I think the preliminary task went quite well but compared to our final production I think we've improved as a group greatly and on an individual level personally I think that my skills with technology have improved greatly.
What made our preliminary task successful I think was the research that we put in to see what generally had implemented at a basic level for example looking at the rule of thirds and the 180 degree rule as well as looking at how to create a match on action. When filming our preliminary" task we didn't use the HD cameras that we used in our final production it wasn't too much different using either one. Though when it came to editing I think the final production was much better than our preliminary task, we used the same program (imovie) to edit both but by the time we had edited for the second time round our skills had greatly improved, I think our editing was more disciplined and on point. Though we put a lot of thought we didn't plan our preliminary task as well as we did for our final production, in the end we spent a lot more time and care making sure we knew what we wanted to have in our BSR to make it as real as possible that it over shadows the first task we had.
Match on action. Preliminary task. - 00:11
Here we implemented the match on action both times in either production but when seen in while watching them you can clearly see that one in the final production was a lot smoother and had more fluidity with the edit.
Match on action. Final production - 01:24
When making the BSR what improved as I said, were the editing process, the use of technology and planning and research. The use of technology such as the imacs we used to edit or the cameras we used, we became more accustomed to as the process went on, but think in the end we were more creative with our idea with the preliminary task because we weren't limited to any genre or style that we had to follow so we could explore more of the ideas we were confident with but with the BSR though we had freedom with the creation of the idea we still had to make sure that we followed the conventions and style of a BSR film.
Through our production i think we were able to capture the true representation of the social group of young urban teenagers. First of all we started the production with a 360 degree track this allowed us to introduce the characters and it also let us show the expressions and reaction that characters had towards each other. The 360 tracks allowed for us to create a persona for each character as it gave an insight into what characters are like around each other. The general positioning of the camera and angle in these shots, which were straight on, had to be spot on to be able to illustrate the types of characters we were using. The representations show two characters who are seen as the typical stereotype of urban youth and the third characters the protagonist who is shown as a victim.
The the third image down, to the left we have positioned the characters so that we can see the reaction to the actions of the boss character, where our protagonist has been filmed from a high angle to connote vulnerability and anchor his position in terms of authority for the audience.
Editing
Here is an example of
the match on action
where money
was thrown to the boss.
I think that our best piece of editing came from towards the end at 01.47 - 01.52 where the protagonist Chas was running away from the boss character the cuts were quite quick and matched the pace of the music with great discipline. Also the transitions between shots were kept to just having a plain cut or occasionally we used a fade to establish a transition in time. I think that if we used any other type of transition it would have taken away from the realism of the BSR and possibly have made it seem tacky. In our production a thing that we tried to implement as often as possible was the use of match on action and to be able to do so we had to use the precision editor on imovie to get the cut between any two shots disciplined and give the sense of fluidity.
Sound We used copyright free music which we found that worked with the general vibe of our production. We used the music from the very beginning in the background because without it, the atmosphere would have been killed massively, but we made it just barely audible so it didn't take away from the focus of the narrative. at the end starting 01:59 we started playing music making it sound as thought the music was diegetic and coming through the protagonists earphones and eventually made the sound graduate louder when both earphones were in. This then turned into non-diegetic music because the music kept playing through until the end. The type of music we used was very important, we opted to select a beat from the grime genre. This relates to the type of characters that were being portrayed and the type of people that would watch a BSR film, its also very stereotypical of what teenage youths that are involved in 'street' life in Britain would listen to. Another thing is that we addressed some social groups through our mode of address, we used slang throughout to show the typical language that these youths use on an everyday basis. For example we made one of our supporting characters say 'you see that ting...' which is a slang phrase which references a female. The fact that we have done this shows the views these stereotypical characters have on women. Also a scene that didn't make it to the final edit of our production where we had Bilal say 'Why is he gonna talk to you, is he a woman?', this is another example where the social group of women are looked down upon in general. Mise-en-scene We tried to make everything as real as possible and this included the props that we used for example the gun and the cocaine bags, which were actually a BB gun and flour. But the realism of the props I think allowed for an insight into what the stereotypical illustrations of these characters get up to and what they are involved in.
Also the costumes of all the characters were really important because we wanted to represent the different social groups properly and realisticly. For example the Boss character that I played wore a Louis Vuitton belt and a Hugo Boss watch which are seen as what people wear when they are successful and have a lot of money this relates back to high society social groups who have the money to be able to afford these luxuries. Where as the protagonist wore generic clothing like jeans and a jacket, to show that he wasn't poor but he wasn't exactly rich and didn't really fit in with the surrounding people. Then the other two supporting actors wore a hoody and jogging bottoms which illustrated them as stereotypical thug-ish youths. The costumes therefore allowed for an insight into the different lifestyles of each of these types of characters just from their clothing.
Expressionism An example of expressionism is the way we used ambient lighting that created atmosphere than have deliberate artificial lighting throughout the production to show the gritty realism of the BSR genre. Using no artificial lighting which could be seen as dark and depressing connotes the fact that we were trying to show that, that is what BSR films are all about they show everything to their entirety whether it be happy or depressing, this relates to any social group who can relate to not having everything go their way everyday which is basically everyone. Typography An example of typography in our opening were the credits which were plain and simple which conformed to the typical BSR style. But for the typography for our title we decided to use a font that we though would act as a visual metaphor for our narrative. Which was that drugs can ruin lives, this is denoted from the 'CLASS A' which connotes class A drugs and the dis-jointed font which connotes the effects on someone life after associating with class A drugs. This represents the social group of youths in general who are prone to being around drugs often and can easily be influenced into experimenting and later realised that they have messed up their lives.
Iconography
We wanted to show the authority of the boss character and we thought that icons were a good way to do so. We decided that a designer watch, a designer belt and a gun would be enough to illustrate the authority we wanted that character to exhibit. as you can see in the images below, all three items become a focal point of a shot at some point, this brings attention to all these icons and connotes the significance to the audience. The watch and the belt were used to signify the fact that the character is successful in his line of work and is wealthy. The gun was used to signify the authority he has and how fearful the other characters were of him, this represents the social group of drug dealers.
