1. How did you use media technologies in the
construction and research, planning and evaluation
stages?
Research and Planning
The research and planning of our TV documentary was highly important for the
production. We didn’t know that so much planning went into making a
documentary and we didn’t know about using media technologies such as the
camera, Final Cut Express and Garage Band. A lot of the planning we had to do
did not require media technologies; it had to be done by hand. For example,
our storyboards were done by hand.
In the research stage of our
documentary, we used new media
technologies to help publish our findings
onto our blog. For example we used
Prezi to publish our different topic
ideas. This made our blog look a bit
different and a bit more interesting. To
research into our topic more, we had to
use up to date sources that could
provide us with recent and relevant information. We used sources such as The
Guardian, BBC and The Telegraph.
These websites provided us with the statistics and facts we needed to use in
our documentary. We also had to do research into the channel we wanted to
broadcast our documentary on. To conduct our channel research, we looked at
the websites of the potential channels and found out what their target
audience was to see whether it fitted into our target audience. The
most suitable channel for ourdocumentary to be broadcasted on was
Channel 4. We chose Channel 4 because we found out that Channel
4 broadcasts a lot of documentaries as part of their regular TV
schedule so we knew that our documentary would fit in. Also, we
found out that their target audience consist of our target audience

2. therefore we knew that our documentary would be shown to the right
audience. Through giving a questionnaire to a group of students in our target
audience we were able to find out that the majority of them watch Channel 4
regularly. This allowed us to be sure that we had chosen the right channel for
our documentary to be broadcasted on.
We also had to research into similar documentaries to make sure that we
could pick out codes and conventions that Channel 4 has used in their
documentaries. To do this, we used 4OD to look at similar documentaries and
note down any features that we could use in our documentary. We also had to
look at YouTube to find documentaries that were no longer available on 4OD.
All of our research was then posted in our group blog on blogger.com which
was used to post all of our research and planning so that it was all in one place
and easily assessable. I found blogger.com useful because as a group we could
all look at the research and
planning as a whole and identify
what could be improved or plan
what our next step was.
Filming
The next stage of production was to start filming. To film our documentary we
used Canon HD Camera. This camera allowed us
to take still shots as well take videos which was a
useful feature to have. After learning basics of the
camera, we were able to learn how to use the
more complex features such as the zooming tool,
focus tool and the white balance tool. Learning
how to use these tools and so many others
helped us to expand our abilities and use
techniques in our documentary that will make visually interesting. As well as
using the video filming function of the camera, we also used the still camera
function to take images of posters which would be useful to fill small sections
of our documentary.
During our documentary we used the tripod to hold the camera steady and
ensure we have professional shots. We did use the handheld camera for shots
that wouldn’t have looked professional and steady if we had used the tripod.
We used the tripod for shots such as establishing shots and expert interview
because using the tripod meant that we could get the framing for each shot

3. right. The tripod meant that we were able to shoot shots such as a pan, or
tracking without the camera shaking.
We also had to make we had the equipment for the sound as well for the
filming. To make sure that our sound levels could be heard
clearly, we used a directional microphone to record our expert
interviews, vox pops and voice over. We had
to plug in headphones into the camera so that
we knew when we were filming the sound
levels could be heard clearly. When we recorded our voice
over we used a quiet room without the echoing effect, so
that the voice over was recorded clear and without any
background noise.
Editing
When we finished all our filming, we uploaded all of our clips from our camera
onto the Apple iMac. Once we had done it once, the process was simple and
easy to do. We plugged the camera into the
iMac and then opened Final Cut Express
which is the software on the iMac that we
used to edit our whole documentary. The first
stage was ‘log and transferring’ all the clips
from our camera and place them into Final
Cut Express so that we were ready to edit straight away.
After every day we logged and transferred that days
clips into Final Cut Express and named each individual
clip something that would help us to find them easily
when it came to structuring our documentary.
Window for
viewing our
Time
documentary.
Unedited footage
Visual footage
Editing tools
Audio footage

4. When filming we had taken our time during each shot to make sure that the
shot was steady. So when it came to editing, a lot of our clips had to be
modified and sped up because they were taking up too much time. To do this
we went onto Modify and then down to speed where we could increase the
speed so that the clip can take up less time on the timeline.
We also had a few problems with the audio levels on particular clips because
when we watched some of the clips back such as the Just4U interview, the
sound levels could not be heard clearly. To fix the problem
we used the pin point tool on the tool bar and picked the
point where we wanted to increase the sound
levels and raised the pink sound bar up. We then
had to listen to the clip back with the rest of the
documentary to check the sound was level.
Modifying the sound levels also became useful when we wanted to
fade the music in and out, which we did before and after the expert
interviews.
Another skill we learnt to do on Final Cut Express was the use of
transitions and effects. In our documentary we used mostly straight
cuts which is a convention used in many actual documentaries. But on
some shots such as the opening sequence and we did this because we thought
the audience would appreciate a more interesting opening sequence that
would grab the audience’s attention straight away. The
transitions were easy to use because all we had to do is
choose the transition from the effects sidebar and then drag
the effects onto the clip we wanted. We used the effects
cross dissolve and swipe during the opening sequence. We
could preview the clip and transition before we made the
final editing which helped us to save time and not make as
many mistakes.
After all the clips and transitions were put into the correct place and the
timeline was structured the way we wanted it to be. It was time to place in the
sound and record our voiceover. Before recording our voiceover, we had to
script it and make sure that the content was relevant to the documentary. We
had to record the voiceover on the camera using the headphones and
microphone and we made sure again that we recorded in a quiet room where
there would be no echoing sound. We decided to record our voiceover in
sections so that it would be easier to place into the timeline.

5. Using Garage Band we composed a simple one beat music track that would
play as our background music. We made a 5 minute track which consists of the
‘Club Dance Beat 007’ which can be located in the Garage Band library and
then exported the track as an mp3. We then opened the track in Final Cut
Express and dragged it in the A2 layer of our audio timeline.
Radio Trailer
Our radio trailer also had to be created on Final Cut
Express. Again, we created our background music in
Garage Band and we used the same beat as we did for
our documentary to link the two
products together. We dragged the
beat into the timeline and then saved it as our track. To
choose a beat, we looked at the different types of sound
that were available in the Garage Band library. We ended
up choosing ‘Club Dance Beat 007’ and pasted the track
over and over again to create one 5 minute track. Once
we had the basic music track done, we then had to place
the voiceover and extracts from our documentary over
the top. To make sure that the extracts and voiceover
could be heard clearly, we had to adjust the sound levels.
Once everything was finished and we were happy with it, we then exported
this again by choosing the export song to disk option on the share drop down
menu. Once we had exported the radio trailer it could be played on any device
as an mp3 track.
The radio trailer was easier to construct as we had already learnt and
developed our Final Cut Express skills after making our documentary. We used
two extracts from our documentary which were clips from our expert
interviews because we thought that these extracts would grab the audience’s
attention and get them interested in the documentary. There were certain
things that we had to make sure were included in our radio trailer like the
time, date and channel of the documentary which we made sure were
included in our script.

6. Magazine Article
To make our magazine article we used the same software that we used to
make our music magazine in AS Media. We used Adobe InDesign which
allowed us toproduce our double page spread.
To start our double page spread I added the purple banner with the yellow text
inside it reading “The Best of this Week’s TV”
because it followed TV Choice’s conventions which
we had researched beforehand.
We then copy and pasted the article into InDesign from Word and structured it
into columns which is also another convention which TV Choice regularly do in
their articles.
To make the single page into a double page spread we had to go onto the
layout drop down menu and select the option add page. This made our single
page spread into a double page spread and
allowed us to make the double page spread
as a whole rather than have to make each
page separately.
Because we had used InDesign before, we
had already learnt the basics and
developed our skills during the AS Media
course. Therefore when it came to making
the double page spread, it was pretty
simple because we knew what we were
doing.