Chloe Jane Hesketh

Within the Creativity and Concept Development module there was a task allocated for everyone within the lecture to come up with a variety of ideas for a short film to be made in Liverpool. Once those ideas were stuck to the walls within the room, everyone within the lecture had to pick two ideas which they thought would be an inspiring idea to create a film.

Subsequently we then shared our chosen ideas in groups to then ultimately come up with a final idea between the groups. Our chosen idea was "Crime in Liverpool". Although, this idea was slightly too broad as there are many different areas this can be looked at for example; Government views and statistics, hatred towards the police, why people commit crimes, societies views and punishments of crime.

We discussed all the different concepts which "Crime in Liverpool" is associated with however the concept we chosen was a punishment of crime, "Tagging". Now that we have our concept our task was to research tagging which would enhance our film idea to be able to pitch within our lecture.

We used Google Maps to be able to identify the areas of crime within Liverpool whilst what type of crime usually takes place. Furthermore we collected all the data from April- September 2012, along with creating a bar chart to display this information. Ultimately we then created a booklet to give the audience when pitching our idea.

The bar chart displayed that the most common crime within Liverpool is anti-social behaviour, which we examined that this might be because the punishment of this is "Tag".

We also interviewed people about their thoughts of tagging, whilst whether they think it is an effective punishment too.
This information is on the Prezi which we used to relate back to during our pitch.



By interviewing a few people about their thoughts this gave our group a more specific concept that people seem to think that tagging is an easy punishment as it does not seem to work. Furthermore after doing a variety of research we thought that within our film we would include;
- A personal profile of a victim who has been on tag (in Liverpool)
- Why was he put on tag?
- Quick summary of "Crime in Liverpool" (maps/statistics)
- Did tagging work for the victim?
- Do we think there should be a different punishment other than tagging?

Audio Workshop;

"Good sound is a very important part of production"

Within our lecture we focused specifically on sound on the Sony Z1E cameras, which we can take note from when filming our own productions.




Sound Recorded:                                            Sound Recorded In Post Production:
-Dialogue                                                               -Sound effects
-Atmosphere                                                         -Voice over
                                                                                 -Music

Why do we need sound?
Music can be very emotive, ultimately it shapes an audiences' reaction as well as viewpoint to the film/programme filmed. For instance in horror films when there is no dialogue, whilst there is tension in a particular scene, as specific type of music will build on the tensed atmosphere.

Dialogue involves the audience, along with giving them extra information. Furthermore dialogue can also create a relationship with an audience especially in soap operas in particular.

When filming some elements of sound you do not take in to consideration until you listen back and realise the dialogue might not be clear due to wind/traffic/air-conditioning/heaters/fridges and many more. Selective hearing can eliminate the main focus of the sound.

Storytelling...

 

"Narrative is the representation of an event or a series of events" (p13, Abott, 2008)

Within our everyday life we either seek out new information which effect our storytelling for instance, reading newspapers online, reading a latest tweet or reading a story on Facebook. We will represent the newsworthy information within our own narrative.

Narrative is almost "conversation" everyone will tell each other the latest news or about their experience in a narrative.

"We perceive stories naturally"- We look for them.

We always try to interpret "what happens next" which keeps us as an audience engaged within the narrative.

Within our lecture in small groups we had to choose a random object from a box to come up with a narrative, meanwhile we could not use words, only pictures or objects to portray the narrative to the rest of the lecture.

Title: The Watch

Synopsis:

Our chosen object was a watch, from this object we came up with the idea that a women along with a man were in the local café Starbucks, meanwhile the women had left but still had some coffee left in her takeaway cup. The man who was also in Starbucks followed the women, which the women noticed and got quite anxious therefore she texted her friend. Although, once the man caught up he gave her, her watch which she left behind.

We called it the watch because our chosen object was a watch, along with the fact the man was watching the women too.

In order to portray the story, we printed of images from the internet, a long with using our phones to show text messages, and used devices to play music to set the scene.

Subsequently now that I have undertaken that task I will now be able to create my own story using Google Maps adding pins to display a narrative.

We also looked at other members of the lecture, they used different techniques to portray the narrative which was quite interesting.

Filming Anglican Cathedral...


The second task within our Production Practice module was to create another film, however this one is a location profile along with adding a time lapse to it too. Initially we were in the same groups as before, furthermore this was helpful as we all know one another now, we know what everyone is capable of whilst we also know how to work effectively with each other. Along with this we already had our Facebook message group with all the members of the group in, therefore we were organized before we had began the process.


We came up with the idea of filming the Anglican Cathedral situated in Liverpool, we thought that would be a appealing location which was not to far to be able to reach. Firstly we went to view the venue to see whether there were specific parts of the cathedral which would be effective within our film. Subsequently we thought there were lots of opportunities within the building therefore spoke to the manager explaining that we were Media students at Liverpool John Moores University and whether it would be possible if we could film the Cathedral.

Furthermore the manager of the Cathedral was happy for us to film, however explained that it would need to be a specific day and time due to there being many bookings in the cathedral during specific days. It was important that we worked around the manager in order to make sure we could film the cathedral.

When working in teams we learnt from our previous experiences that all the group was turning up for filming when only two of the group were actually filming as there were too many members available. Therefore, we decided to split the filming over different days so that there were the right amount of people available for each filming whilst everyone will have some to do too. When we filmed the time lapse we located ourselves on a balcony at Liverpool John Moores' University- this gave us a great view of Liverpool along with a view of the Cathedral too. Along with this the filming took approximately five hours yet the camera only filmed five minutes of every hour, in order to get daytime and night time in the footage.


Editing...
Click here to watch the video "Anglican Cathedral"

Testing...

In order to make sure that our game effectively works, we had to test it asking people within our media lecture to participate and play our game. Initially we gave the consumers of the game a sheet of paper which had the cross word a long with the instructions of how to play. Furthermore the clues were QR codes which we gave to the players once they had completed a clue. 

Throughout the game we had noticed that the crossword itself was slightly difficult, due to not having any letters on it as well as the clues being quite challenging too. Meanwhile, the players were ambitious and worked collectively to conclude with the correct answers. Initially our idea of the game was to play individually which would create more of a competition (agon), however due to the anxiety becoming extremely challenging the players carried out collective intelligence. Ideally the game did not follow our ideal way of playing it, they had more fun playing as a team.

Ultimately once we had tested the game on the players we had to give a presentation within our media lecture to explain our game, how we tested it, what we had learnt and if we were to do it again what would we do differently. 

To guide our team through the presentation we created a Prezi along with a video which is shown on the prezi. 


Click here to view the Prezi and Video!


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 Once the players had finished the cross word collectively they were extremely happy as although it was quite difficult this made them determined to complete it. 

When we were given our results back from the presentation of the game our team were extremely happy with a great result of a first.