H O W D I D Y O U U S E M E D I A T E C H N O L O G I E S I N T H E

C O N S T R U C T I O N A N D R E S E A R C H , P L A N N I N G A N D

E VA L U AT I O N S TA G E S ?

BY E R I N H U N T E R

RESEARCHWhen it came to researching my film I used lots of different types of media in order to find conventions and analyse them in order to apply them to my products. I used Netflix and Now TV to watch existing horror films, I also used YouTube to find videos of how to film, and to find short horror films. I used YouTube as a guide to help me learn the skills I needed to be able to film well. Google was also a very reliable source and it lead me to slide share and prezzi which let me read existing presentations by media students both this year and from years before. I put my research into slide share slides into word and PowerPoint documents and straight onto blogger to help me to present my findings.

SHORT HORROR FILM

For the film I was in charge of filming the scenes and used a Panasonic HC-B7100 camera to do so. This wasn’t the best camera to use as the quality left the scenes pixelated however this was the best quality camera that the school had so this was our only option. It took a while to get the hang of how to use the camera. Unfortunately it was too late before I realised that you could but effects on the film scenes using the camera and so we had to try and do that when editing. The camera was placed on a tripod for me to film. Sometimes when filming, I would press the button and it wouldn’t record so I only caught the ends of the scenes or missed them completely. This could have been because the cameras were old and of poor quality, it was frustrating because it would mean we would have to film the scene again and we ended up filming for longer than we should have done and needing to use artificial lighting as it was winter and it got dark very quickly. I cannot really discuss how the film was edited or the editing process as that job was designated to someone else in the group. However I do remember that the Adobe Premiere software was difficult to use as different versions of the programme meant that if work was done on an old software at home we were unable to open the work at school Also I do believe that it was hard to add transitions such as fades in and out to the film as none seem to be present in my horror film. Conclusively, the camera was of satisfactory standards. If the camera had been a better quality more professional camera the picture would have been clearer and it would have been easier to get better shots. I do not think that using Adobe premiere software was successful as my group member struggled to use it effectively. I think the editing was the most difficult part of the film and that maybe Movie Maker would have been more successful.

POSTERWhen researching how to create a horror film poster I looked at existing horror film posters on google images. This helped me to successfully compare posters and draw similarities and differences and comment on conventions in order for me to apply it to my own product. I used Microsoft PowerPoint and slide share to present my ideas on my blog. To create my poster I used Adobe Photoshop CS6. I applied the findings from my research to my poster in order to make a successful product. Adobe Photoshop was easy to use as I had used it already last year in order to create my final magazine front cover and double page spread. Although this year I used different aspects of the programme. I used the magic want tool a bit and the lasso tool more this year as I needed to erase the background on my main image before I added it to my poster. I also changed the saturation, contrast and brightness of my image this year in order to create a spooky effect and to enable me to different effect to the layers on my poster in order for it to look sinister and horrific. I do think that my knowledge of how to use Photoshop has improved greatly in comparison to the beginning of the course and what I would have once found difficult is now easier as I have developed the skills to be able to use the software- I’m a pro by no means. To evaluate my poster I used PowerPoint and Slide share. The evaluation was about me understanding where I went wrong with my product and about how I could of made changes effectively, what I could have done better. I used these two programmes as they were easy for me to use and simple which is what I needed to be able to evaluate my work.

REVIEWWhen researching my review I used google to find existing horror film posters and presented them in prezzi. By presenting my research findings in prezzi I found that my work was more interactive and this helped me to use more skills to display my work. I looked at 1 double page spread and 2 horror film double page spread reviews. From doing this I was able to evaluate and analyse conventions and specifically horror review conventions successfully. To create my double page spread I used Adobe InDesign. Adobe in design allowed me to insert columns and margins into my work which meant that I could present my work professionally in the style of an existing double page spread. InDesign was the most difficult of the technologies for me to use. The layout of in design isn’t that simple and in order to add features such as drop caps I needed to talk to my teacher and other peers. When editing my Review I stayed with InDesign as my work was formatted for that programme. Once I had created my first draft it was pretty simple to make the changes that I needed and by this stage I was already more competent at using the software. I placed images (originally from google) from my documents and added them to my double page spread. I think although I found using InDesign challenging it was the best software that I had used as it forced me to not over complicate my ideas so I produced my best product. When evaluating my review I used power point again. Reflecting back perhaps using a different software would have shown off my media skills more. However overall I think the software allowed me to evaluate my work successfully.