Media Language essay plan

_­Media language

Q1 (b) 'Discuss how you used Media Language in one of your coursework production to create meaning for the audience

CODES = MEANING 

Introduction
State what you made for A2 production:

·       Media Languages must combine effectively if the intended meaning is to research the audience (Stuart Hall) did you try “close down” meaning by using stereotypes and archetypes or cultural codes?

·       Media language must be consistent across all three pieces if they are to be interpreted as the producer intended.

·       Codes and conventions are interpreted according to the culture.

Media language across your production - digipak, website and video.
Youth is our meaning - teenage bucket list, all about girls having innocent fun, changing room scene. We constantly used this throughout to show the feeling of being young and having fun to be a role model.

Main text

Here is an example of what information you could use in your essay, below I have included what I would write for my own essay, rather than the examples.

Media Language	Example	Meaning Created
Mise En Scene	Outfits	To show youthfulness
	Props – notebook	Transition of age and memories
	Bright lighting and colours	To show innocence and happiness
	Upbeat body Language	To show Ava is young, fun and free
Camera	180 degrees handheld	Modern and to relate to the audience as we are aiming for it to look like a home movie
	Lots of looking at the camera	To make it seem personal to the audience
Sound	Cut to the beat	Gives the video more energy and up beat
	Reflecting music	To create meaning of that genre (pop) ad relate to the lyrics
Editing	Reverse effect	This engages the audience because it makes it seem more fun and playful
	Speed up	We did this so it would match with the song

In the essay make sure to talk about all of the points and spread them out within the essay. As well as talking about other theories, such as the ones I am talking about below.

Conclusion

Sum up some of the main points which I made in my essay, make sure that I spoke about all codes and conventions and also sum this up in my conclusion.

Research and Planning

Research and Planning

Research Year 12

Titles Task – We looked at a certain film of our choice, I looked at Grease, we had to break them down in their opening titles, and we used it as research to see what font, how big and how long each of their titles were for, this helped us progress with titles.

Sounds – We looked at the different sounds which are used in film openings, for example sound effects and also songs which could be used for different reasons, for example to add tension or to create noise to fit with the scene occurring.

Audience – We did research online, into what are the most popular genres of films which are watched so we were able to see what was the most popular and therefore what would fit well with the audience we wanted to look at. We also looked at what audience most went to the cinema, so we could see who we should look at for the audience, because this would most probably get us the most money.

Props – We looked at genres which were similar to ours, to see what props were typically used in this kind of genre. We saw in a film like ours people were usually distracted in the beginning of the video, therefore in our own video I was distracted by looking at my phone.

Narrative – We looked at other film openings which were similar to our genre which was a drama/sci fi film. We were able to see the type of narrative which they came up with for the same genre and use ideas from their films to inspire ourselves.

Planning Year 12

Film Pitch – At the beginning we made a plan of different ideas which we had all been thinking of and what we would enjoy to do. This was a chance to everyone in the group to get their ideas across, we also then presented our film pitch to the rest of the class to understand their ideas on what we should do.

Storyboard – We created a storyboard on the film which we decided to do, this showed the shots which we were going to do in our music video and we also tried to include the timings which we wanted them to appear.

Risk Assessment – We had to do this for every time we went out filming, this would prevent any risks which would occur when going out to film. This really helped us understand what and what not to do.

Shooting Schedule – We created a shooting schedule, also every time we went out to film, this would help us to try and stay on track to complete what needed to be done and helped us with our timing.

 

Research Year 13

Features of a music video – We went through the different features of a music video and what makes it up. We also looked at the different theorists and what their theories were to create a successful music video.

Songs – We put together some songs which we liked and would appeal to the audience which we wanted to appeal to. We did a lip syncing task here to see who would be the best at singing this song out of our group.

Similar Artists – We looked into similar artists to what we wanted our artist to come across as, we were able to take ideas and costumes and use them in our own music video. We found out the appropriate things to wear and behave for the genre we did, which was teen pop.

Costume and Makeup – We looked into costumes and makeup that other artists have used, when looking down the similar artists path.

Videos of the same genre – We broke down our song, into just thirty seconds and looked at some similar videos from different songs with a similar theme to what we wanted. We used a video with the correct theme we wanted and put it to the music which we chose to use to see how the theme would fit in with the music.

Settings – We did some research into what sort of settings we could use and would be appropriate to use, I wanted to use ones which looked fun and interesting such as London.

Digipak and Website – We looked at other artists to find out different methods to make and things to put into our digipak and website. I think in the end it all looked really effective, we definitely learnt more editing things than from the AS project.

Planning Year 13

Song Pitch – We all planned a pitch each, with a song idea as well as having ideas to what we would put in the music video. We pitched this to the class so we could hear their ideas.

Storyboard – We made a storyboard for the shots which we wanted in our music video, we found that this really helped when filming our music video.

Risk assessment – We needed to do this to find out the risks which could be associated with what we were doing during the filming before we actually went out to film.

Shooting schedule – We made a very detailed plan on what we were doing to film, as well as timing, settings, lighting and the structure of the shots. This made it easier for us to know what to shoot when we went out to do the shots for the music video.

Stealomatic – We put loads of clips from different (premade) music videos and put them together, by using Premiere to put all our ideas together and make it easy to get inspiration from them. We used this a lot for our final music video.

Halfway evaluation – We did this to see how our music video and other products, such as didipak and website was going along, and what other people thought of what we had done. We did this to make sure that we were on track.

Digital Technology

Digital Technology

PRESENTATION Emaze PowToon Photobucket Blogger – GIFs Prezi	POST-PRODUCTION iMovie Photoshop After Effects Premiere
COMMUNICATION Facebook Twitter Email	DIGITAL HARDWARE iMac iPhone iPad Drone Digital SLR Steadicam

*HOW YOU'VE DEVELOPED OVER TIME*

What I used in year 12 and year thirteen, in the music video and the film opening.

AS: Dancing bears, Juno, Prelim task, Film opening -  Research, drama, genre, titles

A2: Prelim, Stealomatics, Music video

Music video: Not contentious, disjuncture, change in the premiere from year 12 to 13.

Change of the camera: More professional shots, better camera, more cinematic experience.

Section A

Section A

Post productions

Editing – Premiere (changing colours)

-      After effects (Transitions, animation)

Digipak – Photoshop

-      PowerPoint (Talk about using this in AS and then moving onto Photoshop)

-      Paint

Website

-      Wix

Speak about everything you do after filming to complete your media products – Sound production, Video editing, Image manipulation, creating and editing titles and graphics, sound and video mixing.

Dancing Bears – Prelim task

Premiere – low understanding of premiere, used to gain up skill of editing.

Juno – Editing task

Premiere – Copied music video, to understand how to edit successfully and place clips together.

Prelim AS

Premiere – More understanding of premiere, still low skill, had bad sounds, some of qualities weren’t good and also some music could be improved.

Website

Wix – I made a simple website on wix, it was not high detailed but was a beginning.

PowerPoint – I used PowerPoint to edit the photos which I placed onto the website which wasn’t as good as I did in A2.

Film Opening

Premiere – Not as high standing as AS, starting to understand higher techniques, good at using text, as well as adding in songs and other sounds, for example the ambulance noises.

Poster – Used PowerPoint and a small amount of Photoshop to edit out the background. Not as high level as when editing as in A2 posters.

Prelim

Premiere – Copied music video, which was Oasis Wonderwall, this was good to help me understand the editing.

Stealomatics

Premiere – Used premiere to edit different clips of premade music videos by other artists, and cut them together so I can have an idea of what I would like my music video to look like. Used for inspiration, different clips, for example I found clips of the bucket list from other music videos which I edited into the stealomatics video, so I could use similar shots.

Website

Photoshop – Use of Photoshop to edit the photos which I posted on the website.

Wix – I used wix, to create my website, it was easy and simple and was able to make a better website than I made last year, quickly.

Digipak

PowerPoint – I used PowerPoint to edit the arrangement of the photos in the digipak, this was not necessarily a high skill, but however it was easy to use and made it look slick.

Photoshop – I used Photoshop to edit the colouring of the photos, as well as remove the background in some of them and add a new one.

Music Video

Premiere – I edited my music video on premiere, I used a lot of different techniques, for example, sound editing, colour correction and cutting to the beat. I learnt from all of the other tasks I did how to create a successful video using premiere.

Question 1B

Question 1B

Genre – Music video

Narrative – film opening

Representation – film opening

Audience – music video

Media language – Film opening

Really reflect on how your media products work. Prepare to be flexible.

Genre – Describe setting, themes, icons, narrative, character, textual analysis, representation – DRCAGES. (Apply Rick Atlman’s theory of genre) (Consider the conventions of the genre) (How does your production use the conventions of genre – How does it challenge the theme?)

Audience – Who and how.

Narrative – How is time and space organised in your production? Is it linier? Non-linier? Does it contain enigmas? What are they? Apply the theories: Todorov/Propp/Levi-Strauss/Barthes/Three-Act.

Representation – How are groups of representation in your prediction?

·         Gender – Men/women

·         Ethnicity – Representation of ethnic minorities

·         Sexuality – Gay/straight

Audience – Uses and gratifications, personally identify with a character or situation. Information, entertainment, social interaction.

Media language – How meaning was created through:

·         Camera – FAM

·         Mise en Scene – CLAMPS

·         Editing – STOPS

·         Sound – MCDOVED

Mainstream culture.

Diverse representations.

How we constructed our representations.

Narrative

Analyse the concept of…

Telling a story, plot and character, give a brief summary of your film opening.

 

Levi Strauss – binary opposites > Hot, cold. Day, night. (And what this does to effect the film opening)

Todorov – equilibrium – disruption – new equilibrium

Propp – typical characters – hero, villain, damsel in distress, sidekick, dispatcher.

Barthers – codes, active, symbolic, enigma – anything which has meaning in film opening.

Linier or non-linear in the narrative, Linear – the story flows from beginning to end. Non-linear – it is chopped up, there could be flash backs or two parallel stories occurring.

Talk about all the theories and where you used them, if you did at all. And whether you conform or subvert – fit in it or not.

Only talk about one piece of work, I will talk about the film opening.

You can mention real media which you took ideas from, for example in our film opening we looked at Ghost and The Day I Died.

 My essay plan

Levi Strauss

Man Male hero	Female Damsel in distress
Old Helping girl	Young Hurt and needs help
Dead The dead body of girl	Alive The girl whom is alive, but see’s dead body
Happy When walking out of train station	Sad When seeing dead body

Barthes

Enigma coding – the questions in the film opening.

For example:

-       The cliff hanger at the end (Through the voice over)

-       Why did she die?

-       Why is she still alive/a ghost?

-       What did she do?

Propp

Hero – Harrison protecting Molly, as well as the heroin Ella. This therefore shows that they are both important and shows feminism, because they are both the hero’s.

Damsel in distress – Molly when she sees the dead body, however this makes her seem strong because she stands up and does voice over with a bold, strong voice. She could also be seen as a villain because she mentions ‘is this karma slowly getting back at me for the incident’ as though she did something majorly wrong.

Topics

Topics

1A)
Digital technology
Research and Planning
Post Production
Understanding the conventions
Creativity

1B)
Narrative
Genre
Representation
Audience
Media