HOMEWORK: 20.03.12

Levis-Strauss is a narritive theoriest that showed the uses of binary opposites, this is shown in this title sequence by showing miley as a normal school girl and hannah as a pop star. this is shown by miley wearing everyday clothing and attending school whereas hannah is shown to wear extravagent sparkly clothing and singing in concerts. These opposites as shown to work well together as miley has a double life as hannah and she gets to experience 'the best of both worlds'

5 narrative codes is the theory explained by Barthes, the narrative codes help decide the way we understand texts. 1) action, you can see that Miley and Lily are close friends as they always stand close to each other. Another relationship we can see is the one of her and her dad as they are shown hugging which shows the closeness of the relationship. we can tell miley is the main character as she is shown on the screen the most and also with every other character in the title sequence. 2) enigma, this is shown by showing mileys two characters so we can assume her double life gets her into trouble, the audience wonders how she can juggle school and the life of a popstar. 3)semic-code, this is shown through the props and costume of the character, you can see hannah is a popstar as she wears extravagent clothing & is seen with a microphone. lily is seen as a sporty due to wearing a sweatband on her wrist 4) the symbolics, this is the difference between the characters, Miley is seen as normal due to her being smiley, whereas hannah is seen as diva like, for example when she fans herself with a ticket. lily is seen as sporty but her double lola is seen as exentric due to her blue hair. 5) cultural, which is displayed through stereotypes, Rico is seen to be a lazy male as he kicks his shoes off and lays on the sofa. Robby is seen as a caring dad as he cuddles miley.

drafts of main task

this is the first draft of my children's tv drama sequence, i have yet to add music and some finishing touches

i used facebook at ask people for feedback as this was a quick way of asking my target audience, i got 3 'likes' on this post which would indicate that people liked it and thought it was a good first draft

this shows feedback I recieved from someone off youtube, they commented that they liked the character names & them all sitting on the sofa but should add a shot of the school and maybe a different font


http://www.jamendo.com/en/artist/Tymphony
this is the site where I got my copy right free music from.



this is the final draft of my children's tv drama sequence

HOMEWORK: 13.03.12

The sleepover club is a children's tv drama, aimed at girls between the ages of 6-14.
Dyer's theory of stereotypes can be used to analyse this sequence as it uses 5 girls, all of different sizes, race & hair colour, stereotypes used are blonde hair & a skirt for example to show that one of the girls could be a 'dumb blonde' type character. dyer argues that stereotypes are a way of reinforcing difference between people and representing these differences as natural, The sleepover club follows this theory as the different types of character helps project to the audience that being different from everyone else still makes you liked and still makes you accepted in society which is a good message to put accross to pre-teen & teen girls as they do worry about fitting into society.

Another theory that could be applied to the sleepover club title sequence is Morley's recpetion theory in a way that the gender of the characters makes you think that the programme as aimed at girls as it is an all female cast for the main characters, the age of the characters is meant to reflect the ages of the target audience which would make the programme relatable to them and the social class of the character is middle class which again is to reflect the target audience and this way the audience would feel that the characters are exactly like them.

Drafts of Ancillary Tasks

this is the logo I have created which I plan to use within my DVD cover, my magazine cover and within my actual trailer.

this is my first draft of my DVD cover, i have used a patterned background similar to those used in exsisting products, a main image of the characters and child like fonts to show it is for children, i have also used a logo of an exsiting company that produces childrens tv dramas to show that this product is similar to those already exsisting

this is my first draft of my magazine cover, i have used a patterned background which is bright in colour as it is similar to one i have used on the DVD cover & also bright colours is what attracts the target audience. I have also used easy to read fonts so that the target audience can read them easily & also have included coverlines that would interest them

To see how my target audience responds to them I have asked on social network sites such as twitter and facebook to have a look at these drafts so I can get an appropriate response as most people from my target audience have facebook and twitter.

this is my second draft of my magazine cover, I have changed the background as the other background was too distracting, I added subheading to add more detail to my coverlines and added different fonts to make it more eye catching

this is my second draft of my dvd cover, I have added a backpage to it so I could add more details to it, like running time and other technological features, DVD extras and a blurb to get the audience interested in the DVD. I have yet to add pictures to this draft as I need to be able to photoshop my photo better than in the 1st draft. I have added stars to the front cover as this is similar to my magazine cover and the audience would be familar with this as well as the logo used throughout. I also added copyright information at the bottom and a certificate rating.

This is the 3rd draft for my magazine cover, I changed the background to a similar colour to one I used on the DVD cover as the audience would find this familar, I moved the coverlines around to fit the conventions of a magazine more and changed colours and fonts of the 'Free Gift' section so they were similar to the fonts and colours of the DVD cover and easier to read.

INSTITUTIONS

Nickelodeon is an American children's channel owned by Viacom and operated under its Nickelodeon Kids and Family Group. It first lauched in 1977 under the name 'The Pinwheel Network' until 1979 when they changed the name to nickeloden. The channel is primarily aimed at children in grade school and early teens (ages 6–14) It is broadcast at many different locations around the world including America,Europe, Asia, Africa & Austrailla.

It currently broadcasts many different type of programmes all aimed at children varying from Animations, Sitcoms and Drama. Current programming on Nickelodeon includes SpongeBob SquarePants, iCarly, The Fairly Oddparents, Victorious, Big Time Rush and the House of Anubis with reruns of Rugrats, The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, All Grown Up!, Zoey 101, Drake and Josh, Kenan and Kel and Saved By The Bell.

Nickeloden has many sister channels including nicktoons, nickjr and teennick. This is so the shows are avalible amongst many different channel and a wide range of audiences. From nickeloden many other platforms are avalible including Nickelodeon Universe (theme park) Nickelodeon Animation (anitmation studio) Nickelodeon On Sunset (studio of production for series) Nickelodeon Suites Resort (hotel) CruiseNickelodeon (cruise ship)
Nickelodeon Studios (attraction at universal studios orlando & part of production) Nick.com, Nickelodeon Movies (released by Paramount Pictures), Nick Magazine, Nick on demand (online platform to watch nick shows)

Viacom - short for "Video & Audio Communications", is an American media conglomerate with interests in cinema and cable television. As of 2010, it is the world's fourth-largest media conglomerate. Viacom connects with audiences through television, motion pictures, mobile platforms and online in more than 160 countries and territories. Viacom operates approximately 170 media networks reaching more than 600 million global subscribers and more than 500 branded digital media properties.

Disney Channel lanched in 1983 is an American basic cable and satellite television network, owned by the Disney-ABC Television Group division of The Walt Disney Company. The channel specializes in television programming for children through original children's television series and movies, as well as third-party programming. It is marketed mostly toward young children, pre-teens and teenagers ages 9–14. Disney Channel, originally established as a cable channel in the United States, has expanded worldwide. Countries using English Language are South Africa, Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, India, Australia, New Zealand, Middle East, Scandinavia, Baltic states, United Kingdom, Ireland and the Caribbean.

Disney Channel broadcasts original series all aimed at children varying from Animations, Sitcoms and Drama such as Phineas and Ferb, Fish Hooks, Good Luck Charlie, Shake It Up, The Suite Life on Deck and The Wizards of Waverly Place. It sometimes includes re-runs of old shows including Thats So Raven, Lizzie Mcguire, Cory In The House, The Suite Life Of Zac & Cody and Recess.

Sister Channels include Disney XD, Disney XD +1, Disney Channel +1 & Playhouse Disney. this broadcasts different programmes for different audiences and the use of '+1' Channels allows audience to catch up on programmes if they miss them an hour later.

Like Nickeloden, Disney is also avalible of many different platforms like Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group (film studio) disneychannel.com, Disney World, (theme park, resorts in Florida & Paris) Disney Cruise Line (cruise line) Walt Disney Animation Studios, Walt Disney Studios, Disney On Demand (online programme streaming) as well as many different merchandise branches.

The Walt Disney Company is an American multinational media conglomerate, It is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into live-action film production, television, and travel. Taking on its current name in 1986, The Walt Disney Company expanded its existing operations and also started divisions focused upon theatre, radio, publishing, and online media.

A small insitution is CITV (short for Children's ITV) is a British television channel from ITV Digital Channels Ltd, a division of ITV plc. It is broadcast just in Britian. The CITV channel is an extension of the original afternoon children's programming block shown on the ITV channel. "Children's ITV" began in January 1983 and originally featured pre-recorded in-vision continuity links fronted by various presenters and characters from Children's ITV programmes.

CITV shows programmes such as My Parents Are Aliens, Jungle Run, Art Attack, Horrid Henry, Bookaboo and The Cool Stuff Collective. This branch has a slot on channel ITV and also it's own TV channel on sky.

ITV plc - a British media company that operates 12 of the 15 regional television broadcasters that make up the ITV Network, the oldest and largest commercial terrestrial television network in the United Kingdom. ITV plc is divided into three divisions: Broadcasting, which operates the TV networks (including the ITV News Group, which runs the ITV regional franchises); ITV Studios, which comprises both UK and international production, ITV's facilities businesses and Global Entertainment which exploits programme rights, and Commercial & Online, which runs itv.com and the ITV Player, ITV's advertising sales arm and has responsibility for ITV plc's shareholdings in Freeview, Freesat, SDN and YouView.

PITCH

Throughout the process of research & planning I have been able to find out the conventions of children's tv drama title sequences.
usually they:

- Use visual effects in editing to make it more eye catching and interesting to watch for the target audience

- Feature the main characters of the programme, the main characters are usually of the same age as the target audience

- Include either names of characters or names of actors

- Use montages of footage to create the title sequence

- Use upbeat music as to set the mood of the programme

- Use bright colours to make it eye catching and attractive

- Props that are relatable to the target audience

From my target audience I found out that:

- they like the use of bright colours because they are eye catching

- they prefer the use of character names rather than actor names in a title sequence as it allows them to know they name of the character before they watch it

- they like a mix of different genders for main characters

- they like the use of upbeat music

- like the use of visual effects as it makes things more interesting

- they like a short title sequence else they loose interest in it

For my product I plan to:

have either 4 or 5 main characters that all go to the same school & are friends but have completely different personalities & interests. I want to try & use 3 girls & 2 boys.. this adds diversity and can appeal to both male & female target audiences.

One of the characters could be a sporty type, who wears trackies and plays with a ball to show he's sporty

Another character would be a popular type, who wears a desinger brands, with a mirror and lipstick to show she is concious about her image - this would stereotypically be a female character.

Character 3 would be a nerd type, who carrys alot of books & writes with a pen to show they are studying - this character would be a female character

character 4 would be a quiet type, always has her head buried in a book, to show shes isolated and quiet - this character would be female

finally characer 5 would a be mischievous type character, throws a paper areoplane about to show how naughty they are - this character would be male.

I plan to film between 5 - 10 seconds of each character and then a frame with all 5 characters in to show they are all friends, I shall put all these frames together to create a montage type sequenceI plan to film between 5 - 10 seconds of each character and then a frame with all 5 characters in to show they are all friends, I shall put all these frames together to create a montage type sequence.


My product will be successful as I will include conventions of children's tv drama sequences and also include what my target audience liked because this way it will follow the conventions of media but also appeal to the target audience.

To do this I plan to:

- create between 30 seconds - 1 minute of title sequence

- include upbeat music to set the mood of the drama

- get the characters I use to dress in school uniform so its familiar to the target audience

- use bright colours

- use the props such as the mobile phone, to show that the characters are of similar age of the target audience

- try to use visual effects such as shape transitions between each character introduction


For my product I also have to create two pieces of print media, A DVD cover & A magazine cover

The conventions of a DVD cover for a TV drama for children are:

- use of bright colours

- simple layout

- simple but attractive font types & colours

- one main image of characters or main character

- Logo of company producing it to create convergence


Judging by the answers my target audience gave to my survey about the tv drama sequences I can make a prediction from these results that my target audience would like:

- use of bright colours that would appeal to both male & female audiences

- eye catching fonts similar to ones used on the title sequence

- main image of characters as it would be familiar to them


The conventions of a magazine cover aimed at Children are:

- One main image of characters plus small other images that are relevant to coverlines

- Bright colours

- Scattered coverlines but a minimal amount of them

- 'curly' fonts

- hotspots focused around main image

- masthead

Judging by what my target audience answered my survey with, I can tell that they would like:

- Bright colours

- Main image of all the characters

- Minimal coverlines - as they felt that the only writing needed for the title sequence were the character names so they aren't keen on reading a lot.

For draft work I have created draft layout, colours & fonts for both the dvd cover & magazine covers

Focus Group

The result I got from my questionnaire showed that my target audience were aged between 7-16, using these results I decided to do a focus group so I can find out what makes a popular programme for my target audience, this way I can make my own title sequence based on their preferences. To do this I showed a group of 7-16 year olds the title sequences of the programmes I had previously analysed

DRAKE & JOSH:

- Liked the programme title at the beginning as it made it clear what programme they were watching

- Didn't like the use of actor names and would have preferred character names instead

- Thought that the title sequence perhaps dragged on a bit too long

- Liked the use of bright green & blue for the colours on the title sequence

- Thought that the arrow shapes were eye catching for the transitions of each section

- Generally liked the mix of different gender characters, although some thought that it seemed a bit more bias to male characters.


Thats So Raven:

- liked the use of the bright colours at the beginning as they were eye catching

- thought that the title sequence was a bit boring as it didn't have different shapes between characters and just showed different footage.

- thought that it would have been better to show character names rather than actor names as they felt the information was irrelevant

- liked the mixed gender characters

- thought that the music was relevant to the idea of the show because of the lyrics and was upbeat

Zoey 101:

- liked the shot transitions as the shapes and colours made it eye catching and interesting, some would have liked some 'girly' colours as they thought that blue seemed 'boy-ish'

- liked the mixed gender characters, thought the mix of characters made it more appealing because it wasn't biased to one gender.

- liked the use of an upbeat pop song as the music

- would of preferred character names instead of actor names, but liked how they introduced 'the main character' as 'zoey'

- thought that the montage of clips helped set the scene of a school and established a little bit about the characters before watching the show