Preliminary Exercise 3: What is Mise en scene?

 Introduction

    Mise en scene is the setting or scenery of a scene in a film. The purpose of mise en scene is to communicate the meaning to the audience about its characters, their lives, and the world around them. And the elements of mise en scene are setting, acting, costume, hair and makeup, color , set design: decor and props, composition, and lighting. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has many elements of mise en scene within its film which gives off a message of that nothing and nobody can be perfect and the tone of the movie is both exciting and sad which is the same with the mood. The understanding of Mise en scene is important in a film because it makes the film's genre more of its own in a way and to give the audience a message.

Reflection

    I have created a presentation on mise ens scene and my purpose for making it is to get a better understanding of what it is and examples of how to use it. I have worked on laptop to create this presentation. I have mainly used the tools powerpoint provided to make this presentation also goggle images and when it comes to using these I am at least an intermediate. What I learned in this exercise is the elements of mise en scene and how identify them in film.

Work Cited

Aldredge, J. (2022) What is mise-en-scène in film? (and how do you actually use it?), Soundstripe Royalty Free Music. Available at: https://www.soundstripe.com/blogs/what-is-mise-en-sc%C3%A8ne-in-film (Accessed: 07 November 2023).

Sorkin, A. (2021) What is mise en scène in film? - 2023, MasterClass. Available at: https://www.masterclass.com/articles/what-is-mise-en-scene-in-film (Accessed: 07 November 2023).

Preliminary Exercise 2: Barthes’ Semiotics Theory of Denotative and Connotative Signs Analysis

         Roland Gerard Barthes was a French literary theorist and semiotician. Barthes is best known for his study of semiotics and while doing so he created a theory of semiotics himself. That being the method of myths that he saw in media according to Barthes he claims that "anything in culture can be a sign and send specific message." He also saw that signs have two meanings denotative- meaning non-literal and connotative- the actual meaning. His theory was beneficial for planning film to really make a scene and the film more powerful and give a message more clearly. I have watched a video clip on Youtube from Mockingjay part 2 where the main characters are going through an interview in front of a crowd of people. I have selected 4 types of code, three visual codes which are costume, setting and acting, also one audio which is sound. The codes in the clip really suggest and support's what the director was trying to do with the plot of the movie and its characters. For more info look below at the table me and my teammate worked on.

        Reflection

    I have created a presentation for a better understanding of what Barthes theory of semiotics was for and how it works. How I created this presentation was on my laptop in powerpoint. I mainly used tools powerpoint provided like the tables and I had gotten the images from the video clip itself and from goggle images. Also, my skill level for using these tools are intermediate. As, for the content of the presentation the theorist is Roland Barthes who created a theory about semiotics which is "anything in culture can be a sign and send specific message." Also, that signs have two meanings denotative- meaning non-literal and connotative- the actual meaning. The people who worked on this presentation are myself and my teammate; I did the first two and my teammate did the other two. What I learned doing this exercise was Barthes theory and how it worked and how it was a beneficial to the film making industry.

Work Cited

Roland Barthes (no date) Monoskop. Available at: https://monoskop.org/Roland_Barthes (Accessed: 07 November 2023).

Preliminary Exercises 1: Ferdinand de Saussure's Theory of Semiotics Analysis

        Semiotics is the study of signs of behavior and their use in media. Ferdinand de Saussure is a swiss linguist who had brilliant ideas on the structure of language but best known for his theory of semiotics. Which is that a sign is made up of two parts, the signifier, and the signified. A sign is a unit of meaning for example a picture it can be simple and/or complex, a signifier is a signs physical form or object, and the signified is the meaning or the idea of the sign. This research is beneficial to film because it shows us the audience or viewer the impact of the movie and the main message it is trying to get across. The table below is a good understanding of semiotics and how they convey the meaning of a sign, signifier, and signified.

                 Reflection 

        As seen in the images above I have created a presentation on semiotics to get a better understanding of semiotics. I did this presentation on my laptop on powerpoint and I would like to say that I'm a intermediate user.  As stated in the introduction and the presentation Ferdinand de Saussure is the creator of the semiotics theory and the theory is that a sign is made up of two parts, the signifier, and the signified and the table shows you how the semiotics work with simple and easy to understand images which are a sad face, broccoli, and a group of friends. Their were a total of two of us who worked on this presentation I worked on the first two tables while my teammate worked on the last one and the definitions for sign, signifier, and signified. What I learned from this exercise was that semiotics are important to the media because when you use it you can understand different types of media and their purpose for creating it.

Citations

Mambrol, N. (2019) Key theories of ferdinand de saussure, Literary Theory and Criticism. Available at: https://literariness.org/2018/03/12/key-theories-of-ferdinand-de-saussure/ (Accessed: 03 October 2023).

Admin, S. (2018) Semiotics explained, Sign Salad. Available at: https://signsalad.com/our-thoughts/what-is-semiotics/ (Accessed: 03 October 2023).

 

Welcome to my AICE Media Studies Blog!

                                  Welcome to Cloudy Studios

        

        Entertainment is a wonderful thing that we all seek. Whether that media is funny, romantic, action-packed, or many more genres that we all know and love. My favorite type of product is series or television shows. They love to keep you on the edge of your seat but also let you relax and there are certain ones for different age groups. For teenagers like me, it can be appealing through methods of character that we can relate to in real life or animations like anime that are typically meant to be watched by young adults but also mature audiences. What I find interesting about Media Studies is; that they can affect society, the way it is used (like video games, series, and movies), and finally how we see the appeal of it.

        The type of media I'll be documenting are films/movies about danger. The type of film I would like to create is about the dangers of the world that could change your life. The intended audience is people who try to do these dangerous things; drugs, stealing, gangs, etc. But it is also to warn those about these activities and how they can ruin your life. What I need to learn about to create this film is doing research on criminal activities how they operate, and also what happens to people who participate in these acts. I plan to release this film as soon as possible.

        Four strategies I will use to achieve this goal is the type of setting I will use such as dark settings. Next, to watch a lot of documentaries and movies to get a good understanding about the topic. Third, props to give off a sense of realness to the audience however for safety purposes I need to use things that look similar but not the real thing. Finally, cameras and not phone cameras. It will really improve the quality of my film that will make it even better than it will already be. These four strategies and resources will help me really get the message of my film across. In the future I may change my mind about the film I want to make but that is for that time.