A2 G325 Section A: Qu 1a prompt questions

For this question (1a) you discuss both FOUNDATION AND ADVANCED production portfolios. For question 1b you focus on one production only.

The following prompt questions should help you to organise your thinking (and hopefully revision notes) for Section A, question 1a.

Digital Technology

• How has digital technology helped you to capture your ideas for media production?

• What benefits do digital technologies offer? Are there any disadvantages?

• How did digital technology influence your work in post-production – for example in the creation of video effects, or the manipulation of images.

• How have your skills with digital technology developed, and how has this influenced your productions?

• What role might digital technology play in the distribution of work such as yours?



Creativity

• What features of your work would you say are original to you?

• Which media texts and producers have influenced your creative decisions?

• How successfully does your work engage its audience and provoke its interest?

• Consider some of the creative choices you had to make during the course of your production – how to use cameras, lighting, dialogue, colour etc. How did you make these decisions, and how did these contribute to the final production?



Research and planning

• How did your research into genre contribute to your production work?

• How did your research into audience contribute to your production work?

• How did your research into institutions responsible for the production and regulation of the media influence your production work?

• What pre-production planning techniques did you employ (scripting, storyboarding, shot-lists etc.)? How effective was your planning – how did it help you in the production phase?

• What did you learn from planning your first production that helped you to improve your planning for the second?

• How did you use audience feedback to influence your production work while it was in progress?



Post-production

• How much of your text was ‘created’ only in post-production?

• What technologies did you use to modify your raw material. How did this change the meaning of your work?

• How much did you manipulate sync sound or create new sound for your text? What effect did that have on your text?

• How much of your footage ended up ‘on the cutting room floor’ (unused) and why?



Using conventions from real media texts

• In what ways have your productions used or developed conventions adopted from real media products?

• In what ways have your productions challenged or played with conventions adopted from real media products?
• Some media producers adopt a style of working that is quite distinctive – explore how work you have produced may have been influenced by your own favourite producers/directors/designers/publishers.


Try and offer specific textual examples from your production work to illustrate your points......make the examiner see what they can't see - use technical language: Mise-en-scene, camera angles, editing, sound....