Requirements for production

       Some of the requirements for this production would include many things such as how we got our budget, what the budget had to be spent on, the talent or cast in our project, other cast members and many may more but I will be writing a detailed report on things needed and required for production and things that may have to be considered before hand as it is important to know what goes into making something like this but on a much bigger and professional scale but for now making do with what we have got.

Type of production (media forms)

       The type of media production we made is hard to establish as the media is changing, in short it was a 90 second short film but it comes under so many more categories such as an Internet production as it was made for upload on http://www.youtube.com/ and then eventually to http://www.depict.org/ for the Depict! 90 second film competition but overall it is a short film. Other than the forms mentioned there are so many more media forms that exist in the creative industry such as a Television show, like The Walking Dead for example, or a full feature length movie whereas Trick or Trick was only a short film but you can also have none moving media images such as newspapers or magazines or even music would be considered to be a media form in a creative industry. The Internet in itself is considered a media form and so it should, the media makes the Internet with the use of music, news, films, television shows, social networking sites and many other things and this all makes up the Internet making a media form in itself.

Finance and sources of funding

      There are many sources of funding some can be more reliable than others and some will provide more money depending on who is supplying the money required. Most professional film makers will receive money from banks and get loans and hopefully pay them off with money gathered after release at the box office, films such as Batman The Dark Knight would have done this however we could not do this due to lack of money to pay the bank back, however some films are funded by the national lottery (www.national-lottery.co.uk/) and the UK film council (http://industry.bfi.org.uk/) such as The King's Speech was. There are many films funded by the national lottery and The King's Speech is just one example but once again we could not apply as this kind of funding is meant for professional film producers, but one that can prove quite helpful although rare is private investors.

    Film investors may be a good idea as they are less complicated than banks but like banks they are looking for a profit so will be looking for someone who already has a good name in film making to make sure they get back more than what they started with, that unfortunately means that we would be extremely unlucky to get any private investors especially when the is no guarantee of making any money at all. However you can supply a film on money raised rather than money borrowed by entering competitions. There are many competitions and Depict! is one of them, if you are lucky enough to win a competition and get either a cash prize or something you can sell on than that is a great way to get money however the chances of winning such competitions are slim at best and we really needed the money sooner rather than later. You could get money by sponsorship  for example if coca - cola sponsored you it would be clever to in return use product placement by having a main character drink a can of coke which would mean coca-cola are paying you for the advertisement of their product, in or short film towards the end one of the characters is reading a Joe Browns catalogue so if we were doing this for an advertisement we would be able to strike up a deal with Joe Browns for advertising their products using product placement.

                                                    

   Some companies might want to sponsor you as they have seen some of your previous work and really liked it or something else but the problem here is being finding a company that would want to sponsor you or pay you for advertisement so the odds are not great here either. This leaves us with the only option which is achievable, raise the money yourself by doing a variety of things, running marathons, collecting some money at local supermarkets or even just all chipping in yourself. We all managed to chip a bit in each and get together a budget of £5 which luckily we did not need as we managed to scrape together the required equipment needed from friends with left overs or stuff we had at home.

Requirements for any production

            

     The requirements for any production mainly include what will the budget be spent on? There are many things the budget might be spent on such as equipment or crew but due to the circumstances we manged not to spend any money but other professional levels of films will be much different. Something that anyone will have to do is rent equipment for filming, editing transportation and various other things this will have to be done weather it is on a professional level or not however when doing a amateur production there are ways to get around it for example we did have to rent out equipment but not at a cost we just had to bring it back within a set time, although if it was broken then we would have to pay for it and as for transport we walked everywhere we needed to go as it was close by and didn't require large distance travel. You would have to consider clearances of various kinds such as copyrights if you want to make a movie based on something for example The Amazing Spider-Man movie would have required copyrights from marvel to reboot the series but with our production we had completely original ideas meaning that no copyright's were involved.

     Talent and cast is a big part of making a film, deciding who you want in your film and what role they should play can have a big impact on the outcome of the final project. Actors are never assigned to one person in particular they are always going from one role to another in different films with different directors although you might get the odd director and actor that work together a lot such as Tim Burton and Johnny Depp. They work together a lot one of the films being Alice In Wonderland and many others but its not just here you might see the same actors over and over again some actors might appear in multiple films as the same role just a Hugh Jackman has done so many times with the   X-men series playing Logan or Wolverine. This is where it's useful to have a pick of the talent you want but due to lack of funds and other things we only had the people in the group able to perform so it made it cheaper, easier and quicker.

     Make-up artist are among the crew but are a vital part for making a film look realistic and drawing you into the world that it has created once again very much like how Tim Burton does his films especially like Alice In Wonderland with the Mad Hatters make-up and how it just makes the fantasy of the world come to life keeping the diegisis of the world but the make-up artist are not the only crew there not forgetting the camera guy's and all the rest of the crew that would need hiring and paying all to make it come together but as with my small group there was only the three of us to do all of that between us although it would have looked better with professionals it was meant to be an amateur production and you could tell it was.

     Props and other materials such as costumes can complete a film making the diegisis of the world and once again making it seem all the more realistic, Props and costumes can be just as important as make-up in Alice in Wonderland, yet another fine example, The props and costumes are so in depth and detailed its amazing. Some films don't need the use of much make-up though and rely on purely costume to create this world, a brilliant example of which is Harry Potter especially with the wands and wizard outfits that Dumbledore might have worn. Although with my group once again we did not have much in the way of props and costumes so we wore what we could and didn't use many props at all and the ones we did were found around the house like the Joe Browns magazine.

    Hiring out facilities can be hard especially with dead lines to meet and if they are not met it will cost more money and facilities may not be available as they once why due to someone else wanting to use them. In a professional industry it makes it stressful and can be hard so it is important when booking facilities to always book it longer than you might need so you have that little extra time if needed. With our own production we were lucky as the talent was always there, the editing facilities didn't need hire the only thing that really needed hire was the camera for recording making it important that we got the filming done in the time required. At the end of our project we got lucky because we realised we didn't have to spend a single penny due to having all the equipment needed right in front of us however if it was to be done outside of college it would be a very different story and money would have to be spent to try and finish it. Money would have to be spent obtaining things like costumes, some props and a little bit of make-up plus all the editing equipment then the camera and tripod if no one in the group had one most of this was before hand provided by the college so it would be a very different situation without the college's help.

Time frame and deadlines

     The time we got set to record was over a period of 6 lessons, although we had less time due to travel and it taking longer than thought to get to the location we still managed to pull through and get the project record before the deadline went over but in the times we couldn't record we still used our time effectively by filling out the boring yet important paperwork needed. If deadlines are not met in the professional media industry it can become a real problem, you will need to get equipment back for longer hire, get the cast and crew back but most of them do not work for one person they travel all the time for work meaning it can be up to a year maybe longer before you can get all the cast and crew back together pushing deadlines way back. Although look at Peter Jackson's Lord Of The Rings and his newest film coming out  The Hobbit although The Hobbit is being filmed as a trilogy they record all three films of The Hobbit all at once to reduce cost, time and travel expenses doing this means they now exactly what they are doing and when so it can be done quickly and more time can be spent on editing and special effects.

Equipment

      The equipment available to us was very limited in comparison to professional production's but was only made available through a very easy booking system which the college provides. We had handheld camera's with tripods and other pieces of equipment that allow smooth movement along with the cables needed to upload onto the computers all through a booking system. With this system you can take equipment in and out  using your student card for no charge you just make sure it arrives back on time and when it gets back it isn't broken otherwise you will need to pay for the damages. Where as in the professional media industry you will need to either buy or rent the equipment out no matter what you do it will cost for using it that's why it might be cheaper to rent them out for longer periods of time such as Peter Jackson would have done while filming The Hobbit. In the professional industry you have a wide selection of people for your production but the only people available to us were those who had been placed in our groups from our media class making it so groups were groups of three which isn't to bad as it means it;s easy to talk to everyone and easy to organize things where as the more people there are the more complicated it can be.

Personnel
   
     We were all placed into groups of three keeping it small, quite and generally nice to work with. We had Skipper play the main role, me play the zombies and Connor done the camera work, Skipper had no experience doing this role before hand I had a little taking drama in high school but not having to play many zombies before and Connor has had some experience behind the camera so most of us had experience in doing our role and those that didn't could pick things up from other people. In the professional industry having experience is key to doing anything and those that have had experience usually have skill to get the experience but sometimes having to much skill and experience can affect a movie. Its nice to have the experience on the team as it will make a better quality product in the finish but some people who are well know for what the do might require more money than others for example Dustin Hoffman is a well known actor its hard to find somebody who doesn't know him but due to this he might require more money than others so its a risk to get people who are not well know cheaper than people who are, people who are well known will likely mean a bigger turn out at the box office but if it doesn't go well it will be a lot of money lost so its a risk producers have to take like the did with Meet The Fockers, having a well known cast including Dustin Hoffman, Robert De Niro, Ben Stiller and Barbra Streisand in this instance the gamble paid off and made a huge profit.

     Personnel cost is not only affect by how much experience and skill they have in doing there job but also how good they are. Once again Dustin Hoffman is widely considered to be a very talented actor therefore the price of hiring him is going to be considerable higher than someone like Micheal Cera would be to hire. Although Micheal Cera has been in a lot of films all reasonable good, such as, Scott Pilgrim Vs The World, he hasn't been in any amazing block buster, record breaking movies like a lot of considerable famous actors will have. But at the same time there might be a really good young actor who hasn't been in many films so no one has noticed them much so if they haven't been noticed much the price for hiring them is again going to be lower than someone with a good reputation no matter how good they are.

     In our production we managed to get away with not having any set costumes and no real props, costumes were just what we happened to be wearing and props we would use whatever we could find as long as it would fit, this is completely different to how it would be done on a professional level as when done professionally the costumes would be carefully thought through in relation to the character and props would be used almost always from small thing like a cup of tea or big things such as a two-handed sword. When deciding what talent and crew you want to help in the project it is important to consider many things such as previously mentioned like how much skill they have, how much experience have they had, how well known they are and how good are they. Mainly the budget would come into concern with how much money you actually have to spend on the talent and cast and also how much you hope to get back from it deciding who you want is a long and tedious process but who ever you decide upon you have to make sure there are available to work for you. To ensure the availability of your personnel you will have to book in advance sometimes up to a year in advance to make sure you can get them when they have no other plans especially with well known actors and other crew as a lot of people will be trying to hire them and you want to make sure they are available without question for a certain time period.

Facilities

     The equipment available for our production was basic as we did not have the money for high tech and top of the range equipment that is used in a professional industry  we had available a camera, a tripod, a memory card and any props we could get. However this was for the practical part of the production there was also equipment needed for the post production such as the software for editing, the computers for the editing, the actual footage already shot and somewhere to be able to store it all whilst still editing. This is basic requirements for any media production however some might use more than others for example certain films might use more time in the editing studio putting in special effects a film that would have defiantly put in more special effects than others would be James Cameron's Avatar due to all the special effects use on the Avatar's and on the planet Pandora but most films will use the same amounts of editing time unless most of the film is special effects.

     Facilities houses and studios can be like sets where you can film a part of your production or can be where you edit the footage that has been already filmed and shape it into the final product in a professional industry theses type of things will need to be hired out but with our production they were ready in the classroom for editing and around the college for filming, some productions required it to be filmed out side of college which was fine as long as we had permission as it did not require a set to film. Some productions would require the use of outsourcing, getting another company to help them finish the product, for example a company might hire lucasarts to do the special effects for their production this would be outsourcing.

     If you do outsource you would require some where for the company to work, a building or editing studio some may require hiring out once again so when deciding what to do there are financial considerations to think about when doing so such as how long you want to use it for, the general use of the building and any damages. All of this will contribute to the cost of the building hopefully there wont be any damages so will keep the price low but in case there are the damages cause will have to be paid for. When considering what facilities to use you will also have to think about the availability of the building so it will require you to book in advance to make sure you can get hold of the building.

Locations

     Before deciding on a location to film on most companies will do a location recce just as we done. A location recce is a scouting of the locations you could possible use for your production to make sure the location match the description and theme of the production.Sometimes you might decided to use a public location or somewhere that already exists but has been recreated in a set, if this is done you will need a location release showing permission from the land owner to express permission for filming there, we had to do this to get permission from Connor's parents to say it was alright to film there. A lot of film's use public locations and need locations release's just as Run Fat Boy Run starring Simon Pegg would have had to in order to shoot the various parts of London.

     We decided to shot a Connor's house for a couple of reasons the first being we knew that we wanted to shot in a house instead of showing zombies on the street as it would create a more closed in and possibly scary feel to it and secondly because he was the only one that lived near by. Connor's house was a good location as it had everything needed an alleyway, the front room was positioned correctly and a decent sized back garden for what we wanted it for. Although some problems occurred like he use of a shadow on the wall we managed to change it and fit in with the environment and made a good production. Whilst filming at Connor's house we did have some risks to asses such as skipper jumping over the fence and me being a zombie and walking in the front garden. We assessed skippers jumping by making sure the fence was stable and strong, making sure skipper was safe at all times and assuring the jump had a safe landing where as we assessed the zombie walking around by wearing crew tops so that people knew we where filming and that I wasn't a real zombie.

Materials

     There are many different materials used in media products to make a final product most products will be using original material including soundtrack, footage and script making it a completely new idea however some can be used to make different genres such as archived library materials can be used to make documentaries about that war using archived materials such as letters the odd video available and documents like birth certificates. Another example or archived materials is Who Do You Think You Are? As they will use a lot of archived materials once again like birth and death certificates along with letters, notes and war certificates to dive into their past to find out about their ancestors.

     There are lots more materials though another one being sound library materials being stock sounds already on the computer such as the ones used in our very own media project, although you can have recorded materials be it your product footage or even recorded sound material both being also original material recorded for the project only, most professional industry products will do this as it is original to them and avoids copyright, The Nightmare Before Christmas done this and recorded This Is Halloween just for the film so it's a film score that was written and performed by Danny Elfman.

 

 

     Materials can include many more things other than music and video such as the script or props and even costumes, these are all materials needed for the product to be completed. Most of these materials will be original but things like props and costumes might get re-used in a completely different way for another production. As for script most of the time this will be original unless they are re-making a film or song or something else like that which will then need copyright permission from the original owner of the product. A film which was re-made and turned out quite good was The Karate Kid, although a lot of people said the original was better I personally preferred the re-make to the original but probably because it included Jackie Chan as the teacher and Jayden Smith as the student, they are two of my favorite actors. Although this is done in the professional industry it would have been hard for us to gain copyright permission to do something like this meaning we would have to keep everything original.



     However whatever materials are chosen for use in your production you must always check to see if it contains and kind of copyright especially with music as music is heavily copyrighted just as we were going to use Danny Elfman's This Is Halloween in our own production but couldn't due to the copyright around it. If you do find that some of your material is copyrighted you will have to contact the copyright owners and gain their permission to use it however most people will want money for doing so or at the very least recognition that it is their work and not your own, so if you wanted to use someone else's material you have to consider the finical problems with it, that is why most professional industry product will use original material only.

Contributors

     People who might contributor to a media product can be anything really, talent such as the cast would be considered as contributors and so would the public involved in your production, the public can be involved by being extra's in a large scene just as they did in Batman The Dark Knight Rises when the city is all in rebellion and are fighting each other, that was done using a lot of extra's who contributed to the project. We managed to not use any of the public in the project or any extra's as the talent used was those who were in the group anyway, granted a professional media production would need to use these but as an amateur production we didn't have to.



     You can also get expert and specialists contributors, these are people who specialize in working in this field maybe like special effects artists and this way they will be able to help put together the special effects needed for the production. A contributor will usually have a contributors biography which will contain information on a particular person, their skills, their talents and their hobbies. This would be useful in a professional media industry as it means a employer will be able to get to know what a persons like before they actually agree to take them on, helping an employer chose the right person for the right job.

Legal Issues

     Sometimes you might require a clearance for a media product meaning you would have to seek out permission to proceed with what you are doing. In a professional industry you might require a clearance for wanting to include an Easter egg or hint on a new film or game coming out within the production meaning you would have to seek clearance with that company to make sure you are allowed to do this such as I am Legend did with the Batman Vs Superman poster, although this never came out you might need clearance to make sure its still alright to do this. Where as with us say we filmed in a public place and someone walked into the shot we would need clearance from them to make sure its alright for them to appear in the production.



     If you don't get clearance for all aspects of your production and use it anyway you will likely have to face a lawsuit and will end up paying a big fine due to using the material in question without permission. This can be a big set back especially if you already have the material and are waiting for clearance but if clearance is denied to avoid this you will either have to leave it, re do it or make something else as paying a fine of that size is not really an option and is only one of the many things that could happen if you ignore the clearance. Copyright can affect a media production greatly as it puts huge restrictions on what you can and can't do with your media production such as the name Superman is copyrighted so if anyone wants to use the name Superman even if its for completely unrelated reasons you wouldn't be able to. Copyright has affected our production as we wanted to use Danny Elfman's This Is Halloween as our soundtrack but due to music being heavily copyrighted we decided to leave it and instead use basic stock sounds found on the computers.

     Another legal issue to consider is public liability. It is wise if your media production has any form of interaction with the public to get public liability insurance as this will cover any accidents the members of the public have whilst on your set and if you are filming near public houses, if something of value was to be broken that belonged to the public it would cover this cost, for most professional media productions there will be interaction with the public so public liability although it is not a legal requirement to have it is highly recommended. Another thing to consider is completion insurance, although you would agree on a set deadline just ahead of how long you think the product would actually take to complete in order tom leave yourself some breathing space if something goes wrong, if everything were to go wrong and you couldn't make the agree contracted date of completion this would cover it. Completion insurance would cover thing such as extra moving and storage costs, addition interests and the penalties for not completing on the agreed date.  In the professional media industry it is defiantly something to consider getting as it would cover if you went over the deadline for some reason, although you wouldn't want to go over you can't predict the future so its wise to cover yourself just in case  We did not have to get either due to not having the public involved in our production and also not having a contracted finish date, there was a deadline to meet however if the deadline was not met no money would be involved making completion insurance useless to us.

Regulation

     Their are many regulation's one of the many being Ofcom. Ofcom regulates the TV and radio sectors fixed line telecoms, mobiles and even the postal service. Ofcom exist to make sure the people in the UK get the best from their communication services and are protected from scams and sharp practices whilst still allowing competition to thrive between companies  so as Ofcom are in charge of regulating mobiles they would be in charge of regulating mobile companies such as 3 and Orange. Another of the many is the PCC, the PCC stands for the Press Complaints Commission and they deal with complaints that customers have with newspapers and magazines the PCC Sevres the public by holding editors to account and strives to protect the rights of individuals whilst still giving the press the appropriate freedom of expression.

 
  There are still more such as the ASA and PEGI. The ASA stands for Advertising Standards Authority and they monitor all adverts across all media platforms and are in charge of approving them, part of their job is to make sure all adverts and good, decent and honest so that it is an accurate representation of the product being sold. PEGI stands for Pan European Game Information and they are in charge of rating European games with the ages of 3+, 7+, 12+, 16+ and 18+. They also give symbols on the case to indicate why this game has been rated at the shown age this is to provide parents buying the games with a decent knowledge of what their children are playing and to understand what kinds of media they are seeing and monitor it in such a way.



     One of the biggest classification companies is the BBFC, the BBFC stands for The British Board Of Film Classification and the BBFC has been classifying films since it was established in 1913 and videos since the videos recording act of 1984. They put the age ratings on films that are shown in the UK and some video games but PEGI tend to do most video games. In 2010 out of all the things the BBFC rated only 1.4% of films, 2.5% of videos and 0.6% of Video games were cut, the higher figure of videos shows that the BBFC are stricter on videos than most.  All of this could relate to our Depict video as if there was a Newspaper article on it and someone didn't like it the PCC would be on it, Or if there was an advert or a video game on it that would be for the ASA to decided the advert and PEGI to decided the game's age rating. But if it was released as a feature length film the BBFC would have the job of putting an age rating on the film as it does with every other film in the box office.




Trade unions and Trade associations

     Trade union's are a group of people that are bound together for a similar cause and they fight together. A lot of them exist and fight for better working conditions and higher pay from employers and companies so they can be treated fairly as one and the represent all the people that are unhappy with what happens in their companies. BECTU stands for Broadcasting, entertainment, Cinematography and Theater Union and they strive to help British people seeking employment in the media industry. Any individual seeking employment in the areas covered by BECTU can apply to become a member and receive the appropriate help needed. PACT is the UK trade associations representing and promoting the commercial interests of independent feature film, television, digital, children's and animation media companies. Trade associations are organizations founded and funded by business that operate in a specific industry. Trade associations participate in public relations activities such as advertising, education political donations, lobbying and publishing but its main goal is to form collaborations between companies. BIMA, ELSPA and TIGA all have one thing in common, trying to promote the British digital industry but try to do so in different ways. BIMA stands for British Interactive Media Association and exist's to do three things, support and promote the British digital industry, share knowledge and best practice and also reward great work and encourage the next generation, doing so really helps promote the British digital industry. ELSPA stands for Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Associations. The goal of the company was to establish a specific and collective identity for the interactive leisure software across the European community. ELSPA was even responsible for introducing the video games rating to the UK in 1994 and the system proved extremely successful. Over 60% of the games rated by ELSPA were suitable for everyone with an age 3 and over rating but in 2009 the company closed and re branded to UKIE. TIGA is the non profit trade association representing the UK's gaming industry and their vision is to make the UK the best place in the world to do games business.






     All of the things mentioned are very important when considering a media production and its important to realize and understand the difference's in the professional industry and what problems can occur through clearance and copyright. When making a media product you must always question yourself every step of the way, why are you doing this and how are you going to do this even before you have started something other wise problems might turn up if this is achieved and you know of the companies that exist to help the media industry then you can go on your way to make a high quality media product on any level.