This document discusses Matthew Moffatt's media trailer for a soap opera. It begins by explaining how the trailer uses conventions of existing soap operas, such as parallel narratives and representations of time. It describes the narrative and characters in the two storylines featured. Later sections discuss the use of mise-en-scene, camera work, sound, and editing techniques. Audience feedback suggested adding title cards and transitions between scenes, as well as choosing a channel like Channel 4 that would appeal more to a younger audience. The document concludes by outlining the media technologies used in construction, research, planning and evaluation of the project, including Adobe Premiere and Photoshop for editing and titles, YouTube for research, and blogs and

1. Matthew Moffatt Evaluation Media A2 Trailer AQ092295 Aquinas College 33435

2. 1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

3. Conventions of TV soap – Learning from real media texts – Enigma and Parallel Narratives Parallel narratives show two points of view that come together in to one story line. In my trailer we used two different scene’s to converge in to the same story to create a parallel narrative. I used an enigma to give the audience a sense of danger to get them interested. The narrative is from a clear point of view to enable them a relation between them and the soap. Here is an example of an enigma in my soap trailer. We left it on a cliff hanger to give the audience a good reason to watch our soap.

4. Representations of time The reasons I did this was because so the audience would watch it to find out what happened during the two scenes creating an enigma but in in between a story. There are three different types of representation of time. Past, present and future. In my trailer Idecided to use both present and future as it is a new soap so having past clips wouldn't work. My soap trailers second scene starts a new story line of Brendan and Steve. The following scene is a continuation of the story but further in the future for example Brendan helping Steve out with money troubles.

5. In my trailer I had to guarantee that all the lighting, music and sounds was done to create a sense of realism for the audience. How my trailer creates genre and meaning In my second scene I had to ensure that lighting was dark and grim to give the audience the impression that it was a real life situation and that they could relate to it. I used two story lines in my three scenes from Hollyoaks because I wanted my soap opera to relate to my audiences life.

6. Narrative Coherence My narrative went together well. Even though I did three different scenes we only did two different story lines because we didn't want the audience to get confused or thinks it too complicated and there are too many things going on. Here is one story line where Adam was the director. Here is the two scene narrative. We did this because it would be more effective and also it would give Me and Josh the chance to direct. Me directing. Josh directing.

7. Conventions Mise en scene – Costumes – when thinking of costumes we had to take in to consideration the amount of money each person was making and were they at work (wearing a uniform or dressed smart) Wearing casual jumpers because these are kids. Not looking smart. Clothes give a sense of age and type of class people are. For example if somebody was wearing Ralph Lauren you would automatically think that they have quite a bit of money to there name rather that someone wearing Topman clothes. He is wearing a shirt to show that he is at work, looking smart.

8. Props In this particular narrative the bag was a very important prop for our story to work. Without it, our narrative would not have made sense and the audience would not watch our soap. Here the phone played a significant role in this narrative as who ever ‘Brendan’ is talking to on the phone is the reason why he gets so angry. This is a vital role in this scene.

9. Camera work In this part we used panning. This I where your camera stays on the same spot and you just move them camera. We did this because we had somebody running from one side to another. We used an ‘over the shoulder shot’ to emphasize who was the main subject of the scene. In this case it was Liam. Here we used a slow zoom. We did this because the two actors were walking towards the camera.

10. Sound I used non-diegetic sound in my edit of our soap opera trailer. I used a guitar beat as it was dramatic yet. I chose a instrumental version of Heartbeat – Scouting for girls. This I thought would build tension in a way that doesn’t bore the audience.

11. Editing In my soap trailer I did many different types of editing such as insert title cards and using effects when the scenes changed. Here is an example of the title card I inserted into my trailer, I did this to give the audience a sense of what sort of story line is happening for example “money worries” blatantly shows that there are money problems in this soap which is normally a audience grabbing problem. Here is where I used the effect of ‘cross dissolve’. I used this to show a change in scene and narrative.

12. Disequilibrium We used disequilibrium because it is a very enjoyable thing to watch. Here is the first scene we used conflict in but with a younger cast. This shows that when the younger audiences watch my soap they can relate if they are having similar problems. Here is the second scene of conflict in my soap trailer. This is where grown ups can relate to my soap with work problems.

13. Mise en scene as a message in context. This mise en scene (props) shows context because it is a school bag which suggests this particular part is set at a school which also suggests this is a young cast. This also shows context as the actors wearing a shirt which shows he is at work giving the audience a set.

14. Screenshot from existing soap that it was based on, screenshot from my trailer.

15. 2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

16. Mood Board

17. Making the age of characters clear. We made the age of the characters clear so the audience new what they were watching. We did this by what they were wearing and what sort of situation they were in. Here the actor is wearing a t-shirt underneath and dark jumper. This is too make him look smart and more powerful in the scene. Here we show the age of the characters by props and costume. For example the school bag shows that they are students and the casual young clothes also shows their age.

18. Channel Consistency In my free products I made we chose the channel BBC One to broadcast our soap. we showed this on 2 out of 3 of our products. Our billboard and soap trailer.

19. Key Themes We used fonts and the same colour schemes to create an effect of dark and anger. We used the same colour scheme red, white and black. We sued red to show danger. We used red and black to show death and grim.

20. Audience All three of my products are aimed the same demographic. We did this by putting the two main actors on each product. We did this to keep our target audience interested in our soap. We use similar situations to real life. So that our demographic can relate to the soap.

21. Links between soaps and ancillaries. Our strongest link is that our main narrative on our soap is the main picture on both billboard and Magazine cover. The Genre of our trailer is a soap and it relates to real life problems with the audience. A lot of conflict and worries in my soap to give the audience good TV to watch because everybody likes drama.

22. Codes and Connotations – Facial Expressions In our three media products we used facial expressions and body language to portray the emotions our characters were feeling. We used angry facial expressions to show a seriousness about our soap. Also the fact that the two characters are standing back to back is to give a sense of conflict and hatred.

23. 3. Audience feedback

24. The audience feedback I received was to put music into my soap trailer. It needs music to create and atmosphere and create meaning for my soap. With some music in my trailer the genre will become clearer. I didn’t want anything aggressive, something more like a guitar. For this reason I chose the song Heartbeat – Scouting For Girls. Liam and Adams slide needs a transition/title card between two scenes to separate them and explain what is happening for example “blackmail” could have been another title card which would of explained the situation more to the audience.

25. Our audience are young males generally as we have a young male cast. We do this to relate to the audience. On this point we went wrong by the choice of channel we distributed our soap on. BBC one wasn’t as relatable to a younger audience than maybe channel 4 or E4 would have been.

26. 4. How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation?

27. Construction. During the construction of my soap and ancillaries I used 2 video cameras, adobe premiere 8, adobe photo shop and Microsoft publisher.

28. Adobe Premiere 8 First of all we used adobe premiere 8 to edit our soap. I found adobe quite hard to get a hang of at first but after a lesson or two using it I found it easier to use and very effective in making my soap. For example I found the transitions in my soap very effect. I also used adobe to upload title cards and music from saved files. This helped me a great deal in finishing my soap as no soap trailers today are not edited with out music.

29. Adobe photo shop I used adobe photo shop to create title cards to insert into my soap trailer. This was very effective as it showed what was happening. It gave it an explanation in a couple of words. Here is where I started from and one of the four title cards I had put into my soap.

30. Research:YouTube We used YouTube to research what we wanted our soap to be like for example we searched “hollyoaks trailers” in to the search engine to find out what shot types and music were used. Here is one example I found on YouTube to help me with my soap. This is a Christmas special trailer of Eastenders. Here is another trailer of waterloo road. I chose this because it is the target channel we wanted to broadcast our soap on and it has a similar demographic to our target audience.

31. Preliminary Task; Comic strip trailer When doing our preliminary task this was the first time we uncounted adobe premiere. It was also the first time we used the video cameras and tripods. On this particular task me and Liam found it difficult to secure the camera to the tripod properly and we suffered for this in our finished project as it was very shaky.

32. Audience Research For audience research I asked 5 people different questions about what soaps they watch and their age.

33. Continued...

34. Planning: For our planning we used our blogs and existing products of soaps from YouTube of waterloo road and Eastenders. (refer to slide 28)