We feel our media product definitely uses some of the standard conventions of media products.

-Voice over; voice of authority.

-Reconstruction; creates a sense of drama.

- CCTV shot; creates reality effect.

- Interview; the human response.

- Establishing shots; again, a sense of reality.

Double-click below to play CCTV shot (raw footage, not final outcome)

Our primary influence was the Channel 4 documentary ‘Missing: Claudia Lawrence’, where we examined some of the standard features which made it a successful documentary. There was the element of hostility and eeriness within the Claudia Lawrence documentary, which was either reflected in the visuals or lighting.

Using conventions

The main title font used is ‘type-writer’ like, so this links to the standard conventions of investigation documents. Other fonts are simple, times new roman and white, leaving the main focus to the actual documentary.

The interview is a standard convention. We decided to develop this by using a number of shots to stress the emotional aspect; a shot of Mrs Evans holding a tissue, and the shots of her son in the photo frame behind her. This links to the emotion in what she says.

Developing conventions

Click to play

We’ve developed the convention of music in our

documentary. Standard documentaries often have music playing in certain

sections, whereas we chose to play it throughout the majority

of the documentary.

The risk of this is to make it seem like a drama film, but the

benefit is that it heightened mood, which proved successful

through feedback.

Click to play sound

We’ve used the convention of the poster of the missing person, but developed it by using a screwed up poster in CU- we did this to suggest that Matthew is slowly being forgotten.

Click to play video

Because our documentary was specifically aimed for Channel 4, we had to research the standard features to use the forms of Channel 4 advertisements.

The purposes of advertisements are to persuade, and therefore the first typical feature is the use of a powerful image, designed to make you curious. We did some thorough research and they often symbolise the hidden message of the programme.

The features are simplistic and effective.

The font is simple and not over-the-top, minimal and straight-to-the-point.

We also feel the image is appropriate because it’s a bit abstract and grainy, which links to how the details in Matthew’s investigation are incomplete and rigid.

Using conventions in our newspaper ad

We did two initial ones, but feedback told us we did not use the conventions of Channel 4 advertisements.

An article has clear visual elements. These include columns, quotes, images, titles and colours.

We used the same image from our documentary because we wanted continuity between our advertisement and the article, so the public was to recognise that they are the same. We used dominant images to make people stop and read the article.

We wrote the article and we looked at a short article on how the Claudia Lawrence documentary had impacted on the investigation. This influenced how we wrote the article because it confirmed our purpose of our documentary; to find Matthew. The language we decided to use was straight-to-the-point

Conventions of listings magazine articles

We feel that our ancillary tasks link well because the advert and article would help sell the documentary, if it was in a real-life situation.

If it was a real-life situation, you’d typically expect an article in a listings magazine to review the documentary, and from research you’d also expect to see advertisements exploiting the documentary.

Research was therefore, for us, vital in preparing the production of our ancillary tasks.

The images in the article were screenshots from the documentary, which links both pieces of media well together. Therefore, the person reading the article can understand the sort of thing they’re going to be watching when the documentary is aired.

Our first ancillary task, the advertisement, combines well because the sock indicates that it is evidence, therefore this heightens the awareness of Matthew’s disappearance. The sock, from our audience feedback, makes the viewer want to know how the police stumbled upon the evidence. Although this is not included in the opening to our documentary, we feel it is relevant because it would have been featured later. This allowed us to break away from our main task, but still link some contextual features, which we feel fits well with the main production.

“Mrs Allison should be looking just past the camera, but that's being very minuet.”

“One of the CCTV shots was slightly shaky, but it didn't affect the overall documentary.”

“You could have incorporated a photo of Matthew when the font appears. “

“You could have also taken some better shots of Hertford.”

“The product looked realistic.”

“The flow of the documentary and the structure was really good.”

“Locations were good and well thought through.”

“Music choice was really good and suited the genre well.”

“The pace of the documentary was very good and I was engaged.”

“The time-code at the top of the CCTV footage was really different, and worked well.”

Positives

NegativesMain production

Overall, we believe feedback gave us more options when it came to what shots to use, and other aspects such as font of text, loudness of music and speech. We feel feedback has enabled us to better our documentary to attract our target audience more and to make it look more like a professional product.

With regards to our ancillary tasks, we believed feedback was beneficial, mainly proved by the fact we changed our ancillary tasks quite often as we received mixed feedback from students and teachers.

How did you use media technologies in the construction research, planning

and evaluation stages?

New Media

For our main production, we used a few new media technologies. For example…

Internet- We used the internet to gather ideas and watch documentaries through the use of search engines, mainly Google. Google images gave us the opportunity to gather images for our first ancillary task, the Channel 4 advertisement, which we may not have found in print media. Blogging could also be done on the internet.

YouTube and the Channel 4 website

We’ve used YouTube throughout the project, mainly for our production, because the Claudia Lawrence documentary was on there. Because YouTube and 4OD are in partnership, both Claudia Lawrence documentaries were on there, so for research we could use this as a prime influence. We also used the Channel 4 website in our advertisement to see the stylistic features of their web pages.

Blog

Blogging for us was crucial because it allowed us to gather ideas down virtually. Blogging for us gave a clear direction in what way we were going throughout the project, and for all three tasks, research posted on the blog could be referred back to. It is also a progression of how far we’ve come in terms of skills and ability to handle media technologies.

Photoshop

Photoshop, mainly for our advertisement, was crucial because without it we would not have the same outcome. The effects, including the adjustment to lighting and the moving of the sock over to the left, was only achieved through the tools on the software. We thought it was also significant because many professionals use Photoshop for their main software for photo editing.

Microsoft Publisher

Microsoft Publisher was used for our second ancillary task, the listings magazine article. Publisher’s main purpose is for print media, so therefore we used this to our advantage as it gave us the chance to work professionally. We were able to add columns, lines, images and larger text for a successful looking article.

Cameras and microphones

Cameras and microphones for our main task were clearly the most significant use of technology. We were able to take full advantage of the clear microphone sound, and we were also able to edit some video visuals on the actual camera, for example manual focus on the establishing shot of Hertford. The microphone was used mainly in the interview, reconstruction and voiceover of the narrator.

Click to play

Editing

We edited in Adobe Premier Pro, whereby we used a lot of editing tools to get to where we are today in terms of our main production. Tools including the dip to black, dip to white, cut and text tools were used to achieve a professional outcome. We were also able to add sound, edit the colours of the footage and adjust sounds to our liking. We feel that GCSE and AS Media Studies provided a good foundation to editing in our A2 course.

Old Media- Newspapers and Magazines

Newspapers and magazines could both use our article and advertisement. Through research, we were able to see the stylistic features of articles and advertisements, and use these as foundations to our ancillary tasks. We feel that both ancillary tasks were significantly improved due to looking at professional products.