media studies evaluation

1. How did you use new media technologies in
the construction and research, planning and
evaluation stages?
Shivani Semwal
Evaluation Question 4

2. Research

3. Research
Mostly I used Apple Mac to research and
construct my work during lessons and my own
Toshiba laptop for research outside the lessons.
I frequently used Google search engine to find
different films and conventions of each
promotional products. Google images enabled me
to look at various film posters and magazines.
This was very useful as I could research our real
media text in depth, meaning our promotional
products were likely to be accurate.

4. I used different film websites to find our Real Media Text.
IMDb
We found our real
media text, American
Psycho, under the
genre of thriller films
on IMDb website.
Pearl and Dean
I used Pearl and Dean
website as a constituent
of our secondary target
audience research. It
contained information on
each film’s target
audience which helped us
to decide the suitable
audience for our film.

5. Wikipedia
I referred to Wikipedia
quite often to read the
plot of various films in
order to gain
inspirations to create
the narrative for our
film.
YouTube
I used YouTube mainly
to watch and analyse
teaser trailers in order to
pick up on the
conventions such as the
ident, length of the
teaser, pace and style of
the editing, titles and
more.
Dafont
We searched and
downloaded fonts for
our titles and credits
from www.dafont.com.
The website was very
convenient as it was
very to use.
Freesound
We searched music
suitable for teen-thriller
films using
https://freesound.org.

6. Planning

7. Planning
Mahara
My Mahara blog is the most essential
element that I have constantly used to
store all the research and planning
during each stage of the production of
my film. My portfolio consists of all the
details from pre-production to post-
production of our film. I posted a
number of entries that showed the
development process of our
promotional products and our
marketing strategy. My blog consists
of presentations, mind-maps,
analytical research, images, etc.

8. During the planning stage, I created a
few mind maps using websites such as
bubbl.us and MindMup to jot down
rough ideas regarding the title and the
theme of the film.
In addition, I created a plenty of online
presentations using prezi, google slide
and slideshare. These forms of
presentations are dynamic therefore
creates a better understanding of the
topics.

9. Using online presentations for research and planning.
I used slideshare predominantly to
export my presentation which I created
on Google Slides. This is because
google slides didn’t allow me to embed
the code onto my blog, therefore
slideshare was very useful alternatively.
I used Prezi to create
presentations such as
positioning the audience,
analysing teasers, thriller
film conventions and
cloverfield campaign
research.
I used Google Slides to create
presentations such as Warm
bodies marketing campaign,
treatment research and my
primary target audience
research.

10. Google Docs
Another source of media technology that I used was Google Docs, in order to
create necessary documents for the filming process such as the call sheet, risk
assessment, script and schedule to ensure that we stuck to our plan to make the
most of the filming day. These documents were very helpful as we could refer
back to them to remind us of all the shots that were needed to be filmed.
Google Docs was also very useful as we could share the planning and research
tasks with our group. Each member of the group was able to add and edit the
information to the shared drive and it would be visible to all members of the
group.

11. Pinterest Practice shots
We planned different camera angles and
took some practice shots in order to
prepare us for the filming day. This helped
us to include a variety of angles to catch
the audience’s attention.
I created a mood board on Pinterest in
order to remind us of all the props that
we would need for the filming day.

12. Animatic
We created a storyboard by drawing simple sketches on
post-it notes; each note representing a particular frame.
Once our storyboard was ready, we used a basic flip
camera to create animatic for our trailer. We then used
Final Cut Pro to edit the style of the animatic and
exported it to YouTube so that it was visible to everyone.
The purpose of creating an animatic was to give us the
visual representation of what our actual teaser would like.
It enabled us to get the dynamic idea of the editing
techniques that we could use in our final cut.

13. Construction

14. Filming and Editing
To shoot the scenes for our teaser, we used a DSLR Camera
which is evidently more advanced than the flip camera. This meant
that our shots were of high resolution which contributed in making
our film look professional. It also had the features of selective focus
which helped to emphasise the character in the scene.
Once we had filmed all the shots, we used an Apple Mac to edit the
teaser. We imported the footage into Final Cut Pro which was
already installed onto the Mac. We then placed the clips into a
sequence and edited our entire teaser using Final Cut Pro as it
allowed us to add titles, the ident, sound and effects to construct
our final teaser. We used various tools such as the stabiliser to
make the scenes steady and we also added black screen in
between the scenes as part of the editing.

15. GarageBand, DaFont and YouTube
Although I had used Freesound in the research stage to find
appropriate music for our film, however we didn’t find the music
that fitted with the genre of our film. Therefore we switched to
GarageBand where we created our own music to suit the teen-
thriller genre. This was something new that I learned as I had never
used GarageBand before.
Again, I used Dafont website to download the font for our titles and
to construct our teaser.
Finally, we used YouTube to export our teaser in order to make it
available for the audience to view it. This also meant that we could
embed the code and post it onto my blog.

16. Photoshop Social Media
Websites
As part of our viral marketing campaign,
we created an account on Twitter,
Facebook and Instagram which are a
mass platform whereby the audience can
talk about the film.
Moreover, we used Adobe Photoshop to
create our film poster and magazine.
Photoshop is one of the best software
editing programs I have used because of
the range of tools and filters it provides.
Additionally, it has the ability to merge
different layers together and add images
and text to our poster and magazine. I
found using Photoshop very easy as I have
used the software before, therefore I had
basic knowledge of all the tools and their
uses.

17. Evaluation

18. Evaluation question 1
To present my
answer for the first
evaluation question, I
used Prezi which is
an online, interactive
presentation, allowing
users to display texts,
images and videos in
their presentations.
To present my answer
for evaluation question
three, I chose
PowToon because I
hadn’t used it in the
planning stage.
Therefore, I thought it
would be a good idea
to use a new form of
presentation for the
evaluation. I exported
the PowToon
presentation to
YouTube so that the
evaluation was in a
video format.
Evaluation question 2 Evaluation question 3 Evaluation question 4
I chose emaze to
present my answer for
evaluation question
two because it
provided a variety of
layouts and tools
which made the
overall evaluation look
very appealing.
This presentation is my
final evaluation which
has simply been
created using Google
Slides and exported to
SlideShare.