In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

My film was created using relatively new digital video technology in a now changing industry, the change from film to digital video is now taking a huge turn with many Directors now favouring the systems for their ease of use. This new generation of people creating every sort of video and sharing them on internet sites such as YouTube and Vimeo has created overnight stars and outlets for this new generation. However, I'm challenging the convention of these videos as a majority are not serious short films of movies, rather episodic or amusing clips about the creators own life. By creating a serious film I am hoping to achieve a more spread of publicity and a genuine interest rather than users looking for a quick laugh.

The film is different than what most students would make, its genre- a religious drama is not the first idea that comes into students' heads with a majority of the films on youtube being action, guns and frankly awful acting.

A majority of religious based films portraying religion in a negative way is often protested and rallied against. These public demonstrations against 'Dogma' by Kevin Smith actually caused more positive publicity than negative with Smith stating 'it was the best publicity' he could of gotten. In terms of genre my film defies the convention that most short films do not have a plot, favouring a sequence of events, a quick snapshot from a much larger picture. These films include 'The Hole' 'Get Off My Land' and 'The Box'. My film does have a plot and a narrative arch that covers the events following the flash back that is included, therefore creating a whole plot in a short film. In terms of plot my film does not confine the conventions of a normal drama as it features a flashback a a flashback crossed out of body experience. In the few religious films where the out of body experience applies, it is usually to meet God, whereas in my film, the subject, Anthony' is essentially moving away from God and rejecting his religion.

By leaving the film open to interpretation, I do not confine to the convention that a film must be essentially 'wrapped up' and 'finished'. I leave it to the audience to decided whether Anthony has done right by staying with his girlfriend or wrong by throwing away his religion and the only man left in his intermediate family.