The central hub provides help and advice for your foundation portfolio.

Access to indivdual blogs can be gained through this central hub

Friday 4 May 2012

Moderation Sample

Dear Moderator, Please find below the requested coursework for moderation.

5960 Kate Victoria Wilson http://kateasfoundationportfolio.blogspot.co.uk/

5557 Matthew James Race http://asmattrace.blogspot.co.uk/

5318 Amber Florentina Loizou http://amberloizou.blogspot.co.uk/

5546 Michael Syndey Alan Proffitt http://michaelproffitt.blogspot.co.uk/

5131 Sarah Hicks http://sarahhicks94.blogspot.co.uk/

5050 Daniel Harry Gustard http://dangustard.blogspot.co.uk/

5112 Thomas James Heath http://tomheath310.blogspot.co.uk/

5827 Chloe Tjaguns http://tomheath310.blogspot.co.uk/

Resit Candidate:

4413 Jake Christopher Williams http://jakewilliams93.blogspot.co.uk/

Tuesday 27 March 2012

Useful "CREATIVE" tools and websites

• www.bulbbl.us - online brainstorm/mindmap creator
• www.prezi.com - interactive presentations
• www.pixton.com - an online comic strip creator
• www.scrapblog.com - online scrapbook tool
• www.mashuparts.com - the ability to combine multimedia to form another product
• www.mindmeister.com - online mindmap creator
• www.gliffy.com - flowchart creator etc
• www.evernote.com - upload photos and make notes on top to preserve ideas
• www.my-diary.org - free online diary
• www.goanimate.com - create animations for free
• www.polljunkie.com - create online polls/questionnaires
• www.animoto.com - create short 30 second videos out of photos or video clips
• www.authorstream.com - upload and share powerpoints to blogs/websites
• www.slideshare.com - upload and share documents to blogs
• www.mixbook.com - create photo albums and share online
• www.timeglider.com - create online timelines for projects/research
• www.timetoast.com - create online timelines for projects/research
• www.voki.com - convert text to speech – online voice for websites
• www.vcasmo.com - synchronise videos and slideshows side by side
• www.worditout.com - word cloud generator
• www.a.freshbrain.com - decision making tool
• www.openstreetmap.org - online editable world map useful for location details
• www.tadalist.com - free to-do list creator
• www.video2mp3.net - convert videos from youtube to mp3
• www.wallwisher.com - online comments board
• www.jigsawplanet.com - jigsaw puzzle maker – turn images into puzzles

Useful Websites: Help in refining research and planning for Moving Image producers

Some useful websites

• www.artofthetitle.com - analyse the opening titles of films
• http://thefilmstage.com/2010/09/03/the-25-most-memorable-opening-scenes-in-film/ - top 25 most memorable film openings
• www.watchthetitles.com - a focus on the titles used in openings
• http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/12/19/30-unforgettable-movie-title-sequences/ - 30 unforgettable film openings
• www.petesmediablog.blogspot.com - Pete Fraser’s blog with great advice for students and teachers
• www.bbfc.co.uk - film classification site
• http://www.madtuts.com/2010/02/85-famous-tv-movie-fonts/ - film fonts for analysis
• www.stonewashed.net/free-music.html - copyright-free music
• www.bfi.org.uk/filmtvinfo/publications/16+/ - download 16+ study guides on different aspects of film

Monday 26 March 2012

Evaluations the Exam Board state is "good"

However - we want you to incorporate a wider range of digital technology.



A Creative approach to the evaluation

Untitled from daniel finn on Vimeo.

Evaluation Question 7 - Looking back at your preliminary task (the school magazine task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the main task?

This post should be all about your skills development. Create a powerpoint or an online mindmap (There's loads of free online software if you do a google search).

In this question you need to show how your skills have progressed from the prelim task to the main task. You could organise slides as so;

1. Research and planning - how have your skills developed and what benefit has this had on your work? Did you produce work more in line with professional practice as you have a more detailed understanding of the  conventions of real media products in the form you worked in? Did you manage your time better? Was your work well planned etc.?

2.Construction - include images of details of your prelim and main task and compare them. How did your skills develop using hardware and software and how is this improvement evident in your work? 

Think about: photography composition, page layout and design (alignment, kerning and leading, text to image ratio), use of fonts, use of models and selecting more appropriate mise-en-scene, content of the magazine, etc.

If you did the video task then use still shots from your prelim and main task and discuss:
  • Shot Composition
  • Holding a shot steady
  • Lighting
  • Locations
  • Actors
  • Intertitles
  • Sound


Examples of previous student work

1.


2. http://devonlowe.blogspot.co.uk/2011/04/evaluation-7-looking-back-at-your.html

3. Evaluation Question 7
View more PowerPoint from cjw9494

Evaluation Question 6 - What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?

In pairs, take a picture of each other holding/using the kit (Hardware) you have used throughout the production. This might just be the camera and tripod or the Imac but there may be other things you want in the shot.

Drop the image onto your blog and annotate it, saying what you learnt about it from using it.

You should also include screen grabs of your products in the software that you've used and annotate it, saying what features you used and why. How did this piece of software improve or benefit your production? Photoshop, InDesign, Final Cut Express, GarageBand, Itunes, FreeSFX.com, Prezi etc.

Your written text need only be minimal. You could include reference to all the online and computer programs you have used as well such as Blogger and Slideshare.


be sure to provide more detail regarding the benefits to your production.

Evaluation Question 5 - How did you attract/address your audience?

This question requires you to refer to the forms and conventions that you used in order to appeal to your target audience (you'll need to refer back to your initial primary audience research).

You MUST include some audience feedback on your finished products.

This question will require some substantial work outside of lessons.

To complete this question you must move through 3 parts:

1. Insert your products into your blog and annotate them in line with professional magzines which have a similar target audience - what have you done that's similar in order to have audience appeal (colours, poses, costume, fonts). Then point out what stylistic decisions you made in light of your initial primary audience research (did you challenge any of the professional texts in order to make your product appeal to its intended audience?)

2. Highlight how you made changes to your rough cut in light of audience feedback (include images of your rough cuts and compare to your final products, clearly signalling where the changes took place and why).

3.Conduct some final audience feedback with your target audience. The bulleted questions below would make a useful start.
  • What draws your attention to the product?
  • What genre is it and how do you know?
  • What do you consider are the strengths of the product?
  • What social groups does it represent and how?
  • Would you purchase the product and why?
  • How would you improve the product?

Below is an example of an animation that you could create to show your findings:



GoAnimate.com: Audience Feedback by nnaisbett

Like it? Create your own at GoAnimate.com. It's free and fun!

Check out previous student responses:


Evaluation Question 4 - Who would be the audience for your media product?


For this question you can either create a video montage of who your audience would be or a cut and stick A4 moodboard or an online poster or sketch with a supporting paragraph Try and use;http://www.glogster.com/ You have 1 lesson for this task. Either way you need to; 1. Visually show who your audience members are (a selection of photographs and cut out magazine images would be good) 2. Outline what tastes they have (shops, labels, drinks etc.) 3. What they do in their spare time (sport, clubbing, going to gigs etc.) 4. What type of music or genre of films to they listen to/watch? (images of bands, cd covers) Detailed original audience research will help you greatly with this question. In your supporting paragraph you could write about their age, socio-economic status and their gender. Embeddyour video from YouTube into your blog or scan in your moodboard.

Here is an example of a question 4: This is one of our students. It just needs a brief explanatory paragraph underneath. The moodboard was made in glogster.com (no need to register). The original poster, when scrolled over, enlarges individual text boxes and images.





Some free online mood board creators:

http://olioboard.com/

http://www.imgspark.com/user/register/

Wednesday 21 March 2012

Evaluation Question 3 - What kind of media institution might distribute your product and why?

For this question you need to refer back to your institutional research in your blog and our instructions at http://qefoundationportfolio2011.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/post-research-into-institutions-that.html

1. First you need to outline the stages of production that your product would go through. www.skillset.org is very useful. Then you need to outline what role a distributor has. This can be done as a
short paragraph with some illustration to support points that you make.

2. You need to research into magazine/film distributors: What company would distribute your product. You should look at their magazine portfolio for this - do they distribute magazines from the same music genre as yours?

3. When thinking about why they might distribute your product think about the types of magazines they already work with - do they know the target audience well? What benefit would this have when distributing your product? Is your product similar but slightly different from what they already sell? Why might this be a good thing? Does the company have a good reputation? Why is this important? Is your product mainstream or more niche (this will affect the company that works with it)?

4. How would your magazine/film be advertised? How are similar magazines/films advertised and where are they sold/viewed?

5. How would your product be distributed? Think about changing society as we see the emergence of web 2.0. Alongside shops how else might your product reach people e.g. would people subscribe through the web and have the magazine posted to their house? For Video think about Youtube, festivals, cinema etc.

Here are some examples from previous students:





Helpful resources:

Tuesday 20 March 2012

Evaluation Question 2 - How did you represent social groups?

Take note - there is a difference between question 2 and question 4 (Who would be the audience for your media product?) and question 5 (How did you attract / address your audience?).

Here are some examples of student responses to question 2.

What do you think is good or not so good about
  • what they say about the question?
  • how the response to the question is presented?







Which social groups are represented in your product - in the images and the written text, or in the shots and the sound? *
How would you define them? (What do the examples above describe in order to define their social groups?)
How did you represent them? (Analyse your own product illustrating how you've used micro details to construct representations of particular social groups.) This is the most important part of the question.


* If you don't know which groups are represented in your product,
  1. you should have considered it when planning - look back in your blog
  2. try uktribes - for some of the content you'll need a password: try consumer. DO NOT spend your lesson on this: indulge your curiosity in your own time. Use the lesson just to get some tribal names and images.

Then decide how you will present your response to the question - video, slideshare Powerpoint...
Useful Final Cut skills include how to insert and time images, scale and position them, add text, add voiceover and export for the web - all very easy.

Advice on evaluations from an examiner - Julian McDougall

Friday 16 March 2012

Evaluation Question 1

Evaluation Question1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

For this question we'd like you to produce a video or a prezi.(examples have been included at the end of the post). You could do a powerpoint and convert it in slideshare if you'd prefer. If you don't create a video for this question then you will need to for another.
Videos can be split screen with half of you discussing your production and comparing it to real media texts and the other half examples of what you're discussing or you can opt for a voice over with images on screen of what you're discussing.

You have 2 lessons to complete this question.
PRINT
You should cover the following;

  1. Reference your initial research (textual and photography) - what did you find to be the forms and conventions of the magazine genre you were researching?
  2. How did you use these forms and conventions in your products?
  3. Did you challenege any of the forms and conventions? How and why? (you may want to reference your initial audience research here.
You must - compare you products to professional products. You should include screen shots of both your work and professional texts and highlight the similarities. Strong work would cut up professional texts and aspects of their own work to discuss the micro detail.

The aspects we would like you to consider across your work are:

The title of the magazine
mise-en-scene of images
Costumes and props
People
Title font and style
Written content
Music genre and how your magazine suggests it
Layout
Contents pages

MOVING IMAGE
You should cover the following;

  1. Reference your initial research (textual and photography) - what did you find to be the forms and conventions of the magazine genre you were researching?
  2. How did you use these forms and conventions in your products?
  3. Did you challenege any of the forms and conventions? How and why? (you may want to reference your initial audience research here.
You must - compare you products to professional products. You should include screen shots of both your work and professional texts and highlight the similarities. Strong work would cut up professional texts and aspects of their own work to discuss the micro detail.

The aspects we would like you to consider across your work are:

Shot Distance / Angle
Camera movement
Framing Decisions
Editing Pace (shot duration - rhythm & pace)
Lighting (high key, low key, natural)
Sound (digetic, non-diegetic and dialogue)
Use of Intertitles
Use of logos
Costume
Props
Location
Character Type



Here are some examples of past student work:

PRINT WORK


http://jennylee4.blogspot.com/2011/03/evaluation-question-one.html

MOVING IMAGE


Monday 27 February 2012

Current Logos

Like Print there are some very good logos being produced:


Jonny Ainsley has even produced a YouTube Video of his logos:


Current Photoshoots

There are some really good shots been taken by current AS students:






INTERIM DEADLINE

ALL STUDENTS SHOULD HAVE ROUGH CUTS OF THEIR WORK COMPLETED BY MONDAY 5TH MARCH. YOU WILL RECEIVE WRITTEN FEEDBACK IN CLASS - THE TEACHER WILL SPEAK TO EACH STUDENT INDIVIDUALLY.

ONCE YOU'VE RECEIVED YOUR FEEDBACK SCAN IT INTO YOUR BLOG AND MAKE A BULLET POINT LIST IN A NEW POST (ROUGH CUT FEEDBACK) OF HOW YOU INTEND TO IMPROVE YOUR WORK.

Updating your blogs

Photoshoots
Remember to create posts for photoshoots - upload your photoshoot images and annotate them, outlining the strengths and weaknesses of each shot. Try to refer to your textual research and compare your work to that of professional practice.

Images of me filming
Both print and moving image producers should upload images of themselves filming and taking photographs to act as evidence of your construction.

Updated Shooting Schedules
Moving Image should log the time codes of each of the shots made on your original shooting schedules and then re-scan them into your blog.

Screenshots
Remember to take regular screen shots:

Print Potential post titles - Front cover construction, contents construction & DPS construction

Moving Image Potential post titles - Soundtrack construction, Logo construction, Film Opening construction.

Make sure that you annotate screen shots, stating what features of the software you've been using.

Thursday 23 February 2012

PREVIOUS STUDENT PHOTOSHOOTS





PHOTOSHOOTS

People have started their shoots and what I'm noticing is that images are SAFE.

Remember this is a music magazine. You need to be thinking about your mise-en-scene:

Hair styles - do they match the genre? take inspiration from current artists and bands

Make-Up - again is it safe should you be thinking about elaborate make-up to match the genre?

Costume - don't shoot in normal college clothes - would you go out dressed in your college wear -NO - so glam up for the shoots.
Below are some ideas for inspiration and some previous student work follows.

Front Cover Images:




















































For Double Page Spreads how about:























































MAKE SURE THAT WHATEVER YOU'RE DOING IT RESEMBLES PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE.

Monday 20 February 2012

Mon 20th Feb

You should start this week with a progress update post. In this post you should include the following:

There are 6 weeks until the Easter break which means - 6 weeks of lesson time to complete my foundation portfolio.

There are 60 marks available for construction and 20 marks for Research and Planning and 20 marks for evaluation - 100 marks in total

To achieve a grade:

A I need to get 80 marks

B I need to get 70 marks

C I need to get 60 marks


To be in level 4 (grade A/B) my work must demonstrate excellence throughout.

By Monday 5th March I should have a rough cut of my products

By Monday 19th March my products should be completed

From Monday 19th - Friday 30th March I will be working on my 7 evaluation questions.

The my completed portfolio should be submitted for formal marking on Monday 16th April. I should use the Easter break to make any minor amendments to my work.

In order to meet these deadlines I will:

(insert your own action plan here)

Friday 10 February 2012

Draft R&P feedback

Once your receive your draft research and planning feedback you should create a new post:

Draft marking

.....scan in your feedback sheet.
Then write a short paragraph underneathe the feedback which outlines changes that you intend to make to your work and how you intend to do this.

Monday 6 February 2012

RESEARCH & PLANNING DEADLINE

THE DEADLINE FOR ALL ASPECTS OF RESEARCH & PLANNING IS

FRIDAY 10TH FEB 2012

Work will be marked over half term - NO EXCUSES ACCEPTED! so don't try.

Remember to refer to the level 4 exemplar blogs!!!!!!!


REMEMBER ROOM 722 WILL BE OPEN ON TUESDAY AND THURSDAY TILL 5:30.

Print should have the following posts in their blog by Friday:

2. Textual Analysis Prezi

3. Secondary Audience Research with write up of who, specifically, the target audience is.

4. Primary Audience Research - Questionnaire & Focus group with detailed write up of findings and how they will influence the product you create.

5. Institutional Research - write up of the companies involved in the production and distribution of your product and how their status affects the product. Also you'll need to include a write up of the stages of production involved in creating a music magazine and the job roles associated with each stage. Higher marks will be awarded for students who acknowledge how this will affect them (what roles they will take on and the skills they need).

6. Inspirational Photography Analysis

8. Mood Board of other inspirational images with annotation

9. Planning Article

10.Flatplans (with supporting rationale, justifying the design choices made - the connotations of this and how it will appeal to the intended audience)

11. Assesment of Flat Plans and Write up of Improvements I need to make

12. Article Planning

13. Recce of Location

14. Risk & Hazzard Assessments

15.Call Sheets

16. Model Release Forms

17.
Evidence of me organising costume, Props & Make-Up (Images of me collating the equipment, images of me testing make-up and costumes on friends)

18. Test Shots (Photographs of practiced poses for Cover, contents & DPS)


Filmers should have the following in their blogs:

2. Textual Analysis Prezi – emphasis on TITLES!!

3. Secondary Audience Research with write up of whom, specifically, the target audience is.

4. Primary Audience Research

5. Institutional Research- write up of the companies involved in the production and distribution of your product and how their status affects the product. Also you'll need to include a write up of the stages of production involved in creating a music magazine and the job roles associated with each stage. Higher marks will be awarded for students who acknowledge how this will affect them (what roles they will take on and the skills they need).

6.
Inspirational Image Analysis

7. Research into Logos

8.Storyboards

9.Animatic

10. Shooting Schedules / Shot List

11. Recce of Location

12. Risk & Hazzard Assessments

13. Call Sheets

14. Model Release Forms

15. Researching Sound and making sound (screen shots + .mov of MP3)

16. Sketches of potential logos you’ll make in Photoshop

17. Any test footage that you've taken