Constructing representations

Ideology is encoded into products by the producers.

Having a clear ideological bias helps the paper to attract and construct audiences for financial reasons, it is also used to manipulate audience into believing their ideology so they can benefit.

All media industries are motivated by power and profit.

Most newspapers in the uk have right winged views, the daily mirror and the guardian is left wing.

Broadsheets are more quality or serious based journalism aimed at middle social class, they have plainer layouts using long, more detailed articles with serious headlines that focus on politics or international news.

Tabloids are the 'popular press' aimed at working class audiences with bolder, more dramatic layouts for audience appeal. The articles are shorter with lots of puns and jokes and not much in-depth reporting. The stories are human interest based with use of gimmicks such as bingo games, free travel tickets and phone-in surveys.

Polysemy means multiple meanings. In newspapers producers tend to avoid polysemic readings, the process of forcing an audience in to a particular reading is called anchoring.

Anchorage is the fixing of a particular meaning to media text often through the use of captions.

How can bias manifest?
-Through selection and omission
-Through placement (more important stories are on the front)
-By headline (lexis used)
-By photo (caption camera angle)
-Through use of names and titles (referential)
-Through statistics and crowd counts
-By source control
-Word choice and tone

Bias-
Use of names and titles, referred to as worst pm
By photo, looking down as if n defeat or shame
Headline, emphasises it's importance
Layout- having list of points one after another makes list of things he's done wrong seem longer
Word choice and tone- brackets add comical effect and make tories seem laughable .             

Bias-
Wordplay in lexis makes it comical- labour are laughable.
The image represents him as a chicken- a playground immature insult.
The biased selection of image make him look frightened and stupid
The use of the word 'this' in capitals dehumanises Corbyn further.
Leading question pretends to give audience chance to answer and decide.
Use of nickname Jez is derogatory

Insulting them so much makes it easier to understand and decode for the audience- the assumption is that the audience is stupid.

The Daily Mirror

Newspapers are a form of escapism for audiences, so the stories need to be interesting.

'if it bleeds it leads' -if the circumstance is dire it will be a leading story. 

Hard news is big, serious news whilst soft news is minor happenings. Tabloids use soft news and broadsheets use hard news.

Intertextuality is where one text references another. For example; a tv show quoting a film, or scary movie referencing scream or other horror movies. Parody is a genre completely based on intertextuality. 

Why use intertextuality?

- Relatable

- Spotting them brings pleasure

- Financial reasons

- Attracts established audience

- Allows for a double mode of address

- Demonstrates ideologies of producers

A double mode of address is when two audiences are addressed separately in a media product, for example, children media products including adult jokes children won't understand.

Examples of intertextuality- Eastenders, referenced as enders. Assuming audience recognise colloquialism and are familiar with character 'Hayley.'

Word 'Mayhem' references Theresa May and action/war movie. Constructs ideology brexit is like world war 3 and May is destructive.

'Thug' references crime genre.

 

The paper is incredibly biased and anti-conservative.

Ideology is generally used to describe the ways in which those in power use their power to distort meaning. An ideology can be used to normalise the dominant ideas of the ruling class.

The two broadest political ideologies are left and right wing. Right wing ideologies tend to favour privatisation and lowering taxes- they focus on the money and state controlled systems, individualism, whereas left wing want state ownership and higher tax- they focus on the people and free market, this is collectivism.

Newspaper terminology

Barcode  - Used to scan the newspaper when purchasing. It is an optical, machine-readable, representation of data and contains information such as price

Body Text - Also known as copy. Written material that makes up the main part of an article

Byline - The line above the story, which gives the author’s name and sometimes their job and location

Caption - Brief text underneath an image describing the photograph or graphic

Centre Spread - A photograph, often in full colour, that runs across the middle two pages

Classified Ad - An advertisement that uses only text, as opposed to a display ad, which also incorporates graphics

Edition - Some newspapers print several of these every night, these are versions with some changes and maybe additional late stories

Folio - Top label for the whole page. Can relate to the area covered in the paper for example, National or a big news topic such as Social Media, Syria

Gutter - The blank space between margins of facing pages of a publication or the blank space between columns of text

Headline - A phrase that summarises the main point of the article. Usually in large print and a different style to catch the attention of the reader

Lead Story - Main story, usually a splash

Main Image - Dominant picture, often filling much of the front cover

Masthead - Title of the newspaper displayed on the front page

Page furniture - Everything on a page except pictures or text of stories

Page Numbers - A system of organisation within the magazine. Helps the audience find what they want to read

Pull Quote - Something taken from within an article, usually said by the person in the main image

Skyline - An information panel on the front page that tells the reader about other stories in the paper to tempt them inside

Stand First - Block of text that introduces the story, normally in a different style to the body text and headline

Standalone - Picture story that can exist on its own or on a front page leading to a story inside

Target Audience - People who the newspaper aims to sell to

Newspaper codes and conventions

Newspaper is print media.

Newspaper conventions
multiple main images
mass market appeal
several headlines instead of coverlines like magazines
copy is typically on front covers- especially in columns.
often feature satire which is political humour that ridicules politicians.
newspapers have shorter articles than magazines
blocked layout
masthead

The Guardian analysis

A powerful binary opposition is formed through the colour palette. The yellow headline stands out against the blue border, attracting the audience's eye and the red against the white has the same effect. The image of the robot anchored by the yellow headline is an example of a specific aspect of mise-en-scene functioning as a proairetic code. The hermeneutic code formed by the typeface 'no. no. no.' encourages the audience to question what the parliament is refusing, it is connoted that whatever Theresa May is proposing is ridiculous by the repetition of the word 'No.' with a full stop. 

Daily mirror- initial analysis

Daily mail

Royal logo in the middle suggests their newspaper is centred around traditional beliefs and is patriarchal. The font reinforces this and suggests the paper is a broadsheet which does not talk about trivial issues.

   

The sun

The sans serif font connotes the sun is about lower class trivial topics. The bright red suggests the view points they have are right winged and very bold rather than neutral. 

There a broadly two type of newspaper;

Broadsheet                               Tabloid (or red top)

Bigger size                                Smaller size

More formal                              Informal

Higher price                              Cheaper

Aimed at a higher class            Aimed at a lower class

                                                                                                 

The Daily Mirror-

Uses the Z format to place all the enticing elements- reader see the masthead, the main image, the main headline first.

Buzzwords- exclusive

Uses colour red for masthead and Corbyn strapline to showcase political bias- using it minimally makes the red stand out more on the cover reflecting how they think the labour party is the party which stands out the most.

Boxed football headline to the side, means when the newspapers are stacked alongside each other their will be a story aimed at the lower class visible over everything else

Use of different shaped images demonstrates how paper is image based with minimal text. Makes it look less formal and boring.

Pictures of footballers are proairetic codes.

Green reflects the football pitch, encouraging football fanatics to read it and be enticed by the atmosphere reflected.

Strapline 'First pictures of Mick Jagger' anchor main image.

Introduction to the Newspaper industry

The set texts are the daily mirror and the times, two British newspapers.

For the newspaper unit it is essential you read at least one of the following everyday-
- Print newspaper
- An online newspaper
Additionally try to read a different news outlet everyday.


Text

Decodes

Audience

???

Producer

Encodes

Text


Media institutions

Industry and institution are not the same.
An institution is the value and ideology of a media product.

Long road is a business with a usp.
Differentiation- Long road needs to prove it's different from other colleges.
Competition- Long road is a business which needs to be economically viable, like any media industry
Identification- When describing where you go to college 'long road' is easier to say 'thatbuilding wedged between the hopspital and long road'.
Ideology- Long road has very clear messages and values.


The easiest way for an institution to disseminate (spread its message) as quickly as possible is to have a unique and easily identifiable logo.

The masthead is the title of a newspaper.

The shell logo-
The relaxing arc is connotative of the ocean
The logo takes the form of the shell as it is used to provide oil
Use of bold powerful primary colours
The lines of the shell look like speed lines
Red and yellow are the colours of fire
Brand identity- colours
Looks like a sunset
Colours used in ferrari and porsche logos
Looks similar to other well established brands

Starbucks logo- 
Long hair connotes feminity
Crown shows her importance
Green connotes nature

Commodity fetishism is an obsession for a brand.

mpaa vs bbfc

MPAA- Motion picture association of America

70-80% of the time the BBFC and MPAA ratings will co-inside due to similar standards when it comes to rating movies.

Most of the time when certificates rated by the two associations differ it's because the MPAA rate something a pg-13 whilst the BBFC rate it a pg.

But the differences between the two companies go a lot further.

The BBFC fact file

Set up in 1912 but began classifying films in 1913
Originally known as the British Board of Film Censors
Created by the film industry as an independent body- it's non-governmental and non-profit
Used to provide guidance to UK local authorities who grant licenses to the cinemas in their areas.
When cinemas apply for licenses they must agree to allow children into films in accordance with BBFC guidelines- but the local councils have the authority to overall any of the board's decisions, although this is rarely done.
Funded by fees charged to producers and distributors

The MPAA fact file

Created in 1968
A replacement to the Hays Production Code (a basic approve or disapprove system)
Joined forces with the National Association of Theatre Owners and the International Film Importers & Distributors of America to 'help parents protect their children from mature material'
Funded by fees charged to producers and distributors
Producer's and Distributors can release a film with no rating and bypass the system, or use any description or symbol they choose without it being confused with MPAA symbols
Not associated with the government
US theatre chains are usually reluctant to show unrated films, movies without a rating tend to be independent, foreign or direct-to-video.

I, Daniel Blake trailer regulation

After the advice screening, Entertainment One submitted the trailer for classification with no category request. The trailer was deemed as uplifting and issue-free regardless of the themes of poverty and unemployment. It only has a singular use of the term 'Jesus Christ' which is permitted in the guidelines for a U- the classification the trailer was given.

I, Daniel Blake regulation

When Ken Loach received the Palme D'Or award at the Cannes Film Festival 2016 for the film I, Daniel Blake the director publicly recognised and commented on the film's political message, prior to the BBFC rating it. h

"When there is despair, the people from the far right take advantage. We must say that another world is possible and necessary"

In June of the same year the distributors, Entertainment One, sought advice from BBFC in hopes of a 12A age certificate. But when Compliance Managers viewed the film they gave it a 15, this was due to;

"a single use of very strong language ('c**t') and just shy of thirty uses of strong language ('f**k')."

The use of very strong language is said in anger, but is not particularly aggressive and is not aggravated by other factors. BBFC classification guides at 15 state that:

'Strong language is permitted. Very strong language may be permitted, depending on the manner in which it is used, who is using the language, its frequency within the work as a whole and any special contextual justification.'

Other issues in the film are sex references, including to prostitution out of necessity, prescription drug use, criminality; and some unintentional racism, which may have been acceptable at the requested 12A with appropriate advice for consumers in the 'BBFC insight' for the film. 

Compliance Managers told Entertainment One that they would be required to reduce the amount of strong language in the film to obtain the 12A they sought as well as noting in reports that the film would likely have limited appeal to 15 year olds.

Regulatory Framework of the UK film industry

Every industry has to follow regulations, the uk film industry has some of the most strict rules- controlled by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), it is illegal to release a film without a rating from the bbfc. 


Context is essential to regulation, it can allow pornography to be part of a film. The regulation of the film industry is completely ineffective.

A pre-existing or a pre-sold audience is an audience that are already established for a movie, such as the star wars or Harry Potter franchise watchers.

12A is only existent in cinemas, the equivalent for DVD or blu-ray is a 12.

The regulation of the film industry is not completely effective as underage consumers can use illegal websites in the uk or use Netflix, which is American based.

Key theory 13- Regulation, Sonia Livingston and Peter Hunt

Traditional approaches to media regulation are at risk because of the increasing power of global media corporations together with the rise of convergent media technologies and transformations in the production, distribution and marketing of digital media.

The role of the bbfc is to limit harm in society. 

Black Panther marketing material

https://youtu.be/VIKnmVqCFO4

Film marketing

Film marketing is how the film is sold and how it is advertised. Film trailers are a key film marketing method. Black panther is targeting a young black demographic but has many secondary audiences as it's such a large film with a mass audience.

How does the trailer for black panther appeal to a niche and mass audiences?

Black panther appeals to a mass audience with it's use of setting. Having exotic settings and landscapes visually appeals to those who haven't experienced them in real or just those who find it aesthetically satisfying. The urban setting of Korea also has this effect as it will attract Asians to watch the film as they'll feel included but at the same time those who haven't visited will want to see more. The film uses conventions from action films to build excitement and attract large audiences, such as amazing fight choreography and iconography like weapons, this mixed with the iconography of a superhero films and the highly stylised mise-en-scene of traditional African costume and culture offers a highly original, lucrative film.

More genre conventions: Form fitting costume, tight costumes demonstrating the character's muscles. Clear binary opposition between protagonist and antagonist.

Use of popular Kendrick Lamar rap song appeals to a mass audience as well as high production values and exciting exotic locations including African countries, such as Uganda.

Huge actors appeal to niche audiences such as Martin Freeman, Angela Basset and Andy Serkis. Huge appeal to hetero sexual women and gay men- lots of attractive men in tight costumes. Empowered female characters attract female audiences.

Based off of lesser known marvel character targets niche comic book psychographic

Use of technology and technological designs- Afro futurist design.

Narrative: good vs evil, Positive storyline good guy always wins- dominant hegemonic ideological values

African religious myths.

Synergy is the benefits of convergence, the idea of two media industries working together well.

Websites- interactive, visual, links to social marketing

Social marketing- making accounts for characters? 

Traditional marketing- Any traditional form of marketing like trailers and posters

Viral marketing campaigns- Where the audience does the work themselves. e.g- blair witch project. A website was made to make it look like a real myth that was currently being investigated. People believed the teens had really gone missing. They created a promo reel that producers thought was a real documentary.

Press marketing- Allowing the press to access your set or pre-release images of characters 

PR stunts- 

Fan created marketing- Fans make posters and fanfiction or twitter feeds. 

Hasbro toy merchandise-

https://youtu.be/VIKnmVqCFO4

Blaxploitation

In the 1970's there was a blaxploitation boom.

Marketing black cinema- economic factors

Blaxplotaition films proved extremely popular with a male, inner city, black working class demographic. But broadly they were produced by white filmmakers and financiers as a way of reaching a previously unreachable audience. In short, like any other film, their producers were motivated by profit and power. 

Key theory 12- power and media industries, Curran and Seaton

The media is controlled by a small number of companies primarily driven by profit and power. Media concentration limits variety, creativity and quality. 

More socially diverse patterns of ownership can create more varied and adventurous media productions.

Black Panther fact file-

-Production company; Marvel Studios

-Distributor; Walt Disney studio motion pictures

-Director; Ryan Coogler

-Cinematographer; Rachel Morrison

-Composer; Ludwig Goransson

-Editor; Michael P Shawver, Debbie Berman

-Primary cast; Chadwick Boseman, Michael B Jordan, Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira

-Box office; 1.344 Billion usd. Black Panther's domestic total for its first seven days brings it to $292 million, per Variety, $22 million more than The Avengers made in its first week back in 2012. It's also made $228 million internationally, for a $520 million worldwide total.

-Budget; 200 Million usd

-Critical reception;  97% rotten tomatos, 88% Metacritic, 7.3/10 imdb

- 15 versions of this film were made

-Advertising cost; 37 million usd

-This version was Announced in 2005, first version announced in 1992

- Grossed 105 million dollars in China

- Parts were shot in Africa

The latest big-screen superhero story is a subversive and uproarious action-adventure, in which African stereotypes are upended and history is rewritten. Full review

Peter Bradshaw
The Guardian

Virtually everything that distinguishes "Black Panther" from past Marvel pics works to this standalone entry's advantage. Full review

Peter Debruge
Variety

Director Ryan Coogler introduces us to a vibrant and unique new universe, and it's hard to stop gaping. Full review

Raja Sen
NDTV

Production history; Black Panther, comic strip superhero created for Marvel Comics by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby. The character first appeared in Fantastic Four no. 52 (July 1966). Seeking to address the dearth of black characters in comics, Lee and Kirby created T’Challa, a member of the royal family of the fictional African country of Wakanda. 
The Black Panther joined the Avengers in 1968, where he became a mainstay for the next several years. Although the character predated the revolutionary political organization of the same name, Marvel briefly changed the Black Panther’s name to the Black Leopard in an attempt to dissociate the two. A short time later he was back to being the Black Panther again, and in 1973 he headlined his own book for the first time. The “Panther’s Rage” story arc ran for two years in Jungle Action, a series written by Don McGregor and drawn for the most part by the African American artist Billy Graham. Reflecting the times’ interest in African roots and black consciousness in general, the strip returned T’Challa to a Wakanda riven by infighting and sedition, where he managed to balance superheroics with musings on colonialism and democracy. For the duration of the tale, the strip featured an all-black cast, something that had never before been attempted in mainstream superhero comics, and the innovations continued in a later story, which saw the Panther take on the Ku Klux Klan.

Poor sales prompted Marvel to cancel Jungle Action before the Klan story was finished, and it was replaced in 1977 with a new Black Panther title by Jack Kirby. This new direction was as far from the gritty realism of McGregor’s tales as it is possible to imagine, as it featured a time-traveling frog statue said to belong to King Solomon, the Yeti, and a group of Wakandan nobles known as the Black Musketeers. This title too was short-lived. Sporadic appearances over the next two decades kept the Black Panther in the Marvel firmament, but he was increasingly marginalized. Miniseries in 1988 and 1991 were solid, if unspectacular, attempts at revitalizing what was effectively a lapsed franchise. The first tackled apartheid, and the second dealt with the Panther’s search for his mother, but neither led to anything substantial. With black characters no longer a comics novelty and with role models such as the characters of Milestone Comics—which had more relevance to their readers than a wealthy African king—it seemed as if the Panther’s time had passed.

In 1998 writer Christopher Priest reintroduced the hero as part of the slightly more adult “Marvel Knights” line, in a critically acclaimed series that continued until 2003. For this reinvention, a now aging T’Challa returns to the urban jungle of New York in a deftly written political thriller that balances intrigue with no small amount of humour. Priest’s run on the comic introduced the Dora Milaje, a team of female bodyguards drawn from all the tribes of Wakanda. Film director Reginald Hudlin was the initial writer on both the Black Panther series that ran from 2005 to 2008 and the next one, which ran from 2009 to 2010. During this time T’Challa was briefly married to Storm of the X-Men, a union that joined Marvel’s most prominent male and female African superheroes. T’Challa also became a member of the Illuminati, a secret group of the brightest and most powerful members of Marvel’s superhero community.

National Book Award winner Ta-Nehisi Coates was tasked with writing the relaunched Black Panther comic, and the debut issue was one of the best-selling comics of 2016. The Black Panther entered the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) later that year in Captain America: Civil War, a blockbuster that cast Chadwick Boseman as the Wakandan prince. The character subsequently experienced something of a renaissance, with the success of Coates’s flagship title leading to the release of Black Panther: World of Wakanda, a series that explored Wakanda’s other heroes, and Black Panther & the Crew, a street-level story set in Harlem. Each of those titles was canceled after just six issues, however, because of low sales.

Director Ryan Coogler helmed Black Panther (2018), a dazzling spectacle that saw Boseman return to the screen in the role of T’Challa. Perhaps the MCU’s best-reviewed film to date, Black Panther examined race, gender, and power issues through an Afrofuturist lens and featured an ensemble cast that included Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong’o, Forest Whitaker, and Angela Bassett. The Black Panther and his fellow Wakandans figured prominently in Avengers: Infinity War (2018), the blockbuster culmination of 10 years of filmmaking in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Film is a specialised institution. How has ownership shaped the production and distribution of black panther?

Major vs Indie

A major film is owned by a major company like disney or universal. They have a clear narrative and high production values with professional actors- giving it star appeal. They use 360 marketing strategies and have a lot of mainstream advertising and is distributed through large companies. Often focus on cgi. Use copyrighted music. Extravagant settings.

An independent (indie) film is not associated with a major company. They often have unclear or complex narratives and low production values with amateur actors- no star appeal. Becomes known through word of mouth and is distributed through film festivals. Often don't use cgi. Don't use copyrighted music. Basic settings.

The Film Industry

Media products purpose is to make money.

There's no textual analysis for this industry, this unit is 85% facts and figures. It can only be studied as an industry.

Film is a specialised institution. 

Film originated in the late 1800's, it was seen as a cheap gimmick- shown at fairs and circuses.

Differences between now and then-

Square composition

No sound

All in one shot with no camera movement

Extremely short

Similarities-

Narratology

Title page

 

Primitive films are films which predate Hollywood cinema. It was quickly realised that these films could make a lot of profit.

Hollywood films were made and are still made in warehouses and offices, made using the industrial labour of a variety of specialised production techniques. Hollywood, LA was used because of the sun giving light. 

Classical Hollywood Cinema- Cinema as a production line.

The production line was completely female, they were the editors, because the process wasn't seen as profitable and was insignificant. It soon became male dominated when people realised there was profit to be made. Film narratives became industrialised and adopted classical cinema narrative. 

The studio system is film studios and production lines

Production is the process of making something

Distribution is the process where a media product ends up with an audience

Conglomeration is a corporation of a group of businesses dealing in different products of services

Digital technology is any technology which involves computers

Regulation is how films are restricted and monitored

Convergence is where two industries merge together

Exhibition is showing something

The internet has completely changed distribution and exhibition. 

Key Theory- The Cultural Industries, David Hesmondhalgh

Horizontal integration is where companies buys companies in the same sector to decrease competition for audiences.

Vertical integration is when one company buys up other companies involved in different stages in the production of integration and circulation.

Film process-

Screen writers write a screenplay and sell it 

People who bought it find a producer, a cast, location, crew- pre-production

The film is filmed- production

Editing, focus groups, - post production

Advertising- marketing

Sent to cinemas- distribution

Producer is the company that makes a media product

Distributor is the company that spreads a media product

Black panther was produced by marvel studios. It was distributed by Walt Disney studios Motion Pictures. Marvel Studios was acquired by Walt Disney in 2009 for $4 Billion.

The film was produced and distributed by a major and vertically integrated film studio that is part of a media conglomerate. 

Disney studios bought Marvel because-

- They wanted to crush the competition

- The companies have similar audiences

- They're two easily recognisable brands

- Increases Disney's brand identity

- To get rights to the characters

- To get money

Black panther's usp is that it has a black lead

Blaxploitation= black+exploitation