Name: Melissa NorthCandidate Number: 5667Center Name: St. Paul’s Catholic CollegeCenter Number: 64770

OCR Media Studies – A2 Media Studies

Unit G324: Advanced Production Portfolio

Evaluation

Question 1

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

Both the main and ancillary products produced for ‘Two Rivers’denote ‘elements of repetition and difference’ (Steve Neale) from the Soap Opera genre in order to attract the target audience. For example in the trailer there is evidence of Todorov’s three part narrative, which is commonly seen in all soap operas, and as in a trailer, there is only the use of equilibrium and disequilibrium, which makes the viewers want to discover what is going to happen in the soap opera itself, which the institution (including ourselves)recognise as the open narrative cliff hanger, which is often what gets the viewers excited to come back and watch the follow up episode. For example, the ‘strong dominant female’ (Rebecca Feasey - 2007) removes her wedding ring, and walks off into the distance, indicating something is going to happen in the upcoming episodes. Throughout the trailer, you can feel the tension of the female character and the other two male characters, as they meet or cross paths with each other. The first male character is watching/hiding from her, and then the second male character looks directly at her and stands to stare as she walks away. This is unusual to the typical soap opera, although the theme of the battle of the sexes (female VS male tension) as usually it’s the males who are the dominant characters.

Question 1

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

In the trailer, the non diegetic soundtrack used - ‘Cyrrus – She Kills’ - works well with developing the forms and conventions of a real media soap opera trailer, as the lyrics link to what is going on and help to develop the storyline. For example when the non-diegetic lyrics denote ‘she kills’ play, her foot stamps down, indicating she's strong and in charge, and the way in which its anchored with a red overlay also connotes dominance, as people usually associate red as – strong, blood, scary. With the camera also being on the floor, the technical code of a low angle gives the feeling the viewers watching the trailer below the character, which also goes back to the feel that she is above the rest (Hartley’s seven subjectives – Class). With the final lyrics, of ‘she kills’, the female character rolls her eyes, on sequence, as if it isn’t any faze to her, and she looks directly out to the camera to the audience. This theme of the use of powerful non-diegetic music and the recognition that sound is an important technical feature is inspired by the promotional moving image trailer for as the lyrics to song are ‘she kills’ help show this dominant female, and give the message that this woman is dangerous.

Question 1

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

In the ancillary texts, firstly with the magazine front cover, I have developed on the use of conventions of a real media product, for example, the presence of a ‘strong woman’ (Rebecca Feasey – 2007) commonly seen in the genre to draw people into want to watch my soap and with the image (Right hand side image), I anchored it with the verbal code of a catchy headline, which the audience will read as a question, ‘Who’ll Break The Silence’, and subconsciously want to watch the soap to find out what is going to happen.

Also, on the magazine front cover there is a verbal code which says that you can, ’Win Exclusive Interview With Two Rivers Character Eulalia!’ from Two Rivers, and with this the convention also draws the audience in to want to buy the magazine to maybe find out more about the characters or the actual soap itself.

Question 1

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

Just like other magazines, the verbal codes used such as persuasive language like ‘New’ and ‘Exclusive’ also connote to the audience that they should buy this media product, to see what is inside that’s new and exclusive, which then helps with my soap opera being viewed by the public as well as capturing the all important pass along audience which all promotional material and media products that rely heavily on non-verbal and verbal codes should do. A magazine of inspiration that I decided to ‘exploit’ (Abercrombie – 1995) the conventions of in order to help sell the magazine and in turn the soap opera was ‘TV Mag’ asthey use the big bold text to promote the story line and head lines, and also the colours used are block colours, making the images and the text easy on the eye for thetargeted audience.

Real Media MagazineHeadline

Question 1

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

Likewise with the poster, in Adobe Photoshop CS4 I have over layed cracks onto the main image itself with a slogan of ‘At some point we all crack’. This, along with the headline on the magazine front cover, will allow for cross media promotion that will draw the audience in and create a form of viral marketing and a “buzz” for the shock value this encourages, just like what real media products try to do, through providing thought provoking enigma clues (Roland Barthes) to the audience. This was inspired by the deconstruction of other poster campaigns such as the Hollyoaks Poster, as they too have used an overlay through non-verbal codes such as fire, which connotes in that particular episode some sort of fire related incident is going to occur or the characters are fiery in nature and personality. In my poster, I chose to stay in keeping with real media products codes and conventions in order to construct an appealing poster for my soap opera, such as the main image, the catchy slogan, the time the soap will be on and which days. By using the ‘repetition’ (Steve Neale) of these codes and conventions, this has successfully helped me develop my idea and provide a realistic but unique poster campaign.

Hollyoaks Poster

Question 1

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

The point of call information on the poster and magazine allows the audience to see the vital information needed for the soap such as: what time the soap is on, so that they don’t miss it. The point of call includes the title, the channel, time the soap is playing. On all my products, both main and ancillary, I endeavored to create some sort of synergy with social media products such as Facebook and Twitter, as well as promote the show as being available to watch through online devices and services such as BBC iPlayer. The encouragement of the consumers being able to interact with the soap through social networking sites, and on Catch Up TV, is something that will appeal to the young target audience we tried to capture. There are further examples of where this takes place on the next slide.

Question 1

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

Question 2

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

The combination of the main and ancillary texts within the production of ‘Two Rivers’ on reflection has proved to be very successful. For example, there is evidence of convergence on one of my ancillary texts (the poster) where I have presented a website to encourage the audience to ‘inform’ (Katz) themselves about the soap is all about. Also, with my main product (the trailer), I have included at the end a website to show that you can also access more information regarding the show which is a prime example of cross media convergence. Moving on to Synergy in my trailer, I also have incorporated the use of Facebook and Twitter so the audience can ‘like’ or ‘follow’ the new upcoming soap, which then helps me as a producer identify the popularity of the soap opera as it goes national, just through the audience using social networking sites and creating some form of viral marketing for the show. As a group we recognized the importance of not just marketing the show through the e-media platform, but ensuring the products were connected as much as possible so that the show could be accessible to our younger target audience.

PosterWebsiteSynergy

Question 2

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

This philosophy also extends to the trailer, where the presence of the BBC 3 ident throughout along with with the cross media convergence of notifying the audience that this show will be accessible through on-demand media products online such as BBC i-Player. Firstly, by being on BBC 3, this connotes to the audience that it is a new upcoming soap, as this channel is known for being up to date and showing new shows, although it isn’t the most popular channel for consumers, it still attracts people as before the channel has served as a launch pad for new programming such as Gavin & Stacey.

Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

From the audience feedback that I received for both my main and ancillary products, I gained quite good feedback on what I had created or contributed towards. Starting with my main product, the trailer, I asked a series of questions about what they thought overall on a scale of 1 to 5, and on average I got a 4 so with this it shows myself that the audience enjoyed the trailer, but with one feedback of some of the parts didn’t seem to be needed in the trailer, such as the boy standing behind the tree. Also I found that the audience thought the music chosen to use non-dietetically was relevant to the trailers narrative, but everyone that gave me feedback felt they would have preferred a known song, whether old or new. Taking this on board I realized that maybe when you are watching trailers, if the characters are more of a ‘celebrity’ then you feel of a ‘personal relationship’ (Katz) with them and the soap, vice versa with regards to the chosen song.

RESULTS – NEXT SLIDE FOR QUESTION 1

Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

RESULTS – QUESTION 1 – OUT OF MY WHOLE TRAILER, DO YOU FEEL THE OVERALL PRODUCT WAS A SUCCESS?

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On a scale of 1 -5 my audience were asked if overall was my trailer a success, 1 being the worse and 5 being the best, a had a mixture of answers for my feedback, and from this found about a third thought it was near enough successful, but another third thought it could have been better, and when finding out why they thought it could have been better, one of the main problems was the chosen song used to play over the trailer.

Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Moving on to my ancillary products, the audience seemed out of the two to give more praise for my poster, with one quoting ‘I can see a real media product, when looking at this’, so from this I think with a poster you don’t need a lot to be going on to get the audience intrigued by the soap, you just need a good enough photo and a catchy slogan to pull the audience in, which I feel I did. Finally, with the use of my audience feedback on my magazine front cover, I felt that I did get positive feedback but still could have added more and maybe added in some better quality photos in my other stories, as two of my audience pointed out they didn’t understand why one of the photos of the pub was one of the stories, as usually you see characters in the images. However the decision to include this image was based on our research into the genre and how they often denote some form of location or setting that establishes a community such as a Pub.

RESULTS - NEXT SLIDE FOR QUESTION 1

Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

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On a scale of 1 -5 my audience were asked if overall was my front cover and my poster a success, 1 being the worse and 5 being the best, I had very good feedback not getting a lower answer than a 4, meaning all the audience thought they both were great, the one comment I had was that on the magazine front cover, they felt some of the images weren’t needed.

RESULTS – QUESTION 2 – OUT OF MY MAGAZINE FRONT COVER AND MY POSTER, DO YOU FEEL THE OVERALL PRODUCTS WERE A SUCCESS?

Question 4

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?Construction

Firstly with the trailer, we used Adobe Premier CS6 to edit the footage and music together, which helped with making sure that we had the right length of clips, using a combination of tools such as the ripple edit tool, which enabled us to make sure that the different clips and shots were perfectly combined together and that they don’t have a jump cut or any other mistakes hidden, resulting in the whole trailer appearing to run smoothly. Also, the use of a fading in and out effect, in some of the scenes they are flash backs, created a ‘faze’ back edit, which I also feel worked well and showed continuity but also established the non-linear nature of the show and will help provide a USP for the audience. Also this software enabled us to add a non-diegetic voice over effect to the end of the trailer, over the Point Of Call, which replicates a real media product. With the planning we done for the script and storyboarding for the trailer, we used Microsoft Word and PowerPoint, so the work was clear and presentable, being able to construct my planning with these resources for pre-production I was able to do it in a professional standard which was important as this enabled me and the group to have a clear plan for beforehand and during the day of filming. With my ancillary products I used Adobe Photoshop CS4 to create both the magazine front cover and poster. With this, it enabled me to be able to have a crisp and detailed set of products, without this I wouldn’t have been able to have the best amount of quality that I have in my work. I used several tools, but mainly the ‘Quick Selection Tool’, which helped me be able to select certain parts of a photo and get rid of the background or change the colour of the image. I also used a variety of shapes, for example the cover lines from the ‘Shape tool’ and even used basic tools such as a ‘Text tool’ to create the headline, the strapline, the masthead and cover lines for my magazine. For my masthead I chose to use a website called DaFont.com to download a certain font, called Futura, to use in my masthead. Using both Adobe Premier CS6 and Adobe Photoshop CS4 has helped me produce three products that to me I feel that are near enough identical to a real media product.

Quick Selection Tool

Ripple Edit Tool

Question 4

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

ResearchThe research that I completed around the soap opera genre really helped me with coming up with my ideas for all my products. For the trailer, I watched several BBC trailers for soaps, to see what they used as a storyline, voice overs, soundtracks and even as little as to where they place the BBC 3 logo on the trailers. With my poster and magazine front cover, I also did the same, looking on the internet to see what they use and convey in terms of conventions to catch the audiences eyes, and also buying and evaluating TV Magazines such as What’s on TV and TV Mag.One soap opera trailer I used as a point of research was an Eastenders trailer, which gave me the majority of my ideas for my final storyline.

Eastenders Two Rivers

PlanningIn my planning, I produced along with the other group members several pieces, such as my hand drawn drafts for my poster and magazine front covers, which allowed me to play around and see what I can get and see what works well together such as colours. Doing this helped me by making it easier for me to produce the final pieces in Photoshop. Also I produced computerized storyboards for my trailer, using Microsoft PowerPoint, a shot list, prop list, letter to the council, a list of out locations we were going to use in the filming, just to make sure that I have everything I needed in order to get the best out of my product. Throughout this planning, we conducted meeting notes, just so we could keep track of where we were and where out filming was heading.

EvaluationBy using Microsoft PowerPoint, the software allowed me to produce a neat and presentable evaluation reflecting on my main and ancillary texts, such as the trailer and the magazine front cover and posters, as well as be able to add in screen grabs of my work from my products to anchor the areas of reflection I am certain provide the best examples of how the production work has been a huge success.