Note to Moderator

Dear Moderator,

Hello and welcome to our blog!
Thank you for taking the time to look around- the best way to navigate around our blog is by clicking on the label on the right hand side of the page. 

Under the 'Research and Planning' label, you will find evidence of all the research, planning and development work we did as a group during the pre-production, production and post-production stages of our project. 

In order to see exactly what each candidate contributed to this process, we have also included individual contribution labels names for each group member. All research, planning and development posts contributed to by the named candidate will appear when you click that label. 

Each member of the group has also completed their own evaluation, although we have collaborated to produce some content such as our commentary videos. You can access our responses to the evaluation questions under the individually names Evaluation labels. 

Our finished film opening sequence is at the top of the blog, and each candidate has poster their preliminary task video sequence as part of their answer to question 7 of the evaluation. 

You can also filter our posts by labels or fate and there is a blog archive if you want to look through chronologically. Unfortunately we were unable to fit all of our work onto one page, so please click 'older posts' if required to do so.

You will also find a link to the class film blog which contains links to the other group blogs from our school. 

Once again thank you for taking the time to look around our blog, and we really hope you enjoy looking at our work!

From, 
Zenia Khajotia- candidate number 1375
Olivia Downes- candidate number 1132
Emily Grant- candidate number 1240
Arianna Tipper- candidate number 1815

Q1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

During the basic first planning meetings we all agreed on creating a 'chick- flick/ rom- com' film as it was an area where we believe we recognised and were able to think of an original storyline which would allow us to include the conventions of this genre as well as going against them. 
In order for us to get a feel for this genre we looked back at previous films which we had watched to get a feel for the types of characters, miss-en-scene and the themes before focusing specifically on the opening sequence. 

TYPICAL CONVENTIONS WITHIN A CHICK FLICK.

CHARACTER

The character- The Protagonist

Personality

Blonde protagonist, centre, close knit friendship group, well
dressed, pink-dominant colour etc.....

• popular
• feared
• followed
• popular boyfriend( possibly football team captain)
• close knit friendship group
• The possibility of her being a cheerleader
• rich 
• lavish house 
• Only child
• Fashionable
• designer labels
• Loud
• Self-centered. 

Look

• Blonde
• Usually white 
• 'Perfect' looking
• Skinny
• 'Perfect' smile

Within the Chick- flick genre- especially within school based films- there is often the challenging character/ the 'under dog' who threatens the popular girls perfect life. To the popular girl she is the enemy however to the audience she is often seen as the hero of the situation and after changing the social dynamics becomes the protagonist. 

The character- The underdog

Personality  

Underdog, less makeup, causal clothing etc...

• Nice 
• Sweet 
• Charing 
• Friendly 
• Smart 
• Less Sporty
• Perhaps considered the nerd
• Quieter than the protagonist 
• Much smaller social group 
• Less concerned with appearance 
• Less well known with in the school 
• Often has a crush with the popular girls boyfriend- out of her league

Looks

• Simpler looking 
• Much more realistic appearance of modern teenagers
• Darker clothing 
• Brown haired
• Still pretty

TYPICAL THEMES 

Wild Child-Friendship
Growing up
Education
Love
Lies

Education
Power
Appearance

LOVE

POWER

LIES

TRUTH 

FRIENDSHIP

APPEARANCE 

EDUCATION

GROWING UP 

School uniform- adapted to girls style
school bags
books
make up etc....

TYPICAL MISE-EN SCENE

Signifiers of youth- school books, school bags etc...

school uniform

Modern Fashion sense- adopted for the character 

Pink colours- stereotypical view of teen girls 

TYPICAL EVENTS 

In Mean Girls 2 Jo(left) is new to

school with her controversial style 

and opinions she changes the dynamic

of the school. However as she soon

becomes a spiting image of the 

previous plastic she loses it all 

before winning back her friends and 

the boy.

• The protagonist is the popular girl of the school
• A New girl disrupts this 
• Changes the balance of the school 
• The New girl then looses control
• Often replicates the ways of the old popular girl 
• However turns it around at the end
• Wins her love interest 
• Often everyone is happy with there new character roles 

RESULTS-After doing this research we established the basis for our chick flick- PRETTY POPULAR
However we did not just want to replicate the classic chick flick genre. We wanted to use conventions as a basis for our film so it was easily recognisable but use challenges to reinvent the classic genre. 

Characters

• We liked the typical appearance of the main characters as we felt that they are easily recognisable and the audience would be able to easily relate to them. However we wanted to change the twist within the film. Usually within this genre the bad girl loses out to the good girl- good triumphing evil. In our film we wanted bad to triumph good. In our film Lauren is the pretty popular girl. However unlike many other protagonists Lauren is genuinely friendly and kind. She is very modest with a group of friends and the perfect boyfriend. 
• Lauren's status in the school however is quickly lowered as the new rebellious Scarlett joins. To many Scarlett appears kind and loving but Lauren knows that secretly she is attempting to ruin her life and role within the school.   
• The focus of the film is the contrast between the two characters and how Scarlett manages to change the social structure within the school. 
• The plot of the film focuses heavily on Todorvo's Narrative Theory.
• Todorvo's Narrative Theory is that there are 3 stages within a film-the equilibrium- when everything is 'normal, a disruption-something/one disturbs the normal routine-and new equilibrium- when a new normal is formed and the disruption has been acknowledge.
• How we applied this theory:

Equilibrium- Lauren perfectly happy at school 
Disruption- Scarlett entering and changing the make up of the school 
New Equilibrium- Lauren finding her new place within school
This theory is relevant as it provides a basic storyline which you can adapt to suit the genre. Furthermore it recognises the idea that a 'new equilibrium' can be formed- which is what our storyline focuses on.   

STYLE OF OUR PIECE

Bright 

Pink

Girly 

Quick 

Fast pace

Glossy 

Block buster 

FILM TITLE

The title of our film was very important as it was the first thing that attracts an audience. In order to decide on the title we looked at past titles from similar genres/styles.

•  FAST GIRLS-Directed by Regan Hall
  • A simple title
  • Easily recognisable 
  • Set up themes of the film
• Allows room to easily market the film

• MEAN GIRLS

• Simple title

• Easily recognisable 

• Suggest the on-running themes throughout the film 

St.Trinian's

• Clear reference to the school which is used in the film 

• Lacks interest- without the cover photo it subject

• Easy marketing- USP British boarding school, classic English Stereotypes

• Lacks insight into the film

 Because of our idea of contrast and spilt screen we originally wanted two contrasting titles. We then came up with Pear Shaped. We initially thought this would be a good title as it also brings up the idea of appearance but then discarded it as it distracted from the real theme of the film. We then came up with PRETTY POPULAR. we decided on this title as it involved to of the main elements of the film and allowed our audience to focus of the storyline. .

OPENING SEQUENCES

In order to see what was conventional within an opening sequence we did research on previous chick flicks to see what was commonly included. From our research we found out that the title is usually placed at the end of the sequence, titles are placed evenly throughout the sequence, there is a select list of people who appear in the opening credits-such as director, main actors etc-enigmatic features and usually establishes the protagonist.

In order to fit with our genre we replicated many of these conventions. 

Screen Shots from our opening sequence

TITLE AT THE END

TITLES EVENLY SPREAD OUT





                                                    SET LIST OF PEOPLE WHO
APPEAR

ESTABLISHED PROTAGONIST

Q2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?

In order to represent particular social groups we used exaggerated characters. Being having opposite and contrasting characters it allowed us to show a spectrum of society involving all social classes.    

CHARACTERS

Character research- we looked at characters from other chick-flicks and tried to incorporate their traits into our characters. 

Legally Blonde- Elle Woods

Protagonist

• perfect life
• blonde 
• pretty 
• popular
• upper class
• fashionable
• kind
• friendly

Wild Child

Protagonist

Fashionable 

spoilt

Rich 

upper class

kind really

in reality doesn't have a perfect life

 SCARLETT

• New girl at school 
• Colour scheme- Red. Used to represent danger and rebellion. Also it is used to contrast Lauren's character.
• Her appearance is very dramatic compared to Lauren. She has dark red lips, jet black hair and dark eyes. Her costume is used to focus the audience on to the type of character that she will be. Her skirt is very short and skin tight- this was done to sexualise her character and make the difference between her and Lauren much clearer. 
• As a character she is the typical rebellious teen. Shots of her room indicate her involvement in drinking and smoking. Shots of her make up are to reinforce her awareness of appearance. In addition shots of her phone as her alarm are also included as it shows her as a modern teenager. 
• Scarlett is constantly moving from school to school and city to city meaning she must make new friends at each school that she attends. This is shown through school prospectuses and objects showing she has travelled. This idea of permanently have to relocate is common with many children so is easily relatable.
• It is clear from her room and appearance that she is a school girl although there is no specific mention of her age but her liberal uniform suggests to the audience that she is in sixth form. 
• In many films there is a lack of ethnic diveristy within them as they are often portrayed with white American/ British actors. However we wanted there to be diversity within our and to incorporate  the different aspects within a modern day society. The use of an India actress allows us to achieve this as well as being able to widen out target market.

LAUREN

• Popular girl at school
• Colour Scheme- Pink. Used to represent her girly character and to suggest youth and innocence.
• The appearance of Lauren is very natural. Her make up is very simple and minimal compared to Scarlett. Lauren is depicted as the typical all British girl with blonde hair and blue eyes. Her costume is further used to exaggerate this side of her character with typical British tweed blazer and pearl earrings. Her school uniform suggests to the audience that Lauren is of a certain class which would be further reinforced throughout the film. 
• Unlike many protagonists within chick flicks Lauren is a genuinely nice character who is liked by many of her peers. 
• Lauren is depicted as a very girly girl. The wide pans of her room show her variety of nail varnishes along with close ups of her pink desk and bed. Furthermore you are able to see the sporty side of the character through a focused shot of her medals. This further enforces the idea that Lauren is the all round perfect character. Her room is much neater than Scarlett's further showing contrasts between the two characters. 
• Like in many films the protagonist of Pretty Popular was white British. This was done to reinforce the idea of a british themed feel and allowed us to keep conventions of the classic chick flick film genres.  

IMPROVEMENTS TO THE CHARACTERS  

• The characters were perhaps too exaggerate which may have given an unnatural and fake feel to the characters. This many have meant that people couldn't relate to them fully.  
• The character of Scarlett was overly sexualised with her costume and character traits which were a bit unrealistic.
• There could have been more of a focus on a class divide between the two characters rather than focusing purely on character traits and appearance. 
• There wasn't enough focus the fact that the two girls were modern teenagers. Looking back to when we originally planned our opening sequence was should have focused more on current technology such as Twitter, Facebook ext... as a way for the characters to communicate and allow the audience to see more of them. We did attempt to include technological shots within our opening sequence however, the shots very jumpy and were very different to the feel of the rest of the film. 

Q3.What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Our production compnay was SEA GULL PRODUCTIONS

• We are a LOW BUDGET BRITISH production company
• Our ideal films are low budget chick flicks and comedies
• Our target appeal are BLOCKBUSTER FILMS that are released in chain cinemas.
• The focus of sea gulls to account for the British feel of our films.
• Seagull productions like to produce films that challenge the ordinary genre conventions and change the dynamics of a film's genre. This is why seagull films would produce Pretty Popular. Whilst our film does reference the conventions of the genre it also challenges the classic stereotypes.

The Prezi below is used to show our research into potential distributors. When looking for a company to distribute our film we wanted a company that was known within the film industry. In addition we also wanted a company that specialised in our style of film so could understand the marketing we are aiming our film at. The presentation below maps our progress from our initial institutional research to our final decision  

 

Q4. Who would be the audience for your new media product?

TARGET AUDIENCE 

 Research:

Internet Source

From this research it was clear that the age category that visited the cinema the most was those in the 15-24 age bracket. This was our prime target audience. As our film we a chick flick are primary audience was girls ages 15-24. This specific group made up 13% of people who would visit the cinema.   Our target audience is made up mainly with British teens, however we believe that as the film is a blockbuster rather than a budget independent film it would be relevant to a wider audience range. Although the film is mainly aimed at females it can also appeal to the male audience bracket. Our smaller secondary audience is 25-44 mainly females who would watch the film as a member of their school lives. 

Films such as 'Legally Blonde' and 'Wild Child' were both blockbusters. This meant there film had quite a wide target audience however, because of the genre and plot of their films it means there audience was more niche. With their films being similar to ours their target audience was girls ages 16-24. SPECIFIC TARGET AUDIENCE RESEARCH 

• Name- Lauren Prentis
• Age-17
• Currently a student studying maths, politics, economics and history 
• Enjoys watching chick-flicks, rom-coms, adventure, comedy
• What attracts her to chick flicks- easy to watch, relatable, funny, gives you a different outlook of situations.
• What she looks for in a chick flick- good cast, good plot, good storyline, twist, when films challenge conventions.
• Likes that chick flicks are easy to watch with friends. 

 

• Name- Katie Jessop
• Age-17
• Currently a student studying art, french, history and psychology
• Enjoys watching comedy, chick flicks, thriller
• What attracts her to chick flicks- relatable, easy to watch, funny
• What she looks for in a chick flick- relationships between characters, group of girls and what they get up to, make over scene, prefers challenging conventions- finds it 'refreshing'   
• Watches them at home with friends or by herself.

• Name- Kelly-Anne Taylor
• Age- 16
• Currently a student studying French, history, English, Drama
• Enjoys watching comedy, romance, chick flicks 
• Whats attracts her to chick flicks- provides a means of escape, aspire to be like that characters, the feel good factor
• What do you look for in a chick flick- celebrities (a well known cast),good plot, good reviews, prefers when the film uses the conventions of the chick flick genre.

• From our specific target research we were able to establish the key features that we needed for our film.  The majority of our target research said that they would prefer to have a film that goes against the conventions of the genre. They believe that there needs to be a 'new twist on the classic in order to keep it alive'. However our target audience did also say they prefer to watch films that use conventions on the genre as it makes the film familiar to them and easy to watch. In order to attempt to appeal the the mass market we decided to incorporate both of these features into our film. 
• Furthermore the research also said they prefer to watch chick flicks as they are very up lifting and easy to watch. In order to maintain this factor we start of the sequence with quite a preppy song in order to set the mood. 
• From a chick flick our audience want to be able to relate to the characters. In order to do this we used a spectrum of society in order to incorporate all aspects.  

Q5. How did you attract/address your audience?

The genre and style of our piece meant that our target market was quite niche-focus on girls ages 16-24.  We attracted our audience through genre, feel, characters and enigmatic codes. We later conducted a interview with teenage girls and boys to see there reaction to the opening sequence.  


GENRE

• The genre of our piece was one of the main ways in which we were able to attract our audience. Chick flicks have become easily recognisable genre with relatable story lines and inspiration characters. Many girls often want to see films of this style as they are able to relate to many of the issues raised. In order to allow this to happen we used themes in our sequence that we relatable to our target audience. Themes such as Relationships, bullying and appearance are all common within schools and people lives - This makes it easy for the audience to connect with our characters attracting them to the film.

FEEL

• The feel of the film is quite easy going and relaxed. This is often a positive to many cinema goers as they prefer films that are easy to watch and not too challenging. 

ENIGMATIC CODES

• The audience would be attracted to the film as they would be drawn in by the opening. In this sequence we used a lot of enigma codes in oder to draw in the audience such as 

• Who are the girls?
• Why is she new?
•  Will they clash?
• Why? 

CHARACTERS 

• The characters in our film are easily relatable so can easily draw in the audience. 
  
   LAUREN

• Pretty
• Popular
• Friendly 
•  Clever
• Creative
• Fasionable
• Organised

SCARLETT

Rebellious

Dangerous

fashionable

vain

sneaky

Grown up 

pretty

After we had finished editing our film we did an audience feedback session with some members of our year to see what they thought about it. Instead of just interviewing our target audience- teen girls- we also interview boys to see there views and she how we could have adapted our film to broaden our target audience

 

MALES- Neil shah and Leon Stone	FEMALES- Antonia Fessel and Savannah Davies
WHAT IS THE FILM GENRE?
Chick flick	Chick Flick, Girly, ‘Disney Style’
WHAT DO YOU THINK IT IS THIS GENRE?
Lots of pink, girl characters, focus on appearance	Pink, music, the fonts, the title
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE CHARCTERS?
Lauren is the ‘goodie two shoes’ Scarlett is more rebellious and dangerous	Parallel characters/opposites. Lauren is more upper class whilst Scarlett is lower class
WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT?
There will be a massive falling out/argument where Lauren’s character will win.	They will be mean to each other-rivalry-then bond over a joint problem such as family
WHO IS THE TARGET AUDIENCE?
Girls-Teens. Wouldn’t see it alone but would possibly go with a group of people	Girls. Boys would possibly go with girlfriends and friends ect…
WHERE THE FILM WOULD BE SHOWN?
Large cinema chains	Large Cinema chains
WHAT ARE THE THEMES OF THE FILM?
Decadent nature of teenage girls, education, problems	Bullying, vanity, social status, judging others, competition
DID THE MUSIC FIT THE PIECE?
Yes-upbeat	Yes- good way to start the film
HOW WAS AGE/CLASS SHOWN?
Class: Lauren was upper class but Scarlett didn’t look as though she was of a lower social class Age: young as they went to school- different signifiers	Class: Shown through their costumes. Lauren upper class-heels and pearls ect… Age: young as you see them going to school and their actions
ANY CONFUSION?
Lauren’s friends enter through a different door	Different school enterances
ANY IMPROVEMENTS?
No	Add more split screens

MARKETING
marketing would be on way in which we could attract our audience. Social media campaigns such as twitter and facebook provide free marketing and create a virual 'hype'. Posters and numerous trailers would also attract our audience. We would produce a international trailer which includes classic London Iconography and a UK trailer to attract our national audience.
We would use one poster throughout our advertising campaign so we had one continuos image throughout the campaign much like in wildchild. With our audience being very similar to that of Wild Child we would have very similar marketing campaigns. In order to attract their audience Wild Child held competitions to win Wild Child 'goodie bags'. This could be a possibility with our film although our audience may be too old. Furthermore interviews could be conducted along with radio shows to create a 'buzz' around our film.

Q6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

Throughout our production we used different forms of technology in order to create our opening sequence. 

PRE-PRODUCTION

In the initial planning stages of our opening sequence technology was key in focusing on our unique selling point and being able to connect with our audience. 

• SOCIAL MEDIA- In order to connect with our audiences we created a twitter account @_AZOE(the name of our media group). On this popular site we were able to post updates on the film and gain direct feedback from our target audience. The use of this social media was effective with our specific piece as 'Twitter' is most used by our direct age bracket-15-24 year olds. 
• ANIMATIC- After we created our shot list we also constructed an animatic. The point of this process was to see how well the shots would flow into each other and whether the story line was told fluently. To create our animatic we used shots from our previous practice shoot. To construct our animatic we used ADOBE PREMIERE PRO to edit. This is the program we also used to edit our final sequence. By using this it allowed us to practice how to construct spilt screens and to see how the music would fit with the piece.

MUSIC 

As part of this task we had to use music that was free from copyright. In order to find music that we could use we looked at the website: http://www.freeplaymusic.com

As originally we were going to include a narrative from a teacher at the school we had to choose a song that had no lyrics. Using this site was quite challenging as the songs we originally found were not very appropriate to our selected genre nor the style of our sequence. Finally we found FULL OF MESH-'Happy upbeat track with dual guitars working rocking riffs, solid rhythm section gets your foot tapping'. http://www.freeplaymusic.com/search/keyword_search.php

Animatic


What we learnt from the animatic
After we produced our animatic we felt that the music didn't fit with our piece very well. This meant we had time to change it and find a more matching song. 
In addition we also realised that we needed to change the placing of our title. Originally we were going to zoom into the window where the title would appear however, from our animatic we realised that this wouldn't work so had to change its position in the sequence. 
How to improve our animatic
Our animatic used very rough pictures so it meant the angle and framing of the shots did not mirror what we wanted them to look like in our sequence. This made it much harder during filming as we didn't know exactly how to frame the individual shots.

PRODUCTION

For all our shoots we used

•  Legria HV30 camera
• A tripod

In the re-shoots we also used a lighting peg. This allowed use to use artificial light to brighten the scene. 

As I was one of the only two actors I was only about to shot the scenes that included Zenia. 

 

The Tripod was used in all the shots bar one. The use of the tripod allowed us to create smooth pans which we used in the establishing and master shots. One shot that we didn't use the tripod for was the track of Zenia's feet. 

In order to get this shot we had to be creative. Although we had effectively planned for all our shoots we hadn't taken into account how we were going to get this tracking shot. Whilst shooting at Emily's house we had the idea of using a skateboard. 

For the editing of our film we used Adobe Premiere Pro. We used the tools to cute clips, increase/reduce shots and create our split screens. After we had edited our piece together we graded the sequence using the ProCamp tool. This allowed up to change the contrasts and lighting on the shots. In addition it also allowed us to change the feel of the scene. We were able to fix the colourings of the scene so could make scenes 'pinker' to help reinforce the genre. 

One of the interesting aspects of our film was the use of SPLIT SCREENS.

We used split screen screens in order to show the contrasts between the two characters.

When adding titles to our piece we used the program 'LIVE TYPE' on the Mac. We kept titles pink to fit the genre of the piece and used contrasting fonts for the title to allow the audience to see the contrasts between the two characters.  When adding the titles into the sequence we didn't just want them to appear on the screen but have them related to the action that was being shown such as being blown away by the hair dryer ect...

Summary
From our work with all the different types of technology I feel i have learnt the importance of each piece of technology.

•  The use of tripod is significantly important in the use of trying to capture smooth pans which was heavily needed in our piece. 
• The Peg lighting was also significant in this project as the bright lighting helped to create a bright and girly feel which added to our genre style. Looking back we should have used the artificial lighting from the start so that all our shots had the same feel. This would have meant that we wouldn't have had to reshoot and could have saved time. 
• The use of the editing software was also important as it allowed us to create our spilt screens which were one of the USPs of our films. Looking we could have used this technique more in order to vary our shot type. 
• The use of live type was also significant as it allowed us to add motions to our titles. This meant that the title could fit with the action on the screen making the titles more incorporated into the piece rather than just being an 'add-on'.