Evaluation - Setting Up the Story

One of the key features of a good opening two minutes is how well it sets up the rest of the story, and how much it makes the audience want to carry on watching. Our ultimate aim was to produce a professional looking opening two minutes that makes the audience want to carry on watching until the end of the film. In this post I will be particularly focusing on the second of those two points, however the first one is relevant to this as well.

A widely used tactic of dragging an audience into the plot is the establishment of enigmas. The clever thing about creating enigmas is that no matter how bad a film is, if the audience is asking questions about what is going on, then they'll want to carry on watching simply to find out the answer. Audience's hate unanswered questions and if the enigma is strong enough, then they'll sit through an entire film just to get the answer to their question. The infamous Alfred Hitchcock even said that 'an audience would rather be confused than bored'. Enigmas can vary in complexity - some are complex enigmas as to why a character did something, or what is going on, whereas others are simply 'will the guy get the girl', or 'who will win'. In our opening two minutes we opted for the first of these two options, but also included a few aspects of the second option in order to support the first. The main enigmas that we presented were: Who is Agent Davidson, and who is he working with? Who is Jim and why do they want him? Who stopped the mission's success? Why is Davidson running away at the end? Who is the character advancing on Caprivi? As you can see, we established a fair amount of enigmas all of which the audience would want to find out the answers to. The only problem with having so many enigmas is that the audience may be overly confused and get bored because they don't understand what is going on. I think that we managed to avoid this though, as the action was fast paced and we showed the audience a quick fight sequence, which stopped them getting bored.

The fast paced action was definitely something that would pull in the audience. Many of the people that would be going to see our film would be expecting to see fight and chase sequences, so by giving them a taster of this in the opening two minutes we brought that side of the audience straight in. For those in the audience who prefer to watch something sophisticated with a strong plot we gave them this as well. In the opening two minutes we involved several twists and the enigmas aforementioned. These people would understand that the action is necessary to the plotline, and I'm sure that they wouldn't mind it too much. By making our film like this we made sure that the film was enjoyable for a wide audience, and no matter what style they prefer, they should be dragged in by our opening two minutes.

Overall I think that we were highly successful in setting up the story in our opening two minutes and I think that the audience would carry on watching. I asked a few people if they would carry on watching until the end of the film and they all said that they would, which is obviously a good sign. I think that we established some strong enigmas, but also presented a strong action sequence and both worked well together in order to produce a very strong opening two minutes.

Evaluation - Technology

For the editing process we used a software called Adobe Premiere Pro. This software is commonly used in the professional industry so we thought that it was a suitable software to use for our film. It has exceptional colour grading tools, which are very useful in ensuring the film has a professional look to it. It also has very efficient tools for editing titles, which helped greatly and allowed the titles to look as good as possible. I think that one of the key successes to our film was the editing and it was down to this piece of software that we were able to edit successfully.

We used the Panasonic SD90 to film our opening two minutes. I have discussed this in a previous post, which should cover the basics of this camera. The main reasons for using it were that it filmed in HD and had a very good look to it. Admittedly, some of the footage was overexposed and obviously the footage was colour graded, but it did a decent job otherwise. Another fault that we found with this camera was that didn't give the user control over the focus, which prevented us from experimenting with different depths of field. I have learnt how to use the camera to it's highest potential and to avoid trying to do anything that highlights these negative points.

Other than these two pieces of technology we didn't really use anything. We opted out of using a tripod for a few reasons. Firstly, the look that we were going for worked better without a tripod, as it makes the audience feel like they are involved in the action. If it were filmed on a tripod then it would look too static and the audience would feel like they're observing the action, rather than getting into it. The second reason was that it was impractical to set up a tripod in London as we may have been told to stop filming as we were in public.

Evaluation - Target Audience

Who would be the audience for your media product?
Here is a photo of our target audience - the 16-25 male audience who enjoy watching films. This is because this age group tends to enjoy films that are fun and fast-paced with lots of action sequences. Despite this, they also tend to enjoy films with a relative amount of sophistication and watch films that are well reviewed. Any younger than this and the quality of the film is judged on the amount of action sequences without much plot of talking. This is not what we were going for, but instead we opted for the higher age group as we believe that our film is relatively sophisticated.
The 16-25 male audience also tend to have the most amount of disposable money, so this is a benefit for targeting this age group. It also helps the film to have a higher budget, as the institutions would know that they are likely to get their money back from this audience. However it must not be forgotten that this age group has other commitments such as university and school, so the film would probably be more successful if it were released on a Friday or Saturday - when they are not doing so much work. Our film helps to counter this work as it provides escapism from everyday life, which is certainly a selling point in our film. This age group may be more reluctant to go and see a film based on a classic novel or a period drama, as it would seem like work, so our film would appeal to this age group more.
The problem with our film is that there are a lot of films that are aimed at this age group, and there is a danger that our film will be lost amongst the tidal wave of other action films aimed at this demographic. Therefore, an essential part of the marketing should be ensuring positive reviews and  a good reception. To target this age group successfully we would have to build up a hype for the film, which would involve making sure that the trailers and posters are shared on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. In this age group many are influenced by their friend's recommendations, so it is vital that we employ a viral marketing campaign similar to 'The Dark Knight Rises', which successfully exploited teenage usage of Twitter.
Overall I think that our film would be of great appeal to the 16-25 male audience through it's fast paced action sequences and mature plot. This audience tends to use social networking sites a great deal, and this would be a brilliant opportunity to advertise our film. I think that we very successfully appealed to this audience in the opening two minutes, as we established our film as fast paced and full of twists.

Evaluation - Agent Davidson vs Jack Bauer

Jack Bauer is a character in the US television series '24' who plays a similar character to Agent Davidson in our opening two minutes. He is a CTU agent, who tackles terrorism with a fast trigger finger and a cunning mind. At least once in every season of the show, Jack goes 'rogue' and becomes a lone cop type of character, which is very similar to Agent Davidson's role in 'Sins of the Martyr'. Their costumes are also very similar; both sporting the long, trenchcoat-style jacket that makes them look very militaristic. Both characters' attire is predominantly black, with no bright colours, in order to emphasise the dark nature of their work and the seriousness of their character. Jack Bauer does seem to have a slightly darker colour scheme which seems to be all black, whereas Agent Davidson wears navy and grey in our opening sequence. These slightly lighter shades help him to appeal to a wider audience, as he is more friendly to look at, but without losing any of the seriousness of the role. The two different characters also use similar semantics revolving around the military, such as 'Yung is down' and 'I've got a visual'. By observing Jack Bauer's character these semantics were easy to figure out, and it helped a lot with the development of Agent Davidson's character. The earpiece that Agent Davidson uses was also derived from Bauer, as in '24' most characters just use a normal earpiece, but Bauer has a wire attached, which he uses to change channels. We liked this idea, as it helped to distinguish him, so we used the same idea for Agent Davidson.
Jack Bauer was a big influence on our film making decisions, as he is such a similar character to Agent Davidson. Several times we referred back to him, either to take inspiration from him, or to make sure that Davidson wasn't too similar to him. There are several big differences, such as their fighting style and ways of handling situations and it is clear to see that they are very different characters, but there are some distinct similarities. Agent Davidson represents the 'lone cop' type character as a tough, quick-witted, skilled fighter. In the opening he doesn't show much of his emotional side, so in this way Davidson presents the 'lone cop' as very down to earth and almost like a machine.

Sins of the Martyr - Final Two Minute Opening

Evaluation - Preliminary Task vs Final Opening

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

After completion of our opening two minutes, it is interesting to look back and assess our progression from Preliminary Task to the final product and consider how much we have learnt. There are a variety of areas in which we have improved greatly, the main reason for this is probably the fact that we had longer to plan, as well as being able to see the mistakes that were made in the Preliminary Task and learning from them.

An issue in the Preliminary Task that wasn't tackled effectively was the amount of exposure, that made the distant sky look very white. Not only this, but it also made some characters' faces look very  pale, which greatly damaged the professional quality of the production. In the final task we countered this by checking each of the shots afterwards, particularly the shots that had a lot of sky in them. It was helpful that on the day it was fairly cloudy, so the sun didn't affect it too much. There was only one instance of overexposure in the opening, which was when Davidson is following Jim through the underground in the shot before he walks out into Trafalgar Square. This was caused by the lights along the side of the corridor that reflected off the white walls. Unfortunately this couldn't be fixed in post, and this is the least professional looking shot of the whole film. Overall I think that we have learnt from this mistake and worked out how to minimise the amount of shots that are ruined due to the overexposure, and the opening two minutes looks a lot better in that respect.

Preliminary Task

The garden in the background of this shot is an example of the serious overexposure that occurred in the preliminary task. A whole third of this shot is ruined by this.

Opening Two Minutes

The overexposed shot in the opening two minutes. The lights on the ceiling are much too overexposed, making the entire shot look very bad quality.

Opening Two Minutes

This shot is an example of how we improved the exposure from the preliminary task. It includes the sky, clouds, and a distant background, all of which are at risk of overexposure, but we managed to fix it this time.

Another feature that was improved was the resolution of the camera. In the preliminary task we filmed in 960x540, which is just below HD, we did this because it made it easier to edit on a Mac computer then the larger 1080p files. In the opening two minutes, we decided to opt for 1080p, as it is much more professional looking, and we didn't edit it on the Mac in the end, but on a PC. The higher resolution was a marked difference between the two, and was certainly what made the opening two minutes stronger. It brought our filmmaking out of the 'amateur zone' and gave it a much more professional look which, needless to say, was our intention.

The colour in the preliminary task didn't always look amazing, and I think that this was something that we improved on greatly in the final opening two minutes. The colours didn't look cinematic enough, and between the different rooms in the house, there was a very different shade, which prevented the film from gaining it's own distinctive look. In the opening two minutes we improved this by making sure we kept referring back to our original plan for the colour. We had previously decided that the more prominent colours would be the greys, greens and blues, as these are colours that complimented Trafalgar Square's look. By having this as our base palette we were able to make sure that the whole opening looked as if it was from the same film, and it gave it a very distinct look. The end result made it look much more cinematic and professional than the preliminary task, which seemed to have too much variety in colour for an action/thriller film.

A notable improvement was the location. The preliminary task was simply shot at my house, which isn't the most interesting location to shoot an action film at. It looked far too much like an ordinary house and this made it lose much of the film's impact. We improved this by choosing a hugely iconic, London location that gave the opening two minutes production value. Trafalgar Square has been used in many thrillers, including the recent film 'Skyfall'. By using it, our film looked as if it were worthy to sit along greats such as these.

The props were another improved feature of our opening two minutes. In the preliminary task we didn't think much about the types of props we would use, so we used whatever we could get our hands on on the day. However in the opening two minutes, we spent hours searching for just the right props to use, such as the suitcase that 'Jim' is carrying, and the earpiece that the characters use. The costumes were also more developed, and each character's costume was meticulously thought through, which gave our lead protagonist a very distinctive look with his long trenchcoat style jacket. The costumes in the preliminary task ended up being whatever the actors were wearing on the day.

In regards to match on action, I think that we managed to get it quite well already on the preliminary task. But it was good to be able to apply it to the opening two minutes in the part where 'Yung' stamps on the earpiece and also with the fight sequence near the end. The 180 degree rule was adhered to both times, however in the opening two minutes it wasn't so relevant, due to the fact that the conversation was occurring across earpieces. However, occasionally we broke the 180 degree rule in the fight sequences during the preliminary task, but not so in the final opening two minutes. This was mainly because there was a wall stopping the camera from being able to break the 180 degree rule. In the preliminary task shot reverse shot was used a few times, but we didn't really feel that we had had the opportunity to experiment with it as much as we would have liked to. In the opening two minutes, we played around with it by trying it across a conversation that wasn't face to face. I think that this worked extremely well, and was definitely an advancement in our film making skills.

Overall I think that we have improved greatly from our preliminary task, and this can be clearly seen. The preliminary task certainly taught us a lot, such as how to choreograph a fight sequence well, as well as basic techniques such as match-on-action and the 180 degree rule. I think that we took on what went wrong in the preliminary task, and successfully overcame those problems when it came to the opening two minutes.

Sound Evaluation

There are four main aspects of sound that I will be discussing in this post, and I will evaluate how successful we were at making each part as effective and professional-sounding as possible.

Soundtrack:
The music that we used in our opening two minutes was effective as it built up suspense as the story progressed. This was because the music was specially composed for the film, with an amateur composer working for us who had the film in front of him. We provided him with inspiration to help guide him to what we wanted, but the majority of the track came from his own personal genius. As he went through the composing process, he constantly kept us updated so that we made changes as appropriate.
I think that the music worked extremely well in the final product as it added a new dimension to the drama onscreen. It made the action much more thrilling and I felt as if the action really took off through the way that the music's layers gradually built up, getting faster and and more intense. I am very proud of the way that the music turned out. There are some moments in particular when the music is fitted perfectly to the action. One of these moments is when the camera cuts to Horse Guards Parade and the music moves up and grows in intensity; an extra layer is added as an extra character is introduced. A similar technique is used when the camera cuts to Yung at Trafalgar Square and the music projects a long bass note, which again establishes a new character and new location.
I particularly like the change in the tone of music that occurs when Agent Davidson starts running away from his pursuer. It turns into a sweeping piano piece, that reflects how the mission has gone wrong through its melancholy feel. After defeating his adversary the music slows down to a sad, reminiscent theme, and the dilemma is established.

Ambience:
Unfortunately, the sound that was recorded on the day wasn't useful as the voices were not very clear, due to all the background noise that there was in London. Seeming as we didn't have any tracks that separated the background noise from the dialogue, this meant that we had to redo all the sound in the film. The ambience was the easiest part, as we listened through the original track and noted down all the different sounds that we could hear, such as traffic, fountains, crowds etc. In the final piece we added a couple of extras such as the sound of children playing, in order to make the situation seem more threatening and the sound of the station announcements in order to add to the realism. The ambience replacement was very successful, as it sounded incredibly close to the original track and we were very proud at how well it turned out. What would have made it easier and more realistic would be if we had set the camera down in different places around Trafalgar Square and recorded the ambience, so that we wouldn't have to create it in post and it would add the extra bit of realism.

Dialogue:
The dialogue, like the ambience, was almost completely unusable, as the background noise was too prominent and it was hard to hear what the characters were actually saying. After some deliberation we decided to replace the dialogue through the process of Additional Dialogue Replacement (ADR) which involved re-recording all of the actors' lines and putting them into the film instead. We recorded all the lines outside, as it was closer to the conditions on the day and we systematically went through each line and said it a few times, trying to perfectly replicate the way the lines were said onscreen. I think that this was very successful, as it is not noticeable that we have replaced the dialogue, and I think that it even made it better, as we were able to slightly lower the pitch of the actors' voices, so that they sounded older.

Sound Effects:
There weren't a great deal of additional sound effects used in our opening, as most of it was just the obvious, but we obviously had to add some into the fight sequence. To do this, we downloaded a royalty free package of sound effects from the internet that had a variety of punch, kick, fall and swiping sound effects. They were very realistic and they definitely added to the fight. The fight wouldn't have worked without them, as the audience wouldn't have been able to work out if the punch had hit, or how hard it had hit. Another sound effect that was used was when Yung is shot. It was hard to work out how to establish that he had been shot without a gunshot sound effect, that would obviously raise the attention of everyone in the Square. Instead we decided to use one of the punch sound effects, which helped the audience to realise that he had been hit. During the ADR process we also added in a line from Agent Davidson that helped the audience to realise that he had been shot.

Overall I think that the sound in our opening was very successful, and we effectively worked around the issues in the original raw sound. Just about all of the sound was replaced, and it still worked very well. Better still, all the different aspects of sound worked together so when there was an issue in one of the tracks, it was covered up by the other track. I am very proud of the way that the sound turned out, but if I were to do it again, then I would make sure to record better sound on the day.