OCR Media Studies – A2 Level

Unit G324: Advanced Portfolio

Soap Opera Genre –

Evidence of Planning

Ancillary TasksName: Hannah D’SouzaCandidate Number: 6827Center Name: St. Paul’s Catholic CollegeCenter Number: 64770

1) Magazine Cover DeconstructionCover stories: These give the readers a chance to have a ‘sneak peak’ of what’s on the inside. The target audience may want to read about what they missed. For example, “Aaron and Robert KISS!” and therefore might feel the need to buy this magazine to establish the answer.

Date/ price tag: Date, price and issue number help the audience know how often the magazine is produced (weekly or monthly) and how much it costs and this may lead them to subscribe to the magazine, adding to more copies being sold as a USP.

Main headline: Usually features the celebrity in the main image. However, this magazine doesn’t do that. It’s in big, bold letters and therefore stands out from the rest of the stories. The colour, its printed in matches the shades of the rest of the font and therefore doesn’t look out of place.

Barcode: The barcode is used to validate the magazine.

Pictures: Pictures are the main feature of a magazine. They reflect the stories featured as part of the magazine and also attract the audiences attention. This magazine however, doesn’t have a main image which could be seen as a downside to it. Although it does have a lot of cover pictures that tie in well with other cover stories which show variety of soap operas presented in the magazine.

Masthead: In bold big writing to make it stand out to the target audience. The verbal code “Inside” connotes how the magazine seeks to reveal drama and secrets from the soaps. The colour red is commonly used in soap magazines as it’s bright and connotes some sort of danger or disequilibrium that the magazine aims to feature.

Strapline: The strapline is one of the most important conventions of a magazine. The repetition of the lexis ‘Every’ used, creates a sense of importance to the magazine making the audience want to buy it.

Something that is missing, which is meant to be a key part to the front cover is a competition to increase the amount of readers looking through and even purchasing the magazine. Furthermore, the magazine also doesn’ display a main image for the headline.There is also a lack of synergy with well known social media products such as Twitter and Facebook, which may harm the magazines appeal across the media platforms and discourage viral marketing. This is something I will avoid discounting as I feel this is very important to include somewhere on or in the magazine.

Ident:

2) Poster Deconstruction

Main image: The image uses both high key and

low key lighting for effect. This gives the woman in the poster a ‘scared’ look

making her look like a victim. I would like to

‘repeat’ (Steve Neale) this effect in my own poster as

I believe it creates dramatic effect and keeps the audience interested. The colours of the ‘dull

red’ give us a sense that there might be a death or killings. The ‘East End’ in

the background is significant for the

audience to identify the trailer.

Slogan: “Walford will change. Forever.” The slogan

immediately catches the attention of the audience,

making them want to tune in to watch the series episode when it airs on bbc1. The use of the one word lexis

‘Forever’ connotes a sense of importance for that episode also engaging the audience through it through the ‘one

word’ effect.

Trailer name: This poster doesn’t have a trailer name as the

audience are able to identify the Soap Opera

by the background of the East End that’s used

in the point of call of their theme song. This

is an element of difference (Steve Neale)

as we need to have a trailer name on our

poster as we are introducing a new Soap

Opera.

BBC logo: The logo is in small at the left hand

corner and makes up for the

trailer not having timings

for the audience to tune in as they

already know what time the

Soap Opera airs.

Social networking:#EastEnders is a twitter hashtag so audience are able to engage with the

characters and share their

opinions through twitter.