Liam Denton evaluated his media production project of creating a trailer for a soap opera called MCR. He followed many conventions of the melodrama soap genre including using costumes the target audience could relate to, using idents to foreshadow events, and incorporating non-diegetic music. He also challenged some conventions by establishing a strong regional identity set in Manchester. Liam analyzed how effective the combination of his main trailer text and ancillary materials like a billboard poster and website were at reinforcing the MCR brand. He learned from audience feedback that his editing was good but some clips needed trimming to increase pace. Liam utilized various technologies in his research, planning, production and evaluation including DSLR cameras, i

1. Evaluation
Liam Denton

2. Q1. in what way does yourmediaproduct
developor challenge forms and conventions
ofa real mediaproduct?
We followed most of the conventions associated to the melodrama soap while creating our trailer. The
first being the use of costume.
To appeal to our audience,
which is teens and young adults
we needed to make sure that
they could relate to these
characters. So by having the
characters dress in the way the
viewer would, the soap
becomes a lot more appealing
to them and relatable, allowing
them to believe that this is
something that could happen to
them or there friend ship group.
MCR trailer
Autumn 2013 Hollyoaks trailer
Season 4 The OC

3. Another convention we have kept, is the use of idents to create interest
and to foreshadow events which could occur in the actual soap, drawing
the viewer in to watch.
The OC trailer Hollyoaks trailer
MCR trailer
We see this use in two very popular melodramas, the OC and
Hollyoaks. Also the idents are broken up into ether single words or
extremely short sentences, but never full sentences this is to keep
the view watching the trailer and creates suspense as to whats
coming next.

4. A convention I though we challenged during the production of our melodrama was
the need to establish a regional identity in our soap.
Many melodramas such as the OC and
Hollyoaks don’t really have any regional
identity. Hollyoaks for example you see
many different regions being portrayed
from cockney to scouse, but we felt it
important to establish one. The way we
did this was through the use of
establishing shots and sped up tracking
shots through iconic areas in the
Manchester city centre.
The Printworks
Deansgate
The Arndale
Regional identity is usually a lot more
associated with the likes of a scripted
reality soaps and realism soap, not so
much with the melodrama genre of
soap.

5. Another convention of the melodrama genre is the use of non diegetic music. I have used a song by an
artist that is very well known to my target audience which is teens and young adults, the song is
‘power’ by Kanye West.
‘power’ is an up tempo song
that this means my
audience can relate to this
as I want it to connote a
party/night club
atmosphere. Also the song
is slightly aggressive the
connotes the action and
violent side of the show, not
just the care free attitude
that most my audience my
have due to there age.
The hollyoaks trailer and The OC trailer both have
music over them. Although I am not as familiar with
what songs they are, they both are up tempo with a
slight sound of aggression in them. This is as these
show are aimed at a similar age group as my soap and
are about similar things.

6. Q2. how effective is your
combination of main and ancillary
texts?
This is the billboard poster I created for my soap trailer MCR
Here I have used the MCR logo
in the top left corner, I create
this logo as I believe it is very
important to establish a strong
brand associated to your soup so
that it becomes recognizable
from not only the characters but
form something as simple as just
the text font used.
The use of the tag line creates enigma within the
audience and even if they haven't seen the show
before or even the trailer they will be intrigued and
want to find out more about it.
By associating my soap with
such an established
broadcasting company as ITV
it means viewers will trust my
soap as they already trust ITV.
Behind the characters is a well
known Manchester landmark,
the printworks. This is
important as it established as
setting for the soap and
creates a regional identity.
Date and time that the show is
on so that passers by in cars and
walking van see what day and
time its on

7. In the trailer we also see the use of an establishing shot from
outside the printworks. This again inforces the regional
identity but also creates an association between ‘MCR’ the
soap and the Printworks. For example people from around
briton visiting Manchester might walk by the printworks and
think “that’s what ‘MCR’ is set” therefore strengthening our
brand recognition.
These are screen shots from my MCR trailer
The idents during the trailer are in the same font as the tag
line on the my billboard poster. Again this strengthens the
MCR brand as people can begin recognizing our show even
when they cant see the characters.
Here on the final seen we see both the MCR logo and the ITV
logo in synergy on one screen. This means that the viewer
sees both of these at almost the same time, suggesting MCR
in now apart of or very close with ITV making the audience
trust the brand even more. The MCR is also the same MCR
see on the billboard poster just in a different colour, this way
the audience are never wondering what there watching. Also
the date and time that it is on so that viewes can make a
note and make sure to tune in weekly.

8. The MCR logo top left the the screen, just as on the
billboard poster.
The ITV logo also
on the website
means that the
site can be
trusted so the
audience wont
be afraid of
using the site.
Links to twitter so that fans can interact with the
show and voice opinions. This also broadens the
brand reach of our show by fans retweeting us
and there friends seeing it and wanting to check
the show out
A link to the trailer
on youtube along
with plenty of
other features
such as ‘video
extras’ and ‘cast’
that allow people
to see behind the
show and get to
know the
characters better
Strap line used
again on the
website.
Spreading the
brand.
Date and time on the website also. Maybe the most important
peace of information, as if people didn’t know what time it was
on and what day then they would not be able to tune in and
watch it and once people have missed a couple of episodes they
genually don’t want to be catching up

9. Q3. what have you learnt from
your audience feedback?
pros
good use of quick straight cuts
I like the use of editing techniques
good montage
Good use of sound effects
cons
cut some of the clips down to make it snappier
over all really good
the sound on some of the scenes needs altering as
you cant hear what some of the characters are
saying
From this feed back from my draft trailer I found that they like the use of my straight cuts as this made my
trailer look sharp and fast paces. They also liked the sped up tracking shots that what called a ‘montage’,
which again gave my trailer pace but also was a good use of editing. Finally they liked the sound effect of
rolling thunder when the gun is fired.
The cons of my trailer where that they though that some of the clips where to long, so cut the clips down
to make my trailer snappier and look more action packed and exciting. Also some of the clip had poor
sound which needed altering, this was probibaly to do with the fact that we were filming in the city with a
lot of back ground noise, so I had to reduce the backgroud sound I many of the clip except for one, which
sound was so poor I had to rerecord the sound on a Dictaphone and edit it back over the clip.

10. Another problem we had was the
stability of the camera. Most of our
early scenes were shot with
handheld, but this made them shaky
and were not very pleasant to watch.
We corrected this by borrowing a
tripod and reshooting most of the
shots. This worked great and mad the
footage look a lot more professional.
We still had this problem though on
the scenes we wanted to be hand
held but it didn’t really affect us after
we had sped them up
Finally there wasn’t enough use of
editing transitions. Although this
was the case I didn’t go mad with
the transitions and begin adding
fades and wipes in everywhere as
this would lose its professional
look and feel. Instead I used them
only to intensify the drama in the
action scenes

11. Q4. how did you use technologies in
the research and planning
construction and evaluation stages?
I used many different media technologies such as, DSLR cameras for taking my pictures for
my billboard posters ect and for the actual filming of my trailer. Another technology I used
was imovie, this was used to put my trailer together. Other technologies ive used are,
publisher, word and powerpoint. These were used to type up work and power point is what
I have used to do this evaluation as it give you a professional looking presentation. Green
screens and Photoshop was also used in the production of the billboard poster. Finally
social network sites such as twitter were used, as well as youtube.

12. Imovie
Probably the most important piece of tecnology I used was imovie. This is where I actually constructed
my trailer. By using this program I learnt how to take the raw footage that I had shot, from the camera
and produce a professional looking trailer through cutting down clips, adding effect to the clips such as
transitions, colour differences and also adding my chosen music over the top of it while still being able to
hear the actors speak.

13. In order to place my chosen track over
my trailer I had to use a website called
‘youtube converter’ this converts your
youtube video into an MP3 file which
you can then download and place over
your trailer.
I went onto youtube and found
the song that I was looking for,
which was ‘power’ by Kanye
West. I then copied its URL into
youtube converter and clicked
‘convert video’. Then all I had to
do was download and save the
song to my desk top so that I
could just grab the MP3 file and
drag it onto imovie.
Once the clip was on it could be
moved to where you wanted it on
the clip and also cut down and
chopped in places if I wanted.

14. Microsoft word and publisher
Microsoft word and publisher were some of the most important
programs when creating my trailer, particular during the ancillary tasks
and the planning stages. Without these we would not have been able
to create digital versions of our shooting script, proposal, story boards
and draft versions of our billboard posters ect. Without these things we
would have struggled to have any organization and therefore the
quality of our trailer would have suffered.
Thinks such as this moodboard
were created on Microsoft word
and publisher along with many
more

15. Photoshop and green screen
Photoshop was pivotal in the production of my ancillary products. Without photoshop I
would have struggled to create a professional looking logo, billboard poster ect. Most
every graphic or edited picture you see on my website would have been created in
photoshop.
Not only was photoshot a big part but aslo so was the use of the green screen. The
green screen made it easy to remove the background and allowed me to place
whatever picture I wanted behind.

16. Youtube
In an attempt to broaden the brand reach of our media product, I up loaded the trailer
up to youtube as this is a platform with millions of views and subscribers, which allows
you to upload videos freely, no charge.
To upload a video I had to create an account and from there it was easy, it was just a case
of exporting it from imovie then posting it onto my account.