Creating Media Productions

What Creating Media Productions covers

Creating Media Productions is examined in AS Unit 2 and A2 Unit 4, the two production units. It covers researching the codes and conventions of a form, audience research and defining a target audience, analysing comparable products: genre and competitor research, investigative research and the development outline, treatments, storyboards, scripts and flat plans, schedules, shot lists and risk assessment, production in audio-visual, print and online form, working to a brief, applying media language to construct a representation, original material, copyright and ethics, independent, collaborative and cross-media production and reflective and critical analysis.

The 12 subtopics

Each one has its own page. WJEC AS Media Studies students sit this topic in the first year.

• Researching the codes and conventions of a formConventions of a media form, difference between researching a convention and copying an existing product and subgenre convention.Open →
• Audience research and defining a target audienceTarget audience of a production, four demographic categories used to define an audience and primary research.Open →
• Analysing comparable products: genre and competitor researchComparable product, competitor research and what is meant by a gap in the market.Open →
• Investigative research and the development outlineInvestigative research in the development of a production, what a development outline contains and research finding becoming a production decision.Open →
• Treatments, storyboards, scripts and flat plansShooting script, what a grid does in page design and what a wireframe shows.Open →
• Schedules, shot lists and risk assessmentWhat a production schedule sets out, shot list and purpose of a call sheet.Open →
• Production in audio-visual, print and online formMatch on action, ambient sound used for in an edit and bleed in page layout.Open →
• Working to a briefWhat a production brief contains and purpose element of a brief.Open →
• Applying media language to construct a representationRecall questions on camera angle, lighting, costume, typeface, framing, editing pace, music and colour as deliberate representational choices, avoiding an unintended stereotype, positioning the audience through form, making a representation specific rather than generic, and writing the intended meaning of each choice down at the planning stage.Open →
• Original material, copyright and ethicsOriginal material in a production, what is meant by the public domain and royalty-free music.Open →
• Independent, collaborative and cross-media productionCross-media production and main risk of collaborative work.Open →
• Reflective and critical analysisFirst thing a finished production should be measured against and preferred reading of a producer's own product.Open →

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Take Creating Media Productions further

The same content, four other ways.

Commonly confused

Pairs that lose marks when they are blurred together.

• Primary research vs Secondary research

  Primary research: data the producer gathers directly for this production. Secondary research: data gathered by somebody else and reused.

• Quantitative data vs Qualitative data

  Quantitative data: counting how many people do or think something. Qualitative data: explaining why they do, in their own words.

• A treatment vs A storyboard

  A treatment: a short prose description of the whole proposed product. A storyboard: a frame-by-frame plan of the shots.

Questions from this topic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1. 1

   What is meant by the conventions of a media form?

   Model answer

   Conventions are the features an audience expects to find in that form, such as a masthead and cover lines on the front of a magazine.

2. 2

   Why does a producer research a form's conventions before making a product in it?

   Model answer

   An audience recognises a product by its conventions, so a product that ignores them looks amateur or is mistaken for something else entirely.

3. 3

   What is the difference between researching a convention and copying an existing product?

   Model answer

   Researching a convention identifies the underlying rule so it can be applied to new content, while copying reproduces one product's particular solution.

4. 4

   Name three features to record when researching the front cover of a magazine.

   Model answer

   The masthead, the cover lines and the main cover image are three features to record.

5. 5

   What should be recorded when researching the conventions of a music video?

   Model answer

   The balance of performance, narrative and concept material, the editing pace, the relationship of image to lyrics and the way the artist is presented.

6. 6

   Why is it useful to research products that failed as well as ones that succeeded?

   Model answer

   A failed product shows which conventions an audience will not accept being broken, which a successful product cannot demonstrate.

What is inside Levo

Six ways to work the same material.

Creating Media Productions revision questions

Is Creating Media Productions examined at AS in WJEC Media Studies?

Yes. It sits in AS Unit 2 and A2 Unit 4, which you take in the first year, so it is on the AS paper as well as counting towards the full A level.

What does Creating Media Productions cover in WJEC AS-Level Media Studies?

12 subtopics: researching the codes and conventions of a form, audience research and defining a target audience, analysing comparable products: genre and competitor research, investigative research and the development outline, treatments, storyboards, scripts and flat plans, schedules, shot lists and risk assessment, production in audio-visual, print and online form, working to a brief, applying media language to construct a representation, original material, copyright and ethics, independent, collaborative and cross-media production and reflective and critical analysis. Each one has its own page with questions and model answers.

How is Creating Media Productions organised?

By the WJEC 603-1976-8 specification, subtopic by subtopic, so it matches the order you are taught it in.