Homework:
Pt1: Write up your Research & Planning essay response
Graded Essay Plan
Introduction
How have you developed in your Research & Planning skills across the 2 years in terms of your:
(i) Understanding of purpose of Research & its effect on Creativity
AND
(ii) Understanding of following conventions
OR
(iii) Understanding of making a product to meet the expectations of a Target Audience
Paragraph 1
P1 - AS Preliminary R&P & Planning
E1 - Given template/no R&P/no planning
A1 - Basic skills and understanding, generic copying & imitation, given template not own drafts - structure
S1 - How did this lack of skill limit your Creativity?
Paragraph 2
P2 - AS Music Mag
E2 - What you did/looked at/found out
A2 - How thorough, wide, purposeful and what level of understanding of purpose or why these are conventions?
S2 - How did this skill develop (or lack of limit) your Creativity?
Paragraph 3
P3 - A2 Film Trailer
E3 - What you did/looked at/found out
A3 - How thorough, wide, purposeful and what level of understanding of purpose or why these are conventions?
S3 - How has this shown development across the 2 years?
Paragraph 4
P4 - AS Music Mag Planning to A2 Music Video
E4 - What you did do?
E4 - What you did do?
A4 - How was this based on understanding of purpose or conventions from Research & How has this changed?
S4 - How has this shown development across the 2 years?
Conclusion
How you have DEVELOPED as a Post-Modern Media Producer (consider the defining words you wrote down - Intertextuality - reimagining, influences & The act of production itself is creative (no judgment of what is creative)
Pt2. Prepare your shoot for this week/weekend. Actors
Permissions & Locations
Props
Equipment Booking with Mr French
Prep Work: (45 mins)
Pt 1: Read over the exemplar and identify:
POINT (Skills in understanding, using and breaking conventions of RMT)
EXAMPLES (of AS and A2 RMT and how this was applied)
ANALYSIS (Development of Skills across 2 years)
Q1A - Conventions of Real Media Texts (Unfinished)
1 (a) Describe how your analysis of the conventions of real media texts informed your own creative media practice. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills developed over time.
For my Foundation Portfolio I created a new music magazine called 'Sound' for the indie/festival genre aimed at a target audience of females aged 17 - 24. Then, for my Advanced Portfolio I created a hybrid narrative/performance music video for the song Autumn Leaves by Ed Sheeran, - an indie/acoustic song - with ancillary tasks of a Digipak for the album from which the song was released from, '+' and a promotional website. Conventions are important in a media product as they help to give what the audience is expecting in terms of the genre, whilst analysing them helped me to understand how each product was constructed.
At the very start of my Foundation portfolio, I had very little knowledge on the importance of conventions, or what conventions existed within the world of media, but as I began to construct my music magazine, specific genre and product conventions began to come up and I learnt why they existed. The more I looked at analysing existing music magazines such as 'Kerrang!' and 'NME' I developed an understanding for magazine conventions, such as how they used inserts to persuade the consumer to purchase the product with terminology such as 'exclusive', 'win' or 'free' and how the Masthead was placed in the top third of the page in a size or colour which stood out to the consumers' eye and often reflected the genre of the magazine, such as Kerrang!'s use of a 'grundgy' typography.
For my Foundation Portfolio I created a new music magazine called 'Sound' for the indie/festival genre aimed at a target audience of females aged 17 - 24. Then, for my Advanced Portfolio I created a hybrid narrative/performance music video for the song Autumn Leaves by Ed Sheeran, - an indie/acoustic song - with ancillary tasks of a Digipak for the album from which the song was released from, '+' and a promotional website. Conventions are important in a media product as they help to give what the audience is expecting in terms of the genre, whilst analysing them helped me to understand how each product was constructed.
At the very start of my Foundation portfolio, I had very little knowledge on the importance of conventions, or what conventions existed within the world of media, but as I began to construct my music magazine, specific genre and product conventions began to come up and I learnt why they existed. The more I looked at analysing existing music magazines such as 'Kerrang!' and 'NME' I developed an understanding for magazine conventions, such as how they used inserts to persuade the consumer to purchase the product with terminology such as 'exclusive', 'win' or 'free' and how the Masthead was placed in the top third of the page in a size or colour which stood out to the consumers' eye and often reflected the genre of the magazine, such as Kerrang!'s use of a 'grundgy' typography.
I also analysed 'Clash' and 'Q' magazine to look at genre conventions more specifically, as these were the only two magazines that I could identify which reflected upon my chosen genre of indie/festival music. Whilst Clash was listed as an indie magazine, Q was more of an all-round music magazine, so I specifically looked at indie/festival-specifc articles within it. Through continuous analysis, I began to notice that there was a distinct mise-en-scene convention for my the genre, and this was so that it reflected upon the stereotypical style of the music genre's fans - the people who loved the outdoors, the 'hippies', the 'boho' style etc. A strong colour palette of summery hues were conventional, whilst the models within the photography featured the said 'boho' fashion of loose layers, soft materials, pale colours and floral patterns. I wanted to create a magazine which conformed to the conventions of all music magazines, whilst I tailor-made it to suit the niche genre and consumer base I had targeted, therefore I created my front cover with a circular insert to draw in the attention of the consumers, with my Masthead stretched across the top section of the page so that it could be read from a far distance. Additionally, I used a soft white colour for the font so that it complimented my use of a pink and orange gradient background and the cream coloured clothing my model wore along with her hippie 'flower crown', as I knew this was something that would appeal to my target audience, as it is an identifiable element for my chosen genre.
When it came to conducting my Advanced Portfolio, I felt like I had really developed my understanding into the importance of media conventions, because I also developed an understanding of the importance of audience, as the consumers are the people who allow the media cycle to continue. A consumer buys a media product, the production company make a profit, then the profit goes into constructing a new product to be consumed, and so it continues. By not conforming to media conventions, it increases the likeliness that a consumer won't be able to acknowledge the identity of a product, and are then less likely to consume the product, bringing an end to the media product cycle.
When it came to conducting my Advanced Portfolio, I felt like I had really developed my understanding into the importance of media conventions, because I also developed an understanding of the importance of audience, as the consumers are the people who allow the media cycle to continue. A consumer buys a media product, the production company make a profit, then the profit goes into constructing a new product to be consumed, and so it continues. By not conforming to media conventions, it increases the likeliness that a consumer won't be able to acknowledge the identity of a product, and are then less likely to consume the product, bringing an end to the media product cycle.
Whilst I had completely followed conventions in my Foundation Portfolio, I wanted to develop or challenge some conventions for my Advanced Portfolio in order to have more fun and creativity with my work. Whilst I felt my understanding of the importance of conventions definitely developed whilst i created my ancillary tasks as the visual format of a Digipak or website is not too different from a magazine, I really did feel limited with my music video as the concept was completely new to me, therefore I had to conduct further convention research in order to understand that platform more. Andrew Goodwin was one of the biggest research elements I had to look into, as he developed his own theory into the conventions that make up a music video, such as how the pace of the music fits in with the actions in the shots, which will also typically narrate a story which reflects upon the lyrics of the song. I looked at existing indie music videos, such as Ed Sheeran's video for 'Drunk' and The Script's 'Millionaires', to identify any recurring conventions here also. As Goodwin stated, these two videos had edited shots which cut to the pace of the music, with imagery which reflected upon the corresponding lyrics. Particularly with these two videos, they had specific shots which matched some of the lyrics, but there wasn't a necessary set storyline throughout, with conceptual, confusing elements which creates enigma codes for the audience. On the other hand, other Ed Sheeran music videos such as 'The A Team', another indie/acoustic song, do follow a strict narrative theory, with the plot basic and clear to the audience, which evidently was a strong convention for my chosen genre.I decided to develop these particular conventions by giving my music video imagery elements to reflect on the lyrics, such as shots of flowers, the sympathy cards etc. but I mixed these with rather ambiguous shots of people's feet, the public transport etc. along with including minimal actors within the shots to add a slight sense of confusion, only to simply persuade audiences to watch the video again and again.
Pt2. YOUR EVALUATION Q1 POST FROM LAST YEAR and come up with responses to the following questions below (this will be tested with a Quiz)
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media texts? from Guiseppe17
Now answer the following questions:
- How much was your own production influenced by existing texts?
- Why follow conventions? Think about the relationship with audiences here.
- Which conventions did you follow?
- To what extent did you not follow existing conventions?
- Was this intentional and what were you hoping to achieve/was the result by breaking some of the conventions?
- To what extent did following conventions limit your own creativity?
