How we used/challenged audience theories in our music video

A2 Advanced Portfolio Music Video project -

Our music video follows the story of a relationship breakup and the development of a new relationship, between a love triangle. The two main characters perform cameo roles in the narrative, whilst also performing with guitars in various locations around cambridge.

Avtive consuming -

Stuart Hall - Encoding/Decoding -
Prefered/Negotiated/oppisitonal readings of the our music video -
Because our music video has a linear narrative, it is fairly simple for the audience to understand the plot, so majority of audience members will understand the text the way that we intended as the producers, this would be a preferred reading.

Blumler and Katz - uses and gratification theory -
This theory shows what audiences 'do' with media texts, rather than what the media text 'does' to the audience. Shows how the audience are actively viewing.
States that audiences watch the media text with four different purposes.
It could be said that our music video could be for 'Entertainment', 'Personal relationships' and for 'personal identity'. This challenges the theory as the theorists state how each media text should fall into one category.

David Gauntlett Pick n Mix reader -
Suggests that audiences that are 'sophisticated' enough will be able to pick what they want from media texts and what they don't want from the media when they consume.

David Buckingam - Creative audience -
States how young audiences will use media and specifically web 2.0 to just 'fill time', to keep them 'entertained' so they aren't bored.
He also states that they use the media to make sense of their lives, to help make sense of real experiences such as relationships.


Passive viewing -

Hypodermic needle/copy cat theory -

Section 1B - Audience

Audience are the people who consumer different media products, consisting of people of different cultures, ages and genders who all create different target audiences for the producers.

A select group of people you wish to please with your media content

A variety of different groups you can belong to - audiences can enjoy different genres

Active and Passive consumption -

Something you do rather than something you are - not necessarily actively consuming but passively absorbing

Passively absorbing -  Injecting ideas or views into the minds of the audience - hypodermic needle theory, copy cat theory - controlling the way people behave
Examples: adverts on bus stops, radio on in the background, adverts next to YouTube videos, product placement in films

Hypodermic needle model - no filter between cause and effect the media causes/has an impact
Video games make people violent
This approach suggests the media can have a powerful impact on audiences. The 'injected' audience is seen as powerless to the effect if its influence.



Trendsetting - media sets trends

Copy Cat theory - suggested presumption that an audience would copy what they see - links with murders that were influenced by A Clockwork Orange.

Desentisation - the more you are exposed to something the less you react to it, sex/violence, this links in to an assumption that there is too much sex and violence in the media


Actively consuming - audience have a role in understanding the text - Stuart hall theory
paying to go to the cinema, to a concert, recording a tv program

The rise of the internet led to a more active view of audiences.

Reception theory - more individual

Stuart Hall - encoding/decoding theory - preferred, negotiated, oppisitonal readings of media texts

Blumler and Katz - uses and gratification theory- splits media into four categories -
Entertainment and diversion - to escape, fill time, distract them
Personal relationships/social interaction - enhance and build relationships, shared experience to go to cinema
Personal identity - media injects back to you - you can relate to characters within media texts
Information/education - we go to media with a requirement/to be educated further

Pick and Mix reader - David Gauntlet -
A consumer you pick and chose what you do and don't want.
A theory of the internet age - picking out of multiple google search results
They pick what media and messages they consume (actively deciding)

David Buckingham - the creative audience -
The media is used to help young people make sense of their daily lives, to experiment with new identities and allemate realities. it is now a wallpaper, a wall of noise to fill down time.
Interactions are meaningless

Revision: Theorists for Media Online Age

Andrew Keen - skeptic of Web 2.0 due to the amaterisation of the media being share on the internet. He thinks it lacks the 'quality control'. Can relate to our YouTube case studies, for example Jonason Movies producing the Toy Story film in real life which lacks quality.

Chris Anderson - Long Tail theory - the theory of how the internet allows media products that are in the 'niche' end of the long tail, such as documentary, foreign or anime films. Relating to our film case study, niche films can be distributed by Indie Rights film distribution on YouTube. The internet allows there to me more 'shelf space' for media, instead in the past there was limited shelf space for films as cinemas could not screen many niche films as they had to screen for the mainstream audience.

David Buckingham - is a moderate of Web 2.0, he thinks it gives 'young people the opportunity to produce their own media. But he is a moderate because he thinks people need to have a media literacy before they become producers of their own media, so they aren't just copying mainstream media.

Clay Shirky - Advocate of web 2.0 - cognitive surplus - time spent being wasted such as watching TV is now being spent being creative or 'engaging in social activism online'. For our video games case study for Skate 2, Skate.Create allows consumers of the videogame to produce their own skateparks (maps), skateboarders, and make their own skateboarding edits using the in game editor and then share them on Skate.Create or YouTube. This shows how playing video games is wasting time, as the consumers are now being creative with the videogames whilst playing.

Henry Jenkins - transmedia storytelling, characters existing across multiple media platforms. Relating to our Angry Birds case study, the angry birds franchise can now be seen on television, Youtube, themeparks, in books, and on multiple gaming platforms including handheld portable devices such as iPhone, and consoles such as Xbox 360 or Playstation 3 as a downloadable game.

Genre

Functions of genre -
- Reinforcement of our ideas and values
- Creation of a set of audience expectations
- Creation of characteristics by producers which audiences can recognise
- A relationship between audiences and producers which minimised the risk of financial failure
- Dynamism and flexibility - they are constantly transformed by new additions -

What is the genre of my producer and how is this evident?
We followed the standard conventions of the indie rock music genre for our advanced portfolio music video project. These included followed the mise-en-scene conventions, such as the costumes that our characters/band wore which was fashionable, the handheld cinematography, fast paced cuts in the editing and the conventional full band sound. We followed the conventions by having cameo performances within the narrative along with performance within the multiple locations within the music video.

What are the positives of having a set genre for institutions? 
The advantage of having a set genre for institutions is that they can market the music video to audiences that actually want to listen to the indie rock genre of music. For example they can put adverts in rock related magazines such as NME or Q Magazine, and play the music video on rock channels like Kerrang to an audience that want to listen to rock music. If there was no genre and a rock music video was played on the classical channel then there would be an audience who won't want to watch the music video.

What are the positives of having a set genre for audiences? 
The advantages of having a set genre for audiences is that they can easily locate the music that they want to listen to. Genres categorise the music industry allowing audiences to chose the style of music they want.

Does my product at any point challenge any conventions of the genre?
We challenged the genre of indie rock by not having a conventional full bad setup in the performance scenes of the music video, because we intended for the lead singer and guitarist to be the idols of the band.

How do you think your chosen genre has developed over time?
Now it is more about the star persona and selling the band image to make a profit in the music industry, back in the day rock music was sold just for the music, and the band weren't the core image. Music videos usually included just live performance video footage to help sell the band as live performers.

Is your product in any way a hybrid of genres?
It is a hybrid of indie rock music and rock, it also includes a cinematic romantic narrative.


Task 2 -
How I used, developed and/or challenged generic conventions in all projects -

Childrens film - 'Spy School' - spy/action film opening - foundation portfolio -
Hero protagonist - Ajax
Antagonist villain - Vlaidimir
Gadget character
Three characters that are conventional to spy films such as 'Stormbreaker', 'Spy kids' etc..

Thriller - noir style opening - foundation portfolio project -
Antagonist isn't shown at all, he is seen in the shadows, out of focus and is also blocked by the wooden predators on the church benches
Enigma - why is the character who is praying in the church murdered?
Representation of the animals as predators like the antagonist is
Conventional sound effects - crows in the grave yard
Mise en scene - casual victim/ antagonist dressed in black so he blends into the darkness

Music video - indie rock music video - advances portfolio -
Followed/challenged conventions of indie rock music video as stated above

Narrative

Story: totality of events explicitly referenced in a whole narrative (including backstory as well as those projected beyond the action)

Plot: the story events directly incorporated into the action of the text. Those linked by cause and effect and the order in which they are presented)

Narrative - ''a chain of events in a cause and effect relationship occurring in time'' - Bordwell and Thompson, Film Art, 1980

Range includes either -
- Unrestricted narrative: (i.e news) - can't be restricted, uncovering factual events
- Restricted narrative (only offers minimal info, i.e. thriller opening - for entertainment/audience satisfaction

Depth: the level of idenficiation we are allowed with the protagonist within the text
- Objective: only have access to what a range of characters see and do
- Subjective: given unique access to a characters mental state/dreams - i.e Scottie in Hitchcocks Vertigo

Todorov -
Says that the conventional narrative in mainstream films are all structured with the same five stages -

1. a state of equilibrium at the outset
2. A disruption of equilibrium by some action
3. A recognition that there has been some disruption
4. An attempt to repair the disruption
5. Re-equilibrium that is different to the outset  

Vladimir Propp -

Characters have a narrative function and they provide the structure to the text

There are eight types built around certain functions at certain stages in the narrative

Hero

Villain

Dispatcher

False Hero

Helper

Princess

Princess' father 

Section 1B Genre

Genre -
Used to categorize certain films

Daniel Chandler -
''Conventional definitions of genre are based on the idea that they share particular convention of content e.g. themes and settings''
This means that films within one genre have aspects about them that are simiular, and this is what helps decide what genre to put them in. For example an action film will have a lot of fast paced editing and running about.

Steve Neale -
''genres are instances of repetition and difference, this is what pleasure for the audience is derived from''
This basically means that films within one genre have repetitive conventions that a group of audience members enjoy, and that each film within the genre may have a different plot, and this is what keeps the audience entertained.

Hybrid genres - mixture of genres - makes things different
Sean of the Dead - romantic comedy zombie - rom-com-zom

John Hartley -
''the same text can belond to different genres in different countries or times''
One story can be retold many of times using different genres

David Buckingham -
''Genre is a constant process of negotiation and change''
The genres will develop as time goes on due to change in society and within different cultures

John Ficke -
''Genre attempts to situate some order into the wide range of texts and meanings that circulate in our culture for the conveniences of both producers and audiences''

Nicholas Abercrombie - 'television producers set out to exploit genre conventions' - producers will always try to follow conventions of a particular genre so that the audience recognise it - for our music video we exploted many conventions of indie rock music videos, including performance and cameo narrative, shakey handheld cinematography, casual costumes - these made our music video recognisable as an indie rock video

Katie Wales - ''genre is... an intexertextual concept'' - music videos use interextuality to make reference to other texts, this is to familarise the audience about the genre of the music video - in our music video we made references to the classic rock genre with the jimmi hendrix graffiti, and also a reference to the opening of the School of Rock, a film about a rock school. The audience of these texts would also be the audience of our music video.

Christian Metz - talks about developing conventions of a genre - he says genres go through stages - Experimental, classic, parody and deconstruction. You could say our music vidoe was experimental, as we followed many generic conventions of indie rock, however challenged ones such as having a full band set up.

Genre - to make sense of the world because it helps to organise things to make things more simple

Section 1b notes

Section 1B -

Can only write about one project, can be from foundation or advanced portfolio
You need to support or challenge ideas within one of the 5 areas

Structure - introduction
1. Define the concept. Define the one of the 5 areas the question is on
2. Outline the production you will evaluate
3. Tell the examiner you are going to discuss (x number of ideas about concept in the essay)

Essay should include minimum of 2 theories/ideas to support/challenge the area
4 theories is recommended

Areas - Genre, Audience, Media Language, Representation, Narrative

Genre, Narrative, Audience, Media Language and Representation 

Audience -

'the people that consume the media products. They have different ages, cultures and genders which create a target audience' 

Stuart Hall's theory discusses how producers 'encode' meaning into meaning text which is then 'decoded' by the audience with three different types of readings -

- Preferred reading - the meaning the producers meant to come across

- Negotiated reading - the audience may not agree with the meaning, but they accept it

- Oppositional reading - the audience read the text the way it is intended, however they do not agree with it at all

Hypodermic needle theory - Media injects directly into the consumer whenever it wants to. Media controls what the consumers think. This is a fairly out dated theory now though

Andrew Hart (1991) - ''the meaning is not in the text, but in the reading'' - the way audiences interpret a media text can vary depending on how the audience 'read' or 'decode' it.

Erving Goffman (1974) - Dramaturgy - study of every day life to study media audiences

Genre -
'types of texts or 'categories' with sets of conventions that make them recognizable to an audience'

Branston and Stafford -

Bell et all - 'Genre is good for media industries because their potential audience and consequently their potential profit that can be easily assessed'

Genres are easy to make sense of, people can easily chose a genre film to watch be it a comedy, thriller or a science fiction.

Profit is easy to make because different audiences like different genres, so a sci-fi film could be marketed to sci-fi audiences.

Media Language -
'is about messages conveyed to its audience and its affect. The way in which the story is interpreted'

Reading too much into things such as Micro and Macro elements

Micro elements - Sound, Editing, Mise-en-Scene and Camerawork - to convey meanings
Macro elements - Narrative, Characters, genre

Andrew Goodwin - ''music genres have their own music video style and iconography''
Studied this for music video project. For example indie rock music videos have performance and narrative, primarily conventional band set up, fast paced editing...

David Bordwell - Argues there is a difference between the story given to the viewer through the narrative and the story communicated to the audience though media language.
This is because different audience members may interpret the media language in different ways (links to the encode and decode theory by Stuart Hall)

Representation -
'process of showing real things, people, places and events. re-representing reality'

Tania Modleski - representation of gender favours the good mothers over the seductress. The good housewife stereotype does nothing but reinforce the dominant ideology of patriarchy. This means it reinforces male dominance in films.

Laura Mulvey Male Gaze theory - Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema -
Her theory discusses how female characters in films are 'objects' of the male gaze which softens females as characters and people.

Narrative -
'basic plot and storyline of a piece of media'
'the devices, strategies and conventions governing the organisation of a story'

Roland Barthes - Narrative is infinite, every person has a story, every object has a story

Vladimir Propp - broke narratives up into sections

Stefan Todorov -

Allan Cameron -

Thriller project narrative aspects - voiceover, cliffhanger, flashback, enigma