Evaluation 4How did you use new media technologies in the

construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Throughout the course I used many different media technologies in each stage of the course. These technologies were vital in

helping me to create my work and without them my work would not have been

successful, I have learnt a lot from these technologies when using them throughout

the course.The three different parts of the course were research and planning, creating the product

and evaluation.

Apple MACThroughout the course we used Apple MAC computers. Before media I had never used Mac's before so I learnt a lot throughout the course by using them.It was better to use Mac's instead of normal computers as Mac's come with a lot of software pre-installed which we needed to use to successfully complete the course, such as Final Cut, Garage Band and Photo booth.All of these different software's made the way I present my work varied and more interesting as I had a choice of many different programs to present my work on that I wouldn’t have had if we weren't using the Mac’s.

Blogger• I used blogger throughout the whole of the

course as this is where all of my work has been stored.

• I could embed all of my YouTube videos and PowerPoint's onto my blog, and could also create blog posts to document my progress along the course.

• Blogger has been vital throughout the course to help keep me organised and present my work in a organised clear way.

Firefox/safari/Google• I used the internet (Firefox/safari)

throughout the entire course as I needed the internet to find information during my research and planning, product production and evaluation.

• Without the internet I wouldn’t have been able to find many of the information out that I did so my products in the end wouldn’t have turned out as good as they should have as I would have had nothing to compare them with.

• I also used the internet to store my work on blogger.

PowerPoint/Slide Share• I have created many PowerPoint's

throughout the course, especially in my research and planning as it is a easy way to group together and present my research and findings.

• I could then use online media technology such as Slide Share to post the PowerPoint's online so I could then embed them into my blog so I could keep all my work stored together in the correct order.

Final cut express/ YouTube• I used Final Cut a lot in the course and

learnt a lot in doing so, at the start of the course we worked in groups to film and edit a trailer, then later on in the course I filmed and edited my trailer on my own and when you compare the two trailers you can see that my final trailer is a lot better then the previous ‘practice’ trailers as I learnt a lot from creating these ‘practice’ trailers and drafts which helped me make my final trailer to the best it could be.

• I learnt how to do various things on Final Cut such as how to change the effect of my footage such as how to make it blue so it was more ‘CCTV’ like, how to add text to the footage, and how to do various effects with the footage such as ‘Bad TV’ which I used a lot in my trailer as it gave me the desired effect I needed to make my trailer look as realistic and professional as possible.

• I could then easily export my completed trailer onto YouTube easily using QuickTime movie conversion which changed the trailer to a .mov file which was easy to upload onto YouTube, which I could then embed into my blog.

Final cut helped me a lot during the course as it was one of the easiest programs to use to edit my footage and put my trailer together.I could import all footage, sounds effects, sound tracks and voiceovers into one sequence then edit them all to how I wanted and place them all onto the timeline in the correct order.I could also layer the sounds and voice over's onto the footage.It was also easy to add my pre-made inter titles, Film title and release date information onto Final Cut which I had previously made on Photo Shop.Final cut also helped as I could preview my trailer whenever I needed to see how it was going and see what else I needed to do.

I uploaded all of the videos I produced throughout the course onto YouTube so they were all stored in one space.This helped me as I could then embed the videos into my blog and onto online programmes such as Prezi easily.

HD video camera/tripod• I used the video cameras to record the

trailer in my research and planning however this then helped me later on in the course as I went on to use these cameras in the creation of my final trailer. The cameras helped me as I learnt how to focus and blur the camera when necessary and various other techniques.

• The tripod also helped me as I could fit the camera onto it so my footage wasn’t shaky, my trailer however did use a lot of handheld footage as this is the style of footage that I thought worked well in my research and planning which I completed before starting to produce my trailer.

• The combination of the camera and tripod helped me as I had the choice of having still footage that wasn’t shaky, and then using the camera handheld to make it more realistic.

Digital cameras/ SLR cameras

I used the SLR cameras to take photos for my print products and also my practice shots.By using the camera to take practice shots I could practice different elements of camera taking such as manually focus, adjust shutter speed and aperture settings.This helped me, as when it came to taking my final shoots for my print products they were the best they could be after taking all of the practice shots on the cameras previously and learning what looked best.

Practice shots: Final shots:

I used photo booth to record videos as its streamline and the videos save directly onto the computer so you save time as you don’t need to import the videos from other devices.I could then simply open the videos onto Final Cut then export them onto YouTube and embed them into my blog.

PHOTOBOOTH...

GrabGrab was vital throughout the course as it helped me to document my progress throughout by ‘grabbing’ screenshots and selections off my screen which I could then upload onto my blog.This helped me to keep track of how far along I was in the course, and what I still needed to do.The screenshots also counted as evidence that I was doing the work such as when I took screenshots throughout the process of my soundtrack creation.

Photoshop• I used Photoshop a lot throughout the course and once again this was a programmed

that I hadn't really used before starting media.• I didn’t really have any knowledge of how to use Photoshop before

this course however by the end I now feel confident in how to use Photoshop and I feel like it helped me a lot in this course.

• I used Photoshop to edit my chosen images and to create both my film poster, and magazine cover.

• I used a lot of different parts of Photoshop when producing these print products…• I edited the images under the ‘adjustments’ drop down using the

‘brightness/contrast’, ‘hue/saturation’ and also the ‘black & white’ options.• I also used the text tool, shape tool and fill tool on both products.• Something that helped me a lot when creating my products was the ‘stroke’ effect

that you could add to text as when creating my products I kept coming across the problem were my text would blend into my image however by adding the stroke effect to my text I feel like it helped it stand out a lot more against the image which helped avert the problem.

Creating my magazine cover... Final product

Creating my poster...Final product

Photoshop also helped me to create my production logo which would be included in both my trailer and film poster.I looked at other production companies logos on the internet during my research and planning which helped me when creating my logo as I now had a better idea of what worked and what didn't.I downloaded different ‘brushes’ for Photoshop using online brush downloading website www.brusheezy.com which I then opened on Photoshop.I downloaded a grey background and blood as these are in my horror genres repertoire.The middle image is my first draft of my logo however I didn't think this worked so I changed the background to plain black and centred the blood and text as I think this worked best and looked the most alike to the actual professional logos I had looked at during my research and planning.

www.DaFont.com• DaFont.com helped me a lot when creating all three of my

products as it gave me a wider variety of text to implement into my products.

• The website has a vast variety of text so I knew there would be something that would be suitable for my products.

• When I eventually found the font I wanted it was very easy to download and them open into Photoshop to use on my products.

I downloaded font ‘Another typewriter’ from DaFont.com which I used as the font for my trailers inter titles as this was the most similar I could find to the font used the professional trailer I used as inspiration so I knew it would work.I also downloaded fonts...Primma handmade,plane crash,And universal accreditation

Word

• I didn’t use word a lot throughout the course however it was necessary to complete my call sheets and model release forms which were vital as without them I would not have been able to submit my coursework.

• I also used word to complete my shooting schedule as this helped to keep organized during films and make sure I got each and every shot I needed.

Shooting schedule...

Garage Band• Garage band is another program that I had never used before starting the course

however by the end of the course I again felt confident in using the program.• Garage band helped me a lot in creating my product as it enabled me to create a

soundtrack to go along with my trailer which would make my trailer more professional and make the footage stand out more if it had a corresponding soundtrack.

• I used orchestral strings in my soundtrack and only used two different sounds throughout, this gave me the desired ‘eerie’ soundtrack I needed for my trailer.

• I also used garage band to crate sound effects for when my inter titles and titles were shown.

Voice recorder/Phone

• A lot of my trailers narrative was shown using voice over's as sound bridges to the rest of the trailer.

• To create the voice recordings I used the voice recorder app on my phone and then I exported the files onto the computer and used a online website converter to convert them to a MP3 file, which I then opened in Final Cut and added to my trailer.

• This helped me a lot as it was a easy way to get the voice recording which were a necessity to my trailer.

www.partnersinrhyme.com

• I needed a lot of sound effects in my trailer to make the footage more effective and www.partnersinrhyme.com helped me a lot with this.

• The website contains a lot of different sounds effects which you can download to your computer free of charge.

• I downloaded numerous sound effects from the website and used a lot of them in my trailer.

• An example of this is when in my trailer a glass needs to be smashed, however instead of actually smashing a glass I instead just downloaded the glass smashing sound effect which worked just as well.

• Also I found that many of the ‘screams’ in my trailer that the actors had to do didn’t sound as real and sounded to forced and didn't really work, so instead of just editing on the screaming I instead added a scream sound effect on top which I think worked better then the actors actual screams and gave me the desired effect.

Selection of sound effects... Downloading the sound effect...

After downloading the sound effects I then opened them in Final Cut and added them to my trailer where necessary.