Portfolio Evaluation

Q1:
My portfolio includes my textual analysis, location report for my creative artefact, 9 key frames and script which make up my creative artefact, the purpose of which was to communicate the resolution of my prequel as well as to emphasise the aspects of my MACRO of style of one of my chosen studies: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless mind. The reason I chose this film instead of my other study Scott Pilgrim vs the World was because I believed it was more appropriate to communicate my chosen MACRO of style, specifically visual style, recreate a realistic prequel for Eternal Sunshine on a low budget as well as exploring different aspects within my thesis statement of my textual analysis through both my script and 9 key frames. The aim of my textual analysis was to show creative insight in to how this MACRO of visual style is reinforced through the idea of hyperreality through both of my chosen studies Scott Pilgrim and Eternal Sunshine and craft an argument as to which film conforms or relies more heavily on visual style to portray the idea of hyperreality. Which through the conclusion of my textual analysis, I concluded that Scott Pilgrim does not necessarily rely on visual style to drive forward the narrative forward, but simply to create a spectacle. Eternal Sunshine on the other hand relies on visual style to address the idea of hyperreality as well as drive the narrative of the story along.

Q2:
Whilst creating my 9 key frames I had to attempt to capture iconic moments which were represented in my script. In return, this would drive the narrative forward as well as expressing the idea of visual style through the idea of hyper reality, presented in both my script through  aspects of my textual analysis. These aspects are presented through the portrayal of conventions of surreal visual style through the idea of hyperreality. Key frame number 4 represents my MACRO of visual style and the idea of hyper reality through creating surreal imagery with the use of Photoshop, blurring out Howard's face to exaggerate the idea that Mary is losing her memories of Howard prior to their affair. She is losing these memories so Howard and his wife can go back to their normal lives. which is further reinforced by the whole room becoming black and white to give the idea that it is a past memory as well as the picture of Howard and his wife Hollis Photoshoped in to the background to show that Howard is married, she is having these hallucinations during the procedure because she wants to cling on to these memories of her and Howard. I have used these conventions of style in Key frames 5,6 and 8. I believe I achieved my understanding was through my choice of location since my first location actually looks like a psychiatric or consulting doctors building, similar to that of Lacuna Inc in Eternal Sunshine. My second location reinforces my MACRO of visual style and the idea of hyper reality as it represents Howard's house which Mary is remembering in her dream state. Through the use of props and editing I created memory loss headgear which conforms to the idea of hyper reality and conventions of surreal style presented in my script. Lastly, through costume I have stuck to the conventions of surreal style, to reinforce the idea that my actors are from a memory loss clinic.

Q3:
My location report was very important in the construction of my 9 key frames I had to alter my location report slightly at first after taking my first photos of my location which was at Dartford Grammar School for Boys which I used because I needed a building which looked like it could be a medical building of sorts. I also needed to have a scenes which required a dinner scene, bedroom scene and an office scene which resulted in me having to find a second location report which was at 128 Hawley Road. I chose this location as it had an office in it which I manipulated to look like a personal doctors office to show that Mary is about to undergo this psychological procedure. I manipulated the room downstairs to look like it was a romantic dinner which Howard made for Mary by adding lit candles and wine. For the bedroom scene I had to used used the clothes on the floor to show that this was a sexual scene, I also dressed the set with dark lighting to help represent it was a fading memory. Without this previous planning I would probably not have thought of this idea for my key frames. It suited my MACRO because the second location enabled me to explore and play with visual and surreal style in terms of the idea of hyper reality which made me able to make my key frames look like something which is not something which would not be seen in every day society and matches some of the conventions used in Eternal Sunshine.

Q4:
I believe my script and my 9 key frames achieved it's purpose which was to clearly demonstrate my aspects of my thesis statement of my textual analysis which states to what extent visual style is portrayed in terms of the idea of hyperreality through the memories and setting of my script and 9 key frames. My dialogue and stage directions helped make my characters seem believable and have used them to drive the story forward so when I have attempted to represent my MACRO it has been clearly communicated through my characters and their actions and through this I was also able to build some hyperreality in to it as well. In my key frames the idea of hyperreality being presented through visual style is clearly presented through the use of editing to create a hyper-real  situation, for example when Mary is going through memories in which she is about to have erased from her mind. However, in my script I could have developed my MACRO of style for narrative purpose by perhaps trying to make it more apparent that Mary's memories are hyper-real through stage directions to have a more detailed description of the scene. In my 9 Key Frames to improve my camera shot types could have been improved since I had to edit a lot of my photos due to mistakes I had made as a camera man such as taking some of the photos as portrait not landscape like a film screen which resulted in me cropping a lot of some of the photos to make them look landscape. Better organisation of my actors may have affected the outcome of my Key Frames if I was able to do them again.