How did we use media technologies in the construction, research, planning and evaluation stages?
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Our digital journal: Blogger
Blogger was our digital journal where we documented our final product, ancillary texts, research into audience and TV documentary, the construction of our main product and our evaluation questions. -
Live in Guardians statistics
The use of search engines, like DuckDuckGo, Google and Yahoo allowed us to find Live in Guardians, which further allowed us to find statistics that we could use for our documentary to explain how difficult it is to own/rent a home and giving people alternatives lifestyles. Therefore it was useful in the research and construction of our TV documentary as we were able to produce graphics using these statistics to emphasise the effective of the increasing housing prices. -
Youtube (1/2)
YouTube is a online streaming applications/websites that featured multiple TV documentaries that were useful for our research into TV documentaries, which was important for our group to understand the codes and conventions of TV documentary.
Youtube was extremely important as we were able to upload video clips and drafts of our TV documentary, which also enabled us to receive audience feedback.
Youtube was also the website where we published our final product of 'Lifestyle: Guardian.' -
DuckDuckGo and Search Engines
We used search engines such as 'DuckDuckGo' to find documentary style TV shows and films. DuckDuckGo is a helpful search engine, as it does not filter previous searches, creating for a more unbiased search.
Search engines, like DuckDuckGo are extremely useful as they allowed us to find statistics about 'Live in Guardians', we included this in our documentary. It was also useful in finding popular social media websites, like Twitter, Reddit and Youtube, which gave us audience feedback. -
Reddit
Reddit is sharing forum site that enabled us to share the draft of our TV documentary, radio advertisement and print advertisement and receive feedback from one of Reddit's most popular pages, '/r/documentary'. We used Reddit as a form of summative audience feedback. -
Distinction between TV documentary and film documentary
Although, the criteria says to film a TV style documentary, both TV and film documentaries share similar codes and coventions, and can easily be transferred into each other. However, although they share similar aspects, there are specific conventions that they do not share. Film documentaries appear on television, therefore it is difficult to find a distinction between these two.
Our analysis of both TV and film should help give a clearer idea of what constitutes a TV documentary. -
Netflix and BBC iPlayer
We also watched TV style documentaries such as Reggie Yates: hidden Australia on BBC iPlayer and film style documentaries like 'Grizzly Man' on Netflix. From these productions we were able to deconstruct the codes and conventions of a TV style documentary. Netflix and BBC iPlayer were useful in the research and planning of our TV documentary as our analysis allowed us to look at how the narrative, media language, representation, genre and audience is depicted in all sorts of documentaries. -
Youtube (2/2)
Another way that we used Youtube is through learning how to use other software, such as Premiere Pro,
Adobe After Effects, Filmstro and Audacity. This was helpful in the construction and research of our TV documentary and radio advertisement as we were able to understand how to edit and produce a conventional TV documentary and radio advertisement. -
Celtx
During the planning process of our documentary film, we used a website called 'Celtx'. This allowed us to create professional level scripts and helped us understand the conventions of documentary film scripts. -
Whatsapp
Whatsapp is a text messaging application that allowed us to communicate with each other without being in person. This allowed us to organise our roles, schedules, which enabled for easier and quick communication. Here's an example of one of our conversation -
Equipment and software used in the construction of our TV documentary
For our TV documentary, we used a Sony A7S camera which includes 4K quality, road microphone, tripod, a camera rig, a black magic monitor, blue yeti microphone, Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects, Filmstro. -
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TV Documentary construction: Equipment (3/3)
The black magic monitor was also useful as the Sony A7S didn't include a screen. Therefore, Jacob was able to see what he was filming through the black magic monitor.
We also used a road mic to have the clearest audio when we were outside, as the wind was an issue for our TV documentary.
We also used a blue yeti microphone for Niomie's voiceovers because she was the interviewer in our TV documentary, which commonly happens to be the voiceover that explains the story/narrative to the audience. -
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TV Documentary construction: Equipment (2/3)
We used the camera rig as we found multiple documentaries that included camera movement didn't shake at all. We attempted this without the rig, which was difficult as the cameraman would have to walk extremely slowly in order to make the camera doesn't shake. We came to the conclusion that a camera rig was useful as Jacob could move faster and the camera wouldn't shake anymore.
We also used a black magic monitor as it was helpful Hany, the director, to see exactly what Jacob is filming. -
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TV Documentary construction: Equipment (1/3)
From our research into TV documentary, especially biographical TV documentaries, we found that cameras with extremely high resolution, like 4K, was a necessity. Therefore we used the Sony A7S, which fit the criteria of a TV documentary. We also found that most shots in a TV documentary included still shots on tripods, which we used in our first shooting with Nicholas. We also used a camera rig, which was placed on Jacob, the cameraman's shoulder. -
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TV Documentary Construction: Premiere Pro (1/5)
When constructing our TV documentary, we used a variety of editing techniques, such as L-cuts, J-cuts, voice overs, cutaways and grading on Premiere Pro. Cutaways were used during interviews as they gave us an opportunity to give the audience an image of what Nicholas Garcia is talking about. For example, when Nicholas talks about the demolition sign tied to a tree, we felt that a panning shot of it would help give the audience an idea of what he's talking about. -
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TV Documentary construction: Premiere Pro (2/5)
Cutaways were also useful during the beginning of the documentary, when Nicholas Garcia is outside his home, the camera zooms in far too many times for our product to be considered a TV documentary. Therefore the inclusion of a cutaway helps hide our mistake and therefore helps us present a conventional TV documentary to our audience. -
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TV Documentary construction: Premiere Pro (3/5)
Premiere Pro was the best video editing program available compared to iMovie, Windows Movie Maker, Sony Vegas 7, as it would increase the potential of the documentary's quality. Keyframes were also important as they allowed me to lift and drop the audio due to the very level background. This helped control the levels of audio output for that particular track. -
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TV Documentary construction: Premiere Pro (4/5)
Grading was another effect that was helpful with our production as scenes shot inside Nick's residence had a warm orange colour palette compared to shots outside his residence, which was a dull grey colour. Therefore we decided to make grade the shots by editing the master saturation. We changed the master saturation from 100 to 0, which flattened the colour palette of the shot. We then looked for a suitable form of saturation, which was 90. -
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TV Documentary construction: Premiere Pro (5/5)
We found that 90 was the perfect level of saturation as it made all the shots outside similar to the shots inside.
Another way Premiere Pro was useful in the construction of our TV documentary is through editing audio. Although Keyframes were important when editing certain parts of our documentary, we found that Premiere Pro was extremely useful when editing audio. -
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TV Documentary construction: Filmstro (1/2)
Filmstro is an application that enables the user to access composing, controlling and publishing music. Hany decided to look at tutorials as he wanted to understand how to implement Filmstro into our TV documentary. We decided to look into the 'science & documentary' tab where it had a wide range of soundtracks that were available for our to edit. Our research into music within TV documentary allowed us to know the ambience that we felt was suitable for the audience. (1/2) -
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TV Documentary construction: Filmstro (2/2)
(2/2) Therefore we decided to edit the Dinlas theme, which fits the ambience that we felt was suitable for our TV documentary/audience because it included a serious tone.
After Hany researched for tutorials of how to use the Filmstro plugin on Premiere Pro, he edited the Dinlas theme through it's depth and created a completely different composition using the preset Dinlas theme. -
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TV Documentary construction: Adobe After Effects
Adobe After Effects was extremely useful in the construction of our TV documentary as we were able to create graphics that would help emphasise that statistics being told by Niomie in her voiceover. An example of one of the graphics Hany produced is when we cut Nicholas into a blue background with his name being shown and later the name of the TV documentary sliding out of his name. -
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Radio advertisement construction: Audacity
Audacity is an open source digital audio editing application. Audacity was the best and easiest application that we could use for our radio advertisement as there were multiple tutorials on youtube that gave us the knowledge of how to use effects and how to structure our radio advert. Our research taught us how to apply fade ins and fade outs on audacity. Our research also taught us how to amplify our audio. -
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Radio advertisement construction: External Microphone/Blue Yeti Microphone
When researching how to produce a radio advertisement, we found that making sure that quality of our audio should be as high and clear as possible for our audience to listen to. This is because our research into radio advertisement usually includes a voiceover with a microphone that is clear for the audience to hear. Therefore we found that using a Blue Yeti microphone was important when creating a radio advertisement for our TV documentary. -
Equipment and software used in the construction of our Radio Advertisement
When creating our radio advertisement, we used equipment and software such as a blue yeti microphone and audacity. -
Equipment and software used in the construction of our Print advertisement
The equipment and software used to produce our print advertisement was photoshop and 'DaFont.com. -
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Print advertisement construction: Photoshop (1/4)
Creating the print advertisement relied on us to take a picture that would set the mood of our documentary whilst giving some sort of information about the TV documentary without giving away the story. Therefore we decided to a picture of Nicholas and cut out the background.
We then decided to take a picture of one of Nicholas' kitchen (1/) -
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Print Advertisement construction: Photoshop (3/4)
We then decided to include Nick with the background image. Also decided to include the Channel 4 logo and 2 white bars as it follows the conventions of a Channel 4 print advertisement where they include the name of the program, The next step was to include the information, such as the name of the program, day and time. -
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Print Advertisement construction: Photoshop (4/4)
The final step in the construction of our print advertisement was the inclusion of a link to our TV documentary on Channel 4. -
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Print Advertisement construction: Dafont
DaFont is a website that present you a variety of font types. We tried to find the closest font to that of a Channel 4 TV documentary print advertisement. The font that we found was OCR A. We decided to feature this in the name of TV documentary, day, time and link to an online streamed version of our TV documentary on the Channel 4 website. -
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Print Advertisement construction: Photoshop (2/4)
(2/) as it would present this idea that companies like live-in-guardians supply people would affordable and comfortable homes rather than the idea that they keep people from being homeless or charge "squatters" to live in buildings that they're offering.
The next step was to colour correct the background to be a similar colour to Nick, due to the colours being warm orange and red. We decided to match the colours of the background with NIck's clothes -
Evaluation question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (1/2)
Evaluation question one was answered through Camtasia, a video screen capturing application that allows you to edit your recording and add transitions and text. We used voiceovers to explain how our main product and ancillary texts use, develop and challenge forms of conventions of real media products. We recorded clips from documentaries, like 'Reggie Yates: Hidden Australia', 'I was born on one born' and 'Rich house, poor house' as evidence why we made our decisions. -
Evaluation question 1: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (2/2)
We also showed ways that our TV documentary, radio advertisement and print advertisement develop and challenge real media products by using certain clips of our TV documentary and radio advertisement to demonstrate how we did so. This was to show the similarity and difference between the documentaries and radio advertisements that we were analysing. -
Evaluation question 2: How effective is the combination of our main product and ancillary texts?
We chose PowToon, a website where you can create and publish presentations with sound effects, videos and music, as the platform to answer evaluation question two as it was the best way to demonstrate our understanding of the question through images, sound effects and clips from our TV documentary and radio advertisement. -
Evaluation question 3: What have you learned from the audience feedback?
We used different ways of receiving feedback for our print advertisement, radio advertisement and TV documentary. We decided to print all our print advertisements and received constructive feedback in video format. Therefore we edited this through iMovie, a video editing application.
Social media sites, like Reddit and YouTube were also useful as comments gave us formative and summative feedback. -
Evaluation Question 4: Who would be the audience for your media product?
Question 4 is currently being answered on Timetoast, a website that documents events that have taken place. It was useful for us to put our research, planning and construction into perspective. It showed how we structured our time on our production and was extremely useful when trying to link images, videos or any other website to help make our points.
