Class/ Status

Stereotypes of Class/Status:
Upper class:
  - 'Posh'
  - Snobby 
  - Wealthy/rich
  - Big house/mansion
  - Expensive clothing (e.g. designer clothing/brand names)
  - Rude/disrespectful attitude
  - Arrogant/ignorant
  - Selfish
  - Often away on business
  - Always go on holiday
  - Speak formal english

Working Class:
  - Less formal clothing, scruffy (e.g. builder)
  - Terraced housing
  - Lack of parking
  - Busy
  - Few children

Lower Class:
  - Council flats
  - Criminals (e.g. theft/burglary)
  - Do drugs/drug dealers
  - Alcoholics
  - Many children
  - 'Scroungers' (e.g. benefits)
  - 'Chavvy' clothing
  - No/few qualifications 
  - Jobless (cant get one/cant be bothered)
  - Lazy

Sexuality

Sexuality is an awareness of self and attractiveness. 

Examples of sexuality:
  - Homosexual (eg. gay/camp, lesbian)
  - Bisexual
  - Transexual
  - Hetrosexual
  - Straight 
  - Gender (e.g. men, women)

Representation of sexuality:
  - Clothes
  - Gestures
  - Behaviour
  - Relationships
  - Accent/speech 
  - Narrow minded/limited
  - Friends

Avatar

Directed by James Cameron and produced by James Cameron and Jon Landau.The genre is fantasy and science-fiction. The stars which were included are:

- Sam Worthington
- Zoe Saldana
- Stephen Lang
- Michelle Rodriguez
- Joel David Moore
- Giovanni Ribisi
- Sigourney Weaver

Distributed by: 20th Century Fox.
Production budget: $237million (re-release $9million)
Gross revenue: $2,778,527,559
The running time is 162 minutes.
Ways in which it was marketed was through promotions, books, video games and action figures.

Ethnicity.

Ethnicity is a group of people whose members identify with each other, through a common heritage, consisting of a common language, a common cculture often including a shared religion and a tradition of common correspondent to a history of beliefs.
Members of an ethnic group are conscious of belonging to an ethnic group; moreover ethnic identity is further marked by the recognition from others of a group's distinctiveness. Processes that result in the emergence of such identification are called ethnogenesis.




For example:

Kick Ass.

Mark Miller after producing "Wanted" produced Kick Ass but he decided to make it how  he wanted "Wanted" to be made and the story. Firstly he chose the cast, then  the script being drafted, also he chose the costumes as well as the sets and where the film took place, for how long and how many hours a day overall it took 14 weeks, doing 14 hour days. Kick Ass is based on the comics of Marvel Comic's chief writer Mark Millar, however problems occured because people wouldnt give money unless it had an happy ending which wasnt the orriginal story line int he comic.Also he was shocked at the accommodations that he had to make the film in along with how much work was involved. We were not able to afford even a 'C grade' Marvel character so the film took the unusual step of writing the comic book at the same time the film was produced taking up more time and effort. The technology used was a built a set at Elstree Studios with an enormous green screen. We got high-resolution plates of Manhattan and imported them into Media Composer. Media Composer’s got amazing motion tracking tools, so you can track the background using the on-set tracking markers. There’s a feature called SpectraMatte that allows you to adjust keys with such detail—it’s incredibly realistic.” Directors views on the British film industry. is that we (British) are the most periodical, world class leaders in making movies we just don’t have the industry and that we should stop being service providers we have the best crew directors producers. The problem is that we dont have enough money to finance the films. The film has a wide-ranging soundtrack was also a challenge, maintaining consistency with material ranging from Elvis to The Prodigy.

Kidulthood.

Camera angles used 

• establishing shot
• tracking close up shot
• panning
• extreme close up
• low angle shot
• mid angle panning shot
• tracking shot
• close up low angle shot
• mid angle shot- two shot
• jump cut
• zoom in & out
• over the shoulder shot
• long shot

All off these shot frequently occurred throughout the video click i chopped.

Moon Write Up.

Moon

The film Moon, a British film, was directed by Duncan Jones and created within a low budget of just 2.5 million pounds, to enable the film to be this cheap they managed to have the production take just 33 days over all, also by having a small cast it kept the cost down. Everything was shot in Sheperton Studio and before hand they had a week’s rehearsal before the big filming in New York. It was classed as the best British film in the past ten year in 2009 and won a Bafter for it.

Moon was advertised below the line market, and advertised at a comic book convention where you would usually associate the audience of this film to be. Also, he premiered the film at Nassa; a great place to attract viewers to the film as they relate in genres.  

By including Sam Rockwell in the film he as an actor attracted fan and particular people who will enjoy Moon as he is known for appearing in sci-fi films. Moon is an adventure sci-fi film which has a small majority audience as it is based on just one particular genre being science therefore out of the four quadrant diagram the main category that he focused his audience on would be the men over 25.

Another actor who is not present but heard in the film is Kevin Spacey who didn’t sign up or put his name on the film until after the film was produced to prevent him getting a bad reputation due to the film not being very good. However he did agree to be included in the film afterwards and overall it took them half a day to record him voice to add in as the budget need to remain low, he was still the highest paid actor in the film though.   

Duncan Jones is seen to be not very experienced as during an interview the man had to prompt him into what to reply with, also we see by his appearance of this as he doesn’t look very rich or smart and isn’t well known by people in and out of the filming industry. Another way in which Duncan reduced the cost of the film was by adding the sound on after the film was made, it was sent off for 1-2 days as that is all they could afford, where as normally the sound is added throughout.

Characters played multiple roles and in scenes where particularly the character Sam was needed the director got them to use ear pieces which included a recording of the previous character (still being him) in the conversation therefore he could record him responding in time making it cheaper. There is a scene where the two characters (clones) are playing tennis against theoretically, himself and this particular scene cost the most in the whole film.

Disability Presented

Traditionally, in many cultures around the world, people with physical, sensory or mentally impairments were thought of as under the spell of witchcraft, possessed by demons or as penitent sinners that were being punished by God for 'wrong doing' by themselves or their parents.

Types of disabilities:
-    Emotional problems
-    Mental health problems
-    Behavioural problems
-    Learning difficulties e.g. dyslexia
-    Speech and language impairments
-    'Disfigurement'
-    Chronic illness/health issues e.g. HIV

Moon Analysis

Identify the audience for Moon by using examples from the film?

I surprising enjoyed this film however i did find it difficult to follow at the begining but soon picked it up as the ending sumed everything up. By using Sam Rockwell as the main character him, himself as an actor attracts the typical science 'geeks' to the flm who would enjoy it not only because he is in it but, also because the genre relates to what they like. He is in many science films and therefore is well known uopon them fans of that particular genre, by including him he would also bring viewers to the film.

The main audience of the film would be the quadrant men over 25 as relating to the sci-fi audience genre. They tried by adding a bit of romance attract a different audience steriotypically women, however the story line was based on the science side too much and in my view the romance theme was chucked in. By trying to attract other viewers from other quadrants it would then cost them more money, which they could not afford. Also i dont think the advertising was very beneficial as it was below the line, the poster above it plain with no particular structure which catches my eye.

As it isn't my usual genre of film i watch i dont think otherwise i would of picked it up to watch it, however sitting down with the class being made to watch it i found out that in the end i quite liked it, however thats the problem name, poster, front cover and actors dont attract my attention. This is based on the problem of money and their low budget.

Animoto

Roland Barthes

Today's lesson Becky, Meg and I worked on a prezi presentation on Roland Barthes who was born on the 12th of November in 1915 and unfortunately his life was ending in the year 1980 at the age of 64 on the 25th of March. He is known for being involved in being a French literary theorist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. Roland wanted and got a license in grammar and philology, and in 1953 he created his first full length work called Writing Degree Zero. He also created Writer Sollers, The Eiffel Tower and other Mythologies, The Rustle of Language and Incidents.

"a galaxy of signifiers, not a structure of signifieds; it has no beginning; it is reversible; we gain access to it by several entrances, none of which can be authoritatively declared to be the main one; the codes it mobilizes extend as far as the eye can read, they are indeterminable...the systems of meaning can take over this absolutely plural text, but their number is never closed, based as it is on the infinity of language..."

The quote above is from him on his theory, another quote about his theory was...

The narrative codes Barthes described are:
·         Action/proiarectic code & enigma code (ie Answers & questions)
·         Symbols & Signs
·         Points of Cultural Reference
·         Simple description/reproduction

Meaning he can unravel a text and give it many different meanings, like we can with a scene from a film.  

Becky researched information on his theory and Meg researched about his basic life, they both e-mailed me the work and i cut it down to add it into our prezi..... 

ENJOY :)

Roland Barthe on Prezi

This theory relates to Life on Mars because from each shot we are able to take many meanings just like when Roland can take many meanings from a peice of text.

Hot Fuzz Creators...

Universal is one of the oldest American film studios which was first founded in 1912 by Carl Laemmle, it is a major movie studio which we all recognise as it is on of the top six. They are still to this day producing films and have many lined up for the year 2012, they have producing since 1914 when their first ever film was produced. The very first film they made was called By The Suns Rays a silent western film and the most recently release been created by Universal is Devil.

Working Title was funded in 1983 by Tim Bevan and Sarah Radclyffe which is a british film production based in london.  is a British film production company that is based in London. Some of their most famous films created are: Wimbledon, Love Actually, Jonny English and About A Boy. They have also produced not only films but television series. 

Studio Canal is a French based film production and distribution company. Founded by Pierre Lescure in the year 1988 and owns the third largest film libary in the world. Some of these films in the library include Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Rambo: First Blood Part II and Basic Instinct, and they have international rights to Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, The Graduate to name a few.

Big Talk is another English film and television production company that is also based in London, found in 1995 by Nira Park, and produced the film that we have been studying Hot Fuzz, it's also famous for producing are Shaun of the Dead. Big Talk Productions is also famous for producing sitcoms like Free Agents and Spaced. A few actors have gained a bigger famous status for appearing in Big Talk productions, these are: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Bill Bailey and Dylan Moran.

Merlin

What representation of gender are constructed by the extract through the use of: Mise en scene, editing, used of camera and sound?







The main character of the Merlin is a male we see this at the very beginning on the opening scene, showing thats throughout the series the focus will be on him and his life or adventure. There is then a mid shot of Merlin and the kings son where he is wearing amour representing power and authority, this sis followed by the audience then seeing the king where we identify him by the setting as he is sitting on a throne wearing a crown, the viewers then by the mise en scene notice his importance. By the throne being placed on a step making it higher shows this importance again as he then is looking down in everyone, also his voice is very strong and empowering. Finally with Merlin his eyes are glowing showing editing to show the viewer magic enforcing the idea of power as he has the ability to do whatever he wants with his powers.


The trailer shows a women at the beginning very briefly however isn't shown as a  very feminine character with long black hair wearing a long purple dress being stereotypical as purple is classed as a female colour, also her dress isn't at all revealing due to the length could raise the question weather it is expected of them by men or more specifically their husbands. Commonly you see magic and witches appear in period dramas from the 1100's as the idea was that women were witches, a witch is what we the viewers next see. This then presents an old view and stereotype of women and shows that they were thought of very little back then mostly represented as evil. 

Britishness

We associate Britishness on:

• Posh (Snobby) - queen
• Council Estates - run down
• Iconic things we associate with Britain
• Countryside
• British music - punk
• Private schools
• Self depreating (take mick out of ourselves)
• Bad teeth
• Irony

WHAT IS UNIQUALLY BRITISH ABOUT HOT FUZZ?


Before even the opening scene the front cover is a former copy of a American film beginning with self depriciating, we first here the British police sirens, whistle and bell which are old fashioned relating to the film as inspector Angel goes from a modern police station to a police station in the countryside to work, the countryside being another factor of 'Britishness'. On his police badge we see the crown on it to show that he is from the police force but also the relation between Britain and being posh as we have a queen. They mention him attenting Cantabry Uniersity raised the stereotype of Britishness and our private schools, include in the sequence are filmings of him driving a vauxhall, cycling, fencing (posh sport) and chess all of which represent the sports and car makes associated with Britain. Famous places were mention in London which were Soho and China Town to give the non British viewers an insight. 













WHAT US UNIQUALLY BRITISH ABOUT HOT FUZZ- SCENE IN COUNTRYSIDE?


The first insight we see and notice is the weather being rain with a scene of an old church and a water fountain where there are 'chavs' sitting, he then goes to an old fashioned hotel being a Best Western known as a British chain of hotels. where the receptionist is doing a cross word talking in a polite English accent calling her husband Bernard, a typical old fashioned English name, so as we can see from the first two minute of the countryside scene there are many iconic British themes.The character then stays in a room called the 'Castle Suit' referring to England's heritage of castles. The streets roads are made of cobbles a quant and traditional town. Where we then come across a pub which are present in America so they then can tell it is set in England another theme, uniqually British, and in there there is pint measurements and pint pumps of ale, also underage drinkers, binge drinking. A man is also reading the newspaper in the pub. This scene is set in a town called Sandford set in Britain.  

TV Study-

Over the weekend i was engrosed into the x-factor which is a reality tv program, there is some humour in the shows however i don't think enough to be classed as a comedy. It has a wide range of audience based for family viewing as it is on a the time the family sit watching entertainment eating dinner. Overall I think it is a brilliant show and will continue to watch it and find out the results, i also think its a good idea as it finds talent amoungst those who never get a chance.

I also watches Emmerdale which is a TV drama also for the family which raises awareness on everyday problems and issues, for example this week the tory line has focus on a teenage girl taking heroin which it therefore provides a help line, also a young man showing that he is gay not just within his family but his community. I strongly recommend as some viewers can relate to experiences or issues. 

Hot Fuzz Intro

In the opening scene of Hot Fuzz, the first camera angle used is a long shot which enables you see Nicholas Angel walking into the building striding forward where he is surrounded by a light therefore could be interpereted as a halo of 'gold' relating to his name "ANGEL". The continuity is undisguinisable until the last shot where you see him being stabbed in the hand by a man as Father Christmas in his left hand, but however you see the scar on his right hand. The cutting isn't smooth but this was done on purpose to show the fast pace also representing that he is fast himself many of the shots dissolve or fade, by changing shot when a flash or load sound happens this also makes the filming seem more dramatic and faster. At the beginning there is a close-up of Angels face shown on his police ID where his facial expression is very stern and angry presenting a stereotype of police men, then a close-up of this face again exactly the same implying he is very focused when at work.

Michel Gondry

Michel Gondry on Prezi

For our lesson we all researched in random groups a different inspirational design our group reseached michel gondry and produced a prezi presentation on examples of his work, target audience, style and background information on him. I was in charge in producing the prezi adding all the information in, this is our prezi...

Some background information.

Michel was a french director who was specifically known for his imaginative work and uses of bold and colourful techniques, he was born in May 1963. He is an acadamy award winner for screen writing and produced Music Videos most recently for

• Paul McCartney
• Kanye West
• Mia Doi Todd

The examples of his work we used were White Stripes, The Smirnoff Comercial, Daft Punk where each feature or character in the video represents a tune in the song, also The Science of Sleep which never got shown as it was classed too weird.
We all took notes on each inspirational director and here are my notes on the others...

Wes Anderson:

was born in texas and writes with Owen Wilson he tries to cast him in allot of his films. He focuses on broken families in his films and specialises in adverts, he wrote and also stared in was the American Express card advertisment. His films use similar soundtrack usually containing a rolling stones song, his films title are always shown in yellow.
Some films he has directed-
  - Fantastic Mr Fox
  - The Royal Tenenbaums

Shynola:

it consists of 4 people that met in 1994 who mostly focus on animations by creating unique and non real films which attracts a wide range audience. They have created videos for Coldplay - strawberry swings and Radioheads - Pyramid song. 

Hammer and Tongs:

Two people being, Garth Jennings and Nick Goldsmith who focus on films

-for example.... 

  - Son of Rambo

  - Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy 

American Beauty Essay

The film begins with a mid angle shot of Hayne implying that the two characters in the scene know each other, we can back this up also by analysising the mis-en-scene as it is set in her bedroom laying on her bed- a more intermate setting in comparison to the kitchen. During the first scene we, the audience can hear the sound of the camera working showing it is  amateur recording as we later find out it is one of the characters, Ricky Fitts. 

The audience then see's a high angled shot which provides information on the setting giving them an overview insight of where the film is taking place. The view has a consistent amount of vegetation and the houses are spaced out widely. This gives the viewer a clue to the fact it is a wealthy suburban area which then proves that the characters must be well off.

In the space of the two scenes i have analysed the colouring goes from a grey scheme with dull colours for clothing on the girl which shows her body shape however not in a glamorous way - not an 'American Beauty'. However then goes onto the title of a piercing red on a pitch black background making git stand out more. This is also a connotation of passion, danger and also links into the roses later. The non-diegnetic convasation of the teenage characters when the mid-angle shot takes place on Jayne gives an insight into the relationship of theirs which must be close from the personal convasation is taking place and also the insight of her relationship with her father which is the opposite. 

Group Filming

working with Becky, Sam and Meg.

Pre-production 


For our filming, we had a specification for a scene of a character walking down a corridor, opening a door and then sitting down and having a conversation with another character. We worked in groups of 4 to create a story boardn including different camera angles uch as over the shoulder shot close up and mid shot, we then swapped story boards with other groups to test how detailed they were and if we could create the filming in which was required.


Producing production 


Meg was character 1 and Becky was character 2. Sam did the filming using the different camera angles whilst we all helped organize the props ect. The difficulties we over came were finding the appriate scene in which to  use and reading the hand writing off of the storyboard. Also we had troubles using the other groups storyboard as it was confusing to read and we got mixed up with how to do the scenes as the anotation wasnt clearly stated.


During the Lesson


We learnt the basics on editing videos by uploading our filming and importing it. Then dragged and dropped the different sections and cut anything we didn't want or need, the name of our filming was ' Doors are boring to film' as we wanted to be more creative but it was a starting point. Adding text was easy however the cutting of the clips was more difficult for me but we all soon got used to it. 


Post production


Overall i feel happy with the co-opperation and communication our group managed to undertake we completed our filming in time to the best of our ability and all put our own thoughts and ideas into it when needs, our opinions also were added to achieve the best possible outcome.

My Magazine

Pre-production During my pre-production of the magazine I created a draft copy on an A3 sheet of paper for the main front covers showing the layout and the advertising I would place on it. I looked at the vogue magazine to give me inspiration.Firstly for the front cover I had to choose what I was going to call my magazine by looking on Google at relative words to which my magazine was focusing on being textiles and fashion. In the end i chose to give it the name 'Mantelet' because it relates to the textiles department in the school and their production of fashion by the pupils, which interests me. I then had to design my layout for the front cover for example; I chose to put the main photo on the left hand side of the cover this gains space for the information and advertising to be placed. The writing/headings then were dotted around it. I made sure that I kept the master head at the top of the page as this is essential for the magazine to gain attention. I annotate it saying what fonts, sizes, colour etc. that I would want for the writing and background.

Production Firstly we took some pictures in pairs, i worked with becky, of what image we was going to use on the front cover, we uploaded them onto the computer allowing us to use them on Photoshop. Secondly i uploading the image i wished to use, then by using the 'Magnetic lasso tool' i cut around the image and could remove the background to then place it in a new layer. I then had to adjust the image to the correct place and size on my front cover, the background was set as a baby pink and added the text which i was advertising. I stuck to using only three fonts on my front cover so it didn't end up looking messy,  I had the name of the magazine (MANTELET) in white the headlines and subheadings in a mustard yellow a bright pink and a tourquois blue relating to the colour from the umbrella and then added my barcode. 
Post Production I enjoyed making the magazine however until i did got used to it i felt it fustrating, i would say advertising is one on my strong points and would love to go into the magazine writing industry when i'm older perticually on fashion. My colours compliment each other and the picture as they were samples taken from the umbrella. The colour were feminine as the fashion magazine is not only based on women but would mostly be read my women also there was a male in the image therefore including both sides of the sexs. The ages range is around the school years as i would be selling it within the school as the advertising is strongly based on the Lutterworth Textiles products and subject.As i am not very experienced and haven't used photoshop before it took some getting used to but i learnt quickly and became more confident.

Storyboard

In our groups of 4, we split each section into 4 parts. They were: walking down the corridor, opening/closing the door, sitting down and having a conversation to another character. To create my part of the storyboard (walking down the corridor), i split my section into 4 sections:
1) close up of feet, footsteps sound, pan up by zooming out, camera looking up
2) cameras looking up onto a longshot
3) close-up of persons face as they walk past the camera, looking back
4) medium shot of characters back (reverse shot)
Then we put all the parts together from our group to create the whole scene.


I found using the different camera angles together easy. However, I found putting the 4 sections together difficult as I had to ensure continuity so that the scene would flow and work.