Evaluate how your product used, developed or challenged the forms and conventions of real life media.

1. Title

• Opens with a girly photo album where a page turn transition was put in place and the title in a feminine font in bright pink against a softer pink back ground.
• It ties in well with our genre of chick flick/teen drama with the use of bright feminine colours that appeal to our target audience and the fact that all the colours used are high key showing the story line is light hearted and up lifting and not to be taken seriously.

2. Credits

• The names of our two main characters appear in bright pink and elaborate font and are presented in the blank space that has a baby pink background when the split screen is used.
• Our producer and director name will be shown before the actors’ names, in a simple way and equally on a simple background.
• We intended to put the credits in from the start as soon as the music begins. However, this proved that too much was happening on screen and looked untidy and was distracting to the actions taking place.
• However, it is often the case in our genre that the credits are almost part of the action and we hope we have achieved that to some extent.

3&4. Characters

• Chick flick/teen drama films are about portraying an exaggerated way of life in a glamorous way allowing the audience to envy the lifestyles portrayed and dream. With these teenage themes such as gossiping and bullying are used to give the film credibility perhaps use situations that could arise in a real school with extras to make it gripping and entertaining.
• Characters that are usually used in chick flick and teen dramas are centred around social groups and the particular stereotypes within the existing social group.
• Often consisting of the popular girl who has a privileged lifestyle, confident characteristics and surrounded by friends and boys. And the contrasting character of the nerdy girl, who focuses on work, has few friends and is represented as being quiet.
• Our main characters are females as it is a teen drama. The secondary characters are the back -up friends (the ‘posse’) and boyfriends that are both genders.
• We cast two teenage girls with contrasting appearances linking to our conventions therefore following out genre.
• The secondary characters such as the group of friends that are friends with the popular girl are all girls and her boyfriend is the hunk of the school, which fits into our genre conventions.
• The popular girl is shown as having glamorous surroundings and being spoilt with the way she talks to her mother whilst the nerdy girl is shown to have manners and more basic surroundings. The popular girl in many chick flicks is usually associated with having ‘too much’ money for her own good emphasising her ‘perfect’ life making the nerdy girl seem more common and like everyone else (unoriginal).
• The use of a rich popular girl and the more working-middle class girl is shown a lot in teen drama programmes and films such as ‘Surbugatory’, where these two contrasting girls have had different up-bringing’ and different privileges in life.

5&6. Mise-en-scene

• Typically set around school grounds and bedrooms.
• Usually big blockbuster stars are casted especially to play to popular girl role as it perhaps more believable. However, in some cases such as ‘Angus Thongs and Perfect snogging’ unknown actors were used and this added a sense of mystery into the story and made it perhaps easier for the audience to relate to the characters.
• Use of academic stereotypical props such as glasses, books and clichéd activities like library club as well as on the other hand we used designer bags, makeup and phone were used to create a wide division between the two contrasting stereotypical characters we deal with in our piece.
• The main location used was the two houses picked where the girls lived. We used contrasting bedrooms and added colour and props relating to the popular girl. A plain room was used for the nerdy girl. Additionally, we followed through with these conventions in the bathroom locations using extra cosmetics for the popular girls emphasising her appearance is important to her and the nerdy girls routine was short and simple.
• The second locations used were on school grounds in the corridors. This is a stereotypical location that is used in teenage dramas where something embarrassing happens to the nerdy girl as it is a public place and makes the situation all the more humiliating.
• The final location is just outside the school, which emphasised the popular girl’s power. It shows that she is superior to the nerdy girl in school grounds and outside.
• The costumes were simple as we were relating the school ethos with the UK meaning that we used school uniform.
• We cast Rebekah to play the popular girl as she was tall and this made it easier to make her look more intimidating than the nerdy girl. We gave her a glamorous house that helped maintain her ‘spoilt’ characteristics. We had Rachel play the nerdy girl as the contrast in size between Rebekah and Rachel is large and made it easy to distinguish the possible superiority we could highlight with the use of acting.
• We made the popular girl emphasise on the fact that she had ‘dance after school with the girls’ whereas the nerdy girl was going to the library making it very clear who is the more sociable one of the two.

7,8,9. Camera work

• We used a lot of medium shots and long shots in our sequence as we wanted the audience to be able to see the main characters in action as well as distinguish the contrast in friends that are around them to distinguish the two stereotyped we are dealing with. This is common in opening sequences.
• We also used a series of two shots to portray the intimidating and power of the popular girl and inferiority of the nerdy girl. This is a typical shot used in teen dramas to show which character is dominant in conversations.
• The use of some close-ups showed the emotions of the nerdy girls face which showed her as being victimised throughout the piece, this clearly helps the audience to identify which stereotype Rachel fits into. Similarly, with the popular girl the confidence and meanness on her face was well portrayed with the use of close-ups. Again, this is a common convention in our genre.
• We used one over the shoulder shot/shot reverse shot during the conversation between the two girls. This scene shows Rebekah confronting Rachel and puts Rebekah in a position of power with the use of bright light on her face. The high angle as she was taller than Rachel and the fact that she had more screen time. Shot reverse shot is associated with our genre as many conversations such as gossiping between girls occurring teen dramas and chick flicks therefore we used conventions relating to our genre.

10. Editing

• We used ellipses to move the story along at some points in our sequence. This was created by using simple fade in and outs and cross-dissolves to give a sense of the scene moving on/changing but maintain a smooth and soft transition in scenes rather than a fast cut which would be more appropriate in an action film.
• We put in a split screen to emphasise the differences/contrasts between the two characters.
• Cross cutting was used a lot at the beginning of our sequence between the two girls’ morning routine in different locations, this forces the audience to compare and distinguish their differences which is what was our target. This is a technique we saw in many films such as "10 Things..."

11 & 12. Sound

• Our main sound element is non-diegetic music which plays during the girls’ morning routine as there is barely any dialogue at this point.
• The background music adds a bounce to the sequence and makes it more interesting to watch as it gives the film a youthful edge - new music is often showcased in teen films like ours as well as established hits.
• The music chosen is a rocky/alternative type and this is the typical music you would hear in a teenage film as it has this rebellious tone to it.
• The dialogue used is rare during the morning routine scene but a small snip is used when their mothers talking them to hurry for their bus. Rebekah’s response is more sharp and rude in comparison with Rachel’s sweet and kind reply.
• Another song is used when we use the cross dissolve between two scenes and we did the same with the music and faded it out and faded the next one in at the same time as the scene change.
• The music stopped when the dialogue starts in corridor scene. The dialogue on the nerdy girl’s part is very limited and this highlights her shyness. Rebekah’s dialogue is said in a confident manner and emphasises her confidence and loudness. She almost shows off in front of her friend’s in this scene to highlight her power compared to the nerdy girl by telling her boyfriend off as if she owns him.