...: Double Award Students: What next?

Wednesday, 4 January 2012

Double Award Students: What next?

Having looked at what you have compiled in your Research and Planning over the past 3 months(!!) I thought I would put together a timetable for you to follow.

Research and Planning is to be complete by February 10th- HALF TERM
This should consist of 5 parts:

1. The Issues

initial research into current issues of 'Healthy Lifestyles' - mind maps
analysis of newspaper articles and reports on chosen issue- annotated
facts and statistics, reasons and solutions

This Research should come from both secondary (internet searches, news, TV) and primary (questionnaires, interviews, focus groups, on line forums) methods and should consist of analysis of findings.

2. The Target Audience

profile of target audience to target
social make up of chosen audience- ACORN, Hartley and Fiske etc.
analysis of media products TA responds to (with statistical evidence) and which they are ignorant of- MOST and LEAST effective
analysis of methods of approaching your specific TA ( fear/humour/care/celebs/shock) including strengths and weaknesses of these methods
what MESSAGE do your TA most need to hear ( health, legal, socail, economic)

3a. The Campaign

potential conceptual ideas within each media platform (products, mode of address, conventions, costs)
investigation of similar products and lists of codes and conventions to follow
mood boards
colour schemes and layout mock ups
typography and major font schemes
slogans/taglines/call to action
design of logo
key facts to use
selection of mode of address
scamps- sample rough mock ups
visual style
key iconography
links and integration of media platforms

3b. The Treatment

The term ‘treatment’ is used across all media forms and platforms to which it refers to designate a short, accessible proposal capable of communicating the key ideas of a project to an interested party such as a commissioning editor or potential financial backer. It is often only one side of A4 paper.

4. Presentation (Date: 18th February)

powerpoint slides- with annotations reflecting client feedback
set of speaker notes
observation/feedback sheet signed by client
mock ups presented to client

5. Pre Production

scripts (radio or moving image)
storyboards (moving image)
schedules
production requirement lists
flat palns for print work
website navigation maps
drafts and rough sketches
photo shoots
placement of campaign products and costings

Only once all this is completed and you have presented and pitched to the client should you start work on the final products. You will then have 8 weeks in which to complete your practical components.

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Why Media Studies IS an academic subject.

Every now and then, Media Studies gets what is ironically called “a bad press”.

Even after a general election in which the media played a pivotal role (television debates, the 24-hour news feeding off the corpse of Gordon Brown after his accidental on-mic comment, the on-screen worm during the debates etc.), even after all that, Media Studies gets described as a “Mickey Mouse subject”.

It would be hilarious if it wasn’t so serious. We live in a mediated world, a reality constructed around us and constantly filtered through the media. Although you might experience some of reality directly (in an unmediated way), your response to that reality is inevitably informed by your exposure to the modern media. When you see yourself in the mirror, do you not judge yourself by the standards of beauty and style laid down by the fashion and beauty industries?

When someone is innocently taking pictures of kids playing in the park, are we suspicious that they’re up to no good? In our relationships with each other, do we take people at face value, or do we make judgements based on the way we think they should be? When we desire consumer goods, why is that exactly? Why do we want things? How does that happen?

We get soundbite politics – because of the media. We get personality politics – because of the media. We learn to act the way we do – because of the media. We learn to talk the way we do – because of the media. We get turned on, we get excited, we get angry, we laugh and we cry – because of the media. We became convinced that Gordon Brown wasn’t up to the job – because of the media. We panic about vaccines, medicines, food, drink, sunshine – because of the media.

To understand how things happen, why they happen, and why they keep happening is, for me, a fit subject of study.

None of this is to mention the skills you develop in Media Studies – skills in writing, editing, analysis, research, design, publishing, video and audio editing/mixing, project management, people skills etc. – which are incredibly useful and incredibly transferrable. One of the things you often hear from the media who give Media Studies a bad press is that, “Anyway, there are no jobs, there are too many people coming through and they won’t get jobs in the media.”

Well. Either it’s a Mickey Mouse subject, or it’s “too hard”, a demanding and impossible industry to get into. Which is it? It’s like saying you shouldn’t study Physics because you won’t get a job at CERN; or that you shouldn’t study law because you won’t get to be a “top barrister”. If you study English and you don’t do so at Oxford or Cambridge, what are your chances of getting a “top job”?

The transferrable skills you learn in Media Studies will equip you for working life, whatever you end up doing. And most of you will end up doing several jobs.

So. Next time someone scoffs at Media Studies, ask them this: when did you last go a day without being exposed to the media, in print and on screen? When did you last have an opinion of your own making?

Next time someone calls it a Mickey Mouse subject, ask them this: who owns the Mouse? What other companies do they own? What was the turnover of this company last year? Which member of the board of this company is also a member of the board of another huge company? How does one business relate to the other? How influential are they? Who are their competitors? How does this competition benefit or harm consumers? What ideology does the company who owns the mouse try to impose upon the world? Why do they do this?

Mickey Mouse subject?

View more presentations from Rob McMinn.

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Wednesday, 4 January 2012