Evaluation (Pictures won't show up)

Media Evaluation

Our media product, A 2 minute opening of a sports drama named ‘The Redemption’, themed around the sub-genre of Boxing.
1. In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of media products?
The film we made incorporates a number of generic conventions for films of its type, One main reason is that there are no Female main characters conveying that the film is very male oriented, this is normal for films of its type so therefore develops the generic conventions of boxing films. Our film is very similar to other fight films, Such as the classic film ‘Fight Club’, which is very male oriented therefore giving a macho feel, The film also features a lot of Blood/Violence which our full film would contain, Whereas in the first 2 minutes the only Violence is mild, As ‘Mike Dawson’ punches a bag with extreme force and has a tense moment with Vladimir Zhirkov as a fight is about to break out. The film also contains a lot of cliché props and settings that would be seen in many boxing films, the most noticeable being the boxing gym that we used for filming, Which contained punch bags and training mats we also brought boxing gloves which are normally used as the main point of iconography in a boxing film.



2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?


Our film shows a number of stereotypical views on certain groups, Such as the fact that the 2 minute film contains no Female main characters, with only one female speaking role; this is consistent with the stereotype that most sports do not contain women even in the film industry, thus showing a stereotype that men are dominant and women passive. This coincides with the target audience which is mainly male with a small percentage being female, and the violence and fighting may attract a more teenage audience. Characters in our film are also rather stereotypical, with the main rival of Mark Dawson being a very tall Russian who has a ruthless persona, Which compares well with the villain from Rocky IV ‘Ivan Drago’ (see below), also people who are seen to be working class in our film can be noticed by simple cheap looking clothes which is a stereotype seen with small towns. Coach Barry Howard is also meant to be the oldest character in the film which can be known by the old cardigan and hat that he wears throughout, maybe showing older characters as poorer.

3. What Kind of Media Institution might distribute your media product and why?

The film we made is shown to be very low budget and would have little to no chance of being noticed by a big film company e.g. Hollywood, and therefore would need to either be produced independently or by a very small company, Advertisement would also be a small job with the fact that it is a very small budget, And therefore would have to be advertised through posters made by us, Word Of Mouth or viral campaigns on sites such as ‘YouTube’ where trailers could be released. The chance of this being released in a cinema therefore are very low and would either be released straight onto DVD, or Blu Ray if it got enough copies bought, Or maybe even would be played on late night film showings on websites such as Film 4, Also websites that exist now like Love Film mean that small films can get downloaded online and make money from it.



4. Who would be the audience for your media product?

The film’s main audience would be males from the age of 15 to 30 , with a very small percent being female, people may watch the film under the age of 15, But the film contains a 15 Certificate due to Violence and Crime Themes, the boundaries of film classification were found on the bbfc website,
http://www.bbfc.co.uk/recent/films
.

The male focus of the film is due to stereotypes that most women would avoid sports films which was backed up by the Questionnaires we printed off very early in the film process, but a small female following may happen due to female sport oriented films such as ‘Million Dollar Baby’ or maybe even due to watching female athletes strive for the best in things such as the Olympics.

I Think the film could get a rather large local following due to the main character being from Barnsley and battling his way from the bottom back to his position as Champion, Which a lot of people who don’t live locally would like too because everybody loves an underdog story.

Other films similar to ours that would attract a similar audience include the obvious ‘Rocky’ series, Fighting and 8 Mile, all of which depict a character fighting his way to the top in their own ways.

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

Our audience was attracted through a number of means; the audiences we expect are 15 to 25 year olds with ages above that starting to lose interest due to actors whom they had never seen or a plot that simply doesn’t appeal to them.

Our female audience is attracted due to the fact that one main character in our film ‘Charlotte Taylor’ has a very strong personality which can even be observed in the 2 minute start we made, Because even though she is surrounded by lots of men and two intimidating boxers she still manages to ask her question without losing a smile, This would appeal to women because of the stereotype breaking strong woman image.

Local people may be drawn into the film by the Main protagonist also being local and rising through the ranks to become champion, showing that even people from a small town like Barnsley can reach up and achieve something big.

Whereas on the other had the main Antagonist being Russian may put off some foreign people due to a big stereotypical look at Russians being big and violent, as well as the fact that the character shows a very stereotypical image of Russians, Wearing a leather/fur coat with wild hair, Foreign people may also be put off by the fact that the character doesn’t have the protagonist role and is instead seen as the bad guy, which seems to be a recurring pattern in films.

Action fans may be drawn in by the very tense scenes , like the slightly cliché scene of ‘Vlad’ and ‘Mike’ staring each other out with point of view shots with a heartbeat in the background , which builds a lot of tension for what may happen next.




6. What have you learnt about technology from the process of constructing the product?

The equipment we used during filming was capable with only a few minor faults, But one major fault was that the tapes that fit in the handicam that we used was very flimsy and broke during our first corridor scene that we had to reshoot later on, But the handicam was very easy to use requiring little to no help with. Which contrasts completely with the HD Camera that we used for some scenes, this was complicated and we needed quite a bit of help with it, it was also very heavy unlike the handicam so bringing it to film the Gym scene would have been impossible.
But the difference between the cameras used can be seen easily throughout as the quality on the HD Camera was a lot better than the handicam in visual and sound perspectives.
The computer software we used ‘Final Cut Express’ proved a formidable task to use at first but as making the film went along , editing with the program became a simple task. Creating cuts and wipes was effortless and adding sounds and music like the heartbeat effect and the running music on the first scene involved only a click and drag, I would definitely use the program again.


7. Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to your full product?
I think I’ve learnt a great deal in the progression from our preliminary task to our full film, I’ve learnt to use cameras a lot more effectively and finding and naming different shots has become simple, I Feel my editing skills have improved greatly while I’ve been using Final Cut Express.
The only downsides I could find is that due to group disagreements over shooting times we could have had a little more time to reshoot and gather more training shots if we had all agreed earlier.
I was part of the problem with this and I think time management is definitely a skill I need to improve on
But overall I think our film was a big success and I would love to continue onto A2 to further improve my skills in media, and hopeful create a film which is even better