A2 Media Evaluation

Q1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The A2 Media brief was for us to produce the opening five minutes of a television documentary, as well as complete two ancillary tasks of creating a radio trailer and double page spread for a listings magazine to accompany the main task. In order to establish the type of codes and conventions that we would have to be including in our documentary, called The Pros and Cons of Technology in Sport, we had to carry out extensive research into other existing documentaries. This allowed us to make our documentary appear as professional and credible as possible.

Documentary

There are five different documentary types: fully narrated, mixed, fly-on-the-wall, self-reflective and docudrama. From the outset, we wanted to pursue the mixed type which encompasses interviews, narration, observation, archival footage and real footage recorded by ourselves. This included a lot of useful elements listed above that many other documentaries use, such as Living With Michael Jackson. Watching that documentary on Jackson’s life story inspired us to follow and conform to the convention of a mixed documentary type. In this example, the presenter Martin Bashir was given unprecedented access into the life of Jackson and explored his character by using archival footage (old tape of Jackson performing on stage when younger) and personally taken footage (one-on-one interviews, rare clips of Neverland where Jackson resided). Similarly, we used archival footage to document Frank Lampard’s ‘non-goal’ for England at the 2006 FIFA World Cup and Michael Johnson’s world record breaking achievements at the 1996 Atlanta Games.

Above: Archival footage of Lampard’s ‘non-goal’, clearly showing the ball over the line. Below: Archival footage of Jackson singing as a child in Living With Michael

Jackson.

We used this to create a contrast between the old and modern footage by highlighting the development of Technology in Sport. For example, since Lampard’s ‘non-goal’ incident five years ago, football now has goal-line technology to offer clarity on similar situations that arise. Indeed, at the beginning of the production process, we sat down as a group and agreed that we should open our short film with the Lampard clip because we felt this had a strong and clear connection with our chosen topic. It also immediately suggested that goal-line technology in football is a pro, because with it that goal would have stood and England would have probably beaten Germany.

Having studied one of David Attenborough’s fully narrated documentaries on wildlife, we thought it was best not to go with this type. We didn’t intend to overwhelm or overload the audience with information by constantly talking at them, but instead insert mini breaks from narration. Self-reflective focuses too much on the film-maker and their opinions and input, as we discovered by viewing Ross Kemp On Gangs. We wanted to avoid this and ensure the presenter remained impartial throughout. Meanwhile, fly-on-the-wall and docudrama were simply not the right fit for our documentary. We intended on analysing the issues and getting real insight into our topic and thus fly-on-the-wall (eg Big Brother) would have been totally inappropriate, as it would have restricted us from doing that. Docudrama (eg Crimewatch) consists of reconstructing real life events and that was not something we wanted to do, but instead use actual footage and not people pretending to carry out those actions.

We looked at Bill Nicholls’ documentary modes to try and work out which mode our documentary would fit into. The six modes are: poetic, expository, participatory, observational, reflexive and performative. Our documentary fitted into the participatory mode because the film-maker (Nathan) was seen on screen, involved with the subjects by interacting with them and asking questions. We took inspiration from Supersize Me which has Morgan Spurlock presenting and narrating and Technology in Sport – Is It Cheating?, a short six minute documentary covering a similar topic to ourselves, which has Professor Steve Haake appearing on screen and talking to the audience. In both of these examples the participatory mode seemed to be effective in engaging the audience and making them feel like they were on a journey with the film-maker, instead of just simply watching it. That sense of journey was crucial to us – given the investigative nature of our topic it was important that we talked to people involved in Technology and Sport. We wanted the

audience to hear what they had to say and then get them thinking about the pros and cons. We were cautious of not straying into the performative mode, however, as this mode is entirely about the film-maker and accounts their experiences and nothing else. We wanted to have a presenter and narrator partaking but without overwhelming the audience and imposing the presenter’s views upon them, therefore enabling other voices to be heard.

The expository mode applied to our documentary as the narrator explained and described the events on screen to the audience, this was through a voice-over. A voice-over is a classic convention of documentaries and this was especially important for the opening five minutes, to clearly and concisely explain to the audience what our documentary entails. As well as having narration through the form of a voice-over, we also played background music called Huma Huma by Crimson Fly throughout our documentary. Having listened to all three of Supersize Me, Living With Michael Jackson and Technology in Sport – Is It Cheating?, it was apparent that background music was a convention and that we’d need to use it.

Huma Huma – Crimson Fly was our choice of background music.

Ideally we would have liked to find some ambient sound that has a really strong connection with our chosen topic. Like in Living With Michael Jackson, there was a playlist of Jackson’s songs from over the years, but that proved difficult. We did want something fast-paced, catchy and memorable, though, and the Huma Huma track sounded good when we initially tested it in the background. For the opening sequence of our documentary, however, we didn’t use that track. We had the idea of finding some slow-paced, sad piano music to play over the top of Lampard’s ‘non-goal’ clip, and for that we used ‘At The Ivy Gate’ by Brian Crain. Then we wanted to create uplift in mood and switch to a more positive, upbeat piano sound in the next scene to be played over France’s given goal at the 2014 World Cup. ‘Uplifting Music – Real’ starting from minute 1:47 was what we opted for, and listening back it worked very well indeed in terms of creating that uplift that we were looking for. So all-in-all

we used three different types of copyright-free music in our documentary, with the Huma Huma track the most heard out of them.

The final mode our documentary fitted into is reflexive because the subjects are aware that they’re being filmed and are allowed to react and respond to causes made by the film-maker, adding an element of realism and representation. An example is when Nathan asked questions to people in the interviews and VoxPops and, consciously aware that they’re on camera, the respondents delivered answers in accordance with what was said. This mode is typically associated with experimental documentaries which ours is, when the audience is just as interested in the documentary’s construction as they are the actual content. An example of a reflexive mode in practice in a real media product is Louis Theroux who produces and presents 30 minute documentaries for BBC Panorama. He is often in front of the camera yet still remains slightly detached and impartial, which was what we aimed to replicate for our documentary and we feel that was the case.

Interviews and VoxPops are documentary conventions and we decided to use them because this allowed us an insight into experts’ thoughts and what the everyday person thought. We deliberately asked young people – college students - as our VoxPop because they are representative of our target audience. For our experts we sat down with Media teacher Nick Waring to give us a technological perspective, PE teacher Gavin Shephard to give us a sporting perspective and PE student and Rugby player Matt Hind to give us a student perspective. When interviewing Gavin Shephard we followed the rule of thirds convention, ensuring our camera shot was medium close up to get his head and shoulders on screen. The medium close up shot is nearly always used when interviews are conducted, as seen in Supersize Me when Spurlock talks to Health experts he follows that camera shot. In Living With Michael Jackson, the pop icon is interviewed with a medium close up shot. We followed exactly the same camera shot technique for our VoxPops.

Above: A medium close up shot when interviewing expert and PE teacher Gavin Shephard. Below: Following the same camera shot in Living With Michael Jackson.

This is so the interviewee makes eye contact with the interviewer and not directly at the camera, which is a convention that we replicated in our documentary. However, we wanted to add variety to the way in which we conducted our interviews to keep the audience engaged and interested. When watching an episode of Ross Kemp On Gangs on teenage gangs in South London, we noticed the over-the-shoulder shot was being used, as Kemp met up with a parent of one of the gang members. So we employed an over-the-shoulder shot when interviewing Matt Hind in order to include the presenter Nathan on screen and show him listening to answers and nodding along. This helps make the interview feel more intimate and personal, too, therefore it is likely to get the audience more involved.

Above: Over-the-shoulder shot as the presenter Nathan chats to expert and PE student/Rugby player Matt Hind. Below: The same type of shot seen in Ross Kemp

On Gangs.

Mise-en-scene plays an important part in the interview process, as well, as we consciously made sure in each three of our expert interviews that the backdrop was appropriate. As Gavin Shephard is a PE teacher we interviewed him in the Sports Hall while a Basketball match was going on at the same time. Nick Waring is a Media teacher so we deliberately included the Mac behind him with a picture of Manuel Neuer, who was in goal for that England – Germany game at the World Cup. The picture showed the ball crossing the line and made a link to our documentary topic.

Above: Interviewing expert and Media teacher Nick Waring with the Mac PC and image of the football crossing the line in the background. Below: Books seen in

background to help interviewee come across as credible and intelligent in Supersize Me.

For Matt Hind’s interview, meanwhile, we filmed in the Sports Hall’s changing rooms with lockers in the background to signify that the interviewee is a PE student and spends time in the Sports Hall. We did exactly the same for our VoxPops, filming in the Internet Café, Corridor and Canteen on the College premises to make it clear to the audience that these are students. Seeing as our target audience is from all ethnicities and backgrounds, we ensured one of our VoxPop was an ethnic minority. Moreover, our target audience is predominantly male – as males stereotypically like Technology and Sport more than females – so we had two male VoxPop and the other female. In Supersize Me the mise-en-scene is also carefully considered, when Spurlock talks to the Big Mac enthusiast in McDonalds, from where he buys all that food from. He talks to a person from the Centre for Science in the Public Interest with books seen in the background to create the impression that this interviewee is important and intelligent, adding credibility and trustworthiness to the documentary. This deliberate employment of mise-en-scene made our interviews with experts and VoxPops look a lot more professional and legitimate.

Above: Our documentary title to the left of presenter Nathan Carr, with the font colour white to make it stand out on the light green background. Below: The

documentary title in Technology in Sport – Is It Cheating?, shortened to ‘Engineering Sport’, with a background image of presenter Steve Haake running up a hill.

We also made use of text and titles. Right at the very beginning of our documentary, there are credits which is a classic convention, including the title ‘The Pros and Cons…’ and our names. After showing the introductory archival footage, the presenter Nathan appears on screen to introduce and explain to the audience what they’ll be watching. The picture of Neuer is in the background, again making a link with mise-en-scene, while our documentary title is slipped in towards the end of what Nathan is saying. This reminds the audience of what the documentary is about and acts as an official indicator that it’s about to begin. In Technology in Sport – Is It Cheating? they also have a set title appear on screen on roughly 40 seconds after some introductory footage. The font is clear and bold, and coloured white in order for it to stand out from the brown background. We used a very similar font style and positioned the text to the left of Nathan; our colour was also white to make it visible on the light green background. We developed this convention by adding an effect onto the title, by moving it in from the left onto screen. We did this to accompany Nathan speaking and keep the audience interested early on. Steve Haake’s documentary title was stationary the whole time.

Above: The text positioned bottom left, just like in Supersize Me, identifies the interviewee’s name and occupation. Below: The text positioned bottom left identifies the interviewee’s name and occupation in Supersize Me.

On our interviews we also employed titles on screen to identify the names of the experts and their position. For example, we had ‘Matt Hind, PE Student and Rugby Player’ on the bottom right of that interview and ‘Gavin Shephard, PE Teacher’ on the bottom left of that interview. This is helpful to the audience in case they want to know about the experts’ background or read up on them.

We cut to a picture of Third Umpire in Cricket when expert Gavin Shephard touched on it in his interview, depicting what was being said.

We had cutaways when Gavin Shephard spoke, too, as he mentioned TMO in Rugby and Third Umpire in Cricket. We showed brief images of those two things depicting what was being talked about to offer clarity to the audience. This offers a break from just watching Gavin Shephard throughout, which some members of the audience might find a little tedious, and freshens up the variety of scenes. We used the dip-to-black effect to fade back out and return to Gavin Shephard speaking.

Above: An establishing shot of the Sixth Form College, Solihull. Below: The same type of shot of Neverland at the beginning of Living With Michael Jackson.

We also included an establishing panning shot of the Sixth Form College, Solihull early on in our documentary to give an idea of location. Establishing shots are really useful because they make transitions a lot easier and smoother. For example, straight after the shot of the Sixth Form, we moved into VoxPops. As we’d explained the location of our filming, interviewing students in that kind of environment made perfect sense. In Living With Michael Jackson, an establishing shot is also used but it’s not panning. They start out and then gradually zoom in on the Neverland entrance, which is the mansion that Jackson lived in. Interestingly we challenged that zoom camera shot convention – instead of zooming in; we started with a close up and then gradually zoomed out to give the wider picture. We did this to incorporate all of the College’s entrance including the Hampton building, car park and grass.

There are seven narrative structures: circular, linear, non-linear, open, closed, single-strand and multi-strand. We wanted to adhere to at least one of these structures to make our documentary as professional and conventionally realistic as possible. We adhered to the open structure convention of leaving the ending on edge, allowing the audience to make their own minds up, which was what the viewer had to do in the aforementioned Technology in Sport – Is It Cheating? documentary. This was exploring a question and weighing up the factors but at the end of the six minutes, no definitive conclusion had been reached. Professor Haake had wrapped things up not by giving his own opinion on the matter but by encouraging the audience to ponder technology’s potential impact on cheating in sport, and what the future might bring. This was a similar case in our documentary – we began by saying we’d explore the pros and cons and at the end of the five minutes, we had done that. But at no stage did we show bias or lean further toward one of the pros or the cons. Instead we simply went through both sides of the argument, listing the advantages and disadvantages, before saying goodbye and heading to the advert break. The audience gets to digest the information that we have presented to them, and make their own minds up relative to their stance on the matter. We favoured the non-linear approach of having scenes jumping about in random fashion and not in chronological order, because our footage was taken on various days at various times

for several weeks. Finally, we favoured the single-strand structure because we had just one presenter and one narrative. More than one narrative makes it harder for the audience to keep up with what is going on and they could lose concentration which we wanted to avoid.

Radio Trailer

We carried out research into existing radio trailers off BBC 5 Live, Radio 1 and Talksport, as well as ones that previous College students have produced, to gauge an understanding of the codes and conventions to apply to our own. Seeing as our documentary is about Technology in Sport, we deemed the world’s largest sports radio station Talksport the best fit, as their audience was most similar to ours.

GarageBand is the software that we used to create our radio trailer.

The background music we used for our radio trailer was the same as our documentary – the Huma Huma track. This was to maintain consistency and familiarity as the audience would recognise the tune. We also had a voice-over as each member of the group contributed in some capacity. Nathan opened the trailer by asking a rhetorical question ‘What effect does Technology have in Sport?’ which makes the audience immediately think about our chosen topic. Marcus closed the trailer out by saying the time and channel of our documentary: 8pm on BBC 1. All radio trailers have this to let the audience know the core details so they know when and where to tune in. We incorporated clips of audio from our documentary into the trailer, including expert and Media teacher Nick Waring talking about the uneven distribution of Technology in Sport and a VoxPop too. This gives the audience a taste and flavour of what the documentary is like, and they can form a judgement on whether to watch it or not based on what they hear.

Above: An example of our sound level editing within the opening 10 seconds of our radio trailer, attempting to lower the volume to create a balance. Below: Another example at the end of the trailer when Marcus closes it out, with a significant decrease in level of noise.

There are no awkward silences between each person speaking because the transitions are efficient and the background music is always playing. Having listened to various radio trailers, it was apparent that the convention was for them to be under a minute in length. Bearing that in mind, we made ours 58 seconds long so the audience wouldn’t become bored or restless. Finally, having balanced sound levels on a radio trailer is extremely important and all the ones we listened to had this. We did our best to even the levels out and not have any one person speaking much louder than another, but on reflection with a little more time we probably could have done a better job.

Magazine Article

We produced our magazine double page spread for Radio Times, a magazine which has the latest TV and radio programme listings for the UK. We studied various magazines, both general (sport, music) and strictly Radio Times, to learn the codes and conventions and apply them to our own. I took a Radio Times article promoting the new series of Doctor Who, analysed its features and conventions, and then discussed with my group how best to incorporate those into our own magazine double page spread.

‘Over the line or not…’ is our masthead. It makes a link to goal-line technology in football and was inspired by the commentary from Lampard’s ‘non-goal’ in 2010. It is a question that creates intrigue and gets the audience immediately interested and thinking. The use of ellipsis is effective in helping lead the reader onto the bit of text below.

Double page spreads nearly always have images to accompany the text. These are stills from our documentary to give the audience a taste of what to expect in advance. All the images have borders, a convention, as well as captions underneath them to inform the audience what the picture is about. Our main image is US athlete Michael Johnson wearing his 85g golden spikes at the 1996 Atlanta Games, which we discussed as a pro in our documentary.

We used a drop cap to signal the beginning of our magazine article, which is a classic convention.

Here is a pull quote, highlighting the most significant bit of our article. We decided to use this quote from expert and Media teacher Nick Waring as it really ties in with our chosen topic, and acts as a con of Technology in Sport. It touches on the disparity between the top clubs and lower clubs in football and their varied access to goal-line technology. The speech marks in black make it a quote.

We used columns to make our magazine look conventionally realistic, ensuring the text is organised neatly and tidily. All Radio Times articles employ the same convention.

A stand first concisely explains what the documentary is about, including key details like time and channel.

Page numbers are another classic convention so the audience knows where to find certain content that they want to read. Radio Times is in bold as this is the name of the magazine that we’re featuring on.