1. Radio Trails Analysis
Trail for
(station/channel)
Channel 4
Target audience I think this advert is targeted to quite an open audience of 16-40. The topic of
the documentary its advertising is about losing your senses therefore its not
just aimed at one specific group. The vox pops are of older adults which could
reflect the audience but I’m not totally sure just from listening to the advert
(but as a teen I would watch it).
Tone of voice? The tone of voice is quite upbeat and happy which I don’t really understand
because the topic of the documentary is quite serious. I also watched the
documentary and the tone did not match the advert.
The repetition of the questions at the beginning would have been a good way
into suddenly change the tone and entice the listener however it just stayed
very upbeat all the way through.
Sound effects?
(SFX)
After each question theres a sound effect (e.g. ‘does the sight of a spider
scare you?’ ‘ahhhh’). These random noises keeps the advert interesting and
can also help to catch the listeners attention multiple times as they can relate
(e.g. if they also react like that to spiders).
Wildtrack/ambient
sound?
There are background noises (muffled talking) in the vox pops which is
expected
Use of music? Music embed of an upbeat song creates a memorable catchy background
tune which will be associated with this ad – this can lead to the song being
stuck in the listeners head and remind them to watch the documentary.
How many tracks? one
Sound levels? Constant however during the middle where all the
voxpops are on repeat together, the volume increases in
order to hear them all. I don’t like this
Length?
0:33 which is conventional as adverts last between 30 -60
seconds. This is also long enough for the key bits of info
to be expressed without the listener losing interest.
2. Other notes/common
elements/conventions
Vox pops used, date time and channel of the
documentary, name of documentary, small details about
the overall meaning of the documentary without boring the
listener – the lack of details makes the listener want to
watch and see what happens. Sound effects adds interest
and prevents the advert from being purely a voice over.