Media research

 

E4

E4 is a British digital television channel, launched as a companion to Channel 4. The "E" stands for entertainment, and the channel is mainly aimed at the lucrative 15–35 year olds. Programming includes U.S. imports such as The Cleveland Show, Desperate Housewives, How I Met Your Mother, 90210, Ugly Betty, Scrubs and 2 Broke Girls. Other programming includes British shows such as Misfits, The Ricky Gervais Show, Shameless, Hollyoaks, Skins, The Inbetweeners and Made in Chelsea. I have decided to focus my research on Misfits as I believe my brief has the potential of becoming a similar programme.

Misfits

Misfits is a British science fiction comedy-drama television show, on the network Channel 4, about a group of young offenders sentenced to work in a community service programme, where they obtain supernatural powers after a strange electrical storm. The Misfits series have uniqueness about them which sets them out from every other sci-fi programme airing at the time being. This I something I hope to capture when creating my short film. The image below is from the opening credits of Misfits.

 

The image immediately gives the viewer reason to ask themselves questions. One question might be ‘why doesn’t the person in the middle have a shadow?’ the answer to this question is totally dependent on interpretation. This is fantastic image for an opening credit image as it give the audience motive to understand or relate to the how the characters may be feeling and why they are seen in the way they are.

Also the person on the far left has a shadow which is pointing in a different direction to the rest of the characters this may be because they are different in some way which is also generating curiosity meaning the viewer is interested. This links well to work because I could slowly entice the viewers into watching by giving them small helpings of information. Opening credits are hugely important in the effectiveness of my brief as they set the plot and give an impression of the rest of the story.

A cloudy grey colour is used I think to show that there is no clarity and the shadows are facing towards us meaning the bright, white light is shining from behind them concluding with the reality that their faces would be in darkness. The images match the sci-fi genre of the programme since the people look like cartoon cut outs. The viewer can only see the hands of one character; this may propose that she is the most superior or powerful as we use our hands with most actions we act.

In one scene the camera shot zooms out and we see a character n yellow about to commit suicide on the roof of the community service centre, and a slow soundtrack is played in the background. This is an example of non-diegetic music which I plan to use in my production. The use of the slow playing guitar music helps to elect the target audience of the show. This is as many young people are seen to attend festivals to listen to music with different instruments in and often referred to as indie music.

The characters are stood in a line together which suggests that they might all have something in common with one another although the programme name contradicts this feeling slightly. The characters used within 'Misfits' help indicate the specific target audience, for example, young people(15-35yrs) are presented throughout the programme; this gives the impression that the programme is purposed for the entertainment of young adults.

My research has shown me how camera angles, music types and use of characters can influence and adapt the way an audience will interpret and understand a programme.