Question 1 A

Specific examples for each focusProgression in different skills areas from AS- A2Key Terminology

Digital Technology Creativity Research and planning Post-production Using conventions from real media texts

Question 1 B

Genre Narrative Representation Audience Media language

Theories and detailed examples from your work for each...

Question 2- Collective Identity

Media theoriesCase studiesKey argumentsKey terminologyQuotesEssay planIntroductionconclusion

G325: Critical Perspectives in Media

Section 1:Theoretical Evaluation of Your Production Work

Section 1Question 1(a) you will have to describe and evaluate your skills development over the course of your production work, from Foundation Portfolio to Advanced Portfolio. The focus of this evaluation must be on skills development, and the question will require you to adapt this to one or two specific production practices. The list of practices to which questions will relate is as follows:

• Digital Technology • Creativity • Research and planning • Post-production • Using conventions from real media texts In the exam, questions will be asked using one or two of these categories. Question 1(b) requires you to select one production and evaluate it in relation to a media concept. The list of concepts to which questions will relate is as follows:

• Genre • Narrative • Representation • Audience • Media language

1. Digital Technology

• Discuss what technical skills you have learnt and developed on your A level Media course

2. Creativity

This is quite a tricky one; start by listing the creative choices and decisions which you have made over the course, and what skills you think you have developed:Q. Discuss how you feel you have developed your creativity over the two year course. You should think about:• What have you enjoyed the most, and what experiences

have lead to you becoming more creative• What are you particularly proud of • How this creativity has helped you in other areas of your

life• Are you developing this with your further studies?

3. Research and planning This is a key area for showing you understand how professional production companies work. You need to understand the importance of preproduction work and explain how it informed your planning and eventual finished product.

Primary and Secondary ResearchPrimary- research which you carry out yourself, all of the data is created by the research which you have doneSecondary- this data is already collated by researchers, you then use this to inform your work

Qualitative and Quantitative DataQualitative Data- this is data which is more in depth and carried out on a smaller section of people, this would include focus groups and interviews. This is more time consuming, however it gives you greater quality of research as you can ask people to expand on their responses, this involves open questionsQuantitative Data- this is data which is less detailed however you would get a larger sample, this would include questionnaires and surveys. It is quick and easy to administer and involves closed questions. The advantages of this are that you get a large quantity of data, thus allowing you to draw conclusions, however you do not get detailed responses. • Explain what you researched before starting your production work and why you carried out this research• How did your research inform your production work• What difficulties did you encounter whilst carrying out your research

Preproduction PlanningMake a list of all of the preproduction tasks you carried out before your production work. Next to each task explain how it helped you with your production and why it was important for your planning

4. Post-production

This includes the post production editing process, audience feedback, refining your product and evaluating the success of your product. As you are fully aware filming the media product is merely one part of a long chain; without the post-production process there is no product! • Explain in your own words what the post-production process

involved and what skills you learnt and developed over the course. You should include:

• All of the techniques which you used during the editing of your videos on Final Cut (think about filters, colour correctors, transitions, titles, speed,

5. Using Conventions from Real Media Texts

Whether you chose to follow or subvert conventions understanding the forms and conventions of the medium and genre within which you are working is key to the success of any media product. • Explain why conventions are so important to media texts• Explain how you found out what the conventions were for the

product you were planning (at AS+A2), and how you identified audience expectations for these

• List the forms and conventions of the medium and genre within which you worked

• Explain whether you followed or subverted these, and why you decided to do so

• How did using conventions help you achieve a successful end product?

Past Paper Essay Questions

• Describe a range of creative decisions that you made in post-production and how these decisions made a difference to the final outcomes. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills developed over time

• Explain how far your understanding of the conventions of existing media influenced the way you created your own media products. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how this understanding developed over time.

• Describe how your analysis of the conventions of real media texts informed your own creative media practice. Refer to a range of examples in your answer t o show how these skills developed over time

• Describe how you developed your skills in the use of digital technology for media production and evaluated how these skills contributed to your creative decision making. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills developed over time.

• Describe the ways in which your production work was informed by research into real media texts and how your ability to use such research for production developed over time.

• Describe how you developed research and planning skills for media production and evaluate how these skills contributed to creative decision making. Refer to a range of examples in your answer to show how these skills developed over time.

Question 1b- Deconstructing your work

This question asks you to evaluate one of your productions and evaluate it with reference to one of these concepts:• Genre• Narrative• Representation• Audience• Media Language

• You need to be able to apply each of these concepts to your work through deconstructing your text. For each of these concepts you also need to be able to discuss the importance and significance of them when producing your text

• You need to reflect on how well your project actually works as a media text- this is where audience feedback for each section is important, you should be clear about what worked and what didn’t and what you learnt from this.

• Remember micro evidence throughout- this is worth 40% of your work!

• Genre – how you have followed/subverted/worked with genre conventions, how important genre is when producing a text, audience expectations infectious

• Narrative – what structure did your video follow, how did you ‘tell a story’, how was this used to engage the audience, how did it work with the lyrics/genre?

• Representation – think about what groups you have represented in your music video, how have you portrayed them, how would the audience respond to this, what ideologies have you followed or challenged, what stereotypes have you used (remember stereotypes are extremely important in music videos as they are an easy and quick way to communicate with an audience)

• Audience –how did you target an audience and appeal to them, what research did you do into this, how did your audience respond to the text, what comments did people leave on your blog/YouTube? Theory: Uses and Gratifications, Dyer’s Utopian solutions, Maslow etc…

• Media Language- this involves you deconstructing your text and looking at how you created meaning in your music video, this would draw in the other concepts above, whilst analysing the technical side of the production work.

Assessment Criteria

• 40% - Discussion• 40% - Examples/evidence• 20% - Terminology