I have created this grid to explain how in each of these stills 'Status' uses conventions of a short film, or breaks away from the conventions. Still #1 shows how we were conventional when displaying the title of our film in the same font used in our ancillary tasks at the very opening of the film. However, we have broken conventions as typically as I found from research, film open with a black background and fade into the first scenes, but we have used a white background as this contrasts the bold black text of our title. Still #2 shows how we followed the conventions of short films and indeed all films by displaying the credits in a rolling transition at the end of the film, apart from the four main credits at the opening which is also conventional.
Still #3 shows how we used new media such as the reference to how modern smart phones send and receive messages, and therefore our target audience of young-adults would be familiar with it. This still also shows how we were conventional in terms of framing as we have abided by the rule of thirds, and still #5 shows how we were conventional when framing intense reaction shots, as we used an extreme close up, which is typically used to show extreme detail and focus purely on one subject in the foreground.
Furthermore, we were also conventional in terms of setting and location as shown in Still #4, as we set our short film in an upper 6th form/ college, and we filmed on location in a school. This is conventional as media texts which have main characters of teenagers, are often set in a school environment.
Still #6 demonstrates how we conventional when determining the characteristics of our protagonist. We wanted to make our central character appear to be masculine, and 'one of the lads' and so to do this we used what conventionally defines these things in a British culture; football. Still #7 emphasises this as James shouts at his team mates, joking and creating 'banter,' as this is seen as conventional for 'one of the lads' to do in a modern day British teenage culture. However, still #6 also shows how we broke away from conventions of film as we didn't use any artificial lighting at all, we used the French New Wave technique of only using natural lighting, in order to make the film appear to be as realistic as possible.
Additionally, we also used conventional framing and camera work when trying to establish the relationship between two characters; in this case, James and his girlfriend. In order to achieve this, we have used the shot which is conventional and often used to show relationships between two characters, a two-shot. We have also used conventional camera work, as shown in stills 10-13, as we have used a shot reverse-shot sequence to show a conversation between two characters. Even though we were conventional in terms of camera work and framing within the shot reverse-shot sequence, we did challenge conventions in terms of sound. We used Jean-Luc Goddard's technique of entirely dropping the sound to symbolise the protagonist not listening.
We also challenged conventions of camera work by using a hand-held technique (as shown in Still #14) without a Steadicam to track the action of the football being passed between all of the player's feet. However, Still #9 show how we followed conventions as unfortunately when bullying occurs it often involves a 'gang' shouting abuse at one person, and so we used this to show how Ashley is bullied for being who he is, in order to make the audience feel sympathetic towards him.
Still #15 shows how we've been quite innovative about the way that we've shown James typing a text message, as we have edited each individual letter of the text message appear on screen seconds apart, as if he is typing it on screen. This is an unconventional way of doing this as usually a text message is displayed simply via a close up shot of a mobile phone screen with the text message on.
Finally, still #16 shows how we challenged conventions at the end of our short film as we used the new media of the editing software Adobe Premier Pro to insert a 'pull focus' effect, which resulted in the screen blurring gradually to black. With all of the short films which I analysed, they simply cut to black to end their films, but chose to insert the focus pull as by making the visual gradually softer this anchors the soft audio music which is gradually brought up, and continues to roll over the credits.
Finally, my film review uses conventions which I have analysed from researching exsisting review pages from Sight&Sound industry magazine, including a large image at the top of the review, a synopsis at the bottom of the review, two thin coloumns displaying the cast and credits and a box of information about the film next to the image.
In order to make my review appear to be as professional as possible and as close to an actual review page from Sight&Sound magazine, I have also added minor features which the page has, including margins and lines precisely in line with the image and the text, the page numbers in the same different bolder and thinner fonts and the Sight&Sound logo in the bottom left hand corner of the page, as well as the exact same font which the different sections of the page use and even the red square bullet point next to the 'synopsis.'
However, my film review page challenges the conventions of an industry film review as usually Sight&Sound wouldn't review a short film, and so I have made my page appear to be a 'Short Film Special.' All of these conventions benefit the target audience as they are provided with all of the information that they need to know, and it is layed out in a clear and easy-to-understand way, so that even if people who are not in the industry are reading the magazine and just have an interest in films, they they can enjoy reading the magazine as well.
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