Note for moderator

Hi

Thanks for taking the time to look at the students' blogs, which I hope you will find of interest. All assessment materials can be found on candidate blogs. All students undertook the Opening Sequence for a Film brief.  Each student created an individual blog, which can be accessed via the BLOGHUB link on the menu bar above, via the sidebar. or from the links below. Videos are mostly hosted on Vimeo.

For your convenience, videos have also been sent on  DVD along with CCS and CAF.

Please contact me if you have any queries.

Chris Earl (chris.earl@fram.durham.sch.uk)

Candidate Blogs:

• 3286 - Charlotte Dyer
• 34254 - Luke Tiplady
• 3440 - Eughan Wooding

Evaluation presentation

Blog Alert

Looking at some of the blogs, it is clear that a lot of material has not been posted. It's crucial that your blogs contain detailed research and planning as well as a clear log of what you have been doing over the course of the last few weeks of editing.

You also need to think about how you are going to approach the evaluation. I would like to see a post where you map out exactly how you are going to answer the seven questions - by next Monday (14th March) please.

Final Cut and Evaluation Package

Just to outline the dates and times for submission of your remaining Foundation portfolio materials. Interviews and presentations will be recorded and can be used to augment your evaluation posts.

• SUNDAY 13th MARCH - final cut uploaded onto blogs, including initial reflexive comments - this forms the end of your research and planning section
• WEDNESDAY 16th MARCH - period 5, interviews with Charlotte and Eughan
• FRIDAY 18th MARCH - period 5, interviews with Luke
• WEDNESDAY 23rd MARCH - period 5, 15 min presentations by Charlotte, Eughan and Luke

Over Easter - finalise multi-media responses to evaluation questions. To remind you, these are:

• In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
• How does your media product represent particular social groups?
• What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
• Who would be the audience for your media product?
• How did you attract/address your audience?
• What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
• Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

You are advised to use a range of approaches. For example:

• With the first question you could compare footage from your project with footage from the films which inspired you to demonstrate how you used or challenged conventions.
• For the second question you could use stills which you analyse and compare to existent material, using a platform such as Prezi.
• For the third question, you could use information you have derived during your research and create a simple documentary about distribution.
•  For the audience questions, you could show people from your target audience your work and interview them, embedded in a PowerPoint or other form.
•  For the technologies process you could compare work in progress with the final piece, discussing how you used various effects and so on.

Although you can use written blog posts to support your answers, you should aim to use the full multi-media functionality of your blog; otherwise, you will be unlikely to get a +L3 mark.

McBain

"Mendoooooooza!"

Rough cut

Tommy Mac says - don't forget, the deadline for your Rough Cut is FRIDAY 12th Feb).
Tommy will be very upset if you don't post your Rough Cut on your blog. I will also be looking at your planning and research over half term, so do make sure that this is all complete and uploaded.



Who let the blogs out?

At this point, you should have entries covering:

• Initial feelings about the shoots you have undertaken, including exemplar footage/ screengrabs/ evidence
• Analysis of material, considering pros/ cons/ things to consider
• Overview of the work in progress with relevant links to the evaluation
• Any other details you think are appropriate

Remember, if you're not doing at three detailed entries a week you're not doing enough.

Don't forget - the blog is an integral part of your assessment for this element of the course and will form a foundation for 40% of your mark (20% of the entire AS) so you need to get into the habit of maintaining it on a regular basis (at least every couple of days you are working on a project). I will be marking the research/ planning sections during half-term, so you need to be up to speed by then...

All these things that you (should've) done



Here is a list of all the things you should have done (to paraphrase The Killers) or at least should have done by the end of last week:

WORK YOU SHOULD HAVE COMPLETED

• Research
• Scenario
• Scripting
• Storyboarding
• Location scouting
• Prelimary footage
• Animatics
• Production schedule
• Call sheets
• Props lists
• Production of log and continuity sheets

EVALUATION QUESTIONS - check you have covered the bases (to remind you...)

The following questions must be answered: 

• How does product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? - Have you researched these?
• How does product represent particular social groups? -Have you included a social group?
• What kind of media institution might distribute product and why? - Have you researched studios and distribution?
• Who would be audience for product? – Have you researched audience?
• How did you attract/address your audience? – Evidence in planning/ final product?
• What have you learnt about technologies from process of constructing product? – Evidence from blog (shooting/ editing)
• Looking back at preliminary task, what have you learnt in progression to full product?

  TIMEFRAME:By end of...

• 22nd January [revised]
  All pre-production planning (including storyboards, production schedules, call sheets etc.) completed/ posted to blog in digital form.
  Might also include test footage and mood boards
• 7th February [revised]
  All material required for project shot, converted and uploaded onto media servers
  
  During the period 17/01-07/02, you are invited to periodically upload brief examples of work to blog for peer and staff review
• 12th February
  Rough edit completed and uploaded to blog for peer/ staff review
• 22nd February (including half-term “holiday”)
  Final cut begun
• 14th March
  Final edit completed and uploaded to blog and media server in order to gather audience response and feedback
• 15th March
  15 min presentations of work, including initial evaluations and outlines of audience response
• 11th  April (including Easter “holiday”
  Detailed blog entries answering the evaluation questions uploaded, coupled with a video commentary

THE PROJECT:

Blog including detailed research/ planning (20 marks)

• Must include research into existing opening sequences completed (minimum five): analysis linked to evaluation, notes made on how example might be of value to projects
• At least one blog entry dedicated to each of:
• ­institutions (e.g. distribution companies, studios),
• ­audiences (some evidence)
• representation (reasons)

Titles and opening of new fiction film - 2 mins (60 marks)

Continuity features:

• Action match
• Shot/ reverse shot
• 180 degree rule

Other features

• Titles
• Genre-specific features (e.g. mise-en-scene/ music)
• Range of shots/ camera movement (essential
• Range of edits/ effects (if appropriate)

Evaluation (20 marks)

WEEKLY TASKS

• Maintain blog (at least 3 entries a week – OCR suggest one a day) – have you?
• Include images/ video clips supporting work (planning + work in progress)
• Consider all aspects of production process, including institutions, audience and representation
• Include as much detail as you can, justifying choices made
• Link to your work in progress
• Thorough outline of production process

Filming Landscapes

Here are a couple of interesting pages about shooting landscapes, if it's of interest:

http://www.moviemail.com/film-shop/collection/684-Top-10-Landscapes-in-Cinema/

http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2013/sep/15/urban-wandering-film-barbican-review

Rough Trade

Quite a fun project from some previous students I taught.