The incredible’s and Super hero codes and conventions.

In this article I will be discussing the codes and Conventions of cinema superhero films to see what aspects they share and in some cases how they differ. In this essay I will mainly be looking at the Disney film ‘The Incredibles’. This film is very interesting because it  goes both with and against the codes and conventions.

Plot

This film concentrates of one main character and his family as he goes on a journey which puts himself and his family at risk by a villain known as syndrome.

The film starts off with MR. Incredible AKA Robert Parr in his prime as he is battling criminals in the streets of his city using his super power of super strength, whilst doing so he is being followed by his biggest fan 'Incredi-boy'. Annoyed by the child, Mr. Incredible tells him to go away and later meets his soon to be wife Elastic girl (soon to be Helen Parr) who posses the power to stretch her body. They get married but shortly after the marriage superheros became banned and all supers had to stop their superhero jobs and settle down, due to this Mr. incredible and Elastic girl go to using their normal names Robert and Helen Parr.

Mr. and Misses Incredible

Many years later Robert and Helen have started a family with three children, Violet who is the eldest sibling, she and quite Violet posses the power to turn invisible and to create force fields. Dash the second eldest sibling has the power to run at super speeds, a cocky trouble maker dash always finds himself in trouble. and last but not least there's Jack-jack, still a child he has no powers what so ever.

Violet, Dash and Jack Jack (left to right)

Now with a new life and identity Robert is still unsatisfied, he wants to re live the glory days where he was Mr. Incredible, because of this he and he best friend Froze-zone secretly go out to fight crime under the radar. As this is happening they are being watched by a secret agent who discovers that Robert is Mr. Incredible, which is their primary target.

The agent contacts Robert about a top secret mission in which a government machine called the Omnidroid 9000 has gone loose and they need his help to take it out. Reminiscing about the past Robert decides to go for it with out telling his family.

When he is there he discovers its a trap and that his biggest fan from the glory days became Syndrome the evil villain who controls the robot and wants to use it to become super. Mr. Incredible gets captures and is imprisoned on the island as Syndrome plans to cause havoc in the city using the Omnidroid.

Whilst he is caught Helen discovers he is not where he says he is and goes after him as she fly a jet over to the island she discovers that Dash and Violet stowed away on the plane and whats worst is that missiles have locked onto the plane and destroy it. Surviving the explosion they get to the island and Helen tells Dash and Violet to stay put as she goes to find Robert.

As Helen breaks into the compound which Robert is at she discovers a rocket being launched and another rocket within the compound. She makes her way through the place until she finds Robert and releases him and make their way out.

Meanwhile Dash and Violet are found and are pursed by Syndromes henchmen. As they fight of the foes they run into their mum and dad, together they team up and fight Syndromes men only to be stopped by Syndrome himself. Syndrome captures them and locks them in the compound as he goes to the city with the Omnidroid to cause havoc.

As they are stuck in Syndromes base, Robert apologies to the family and lets them know how sorry  he is for being so selfish and putting them at such great danger. Violet discovers that her force field can get her out of the contraption they are stuck in, after escaping herself she releases the rest of her family and together they pursuit Syndrome using the rocket that Helen saw before.

Whilst on their way to the city the Omnidroid has been activated and is destroying the city, Syndrome is there pretending to fight the Omnidroid when he is actually controlling the machine using a remote on his wrist.

When the Incredible's finally reach the city they come face to face with the Omnidroid and begin a battle to destroy the machine, as the fight progresses froze-zone joins them in the fight and they discover that the remote controls the robot.

Using the remote and Mr. Incredible experience fighting the old machine they trick the Omnidroid into destroying himself using one of his claws.

Now with the Omnidroid destroyed and Syndrome nowhere to be seen the city realizes the need for super hero's like the incredible and Froze-zone. With the city being happy with the return of the supers the Incredibles are escorted to their home in a limousine where they realize that Syndrome has captured Jack-jack and is going to abduct him in order to make him Syndrome side kick. 

Syndrome blast through the roof of the Parr residence with Jack-jack in his arms and he flies to his private jet which is waiting above the house. As he gets closer to the jet Jack-jack gets angry and unleashes his power of shape shifting. He shape shift into flames, a solid piece of metal and then a little devil and goes on to fight Syndrome in mid air.

Jack-jack is able to fight Syndrome off and make him lose control of his flying mechanism..resulting Syndrome being sucked into the jets engines and destroying himself and the jet.

After this the incredible live their lives happily as they are living as normal people among other normal people but when ever there is trouble they will become the super heroes which they really are.

The Incredibles is a very interesting type of super hero movie compared to most other super hero films and there are many reasons for it. When you look at the codes and conventions of ordinary superheros films and then compare it to this film the reasons why are extremely clear.

Codes and conventions in super hero films:

Target audience

This aspect is probably the most out standing feature of this film which has such big impact of the film. The target audience of this film are children aged 3-15 but provide adult innuendo. Due to this, this film is very restricted in the nature of its content for example the violence factor. 

A typical hero film such as 'Batman the Dark Knight' is jam packed with fights and violence which an older, more typical superhero target audience's find very attractive, as they like gripping action scenes in which the bad guys get hurt. 

Because The Incredibles target audience is family friendly it must have action scenes but themes which are sutible for very young children. This means no over the top killing, no blood, no scary themes, no swearing ETC. This is definitely the main reason why this film is different because of the nature of the target audience although, this film has attracted a skew in older audiences which are not put off by the reduction of violence and other normal super hero features. This shows that this film is a great success because even when going against the codes and conventions of a typical superhero film it still manages to capture the typical target audience well.

Studio

The makers of this film are Pixar studios, which have made such animated films as the very popular 'Toy Story', 'Cars', 'monsters inc' and many more. This company is very good at what they specialize in, family friendly animated films, they have been doing it for years and with the massive entertainment company Disney owning Pixar they are sure to have a big budget and advertising.

Disney differ a lot when compared to companies which typically make super hero films. Companies like Warner Brothers which have made many of the Superman and Batman films, as well as 20th Century Fox which work of many Marvel feature films, are all more serious and mainly use live action rather than Pixars animated movies style. 

Another way the film goes against the codes and conventions of superhero movies. Where most superhero films are live action with massive budgets and costs, Pixar differ and animate their films which is unorthodox especially for a super hero film. This all comes down to target audience because children will find a cartoon much more appealing that live action.

Characters

The characters in the incredibles are very interesting as they follow conventions and also go against them. Any one who is familiar with super hero trivia can straight away point out the resemblance between the Incredibles and marvels Fantastic four. 

Mr. Incredible and The Thing both share the power of super strength, Mr. fantastic and Elastic girl both have the ability to stretch their limbs. The greatest similarity is with Violet and Invisible woman who both share not only one but two powers, the power to turn invisible and to create force fields. Pixar have definitely taken inspiration from this very well known group of hero's. Another aspect which the characters in The Incredibles share with many conventional super hero is the fact they are in an alliance, very similar to other groups such as 'The Avengers', 'The justice league', 'x-men' and even the fantastic four. although this aspect of fighting in a group is familiar the reason why The Incredibles fight together is because they are exclusively immediate family, something that not many other groups of super hero can claim to do.

The reason for this comes back to the fact the target audience are children and family audiences, the idea of family bonds seem very appealing to them and is very friendly.  

Narrative

Here is an aspect of the Incredible which does in fact follow the codes and conventions of a super hero movie accurately. Firstly the narrative is linear and follows a progressive time line, This is similar to a lot of superhero films. Some super hero films may include flashbacks but nothing which actually influences the structure of the narrative itself. One example of a super hero movie where the narrative is not linear is the new X-men movie called The days of future past, where the story goes back and forth between past and future.

The Incredible also follow Todorovs theory very accurately, his theory states that a successful narrative follows this order.

Equilibrium

·      Disequilibrium

·      Recognition of disequilibrium

·      Attempt to resolve disequilibrium

·      Resolution - equilibrium restored

    Where these points are covered in the Incredibles is as follows:


Equilibrium - Supers are respected around the world and crime is being beaten out of society by super hero's

·      Disequilibrium - Supers are banned and a government machine is going rampage in a private island (it must be stopped)

·      Recognition of disequilibrium - Mr. Incredible discovers the truth about the machine and the antagonist has been revealed. Mr. incredible then gets captured and needs to be saved (very popular plot line in most films)

·      Attempt to resolve disequilibrium - Mr. Incredible gets saved by his family and they attempt to destroy the Omnidroid 3000

·      Resolution - equilibrium restored - They destroy the Omnidroid 3000 and people realize that supers are needed, therefore the supers regain their respect and make a come back.

The target audience which is a family friendly audience (parents and their children aged 3-15) feel very familiar with this narrative as it is easy to follow and for young people very understandable. The aspects which the younger target audience will find more appealing would be the animations and characters such as dash and violet which they can relate to themselves. Older audiences such as parents will find the aspects such as tension very appealing, they may also connect to Mr. and Mrs. incredible as they feel as if they reflect their own family. As well as this the audience want to see a film where the protagonist wins, this is with all super hero films. The audience is sympathetic towards the main character and feel a connection with them, that's is why the audience want to see them prevail.

photography breakdown

ISO:

In a camera there is a light sensitive sensor which can tell how much light falls onto the sensor and in what parts to produce an image. The way ISO works is to control the sensitivity of the sensor, the higher the ISO the more light sensitive the sensor is. One way to use this in photography is to counter wether your in dark conditions or very bright conditions, for example if you are taking pictures in a very low lighted room, you can raise the ISO so your picture turns out well. Depending on what sort of camera you have the range of ISO can vary, the very high end cameras have the whole range.

This images shows the way ISO can influence an image

Aperture:

aperture allows you to change the depth of field in the photo, by this i mean it influences the focal length and sharpness in different regions of the image. The way it works is in the lens, the lens has shutter blades to allow certain amount of light into the camera but creating a hole, by changing the aperture you can change the size of the hole. The bigger the hole is the more light is let through into the camera, as a result the focal region is smaller meaning the blurred areas are extremely blured. If the hole is smaller there is less light going into the camera which in turn makes more of the image sharper.

The unit of measurement for aperture is the 'F number', the higher the 'F number' the smaller the hole is. A lower 'F number' the larger the hole is. Some specialist cameras such as prime lenses have a aperture range which is a lot lower than normal lenses, This is for certain types of photography such as portraits.

The diagram below will illustrate the aperture setting and what the hole would look like.

This photo was shot which a very high aperture therefore more of the image is in focus. They best time to use a high aperture is in landscape and architectural photography where you want all parts of the image to be sharp.

This image was shot with a low aperture (f/5.0). More of the image is blurred so the attention is shifted towards the subject more. this is great for macros photos and especially in portraits.

Shutter speed:

shutter speed controls how long the light sensitive sensor is exposed to the light, This is done using a shutter which stays closed. when the shutter opens the picture is being taken, when the shutter closes the photo is finished taking the picture. using the shutter speed you can change how long the shutter stays up. If the shutter speed is fast the image will capture moving targets in a still shot and will reduce motion blur, the side effect of having a fast shutter speed is that you image will tend to be darker because less light is being registered.

A slow shutter speed with register more light because the sensor is exposed for longer, this can be used to take really good effects such as light streams, misty water and rolling clouds. The image will also be blurred if there are moving subjects but this depends on the length of the shutter speed.

In this image the shutter speed was fast enough to capture the water sprout whilst in mid air, this means that the shutter opened and closed before the water moved to much. Normally the image would be pretty dark but because its was outdoors and very bright it canceled out and created a good photo.

Here is an image i took with a very slow shutter speed. The light streams were done by vehicle lights being registered by the sensor and they go past. This is great for landscape photograph and cool city photos.

photography location planning

For this photography project my task is to take photographs which depict the economic divide between rich and poor. In order to do this effectively, I need to plan the locations where id expect to see an economic divide.

I live in East London, which is a very good area to do this project because the East End has always been poorer than other areas of London and has a strong history of having a great civilian work force and working class community. In recent years this area has seen a lot of economic change, it has become the cultural capital of London and is fast changing to become richer and better off, yet the spirit of the working class community is still strongly present. Also the housing in the area is changing where you see council estates next to high end apartments and flashy sports cars speeding down poor neighborhoods. I believe this is one of the best places to get the contrast of rich and poor effectively.

Location 1

Here is a very interesting location near Brick Lane. The area is deserted and derelict with train tracks running either side of it. This area was planned to be part of a train station, which supposedly lacked funding. Now it just lays dormant. Many people shoot films and music videos here and I have used this place myself many times. The main aspect of this location is that you can see the skyline of the well known 'Liverpool Street' in the distance, which in itself sums up the divide between rich and poor. 

I plan to do portraits in this location.

 location 2 (the oval)

 This location hold a lot of interesting assets and is very popular to show the 'nitty gritty' side of London. Located in Hackney which is a borough that has seen much improvement in recent years, This location has been well known in British music videos and has also been used as the set of the block buster movie 'Fast and Furious 6'. The reason why I like this area is because of the mix of large bulky industrial buildings alongside a serine and calm canal.

Here is a music video which was shot there.

General Location

The next area is Bethnal Green. As rest of east London it has recently seen a boom in development. Being right next to the inner city, a lot of money has been spent on developing the place. People describe Bethnal Green as a future Shoreditch and is expected to have a bright future. Right now, new buildings and sky scrapers are rising from the working class environment which highlights the contrasts between rich and poor. The area has a rich history and many great landmarks such as York Hall, Brick Lane etc. And is the birth place of many famous people including the infamous Kray twins and artist such as Sanchita Islam, Peter Green and Micky Flanagan.