So after going through everyone’s ‘strong’ points in the group, I’ve pretty much been assigned to make the video, which I’ve mentioned earlier. I started on it pretty apprehensively, mostly because it’s hard to have that kind of responsibility to make something that the rest of your group will like. We all decided on a song – ‘Piece of Me’ by Britney Spears, as the soundtrack. Mia and Bronte have started helping me source clips from all over YouTube and I’ve downloaded all of those, and started putting them into Premiere Pro. I have a 40 second introductory clip of Victoria Secret models and… well I don’t want to spoil it. But if you hadn’t already guessed, our project, themed Audience, is focusing on Beauty standards by Media and its impact on individuals consuming it. So you can imagine many of the clips sourced are relating to the beauty industry – fashion, make up, dieting, etc. With those clips I’ve also got professionals giving their opinions on the impact and giving statistics – all of which I’m cutting down and editing to what we need so that when I start putting it together, the process will be a lot smoother.
Author Archives: lucywadelton
Memes? Memes.
The guest speaker, Anne Lennox, spoke to us about copyright. One of the things she said that got me (and quite a fair few other students) laughing was ‘there’s not much we can do about memes’, in reference to copyrighting laws. She made a good point though – starting initially by explaining that the gif feature in Facebook messenger is breaching laws. When we got onto the internet phenomenon that is ‘memes’, I couldn’t help but relate it to my own life. I admit it – I’m not ashamed – I love memes. All kinds. From Pepe the frog to personal inside jokes with my friends. And it’s actually pretty funny to think of something so, well, kind of stupid and ridiculous in a context so official and serious such as copyrighting laws.
I was actually a meme once, technically still am – when I posted a photo of myself last year that my dad had taken years ago, on my 9th birthday surrounding a barbie laptop with my 4 other best friends. I had always found the photo kind of funny, because our expressions were ridiculously uh – bitchy, I guess is the word. The picture went pretty viral – currently it has over 260,000 notes on the website I originally posted it on and countless other hits and likes and comments on Facebook, Instagram and the iFunny app (I only know this because people kept sending me links with the photo edited with different hilarious captions), reposted endlessly to the point that I can’t even keep up.
But the funniest part of it, and what relates back to what Anne Lennox was telling us about copyright, is that my dad is a professional photographer and now one of his works was an internet sensation. He was a little confused by it (memes aren’t exactly his generation’s thing) and especially frustrated with how quickly people repost and re-blog a photo without crediting the artist (even if it was a private at home photo rather than one of his official works). That’s the thing with the internet and copyright, sources are very easily lost in the feed.
What is copyright?
We had a guest speaker come in yesterday and talk to us about Copyright. I found it all very interesting, and I can tell I’m going to be caught up in it as I go through my degree. It’s all very confusing. First off, copyright is automatic, it is law – Commonwealth Law to be exact. In other words, as soon as you create content, you don’t need to add any ã for it to be copyrighted, nor are there any registration requirements in Australia. However, facts and ideas aren’t protected by copyright – so you can’t have an idea for say, I don’t know, a boy wizard with a lightning scar and expect that you will win a law suit against J.K. Rowling for writing the Harry Potter series (though I’ve seen a few idiots attempt it).
Ideas can only be protected if you mark with a statement like ‘the information in this folder is confidential and must not be used without first obtaining (name) written consent’.
Why do we need audiences?
Audiences are pretty important, but why? Who actually cares? Advertisers, commercial broadcasters, Cable networks, production houses, individual program makers, government policy makers, social scientists/psychologists and cultural theorists – that’s who!
Essentially, if we didn’t have audiences, we wouldn’t have media to begin with. Because what’s pushing creators to produce media that people aren’t going to view/watch/consume? Audiences help generate income and product value – fans of bands increase their net worth, ratings of TV shows decide whether they get a second season, and so on. Like a sort of domino affect – audiences exist to consume media, and media exists to be consumed by audiences.
Fandomonium!
In today’s lecture we got to touch on audience a little, which was good for me and my PB4 group because that’s the topic assigned to us. It was toward the end of the lecture, so we didn’t spend a whole lot of time on it, but what Brian did say was quite useful. First off, we talked about what audiences are – active audiences being participants of media consumption, from fans and fandoms to ‘mass’ audience (though Brian assures us that term is a little outdated now).
I think the element of that demographic that stuck out for me the most was fans and fandoms – which I would be lying if I said I didn’t consider myself a fan of at least one Media platform (I am a teenage girl after all).
Fandoms interest me a lot, when I consider them from the outside rather than as just a subjective participant in one. There’s a lot of elements of fandoms that are like a sub-culture – a group of people with one common interest, who band together to create something unique and special to them. Fandoms host hoards of talent – from writers (fan-fictions) to artists (fan-art). Fandoms grow and develop together, from the very beginning of something – say a show pilot – to the very end. Some fandoms go on for years after something has become dormant, this is most true in the Harry Potter fandom, which continues to be a major online platform for millions of different people around the world.
Fandomania (puns, puns, puns!) is something that has struck probably everybody my age – you’d have to be truly embarrassed to say you don’t belong to a fandom. Because really, fandoms are everywhere – think about the 60’s and the Beatles – that was its own fandom minus the internet component. There are different levels of intensity of course, like, my mum watches Escape to the Country but that doesn’t mean she goes on her laptop to an online community to discuss the latest cottage shown on the show. No, the very depths of fandoms tend to be reserved for content aimed at teenagers and young adults – things like bands, One direction for example, and movie series’ like Marvel and DC.
I think Fandom culture is something very new and should be explored, especially in relation to media producers and audiences in this day and age.
What is Audience?
This week’s workshop was cancelled, which is a shame, but my group took the time to discuss and research for the upcoming project anyway. We’re doing audience, and if I’m honest we’re all a little collectively confused by the brief. There’s still a lot of time until it’s due, but we wanted to start brainstorming now because we don’t want the time to run away with us. Everyone did a little research on what audio/video essays actually are, which I didn’t know about at all before this brief. I found some really helpful video explanations of things. We also did some research just on Audience – our topic – which I feel slightly more confident with. I actually did quite a bit of audience related work in Year 12 Media, so I wrote a list of some things I could remember just off the top of my head. Here it is!
Audience is an individual or collective group of people who consume media texts. This consumption can be categorised in a variety of ways. Over the years, many theories have been developed in order to ascribe types of media consumption and media influence from the perspective of said audiences.
Some well known theories are the Hypodermic Needle Theory – the theory that suggest audiences are entirely dictated by the media they consume, the Agenda-Setting Function theory – which believes media cannot decide what people think but can ascribe what to think about.
Audiences can be radio listeners, television viewers and movie goers. Audiences occur whenever there is media to consume – from advertisement to novels.
Terms like ‘target audiences’ exist in order to create media specific to a type of individual which the media creator wants to view their product. For example, the movie Frozen has a target audience age of children, and possibly even of gender. Target audiences are also important when it comes to rating the appropriateness of a film, novel or TV show. That’s when ratings from G – General, to R18+ are used to tell people what media is consumable for them. Target audiences (and audiences overall) help categorise media and make it profitable. Without audiences, media cannot make money or even be produced in the first place, as there would be nobody to consume it.
There are several types of audiences, ranging from impressionable to sceptical when it comes to the level of influence media has on them.
Film Festival!
Last week we sat down for a ‘film festival’ screening of everyone’s interview shorts. This would have been terrifying enough for me, only we were divided into groups and allocated ‘thinking hats’ (green, red, yellow, black) in which we’d have to talk to the class about what we thought. I have a huge fear of public speaking, even in such a laid back setting. As a result, I got a little nervous and stumbled on my words a few times when directly addressed, but I’ll live.
My group went first.
We watched Luka’s film “Filthy Rat Bag” – the name alone was intriguing to me. I really liked the relevancy of this topic – social media and art are elements I really enjoyed. I liked the informality of it, too and just everything that the girl was talking about made me think which was good! I would have liked to have seen some more footage of the actual interviewee, personally.
Second was Alec’s “Head Trauma”, which was about a man who experienced memory loss. I really enjoyed the experimental art-house feel of this one, and the eerie quality of the music and footage accompanying his explanation of what it felt like to have head trauma. One thing to change might be not to have the audio still running while the credits roll.
Then Anna’s – “Olivia” – which was probably my favourite, though I really loved everyone else’s. I think the subject matter attracted me the most, because I have always been very passionate about LGBT+ issues and the concepts, especially about gender expression and perception of femineity and what makes someone a woman, were very interesting. If I had to say anything negative, it’d be that some shots seemed a little overused/repetitive.
Lastly in the group (before myself) was Jasmine’s “Healthy Clean Times” – which was really uplifting. I enjoyed the use of animated found footage – which hadn’t really been used by anyone else. The only downside to this was the unusual backdrop to the actual interview – old bookcase – which didn’t seem to fit the atmosphere of the whole project.
After our group a number of people showed theirs too – we got around to almost everyone and I was really delighted and interested in every film shown! Well done class!
Vivre Sa Vie
Vivre Sa Vie was a very interesting screening choice. Going into it, I was very tired, or at least the movie made me feel tired. I know I sort of nodded off once or twice for a few minutes and I had to shake my friend awake twice too. I think sometimes subtitles do that to you, coupled with the black and white and the long, exhausting shots without breaks. Overall, I liked the aesthetic of the film, especially the cinematography. I was a huge fan of the lead actress, she was radiant on screen, despite my misgivings about other elements of the plot and so forth. I enjoyed listening to the French language and the experimental nature of the use of audio, which was the focus this week to begin with.
Some of the audio aspects that intrigued me the most was the lack of backing track in terms of instrumental sound. I think a majority of the film was relatively silent in that regard (minus of course dialogue and atmospheric sounds). The scene that stuck out for me the most was the dancing scene in which Nana dances around the men to an up-beat instrumental song playing on the radio. I really enjoyed that sequence, I thought it was a very clever use of sound when the rest of the film very deliberately lacked in such a thing. I think because of the quietude of a majority of the film, these particular scenes are emphasized and noticed more by the audience. The scenes with the most unusual amount of sounds are the ones I remembered – firstly the dance sequence, secondly the balloon miming and lastly the gun shooting.
Mystery Road
During last week’s seminar we had an interesting discussion about narrative, notably in relation to the movie we watched the day before, ‘Mystery Road’. Personally, I was a fan of the film simply because it was Australian, which is hard to come by. There were a few times that it lost me, especially in the shoot out and the overall discovering of who killed the girl, but it was easy to overlook when the film was just so beautifully shot.
The opening title is apart of the film, which is interesting considering most would simply superimpose. It’s the sign of Mystery Road itself and the clouds are parted enough to make out the silhouette. When the frame gets tighter though, the cloud shrouds the ‘road’ part, so that you can only read mystery. I thought that was a very clever way of indicating the thematic concerns of the film before it had even opened on the first scene.
I have to admit; narrative confuses me a little. Things like inferred events (when something is talked about but not shown and usually takes place before the plot chronologically) are relatively easy to understand. But when it comes to the difference between plot and narrative, I get a little hazy.
From what I can tell, narrative includes objects, place and people that all help illustrate the plot. I think! In Mystery Road, this would be things like the girl’s necklace and phone, which are clues to her death which is the whole plot. Place would be obvious – Mystery Road and outback Australia in general. People would be Jay, the protagonist, whose perspective is established within minutes of the opening scene.
Enemy of the State
I’m a little behind when it comes to talking about the movies we’ve been watching. A few weeks ago we watched Enemy of the State. I was sick that day (as I was most of the week), so I attempted to watch it from home – on Netflix – between bouts of feeling ill.
I’ve always been a fan of action films, especially the post-apocalyptic kind, but this was an exception for me. Maybe it was my short attention span that particular day, but I found the film dull and repetitive and I barely finished it.
I also happened to still be sick the following day, during which we apparently discussed editing in relation to the film. I’m going to have to just try and think about this with what small amount of editing we learnt in year 12 Media.
In a lot of scenes quick cuts back and forth are used to heighten the pace of the film and to add tension. This is done several times in The Enemy of the State, particularly chase scenes and fight scenes. Cutting back and forth helps create a sense of urgency, where the audience have little time to settle on a shot/angle before it changes to the next.
The film also utilised establishing shots to demonstrate the surveillance of Will Smith’s character throughout. By using these long shots we’re privy to the POV of the people trying to catch Smith’s character. Even though I personally didn’t enjoy the film, I thought these two uses of editing were really integral.