Unit 8, 4.1 "Explain the individual roles within a specific team" and 4.2 "Explain their responsibilities and outputs within a specific media project life cycle."

Unit 8, 4.1 - "Explain the individual roles within a specific team" and 4.2 - "Explain the responsibilities and outputs within a specific media project life cycle."

There are so many departments in making a feature film, even in independent filmmaking, there are still key roles that need to be filled.

While there are so many departments I can speak about, the one that I have chosen to discuss is the Art Department.

The Art Department is a sector of the film industry I have always had interest in and have appreciated as a difficult project, especially when achieving the aesthetics of the film - making houses look like they're lived in, etc. 

Here is a quick run down of some of the roles in the Art Department:

PRODUCTION DESIGNER:

The Production Designer is the main member on the Art Department. He/she is responsible for the whole Art Department. Their role is crucial in helping the vision of the director come to life. Sometimes, the Production Designer will l begin work on the film months before it heads into production; showing detailed drawings of sets/locations. The overall look of the sets and locations is all down to the Production Designer, who will liase with the Director and DOP (Director of Photography) to get the visual style that is needed.

Production Designer reference

ART DIRECTOR:

Art Directors are the project managers of the Art Department. They help the vision of the Production Designer when it comes to the locations and sets that are needed. Responsible for the Art Department expenditures and schedule, the Art Director helps the Production Designer to maximise the money that has been allocated to the department and also manages most of the Art Department team (who include the Assistant Art Director and Art Department Assistants.)

Art Director reference 

SET DIRECTOR:

The Set Director's job is in the name. They will furnish all the sets/locations with various props, ranging from all different kinds of furniture to artwork. Whatever props are needed, it is the Set Director's job to find the props. Even if the props are not on screen, the Set Director ultimately adds a personal touch to the characters through the decoration of the locations/sets. 

Set Director reference

Unit 8, 3.3 "Explain the role of a specific team within the organisation."

Unit 8, 3.3 - "Explain the role of a specific team within the organisation."


The producer’s role is vital within filmmaking. It's a role that, before I entered my apprenticeship, I took as being just the, "boring, business-side" of the industry.


The producer is involved from start to finish on the project. From the get-go when the idea is pitched, through all the stages of the filmmaking  process and beyond.


In my company, we have two producers - one producer and one co-producer. Both have their own projects they are working on. Our companies main producer is working on an adaptation of successful, cult book and two other projects, while the co-producer works on promos, shorts, and has a stake in one of our companies other feature films. 


A producer's job is essentially to get the film financed and out there in whatever capacity it needs to be (omline, straight-to-DVD or in the cinema.)


In some cases, before there are any investors in the film, the producer will put their own money forward (something I am sure that the producer at my company did on our first feature.)


Major aspects of the project are controlled by the producer. These include raising the funds for the project and hiring the film's director.


Sometimes, as with the case in my company, the director is the one that comes to the producer with the idea. This is usually singular to small companies like my own.


A producer makes all the important decisions, with the director's input. Essentially, the success of a film lies in the producer's hands (something I had no grasp on whatsoever before my apprenticeship). Though the director has a lot of say in what happens with the film, most of these decisions come down to the aesthetics of it, and not necessarily who is going to finance the project.


It will be the producer that hires someone to rewrite the script if needed, not the director.


Before learning all of this about the producer's role within a film (and my own company), I had no idea why the Best Picture Academy Award would be handed over to, what was to me, the business mogul. 


Now it makes sense why this rule is in place for the Oscars. 

Unit 8, 3.4 "Explain the relationship between the specific team and others within the organisation."

Unit 8, 3.4 - "Explain the relationship between the specific team and others within the organisation."


Within my work place, we are a very small team who consist of an in-house director, a producer and co-producer.

Christopher Nolan with producer Emma Thomas

The producers in our company have to work very closely with the director when they are working on a project together.


The film we are filming at the moment is a company production, both producers are on board, and our director is in the directing chair. This means that everything that we do, the director and producers have to constantly speak to each other about the project. 


We also have our own Head of Development, a role that is freelance.


The director deals with the creative side to the film. The director at my company has had many meetings with actors, our cinematographer, has gone up set to check out the locations, and more. Everything that the director does is to realise the visual vision.


The producers have a say in on the creativity of the film, too, but their main angle is to work on all the business side of the project - to find the funding, to secure the cast, and so on. 


The directors vision needs to be communicated with the producer/s so they can get the right cast, the amount of money that is needed, and the people that will help this vision come alive on the big screen.


The Head of Development has a say on the project, too. Their role is a lot more involved in the pre-production stages (looking over the script, making suggestion changes, estimating how much the film should cost to make and what it will make). They will work mostly with the producers, but when it comes to the script, the director will have a say on what the development head says, too. 


Filmmaking is not just a singular effort, it is all about the team work. 

Unit 8, 2.1 "Describe the stages of a specific Creative Media project life cycle."

Unit 8, 2.1 - "Describe the stages of a specific Creative Media project life cycle."


When making a product for the creative market, there are four stages that you most likely will undergo. To speak about these four stages, the product I have decided to work with is the current feature film the company I am working at is shooting now (illustrated with images from The Simpsons.)

As I have not experienced anything past the production stages of the film so far, there will always be room to update this post as things progress.

PRODUCTION

Firstly, you have the production itself, which includes the following:

PRE-PRODUCTION

This can range from writing the script to crewing up. Pre-production is considered the most difficult task in making a film, as if you are not prepared or organised to the final detail, the production stage of the film can be a nightmare.

PRODUCTION

Once you have your dates, your crew, your locations and equipment - shooting begins. If everything has been organised in the pre-production stages, most of the time, the actual shoot of the film will run smoothly. It is all about preparing beforehand. 

POST PRODUCTION 

Here is when the film has been shot, the rushes are ready, and the editing begins. Editing, as we all pretty much know, can make a good film into a wonderful film (see Raging Bull, Tarantino's films, etc.) but some do take it for granted. You can have great footage for a film, but if the editing is not up to scratch, well, all of the slaving prior to getting to the post-production stage would be a massive waste.

Working at my appointed company, I have discovered the labour of love that goes into filmmaking (and the amount of time that, for someone who has won many awards and has been BAFTA nominated, still has to go through in order to make a feature.)

The film that we are currently filming has been in the development stages for the past four years – that’s right, four years.

Now, for someone who first started writing their book four years ago, and finished a year in, well, it doesn’t seem like so much time to me, but for the majority of people, four years is a ridiculously long time to be working on one stand alone project.

There are plenty of reasons for a project to be in limbo for that long (and even longer in many cases in the film industry). Money, of course, is one of the main factors. Time can be another, but for us, finding the right cast who were available when we needed to shoot was one of, if not, the most important thing (among all the other factors I have spoken about as well, since it is a low budget feature.)

Because our story is so character driven, it was important that we had the right cast who not only would people connect with when watching the film, but would be able to put bums in seats (see Audience Consumption below.)

      MARKETING & EXCHANGE

Marketing and Exchange is the stage of getting your film out there to the right ‘market’ (or in real talk – audience). Whether that is through the internet universe, or the traditional advertising posters on the underground, the more coverage you have of your film, or product, the more likely it is going to reach a wider audience and be consumed more frequently. (Again, see Audience Consumption.)

 

DISTRIBUTION

“The action of sharing something out among a number of recipients” is the dictionary definition of distribution. While Marketing and Exchange handles the, well, marketing side of the production – designing the campaign, i.e posters, trailers and so forth – the distribution side of filmmaking actually gets the film out there; gets the film into the places that it needs to be.

Distributing occurs in all media sectors, and in day-to-day life, really, but in the film industry, it can be from distributing your film in the medium of DVD’s to the cinema.  

As said previously in the Production and Marketing & Exchange section, distributing needs to work with what kind of audience the film is aimed at. It is pointless only playing the Inbetweeners film in Curzon cinemas because too many people are interested in the film; it isn't an underground arthouse movie.

AUDIENCE CONSUMPTION

Knowing who your target market is before you even get going on your project is vital. If you don’t know who your audience is or who you’re supposed to be aiming your product at, then how are you supposed to sell it? 

Marketing and Exchange need to know what kind of film they are trying to sell (through advertisements and posters, so they can attract the right audience) and when it comes to distribution, you need to go through the distributors who are going to get your film out to the places, the cinemas, that your audience would most likely visit (most arthouse films play in Curzon cinemas rather than somewhere like Vue for example.) 

The films that my appointed company have produced have a very gritty and urban feel to them. The film that we are working on now is the complete opposite – it’s a tearjerking, feel-good family event.

If there are viewers going into watching our film who have seen our previous back catalogue, it is important that this family vibe we are trying to pull off his blatant (whether that is through cast, the way it is shot, etc.) otherwise; you are going to lose your audience instantly. 

To make a family film, it is of strict importance that it is accessible. When we get round to the marketing and distribution stages of our film, working with this 'accessabilty for all ages' is very important to the kind of market that we want to attract.

Overall, all four stages of creating a film are as important as each other. Without the audience, you will have no production, and without the marketing, there will be no distribution. All of the stages have to work with each other otherwise you will never get your film out there, let alone make your money back.

Unit 8, 1.2 "Describe cross-industry ownership in the Creative Media Industry."

Unit 8, 1.2 - "Describe cross-industry ownership in the Creative Media Industry."

There are so many companies that cross the divides of industries in the creative media sector (more so than ever, now). It seems that, in order to create a big, successful company in the 21st century, you have to, as the saying goes, "Have a finger in each pie."

 

Here are a few examples of worldwide known companies who have had more success than they could have possibly imagined just based on the decision to not pigeon hole themselves into a certain industry:

The BBC, many years back, were mostly known worldwide for their news coverage, right? Well, now, the BBC own their own commercial subsidiary company, BBC Worldwide LTD. who have stepped into the world of publishing books (via Random House) and magazines (their most successful outlet being The Radio Times). Instead of making films for the small screen, the BBC have created another extension to their brand - BBC films. Many successful exports, both critically and commercially, have come out of BBC films including the body popping StreetDance 3D and Academy Award nominated An Education.

 

Richard Branson begun his venture into business in the late 70s with a record shop he named Virgin. When Branson launched Virgin Records off the back of the success he had with his record shop, it went global. 

Now, years later, Virgin Group are one of the biggest and most recognisable brands going, consisting of more than 400 companies world wide.

From travel (Virgin Airlines), to their own gaming line (Virgin Games), Richard Branson has managed to field a goldmine with so many industries all connected to one company. Films, Music, Technology - Virgin has everything and anything in its brand that is remotely technological (or money making.)

It is near impossible to come across someone who hasn't heard of Universal Studios or Universal Music. Subsidiaries of NBCUniversal, both Universal Studios and Universal Music are two of the most successful branches of a company in their chosen field in the world.

NBCUniversial have not only concurred the music and film industries, but they dominate American television, and even have their own resort park.

So there you have it, three worldwide known companies who, after venturing away from their original target industries (whether that be in TV for BBC or music for Virgin), have made globally known brands that continue to dominate the creative media industry. 

DiVA Video Viral Campaign: Final Cut

And here is the final viral video for the DiVA campaign that I and my fellow apprentices worked on.


Enjoy!

Unit 8, 1.1 "Describe the industries within the Creative Media sector."

Unit 8, 1.1 - "Describe the industries within the Creative Media sector."


There are so many creative media industries out there that it is hard to keep up at times with them.  Though all industries, at some point or other, cross paths (Music in Film, Games in Film) the two creative media fields I have chosen to speak about are very big

The first industry I am going to talk about is the literary industry, but what does it mean exactly?

For me, the moment I hear the word ‘literary’ I automatically think of books. Books are still as popular as ever, but it is the eBook that is really gaining momentum in our technology-dominated world¹. There will always be books out there because, as humans, we have a desire to escape from our day to day life, and fictional books can supply this, whether that is in an electronic or physical format.

For non-fiction, the internet has become our go-to place (news sites, gossip sites, and the like) but escapism is something the internet fails to give to us in the way that fiction can. And argue with me if you will, but there are two types of books: Fiction and non-fiction.

Fiction and non-fiction are two lines that are constantly blurred, though. And two of the main sources of information, something we all try to gain more of throughout our life no matter what kind of information, are newspapers and magazines.

Unlike with books, which have obviously undergone heavy debate over whether they are more ‘artsy’ or more ‘intelligent’ than your average magazine or newspaper, you have a gigantic worldwide source of daily information within newspapers and magazines that books – particularly fictional ones – cannot achieve.

As a society, we are fed stories through the opinions of so many published columnists. Because newspapers are distributed daily on most occasions, we’re more likely to be swayed by the opinions of The Evening Standard than Heat magazine because of this frequency of publication.  

The Daily Mail is a prime example of a newspaper that produces the most ridiculous stories of day-to-day like; happily letting their readers buy into these ideals because it is ultimately what sells the newspaper². This isn’t a criticism of Daily Mail readers; instead, it makes perfect sense. 

Society, and the people that occupy our society, are always looking for acceptance, whether we like to admit it or not. The acceptance that we all to some extent aspire to can range from being within our family, friends, or in a working environment. The main thing is, it is important for us to feel like we apart of life. This is why branding works so well, if we have a certain brand of clothing, we are in the know – we are in vogue. We belong .

Magazines lock onto this human desire to belong, which leads me onto what magazines do best: plugging lifestyles, and acceptable ones at that.

I am not going to deny that I enjoy reading fashion magazines like Dazed and Confused and iD, but I’d like to think I am not buying into what they are ultimately trying to sell me – a cool lifestyle.

At times, they are in tune with what is going on with society. For example, Dazed and Confused ran a detailed piece on the student riots a few issues back³, and dedicated a whole issue – and I mean a whole issue – to unemployed and undiscovered creative’s in Britain⁴.  Most recently, the UK riots have featured heavily on their site, Dazed Digital⁵, and no doubt will make an appearance in their upcoming October issue.

But after all, Dazed and Confused is a fashion magazine, and their readership is expecting a lot more fashion than the discussion of political issues, and the epitome of fashion (no matter how much I respect it as a wonderful art form) is there to sell a lifestyle.

In the mix of fashion, there are mountains of other lifestyle magazines, both for men and women. Cooking, sport, gaming – there is such a diverse arrangement of magazines out there that whatever your area of interest is, there is bound to be a magazine that covers it, and one of those magazines, to me, is the biggest offender of ‘selling’ a lifestyle outlook – gossip magazines.

While Dazed and Confused can get your blonde cutesy Hollywood actress on their front cover if need be⁶ or pop royalty⁷, gossip magazines take it one step further than seeing a photoshopped celebrity on the cover of Marie Claire⁸. Celebrities are, for some reason or other in this culture, Godly figures.  You could say that ‘celebrity’ is the new religion.

The celebrity lifestyle is one we are all supposedly supposed to aspire to – the money, the cars; the girls – that is the way of living which will apparently give us most happiness.

So when we see bikini photographs of ‘celebrities’ with a little bit of cellulite, that god-like status is knocked down a notch and suddenly, these people become, well, people – normal.  

Again, this is one of the many reasons why gossip magazines sell so well. Seeing celebrities in this state of ‘normality’ makes us feel better about ourselves, linking back into what is acceptable within our society.

Selling a certain lifestyle doesn’t stop at magazines and newspapers, either. 

It transcends right on over to the next topic I am going to speak about – the TV industry.

You’d think with the massive internet boom in the 21^st Century that the TV industry would have been bust years ago.

Wrong.

To this day, TV is still alive and kicking, having managed to fight with the instant access of the internet. Things like BBCiplayer and being able to pause programmes while they are on air⁹ are just some of the many tools that the industry has used to tackle the quick accessibility of the net.

One show that has kept viewers glued to their screens is none other than The X Factor. Even saying the name of the programme sparks some kind of reaction from anyone who lives in Britain – whether that be joy or disdain – everyone has an opinion on The X Factor, and its success is down to one man, and one man alone – Simon Cowell.

How Simon Cowell has managed to what was basically Pop Idol with a few tweaks, into a ridiculous headline grabbing¹⁰ phenomena is beyond me, but he has done it, and now X Factor has gone global¹¹, ready to make even more dollars for the grey crew-neck wearing multimillionaire.

Out of all the types of TV programmes you can get (soaps, dramas, documentaries), this century, it is impossible to flick through TV channels without finding one reality TV show. From guilty pleasure American imports like Keeping up with the Kardashians and Jersey Shore, to our own home-grown rip-offs Made in Chelsea and The Only Way is Essex, we can’t get enough of reality TV. Even programmes like Come Dine with Me and Mastermind are, to an extent, reality TV.  

BBC3 are notorious for running ‘documentaries’ on their channel that play out much more like reality TV than a real insight into the lives and hardships of others in the world (see Smaller Teen, Bigger World which follows the life of 3ft 11’ teenager Jazz.)

Society keeps coming into play when speaking about these industries because, well, society is such a big part of how we all operate; how all the creative media industries work. Our society is people, and people buy into products. Reality TV is a product, just as magazines and newspapers are.  Yet again, reality TV is another field in the many creative money making industries that is selling us a lifestyle.

There are definitely times when reality TV can go completely overboard and verge on just plain wrong.

Celebrity Rehab, in my eyes, is such a degrading and sickening show, that I can’t understand why anyone would get even guilty-type pleasure out of watching human beings breakdown right onscreen.

Either way, no matter what I think, reality TV will probably always have a place in society in some form or another, so what are the programmes that really kicked off this fascination?

Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and Big Brother are the real game players; the shows that brought reality TV into the lime light. And remember, this was long before our screens were dominated by singing contests and heated cookery shows.

Aired in 1998, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? was one of the first reality TV shows to make a really big global impact. From board games¹², to its own film in the shape of the Oscar winning Slumdog Millionaire, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? was the predecessor to The X Factor – it really grabbed headlines¹³.

Rolling round in 1999, Big Brother, just like Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, went global. The first series of the controversial TV show aired in the Netherlands before coming to our shores, where it became a must-talk about craze¹⁴.

As other reality TV shows came along, the Big Brother viewership declined¹⁵ and Channel 4 dropped the show. Now Channel 5 have bought the programme and the question of whether it will ever be able to relive its heyday will always be there, but who knows, maybe the nation will fall in love with Big Brother all over again?

Doubt it.

Why does reality TV work so well, though? Well, to me, it does exactly what it has been bred to do because it gives in to the infamous Andy Warhol quote about everyone having their 15 minutes of fame. For a moment, even if it is brief, your average Joe can become famous, a celebrity, a godly figure. Without this obsession with celebrity culture and the lives of the rich and famous, reality TV would be nothing, it would be non-existent.

So, to wrap things up (as there are so many fields in both the literary and TV industry that I couldn’t possibly talk about them all), both these sectors are important to the Creative Media Industry as a whole, and, as I have proved, are extremely influential within the fabric of society. Whether the way they are influential to us is actually a good thing or not is debatable. 

Final product: My Zine

A while back, I spoke of making a zine for Unit 8 of our college course, and here are photos of some of the pages in the final product!