Semiotics revision- How is 50 cent presented?

50 cent
Connote
-The white background
-connotes its pure but the dark colours on him-gangster

Denote
-Fit
-Strong
-Masculinity

Signifier
-Necklace
-Hat

Signified
-Necklace- Religion
-Hat- Urban


This is a image from 50 cents album cover, he is represented as a urban gangster, this is shown from what he is wearing. He is wearing a necklace and a hate, If we signified those objects the necklace implies his religion and the hat implies he is urban. The connotation of this is the white background with patterns on it, he is trying to imply he is a true artist, the white background against him and the clothes he is wearing emphasises him and his body more. The lighting on his chest brings out his body more, his body is also emphasised more by the camera angle, the angle is a low angle making him look bigger and significant. The binary opposition is shown with his religious necklace however on the side of the image it says 'The Massacre' this suggests there are two sides to him.

Post production:Sound

Parallel sounds: Music matches what you see in the film.

Contrapuntal Sound: Sound that opposes what you see in the film.

Sound Bridge: When the music from one scene goes into the next.

Ambient Sound: Sound that you expect to hear in a location, for example: traffic

Foley Sound: Everyday sounds that are added to a certain clip.

In the short clip 'Fast and Furious 2' they use different kind of sounds to create tension. Parallel sound is used, the music is upbeat and fast just like the cars.

What is the purpose of censorship?

So what is the purpose of censorship?  It is to filter out some of the things thats are deemed to the explicit, it is to make sure the media doesn't offend any people or groups that may view the media.

There are 3 main examples of censorship:

The Hays Code

The Hays Code (The motion picture production code) was introduced in 1920. It was set of industry moral censorship guidelines that governed the production of most United States motion pictures released by major studios from 1920 to 1968. The code was made to prevent people using the media to effect the public and prevent any possible harm that could come from abusing the media.

The code was based on three general principles:

-No picture shall be produced thats will lower moral standards of those who see it, hence the sympathy of the audience should never be thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil or sin
-Correct standards of life, subject only to the requirements of drama and entertainment, shall be presented.
-Law, natural or human, shall not be ridiculed, nor shall sympathy be created for its violation.

There is a whole list of things that isn't acceptable:
-methods of smuggling
-prostitution
-rape
-selling drugs
-scenes of childbirth
-theft/robbery
-surgical operations
-etc...

Music Videos

In music videos theres a set of guidelines which has to be followed.

To make it suitable for as many people as possible, if the music video swears it will be removed either by bleeping it out or cutting the sound of
Another way to make it sensible, is censoring sexual imagery, many distributors wont't allow nudity within videos. On radio and T.V channels swearing is removed until 9pm, this called the watershed when swearing and sexual imagery on T.V is allowed after 9pm...

Watershed
The watershed is used for T.V media which is displayed after a set time. The watershed starts at 9pm, it is made so that young members of a T.V audience won't see something which isn't suitable for them but for the older members. This is because of imitation as they don't want them to copy things on screen as it's considered inappropriate.

How far do you agree with the comments that mass audiences are still passive of media?

Passive audience- an audience that does not actively engage with the media text, they unconsciously learn from the media.

I agree that mass audience are still passiv repients of media. The media puts a lot of messages across to the audience but when you are passive you take in the concept and information without realising it. In other words the audience do not realise they have these ideas and thoughts as the media has told us to believe it.
In the 1920's films and T.V were censored, you would never see someone showing too much flesh, they were covered up more. This is because the audience wouldn't repeat any of their actions also the audience wont get affected by certain aspects wes ee on television, films and magazines.

We have ideas on stereotypes but the media can influence on the way we view it. Women are stereotyped as having the perfect figure and to look pretty. If a man saw a very good looking women in a magazine with a lot of flesh showing, majority of men would like it however some women would not accept this as they don't like being portrayed stereotypically like that.

Audience Theory

Target Audience- is the specific people that the type of media is aimed.
Target Audience is broken down through representation, this is what makes it up:
Age
Race
Gender
Class
Disability
Religion

There are 3 main theorists to help us get a better understanding about the relationship between text these are:
1) the effect model or Hypodermic Needle
2) The uses of Grafications Model
3) Reception Theory

 The effect model/ hypodermic model has 3 parts to the theory. Firstly, imitation, this is where you copy what you see. Secondly, catharsis, this is where you feel better about yourself as their lives are worse than yours and makes you feel sympathetic for them. Lastly, desensitisation, this is where you get used to what you see and it doesn't have as much of an effect on you.

The uses and Grafications model covers, personal identity, surveillance, pleasure and diversion

Reception theory is a version of reader response literary theory that emphasises the  reader's reception of a literary text.

There are 2 types on audience:

Active audience- engaging with a media text
Passive audience- tertiary, they don't consciously take in the message being portrayed.

Terror In The Night

In our lesson we were put into a group and made our own storyboard for the film 'Terror In The Night'. We had to make up our own story line which had to be horror related.We also had to decide what cuts we would use for every picture we drew, they were either jump or straight cuts.Jump cuts are used in a lot of horror films because it grabs the audiences attention and creates more tension..

Afterward we changed the positioning of our storyboard by putting the 4th picture at the beginning but because it didn't make sense we nearly changed the whole sequence of the storyboard. By looking at the storyboard now and before we can tell that the story has completely changed, this means that the audience will view the characters in a different way because we have positioned them in a different order.


Our story related to a few narrative theorists:
Strauss- There are binary opposites, 'Man/Women' 'Good/Bad'
Todorov- follows the classic Hollywood narrative; order and setting

Representation

Representation is the way people, groups, cultures and ideas are shown by media. Media text show us not the truth but an interpretation of the truth. the key concepts of media text is; representation, ideology, institutions, audience, media language and genre.
Semiotics is a study of signs system which allows us to deconstruct media texts to understand how meaning is being created.
The signifier is the object itself, signified is what it represents and example of this would be the 'rose' as the signifier and 'love' as signified.

                                                         

                                   Signifier                                                                                   Signified

                                                                               


The combination of signs create a code which can be understood usually through cultural or social contexts.

There are 3 types of signs:
Iconic- those which work through remsembles (photographs)
Symbolic- those which are learned (abitrary signs such as words)
Indexical- those which work through a casual link (e.g. smokes as an index of fire)

Denotation- the literal meaning of a sign
Connotation- the interpreted meaning of a sign or signs
Polysemy- refers to the capacity of all signs to be 'many signed' (polysemic): to have more than one meaning.

Main Task

For our main task we are going to make a title and a opening of a new fiction film lasting maximum of 2 minutes.

Their are 4 main parts that we are going to be assessed on which are; research, planning filming and post production.