animatic

Progress so far...

So far i am fairly happy with my progress and the transition from AS to A2 e.g. working as a group/on my own. However, i am aware that things will get harder as technical aspects come into place. My planning and research is complete and now i am going to complete my animatic tomorrow. Once i have finished my animatic, then i will start applying sounds and getting a real idea of what i want my opening to look like. I have made the decision to add more charcters into my opening sequence, therefore making it more interesting to watch and complying with the themes of existing childrens tv dramas. The process so far has been fairly difficult as i am working independantly, but now i am getting used to the software i am finding it easier to do and i hope my progress will continue.

In addition, within todays ILP lesson (monday 12th October) we presented our animatics to the class and got feedback. My feedback was as follows:

• Good use of non-diagetic sound.
• Needed to improve drawings- i did this by asking a friend to draw some of the stills for my animatic thus making it easier to understand and of better quality.
• Add some transitions/'camera angles' e.g. pans- i did this by working out how to add a couple of pans into my animatic and making it more realistic to my final piece.
• Add more characters near the end- i did this by add more characters into my animatic.

I can now compare my opening more readily to currently existing childrens TV drama's such as 'the demon headmaster' where all of the main characters are introduced within the opening therefore helping the viewer connect with them before the 'drama' begins.

Still Number 2

Location Still

A home environment & a school setting :) real life childrens TV drama.

Questionaire Evaluation

From my questionaire i managed to gain information as to what my target age group are interested in within TV drama. In addition to this, i founf that the most popular childrens TV dramas at the moment are: Tracy Beaker and Doctor Who, from this information i can assess that children enjoy both fantasy and real life within their programmes of choice. Furthermore, i founf that the most popular genre in itself were Drama and Comedy, again a wide spectrum. Within an actual opening the favourite aspect was On Screen Action, helping me within my planning and the choices i am going to have to make in order to create my piece. As for favourite character and setting, Schools and 'human' characters were chosen as the favourite. Lastly, my target audience aged from 7-12 mainly prefer it when real life issues are presented within TV drama, again helping me within my planning.

21st September Planning- to be continued...

Today i decided to brainstorm further ideas for my childrens TV drama opening.
Ideas that i thought of were:

• Setting the drama within a school environment with a 'real life' theme.
• Creating a title sequence which is engaging to a younger audience and also longer than on-screen action.
• Making the plot relate strongly to real life issues.

Furthermore, i have decided to think about the sort of character that i would like to include in my opening- maybe a stereotypical character that is only seen for a second (elaborated further later). I would most probably only have one character shown- but with extras.

By making these decisions i am using themes/ideas that are present within other childrens TV drama's such as 'grange hill' and 'the demon headmaster'.

Film Noir

Within todays lesson we viewed a television extract on Film Noir. From doing this i have learned that genre is created through stylistic conventions such as lighting, narrative and structure. Also, about characterisation and how it is used to re-enforce conceptual ideas.

Here are some of the things i noticed within 'Film Noir':

• There is dark lighting, and on-screen action is always shot in black and white.
• Women are powerful within a sexual manner and men are through power and violence.
• There is always a dark storyline to be followed.
• Media culture has literary influences.
• Voice overs are used to connect charcter and audience.
• As are phychological messages and effects.
• From 'Film Noir' iconic music was founded.
• There is always a build up of suspence.
• Framing of character challenged conventions at the time.
• Artificial lighting was used.

Although i cannot directly use all of these factors within my Childrens Tv Drama opening i can develop a couple in order to make my piece original. For example:

• Using some artificial lighting.
• Framing characters in a different way- challenging conventions.
• Representing the way children live in a different way than the norm.

IDEA'S FOR OPENING (so far):

• A 'Grange Hill' type of opening but futurised/ modernised to present day.
• A horror theme e.g. Goosebumps.