As a part of my A2 Media Studies, I was asked to complete a coursework task counting for 50% of my marks for A2.

The brief given to us said that we were to produce the opening 5 minutes of a TV documentary as the main task; this would be marked out of 40. There were 2 ancillary tasks also, which consisted of a radio trailer (marked out of 10) and finally, a double page spread article to advertise our documentary. The ancillary products are designed to back up or support our documentary. As we were only to produce the opening 5 minutes of the documentary, we had to ensure that there was a sufficient amount of research into similar products as well as planning, in order to make sure that the documentary was of its best quality.

Documentary Modes - The opening 5 minutes of our documentary has to demonstrate that we
had researched enough about documentary modes as well as common conventions/elements. In briefly studying Bill Nicholls theory of Documentary Modes (2001) he describes a selected number of types/styles under which a documentary can fall; poetic, participatory, reflexive, performative, observational and expositional. It is important to note that in practice, documentaries can contain a mixture of the elements featured in different modes. The poetic mode was said to be used by early documentary filmmakers in the 1920s with modernist ideas. This mode stresses the mood and tone of the piece, and also tends to be quite subjective. The expositor y or expositional mode tends to address the viewer directly as well as emphasising on the impression of objectivity. This mode can use a voiceof-God commentary, where the speaker is heard but never seen. Finally this mode uses footage to strengthen the spoken narrative through cutaways during an interview for example. The observational mode is different in that it follows the subject around with a fly on the wall style due to the less intrusive manner of which it is filmed in. Nichols remains somewhat unclear about the performative and participatory mode, as both utilise the filmmaker in the story. The difference lies within the idea that in the participatory mode, the filmmaker attempts to construct truths that seem self-evident to anyone; however the performative mode creates subjective truths (only significant to the filmmaker him/herself). A good example of this is Morgan Spurlocks Super Size Me . Finally the reflexive mode tries to demonstrate the issues of realism and representation in a documentary, encouraging the audience to view the piece in a more objective fashion. In conclusion, I believe that our documentary follows the conventions of the expository mode mostly, due to the use of the voice-of-God (or voice-ofauthority) commentary and the direct address attached to it. Our documentary also emphasises objectivity in that we present different sides of opinions and stories in the featured voxpops, as well as developing possible solutions to the issue of maintaining a fit & healthy lifestyle. Some of our shots use an observational mode such as cutaways of the public on the Solihull high street, as these shots stay in the action with the subjects whilst remaining as unobtrusive as possible.

Narrative Structure - The narrative structure of our documentary is quite linear in that there is a
clearly developed solution to the issue raised at the beginning. Unlike other media such as Pulp Fiction(1994) where the chronology is broken up, documentaries tend to follow a linear structure so

that information is not misconstrued; it usually involves introducing a problem and this drives the documentary forwards. The documentary is very rhetorical, mainly using an argumentation scheme of appealing to authority. We effectively achieve this scheme by presenting voxpops firstly upon the response of a question, followed immediately by the expert (Jez Ingram) to offer their opinion which is more likely to be accepted due to his reliability and expertise in the field. Another scheme we used was problem-solving, which was applied by asking a question about health & fitness, followed by revealing solutions through voxpops and clips of our interview with an expert. This use of the public in voxpops combined with clips the interview are effective in providing a positive solution to the problems addressed, which reinforced our underlying argument that health & fitness can be achieved in a typical modern life.

Codes - Overall our documentary uses the enigmatic code, in that it develops an argument and offers
viable solutions but fails to provide a solid solution tailored to fit anyones lifestyle as we all differ in that respect. Further along in the documentary, more idea could possibly be explored and discussed but its almost inevitable that somebody wont be able to follow all/some of the solutions provided, therefore the fundamental question of how hard is it achieve a fit & healthy lifestyle? is eventually left unanswered because it depends upon our lifestyles. The enigmatic code is useful in that we present an issue early on in the documentary, leaving the audience gripped upon how this issue can be resolved.

Shot Types - Through the early stages of the A2 Media Studies course I have watched a number of
documentaries in order to begin the preparation of making our own. Although every documentary differs in its own way, they all follow codes/conventions of other documentaries. In order to produce an authentic piece, we had to be sure to know many of the codes/conventions used, with a key focus being the types and framing of shots. Super Size Me (2004) was a documentary very similar concept-wise and so it was only right to follow several conventions of this piece. Examples of some of the shot types we used can be seen below. This shot type was able to set the scene on this occasion for the interview with the expert in the field, Jez Ingram.

The OTS shot used here allowed us to give the audience a different perspective of the scene with the subject purchasing a burger.

This shot is perfect for voxpops and interviews as it allowed us to show the face more clearly to the audience, without being uncomfortably close.

The close-up was also used frequently throughout the documentary as it was a great way to tightly frame detailed subjects and link them into a broader context this particular one was linked to healthy supplements. The main shot used was most likely the medium close-up shot (MCU) due to our opening 5 minutes comprising of many voxpops and excerpts from the interview with our expert, Jez Ingram. The shot was used on many occasions not only to due the framing aspect in that most voxpops and interviews are framed using the rule of thirds, but it also allowed the audience to see facial expressions more clearly. We also used two different methods of stabilising the camera through using handheld shots and using a tripod. The only time we used a handheld shot was when we shot an OTS shot of our subject purchasing a burger on the Solihull high street. We did this because we had no time to put up a tripod and there was a lack of space also. The rest of the time we used a tripod as it was steadier and would provide us with the quality we needed to make our product authentic. Whereas the handheld camera had its benefits in that it was a bit more fly on the wall, we were more concerned with the ability use skills such as panning, tracking and zooming in an industry standard fashion using the equipment provided. Unfortunately we didnt have a dolly track available and so I believe we didnt include any tracking shots as they would have been too jittery, but we made use of panning and zooming as well as throwing focus on many of our cutaways.

A main convention used as I highlighted earlier is the use of the rule of thirds, where particularly the interview shots are framed so that the subject is a third of the way in from either side (in this case the left) and with their roughly their eye line meeting a third of the way down (shown by orange marker). The subject is also conventionally to be looking into the dead space, that is where there is empty space either side of the camera depending on which side the subject is positioned/seated.

Sound - Another key focus was the area surrounding sound, which is vital to get right. Sounds could
include background music, voiceover, presenter, diagetic and non-diagetic sounds. Where as Super Size Me uses a presenter as well as a voiceover, we just used a voiceover as I feel that the use of a presenter is to become more personal with the audience however our documentary isnt supposed to appeal to much emotion as it is more informative and so it seemed unnecessary. The voiceover was scripted and then recorded in a fashion that it wasnt too dynamic and over the top, and that it didnt use Received Pronunciation because we wanted to appeal our intended target audience. Background music was also an issue for us as documentaries such as Super Size Me were able to use copyrighted music such as Queens Fat Bottomed Girls and so would have a comical link to the topic that they were dealing with. Unfortunately we couldnt use any copyrighted music and we were also setting out with a more serious tone than of Super Size Me and so we opted to use a website called www.freeplaymusic.com in order to obtain some background music. We commonly followed a convention to link the music to the topic and so it seemed only fitting to have a quite funky upbeat tracks running throughout the documentary. The first track is a reproduction of Green Onions from a member of the group, and the second track is entitled Super Babe Groove from the website mentioned earlier. The looped music certainly thickened the documentary sound-wise and was effective in maintaining a lively feel.

Research We knew it was very important to research

into our topic of health & fitness before pursuing solutions to issues we had thought of. A key element of Super Size Me is that there is a vast amount of first and second hand research that went into finding out facts and figures to shock their audience; however we were going for a different approach in our documentary. Similarly to Super Size Me, our documentary presents some worrying news in the opening five minutes, only ours concerns a purposed 20% rise in VAT on supplementation designed to support and encourage a healthier lifestyle. This could discourage the nation to aspire to a fitter and healthier lifestyle and so presents an issue we could discuss further in the documentary.

Special Effects There are an abundance of special effects used in Super Size Me and so it seemed
logical to use a fair amount in our documentary, by enhancing the visuals rather than overpowering them. Firstly a subtle special effect is used on the title screen where the shot is deliberately blurred and also slowed down by changing the speed of the clip to around 50%. The idea behind it in my eyes is to show that societys thoughts and lives are so blurry nowadays and we get lost in jobs and commitments that set us loose on poor diets and bad habits. The idea of slowing the clip down was to almost stop time; to get the audience to step back and think about what is going on in their lifestyle with regards to juggling commitments & responsibilities, and how they could work around it. Another effective use of special effects was with the graphics positioned around Jez Ingram during the interview. Examples of these graphic effects can be seen below. These effects are intended to introduce Jez as a reliable source of information (from his job title) and to break down his ideas into a easier format for the audience to digest.

Magazine Article
Our final double page spread can be seen to the right. We produced it to be featured in the Radio Times after looking through various different TV listings magazines to gather a list of conventions and codes we were to follow when producing our double page article. Our ancillary products have to be consistent with the main product (the documentary) and so must carry the same tone and vibe about them. The spread at a glance looks simple but serious and down-to-earth. It is sensible to assume that many of the common codes and conventions have been used through the product as it quite clearly appears aesthetically authentic. Often double page spreads consist of one main image with the body text wrapped tightly around the subject, however we adopted an approach similar to one of the articles that I analysed in the research & planning section, which uses several images with the main image dragging across roughly two thirds of the page and stretching half way down. The article pictured left is almost a template on which we built our double page spread. Common conventions such as a masthead, drop cap, pull quote, page number, main/secondary imagery, date, publisher, quote line, columns, programme name, channel and viewing time have been used as I will show next.

Drop Cap A common convention of magazine articles and text based media is the use of a drop cap at the beginning of a piece of writing. This was used to create the authentic feel of professional text based media.

Page Number, date and publisher Aligned right and left at the bottom corners of each page are the page number and also the date and publisher. This is very generic and conventional.

Columns conventionally articles use columns as a means of organising text, and so here we have applied this technique to organise our body text by separating them into 4 even columns. Body Text The body of the article describes a summary of the documentary and further discusses the contents of it. This is used to give the reader an insight into to documentary, hopefully persuading them to watch it.

As you can see, we have used as many conventions of real media products as we could in our final ancillary product.

Radio Trailer
For the second of part of the ancillary tasks we were to produce a radio trailer, and so it was evident that we needed to study the common conventions of radio trailers as well as ones that may be similar to ours. I listened to the radio trails advertising Stephen Frys English Delight as well as the advertisement for the BBC 5 Live Grand Prix. With our choice of software being GarageBand, we set out to create an appealing radio trailer for our target audience.

Voiceover- As the main voiceover I had to be sure that my tone of voice

was easily audible and made sure that the topic didnt seem dull or boring. It was also important to be rid any stutters or erms in the voiceover, but gotten rid of in the editing stage with ease by simply cutting the extracts down. We used a question directly after a brief use of three extracts; the listeners

were more likely to be immediately drawn into the topic this way. My voice was clear, and although we challenged a convention by panning the voiceover to the left, we believed that the extracts were much more easily distinguishable this way; making features more clear and distinguishable was agreed by the group to be a foot in the right direction. Also we used a change of voiceover to introduce the final piece of information; the date, time and channel of viewing for the documentary. This was very conventional and so we stuck to it to ensure the greatest level of authenticity.

Sound Effects -Due to the fact that our radio trail was to be aired to a more mature audience, we
found it only fitting to be more subtle about any sound effects being used. However, with a lack of sound effects in the trail, we kept the atmosphere lively with the help of background music. Sound effects would have only complicated our radio trail, and the last thing we wanted was for our audience to be unclear about any information given in the trail due to overpowering sound effects distorting more important tracks. We also chose not to include ambient sounds for this reason also.

Music Throughout the extract we used a song from

the website mentioned before called www.freeplaymusic.com as this would be copyright free and so enabled us to use it in our trail as a source of background music. We had the track Funky Peppers playing at a lower volume than of the voiceover as to be certain that we were prioritising the most important features of the trail. We needed to strike a balance and make sure that our audience werent bored by the piece and so this was agreed to be a solid solution to thicken the sound of the trail.

Tracks Overall we used two tracks, with one being

the voiceover and extracts track and the second was dedicated solely to the background music. This enabled us to follow common media conventions in that we could lower the volume of the background music during any speech to enhance the audibility of the voice.

Length - After studying the common length of most radio trailers we found that the conventional
length was between 30 to 40 seconds. We made certain to have our trailer run somewhere in-between this time frame and did so, resulting in a 38 second trailer. This was found to be a perfect length as it allowed to us to utilise a voiceover, plenty of extracts and music to get our message across in a concise manner. To conclude evaluation on our radio trail, we made sure to stick to main conventions even though we challenge one by panning the voiceover and extracts differently, but we did this with good reason. We made sure to be more simple and concise rather than over the top as this was what our target audience would be more interested in hearing. We believed in this case that simple was effective and so we hope that by following only the necessary conventions that we achieved this.