Friday, 26 February 2016
Question 3
A target audience is a group of people that a product is aimed/created for. We are recovering audience research in order to see whether or not we have reached our traget audience and created a product that has appealed to them. Our target audience was a unisex one between the ages of 15 and 25. Each of us conducted a survey for each of the products to see how well they have been received by our target audience.
Monday, 22 February 2016
Media regulator Ofcom received nearly 700 complaints about TV news coverage of the Woolwich attack.
Ofcom has been investigating whether the broadcast of the footage before the 9pm watershed is in breach of the UK broadcasting code.
It is understood that Ofcom has cleared all the broadcasters on the basis that showing the footage was in the public interest.
According to Ofcom's code, broadcasters must apply "generally accepted standards" meaning that any material they air which might be offensive or explicit must be able to be justified by context, such as whether children are likely to see it.
In May an ITV News spokesman defended the decision to air the footage as "editorially justified", saying that it was done on a "public interest basis as the material is integral to understanding the horrific incident".
The bulk of the complaints – 500 – were directly to ITV, with Ofcom receiving about 100 separate complaints about the channel's decision to air the film.
ITV News declined to confirm or deny whether it paid the man for his footage.
"It was editorially justified to show such footage in the aftermath of such a shocking attack, and we prefaced it on ITV News at 6.30pm and News at Ten with appropriate warnings to make viewers aware in advance of the graphic images about to be shown."
After midnight on Wednesday, ITV edited the video on its website to obscure the body of the soldier and the face of the second suspect. It is understood that this was after editors decided there was less public interest justification in showing the unedited footage to a Thursday lunchtime audience.
Ofcom has been investigating whether the broadcast of the footage before the 9pm watershed is in breach of the UK broadcasting code.
It is understood that Ofcom has cleared all the broadcasters on the basis that showing the footage was in the public interest.
According to Ofcom's code, broadcasters must apply "generally accepted standards" meaning that any material they air which might be offensive or explicit must be able to be justified by context, such as whether children are likely to see it.
In May an ITV News spokesman defended the decision to air the footage as "editorially justified", saying that it was done on a "public interest basis as the material is integral to understanding the horrific incident".
The bulk of the complaints – 500 – were directly to ITV, with Ofcom receiving about 100 separate complaints about the channel's decision to air the film.
ITV News declined to confirm or deny whether it paid the man for his footage.
"It was editorially justified to show such footage in the aftermath of such a shocking attack, and we prefaced it on ITV News at 6.30pm and News at Ten with appropriate warnings to make viewers aware in advance of the graphic images about to be shown."
After midnight on Wednesday, ITV edited the video on its website to obscure the body of the soldier and the face of the second suspect. It is understood that this was after editors decided there was less public interest justification in showing the unedited footage to a Thursday lunchtime audience.
Benefit Street 02/03/16
Sunday, 21 February 2016
Essay Question (Half Term)
How well does contemporary media regulation protect the public?
BBFC and PEGI are both regulatory organisations who are in control of certifying and rating media products in the UK.
The BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) was set up in 1912, to protect the general public from viewing material that could be seen as harmful or offensive. They were originally in charge of classifying cinema released films and later went on to rate videos and DVDs, as well as video games in 1984. However, a new regulator was formed in 2003, called PEGI (Pan European Game Information). They took over the classifying of video games in the UK, along with the rest of Europe. However, the BBFC still has some say in video games, in relation to heavier sexual content.
The BBFC are a proactive, non-government, self regulating organisation that classify films that have been submitted to them by the creators. They then place an age rating on these films, in order to protect certain age groups from harmful and offensive content. The age ratings allow the public to choose what they view with an easier decision, as the rating defines what will be shown within the film. Each age rating has a list of factors as to why a film has been justified at that particular rating.
PEGI, similarly to the BBFC, also place age ratings on video games, for similar reasons. The content of a video game is what the rating is judged by, like films, and is there in order to prevent certain age groups from accessing certain material that could be deemed harmful.
There are problems, however, with both regulators. Although they are in place to provide protection, in modern day media, there are other means of access.
For example, the Internet has become a beacon of unregulated material in that anyone of any age group can access it, through websites like YouTube and illegal film streaming websites. Demo prototypes of video games can also be found on the Internet, stopping the regulators from being able to protect like they aim to.
As an audience, we rely on these regulators to make the decision of what we should and shouldn't be able to access and piracy such as this, defies these organisations the ability to that.
One film that was controversial was The Hunger Games. The film itself was rated a 12A in the UK. However, there were complaints that it was too intense and 'gory' for children that young, with scenes including blood and death. As none of the scenes showed graphic deaths, it was allowed to be passed as a 12A, but managed to stir up doubts as to whether films were being regulated properly for children.
Hatred is an unreleased game that has not yet been rated in the UK. However, it has gained controversy due to the high content of sexual and violent imagery shown in the trailer. PEGI have not yet rated this game and therefore, it is difficult to see whether or not this will protect the public and show it as an effective regulator.
Due to the desensitisation of the public over the years, film and video game regulators continue to push the boundaries, as ratings seem to change due to the content becoming 'normal' in today's society. The regulators classify for the 'standard, normal' person, which leaves it open to criticism on whether this is effective. Overall, regulators will not always be able to regulate effectively, due to the content being available on other media platforms and this is down to viewer discretion only.
BBFC and PEGI are both regulatory organisations who are in control of certifying and rating media products in the UK.
The BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) was set up in 1912, to protect the general public from viewing material that could be seen as harmful or offensive. They were originally in charge of classifying cinema released films and later went on to rate videos and DVDs, as well as video games in 1984. However, a new regulator was formed in 2003, called PEGI (Pan European Game Information). They took over the classifying of video games in the UK, along with the rest of Europe. However, the BBFC still has some say in video games, in relation to heavier sexual content.
The BBFC are a proactive, non-government, self regulating organisation that classify films that have been submitted to them by the creators. They then place an age rating on these films, in order to protect certain age groups from harmful and offensive content. The age ratings allow the public to choose what they view with an easier decision, as the rating defines what will be shown within the film. Each age rating has a list of factors as to why a film has been justified at that particular rating.
PEGI, similarly to the BBFC, also place age ratings on video games, for similar reasons. The content of a video game is what the rating is judged by, like films, and is there in order to prevent certain age groups from accessing certain material that could be deemed harmful.
There are problems, however, with both regulators. Although they are in place to provide protection, in modern day media, there are other means of access.
For example, the Internet has become a beacon of unregulated material in that anyone of any age group can access it, through websites like YouTube and illegal film streaming websites. Demo prototypes of video games can also be found on the Internet, stopping the regulators from being able to protect like they aim to.
As an audience, we rely on these regulators to make the decision of what we should and shouldn't be able to access and piracy such as this, defies these organisations the ability to that.
One film that was controversial was The Hunger Games. The film itself was rated a 12A in the UK. However, there were complaints that it was too intense and 'gory' for children that young, with scenes including blood and death. As none of the scenes showed graphic deaths, it was allowed to be passed as a 12A, but managed to stir up doubts as to whether films were being regulated properly for children.
Hatred is an unreleased game that has not yet been rated in the UK. However, it has gained controversy due to the high content of sexual and violent imagery shown in the trailer. PEGI have not yet rated this game and therefore, it is difficult to see whether or not this will protect the public and show it as an effective regulator.
Due to the desensitisation of the public over the years, film and video game regulators continue to push the boundaries, as ratings seem to change due to the content becoming 'normal' in today's society. The regulators classify for the 'standard, normal' person, which leaves it open to criticism on whether this is effective. Overall, regulators will not always be able to regulate effectively, due to the content being available on other media platforms and this is down to viewer discretion only.
Thursday, 18 February 2016
Question 4
Research and planning was used in order to prepare ourselves for the products we were about to make. Research involved looking at including existing products to see what was used a s a convention in them.Then, we planned out what we were going to take from these and the programmes we would need in order to recreate them, such as Photoshop and Final Cut Pro. In order to present our findings from our research and planning, we used the website Blogger and Weebly. These websites are blogging websites and allowed us to post text, images and link to videos that we had researched during this period, in an organised and productive way.
Both sites have default background settings, and so we changed these to reflect our supernatural sub genre. We then created drop down tabs on our weebly to make it easier to find all of our work. This was useful as it allowed us to have everything in a certain place so we could find it and edit it easily. We also used the image attachment options in order to support our text with visual evidence.
YouTube was also a key part of our research and planning. We used it in order to view existing trailers and products that have been made by previous students. We then also linked these videos to our weebly page to support our textual research with examples. We then also created our own Youtube page in order to post our own trailer on eventually.
We used Google and IMDB as well in order to carry out secondary research that allowed us to understand the different conventions of our sub genre as well, by looking at the existing products that were available to us.
We used Microsoft Powerpoint when we were presenting our pitches and our research that we had done over the summer. This was helpful, as it allowed us to present the work we had done in a creative way that had images and videos to support it. It also allowed us to show it on a big screen to our entire class with a simple click through process, which made it useful to our research and planning.
(Cont.)
Both sites have default background settings, and so we changed these to reflect our supernatural sub genre. We then created drop down tabs on our weebly to make it easier to find all of our work. This was useful as it allowed us to have everything in a certain place so we could find it and edit it easily. We also used the image attachment options in order to support our text with visual evidence.
YouTube was also a key part of our research and planning. We used it in order to view existing trailers and products that have been made by previous students. We then also linked these videos to our weebly page to support our textual research with examples. We then also created our own Youtube page in order to post our own trailer on eventually.
We used Google and IMDB as well in order to carry out secondary research that allowed us to understand the different conventions of our sub genre as well, by looking at the existing products that were available to us.
We used Microsoft Powerpoint when we were presenting our pitches and our research that we had done over the summer. This was helpful, as it allowed us to present the work we had done in a creative way that had images and videos to support it. It also allowed us to show it on a big screen to our entire class with a simple click through process, which made it useful to our research and planning.
(Cont.)
Wednesday, 17 February 2016
Question 2
Keeping a consistent theme, or synergy, throughout a a brand, is one of the most important things in advertising and marketing. Making sure all products have the a similar feel includes colour schemes, lighting, main images, logos and fonts. In media, synergy is used to create an easily recognisable brand by the audience, that is eye catching and relates to the brand itself. This is done using cross promotion and cross media convergence, advertising the brand across all different platforms of media, in order to reach as much if the target audience as possible.
The three products that we have produced as a group, all boiled down to having a synergistic feel across the board. We did extensive research into the supernatural sub genre, as that is what our film was about. The three final products had to have a 'look' that was appealing to an audience of the sub genre, and this is what we were concentrating on.
We then thought about the most appropriate ways in which we would be able to approach our audience, using all different platforms. As our target audience range between 15-24, we decided that social media and internet platforms would be the foremost place in which we would reach them. Therefore, YouTube was our first port of call. It is a free to use video uploader, which gains millions of views everyday, and is mostly used by this generation of people. We thought that this would be the best place to upload our trailer. We then considered the different ways we could promote the trailer and decided that social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter, were the best choice in reaching the audience.
Cross media promotion is the method used in media to promote a product across different media platforms. This way, our audience would not only be able to give us feedback, but also share the trailer with their friends, helping us reach an even wider audience. These means of promotion are also available on portable devices, such as phones and tablets, therefore, making it even easier for our target audience to access.
(Photoshop images to follow, getting help from Mr French.)
The three products that we have produced as a group, all boiled down to having a synergistic feel across the board. We did extensive research into the supernatural sub genre, as that is what our film was about. The three final products had to have a 'look' that was appealing to an audience of the sub genre, and this is what we were concentrating on.
We then thought about the most appropriate ways in which we would be able to approach our audience, using all different platforms. As our target audience range between 15-24, we decided that social media and internet platforms would be the foremost place in which we would reach them. Therefore, YouTube was our first port of call. It is a free to use video uploader, which gains millions of views everyday, and is mostly used by this generation of people. We thought that this would be the best place to upload our trailer. We then considered the different ways we could promote the trailer and decided that social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter, were the best choice in reaching the audience.
Cross media promotion is the method used in media to promote a product across different media platforms. This way, our audience would not only be able to give us feedback, but also share the trailer with their friends, helping us reach an even wider audience. These means of promotion are also available on portable devices, such as phones and tablets, therefore, making it even easier for our target audience to access.
(Photoshop images to follow, getting help from Mr French.)
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