Analysis of AS Media Studies

Throughout Year 12 AS Media Studies my class and I covered a wide variety of subjects which I felt has helped me become more skilled and knowledgeable at this subject.

Prelim Task

At the beginning of the year our first task was to use Adobe InDesign and Photoshop to a limited extent with the goal of creating our own college magazines using real magazines as inspirations and taking some ideas from them.

This is the cover for the college magazine that I created in September 2016. It is clear that it was created by someone trying to learn how to use the Adobe software.

This is an example of the practice we did in Photoshop. This taught me how to manipulate images.

The prelim task was a good introduction to the two main software that I would be using for the rest of the year. I did originally have worries about the software as it looked too complicated however by the end of the task I felt more confident in it.

Main Task

The next part of the year was spent on perfecting our skills that we learnt in the prelim task to create a music magazine. I started off by finding examples of real music magazines and basing mine off on them.
To the left is the contents page of a music magazine that I chose to base mine on which is located below. This was the one that came out most similar to the original inspiration.

One thing that was essential to the creation of the magazine was to get your own photos to use. In order to do this two members of my class and I went into Town to take pictures for our music magazines. I edited these photos in Photoshop to make them fit with the tone I wanted my magazine to fit.

During this task I created a cover, a contents page and a double-page spread. The last two I had to put in information into them to make them appear more legitimate.

By the end I considered this task to be a success as it gave more confidence in using Adobe software and how to use my own initiative to get the task done.

Evaluation

Near the end of the year I had to answer seven questions and upload them to my blog. Each of them needed to be using a different technique.

This was probably the most difficult thing that I did in the year as it forced me to use different skills that I had not used before.

The questions and styles I did them in are as follow:

1. Who would be the audience for your media product? Audio with Images

2. How did you attract/address your audience? Lip-sync animation.

3. How does your media product represent particular social groups? PowerPoint with Voice-over.

4. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product? Cards (key words place on cards which are held up when they are said)

5. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? Piece to camera

6. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? Greenscreen

7. Looking back at your preliminary work what have you learnt in the progression from the college magazine to the full product? PowerPoint presentation with music

The lip-sync animation was, in my opinion, the most difficult of all of them as I found it frustrating how to get it to match the audio. I had to think outside the box in order for some of these to work. For example, in order to film Question 4 I had to match the cards with the key words and make sure they would match up with the audio from the voice over for the video.

During the evaluation, I learnt how to use the greenscreen which will come in handy in the future. During this time I started to use Revelation Art to create a stick figure animation however I decided against using it for my evaluation. I also continued to be more independent as much of what had to be done was in my own time instead of in school (i.e questions 4 and 5 were filmed at my home).

The main software that I used during this period was Sony Vegas which helped match the previously recorded audio with the video that was filmed afterwards. For example, I had to use it to place in different versions of the same character with a different mouth and match it with the audio to create an acceptable lip-sync.

Media City

In January 2017 we visited Media City and had a tour around the BBC building where we looked around at different rooms like BBC Radio 6, the stage for BBC Breakfast and a large studio for the TV dramas and learnt how they put up the sets for the different programmes. I found this visit to be very informative in learning what went on behind the scenes in making things, such as the news, and how difficult it is.

Exam

For our exam we had to answer two questions, one relating to how things such as gender, sexuality, social class etc were represented in a clip from a TV drama and the second one was having to analyse how something like advertising affects the successful distribution of a film. For the second question we had to look at two films and their respective production companies in order to compare them.

In the build up for the exam I experienced a large increase in my media knowledge. For example, for the first question we had to look how a particular thing was represented through the use of sound, editing and camera. Because of this I had to learn the terminology relating to these topics.

I also had to learn different terms and remembering figures in order to properly answer the second question. For example, how the films were advertised, the budget, the box office and synergy and cross-convergence with other companies.

The exam and the weeks leading up to it were an incredibly frustrating time but I do believe it gave me more knowledge in Media.

Conclusion

I think that Year 12 had me experiencing a great increase in my skills and knowledge for a subject that I hadn't done before. I have definitely become more confident in the basic software and now know how to analyse representation in clips by looking at the mise en scene, the editing, the sound and how the camera is used. I also have much greater knowledge than I did at the beginning of the year. Even though it was sometimes stressful I believe that what I learnt in Year 12 will help me in Year 13.