LESSON 52: THE EXAMINATION SECTION B

In the examination you will be presenting a case-study that you have developed around a series of media products that you are interested in studying in detail. This can be around the media output of a specific 'star' [Beyonce; Lady Gaga] a programme [Match of the Day; Doctor Who] or a genre [Marvel Movies; Spider-man].

You are required to study the products over the THREE PLATFORMS - PRINT; BROADCAST; E-MEDIA.

For the mock exam / exemplar you will be exploring the youth drama outlined in Lesson 51. You will use this to answer ONE of the following questions.

The choice of questions are:

EITHER:

[5] Consider how imaginative techniques are used by media products from your cross-media study to attract and maintain audiences.

Support your answer with reference to a range of examples from three media platforms.

OR

[6]  Synergy is the process by which media institutions use a range of platforms to promote, sell and distribute their products. Assess the impact of synergy in your cross-media study.

Support your answer with reference to a range of examples from three media platforms.

IDEAS:

The examiners report for this exam told centres that:

Question focus again seems to be the main problem for candidates not achieving level three or above. Many just want to write everything they know about their cross-media study in a very descriptive way rather than addressing the question set and applying their knowledge and understanding

So, we need to be selective in the task and consider exactly what it requires from us. we then need to think of examples that enable us to show our understanding.

Here is a little guidance to help you prepare for the mock

[5] This question wants you to consider the fact that media products no longer rely on a poster in the paper to advertise a new film or an advert on a bus shelter to inform us of a new CD being released.

As a  starting point, you need to think about how the products in your study [such as Attack the Block] used the marketing devices such as the trailer to create interest among the target audience [and you need to say very clearly who the audience are].

You might consider that a youth audience in 2015 is increasingly sophisticated in its understanding of the media [and thus in its demands of media products]. A product such as Attack the Block - a low budget British film - may realise that it cannot compete with the mammoth budget blockbusters from America such as Transformers so has to be imaginative in the way in which it promotes the pleasures it offers - here the construction and content of the two differing trailer may be effective examples. Think of the poster from lesson 51.

The key word in the task is imaginative. To simply say that products use Twitter and Facebook and the web to market themselves is not really showing that you understand the task as this cannot be considered in 2015 to be imaginative uses of such platforms/technologies. To this end you might think about the campaigns for films such as Batman.

Remember that sticking to one product - like a specific film - is not a good idea as the examiners report suggests this will limit the grades of even the best responses. Reach out to other products - such as Skins; Misfits; Hollyoaks - for further examples that show you have a breadth and range of understanding.

How about this resource for exploring issues as to why imaginative marketing may not always lead to success:

5-Reasons-Kick-Ass-Failed-At-The-Box-Office

The final paragraph from this article states: 

The thing is, Kick-Ass never had an audience outside of those who were already predisposed to love it. Its appeal, from the start, was tremendously limited. You can’t have controversy unless someone bothers to see the movie, but the only people who were ever going to see this movie were hardcore geeks who embrace what it's doing. No one else cared, they were never going to care, and advertising it was both a waste of money and time. Kick-Ass didn’t really fail, Hollywood simply expected too much from it. 

This, in itself, holds some sense of an answer to the task - products have to find their audiences and audiences - weary of so much media bombardment - require approaches that have to be imaginative to stand out and to be successful.

Traditional film marketing models had a star; a big budget; exciting posters; a cool trailer to market with. Today something more is required.

Attracting audience is one thing, sustaining them is another.  Here we may well have to lexpand our case-study to look at TV series such as Skins or to franchise movies such as Spider-man or even the In-Betweeners which all have marketing that builds on audience pre-existing knowledge of what the product is all about. This may enable a more imaginative approach to be taken [as audiences have already got the basics of the product] or may limit the possibilities [institutions wary of killing a market that has already proven to be successful]  - either way, you have some issues to discuss in your answer.

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-inbetweeners

LESSON 51: EXAM PREPARATIONS

The next hurdle is the examination - specifically Section B case-study.
for the purposes of the mock examination I am expecting you to have considered some material from the youth market with the general theme of Youth drama

The case study expects you to study a range of texts across all platforms on your chosen area. For youth drama this can mean viewing episodes of broadcast media products aimed at a youth audience such as Skins, Misfits; considering the representation of youth in web sites of products aimed at them [such as the sites for E4 or BBC3]; films such as Attack the Block or Kick-Ass or In-Betweeners; posters for such products and youth in mainstream products - newspapers; Tv shows.

You need an over view to begin with - this can be attained by asking the usual questions:

[1] what do we mean by youth - how are we defining this group?
[2] what does youth demand of media products?
[3] how do media products 'talk' to them? - how are youth seen? represented?
[4] how do products exploit youth?
[5] which stereotypes are used? for what purpose? how accurate are these?

Let's look at Attack the Block 

Here is the trailer [Broadcast platform]

1. What does the trailer convey in it's representation of 'youth'? How is this done?
2. What stereotypes [of youth] are used?
3. How accurate are these?
4. Where do they originate from?
5. What in the trailer appeals to the youth audience?

Next up is print platform [the poster campaign]

• How does the print product [poster] appeal /attract youth audience? 
• What ideas does it construct about youth [hint: you are not like us!!].

What can we discover about the web-site [E Media platform]?

Official Sony Films web site

Attack the Block Twitter site

Clearly, the Sony site has adopted a fairly minimalistic option with little beyond where to buy, how to buy and some brief notes about cast and crew.
We might ask how this sites trailer differs from the original and why this might be so?

What aspects of youth representation is contained in the Sony blurb?
From the producers of Shaun of the Dead, ATTACK THE BLOCK is a fast, funny, frightening action adventure movie that pits a teen street gang against an invasion of savage alien monsters. It turns a London housing project into a sci-fi battleground, the low-income apartment complex into a fortress under siege. And it turns a crazy mix of tough street kids into a team of kick ass heroes. It's inner city versus outer space and it's going to explode.

Let's have look at a more general youth web site - E4:

http://www.channel4.com/e4

Here we might ask some questions around the idea of appealing to youth:

• What representations are offered of the programmes [and thus the audience that might choose to watch them]?
• How does E4 brand itself as a youth product?

If we go to BBC3

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree

We might engage in the wider issue - why BBC3 is proposing to move to on-line only and what this tells us about audience needs of the media and their access/uses of media especially broadcast. This might be a very productive field for an essay / case study.

LESSON 50: TEENAGE KICKS

This lesson is a landmark - not just our 50th lesson but the start of your case-study. Today we are going to take our prior learning and use it to explore a modelled case-study that will serve as the basis for the mock exam in january and also an exemplar for your own case-study development for the real thing in May.

Objectives:

Application of previous learning

understanding of key concepts

Apply understanding to explore how media products construct meaning

In lesson 49 we explored issues around this Reebok advert from 2005. we considered how some saw it as 'glamourising a deviant life style' whilst Reebok saw it as a celebration of individuality, freedom and authenticity.

In lesson 50 we explore why representations are so important - that people 'understand' themselves, others and the culture we live in largely from the way the media represents the world to us. that such images are repeated [saturated] and that human beings act on our developed constructed reality.

Our exemplar case-study is Youth and the ways that the media represents Youth to us.

We begin by considering a range of representations in media products as to what youth is. Each representation conveys the idea that each generation constructs its own representations but that there are consistent ideas that run through all of these.

Great work today - some very informative and insightful analysis. so many of you contributed to the work and to moving the ideas forwards that it's hard to focus on any individuals but some real sense of understanding from Manny, Kai, Eliott, Jacob, Steven. Solid and imaginative ideas from Imaani, Ravi, Rachel.

The underlying ideas focused on the sense of group for each image - the idea of 'belonging' - often signified by shared fashion style and postures struck by those in the image. We explored ideas of gender and racial/ethnic inclusion [and exclusion] before coming to focus on the ideology of power. The youth were all reflecting a sense of being 'rebels'; outsiders from mainstream [older] society and the street locations suggested that power for them lay in the streets.

We ended up at the original image we began with - that the reason why 85% of young boys were most scared of other young boys was, in part, the product of media representations which for every generation seemed to offer similar ideas about such a group.

LESSON 49: RE-PRESENTATION

Objectives: 

understand the concept of representation

application of concept to elected images

application of concept to range of images

We have focused on the concept that representation is the idea that media products in their content and construction contain ideas about the culture that created them. If we analyse the product in terms of the intention [what it is; who it is aimed at; it's purpose] we will uncover understanding of the prevailing zeitgeist.

Look at this advert for Harvey Nicholls sale

what does it tell us about the company [?], the audience [?] the zeitgeist of the culture [?]

Apply the questions below to help reveal the issues

Key Questions about Specific Representations

•          What is being represented? 

•          How is it represented? 

•          How is the representation made to seem ‘true’, ‘commonsense’ or ‘natural’? 

•          Whose representation is it? Whose interests does it reflect? How do you know? 

•          At whom is this representation targeted? How do you know? 

•          What does the representation mean to you? 

•          What does the representation mean to others? 

•          How do people make sense of it? 

•          With what alternative representations could it be compared?

We noted that the campaign - though a comment on the sales and people's behaviour at them - whilst suggesting the desireability of the sale also conveyed ideas around the acceptability of violence to get what you want and even linked to attitudes towards domestic abuse.

Some of you found this work tough, possibly the hardest task we'd undertaken - but you all managed to say something around the issue.

We finished by taking a look at the I AM WHAT I AM Reebok campaign from 2005, specifically the advert featuring 50 cent.
We explored ideas around WHY he was chosen, HOW the mise-en-scene of the advert and the campaign slogan all linked to construct a reading of the advert that objected to the product because the advert suggested his lack of remorse and appeared to glamourise the violence of his youth.
we explored how this might be constructed - the soundtrack; the location; his demeanour; the camera angle; his laughter and the slogan - i am what i am.
In banning the advert the ASA said it 'endorsed his type of lifestyle and disregarded the unsavoury aspects of it'. Reebok said that the campaign was 'a positive and empowering celebration of freedom of self-expression, individuality and authenticity'
At the time, a mother of a young black boy killed in such a drive-by incident in London expressed her objections at an adert that she felt glorified a gang lifestyle.

Great insights today - though we struggled with a few of the concepts! Overall we seemed to get to the main ideas quite well but struggled when applying the more sophitsicated ideas to the Reebok advert. These are the ideas that grant access to the B and a grades so several of you [ Manny; Jeeves; Rachel; Steven; Dorian; Ravi; Jacob] really do need to step up in terms of the thinking around the idea of intended representation and divergent readings.

LESSON 48: ALVARADO SAYS WHAT?

The SUN EXPERIMENT is an idea based on a very simple media studies tool: the content analysis. Put simply, counting images from a publication and then grouping these onto categories for comparison. Such work whilst limited enables us to have a very simple view of the nature of the product [and of its audience].

By definition, all media texts are re-presentations of reality. This means that they are intentionally composed, lit, written, framed, cropped, captioned, branded, targeted and censored by their producers, and that they are entirely artificial versions of the reality we perceive around us. More than this, the representation varies according to the intentions of the text, the values of the institution and the needs of the audience.  There is no singular ‘truth’ – there is no singular notion of family, or love or relationships or youth or age or ethnicity .  There are only common perceptions created by the media – the ‘myths’ of  Roland Barthes

We look at Alvarado and the Representation of Racial types in the Media  [Alvarado Learning the Media 1987]

He suggests 4 dominant types: the exotic; the dangerous; the comic; the pitied

We may now apply his ideas to other groups and see if we can come up with similar dominant types for these groups: the old; the young; the poor; the rich

Key Questions about Specific Representations

•          What is being represented?

•          How is it represented?

•          How is the representation made to seem ‘true’, ‘commonsense’ or ‘natural’?

•          Whose representation is it? Whose interests does it reflect? How do you know?

•          At whom is this representation targeted? How do you know?

•          What does the representation mean to you?

•          What does the representation mean to others?

•          How do people make sense of it?

•          With what alternative representations could it be compared?

Comparisons with related representations within or across genres or media can be very fruitful, as can comparisons with representations for other audiences, in other historical periods or in other cultural contexts.

LESSON 47: WHO WE ARE

This session is all about the way that the media constructs and then sustains representations of particular groups, places, events, ideas. if we are to be successful students of the media then this is a key element of our understanding.

We explore the basic issues.

The media is an important part of how we live our lives

We spend a great deal of our time with the media, using it for a variety of purposes. 

That something that we spend so much of our time absorbed in must surely have some impact upon us.  Specifically...

•       How we see ourselves [self-image;identity]

•       How we see others [ethnicity; gender; age; the’other’]

•       How we see the world [cultures; ideologies]

•       Our values and ideologies [beliefs; values; actions]

We need to consider the extent to which we are ‘saturated’ by the media and thus have our views, values, understandings, beliefs and actions shaped by it

What is represented? 

How is it represented? 

Why is it represented this way?

What is the impact of this representation in this context?

LESSON 46: NO CREDIT HERE

The idea of the impact of music is obviously very important for the creation of an audience.  it is, after all, a call to arms, a herald letting us know what is about to happen: the show is beginning.

Music is an important part of the overall mise-en-scene. Where would this scene [this film?] be without it?

We have a very deep understanding of what music is doing, and it's very physical.

There is a psychology / physiology in all of this. Thriller and horror films, which employ dissonant, screeching sounds we unconsciously associate with animals in distress are very good at this. 

A 2010 study by the University of California found that human sensitivity to non-linear alarm sounds, such as ones made by groundhogs to warn about predators, is being employed by film composers to unsettle and unnerve.

In films like Hitchcock's 1960 classic Psycho, straining strings and overblowing brass are mimicking the noise of panic in nature. 

For audiences who enjoy a lush romantic score, a 2011 experiment at Canada's McGill University studied the neural mechanics of why humans get goosebumps from great tunes. 

Far from being a purely aural experience, scans suggested that the regions of the brain that light up with music are those linked to euphoric stimuli such as food, sex and drugs. 

Blood flow in the brain is responding to areas associated with reward, emotion and arousal.

Science writer Philip Ball, author of The Music Instinct, says soundtracks can produce the same reaction in us whether the music is good or bad.

"Our response to certain kinds of noise is something so profound in us that we can't switch it off," he says. 

"Film composers know that and use it to shortcut the logical part of our brain and get straight to the emotional centres."

Some filmmakers are now using infrasound to induce fear in audiences. These extreme bass waves or vibrations have a frequency below the range of the human ear.

While we may not be able to hear infrasound, it has been demonstrated to induce anxiety, extreme sorrow, heart palpitations and shivering. 

Naturally-occurring infrasound has been associated with areas of 'supernatural activity', as well as being produced prior to natural disasters such as storms and earthquakes. 

Producers of the 2002 French psychological thriller Irreversible admitted to using this technique. 

Audience members reported feeling disorientated and physically ill after just half an hour of infrasound, leaving before the most shocking visual sequence on screen.

In the 2007 horror Paranormal Activity, audiences also reported toweringly high fear levels despite a lack of action onscreen. It is believed this was caused by the use of low frequency sound waves.

If we are in any doubts let's look at a classic sound / audience response sequence more famous even that Jaws and it's cellos. Hitchcock's violins.

To have a final thought - here is the same scene but each time with different emotional cues for the audience,  However we 'see' it, the music does have a defining impact that overrides all other responses.