Monday 1 May 2017
Evaluation Question 1 - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
In our short film 'The Swift End', I feel as if we have challenged the traditional conventions as we tried our own take of putting a modern twist onto the old conventions in order to make it a little more interesting for a younger audience, so they can relate.
The first example of this being our Femme Fatale, we challenged the usual stereotype. Even though we included the seductive, flirtatious and mischievous characteristics in behaviour of the femme fatale, we decided to change her aesthetic appeal. In this we changed her old seductive attire which consists of the finely made dresses/outfits, to the new modern outfits of black knee high boots, over skinny tight blue jeans with a red crop top to top it all off. The red colour of the crop top, which also shows skin, implies the seductive and dangerous nature of the femme fatale. She accompanies this with black boots, which are also seductive but they are black which implies danger, and someone who is evil, which sticks to the usual conventions of film noir. We used the usual convention of colour scheme for the femme fatale with the red and black. We used the traditional conventions of colour and behaviour in order to specifically identify the femme fatale to the audience, but also changed them to match our modern twist aim through the use of clothing.
Another convention we challenged was the locations. We decided that we would like to include rural scenes, this is because in none of the film noir films that we had all watched we had not seen one which had a heavily based rural story line. In order to do this we altered some of our scenes, for instance the office scene was originally going to be in an office, however we decided to change it to one of our local 'springs' to give that rural area vibe and challenge the traditional convention.
Finally another way in which we tried to challenge the traditional media conventions is through the dialogue we use. Originally the dialogue was from around the 1950's and 60's and Americanised or traditional standard English. With our project, as a group we discussed whether we wanted to use the dialogue style of the 1950’s and 60's, or whether we wanted to challenge the original convention and speak in a more modern way. As we decided we wanted to create our own film noir with a modern twist, we decided to speak in a way we would normally, which would also make the production better and more efficient as this is how we normally speak. Moreover it would also fit in the location/style of the house, being a modern housing estate built this year.
The first example of this being our Femme Fatale, we challenged the usual stereotype. Even though we included the seductive, flirtatious and mischievous characteristics in behaviour of the femme fatale, we decided to change her aesthetic appeal. In this we changed her old seductive attire which consists of the finely made dresses/outfits, to the new modern outfits of black knee high boots, over skinny tight blue jeans with a red crop top to top it all off. The red colour of the crop top, which also shows skin, implies the seductive and dangerous nature of the femme fatale. She accompanies this with black boots, which are also seductive but they are black which implies danger, and someone who is evil, which sticks to the usual conventions of film noir. We used the usual convention of colour scheme for the femme fatale with the red and black. We used the traditional conventions of colour and behaviour in order to specifically identify the femme fatale to the audience, but also changed them to match our modern twist aim through the use of clothing.
Another convention we challenged was the locations. We decided that we would like to include rural scenes, this is because in none of the film noir films that we had all watched we had not seen one which had a heavily based rural story line. In order to do this we altered some of our scenes, for instance the office scene was originally going to be in an office, however we decided to change it to one of our local 'springs' to give that rural area vibe and challenge the traditional convention.
Finally another way in which we tried to challenge the traditional media conventions is through the dialogue we use. Originally the dialogue was from around the 1950's and 60's and Americanised or traditional standard English. With our project, as a group we discussed whether we wanted to use the dialogue style of the 1950’s and 60's, or whether we wanted to challenge the original convention and speak in a more modern way. As we decided we wanted to create our own film noir with a modern twist, we decided to speak in a way we would normally, which would also make the production better and more efficient as this is how we normally speak. Moreover it would also fit in the location/style of the house, being a modern housing estate built this year.
Sunday 30 April 2017
The Swift End + Short Film Evaluation
I extremely enjoyed the processes of creating and making the final film this year and in my opinion it has given me an opportunity to improve my skills on camera. As a group, we are very proud and pleased with the way our final Film Noir short film turned out, I enjoy the fact that we kept with our original first idea to create Film Noir with a more modern twist to the genre. Our group dynamic also worked well in order to get the film finished, even when we encountered some large, almost impossible, hurdles regarding character availability as one of our characters was on holiday and wasn't back till after our coursework had to be handed in, however we were able to go back to the storyboard and use our imaginations to come up with some more ideas, in order to make up for the character loss. On the other hand, even though we are pleased with our final cut, there are definitely areas where we could have improved on.
What we did well was the use of camera angles in our production. Throughout our project, we used a large variety of camera angles, some of which we consider to be unique. An example would be in the scene where Clive Swift has first knocked on the door of the Roper Household, where we see Mrs Roper walking down the stairs. The camera angle used is a tracking shot, focusing in the lower body of Mrs Roper, leading to a build up of suspense for the audience as all we see is her lower half, jet black knee high boots on contrast to the pure white banister. One more example would be the over the shoulder/pan shot at the beginning of the scene involving Clive and detective Nigel Montjoy, in the quiet park where Clive is sitting down on a bench lower down in the distance, whilst Nigel looks down upon him. We felt this shot represented a convention of film noir, where often the 'hero' looks upon his 'prey'.
An area of criticism for our project would be the scene at the very start. In this scene, Mr Ropers and Clive Swifts heads are cut out of the top of the scene, when Mr Roper stands up to greet Clive. We could improve this scene by when the heads get cut out of the shot that we insert a new high shot camera angle that can fill that section, then cut back to the other clip. However it is difficult to keep cutting camera angles, as Film Noir conventionally has long takes.
Another thing I have noticed is that between some of the shots in our short film are very sudden and sharp transitions. For example, the scene between where Mrs Roper is attempting to seduce Clive, and the one where he phones her back changing his mind. They suddenly cut between the two without no suspense etc. One way we could have improved this is by adding in a fade transition, and in the background apply some slow jazz music, to add more suspense and split the scenes up a little more.
Finally, the last thing I would change is the final scene. This is where Clive Swift is shot, outside on the graveyard. However there is no explanation and it leaves the audience baffled. This scene is different due to the character unavailability. We could include some minor detail of a narration, or name in the book to take away the confusion and questions, however it can be a good thing to leave it on a cliff hangar.
Overall however despite these minor flaws of the project. I feel like we did the best we could do within the time limit, also with the hurdles we faced in order to complete the project.
Magazine Article
The Swift End
The short Film Nor film 'The Swift end' is a film filled with excitement and mystery for the viewers, with a climax at the end leaving us (the audience) to ask questions as to who, what, where and why? In this we see actors Anil Sidhu, Adam Orton, Becca Varley, and Charlie Rodgers with possibly the performance of their lifetime careers along with Director Scott Taylor succeeding again with another amazing short film, this time in the Film Noir genre.*SPOILER ALERT*
In this short film, we see Charlie Rodgerr as the Solicitor(arranging where Mr Ropers money will go, once he dies) who is having a performance of a lifetime, dressed in a finely fitted designer suit. We meet the character, Clive Swift, in the first scene of the film where we see the character take the long walk up towards the newly built household of the Roper family. He is greeted at the door by the seductive, flirtatious and manipulating younger wife of Mr Roper. Matilda. Once Clive has finished finalising the details of Mr Ropers will, Mrs Roper is left 'hurt' and 'upset' after finding out the will proceedings of Mr Roper has all been left to his son, without a mention of her name at all. She tries her best to seduce Mr Roper (Charlie Rodgers) into putting her name on the will instead of his sons when they are left alone in the kitchen, but her attempts shatter before her eyes, as she fails to change Clive's mind about tampering with the will.
However as time passes, Clive begins to overthink and allow his emotions to overwhelm him, resulting in him calling Mrs Roper to discuss the plan of action, to kill Mr Roper and change his will. Later that day, Clive is to turn up to the Roper household to sneak in and murder Mr Roper, it is clear that Clive had been reeled in and manipulated by the seduction of Mrs Roper.
Once the murder of Mr Roper is made clear, a slow painful suffocation death for Mr Roper, we are introduced to the blunt, stocky detective Nigel Montjoy who shows little emotion or sentiment for the death of Mr Roper. After a shifty swift confrontation between both Nigel and Clive on a park bench, where it is immensely quiet, Clive Swift is anxious and has to leave suspiciously as Nigel begins questioning him about the Roper families Will.
In the final scene, It is seen that Clive is waiting for somebody. But who? Who is he waiting for so impatiently? Mrs Roper? Nigel Montjoy? However, before we find out. Bang. Clive is shot dead, the killer unseen. This leaves us with so many questions. Who was he waiting for? Who shot Clive? Mrs Roper after seeing he was having second thoughts? Nigel Montjoy, taking the law into his own hands? I guess we'll never know!
Editing of my Poster
The inspiration of my poster came from two different Film Noir films. These are 'The Third Man' and 'The Dark Corner'. Mainly due to the face of the singular man on the poster, and the contrast of light and dark colours.
I used this title font because it is the one that we use in the main project, also because all the letters are joined as if the words are one swift movement that all come to the same end. I used the font for the other wording on the poster because they are simple, don't stray attention from the main title and are also clear to read without struggle.
Another editing feature I used was the gradient tool, with this I used it to fade from the main background picture to black to show the contrast of colours and so that you can read the text without having to concentrate or squint. I used several layers in order to get the curve just right, using the rubber tool to remove any inconsistency with the fade in colour.
Making this poster hasn't furthered my skills on Photoshop as I had already taught myself how to use it, so I already had the ability to make this poster efficiently and to the best of my ability. I used a lot of layers within this poster, to get the best quality. The bottom layer being the picture of me on the bench looking outward(of which was screenshotted and cropped from the final cut.) The gradient layers being on top of the picture, and then the text layer being above the gradient layer.
Shown below are the two posters I took inspiration from:
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