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‘Underage Binge Drinking’
Evaluation
1) In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms
and conventions of real media products?
The Documentary:
 Once given the task to create the opening 5 minutes of an hour long documentary,
alongside a radio trail and double page spread in a listings magazine to support it, we
discussed topics which we could base our documentary on. We researched different genres
of documentaries that we could include, along with any recent situations in the news, as
well as facts and figures which would become a useful to the documentary opening.
We concluded with basing the documentary on ‘Underage Binge Drinking’, as it was a
neglected problem in the UK which was highly increasing.
 We researched what is needed to create a documentary further, looking at different
categories: optimistic, pessimistic, serious, ironic etc. As well as the conventions: voiceover
(the commentary/ narrator), actuality (filming real life events, places, people), expositions
(theme is revealed in the start), reconstructions (to reconstruct an event/ act it out) and
archival footage (secondary or stock footage). In our documentary, it has many serious yet
optimistic aspects, as it sets the tone for our target audience, allowing them to know what
type of documentary they are viewing.
 We began looking at different types and styles of documentaries which support Bill
Nicholstheories of Documentary Modes (2001). Documentary modes are a kind of
conceptual scheme, similar to genres. Six of which were very important to Nichols: Poetic-
artistic and creative/ soviet montage theory at the start, Expository- way to expose the
social problem, persuading the viewer on a viewpoint through an omniscient narrator and
cutaways to illustrate points further, Reflexive- demystifying the art of making the
documentary, Observational- way to observe people in everyday life- usually done by a ‘fly
on the wall’ style, Participatory- when the film maker appears as subjects in their own work
and Performative- the maker of the documentary is the subject of the film/programme,
making it autobiographical.
 In order for our documentary to follow the conventions of a real media product, we watched
a variety of documentaries that were aired on well-known channels such as: Channel 4, BBC
and ITV1. The documentary ‘Supersize Me’ (2004) is an excellent example portraying both
performative and participatory modes, as Morgan Spurlock (the presenter) makes himself
the subject to the programme, by carrying out an investigation they call a ‘McDiet’, to

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portray his argument to the audience of obesity in America.
As well as this, a lot of hand held camera is used which
creates actuality and an autobiographical style to the
production, which makes it more personal for the audience.
Instead of this, we use a voiceover in our documentary, an
omniscient narrator, a narrative structure. We have done
this as it persuades our argument across to the audience by
repetition, and more suitable for our documentary on
‘Underage Binge Drinking’.
 This is similar to ITV1’s documentary ‘Fire and Rescue’ (2003),
which seemed to be an educational, investigative type of
documentary, profiling fire-fighters and their work. They
utilised a particular narrator- Allister Stuart, a news reader. By
using a news reader’s voice as the voiceover, it creates a more
serious tone which is very factual, more believable and
appropriate for the target audience.
 Furthermore, as our documentary is on ‘Underage Binge
Drinking’, we decided that it would be an investigative, informative and expository
documentary, however consisting of an ‘enigmatic code’ structure, as the investigation of
the causes and effects of underage binge drinking cannot be solved- likewise to ‘supersize
me’.
 From watching other documentaries, we analysed the features and ideas and thought of
how we could incorporate them into our own documentary. Many of these conventions
were used through camera. Involving many different types of shots and angles such as:
establishing shots, medium close-ups, long shots, extreme close-ups, high angle, low angle
etc. Many of our shots are done by using a Tripod, so then the picture is both steady and
level and also enabling us to pan the camera while filming an establishing shot to make it
more professional. We used this in our establishing shots of the college, the college canteen
and of Touchwood high street.
Camera:
Tripod:

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One particular feature would be the montage used at the start of the documentary, as it was
similar to a real media product. This exposes the theme and subject of the documentary as well
as making it more dramatic for the viewer.
Another would be medium close-ups, which we used a lot in the expert interviews for our
documentary, so then we can see the persons reactions and expressions- like ‘supersize me’ has
done. We have used ‘rule of thirds’- having the interviewee looking into an empty space and a
third of the way in on the screen- this is to ensure that there is no ‘dead space’ behind the
interviewee, so the viewer will have their eyes on the expert. However, still portraying to the
viewer the expert interviewees’ work surroundings- similar to an expert interview in ‘supersize
me’:
 Furthermore, we also incorporated the idea from ‘supersize me’ of using a low angle
medium shot. This shot had to be very precise in order to achieve the appropriate mis-en-
scene and focus of the bottles- ensuring that they would not look blurry- and pulling some
focus from the background to make the bottles stand out more- as they have done so in
‘supersize me’:
We also ensured that the bottles were in size order, to portray the units, like it has done so in
‘supersize me’ when conveying what the size portions for drinks are. This makes it more
Our Documentary: ‘Supersize me’ Documentary:
‘Supersize me’ Documentary:Our Documentary:

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effective as the viewer will realise the shocking differences in unit size of alcohol.
 Another convention our media project uses is through sound. In particular, our documentary
use a variety of diegetic and non-diegetic sounds, along with a presenter, background music
and a voiceover. ‘Supersize me’ uses both a presenter and a voiceover, which is done
effectively as it involves the audience in the whole investigation of the documentary,
therefore making it more personal for the viewer- both performative and expository in Bill
Nichol’s documentary codes. As our documentary was more informative than investigative,
we decided to only include a voiceover and no presenter, as it would have been more
appropriate for the topic and theme of the documentary. A voiceover was also only used in
both ‘Fire and Rescue’ (ITV1) and ‘A Good Smack’ (BBC) to narrate to the viewers what is
going on, as well as the cause and effects of these situations.
 Background music we had made using the software ‘Garage Band’, where we created
instrumental sounds to fit the theme and make it parallel to the scenes of our documentary.
In all the documentaries we researched and studied used background music. However, a
majority of the music was copyrighted from bands and song artists.
In ‘A Good Smack’, a lot of chaotic music is played when portraying the misbehaving
children, the choice of band was ‘Madness’, and the song choice did not overpower the
recording of the misbehaving children.
In ‘Fire and Rescue’, the music was parallel to the scenes, which does grab the viewers’
attention however, the music was over the top and over powering of the clips which made
the extract look not as professional as it could have.
The background music which we created on Garage Band was not overpowering the
voiceover or the clips and was not over the top in the scenes we utilised it in. The music was
appropriate and parallel to the scene as it was simple beats; however the sound levels were
a bit sketchy as it went back and forth from high to low therefore slightly overpowering the
voiceover at certain points. This is something that would be improved in our documentary.
This is part of the voiceover script introducing
Neil Attewell, which we had made using
amicrophone recorder, headphones and editing
in final cut express

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 In order to support our documentary on ‘underage binge drinking’, we needed to acquire a
fair amount of reliable research which was relevant to the topic. This is to inform our
audience about the rising statisticsfacts and figures of the topic, to educate them that
underage binge drinking is an increasing problem in the UK, as well as educating them on
various causes and effects of young teens binge drinking. In order to get the correct statistics
we produced questionnaires which we handed out to students in our sixth form college. We
also researched the BBC News on the internet to find any articles or news mentions on
underage binge drinking- hoping to use it as a case study for the documentary, similar to
‘supersize me’ in their case study of the two girls who attempted to sue McDonalds.
Background music track was exported
from Garage Band and imported into Final
cut express
Case Studies (‘Supersize me’)

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 Special effects are also utilised in the conventions of real media products. One in particular
which we have used is speeding up the clip whilst the voiceover is explaining statistic facts
about underage binge drinking. We blurred the image as well as speeding up the clip, later
crowding it with images of alcohol bottles and cans.
As the clip was not long enough to cover the voiceover, we challenged the conventions of
real media products and reversed the clip- still quick paced- to make the clip cover the
voiceover. This had successfully worked as it was not noticeable to the viewer that it had
been reversed.
Our Documentary:‘Supersize me’ Documentary:
We have displayed percentages similarly to how ‘supersize me’ has done. This technique is
effective to the viewer as can clearly see the abnormally high or rising figures. By blurring out a
previously used image as the background fits well and appropriately into the scene.
Here the clip has been
speeded up, and pulled out of
focus.
During this part of the clip, the
video has been reversed, while out
of focus and is speeded up
This is how we changed both the speed and
how we reversed the clip to make it last
longer (tick the ‘reverse’ box)

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The Magazine Article:
This is our magazine article which we had designed and produced for ‘More’ magazine. We had
researched a number of magazines to see how they used the conventions to make the article
more effective. Considering that our documentary was targeted for a younger audience, we
decided to keep the layout simple and to a colour scheme of red, black and white.
Double-Page Spread articles from ‘More’ Magazine:
Both of these double- page spreads consist
of colour schemes, main (powerful) image;
grab quotes, columns and captions etc.
These are some of the conventions we had
incorporated into our magazine article. We
had also used still images from our
documentary, one of which conveys the
intended target audience.

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Some conventions we used on our article:
These are the still images that we used
in our magazine article as we thought
they were effective and portrayed our
documentary well as it gives an insight
to the reader on what is included in
our documentary:
I would definitely re-do the grab quotes in the article, as the text box outline is shown in the
page. As well as this, I would also include captions underneath the images to explain what is
going on the image, this can also make the documentary seem more appealing to the reader.
Included the date, time and
channel the documentary
would be showing on
Inserted page numbers, used martini glasses to
emphasise the topic of our documentary
Inserted a website in which the reader could
find out more on our documentary
We set the article in columns and
wrapped the text around the grab
quotes (which are important
quotes said in the documentary)

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The Radio Trail:
 In order to have an idea on what the conventions were on a radio trail, we had listened
to a variety of professional radio trails from stations such as ‘Capital FM’ and ‘BBC
Radio’. We had also filled in sheets to analyse other radio trails for documentaries which
involved analysing the voiceover, music, tone and other conventions of a radio trail.
Furthermore, we had also practiced making a radio trail, however using secondary
background music, earlier in the year so we had an idea on how to create and put
together a radio trail on ‘GarageBand’.
 Our radio trail was produced for ‘BBC Radio One’, as they have a wide variety of our
target audience; therefore we needed to make our radio trail appealing and upbeat for
the young listeners, however still considering that our documentary consisted of a
serious topic.
 We used extracts from our documentary which were effective and powerful quotes-
from both adults and students- quotes such as ‘…alcohol would be a sludge hammer’
and ‘13 year olds would be vulnerable…’
 The background musicwe had made using ‘GarageBand’, we had to make sure that the
music did not overpower the voiceover script, we had done this by altering the sound
levels of both the voiceover and the background music:
The background music is also upbeat however serious in tone, this supported the quotes
and created a theme in the radio trail. As well as this, we included the date, time and
channel as a finish to the radio trail which created an effective ending as that important
information would stick to the listeners mind, intended to increase the views of our
documentary.
 Our radio trail was approximately 40 seconds; this gave us enough time to include
powerful quotes, important rhetorical questions (used to include the listener) and more
information which almost summarised the topic of our documentary.

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Overall, we have stuck to the main conventions used in a documentary, article and radio
trail in order to make our product and ancillary texts appeal to the target audience. We
have also challenged the conventions through the transitions.