Media Essay Ford

 

What impact does media ownership have upon the range of products available to audiences in the media area you have studied?

Media Ownership has a massive influence over the range of products that are available due to the big six companies which are Universals, Columbia, Paramount Pictures, 20^th Century Fox, Warner bros and Disney. These six big companies have most of the control over the movie making industry as they own over 80% of it all.

Due to the big six companies mostly making all of the big hit movies such as Batman and Transformers they know how to correctly make the film as they have done it many times before. The main impact it creates is that all of the films they all have in some way the same element in it, which is action. They all know by adding some sort of action to the movie it will gain more interest from audiences. They may make some original story lines and creative ideas for each  film to try and make a profit but it always will relate to action because each of the big six companies know that by adding an action element into the movie it will gain them more viewers and more profit overall.

Warner Bros distributed films such as Batman and Superman which were films that were based around action and general fighting but films that were not made by one of the big six such as Twilight which Is also a film based around romance did bring action into the film due to the fact that they know that from the films that the big six has made and have all had action elements in normally make a profit so this shows that the media ownership will impact how other people will create movies.

The big six dominate the media industry because of the money they have at their disposal so they can create pure action movies or movies that aren’t based around action but can still make the quality and effects to a brilliant standard due to the amount of money they can spend on editing the film. Smaller film companies must follow the ideas and creations of the big six so they hope that they can gain a profit if the movie is somewhat based or has the same idea as one of these movies. Due to the big six having massive budgets and having control over the movie making industry they can take more risks due to the amount of money they can spend and already have but barely any small solo movie making companies will take the risk in there movies due to there being a massive chance of them not making any profit.

The film Paranormal Activity was made Orin Peli with a very small budget of $15,000 but then needed to use the funding of Paramount pictures so they could advertise the film so in the end Paramount Pictures distributed the film and they made a profit of over $193 million. This shows media ownership can cause a very small budget film that no one knows about and turn it into an international success  due to the control and power that the one of the big six’s influence.

In Conclusions media ownership has a massive impact over the range of products that are available to audiences due the amount of influences that certain companies have in the movie making industry and it then forces and encourages other companies to follow and base their ideas around the companies with power and dominance. Small companies even need the companies with ownership to help them boost there productions.

Mr Ford Essay (Marketing)

"Successful media depend as much upon marketing and distribution to a specific audience as they do upon good production products"

The main thing that influences people to go and see a movie is the marketing that has been produced for it. If a movie is made to an amazing standard it wont matter due to people not even noticing the movie has even been created because of no advertising and marketing. Because of this i strongly agree with the statement.

Movies that have distribution companies such as Universal or Disney have a major advantage due to the amount for money they can spend on marketing, and example is the Batman franchise, the distributers for Batman Dark Knight and Batman Dark Knight Rises were the Warner Bros which are a very well known distribution company from other films such as the Harry Potter franchise. Films like Batman The Dark Knight and the Harry Potter franchise may not of been as successful as they were if they did not advertise and use marketing to show the film because without things like trailers and posters some people would not even no the film has even been created or released so they would never go and see it even if it is a well known company or franchise.

You can use marketing in many different ways such as a big distributer would be able to produce multiple advertisements internationally and produce things like apps to let people know of the movie what they are creating but there are much cheaper ways for much smaller solo movie distributers to advertise there movie is by posting information and pictures about on international social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Some movies do not need constant amounts of advertisements, the best example of this is if a sequel of a movie of a movie or if a remake of a book series so people are expecting a second film and if the first was up to a good standard people a lot of people will come to watch with minimal advertisement.

Movies such as Avatar is a great example of a film which would require constant amounts of trailers, posters and apps being made for it because it is an original film made from scratch, people may argue that with its massive budget of $237 million it was obviously going to be a fantastically made movie but  no-one would even known about the fantastic quality the movie was made to without constant amounts of marketing and advertisements. Some examples of advertising that the distributers of Avatar (20th Century Fox) did was releasing two trailers, one was 129 seconds while the other was 210 seconds, they showed these trailers in very strategic places like at half time at a American football match, this trailer was 3 and a half minutes long. The trailers then progressed to be shown online of Yahoo and in 3D IMAX in countless cinemas around America. The constant spamming of trailers did pay off because a teaser of the film has become the most watched trailer in the world with 4 million views on Apple.com. They also made deals with world-wild companies such as Coca-Cola and Fox Studies to show advertisements of the movie. In my personal opinion i feel that without the massive range of advertisements and marketing that 20th Century Fox used Avatar would not of made a outstanding profit of over $2.7  billion, so with this evidence it makes strongly believe with the statement.

Some movie genres have a advantage over others with marketing because the action genre dominate over other genres due to the enjoyment it gives people, you could use Avatar as an example with the help of there overwhelming budget but you could also use a classic action film such as Mad Max which was a low budget film of $400,000 and a very low amount of advertisements but to this it has made a profit of over $421 million just because of the entertainment people find from the action and entertainment in the film. Because action is the dominating genre it gives a massive advantage to film such as The Avengers Assemble and most comic book films because people are going to expect to enjoy due to the action in the film so it means that they need less advertisements from other genres like romance or horror.

Advertising and marketing work in synergy in with money and finance, without the money to produce the advertisements the film would be at a great disadvantage as they would have no way to tell people about the movie or any information about it so they would not be influenced to see the movie. This gives a massive advantage to massive distribution companies such as Universal Studios and Paramount Pictures, due to there massive amount of money each company they have they are able to successful advertise any movie that they are creating.

In conclusion I strongly agree with the statement "Successful media depend as much upon marketing and distribution to a specific audience as they do upon good production products" due tot he fact that without advertising and marketing people would not be influenced to see the film no matter what the quality it is made to.

Regional identity

Regional Identity

Where is my family from?
My Mum: Watford, England
My Dad: Limerick, Ireland

Do you have an accent or use dialect words for things?
I swap my saying for things like grass and bath. I say roll instead of batch or cob or bun

Do you think you can tell where people come from by their accent/clothing food/food habits/how they spend there money etc.?

I think that you can tell where someone is from by there accent if it is very strong, and you can tell someone by what there were and things like makeup an hair cuts, and example of this is something like a scouse brow. I do not thinks you can tell someone where they are from by how they spend there money.

Do we have different opinions of people if they are from urban or rural areas? what about in the past if people came from urban or rural areas?

Yes we do stereotype people from where they are from because of things like the media, such as people from rural areas all farmers and people from urban places are all hooded thugs.

Gender (Doctor Who)

Gender

Gender is shown as the man being the dominant and powerful one and having control of the situation and the woman is shown as being vulnerable, weak and helpless and cannot do anything to help themselves but in the clip Martha is shown as dominant and powerful compared to most of the men and ends up having control of the situation.

With the miss-en-scen of the scene it shows The Master and the women in the red dress on a higher platform than martha, this is to show the dominance over Martha in this part of the scene, there is also multiple mid shots of armed guards keeping people hostages, they are mostly females that are being held  hostages in working clothes, this shows the dominance of the armed guards in there military uniform.

In the scene Martha is wearing very masculine clothing, maybe even military. There are lots of close up in the shot which shows all of Martha's emotions in a lot of details, this would show the stereotype of women being much more emotional compared to men as there are not many close up to the masters face, also the people being held hostage seem very emotional and the majority of them are women. The women in the red dress would be shown as a typical women because being in a dress showing a lot of body parts and also wearing makeup which is mostly linked to women.

Constantly throughout the scene there are multiple low angle shots of Martha and high angle shots of The Master, this would be to show that The Master has all of the power and dominance over Martha. The Master is at an high angle shot at the beginning of the scene so the viewer would instantly know who has the power in the situation.

In the scene there is a flashback were Martha is shown doing independent hard work, this would be seen as an opposite of the female stereotype because this would normally be associated for the man, also at the end of the scene it is Martha that saves the Doctor at the end of the situation but at the very end of the scene it is an confrontation between The doctor and The Master and Martha does not play a part anymore in the situation.

Throughout the scene the Master voice seemed to be raised a lot louder compared to Martha, this could be to show The Masters dominance over Martha which would stereotype the male being stronger over the female but as the clip progresses Martha's voice slowly begins to increase in volume as she slowly begins to stand back up and when she has full control of the situation the Masters voice has greatly lowered in volume.

Overall in the clip of Doctor Who there are multiple female stereotypes that are proven wrong and have swapped roles with the male, the use of sound and camera angles show who has the power in the situation and who doesn't, stereotypically the female beings as the weakling in the scene but by the end she has full control of the situation.

The male Gaze

The Male Gaze

Chocolate Box: half or full-smile, lips together or slightly parted, teeth barely visible, full or three-quarter face to camera. Projected mood: blandly pleasing, warm bath warmth, where uniformity of features in their smooth perfection is devoid of uniqueness or of individuality.

Invitational: emphasis on the eyes, mouth shut or with only a hint of a smile, head to one side or looking back to camera. Projected mood: suggestive of mischief or mystery, the hint of contact potential rather than sexual promise, the cover equivalent of advertising’s soft sell.

Super-smiler: full face, wide open toothy smile, head thrust forward or chin thrown back, hair often wind-blown. Projected mood: aggressive, ‘look-at-me’ demanding, the hard sell, ‘big come-on’ approach.

 

Romantic or Sexual: a fourth and more general classification devised to include male and female ‘two-somes’; or the dreamy, heavy-lidded, unsmiling big-heads, or the overtly sensual or sexual. Projected moods: possible ‘available’ and definitely ‘available’.

The Male Gaze video (Lynx Apollo advert)

This video fits the Laura Mulvey male gaze theory because the video focuses on things like the curves of the body when she is running to the dominant man, it makes the viewer feel that women will be attracted to him for using that product. it also shows the women being treated like an object as she being carried around by the man and is instantly takenfrom him.

Intro Scenes

Misfits


Description:
The misfits intro scene music makes it feel like a fast paced intro with a bit of comedy behind it. It has very dull and boring colours and it gives you  a basic idea about what happened to them in the intro.


The Walking Dead:
This has very dramatic and depressing music, it shows multiple scenes of empty city streets and schools to show that it is a post apocalyptic type series.

Ethnicity

Ethnicity

In the clip show at the beginning the women at the front desk was in a very clean and white formal suit and placed in front of everyone else, also the lighting in the room is very bright and the room is very open compared to the other staff she is wearing different coloured clothing where as they are wearing black suits, also she is a blonde haired blue eyed female and the scene makes here seem that she is clean and pure.

If you compare the women at the front desk to Jackie they are very different as she is in a storage room in the back of the hotel, also the room is very crammed and has no space compared to the big open front desk and the lighting is very dim and hard to see inside the room compared to the bright large lights shining down on the front desk.

Throughout the clip the white legal immigrants are shown as dominant and have power in the hotel and seem to run things but if you compare this to the illegal multi-racial immigrants they have no power and authority throughout the clip and they are constantly being told what to do.

Another way that ethnicity is shown in the clip is by Paul the character that spreads jam in the gums of the women that faints, he is quick to react to the situation and it is obvious he has medical knowledge from his past yet he still needed or wanted to move to England as an illegal immigrant. he would normally be told what to do all day because he is doing basic jobs but when put on the spot he instantly takes up a leader role to show he was maybe dominant in the country he came from.

The police officer at the start of the clip is a white male he is shown as very confident and the camera is zoomed in at his face but it seems that he is showing no emotion, he is very calm and collective and seems like he knows what he is doing and when one of the immigrants gets caught he says "We caught him thats the game" this shows that it is a regular thing that happens and that there is no surprise that it has happened.

The overall mise-en-scen could be shown as racist because the front of the hotel is very open and well light and all of the staff are dressed very formal and have a lot of interaction with the customers but if you compare this to the other side of the hotel were the illegal immigrants are it is very small and compact.

Also through in the clip when the camera enters the small cluttered room that Jackie is working in the camera is at a low angle on Jackie, this shows that Jackie has no power in the situation and that he is vulnerable and weak compared to the girl at the front desk.