Magazine Cover Feedback

After creating a version of my magazine cover that I was happy with, I decided to ask a set of people for their opinions on it. I chose to do this as I felt that it would give me an insight into what magazine’s readers would think of the cover, as well as allowing me to identify possible areas of improvement.

The first person that I decided to ask for feedback was Micah Hills, a student currently studying media. He granted me permission to film him giving a small overview of the magazine as well as giving his suggestions on how it could be improved.

The second person that I asked for feedback was Christian Turner. He opted for giving the feedback in a written format rather than being filmed. His feedback is as follows:

“I feel that this is a very strong magazine cover design. It captures the style and conventions of a Little White Lies magazine perfectly. I honestly can’t think of any way in which you could improve it.”

The third and final student that I asked for feedback was Joseph Gower. His feedback was as follows:

“You’ve designed the main image very well. I really like the splatter effects that you’ve used in the background. Altogether the design of the magazine is really good. As for improvements, I noticed that there wasn’t an issue number displayed on your cover. I don’t think this would be a major issue but I feel that it could be better if you added one. Also you may want to experiment with the colours of the main image and the background.”

In conclusion, from the feedback it was clear that I needed to add an issue number to my cover. In addition to this I shall take into account their opinions about the background colour and experiment with a few different colours and styles.

Magazine Cover Variations

Props

The genre of our film was action and crime. These types of movies generally contain a lot of props and outfits for their characters. However since my group was going for a realistic, small scale production about a thug that is out for vengeance after his friends money was stolen, we did not require a massive amount of props. The props that we ended up using were a rounders bat; a bike; a poker table and cards; a bag; a list of names and outfits for Jason Dyer and Sam Williams.

The rounders bat was used as the primary weapon of Jason Dyer as he enjoys fighting with blunt weapons. In addition to this guns are illegal and very hard for people to obtain in the UK, therefore it is unlikely that Jason Dyer would have been in possession of one.

The bicycle was used as a means of transport of Rory Macbride. In addition to providing him with transport it was used to subconsciously remind the audiences that his money had been stolen and he was therefore unable to afford to use his car.

The poker table and cards were used so as to make the poker scene believable. We chose to use poker as the character’s game of choice since it is extremely well known and is often used for gambling. In addition to this, there are similar gambling scenes in many other crime related movies.

The bag that Rory Macbride used was to carry his possessions. It was also used as a reminder that he had lost everything and now carries everything he owns with him.

The list of names was used to show the targets of Jason Dyer. The title of the film relates to this list as it plays a major part in the movie. In the trailer, Jason Dyer shall be shown crossing names of the list thus symbolising that he has eliminated his targets.

We decided that some of the characters needed unique clothing. We therefore decided to give Sam Williams a leather jacket and Jason Dyer his iconic clothing. These can be considered props as the actors were required to wear them in the majority of the footage.

Exploring Different Types Of Videos

Exploring Different Types Of Videos from Joseph Dunkerley

Photography Session

One of the activities that we decided to do for our project was a photography session. This session was done because be required a set of different pictures for usage in our film posters and magazine covers. We had to take pictures of the models in a range of different poses so that we would have enough images to each be able to use a different one for our projects. In addition to this, taking a lot of photos would give us a greater selection of images to choose from. The more photos there were to choose from, the greater the chances of us producing a high quality product were.

In the photography session we used two separate models, Tom Nelson and Joseph Inns. These were the two main characters in the film trailer and were therefore the most appropriate people to use. We had a limited amount of resources and space to use for this photoshoot as we decided to do it at school. The area in which we did this was an empty classroom. We cleared a section of the classroom and covered a window with a white sheet. This was done so as to provide us with a blank background. A blank background would allow us to easily be able to replace it with other graphics such as picture of the locations that we filmed at. The window allowed a nice amount of natural lighting into the room, as well as this we had a large bright light that we borrowed from the school’s photography department.

Below is an image of the set up that we used and a diagram of how it was put together:

Camera Technique Research

In preparation for the task of creating a film trailer I decided to investigate and compare how three different types of videos filmed their products. For this I compared a film trailer, television advert for a product and a music video to each other and reviewed a variety of their different aspects. I chose to focus on their movement; angles and shots; focus; amount of cameras used and their formats. I believe that doing this has given me a more advanced idea of how I could shoot my own film trailer as well as potentially using codes and conventions from other types of videos.

The three videos I compared were:

The Guardians of the Galaxy trailer:

The Cadburys Gorilla Advert:

Feed Me & Crystal Fighters - Love Is All I Got music video:

Camera Techniques	Film: Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) - Trailer	Advert: Cadburys Gorilla Advert (2007)	Music Video: Feed Me & Crystal Fighters – Love Is All I Got (2012)
Movement	As this is a full-length action movie the majority of camera movements are used (panning, crabbing, tracking, peds, tilting and zoom). There is a contrast between the smooth and relatively slow motion of the shots that do not contain action scenes and the action scenes. The action scenes use very fast movement and a mixture of handheld cameras and cameras which that are not. There is significantly more variety of movements shown in this movie and trailer then there is in the Cadburys advert and the Love Is All I Got music video.	The advert primarily uses the dolly camera method as well as a range of panning and tracking. The movement starts off slow at the start because the music is calm. However the motion speeds cut dramatically when the drum solo occurs and the pacing of the music increases. In addition to this the camera work is rather shaky, therefore it may have been recorded via a handheld method. The movement in the advert is far less varied than the movement shown in the guardians of the galaxy trailer and the music video. However this is intentional and gives a more realistic and ‘homemade’ feel to it.	The music video primarily makes use of tracking and zooming. The motion is very smooth and it does not appear that the camera is a handheld one. There are a large amount of movement types such as panning, crabbing, tracking, zooming and tilting used in this video. It appears to be of a high quality but is clearly less professional then the movement shown in the guardians of the galaxy trailer. However it makes better use of the movement then the Cadburys advert does.
Angles and Shots	The trailer shows a montage of different angles and shots. However the most used type shot appeared to be a medium close up taken at eye level. Due to the length of the full movie it is very likely to include a majority of the possible angles and shots. In the trailer I noticed low angles, high angles, eye-level shots, bird’s eye views and examples of long shots, medium shots and close ups.	At the beginning of the video, close ups and medium close ups are primarily used. This is done so as to hide the drum kit from view. These shots range from low angles to high angles and eye-level shots. When the drum solo begins, medium and medium long shots shots are used in addition to a selection of close up cuts.	This music video used a range of angles and shots. It is able to explore them to a greater degree than the Cadburys advert as it does not limit itself to using a single camera and is set in a more open location then it.
Focus	A selection of different focuses are used (both shallow depth of fields and deep depths of field).	A shallow depth of field is used for the close up scenes of the gorilla. However, when it zooms out to reveal the drum kit it is changed to a deep depth of field thus showing everything in the scene.	Both shallow and deep depths of field are used in the music video.
Multiple Cameras	Since this is a trailer for a highly expensive movie many cameras have been used. There any many instances in which these are displayed. Multiple cameras are used to display a variety of different angles and movement times throughout the scenes. It makes best use of the multiple cameras and does it with a relative amount of subtlety.	The scene appears to have only been shot with one camera that pans around the area. I am led to believe this because the area appears to be too small to use multiple cameras without capturing the other cameras in the shot. I believe that they would have simply taken multiple takes so as to allow for the cuts. A similar method was used in the new movie ’12 Years a Slave’.	I believe that there were multiple cameras used for this music video as there are certain scenes such as the party scene in which the switch between the locations is seamless. Also many cuts are used.
Format (what camera may have been used)	The movie is still to be released, it had a large budget and would have therefore used top quality equipment such as the Sony PXW-Z100. It is the production with the largest budget and therefore would have been able to afford more expensive gear than the Cadburys advert and music video.	Since it is an advert for a well-known company I would think that an expensive camera was used. A camera they could have used is the Sony PMW-500. This is because it is a highly expensive camera that is used for professional situations and was available in 2007, when the advert was produced.	The music video is filmed exceptionally well. However I do not believe that the equipment available wouldn’t have been as expensive as that used in the Cadburys advert or the Guardians of the Galaxy trailer. I am led to believe that they would have used a medium priced video camera such as the Panasonic HDC-MDH1 PAL Camcorder due to budget restrictions.

Film Script

Due to the nature of our film we opted for the usage of narration entirely instead of using character dialogue within the actual video footage. One of the major positive aspects of this was that it allowed us to get a crisper and nicer sounding set of audio as we were able to use microphones instead of talking straight into the video camera. The sound was therefore vastly improved as it eliminated most of the background noise that we would have otherwise had to face.


Script:


Rory Macbride (Intro) - I was involved with some bad people. And one game, a fixed game, was where it all went downhill.

Rory Macbride - Sometimes it just takes a few phone calls and all your problems are gone, just like that.

Jason Dyer - I don’t care who they are or where they are. You give me their locations and I’ll find them.

Rory Macbride - So I wrote a list and gave it to the only person I knew who could deal with the problem. Jason Dyer!

Jason Dyer (Credits) - The world’s a dangerous place to live in, you’ve got to constantly be looking over your shoulder.

Below you can listen to the script being read by computer generated voices:

 Here is a picture of what the script looked like when it was printed off. We used this sheet for reference when the lines were being recorded.

Below is an image of Joseph Inns reading through the script. He was one of the main voice talents in our trailer.