2. Write out the following generic question in the
middle of your page and annotate the key
words according to what you understand them
to mean/stand for
Problems
How successful
Solutions
What I learned
0 Describe and evaluate your skills development over
the course of your production work from the
Foundation Portfolio to the Advanced Portfolio

3. Research and Planning for
1(a)
0 What were the different processes that went into your
pre-production work across AS and A2?
0 Different approaches to research/planning
0 How you recorded all of this
0 Audience consideration/research and its effect on the
planning/production
0 Research into institutions
0 What you had to have in place before you went to film

4. Research and Planning
AS A2

6. What exactly IS Media
Language?
0 How a media text communicates meaning through
0 Camerawork
0 Editing
0 Mis-en-scene
0 Soundtrack
0 Film uses verbal and written language as well as the
languages of moving image
0 Each form of communication has its own creative language
– e.g. Camera close-ups convey intimacy or discomfort at
being so near a subject, big fonts in the titles signal
significance – MORI

7. Media Language
0 Understanding the grammar, syntax and metaphor
system of media language increases our appreciation
and enjoyment of media experiences
0 Example: The camera positioning in the shower scene of
‘Psycho’ places the viewer as a voyeur; in the first instance
watching Marion as she washes and then
positioning them as being able to foretell of
her death at the hands of ‘Mother’.
0 The camerawork constructs connotations of
fear and suspense, two generic expectations

8. Semiotics – Barthes (1977)
0 We last saw this theorist with Representation
0 Key words
0 DENOTATION = Signifier [Visual/physical on screen]
0 CONNOTATION – Signified [Suggested or Culturally
agreed meaning]
0 John Fiske (1982) ‘denotation is what is
filmed, connotation is how it is filmed.’

9. Media Language and
Genre/Narrative
0 Meaning is created through analysing the micro elements of a
film
0 Camerawork – shot types, movement, composition of
frame, angles
0 Soundtrack – diegetic, non-diegetic
0 Editing – organisation of scenes to create meaning – link to
narrative. Continuity editing (match on action, 180 degree
rule, S/R/S. Long or short takes?
0 Mis-en-Scene – Iconography, setting, lighting, costume and
props
0 Discuss how generic codes and conventions are displayed
through the use of these micro elements in your film
0 Stuart Hall (1980) – how you encoded meaning for your
audience and what you wanted them to decode

10. Structure your Writing
Suggestion 1 (if you think you might struggle with this Q)
0 Separate out your essay to discuss the four technical elements
Suggestion 2 (if you think you can aim for high B/A)
0 Separate out your essay to discuss the production process
0 Pre-production – research into generic codes and
conventions, how you applied this in your location search and
storyboarding
0 Production (filming) – how you applied camerawork codes and
conventions into your filming, costume
considerations, characterisation
0 Post-Production – use of your titles, how did your choice of font
reflect certain connotations about your film? Soundtrack choices
– did you add any foley (sound-effects/hyperbolic sounds) to
your film? Voice/over? Diegetic/non-diegetic