Making an item glow

Within my piece, I want to make a certain item glow to show it's significance that it has magical effects to it. The item in question is the pendant that can enable the user to stop time. After filming the initial shots I realised it wasn't clear that the pendant was the cause for time stopping so there needed to be some significant visual to emphasise that this is the item causing it. I've researched the best program to use to do this and it seemed that Adobe After Effects will work well. I do have some experience with this program as I used it to create the motion tracked titles in my AS piece There are also many tutorials online showing how to do nearly everything on After Effects including making things glow. Below is the tutorial that I plan on using when it comes to that stage in my editing.

Media in the online age: The Internet

On the theory side of media, we have moved on to looking at media in the online age, specifically media associated with the internet. We have covered very important issues such as the history and then what is available at the moment.

In this current age, the world relies on the internet to carry out the basic tasks needed such as communicating and banking. The most amazing thing about the internet is that it’s still fairly knew, with it only being initially developed in 1957. It was created by Tim Bernes-Lee who had the aim to distribute it completely free of charge. At that time it could only work on one item at a time using batch processing. This was overall ineffective as it took too long to process anything. As time went on however more connections were developed, such as the Arpanet network in 1966. This added a selection of different networks designed for specific purposes, which were commercial, scientific and military. These were set up so that gateways didn’t have as much traffic as they did previously. It then slowly developed from phones servers to an integrated net of connection in 1990, otherwise known as the internet. As mentioned, the internet was intended to be free for all users however there were people out there who saw this as a huge investment opportunity, such as Bill Gates. Gates is the founder of Windows and essentially made it for a computer to operate, windows would have to be installed, thus creating a massive income.  

As mentioned, the internet is an essential pillar of society as nearly all aspects of life are associated with it. One of these aspects is TV. Before the internet became so big, programmes could only be watched as it was happening on TV with some being able to record a limited amount. However the internet has changed this as it now provided on demand features. This allows users to choose to watch programmes on catch up websites such as iPlayer and 4OD. There are also subscription based websites that provide a wide variety of films and TV shows, some of which are exclusive to that streaming service. Similar to this YouTube has revolutionised how digital media can be distributed and consumed. YouTube lets users upload their own videos as well as allowing people to follow channels. It has around 1 billion viewers a month. An important aspect of this is citizen journalism. Before this was available, the media was dominated by news channels who could miss out key features and censor things their viewers would not like. However with pictures and video being available anywhere through the use of mobiles, things can be seen as they really are with nobody trying to censor it.  Another key aspect of Web 2.0 is social media. There are many social media websites available, the leading ones being Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Twitter arguably contributes the most innovation to the internet as it provides many things that were never available. It lets uses live talk about whatever they’d like wit a character limit of 250. This live feed means that if an event or a news story is dominating the media you can hear people’s opinions about it. It also breaks the barrier between celebrities and their fans. The fans can easily contact the celebrity and vice versa which introduces a more three dimensional take on fame.

A way in which we have learnt about the impact the web has had is through a documentary called 'The Virtual Revolution.' This documentary investigates how far the world has developed in the few years that the internet has been widely available and looks at the positives and negatives that it has had on culture society.  

      

Ancillary Texts: Poster research

Along with the magazine review, another ancillary text that I need to produce is a poster for the short film. A poster is an essential part of advertising when it comes to films as it can be seen by a large number of people and placed virtually anywhere. If this is going to be seen by lots of people in all sorts of places, it needs to be eye catching and effective. I have researched into the forms and conventions of film posters to see what I need to include on mine. My findings show that there are a small list of things that need to be included, the first being the title of the film. The title needs to be one of the main focus points of the poster and this can be done by using eye catching font or font colour. Another needed convention is the image used. It needs to be relevant to the film by either including the main character or giving an impression of the film genre. Finally, the date of release and a shortlist of cast and crew members needs to be displayed somewhere on the poster.

With all this in mind, I have an idea of what my poster will look like. I plan on incorporating the element of stopping time into the image along with the main character. As the film is along the lines of a thriller I will use a darker colour for the background. The font I will use for the majority of the text will be fairly simple as if the font is too complex it will seem off putting. Below are a few examples that I will use as inspiration for my poster.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

Beginning to edit

Now that I have done a good amount of filming, I am beginning to enter the post production stage. Unlike a conventional production process, I have decided to edit whilst still having quite a lot to film. By doing this, it means the raw footage can be implemented at stages rather than having to edit all the raw clips all at once. So far, the editing process has gone well and has helped me decide on what I want to add in this stage. These things include the titles I will use, the colour corrections and the effect used to show that whoever wears the pendant is greatly affected by it. To perform all this, I am using Premiere Pro CS6. I decided on this software as it is strongly recommended by many editors and has more features available than its competitors, such as Serif MoviePlus. I have edited the initial opening sequence of the film as well as a few rough edits of the main part of the sequence. Next editing session I will attempt to add the music needed and edit the majority of the main sequence.