The document discusses how the media product conforms to conventions of real documentaries. It challenges some conventions by having a longer title sequence than typical. However, it aims to follow many other conventions such as using the rule of thirds for interviews, medium close-up shots of subjects looking off camera, omitting questions, relevant background details, on-screen graphics, and actuality footage. It also conforms to conventions through its use of a single-stranded narrative, non-diegetic soundtrack, and inclusion of vox pops and natural sounds. Overall, the document aims to mimic professional documentaries through adhering to standard documentary conventions in its formatting, visuals, and storytelling techniques.

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

2. Challenge:
I aimed to follow the list of conventions that we wrote at the beginning of the project and so
there’s few aspects that don’t follow convention.
One feature that arguably is atypical is the length of our title sequence as often they’re short
and use a variety of graphics but my title sequence is longer than most at approximately 30
seconds.

3. Conform to convention through
interview:
I conform to the conventions of the following:
Rule of thirds
Subject looking off camera
Omitted questions
Relevant mise-en-scene
On-screen graphics
Medium close up camera shot
Always an expert being interviewed

4. Rule of Thirds:
The rule of thirds means that the interviewee’s eyes are ¾ way up the screen, this is a
convention followed by most – if not all – professional documentaries. I replicated this in my
documentary in order to use the convention and produce a typical documentary.

5. Medium close up and subject looking off
camera:
In documentaries, in order to maintain a professional appearance, the convention of having the
medium close up camera shot in interviews exists. I abided by this convention as evidenced by
the examples below. In between the two, as a comparison, is a professional example. Alongside
this, the convention of having the subject look off into the space beside the camera – or the one
asking questions – provides a professionalism too.

6. Relevant mise-en-scene
In the documentary, I know that the mise-en-scene is important as it consolidates what the
speaker is saying and is hence a convention that’s common in professional documentaries. I
attempted to mimic this in order to achieve a professional demeanour in my documentary and
make mine typical, to help the audience understand what they’re looking at. An example of a
real documentary to compare will be placed in the middle of the two examples from my own
work.

7. Cut aways:
Cut aways are a common feature of every documentary as it’s a convention in itself but also to
avoid jump cuts which are thereby atypical of documentaries and so of course I mimicked this
idea of covering cuts with cut aways. I followed this convention and implied a professionalism
into my work as there’s no jump cuts, much like the average real documentary.

8. On screen graphics:
The convention of using graphics at the beginning of an interview is typical of documentaries for
obvious reasons, they must therefore be clear and provide all the detail that is necessary
economically. They’re small and occasionally have some form of graphic behind them, I strayed
away from any form of color behind the names and instead opted for white with a slight outer
stroke enabled in order to ensure boldness. As you can see, in comparison with the professional
documentary, my graphics are just as clear and similar in style.

9. Conventions conformed to through
footage:
I conform to conventions of the following:
Actuality footage
Archive footage
Vox pops

10. Actuality footage and Archive footage:
Documentaries often use archive footage, especially mixed documentaries – which mine is. This
helps to provide the audience with a contextualized understanding of what’s being portrayed in
the documentary. In my documentary, I opted to use very little archive footage and instead
mostly actuality footage – footage that my group and I actually shot ourselves. Often
professional documentaries use archive footage to consolidate their own sources, this is
something I mimicked.

11. Vox Pops and omission of question
Vox populi; this is basically the act of filming members of the public, asking similar if not the
same question over and over again to get a mass of different answers. I began my documentary
with vox pops, and so followed the convention of including them in my documentary to achieve
an aspect of public opinion to appeal to my audience. As you can see from the comparison, I
followed the general convention of omitting the question; something I also did in my planned
interviews.

12. Conforming to conventions through
sound:
I conform to conventions of the following:
Non-diegetic soundtrack
Single stranded narrative
Natural sounds/diegetic sounds

13. Non-diegetic soundtrack:
My documentary features two songs in the non-diegetic soundtrack. Both of which were chosen
because I believe they complement each other, I also used this song in the
radio advert to tie the two of them together through having the same
soundtrack. This follows convention as the same song is supposed to be used
as it’s typical of professional documentaries.

14. Single stranded narrative:
As all documentaries have a narrative, it was optional whether I had a single stranded narrative
or not. A single stranded narrative is a narrative strongly focused on one argument – in my
documentary, I opted for the single argument to be that obsessions are common, this was
conveyed through both the voice over but also the two experts – the therapist that started the
documentary and the student helper that ended it as exemplified in the videos beneath. This is a
convention and so imitates real media products, for example like Obsessive Compulsive Cleaners
which suggests the same thing that mine does.