tv drama casestudys

My left Nut 

Average runtime of 24 - 32 minutes 

My Left Nut tells the story of a Northern Irish teenager who finds a lump on his testicle, and his life trying to juggle school and home. 

MLN subplots are present, but they aren’t as big a deal as the ones in breaking bad, simply because they don’t hold the same weight. An example of these subplots is when mick tries to get rachel to be his girlfriend. on the face of it it seems like a small goal, but to the teenager mick, is the biggest decision fo his life so far. but it is no way comparable to walter whites actions and goals. 

MLN could be branded as entertainment, there is a lot of comedy elements intertwined in the series. people may indenting with mick, the main character as they may have been through the same challenges that he faces. 

breaking bad

Crime Drama

average runtime of around 60 minutes

The show is branded as entertainment under the uses and gratification theory

walter could be branded as personal identity, a lot of people feel like their life is mundane and boring, they yearn for a more exciting life. walters journey from school teacher to meth kingpin may not be a morally correct one, but it is an attractive future for people who’s live seems to go nowhere. one could argue that breaking bad could be labelled as escapism and, at a stretch, integration and social interaction, people discussing the latest episode and spoilers. 

Todorov Theory is applied here, until it slowly falls apart and is twisted beyond recognition, Walter whites life begins at a sort-of equilibrium, he’s got a house, a family and a secure job. but his son has cerebral palsy, his wife is pregnant with a child he can ill afford, he works a second job at a car wash where he is mistreated by his boss. Cancer comes along and knocks his life down, which wasn’t at a great level to begin with. he decides to cook meth with an old student of his, jesse pinkman. over the course of a year and a half they build a drug empire worth millions. along the way the kill, cheat and ruin people’s lives. but all isn’t well, his cancer returns from a temporary break and starts destroying him again, his wife openly cheats on him with a former boss of hers, his brother in law (who’s a DEA agent) finds out about the meth business and is then shot by thugs acting on walts orders. his partner, jesse, is imprisoned by those same thugs who also steal all most all of walters meth earnings.  walter then turns up to the thugs clubhouse after being on the run for half a year, and kills them all with an M60 machine gun, whilst getting hit himself with shrapnel which ultimately ends his life surrounded by equipment for the production of meth. whilst the equilibrium hasn’t returned to the start of the series, it has been partly repaired by walter. he rids the world of the biggest meth producers, nazis and cartel gunmen, he secures his family future financially in the form of a trust fund set up by a former colleague using the meth earning and wipes out those who have crossed him whilst saving his partner in the process, so whilst walters life hasn’t returned to the equilibrium, the world is better off thanks to his actions. 

Throughout the entire show there are several subplots that span over several episodes. one such example is the when Walters wife, skyler, tries to buy Walters old car wash as a way to launder the meth money, the subplot spans over season 3 and season 4 from the moment Skyler suggests the idea of buying to car wash to her actually buying the car wash. Another example of subplots is when Jesse goes to rehab for a few episodes. 

Now Breaking Bad is a odd example, as we see the story through the eyes of the villain, but the audience roots for them, it doesn’t follow traditional theory’s on dramas such as props theory’s on heroes and villains. 

P1 Response to brief

The BBC, usually shortened as the British Broadcasting Corporation, is the national broadcaster for the United Kingdom. the corporation hosts a range of programmes that include but aren't limited to; the news, a staple of the BBC, quiz shows, comedy shows, documentary's and sporting events.

bbc3 is part of the British Broadcasting Corporation. its target audience is between 16 and 34 years old. the channel offers a wide range of shows for viewers to watch. The channel was moved to an online status in 2016, the decision was "motivated by financial considerations" according to the BBC. It returned to TV screens at the start of February 2022 after a 6 year gap. the channel hosts a long list of successful shows such as Fleabag and This Country

BBC 3s biggest competitor had been channels like ITV, Sky, Channel 4 and to a lesser extent, the other BBC channels, but it recent times streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon prime have become more popular and threatens to take away the majority of BBC 3s viewership.

BBC Dramas usually have around 6 episodes in a single series, and each episode normally takes up an hour slot. shows such as The Responder and Peaky Blinders. 

Brief notes

low budget - filmed in Yorkshire

Drama - 6 episodes - 60 minute runtime 

Audience considerations

the survey we took at the school allowed us to see what different people were watching and why they chose the watch it. 

the data showed us that the gender balance was pretty spot on, with 104 responses being female and 94 being male whilst the rest were made up of people who were transgender, non binary and others.

we had a range of ages in the survey from 14 to 22 or older with the highest amount of people being of 16 years of age.

the majority of the survey takers were white, 170 to be exact, with again Pakistan and white (other) being runners up. 

peaky blinders, euphoria and breaking bad were listed as the top favourite tv shows of all time. it also seems that most people watch tv dramas to escape from reality. Netflix was the streaming site chosen the most, probably due to its cheap price, large catalogue of film and tv and its easy accessibility 

P4 Filming Diary

                                                                         Filming Diary 

created over the course of filming starting on Monday the 6th of December and finished on Wednesday the 5th of January 

Camera settings: 1920x1080 at 25fps, 48kHvin stereo sound. We also used a tripod when needed 

We filmed in 4 locations, Inside ilkley grammar school, Outside ilkley grammar school, Alleyway by ilkley grammar school and James’ house.

the safety considerations we were extremely mindful of was the Alleyway location. scouting the location revealed a large amount of litter and broken glass, which if the actors accidentally fell on because of  a fight scene, would end up being catastrophic for filming 

D1 Task

                                                        D1 Production techniques

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Improvements 

the filming schedule took place over different hours of different days. for example the scenes filmed in the alleyway took place in the morning, around 11AM whilst the scenes where James is walking home were filmed later on, at around 4PM, meaning that the lighting was dimmer in certain shots, so to fix this i adjusted the exposure on each shot so that the scenes roughly look the same. 

Not enough detail for a D task – this is a question about post-production.  Basically what did you do in post-production to create meaning in your video. How do music videos create meaning to their audience? 

Continuity

For every shot we captured we tried to make sure that continuity carried on. For example, whilst filming different angles of James we tried to make sure that all the actors where in the same position in when filming. in the section of the music video where the bully confronts James, there are 2 shots that show James walking down the stairs, one from behind him, and one in front of him. when the shots change we can see that James remains in the same position. unfortunately its plainly visible to see James leave school without his jacket on, we only noticed this after filming was completed and we were on to the editing stage and there was nothing we could've done. so as much as we had tried, a few mistakes slipped through the cracks. 

There are several scenes that we’re filmed towards the end of the day, meaning that the lighting was dimmer in certain shots, so to fix this i adjusted the exposure on each shot so that all shots roughly look the same 

Mise en scene

the locations we used was our school, James' bedroom and an alleyway 2 minutes walk away from school

Alleyway

we used the alleyway as we felt it could be used as a metaphor: alleyways are almost always depicted as dank, dirty and smelly, somewhere the lowest forms of life reside, so its only logical that James' bully would be there. this helps convey the message that James is the victim here and that the audience should feel sorry for him. Alleyways are also known to be shady places, where people cannot see the actions going on, this could help convey the message that James is alone and cannot be helped by anyone and so he must defend himself. 

School

the school was used as its helped convey james weakness. its not really apparent in the final cut of the video but there was a shot in which the camera pans down from a shot of a clock, which shows the time to be around 4.30 pm. showing that the protagonist has decided to stay at school studying, rather than going home. this helps build up the character that James is playing, a weak nerd who finds shelter in an academic institute rather then, say, a gym which is viewed as a more masculine building.

House

we used james' house to help convey his redemption. there's a shot of James lying on his bed after the beating. its a close up which helps the audience see James' emotions. he wears a sad expression, presumably due to the beating he just went through. this is James' at his lowest point. he then sees a cat poster with the words "hang in there" below it. this inspires James to rise up and take revenge on the bully. On james’ bed there is a union jack pillow present, this implies that james’  

Target audience 

our target audience for the msic video was 2 kinds of people, those who remember aand have watched the original karate kid from 1984, and teenagers. these 2 groups may overlap.

i believe that the music video is suitable for the target audience as it is clearly reminiscent of the original karate kid film. it shows a cohesive story which is mirrored is the music video. it has all the elements included which the original film had: a innocent victim, a typical bully and an ending where the victim prevails over the bully.

camera work and what we were trying to achieve

our camera work could be labelled as average, and id have no objection to that. there is nothing special about how we set up each shot, we just decided to shoot where was possible. after we received feedback about our camera shots we noticed there was a lack of close ups shots. so we added them in for when James opens the door at the beginning of the video and when james goes home after being beaten up.

Editing choices

I decided to keep the visuals the same, we didn't tweak the colour correction as i felt it would detract from the message and story of the music video. looking back however, it may have bee

What we could've done better

Its safe to say that the final cut didn't come out as i (and i assume the rest of my group) would've liked. The acting was atrocious, the story was laughable. but we did follow the brief. the video had no copyright problems, the music video length matched the songs length, the videos live action and it appeals to the target audience. 

Final Export of Music Videos

 

p3 risk assessment

 

p3 Develop pre production materials for a original media product UNIT 3 DONE

 

  Shooting script in its entirety 

Consent forms and Call Sheets

Animatic

P3 Actor consent form