1. My Evaluation of all 3 products
(Trailer, Magazine Cover and
Poster)
By Dayle Alex Latham
Candidate: 6192
Year 13

3. • Secondly, we looked at various ways of making it easy to tell who is the ‘villain’ and who are the
protagonists, so we went for the easiest and time efficient technique. We also started to notice a pattern
in the trailers, those who had been singled out as villains or were guilty of something would wear black or
be followed by a black figure of some sort, for example: a crow or dark clouds – anything which
represented evil or darkness. So we chose to dress the ‘villain’ in a dark attire, a black coat, black
trousers and black shoes, with aviator sunglasses that had mirrored lenses to hide his eyes – the ‘villain’
represents evil and darkness – which is why we chose so many black clothes as it was a ‘repeated’
(Steve Neale) convention throughout most of the trailers we watched.
Throughout the trailer we followed certain conventions we had deconstructed in other Soap Opera trailers –
specifically ‘Eastenders’ and ‘Hollyoaks’.
The following are conventions we chose to follow:
• Non-diegetic soundtrack having a symbiotic relationship with the action on screen, a clear and obvious
outline of a ‘villain’ (Propp) and protagonists in the new Soap Opera and finally we chose to change the
colour of the flashbacks to black and white from colour – the idea was collected from: ‘Hollyoaks Promo:
The Wedding’ where we agreed it had a very dystopian and unsettling effect.
Firstly, I chose to use the soundtrack because it was ironic and gothic as it was a happy and upbeat song (you
are my sunshine) accompanied with a slow, dark and gothic instrumental which highlighted our themes of:
‘Drama, Hate and Love’ – the lyrics expressed love and drama, whilst the instrumental conveyed the idea of
hate – with its dark and gothic connotations. Certain lyrics deepened this idea, for example: “You’ll never know
dear how much I loved you” and “Please don’t take my sunshine away” as they both connote how the ‘villain’
feels betrayed by his ex girlfriend, as his ‘sun’ is being taken away from him – therefore the lyrics have voiced
the ‘villains’ inner emotions and feelings.

4. Lastly, by having the flashbacks in black and white, it
hides a connotation that his thoughts of his ex and her
new boyfriend are dark and could lead to something
terrible – which travels deeper in to the psychological
side of the ‘villains’ mind. The constant jump cuts to
reality and back to his head, show how what he’s just
witnessed has clearly messed him up, as he cant stop
thinking abut his ex and her new boyfriend – conveying
anger and ‘hate’ towards them both. Infuriated with what
the villain has seen, he lights up a cigarette as quickly
and then moments later stamps it into the floor –
cigarette smokers tend to suggest that cigarettes ‘calm
them down’ – this clearly underlines how angry the villain
is and smokers amongst an audience could make
personal relation to his situation. These small enigma
codes all add up to one over riding image; The Villain.
To expand on our trailer and give something new to an
audience, we decided that we should place our social
media idents at the end of the trailer in order to
encourage a wider fan base, exploit the new Soap Opera
further, get it as many likes on Facebook and make it
‘trend’ on Twitter. This way we’re not just finding a niche
audience that views BBC Three, we are going much
further and reaching a worldwide audience through the
worldwide web.
0:57
0:59
1:01

5. I decided to use a white outer
glow to keep to the conventions I
had seen across nearly every
Soap magazine – I wanted it to
follow this convention so it would
be recognized as a soap
magazine, but stand out because
of its bold magazine ident. Its
shape is original and the title is so
basic but works well, as it stops
you in your track and draws you in
to have a look ‘Britain’s Newest
Soap Mag’. I also made this main
image the largest on the
magazine front cover to again
keep to what I had seen in other
Soap magazines – it makes ‘The
Avenue’ the center of attention
and indicates to the reader there
is a new Soap story headlining on
this new magazines front cover.
Other Soap stories from
Eastenders, Coronation Street
and Hollyoaks are around the
edge of the magazine in order
to keep the main image the
biggest focus, all with mini
straplines – keeping the
audience in suspense for their
favorite Soap Operas. This
followed the conventions of
every Soap magazine I had
looked at on the market, having
the Soap Opera ident was a
ritual thing too, which is why I
reproduced it on to my own
magazine front cover.
I expanded on my magazine by using ‘Puff’/promotion to get a higher
amount of buyers as it’s a new film that has come out for children, which
is also popular to teenagers and adults – some people will simply buy in
order to obtain a free Despicable Me minion toy, but this will also help to
sell the magazine more easily, I chose to do this because I believed it had
good relation with the Soap Opera genre and sales.
Incorporating a Twitter and Facebook
logo makes the magazine unique as I
didn’t see this done on any other
magazines, but I thought it was a
convention I should carry across from
my trailer and poster to show
similitude in all 3 products I had
created and like the trailer help the
new magazine ‘Trend’ on the social
network.

6. Firstly, I used the main characters from the new
Soap Opera: ‘The Avenue’ to gain an establishment
of characters who will be the main focus of the new
Soap. This is a convention that was derived from
most posters and billboards that I had looked at
involving film and various television promotion.
Secondly, the point of call information is extremely
important which is why I have placed it in as this
gives the audience all the information they will need
for ‘The Avenue’, most of the posters I saw for new
TV shows and films had information on release
dates and show times.
Thirdly, the ident is the biggest writing on the poster
to exploit the new Soap to the public eye, by being
the boldest piece of text, it’s the part that will stick in
the audiences head the most, which will get people
talking about it.
Lastly, I placed the BBC Three ident in to the
poster, in order for the audience to have a clear
idea of what channel they can find ‘The Avenue’ on
– this is a commonality amongst the posters and
billboards I have seen, which is why I felt it was
relevant to have it in my poster.
Most posters follow the convention of
having their tagline under the title or the
point of call information, so its all
together and presented in an orderly
fashion – that’s where I thought I would
be different and place my strapline
around the outside of my poster to act as
a ‘picture frame’, to convey the following
suggestion to the audience; that the
pictures are in a frame because they are
frame worthy images and that their
‘picture perfect’ to create an ironic
connotation as that’s clearly not the case
with what they see on the poster.

8. The convention/theme of a ‘break up’ runs through all three
products, which is represented in the trailer through the action
on screen, when the audience see the ‘villain’ (Propp) following
his ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend to express in more detail
that he is following his ex lover we chose to have Harriet (ex
girlfriend) show an extremely shocked facial expression when I
(the villain) enter the pub, to convey the idea that she is totally
blown away by the ‘villain’ turning up.
It is then portrayed in the magazine cover through the main
headline under the new Soap Opera trailer main image, which
quotes: “He’s Back! But who will she choose …”. The poster
then utilizes the same theme by having the ‘villain’ stalk his ‘ex
girlfriend’ and the ‘new boyfriend’ through Facebook connoting
the trending phrase; “Facebook stalker” as well as revealing
they break up and that there is a past between them, as the
audience can see the images of the ex girlfriend and villain in
the background of the poster. The verbal code; “She loves me,
she loves me not” – further emphasizes the narrative idea of a
‘break up’.
Secondly, the ‘villain’ is shown as the antagonist throughout the
three products by the use of dark colours to indicate that he is a
dark and villainous character, which is supported by the fact I
kept his attire all black across all the products I produced. This
was used to get a familiarity with the characters in this new
Soap opera, so that the public can easily identify the characters
across all three products.

9. Thirdly, the social media convergence spreads across all 3 products
to establish a much wider fan base/audience through the ever
growing social networks such as: Facebook and Twitter. With it
being across all of them more people will start looking in to it –
creating a wave through social networks – getting the new Soap
Opera as many viewers as possible.
Lastly, the ident of: “The Avenue” has been put in to all three
products to establish the new Soap Operas brand and get it out
there and make it a recognizable ident to more than just a selected
amount of viewers.

11. If the video analysis doesn’t work please go to blog page where the
video will be embedded, thank you very much.

12. From the feedback I received of Jordan I could collate pros and cons for my three media products and see
where I could rectify certain faults. I gathered these points for the trailer; there was a clear theme established,
dark and sad were two themes that were highlighted for Jordan. At first it made him feel uncertain and
unsettled, the music hinted to him that something bad had happened or was going to happen. The enigma
codes worked well as small hints were all leading up to the final action of ‘The Avenue’ and Jordan noticed this
very easily. The connotations behind the soundtrack were picked up on and Jordan believed that it created a
sad and angry feeling when he was watching the trailer. This made me learn that I had successfully crafted a
trailer that would give off the themes of a gothic nature.
The strokes around the main characters made them stand out on the magazine front cover and made them look
interesting, which made me realize following conventions of other magazines made my magazine stand out,
even though so many before me have done this same convention.
Jordan had picked up on the hinted connotations behind the pictures – he realized that the two protagonists
seemed happy, whilst the villain seemed sad and jealous, which is what I was going for – I had clearly identified
key ways of opening up the audiences/readers minds. I learnt also that by putting small Soap Stories from
different Soaps increased the overall value of the magazine because it would still be something of interest to
those who don’t intend to watch; The Avenue’ as it has their other favorite Soaps. I followed the codes and
conventions of other magazines very closely and this has paid off.
The representation of the ‘villain’ was clearly understood, as the attire became recognizable by the time Jordan
had got to the poster – the villain was branded as the antagonist throughout. He believed that it connoted ‘evil’
and darkness within the character. The picture of the new boyfriend and his ex girlfriend in black and white
connotes that its been designed that way because their happiness is the villains demise. This also connotes
how they were all colourful and happy on the outside when they were together, but now; ‘she has left him to love
another’ all the happiness is gone and he's dark inside.
The only negative that was given throughout the three products was that some pictures in the poster were
unclear in what they were representing, so this is something at a later date I could rectify to make up for this
negative.

14. Canon 500
Sony Pro HVR Z1
Four cameras were being used in order to catch several shots at different angles and with various shot types;
this also helped to save time and get a lot more footage in a sufficient time period. The two types of cameras
that were used to film; ‘The Avenue’ were called: Canon 500 and the Sony Pro HVR Z1.
In order to edit the footage we had caught on, we had to use ‘Adobe Premiere CS6. In this software we
created various folders, which were called; ‘bins’, in order to keep the footage split up in to groups, which
made it a lot easier to edit and find specific scenes. This made life a lot easier for my group and I, because
everything was so much easier to find.
To control the volume of the soundtrack we used ‘key frames’ in order to be able to lower the volume, tone
and pitch of the sound and place voice overs/SFX on top of the sound track without there being a sound
clash, it being to loud (decibels being to high) or having to cut the soundtrack entirely just so the point of call
information can be heard probably, instead we were able to just make the soundtrack softer and it could just
run smoothly without any clashes throughout the trailer.
Lastly, we used the ‘black and white’ effect to have the flashbacks contrast against the coloured footage and
create dark and dystopian notions to the audience about the thoughts of the villain being ‘evil’ and ‘dark’.

15. The outer glow was used to convey conventions of other
Soap Opera magazines, I selected the image and
added a white outer glow, by clicking on ‘layer
style/properties’ in Photoshop CS6 – this was to
suggest key connotations of ‘good and evil’; ‘dark and
light’. I became more familiar with the ‘quick selection’
tool which helped save time, made the images look
much more professional throughout the magazine and
poster images. It made the edges and the image all
round look a lot more smoother, at AS level I used the
‘rubber’ tool to remove background and parts of the
images I was editing, which was time consuming and a
bit messy at times, so having gained this knowledge it
helped me edit faster and have my images cut and
clean a lot faster than they would have been done last
year.
Lastly, by using the software Photoshop I was able to
lower the ‘opacity’ of the background images and could
make the black and white image of the villain stalking
his ex girlfriends Facebook, stand out a lot more than it
already did, also the ‘point of call’ information could be
seen better and more clearly.

16. When presenting my work, I used the blog page ‘Wordpress’ to display my research material and finished
pieces of work, such as; ‘The Avenue’ trailer, Magazine front cover and my poster. This makes viewing a lot
more easier as its all embedded on to one page, which makes finding specific pieces of my work a lot easier for
others. To embed my work on to this page I used a sharing blog site called ‘Slideshare’ – this allows me to
embed work from Microsoft Word; Excel and PowerPoint, this way the viewer can easily scroll through my blog
page without having to click on to links, which may not always works, this way there is a reassurance that the
viewer will not have trouble looking at all aspects of my work. Throughout my coursework for my pre –
production tasks I had to use the following Microsoft software: Word, Powerpoint and Excel. I used Word to
present certain pieces of work differently, for example when producing a letter to the council and record label I
used Word as it would not be suitable to use Powerpoint as it doesn't fit the purpose and would look
unprofessional, which could lead to getting little or no response from the occupant. The format of Word makes it
look a lot more formal, which will engage the reader in to taking the letter more seriously, which overall is what
you want in a response. As for the; prop list; script; production log and locations it was a lot more neater to
present them in Word as it created a clean overall layout for these pieces, however if I could go back and
change the format for the locations I would use Powerpoint to present it as I believe it would look a lot better,
having the pictures contrast against the words on separate slides, an altogether have a better look. Powerpoint
was used to present my: textual analysis and storyboard – as it was a tidy and presentable format, the images
allowed me to work from visual elements and gave me something to work from when producing this piece of
pre – production work. Having these two pieces of work on Powerpoint allowed me to place a large amount of
information in a small space, to avoid it becoming tedious for the reader; not only did I use the storyboard on
the day of filming to help know which scene came next and which camera shot/angle we were using but it also
helped me post production to get a general understanding of how the trailer would look when we began editing.

17. Value of Social Media
The benefits of using Social Media are endless, here are a few examples that I found:
• Increased business exposure – Facebook and Twitter alone serve reportedly 1.5 billion users globally, this
means that by using social media I am more likely to have my magazine seen as it could become a trend on
Twitter or have a high number of likes on Facebook which would lead to it being on peoples ‘News Feeds’
increasing the overall value of the new trailer and/or magazine. This is why social media was a huge benefit
to our group as it allowed our trailer and magazine to become more exposed to the public and more
specifically the prosumers.
• Insight about customers – social media provides a ‘social area’ where I can interact with potential
customers/audience about new Soap Opera ‘The Avenue’ and the new magazine ‘Soap!’ – I can also
establish what they are already looking for and what they really want in a magazine or trailer.
• Reduced marketing expenses – social media/networking is extremely cost efficient as its free to create a
page on Facebook and Twitter, it is also very cheap to pay for promotional ads if we wanted to go that one
step further, roughly I could spend 0.59p on a targeted Facebook ad and I could generate from this 1 result;
that’s one more result than I would have had, and that one more result could be the catalyst to my magazine
and trailer exploding on to the market.
The internet served crucial for secondary research, throughout my coursework I used the internet to constantly
back up my ideas and points that I had made on certain areas of work, especially when involving figures and
statistics. It also helped me to source various images for my magazine, trailer and poster which helped add
originality to my work, for example having social media idents present throughout all pieces of work especially in
the trailer as this made it unique to other Soap Opera trailers that are present today.