Evaluatiuon question 2 - How effective is the combination of your ancillary production tasks with the main production?

Ancillery task 1 - poster:

Here is my poster for my first ancillary task. As you can see it features many of the normal conventions, I will list the conventions I have used top to bottom, explain why I have used them and compare them to what was used on the Donnie Darko film poster.


Actors Names.
At the top of the poster I have featured 3 of the actors names that were involved in the making of the film. If a movie contains actors that are considered very famous they will put names of the actors at the top to promote the film and make people who are fans of the actors want to see it. Sometimes actors names are put at the bottom and sometimes they are put on both bottom and top, but I decided to put them on the top as it leaves room for other typical conventions that use the bottom, and because they placed them there on a Donnie Darko movie poster which is of a similar genre to ours.


'Tagline'/Quote.
I used a quote from the movie that creates enigma and draws the audience in, this will give them almost a preview of the film and get them interested in seeing it. A couple of Donnie Darko posters used a quote from the movie that read 'Why are you wearing that stupid man suit' which again creates enigma and makes the audience more interested. I used a surreal, creepy sounding tagline that helped to cement the genre in the minds of the viewer of the poster, with the film genre being a chilling surreal film.


Central image.
I used a central image depicting 2 silhouettes of the main antagonists in our film. The image is creepy and fits the chilling surreal genre. I also added a blue tint and darkened the image to emphasise the creepiness even more, this effect was also created with the Donnie Darko poster shown, with a bright area of central focus, and very dark surroundings. I opted for the dark central focus and slightly lighter blue surroundings as I wanted the main subjects to seem creepy and sinister.


Main title.
I positioned the main title about two thirds of the way down the poster so that the central focus was visible. I think this also would have worked if the title was over the subjects faces as it would create even more enigma. I used a simple black typewriter font on a white background, that matches the opening and ending credits of our short film. I did this rather than opting for the typical blurred/strange font of surreal films as I would like to make the typewriter almost a recurring house style throughout the production, due to its ties with Chillers, Horrors and Dark Noir films.


Movie information/Footer.
I again listed the names of actors/directors/production workers at the bottom, following typical conventions, so that the potential audience can view information on the film. This allows them to look up directors or the production company maybe and see what else they have been involved In, then decide whether or not they would like to view the short film. I again coloured this blue to fit in with the house style, and followed what the Donnie Darko poster did. Finally I added final details by placing a 'PG13'

Ancillery task 2 - radio trailer:

We also made vocal notes over our radio trailer explaining use of techniques and conventions.

Evaluation Question 1 - How did you use conventions of real media texts in your production?

Evaluation question 4 - How did you use digital technology in your production work?

This is a presentation highlighting the different types of hardware and software that aided the production of my short film.

Final film

Here is our final film, fully edited and completed. We hope you enjoy.

Evaluation question 3 - What have you learnt from audience feedback?

We previewed our film to our media class and handed out a questionnaire for them to fill out about the film. we asked them to suggest improvements and tell us good points about the film. Overall this method gave us a very good insight into what we have done well and what we could do better next time.


All together we received around 15 questionnaires, but here are a varied few that we have chose to represent good changes that could be made to our film to improve the overall quality.

We made a video in response to the feedback that highlights popular suggestions and shows us saying how we would tackle them along with crediting ourselves on good points.



Overall i think that the film would actually benefit from a voiceover, which was considered in the early ages but never followed through with. This would give more of an insight into the characters feelings and show the confusion that he is feeling as currently the audience is very confused up until the closing scene of the film.

Ancillery task 2 - Radio Trailer

Movie Soundtrack

This is the final song in our movie named, aptly named nausea, it is disorientating and psychadelic. It almost sounds like The Pixies' song 'Where is my mind' that plays at the ed of fight club and adds a sort of calm closure to the build up of the narrative and the solving of the enigma.

Ancillery task 1 - Movie Poster

Risk assessment

Each time we went to a new location we checked the spot to assure it was safe for filming and checked all the possible things that us filming could effect to deem wether it was an okay spot to film.

Film poster research and planning.

I have researched some film posters from other surreal feature length films that have a similar vibe to our film.

i looked at film posters from;

Donnie Darko

Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas

and Filth

As you can see all of the posters have a general feel to them in terms of the instant impression such as the colour and composition of the central image. Most posters also follow most main conventions such as central image, title of film, credit to actors etc, more from the producers, age rating, and a quote. But one poster doesn't for filth, just showing a central image and the film title. I like this simplistic change in conventions in this example although i do not think it would suit our film.

The general colour of the poster heavily depends upon the tone of the film, for instance, donnie darko and filth are both very dark films depicting death, crime, drug usage and the effects of mental disorders. The posters for both of these films are very dark and have a blue tint. Whereas fear and loathing in las vegas is a very bright comedic film depicting surreal drug usage in a bright, neon or desert atmosphere.

I think that adding a dark blue filter to my film poster would suit the general dark atmosphere of our short film. I would like to follow most main conventions including title, credit to actors etc, tagline, age rating, and production company.



I took this still on the set of one of the scenes showing the sillouettes of the 3 main antagonists so to speak, i like this shot and wish to use it as the central image for my poster.

Radio trailer progress.

We used a lot of sound effects and added both studio recorded vocals and audio from the movie itself. We used garage band on a mac as it is a very easy piece of software to use and we could get a lot of desired effects.

By using a lot of layers of different sounds and effects, we were able to make the trailer very realistic. By using vocal clips from the movie we also created an enigma which will pull the audience in and make them want to watch the movie to see how the enigma is resolved.

editing update 2

We are mid way through completion of the editing of our short film, we have finished filming and predict we will soon be completed and can start working on the advertising side.

Filming Update 4: Final Scenes.

Today our group filmed the final scenes of our film. I did most of the filming and thought up quite a lot of the shots for these scenes. We have now started editing and putting all of our stuff together on final cut pro.

Editing update 1

We have started editing on final cut pro and are all getting used to the software gradually. we predict that it will be completed fully in a couple of weeks.

Filming update 3 - more scenes

We have recently filmed the drug deal, chase through the woods and the scene in which the protagonist is confronted with the driver and passangers of the car with weapons sat on the sofa in the front room of his house.


For the drug deal scene I played the drug dealer, and for the rest of the shots I did most of the filming, took skills and suggested improved composition for the shots from the storyboards.

Filming update 2: Scene 3

On friday 6th february, we completed filming for scene 3. This is the scene in which the fight happens between the main character and his brother. We filmed in Matty's house and used a range of different shot techniques, camera angles, composition choices and lighting techniques. For this scene, I was the cameraman and chose most of the angles and composition.


I also took some stills to use on the later ancillary tasks.

Filming update 1 - Limbo storyboard

LIMBO Storyboard

Group filming

I am going to be working on a film in a group with my friends Mati, Dan and Jack. we will share ideas and in the end come up with a short film while working on our own work separately also.