By Reema & Stefanie

CMNS 220 – D108

Chapter 17

“Television’s language is evolving at great speed, and the medium reflects upon itself to a considerable degree. This self-reflexivity ensures that even casual viewers can remain fluent in their understandings” (p.275)

Series and established formats are expected from audiences, producers and actors (including commentators)

Expectations and security “made within a framework of common understandings”

(p.276) Cultural specificity and adaptation is essential Time Worker flexibility Division of labor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vFvLhNWfZU

There are 3 production organizational forms:

1. Vertical Integration: every process stage is owned by 1 corporation and is “contained within the same organizations” (p.278).

2. Independent Production: a broadcaster contracts another company to provide the programs

3. Co-Production: “co-operation between companies on a specified project” (p.280).

1. Finance: is heavily related to the “intimate details” (p.281) of a production.

2. Pre-Production: planning and anticipating the budget and schedule Both the budget and schedule are in constant

negotiation and adjustment

3. The Shoot: “The television studio is now a familiar feature of the self-reflexivity of the medium and representations of it tend to emphasize its artificiality and the degree to which physical separation determines control over the finished product. For those who work within it however, studio practice is highly routinised and relatively inflexible” (p.286) Celluloid film vs. Video tape

4. Post-Production: assembly, creation and addition of materials and footage like music, animation and commentaries Linear editing vs. non-linear editing/tapping

5. Marketing: pre, during and post-production involve advertising and controlling media coverage through horizontal-integrated media companies

“The application of television technologies to everyday commercial activities” (p.289).

Spot Advertising Sponsorship Public Display Television Corporate Communication Video Art Personal production: “The most fundamental

change in television within the recent past has been the availability of digital production tools for the ordinary domestic consumer” (p.291)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAl28d6tbko

Chapter 18

The development and availability of digital video effects is utilized both by techno-futurists and production executives that wish to save money by getting rid of real and expensive locations and sets

Video-assist – It is a system that allows filmmakers to view a take as soon

as it is shot.

Motion Control – It spreads and intensifies an image while It has precise control and it also allows repetition of the

camera movements

Electronic and nonlinear editing: “Thirty-two levels of undo”

Film-style editing for television was made possible by the “electronic video discs” and “greatly expanded computer hard drives.”

Tapes and films were transferred over into the computer and now any material can be pulled-out within seconds

Avid was created to provide “limitless reworkings” that allows creative freedom

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr3pdCH8C4c

Self-conscious primetime practice Television is currently stylish, except it has

become stylish in a self-conscious and analytic way.

Style-driven trends truly depend on the visual style

The film look – The film look in television is being interpreted and

explained by the practitioner instead of the technical aspects of the film

New Film Stocks – Film grew in two major areas of television:

1. Primetime programming (episodic shows) 2. Commercial advertising for television

Film stocks impacted camera mobility, low-light sensitivity, and “photographic tonality which” led to a “new level of visual detail in front of the camera.”

Rank-Cintel – It is a “chip-based” film-to-video transfer machine

Shows have their own established “look”

They must identify this look through visual stance Great detail and practical effect that bring out physical

attributes to the show Program Individuation’s role is to be able to dress up a

script making it come alive in thought and words through writers that believe the words alone carry a scene

http://www.stargatestudios.net/page.php?section=4&page=427

It is a type of mythology used in televisual programs today

It focuses on its selective visual codes and is more dynamic

Masquerade shows display more than aesthetic visual views

Electronic cinematography –

This mythology is used when producers don’t have the proper lighting or resources to shoot a certain film, scene, or episode

Electronic cinematography gives the audience the feeling of actually being in the scene with the characters

Digital compositing – Digital composition is when multiple images are

utilized to make one scene This brings the viewer a clear and detailed image

with all the important factors

Commercials being 30-60 seconds long captured and advertising the trigger message to the audience

Commercial ads distracted audience “during breaks from the program” pg. 304

Television is “about advertising, selling viewers to advertiser. “ pg. 304

As companies continue to sponsor (associate their product to) television programs, and pay for a lot of their production activity, how much power should they have over the program material?

 At the end of the reading, Ellis states that personal production (like a YoutTube video) “has not led to a democratization, but to person-to-person communication” (p.291). Do you agree or disagree with this statement and why?

How many producers and writers work for the television series Heroes? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0813715/fullcredits

Why do you think these numbers are so? (think about routine and standardization)

Do you think shows will do as well if they weren’t advertised through commercials and why?

Without cinematography, do you think shooting films and shows in Vancouver would be difficult being it is always over casted, not sunny, and what would that do to our film industry?

Without motion control, do you think that the movies like ironman, pirates of the Caribbean etc., would look as action packed and character close-up imaging?