Amir's A2 Media Studies Evaluation

Candidate No:

4035

?In what ways doesIn what ways does

your media product your media product use, develop or challenge use, develop or challenge

forms and conventions of real forms and conventions of real media products?media products?

There are many features that indicate that my documentary forms to the conventional aspects of a typical poetic documentary. This can be proven through comparing my documentary, to other documentaries of the same category, analysing the similarities of the techniques used in both documentaries. I will be analysing six various shots from my documentary and discuss the techniques used.

OK, so how is OK, so how is my documentary my documentary

conventional?conventional?

Title / IntroIt is apparent that most poetic documentaries are known for having an opening sequence building up to a title. It often has music from the start that slowly builds up. There is usually also a voice over the clip. This does not necessarily have to be a voice over but may also be extracts of different people talking. Below is an example of this type of documentary opening:

Click to play video...

Title/ IntroWith regards to my own documentary, I found the opening of a BBC Levi Roots documentary. It discussed how far Levi’s career has progressed since leaving the Den in 2006. I liked some of the footage used in this opening scene and decided to use two small clips as part of my archive footage for my own documentary. I also admired the opening scene as it had numerous pictures and video clips all playing to the soundtrack of the documentary. I knew I wouldn't be allowed to take the footage and instead decided to create my own version, using the other clip as an inspiration. Below is my version (left) and the BBC version (right).

Click to play video...Click to play video...

VoiceoversWe decided to use a “Voice of God” technique for various sections of the documentary. This was used for numerous reasons, such as to make the audience understand the scene with a descriptive narrative. This also helps to keep the audience engaged as it will isolate and set the scent throughout the documentary. We decided to use a female voice for the narrative as the as it would be a stark contrast to the subjects who are predominantly male, throughout the rest of the documentary. One of the clips that I thought to compare it to was a documentary on Tutankhamen and Ancient Egypt. Although the subject does not specifically relate to my documentary, the voiceovers are still similar. This is because as the clips are shown, there are facts and the scene is generally being described. The voiceover continues as one clip fades into another which is the same style that I have used for my own documentary. Below is my voiceover section of the documentary (left), compared to the other voiceover documentary (right).

Click to play videos

Archive MaterialMany documentaries take extracts from archive material. This content is available for use by the public. It is the content that had been previously published or had been published by another source. Although we are allowed to use this content in the documentary, there is a strict limit on the amount of archive footage that we are allowed to use. This is because the content is not our own and therefore we cannot have too much of someone else's work. The BBC released another documentary on the success of Levi Roots, separate from the one I showed earlier. In this clip there are extracts where Peter Jones and Richard Farleigh are talking in the present day whilst shots from in the past are shown. These shots in the past are archive footage. Here was an inspirational video from the BBC documentary with regards tousing archive footage from clips of the dragons den. Again my work is on the left hand side and the content that inspired me is on the left.

InspirationalInspirationalContentContent

MyMyContentContent

Click to play video... Click to play video...

Location ShootMany documentaries of this genre have what’s known as a location shoot. A location shoot is a shot taken from either outside of the building it’s set in, or just generally in a local area. This is to engage the audience by establishing and setting the scene. Many documentaries use this shot in their documentaries for this reason. Therefore I too had decided that I wanted a location shoot in my documentary as well. Below is my location shoot (left) and another location shoot that gave me inspiration. Although the establishing shot is silent, it is common for someone to explain the location of the scene as I did in mine.


InterviewsInterviews are very commonly featured in poetic documentaries, in fact it’s one of the key aspects. As many poetic documentaries are about a specific person, there are often interviews with the main subject. In my case I researched into interviews with Levi Roots. This was not only because I needed to find out what to ask Levi but also to find out how I should set up the interview with regards to the camera angles. Here is a video that I had created on interview techniques to practise with before I met Levi.

Here is my interview that I used in my documentary:



Summary / ConclusionMost documentaries of this type have a summary and / or a conclusion at the end of the documentary. At this stage of the documentary the narrator will give a conclusion to the documentary and may sometimes add humour. On the left is my ending of my documentary and on the right is the ending of another documentary that gave me ideas for my own. The idea it gave me was from the line “the colour just stuck”. This line with it’s play-on words is what gave me and Lauren the inspiration to come up with our line, “...and to this day, the dragon slayer continues.”


?How effective is the How effective is the

combination of your main combination of your main product and ancillary texts?product and ancillary texts?

I believe that my supporting pieces were very well done and would be very effective for attracting our target audience. We had decided that our target audience would be 16-25 year olds as they are the demographic that watch Dragons’ Den the most. 16-25 year olds also would be attracted to the documentary as it is about a relatively current topic as well as the fact that Levi Roots is very popular amongst the younger generation today. We knew we would therefore have to produce our supporting pieces with professionalism, giving it a sophisticated look, avoiding making it look childish and substandard.

Magazine Article

Magazine Article Video – Click to Play


How would this attract our target audience?

Bright colours stand out against the white background.

People will immediately recognise that, that is a Reggae Reggae Sauce bottle.

Instead of being straight on the bottle is slanted making the poster look more engaging.


More detailed information about the documentary.

The text contrasts with the bright vivid colours well, making the text stand out for the consumer to read.

The background colours as well as the guitar make the poster look more professional as they are the symbols of the official brand.


The use of Photoshop to blend the money into the bottle, making it look like a money tree is very effective as it makes the image look professional.

Likewise with the lighting effects it makes the image stand out, making the image as a whole engaging for the consumer.

The fact that a question is being asked as the caption, makes the audience feel engaged, wanting to know more.


The lighting effect is effective as it emphasises the writing on the bottle making the message clearer to understand from the audiences perspective.

The writing at the top contrasts with the white on black and makes it clear for the consumer to read.

You can tell that the photo is taken from a supermarket emphasising that Levi’s sauce is already a well established brand as his sauce has hit the supermarket shelves.

Comparing my own poster to another

Plain background makes object stand out

Clear text

Main object enlarged

Logo

Plain background with shadow

Bright colours used to attract the audience

Short sweet and simple caption used for both posters

Not a lot going on, very “to the point” – gets the message across easily

A lot more going on in this poster as the money splashes out of the bottle

Logo on object

Overall about the supporting pieces…

Overall, after carrying out a vast amount of research, these are the messages we wanted to convey with our documentary:

•Very simple and easy to read and understand for the audience.

•To have the posters relatively plain, to not over-complicate the poster but at the same time make sure not to have the posters too plain as we want to keep out audience engaged.

•To have the colours of the sauce bottle to represent each of our posters to make it distinctive to the Levi Roots brand.

•To have the posters from the supermarket shelf to represent that the Reggae Reggae sauce is an already established product that has made the shelves.

•To have the posters simple yet to have bold colours and lighting. This is to reflect the boldness of the personality of Levi himself.

?What have you learned What have you learned

from your audience feedback?from your audience feedback?

Youtube Comments on the Documentary...

What went well with the documentary, from the audience

feedback… We used smooth transitions between clips as well as

smooth transitions in the clips woven in the interview. Liked the questions asked by myself, as they were

open and Levi was able to reply back to them well. Liked the humour that was used in the documentary. The way the clips at the beginning are in sync with the

soundtrack at the build up of the title. The fast forward effused used when I walked inside

the building. The song at the end was engaging as well as

providing some humour. The highlighted £30million Wikipedia page was

engaging.

What didn’t go well with the documentary, from the audience

feedback… There could have been more clips inserted to break up

the interview further. The cross-fading is a bit too long at some points of the

documentary and it cuts in too much, into the next scene.

You could hear a fair amount of background noise during the interview. It would be better if Levi could do the interview while the restaurant was closed or do it in a more secluded area

The volume of the upbeat music during the introduction made it slightly hard for some people to hear what was being said.

The quality of the footage used from the interview was not the best.

What we could do to improve on our documentary...

We could have insert more clips to break up the interview further and to keep the viewer engaged.

Cut the length of the cross fades down and if the transitions do not look good, then we could always just have sharper cuts used between scenes instead.

If we were to interview Levi again, I would ask him if it would be possible to have the interview take place in the most quiet place possible to eliminate the issue of background noise during the interview.

During the introduction I would turn the volume on the soundtrack down slightly, to make sure all the narrative over the saoundtrack can be easily heard.

If I were to interview Levi Roots again, then I would use a HD Camera or an SLR camera with a video function. This would allow is to obtain crisp, clear and professional looking videos.

?How did you use media How did you use media

technologies in the technologies in the construction and research, construction and research,

planning and planning and evaluation stages?evaluation stages?

This is from our AS evaluation...This is from our AS evaluation...

A2 Construction - Technology RequiredA2 Construction - Technology Required


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Amir Choudhury Candidate Number:4035

Amir's A2 Media Studies Evaluation

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