A2 Media - Unit G324

1. Soap Opera Genre –
Ancillary Product
Analysis
Name: Zakary Winsall
Candidate Number: 2144
Center Name: St. Andrew’s Catholic School
Center Number: 64135
OCR Media Studies – A2 Level
Unit G324: Advanced Portfolio

2. Tagline – The verbal code of the tagline
“There’s a killer amongst them” illustrates to the
audience that out of all the character in
EastEnders, someone there is responsible for the
murder of someone. It entices the audience to
watch the coming episodes to find out who it is.
This specific tagline does not illustrate that there
is a multi-stranded narrative.
Image – No specific manipulation has been applied to
the image. However the shot is a high angle shot. The crowd
is looking up towards something, which may illustrate that
there is something more important than them above them.
The characters present in the image are look up, possibly
looking for something to help because ‘there’s a killer
amongst them’ and they want help to be safe from the
killer.
Synergy with Social Media –
In this particular poster for EastEnders
there is no synergy with social media.
However, this would be to promote the
soap and get more people interested in it.
This could be done through Facebook or
Twitter, using hashtags.
Institution Logo – With this
poster, there is no institution ident
present. However it would be beneficial
to include to promote which TV channel
will be presenting the soap.
Brand Identity –
The brand identity in this poster
is the words “EastEnders”. This is
to clearly illustrate to the
audience that this poster is for
that show.

3. Image – A lot of manipulation has been applied to the image on this poster. The people present are
all seen to be in flames. This could illustrate to the audience that there may be a fiery argument
between certain characters or take the manipulation of this image literally and say that there could
actually be a fire. The connotations of fire is usually bad, could possibly involve death.
Institution Logo – The institution
ident present on this poster is the number
4.
This is because the channel that is showing
this soap is Channel 4. They want to build as
much hype as they can for this channel to
get people interested in this particular soaps
and other soaps on this channel.
Tagline – The tagline for this poster
illustrates that something will happen in
the episode. The word ‘change’ suggests
that everything changes in Hollyoaks. The
word ‘forever’ also suggests that these
changes are permanent and cannot be
reversed. This also supports the
connotations of the fire.
Point of Call –
The date is clearly displayed on this
poster. By doing this it makes it clear to
the audience when the episode is due to
be aired so they will not miss it. The
connotations of the word ‘starts’
illustrates that it is the beginning of a big
change that will not go back to how it
was previously.

4. Student Exemplar Work – Textual Analysis
Synergy with Social Media
– Clearly present at the bottom of the
poster is various different links to social
media pages. By adding this the audience
is able to stay completely updated with
the soap and they can follow everything
that happens.
Image – Fairly little
manipulation has been applied to
this image. The background image
has had the contrast lowered in
order to make the image appear
darker. By doing this is gives an
eerie feeling which works well
with the tagline.
Institution
Logo – In this case
the institution logo is
BBC Three. It is placed
on the poster to
promote the channel.
Even though it is on
the poster, I do not feel
that it is big enough. It
should be slightly
bigger it order to make
it clear to the audience
that it is on this
channel.
Tagline – The tagline could have
various different connotations because it is
so vague. The most obvious connotation
could be that someone is clearly looking for
revenge, however the silence does not
mean they’re not looking for revenge, it
could just mean they are planning someone
to begin their revenge.
Soap Name
– The soap name
is clearly displayed
at the top of the
poster. This makes
it clear to the
audience what
soap this poster is
intended to
advertise.

5. There are a variety of features present on all three of these posters that have great features
that I would like to ‘repeat’ (Steve Neale - 1980). The manipulation on the image in the
Hollyoaks poster connotes a very intense feeling for the audience who view this poster. It
has the various different connotations of fierce activity between characters or a form of
fiery rage.
However, in the student exemplar work, I also like the manipulation of the background
image. I like this because that even though it is so simple, yet it implies an eerie feeling on
the audience which may then draw them in to watch the new soap.
Other minor features that I would repeat is the synergy with social media. On my poster I
will be sure to add various different social media links as this would help to build awareness
of the brand new soap.
Finally, the institution logo is important to be present on the poster as you are clearly
advertising which channel the soap will be aired on, along with the date and the time.
Conclusion (Reflection)