Research into War Films

Audience Questions for Video Questionnaire on Aftermath:

 Video Questionnaire:

In preparation for our video questionnaire, we came up with ten questions that we believed would be suitable to ask our potential audience in order to gain an insight into the intial thoughts surronding our film. Here is an overview of the questions we are planning to ask:

Audience Questionnaire for Aftermath:

1.       What is your name?

2.       What age are you?

3.       What is your gender?

4.       What is your occupation?

5.       What type of films do you usually watch?

6.       Where do you go to watch films?

7.       What genre do you think our film falls into?

8.       What settings would you expect to see in our film?

9.       Where would you expect to see a film like ours?

10.   What type of music do you believe would suit our film?

11.   What certificate do you think our film is?

12.   Do you think the storyline is intriguing and is it understandable?

13.   Do you think our title is appropriate to the storyline?

14.   Any suggestions about how our storyline could be improved?

1

Research into title sequences

Opening titles 

Opening title sequences are often short to allow more time in the short film for the plot. Some filmmakers have a specific style of title sequence that can be seen throughout their shorts. On sites such as YouTube opening titles are often left out as the title can be seen throughout the film just underneath the video player. Opening titles can consist of just the film’s title or can also include information about the cast and possibly crew

Types of opening titles

The artsy montage - The artsy montage is a montage of shots of items that give hints about the films tone or plot. These are accompanied by overlapping text

Stray Dog by Bertie Gilbert

The 56 Year Old Boy by Bertie Gilbert

The lead in - The lead in can consist of a montage but the main difference is that the final shot leads straight into the film

The Fleeting Little Life of Peter Wright By Tim H and Sammy Paul

The plain text on blank background - The plain text on a blank background is exactly that. Text on a plain coloured background

7.2 by Nida Manzoor

The plain text overlay - The plain text overlay is similar to the plain text on blank background but instead of being over a coloured background it is overlaid onto the film 

Growth by Elliot Gough

The art card - The art card is a still image that is usually a drawing of the title that is relevant to the film, this can be then followed by a plain text on blank background to list the actors

The Forever Train by PJ Liguori

Closing titles

Closing title lengths can vary from seconds long to a minute, depending on how many people are involved in the project and the style the sequence is in. Just as some filmmakers have a specific style of opening titles they can also have styles of closing tiles. Some short films do not have closing titles and just end. Closing titles contain information about the cast and crew and can sometimes include the title of the film.

Types of closing titles

The plain text - Plain text on a coloured background. The words fade in and fade back out again to change who is on the screen

Office Space by PJ Liguori

The scrolling text - Like the plain text but instead of fading in and out it scrolls along the screen

7.2 by Nida Manzoor

The montage - Made up of clips either from or linked to the film, The text is usually overlaid over the footage but can be followed by a plain text  to get more information across quickly 

Don't Do It by Elliot Gough

The using clips/stills to identify actors - This is made up of clips and screenshots of the characters in a memorable moment and when they appear on screen so does the name of the actor. These are often surrounded by plain text titles and/or scrolling text titles 

7.2 by Nida Manzoor

The inspired by the film - These will often link into the theme of the film, for example the film bellow is about a man who is allergic to technology so the title sequence is on a cork-board

Technophobe by Cyprien

Closing title sequences can also be followed by small after credit scenes such as the example above that can add a small joke or round of a small side plot.

Title sequences on films hosted on websites such as YouTube can differ to traditional short film title sequences. Often they have either an opening title sequence or a closing title sequence. If they have both, one of the sequences usually lasts only seconds to make sure that the film isn't too long. Also closing title sequences often include annotations which make parts of the video clickable, these can take viewers to other videos they have made, behind the scenes footage, or other content creators that were featured in the short. They can also act as text boxes to rely small parts of information that aren't in the credits or that describe where the clickable link takes you. Another difference between traditional shorts and YouTube shorts is that some content creators already have set branding that they put on all of their videos such as an end screen (such as the example from Office Space) so these will often appear at the end of short films.

Music is also an important part of title sequences. The music has to fit the tone of the film or it'll not fit. For example if the film is a comedy, the music can be fast paced and happy but if it is a sad drama the music should be slow and maybe on a piano.

Possible Distributors

 Possible Distributors:

Our film will consist of a British cast and director which will mean that our distribution company will most likely be an international or British business organization. We managed to shortlist three possible distribution companies that we believed would be best suited to sharing our film:

1.Youtube

Youtube acts as a video-sharing website that allows users to upload, view, rate and comment on videos. Youtube is a possible contender for our distributor as most of it's content is uploaded by individuals but can be accessed by well known media corporations like Vevo, BBC and Hulu. This is integral to short film makers as they know it gives them the chance to be noticed by major companies thus contributing to the attention and success of their film. Musicians such as Lana Del Rey, Katy Perry and Justin Bieber were all discovered through the Google subsidiary while film festival recognised projects such as 'BOY' made their debut on the video hosting service. Because Youtube is such an acknowledged platform in which people share their talents, the site is used worldwide by young innovators who want to get their work shared to a wider demographic. This would be ideal for distributing our project because there are no creative limits and it is completely free to upload which means we can spend more on the actual production of our film.

2. Future Shorts

Future Shorts has been supporting short films since 2004 that reaches a half a million audience. It is a recgonised distributor amongst filmakers, the filmmaking industry and the media press due to it's passionate belief that short films can cause a cultural impact because of the unique and innovative ideas that they explore. The company is based in London, which is more accessible to us because our film is British. However, the company does provide opportunites for the films they distribute to be shared worldwide witth a monthly short film festival called Future Shorts ONE, which screens films from people all over the world. Screen Daily acknowledged that Future Shorts "offers a platform for film-makers in 25 countries." This would be ideal for us because it would give our film the opportunity to be viewed by a larger and less niche audience and possibly the chance to be spotted by a distubutor who was interested in making our short film into a feature length one. It has also launched it's own DVD and Web TV services which would be helpful in promoting our film further if it was successful.

 

3. New Form Digital

 New Form Digital is an American distriubtor that aims to develop, produce and distribute short films and internet series to an online audience. This may be helpful to us because of the impact that the internet can have on people through it's use of social media and streaming sites to share creative projects. People now have the ability to communicate with people from all around the world, implying that if our film was enjoyed by an individual, they would most likely forward it onto their friends therefore, taking our film even further regarding the attention that it would recieve. A slight disadvtange with New Form Digital is that the company is primarily American which means it might not be as easy for us to upload to. Also, it is more likely to distribute a web series which isn't a medium that our film falls into which could disadvantage it in some way.

Final Choice:

Overall, we have decided that the best distributor for our film would be Youtube because it's a company that has remained consistently relevant to short filmmakers in sharing their creative projects with people from all over the world. It is a social hub that allows filmmakers to interact with each other and share opinions on their short films that can create the opportunity for it to be shared further but also for creators to make improvements in case our film dosen't make the impact that we initally inteneded it to.