Q. In what ways does your media products use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Indoors alter Outdoors, there's is so much work that lies behind the creation of this logo and what it represents. To begin with, the concept behind the documentary was to identify the change in the preferences of children from outdoor activities to those of the indoor activities. This documentary was created to capture this transformation among the young generation.
When looking at the concept and the title in depth, many could refer it to the concept of Binary Opposition, by the famous theorist Levis Strautt whose theories on narrative are being studied by many students of Media Studies in particular. It consisted of the concept of opposites that people witness in many films e.g. good and bad, truth and lie, i.e. where there's bad there's always good in narratives we see. So, accordingly, we have created Indoors alter Outdoors, with great emphasis of the key terms INDOORS and OUTDOORS, comparison between the two ends of a concept, which we have tried to portray in our work.
Before working on the documentary, we did a lot of research on how a documentary is made. This research guided us towards the codes and conventions of making a documentary. It was imperative for us to study these as they are the key components with which a documentary is brought into form. The codes and conventions were studied and identified in several documentaries and posted on the blog under the headings of genres and de-construction of documentaries. Although, different in nature but in the end all these genres are basically documentaries, due to which there is a lot common among them. After the extensive research, Sabaina and I were fully equipped with the knowledge of making a documentary with the aid of the codes and conventions that were necessary for us to incorporate in our work. While watching our documentary, the viewers will witness a number of codes and conventions that we followed in the documentary.
There are a number of ways to introduce the title and production house logo in the documentary. These two play a very important part in the creation of any media text due to which it is significant in informing the viewers about these two. The title connotes the concept of any media text and the production house logo informs the viewers about the company who has invested its resources and time in bringing a product to existence. In some documentaries we get to see the title at the end before the credits list appears; this plays the role of summing up the entire video into two to three words which re-informs the audience about the story of the media product. Whereas, in others there is always an introduction clip which represents a number of clips that the viewers get to watch in further development of the media text and the narrator narrates the concept of the media text to explain the viewers about it and then the title suddenly appears. We have used this approach. With help of a montage of different pictures that connotes the story of the documentary, we told the audience to some extent about the concept and then introduced the production logo and the channel it is being aired on, followed by the logo of the documentary in three different slides to create an impact and put emphasis on each and every word on the logo of the documentary.
We started the documentary with a quote, at beginning. This could be seen in a lot of documentaries all over that display a quote at the beginning in reference to the entire concept behind the creation of a documentary. This quote was displayed infornt of a clip of a girl taking swings in a ground. These two elements contrasted with each other as the quote described the impact of one of the components that transferred children from outdoor activities to those of indoors and the background was of an outdoor activities. This scene established both the ends of the topic our documentary.
All the documentaries produced by many people create a starting in a way that leads the viewers to the main element footage of the documentary. The beginning is molded in a way that comprises of all the elements on which a documentary is based on. We have done that and the tactic we prepared to familiarize our audience with the topic was by putting a number of clips from both the key components i.e. Indoors and Outdoors, in particular, the shot of the little girl on the swing and the teenagers playing football, signifying outdoor activities and on the other end, macro-shots of people using mobile phones etc., to relate to the Indoor activities. This was backed up with the narration which was transformed into questions regarding the topic of the documentary in order to make the audience curious to know more. These clips, with the help of narration, drives the audience towards the interviews which further explains the background of the our media text.
Then come the interviews. Every documentary has interviews, which are opinions and views taken by the survey population in order to get their perceptions regarding the topic in light, considering that documentaries provide information. We took interviews from a number people who we believed came under the target audience of ours. These interviews were very helpful, indeed. We obtained a lot of information from these on the concept of our documentary. The interviews were incorporated in the documentary at the beginning. They played a role of establishing the concept of the documentary. Furthermore, we took detailed interviews of the main character Dawood and asked him of his change in preferences from outdoors to indoors and why is it that way to give more information to the audience. And wealso interviewed his parents asking them bout the activities of their time and how they take this habit of Dawood of staying indoors all doors all the time.
In accordance to the codes and conventions, there was narration in our documentary. Almost every documentary comprises of narration. Narration guides the audience throughout the entire product and provides with the necessary information on the topic in consideration. We began the narration with the help of questions that were based on the concept of the documentary. These questions were used to:
The cinematography was done in accordance to the codes and conventions. We took mid-shots of all the interviewees in order to put more emphasis on them while speaking to the audience. We took candid shots of Dawood to show the viewers what he actually does in real life. The use of macro- shots was made to put the hint of body language of the interviewees while addressing the audience in order to make it more effective.
However, we have challenged the codes and conventions at one point of the documentary. This was done at the very beginning where we have placed a montage of different pictures that comprises of elements that describe the concept of our media text. Picture montages are very rare to see and we have used this different approach to try something new and start the documentary with very strong imagery and editing to create an impact that would compel the viewers into further watching the documentary.
Indoors alter Outdoors, there's is so much work that lies behind the creation of this logo and what it represents. To begin with, the concept behind the documentary was to identify the change in the preferences of children from outdoor activities to those of the indoor activities. This documentary was created to capture this transformation among the young generation.
When looking at the concept and the title in depth, many could refer it to the concept of Binary Opposition, by the famous theorist Levis Strautt whose theories on narrative are being studied by many students of Media Studies in particular. It consisted of the concept of opposites that people witness in many films e.g. good and bad, truth and lie, i.e. where there's bad there's always good in narratives we see. So, accordingly, we have created Indoors alter Outdoors, with great emphasis of the key terms INDOORS and OUTDOORS, comparison between the two ends of a concept, which we have tried to portray in our work.
Before working on the documentary, we did a lot of research on how a documentary is made. This research guided us towards the codes and conventions of making a documentary. It was imperative for us to study these as they are the key components with which a documentary is brought into form. The codes and conventions were studied and identified in several documentaries and posted on the blog under the headings of genres and de-construction of documentaries. Although, different in nature but in the end all these genres are basically documentaries, due to which there is a lot common among them. After the extensive research, Sabaina and I were fully equipped with the knowledge of making a documentary with the aid of the codes and conventions that were necessary for us to incorporate in our work. While watching our documentary, the viewers will witness a number of codes and conventions that we followed in the documentary.
There are a number of ways to introduce the title and production house logo in the documentary. These two play a very important part in the creation of any media text due to which it is significant in informing the viewers about these two. The title connotes the concept of any media text and the production house logo informs the viewers about the company who has invested its resources and time in bringing a product to existence. In some documentaries we get to see the title at the end before the credits list appears; this plays the role of summing up the entire video into two to three words which re-informs the audience about the story of the media product. Whereas, in others there is always an introduction clip which represents a number of clips that the viewers get to watch in further development of the media text and the narrator narrates the concept of the media text to explain the viewers about it and then the title suddenly appears. We have used this approach. With help of a montage of different pictures that connotes the story of the documentary, we told the audience to some extent about the concept and then introduced the production logo and the channel it is being aired on, followed by the logo of the documentary in three different slides to create an impact and put emphasis on each and every word on the logo of the documentary.
All the documentaries produced by many people create a starting in a way that leads the viewers to the main element footage of the documentary. The beginning is molded in a way that comprises of all the elements on which a documentary is based on. We have done that and the tactic we prepared to familiarize our audience with the topic was by putting a number of clips from both the key components i.e. Indoors and Outdoors, in particular, the shot of the little girl on the swing and the teenagers playing football, signifying outdoor activities and on the other end, macro-shots of people using mobile phones etc., to relate to the Indoor activities. This was backed up with the narration which was transformed into questions regarding the topic of the documentary in order to make the audience curious to know more. These clips, with the help of narration, drives the audience towards the interviews which further explains the background of the our media text.
Then come the interviews. Every documentary has interviews, which are opinions and views taken by the survey population in order to get their perceptions regarding the topic in light, considering that documentaries provide information. We took interviews from a number people who we believed came under the target audience of ours. These interviews were very helpful, indeed. We obtained a lot of information from these on the concept of our documentary. The interviews were incorporated in the documentary at the beginning. They played a role of establishing the concept of the documentary. Furthermore, we took detailed interviews of the main character Dawood and asked him of his change in preferences from outdoors to indoors and why is it that way to give more information to the audience. And wealso interviewed his parents asking them bout the activities of their time and how they take this habit of Dawood of staying indoors all doors all the time.
In accordance to the codes and conventions, there was narration in our documentary. Almost every documentary comprises of narration. Narration guides the audience throughout the entire product and provides with the necessary information on the topic in consideration. We began the narration with the help of questions that were based on the concept of the documentary. These questions were used to:
- create an impact
- establish the topic to some extent
- create curiosity among the answers and persuade them to discover the answers to the questions by watching the whole documentary
Furthermore, to give real life example of the concept to the target audience, we followed a kid named Dawood throughout the day. This could be seen in many documentaries in which the camera follows the people who are an example of the point they try to give information on. I believe that this makes the content even stronger than giving opinions of different people as the people who can relate themselves to a particular situation can best explain what they experience in it.
The cinematography was done in accordance to the codes and conventions. We took mid-shots of all the interviewees in order to put more emphasis on them while speaking to the audience. We took candid shots of Dawood to show the viewers what he actually does in real life. The use of macro- shots was made to put the hint of body language of the interviewees while addressing the audience in order to make it more effective.
However, we have challenged the codes and conventions at one point of the documentary. This was done at the very beginning where we have placed a montage of different pictures that comprises of elements that describe the concept of our media text. Picture montages are very rare to see and we have used this different approach to try something new and start the documentary with very strong imagery and editing to create an impact that would compel the viewers into further watching the documentary.
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