Social media Evaluation Question 4 for A2 Media

1. Evaluation Question 4
How did you use new media
technologies in the research,
planning, construction and
evaluation stages?

2. O In this essay will explain how important
technology was during the making of my short
film and the skills I gained. I will also explain the
advantages and disadvantages of the use of
technology and the different platforms available.

3. O Throughout my project, I used lots of different
varieties of technology. I used hardware such as
DSLR cameras, mac minis and iPads; software
such as iMovie, Garageband and Prezi and also I
used lots of useful websites to help with research
and planning such as my VLE blog, Freeplay
music and YouTube. As I started my research, I
had to use the VLE blog quite a lot to upload any
work I had done such as audience research,
background research, print products etc.

4. O As I started my research, I had to use the VLE
blog quite a lot to upload any work I had done such
as audience research, background research, print
products research etc. The VLE blog was a great
website to present my work as it was simple to use
and I had previous experience of using it because I
used it on last years project. I used software to
present some of my research to then be put onto
my blog. I learned how to use a new application
called Prezi which allowed me to present my
research in a unique format to upload to my blog.

5. O The websites we used were very useful in the
research and planning stages of my project as they
helped me carry out my research and present them in
a creative way. I used YouTube to find clips of wellknown documentaries to analyse and use in my
textual analysis. These clips helped me with my
research because I was able to benchmark against
the project I was going to create and I gained help
such as which types of shots to use and add-ons that
could be used in my film such as voiceovers. I
presented my work through websites such as Prezi
which showed my creativity and enhanced my
technological skills.

6. O Once I began the construction of my short film
documentary, I started to use more software and
hardware to create my project. DSLR cameras
were used to film all the shots such as fly-on-thewall and interviews. The cameras were a very
important and useful piece of hardware that was
needed for our film. Once, I had learnt new skills
with the cameras such as, how to operate them
correctly which includes learning how to zoom in
and out, flick settings depending on the lighting
your in, how to change from video to camera and
even more complex things such as when filming,
putting camera focus on the subject and blurring
out the background, they really increased the
quality of our film and improved the standard to
make it seem more professional.

7. O We used the Mac computers on a regular basis
from research to construction and I found that
they were very complex to work with. The layout
is very different from that of regular PC’s and
practice was needed to understand how all the
applications worked and how complex it would
be for me to produce my film. However, the
applications downloaded onto the Macs were
extremely useful and I would have been hopeless
without them.

8. O I created my short film using iMovie to edit
and upload my shots from the DSLR cameras.
The uploading process was slightly
complicated but got easier each time it was
used. When editing my project, iMovie was a
good application to use because it was easily
compatible with other hardware and software
such as the cameras and Garageband and
could be used on different platforms. It was
also a useful application because iMovie
allowed me to take control of the editing and
there was hardly an restrictions as to what I
could upload or add-on.

9. O Another software that I used for part of my
short film was Garageband. As I mentioned
previously, it was useful because of its
compatibility with iMovie and an overall easy
application to use. The layout of this software
made it user-friendly and simple to mix
together any tracks you wanted to create
something suitable for your project. As
Garageband and iMovie are both Apple
applications, they worked well together and
made the process of uploading tracks from one
application to another. If we were given more
time on our project, I would have played
around with different tracks and sounds and
created a tune to perfectly comprehend with
the mood and tone of our documentary to tie it
all together. A disadvantage of to using this
application would be the length of time it takes
to specify the genre or mood of a track that you
are looking for because you only have a
selected few genres available to choose from.

10. O For the production of my print product, I used
Microsoft Office Publisher. This document helped
me produce a professional looking review and
film poster. I chose to use publisher over any
other program because I was already familiar
with it and it had less limitations as Microsoft
Word, for example. Also, by creating my print
products on Publisher, it allowed me to layout my
review like one out of a magazine and to be able
to give my images on my poster a blue tint to tie
in with the theme of social media.

11. O Using all these applications, hardware, software
and websites, my short film is made with good
quality and produced to the highest of my
standards. I have gained new skills by using
hardware and software that I have never used
before or come into contact with such as the
DSLR cameras and Garageband.