Soap Opera Project Evaluation
- 1. Soap Opera Project Evaluation Hannah Clark 13W
- 2. Initial Research When choosing the brief of 'Soap Operas' for my coursework choice my initial research was exploring and gaining an understanding of different Soap Opera trailers for all different genre of story lines. This research began to give me a few ideas of what sort of trailer I could potentially create. I primarily used Youtube as my primary source of research because of it's broad database of footage. I also closely monitored TV advertisements to gain an good understanding of what Soap trailers are like today.
- 3. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
- 4. The initial first big step was to decide on what sort of mood of storyline I am going to be aiming for. Then I could start analysing more specific soap trailers in detail and begin to gather inspiration and brief ideas. I decided upon the Soap Opera choice because not many people have attempted it in the past and it seemed like more of a challenge as there are limited soap trailers available compared to other types of trailers so it was harder to determine what we should be aiming for. Soap trailers are always dramatic and they are always effective because of it's hooking soundtrack and clever but natural camera work. We wanted to find a unique,catchy and dramatic soundtrack in order to hook the audience, a typical convention of a soap opera trailer.
- 5. Lighting Lighting in a trailer is very important as it helps create the mood and tempo of the storyline and mood. As it's a soap opera and is created to try and hold a representation of reality we have tried throughout to keep the lighting very natural to try and keep the footage looking very realistic. However the footage where one of my characters is running out of the house where it is light into the darkness outside holds connotations of running into more darker problems.
- 6. Camera Work As our topic is a soap opera which is trying to demonstrate and portray real life situations so in order to make the footage look as realistic as possible we didn't use any drastic camera shots and any high technological effects however at the same time attempt to show our camera skills which we have developed. Our trailer begins with the E4 logo and background screen which leads into a bleak setting of a blank screen with our title 'Behind Closed Doors' appearing with the music subtly just beginning to be brought in.
- 7. MUSIC After researching all different kinds of trailers we decided that the most effective form of soundtrack was definitely ones that were dramatic and create immense suspension without being scary. After a long time of deciding We settled with 'Radioactive (137 bpm instrumental version)' for our first choice as we really feel that it helps portray the moods of the characters. Throughout the track the pase slowly escalates which holds connotations with the themes of the storyline slowly progressing and worsening. The first clip with one of my characters in the toilet looking upset the music is slower and as then when another character runs to escape out of the house the music picks up it's pase and the 'drop' of the song begins when the door slams. The footage of the graveyard is shown to be slower as its the ending track however the singing in the track begins towards the end of the clip and is shown throughout the ending title clip. The song slowly progressing throughout creates tension slowly and also demonstrates the moods of the characters at the time. We slowly began to edge the track in while the trailer title was beginning to start, this was because we wanted to create suspense and also have a steady beat going on throughout the clip to not distract attention away from the footage and storyline.
- 8. Mise En Scene With any type of productions its essential to take into serious consideration the clothing and setting of the trailer. As Soap Operas are trying to create social realism it's essential we kept the characters clothing as normal as possible, nothing drastic. As our characters are in distress and in a bad way in the starting topic of the soap we decided to keep them very laid back and casual as if you were upset and in a bad way as stereotypically in real life you wouldn't be dressed formally in a suit if in those situations and at home. Our characters in the soap starting up at the moment are teenagers. For Gemma we have a plain burgundy red long sleeved top and plain legging trousers, this could be seen as a stereotypical outfit for a teenager in home surroundings. Amy in here scene of in the toilet, she is wearing sleepwear signifying her bad mood and distress as she doesn't want to go out of the house and get ready. However for the final footage of in the graveyard she is seen wearing black trousers and a black school jumper signifying her age to the audience.
- 9. Typical Conventions Presented in my Trailer ● Our trailer is 1 minute six seconds long which its a stereotypical average for a soap trailer because the aim is too not give too much of the storyline away. ● Has a soundtrack that slowly builds up throughout the footage to increase tension. ● States the theme of the storyline, what channel it would appear on and when, informing the consumer. ● Variety of Angles ● Soundtrack matches the footage
- 10. Conventions Here My initial title of our soap opera 'Behind Closed Doors'. It's a typical connotation of a trailer for a television trailer it informs the audience of when to expect the programme to be shown. All channels before starting a programme put a few second long bit of footage showing their logo and colour scheme informing the consumers who the programme is screen by and sometimes produced by.
- 11. Was your production an effective piece? Melissa Penney - “all of it looks really good, in the trailer the use of soundtrack really makes the trailer what it is because it all fits in really well with each storyline” This shows that my audience has picked up well on what we were trying to achieve with the soundtrack. We really wanted people to notice that the parts of the song were meant to link in with each section of the storyline. Georgia Clark - “I love all of it, especially your choice of photograph for your poster, its really eye catching and the choice of facial expression and intenseness of eye contact really helps you engage with the characters” We are really glad that this has been expressed because the choice of looks and expressions we chose were supposed to be a method of engaging for the audience. Georgina Hatchet - “Altogether the three texts all compliment each other really well, however you could have used a few more photographs on your magazine front cover in order to achieve an equal text to photograph ratio” This feedback is one of our most critical but I thought it was important to include in order to improve on future ventures. We realise now we could have used a wider variety of photography.
- 12. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
- 13. Our combination of trailer and ancillary tasks we thought as a whole complimented each other really well. Each task helped towards a good promotion package for our up and coming Soap Opera, Behind Closed Doors. Our Magazine front cover helps introduce some of the story lines that will be arising over the season and helps introduce some of the characters personalities. The Poster helps give a feel of the mood of the starting soap and also gives us a sneak peak of who the current primary characters are. Finally the trailer is the promotional tool that gives the consumer and potential viewer a good insight to what is in store and helps introduce everything that the poster and magazine cover already does. The solum faces of the characters on the magazine front cover and the poster help create a signature look for the mood of the soap and helps link the magazine and the poster together.
- 14. How the three texts would work together as a marketing strategy When it comes to a new product being launched, service or media text in order for it to be a key success is good a good marketing strategy. For a programme or film it's thee main media promotion tools aside from social media platforms are, posters/billboards, magazine coverage and television trailers. The poster is effective as it is simple yet eye catching which makes the consumer want to know more about the programme however some people may want to know a bit more about a programme before beginning to watch it, that’s where the magazine cover and trailer comes in. The magazine cover manages to give the potential viewer an inside to what possibly could be in store and the trailer gives you a more personal introduction to the unraveling's of storyline and characters. All three texts compliment each other well and all have their own individual valuable purpose.
- 15. What have you learned from your audience feedback? Constructive criticism is key in when launching a programme as it gives the production companies an insight into what they could have done better and what they should be looking to do in the future. Most of our feedback was given through word of mouth an alternative and change from using the internet for a source of feedback, this allowed us to gain knowledge from the reactions and facial expressions. I have learned that in order for our magazine cover to be more of an effective success we could have used a broader range of photography to emphasise the identity of the characters. Overall we realised that we managed to mostly achieve everything that we set out to do and all the creative methods and tools we did in order to attract a specific audience and get them to notice certain aspects worked.
- 16. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
- 17. Construction When starting out to begin the construction production process we were pretty much out of our depth. I personally have only used basic camera equipment but have never used the more high market equipment so admittedly went through some difficulty getting started and getting used to the equipment. For filming we used a video/camera with the stand however we didn't use the sound detector and recorder as it wasn't necessary for our piece as it was all non-diegetic sound based.
- 18. However the biggest challenge yet we were yet to face; editing. We were told that Adobe Première Pro is the most suitable software for us to use and we really struggled to get accustomed to the software as we had never used anything like it before. We managed to pick up the basis relatively quickly however some effects that we desired to use we never figured out how to use them. However we had used Photoshop many times in the past including in depth experience from our first year a level media studies so managed complete the task with ease to a simple standard however we did struggle to take the magazine front cover to a higher level to meet the standards of doing media for A2 so we had to learn by watching various YouTube videos and doing research online to reach our desired effects. When making our magazine front cover Photoshop allowed us to create different fonts and effects to a higher standard. When it came to downloading our soundtrack for the trailer we found that the song wasn't available to buy on iTunes and found that the next safest method to download the track was taking it off YouTube via YouTube converter.
- 19. Research The majority of our research conducted from our project was through the internet based platforms. YouTube was an extremely helpful source of research when gaining knowledge and looking for inspiration on soap opera trailers. We also analysed soap opera trailers when they were being screened on TV to see when they would be most manage to reach their target audience. For our poster and magazine front cover we primarily used Google images while conducting most of our research. However for magazine front covers we did go into convenience shops and supermarkets and did take a close look on what ones were more popular than others and which ones are placed more prominently
- 20. Planning Planning is a important part when it comes to planning something like this so its key to keep everything all together in one place. The website 'Blogger' is what we used to post all of our research too in order to keep everything together. A bonus of using a public blogging site in order to post all of our planning is it allows all my class peers and I to exchange ideas and inspiration while going through the project process.
- 21. Evaluation We were given the choice of a few options on how to evaluate our project. However as it is media studies and it prominently revolves around technology we decided to conduct our evaluation on Microsoft PowerPoint and then to upload it onto Slideshare which is a service that allows you to upload your presentations online with a suitable internet format and then I will post it onto my blogger account.
- 22. In Conclusion.. Although this project has been a massive challenge for Tilly and Myself we have thoroughly enjoyed the whole process and learning new skills and discovering new software’s. However if I were to make a few alterations to the project it would be the magazines images. We realised now that the photographs weren’t as prominent as they probably should have been. We are thoroughly pleased with our product and is worth what time and effort we put into it.