What makes a good film poster

• To look professional
• The images blend in with each other
• The colors refer to the tone of the film
• Important features of the film are displayed
• A credit block
• Appealing
• Clear who the audience is
• A unique/original idea for the poster

Good poster

Bad poster:

Current Affairs - Are video games linked to violence and laziness?

Video games are violent & will make you lazy

Many politicians are against video games and they use the points above as an argument, however there are many reasons why this isn't true.
I personally believe that video games can be beneficial but can also cause laziness, but this isn't because of the video games, it is the person's choice to play them, they aren't forced, they could go out and be active but they choose to stay inside and play games. And video games won't make an ordinary person violent, if they already have anger problems or a bad life then the games may encourage them, or it may calm them down as they take the frustration out in the game.

http://www.lazygamer.net/general-news/study-attempts-to-link-violent-games-with-decreased-brain-function/
This article talks about how a study proves that video games are linked to decreasing brain activity, however the author speaks against it and says that the studies weren't fair as the number of people used can't compare the whole number of gamers there are in the world, and the tests were done with non-gamers, their decrease in brain activity may have been because they didn't understand how to play the game.

http://www.cardinalpointsonline.com/opinions/video-games-will-not-help-fix-lazy-generation-1.2678777#.TuHclbKa_UA
This article supports the title, it speaks about video games taking over young peoples lives and that it makes them less sociable and lazier. He says that when he plays video games with his friends "there is more yelling from the sidelines of my living room than there is most stadiums" - already he goes against his own argument, video games made him and his friends spend time together, and from my own experience this "yelling" is good, my friends and I have a laugh when we compete each other in various video games, even when we are playing online, in person we will have a conversation about it; all of this makes us more sociable. 

Film Poster

Comedy Poster Analysis

My Film Idea - first draft

My film will be Thriller because it borrows conventions from Action and Horror

The age rating will be 15 because there will be many violent scenes and themes, strong language and possibly some gore.

My target audience will be men between the age of 15 - 40 because they are the main target audience for action and horror, they would be men who enjoy sports and like films such as The Expendables, Rocky, The A-Team, etc.

My film will be about a man who lives a very depressing life, he's been fired from his boring job, his social life is almost non-existent and he has nothing to look forward to, so when he attempts suicide he's confused when he ends up in a hospital and a mysterious briefcase is thrown into his room. It contains a key to a security box in the bank, which leads to a new life full of money and power for him, but he abuses it and becomes greedy and learns that wealth does not equal happiness and can lead to trouble.

Title - Choices
Characters - Nathan Teale (Main Character), Mr. Bale (Main antagonist), Erica (Love interest), Dean (Friend)
Actors - James Franco, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Natalie Portman, Tom Welling
Location - London

Conventions of an Action Movie

An action movie will often use bright yellow, orange, red and white colors but there are exceptions for example if there is a torture scene in a dark room or if the overall tone of the film is grim.
They will often be set in large cities because then it is possible to also film in buildings, houses, and usually on a motorway for car chases. For tighter shots they will film inside or bars.
The film will usually start off with characters in their usual clothes, which can be casual or work, and by the end they will be ruined, with cuts and burn marks.
Actors usually found in action films are Sylvestre Stalone, Bruce Willis, Jason Statham and Will Smith as they are tall, muscular and good looking so men will want to be them and women will enjoy watching them.
Props in actions movies can be guns, knives, bombs, etc.
The characters will be the good guy, his love interest, his friends/family and the villains.
Examples include Mission Impossible, Die Hard and The Expendables.

Different Film Marketing Methods and what they are suitable for

The marketing methods I can remember from today are viral, film websites, trailers, merchandise, video games, posters, books and toys.
Today I learnt that some film marketing methods are suited to particular audiences. For example creating toys for a film is best suited to a film whose audience is a young age up to 12 years of age because they are the main audience who buy toys so they would find out about the film and want to see it.
Creating a poster in a men's magazine for a film is best suited to a film whose audience is men above the age of 18 and because they are the primary audience who buy these magazines and enjoy these types of films.
Today I learnt that some film marketing methods are suited to particular genres of film. For example having a video game based on the film is best suited to a film which is from the action genre because they will enjoy be part of the film and being in control so after playing the game they will watch the film.
Having a trailer before a comedy film is best suited for a film which is from the same genre because fans of comedy will see the trailer and want to see the film themselves.

Marketing Campaigns

High Budget:
These are expensive films made by huge, well known studios. They put a lot of money into promoting the film by placing posters everywhere, especially places where many people will see it. They will tag the trailer will a lot of movies being released that will be watched by a large audience. Films with big budgets will often put a large amount of it into marketing to generate greater revenue. Advertising a film on TV can cost a lot of money so if you see a trailer for a film on a popular channel during prime-time, chances are it is a big budget film.
If studios have A-list actors starring in the film then they will be paid to promote the film in various ways such as social networking, interviews or in public events.

Low Budget:
A low budget film will only use a few sets, unknown actors and basic filming techniques. They will focus of promoting the film through viral marketing and word-of-mouth. A good thing about low budget marketing is that there will be a high profit because they didnt spend much on marketing. They won't be putting many trailers on TV as that costs a lot of money or big posters in tourist destinations or bus stops for the same reason, instead they may try to build a fan base and use them to spread knowledge of the film thorough various means such as Facebook and Twitter, or more simply by word-of mouth. They will often be premiered at Film Festivals where they can be auctioned off to various studios to distribute, it can take several years before it reaches the main public.

Viral Marketing Campaigns

Viral Marketing is a marketing technique which uses the internet, specifically social networking to promote and advertise, it can be thought as the modern day word-of-mouth, which also plays a part. Viral is taken from the word virus, of course viral marketing isn't a bad thing, but it spreads around quickly and a lot, hence the name. Viral marketing is becoming more and more popular because it is free, for example if someone sees a poster, and shares it with a friend and this continues for a while, millions of people would have seen it and the studio wouldn't have spent a penny.

The Blair Witch Project
To create the illusion that the story was real, the creators made a website called BlairWitch.com, this had archived photos, police reports, interviews and a detailed background story to the events.

The Dark Knight
This film used viral campaign even though it was a very high budget film, they made a website called http://ibelieveinharveydent.com/ which was related to a character in the film, this became popular because many people wanted to know the story behind the character. They also made the website whysoserious.com which had objects or characters changed by the Joker adding a red smile to all of them.

Tron Legacy
This film was a sequel to "Tron", a film in the 1980s. The studios used real world-arcades, light bikes and games to promote the film, however its best technique was when they held a real press-event as fictional company Encom, they announced that the company was being taken over by new management, and then actors came and protested, they believed that the creator of the company was still alive, this is tied to the film as the story was about this characters son who finds his father after many years. 

Film Marketing Research

1) Film marketing means advertising the film and letting audiences know about it. It is also known as film promotion, studios will put in a lot of money to promote the film so they can get a big opening so in turn it will generate a lot of revenue.

2) A film poster is one way of promoting a film, it is an picture which will usually contain the name of the film, the starring actors, the film studio, a tag line and an image of characters(s) or the something that the film is about, which could be an object or a setting.

3) A film trailer is a short video, generally between 1-3 minutes which promotes a film by showing brief scenes in a montage often backed by a voice over and music. A trailer will show what genre the film will be, the target audience, the actors and an overview of the story. A trailer will try and grab your attention, for example an action movie would show a fight or explosions, or a comedy would show a funny scene or line, most trailers will create some sort of suspense so that the audience will want to see the film.

I recently saw a trailer for the film The Avengers, I liked it because it was very suspenseful but showed a lot of action scenes such as explosions, fight scenes and chaos. At the same time it showed off the characters like Iron Man, Thor and Captain America, the music builds tension and there are voice overs from a few characters which hint the story. 

4) Film merchandise are products created and sold for a certain film or franchise, they are made to promote the film, a percentage of the money made is given to the film studios, so it is a win-win situation for them.

5)A film website is a website made for a specific film, it will have a modified version of the film poster as the background, and a few videos you can watch which will be trailers or behind the scenes videos. If the film has not been released yet then it will have a release date and local cinemas where you can watch the film, otherwise if it is on DVD it will give you links to websites where you can buy the film on DVD, Blu Ray or digital. 

6) Mobile phones are becoming more and more popular these days so to advertise films on them is a very good idea. Orange has been using adverts to promote films and remind viewers to turn their phone off whilst they were in the cinema.
They will often use a scene from the film and then they will replace an element with their own Orange product, usually a phone. The characters will be very confused whilst the Orange men will take position as director and tell them to work with it.

7)

The title of the film and the characters show that the film is based around Superheroes, the title is just the name of the group. There is no tag-line for this film, all it says is that it is "From the visionary director of "300", this is effective because 300 was a success so many people will want to see the film, and anyone unsure about seeing the film will definitely see this film because he directed it. On the other hand, anyone who disliked 300 won't see this film.
The colours are very dark, except on Mr Manhattan because he is bright and has a blue aura around him. The colours are very dark and bleak to show the tone of the film, which is very dark and adult.
The images are of the main characters in very serious poses, one character holds a gun and others stand with crossed arms or hands in pockets. Because it is a large cast all of the actors names are displayed side-by-side at the bottom.

Advert Analysis

Mohammad Pro Analysing Adverts 2

Mohammad Pro Analysing Adverts

Mohammad Advert Analysis

Raising Social Media and Privacy Law Awareness.

Social Media is also known as Social Networking(an example would be Facebook and Twitter)

Privacy Law protects a persons right to have privacy, we are talking about privacy on the internet. The importance of privacy has gone back to references in religious writings. How far society can intrude into a person's affairs is a fine line to protect privacy.
Privacy allows an individual to choose the way they live their life and protect them from invasion from the media.


One's privacy is highly valued, but protecting someones privacy can be very complicated. The UK abides to the existence of many international privacy rights but the UK itself doesn't have any.

An example is phone hacking, between 2005 and 2007, the police investigated the News of the World and found that celebrities, politicians and members of the British Royal Family but in July 2011 it was found out that members of the public such as those affected by the 7/7 bombings, British soldiers and Milly Dowler and others were also hacked.
Journalists of NoW hacked into the voicemail of many people to find illicit stories.
Clive Goodman was arrested in January 2007 after pleading guilty for hacking into the phones of royal aides'.
4, 000 were possible targets in the scandal, these included Hugh grant, Steve Coogan, Sienna Miller, Boris Johnson and the list goes on.
It got worse when Milly Dowler and relatives of dead UK soldiers were included in those who were hacked.

My Shoes Advert

Analysing My Own Advert

My Idea for an Advert

I will be advertising shoes, my unique selling point will be that they can be used in any situation, casual, sport, formal, etc. I will have an actor such as Chris Evans who has been in a lot of films recently because he is very popular at the moment, and he played a superhero which makes it even better because he is a role model.
The name of the product will be Morales because it will be easy to remember and catchy.
The main colour will be dark purple as it appeals to both men and women.

Adverts for Shoes

This is Adidas advertising their new shoes and slogan, "All Day I Dream About S-" I like how they have incorporated the shoes design into the cloud, it makes it eye catching, but I don't like the colours, they are very dull, even the shoe is white so there is no attention to them. It doesn't have a great unique selling point, only that they are "electrifying". It doesn't have a clear target audience but it appeals to young people because of the thunder which makes it exciting. 

This is Vans advertising their "Half Cab" shoes, I like that the name is from skateboarding so they have a skateboarder advertising it. This is also the selling point, it is saying that buying these shoes will make you a better skateboarder. The target audience is teenagers and young adults because it is very exciting  and there is a crowd to impress.

This is Converse advertising their high tops, I like how unique it is using an everyday situation, the unique selling point is that they are saying that the shoes are so appealing and strong that even gum can't stick to them, the target audience is people who go out a lot because they need to have strong and durable shoes. 

Conventions of Adverts

1. Slogan
2. Main image
3. Title
4. A theme/colour
5. Company logo
6. Brand logo/name

Analyzing Clever Adverts

• How can you tell who the target audience is? (age, gender, interests etc)

This advert is aimed at women who are about to get married and want to lose weight. 

• What is the “unique selling point” of the product making you DESIRE this product (ie why should you buy THIS product)

It promises to help you lose weight before your wedding, something a lot of women would want.

• Why would an audience like this advert or be "interested" by it?

The picture shows a bride falling through the cake because she is too heavy, and brides will worry about their appearance at their wedding so they will be interested in it. 

What do the colours in the advert signify? (about the product, company or audience)

All of the colours are similar.

Rooney and Lucozade Advert

In this lesson I found out how to use a variety of pictures and effects to create an advert. We used the pen tool and the Render features under Filter. I added lighting effects and designs in the background to make it more appealing. 

How I am going to be marked

Media Level Ladder

Photoshop Editing

I learnt how to cut out a part of an image, this time it was a person and then I added her to a background. We used the pen tool to draw around her, then added a "feather", took away the background and inserted a new background.

How ethnicity is portrayed in the media

Introduced, I am going to research how ethnicity is portrayed in the media, positive, negative or stereotypes for example. I chose this topic as south Asian are not represented much and I'm interested how different ethnicity's are shown, finding similarities and differences.

TV:
In the Big Bang Theory one of the main characters is Raj, an Indian doctor who isn't proud of culture and enjoys his life in America greatly. He is shown as very shy and is a stereotype "nerd", just like the rest of the cast. He has an even further problem as he cannot speak to women if he isn't drunk. He has an accent and a lot the things he says are funny because they are negative about it him. I like the way he is portrayed because many times in Media, Indian's are very religious and flamboyant, whilst here he is a proud american.


Everybody Hates Chris

This program is loosely based of a young Chris Rock's life, with him narrating. It follows Chris' teenage life in Brooklyn, he attends an all white school, with a racist but naive teacher who is attracted to African-american people so she sympathizes with Chris but often in a stereotypical way. His family is often struggling with money as his father works 2 jobs and Chris himself has to have an after school job. A lot of the humor comes from how Chris is treated being an only black kid in his school or how his parents are very strict, stereotypical african-american parents.




Skins

The character Thomas has a heavy African accent and his mother is very strict and he finds trouble adjusting to life in Britain, in the second season he becomes a drug dealer, which is stereotypical.



Movies:

Harold and Kumar is a film series about two asian-american "stoners" who embark on a simple journey which ends up going horribly wrong. Kumar is very different from the indian stereotype, he is very lazy and a free spirir, not afraid to do anything he wants. Harold is very much as you would expect him to be, he is a hard working investment banker, he is very uptight and the opposite of his roommate. It shows that asian-american's can also be easy going at the same time as being very smart.

Of Mice and Men is set in the 1920's during the Great Depression, one of the characters is an african-american stable-hand who is isolated from the others because of his skin color. He is frequently referenced in a racist manner, but the writer wasn't racist himself, this character was introduced to show racism at the time.

Although the film is about a white rapper, the film has racism in it as his african-american peers do not respect him in the rapping scene. They believe that because he isn't black he will bad a bad rapper.

News:

Riots in Tottenham after Mark Duggan shooting protest

There were riots in Tottenham erupted after Mark Duggan was reportedly shot and killed because of his race, soon the riots spread over the country, for no specific reason.

Hideously diverse Britain: why so few black football managers?

Kelis upset by 'slave' insult in London

BBC Research

1&2. The British Broadcasting Company was founded on 18th October 1922 by John Reith.
3. The purpose of the BBC is to broadcast news to the British public.
4. The BBC are funded by the TV license everyone has to pay for.


5. BBC is on TV, radio and internet.
6. The BBC has 10 TV channels and 16 radio channels.

7. It is important to have the PSB so we can have programs which are made for the public and not commercial success. The point of these programs are to educate, inform and entertain everyone in the UK of every race and gender.
8. I think we should have a license fee to continue broadcasting PSB programs such as the news and drama but its also bad because it costs a lot of money especially for those who pay for Sky or Virgin Media.

Assessment September the 13th

In the exam I got an overall C grade and my target minimum grade is a B. My strengths are understanding the audience and new technologies. I can improve by finishing my work and understanding media language.

News Corporation

• 1953 - Rupert Murdoch takes over his fathers business after he died
• 1957 - News Limited launches TV week
• 1960-1969 - Cumberland Newspapers, the Sydney Daily, the Sunday Mirror and The Sun were acquired. The firm establishes Australia's first national newspaper, The Australian.
• 1973 - News Ltd enter the US market
• 1988 - FOX broadcasting company begins operation
• 1989 - SKY television is launched. 
• 2001 - Fox Family Worldwide Inc is sold

Different Mediums

1. Books
2. Newspapers
3. Magazines
4. Music
5. Radio
6. Sports
7. Studios
8. TV
9. Internet

Companies they own

1. FOX
2. FX
3. National Geographic 
4. Sky
5. Wall Street Journal
6. News of the World
7. The Sun
8. myspace.com
9. ign.com

My Media Interest

I like watching different types of movies, this week I watched Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, New York, I Love You and Inception.

My favorite comedy movies of the summer were Hangover 2 and The Inbetweener movie.


My favorite TV show at the moment is Supernatural.