Evaluation-question 1

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

The first title in our film opening is for the ‘lexisFilms’. For this we kept a basic font yet the font is thin and looks very ‘TIMES NEW ROMAN’. The serif font we used was birch std ‘LexisFilms’ .This adds a sense of formality to the production company and also implies the complex and difficult plot that will follow. This will also indicate that it is independent minds that will find more understanding within this production.  Tim Burtons Edward scissorhands also uses thin fonts for his titles. I think this is because it creates a fragile yet clear presentation to the audience. This fragile font could also reflect the fragile and yet intense plot of our following film opening and could suggest that this film will include personal weaknesses such as a characters personal problems such as illness and conditions or problems faced by society such as equality, pressure and judgment. Another example of thin fonts used by companies in film openings is ‘PIXAR’ however they use a thin font to make it understandable and readable for their viewers as their audience is less mature and educated than the audience we are aiming for.

                         Our first titles also fade in and fade out. This was done on Adobe editing software. We decided to do this because it is a popular technique used by films we have studied and looked at and production companies such as 20^th Century Fox. This tends to fade in and out this is to just quickly introduce the company to the audience and with this company being well known this is all that is needed to secure quality and quantity within the following film as audiences have learned to put their trust in this company and its films. This is a popular technique as it allows the audience to absorb the title well and consider the films quality. This is also a demonstration of slight editing qualities and this will present some form of modern input. As we show some technological examples of average editing. This technique is also fairly simple looking but is still yet effective as the audience will recognise this technique and will be able to identify the titles.  Examples of film openings that used simples editing and thin fonts would be psycho however this works as this simplicity has almost an opposite affect than what is expected as it attracts viewers as looking original and realistic.

       The next titles are ‘Expectation Productions’. The name of this production company itself is raising the bar for the audience and creating interest as the word expectations means a strong belief that something will happen and this production is expected to be so far formal and complicated and yet interested and encouraging independent solutions and explanations for the situations presented to the viewers. The production name is introduced to the audience with a fade in fade out technique. This is now how our audience will recognise our titles as they all will be introduced to the audience through this technique and it enables the audience to recognise and identify the purpose of the titles. The titles for our ‘Expectation productions’ also bridges across two scenes this is two start the film opening and yet still include our titles in a fluent manor.

The opening scene is where our hero character puts his costume away into a cupboard. This is an iconic and symbolic gesture. Batman the Dark Knight includes a scene where Bruce Wayne puts away his suit. This symbolises a change in personalities within the same character.  This also helps the audience focus on the character instead of his superhero identity and this is a way of us creating two different characters within one actor and enables the audience to bond with the normal everyday character. This is a popular technique used such as Bruce Wayne and batman as DC presented Bruce Wayne in a different way to batman and this enabled the audience to make a connection with both identities. Another example would be Tony Stark who is Iron man.  These characters have been represented differently to the super heroes by having their everyday and personal background shown to the audience for instance both Bruce and Tony are shown to be millionaires. Their love life also plays a role with the character building of the person and bonding with the viewers.  By using this technique we allow our viewers to predict the plot and plan what is going to happen throughout the film however we then present them with a different outcome which recklessly throws off the stability of the plot of the film as now our film becomes quite unpredictable and this is where imagination will have to get involved with helping the viewer understand the concept and the diversity of the plot as we present them with the villain who happens to also be the hero. We then begin to present the viewers with the idea of a contained ongoing battle within the hero between him and the villain. This is a similar event to what happened in spider-man 1 with the green goblin. As Norman Osborn he wants to be a respected figure and a father figure to Peter Parker however after a freak event he develops a disorder which leads him to believe he has a split personality which has evil intentions and a violent nature.

     Immediately because we have presented ‘hero’ and villain’ symbolic characters this starts to imply more to the genre of the film and stereotypically action films will have a good character highlighted by his gentle and general caring nature and the use of costume and is personal views on the people around him . An example of this would be Superman as when he is in the character of Clark Kent we are presented with a ‘geeky, nerdy’ character and seems to be very timid and gentle placid character almost a complete opposite to the strong, bold confident crime fighting ,world saving hero. A villain character will be presented as somehow crippled and odd looking with a very narrow view and strict opinions on important situations and will be shown as a more powerful and dark natured character. An example of this would be the Joker from batman as he has scars on his face self-inflicted so he is ‘always smiling’. This shows mental instability and instantly people are scared of different and can’t adapt to people who are ‘weird’ so instantly this will trigger a fear or a sense of discomfort with the audience and help create his negative evil atmosphere.

Our hero wears a white shirt as this is a stereotypical colour of goodness and is a powerful colour to highlight his role in the film. We relied on this stereotype as with the limited time we were given this was the quickest and clearest way to represent a definite role and the characters personality. The villain however is still the same actor however this time he is wearing the black shirt. The black shows immediate contrast with the first hero character that was presented and this means that there will be opposites in personality and yet because they are the same actor this starts to enhance the plot and the hero’s ‘normal’ identity and adds relevance to the two characters.