Written Side of Evaluation (Photos to follow)

Evaluation of Film ‘Shinigami’

1) In what way does your media project use, develop or challenge forms and convections of media products?

The ways in which our film incorporates generic conventions, in specific scenes are using POV shots and handheld cameras along with shaded red effects following people in forests. An example of this tainting is in the film ‘Deathnote’ where a similar character has the same POV look.

Our film challenges and develops these convections in the way we choose to speed up and slow down sections of the film to change its pace.

The use of conventions indicate the sub-genre of our film, they do this by putting a small amount of dark, creepy music we can make it slightly horror. The use of this type of music is comparable in all major horror/thriller films.

The use of conventions also indicate which films have influenced our work, these are the POV shot from the film Deathnote.

Comparing our film to the film ‘Shinigami’, our opening sequence is similar and different because ours has two plot lines at the same time during the first minute or so, that combine, whereas Deathnote only had the same plot all the way through.

2) How does your media project represent particular social groups?

The social groups represented in our film in terms of gender, age, class and race are those of middle/lower class; those that are young and steal; white British males and people who wear ‘hoody’ jumpers.

I believe it can be perceived as stereotypical because those are typical social groups for bank robbers and other semi-organised crime doers. When we were planning our film we thought that going along with the stereotype would help to build a more realistic picture in peoples mind when they view the film.

This links to our target audience because we aim it at younger, more diverse people whom may have friends, know people or have seen in the media ‘hoodies’ and/or heard of Shinigami which means God of Death in Japanese.

3) What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

In my opinion our film could be produced by a major Hollywood Studio because most of the shots are in places that could be a set; for example, in the forest could be a set and the road/ car scenes.

There aren’t many similar products to ours, that’s because it is so diverse and original.

Our film would be released on the internet, in cinemas and on DVD, just like other films. Hopefully taking advantage of the largeness of the internet perhaps early previews like a few recent films could be shown to a select few on pay per view streams.

We believe our film has some opportunity for merchandising, bags, t-shirts, perhaps a soundtrack if we could get a band to work with us and help produce it.

It would relate to the mise-en-scene of our film because it is dark and mysterious.

One example would be 20^th Century Fox, London.

4) Who would be the audience for your media product?

Comparing the age and gender of our target audience, it links well to our style of film because that is what we, as the producers and target audience, would like to watch. We know this because we enjoy the sounds and editing and effects. Also the actors are of the same age and gender so the audience can relate.

Similar style of films to ours, appeal to the same target audience, this is because they show also the same age group and gender. They have similar effects and POV shots.

We predicted in our research that younger, male men would prefer our film after our questionnaire results showed us this.

We believe that they should class our film as a certified 12a because its might scare younger viewers so should be accompanied by an adult. There is no swearing or blood/gore so there is no need for a higher rating.

5) How did you attract/address your audience?

Linking back to our audience profile, there are points that would appeal to and terrify certain audiences. This is especially the case during POV shots when it’s hard to see much and maybe young children who are scared of the dark would get terrified.

This is why we think there should be a certificate of 12a.

The audience are put in the position of the Shinigami they witness running through trees and acting primal. They also witness a near death experience.

6) What have you learnt about technology from constructing the product?

There are some strengths of using small camera; these are maneuverability, the ability to walk through the forest with ease.

On the other hand, the weaknesses are that the quality of the takes is compromised, the stability of shots, the same.

During filming we encountered one or two problems, these are that’s it was hard to walk through the forest and center the camera consistently.

We resolved them by having two people to control the camera shots.

Our editing software was a weakness because of the lack of training and being on a mac computer.

On the other hand, it made it easy to add DVD features and edit sound well.

7) Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

During our planning stage, researching the genre and storyboarding, the detailed planning helped us to produce the film efficiently because most of the problems during editing and filming get solved quicker and easier.

Since learning more about different types of shots, we can say that we view watching films in a different more critical way. Shot types effect emotion and opinions.

I feel I am more confident with the equipment because we resolved all problems we encountered and gained valuable experience.

I feel that the final product was a success with the time and budget scales we had.

Ashley Ward