Re-Presentation

Re-Presentation - The way the media presents 'something' as though it were real. It is not real, merely a copy of something.

Signs and Signifiers -

A sign is something which communicates a piece of information.

A signifier is the multiple 'ideas' or 'feelings' behind a sign.

All signs belong to certain cultures; different cultures recognise different signs.

When asked to draw 'a house on a sunny day with a tree in the garden and a number from 1 to 10',pretty much everyone drew similar to this picture. This is because when asked to draw this, these are the imediate signs we picture in our head. This could differ between cultures.

Gatekeepers - These are the people in charge of what we see. They decide every single detail of what is shown on our screens, so the character is represented in a way in which the audience can understand.

Ideology - A belief system; a set of ideas which the makers of programmes might want to put across.

RUSHMORE:

  Mise en Scene:

 Camera Angles. Props. Setting. Lighting. Acting.

Where is film set? 

From watching the opening scenes of the film you can see that it is set in a school. Looking in more detail you can see that it is most likely an all boys private school, which is religious and in America. You can also see from the name of the school that it is most likely a successful one, since it produces connotations of success with its direct link to Mount Rushmore. We deduct this from certain clues by looking at the Mise en scene, such as the uniform they wear and the classroom setting.

Describe the main characters personality.

Immediatley the main character comes across as very smug. He thinks highly of himself and in his daydream he is the person everyone loves.He appears to be good at maths and seems to want to be appreciated by people his own age, even though he thinks he is above them. 

What is he excellent at?

In his dream he is excellent at maths, especially algebra which he solves without even trying.

How do others view him?

In his dream the others consider him a hero, whereas in reality he comes across as the opposite of this.

How was he dressed?

He was dressed in the standard school uniform that gave us a clue about his school, but he is dressed in a blazer so comes across as having more pride in his school appearance than most.

AS Preliminary Magazine Task

Production: We took photos that we had planned in our mock-ups, and then we imported them to Photoshop and began editing. We then had to cut out these photos and add it onto the base of our magazine. We then proceeded to add a masthead and cover lines according to our mock-ups. I wasn't really sure what fonts I wanted to use, but I knew that I wanted them to be bold and eye catching, also i wanted the fonts to link to the 'geek' aspect of the magazine by keeping the fonts striaght forward and not particularly edgy or interesting. We were allowed 3 different fonts, so for the title I went for a simple obvious font to make it stand out. For the cover lines, I wanted a less bold, but still easily readable font, so I chose a more subtle font, yet kept it simple. For the competition cover line, I used a slightly more interesting font because I thought this would advertise the competition better and be more eye catching to the reader. Although I had originally planned to keep the colour scheme to greys and blacks, I soon realised this would look dull and uninteresting, so instead I chose to link it to the school itself by resembling the school colours. I chose the lighter shades of blue because they matched the colour of Izzy's top, and I chose the darker shades to contrast with this. I found that a white background was the most effective as other colours made it look either too busy or drew attention away from the other aspects. During the production I found the cover shot and some of the contents page pictures were too dark so I adjusted the lighting on it. I also found that I had a lot of additional space on the cover so I had to make my cover lines bigger. Here is my magazine cover and contents page:

Post-Production: At the end of this task I had produced a cover and contents page for a school magazine. I had learnt a lot of skills on how to use Photoshop as well as what a magazine should look like. I have also found how my mock ups needed to be slightly adapted to make the magazine look better and that how although you can plan the mock-ups very carefully it is important to change things that don’t work well when on the computer. However it is very important that you include a lot of detail on your mock-ups as this both saves time and gives you a better idea of what to do. Overall i think the task went reasonably well. Considering my lack of skills and knowledge about how magazines are designed and produced, as a first attempt i think the end results were ok.

AS Preliminary Magazine Task

Pre-production: We were set the task of creating a school magazine cover and contents page. We were told it had to include a mid shot of someone, a masthead and various cover lines. To start off with we looked at magazines and how they had been put together and then we were left to design our own. I came up with the idea for my magazine after thinking about how although school issues are not particularly interesting to students, other aspects might be. I thought the name would appeal to audiences in an ironic way. Because it's a school magazine, I took the idea of geeks being associated with school as inspiration however the magazine isn’t aimed at a 'geeky' demographic. Here is my final plan of my school magazine:

I chose the title as it seemed appropriate for school; however I felt it would appeal more to students. I initially planned to use a monotone colour scheme as I felt it would link into the concept of the magazine; however I found that this just made it look boring so I chose to add blue to my palette. I based my cover lines around what the magazine was about, something that concentrates mainly on other aspects of school rather than lessons. The main shot of Izzy wearing 'geek' glasses was inspired by the title. It had to be a mid shot of just one person so we were limited with what we could do.

The contents needed to be interesting and contain numerous pictures so I collected different shots of Izzy, involving her reading and other things. I labelled on the mock up the colours I planned to use, I wanted to follow the colour scheme of the front cover and make it eye catching. The contents will contain page references to articles in the magazine and where to find them as well as additional information.

Film AS Preliminary Task

Pre-Production:
For the task we had to film and edit a character walking through, crossing a room and sitting down in a chair opposite another character, with whom she then exchanges dialogue with. The key shots we had to include were long shot, a medium shot, over the shoulder, close-up and shot reverse shot. We also had to keep within the 180 degrees rule. To start with we designed a storyboard of the film, where we had to write all the information about each shot individually, we then swapped the storyboards around so we could film a storyboard from scratch to see how important having a detailed storyboard is to the filming process.

Production: 
We filmed according to the storyboard we had been given, I filmed the close-up of megans feet and also some of the shots of Megan and Izzy's conversation. We found that a detailed storyboard was really important, otherwise filming becomes more difficult and it is much harder to create the desired film. Also we had to film with a camera that faded, we had to work around this to make sure none of the shots were fading as the clip started or ended as this would have led to the film not flowing.
Post-Production: 
We edited our film by importing it on to imovie and cutting it and adding a scream at the beginning, as this was part of the storyboard. I edited some of the conversation and also some of the door opening. The strengths were using the camera and quickly learning how to use the editing software, but the weaknesses were that we had to film some shots again because of breaking the 180 degree rule and filming the over the shoulder shots from the wrong side.

The 5 C's

Long Shot

Camera Angles:
Long Shot: tells the audience where the film is set, lets you know all the important information.

Medium Shot

Medium Shot: Most commonly used shot, Used for any character interaction.






Close-up: When something/someone important needs to be shown to the audience then a close-up is used.

Close-up

Continuity: Generally refers to visual errors. Basic example: A character wears a red top and then seconds later wear a blue top.


Cutting (Editing) : Essential part otherwise films would be in real time and never end. Allows director to change location. Main use is to either add pace to a scene to make it exciting (action films) or to slow it down for dramatic purpsoses (Romance films)

Composition: How the film is put together.

Hello!

Hello my name is Becca. At school I'm taking art, media, maths and psychology. I like stuff like music, TV, films, shopping and loads of other stuff. My TV is pretty much constantly on E4 so I have probably seen every single friends and scrubs episode. I also love The Inbetweeners- I like Neil because of all the things he says-, Skins, Misfits, The Cleveland Show (although it's not as good as family guy). I also love Gavin and Stacey and have all the box sets for it, IT Crowd, Greys anatomy, Hustle, Top Gear, Come dine with me, Mock the week (but I watch it more on Dave now because I prefer it with Frankie Boyle) I also watch Jersey Shore religiously with my friend Emma because we find it hilarious, mainly because it's so rubbish and I also probably like a lot more that I can't remember.

This is one of my favourite parts of Gavin and Stacey

I watch loads of different films but I really like comedies like The Hangover, which has to be a favourite, mainly because of Alan. I also like Mean girls, Anchorman, Superbad, Forrest Gump and Stepbrothers. I have a few of these on DVD as well as tropic thunder, the devil wears Prada, an education, the notebook, Marley and me, Hot Fuzz, step up 1&2 and the first three Shrek films. I loved toy story 3 when it because I loved the first two as a kid like most people. I also like to watch lots of films on TV that I've never heard of.

I love music and I listen to it all the time. I've had one of the old iPod Nanos (not sure which one, but it's square) for ages even though it's about full. I'm a huge killers fan and particularly love the hot fuss album because of Mr Brightside and Jenny was a friend of mine although they haven't made a bad album yet. I also love Oasis (gutted they split) and their older album what’s the story (morning glory) which is by far the best one with all the classics on. And I really like the arctic monkeys especially there older stuff like the beneath the boardwalk album. I also like the courteeners, MGMT, especially time to pretend, The Pigeon Detectives, Pixie Lott who I'm going to see in November, red light company, Airborne toxic event, The Kooks, Mumford and Sons, We are Scientists, Temper Trap, Katy Perry, The Script, Scouting for girls, Florence and the Machine, The Verve, Marina and the Diamonds, Ellie Goulding, Kings of Leon (love their new song) , Vampire weekend, started listening to Biffy Clyro recently as well and Maroon 5 (Songs about Jane is brilliant). I also really like lots of unheard of songs that are in the background of films or TV programmes, or run on the credits, like the Gavin and Stacey song by Stephen Fretwell. Also, I'm a big fan of Motown, mainly because of my mum who loves it so I like the occasional bit of Smoky Robinson, Marvin Gaye and the Jackson 5. Plus I like Queen, Bon Jovi and a bit of  Bryan Adams.

 

That's about it I reckon.