Evaluation: How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Many technologies were used in this project.  Throughout the research and planning stages, the internet played a major part in our progress, from this website, blogger.com, for example, which enabled us to easily document our findings and progress to Google Images, to illustrate our findings.  Sites such as Scribd transcribed our Word/Publisher documents for viewing on the blog.  Thanks to the internet we found a site that let our Powerpoint documents be viewed on the blog also: slideshare.net.  This was very helpful as it meant we could display our work in another different format.  On-demand websites, YouTube and television meant we could watch pre-existing soaps to analyse in order to know what we needed to include in our own soap opera and inspire us.  In these planning stages we also experimented with some of the programs on the Mac to decide what software we like the best and the results we got from them.  We used GarageBand to create our own music tracks which we could've used as the backing of our trailer, however we didn't use these in the end as we preferred the pre-exsiting, non-copyrighted sounds in iMovie.  To create the poster and magazine I experimented with Photoshop to see what effects I could create and gain some more experience with it.  A scanner was used as a way of getting some written documents, such as the draft storyboard, onto the blog.  For the animatic and photographic storyboard we used Movie Maker to put them together before uploading them to YouTube, in order to get access to them and upload them to our blog. 

The camera we used to film our trailer

We edited our trailer on an Apple Mac

The construction of our media texts (trailer, poster and magazine) was very hands-on and involved the use of a video camera (HD Panasonic) to film the trailer and a Mac and iMovie to edit the footage together.  We also used YouTube as a way of distributing our trailer.  From here we could embed the trailer onto our blog.  An SD card was used to store the clips and a USB/memory stick was used to store our  trailers on before uploading to YouTube (and as a back up, in case anything went wrong on the Mac). In the end, I used Publisher to design the layout of our poster and magazine due to the ease of moving images and adding text/effects, however I chose to use Photoshop to crop out backgrounds from images which gave a professional outcome.  I sourced the Channel 5 logo, on the poster, from the internet.  I used photographs from a Nikon D3100 and stills from the clips filmed on the Panasonic video camera for on the magazine as I knew we couldn't use copyrighted images from the internet.  When looking for feedback on our trailer, magazine and poster we uploaded them to social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.  This way, we got non-biased feedback as it wasn't from only our friends/families but strangers.  Without new media we would be unable to receive feedback as easily and effectively as we did.

MovieMaker was a quick and easy way to edit evaluations;
it was also surprisingly effective.

Again, Blogger was used for the initial drafts of my evaluations.  Movie Maker was a good way of animating them where I could use video clips and image montages.  I could also do a voiceover, as I have for Question 1 of the evaluations where I did a 'director's commentary' on the Mac over our trailer.  For Question 2, I filmed myself, using my HD Nikon D3100, as I spoke about my media texts.  I have found that Movie Maker was actually the best format for getting my point across as I could add pictures and videos, voiceovers and sound and I didn't feel I was restricted.  However, since using Prezi for Question 3, I have found it is even easier to do these things mentioned than on MovieMaker.  I am enjoying Prezi - it looks very modern, professional and I like the way it 'flies' between sections.  You can also easily go back to linking screens and input different formatted media into the presentation easily (such as YouTube videos, PDF documents and images).  On reflection, without new media, we couldn't have created this project as easily as we have.  Without it, tasks would have been more lengthy and a struggle to complete.

Evaluation: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Evaluation: What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

We got our audience feedback through first-hand viewings of our trailer; where we invited members of our target audience (16-60 years) to watch it and by uploading it to social networking sites; Facebook and Twitter.  We received interesting and unbiased feedback through Twitter, as our 'followers', of whom we do not know in person, commented truthfully, thoughtfully and with a judgemental eye.  We found feedback from Facebook was not as reliable as 'friends' would say nice comments so as not to hurt our feelings, even after telling them to be brutally honest!

Audience feedback is so important to us as it depends on this that, if we were to air this soap opera on television, it would become either a success or a flop.  By listening to our audience and what they want to see, we are reducing the risk of our soap not being successful as we know they will continue to watch the soap as it is tailored to them, so stands more of a chance of doing well.  Obviously, if we didn't change elements of our production, it wouldn't do so well if it was aired as the viewer would switch it off if they didn't like it.

Evaluation: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our poster and magazine are also conventional to their real counterparts; but the magazine more so than the poster.  We ensured we included every convention of soap magazines on our own as we suspected there would be little room for experimenting if we were to create a real-life soap magazine, which has to conform to certain regulations - for example, displaying various soap stories on it (with images and screenshots from the soap opera that are always stereotypically verisimilitude to easily recognisable scenes of everyday life), following the left-third rule to make for easy viewing for the potential buyer and a bold, catchy title and captivating text.  All these conventions are essential to entice the buyer to purchase the magazine.  We didn't think we could subvert conventions to our advantage in this section.

Our poster is slightly challenging of the conventions as we have chosen not to portray every character from our soap on the poster.  We have chosen one particular storyline involving only four characters - more like a poster for an already-running soap opera.  We knew we had a good slogan, "It's not always sweet in Cherry Gardens", and wanted to use this to our advantage and thought the best way to go about this was to be suggestive through our use of characters and positioning; hinting at a plot without giving too much away.

Evaluation drafts

In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
In order to make sure our soap opera trailer followed generic conventions of soap operas, we carried out lots of research before we began, to make sure we knew what we had to do to make the outcome realistic and professional.  An important key convention of soap operas is that must have an open narrative, without this they would no longer be a soap opera but an ordinary TV drama.  Because we couldn't show this in our trailer, when planning the narrative to our first episode, we ensured it had an open narrative. 

Soap operas usually have multiple storylines in progress throughout one episode, to create a verisimilitude situation to that of everyday life.  To show the wide variety of characters portrayed in our soap, which suggests there will also be various storylines, we included many of these characters in our soap trailer.  Being a new soap, this was also a good way of introducing the characters to the audience.  We also included different settings in our trailer, specifically chosen to reflect pre-existing soap settings and remain conventional to the soap genre.  Pubs/bars, houses and streets are commonly used settings in Eastenders and Hollyoaks which is why we have also used a pub, street and house setting. 

There is minimal use of diegetic sound in soap opera trailers, like in our own soap trailer.  However, we did challenge this convention slightly as we edited an exaggerated noise of the punch into our trailer for impact to grab the viewers' attention.  Being a new soap opera, we thought we needed to hook the audience from the very start of the trailer following the Uses and Gratification theory where the audience are interested and want to watch the whole episode to find out more.  This reason justifies our decision to leave some diegetic sound in the trailer.

We followed the convention of having titles at the end of our soap opera trailer.  We chose to have this in a visual format, rather than narrated or having both.  The reason behind doing this was due to our decision for our soap opera to be shown on Channel 5 which uses visual title screens.  The BBC usually has the addition of a voiceover overlaying the visual titles.  We decided that it was inappropriate to add other forms of interactive media, such as a Twitter hashtag, onto the title screen (as some programs do to engage their pre-existing audience) as our trailer is advertising a new soap which wouldn't already have a loyal audience so we thought this may discourage more mature viewers, with the majority of Twitter users being of a younger generation, and we didn't want to restrict our audience.

Our camerawork is conventional to that of soap opera trailers, with many establishing shots and close-up/mid-shots to introduce location and characters to the audience.  These close-up shots show the characters' facial expressions which gives the audience an insight into the characters' personalities and how they interact with other characters.  It is important that he acting in the shots is very captivating and believable and the editing seamless to ensure the story is easy to follow, especially when there is no diegetic sound, in order for the trailer to make sense and draw the audience in.

Propps' hero/villain/helper theory is apparent in our trailer.  Through multiple cuts and cutaways we are introduced to 2 'villains', Dan and Kirk, with our 'damsel-in-distress' figure being Marris Morris.  We introduce the audience, through continuous/discontinuous? editing, to many possible heroes and helpers but we left the trailer unresolved purposefully as an incentive for the audience to watch the full episode to find out what happens.  This cliffhanger leaves the audience wanting more and is proof of our use of Todorov's theory of equilibrium, however the final stage of equilibrium is not shown. 

From our research into soap opera characters we found there were lots of stereotypical characters; with characters with similar attributes in each soap (e.g Michael Moon from Eastenders and Brendan Brady from Hollyoaks - both stereotypical 'bad boys').  Examples of these stereotypical characters found in every soap are often referred to as 'the elderly, wise person' (in our soap opera this role is portrayed by Beryl), 'the strong woman', 'the pregnant teen', 'the matriarch', 'the bad boy', 'the loved-up couple', 'the boss figure' and the 'the villain'.  We couldn't show our representation of each one of these stereotypical characters in our trailer as it would have made it too long, but we did consider them when inventing characters for 'Cherry Gardens'.

Use images and videos of real media products alongside that of your own work - compare and contrast.

We have tried to be as conventionally accurate as possible but we also wanted to make something exciting and new, that hasn't been seen before.  I think we've achieved through our unconventional use of  transitions and the way we edited the piece.

Highlight specifically where you have followed/challenged soap opera conventions.

How effective is the combination of your main product (your advert) and ancillary texts (poster and magazine cover)?
We tried to remain consistent when designing our ancillary texts by including a similar story on both of them.  Our soap opera's slogan is, 'It's not always sweet in Cherry Gardens'.  Because of this, we felt we needed to show a negative story on the magazine and poster to reflect this slogan.  Marris Morris getting attacked by the troublesome youths, Kirk and Dan, is the story we chose to be the focus of our main product and ancillary texts.  We felt this was a relatable storyline for the audience, which would hook them onto the soap, and reflected our slogan well.  We also considered adding a narrative voiceover to the end of our trailer saying 'It's not always sweet in Cherry Gardens', to link the products further, however after research, this didn't comply with similar adverts on Channel 5.

Our trailer focuses upon the character of Marris Morris and his attackers, Dan and Kirk.  Other characters in the soap are then introduced through Marris' memories and flashbacks of the village people, in his confused state, of Beryl Clark, his son, Dom Morris and more, and various settings such as his pub, the church, village shop and the road Cherry Gardens gets it's name from.  We focused the poster on the same storyline that is shown in the trailer.  This is because, as it is a new soap, the storyline shown in the trailer is the only one viewers are familiar with.  If we used different characters on the poster, the audience may not realise the two texts are related.  Cherry Gardens would be shown on Channel 5 and because of this, we had to include their logo on our poster so the audience knows where they can watch the soap.  We didn't put the Channel 5 logo onto our trailer (this isn't a characteristic of Channel 5 adverts), but the title screen at the end of the trailer is as similar to the real thing as we could make it and features the Channel 5 website - which is an indicator of the channel it is to be shown on. 

The magazine was different to the poster, in the respect that we had to think how an outside institution would portray our soap and storyline to the viewer, rather than how a company would promote their own soap.  A magazine company wouldn't use a soap's slogan as we found from research.  They make their own witty, revealing titles up for each story they cover.  We thought that they would continue with our story of the teenagers and Marris (as we have in our trailer and poster) as it is a new soap and they wouldn't have any additional footage or images they could use, unless they had their own photoshoot with the actors but we didn't think they would pay to do that, in case the soap opera wasn't successful, in which case it would have been a waste of money. 

To create the connection of our magazine to our poster, we used part of the same image used on the poster to make it obvious to the buyer of the magazine that, again, the two products are related and not confuse them by using other, less familiar, characters.  Because the magazine mentioned Marris, we needed to include him on our poster to create a link between the products to ensure our audience remained drawn into the story, without getting confused with multiple storylines.  The use of young and mature characters engages a youthful and mature audience - we did this as we want our soap to be suitable for everyone, from 16 - 60 years (a convention of soap operas).  To make it even more obvious to our audience that our products are all promoting the same new soap opera, we kept to a similar colour scheme throughout; red, white and black.  We chose the colour red as it has connotations of blood and horror (which suggests how badly Marris is injured), conveniently is the colour of cherries, and  is the colour of choice for Channel 5, so it seemed the perfect colour to use in the promotion for 'Cherry Gardens'.

What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Since rough cut 1 of our soap opera trailer to rough cut 3, we've received audience feedback to help us in finding out what our audience want to see and how we can progress in making our soap opera trailer enticing, understandable and interesting.  We asked them to be truthful and tell us what they liked about it, what they didn't (and reasons behind these points) and how they thought we could improve it.  We then adapted our trailer if we received many comments regarding the same thing.  Sometimes we had contradictory points made of which we ignored, as we assumed it came down to opinion, which meant there wasn't much we could do about these issues to please everyone.  This seemed to be the case with the music and it wasn't that it appealed to older people and not to younger generations, for example, as a 17 year old said: "music maybe too over the top", and an 18 year old: "really like the music" and that it "is really suitable".  Comments like these were quite frustrating as there wasn't much we could do about the situation - but we realise you can never please everyone, even in a professional industry, but we had to compromise and strive to please as many as possible!

The feedback also made us realise how much more research we needed to do in order to make things look professional, for example, our title screen.  At rough cut 2, we weren't thinking about the title screen at the end but more on the order of clips, but from the feedback, we realised a professional-looking title screen was important to people in order for them to take it seriously and the lack of one negatively affected their opinion on the whole trailer.  We quickly researched title screens on Channel 5 and made ours look as similar to them as possible for rough cut 3, which was then well-received by the audience and made them look at the whole trailer in a different light.  Another piece of feedback that didn't hinder our progress but we felt like we couldn't do anything about it was, "It would have been better with speech".  Again, we weren't able to do much about this, as conventionally soap trailers don't tend to have diegetic sound.

I was encouraged to use my initial 'Soapy Scene' magazine layout idea after receiving positive feedback on it that said it was eye-catching and followed soap magazine conventions such as the left-third rule.  This is why we used this layout, instead of designing a new one, for our magazine promoting Cherry Gardens.  Feedback on our poster layout idea told us that it looked too like a poster for a horror film because of the blood runs.  People generally thought it was too over-the-top for a soap poster so we tamed it down for the final poster. 

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
Many technologies were used in this project.  Throughout the research and planning stages, the internet played a major part in our progress, from this website, blogger.com, for example, which enabled us to easily document our findings and progress to Google Images, to illustrate our findings.  Sites such as Scribd transcribed our Word/Publisher documents for viewing on the blog.  Thanks to the internet we found a site that let our Powerpoint documents be viewed on the blog also: slideshare.net.  On-demand websites, YouTube and television meant we could watch pre-existing soaps to analyse in order to know what we needed to include in our own soap opera and inspire us.  In these planning stages we also experimented with some of the programs on the Mac to decide what software we like the best and the results we got from them.  We used GarageBand to create our own music tracks which we could've used as the backing of our trailer, however we didn't use these in the end as we preferred the pre-exsiting, non-copyrighted sounds in iMovie.  To create the poster and magazine I experimented with Photoshop to see what effects I could create and gain some more experience with it.  A scanner was used as a way of getting some written documents, such as the draft storyboard, onto the blog.  For the animatic and photographic storyboard we used Movie Maker to put them together before uploading them to YouTube, in order to get access to them and upload them to our blog.

The construction of our media texts (trailer, poster and magazine) was very hands-on and involved the use of a video camera (HD Panasonic) to film the trailer and a Mac and iMovie to edit the footage together.  We also used YouTube as a way of distributing our trailer.  From here we could embed the trailer onto our blog.  An SD card was used to store the clips and a USB/memory stick was used to store our  trailers on before uploading to YouTube (and as a back up, in case anything went wrong on the Mac). In the end, I used Publisher to design the layout of our poster and magazine due to the ease of moving images and adding text/effects, however I chose to use Photoshop to crop out backgrounds from images which gave a professional outcome.  I sourced the Channel 5 logo, on the poster, from the internet.  I used photographs from a Nikon D3100 and stills from the clips filmed on the Panasonic video camera for on the magazine as I knew we couldn't use copyrighted images from the internet. 

Again, Blogger was used for the initial drafts of my evaluations.  Movie Maker was a good way of animating them where I could use video clips and image montages.  I could also do a voiceover, as I have for Question 1 of the evaluations where I did a 'director's commentary' on the Mac over our trailer.  For Question 2, I filmed myself as I spoke about my media texts.  I have found that Movie Maker was actually the best format for getting my point across as I could add pictures and videos, voiceovers and sound and I didn't feel I was restricted.  However, I am also enjoying Prezi - it looks very modern, professional and I like the way it 'flies' between screens.

Talk through the technologies you used to create your product at each stage - paragraph on research and planning, paragraph on construction and paragraph on evaluation.
Discuss the use of internet and computer programs to create your work.
Be positive about the use of technology.
When discussing your product, you need to mention your trailer, poster and magazine cover.

Cherry Gardens Poster

Cherry Gardens Magazine

Soapy Scene Cherry Gardens

Cherry Gardens Trailer Final Cut

Plan for Poster

 This is my first poster layout idea.  Conventionally, the poster must include what time the soap is on, what it is called and what channel the audience can watch it on.  I ensured I included all these things.  I like our slogan "It's not always sweet in Cherry Gardens" so I have chosen to use it on both my poster ideas - I think it is memorable and will draw the audience in.  My two ideas are very sinister also; displaying the storyline shown in our trailer where Marris is challenged by Dan and Kirk.  I did this so the audience can easily link these two texts together.  Being a new soap, if we were to use different characters that haven't been introduced through the trailer on the poster, the audience may not realise the two pieces were related and promoting the same new soap opera.  This poster is to be very dark and sinister.  The background will be shadowy and grey/black in colour, connoting horror and dark happenings.  The slogan and title of the soap opera will be in a bright red in contrast to the background and conveniently matching the Channel Five logo, again connoting death, blood and horror.  Hopefully this will interest people into watching the soap to find out what happens.

 

This poster has a portrait layout - unlike my other design.  I wanted it to be striking and capture the viewers attention at first glance which is why the image is quite disturbing.  Hopefully, this shock-factor would make the audience tune in to watch the soap.  I have only included 3 characters on this poster as these are the focus of our trailer so the audience will be able to link the texts easily.  This poster will show more of the soap scenery in the background; with houses from Cherry Gardens in the shot.  Again I have used our verbal slogan on the poster as I think it outlines the content of our soap opera in a nutshell.

Plan for Magazine

Soapy Scene

This is soap magazine I created and named, 'Soapy Scene', to practice with different programs before creating our final soap opera magazine.  Whilst making this I experimented in Photoshop, Paint and finally used Microsoft Publisher to put it all together.  I wasn't sure how it would turn out in Publisher - I thought we might need to use a more specialized program for a more professional look, but I like the result and the layout and will use it for our final magazine.  It also follows important conventions of a soap magazine such as the left third rule - where all the selling points of the magazine have to be situated in the left third of the cover (barcode, title, price, date and sometimes an issue number) to make it easy for the buyer to see these pieces of information when displayed on a shelf where the rest of the magazine would be covered by another magazine.  It uses bright, eye-catching colours and images to grab the buyers' attention, various stories from multiple soap operas (albeit fake soap operas for the purpose of this practice magazine cover) and bold, legible fonts.

Magazine Plan for Cherry Gardens


This is the design I came up with specifically for our soap opera 'Cherry Gardens' with a possible main story we could use and how we could lay it out.  The main story involves Marris Morris (the character our trailer and first episode will revolve around) and 2 stereotypically troublesome teenagers, Dan and Kirk.  Marris is in the middle, trapped by Dan and Kirk, unable to escape, portraying the conflicting and constrictive opinions and relationships between youths and mature/elderly people in society today.  Therefore this story is verisimilitude to everyday life and conventional of soap opera storylines.  The verbal message of 'Behind YOU...' connotes that the story is dark and suggests a cyclical nature (when in pantomimes the character's realisation of the threat is long drawn out) where the characters never reach an agreement and, just when you think it's over, the story continues.

 

Magazine Analysis

Mag Analysis

Soap Mag Analasis by

Poster Analysis

I have chosen to analyse 2 soap opera posters that are different in layout and concept which will hopefully aid the construction of our own soap opera poster.


As I have said previously, Hollyoaks is not a conventional soap opera due to its lack of character age range, unlike other soap operas that represent family life and the different generations.  Most of it's represented characters are teenagers and young adults as it has a specific localized setting around a college/university, again making it different from any other soap.  However, it does stick to verisimilitude soap opera conventions as the type of people who go to college and university in real life are like the young people represented in the soap. 

The bar setting as the communal area, different from other soap operas that often revolve around pubs, also suggests this verisimilitude approach to students and the younger generation who would be found in such settings.  The addition of the bar, rather than a pub, also gives the soap opera a classier, more sophisticated, unique feel.  If the characters in Hollyoaks were kept the same but with the communal area being a pub, it wouldn't seem as believable or real, and wouldn't be inkeeping of the soap world's verisimilitude conventions.  Alongside the tagline "Rub some Hollyoaks on it", the picture resembling a scene that could be found in soap operas such as Coronation Street or Eastenders looks rather grotty in comparison with the more visually pleasing image beside it; giving Hollyoaks a notion of superioriority over any other soap.  Visually, everything about the picture on the right is more appealing, from the high key lighting, vivid colours, well-groomed characters and happy facial expressions.  This clever editing draws the viewer in and makes the other soap operas seem laughable (note the dog soiling itself).  To enhance this even more and make their point even more prominent, the editors have made the image on the left washed-out and old-fashioned, including images of uninspiring individuals.  Hollyoaks has got a more refined target audience of primarily teenagers and young people because of it's young cast.  This poster displays what the youth aspire to be in the hope of gaining viewers because of this.

In conclusion, Hollyoaks uses it's unique qualities to it's advantage and embraces the fact it is different as a way of 'selling' itself.  Surprisingly, the poster doesn't refer to any particular storyline to entice the viewer in, but refers to the soap as a whole. 


This poster is very different in format to the Hollyoaks one.  It entails what looks like a family portrait of the characters in the soap to connote what can only be described as 'togetherness'.  This could be portraying a false picture of happiness, or a true one; either way it entices the viewer in as, knowing about soap opera conventions, the happiness can't last for long and the audience will sadistically want to know what the catch is and how it all inevitably falls apart in the end.

This poster gives the viewer a brief introduction to the soap as, just by looking at it, you can tell it is set in a sunny, fairly rural-looking location with the kangaroo/wallaby in the bottom left-hand corner confirming the guesses.  With the assumption the people included are some of the characters involved, you get an idea of their personalities, hobbies and relations to the other characters from how they are interacting with each other, what they are doing and whether they are holding anything.  Conventionally, the young to the old have been represented and included in this poster, suggesting to the broad target audience of the relatable onscreen characters portrayed, which are their reason to watch. 

The poster includes easily legible information of the soap name, channel and time cleverly displayed on a sign post, as well as some additional information catering for existing viewers.   

Initial notes on soap opera poster

Initially, I noticed that I couldn't find many soap opera posters about - it seems a feature more standard practice for films than for soaps, but Hollyoaks had made a couple of really interesting, punchy ones.

Being an unconventional soap, Hollyoaks uses this to their advantage and plays on this in the (above) poster.  The tagline "Rub some Hollyoaks on it" alongside the image used, seems as if they are mocking other soaps through their contrasting representations of everyday life, although both remain verisimilitude to the situations portrayed, only one -being a bar scene- more sophisticated than the other communal area (a pub). 



This is a very blunt tagline, guaranteed to ensure that pre-existing audiences will tune in to see the episodes, but also a new audience, who maybe didn't like the soap before, intrigued to find out how it will change purely out of curiosity. 

On both these posters, the channel and time the soap opera is aired is clearly visible, however the layouts are completely different.  We must ensure the channel and viewing time is visible when creating our own poster in order to remain following conventions and most importantly, achieve high viewing figures.

Initial notes on soap opera magazine

Looking at a soap opera magazine, at first glance I am struck by the colour.  Every magazine cover is full of colour; hardly a white space to be found.  Obviously this is to capture the buyer's eye, just like it did mine.  Everything about the soap opera magazine is designed to capture attention: bold, outlined text in easily legible fonts (often captitalised), punchy titling and well-illustrated with enticing, colour screenshots and images.  They will always have stories on the cover from more than one soap opera, to target a wide audience and achieve large sales.  Somewhere on them is a price of the magazine, which is generally easy to spot (and fairly cheap to compete with other magazines) so the buyer can easily compare it with other soap magazines. 

Purpose and conventions of a trailer

The main purpose of any trailer is to entice the viewer to watch the full media, and this is no different with a soap opera trailer.  It will be aimed at the target audience of the soap, which is generally a broad range; from teenagers to the elderly, and so has to cleverly capture the interest of these people.  In order to do this, it will usually tease at the plot line and characters involved, without giving away any major facts or outcomes.  It is common for soap trailers to end on a cliffhanger, which helps to draw the audience in as they want to discover what happens.

Conventions of soap opera trailers differ from those found in full soap opera episodes.  We will need to consider the following conventions in order to create our own realistic soap opera trailer:

Sound
A vast difference is how sound is used in the two.  Within soap operas (apart from Hollyoaks), there is never any non-diegetic sound as the soap is made to be as realistic a verisimilitude representation of everyday life as possible.  In a soap opera trailer however, there is use of non-diegetic sound and is rarely much diegetic sound involved.  However, this does depend on the audience the trailer is targeting.  For new audiences, to give them an insight into the storylines and characters, the trailer may consist of a combination of clips from a soap episode itself, where there would obviously be diegetic sound involved.  Other soap opera trailers consist completely of new scenes filmed especially for the trailer.  These don't often have diegetic dialogue and have a song overlaying the action.  These trailers are for pre-existent viewers, who already know about the characters and plots, to capture their attention using the Uses and Gratifications theory;  they are interested and want to watch the episode to find out more.

Titling
Unlike soap opera episodes, the titles in soap trailers come at the end.  These can be in a visual or narrated format, or both.  The name of the soap, the channel it is shown on and when it is shown is always included to ensure it is clear to the audience where they can see the soap, as you can see below:

 

To entice and entrail a younger audience, as you can see from this last image, the use of the social networking site, Twitter's, hashtag has been incorporated into the title screen.  This is an effective way of reaching out to the youth of today's society; where most people have access to social networking sites at all times through their handheld electrical appliances such as mobile phones and iPods.

Camera Angles

Lots of the time in soap opera trailers, more close-up shots and mid shots are used, than in the soap opera episode, as a way to introduce the audience to the characters.  These shots help to convey the emotion within the characters faces and how they interact with the other characters so the audience can create assumptions, assess and determine the characters' personalities and relationships.  In effect, this gives them a taster of what the whole episode is to be like - so the more interesting and captivating it is, the better.  These closer shots are used more so in the trailers than in the full episodes; where the action is followed with long shots.

Narrative
Similarly to soap opera episodes, the trailers are usually edited continuously in order for easy viewing - if the trailer was too confusing, the audience may not want to watch the whole episode, although there does need to be a level of excitement and mystery to add the interest needed in order to claim this new audience.  More often than not, Propps' hero/villain/helper theory is seen in soap opera trailers to increase interest and to give the audience a sense of knowing and an insight into who the characters are. 

Over many half an hour soap opera episodes, Todorov's theory of equilibrium is used where the state of equilibrium is disrupted and recognised before being, usually, overcome once again to reveal equilibrium.  However, this happens over a long period of time throughout various episodes.  In a soap opera trailer everything happens a lot more fast-paced.  Usually, the state of equilibrium is shown as well as the disruption of the equilibrium, which builds to a dramatic climax at the end of the trailer.  This cliffhanger cleverly encourages the viewer to watch the full episode.

Soap Opera Trailer Timings

It is important, in order for any program to access high viewing figures, to consider when it will be shown on television.  This will sometimes be dependent on the target audience, however because soap operas have a large target audience, this doesn't restrict when it can be shown.  Therefore, the best time to have a soap opera trailer aired on television is at peak viewing times, such as recently, in between The X-Factor, Strictly Come Dancing, Doctor Who and Merlin - Saturday night television.  By airing the trailer at these times the maximum possible people will see the trailer which will, ideally, generate a large figure of people tuning in to watch the soap after the trailer for it captured their attention. 

                                                        
Mainly though, I have noticed soap opera trailers on television around and after 7 o'clock.  I have even noticed soap trailers around the times of pre-existing soap operas on television, such as Coronation Street and Eastenders, which is very advantageous as these soaps already have a large fanbase and by positioning a trailer close to these programs, you would be targeting that soap-loving niche audience who would hopefully watch the new soap also.

Student Trailer Analysis

Camera angles -

• establishing shot at beginning to show a setting
• low angle shows characters are looking down on grave
• mid shots to show action
• low angle on man with gun to show power/dominance
• close ups on faces to introduce characters
• tilt from face to photo shows where audience should be looking and girl's reaction to image and her feelings towards the people in it
• slow motion builds up suspense and highlights key moments
• montage at end introduces characters and storylines.

Narrative -

• continuous editing with cut aways to other storylines.

Sound -

• dramatic music which builds up
• gunshot noise on flick of cigarette connotes man has shot someone (have to watch full episode to find out).

Mise-en-scene -

• chipped nail varnish and burning of photo of friends suggests girl's breakdown of a friendship
• close up of woman's left hand and wedding ring followed by long shot of the woman with man's left hand in shot without ring connotes he has taken it off and is committing adultery.

Titling -

• key words intertwined into action suggest storylines
• professional-looking title screen at end.

Camera angles -

• mid shot also shows setting
• close ups introduce characters
• long shot shows action
• slow motion highlights costume
• pan showing action and introduces new character
• low angle shot showing large house and character's legs suggests walking into his home
• various shots showing different settings
• handheld shot showing boys running generates a frantic feel and makes the trailer seem more fast-paced and exciting.

Narrative -

• Continuous editing which tells a story (linked storylines)
• Shows various storylines - good to hook audience (gives them an idea of storylines) and introduces characters.

Sound -

• Catchy soundtrack that fits with action
• Conventional of soap trailers and has no diegetic sound.

Mise-en-scene -

• Children wearing hoodies has connotations of the stereotype of a 'chav' - signifying they will be troublesome characters.  The fact they are running from something also connotes this and them running in front of the car signifies their ignorance
• Man wearing all black connotes there will be dark happenings in the soap opera such as death.

Titling -

• Titles throughout trailer fitted with music and transitions looked smooth and professional.  Clever use of the word 'new' throughout trailer as soap's name is 'New Street'
• BBC logo overlaid on trailer throughout gives professional outcome and is conventional to that of real BBC soap trailers
• Professional-looking title screen at end of trailer (music continued over it and fonts look very similar to that used on real trailers/programmes on BBC).  Voiceover also adds to the trailer's professional outcome (conventional of BBC trailers).

Camera angles -

• Breaks 180 degree rule which makes some shots difficult for the audience to understand (when they are talking about loan, around 0:17)
• Close up shots show characters expressions
• Mid shots show action
• Pans to show other characters.

Narrative -

• Lots of cuts to put clips together to make sense (looks unprofessional), need to film continuously for professional outcome
• The way it's edited doesn't always make sense to the viewer e.g order of clips shown and angle of shots needs to be changed (the 'Confrontations' scene and the loan scene in particular)
• Doesn't flow.

Sound -

• Unconvincing voiceover
• Unconventional speech within soap trailer.

Mise-en-scene -

• Lack of realistic-looking settings, costume and characters (not believable)
• Haven't particularly considered mise (e.g the boss man is wearing casual clothes but does he work in an office? Suit and tie. Or is he a builder? Work clothes/overalls.)

Titling -

• Unprofessional-looking title screen at end (need to use real logo).

Initial Ideas for Soap Opera

As a group we made a mind map of ideas for our soap opera.  We decided upon a rural setting for our soap as we think this will be practically more accessible for us as a group.  I would like our trailer to be very punchy and attention-grabbing that will make the viewer think about what is happening in it.  From experience, I think these are the best trailers as they are more memorable because of the work you have to put in to understand it.  These trailers can also be quite challenging to pull off as a success as the viewer can switch off if  the story is too complicated so we need to hook them from the very start.  It will need to be action-packed, fast-paced and exciting. 

Soap Opera Trailer Analysis'

Soaps use trailers, like other media texts, to capture the audience's attention.  By having an interesting, captivating trailer you are increasing your chance of gaining new viewers who may not have already been interested in the soap. These exciting trailers are shown during prime time TV to attract the greatest new audience.

After watching different soap trailers, I found that personally I was captivated by Hollyoak's advertising.  Their trailer's seem very obscure at first glance, but the content and storylines within the soap itself are cleverly reflected by the music, props and lighting and intertwined with connoting factors in each of these conventions to create a very eerie, atmospheric production.



There is extensive and clever use of mise-en-scene within this trailer which helps to connote the storylines in the soap without giving too much information away.  As soap characters are the refelctions of people's everyday lives, the animal masks connote that they are free-willed and, potenitially, dangerous.  This suggests that the writer doesn't want the viewer to see the characters as his puppets, but individuals with emotions and feelings.
          The rain on only one girl, instead of all girls, suggests she is an outsider in the group and the writer wants the audience to pity her.  Oppositely it could connote that maybe she has an antagonistic nature and the rain is a sort of punishment; where, if interpreted this way, the viewer would feel anger towards her.
          Lighting in the trailer also connotes the rollercoaster nature of the soap and mirrors the personalities and moods of the characters shown in that part of the trailer with the specific lighting.  The changing of the lighting throughout the trailer suggests different moods and diversities of stroylines within the soap.  The bright sunlight connotes happiness, sunset - love and peace, with nighttime having more sinister connotations.  Meanwhile the rain connotes sadness.  These emotions would all be expected to be apparent in any soap and it's characters.
          The worried faces paired with the chaos happening on the screen behind the characters connotes the chaos between the characters and the breakdown of their relationship.  This upset happens within any characters' relationship and can end in lesser or greater damage.
          Soap operas have ongoing storylines.  This idea is represented through the releasing of hundreds of chinese lanterns - suggesting the hundreds of different storylines between many characters.  The lanterns will float up into the Earth's atmosphere where they will be parallel with space; an area that is neverending, similarly to soaps.

Mid shots in the trailer help to show the characters' clothing and costume which has various connotations to the audience so the importance to convey this is great and essential.  Long shots ensure the action and interaction between characters can be clearly seen which is vital for establishing the relationships between the characters.  In order for the characters' emotions to show, close ups have been used.  It also gives new viewers a chance to see the characters up close and get a feel for who they are. 

Like many soap opera trailers there is no diegetic speech within the trailer.  This ensures none of the storyline is given away and that even new viewers are entertained and can understand it and, in the future, may become committed long-term viewers.  The non-diegetic eerie song with a strong drumbeat overlaying the trailer has sinister connatations of heading to war, which brings with it all the relations to war; like chaos, hurt, sadness which cleverly suggests these factors and more are all touched upon within the soap opera's storylines.

The trailer is very obscure and doesn't follow an obvious narrative which suggests the soap follows a variety of different characters and their lives.  More confusion is created for the audience when there is a juxtaposition of sad faces matched with extremely joyous ones around a merry-go-round (something that is fun and should bring happiness to people) which, again, connotes various stroylines within the soap that could have elements of conflict, joy, happiness, sadness and more in them.

A youthful target audience is suggested through the use of hashtagged words "#savageparty" at the end of the trailer.  This is aimed for those inhabiting the social networking site; Twitter, of whom are generally teenagers and young adults.  It is a very clever way of connecting with this niche audience.  Importantly, no titles are shown within the running time of the trailer itself, but at the end on a blank screen.  This ensures the details of the viewing times are easily understood by the audience as they are not being distracted by any action playing in the background.



It is important that the characters and their expressions are clearly shown within soaps.  This also seems to be the case within the trailers, with mid shots and close-ups being used to identify characters.  Some over-the-shoulder shots have been used to shows the characters' interacting and  their expressions toward one another which gives the audience a brief idea of their personalities. The slow-motion used helps ensure the audience can clearly see the characters' expressions.

The soap opera has a continuous narrative to ensure it is understandable and doesn't confuse the viewer too much.  If it did, the viewer may not want to watch the soap episodes; which is the opposite to what a soap trailer is supposed to do; entice a new or existing audience. 

A juxtaposition of white clothing - which connotes innocence (for example, the girl at the beginning looks like a white angel) - is matched with the fire and use of red and black which all symbolise the devil and hell, connoting information about the characters, their personalities and the different plots that will take place in the soap; be them happy or sad.
The use of sound in this trailer is interesting.  Like many soap opera trailers there is no diegetic speech involved however the objects and fire in the trailer still make their diegetic noise.  This exaggerates the disastrous actions happening within the trailer connoting the liklihood of disasters within the soap itself.  Throughout the trailer there is the sound of a ticking clock which suggests that time is running out and that there is little time as it builds up to an occurance that is likely to happen soon and is not likely to be good.

Again, similarly to other soap opera trailers, there are no titles within the trailer itself but they are at the very end on a blank screen, as being important information, this needs to be clearly visble to the audience to know when they will be able to watch the soap opera. 



This trailer is very different as it uses an actors' life as the basis for the trailer.  Ricky Whittle, who plays the character of Calvin Valentine in Hollyoaks, competed on the programme 'Strictly Come Dancing'.  There is a narrative overlay of the phrase, "Strictly not for the fainthearted" which is suggesting this link between the actors' real life and the soap.  Usually, soaps will avoid an audience having preconceptions of a character because based on the actor who plays them and will purposefully seek out  new talents.  Whereas, with a famous, more experienced actor, although this may generate a larger audience for the soap because of the big name involved with it, previous roles may be brought forward and seen in their acting by the audience meaning the verisimiltude representation of life, which soaps try to achieve, is dented.  This said, I personally find the link very clever as a way to promote a soap opera as well as the way the characters interact with each other to show the relationships or feuds between them.

The mid-shots highlight these interactions; highlighting the facial expressions and body language towards each other.  There are lots of cuts and camera shots and angles which connotes a hectic atmosphere.  Amidst the chaos, the character of Ricky's ends up getting betrayed by his dance partner, after getting abused by the other characters, for another man.  This has huge connotations of various storylines including heartbreak (the blood thrown over Calvin on the left-side of his body, near where his heart would be, helps connote this) and revenge.  The trailer could also connote storylines of deteriorating mental health issues because of the confusion the camera shots generate and Calvin's expression at the blood on his hands, or even darker ones of murder or even being set up for a murder he didn't commit as the red drink spilt could connote blood spilt.  There is a music overlay the whole way through which the characters are dancing to.  The song contains the lyrics, "Dance 'til you're dead", which also suggest these dark, murderous undertones of the trailer.
The 3 judges create the number '999' which is a distress number called to capture police attention suggesting a criminal offence has been committed.  The judges holding up '9's could be judging the characters on the cover up of their crime.  They could also be judging '9's could be the characters on the cover up of their crime.

Soap Opera Episode Analysis

In order to understand the layout and structure of soap operas, I analysed an episode of Hollyoaks, while my group members analysed different soap episodes.  We were then able to compare the episodes and see if any of the soaps had anything in common; from settings to number of scenes and character types.  We found they did have lots of similarities; the characters' in particular were mostly very stereotypical as were they locations used.  However, this is because the main feature of soaps is for them to be verisimilitude to that of every day life, so the audience can relate to them, explaining the repetition of similar settings in different soaps such as bars, pubs, houses, parks and schools, as well as issues touched on.

 

 

(Ash from Hollyoaks)