The document discusses the importance of pre-production planning for creative media projects. It covers key aspects of pre-production including understanding requirements, finance, timelines, personnel, facilities, materials, and contributors. Thorough planning in pre-production helps reduce costs, ensure deadlines are met, and lay the foundation for a successful project. The document emphasizes that pre-production is a vital stage to carefully structure all aspects of the upcoming production.

1. Pre – Production techniques for the
creative media industries.
- Understanding requirements for a specific media production
1.1 Of productions: in the set up activity I should have identified the range of
different types of production that I will be involved with throughout the
course. It does not really matter which pathway I have chosen, or what
products that I have chosen to work on, as pre-production is a vital stage of
any creative production process. The process and activities that you learn
about in the early parts of this unit should be applied to one or more of the
productions that I will be working on in optional practical units. All of them will
benefit from a carefully structured and planned approach to the work, and a
comprehensive and well-managed pre-production stage should provide a form
foundation for the production itself.
Single – camera drama:
When a filming budget is tight, one way to reduce costs is to shoot using a
single camera. This reduces the equipment costs and crew costs. Single –
camera production methods are often used drama, documentaries and
comedies. Two examples of comedy shows that used single – camera
techniques for filming are My Name Is Earl and The Office. Careful pre –
production planning needs to be in place for low – budget productions to save
time and money during shoot. Locations need to be carefully chosen to
minimise setup and travel times. Using natural lighting where possible can also
reduce crew and equipment costs and again setup time.
1. In ways that careful pre-productions planning can be helpful will small
budget is that you save time and money, in ways you have to be well
organised so that you don’t lose out.
2. Advantages of undertaking a single camera production are that it costs
less in equipment and crew costs.
3. Problems that might occur when planning a single-camera production is
that locations may not be carefully chosen, you need to be strict on setup
and travels times or you could lose out money you don’t have spare.
1.2 Finance: an important part of the pre-production process is to assess the
financial viability of the proposed production. There are two aspects to this:
firstly, the potential sources of the finance such as:

2. - Advertising
- Sponsorship
- Subscription fees
- Cover price
- Sales
- Rental charges
And secondly, the expenditure covering such elements as:
- Equipment
- Materials
- Transport
- Costs
- Crew
- Personnel
- Facility hire
- Clearances
- Legal costs
It’s likely that the productions that you will undertake for your practical units will
be subsidised by college, will be using their equipment and material and you will
not have to pay for the personnel on your team. This means that your financial
needs will be minimal and you will not necessarily need to secure funding for my
projects. However, I need to demonstrate that I am able to work in a realistic
vocational context and I should explore the potential funding for your project as
well as the potential costs, as both of these factors are critical to all creative
media productions if they are to be viable.
Sources of finance: research the potential sources of finance that would be
available for my type of media product.
1. How much income could I generate from these sources?
http://industry.bfi.org.uk/funding

3. They get 15million pounds a year to support development and productions of
student films. Other funding they do is prints and advertising funding, innovation
funding, film training and more.
2. How would I go about securing this income? You would use one of these
applications (which is printed on the back of this) and read the terms and
conditions.
1.3 Time: the timescale is an important factor for any media production and
deadlines can often be very tight. A journalist working on a daily newspaper will
have a very tight deadline to research and write a story for the next edition of
paper; the production team who plan and produce the evening television news
programmes must have all of the news items completed and ready for broadcast
by the specified schedule time. The timescale and deadlines for my practical
projects are likely to be less pressured, but you will still need to think carefully
about the availability of your crew and equipment, the timings of the different
stages of the productions process and the final deadlines for the project when
you are undertaking my pre-production planning.
TV drama:
TV drama can be expensive to make and the timing of the different aspects needs
to carefully control. The American TV series LOST was a high profile production
that had over 250 people working on it, with each episode having a tight three
week production schedule. This schedule included:
• Five days of pre-production planning and preparatory work on
scripts, sets and locations followed by three days getting all of the
technical aspects in place
• Nine days of shooting, with most of this taking place on location in
Hawaii
• Four days of post-production work, including editing and adding the
soundtrack and any special effects
1. The breakdown of the time for this programme reflects the
timing for my own productions in ways that we will be on a
tighter schedule only using Single camera, having four different
locations and lighting only being able to use natural lighting due
to cost, so this will be very time consuming. On the other hand
we don’t have as big of crew and casting which will ease some
time to get our production finalised with editing and special
effects to add like the sound track etc.

4. 2. A series like Lost needs so many people work on it because it’s
such a big series that’s well known and with the location it is at
they are going to have to risk assessments after risk
assessments, it’s a high production so the editing, lighting,
costumes and makeup has to be well thought through. Pre-
production planning, preparatory work on scripts, sets,
locations and the technical aspects which I have already
included need to be thought through, so they need a big strong
team to help them do this.
1.4 Personnel: sourcing the right personnel for my media production is
another important aspect of the pre-production process and I will need to
ensure that my production team is the right size for the job and that each
member had the right balance of knowledge, skills and experience to
undertake the specific role that is needed. An important first step is to
assess the initial skill level that each member of your team has. I will then
be able to plan what skills you need to develop further and how I will be
able to do this. This process can also help identify any skills gaps I have and
those areas in which I might require extra help and support from other
people.
Carry out a skills audit for my production team:
To do this you need to:
• I and Emma already know how to use the camera equipment,
lighting equipment, music recorder, Premiere and lighting
equipment.
• I have a level two in BTEC MEDIA and currently doing my Level
three I also have an A level in media which Emma also does. And
this is where we learnt to use this equipment. But also we have an
expert for the lighting called Tom Metcalf.
• What we could develop on personally for me is using premiere and
for Emma the music recorder and lighting.
1.5 Facilities: any creative media production will involve the use of production
equipment and facilities to capture, record, edit and manipulate the raw
material into the finished production. Moving image, audio and
photographic products will need equipment and perhaps studios to record
and capture the sounds and images that I require. Computer hardware and

5. software is now at the heart of the production and post-production
processes that are used to create all digital media products. Professional
production companies will either use their own equipment and facilities or
hire what they need for a specific production from facility houses. They
might even outsource some of the work, such as post-production special
effects, to a specialist company.
1. What I will need for my own project is facilities for the production such
as costume, makeup, lighting, camera equipment, music recorder for
the single and premiere for the editing. We will use these facilities from
the school and borrow them.
2. What is available in my school is everything that I have listed above
except the costumes and makeup.
1.6 Materials: all media products require raw materials for the actual content
and I can plan together and generate this raw material in various ways.
Some will be original material that I can be planning to produce.
Undertaking a series of test shoots or recordings can help me further
develop my ideas during the pre-production stage, help me to decide what
original material I will be able to include in my final production and what is
the best way to get the effect that I want. For example, for a multimedia
production project I might need some country sounds, so I would need to
look for a suitable location to undertake the recording. After doing a test
recording in a local park and, through additional research, discover that I
can use some copyright-free sound effects instead. I may also want to use
some existing archive material, such as photographs library or film
footage, material from sound or photographic library or sourced from the
internet, or some existing music or graphics. In all of these cases I will need
to be aware of copyright. Copyright owners can choose to grant
permission or license others to use their work, usually for a fee, while
retaining ownership over the rights themselves. Like other forms of
intellectual property, copyright can be bought and sold. When I am
developing my ideas, I need to think about permissions that I will need to
get before the production process begins. This might include clearing
rights, agreeing royalties or paying fees for copyright material that I am
planning to include. I will need to write to the copyright holder and ask for
permission to use their material. Often I would have to make a payment
for the rights to use the material. I can find out more information on
copyright and other forms of intellectual property, such as logos and
trademarks, on the intellectual property office website (www.ipo.gov.uk).

6. Television and radio Ofcom www.ofcom.org.uk
film British board of film www.bbfc.co.uk
classification (bbfc)
advertisement Advertisement standards www.asa.org.uk
authority (ASA)
Computer games Pan European game www.pegi.info
information (PEGI)
www.esrb.org
entertainment software
rating board (ESRB)
Newspapers and magazines Press complaints (PCC) www.pcc.org.uk
Internet W3C (world wide web www.w3.org
consortium)
Trade union Website
Pact (producers’ alliance for cinema and www.pact.co.uk

7. Key term: copyright – an automatic right that protects a piece of written or
recorded work from being copied or used by anyone else without the
copyright owner’s permission.
Performing rights royalties are paid to a writer, composer or publisher whenever their
music is played or performed in a public space such as on television, radio, on the
internet, in a shop or restaurant, or at an event such as concert or a football match.
Mechanical rights royalties are paid to a writer, composer or publisher when music is
reproduced and used in a physical product or artefact such as a television or a video
game.
Here below are some of the practise shots I and my pier have done.
1.7 Contributors: as well as needing a productions team, I also need other
people to contribute to my project. I might be able to require the services
of actors which I and my pier do. Also the contributions of the singer/song
writer for her music and to have her single over the top of the shot film. I
will need to get a permission form for people of the age under 18 and also
for consent and agreement so that I have the evidence of permission of
them to be featured. Also I need a biography of contributors in the
supporting documentation that I will produce.
Here below is a copy of my letter of consent.

8. software is now at the heart of the production and post-production
processes that are used to create all digital media products. Professional
production companies will either use their own equipment and facilities or
hire what they need for a specific production from facility houses. They
might even outsource some of the work, such as post-production special
effects, to a specialist company.
1. What I will need for my own project is facilities for the production such
as costume, makeup, lighting, camera equipment, music recorder for
the single and premiere for the editing. We will use these facilities from
the school and borrow them.
2. What is available in my school is everything that I have listed above
except the costumes and makeup.
1.6 Materials: all media products require raw materials for the actual content
and I can plan together and generate this raw material in various ways.
Some will be original material that I can be planning to produce.
Undertaking a series of test shoots or recordings can help me further
develop my ideas during the pre-production stage, help me to decide what
original material I will be able to include in my final production and what is
the best way to get the effect that I want. For example, for a multimedia
production project I might need some country sounds, so I would need to
look for a suitable location to undertake the recording. After doing a test
recording in a local park and, through additional research, discover that I
can use some copyright-free sound effects instead. I may also want to use
some existing archive material, such as photographs library or film
footage, material from sound or photographic library or sourced from the
internet, or some existing music or graphics. In all of these cases I will need
to be aware of copyright. Copyright owners can choose to grant
permission or license others to use their work, usually for a fee, while
retaining ownership over the rights themselves. Like other forms of
intellectual property, copyright can be bought and sold. When I am
developing my ideas, I need to think about permissions that I will need to
get before the production process begins. This might include clearing
rights, agreeing royalties or paying fees for copyright material that I am
planning to include. I will need to write to the copyright holder and ask for
permission to use their material. Often I would have to make a payment
for the rights to use the material. I can find out more information on
copyright and other forms of intellectual property, such as logos and
trademarks, on the intellectual property office website (www.ipo.gov.uk).