–G235: Critical Perspectives in Media

– –Theoretical Evaluation of Production

– 1(b) Media Language

Aims/Objectives

• To reinforce the basic media language that create meaning in texts.

• To have a basic understanding of how to evaluate your coursework against the media language that you used.

• Media Language• • identify the elements or ‘signs’ within the production that• are going to be discussed.• • what connotations and significations are apparent?• • what codes and conventions have been used?• • what semiotic techniques have been used to generate• meaning?• • identify and describe the meanings generated.

Importance of media language

• Every medium has its own ‘language’ – or combination of languages – that it uses to communicate meaning. Television, for example, uses verbal and written language as well as the languages of moving images and sound.

• We call these ‘languages’ because they use familiar codes and conventions that are generally understood.

• A Media Text = the sum of its many parts. • These parts include every element within it ...... • Camera angles, sound, font choice, lighting, body

language, colours etc. etc. • This is Media Language

• Media Language also known as Codes, or Form can be split into ....

• Technical • Symbolic • Written

• Semiotics Semiotics is the study of the language of signs. It deals with the meanings we attach to signs. Signs consist of a Signifier (the thing or sign itself) and the Signified (the meaning we attach to the sign) Other important terms include.... Denotation = the literal meaning of a thing or a sign Connotation = the second level of meaning agreed by the community but not an inherent quality in the thing itself.

Syntagm & Paradigm

• Conventions • Where signs, codes & syntagm are repeated

over time, they become Conventions - expected patterns in texts.

• Like rain on a British summer holiday, Conventions equal the ‘typical’ form.

The medium is the message

• McLuhan tells us that a "message" is, "the change of scale or pace or pattern" that the brings. It is not the content of a text , but the change that it brings with it. For example, the message of theatrical production is not the musical or the play being produced, but perhaps the change in Tourism that the production may encourage. In the case of a specific theatrical production, its message may be a change in attitude or action on the part of the audience that results from the medium of the play itself. Similarly, the message of a news broadcast is not the news stories themselves, but a change in the public attitude towards crime, or the creation of a climate of fear.

• A McLuhan message always tells us to look beyond the obvious and seek the non-obvious changes or effects that are enabled, enhanced, accelerated or extended by the new thing.

• Mcluhan’s work was groundbreaking because it forces us to consider media texts in a radical new way

• Media texts have to appear to be real in order for the audience to accept them – even a fictional dramatic 19th Century period piece needs to suggest reality through high production values, by not having an actor taking a call on their mobile during the shoot.

• Where reality issues are also important is in News, Documentary, Confessional talk shows and of course Reality TV.

• All of these are constructs of reality, some with higher entertainment values than others.

Post-Modernism

Denotation, Connotation and Myth

• In semiotics, denotation and connotation are terms describing the relationship between the signifier and its signified.

• Barthes (1977) argued that in film connotation can be (analytically) distinguished from denotation.

• As John Fiske (1982) puts it “denotation is what is filmed, connotation is how it is filmed”.

Making connections?• Evaluating media language is an

evaluation of all micro elements and how they have created meaning to inform us about genre, narrative, representations/ ideology, targeting of audiences.

• This requires us to use semiotic terminology to explain our encoding of elements and codes and conventions within our texts.

• We must also remember to discuss the preferred meaning (Hall, 1980) that we wanted our audience to DECODE.

Micro Elements: Mise-en-Scene

• Mise-en-scène constitutes the key aspect of the pre-production phase of the film and can be taken to include all aspects of production design and Cinematography.

• Mise-en-Scene creates the diegetic world - the fictional space and time implied by the narrative, i.e. the world in which the story takes place.

Aspects of Mise-en-Scene – video and print style

1. Location - settings, set-design and iconography

2. Character – Costume, Properties and Make Up, Actors and Gesture

3. Cinematography - Lighting and Colour

4. Layout and Page Design – colour, juxtaposition of elements.

Micro Elements: Camerawork

• There are Four aspects to camerawork that you need to understand:

1.Shot Types – particularly relevant for print.

2.Camera Composition 3.Camera Movement4.Camera Angles

Continuity• Establishing/Re-establishing Shot• Transitions.• The 180° Line Rule.• Action Match.• Crosscutting.• Cutaway.• Insert Shots.• Shot-Reverse Shot Structures.• Eyeline Match.

Non-Continuity

1. Montage Sequence.2. Flash Back/Forward.3. Ellipsis.4. Graphic Match.

“Media is communication”. Discuss the ways that you have used media language to create meanings in one of your media products.

Think of this question as the first part of your revision...

• 3. Media Language • A Media Text = the sum of its many

parts. • These parts include every element within it

...... • Camera angles, sound, font choice, lighting,

body language, colours etc. etc. • This is Media Language • Media Language also known as Codes, or

Form can be split into .... • Technical • Symbolic • Written

• If ‘language’ is defined as how we communicate, then it can be interpreted in many levels when it comes to the medium of film. We know that each language consists of learnt “words, phrases, grammar, punctuation, rules and common practices” (Wohl, Michael; The Language of Film 2008). Therefore we could transfer this understanding to the micro elements of film, camera, sound, mise-en-scene, editing etc, and/or go to a deeper level of analysis with a detailed look at choices of shot sizes, match-on-action, rules of continuity, framing and how they are pieced/edited together to create a sentence and therefore a language of communication.

Unlike the other concepts in this part of the exam, we are not so much looking at what we are communicating but how we are communicating it.

All of the decisions you made in your short films about which shots, angles, costume, set design, location, lighting, character movement, etc, play a part in this discussion.

Arguably the language of film can’t be discussed separately from genre, narrative, representation and audience as your knowledge of each of these influences the decisions you made throughout production.

MEDIA LANGUAGE

Objective: Explore concepts in order to prepare for Key Concepts Exam

Useful linkshttp://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/language_of_film.html

http://www.mediaknowall.com/as_alevel/alevel.php?pageID=filmlang

• Theorist

• Theory – what to write about

• Blumler & Katz / Richard Dyer

• Uses & Gratifications theory / Utopian Solutions – explaining how your use of MEDIA LANGUAGE offers these to an audience

• Vladimir Propp

• Propp’s Character theory – how your MEDIA LANGUAGE helps audiences identify particular characters as heros / villains etc

•  

• Stuart Hall

• Explain that your decision to use the MEDIA LANGUAGE you chose was to create a “preferred reading” for your text. But that audiences are used to Encoding and Decoding tests AND could take a negotiated or oppositional reading

• Rick Altman

• – Explain how you used MEDIA LANGUAGE to include Semantic Elements (eg signs such as knives, blood, dark colours, eerie music) or to signify Syntactic elements (eg themes like love, revenge).

• Media Language• This is all about the specific medium and how the

language of the medium has been used to create meaning for the audience. The meanings generally are a synoptic round up of other options covered (genre, narrative/stories, representations).

• As part of this it is important to include terminology about how signs work in the media.

• Essentially, however, this is one where a generic approach is more difficult and the language of the medium needs careful revision to encourage students to textually analyse their own essay against medium specific theory (e.g. Goodwin and music videos).

Q1b) Breakdown of the Options?

Technical terms check list:• Performance clips and band shots• Fast-pace of editing• Mainly straight cuts• Bright lighting• High angle/low angle• Bright colours against black and white background• Panning• Editing to reflect pace of music• Special lighting effects• High lighting• Equal division of shots upon band members• Whole band shots• No real sound effects• Colour effects – often monochrome• Dubbed sound• Zooming out• Shadows• Mise-en-scène reflects atmosphere• Animation • Does the music video adhere to or subvert these?

Textual Analysis of Pop Music Video

Representations• Short skirts• Legs and low cut tops• Voyeurism• Glamour – lifestyle• Seductive poses from female artists• Urban locations• Dancing• Crowd shots• Playing out ‘pop star’ lifestyle within video• Fairly straight forward narrative• Group singing whilst chaos takes place around• Anti-establishment activity• Destroyed environments• Mean and moody men• Deserted locations• Singing whilst acting• Trying to portray a certain image• Self-appreciation• All playing to the audience• Does the music video adhere to or subvert these?

Textual Analysis of Pop Music Video

• technical codes: e.g. MS/MLS newsreader to connote objectivity, 3/4 shots

• of interviewees to connote subjectivity, high-key lighting more objective;

• edits e.g. cut, wipe, dissolve; use of continuity editing e.g. establishing shot,

• shot/reverse shot in interview by presenter

• • cultural codes: e.g. suit, voice, RP to suggest authority; minimal body

• movement and expression to suggest objectivity; clock; computers to

• connote up-to-date, hi-tech; colour codes; sans serif font connotes up-todate;

• connotations of words, active voice

• • anchorage: use of music to create sense of drama/urgency; use of

• voiceover to explain actuality footage

• • mode of address: ‘objective’ newsreader & reporters use direct address;

• other ‘subjective’ views indirectly addressed to reporter; different modes of

• address for mass audience or to more educated social class ABC1s

Media Language - Basic Music Video stuff

Tempo of music drives the editing.

Genre might be reflected in types of mise-en-scene, themes, performance, camera and editing styles.

Camerawork impacts meaning. Movement, angle and shot distance all play a part in the representation of the artist/band (close-ups dominate).

Editing is done in fast cuts, rendering many of the images impossible to grasp on first viewing, so ensuring multiple viewing (repeatability).

Digital effects often enhance editing, which manipulates the the original images to offer different kinds of pleasure for the audience. 

Media Language

Slightly more advanced – Andrew GoodwinIllustrate: Images used to represent the meanings of the lyrics and genre (this is the most common feature of a music video) this is very often literal.Disjuncture: When the meaning of the song is completely ignoredAmplify: Meanings and effects are manipulated and constantly shown throughout the video and shown to the audience (basically repetition).You MUST link these elements to the basic technical elements.

1(b) Media Language

• Production Terminology - effect of technical choices– Print Media– Moving Image

• Use of genre conventions• Use of narrative structures/codes• Encoding of meaning