A guide to writing the OCR A2 Media Studies Evaluation.

1. In the evaluation the following four questions must be addressed:
1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms
and conventions of real media products?
2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?
4. How did you use media technologies in the construction and research,
planning and evaluation stages?
A2 G324: EvaluationCWK Friday, January 12, 2018
LO: To demonstrate an understanding of media products.
You must be creative in your use of ICT to present your evaluation.
http://mrshrobbins.blogspot.co.uk

2. 1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and
conventions of real media products?
Documentary Magazine Listings DPS Newspaper Advert
- Write about your chosen
genre’s typical conventions
- Plot and character
- Shot types
- Editing
- Transitions
- Sound
- Text
- Representation
- Title
- Large image
- Colour scheme
- Font size
- cover lines
- Pull quote
- Text – the article, or what there
is about the documentary
- Main focal picture to relate to
- Prominent title
- Tag line
- Price (in case of product)
- Company name
- Company logo
- Contact information
- Colourful or black and white
- Portrait or land scape
How do your products compare to the industry?
Consider the codes and conventions of each product. Did you follow these? How? Why?
Give examples from YOUR documentary and compare them to the pieces you researched.
Do this on slideshare
Include screen shots of your work COMPARING what you have done with an
example of a real product you researched.

3. 2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
Consider the following ideas to develop
• house style - How do all of your products link? What is the purpose of this?
• Colours – this is linked to the house style.
• characters/actors – have you used people in your documentary in your print
products?
• Taglines – in your print products that are in your documentary?
• relevance to documentary? How do the print products help with the marketing
of your documentary? How? Why?
How have you created links across all three products?
Do this on Soundcloud
Include screen shots of your work COMPARING what you have done with an example of a real
product you researched alongside your Soundcloud.

4. 3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?
Consider the following:
• What do your audience think about the final products?
• Ask people to comment by looking at your work on your blog
• What are the things you would improve? Why?
• How did you use audience research to help you create your product?
• What is good/bad about audience research?
• Research the pros/cons of questionnaires – how does this help you to evaluate your products?
Why?
• How did your YouGov Lite research help you? Why? What was the difference between this,
your focus group and your questionnaire? Why is this more effective?
Can you include any audience theory here to back up your reflective ideas about audience?
Link to Stuart Hall’s Reception Theory – consider the type of reading you wanted your
audience to have? Preferred, oppositional, negotiated?
Do this as a YouTube video
Include screen shots of your work or examples of audience feedback.

5. 4. How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and
evaluation stages?
 How has each piece of software allowed you
to make what you planned to do?
 Give specific examples – use screen shots of
your work in progress.
 Was there anything that you were unable to
do and why?
 How do you feel you have progressed in term
of software use? How did you improve this
year, in comparison to last year?
 Do you plans and your final products
correlate? Why/why not?
 Were there any challenges with software that
meant it hampered your ability to succeed?
How? Why?
• Adobe Photoshop
• iMovie
• Cameras – what camera did you film
with?
• Apple Macs
• lighting equipment in the MS
• blogger
• internet – google, slideshare, emaze,
soundcloud etc.
• anything else you can think of.
What forms of technology did you use?
Do this as a Prezi or Emaze
Include screen shots of your work showing
how you have used these products.

6. THEORY: Roland Barthes - Semiotics
According to Barthes, the way we come to understand a story comes from our
interpretation. So despite there being a basic narrative in any form of media, it
depends on who we are our experience and age, to name a few because these
influence our perception. He suggested that narrative works with five different
codes which stimulate the reader to make sense of it.
These codes are as followed:
• Action – a narrative device by which a resolution is produced through action,
e.g. a shoot-out.
•Enigma – a narrative device that teases the audience by presenting a puzzle or
riddle to be solved. This works to delay the story’s ending pleasurably.
•Symbolic – (connotation)
•Semic – (denotation)
•Cultural – a narrative device which the audience can recognise as being part of a
culture e.g. a “made man” in a gangster film is part of the mafia culture.
How can you
incorporate this
theory into your
evaluation?
How does it match
what you have
done?