2. The show Hollyoaks is aired on E4. The show is shown on E4 on weeknights at
7pm. This is the prime time for soap opera’s to be shown during the week. The
show is also shown on channel 4 at 6:30pm this is the repeats of the night
before episode. The main target audience for Hollyoaks is aimed at people
aged between 16-24.The show likes to have a heavy focus on students and
their lives which makes me believe that the how wants to target students from
all different backgrounds which is why they use such diverse storylines in hope
to connect with a large audience. The show mainly aim to target females
mainly this is because the stereotype that surrounds soaps is that women are
more likely then men to watch a soap opera.
The audience would likely be from the socio-economic grouping of c1, c2 and
D. The majority of the characters are in group D as they are semi and unskilled
manual workers, such as the McQueen family, the other characters relate to
groups c1, and c2 as some characters run their own business and some
characters are skilled manual workers such as Trevor.
HOLLYOAKS – TRAILER SIX WEEKS OF
SUMMER
3. In this trailer the characters personalities have already been established and the
audience has already been able to establish a connection with the characters.
The trailer doesn’t focus heavily on one main issue/plot and instead has a lot of
multi-strand narratives. In the trailer we can see a storyline that is going to be
coming up in the next few weeks for at least every character in the show.
At the beginning of the trailer we can see the Hollyoaks title with the slogan of
what the trailer is all about which is ‘six weeks of summer’. This needed to be a
main focus at the beginning of the trailer so that the audience are able to
anticipate the six weeks that are going to come. As well as this the trailer uses
non-diagetic sound by using background music to add a summery feel to the trailer.
This supports the main theme of the trailer which is all about summer.
One key moment was right at the beginning when a sound bridge was used, this was
used when the character says “Why do I get the feeling you're using me to get
Esther’s baby”. While the audience hears what this character is saying we see a
visual which shows two clips in which both of the characters who are in the first
shot are pictured doing something which revolves to that part of the storyline. This
plot is only highlighted for 2-3 seconds which gives the audience the opinion that
this storyline will not be a major storyline that will come up in the summer.
HOLLYOAKS – TRAILER SIX WEEKS OF
SUMMER
4. The trailer also features a plot in which a young teenage girl is having
a relationship with an older man who is seeing the girls father. The
scene starts with the older man telling the younger girl that he loves
her in which this is also a sound bridge with a clip of the older man
kissing the younger girls mum. This shows to the audience that there is
going to be a strong focus on the jealousy of a young girl over the fact
that her mum can have the guy that she likes. This is a key theme that
I would like to portray as I feel that the target audience that I would
like to target to would like the dramatic scenes that would come with
the storyline. Although the audience may not be able to relate entirely
to the specific scenario of the character they will most likely be able to
relate that scenario to something that they have experienced.
As a whole the trailer utilises the use of a sound bridge. A sound bridge
is used with dialogue to help narrate what is going on in the scene. In
another example we see another girl get into the bed of one of the boys
as she says his name we see another scene in which another girl is
talking about how she is having problems with that boy. The use of
these two scenes being played back to back allows the audience to
understand what is going on and who could possibly be the main cause
of these problems.
HOLLYOAKS – TRAILER SIX WEEKS OF
SUMMER
5. The trailer uses many technical aspects Including the
following:
Editing: The pace of the trailer is fast we see a lot of action
happen in a short amount of time. This is predominantly used
to show the different multi-strand narratives that are going to
take place in the episodes to come. This is Hollyoaks
foreshadowing to the audience of what is to come in a few
weeks time. This is an effective technique to entice the
audience as the audience will be looking out to see if they can
work out what will happen to their favourite character’s in the
weeks to come. The scenes that we see are very short, the
whole idea of this is so that the audience are kept guessing
‘what happens next?’ this is a way for the show to have
returning viewers as they want to be able to hold up an
audience.
EDITING
6. Sound: At the beginning of the trailer we hear diagetic sound in the use
of background music. The music used is very happy and adds to the
idea that summer is mean to be a good and happy time. However we
see that in the clips the characters are not happy and are defiantly not
having a good time. The trailer uses a lot of sound bridges in order to
hurry the narratives along. This also allows the show to be able to show
multiple clips when playing only one piece of dialogue, this is essential
to be used in a trailer so that the show is able to show the multi-strand
narratives as proposed by Levi Strauss.
The trailer also uses diegetic sound as it uses dialogue. This is mainly
between the characters in the scenes who are talking to each other.
This helps the narratives to be told.
Another way that diegetic sound is used is by having sounds such as
car wheels screeching and the sound of leaves being crumpled on. This
helps to create verisimilitude as the audience know that this is sound
which the characters can hear in their world.
The trailer also uses non-diegetic sound as it uses background music
which is played throughout the trailer, this is played at a low volume so
that the dialogue is the main focus of the trailer.
SOUND
7. Camerawork: The trailer never uses an establishing shot which I
found quite odd. For returning viewers not using an establishing
shot is fine because they are familiar with the location and
places that action may take place. However this is not appealing
to newer viewers as they don’t get a sense of location and aren't
able to start to relate to the characters or the locations in the
show. The trailer uses very minimal camera angles but has a
hefty focus on mid shots, and two shots. Those are the two main
camera angles used throughout the trailer. The trailer also
features other camera angles such as a low angle to show a
character as weak and a high angle to show a character as
strong and one long shot is shown throughout the whole trailer.
The trailer uses a low angle when we see Robbie knock his
brother off of a cliff. This is something very unconventional to
see in a soap as it breaks the verisimilitude. The low angle
helps the audience to see that Jason is the stronger character in
this situation.
CAMERAWORK
8. The lighting in this trailer is very natural. This helps to create
verisimilitude as the settings that are used are familiar to the
audience which helps them to relate to the characters. Very little
artificial lighting is used throughout the trailer the only artificial
lighting used is the light from lamps in the houses.
The clothes that the characters wear are very similar to that of
what the audience would wear. This is done so that the audience
are able to relate to that character. This helps to reinforce the
verisimilitude of the soap and helps the audience to relate and
escape from their everyday lives. We see Jason in a Police officer
uniform which shows to the audience that
The props that are used in the trailer are things such as drinks,
cars, bags etc. These are things which the audience would see
and use in everyday life which helps to create verisimilitude as
the audience start to believe that they are watching real life.
MISE-EN-SCENE
9. The way that the trailer entices the audience in and makes them want
to watch the show is by briefly showing small clips of the major plot
lines that are yet to come in the soap. This is an effective technique as
the audience will want to know more and as long as the audience are
questioning and wanting to know what is going to happen next then
they will be able to keep a repeat audience.
In conclusion I feel that this trailer follows the conventions of a soap
opera as we can clearly see the multi-strand narratives that are going
to go on throughout the show. This is a key aspect of the trailer
because it shows that there are a lot of characters that are in the
show. The main idea of this show is to create verisimilitude (realism)
as most soap operas are devised as an escapism from real life they
need to show stories which the audience can relate to. Hollyoaks does
this by using issues that their target audience may face, because they
have a niche target audience they are able to focus heavily on getting
the message that they want to across.
HOLLYOAKS – TRAILER SIX WEEKS OF
SUMMER
