Media Evaluation

By Scott DickinsonCandidate Number: 3352

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

Throughout the production of our documentary we felt it was important to apply to a wide range of codes and conventions that we are familiar with. One that we have included in our work is the use of interviews when exploring our topic. We tried to make use of the resources that we had available in the sixth form and include a range of both teachers and students to include in the work, in order to express a vast majority of opinions from different age groups.

Interviews that we found particularly effective were with Julie Maitland and Nick Wearing, teachers at the college. Their answers to our questions were interesting as they were well thought through and clearly rehearsed, they provided clear and effective evidence of their opinions by making references to their own personal experiences. We decided to portray them in the documentary as expert interviews due to professional nature of the footage.

As well as our expert interviews, we have also included various vox pops which were filmed both in college and Solihull town centre. By including the vox pops we were applying to a familiar convention of the documentary genre and were able to gain quick results from our target audience. They became very helpful to us due to the fact that they were entertaining to watch, and expressed a wide range of opinions on the matter.

Whilst it was important to apply to a range of familiar codes and conventions, we felt it would be effective to challenge a few in order to be creative. Throughout the duration of the documentary myself and Tom are presenting , we introduce interviews and background footage as well as provide a duel narration. Whilst duel presentation is unusual to find in a documentary, we thought that it would give our work a unique style.

The main purpose of including this type of presentation was to bring a light hearted and entertaining style to the documentary. The fact that there is two of us gave the opportunity to joke with each other in an unusual way. We would often support one other in our dialogue by interacting as if the camera wasn't actually present, meaning that we achieved humour and cheek in our style.

Most documentaries make use of a serious and journalistic approach in their exploration of the topic, yet we present a direct contrast in this style. Our work makes clear efforts to apply to our target audience of 16 years and over. The duel presentation brings a uniquely entertaining way of expressing information to the viewers. Our group is aware that our chosen demographic appeal to a humorous and less serious style, therefore we take advantage of this by making use of two informal presenters making occasional jokes.

Another double act we took

inspiration from, Ant and Dec

Whilst the documentary and radio trailer were difficult to produce, I personally found the double page spread the most challenging. This was because many of the group members were unfamiliar with the Indesign software that we were required to use, due to most of our time being spent on Photoshop in our previous academic year. However we took large inspiration from a range of articles in order to create a professional looking piece of work, they became very helpful in understanding the familiar conventions .

Here we have decided to use a pull quote from the article. From close analyse from a range of articles we have learnt that pull quotes are an effective way to split up the main text, they can often make the article itself easier to read and look more attractive. We therefore felt that they would look good in our work as we would also be able to put clear emphasis on particular quotes that we thought were significant. For example in this case we felt that the use of informal language in this quote highlighted the friendly tone we were trying to create with our reader.

We also have used a drop cap at the beginning of the article, yet another convention from the media product. I had seen drop caps used regularly in texts, not only in magazine articles but also in newspapers and novels, therefore I was aware of their consistent use amongst different media types. We felt that by applying this small but significant aspect we were giving our work a familiar layout.

A main function in which magazine articles appeal to their target audience is through use of colour. Whilst some articles can attract an older and mature audience through use of luxury colours such as black and gold, we took a different approach. Our pages are dotted with large blue spots that work well against the a white canvas background. This was done to make the text easy to read for an audience, due to the black font standing out against the light colours. But also to appeal to our younger demographic, by applying light and vibrant colours we were able to connect with a young and less mature audience. We created a pattern that looked visually attractive whilst also making efforts to appeal to our target audience.

Taking into consideration all three products, I feel that the magazine is the one that we tried to apply the most conventions to. This was because of our determination to make the work look as professional as possible throughout production. Despite this, we would often take a convention and creatively develop it further using our own ideas. For example we noticed that images are a crucial element of magazines, and a typical convention is to use images that are directly from the product that is written about. Whilst we have used this technique for our main image, we decided to pose and take a picture to include on the page. By doing this we were able create a funny and interesting image that applied to our comedic style of writing in the article.

When challenging the familiar style of presenting, we realised that writing the interview for our work may difficult. We resulted in using a colour code that distinguished both mine and Tom’s answers, an unusual presentation of text.

For our magazine the group made consistent use of the “Radio Times” in order to familiarise ourselves with the layout of a standard television article. Unlike our AS year, we avoided use of magazines that lacked in connection with our work, such as music, gardening and movie genres. We felt that to produce an effective piece of work, we should try to limit ourselves to the genre that we are creating. However throughout our analyse, we would often use and reject different conventions in order to achieve our desired style.

Convention: UsedConvention: Not Used

Main ImageA main image that is in direct relation to the article

Pull quoteQuotes taken from the article itself

Image taken from the showWe took our own supporting image

TitleOur title is also below our main image

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

In order to appeal to our target audience we felt it would be effective to apply a comic style to our work. This would be introduced by the duel presenters cracking occasional jokes and providing an uplifting tone throughout the duration of the documentary. For example there is a moment were one of the presenters is off screen and leaves the remaining one presenting alone. When he returns, he uses the excuse that he was “buying a new coat”. Our narration in the documentary is also playful and unprofessional, established by our utterances such as “look at their lovely faces” and “It looks so real!”. Occasional moments of wit are funny and allow us to connect to our audience by making them laugh.

Whilst applying a comic style to the documentary was important, we felt that it was required to extend this style into our ancillary texts. Whilst myself and Tom found it very natural to speak in front of the camera and sound funny, we found it difficult to modify our linguistic choices in the magazine article to achieve the same effect. The group spent a lot of time writing our interview so that myself and Tom’s answers matched the informal style that we had brought to the documentary. For example on the left you can see that we have concluded the interview with “Cheers Chaps” in order to finalise the playful style that we aimed to achieve in the text.

Another way that our group continued our comic style into another piece of work is through use of a voice over. Throughout the radio trailer, myself and Tom apply duel narration that is in comical contrast with each other. I act as if I am well informed about the documentary, as I know exactly when and what channel it is airing on. Whereas Tom acts as if he can’t even remember he is in it. By doing this we managed to create an entertaining trailer and extend use of our comic style to reach our target demographic. Whilst this was an unusual technique to use, the group felt that we were giving our audience a preview as to what to expect in our documentary in terms of style. Many other radio trailers use a similar technique so that they avoid misleading people into watching something they may not be interested in, therefore we were also following a familiar convention.

Target audience: 16-21 year old, All Genders, All Classes, Lifestyle: Both Interested and not interested in gaming

From various focus groups and research we learned that our particular audience are more likely to appeal to an upbeat and light-hearted style, as opposed to a serious and journalistic approach. I feel that by applying a distinctive style throughout all three products we have shown a professional attitude towards production and a clear understanding of what we want to achieve. We took inspiration from popular television shows and documentaries that aim to appeal to different audiences such as these.

It was very important to include material from the documentary in our other two products. It is a widely noted marketing technique that gives an audience a preview of what to expect in the product. We therefore decided to include the opening soundtrack from our documentary in the radio trailer to make it sound more catchy and fun to listen to. We felt that this decision created a direct link to our main product and applied to a familiar marketing technique.

As well as the use of the theme tune, we also decided to include the soundtrack of various footage taken from our documentary. For example, occasional quotes can be heard from both myself and Tom in the trailer that are taken from footage in the documentary. We also included the voices of many of our Vox pops to highlight the wide variety of people we interviewed for the project. We then decided to make use of an unusual audio technique by editing all the sound clips together as if they were all talking over each other, this established our skills on audio software.This is the beginning sequence in our documentary

that we took our sound from

Whilst we posed for a supporting picture in the magazine article, we also decided to use a screenshot taken directly from our documentary as the main image. We felt that this reinforced our primary work to the audience, and also showed the style that we have applied. For example our audience are able to detect that we have challenged conventions, as they can see myself and Tom in duel presentation. The image has also been angled particularly well, as the focus is on the presenters, yet a busy and vibrant street can be seen directly behind us. In the early stages of production I was adamant that the group could capture a more effective main image by posing to take a new one. However after my reflection, I have learnt that by using this picture we have applied to a common convention of magazines, and increased links between our ancillary texts.

There was much discussion in our group as to what channel we should air our documentary on. We did research into various broadcasting channels and learned that each channel’s shows vary in both style and content. For example BBC2 are widely known for airing documentaries that explore serious and controversial topics in a journalistic approach, therefore we avoided channels such as these. We resulted in using BBC3, this is because they aim to attract a similar audience to ours through use of comedy programmes such as “Gavin and Stacey”, “Crims”, and “Pramface”. We then used a prime time slot in order to attract the most viewers. Throughout all of our ancillary products we have presented the viewing details very clearly, stating when and where the documentary will be shown.

3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

A main way that we obtained audience feedback was through use of various questionnaires. The group would often design a question sheet and hand them out to people of our target audience in the hope to make our work more relevant to them. By doing so we were able to learn the different documentary conventions that people liked, such as narration, style and main topics. By learning this information it made the process of production a lot more efficient, as we knew what our target audience enjoys generally speaking.

Other information that we have learnt from our audience feedback during the research stages is the video gaming habits of our target audience. We created another questionnaire to explore their different opinions and lifestyles that could be interpreted into our documentary. By gaining these results we were able to express the contrasting answers to the questions, making our project completely unbiased. Throughout production we have always tried to create a piece of work that doesn't support any particular views or morals, we want our audience to evaluate and make their own educated opinions. Therefore by gaining lots of audience feedback, we are supporting a variety of people’s views.

Documentary Questionnaire

Videogames Questionnaire

Documentary questionnaire results... Video Games questionnaire results...

When all of our three products were finally complete, we presented them to a carefully chosen focus group. This group consisted of both an equal number of males and females, all of the same age. After showing our

documentary we had a brief group discussion with our audience so that we would be able to gain a quick informal review of what they thought. Overall we were very satisfied with the results of this chat, every audience member

spoke of how they enjoyed the duel presentation and the entertainment it brought to the piece. People also mentioned how effective the various vox pops were, as they found the opinions expressed by people of their own age very useful. By having a casual conversation with our focus group, we felt that we were applying to the light

hearted and friendly style that we had applied throughout all three of our products.

“The Quick Chat”

• Our audience do not regularly watch documentaries

• People wanted to see documentaries on topics of entertainment, such as music, film, television and videogames

• They preferred humor in their documentaries, as opposed to a serious and journalistic approach

• On screen narrator proved popular• Archive footage was the most popular

documentary element

• People played approximately 15-hours of videogames per week• Everyone was in possession of a game that exceeded their own age• Grand Theft Auto 5 was the most popular game amongst the

audience • Most people had never felt an influence to perform a violent act due

to video games • Yet most people had been antisocial due to their addiction• We gained mixed results as to the most violent scene that people

had witnessed in a videogame, Call of Duty and Grand Theft auto were popular

• Everyone thought that producers should refrain from heavy use of violent scenes in videogames

Alongside our “Quick Chat” we also made use of questionnaires yet again to gain feedback on our work. We constructed the questions so that our focus group had to rate aspects out of ten and make different choices. These are the conclusions we were able to draw from our results...

All members of the focus group felt that they had learned as much as they possibly could from our product. They found the documentary very informative and interesting. They enjoyed our exploration of the topic and the different facts and statistics we included. The focus group also felt that we had presented the time, date and channel of the documentary’s premiere very clearly in all pieces of work. We had efficiently informed them of how to watch the programme.

Unlike our other questions, we received mixed results from our audience in this. Each individual member of the focus group expressed particular preference to different conventions of the genre. Yet whilst interviews and voiceovers proved successful, game clips appeared to be the most popular. Throughout the production of the piece we have made strong efforts to include interesting and entertaining videogame footage that we enjoyed ourselves, we used ‘Grand Theft Auto’, ‘Call of Duty’ and ‘Fifa 15’ as primary sources. Therefore our group found it very satisfying to learn that this was the most popular element of the piece.

Other Results:

Radio trailer results:

The group concluded that overall the radio trailer was well received by our audience. We felt that we had created an entertaining trailer that people would find humorous and interesting. This achievement was established by the high ratings we received when people were asked how much they enjoyed the work, giving the group a clear outlook on how successful it is. We also learned that most of our audience were impressed with the unique style of the trailer, as they were intrigued to watch the final product that we were advertising, again highlighting our victory in marketing our media product.

Whilst the process of handing out questionnaires was an important task, we felt that we needed to include an element of humour in the text, just for the sake of applying to the comic style we have consistently used. Therefore we created the category “banter” as one of the possible answers. This was making clear reference to playful jokes and chemistry that was evident in myself and Tom’s presentation. Unsurprisingly, this answer was very popular.

Magazine Article results...

To conclude the session we made our focus group fill out a final questionnaire on our double page spread. Like our other results, we were very pleased at how satisfied people were with our work. We constructed the questions so that our group would be able to detect the specific codes and conventions that our audience appealed to.

For this question, 2 people circled 9, and 3 people circled 10. This clearly indicated that everyone liked the overall appearance of our double page spread

Everyone in the group felt that the text layout was easy to read. When we asked the audience to elaborate on this, they said it was because the text was placed into 3 columns.

4 people circled yes and one person circled no. The group made strong efforts to include relevant images in the work, therefore we were pleased with this result.

For the remaining questions everyone in the group answered ‘Yes’. Therefore we were able to conclude that the magazine article was well received from our target audience.

In conclusion, I found the audience feedback very helpful in determining how well the products were received. Our group found a number of aspects in the results both expected and unexpected.

Expected Unexpected

•As well as enjoying the comic style, people found the documentary very educational. Whilst we always intended to inform our audience, we spent lots of time on finding ways to entertain them. Thankfully we achieved both in equal measures

•The comic style was well received as people laughed and enjoyed the comedy.

•The focus group finished the session knowing exactly when and where the documentary will be shown

•Whilst I was getting concerned that the presenters were being used too heavily throughout the products, our audience enjoyed the consistent appearances of the duo in the magazine and radio trailer

•The bright colours and informal language used in the magazine were familiar to the audience, as many other magazine companies use similar conventions to appeal to the same target demographic

•Game clips proved effective as our audience recognised the games and found the footage entertaining to watch

•Whilst the duel presentation challenged conventions, we knew that our audience would appreciate this unusual decision

•Our feedback suggested that people valued the opinions expressed in vox pops over expert interviews

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

It was very important to the group that we intensively researched our topic so that we could express accurate results. This was achieved through use of the specialist media equipment that our college had available. For example most of our research was done online on the apple mac computers. The large volume of computers we had meant that our group could conduct productive research sessions in class and focus on a particular aspect of the topic. The quick and easy format of the IOS software also made it easier to explore a range of online sources at a fast pace.

Whilst the college was a primary source of specialist media technologies, we found it very helpful to use the modern technologies that we access to ourselves. Smart phones were consistently made use of to quickly confirm statistics and information online to include in our products. We would also regularly use the phones to send each other emails of small pictures that would be helpful to include in our blog and ancillary texts. But mostly we would construct emails and Tyber messages on our phones that would be sent to potential experts for interviews. The use of this media technology improved our research and planning, and increased communication between group members.

Throughout the construction of the documentary it was crucial that we had the correct filming equipment. Thankfully the sixth form had access to a wide range of technology that would help us carry out our tasks. For example our group made consistent use of a ‘Panasonic’ camera and tripod when recording our footage. The camera was great to use as it allowed us to watch our recordings on a small screen after we had finished filming, meaning that we could reshoot any unwanted elements. It also rested easily on the tripod, allowing our shots to be smooth and perfectly angled when achieving our intended effects. All of our work could then be quickly uploaded to the Macs due to the camera’s convenient ‘USB’ setting, so the footage is ready for editing.

Whilst the camera was an important factor, the sound in our documentary and radio trailer is a very crucial part that we are assessed on. In order to achieve the highest marks, we used a variety of microphones that suited the content that we were filming, and the environment that we were filming in. For example when presenting our sequences, myself and Tom used clip-on microphones and attached them close to our mouths to achieve a clear sound, despite being indoors or outdoors. However for our interviews, we decided to use a longer and more powerful microphone as it could be placed behind the camera when filming. Throughout the production of our radio trailer we experimented with a range of microphones so that we could achieve a sound of the highest quality.

• Example of myself and Tom experimenting with the clip-on microphones

Headphones were also consistently used to preview

our work and detect any faults in the sound

We also made consistent use of ‘InDesign’, this is a programme that is used to create posters, flyers, brochures, magazines, newspapers and books. It proved to be very effective when creating our magazine article as we could easily apply familiar conventions to our work. For example there were options to use drop caps and apply three column text, making our work look professional. We were also able to make small yet crucial changes to our images and text using different tools, such as size and colour, in order to create a visually attractive double page spread. I found the software very difficult to use at first, whilst I had used it briefly last year I was still unfamiliar with the different options and tools. Yet after experimenting with practice pages, I soon had enough experience to achieve my intentions.

Software that we found very helpful when constructing our own audio was ‘Garage Band’. This was a programme that allowed us to use a range of tools to create our own original sounds. We used this mainly because copyright issues restricted us in including pre-existing material, however we also thought that it would be more creative and satisfying to make our own. Therefore we used ‘Garage Band’ to create an opening theme tune for our documentary, combining lots of different sounds available on the programme to have a “videogame” style. We also created background music for the piece that was light hearted and up beat, fitting with the style that we were aiming for. Yet ‘Garage band proved most useful when creating the radio trailer, we gathered material from our documentary, such as songs and background footage, and used the software to transform it into a full length trailer. The smooth transitions of voiceovers and achieve footage would not have been possible without the programme.

The programme that our group used the most was ‘Adobe Premiere’. This was used primarily to create the documentary, yet we occasionally edited extracts from the radio trailer on it as well. We used a massive range of techniques on this software including the cropping of our footage. Often our recordings would be too long therefore we would have to cut them down, yet manage to keep the most effective parts. For example our expert interview with Nick Wearing was 10 minutes long, however we managed to condense the important points he makes to 30 seconds without it being obvious in the documentary.

Like ‘InDesign’, this software was also very effective in helping us use different codes and conventions of the documentary genre. For example we have managed to include text in the documentary that often portray statistics and information. In our expert interviews we have used a briefing of who the person actually is and their relevance to our topic. We have also created a facts and statistics sequence in which the text is placed in front of archive footage. These visually effective techniques have only been possible through the experimentation we have done on this advanced software.

A moment in our documentary in which our work on ‘Adobe Premiere’ is most evident is when we use another screen. Whilst Julie Maitland is speaking about the effects of videogames, we have been able to include in-game footage from ‘Grand Theft Auto’ in the left hand corner of the screen. We felt that this gave the audience visual evidence of what Julie is saying and accompanied her speech well.