Andrew Goodwin 'Dancing in the Distraction Factory'

The 6 Rules Of Andrew Goodwin 'Dancing in the Distraction Factory' on Prezi

An Insight In To Music Videos

This music video is called 'Kickstarts' by the artist Example and is a cross between performance and narrative. The film is effective as a low budget concept as it is filmed mainly in the same location with a vast aray of simple yet effective editing techniques. This makes the video more aesthetically pleasing alongside the song. The video contains the artist (Example) singing, but also involves a form of narative with many other actors performing throughout the video.

These 2 music videos 'Golddust' and 'Louder' are by the artist DJ Fresh. I would class these as narative based concept videos as although the video tells some form of a story, it does not coincide with the lyrics of the song and therefore could be seen as quite disjointed. In comparison to 'Kickstarts' these videos use little editing but are effective by focusing on talents and skills (double dutch jump rope and roller blading). These can be seen as quite random concepts to place in a music video however I feel that they fit well with the tempo and the pace of the music.

 

This music video is called 'Written In The Stars' by the artist Tinie Tempah featuring Eric Turner. This is a performance video with an element of narration. There is a good mix between the performance and narration cutting between the two throughout the video. This is the most effective narrative video I have seen because the video truly narrates the song allowing the viewer to gain a much greater understanding of the true meaning of the lyrics.

Welcome to A2!

                   Welcome to my A2 Media Course!

 Im really looking forward to creating my own music video and developing my knowledge of the media industry.

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

This shot is found in the first scene of the film. We have placed our main character in a dark room tied to a chair.  This is a conventional scene in an action thriller film. By placing this as our first scene we have opened our film with sudden tension and excitement. This differs from other action thrillers where the tension builds up in the opening and does not begin with a high impact opening. There is very little information about what is happening in this scene leaving the audience puzzled, questioning and intrigued about what is going to happen next. Leaving the audience uncertain of the reality is a conventional form of a real action thriller film. The main character is also introduced in this scene, however the audience may not be aware of this as no evidence is given in the shot to lead the audience to believe that he is the main character. This is very unconventional of any film as normally the main character is introduced very early on in the film and with detail and information that the audience can associate with the character.

This shot follows on from the previous one and although it begins to set the scene, it still leaves the audience questioning what is happening in the movie. In this scene we looked at raising the pace of our opening as the first scene was rather slow. In this shot the main character is made to look secretive and shifty as he enters a room and begins to unlock a cabinet. We achieved this feeling through our shot angles as well as our chosen location. Firstly with regard to the filming, instead of placing the camera in a stationary position we decided to use it to track our main character as he moved into the room, giving the impression to the audience that he was being followed. Acting also a played a key role as Fergal (the actor) made his character to look shifty by the way he kept looking behind his shoulder as if he was making sure he was on his own. Finally we chose this location as it best suited the scene that was going to be filmed, since the room looked elegant,  it was well lit and it contained a lockable cabinet.                  

This is an example of one of our many screen titles in our opening. We found it difficult when deciding what tiles to use as although we wanted to use something that would be perceived as conventional in an action thriller film we also did not want to use anything that would make our film look tacky or cheap. This resulted in us choosing to use a rather basic, sleek font design placed on top of a graduated blue and black background. Although this may not be the  most action thriller oriented title,  it simplifies our opening allowing the audience to focus on the story rather than be distracted with large flashy titles.

The scene which depicts the opening of the briefcase again represents something similar to the expectations of an action thriller. A briefcase is unlocked and opened to reveal large amounts of used banknotes. It is common to see large amounts of money in an action thriller, however it is often represented in different ways. Large amounts of money are more likely to be associated with the villain, the villain has normally obtained this money illegally possibly through robbery or business to do with drugs. So although we have used large amounts of money which is represented as a key element in an action thriller film, we have also challenged the forms of the genre by giving the main character (who isn't a villain) a large amount of money instead. As this is in the opening 2 minute sequence the audience are unaware of where the money has come from, again this is aimed to keep them puzzled and confused.  Clearly the reality will become clearer later  in the film.  

Games of poker are often found in the action thriller genre of films so again this is very conventional. Card games depict tension and gambling.   However we have again attempted to challenge the conventions of our genre, this time through our editing. When looking through our filmed footage of this scene we felt that it was rather slow and not as exciting as it could be. Instead of re filming the scene we decided to use editing to make this scene more lively. Through editing we made two large changes; the first of these was to place slow motion on to a shot of Fergal flicking a poker chip in to the air. Although this did slow down the piece even more, it added a much greater effect to the scene by focusing on certain points. Secondly, we also used editing to fast forward and then rewind Fergal throwing his cards on to the table. This was effective as it added contrast to the slow motion shot before, it also flowed better with the music we added to the piece making it look more like a flash back/ dream rather then something that was happening at present.  

Similar to the scene with the briefcase this shot again includes large sums of money. We attempted to develop this usual convention through our filming and camera angles. We started with the basic scene of Fergal throwing a large amount of money in to the air.We made adaptions to the camera angle by using a low camera angle, thus increasing his status making him look more superior and mighty as well as exaggerating the amount of money being thrown into the air. Editing also allowed us to slow the speed down adding greater effect as the money slowly floated to the ground.

The shot at the desk was again taken to represent our main characters wealth.  He is filmed buying shares on the stock market whilst looking at a magazine advertising a new Porsche 911. When deciding this scene we looked at how other action thriller films represented a characters wealth.  Although we had not seen anything exactly similar to the scene we filmed, we were aware of films where characters demonstrated their wealth by buying expensive items like cars. Instead of copying exact scenes from other  action thriller films we decided to be creative and plan our own. We took inspiration from other action thriller films and so  this does use some conventions of the action thriller, however by developing this in to a way we could easily film whilst keeping the shot looking proffesional alowed us to slightly develop and change the conventions of the genre.

The scene filmed in the main characters flat is placed in to our film opening after the sequence of flashbacks and the title sayinvg '3 weeks previously'. This is when our character begins to be properly introduced to the audience. The scene begins with an alarm clock going off. Our main character moans to show he does not want to get out of bed. His room is intentionally made in to a tip as well as him sleeping on a basic mattress. This was intended to show the audience that this character is living a very poor and chaotic lifestyle with no routine.  Location and scene setting was very important in this shot as it is in this part of the opening that the story begins to be told properly, it needed to be clear to the audience what lifestyle this character was living in.

Finally this freeze frame represents the last scene of our opening, the main title of the film. When we were deciding on where we were going to place the title and where our opening sequence was going to end we made a few decisions early on. What was important to us was that the main character was outside and was positioned in a place which clearly set the location for the rest of our film. The shot you can see on the freeze frame is of Guildford, the town we all live in. This is the view from Fergal's house which is on a steep hill giving a great panoramic view of the town. After deciding we would film the ending there we realised we could quite easily fit the title in to the sky as our main character walks down the hill in to town. This was very effective as it looked natural due to the font we used and the transition of fading it in to the shot. The name of our film 'Tainted Money' sounds like an action thriller film so the audience should know what to expect. I feel this title is very unconventional of an action thriller film due to the fact that it is very basic and simple. Most titles in our genre are large, bold and colourful. I feel this title really questions the conventions of our genre due to the fact that it gives such an impact yet it is very basic and simple.   

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

Our main character is a white male aged 19. We chose this as it best relates to our target audience for our film. We chose to use a white character as it is often a conventional stereotype that white brittish teenagers are lazy and dont do anything productive. We decided rather than questioning this stereotype that we would instead use it as a key element of our film. We chose a 19 year old as we believe this was a suitable age to represent a character who may receive a large amount of money unexpectedly and instead of question the situation, spend the money, again a characteristic you would expect a 19 year old to do.

We did some research looking for comparisons with our main character and other main characters in films with the action thriller genre.

A character we found very similar to ours was that of Eddie Morra (played by Bradley Cooper) in the film 'Limitless'.    Edward "Eddie" Morra is a writer who lives in New York City. He has recently been dumped by his girlfriend Lindy in addition to failing to meet the deadline to turn in his new book, which he hasn't started yet. Eddie lives in a run down flat on his own, with no income and little prospects. 

Our main character is very similar to Eddie at the beginning and end of the two films. For example at the openings of both films we see these characters down on their luck,  living on the brink of poverty, badly dressed and without a real job. They are at the bottom of the social ladder living in very basic accommodation, in these cases a small flat on their own.

Their roles in the film are very similar, although the story lines diferentiate slightly. The opening and endings contain similar comparisons. Because of this in the openings of both films they are found to be living in difficult situations making it obvious in both cases that they are short of money ad are struggling at this point of their life.

When comparing between them towards the end of the film their life is seen to have turned around. Through luck they are now able to live a life of luxury with endless amounts of money which they spend on excessive things such as fancy suits, fast cars and investments in the stock market.


Finally, again in comparison both lifestyles come crashing down when they are both similarly caught by gangsters demanding what is rightfully theirs.

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

The obvious answer to this question would be a small scale film festival, or even possibly an independent cinema. If we were to continue making this film on the budget and the resources we used to make the opening, then it would be fair to say that this film would never be able to become a large motion picture. However it would still be possible (as shown in our opening) to make an interesting and appealing production which people would want to watch with the budget and resources we had available to us.

The London Film Festival or Sundance Film Festival are two of the many popular film festivals who show many of the hundred films created by amateur directors and movie makers. Film festivals attract thousands of people to their events and although it is impossible to view every film showing, often the attendees are fanatic film fans who look to watch as many of these films as possible. As an Action Thriller film one of the most popular genres of the movie market we would be likely to have a rather high demand for viewings of our film.

If we were to be more creative and use our initiative there is a strong possibility that an independent cinema may be interested in showing our movie (with the selling point of being filmed in the surrounding area by amateur film makers). We would offer the cinema to distribute our film for free so even if it was to be shown only once or twice in the cinema they would still be likely to make a small cash return. From research I have found a fairly local independent cinema located in the rural village of Alton in Hampshire called the  Palace Cinema. It is a small family run cinema with 3 screens which have been showing films 7 days a week since 1932. This is very unusual for an independent cinema to still be surviving with all the competition from the large cinema company's such as odeon. This shows that there must be a high demand by the local cohabitants to experience and view new film releases, possibly ours! I think if the cinema charged a few pounds for customers to view our film, local people may be interested in viewing something a little different.

Thinking creatively again;Virgin Media, the television and broadband Internet supplier have for the last 2 years hosted independent films by amateur directors on their movie on demand service. Customers of Virgin Media are able to pay a small fee to view these films. Although the quality of the movies shown are rather high, I still believe that our finished product (i.e the whole film) would have a good chance of being offered on their service.

Finally You Tube would offer a large audience with no cost or hassle. Although this does seem like the easy option, we could find this to be very beneficial! Youtube has an audience of millions, being one of the most popular sites on the web. By taking advantage of this free service to promote our film we could offer our film to a global audience, not underestimating the powers of word of mouth (especially in the age we live in with social networks such as facebook!) We could see our film being viewed all across the world. This would then hopefully lead to potential offers to distribute our movie in mainstream cinemas and DVD's.

   



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

This is Tom. Tom is 17 year's old and is currently at college studying for his A Levels. Tom is a hard and conscientious worker and although he spends most of his week studying for his exams he loves spending his weekends going out with his friends, partying and having a good time. When a party isn't on the weekend agenda Tom enjoys viewing the newest film releases at his local cinema complex either with his mates or when hes out on a date with his girlfriend. Tom best enjoys the action thriller genre of movies, which are similar to his fast paced adventurous lifestyle. However to Tom these films must be more than just cheesy fighting and explosions. It is important to him for the movie to have a detailed and interesting story line, the bigger the twist the better! His favourite action thriller films include; 'Inception', 'No Country for Old Men' and 'Die Hard'. Tom is extremely fashionable, it is very important to him that he keeps up to date with all the latest trends. His favourite shops are Top Man and River Island. Tom is also a keen footballer where he is the captain for his local team. Toms music preferences are very varied as they depend on what is popular on the charts at the time.

Tom is an example of our target audience for 'Tainted Money'. Before we had even created the story line for our film we knew we wanted to aim our movie at this segment of the large film production market. Because of this we knew that we would have to work hard on producing a detailed and exciting story line which would interest the 16- 25 male market. After we had the story line agreed we had to look at where we would place the fighting and the tension most commonly represented with action thrillers.

We made the decision to target this segment of the market for a number of reasons. The main reason came from our secondary research where we found that this market was the most lucrative in terms of cinema sales as well as Action Thriller being one of the most popular genres of film. This is important as it would give our film the best chance of being succesful at the box office. Secondly as all three of us fit in to the market segment we felt this would be of a huge advantage as we know first hand what would appeal to the market and what would be good to put in to our film.