Continuity
Transition speed
Effects
Length of frames
Shot reverse
Narritive- Time, Theory
Codes such as action and enigma.
180 rule
Time:
Screen Time-How long story needs to be told
Subjective Time- From perspective of character
Compressed Time- Skips the insignificant parts
Long Take
Simutaneous Time- used for events such as phone conversations, etc...
Slow motion
Flash forward timing
General manipulation techniques.
Sound:
Diegetic
Non-Diegetic
Contrapuntual ( Opposite)
Parrallel
Bridges ( Links between scenes)
Props, costumes...
Colour
Setting
Denotation-Connotation
Inconographic essence
Stereotypes
Lighting inclusion
Camera:
Movement
The framing
Focus of camera
Editing:
Transitions
Continuity
Transition speed
Effects
Length of frames
Shot reverse
Narritive- Time, Theory
Codes such as action and enigma.
180 rule
Time:
Screen Time-How long story needs to be told
Compressed Time- Skips the insignificant parts
Long Take
Simutaneous Time- used for events such as phone conversations, etc...
Slow motion
Flash forward timing
General manipulation techniques.
Sound:
Non-Diegetic
Contrapuntual ( Opposite)
Parrallel
Bridges ( Links between scenes)
Tuesday 1 November 2011
Sunday 23 October 2011
Thursday 13 October 2011
Wednesday 12 October 2011
Notes for opening of TV drama:
Mise-en-scene:
Setting is a road, lighting is somewhat dark which foreshadows negative events and the enigma code.
Red van before incident on road hints of these events.
Office setting suggests new professional atmosphere at that point.
Angles and effects:
Angle on road shows danger, shows how scene looks to others.
Angle in the shoe shop, shows rd behind head of mother, shows she is asociated with negativitity due to son being bad.
Movement of angle while walking shows narrative time, also on road as time moves on around mother and son as they struggle.
Movemet includes whip pans as car moves past the people on street.
Codes:
Enigma code in opening.
Action code on road scene.
Editing:
Transition at the start of the video.
Effects:
Sound is mostly digetic.
Setting is a road, lighting is somewhat dark which foreshadows negative events and the enigma code.
Red van before incident on road hints of these events.
Office setting suggests new professional atmosphere at that point.
Angles and effects:
Angle on road shows danger, shows how scene looks to others.
Angle in the shoe shop, shows rd behind head of mother, shows she is asociated with negativitity due to son being bad.
Movement of angle while walking shows narrative time, also on road as time moves on around mother and son as they struggle.
Movemet includes whip pans as car moves past the people on street.
Codes:
Enigma code in opening.
Action code on road scene.
Editing:
Transition at the start of the video.
Effects:
Sound is mostly digetic.
Tuesday 4 October 2011
Narrative time examples:
Crime. | Period/literary. | Family. | Relationships of various content. | Hybrid – post-modern. |
Example: | Example: | Example: | Example: | Example: |
Time is manipulated in this scene as there are shifts from certain time periods. The mise-en-scene helps to support this as you can tell by the lighting and setting that the time is skipping. Within this 7 minute clip, it starts in mid-day and ends at night in the hospital. Directly, you can see Kerry getting hurt in the day, and then the hospital scene starts during the sunset judging by the lighting, then at the end it is in the dark, implying it has skipped straight to night time. This technique of time manipulation is compressed time. It is where time is skipped in order to only view the important parts. In this case, the audience does not want to see her being taken in the ambulance all the way to the hospital, so they cut that part out of the show. | This entire scene is set in real time. Pride and prejudice only has one common time manipulation usage, compressed time for when they transfer to new scenes in the show. In this scene, however, there are no transitions, and since the show has a realistic feel to it, it plays in mostly real time, with a few exceptions being present in the shows run. This scene progressively focuses on just the conversation involving these characters without changing anything involving time. Basically, since the time is generally moving properly in this scene, there is no time manipulation involved with this scene. The time is also linear in this clip too, meaning it is straight from start ot finish and no twisting or manipulating in the time at all. | This scene also features compressed time due to the fact that every time the food is cooked, only a few seconds of it is shown. This is due to the fact that no-one wants to see it being cooked from start to finish. The second part of the scene involving the eating section had a real time inclusion to it as no time was skipped in this part. This is because the conversation they were having was linked to the content in the series afterwards and the audience needed to carefully listen to it. The time cut outs of the cooking were made purely due to irrelevance and lack of interest within the episodes featured content. it only shows the important factors of the scene in the Doctir actually eating it and hating it when it is cooked. | This scene features a fair amount of time manipulation. For example, it includes the scene where Del and Rodney are running in their costumes, and it seems to be that the camera is providing a slight slow-motion effect to add to the effectiveness of the scene. It also presents false emphasis on how Del and Rodney seem like heroes to the other characters when they are really not. Also, the scene gives us an ambiguous time effect, during the part when the Trotters are running down the town and the lady is getting mugged after leaving the station, the Trotters arrive just a mere short period of time after she started to get attacked. It is unknown if this was real time and it actually took them that long to run there, or if it was either slowed down or sped up time used to make it seem that way so the events in the scene can appear to be logical and chronological when they are actually not. | This scene features obvious time manipulation since the lighting changes from sunny to dark and gloomy within just a few minutes. This mise-en-scene trick is added to show the effects and feelings of the characters as worried and the plot context to be intimidating. It also plays with the lighting as it wants the show to emphasis of the conversation by showing time pass quickly as the talking continues to draw in tension to the characters. It shows the intensity and importance of the scene in the respect. Basically, time is sped up to develop an understanding of the conversation and how significant the issues surrounding it are overall. It also makes the event stand out amongst other events occuring within the scene around them. |
Toy Story: Small exhibition details...
Exhibition details for Toy Story 3:
How many cinemas did TS3 get shown in on its release date?
Within the first day: 4,028 theatres on its release date.
In general: Several thousand theatres worldwide, within several different countries.
Box Office for TS3: $1,063,171,911 approx.…
Budget for the movie production: $200 million approx.
Monday 3 October 2011
Thursday 29 September 2011
Narrative theory:
Gerie's game...
Character roles: The hero: Gerie. The protagonist who seeks to win a chess game against himself.
The villain: The other Gerie. Gerie's alternate self who opposes him in the chess game.
The donor: Gerie 1 again, he provides himself with a tactic in order to beat his other self.
The helper: Again, Gerie 1, he helps himself in order to win the chess game.
Equilibrium:
Gerie is an aging old man who is playing a daylong chess game with himself.
Dis-equilibrium:
During the game, his alternate self starts to defeat him in the chess game and Gerie is stuck without any ideas.
New equilibrium: His alternate being is beating him horribly but then he fakes a heart attack and literally turns the tables, thus winning the chess game and set challenge in the story.
The 5 codes inclusion:
The codes used in this are the action code, the semantic code, and the symbolic code.
The action code is used during the scene where Gerie is losing to his other self and then he fakes a heart attack in order to flip the table around.
The semantic code is involved in the sense that the setting is a quiet park bench in the sun, with two old men, or one man with two sides to him, playing a chess game in private. Most old people are sometimes stereotyped in the sense that they are old, worn out men who want quiet and cannot stand noise. That is why it is semantic, it is portrayed how people think it should be, an old man is a quiet park in the morning playing a chess game.
The symbolic code is somewhat involved as it includes a binary opposite. The story sees Gerie as an immature man especially when faking the heart attack. He is described as a young man at heart. This is the old-young opposite.
Wednesday 28 September 2011
Tuesday 27 September 2011
Tessa Perkins stereotypes work:
Theory homework for Ms Frearson in media studies:
To what extent do I agree with Tessa Perkins 5 assumptions?
I do agree that not all stereotypes are negative quite a bit as in TV drama’s it only ever seems to be the character with a bad attitude that labels people with bad stereotypes. For example, in South Park, Kenny McCormick is labelled as a poor nobody be Eric Cartman, but Cartman is a boy who is hated by all the public around him and often seen as a fat sociopath.
However, sometimes, people in general can label someone with a good stereotype. For example, a space captain is usually stereotyped as an intelligent, wise, handsome man with a happy and successful lifestyle. Examples include Captain Kirk from Star Trek, and Zapp Brannigan from Futurama, which is saying something since Zapp is a low-life who has a low intellect and a jerk personality, and yet the characters in the show seem to think of him as a successful captain, those who don’t know him well, at least.
Another example is, surprising enough, people who are paralyzed from the waist down in wheelchairs. Sometimes in a TV show, of someone who has a regular functioning mind and the movement of their arms still there, then he/she can sometimes be seen as an independent, hard working, and smart person. An example would be Izzy Armstrong from Coronation Street.
So overall, there are many examples of good stereotypes, both in fiction and in real life. Tessa Perkins was right about that one.
Another point she made is that stereotypical labelling does not only apply to the poor. Upper class individuals also can be labelled badly too.
For example, in Only Fools and Horses, Boycie is a rich man who hangs around with the lower class on screen. Most of the other lower class characters such as Derek and Trigger sometimes make fun of him. For E.g. Del has taken the mick out of him for being a ‘tight git’ and Rodney called him a ‘Rich snob’ as well.
Another example in The Simpsons is Mr Burns, the richest man in the town. He is often hated and despised by the rest of the people because he is seen as a selfish, heartless, evil old man with money he does not deserve.
Therefore, Perkins is right about this point too. Rich people can be slandered by stereotypes as easily as the poor person.
The third point she made was about the fact that a stereotype can be made within a person’s own group.
An example of this includes ‘Two and a half men’ where Alan Harper considers himself to be a lonely, miserable, pathetic man. And, the other characters more than agree on that. Alan seems to claim himself as these things because the represents his character in a way that it is like that.
A second example is ‘Everybody hates Chris’ where Chris believes that he himself, and his friend, are social low lives with nobody to like or care for them.
So yes, Tessa is also right that it can be done to one’s own group. It usually occurs when one insults themselves or their people when they are made at themselves.
The fourth point she made about stereotypes not changing is false, since the way society looks at things in general changes over time…
For example, in the early 1900’s a wealthy man would be seen as a rich snob since it was uncommon to see someone with lots of wealth. In them days, people were not as rich, neither were they as advanced, meaning rich people could not buy big, expensive, valuable items like a super computer with their money anyway.
In the 21st century, however, even though people may still think that deep down, the rich people are provided with a lot more power and can display it better by being able to afford advanced technology and expensive items. Now that the poor people realise the power of the rich men, they don’t dare labels them snobs in public.
Also, in the 50’s and 70’s, rockabillies were considered decent people, in the 60’s; people were off that whole fad entirely and thought of those people negatively.
So, basically, they are just subtle examples of how stereotypes can change over time.
The fifth and final point she made was that stereotypes are not always false. Even though they usually are, she is right in the sense that some are actually true.
An example of this is in Eastenders’ where Phil Mitchell is described as an angry, mad lunatic. Judging by his actions in the show, this is certainly true as he had had many fights and aggressive moments in the show.
Another is the character of Batman in the Batman franchise that is seen as an anti-hero. This is a correct stereotype aimed towards him as while he fights for good, he also hurts a lot of people, some who turn out to be innocent. Particularly the recent The Dark Knight movie, where on the cover he burns down the building just to show he is a superhero there to help supposedly.
Therefore, some examples can be true, as Tessa says, though mostly not.
A grade work:
Relating to point 1, about all stereotypes being negative, what can be argued is that the entire concept of this is a method of people being horrible to each other for petty amusement, rather than genuinely meaning it. Basically, the entire concept of stereotypes can be to just hurt people verbally and make them feel weak about themselves. Some stereotypes can be positive also, such as complements. However, most of the time, they are just used for slander, and they usually mean nothing as statements anyway. Such as in ‘Only Fools and Horses’ when Del labels Rodney as a ‘plonker’ and an idiot. He may not always mean it, but it’s a very of insulting him when he is mad.
Relating to point 2, it can be argued that while stereotypes can also apply to the rich, the poor suffer the most from this slander. While that is considerably true, that is due to the fact that statistically, more poor people exist than rich ones. That means the stereotypes towards the poor will be used a lot more since there will be more people to label. It is just an effect of population classification percentage in a way, not necessarily people hating a single individual who is poor over one who is rich.
As far as point 3 goes, a stereotype that one aims towards ones own group will not be used as often and frequently as a stereotype used towards other groups. This is because one may only classify themselves as a certain category of personality type when in an intensely serious situation, such as their wife dying in a car crash. Relating to the Alan Harper example, Alan only considers himself to be a lonely, miserable loser in scenes when he is feeling miserable. Whereas other characters label him as that all the time whenever they just want to verbally abuse him for their own pleasure. So, while a stereotype aimed towards one main group does sometimes happen, it is uncommon at least in comparison to labelling of other groups.
Point 4 has an interesting factor to it. While stereotypes do tend to change over time, Tessa wasn’t completely wrong as the original stereotypes from the past do not leave peoples thoughts; they are just forgotten by society. However, then can come back. A real life example involves politics, while in the early days of the political system, no one ever participated without force, and it was only due to compulsory law that you had to take part. If anyone didn’t, not only would they be slandered, but also fined. The term ‘Biggot’ among others was used to refer to anyone who didn’t vote in those days. Even in the mid 20th century, some of the political members of society thought of non-interested individuals as things like this. While in recent years this attitude has not been common in usage, Gordon Brown recently referred to one of his own supporters as a ‘Biggot’ in a huge story. So, stereotypes do change, but the originals are not always forgotten.
Finally, even though I claimed point 5 to be that not all stereotypes are false, they usually are. I noted out exceptions which provided examples as to why both I and Tessa were correct. But, when you think about it socially, most stereotypes are seemingly negative based. The reason for this is the point I made earlier about people using these for slanderous purposes. While there is the occasional good stereotype based on the rich being powerful or the old being wise, a lot of stereotypes are in fact negative. Technically, stereotypes being referred to as negative could be considered a stereotype in itself, since many of them are negative with certain exceptions. A stereotype based on another set of stereotypes.
So basically, while not all stereotypes are false, many of them are, which is why is seems that way to people.
Monday 26 September 2011
Thursday 22 September 2011
Monday 19 September 2011
Friday 16 September 2011
Wednesday 14 September 2011
Denotations and connotations:
In simplistic definition, it is the secondary meaning of a word.
E.g. Red is a colour: This colour is associated with evil, danger, high temperature AKA heat.
That was a connotation, a denotation is the direct meaning or set f meanings based on a word or an expression.
E.g. an angry face is assocaited with something going bad, or an event damaging that person's feelings.
E.g. Poodle is a denotation of a breeded dog.
E.g. Red is a colour: This colour is associated with evil, danger, high temperature AKA heat.
That was a connotation, a denotation is the direct meaning or set f meanings based on a word or an expression.
E.g. an angry face is assocaited with something going bad, or an event damaging that person's feelings.
E.g. Poodle is a denotation of a breeded dog.
Tuesday 13 September 2011
Glossary:
Production: A production is the process in which a movie or any type of video package is general is created. There are many steps in the process of production. These steps include the concept development, the casting of the actors involved, the editing, and the exhibition.
Marketing: Marketing is a term based on a process with determines what specific products or services are of use and/or interest to the customers. It is stragedy used in business development, commercials and sales. Marketing has been described as the 'management process' by many.
Distribution: This is a process which involves the edited in completion terms movie or other media source being given to the retail company which exhibits it. It is basically where the movie or show is given out to the people who show it. It is shared between teritary companies.
Exhibition: This is the stage of a film or show production in which the media source is actually shown to the people who want to watch it. It is when the production has finished and the movie is ready for display, and where the customers pay an arranged price in order to watch it in the cinema.
Marketing: Marketing is a term based on a process with determines what specific products or services are of use and/or interest to the customers. It is stragedy used in business development, commercials and sales. Marketing has been described as the 'management process' by many.
Distribution: This is a process which involves the edited in completion terms movie or other media source being given to the retail company which exhibits it. It is basically where the movie or show is given out to the people who show it. It is shared between teritary companies.
Exhibition: This is the stage of a film or show production in which the media source is actually shown to the people who want to watch it. It is when the production has finished and the movie is ready for display, and where the customers pay an arranged price in order to watch it in the cinema.
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