Technical Camera Terms

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There are certain things that need to be set in place before taking a picture in order for it to come out as a nice clear image. Some of these being;

  • Shutterspeed – How fast/slow the shutter closes over the lens. A high shutter speed will give you a very clear image.               – A low shutterspeed means a blurry image, it will let a lot more light into the picture.
  • Aperture – How much light is coming through the lens, this will enable the image to be as light/dark as you want.
  • ISO – Automatic, so you don’t have to manually focus the image.

Other aspects that you should consider when capturing a picture are:

Framing 

How far away the camera is from the object being photographed eg.

  • Long shot
  • Extreme long shot
  • Mid shot
  • Close up
  • Extreme close up
  • Wide angle
  • High angle
  • Low angle
  • Point of view angle

Movement

This is a few camera techniques that can be used to take a moving picture :

  • Tilt
  • Pan
  • Dolly
  • Zoom
  • Crane
  • Ped
  • Tracking
  • Hand held
  • Steady cam
  • Aerial

Keeping all these aspects of a picture in mind, we were put into pairs and sent off to do a photoshoot where every picture must tell a story. We attempted to use different lighting, angles and frames . Here are a selection of the images we took.

This picture I think is my favourite and turned out really well mainly because of the background being very dark and gloomy along with the mystery of the trapped hand and the padlock.

This picture however did not turn out so well as it was meant to look mysterious and as if they were trapped, but the lighting and angle didn’t compliment each other so I did not use this image in my top 9.

My image that uses mise-en-scene to communicate meaning.

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We explored mise-en-scene by being allocated into groups and given  a theme. The themes given out were punk, rap, folk and pop. My group were given rap. I was happy with this genre because it was easy to create the look and rap is something I have great interest in.  In our group we created a mood board of all things that came to mind and linked to the word ‘rap’.  We put all our inspiration and shared our ideas on this so we could create the most realistic look possible. This board included our favourite famous rappers and items of clothing rappers ‘typically’ wear.

Made with Padlet

We came to the conclusion that when doing our photoshoot we would focus on the baggy clothing, jewellery and little facial expressions.

Next I dressed up as a ‘stereotypical rapper’ and did our photoshoot. Some of the things I wore to enhance my look were:

  • Black Baggy T shirt, rappers tend to put little effort into their clothing and more effort into accessories.
  • Baggy jeans, to disguise the figure of the model, to give a scruffy and careless look and to match the colour of the hat.
  • Black nike shoes, almost every rapper owns a pair of black nike air force 1, so these fit our genre really well.
  • Blue and Gold DC cap, The gold of the cap matched all the jewellery and DC is a rappers brand so this was perfect.
  • Gold chain, very stereotypical but a statement piece of the outfit as all rappers wear a gold chain.
  • Bandana around my face to disguise myself, to portray the ‘gang culture’ effect, disguising my face was key.
  • Other Jewellery such as rings and many bracelets, to come across as rich.

This helped me understand the concept of how media communicates meaning because if I didn’t dress like the ‘stereotypical rapper’ my meaning/message wouldn’t be portrayed well; my aim was to look as realistic as possible and this wouldn’t be effective if I couldn’t communicate and pass my meaning on to the audience.

Here are a few pictures of my final outfit, posing like a rapper:

Next, we asked our classmates to write adjectives on post it notes and stick them on each person that dressed up. This is so we can evaluate the looks of the models using words relative to their appearance. Some of the adjectives that were stuck on me included:

  • Thug like
  • Criminal
  • Chav
  • Filthy
  • Defiant
  • Gangster
  • Rude
  • Offensive
  • Independent

Doing this shoot and experimenting with mise-en-scene within my look has really helped me to grasp the concept of everything that pulls a look together. This has helped me develop my skills so when beginning shooting for my music magazine, I now have some knowledge so my shoot will turn out well.

 

 

Print Media that Communicates Meaning

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The 5 parts of ‘mis-en-scene’ creates the word CLAMPS.

  • C- Costume
  • L- Lighting
  • A- Action
  • M- Makeup and Hair
  • P- Props
  • S- Setting

This allows us to unpick images, videos and posters etc. In Media we need to be able to identify all these things within an image. I had a go at this when I was given the task to evaluate a tour poster by myself. CLAMPS helped me do this as it gave me a guideline of what I needed to focus on and what to start writing/unpicking. I chose to evaluate the Clean Bandit ‘I miss you’ tour.

So… I’m a media prosumer

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The uses and gratification theory was proposed by Blumler and Katz. When we choose a form of media it has to fulfil at least  one of the four main points of the theory. These being;

  • Information – To gain understanding about the media, the media may also feed you information.
  • Entertainment – To have fun and enjoy what you’re doing-  whether this be watching a TV show or reading a magazine
  • Personal Identity – Some media we consume shapes us as a person
  • Social interaction – Communicating with others, because you consume similar types of media or learn what other types of media people consume and are interested in.

My media poster is a mixture of media I consume and prosume, blended into one big image. Included in my poster are my favourite music albums, podcasts, Magazines, TV shows, films and youtubers.

All of these types of media that I consume fit into one of the 4 categories of the Uses and Gratification theory. Here are my types of media within their categories.

Using the Blumler and Katz theory that suggests that consumers are a big part in using and producing media.

Entertainment- Consumers get pleasure out of listening/reading/watching.

Social Interaction– Talking with friends and family over a common topic. Eg. a TV show.

Personal Identity– Consumers seek types of media they think will interest them/apply to their lifestyle.

Information– The consumer will gain knowledge from the type of media that they have seeked out they believe will interest them. They then become educated on this topic.

I have concluded that when I make my music magazine I will keep the audience in mind at all times. This is so I focus on my target audience of who I would want to buy my product and read it. It will be a fashion within music magazine so my target audience will be teenagers interested in this industry.

The Media Ecology. Map of concepts and mediascape.

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Media refers to various different types of communication on many platforms. For example, television, radio and the newspaper are types of media. This is the basics of media to most people, but in reality there is a lot more to media than you may think. The media ecology is an underlying necessity for the media to work; Media ecology theory is the study of media, technology, and communication and how they affect human environments. This consists of

  • money
  • technology
  • the government
  • distribution
  • creators
  • institutions
  • social media
  • audience

All of these components rely on each other to keep the system going. Without one part of this chain, there would be no constant media production.

In groups in our media class, we used lego to create our own land to get our head round the idea of ‘ecology’. These consisted of aspects of the environment relying on each other to keep the land alive. Such as humans relying on trees to supply oxygen, animals relying on trees and grass to sustain their habitats, humans relying on fish to eat to keep them alive etc. Here is an image of a small section of my groups’ lego land.

Also, in pairs we created a poster of the media ecology. Our designated part of the chain was Creators. We had to write small sentences about why we thought creators were the most important part of the media ecology. We linked this to all the other components and realised everything feeds off each other.

The media ecology will impact the production of my music magazine. Here is how I will include all the parts of the ecology in the production of my magazine:

Money- This will enable me to create many copies of the magazine for all over the world, i’ll have unlimited resources which means I can do whatever it takes to make my magazine good, money will play a big part in the distribution of my product.

Technology- Technology will play a big part in the production of my magazine as this is where I will edit the image and the cover and print it off.

Institutions- Without this nobody could view or read my magazine

Creators – The creators will come up with the ideas and make the content. It is everybody else’s job to edit what the creators give them.

Audience- Without the audience there would be nobody to view or read or be a fan of my magazine. I would make little to no money as I wouldn’t be selling any copies.

Social Media- This is where the advertisement and promotion of my product will take place to spread the word to younger audiences.

Governments – The other parts of the ecology will follow and obey the rules that the government lay.

Distribution- This is an important part of the ecology especially within making my magazine as this is the key to getting my product all over the world and being sold to many types of audiences in lots of different stores.

 

We came to the conclusion that there’s not one most important role, everything needs each other to survive. Here is a picture of our poster.

 

So… Hello Media Studies

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I am looking to learn a lot of technical skills such as photo shop and gaining more experience on using a camera. I am also hoping to learn lots of new terminology and language which I can understand and use in my blog posts to achieve more interesting posts.

I have some skills in technology already but I’m looking forward to developing these further as I am using software I have never used which excites me. The skills I will learn with the technology will stick with me throughout life meaning I will gain lots of experience. Media studies will teach me time management and organisation when keeping up to date with adding to my blog frequently. This is important because organisation is the key to being on top of the work within my studies. In addition being generally organised and up to date with my work will prepare me for future life especially in the work place.

I also believe I will develop my skills in:

  • Team work – I hope to gain ideas from other members of my class to develop my thinking throughout the course.
  • Patience – It will require patience when producing my music magazine and music video as it will be a long process with lots of editing included.
  • Communication – This is a general life skill so developing this well prepare me for future life when working with new people in new environments.
  • Visual learning – Learning through images, slideshows, videos and blogging will develop my skills in knowing what looks good and is eye-catching. This should make blogging come more naturally to me once I get the hang of it.

Hello world!

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