Question 4: How did you use technologies in the construction

and research, planning and evaluation stages?

By: Connor Dokic (C.D)

Evaluation Question

Beginning of the Technology Story of our

groupFrom using an Apple Mac in Media as a group, we have learnt that there was a wide range of different tools and apps available to use to create such magnificent designs through pictures and video creations. That will help to begin the process of our opening title sequence. Here is a list of the technologies which we used to develop our Opening Title Sequence:

• Final Cut

• YouTube

• Weebly

• iTunes

• Camera/Tripod

• Photoshop

• Prezi

• Google Chrome

Final CutWhen we filmed our first couple of clips for our opening sequence. The first thing we had to do was on Final Cut to Log and Transfer. This means that the beginning of the opening title sequence story begins. The Log and Transfer is the beginning where all the individual clips are chosen and uploaded. The sort of things which Final Cut taught us as a group is that you can change each individual clip you have filmed and change the colour balance. This means you can make one clip brighter then the other or change the colour of the scenery to any colour you want. The next we got taught was that you can film with a green careen background and then change backdrop into a motion shot or a still image from using a chaotic colour key. Also it showed us when connect clips up like a timeline we could overlay clips and music together to make the opening sequence much more better and place transitions in between them to make the change over more of a professional look to it and adding motion text to the clips. Once you had finished a video you could then export the final piece as a AVI. File which means you can upload to YouTube. When we added sound to the opening sequence we could adjust the sound to make it low to higher. This means we could make parts of clips more effective because we can make the main music clip quiet and place another sound higher which will make the audience jump. The benefits of learning this skill is that we can develop and present a professional looked opening title sequence/any other video using Final Cut.

YouTubeWhen we finished editing our final opening sequence. We have to place the video on to YouTube. We do this by on Final Cut you import it and it directly imports it to the user of our media department: ‘Churchdownschoolmedia.’ What we got taught was that you can make colour enhancements to the video such as change the fill light, contrast, colour temperature and the Saturation. We can use this to make some parts of the video look more scarier because the darkness changes et. Also we got taught that you can add and change music to the video. Lastly we got taught that you can change the slow motion of the video. We can use slow motion to make some parts look more effective when there is a dramatic Slasher scene.

WeeblyWhen we started the process of making our opening sequence we need to do research and this involved researching the horror industry and constructing our ideas. Everything in terms of work we place on Weebly in a form of a website. What we learnt from placing our work on to this site is how to essentially construct a website by placing things like buttons, pictures, videos on different pages. The buttons we learnt how to link to each pages which means that we made a good pathway through our website. The pictures we placed but we got taught to place them in many ways such as Image with text, gallery, slideshow and image on its on. The videos we placed and we could decide on whether we want the videos a certain size on our website. Also we got taught how to connect other website presentations, documents, videos and work to our website using either the embedded code or file. Lastly we got taught about how to change the colour scheme of our website and we could place different features on the website such as headers for each page and titles for the website.

iTunesWe used iTunes throughout the process of making our opening sequence because it had different soundtracks and sounds which we used and tested throughout the time. Also we learnt that any kind of sound can be imported into iTunes such as one of us doing commentary to a piece of music. Also we got taught that you can upload too many things such as CD’s, Video Camera, Ipod’s, Phones etc.

Camera/TripodWhen we received these 2 objects the camera and tripod. We first got taught how to use the camera such as save clips, delete clips, turn on/off, charge the camera and undo the legs on the tripod. This means that we was ready to use the camera once we learnt this stage. Then we got taught how to film and capture different shots such as the mid shot, close up, long shot etc. By doing this we found out that we could capture different shots by using the tripod and without to give the shot a more of a professional and realistic look. We then got taught the next stage such as once we filed the clip we could adjust the brightness (Colour Balance). Also we learnt about different definitions such as the camera did HD and we learnt we can film in HD when we pressed on that button. The tripod taught us as a group that if you want a very good shot with a professional edge then the tripod is your best bet because it stays still and keeps that shot position for you.

PhotoshopWe used Photoshop at times in the process of making our opening sequence because we needed to take many photos to back up our research such as the location of where we are filming, costumes/make-up and props. This means we wanted to demonstrate our photos in the best quality possible and we did this. How we did this is that we got taught how to place the picture into HD such as tweaking the picture to make the quality of it stand out more such as adding a light effect to brighten up the scenery of the picture. Also we learnt how to had different colours and change the brightness and sharpness in the picture.

PreziWe used Prezi through out the process of making the opening sequence. We got taught how we can extend a mind map into something which can explain something really well such as adding pictures, videos and other files to support the mind map’s subject question. Also we got taught that we can present it in different ways such as when you press the next bit in the Prezi presentation it will do a animation move such as zoom out and then zoom in onto the next part. This really made our Prezi work effectively.

Google Chrome

We used Google Chrome because it is very simple to use and it is the most quickest search engine in terms of response. We also used it for a lot of research and information on tasks such as looking at websites ad finding out about different horror films. The kind of websites which we looked at through Google Chrome was Amazon, LoveFilm, YouTube, Box Office Guru, IMBD, Netflix, BBFC, Google Trends and MetaCritic.