Evaluation 4: How Did You Use New Media Technologies in the Construction, Research, Planning and Evaluation Stages

How Did You Use New Media Technologies in the Construction, Research, Planning and Evaluation Stages

Digital camera:

One of the most crucial pieces of technology we used was a digital camera, this way we film scenes in very high quality as well as editing them straight from the camera. Settings on the camera allowed us to adjust the amount of light in shots and the focus points. for example in one of the first scenes with Scarlett Rosewood, she is seen looking out the window, so we wanted the focus to be on her, therefore we used a short depth of field. Also by adjusting the light in scenes like the running down the corridor, we were able to adjust the lighting to low key, changing the overall atmosphere. Another feature of the camera is that we had a really wide zoom range, which was helpful in scenes such as Santa's hand creeping around the door to emphasise the feeling of fear. The camera was also easy to transport around, it came with a case, a charger and an extra lens. this way we were able to take it with us around school, each others homes and out into the town. Because the school allowed to take the camera out of school for long periods of time, this reassured us that whenever we have any ideas to add or change about our trailer, we could because we would have the camera at hand. The school also allowed us to take a tripod which was helpful when filming stable steady shots, for example when we were filming the dinner scene the camera was able to stay steady so it was easy to add the zoom effect post-production. The tripod also had many adjustment levels so we could change the height and angle of the shot. This was helpful for shots such as all the guest's waking up scenes, which were filmed with a high angle to connote the guest's vulnerability against the kidnapper. Finally another useful tool that came with this camera was a neck strap, this allowed us to take a hand-held P.O.V shot of Alice's Character running away from the kidnapper down a long corridor. By having the neck strap it allowed us to perform this shot safely without dropping or damaging the camera.

Voice Recorder:

We used a voice recorder app on windows 10 to record the voice over for our trailer. The voice over was of Alice and I reciting a dark poem from Catherine Fisher's book, Songs of Sapphique. The tone of voice was slow and low pitched to create an eerie atmosphere. We preferred using a app instead of a hand held voice recorder because we got better quality audio as we were able to plug in a professional microphone.



Adobe Premiere Pro:

All of our editing was done using my own laptop (Lenovo Yoga Touch) and our school computers. I had a reasonable amount of experience with premiere pro, having used it for our AS production, however during post production I spent a little amount of time looking at tutorials for some special effects. An example of this would be out 4 split-screen security camera scene of the guests waking up, as I did not already know how to do this I watched a YouTube tutorial. Premiere Pro allowed us to import all of our footage into folders, re-watch them all and delete any unnecessary files. it was easy to delete and separate any audio files we were not happy with.

We could also include intertitles by adding a title into our sequence, for example we made an intertitle that said “Are you on the naughty list?” this allowed us to address our audience directly, and therefore grab their attention. After using just the schools computers in our AS production we realised it might be easier to use my own laptop. I already had the software from my other classes, and I could use it easily at home as well as bring it into school. This made our post-production so much more efficient this year, as we could not only edit our production in class and school hours but also at home in our free time. Although once I transferred the files over to my laptop we couldn't use it on the school computers no more as they used the 2010 version whereas I have the updated 2018 version, therefore the school computers couldn't render the new files.



Adobe Photoshop:
Photoshop became extremely useful when it came to creating my magazine front cover, film poster and our production company logo for our trailer. I have a lot of past experience with Photoshop as it is one of main pieces of software I use in my graphics design class. I have made magazine covers before in graphics so it was really helpful to have this experience.

For my magazine front cover I used tools such as the selection tool; to select the head of Santa, the layers panel; to create a copy of the head, and the mask tool; to layer the head over the masthead to get that conventional covered masthead layout. I also used the select tool on my film poster to select and mask certain parts of my main image, this is because I wanted to increase the brightness and saturation of the wrapping paper on the door but not anything else. by using the select tool I could apply this adjustment filter to specific areas of my choosing.
Photoshop also provided me with a variety of Serif, Sans Serif, Script, and Stylised fonts to choose from. However I decided to stick with my thriller stereotypical Times New Roman, because I've used it in all my other texts. I was also able to apply effects to my texts, for example, drop shadows which I applied to both my film poster and magazine cover to emphasise the titles.


Phone:
My mobile phone was very useful during production as I could do last minute research from wherever. I had my phone with me at all times so this meant I could search up trailers into order get inspiration for certain shots, for example when filming the guest wake up scenes I looked at the trailer for 'Split' for inspiration on how to frame the shot and how the actors should wake up.

As I have a Sony Xperia Z2 this meant that I could download up to date apps to help with communication, for example we used the Facebook Messenger app to contact our cast so we all knew where and when to meet. The calendar app was also useful for scheduling what day we were filming, setting reminders for handing back in equipment, and prioritising our time.


Blogger:
Blogger is a great website for presenting my progress and ideas, it was easy to use and practical in that I could use blogger at school, at home, and out and about on my phone due to the app. Blogger allowed me to upload my research and planning, my development, and our final productions. I could chose to save these as drafts and come back to them later on or I could publish them and get feedback from my teachers, this was helpful because that meant I could work on various pieces of unfinished work and publish them when they're ready.

Other Websites:
We used various other websites to look at tutorials on how to complete certain techniques for Photoshop, Premiere Pro, etc. that I hadn't yet learnt. We also found copyright free music to add ominous background music.