How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

In this section I will describe and illustrate the use of media technologies in the research, construction, planning and evaluation stages of my media film. I will do so by providing a detailed description and illustration of the hardware and software used the research, construction, planning and evaluation stages of my media film. The initial idea I wished to research for my film was the idea of masks and what they represent. Using the popular search engine Wikipedia, a free and comprehensive online encyclopedia and I found a plethora of information on various cultural uses of masks throughout the ages, I learnt to trust Wikipedia as a source due to it’s reliable auditor system. With this idea in mind I designed the first version of my film, I had used the film Donnie Darko as my main inspiration and modeled the character Wyatt after Frank, changing him from a normal person to an anthropomorphic personification of my film’s ideology.

The other films I used and found through online film streaming websites were Pi by Darren Aronofsky and an independent film called Under My Mask. However Donnie Darko remained my main focus in terms of narrative style, representation and Ideology. I found info on all three films on Wikipedia. Writing all my research into MIGRAINE analyses’ on Microsoft Word and adding images taken from Google Images I created a makeshift website on the free website construction program Weebly to act as a platform for presenting all my work, dividing each category of my process into subcategories so that every aspect of my work had its own section. Word was a reliable and simple program that allowed unhindered text writing and Weebly really helped organize my work and make it manageable by dividing it into small sections. From here I began developing my film, using Microsoft Word to devise my log line, shot plan, shot list and synopsis. For my script I initially used a specialist script-writing program called Celtx that took care of the script format whilst I wrote the content. However I was forced to abandon it in favor of word as my work was unable to be viewed on any computer that didn’t have Celtx installed; I wrote the script in Courier font as t is the customary film text font. For both my shot plan and my storyboard I constructed a layout with the shape- making functions of word. The layouts created by the rectangle text boxes and the basic shapes tool organized everything and made the shot plan concise and accurate like a graph

When this was all prepared I began filming. I used a CANON 600 to film because if its versatility and easy transportation, equipping it with a large safari tripod, the tripod succeeding in making my shots look more stable and I learnt to utilize it effectively. I decided to leave it on Autofocus, as my handling abilities of the camera were very limited. The locations I used for my film were my own house, the outside of a local book shop owned by the father of a friend of mine and a café known as kitchen and pantry. My friend’s father was happy to help and the manager of Kitchen and the owners of Kitchen and Pantry were happy to let me film outside as long as it stayed outside. My actors (volunteers from my school) wore street clothing and the masks used were masks I made myself from plain white, canvas masks and acrylic paints bought at a local art shop. Painting them was simple enough given my experience in Art and the mask designs were easy to invent, taking inspiration from many sources including images of Venetian Masks as well as tribal masks and chinese folk masks. Filming wasn’t entirely successful with problems encountered due to fading daylight and my inability to operate the camera that affected the narrative flow with some shots intended to e at the start of the film dark while shots in the middle were bright and dark again at the end. This occurred because I re-arranged the filming schedule to accommodate actors who had less time to film then others, I’ve learned in future that as director I must plan ahead for changing daylight and take priority over other actor’s personal affairs.

A large problem that also presented itself was the tripod attracting attention in the street during the running sequence shots, it was starting to become clear that the scope of my film was too large for me to accomplish. Nonetheless I constructed the film on the editing program Final Cut Pro, as I wanted the dialogue to be back and fourth with the actors I used a lot of cuts and ended up having hundred of shots which became very convoluted. I learnt that I should consider carefully what is feasibly with my available resources before launching into a project When I thought I had a successful film I showed it to teachers and fellow student via uploading it to the video distribution website Youtube and transporting the raw film via a memory key between school and home so that I could work on it in both locations. After it was made clear to me that the film I had created had a too-convoluted narrative and was not feasible to re-shoot with my available resources I decided to abandon everything I had previously created regarding my film and start a completely new project (keeping the original ideological intact and concept of masks). For my new concept I decided to take everything I had learnt through using the software and hardware in my previous film and apply it to the new film. I structure the new narrative as a documentary/ poetic realist film with only thirty-seven shots and one location.

I erased my Weebly and constructed a new one, salvaging my research, as it was still applicable to my new narrative. Everything else was re-constructed using the same programs with the exception of my Storyboard being done on Microsoft PowerPoint then run through a JPEG reformat to allow it to be uploaded to Weebly and the photographs themselves taken on a small digital Panasonic as well as an Android smartphone instead of an iphone; the android was required to re-shoot a couple photos that had been forgotten. This Panasonic was also used in my location shots. I used the same CANON to film my new film and made the addition of using clips from both the free new website RussiaToday and BBC Motion Gallery, these news clips served to accentuate the points made by my protagonist.

I also used several technologies within the film such as and apple trailers trailer of iron man for a gag and musical instrument as props. Then I edited the film-using Final Cut Pro again. Learning from previous errors I decided to use mainly long takes and micro-montages for my film and learnt that this more abstract style worked better in getting my intended meaning; the tripod very much assisted in this as I was forced to act on camera due to a missing actor and I learnt how to use the focus on the camera to get the focus the way I wanted so I could then film me and my actress. There was an issue with the video quality and framing that required me to utilize some of Final Cut Pro’s advanced video formatting functions, this proved to resolve the issue. The soundtrack used for my film was a looped cover of Alexi Murdoch’s Orange sky as done by a youtube artist by the name of Sally Fowler. I asked and received permission to use the track and looped it using final cuts audio software. For my film’s title font I used a font called PaintScratch downloaded from a free font website called Dafont.

After my new film was completed I set about designing my two film posters. I took two pictures with the Panasonic and used Photoshop to turn them into posters. The first poster was made form and old image of the character Wyatt from my previous film; I decided to still use his image as his faceless appearance represented the universal nature of my film’s message. I remove the background and polarized the image so that it resembled a black stencil. Then I added the title WarPaint in large, red PaintScratch letters. Finally I added a plethora of made-up quotes from critics I thought would see my film as well as many festival commendations from independent film festivals such as Sundance film festival. For my second poster I used an image of all the masks in my film in a circle on a black background. I chose not to tamper with this image as I felt it already captured the feeling of diversity I sought to achieve. I added the title in the center of the masks in a much smaller, white Paintscratch font. Lastly I added the same critics and quotes as the other poster.