Question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The opening to 'Unlawful' both challenges and follows the conventions of the film noir/neo-noir genre. We chose to do this in order to attract our target audiences. It was important to include typical conventions for the fans of noir but by putting a twist on the genre, it could appeal to younger audiences too.

The Plot of 'Unlawful'

'Unlawful' follows the life of Stacey, a young female detective in her twenties, who stalks and seduces a rich businessman, before killing him and inheriting all his money. She is then put on the investigating team to track down her ex-husband's killer and so she has to cover up her tracks. Several months later, a new male detective is put onto the case and he is suspicious about Stacey. This results in her putting her seductive charm on him but the film ends before the audience get the chance to find out whether he finds out what she has done, and so essentially it ends on a cliffhanger. 

Form

Some typical features of an opening sequence include: music, credits (either put over a blank screen/picture or on top of the action taking place) and dialogue. The opening for 'Man of Steel' (below) features all three of these conventions. In this sequence, voice overs of news reporters can be heard, as well as backing music. The mixture of dialogue and music has the effect of setting up an exciting atmosphere. The credits appear over moving images, allowing the audience to gain knowledge about the background to the story in the title sequence.

Genre Conventions for Film Noir/Neo-Noir 

1. Femme Fatale Character

Top left across:The Paradine Case, Catherine from Basic Instinct, Kathy from Out of the Past,
Bottom left across: Cora from The Postman Always Rings Twice, Gilda, Matty from Body Heat
, 

Femme fatales are common characters in the neo-noir and film noir genres. They are usually mysterious and seductive and can often manipulate their lovers into doing something dangerous or draw them into deadly situations. They are often able to cover up their true intentions through their feminity, beauty and sexual power, whereby they can easily charm men. For example, Catherine from 'Basic Instinct' (above) is a typical femme fatale character as she manipulates the male detective investigating her for murder into a relationship. She achieves this through her sexual power and appearance. Furthermore, she is able to put on an innocent front, easily deceiving those around her.

The seductive nature of a femme fatale, The Killers 1946

How our sequence follows this convention:
Stacey has stalked the man she is about to meet which can be seen by the photos she is looking at whilst she is flirting with him on the phone, suggesting she is not as innocent as she would come across over the phone

2. Low Key Lighting

Clockwise:The Big Sleep, The Last Seduction, Out of the Past, Fatal Attraction, The Big Combo , Mulholland Drive 

Low key lighting is a common convention. This lighting creates a strong contrast between the light and dark areas of a shot, hence why prominent shadows are regularly seen. It often uses only one key light which can be controlled with a fill light. It helps to create an ominous and mysterious atmosphere. For example, the low key lighting in 'The Big Sleep' (above) has been used to create a tense atmosphere and hold the audience in suspense, as they anticipate danger. Overall, this has an exciting effect.

How our sequence follows this convention:
In some of the bedroom shots, Stacey's shadow can be seen. ,

How our sequence challenges this convention
To create a feminine atmosphere, we have actually not used low key lighting as we want this to contrast the things that are revealed about her, to make it seem more shocking to the audience

In our film, Stacey's shadow can be seen but it is not low key lighting

3. Crime

Crime is a central part to the neo-noir and film noir narrative. Popular types of crimes and criminals that feature in this genre include: murder, bank robberies and con artists. The crime allows lots of characters to be caught up in the action, making it more exciting. 

Murder My Sweet - Trailer

L.A. Confidential - Trailer

L.A. Confidential involves the son of a murdered detective seeking revenge and so includes various aspects of crime, including: murder, violence and drugs.

How our sequence follows this convention:

She has a gun which connotes criminal intentions. The numerous passports and identity cards imply she has multiple identities, suggesting she is a fraud. She has been stalking someone which creates ominous foreboding.

How our sequence challenges this convention:

No crime has actually been committed in the opening sequence itself.

4. Smart/Formal Dress

Femme fatales often wear tight fitted clothing that gives them sex appeal, so that they can seduce men. The male characters are often rich businessmen or detectives and so they wear smart suits. 

The Killers, 1946

Chinatown, 1974

Stacey from 'Unlawful'

The dress of Jack Nicholson in 'Chinatown' is extremely smart and classy, that of a wealthy gentlemen. He is wearing a three piece suit, reflecting the expense of the outfit, and the hat signifies his status.This is the typical outfit for the leading male character in film noirs. 

Style Conventions for Neo-Noir/Film Noir

1. Music
The music for film noir/neo-noir films is often both mysterious and exciting. With neo-noir films in particular, the pace of the music can be quite fast but downbeat jazz music is still used, like in the older film noirs.

Jazz music from the film noir Sweet Smell of Success (1957)

Opening music to the neo-noir Drive

The opening sequence music in the film 'Drive' is laid back and fairly slow paced but has undertones of mystery, particularly due to the synthesizers. Furthermore, the music echoes in parts of the song, creating an illusive atmosphere. 

Our music is fast pace to build tension and the prominent drum beat also helps to create this atmosphere.


2. Titles
We have simple titles over a black background, similar to the titles in 'Black Widow' but ours are white instead of black. The flickering effect that we have chosen reflects our genre and as the titles are in between the shots, excitement is being built up. Here is a comparison of our titles and 'Seven,' the film which inspired our style.

Titles in 'Seven'

The titles in 'Seven' are snappy and punchy, achieved by the rapid flicker. This has a rather creepy effect and seems fragmented, foreshadowing the corruption within the plot..

Titles in 'Unlawful'

Question 2: How does your media product represent particular social groups?

The social groups key to our film consist of gender and age and as our protagonist is a female in her early twenties, we have decided to combine these two categories and focus on the representation of young females.

How are females generally represented in film?

Female characters are often said to be under represented in film. Some typical ways that they are portrayed include: being hypersexualised and having traditional roles.

1. Hypersexuality of women

According to a study in 2012*, 31.6% of female characters were shown to be wearing stereotypically "sexy" clothing. This can range from tight fitted clothing, underwear and in some cases nudity.

Example: Nancy Callahan from Sin City.

She is wearing tight leather trousers and her stomach is exposed

 In addition, many females have extreme amounts of make up suggesting this is perfection. 

Example: Elizabeth from Bad Teacher.

She has heavy eye-liner, mascara, lipstick and blusher

Finally, females are often put on display for the gaze of other characters.

Example: Mikaela from Transformers.

2. Traditional roles of women

Many female characters are mothers with children. These characters are often performing tasks such as cleaning and cooking,

Example: Leigh Anne Tuohy from The Blind Side.

How are young females represented in film?

Young female characters who are for instance in their twenties are typically represented to be: lacking in ambition, pursuing a romantic relationship, hypersexualised, drama queens/damsels in distress.

1. Lacking in ambition
Female characters in some films may not have a distinct goal or set of desires.

Example: Bella from Twilight. She lacks aspiration to make a success of her life and has few desires, e.g. wanting to be with Edward. 

2. Pursuing a romantic relationship 
In some films that have this, the female's romance is the primary or secondary focus of the plot.

Example: Iris from The Holiday. 

3. Drama queens/damsels in distress
These characters are often presented as extremely feminine and weak. They are not accustomed to dirty work and can be obsessed with how they look. Drama queens are often popular.

Example: Giselle from Enchanted

                                                      Representations in our film

Our protagonist is a strong, confident female character; what a femme fatale ought to be and so she breaks many of the common female representations in film. 

*Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism at the University of Southern California, studied the 100 top-grossing fictional films from 2012

Question 3: What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

Our production company logo

Our production company is an independent British production company based in London.

'Unlawful' is an independent British film and so the budget would not be too big. There is no heavy requirement for CGI and special effects and the actors would not be internationally known. Therefore, a suitable budget would be £7 million, similar to that of 'London Boulevard' (£8 million) and 'Narc' ($6.5 million).

Our distributor, Lionsgate, is a Canadian-American film production and distribution studio with many bases, including the UK. Lionsgate is a horizontally integrated company who will buy the rights to 'Unlawful.'

                

Question 4: Who would be the audience for your media product?

We thought it would be useful to find statistics on the main audiences of cinema as a starting point. Once we had chosen our film noir genre, we chose our audiences, some of which can be explained through the statistics below:

Source: BFI Yearbook 2013

Findings/Conclusions

• 45+ age group was the largest age group overall of cinema goers. Film noir can appeal to this group and so it is one of our audiences.
• 15-24 age group was the second largest. The characters in 'Unlawful' are in this age category so hopefully this can be a reason why this age group will be a mass audience. 

Question 5: How did you attract/address your audience?

We attempted to attract our audience by researching theories and incorporating them into our film. Additionally, we shared the film with people we knew, in order to get feedback.


The Uses and Gratifications Theory helped us to attract our audience:




We also tried to attract our audience by including conventions of the genre, such as mystery, femme fatale and crime.

Response from Audience
We created a survey using 'freeonlinesurveys.com' to get general feedback on our opening sequence.

Gender

Age

14 people took the survey and only one was male. Over 90% were in the 16-25 age category.

We then asked if they would watch the rest of the film and got extremely positive feedback from the majority. Only one person said no because they found it 'boring'.

People also seemed to understand what was happening, which can be seen in their responses:

 We did get some criticism, mainly to do with the acting and script being slightly 'cheesy':

Conclusions:

• I think the 15-30 target audience was a good choice as 13/14 who took the survey were 16-25 and 13/14 enjoyed it as they would have continued to watch the film.
• I believe our plot was fairly easy to understand as the feedback indicates that they understood what was going on and all the hints about Stacey's character and what she was going to do.
• Thanks to the criticism, next time if we were to re-shoot the film, we would make Stacey's lines seem more natural and think of some lines which are less 'cheesy.'

Below is an audio file of two people's feedback that I got. They are 16 and 17 year old girls.

Question 6: What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

This project has allowed me to gain experience and knowledge with the technology I have used and as a result of this, my confidence has increased. The main thing I have learnt about technologies for constructing this product is that the more you know what you are doing, the easier the task becomes.




Conclusion
It was really interesting to learn how to use the different equipment and to see how much we improved from our test shoot to our back up shoot, as we were more experienced. I know a lot more about lighting but my knowledge has mostly improved in the area of editing; in particular with polishing the footage e.g. grading.

Question 7: Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

I think that my knowledge and skills have improved dramatically since the preliminary task. I had little experience in both filming and editing at the time of the preliminary task and so I feel as if this project has been a great learning curve.

For the preliminary task (above) I was in a group with Amy and we had to demonstrate continuity by:
"...filming and editing a character opening a door, crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom she/he then exchanges a couple of lines of dialogue."

We also had to incorporate the following techniques:

• Match on action
• 180 degree rule
• Shot reverse shot

Planning

As you can see from the table below, a lot more preparation was required for our main project. 

Both tasks involved choosing shots and writing dialogue but overall the thought process, including shots, was much more detailed for our main task. 

Storyboard for prelim

Storyboard for main task

                                    

Production

We demonstrated the techniques of match on action and shot reverse shot in both our preliminary task and our main project.

Over the shoulder

Preliminary task

Main task

Match on action

Preliminary task

Main Task

Running the shoot

I filmed all of the preliminary task but I was able to experiment and challenge myself more with the camera in the main task as some shots looked better if handheld and the angles were more complex. We had many more takes on the shoots for our main task as there was more detail and accuracy required and more scenes to shoot. There was certainly more teamwork involved in set for the main task and it helped to have two people (Amy and I) managing the technology. We discussed how we would tackle each shot in terms of lighting as well as angle, unlike the preliminary task where only angle needed to be considered. Finally, we ran the shoots in the main task more professionally as we always used the clapperboard and the headphones and said the correct things e.g. "Sound?" "Rolling."

Post Production

Our edit suite

Editing in definitely the area where my knowledge and skills have developed the most in terms of progression from the preliminary task to the main project. These are some examples of how I have improved and what I have learnt along the way:

• I had limited knowledge in Adobe Premiere Pro for the preliminary task and did not need or get the chance to exercise many skills for it as all we needed to do was cut the footage, so it was a quick process.
• For the main task, we had already used the program for our animatic and test shoot so by the time we edited the main shoot and back-up shoot, we were quite used to it.
• We had to do a lot more editing on Adobe Premiere Pro for our main task as we needed to: choose from a larger number of shots, cut them down, add in music, add in effects/grade and add in titles. As we had so much to do, we learnt to be efficient and got things done quickly as we had more experience.
• I learnt how to grade using Procamp and Three way colour corrector so I know more about incorporating effects on this program, which was not required for our first task.
• I learnt how to create simple titles and add a simple effect using Livetype. 
• The main thing I would like to improve on is being able to cut footage quicker.

Teamwork

The preliminary task was a good starting point for working as a team. During this task we found that communication over social networks was a really efficient way to work and this method was used for our main task.

Our group in pre-production

Our group on set

Our group in post-production

We had to work together through various stages of the project and so it was important that we got along and discussed any problems we had, which we did. There were few disagreements. We all equally did our bit and put in effort. I am most proud about the way the professional way in which we dealt with situations, for example:

- the ability to agree to change the original music I selected 

- good communication which enabled us to change person in the photos with very little time

Conclusion
Overall, the main task has allowed me to learn many new things and improve the skills I began to develop in the preliminary task. Not only has this experience been valuable, but it has also been extremely fun and I am proud with the outcome of 'Unlawful.' I am grateful to Amy and Shayam for being such helpful and kind team members and although in hindsight we would probably have changed some aspects to make our product better, none of us can deny that this has been a massive learning curve for all of us.

Construction Post 10: Looking Back - Reflections on our Final Outcome

Overall, I am extremely happy with the opening sequence that Shayam, Amy and I have created. It has been a long and sometimes hard journey but it has been made easier with these two by my side.

Our completed film opening - Unlawful 

Highlights

• Working so well as a team throughout. We had good levels of communication and everyone was there for each other. Also as we are good friends, it was a fun experience to share together.
• Organisation. Being organised with the filming equipment and having ideas in advance about how a shot should look helped with the success of the shots.
• Being creative. I want to be in the film industry when I am older and with this project, I feel as if I have been given more of a taster of what the future could hold for me. I found coming up with story ideas and filming really fun as I like to think creatively. 
• Gaining confidence in editing. I have now done editing to a higher level and so I have improved my knowledge on how things work. I enjoyed grading and seeing the effect of the changes made.

Low Points

• In terms of production, it was sometimes frustrating to have to re-do the same shot again and again. For example, we had about 20 takes for the lipstick shot on one of the shoot sessions.
• It was a shame to see that the shots were not always as good as we thought they would be when we reviewed them at the edit suite. 
• It took us a long time to find music, as we were constantly not happy as a group with the track that one of us selected.  Sometimes, it did not suit the character or the atmosphere.

I hope that the audience will recognise the mysteriousness of our protagonist; that she has something to hide. It would be even better if they think she is a femme fatale type character. We have tried to connote this through her putting away her detective badge and by revealing that she has several identities and a gun. Finally, I would be pleased if the audience are drawn into the story; enough to want to know more about what Stacey is up to.

Overall, I believe the project has been a great success and I can see that individually we have all improved and gained experience. The main thing I would change in hindsight would be the time spent on music. If we had found a song earlier, we could have spent more time on other aspects of editing. Lastly, I would have made changes to the speed of some of the shots downstairs, for example, when Shayam is putting on her gloves, the pace is a bit slow. 

Construction Post 9: My Technical Learning Curve (Production and Post-Production)

Me with the clapperboard

I feel as though I have gained a lot from this experience, as I have both developed skills and learnt new ones. I learnt more about teamwork on set; how to set up shots together as a group and solve any issues together too. I think my strengths during the production were filming and directing, which I really enjoyed, and trying out new, spontaneous ideas. Even if the new ideas did not work, it was still fun to experiment with them. Collectively as a team, we could have been stricter with our takes, as we spent perhaps too much time on the make up shots during each shoot.

Me filming our first shot

All of us at the edit suite. I am creating titles

In terms of editing, I gained a lot of confidence and experience. During the first week, I mainly did research such as looking for music and developing ideas for titles, which allowed me to use my creative skills, as I had to think about what would suit our film best. During the second week I feel like I picked up things very quickly which was essential as we had a lot to do. I instantly understood the basics of Livetype and grading and so this allowed me to contribute to these tasks. I found grading and creating titles fun. My weakness during the editing stage was making the cuts on Adobe Premiere Pro as I found it sometimes challenging to perfect the cut. 

Overall, I learnt a lot during the construction process. I had never used lights before and so it has been eye-opening to see how much the lighting improved between the first attempt (in the test shoot) and our last attempt (in the back up shoot). Furthermore, although I have edited before on Adobe Premiere Pro, I had not colour corrected to this much detail and so I now know the basics. 

Construction Post 8: My Personal Contributions to the Edit Sessions

The editing process is very long but working as a team has made it an easier experience. Although I did some cutting, I was not as instrumental in this process as Shayam and Amy as they really enjoyed this part of the editing process and could cut very quickly. Therefore, it made sense to take advantage of their skills.  Whoever made a cut always asked the rest of the group if it looked okay and so it required input from everyone. The practical editing I did included:

• Organising the footage 
• adding footage, titles and music to the timeline 
• Cutting the above to the right time 
• Creating the titles
• Doing some grading

I believe that one of my main strengths lied within the research side of the editing, such as looking for music and choosing the style for our titles. Furthermore, the logo we created was based around my vision. I also think I was good at grading and I really enjoyed this.

                  

                        Here I am working on the  Mac for titles but looking at the sequence on the computer for reference

A photo of me creating the title effects on the Mac

                      

Shayam and I discussing grading 

How I graded a shot

Overall, I was really pleased with how we worked as a team. In order to finish our film, a group effort was required and so we all did a bit of everything and helped each other, which was important. I have gained confidence in editing as I am now faster in what I do and I am more familiar with the different stages. In future, If there was something I would improve in future, it would be to develop my skills in knowing whether a cut is breaking continuity because I realised that sometimes I could not tell if the cutting was accurate enough, when the others asked me.

Construction Post 7: My Personal Contribution to the Shoot Sessions

As Shayam was our actress, Amy and I were left to occupy the technical roles on set which included:

• Camera and sound
• Director and First A.D.
• Lighting 

Ultimately, these roles were shared but Amy recognised how comfortable and well I worked on the camera and so was happy for me to do a large amount of the filming. We had a number of hand-held shots that required a steady hand and I believe this was one of my strengths. Amy filmed too but was more involved with testing the lighting and organising the shots we had to do.Amy would often adjust the lighting while I looked on the camera to see the effect.While one of us was on camera, the other controlled the clapperboard. For example, when I was operating the camera, I also had to check the sound and Amy would say "Camera?" to which I would reply "Rolling" and the same applied for sound. When I wasn't filming, I effectively took on the role of First Assistant Director, as I would use the clapperboard where I wrote the shot and take number and say "Silence on set!" before Amy started filming. We both directed Shayam and told her how she could improve an action. It was very much a team effort as all three of us would review the shots together afterwards. Below is a video of me filming Shayam pulling up her stockings on the back up shoot:

A photo of me directing Shayam, our actress

                 

                        A photo of me reviewing a shot on the camera

A photo of me using the clapperboard

Overall, I am really happy with how everyone worked in the shoot sessions and I especially liked the fact that we all had creative visions which helped improve the shots. Shayam was a very patient actress who improved as the shoot sessions went on and she was also very helpful in dressing the rooms up. Amy was very organised and excellent at preparing the shots. I think my strengths were in filming the shots and directing.I believe we all had a strong working relationship on set which was essential as there was so much to do to ensure the shots went smoothly. 

Constriction Post 6: Reflections on Edit Week 2

Our edit schedule

I think this week has been more successful than last week as we knew more about what we wanted to achieve and as we have all had chances to edit individually, we were all confident enough to do things more independently. This is what we have done this week:

• We asked Chris, the technician to give us a demonstration on grading and titles
• We used Livetype to create our titles. We added a flickering effect but kept our original idea of plain font. The flickering created the dark and mysterious atmosphere we wanted.
• We chose our music. We decided to explore different genres and eventually we found the perfect song.
• We changed our original order for the titles by adding in the 'producer' and 'director' credits later, in the hallway scene. 



Our music research on 'Incompetech'

• We used Procamp and Three Way Colour Corrector to grade our shots. They were easy to use and very useful.

Three way colour corrector 

Shayam and I doing some grading 

Warm effect created using Procamp

Cold effect created using Procamp

Music was the main issue, as the original song we picked for the animatic did not end up suiting the actual footage. We have tried various songs throughout this process but discarded them for various reasons, ranging from not being feminine enough to being too boring. Perhaps if we had a clearer idea of what music suited the atmosphere we were trying to create, it would not have taken so long to find a song.

Construction Post 5: The Back-Up Shoot

We will need a back up shoot because we are not satisfied with some of the shots from the main shoot. There were several shots from the main shoot that we need to re-take, which include:

• The stockings shot, as the motion was too quick
• The lipstick shot, as Stacey's technique was still not quite right
• The shoe shot, as we were not confident they suited the look for our protagonist 
• The master shot of Shayam walking out of the room as the lighting did not match the other shots
• The shots on the stairs as they were not the angles we wanted. We want a close up of her arm on the banister and the stairs so that we see her feet walking into the frame
• We realised that Stacey will need to put on her coat downstairs, as it looked strange that she was carrying it for so long without wearing it
• The shot on the iPad showing the pictures needs to be redone as the actor in it looks too school-boyish. Therefore, we will either need to take new pictures of the same person wearing a suit so they match the character description, or we will find a new person
• The shot from outside as we felt the zoom in on Shayam's face did not work and the lighting was too dark

The pictures on the left column are from the main shoot and those on the right are from the back up

Amy setting up a shot outside. 

Amy and I lining up a shot at the back up shoot

Shayam getting ready before filming

Above is a video of Amy and I testing the lighting. 

Reflections

Noting down in advance the changes we needed to make really helped with our organisation of the back up shoot, as we knew what we had to film. Furthermore, the shoot session was quicker in some ways, as it was our third time and so we knew how to set up each room and the equipment. However, it still took a while to do some of the re-takes as we wanted them to be perfect. Despite this, I think all the time that we spent was necessary as we are now certain that we have the all the shots we need and so we can continue with our final edit. There will be a lot of shots to look over but it is better to have too many than too little. Overall, I am really pleased with how professional some of the shots taken on the back up shoot look.