transformers magazine article

The film that I am going to talk about is the animated film of transformers from 1986. The film was produced by Joe Bacal and Tom Griffith and was directed by Nelson Shin. The movie was released on August 8^th 1986 and had a budget of £6 million. The running time was about 84 minutes. In the film different music artists contributed into make a soundtrack for this film, the artists that I know that were involved was Stan Bush and Lion.  

The plot for this film is that at the start of the film, the audience is introduced to the character and main villain Unicron. A cybernetic planet that survives by consuming other planets. This then leads through the opening credits (the music for the opening credits for the film was a rock version of the transformers them produced and performed by a band called lion.), on the next scene we see the transformers home planet known as cybertron which has been taking over by the decepticons, the audience are then introduced to other transformers such as megatron, starscream and soundwave. The next scene is much the same except we are introduced to the autobots, which are lead, by the most iconic transformer Optimus Prime. The next scene starts off a bit slow but it gradually gets faster, in this scene we are introduced to another autobot going by the name of Hot Rod (who later becomes Rodimus Prime at the end of the film), the scene starts to get faster when the decepticons decide to attack autobot city on earth, this then leads to the first major confrontation which is megatron vs Optimus Prime but due to hot rods foolish actions the fight leads to death of Optimus prime but the birth of Galvatron. The next of the film is more of a manhunt mainly because now because the audience is now introduced to Galvatron, the autobots are being hunted by this new transformer so the autobot matrix of leadership, so this results in the autobots being separated into different groups but they are on different planets but soon they are reunited Where they face unicron in person. Whilst some of the autobots try to find some of their companions, the autobot hot rod faces Galvatron alone for the matrix of leadership. Hot rod defeats Galvatron by throwing him out of unicron and opens the matrix of leadership to light the autobots darkest hour and so he becomes Rodimus prime the new leader of the Autobots, he then opens the matrix that destroys unicron from the inside. The final scene shows all of the surviving transformers on cybertron talking about a new beginning and a new chapter and that’s the end of the film.

The codes and conventions for this transformers film is basically using Hollywood conventions, what I mean by this is that Hollywood uses a common idea in this film and that is basically showing Earth being attacked by aliens and the hero’s (the Auto-bots) fighting the bad guys (the Decepticons).  Other codes and conventions used in this film is the good guys and the bad guys in the film, the good guy of the film would be Optimus Prime and the bad guy would be Megatron. 

This film was created in 1986, but when people watched tis film the narrator said that the transformers film was set in the year 2005, 20 years after the last television series of the generation 1 transformers, so you could say that the film was different episodes put into one so that after people have watched the film and if there was another series of transformers then some events would make sense to the audience. 

I would not say that getting the film to be set in a different time is not really a typical idea of all superhero movies, I mean there are some movies that are set in the future or the past, the movies that I have watched that are set in the future would have been films like Judge Dread, Robocop and The Terminator. But with the terminator film it starts off with the film showing the audience the future which is basically humans going to war against the machines. Some films start of in the future but then get set in the past, examples of films like this would be Men in Black 3 and yet again The terminator.

In this transformers film there are a total of 18 Autobots, they are Optimus prime, hot rod/Rodimus Prime, Ultra Magnus, Springer, Arcee, Kup, Wheelie, Blur, Blaster, Perceptor, Grimlock, Slag, Swoop, Jazz, Cliff Jumper, Bumblebee, Ironhide, and Brawn.

The total of Decepticons for this film is also 18, they are megatron/ galvatron, Cyclonus, Starscream, Sound wave, Frenzy, Rumble, Devastator, Bone crusher, Hook, Scavenger, Scrapper, Shock Wave, Astro train, Blitz wing, Kick back, Shrapnel.

The Autobots are voiced as followed

Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen)

Hot Rod/Rodimus Prime (Judd Nelson)

Ultra Magnus (Robert Stack)

The decepticons are voiced as followed

Megatron (Frank Welker)

Galvatron (Leonard Nimoy)

Star scream (Chris Latta)

The style and theme of the transformers film is an action, a bit of emotional scenes too. The film is much like the series and it shows non-stop action but when you watch the film for the first time you have different emotions that you would not have got from the television series, I mean there is no doubt that the viewers would have been very upset in the scene where Optimus prime dies this is because you don’t expect that to happen, you expect him to be the main character that will survive in the film, the people watching the film would have been surprised and shocked because in the film we see other iconic transformers like Iron hide being destroyed by Megatron so that makes you think that is there is another series of transformers would they return to the franchise and series. In superhero films the killing of a main character or an iconic character rarely happens but I suppose doing this is more of a last resort to keep the story rolling and making sense to the audience as the film continues. Other things to notice with this film is that it is different to the live action film of transformers is that the 1986 film sticks to the boundaries of the television series mainly because this films was like a super long episode of transformers that would relate to the next series and would also have references to the next series. Basically what I am saying is that if there was another series of transformers then any events that happened in that series would relate to the film. But the live action film is different mainly because each of those films have separate story lines to them.

The next thing that I want to talk about this film is the props used in the film, now in my opinion there is now point of really talking about this because the transformers film is just an animated film just like the television series, but if you think about it props may have been used to create the sounds in the film. For example the sound for the explosive hitting devastator may have been created using fireworks or for the sound of the rockets may have been created by a flamethrower or something I am unsure.

But because I am talking about the animated transformers film and not the live action film that was made in 2007 by Michael Bay, I think that it is important to talk about the items in the film or better yet the transformers franchise. The item that I want to discuss is the Auto-bot matrix of leadership, this is significant to talk about because in the overall plot the matrix is used to show a new leader of the autobots has risen or as Optimus Prime puts it in the film “an autobot shall rise from our ranks, and use the power of the matrix to light our darkest hour.” (This quote was taken from the scene where Optimus Prime dies), when you hear Optimus say this it sort of gives away the ending of the film. When you watch the other 3 transformers films that were directed by Michael bay the films don’t really have an important item to use in each of the films (tell a lie) the first live action film that was made in 2007 did focus around a certain object and that is the all-spark, the all-spark is basically the transformers life source so you can compare this version of the film to the 1986 version of the film. But the second transformers film Revenge of the fallen, it is quite similar to the 1986 film mainly because this film features the Matrix of leadership also. But the only difference is that this version of the matrix can resurrect the transformers, an example of this is when the audience sees Optimus Prime coming back to life in Revenge of the fallen and the resurrection of Sentinal Prime in the third film Dark of the moon. So in conclusion to this, the Matrix of leadership is an important item in the transformers film because this item keeps the story going and is an iconic item used in the transformers universe.

When watching the transformers film over and over again I have noticed that there are sub-plots used in this film, the sub-plots in this film show the Auto-bots being separated and landing on different planets, with these sub-plots used in the film the audience is introduced to new characters such as Wheelie. The other sub-plots used in the movie also help’s the transformers and the audience by giving background information on who unicron is. 

Films like Green Lantern, Men in black do feature aliens in their films, but most films tend not to use aliens mainly because the director wants to keep the story more realistic so it appeals to the audience. But in the transformers film they get there power or ability to transform from something called a T-cog, this cog allows the transformers to transform. Other powers that the transformers have is that they can scan different vehicles so they can copy every aspect of that vehicle so they can transform.  

The narrative for this film is a linear narrative because the film sequence are in chronological order so they are working towards an end. The film does supports Todorov's theory of narrative so the equilibrium is the autobots on earth and getting on with each other. The disruption is when the decepticons attack the autobot city on earth. The realisation of the disruption is when the transformer leave earth to find salvation. To repair the equilibrium the autobots must destroy Unicron. The restoration of equilibrium is when the autobots re-claim Cybertron as their home. 

The target audience for this film would be for kids and would have a U certificate, The age range for this film would be from 6-15, this film has a simple narrative to follow, like every other superhero film, this film is watched by kids because of the characters which are one dimentional and easy to follow their development. The locations would be earth, space, cybertron (which is a fictional planet), this would apply to the target audience because of other films like Superman, Green lantern they have similar settings and this is what the target audience is expecting. There is lots of action through out the film and this would keep the target audience interested. The dialogue in this film is very simple and easy to follow for the target audience to understand. 

In my opinion the transformers film is like any other superhero film because the codes and conventions that are used through out the movie such as the plot, location and dialogue is much the same as any other super hero film like Superman, Green Lantern.

media cover work 17/1/2014

1. Open world game play: i think that Open world game play is a way of the game not have a limited of space for the game character to travel around the whole place, games like this would be G.T.A
Saints row, Prototype 1 and 2.

2.sandbox games are basically known as free roaming games that use free roaming and free roaming is when the character in the game can do their own thing like in G.T.A and you are free roaming you can basically steal cars, kill people, travel to far places or just find Easter eggs (things that are not in the game). Side quests in this game would be stopping crimes that happen in the game.

10/3/14 media work

when games are produced Characterization is used by the producers and developers mainly to sell the game to the target audience, to make the game play more exciting for the gamer and to help establish the genre and the narrative of the game. Bright colors in gaming would suggest that the game is a "family friendly" game, games like Mario or donkey Kong but games with dark colors would suggest violence and horror, games like this would be prototype or Soul reaver.

A game that i have played that has a strong protagonist is the first prototype game, i was going to talk about prototype 2 but the protagonist in the first game becomes the villain in the second game and the protagonist for prototype 1 is Alex Mercer and his role in this game is to stop a virus that is known as the black light virus and the things that were successful with this Characterization is the dark colors used on the character.

Back story  is the narrative details of a character that have happened before the game's story-the characters history. Two games that i have played that have back story is the recent tomb raider game and star wars the force unleashed, and tomb raider is a back story because it is a prequel to the other tomb raider games because this game show how Lara croft became who she is in the other tomb raider games and in the star wars game there is a back story for the main character Star killer in the first mission and that is that he was to be trained to be a jedi but instead he gets trained by darth vader.

point and click games

What are point and click games?, Point and click games are games where the player makes the decision for example a part of a game could show multiple choices for what the character should do in the game.

When point and clicks games started to become well known in the gaming genre of adventure, an example of a popular point and click adventure game would be MYST, this game shows a first person view of the character and the game player chooses what the character does, this game was so popular that six million copies were sold because of what style of game that it was.

Later through the years point and click games were not being bought as much to when they first came out mainly because that every couple years different games consoles were coming out like the play station one, but another thing to notice is that the graphics on the different platforms of games and consoles were so advanced that the graphics in point and click games were not matching up to what the gamers wanted so  the better the graphics were on the consoles the less point and click games were being sold.

But even to this year point and click games are being incorporated in to games like Tomb raider: Angel of darkness, firstly i played this game and a mission that you have to use point and click is where you are talking to this woman about someone you somehow murdered and you have to pick different things to say to not let this woman call the police. Another game that uses point and click is G.T.A IV point and click is used when the gamer either lets a certain character dies by executing them or letting them live.

A game that i have recently played is called The wolf among us, and this game is built around point and click so the story of the game can develop to what the gamer has made the character do. firstly this game is downloadable on the P.S.3, this game also uses multiple narratives, it also shows the darker side of the good guys that were in little red riding hood and then it shows the lighter side of the bad guys in little red riding hood you could say that this game is like a paradox or it is a parallel side to the fairy tale, one of the missions in this game show you playing as wolf and you are talking to the woodsman and some of the choices that you make with this character could end up with having a fight with him. 

Assassins creed brotherhood and Iron man 2

Basically when playing assassins creed brotherhood, i enjoyed the narrative of the game the narrative behind the games was the idea of redemption for the character and the game starts off with the final mission so it interests the character on how the game would proceed, but in fairness i really enjoyed the narrative.

On the other hand when playing Iron man 2 i was disappointed with the entire game mainly because the game never stuck to the movie and the game was saying it is the official game of the movie, well that's a lie for starters because in the game you battled enemies that are not relevant to the game and film, and another disappointing feature to the game is the amount of missions that there were to the game in total there are 8 missions so this really affected the narrative and idea of the game.

visual narrative

Not long ago i had to create something called a visual narrative and my narrative shows my journey from stratford back to school/ college, in total i must have taken about 50 to 80 different photos and i had to pick out 20 photos that came out better than the rest, i linked all the photos together to make it in to some sort of story and i added a song on to my visual narrative, the song i added was bringer of storms by hate eternal.

stuart hall theory of gaming

Preferred reading is when audiences respond to the media product in the way the media producers want/expect them to. when the meaning is negotiated the audience will accept that a film is based on the film like e.t for example. sometimes an audience will not accept the producers representation, Hall described this as that the media audiences have three ways of reading/responding to the media text.

The producers of early computer games were only able to produce simple graphics,  so the visual representation was not very accurate for example pong.

The graphics in this game at the time was probably advanced but when we play this games years later when we look at the games the graphics are very poor because other games have more advanced qualities, beside this game does not  look like a ping pong match


Even so, these games markers wanted to include some sort of narrative with their games because some gamers need a sense of purpose, They used titles and box art to suggest narrative and themes and settings. like mario for example.

In this game super mario bros the design on the game cartridge shows the narrative of the game which is Mario going through a castle .




This approach to game play is a very good example of how producers and consumers negotiate their reading of narrative in media texts.

todorov and propps theory

Last night I watched the film 'Transformers', the way the film's theory is told through Todorov's theory is quite easy to follow because the character is introduced with Witwicky and the autobot Bumblebee and the Decepticon Barricade.

The narrative of the film goes through 5 stages which are the equilibrium stage, the disruption, the recognition of disruption, attempt to repair the disruption and the reinstatement of equilibrium.

In the equilibrium stage we see the main character buying his first car and we see the a yellow Camero which is a yellow Camero, we then hear alien sounds coming from the car which then makes the audience want to carry on watching the film.

The disruption starts when we see a police car transform into the Decepticon Barricade which then tells us that he is here to cause trouble and to enslave mankind.

The r.o.d starts when the Autobot Bumblebee transforms and starts to fight Bumblebee and the human character Sam Witwicky is caught up in that fight scene.

The attempt to repair the disruption is signified when both the good and evil side go to a new surrounding for the final battle of the movie with all of the characters.

The reinstatement of equilibrium  because we can see the Decepticon leader destroyed, which signifies a new hope and a new chapter for the film.

The characters in this film were also easy to categorize in Propp's theory because of the name of the characters and which side they are on.

The hero (Optimus Prime) was a good guy in the film this would appeal to the audience because it describes the character and what they stand for and what they are fighting for.

The princess in the film was Witwicky because in all 3 'Transformers' movies he is the victim of the Decepticons. I think this character would not appeal to the audience because firstly he may be a main character but he is not a main part of the film he is more like an extra.

Another character who was important in the film was Megatron who is the Decepticon leader, he is an important character because it sets the story of the Transformers and what they are fighting for the Deception leader clearly fulfills the role of antagonist.

evaluation about game cutscene

I was assigned to make my own game cut scene in my media class, when story boarding this cut scene I too the idea of the terminator films and sort of in-incorporated the films in to my vision. When I say my "vision" I mean taking some ideas from the things that interest me and then mixing the two together.

The planned cut scene from my game narrative is actually the start of the game, this cut scene would more an in game narrative than a narrative cut scene mainly because of the way the characters act. This is because of the fight scene that occurs, you wold normally expect these sort of things to happen in a form of game play.

The narrative that i have established in this game is that the plot devises used in this cut scene is the beginning and the character devises used in this cut scene shows that the two main characters are always on edge and in this cut scene there is no game play devises.

The things that would happen in the game after the cut scene would be both of the main characters would slowly wake up after being sent back  the year 2014 and then the gamer would be trying to find the machine in the game before it moves onto the next cut scene.

In the cut scene that i created it was important that the location i had put in my story board matched up to when i started filming. the location that i had chosen had to be a dark rotten place so i done most of my filming under a bridge. because filming under  bridge would also show, urban decay and the darkness would stand out on the camera.

In my opinion i think that the cut scene would suit the games genre because i think that the genre of the game would be a sci-fi and music game. This would be a music game because when i was story boarding this cut scene i wanted to the game to be like the game guitar hero but it would have a story and a twist.

photography (8-10 photos)

In this blog article I have 8 photographs that I took and photo shopped in to these abstract designs.

The first photo shows barbed wire and this image would show a low economic divide and what i like about this photo is the fact the barbed wire could represent protection and harm at the same time, the second thing that i like about this photograph is that when i took this photo i controlled the aperture on the camera and what this
                                                      done is that the brick wall became blurred so this made the barbed
                                                      wire stand out more, so the photo has a sharpness to it.

                  This second photo that I have taken shows graffiti and the reason why i have taken this is because places that have a higher economic divide would possibly place there mark somewhere like an autograph, but when you come down to the lower class or lower economic divide this is how people would place there marks, in this photo there is only two things that i like and that is the angle of the photo was taken, the second thing that i like is the way that the colors stand out when i changed the brightness and contrast on photo shop. when i took this photo as well i jut changed the I.S.O to a higher setting.

This next photo was used when i changed the aperture on the camera, when taking this photo the original subject was what i could see behind the gate but when i changed the aperture the camera reversed the photo, this means that the padlock became the subject of the photo. But when it came down to photo shopping the photograph i kept on changing the brightness and contrast setting then i changed the photo to black and white and then finally i added a tint to the photo.
                                                     
   

These two photos are similar so i am going to talk about both of them, these two photos were taken to show a lower economic divide and urban decay, out of the two photos i prefer the first photo mainly because of how it is presented, before i photo shopped this photo i used the I.S.O setting on this camera to make the sign stand out and to make the grime and dirt on the sign stand out, but when i did photo shop the photo i just changed the contrast to give it the absurd effect on the color.

But with this photo i did the same things as i did with the top one but the only thing that i like is the way the water looks like blood from where i changed the contrast in photo shop.

This photo i really like because where i kept changing the brightness and contrast on the photo, this photo has a sort of negative effect about it, originally i wanted to some how make the wall blurry and make the screw stand out because this shows a lower economic divide because on the wall it has graffiti on it and rust on the screw, so getting a close up shot of this screw was a great idea for me to take a photograph of.

This photo is a good example of lower economic divide because the photo shows a sort of taxi graveyard and to have this photo definitely shows a poorer area, when i took this photo i changed the I.S.O to a higher setting make the taxi's stand out especially where parts of the taxi's are hanging by a thread, when i came round to photo shopping this photo i originally was going to change the brightness and contrast to how the taxis would come out but i did not like how the colors were coming out so i changed the photo to

black and white and started to mess around with that setting to get this photo.

With this last photo I thought it would be a good idea to change the I.S.O levels on the camera to get this sort of weird look but the main subject in this photo is the plant because vine-weed would represent old and decaying surroundings in a lower class area and setting, the thing that i like is how parts of the wall are so dark that make things on the wall stand out, i got this by changing the contrast level slightly on photo shop.

becoming a writer for tv and film

When becoming a writer for television and film, you don't really need a qualification to write anything whether its a book, writing for a television company or working in the film industries. In my opinion when it comes to writing for a book, television series or the film industries you need to be able to do the following. You need to have the following, Creative ideas, thinking outside the box, team work, pitching ideas,  Researching subjects or topics, being well read ( writers tend to read a lot) and they feed there own ideas, managing budgets, knowing their target audience, some have agents working their behalf. And now i will talk about these skills in some more detail.

. Creative ideas: This is the most important skill i think that is needed for any writer and that is being able to have creative ideas or better yet having an overactive imagination or brainwaves, these can happen from writers getting ideas from stories in different genres of stories like if you are writing a science fiction story, you could read or watch a sci-fi film for inspiration. Another way could be educating yourself, and this is only for people who are new to writing and as i said before reading stories that have been done can give you some ideas about writing your own material, but when you want to learn the basics of screenwriting for television and film you can get books the teach you what to do.

One of the books to read is called Story Structure by Robert McKee, it is one of many books to read about becoming a writer for t.v and film. The book shows you the techniques and tips on becoming an ingenious writer.

. To be able to think outside the box: (Thinking differently to everyone else), When writers create story's they tend to think about twists to put in to keep the audience on suspense. Writers tend to think of these sort of things when creating films more than television series mainly because on a t.v series the story has to stay solid so the audience can understand whats going on, but for films it is the same situation but they add the alternate endings because the different stories for it would work for an ending.

.Working in a team: For writers working in team  it is more of a skill, I mean like a writer would work with the director, the agent and the producer. When the writer works with the agent they would talk about how much money it would cost to hire a certain actor, for example how much it would be to hire out Wesley snipes out for a film like Blade, if the writer was talking to the producer then that would be focusing on the locations for the film or television series, the props that would be used to in that film or television and probably how the character would look like. But if the writer was speaking with the director then it would be the case of what the actor is doing in the role of their character and what they have to do in a specific scene.

.Pitching ideas: Writers pitch their ideas to show the creativity, but the writers would have to pitch their ideas mainly to see which is the best story line to use in there film or television. But in my opinion a pitch is no just a competition for writers just to show the creativity, it is a way for other writers to listen to different story's that the audience would enjoy, not just a load of writers gathering around a thinking what story would be better just for them, anything a writer does is all for the target audience, its what the audience wants to see, hear and to talk about. So basically its the audience's opinion on what they want to see

. Researching subjects or topics: Writers have to research subjects or topics because they want to get the background information on certain characters, this happens more in the film industries, especially with re-makes, for example with the remake of nightmare on elm street. The writer would have to research the background behind "Freddy Kruger" (who is the main villain in the nightmare on elm street series and the film Freddy VS Jason), on how he became the person he was and why he does what he does.

. Managing budgets: This is highly important to all writers mainly because this relates to all writers because in one of the previous sections i was talking about it said about hiring out actors, the amount that you have to pay for a specific actor can cost a few quid so the only way to keep an eye on how much you spend is by making notes on how much you spend the see how much you have left.

. Knowing their target audience: This is another important point to know about when writing for television companies and films and that is getting to know your target audience, the reason I am talking about this is because you have to get to know your target audience because in the television industries you don't want to write a new program for a children's television channel and make it really dark and scary, or if you are writing a new T.V series that is like a crime/drama program for the B.B.C (British broadcasting channel), and make it sound very colorful and happy because it wont work.