Audience Research (Primary)

Before starting to produce our title sequence, I had to conduct a survey in order to fully understand our demographic. I set up a questionnaire on ‘Question Pro’ and then using social media such as ‘Facebook’ we asked people to do the survey.  After a week of our questionnaire being online, I collected the results.  50 'teenagers' took part and 27 were male and 23 were female. Here are our results for every question;

Teen drama research

I continued to research into different teen dramas that are out there..
Teen dramas have got to be one of my favourite styles of film and TV because I can personally relate to them in some cases, as they are based on issues that teenagers will probably have to go through at least once in their teenage life. These issues/ problems are:
1.Coming of age
2.First love
3.Rebellion
4.Conflict with parents
5.Teen angst
6.Alienation
7.Sex
8.Drugs
9.Alcohol
10.Sexuality- (gays and lesbians)
Codes and conventions of the teen film genre are different depending on the film, the most common conventions of a TV drama can include but they can include alcohol, drugs, high school and parties. This shows that when dealing with a teen drama we have to focus on the codes and convections so the audience understand our representation of teen drama as they can see it in our opening sequence. The classic codes and conventions of teen film come from American films where one of the most widely used conventions are the stereotypes and social groups. The stereotypes usually used include:

 •The Geek/Nerd

 •The loner

 •The outcast

•The new kid in school

Apart from the characters there are many other codes and conventions of teen film. These films are often set in or around high schools as this allows for many different social cliques to be show.

THE 10 BEST TEEN DRAMA FILMS OF ALL TIME

1) The breakfast club
2) fAST TIMES AT Ridgemont HIGH
3) Ferris Bueller's Day off
4) Dazed and confused
5) Empire Records
6) 10 things i hate about you
7) Ghost World
8) Donnie Darko
9) Juno10) the perks of being a wall flower

As part of research I watched some of the following teen/drama films to get the sense of what the codes and conventions are of a teen drama, displayed above are the top 10 teen drama films brought to you by pepsi.com
http://www.pepsi.com/en-gb/d/content/15536483/The-10-Best-Teen-Drama-Films-of-All-Time

What do teenagers like and dislike? (Primary Research)

What do teenagers like and dislike? (Primary Research)

I interviewed 20 teenagers between the ages of 15-19 on what they like and dislike. I gave them a range of things to like or dislike (from food to fashion), and here are the results:

-Food: 20/20 liked, 0/20 disliked
-Drinking: 17/20 liked, 3/20 disliked
-Parties: 16/20 liked, 4/20 disliked
-Smoking: 8/20 liked, 12/20 disliked
-Sex: 15/20 liked, 5/20 disliked
-Fashion: 17/20 liked, 3/20 disliked
-Social networking sites e.g. Facebook/Twitter: 18/20 liked, 2/20 disliked
-Smart phones: 20/20 liked, 0/20 disliked
-Taking photographs: 18/20 liked, 2/20 disliked
-School/College: 1/20 liked, 19/20 disliked
-Parents: 20/20 liked, 0/20 disliked
-Friends: 20/20 liked, 0/20 disliked
-Films: 19/20 liked, 1/20 disliked
-Music: 20/20 liked, 0/20 disliked

From conducting this survey, I have found out that on average, teens mostly like food, smart phones, friends, parents and music. Because it was a minor survey, that does not conclude that all of these things should be included in the film. It simply allows a few themes and ideas to include within our film.
The knowledge that most people from my survey do not like school or college is also useful, because from that information, we could include some sort of rebellion against school in our film.

Things I included in my survey

What do teenagers like and dislike? (Secondary Research)

What do teenagers like and dislike? (Secondary Research)
Continuing my research on our target audience for our film - teenagers, I decided to get to the bottom of things and find out what teenagers actually like and dislike. From this, my group and I would be able to include these things in the film (or not), and be more aware of what appeals to our teenage audience, and what doesn't.
From my secondary research, I have found out that teenagers like:
-Loud music/Ipod
-Sleeping in
-A messy room
-Hanging with mates
-Ditching parents
-Phone
-Hot boyfriend/girlfriend
-'Cool' mates
-Social networking sites e.g. Facebook/Twitter
-Junk food e.g. McDonalds
-Food in general
-Taking photos with friends
-Taking 'selfies'
-Being alone sometimes
-Parties
-Drinking
-Porn

And apparently they do not like:
-Nosy parents
-Chores
-'Bitchiness'
-School
-Homework
-Being bored
-Babysitting

(Research carried out from www.wikianswers.com)

Of course, this is a large generalisation and not all teens will like and dislike all of the above. But as an average list, this research will help my group and I to consider our film content.

                                          Typical 'teen' situation

Our Teenage Audience

Our Teenage Audience

Our film 'Isn't that Illegal' is aimed mainly at teens from 15-19, although it may also attract young adults.
Because our film is specifically a 'teen drama' and, of course, has its main characters played by teenage actors, it is important to know what the teen audience will like and what they will most want to see in our film.
I started by carrying out some secondary research on what matters to teenagers. Here are some thoughts:

Teens share five characteristics that make them 'uniquely young':
Detached: No one desires the company of teens—they’re not unreserved as the way children are, which is why adults and children love being around each other. Because adults have reservations about spending time with teenagers and teens are skeptical of other teens—that leaves teens essentially on their own.
Oppositional: Teens define themselves not as who they are but who they are not—so the street savvy girl is highly focused on, say, not being the girl who likes riding horses.
High on influence: Teens develop special mix of exalted optimism and self-confidence when they discover their ability to understand and influence areas they’re interested in, such as politics and NGO causes.
Boundless: Teens experiment with limitations—they don’t try to experience their existence (like children do to feel the love of their parents) or to seriously engage in activities on the other side of social norms (as when adults visit swinger clubs to feel “free”). Instead, teens are simply interested in answering big questions about their abilities.
Fleeting: Teens feel entitled to change their mind and shift their fundamental ideas about the world—not because of insecurity or a lack of reliability but because that ability is seen as a fundamental privilege exclusive to being a teenager.

(Research used from www.redassociates.com)

By discovering these five aspects of what makes a teenager, well, a teenager, I can now get some further ideas of how to portray 'typical teenagers' in our film.

                                           Photo of variety of teenage girls

Reflecting on original idea

Notes from pre-production process

As shown above, the original plan for what our film opening would consist of is very different to the outcome. Some changes include:
-Showing only four characters (Georgia, Jason, Jacob and Nalika) rather than six
-Titles in the sequence were embedded differently to make the editing simpler
-Music soundtrack was changed to 'F For You' by 'Disclosure' instead of music by 'Don Broco' - we changed this because the soundtrack fitted a lot better
-We shortened the 'pregnancy' scene due to timing and so that the opening would be less dramatic
-The settings we used were a bathroom and three bedrooms, instead of shops and outside houses, as the setting flowed better with the idea of 'teenagers getting ready'

Hopefully the changes we made during editing will help to create a flowing and successful opening sequence!

Dawn of the Dead - Opening Tilte Sequence Analysis

Production Diary entry - 25/02/14

Tuesday 25th February 2014 - 13:00-16:00

Today, my group and I continued editing, and hopefully created our final cut (excluding titles and music).

We added a music track to our film opening today, which we finally decided would be 'Disclosure - F For You.'
We chose this track because it is an extremely catchy song, which would create audience engagement. It also went really well with the timing of the film, even before we rendered it!
Originally, our music track was going to be a song by Don Broco, for the 'alternative edge', but we eventually decided that the music track should be very engaging and fitting with the variety of fast-paced and slower shots. 

We had to mercilessly cut our film opening, cutting out huge chunks of shots that we had worked very hard on. Some examples are:

-The phone conversation between Jacob and Georgia (we had timed it to make it sound like a real phone conversation)
-Many of Nalika's shots e.g. perfume shot and alcohol shot

-Many of Georgia's shots e.g. walking into the bathroom and pregnancy test shots

-A few of Jacob's shots e.g. cologne shot

We had cut out Nalika's entire scene at first in order to fit the phone conversation in, however we decided today that the film would look much neater with Nalika's scene without dialogue, rather than a conversation with dialogue.
We will also have to mute quite a bit of the diegetic sound from our film, for example the camera clicking, in order to make the music fit with the film even better.

All the shots we took throughout our filming process will later be posted onto this blog as 'deleted scenes', however due to the time limit of two minutes, and keeping the film engaging, we had to cut put as much as we could. 

Behind the scenes

For this production we didn't want to spend much money on props that we could easily manufacture or acquire at home. For example Eva made the pregnancy test box from paper: she had printed out a template and then stuck it on a box to give it shape.

 

 Eva posing with the 'pregnancy

test' prop!

ENTER THE VOID - Opening Title Sequence < I was thinking along these lines, BOOM!

Basic Typography & Motion Graphics - I found this to help with the title sequence, go big or go home yayah

I found a cool way of animating our production logo for the start of our title sequence :)

'Behind the scenes' on Nalika's scene for our film opening

This video is our 'behind the scenes' video from when we filmed Nalika's scene on Tuesday 04/02/14. The filming went efficiently well and we took many shots. We later realised that we had far too many shots and had to remove some, but we always said it was better to have too many than too little. An overall success!

Evaluation on Editing Session - 12/02/14

Evaluation on Editing Session - 12/02/14

I did a bit of editing for our film opening today. As my group and I had selected all the shots that we wanted to keep yesterday, it was easy for me to get started on cutting the shots, and ordering them suitably.
However, I could not get as much editing as I would have liked done today, for the simple reasons that the editing suite was only available for me to use for one hour, and I wanted opinions from the rest of the group.I tried to get a reasonable amount done with the time given, nonetheless.
I cut the shots down as much as I could to save precious time, and ordered them in a way that I think would look creative. Of course, this is not the final cut yet and I will need to get further opinions from the rest of my group, and the teacher, to make it look flawless.

So far, the editing of the film opening is going well and is a lot of fun to do, as well as being a chance to be as creative as possible!

Our Pitch For our Teen Drama Film Opening

This is our Pitch for our opening title sequence for 'Isn't That Illegal'.
During our pitch we conducted primary audience and genre research with our classmates.

Film Pitch

Below is the video for the film pitch we presented to our class. Overall, it was quite successful, although we did have a few hiccups. For example, some of the links took quite a while to load, but this didnt cause too much of a problem. Overall, we had quite positive feeedback from the audience, for the most part. We were able to conduct our primary research, by asking members of the audience to come up and answer a few survey questions. (In return for chocolate). This was quite useful, as we were able to gain an understanding of what teenagers want in a teen film. During our pitch we conducted primary audience and genre research.

Eva, Crystal, Shuriti, Chelsea FILM PITCH

'Behind the scenes' on Georgia's scene from our film opening

 

We created this video after shooting our 'Georgia' scene today. We had fun making it, but used our time productively to create a hopefully successful scene.

'Teen TV' book for research

I borrowed this book - 'Teen TV' - (edited by Glyn Davis and Kay Dickinson) from the library for research. It includes information mainly on 'Teen Drama' television, but it explores the overall teen genre, therefore I thought it might be useful. It also goes into depth about the importance of television in teen life.

Now is good

A film opening timeline...

A girl dying of leukemia compiles a list of things she'd like to do before passing away. Topping the list is her desire to lose her virginity.

 

 The film opens with a medium shot of a females lower legs and black converse shoes, walking down the stairs. This is at 0:00 seconds.

 The next shot a medium close up of the girls stomach stomach walking down the stairs.
0:03 seconds

This is followed by an over the shoulder shot, from the girls perspective, of a man lying topless on a sofa, with a girl. Based on the remnants of glasses strewn, presumptions could be made that there was a party the night before. 0:05 seconds

This shot is a medium shot of the girl walking out of a door. The place she was staying is located next to a café. This suggests it might have been an apartment/ flat. 0:11 seconds

Another medium shot of the girl walking. She appears quite glum. She has short hair, which could link to the fact she has Leukemia. This is the first time we properly see her face. 0:17 seconds

 Medium close up of the girls face. The first part of the credits appear, which is the film company, "Sony pictures". 0:22 seconds

Who the film company is associated with...
0:32 seconds

 The first actor name is the main character...played by Dakota Fanning
0:37 seconds

This is where the opening gets interesting...It all suddenly becomes animated. I like this style of animation, as it looks very cartoony and childlike. This may be representing the fact that the character is still technically a child, but has been forced to grow up. In this shot she is seen running away, but metaphorically she want to run away from the situation as well. Long shot. 0:48 seconds

 

The film name, "Now is Good" appears, written on the road. The character is still visible in the distance.
0:51 seconds

 

The other main actor, the talented, and extremely gorgeous...cough, Jeremy Irvine's name appears. His name is displayed just under a marker pen. 0:55 seconds






_{Another actors name appears, Paddy Considine. The name appears parallel with the cars situated just below, giving it a more symmetrical look overall. I think it works quite well. Personally, I find the simplicity, and child like drawings quite beautiful.
1:00}

Homemade Prop - 'Pregnancy Test'

Here is my homemade fake pregnancy test. It is used for Georgia's bathroom scene, where she is about to take the test.

Notes from group meeting 28/01/14

Notes from group meeting - 28/01/14 from 13:00 - 16:00pm.
Notes include shot lists for each scene, prop and costume list for several scenes, and scene order.

Photos from group meeting - Monday 27/01/14

 

These are some photos from our group meeting where we continued to plan production; we covered character development, settings, locations for filming, actors, script, props, and the budget.

This was our first production meeting outside of class, we had more time to discuss in depth what we were going to do for production.

 

Notes from group meeting discussing film opening

These are the notes we had taken during our first production meeting.
We discussed characters, credits, music, settings, research, genre, ideas for the storyline, and how we could do our opening sequence.

Eva's notes at group meeting (21/01/14)



Chelsea's notes from group meeting (14/01/14)

Chelsea's notes from group meeting (14/01/14)

Preliminary Exercise Script

This is the script I wrote and formatted, for our preliminary exercise. The idea of this scene, is that a teenage girl is fearful that she may be pregnant, and therefore goes to see the college councillor for advice.

 

EXT. HARROW COLLEGE – DAY

EVA nervously sits in the councillors’ chair, absentmindedly fondling the button on her sleeve, staring at the floor

EVA

I just don’t know what to do. I’m so scared

Eva runs her hands through her hair, cupping her face in her hands.  SHERRY places a caring hand on Eva’s shoulder.

SHERRY

You need to take a test, and soon.

The fear in Eva’s eyes is evident as her eyes flick upwards, making contact with Sherry’s. Sherry holds out a pregnancy test to Eva.

EVA

I can’t, I don’t want to know!

Eva’s voice breaks as she abruptly gets up from her chair, swiftly heading for the door. Her hand is holding the door handle.

SHERRY

This won’t just go away

Eva walks out the door, slamming it as she goes. Sherry stares at the door, pregnancy test still in hand, cupping her neck in her hand. Frown lines are visible on her forehead.

 

Teen Drama mood board, done by collaging different images, from both the internet, as well as magazines.

LOL
Director: Lisa Azuelos 
Rating: 12
Starring: Miley Cyrus

      

Synopsis:

Pretty teen Lola and her high school friends struggle to elude their bewildered parents, pull off daring hookups and sow some seriously wild oats in this coming-of-age comedy for the social media era.

 

LOL trailer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

         

 Cyberbully trailer

 2)    Cyberbully

 Director: Charles Biname

Rating: U

Synopsis:

Teenager Taylor Hillridge finds herself a target of bullying by fellow students through a popular social website in this topical drama with a message. After the abuse makes Taylor afraid to face her classmates, her mother gets involved.

 

3)      The Last Song

Director:  Julie Ann Robinson 

Rating: PG

Synopsis:

Miley Cyrus has top billing as 17-year-old Ronnie Miller, a rebellious former piano prodigy who doesn't hide her hostility after being sent off to spend the summer in Georgia with her estranged father (Greg Kinnear). Rebuffing her dad's attempts to reconnect, the aloof Ronnie begins to thaw when she meets beach volleyballer Will Blakelee (Liam Hemsworth). Kelly Preston also stars in this contemporary tearjerker based on the Nicholas Sparks novel.

 

4)      Prom
Director: Joe Nussbaum 
Rating : U
Synopsis:

Reinventing a rite of passage event for a new generation of prom-goers, this Disney movie mixes the stories of several high schoolers who are alternately planning on going -- or not going -- to the biggest dance of the year.

 Prom trailer

 

 

5)      Sleepover 

Director: 

Rating: PG

Synopsis:

As their first year of high school looms ahead, four best friends have one last summer sleepover. Desperate to shed their nerdy status, they take part in a night-long scavenger hunt that pits them against their popular archrivals.

Sleepover trailer

 

6)      Ginger and Rosa  

Director:

Rating: 12A

Synopsis:

With the Cold War looming over them, teen best pals Ginger and Rosa share everything in early 1960s London -- until betrayal drives them apart. Sally Potter directs this intimate period drama steeped in the anxieties of the dawning nuclear age.

Ginger and Rosa trailer

 

7)      Anita and me                         

Director: Metin Huseyin

Rating: 12A

Synopsis:

As a recent Indian immigrant, 12-year-old Meena is so desperate to distance herself from her family and become part of the British in crowd that she swears allegiance to the local bad girl, with disastrous results.

anita and me trailer

 

8)      Tuck Everlasting  

Director: Jay Russell

Rating:PG

Synopsis:

When a teenage girl named Winnie gets lost in the woods and meets Jesse Tuck near a magic spring, she befriends his family and learns why they need to keep their lives a secret from the rest of the world.

Tuck everlasting trailer

The synopsis for each film was taken from www.netflix.com.