Thursday 5 December 2013

IMPORTANT - Please read!

We are aware and encourage you to work together on your research and planning. However, as your film (unless it is clear that somebody has not taken part or pulled their weight) will be similar. Research and planning and evaluation are where you can extend your thinking and get distinctive marks.

In order for us to fairly award marks for Research and Planning to each of you and to ensure groups remain harmonious and joyous you will need to do some or all of the following:

1. Note on each post who was responsible for it. Eg: if whole group put 'Whole Group' if one or two individuals make that clear too.

2. Personalise work. If you are just uploading each other's work then you need to go in and change it to put your own personal touch on it (this may not always be possible).

3. Add extra content on top of that work completed by your group.

4. Keep a log of how you have used your time (this is suggested on the Portfolio checklist) - you may have to do this retrospectively.

Generally, make sure you are sharing the burden of the group work and not taking advantage of one or two people's hard work.

Wednesday 27 November 2013

Stephen King

Nice infographic on Stephen King, who although an author, is very influential in the world of the thriller film genre. You could use this alongside other sources for a key director/industry figure. You may also choose to use the infographic method of presentation.

You can make your own inforgraphs using infogr.am (thanks to Danny for this!)

http://www.theguardian.com/culture/picture/2013/nov/25/stephen-king-infographic

Wednesday 13 November 2013

Downloadable storyboards, artist contracts etc...

This site is quite useful for standard documents related to film making. Some of them may seem quite irrelevant for your film/video but it is a good piece of research and planning to show that you have got your performers to sign a contract etc...



http://dependentfilms.net/files.html

Tuesday 5 November 2013

OCR Examples of students blogsites

Have a look at the following links and check out the marks they received. These are from the very useful OCR Media Studies weebly site - make sure you have a look at each of them and the marks BUT also read the short comments explaining why they got that particular mark.

Examiner's feedback

Kamini's Thriller Blog

Snehal's Thriller Blog

Anujan's Thriller Blog


important: by all means use ideas from these blogsites (methods of presentation/approaches to research and planning/ways of working/ways in which you may improve on this student's work...) but DO NOT copy these students' ideas. (a) It is plagiarism which is both unfair to the student and dishonest (b) As they are on OCR's official website it would be possibly the least effective bit of cheating possible!!

For your thriller research and planning, use your foundation portfolio checklists and if you come up with your own ideas and are not sure whether they are useful pieces of research and planning then check with myself or Mr Hudson.

Wednesday 23 October 2013

Previous Students' examples of Film Openings

A worthwhile piece of research and one that you can textually analyse or at least comment on the strengths etc..of, is to look at previous students' examples of film openings. Searching on YouTube or Vimeo with any of the criteria 'OCR G321 Media Studies Foundation Film' should bring up hundreds of examples. Try and narrow your research to thrillers and beware of people claiming they got 'top marks' or 'Level 4' - it may be wishful thinking.

Check out our current Y13s work from last year:

Tupton Hall Media
The following students videos all got Level 4 marks (see criteria below):
Amy, Emma, Misha, Molly
Dom. Dom and Harry
Callum, Georgia, Gem and Olly
Plus...Kennedy, Amy, Tyler etc were right at the top of Level 3

The following thrillers also got Level 4 marks - the first one got 59/60

The Edge

John Hunter

The Hoods

The Pursuit

This one isn't a thriller but does show an interesting and inventive use of titles.
Roses are Red

Remember this is
 
Level 4 48–60 marks
 
There is evidence of excellence in the creative use of most of the following technical skills:


-holding a shot steady, where appropriate;

-framing a shot, including and excluding elements as appropriate;

-using a variety of shot distances as appropriate;

-shooting material appropriate to the task set;

-selecting mise-en-scène including colour, figure, lighting, objects and setting;

-editing so that meaning is apparent to the viewer;

-using varied shot transitions and other effects selectively and appropriately for the task set;

-using sound with images and editing appropriately for the task set;

-using titles appropriately
 

Monday 14 October 2013

Confusion with blogger - PLEASE READ!

There has been some confusion with blogger and how your site links to the main blog hub.
Hopefully this clarifiies it but if not please see me ASAP.

1. You should have set up your OWN blog site. You can do this by clicking 'create new blog' . Put your name, AS Media Studies Foundation Portfolio and your candidate number (if you know it). Do not post directly to our blog hub, this acts just as a gateway for us and the examiner to find their way to your blog site. Also this is where Mr Hudson and myself will be posting advice ang guidance and you can also look at each others' blog sites.

2. You need to make sure your blog site is not a google + account otherwise the link on our hub page won't take us or the examiner directly to your blog - it will take them to your google + page which pulls together all of your googly ways. You can change this back by clicking on the link at the bottom of this...
https://support.google.com/blogger/answer/1375600?hl=en

Tuesday 17 September 2013

A useful guide to storyboarding!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ux_Em1lVsjI

Welcome to the THS Y12DMS2 Blog Hub!

Greetings student people! 

This will be the hub for your Media Studies portfolio work. You should be linked in the bottom corner, if not let me know as soon as possible. I will use the blog hub to monitor your work so it is essential that you are uploading/posting everything you have done. 

I will be posting information regarding deadlines, course information, practical tips and anything else relevant! 




You should be posting regularly and, as this Media Studies, using a variety of methods of presentation to make your blog suuuuuuper cooooool. Ahem. 

Please see the list below to find out loads of different ways you can present your work on blogger. Let me know if there is anything you want to do, but can't access here, and I will ask IT to unblock it.

Credit to Andy Wallis, Teacher of Media (check out his presentations on Slideshare) for coming up with this list.

No excuses now, be creative...