This document discusses the importance of using media language in media exams. It provides guidance on terminology related to the four main technical elements - camera, sound, editing, and mise en scene. Students are advised to analyze their work by discussing how they created meaning for the audience through genre, representation, narrative or other techniques. They should explain why they chose specific shots, layouts, colors, lighting and other elements, rather than just describing their work. The document also introduces semiotics, the study of signs and their meanings in media texts. It explains key concepts around signs, codes, and culture in semiotic analysis.

1. Media Language
A2 Media Studies.

2. Importance of using media language
• The use of media language is essential in the exam.
• It is the “terminology” you are graded on.
• It refers to the four main technical elements
• There is general media terms you need to use and also specific media
language depending on your production (production terminology)
• There are guides for production specific media language on Moodle.
You can find them in the glossaries section.
• This powerpoint collates some of the general media terms. Please
refer to the specific glossaries for your own productions.

3. • This media language will need to be used regardless of what the
question is, tackle it in a similar way to how you responded to the
Section A TV Drama exam at AS.
• You need to analyse your work (NOT describe). Discussing how you
created meaning for the audience on particular issues, such as genre,
representation, narrative or audience.
• WHY you chose specific shots, mise en scene, layout, fonts, colour,
lighting etc..

4. Media Language and Semiotics
• Semiotics is the study of signs and their meanings. This approach aims to
deconstruct media texts and examine the signs used and how they convey
meaning. Many of the concepts used in semiotics are quite straight forward
but there is a lot of terminology to learn. This approach is qualitative. With
this approach the reader (audience) is important as it is through the active
process of decoding and interpreting that meaning is generated.
There are three main areas to consider with this approach:
• Signs. The different ways they convey meaning and how they relate to the
people that use them.
• Codes that signs operate in. How they are organised to convey meaning.
• The culture in which the signs and codes exist.

5. Signs
• Anything can be a sign. Colour, Body Language. Words. Sounds. Smells.
Clothes. Music. Etc.
We can classify signs as being either
• Icon - A sign looks like what it actually represents. E.g. A photograph is
iconic.
• Index- There is a direct link between the sign and that which it represents.
E.g. smoke is an index of fire.
• Symbol - Here there is no connection between sign and meaning. Meaning
is socially or culturally agreed. E.g. Words are symbolic. (Look back at the
work we did on Language). But some words are iconic, i.e., they sound like
what they are - onomatopoeia.

6. • For communication to take place, messages are created from signs.
• Take this powerpoint for example. It has been encoded by me using signs - in this
case symbols.
• The words stimulate you to create a meaning (decode) - which relates to the
meaning I generated (hopefully! I’ve even tried to use a font that tries to look
‘friendly’ and informal – you may think that it doesn’t connote academic learning)
• Meaning depends on sender and receiver sharing the same sign systems. Icons
are probably less ambiguous, but the vast majority of signs rely on readers
sharing the same meaning. But we should be aware that the reader brings to any
communication their own values, attitudes, experiences emotions etc. Signs can
therefore have several different meanings - they are polysemic.
• Because signs are polysemic, open to interpretation, they are organised and
follow certain rules, codes and conventions. We therefore read media texts as a
whole, examining the relationship between signs. The meaning is therefore
generated through our active involvement with the text. We acquire the ability to
read signs in much the same way as we learn language.

8. • Intro. – explain what you are analysing
• Main: key areas.
• Camera – shot size, framing, high and low angles etc.
• Sound – Diegetic and Non-Diegetic, sound effects, ambient sound, voice over,
music
• Editing – cuts, fades, transitions, wipes / dissolves, slow motion, green screen
/ chroma key.
• Mise en scene – costume, lighting, settings, body language, facial expressions,
make up, props, colour.
Conclusion – how well do you think you used this to communicate a meaning to
the audience?