Form and Style Development

For my project, I am making a video for a school, which is under the branch of Social Action and Community Media. My client, Eaton Primary School, first gave me a brief idea of what kind of video they were looking for, and pointed me in the direction of a video from The Wroxham School. After studying this video, I was able to pick out a few techniques that they had used in the video and implement them into my work as well.

First off, there were interviews with the teachers and the students, and clips of teaching in the classrooms. After seeing these techniques used, I decided to use these in my own piece. I also noticed that they made a conscious effort to match clips together to create a vague narrative structure, for example they’d show one of the children getting interviewed, and would then cut to a clip of that child working in class and interacting with the teacher. One of the main messages in this video, was that they were passionate about letting the children choose their own challenges, and letting them be independent in their work and take control of their own learning. I hope to be able to portray this message in my own video too, by following some of the techniques that the original video used.

To get an idea of some other techniques I could use, I studied other social action projects that centred around schools and education. One of the first videos I watched was called Belton High School, and it was a promotional video that showcased some of the activities that the school offered. It was quite fast-paced, showed them taking part in lessons and interactions between the students and the teachers. There was a real sense of community in the school and it displayed the hard work that the students were willing to put in. There was no talking in the video, and the music was very upbeat and happy. I also watched a video from Hartpury College, which was in a similar light to the first schools video. It was more of an informative video that showed students what they could be getting from the college. It included testimonials from the students, as well as shots similar to the first video that showcased the range of activities that they offer to their students.

Overall, I observed that in the schools videos, there was usually a few shots of the services and activities that they offer, and it would show the students working along with the teachers providing support. I found they also included upbeat music, whether it was in the background or as a feature, as well as student testimonials and voiceover clips of what the person is talking about. From these findings, I am hoping to incorporate some of these elements into my own work to comply with the codes and conventions of the genre.