Ahren Hughes – Final evaluation of our finished film.

Evaluation of film – ZOMG

1. In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of a media project?

Our final product in media, is a horror film. Or more specifically a zombie, it uses and challenges the boundaries of other zombie films as ours like many starts “in the thick of it” as if to typical zombie fashion it doesn’t take long for the zombies to appear and start reeking havoc. Also the use of the fog effects live up to the zombie film success checklist as most great zombie films have at some point a scene that quilts and drowns the characters in the creepy abyss of foggy weather. We also used a very forested area as this also has mystery about and gives a certain addition to the suspense as it makes the audience feel like there is something more. The forested area was also well used in the Blair witch project(1999) which was a very successful film in the aspect of it really creeped people out and kept the audience watching http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D51QgOHrCj0 . The unique thing about our final project was the way that we combined the opening credits, eerie and suspense music with the action. We also try to shock the audience or as it is sometimes known we add a feature called “Screamer” this is where something pops up on screen after a loud screaming sound. We altered this a little bit in the part of our film where Joey grabs the zombies shoulder and it turns round really quick and screams. This is used to make the audience jump out of their seats and get the blood pumping.

Forested area in The Blair Witch Project(1999)

2. How does your media product represent a particularly good social group?

Our media project singles out women in the film as always getting into trouble as there are only 2 female characters in the film and one of them is a damsel in distress and the other a child. This is sexist and in a way through use of the child’s role projects the assumption that if the child were attacked by a zombie it would be helpless, this is not necessarily representative of all women as other films from other genres shows strong powerful women such as Lara Croft from Tomb Raider(2001).

 Although in every film there is a certain typical feature of representative, in our project it shows men to be the heroes and rescuers. But every film is different and has different aspects of representative. The women characters are vastly outnumbered in this film also as most of he main characters are male.

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your film and why?

I highly doubt our film would make it big and I have some doubts are film would make it small time with someone like Film Four. Zombie films are in decline, simply because all the good ideas are seemingly gone. Whether it’s a pandemic such as in 28 days later(2002) or mutation like Resident Evil(2002) all these ideas have been used and people want originality but how can it be brought to them as there is only a handful of believable theories as to how a zombie apocalypse could happen. (And even they aren’t that believable). Our film didn’t have a massive budget and if it did go somewhere small like Warp Films it would be hard to make money from as there would only be limited room for merchandise such as a DVD, Soundtrack and a Poster.

 There isn’t any real room for further merchandising as there could be some sort of sequel but as far as a game goes there would be no chance as there would be know means of making profit if they put it into production.

4. Who would be the audience for your media project

The audience for my media project would be mainly males aged 18 and above.

This is down to the blood and gore. The graphic scenes in our film certainly suit a more mature film rating and could be offensive or unsuitable for younger people.

 The reason our target group is aimed more at males is because it has more males in it and going back to representation most males would rather see some guys save girls to make them seem and feel more masculine then to see women kill a load of zombies and save the day and a man. Our film was originally intended to be a 15 as mid teens find zombie films quite cool and it would improve grossing if it went to cinema or to DVD but with the amount of bad language and mental trauma the film has and projects 18 was the only real suitable option.

 Here are the necessary links to see how we classified our film.

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/classification/guidelines/15

http://www.bbfc.co.uk/classification/guidelines/18

5. How did you attract/address the audience?

We attracted the audience through use of blood work, films these days seem to have an over use of blood where it is not needed. We tried to only use as much blood as needed. Although yes a zombie film needs a hell of a lot of blood we tried not to oversell any points and make it all seem necessary. This seems a little bit like a contradiction but it isn’t. Most people actually lose interest if there is a lot of blood and the point and use of the blood is over sold, it makes films seem more like a laughing stock and stops people from taking it seriously. And we tried to keep the film as serious as possible.

 We didn’t address the audience really as we didn’t want to directly make the audience view the story from a singular view point as each of the characters have there own individual differences and are unique. Although the audience can guess who the main character is, we tried to make the bias and focus on him as little as possible so everyone got a decent amount of screen time and got to be seen by the audience for there differences.

6. What did you learn about technology from the process of constructing the product?

I never actually got to film or have a real part in the editing, but the HD1000 cameras we used were very high tech for a short film and did a superb job, and the final cut program used on the MAC computers seemed very professional and taught me that if I want to make a film its really not all about Hollywood productions and its not as hard as most people think. I had never used the technology that I had to use making the film and therefore had no experience but I think now if I needed to I could edit with final cut and assemble and film a piece if I was called upon to do this.

7. Looking back to the preliminary, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

From the preliminary task I learnt that there is a 180 degree perspective that cannot be crossed and I also learnt the value of filming from different camera angles.

 I also learnt that the editing is just as important as the filming as if the piece is not fitted together correctly it makes the film look unprofessional and rather silly.

The only thing I would change is that I would have liked to spend more time on costumes and maybe got more F/X included. And maybe to even make the film a little bit longer. I would also like to try directing the film as I we all had a lot of good ideas we couldn’t use. But that being said I am relatively happy with the way our film turned out and I would be delighted to do it again, the team have all been terrific and id like to think I’ve pulled some of my own weight also.