Intention – We used.../We created.../We sought to ...
At AS we researched the conventions of existing media texts to inform our own planning.
Example – Through our use of .../We used the camera to ...
For example, we found Thriller have various character tropes such as the innocent victim, which is often portrayed through high angle shots and quick cuts to various close ups of key objects to connote fear.
Impact – This enabled us to ... More authentic/awareness of genre/build suspense/create a convincing narrative
This was something we duplicated in our video, planning in high angle shots of the victim, cross cutting with the close – up footsteps of the criminal
Change – At A2, there was a greater/more demand for/more diversity/a challenge in ...
However at A2 the emphasis was not on the emulation of the genre conventions but more the adaption of conventions to our own product
Example – We now .../We used the camera to .../We deliberately edited ... for example in the scene ...
For example we found that many indie videos cut between close-ups of the artist’s skill and performance in conjunction with a film-based narrative, often surrounding the artist himself, for example John Smith’s ‘I Need You’ portrays a flashback narrative through the use of vintage-style filters.
Impact – This changed as we were far more aware of .../We were now .../We realised ...
However, rather than emulating this, we sought to adapt it, so we maintained the cross cutting between performance and narrative, however we selected a brighter, more saturated colour filter to imply almost a cartoon-style effect in order to suggest the dreamlike qualities of the narrative, rather than aiming for the realism of traditional indie
Monday, 15 April 2013
Paragraph Structure for 1A with suggestions
Try using INTENTION-EXAMPLE-IMPACT-CHANGE-EXAMPLE-PROGRESS
Intention – We used.../We created.../We sought to ...
Example – Through our use of .../We used the camera to ...
Impact – This enabled us to ... More authentic/awareness of genre/build suspense/create a convincing narrative
Change – At A2, there was a greater/more demand for/more diversity/a challenge in ...
Example – We now .../We used the camera to .../We deliberately edited ... for example in the scene ...
Impact – This changed as we were far more aware of .../We were now .../We realised ...
Intention – We used.../We created.../We sought to ...
Example – Through our use of .../We used the camera to ...
Impact – This enabled us to ... More authentic/awareness of genre/build suspense/create a convincing narrative
Change – At A2, there was a greater/more demand for/more diversity/a challenge in ...
Example – We now .../We used the camera to .../We deliberately edited ... for example in the scene ...
Impact – This changed as we were far more aware of .../We were now .../We realised ...
Tuesday, 26 March 2013
1A Questions
Specimen: “Digital technology turns media consumers into media producers.” In your own experience, how has your creativity developed through using digital technology to complete your coursework productions? [25]
January 2010: Describe how you developed research and planning skills for media production and evaluate how these skills contributed to creative decision making. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills developed over time. [25]
June 2010: Describe the ways in which your production work was informed by research into real media texts and how your ability to use such research for production developed over time. [25]
January 2011: Describe how you developed your skills in the use of digital technology for the media production and evaluate how these skills contributed to your creative decision making. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these developed over time. [25]
June 2011 Explain how far your understanding of the conventions of existing media texts influenced the way you created your own media products. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these develop over time
January 2012 Describe how your analysis of the conventions of real media texts informed your own creative media practice. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills developed over time.
- Used real media texts for genre conventions
- Used real media texts for technical aspects
- Used real media texts for emulation and challenge
January 2010: Describe how you developed research and planning skills for media production and evaluate how these skills contributed to creative decision making. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills developed over time. [25]
June 2010: Describe the ways in which your production work was informed by research into real media texts and how your ability to use such research for production developed over time. [25]
January 2011: Describe how you developed your skills in the use of digital technology for the media production and evaluate how these skills contributed to your creative decision making. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these developed over time. [25]
June 2011 Explain how far your understanding of the conventions of existing media texts influenced the way you created your own media products. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these develop over time
January 2012 Describe how your analysis of the conventions of real media texts informed your own creative media practice. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills developed over time.
- Used real media texts for genre conventions
- Used real media texts for technical aspects
- Used real media texts for emulation and challenge
Global Media Questions
January 2010
1. What impact does the increase in global media have on media audiences?
2. To what extent are the media now more global than local or national?
June 2010
1. What impact does the increase in global media have on media production?
2. Discuss the positive and negative effects of globalisation of the media.
January 2011
1. What impact does the increase in global media have on local identity?
2. Discuss the idea that the media are becoming increasingly global.
June 2011
1. What is the impact of global media on people’s culture?
2. “The media have enabled us to live in a global village”. Discuss.
1. What impact does the increase in global media have on media audiences?
2. To what extent are the media now more global than local or national?
June 2010
1. What impact does the increase in global media have on media production?
2. Discuss the positive and negative effects of globalisation of the media.
January 2011
1. What impact does the increase in global media have on local identity?
2. Discuss the idea that the media are becoming increasingly global.
June 2011
1. What is the impact of global media on people’s culture?
2. “The media have enabled us to live in a global village”. Discuss.
Wednesday, 20 March 2013
Cut down AL Jazeera Information
Taken from Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Jazeera
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Jazeera
Al
Jazeera
Al Jazeera (Arabic: الجزيرة al-ǧazīrah IPA: [æl dʒæˈziːrɐ], literally "The Jazeera", abbreviating "The [Arabian] Peninsula"), also known as Aljazeera and JSC (Jazeera
Satellite Channel), is a broadcaster owned by the privately held Al
Jazeera Media Network and headquartered
in Doha, Qatar.[2] Initially launched as an Arabic news and current
affairs satellite TV
channel, Al Jazeera has since expanded into a network with several outlets,
including the Internet and specialty TV channels in multiple languages. Al Jazeera is
accessible in several world regions. Until 2011, Al Jazeera was owned by the
government of Qatar.[2]Before and after the change, it has claimed editorial independence from the government of Qatar, though this
has been disputed.[3]
The
original Al Jazeera channel's willingness to broadcast dissenting views, for
example oncall-in shows, created controversies in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf. The station gained worldwide attention
following the outbreak of war in Afghanistan, when it was the only channel to cover the war live, from its
office there.[4]
In
the 2000s, the network was praised by the Index on Censorship for circumventing censorship and
contributing to the free exchange of information in the Arab world.
Al
Jazeera Satellite Channel was launched on 1 November 1996 following the closure
of the BBC's Arabic language television station, a joint venture
with Orbit
Communications Company,
owned by Saudi King Fahd's cousin, Khalid bin Faisal Al Saud. It had fallen apart after a year and a half when the Saudi government
attempted to kill a documentary on executions under sharia law.[7]
Al
Jazeera's first day on the air was 1 November 1996. It offered 6-hours of programming per day; this would increase to 12-hours by the end of 1997. It was broadcast to the immediate
neighborhood as a terrestrial signal, on cable, as well as through satellites
(which was also free to users in the Arab world).
Al
Jazeera was pitched as an impartial news source and platform for discussing
issues relating to the Arab world.
In
presenting "The opinion and the other opinion" (the station's motto),
it did not take long for Al Jazeera to shock local viewers by presenting Israelis speaking Hebrew on Arab TV for
the first time. Lively and far-ranging talk shows, particularly a popular,
confrontational one called The Opposite Direction, were a constant source of
controversy regarding issues of morality and religion. This prompted a torrent
of criticism from the conservative voices among the region's press. It also led
to official complaints and censures from neighboring governments. Some jammed
Al Jazeera's terrestrial broadcast or booted its correspondents. In 1999, the
Algerian government reportedly cut power to several major cities to censor one
broadcast. There were also commercial repercussions; Saudi Arabia reportedly pressured advertisers to avoid the channel, to
great effect. Al Jazeera was also becoming a favorite sounding board for
militant groups such as Hamas and Chechen separatists.
Al
Jazeera was the only international news network to have correspondents in Iraq
during the Operation Desert Fox bombing campaign in 1998. In a
precursor of a pattern to follow, its exclusive video clips were highly prized
by Western media.
Around the clock
1
January 1999 was Al Jazeera's first day of 24-hour broadcasting.[9] Employment had more than tripled in one year to 500
employees, and the agency had bureaus at a dozen sites as far as EU and Russia. Its annual budget was
estimated at about $25 million at the time.
However
controversial, Al Jazeera was rapidly becoming one of the most influential news
agencies in the region. Eager for news beyond the official versions of events,
Arabs became dedicated viewers. A 2000 estimate pegged nightly viewership at 35
million, ranking Al Jazeera first in the Arab world, over the Saudi Arabia-sponsored Middle East Broadcasting Centre (MBC) and London's Arab News Network (ANN). There were about 70 satellite or
terrestrial channels being broadcast to the Middle East, most of them in Arabic. Al Jazeera launched a free Arabic language web site in January 2001. In addition, the
TV feed was soon available in United Kingdom for the first time via British
Sky Broadcasting.
War in Afghanistan
Al
Jazeera came to the attention of many in the West during the hunt for Osama bin Laden and the Taliban in Afghanistan after theSeptember 11 attacks on the United States. It aired videos it
received from Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, deeming new footage of the
world's most wanted fugitives to be newsworthy. Some criticized the network for
giving a voice to terrorists.
2003 Iraq War
Before
and during the United States-led invasion of Iraq, where Al Jazeera had a
presence since 1997, the network's facilities and footage were again highly
sought by international networks. The channel and its web site also were seeing
unprecedented attention from viewers looking for alternatives to embedded
reporting and military press conferences.
Al
Jazeera moved its sports coverage to a new, separate channel in 1 November
2003, allowing for more news and public affairs programming on the original
channel. An English language web site had launched earlier in the year. The
channel had about 1,300 to 1,400 employees, its newsroom editor told The New York Times. There were 23 bureaus around the world and 70
foreign correspondents, with 450 journalists in all.
Afshin
Rattansi became the channel's first English-language broadcast journalist after
he left the BBC Today Programme, after the death of UK Government
Scientist, David
Kelly.
Al Jazeera English newsroom
The
new English language venture faced considerable regulatory and commercial
hurdles in the North America market for its perceived sympathy with extremist
causes. At the same time, others felt Al Jazeera's competitive advantage lay in
programming in the Arabic language. There were hundreds of millions of potential
viewers among the non-Arabic language speaking Muslims in Europe and Asia,
however, and many others who might be interested in seeing news from the Middle
East read by local voices.
Al Jazeera America
On
January 2, 2013, Al Jazeera Media Network announced that it purchased Current TV in the United States and would be launching an American news
channel. 60% of the channel's programming would be produced in America while
40% would be from Al Jazeera English.
Reach
Increasingly,
Al Jazeera's exclusive interviews and other footage are being rebroadcast in
American, British, and other western media outlets such as CNN and the BBC. In January 2003, the
BBC announced that it had signed an agreement with Al Jazeera for sharing
facilities and information, including news footage.[43]
Al
Jazeera introduced a level of freedom of speech on TV that was previously unheard of in
many of these countries. Al Jazeera presented controversial views regarding the
governments of many Arab states in the Persian Gulf area, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrainand Qatar; it also
presented controversial views about Syria's relationship
with Lebanon, and the Egyptian judiciary.
The result of Al Jazeera's market dominance is
that it has itself become a mover and shaker in Palestinian politics, helping
to craft public perceptions and influence the debate. This has obvious
implications for the peace process: how Al Jazeera covers the deliberations and
the outcome of any negotiated agreement with Israel will fundamentally shape
how it is viewed—and, more importantly, whether it is accepted—by the
Palestinian public.
Al
Jazeera's broad availability in the Arab world "operat[ing] with less
constraint than almost any other Arab outlet, and remain[ing] the most popular
channel in the region", has been perceived as playing a part in the Arab Spring, including the Tunisian and Egyptian
revolutions. The New York Times stated in January 2011: "The protests
rocking the Arab world this week have one thread uniting them: Al Jazeera,
[...] whose aggressive coverage has helped propel insurgent emotions from one
capital to the next".
Availability
The
original Al Jazeera channel is available worldwide through various satellite
and cable systems.[57]
In
contrast, in the United Kingdom, Al Jazeera English is available on the Sky and Freesat satellite platforms, as well as
the standard terrestrial service (branded Freeview), thus making it available to the
vast majority of UK households.
On the Web
Al
Jazeera's web-based service is accessible subscription-free throughout the
world. The station launched an English-language edition of its online content in March 2003. This
English language website was relaunched on 15 November 2006, along with the
launch of Al Jazeera English. The English and Arabic sections are
editorially distinct, with their own selection of news and comment. Al Jazeera
and Al Jazeera English are streamed live on the official site,[68][69] as well as on YouTube.[70][71] On 13 April 2009, Al Jazeera launched condensed versions of
its English and Arabic sites for mobile device users.
The
Arabic version of the site was brought offline for about 10 hours by an FBI raid on its
ISP, InfoCom Corporation,
on 5 September 2001. InfoCom was later convicted of exporting to Syria and Gaddafi-ruled Libya, of knowingly being invested in by a Hamas member (both of
which are illegal in the United States), and of underpaying customs duties.[72]
Creative Commons
On
13 January 2009, Al Jazeera released some of its broadcast quality footage from
Gaza under a Creative Commons license. Contrary to business "All Rights
Reserved" standards, the license invites third parties, including rival broadcasters,
to reuse and remix the footage, so long as Al Jazeera is credited. The videos
are hosted on blip.tv, which allows easy downloading and integration
withMiro.
Al
Jazeera also offers over 2,000 Creative Commons-licensed still photos at
their Flickr account.
Citizen journalism
Al
Jazeera accepts user-submitted photos and videos about news events through
a Your Media page, and this content may be featured on the
website or in broadcasts.[80]
Al
Jazeera used the Ushahidi platform to
collect information and reports about the Gaza War, through Twitter, SMS and the website.
United States
On
13 November 2001, during the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, a U.S. missile strike destroyed Al Jazeera's office in Kabul. There were no
casualties.[96] According to Glenn Greenwald, Al Jazeera is "constantly demonized in
the American media."[97] When Al Jazeera reported events featuring very graphic
footage from inside Iraq, Al Jazeera was decried as anti-American and as
inciting violence because it reported on issues concerning national security.[98]
Egypt
During
the 2011 Egyptian protests, on 30 January, the Egyptian government ordered
the TV channel to close its offices. A day after, on 31 January, Egyptian
security forces arrested six Al Jazeera journalists for several hours and
seized their camera equipment. There were also reports of disruption in Al
Jazeera Mubasher's Broadcast to Egypt.
China
In
May 2012 Chinese authorities refused to renew Al Jazeera correspondent's press
credentials and visa, or allow a replacement journalist. Al Jazeera
consequently closed its bureau in Beijing.[116]
Editorial independence
Al
Jazeera claims that it is editorially independent,[122][123] though much of its funding comes from the Qatar government.
In 2010,United States Department of State internal communications, released by WikiLeaks as part of the 2010 diplomatic cables leak, claim that the Qatar government manipulates Al Jazeera coverage
to suit political interests.
Criticism
and controversy
While
Al Jazeera has a large audience in the Middle East, the organization and the
original Arabic channel in particular have taken criticism and been involved in
several controversies.
One
controversy founded on misinformation alleged that Al Jazeera showed videos of
masked fighters beheading western hostages in Iraq.[126] When this was reported in other media, Al Jazeera pressed
for retractions to be made.[127][dead
link] This allegation repeated on Fox News Channel on the launch day of Al Jazeera English on
15 November 2006.[128][dead
link]
Recognition by Secretary
Clinton
On
4 March 2011, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Al Jazeera provided more informative
news coverage than the opinion-driven coverage of American mass media.[139] Most American media outlets declined comment. Michael Clemente of Fox News called the comments "curious", while not directly
refuting them.
Secretary
Clinton's remarks contrast dramatically to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's complaints of bias early in the previous
decade.[140]
Competitors
·
In order to counter a
perceived bias of Al Jazeera, the U.S. government in 2004 founded Al Hurra ("the free one").
·
Since the launch
of Al Jazeera English, Al Jazeera directly competes with BBC World and CNN International, as do a growing number of other international
broadcasters such as France 24, NHK World, and Russia Today.
·
The BBC launched BBC Arabic Television on 11 March 2008, an Arabic-language news
channel in North Africa and the Middle East.[147] This is the second time that the BBC has launched an Arabic
language TV channel; as mentioned above, the demise of the
original BBC World Service Arabic TV channel had at least contributed to the
founding of the original Al Jazeera Arabic TV channel.
·
When Euronews started broadcasting its
programs in Arabic on 12 July 2008, it entered into competition with Al
Jazeera. Arabic is the eighth language in which Euronews is broadcast, after
English, French, German, Russian, Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese.
Media Language
Media Language is basically how a chosen medium communicates with it's audience.
|
Roland Barthes
Signs and Signifiers
Barthes argues that media
texts and narratives consist of signs that are there for the audience to
interpret using their own experience
|
Fiske
Shared cultural knowledge
A representation of a car chase only
makes sense in relation to all the others we have seen - after all, we are
unlikely to have experienced one in reality, and if we did, we would,
according to this model, make sense of it by turning it into another text, which
we would also understand intertextually, in terms of what we have seen so
often on our screens. There is then a cultural knowledge of the concept 'car
chase' that any one text is a prospectus for, and that it used by the viewer
to decode it, and by the producer to encode it.
'denotation is what is
photographed, connotation is how it is photographed'
|
Goodwin
Lyrics and framing
Illustration – either
a straightforward performance video or a simple narrative video that
illustrates the meaning of the lyrics and visualizes the music - music video
‘denotation’.
Amplification – Rather than simply illustrate the lyrics
or sounds this director will ‘amplify’ both with creative interpretation,
unusual ideas and surrealistic approaches. There is still a direct link to
the song like a ‘connotative’ link.
Disjuncture – also
created by ‘auteur’ directors these videos are completely abstract and have
no obvious link to the music, lyrics, song title or artist.
|
|
Archer
Repeatability
Music videos will cut between a
narrative and a performance of the song by the band to show ‘real connection’
with the music. A carefully choreographed dance might be part of the artist’s
performance or an extra aspect of the video designed to aid visualisation and
the ‘repeatability’ factor
|
Saussure
SIGNIFIER + SIGNIFIED = SIGN
The SIGNIFIER is the sign’s physical form in the real
world while the SIGNIFIED is the mental concept evoked by the
signifier.
If we perceive a four legged animal with a very long neck (the
signifier), this evokes the mental concept of a giraffe (the signified). This
combination creates the sign “giraffe”.
The basic act of signification operates at the level of denotation.
Denotation is dealt with more fully elsewhere in this worksheet, but is
simply about identifying a sign. The
denotation of an image is what it actually is, rather than what
meaning we give to it. For example, the colour red is the denotation. The
meaning we give to red, possibly danger, is its connotation.
|
Stewart
TV commercials and aspirations
The music video has the aesthetics
of a TV commercial (focus on the star’s face). Stewart’s description of the
music video as ‘incorporating, raiding and reconstructing’ is Intertextuality
(using familiar thing to generate both nostalgic associations and new
meanings). The video allows more access to the performer and the
mise-en-scene, in particular, can be used to emphasise an aspirational
lifestyle.
|
Example Full Mark Genre Essay
The media production I am going to write about in relation to genre is my favourite piece from the whole course which is my horror teaser trailer.
The genre of the trailer is obviously ‘horror’ and this in itself allowed us to be creative with narrative etc but limited us because we had to stick to a certain amount of generic conventions in order for it to be recognised by it’s existing target audience. Steve Neal said that ‘genre is a repetition with an underlying pattern of variations’ which meant certain generic features had to be included and repeated which in my case was the use of a creepy location of the woods as well as hand held camera and restricted narration to cause disorientation and suspense within our trailer. However, the pattern of variation Neal describes also links to my horror teaser trailer because we were able to creatively push the boundaries by twisting some generic features in order to make the trailer interesting and therefore cause the audience to want to watch the full movie. For this my group chose use a female psycho killer I order to subvert the stereotypical male dominated role. This female identification through point of view shots etc captured our female audience because were providing them with power and this is unusual for the horror genre although it is known for its forward thinking approach as it often attempts to focus on subcultural views instead of targeting the mainstream.
Genre encompasses many parts and the trailer links to it in more ways than one. Its use of enclosed location and the fact the woods attempts to reinforce our society’s fear of loneliness and isolation which the woods creates when the three friends get lost. In these sections of the trailer we used a lot of heavy cross cutting between the female victim who is running anxiously through the woods in order to find her friends and get home safely. We also used the Kuleshove and collision cutting methods as the pace began slow as the friends head our in the car unaware of the danger before them and once they are in the woods we deliberately quickened the pace of editing to cause tension and to show that something is not right, keeping the audience on the edge of their seats. Editing and mise-en-scene is really important to genre and reflects very quickly certain moods and atmospheres.
Levi Strauss and Roland Barthes argued that the horror genre like many others used ‘binary oppositions’ in order to show the contrast between good and evil in order to force the audience to be constantly questioning the trailer for example; in my trailer I used light and dark to connote their happiness and carefree attitude in the daytime and the darkness to emphasise their fear and reliance on their senses. This is particularly important to the horror genre as characters are often shown in high angle shots to appear vulnerable and therefore under threat.
Gore or ‘body horror’ is also a common generic convention used by most horror films that we studied including Dawn of the Dead by George A. Romero who used it to make the audience feel sick by forcing them to see extreme violence. In my own trailer we were inspired to use gore differently by showing a hanging scene in slow motion to create tension and the centoring in on the face and neck which had been broken and this was shown by the rope burn we had made from latex and the blood pouring down her chest. This shot moves clockwise and slowly zooms in to force the audience to see what the hang (woman) has done. In our final two shots we finish the trailer with the male anti hero being lifted off the ground with blood pouring out of his mouth which causes the audience to assume no one survives because the final girl is stabbed by her friend accidentally which quickens the pace and adds tension but she is the survivor who as Carol Clover suggests will be terrorised throughout the film and finally overcome the monster. This plays with the audiences emotions and links back to the horror genre well by creating our own style of horror. Andrew Sarris argues because it encompasses so much and is key to explaining a film. Genre is the ideas that collectively make a particular recognisable style that draws in its existing target audience. My horror trailer had expressionist camera angles as the female victim desperately trips over the camera and we see her running above it as well as close ups of her facial expression that causes us to identify with her fear and therefore makes us scared. This meant the audience also were forced to objectify the female victim from the high angle camera shot down her top in which we can see her breasts slightly after watching other Hitchcock movies which use the male gaze theory by Laura Mulvey to force us to take a male’s viewpoint.
In my trailer we also used an iconic symbol of the noose because obviously as a hangwoman she needed the prop but also as a female the circular shape suggested female power and this is something the horror genre often does but for male characters using guns etc as phallic symbols which we also used as the male anti hero takes out a knife and stabs his friend frantically when she walks up behind him. The horror trailer was made much darker in Final Cut Pro using the brightness and contrast menu and also dragged the saturated colours towards the blue in order to create a dark, dusky night time atmosphere a generic convention of horror trailers.
The generic conventions we chose to use were all important to the success of our product and since distributing it on YouTube we have over 4000 which I am really pleased with and gives me the confidence that we obviously stuck to the genre enough to capture our intended target audience but were creative enough to make people want to keep watching the trailer and virally sharing it with others.
Genre places a media text into a grouping giving it an identity which can be recognised by the mainstream society and I believe my product is successfully fitted to the horror genre using the narrative that todorov argued was important to the horror genre by following an equilibrium at the beginning then a problem which in our case was the male anti hero playing a joke on the soon to be female victim making jump running after him causing their separation then a pathway to resolution – as they attempt to find each other and then a new equilibrium at the end which we deliberately left as an open ending to capture our audience effectively.
EAA 10 EG 10 Term 5
Taken from http://www.slideshare.net/allisonhammond/june-2010-example-level-4
The genre of the trailer is obviously ‘horror’ and this in itself allowed us to be creative with narrative etc but limited us because we had to stick to a certain amount of generic conventions in order for it to be recognised by it’s existing target audience. Steve Neal said that ‘genre is a repetition with an underlying pattern of variations’ which meant certain generic features had to be included and repeated which in my case was the use of a creepy location of the woods as well as hand held camera and restricted narration to cause disorientation and suspense within our trailer. However, the pattern of variation Neal describes also links to my horror teaser trailer because we were able to creatively push the boundaries by twisting some generic features in order to make the trailer interesting and therefore cause the audience to want to watch the full movie. For this my group chose use a female psycho killer I order to subvert the stereotypical male dominated role. This female identification through point of view shots etc captured our female audience because were providing them with power and this is unusual for the horror genre although it is known for its forward thinking approach as it often attempts to focus on subcultural views instead of targeting the mainstream.
Genre encompasses many parts and the trailer links to it in more ways than one. Its use of enclosed location and the fact the woods attempts to reinforce our society’s fear of loneliness and isolation which the woods creates when the three friends get lost. In these sections of the trailer we used a lot of heavy cross cutting between the female victim who is running anxiously through the woods in order to find her friends and get home safely. We also used the Kuleshove and collision cutting methods as the pace began slow as the friends head our in the car unaware of the danger before them and once they are in the woods we deliberately quickened the pace of editing to cause tension and to show that something is not right, keeping the audience on the edge of their seats. Editing and mise-en-scene is really important to genre and reflects very quickly certain moods and atmospheres.
Levi Strauss and Roland Barthes argued that the horror genre like many others used ‘binary oppositions’ in order to show the contrast between good and evil in order to force the audience to be constantly questioning the trailer for example; in my trailer I used light and dark to connote their happiness and carefree attitude in the daytime and the darkness to emphasise their fear and reliance on their senses. This is particularly important to the horror genre as characters are often shown in high angle shots to appear vulnerable and therefore under threat.
Gore or ‘body horror’ is also a common generic convention used by most horror films that we studied including Dawn of the Dead by George A. Romero who used it to make the audience feel sick by forcing them to see extreme violence. In my own trailer we were inspired to use gore differently by showing a hanging scene in slow motion to create tension and the centoring in on the face and neck which had been broken and this was shown by the rope burn we had made from latex and the blood pouring down her chest. This shot moves clockwise and slowly zooms in to force the audience to see what the hang (woman) has done. In our final two shots we finish the trailer with the male anti hero being lifted off the ground with blood pouring out of his mouth which causes the audience to assume no one survives because the final girl is stabbed by her friend accidentally which quickens the pace and adds tension but she is the survivor who as Carol Clover suggests will be terrorised throughout the film and finally overcome the monster. This plays with the audiences emotions and links back to the horror genre well by creating our own style of horror. Andrew Sarris argues because it encompasses so much and is key to explaining a film. Genre is the ideas that collectively make a particular recognisable style that draws in its existing target audience. My horror trailer had expressionist camera angles as the female victim desperately trips over the camera and we see her running above it as well as close ups of her facial expression that causes us to identify with her fear and therefore makes us scared. This meant the audience also were forced to objectify the female victim from the high angle camera shot down her top in which we can see her breasts slightly after watching other Hitchcock movies which use the male gaze theory by Laura Mulvey to force us to take a male’s viewpoint.
In my trailer we also used an iconic symbol of the noose because obviously as a hangwoman she needed the prop but also as a female the circular shape suggested female power and this is something the horror genre often does but for male characters using guns etc as phallic symbols which we also used as the male anti hero takes out a knife and stabs his friend frantically when she walks up behind him. The horror trailer was made much darker in Final Cut Pro using the brightness and contrast menu and also dragged the saturated colours towards the blue in order to create a dark, dusky night time atmosphere a generic convention of horror trailers.
The generic conventions we chose to use were all important to the success of our product and since distributing it on YouTube we have over 4000 which I am really pleased with and gives me the confidence that we obviously stuck to the genre enough to capture our intended target audience but were creative enough to make people want to keep watching the trailer and virally sharing it with others.
Genre places a media text into a grouping giving it an identity which can be recognised by the mainstream society and I believe my product is successfully fitted to the horror genre using the narrative that todorov argued was important to the horror genre by following an equilibrium at the beginning then a problem which in our case was the male anti hero playing a joke on the soon to be female victim making jump running after him causing their separation then a pathway to resolution – as they attempt to find each other and then a new equilibrium at the end which we deliberately left as an open ending to capture our audience effectively.
EAA 10 EG 10 Term 5
Taken from http://www.slideshare.net/allisonhammond/june-2010-example-level-4
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