Kane Lyttle Media Studies

EVALUATION
INTRODUCTION TO THE WHOLE TASK, WE WERE SET OUT TO COMPLETE

After months of research, planning and construction we finally have managed

to complete our task including the two ancillary tasks. A lot of time and effort
went into research and planning(R&P), enabling us as a group to produce a
professional like documentary.

The focal area to store our R&P

was blogger – we updated the
blog regularly to ensure we note
down all relevant information.

After R&P was complete, we then moved onto preparing our interviews due
to filming being imminent. We took various footage including background and
also many important interviews – like the police officer.
As a whole we had roughly 6 weeks to film. Once the filming stage was
coming to a close, we needed to prepare for the footage to be transferred to
our area on the Macs – which initially came to some difficulty because the
data needed to be converted. Once this was done we began the construction
stage.

Again we had roughly 6 weeks to complete this section, while also preparing
to produce our ancillary tasks which were a magazine article and a radio
trailer – because of this, we split the work between us, I decided to draft the
article – designing the layout and title and then Samheel put in the relevant
information including screenshots taken from the documentary. The drafting
was done on paper – but the final was done in Adobe InDesign. As a group
we decided that Amaar Baz will initially draft the radio trailer, then as
a group, we would complete the final trailer together in a
programme called Garage Band.

Before deciding all tasks were complete, we went

through a final somewhat ‘quality control’ – to ensure
everything was at a high standard. Following this we
needed to burn our work to a CD as everything now
was complete.

The next and final stage is Evaluation; this need to be put on the blog and
must illustrate the 4 questions that I have answered below.
IN WHAT WAYS DOES OUR MEDIA PRODUCT USE, DEVELOP OR CHALLENGE
FORMS AND CONVENTIONS (F&C) OF REAL MEDIA PRODUCTS?

Given the experience, time scale and equipment, our media product,
predominantly ‘uses’ forms and conventions of real media products. One way
it used F&C is that it follows the traditional educational/informative
documentary by having interviews. We found that this was very common and
for our topic, interviews were very
important. For the structure we wanted to
produce a realistic mise en scene. Below,
you can see how its set in a office
environment, depicting professionalism,
the shot used was a commonly used
interview – midshot. Our product uses this
F&C…..What Jag is wearing is also
important, As stated he is a youth worker,
therefore he is not in a suit, instead he is
in casual ‘sixth form college’ t-shirt. This
represent being on the same level of the people he is working with – being
non uniformed student – in my opinion it makes him more relatable.

In our R&P stage we looked at various real life products and found that music
played in documentaries, but at different stages and also sometimes the
music actually changes. However ours develops from this, as the music is
played the same all the way through. However we did take into account our
doc was only 5min long, whereas others were 30min, so technically when
their music changed it already played 5min if not more. So maybe if our doc
was 30min, we may have decided to change our track at some point.

The music that was played was an instrumental of a grime genre – it was non
copyright and was made exclusively for our doc. Many documentaries have
music that relates to the topic, we decided to follow this convention in our doc.
Being that the topic was street crime, grime was a perfect genre for the track
– stereotypically grime is associated with these typical British working class
teenagers.

In our magazine we also use and develop F&C. one way we use F&C is by
the structure of the article, like the common article ours has a big title to jump
out at the audience, it also includes pictures/stills - another convention that
most articles follow.
For our radio trailer we used many forms and conventions, one main was
having sound clips of actual sounds from the documentary. To not only give a
quick preview but also to provide real examples of street crime
victims/committers.

We slightly developed our radio trailer by making the time longer most are
about 30sec but ours was over a minute. Initially we did think that it should be
short and snappy but we wanted to really stress the importance of this topic to
our audience.
 Again our experience in producing documentaries was limited; therefore our
documentary rarely if not never challenged F&C. However if we had the
opportunity again to produce a documentary, we may be more confident in
doing this. For example the voice over - we may challenge the usual voice
over in the background and instead having he/she in the scene itself.

Below is a brief outline of some of our important shots

Youth walking showing the magistrates
Opening Title
courts

This was done on computer and was hand written in a graffiti For this, we used a ‘MS’ from the back looking over his shoulder
style text – because it’s a font commonly associated with youths – showing that he is in control and is showing us around
and crime.

Interview with a local youth Youth walking through alley

For this, we used a ‘MS’ against a vandalised fence in a alley – For this, we used a ‘LS’ with the youth walking towards and past
portraying that street crime life. He also had his hood up to the camera – it was used as an introduction to the interview with
support this, further more he was a young male (highest crime him. Many documentaries do these kind of things therefore we
committers) followed this code and convention

Police Post Police Interview

For this, we used a low angle shot – showing that the police are In this scene we used a MS – we also used props such
above – representing the dominance of the police. Looking as the police signs to portray a realistic setting
down on the vulnerable
 Student Voxpops
Student Voxpops

The camera shot used here was a MS – it gave more of a

relating touch when we got shots of the student smoking – In this scene we cleverly took a MS footage of a student
which crime committers could relate to because the majority outside a Magistrates Court – relating to our topic
are smokers.

Youth interview down an alley Victim of crime

In this MS scene – he is against a vandalised wall down an This was set inside college – it gives realism when you hear
alley, again portraying our topic. people in the background talking.

Reconstruction
Youth Worker

We gave a black and white effect to show that typical

reconstruction scene – also black and white portrays that This MS interview was set in an office – showing that
realistic factor. professional feel. Used commonly in many real documentaries
 HOW EFFECTIVE IS THE COMBINATION OF YOUR MAIN PRODUCT AND ANCILLARY
TASKS?

The combination of our main product and ancillary tasks is very effective
because it all links successfully.
The main reasons it combines well is because the grammar that is used being
‘slang’ – in the doc – we hear it frequently like ‘Blud’ this unlawful, working
class language is instantly transferred in the magazine. The audience is hit
with this grammar straight away by the title – ‘I own da streetz’ – like the doc
it portrayed the target audience we were targeting, due to this kind of
language being used by this particular social background.
Here you can see green, splattered lettering, we
As stated the grammar used the colour green because it associated with
isn’t proper English grime. The instrumental genre used in the doc
instead short slang/text
like language ‘da’ The structure of
meaning ‘the’. This is the magazine
used because the target was organised
audience use this kind of but wonky, we
language. This links to the done this
doc because the because it links
language used by some with street crime
of the youths isn’t proper being out the
English. Also the radio norm.
trailer has elements of
this.

The radio trailer also combines well because, not just the language links with
the other tasks, but also the voice being that stereotypical brummie accent,
portrays that working class background,
that would attract that particular audience.
The radio station it also is played on
‘Galaxy’ has a wide audience that consist
of our target audience. Not just the
persona of the DJ’s etc but also the genre
of music being hip hop, rap etc.
WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED FROM OUR AUDIENCE FEEDBACK?

Firstly our questionnaire went out to a 20 people; all

being different genders ages and ethnic backgrounds

Subsequent to showing the documentary to a range of

different audiences, we have learned various things from
the feedback.

As a whole the majority of the feedback was positive, as

most rating the documentary as excellent with nobody rating it as rubbish.
Verbally we concluded most if not all, would have watched the rest of the
5min clip.

Our first question went straight into asking the audience how good it was. We
wanted the audience to immediately express their feeling towards the doc
after watching it. Not only was the feedback questionnaire based, but also
verbal – what we learned from this was that, the audience found the topic
interesting and found the interviews including the mise en scene professional.

16 Following feedback, the

response we got from
14
the question was
12 pleasing, out of 20
10 people – 15 said the doc
8 was excellent and 5 said
okay with 0 rating it
6
rubbish.
4 From verbal feedback
2 we concluded that the
0
majority of people
Excellent Okay Rubbish though it was
How Good Do You Feel the Doc w as
professional and liked
the interviews.

In terms of criticisms of
the documentary, a
minority of the feedback
outlined sound problems
i.e. – too loud, repetitive
and the voice over being
slightly fuzzy. What we
have learned from this is that its
very important that quality is
checked regularly through the
construction stages to ensure the
sound is at its best. Another thing
we have learned to prevent this
again is to allow a secondary source (e.g. teachers, family, students etc) to
review the sound
to get his/her perspective on it. We did initially do
this but mainly for the actual footage instead of the sound, therefore next time
we will take this into account.

14 Again most people rated the

sound quality as excellent ,
12
out of 20 - 12 rated it
10 excellent, 8 as okay with 0
8 being rubbish.
Verbal feedback we
6
concluded that for the most
4
part the sound quality was
2 excellent , however one
0
issue raised was the voice
Excellent Okay Rubbish over quality was slightly
How Good Was The Sound Quality
bassy/fuzzy and the
instrumental abit loud over
some interviews

To engage the right target audience was really important for us to do,
therefore a question we asked was who they feel it targeted, we decided to
target teenagers, from a working class background – social class E. However
secondary audiences like adults, different social classes etc can watch the
documentary and we wouldn’t be surprise if they did.
After reviewing the feedback, it shows we did this successfully target our
audience.

14 We already decided that

12
teenagers were our
target audience following
10 the response we got
8 from our audience
research, from this
6
feedback we can see
4 that we targeted them
2
successfully because 13
out of 20 said it suitable
0
for teenagers and 7 for
Seniors Adults Teenagers Children
adults.
Target Audience For Our Doc

Another question we asked was what channel, time and day would be most
suitable.
We decided that we wanted it to be showcased on Channel 4 because there’s
programmes like shameless, hollyoaks, big brother
etc that have more or less the same target audience
as ours, therefore we felt it would be most suitable.
The time we all agreed was 9.00pm (not too early and
not too late) the day we initially thought was a Friday,
however because of the target audience we thought
that it would be better in the week like a Wednesday
because Friday is the start of the weekend so many of
our audience may be socialising etc, where as a
Wednesday, people are more likely to be at home at
this time and day.
HOW DID WE USE NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES IN THE CONSTRUCTION AND
RESEARCH, PLANNING AND EVALUATION STAGES?

Tasks/stages Technologies
*may be more

Research & Planning Computer - internet, Blogger,

Hotmail

Sony HD Cam, Microphone,

Construction Computer - Internet, Final Cut
Express, Garage band, iDVD,
Hotmail, Blogger, In Design, Word,
YouTube.

Evaluation Computer – Blogger, Word,

Intervideo

From start to finish, there were a variety of

technologies we used to complete our product.

In the research and planning stage, the main

technology that was used was ICT. We mostly
used apple macs throughout the whole process
and used the
internet to obtain
important information about our chosen
topic and used blogger to save info for later
use. We used YouTube to find similar
documentaries to ours, so we could get a
feel for the codes and conventions they use
to illustrate and target a particular audience. The clips we did find we were
able to embed to our blog.

Once we had everything in terms of planning out the way, we moved onto
early construction – filming. Around this time the college were equipped with
new cameras, so fortunately we were able to use these new Sony HD
camcorders. We used these for various things, the main object for the
cameras was to film the footage, and however we also used it to record our
radio trailer and to take stills.
Before taking the cameras out we had to
complete and form covering where we are
going, contact details and equipment etc – it
was a standard safety check for the
college. Along with the cameras we used a
tripod, microphone and headphones. This
equipment was all important throughout the filming because we needed the
tripod to keep the camera steady where appropriate, the headphones were
important to check the quality of the sound – is it loud enough etc and the
microphone was needed to pick up the sound of what people were saying in
the interviews
reducing the levels 14
of the diegetic
background noises 12

like cars, wind etc. 10

In some cases we
8
actually wanted
these sounds to 6
represent realism. 4
For example ‘Sam’s
2
interview’ you hear
laughing and talking 0
– this represented Excellent Okay Rubbish
realism in a college How Good Was The Sound Quality
environment. Other
uses were the voice-over and radio trailer. Sound quality was important and
feedback shows we done this well.

Once all filming

was done, we
needed to
actually construct
the product. To
do this we used
the Apple Macs.
Firstly we had to
transfer the data
for conversion.
Once this was done we used a piece of software called Final Cut Express, to
start building the documentary. At this stage we stared to organise the clips
we wanted to use. There were over 30minutes of footage and we only need
5min so filing through all the different footage was difficult. Once we sorted
out the clips we wanted, the next stage was to put them onto the timeline and
shorten any footage if necessary.
 To put them on the timeline was simple it was just a drag and drop job.
The next stage after this was editing. We had to think about applying
effects – some used in ours
was:

• Slow motion – to
slow down a fast
paced clip for the
audience to see
more clearly
• Black & White – this
was used to show
realism and also the
effect of a
reconstruction
• Cross dissolve – to
speed up/move on to
a later part of a
particular scene.
• Fade – effect used
to move onto a next
scene.

One of the ancillary tasks was to produce a radio trailer for the documentary.
We done this in a programme called Garage Band.

The trailer was intended to promote the documentary by broadcasting the

1mintue clip across Birmingham. It’s a different form of advertising
– it uses cross media convergence to market the documentary.

Firstly we had to produce the trailer on final cut, then

transfer it to garage band to put effects and sounds to it.
To make the trailer more realistic I decided to put an
opening Galaxy FM sound effect at the start and end. The
radio trailer consisted of different sound clips from the
documentary but also clips that were produced specifically for it to promote
the documentary for example one was: ‘This is the latest of Channel 4’s
Documentaries’.
 The other task was to produce a magazine article for
our documentary. Before constructing it, we produced a
draft of the article. Once this was done we produced the
article on a programme called InDesign. Initially we
decide to go with a cramped bright article, however we
felt it was too bombarding and a more subtle, simple
article would be most appropriate. In the article, it
included stills from our
documentary to aid the
presentation and content.
One still that was included
was a still of the first
interview with ‘Bustaman’
we included this picture
because the article was
based around him – it asks
various question like why
street crime and what was
it like in prison.

OVERALL

Looking back at the whole task, it has been really good and not only was it
satisfying for us, but we actually learnt more about street crime, and the
effects, role of the police etc.
In terms of development the whole process meant I have learnt new things –
therefore if I was asked to produce another one, I will be able to produce a
more professional documentary.
WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED FROM OUR AUDIENCE
FEEDBACK?