WELCOME TO A2 MEDIA STUDIES!So, what will we be doing?

1. Advanced Media Portfolio - coursework2. Critical Perspectives in Media – exam3. Learning cool stuff, having lots of fun doing it,

making some awesome products and getting cracking results!

A2 OVERVIEW – G324 Advanced Media Portfolio – G324

Coursework unit worth100 marks - 50% of A2 A significant body of work requiring excellent organisation, high levels of

technical skill, unbridled creativity and a lot of time and effort1. Research and planning – blog – 20 marks2. Three products make up the portfolio – a music promo video and two

supporting products (a digipak a poster and a webpage) – 60 marks (40, 10,10)

3. Digital evaluation – 20 marks

This is what you are expected to produce to get top Level 4 marks Example 1 – Puretone – ‘Totally Addicted to Bass’ Example 2 – Beastie Boys – ‘Triple Trouble’ Example 3 – You had me at 6 - Crash’ Example 4 – Viva Brother – ‘Still Here’ Example 5 – Noah and the Whale ‘Five Years Time’

A2 OVERVIEW – G324 Q - What do these music videos have in common? A - Technical skills (tekkers) in abundance including:

Accurate lip synch Layering / splitscreen (multiple versions of same person in shot) Green screen / chromakey High level editing techniques such as rapid cutting on the beat Colour correction/lighting adjustments Sophisticated use of SFX (not just cos their ‘cool’)

Next 5 weeks - you will ALL know how to do these things! (except the dinosaur bit)

Your ‘tekkers’ need to be strong so… That’s why we’ll be doing skills based lessons on Final Cut Pro

after an introduction to music video

A2 OVERVIEW – G325 Critical Perspectives in Media – G325

2 hour examined unit worth 100 marks - 50% of A2 Two Sections – 50 marks each – one hour on each question Section A: Theoretical Evaluation of Production (50 marks) Section B: Contemporary Media Issues (50 marks)

Section A Question1a – you have to evaluate your skills development over the

course of your production work - from Foundation Portfolio to Advanced Portfolio. You’ll be given a specific production practice focus for this in the exam. E.g. creativity, digital technology, post-production etc – 25 marks

Question1b – you have to select one of your productions and evaluate it in relation to a media concept. E.g. representation, narrative, genre etc – 25 marks

A2 OVERVIEW – G325 Section B – Critical Perspectives in Media We study: Postmodernism and the Media – one big essay – 50

marks We have to look at this concept through the past, the present and the future We need to understand it as a concept, a critical framework, a time period and

the theorists who pontificate about it (Baudrillard, Strinati, Jameson, Lyotard) An intellectually challenging, thought provoking and highly stimulating unit of

work! Past texts studied include: Film: Inception End of Watch. Hot Fuzz, Catfish, Scream, Sucker Punch Television: Flight of the Conchords, Extras, The Mighty Boosh, The Simpsons,

various Reality TV, Black Mirror, How Television Ruined Your Life, Supernatural Web 2.0: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Internet memes (e.g. lolcats) Video games: WOW, GTA, Assassins Creed, Farmville, SIMS Music: DJ Shadow, Gorillaz, Lady Gaga

KEYS TO SUCCESS AT A2 Be organised – get your folders sorted now Up skill your tekkers - especially Final Cut and Photoshop Blog prodigiously and with quality on your production work Put in the hours for your production work – the most common

link with outstanding Level 4 work is ‘amount of graft’ Plan and execute your evaluations EARLY – it is the most

commonly underdeveloped part of the portfolio Subscribe to things like this -- or this -- or this -- in general,

keep up to date with things happening in the media, especially the digital side

Watch past episodes of this There are clips on Channel 4 and youtube. Look out for the new series

Start reading this (Username and Password to follow) and make use of the books and magazines at the back of the room

CLASS NOTES All powerpoints (and handouts) will be on the blog so check

regularly and download what you want – I will TRY and put powerpoint up before the lesson so you can come to the lesson with the powerpoint already saved on to your laptop or printed out (with space for notes…..)

Some extension reading will also be set using Twitter so make sure you are a follower!

It is your responsibility to keep up to date even if you miss classes. This includes homework tasks

LETS THINK AND EVALUATE OUR PROGRESS AND GOALS What do you have to do to improve your performance this

year? What are you going to avoid? What grade do you want/think you can get? How are you going to get it? What help do you need in order to get that grade?

LETS GET DANCING Music Video Homework Task You need to find a pre your birth iconic or ground

breaking music video – think Madonna, Michael Jackson, Peter Gabriel etc

You need to complete a detailed blog post about why this video is considered to be iconic (what have people said about it), what you think of it, and detailed textual analysis (camerawork, editing, mise en scene technical elements etc) You will also need to include an embedding copy of the music video……

Due in one weeks time! This website could help you think of a video but feel free

to research far and wide! This website is also good.