Katriona Fraser's Media Studies AS

Here is my finished AS Foundation Portfolio Coursework Film Opening:

When I began this project my knowledge on technologies was basic and limited. Therefore, I had to learn lots of new skills during the construction process.

I have answered this question by annotating my final film, analysing how each filmic technique attracts and addresses my audience: (MAKE SURE ANNOTATIONS ARE SWITCHED ON)

I researched my audience demographic and psychographic in two ways: 1. I questioned four members of my demographic and psychographic and created two videos. 2. I created a questionnaire on word for a focus group to fill out after they watched the film opening. I found that from the questionnaire, (21/40) 52% of the people said that my film would be suitable for teenagers aged between 13 and 16. 97.5% of people (39/40) rated my film 6 or above out of 10. I have assembled this infographic to display my findings:

I have created a video using the online software 'go animate'. To produce this video, I researched romantic dramas and their distributors. I found 'EntertainmentOne', 'StudioCanal UK' and 'Peccadillo Pictures'. I decided that 'Peccadillo Pictures' would be the most likely to distribute my film as they specialise in LGBT romance films, often produced by independent companies. Like my film opening, the majority of films they distribute are small, niche-market films that would appeal to the LGBT community above all.

I have created a Prezi to answer this question:

I decided to write, record and add a voice over to my film opening following some feedback from my family, who said that the story could be a little confusing for some. I hope that the voice over puts across the message of grief and loss that I wanted it to convey. I recorded it and am now planning to edit it to enhance the sound a bit and then add it in my film opening. Script: One day you're on top of the world And the next it's falling on in you. People constantly tell me that life goes on and I have to keep going, but for me that is the saddest part about it all, how can I go on everyday like nothing is wrong. It's impossible to forget someone who gave me so much to remember. It feels like everyone is moving on with their lives while I am stuck in this hole I can't climb out of. Believe me, I am trying my hardest, but life's not worth living without her.

Today during editing, Mrs Williams suggested that in order to distinguish the differences between the memories and the self-harm scenes, I could add a Vignette filter to the memories. They look like this:

My survey results are in! The result was 100% a 15:













I would agree with this result. My friends and family that did this survey said they chose 15 because it deals with some quite adult themes (self harm,grief) , which would be too disturbing to be a 12 or 12A. In addition, my demographic is 15-19 year olds. This means my film is appropriate for 15 and up.

Romance Sub-genres: 
Originally, I was doing a Romantic-Comedy, but following my change in plot, I would say it is more a Romantic Drama/
Romantic Drama
Romantic Drama film is a genre that explores the complex side of love. The plot usually centers around an obstacle that is preventing love between two people. The obstacles in Romantic Drama film can range from a family's disapproval, to forbidden love, to one's own psychological restraints. Many Romantic Dramas end with the lovers separating because of the enormity of the obstacle, the realization of incompatibility, or simply because of fate. Examples: Titanic, Breakfast at Tiffany's, An Officer and a Gentleman.

Since my film contains triggering ideas of self-harm, I thought it would be a good idea to have a warning at the start. So this will be my first frame:

Overall, I think my colour grading looks subtle, yet clear enough to show a difference between the two emotions. This description of blue is exactly why I wanted to use the light grey-blue in my sad scenes, as it creates a feeling of sadness:

For my title screen, I filmed a shot of some blossom which I thought would be an interesting shot to incorporate into my film. I then took to font generating websites, finding this font, which I thought looked suitable for my genre as it seems quite romantic and pretty to me. Here is the finished product which is going to be near the beginning of my film opening:

After deciding to change my film opening, I have created a new film treatment presentation:

For the AS Media Studies Foundation Portfolio, the soundtrack must be original or from a royalty free source. This could however mean that the students perform an existing song/piece of music themselves- as the audio is made by them.

Since my film will contain the mature themes of self-harm and grief, I have decided that it would be a good idea to change the certificate rating, so please look at the below helpful infographic and my previous research:
Create your own user feedback survey

My original idea has evolved for the better. I decided that my original idea that I explained in my film treatment was anticlimactic. I have now finished the filming and starting editing. These are the changes:
I decided to have Jessie be involved in a car accident, which means my film now has a darker tone, as Katriona, grieving, self-harms. Additionally, the couple have been dating for a while, which is shown by memories of them together.

Here is my film ident using kinetic typography in Motion 5:

Here is a simple film ident I made using a template which I thought was similar to the Universal ident. I was just playing around and trying to get more familiar with the programme.

We are making our film idents at the moment, and I thought I should keep the French theme going, so I toyed with a few different ideas, including 'Coquillage' which means seashell, and even 'Pamplemousse' which means grapefruit! In the end I think I am going to go with 'shooting star films', which sounds a lot better in French:
 étoile filante films

Here's a video of the Christmas entertainment done by year 13 in December 2015 that I filmed one third of. Hope you enjoy!

Here's a short video, found by Chaya that I found quite interesting and will attempt to apply to my film:

During the Christmas holidays, we were set an essay with the title 'Media production is dominated by global institutions, which sell their products and services to national audiences'. To what extent do you agree with this statement?

I need to include in future essays:

• Marketing
• Niche market
• Internal/ external
• Conglomerate
• Cross-media convergence
• Vertical and horizontal integration
• Synergy
• Distribution
• Local cinemas
• Cross promotion
• Exchange: subscription (eg. Netflix)/one-off purchase/digital
• Platforms
• British audiences

I mentioned a lot of information on the US and its audiences, but in the future I need to include more on the UK/ British audiences:

• As well as mentioning ABC and ESPN marketing of 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' in the US, mention in the UK Disney ownership of 'Disney Channel', 'Disney XD' and 'Disney Junior' (each of these channels has a +1) on which the film trailer was shown during every advert break during the weeks leading up to the release; each week, Disney Channel reaches on average 1,456 homes
• 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' has smashed the record for the biggest box office debut weekend globally, with ticket sales of £355 million
• 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' made £83.4 million in UK cinemas in the first fortnight after release
• 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens' has become the fastest film ever to pass the £80 million mark at UK cinemas, just 13 days-the previous record-holder 'Skyfall' took 23 days
• Synergy: Burger King 
• Disney not only shows on Big Screen, but also phones and TV
• Birmingham Fashion Show-appealing to fashionable stereotypes
• The figures on 31st December 2015: UK box office - the all-time top nine 

Tonight, after learning what the top 10 LGBT films of 2015 were, and discovering I had seen none of them, I watched 'The Way He Looks'. This appealed to me when I did some further research on the films included in the list as it is a romantic, coming of age drama style film. I really enjoy the genre of romance and coming of age films, so I was immediately attracted to it. I think that I like coming of age films because I can relate to them in some ways as I am a teenager who has had some of the experiences in these style films.
The film is Brazilian, and its original title is 'Hoje Eu Quiero Voltar Sozinho', which literally translates to 'I Don't Want to Go Back Alone'. One thing I liked while watching was the fact that it is in Portuguese, which has some similar sounding words to Spanish, so I could guess what some things meant.

The story is centred around Leonardo, a blind teenager and his struggle for a more independent life and to overcome the vunerability surrounding his condition. At home, he has an overprotective mother, while at school his best friend Giovanna leaves him no room to stand up for himself. Things take an unexpected turn when Gabriel, a new student, arrives at school, befriending him and Giovanna. Leonardo then gravitates towards Gabriel, excited by his uniqueness.
Leonardo changes the way he looks at his life and develops intense feelings towards Gabriel. READ MORE

This film was made by 'Lacuna Filmes':
Created in 2006 by a Diana Almeida and Daniel Ribeiro, 'Lacuna Filmes' is a production company based in São Paulo, Brazil. Among its productions is 'Café Com Leite' (You, Me and Him), a short film that was screened at over 80 film festivals worldwide and won the Crystal Bear at the 58th Berlin International Film Festival. In 2014 'Lacuna' released its first feature film, 'Hoje Eu Quiero Voltar Sozinho' (The Way He Looks). The film had its world premiere at the Berlinale 2014, receiving the FIPRESCI and the Teddy Award. 'Hoje Eu Quiero Voltar Sozinho' has been screened at more then 60 festivals, receiving 38 awards. Handled by 'Films Boutique', the film was sold to 24 countries such as USA, France, UK and Hong Kong. The film had an impressive theatrical performance in Brazil, where it was released in only 33 screens but sold more than 205.000 tickets, grossing over US$ 1.000.000. It was the 19th highest grossing Brazilian film of the year. 'Hoje Eu Quiero Voltar Sozinho' was chosen as the Brazilian entry for the Oscars 2015.

This film was highly praised, winning many awards around the world, including at the 2014 LGBT Film Festival in New York the film won the best film audience award.

LGBT or GLBT is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (you probably already knew this, I mean it's 2016, but I'm just putting this here for reference).