Final Product - Intruder

 

Critical Reflection

 

Outdoor Media

 

 Outdoor media are media used to advertise people who are outdoors, these media are convenient because almost everyone drive/walk around the streets to go somewhere/someplace. Outdoor media can be seen almost everywhere someone goes, either in billboards or even signs. Outdoor media can gather an abundance of attention if they are seen, which gives them an advantage over other types of media in attempts to advertise a film or such.

Digital Media

 Digital media are a more advanced form of Print media, books can be read and found at a more rapid pace than Print Media. Digital media contains many different applications, some of these applications are streaming websites such as Hulu, Netflix; this helped consumers have a better experience watching movies. Media convergence had also helped this technology at an abundant rate, due to the many applications that had been modified from Old media, news and books could be found in a matter of seconds by simply typing.

Print Media

 Print media are the types of media that do not require technology to be active, these media were mostly used back when technology was only an idea and not a group of multimillion dollar businesses. Print media were used to research topics and to increase one's intelligence on a specific topic, however the process was somewhat slow to some. Examples of this media would obviously be: Books, Magazines, Newspapers, etc... These types of media are still here today, but some had become more advanced to become more preferable for the generation of today.

Niche Audience

  A niche audience is a type of audience that gathers a small group of people to enjoy a specific type of film, these movies do not like to focus on multiple genres and decide to focus on one in an attempt to mater it to the point of being consumed by a niche audience. An example of a movie that is a niche audience would be "Joker" which follows "Arthur Fleck" a failed comedy artist that was bullied into becoming one of the worst criminals in the batman series. This movie follows a psychological genre, which invites people to watch the slow and painful transformation of Arthur Fleck into the one and only Joker.

Mainstream Audience

  A mainstream audience is an audience consisting of a large group of consumers, these types of audiences do not have a limit on who or what is part of it and can include an abundance of different genre enjoyers. An example of movie that utilizes the mainstream audience would be "Spider-Man: No Way Home" which follows the adventures of "Peter Parker" whilst he attempts to make everyone he knows forget about his identity, however after tempering with Dr. Strange's spell, the universe had collided with a number of other universes, inviting villains from other Spider-Man universes before they had ultimately died in the hands of other Peter Parker. The movie had gathered a large number of people and had gained an abundance of popularity in the first week of its release, which had gathered attention from people who enjoy Action, Sci-Fi, Adventure, Mysterious, Thriller, Intense genres of movies

Audience

  An audience is someone or a group of people who consume and intake media productions, the audience is tasked to connotate a movie and gain a better understand of the multiple different scenes in them. The audience could be mainstream (A movie tasked to gather a large number of people) or a niche Audience (A movie made for a small group of people) depending on the movie's genre and theme. To advertise their movie, media companies mostly put trailers and place clips of their movie at popular places via contracts to intrigue the audience into watching their movie.

Conglomerate Media Companies

   Conglomerate media companies are the companies that utilize other companies to produce, sell and promote their media productions. These types of media companies usually possess an abundance of money, which can help them produce products and create their own companies, such as gaming, stores and popcorn companies. An exceptional example of this kind of media company would be Walt Disney due to its large variety of companies. These companies range from Games, such as the "Spider-Man: No Way Home" game made by one  of their companies.

Conglomerate companies are usually mainstream and will try to gather as much attention as they can possibly get. To do this they constantly advertise their movies to keep the audience avid and amused until the actual release of the movie.

Shot Sizes

  Shot sizes are the scale of different types of frames, these are used to help the viewer connotate what it means. Shot sizes are extremely frequent in film or photography, which is good to convey meaning and help the audience understand what is happening in the scene/frame. They range in wide numbers, however shot sizes are great to convey meaning onto a subject. An example of this would be the usage of an establishing shot.

In this scenery we can notice a lot of things, ranging from the usage of Leading lines to the time of day, and setting. Like the establishing shot, there are many other shot sizes, which are: The Master Shot, Wide Shot, Full Shot, Medium Full Shot, Medium Shot, Medium Close Up, Close Up, and Extreme Close-Up. The audience is directed towards the Direction of the leading lines, which leads across the wide and glistening river.

Film Analysis - Part 3

 

Film Analysis - Part 2

 

Film Analysis - Part 1

 During our Midterms, we had to do certain researches on movies that we, the students, had selected. My group had selected the Media Production dubbed "Venom". Venom is a movie which follows the Protagonist Eddie Brock, whilst he finds a way to stop Carlton Drake from seemingly destroying the world with another Symbiote (Venom's race) named Riot. Riot is seemingly more muscular then Venom, and was even said to be stronger than Venom is. We were showcased the difference of strength when their fight had begun, which led to multiple complications for not only Venom, but Eddie as well.

The movie was directed by Ruben Fleisher, however the original Character "Venom", was distributed by 3 major production companies ACME, Andes Films, B&H Film Distribution, Big Picture 2 Films.

The main characters of this movie are Tom Hardy, as Eddie Brock and Venom, Riz Ahmed as Carlton Drake and the infamous Riot, and Michelle Williams playing as Anne Weying otherwise known as the "She-Venom"

Venom was mostly directed to Comic Book readers who enjoyed reading the Anti-Hero's adventures and actions during its long story. Even though it would be enjoyed by Action/sci-fi watchers as well, the Comic readers would enjoy it the most, even though Venom's story is somewhat modified for PG-13 viewers.

Venom was marketed in multiple ways, either Tom Hardy and the director did interviews, masks were sold or even music made by Eminem, a rapper, to support the media production. This movie had gathered a lot of attention around the world, due to it being a Mainstream and not a Niche.

New Media

  New media is the media that everyone seems to use today, it includes many things that had ultimately replaced Old media. However, due to convergence, some forms of old media had been adjusted into New media. For example, in a phone, there are radios, news, and messaging someone or a group of people is now instant instead of having to wait weeks for an answer. New media had helped the film industry due to its many apps as well, because of this, students who are aspiring to become editors or film-makers can easily make movies and present them to the world via streaming them on YouTube and other streaming websites. 

Old Media

 Old Media are media that were used during the old generations, before technologies such as the touchscreen telephone was even presented, they were less technological and we're mostly written on paper or were not as advanced as they are today. Old Media consists of many components, which are ; Books, Tvs, radios, newspapers, letters. These components were what had evolved into a different type of media, they were upgraded to the point that you can read/listen to them anywhere you are. 

Preliminary Exercise

  During this preliminary exercise, I've learned the benefit of utilizing specific areas for different shots. These shots require to be extremely precise and some of them are simply shapes made by the characters via the way they are interacting with each other. One example a specific shape would be a scene from a famous series named Crisis On Infinite Earths, which was directed by Jesse Warn; this series was about a group of heroes gathering their strengths for the good of human kind, these Heroes consisted of The Flash, Supergirl, Superman and even Green arrow. They were extremely colorful clothing in an attempt to brighten the shot for the viewers. The heroes seemed to be sitting in a round table, which indicated safety and inclusivity.

The overhead shot gives the heroes a clear visual of each and every character, and gave the audience somewhat of a feeling of curiosity. Jesse Warn utilized the circle shape to show clear coordination from all the characters, they are most likely attempting to speak about a serious or unnatural manner.​ This shot contains a greyish coloring. Even though we do not have a visual of their face, the characters are obviously having a serious issue and are attempting to deal with it quickly. They are all in their superhero suits which means the issue must be extremely troublesome for each of the characters. The tone seems serious, which is most likely why the entire team is clearly stressed.​

Preliminary Exercise

 Mise-en-scene, which means "what to include in a scene," is what is used in almost every film, no matter what genre; it is mainly used to show realism in a movie and help the audience have an easier time recognizing its conventions. The codes used in Mis-en-scene are "Setting," "Acting," "Costume, Makeup, and hair," "Set Design/Props," "Composition," "Lighting," and "Color." These different types of codes are used accordingly, and help any type of movie have a more realistic feeling, instead of being bland.

Preliminary Exercise

 Symbolic codes are different types of ways filmmakers give the audience an idea of what kind of movie they are watching, for example, an alien costume could give away that the audience is watching a movie following a sci-fi genre. The acting could be somewhat comedic and tis would most likely give the characters a sense of comedy in the film, and they would connotate that the movie is a comedic sci-fi. There are many different ways that Film producers/Filmmakers can manipulate and use symbolic Codes, this can help the movie get a more appealing feedback from their audience. 

For this purpose, I have decided to study a certain trailer provided to me by my Teacher. Upon watching said movie, I was tasked to search for those symbolic codes, whilst also being vigilant of conventions used in the Sci-fi movie named; VALERIAN. Conventions are simple adjustments that the editors of the movie add to make the movie more appealing to watch, this could be the color of the scenes and the music used in intense or suspenseful moments, they could even have a bit of crescendo.

Preliminary Exercise

  Ferdinand de Saussure was a linguist, semiotician and philosopher. He studied that the signifier could not exist without the signified. He believed that written or spoken language is the primary form of communication between humans. A signifier is a sign's physical form/object, whilst a signified gives the meaning exerted by the signifier. An example of this would be a cat; whilst the cat is the signified, the signifier would be Stealth, loneliness or even arrogance.

With this specific theory, I will study a simple movie named "The Hunger Games". This movie is a media production created by Universal Studios, the story follows Katniss Everdeen and her companion Peeta Mellark as they participate in a death-game called The Hunger Games against multiple other participants, which are mostly teenagers and/or adults. Children can also participate in the game as shown at the beginning of the movie, when Katniss's sister was chosen for the reaping (This is some sort of event where someone from a higher class nominates someone to participate in the death-game).

Preliminary Exercise

 Roland Gerard Barthes was born on November 12th in the town of Cherbourg in Normandy. Once he had attained the age of 11, Barthes had travelled to Paris. Barthes surveyed the signification process and studied the connection between Connotation and Denotation. Denotation is the specific and non-symbolic meaning of an object, animal, or person, whilst Connotation is the symbolic meaning of an object, animal, or person. Ex. For an apple, An apple would be its Denotation, however its connotation could be Health or Power. During this blog post, I will decipher how I can utilize Bart's Theory to Connotate and Denotate a specific scene in this media text named "The Hunger Games". This specific movie contains the genres named: science fiction, adventure and thriller genre and was previously a book. The story follows Katniss Everdeen after she stopped her sister (Primrose Everdeen) from being nominated as Tribute, Katniss volunteers as tribute in her place, thus meaning she has to fight other Tributes in a free-for-all battle.

With Roland Barthe's Theory of semiotics, I will create a chart which shows a more understanding about his theory.

Location

 Our group had been set on filming the movie in one hallway in an attempt to not waste time on details (also due to the utilization of the other classrooms), however, a very nice Teacher had given us permission to film in his classroom to complete our. Upon entering the room, my group and I had instantly gathered idea on what to do for the movie, which of course had shown our creativity. We utilized one chair and had finally added props into the film, which had invited an abundance of ideas. The group dedicated the rest of the class time to filming the film and finally making the classroom scene:

Preliminary Exercise

  Charles "Sandes" Pierce was an American scientist and philosopher that had presented the idea of 3 main categories as his theory of semiotics, Symbols, Icons and indexes. These three categories are dubbed the Triatic model. Iconic signs are signs where the signifier resembles the signified, they are equal and the meaning of said Icon is extremely straight forward. A good example of this sign would be a stop sign.

Symbolic signs are present when the signifier has no connection to the signified, and is mainly understood by people who are familiar to it.

And finally, Indexical signs are signs where the signified is the root cause of the signifier, meaning that from knowing what the sign means, we can infer what it is.

Here is an assignment where I explain what certain signifiers/signified mean in the "Captain America: Civil War" movie.

First Draft - Intruder

 

Editor/Actor - Kevin

Cameraman/Actor - Carter

Actor/Writer - Tianna

This movie, that had created a sense of Dramatic Irony at the beginning, is about two students who have fallen victim to an unidentified being who seems to have infiltrated the school, the protagonist "Mason" is being chased by the being and it seems somewhat impossible to stop the being from catching up to him. No matter what he does, "Mason" the protagonist, was left with the one option to run away. Even though Mason had a quick and rapid composure, the beast seemed un-phased by his movements and simply followed him. The beast could teleport Infront of him or behind him instantaneously with a malicious composure following his movements. Not many Mis-en-scene props were used for the production of this movie; this was due to the fact that the movie simply didn't need a lot, we had attempted a simplistic approach in order to not waste anytime having to use different props for each frame. The props we did use however were: A Notebook, A Pencil and One two completely different bookbags. I had been planning to gain more information about horror movies, but time was short and this was all we could do for the time being. Mis-en-scene costumes were also used in the film, such as Mason's Grey Jacket, which was used to stop the cold breeze from making contact with his body, long Khaki pants, which seemed to temper with his running capabilities and even dark, white Socks and Dark/White shoes. The beast had taken over an extremely dark color of clothing to give the audience a sense of darkness, superiority and of course unusualness. The movie took approximately 2 days to make, even though we had only managed to make 59 seconds out of it.

Genre - Horror, Comedy

Subgenres - Supernatural Horror, Cringe Comedy

Theme - "Attempting to run away from
something that people have never thought could exist."

Changes In Film

 My group had decided to change multiple things about the storyline, Jasmine was originally going to survive and was going to tell Mason to run away; which Mason would of course think was a prank. However, the whole scene was deleted and we had decided to make Jasmine die for the plot, this would also raise a question, if Jasmine died, and the monster was from Mason's imagination, who killed the poor girl. This would cause great confusion to the audience, and this is what we're trying to accomplish. 

This was the scene that determined Jasmine's death/life:

Changes in Film

 Today we had decided to change an entire scene of the movie, and placed it somewhere else in the school. This was to add more dynamic and intensity in the movie, instead of Mason being completely stagnant; me and my team had instead decided to let him run around before eventually starting the changed scene.

This is the changed scene, as you can see, Mason is clearly cornered next to the wall and it would obviously make no sense for the monster to let him go, hence the team changed this completely into a full on race for survival.

It was changed completely into this:

Preliminary Exercise - Composition of film/ Leading Lines

 With my teams cooperation, I could clearly understand this assignment at my best level, and upon understanding said Preliminary exercise, I came to a profound conclusion that Leading Lines were an exceptional tool to draw the audience towards an object or person. This Composition gives the audience an idea of what to look at, without having to search for the object or person of importance. What I've noticed regularly is that directors use this technique multiple times in their Media production, and even in multiple different genres of Film. Leading lines are great to draw attention and help people focus directly onto what the director desires them to direct their eyes towards.

This movie, named Venom was one of the variants of the Leading Lines and was the example I used in my assignment, it was directed by Ruben Fleisher, who had the idea of leading the audience's eyes towards Eddie and Venom's expressions. Eddie is clearly terrified once he had truly seen Venom for the first time, the Leading Lines show Venom's calm/disappointed demeanor whilst it speaks to Eddie. ​This shot contains grey coloring and a mostly dark background, the characters seem to be somewhere isolated from the city clearly glistening behind them, there aren't any props aside from the Metal scaffolding Eddie seems to be lying upon. Eddie's hair seems messy and dis-organized, whilst his face seems burnt out and fatigued. Eddie is wearing a grey jacket and the sleeves seem to be reaching for his palm. The tone of this shot seems terrifying for the viewers and Eddie, this is because there is a dark gooey man-eating head floating in front of Eddie's face.​