How does your media product represent particular social groups?

Our Media Thriller represents multiple social groups because we have many different types in it. With it being the  Vietnam war there are Americans and Vietnamese people which are represented in our thriller. The gender differences are also apparent because there's a woman and man on together on screen and we see the differences between them. The comparison between the old and the young also get shown because the shots we take show that the old have much more memories than the younger generation and are a lot wiser. The Americans are shown very stereotypically in our intro because they're seen to be tough, armed fighters who will waste bullets on the enemy this is shown by our American soldier. The Vietcong is shown very blandly like from a photo, we got a part Chinese girl to dress up in the Vietcong costume but no in depth study was made. The young is represented by the couple before the war all happy and full of life, and the old is shown by the bitter veteran staring at the gravestone.

What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

To get our thriller into cinemas nationally or internationally we would have to find a company that would be willing to distribute it for us. With our film being a thriller intro we would offer it to universal studios because they have a good history with thrillers and have become famous because of it these include Jaws, The Wolf Man and Dracula. These films have had good ratings and reviews so with Universal Studios guidance we could make our intro better before distributing it. Another company we would offer to would be Paramount Pictures this is because this is a company that focuses mainly on action films these includes Transformers, Saving Private Ryan and Star Trek. Although our film is a thriller it does have a considerable amount of action in it this is where Paramount would come into the picture because of their popular action films this company will help boost our film. Another reason to have them is because Paramount has a deal and good history with Tom Hanks (we might meet him). This is what we would do if distributing to a cinema below is what we would do if we were selling the thriller just as a DVD.

In all honesty I don't see our Thriller opening doing very well at first, because of it's shortness and amateur quality, no offence to the rest of the group but this is our first time being marked on filming, we wouldn't be able to get into anywhere which has a large empire of stores across the country. So we would have to start small this means independents small stores that probably sell their products for cheap prices, the stores we would look for would be ones selling old-new DVD's and maybe VHS, retro and modern games but the reason for going there would be the cheap DVD collections or retro video games. An example of this is the now closed Music Zone in Stafford town it had the quality's we were searching for and if it hadn't closed I believe they would've distributed our product. However because that shop closed due to the governments credit crunch, damn them, so we would focus on Blockbuster stores, Dalons next to Stafford Prison, Disks in Stafford Town and Chips again in Stafford town. These places would be our main focuses for distributing our Thriller intro. As the weeks go by and our intro becomes more popular we would try to strike a deal with ASDA, Sainsbury's and Tesco to again boost the popularity of our Thriller intro and with the backing of the stores that have popularised it we would have a better chance. After a certain amount of time had passed we would try and show our product to hmv but I don't see us getting any better than the supermarkets.

How did you attract/address your audience?

We attracted audiences to watch it by the following ways. First off when it was released we posted it on Facebook so that friends from each of us could view on it and comment on it, this is without a doubt the best method we took because there are more people on Facebook than anywhere else and we could inform the most people by it. Another way was that we could tell people at school about it too but seeing as most of these people would see it from Facebook anyway it made it quite redundant. Another method was Youtube although it was necessary to upload it there anyway, the title memories is different to most and at the same time simple so if people here about it and want to look it up they won't be going through pages of either too simple titles or ones that take forever to spell. The final form of advertisement was all members of the cast and crew found a way of spreading the news of the thriller round so it was guaranteed that over 100 people would view it. The fact that our Thriller was flexible with its age rating was also helpful, I'd say it was at least a 12 upwards. The reason for this was that there wasn't any nudity and not buckets of blood and gore, but there was still enough violence for certain ages to stay clear of it.

What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

The technology's I have learnt about while making our Thriller have been digital cameras, Mac Airs, and the right and wrong cables to use when connecting the two. I have been using the digital camera to film the entire thriller as shown in some photos beforehand. The camera is simple enough to turn on, off and start recording, I had no trouble with getting it to work once I found out how to record and play back. The only trouble we had was that when playing back you had to make sure the video was right at the end before starting recording again. Though I had no trouble with this when Ben filmed the graveyard scene he accidentally filmed over previous footage that we took in Cannock it left a gap between the death of the Vietcong and when he returns to the other soldier. Though Ben and Sam initially did the editing I learnt how to use my Mums Mac Air in such a way that I could add effects, sounds and visual effects to the video. The only problem I found with this was that for every computer you need a different type of wire, which brings me to the next point. The wires were the biggest problem to come to terms with it took me three days to find the right wire to get the camera compatible with the computer. Other than this though I was able to learn a lot about the camera and editing which should help me in later productions.

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

While filming our Thriller I tried to use as many techniques and camera shots as you would see on most films and shows shown on television. Most of the camera shots we use are edited well so that the scene cuts to another quite nicely, this also prevents from having any long panning shots, films like 'Sin City' can pull those off but we couldn't with ours being set much different. Another way we've used camera techniques from professional media productions is that our camera shots don't shake. I know I have mentioned this before but the fact that our camera shots don't shake in the film does count as us learning from TV developers. The shots we took initially followed the way films take their shots but it was the editing that developed it for us. The muzzle flashes, music and sound effects in the thriller opening are all edited in. Another way we've developed the filming is that every time we filmed a scene we would always do it more than once so that we could pick the best one and use it for the final product. Though our Thriller was more of a war film and a lot less scary or enticing as it should have been but we were able to fit it to be a successful production as shown by the likes and dislikes of our video.