REBORN: Critical Evaluation - Benjamin Squires

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

Research into continuity and the language of film and editing was a major part of the preparation that I did before we began filming. I personally revised rules of film such as the 180 and 30 degree rules, the video below is a perfect explanation of the 180 degree rule.

I also took an extensive look into colour editing and the look of film compared to digital video. I did this because I personally wasn't happy with the look of my AS film; I felt that the video looked very 'digital'. I have always thought that the giveaway of a student film is in the poor video quality, I often overlooked many short films on YouTube whilst researching continuity and story telling in short films because of poor video and production quality.

I also took into consideration the pace of the film we were going to make - we had always planned on making a drama which would normally consist of drawn out shots and a slow pace. Unfortunately due to time constraints and inexperience of building an effective atmosphere, we avoided a slower a pace, keeping the editing and cutting consistent and always moving the narrative forward swiftly.

We had always intended to conform to the conventions of drama, moving the narrative forward with thoughtful conversations between the characters and both visual and audio cues throughout the film (tire screeching sound effect, roses on the lamppost, hand resting on the chair). The characters always had to be authentic too whilst telling a believable and even relatable story, giving the audience as much as an emotional attatchement to the characters as we could. I always would've wanted the ending of the film to be a happy and satisfying one for the audience, leaving them with positive emotions and connotations regarding the film. However, I knew this would only work if the story had started on such a low point; Ivy is consistently unhappy throughout the film and we used the 'gloomy' nature of the film to reach a more satisfying, conclusive finale - this way the audience are glad to see that the character's story ends on a positive note.

To create a deep illusion of film for the audience, we threw in a lot of other classic film/genre elements. The first scene is typical of that of a horror/thriller; we see a petrified, defenceless girl, the music builds slowly to a loud crescendo and the protagonist is about to meet her end before she shoots out of bed and the music stops to a halt. She was having a nightmare. When the same girl notices the 'monster' across from her one night, she drops a cup of water and it crashes to the floor (we would've done this in slow-motion if we had cameras capable of recording in higher frames per second).

Our film conforms to a number of Richard Dyer's sensibilities from his theory of entertainment and utopia. These include intensity and energy. For example, If the viewer has been paying attention to Ivy's story then the build up to the confrontation scene in Ivy's final nightmare should provide the audience with intensity. The film supplies 'energy' during the second nightmare when Ivy has to franticly run away from 'the monster'. This particular sequence consists of snappy cuts and a huge orchestra crescendo. Whether the films manages to make these impressions on the audience is up to them!

Ivy's character could be compared to Cole Sear, the lead character in 'The Sixth Sense' who is suffering because he is able to see/communicate people who have already died. Ivy's character is also plagued by this same issue in a sense, except she only sees her sister and only in her nightmares.

Cole Sears, lead character in 'The Sixth Sense'

Ivy, lead character in 'Nightmares'

Other aspects may also be comparable such as the title sequence which I looked particularly close at. Each of the films use a very simple font against a plain black background to introduce the films, the music also 'swells' in a way when the title of the film is revealed, similar to how the main theme beings to play in 'Nightmares'.

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and the ancillary texts?

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and the ancillary texts? on Prezi

3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

4. How did you use new media techniques in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

From the very beginning of our project, I remember new media technologies being particularly important to us as a team. Through the popular social networking site, Facebook, we were able to regularly discuss initial ideas and thoughts about the film that we hoped to create. I personally also used Skype to send a couple of my friends a first draft cut of the film to make suggestions to improve the quality before the final cut was made. But arguably the two most important websites that we used for the duration of the course were www.blogspot.com and www.youtube.com.

Just as we did in our previous year, we set up a blog displaying all of our work as a team and as individuals; this also helped us keep track of what tasks we had to complete and how far along we were in the process of film-making. Right from the beginning of the course I was using YouTube to research a large quantity of short films; the variety of which across YouTube is astonishing. Many of the films gave me great inspiration, both from amateur and professional filmmakers alike. Another fairly important website I used was www.imdb.com, the internet movie database, giving us access to trivia of films, budget, cast and crew, etc. Arguably, the Internet has been my biggest source of inspiration for the duration of the course.

When it came to filming and editing, there were a large number of new media technologies that helped us achieve our final product. We used the Sony HDV-1000 video camera. A camera that allowed us to shoot in 1080i, HD quality footage, this alone made the film look a whole lot more professional. The microphone that we used to record the sound was not the one equipped with the HDV-1000, but a better quality boom microphone. Along with such technology, we also had access to some impressive lighting equipment, both from college and from my teammates dad who works in archaeology (lighting that was in fact so bright that we couldn't use during certain scenes because it lit too much!). I also, for the first time, used a Steadicam for improved stability whilst controlling the HDV-1000 during moving shots such as tracking or dollying. Although I enjoyed using the Steadicam, I wasn't amazing with it and many of my attempts using it didn't look fantastic and were subsequently cut from the film. Nevertheless, It was worth it for the experience of using it and one shot in particular that made it in to the film I am quite proud of!

As soon as filming was complete, we moved back into the classroom to commence editing on the colleges iMacs. The iMacs have Final Cut Express installed on them, video editing software that I had now personally become comfortable using thanks to previous experience and owning the software at home. This meant I was very confident whilst approaching the editing stage after demonstrating ways in which we could achieve a more professional film look in Final Cut on the blog beforehand.
The ease of Final Cut allowed me to create effects in the film that I would've otherwise never known how to do. At one point for example, Ivy wakes from her nightmare and the screen fades to white before dissolving back into a shot of her in the bedroom. Timing was essential in this scene to create the right amount of tension. I made a solid white still in Final Cut and had the shot dissolving into the colour then into another shot to create the effect.

The fade to white edit.

There are a couple of things that I think could still be improved upon in regards to the editing stage; I couldn't quite control the unfortunate noise that was produced from the attached microphone during filming. It left almost every single shot with an annoying hissing sound which I managed to remove the most of using a very precise equaliser and hum remover.

The details of the hum remover, any more harmonics used created an effect that was
far too obvious.

My knowledge in Music Technology helped me more than ever here! A lot of the shots had to be colour corrected in some way or another, sometimes to achieve colour continuity throughout the film to maintain the mature tone, others to simply brighten them up because of the purposefully unlit sets.

The colour corrector during a scene which was simply too dark;
half of the shot is adjusted with a colour corrector which then fades to the
regular colours of the shot.

I also used Livetype again this year to create a font effect that we would use to show the title during the film. I did in fact use the same effect as I did for my AS film; simple but very effective, and relevant to the film!

Another important piece of software at my disposal was Logic Pro 9, audio editing and MIDI sequencing software that allowed me to compose the score for my short film, as well as create the final radio trailer for our film.

Scoring in Logic Pro with realtime video playback.

Within Logic I had access to several instrument libraries allowing me to replicate an orchestra from my bedroom at home! These particular sample libraries that I used were from a company called EastWest. They founders of the company specialise in writing 'epic' orchestral scores for hollywood film trailers, as well as creating incredibly detailed instrument libraries. I personally own EWQL Silk, Symphonic Orchestra, Gypsy and SD2. Most of the instruments that were available to me simply weren't applicable to the genre of 'Nightmares'. Therefore, I used a lot of simple instruments such as the piano, violins and other string instruments, and a few synthesisers. Reverb was one of the key parts to the score of the film, it adds a sense of 'dreaminess' to the soundtrack with haunting piano hits and crescendo violin effects. I am also able to control the articulations (style of playing) of the orchestra as well as it's volume, giving me huge control over the sound of my music.

A selection of virtual instruments available to me.

A number of available articulations for 18 violins.

This was the third time I have scored a short film, and i'm getting in to the hang of it! With each piece of music I compose I get better.

Finally, I also used Adobe Photoshop and a Wacom graphics tablet to paint and manipulate photos from filming to create a poster for our film. I took a shot from the film which I particularly liked, a silhouette of Ivy. I also got a character profile of Ivy's dad. Incorporating each of the stills into the poster and painting part of it myself, I was able to create a very professional looking poster. I also found the official 'movie poster' font after a short time spent searching the internet. I would've been lost without the internet during A2 media!