During my AS course in Media Studies, I was fortunate enough to learn a broad variety of media terminology, techniques and key concepts of Generic film trailers and generic TV dramas. Even though I took Media at GCSE, I still hadn't grasped how to use iMovie or Final Cut Pro. However, I learned how to use them both efficiently as the AS course progressed.
One of our tasks at the beginning of the AS course, was a "preliminary task", in which we had to create a short film, where we had to follow the guidelines as to what must feature in our short film. A few of the editing techniques that had to be present were - Continuity - where the shots are placed together in a way to maintain a flow of constant time, Match On Action - where an object would begin an action in one shot, and complete it in the next; thus creating a visual bridge that deters viewers from noticing the cut from one shot to another. At first it was quite difficult for my group and I to be able to show these techniques in our footage, but with trial and error, we succeeded in making these techniques fit in smoothly within our short film. As we were learning the new tricks of the trade, I was becoming more and more confident with understanding how different shots and editing techniques can change or add meaning to a certain text. During the editing process of our short film, I was understanding how to use iMovie more efficiently as I observed a group colleague work her magic on the editing software which was highly beneficial to myself.
With the techniques learned, we were able to move on to the next task being coursework. The coursework was to create a generic trailer. Before any planning and filming could commence, we had to learn the key codes and conventions of specific genres. These codes and conventions include things such as what the audience would expect from that specific genre like Horror - audiences would expect blood, and lots of it! or Adventure - audiences would expect a heroic figure, and perhaps a mythical creature or two! Also, we had to learn and understand the five key concepts of a film: Genre, Narrative, Representation, Audience and Media Language. We then got put into groups, and all the groups were able to choose what genre we wanted to make our trailer to be classed as, my group made a joint decision to create a horror themed trailer for a new fictional film. Within our group, we delegated ourselves roles, which I was in charge of the planning & research, the other 3 members were in charge of production (filming), editing, and exhibition. I learned as this course progressed that a lot of commitment, effort and time were needed to keep on track and stay on schedule and stay organised. As the weeks passed, we were finalising our footage, ready to be burned to a disc. However, we realised once Mrs Raji had viewed our media product, that we had only one or two editing techniques present in our trailer. So we took our product back, and re-shot certain scenes making sure we had all the elements in our media text. We made an animated production company logo which took some time figuring out how to create it and make it look professional. Finally we had finished re-shooting and re-editing, and again showed it to Mrs Raji, and we had made a successful trailer! Then came the presentations. We presented our trailer to the media class, and beforehand we had to tell them our processes of how the trailer became to be. We got a general positive feedback from our audience, and we were really pleased.
Once the trailer exhibitions were over, we began preparing for our examination. Preparation for the exam took a whole lot of revising, and a whole lot of learning terminology, key concepts and media theorems. Whilst the deadline was coming up for everything needed to be put on our blogs ready to be sent of for examination, I had a personal problem that affected my work and was unable to complete everything on my blog, and revise and study efficiently and put 100 percent effort into the preparation for the exam.
Overall, I really enjoyed my experience of the AS Media Studies course, but due to the unfortunate circumstances, my inability to put maximum time and effort into my work; jeopardising my chance of achieving to the best of my ability, however, I remain optimistic about my outcome of this course, and hope to be able to continue to Media Studies at A2.
