Codes and Conventions are important in the media industry because they help us to breakdown what goes into media e.g. a television show, film etc.
Codes and conventions are used together in any study of genre – it is not enough to discuss a technical code used such as camera work, without saying how it is conventionally used in a genre.
For example, the technical code of lighting is used in some way in all film genres. It is a convention of the horror genre that side and back lighting is used to create mystery and suspense – an integral part of any horror movie.
http://media-studies.tki.org.nz/Teaching-media-studies/Media-concepts/Codes-and-conventions
Television News Item
The codes and conventions of a TV news programe are:
With BBC News at 6pm most people will watch it because they will be getting home from work so they will want to catch up on the news when they get home.
Multi Camera
A multi camera set up is used in a T.V news programe because if there was only one camera it wouldn't be possile to do the show because the camera man would have to move the camera between presenters.
Report Structure
In a news show the news stories are organised by having a headline story first and then they have smaller stories that have happend during the day.
Music
The music they have on a news show is the intro and have an ending tune.
Presenter sitting at desk
A news show needs a presenter/anchorman to present the main show and if they have a second presenter they will move on to them. Also a news show might have presenters for sports,weather etc.
News: world, national , local
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For an hour long news show the first half of it is world and national news and for the last half it be news for what area a viewer lives e.g. North East
Field Reporters
A news show typicaly has field reporters to report news stories from where the story is happening. They report both of events that are ongoing or events that have already occured. On occasions they may revisit the story if it is still ongoing. For example if a major disaster has happened they will report on the aftermath of the disaster and then a few months later they might go back to the it to see how the people are coping.
Interviews
A news show will have interviews to get the point of view of a topic from people. Also they can get up to date information on particular news stories.
Mode Of Adress - Formal
A news show has formal language because they are reporting on factual events that have happened and if the adress was informal viewers might not take the stories seriously.
An example of a television news item is the 6 o clock news on BBC 1. When you turn the show on you expect a presenter in front of the camera presenting the show. When discussing a particular topic the show might use interviews to get eye witness first hand accounts or views of two opposing sides to get a balanced argument.You would also expect the presenter to be objective so they don't influence the audience.
On the technical side of the programme the presenter would use polite, formal language and to not raise their voice as that might give he impression that they might be for or against a topic.
When the presenter is on camera you would expect them to be the main focus and when they give an interview there should be a faultles flow of ideas between the presenter and the interviwee.Also they would use formal language.
Website Article
An example of a website article is a football article that Phil McNulty on the BBC Sport website writes where he discusses different topics football related.
The codes and convections of a website article are:
He was a BBC summariser at Griffin Park and he said: "The FA Cup is about David v Goliath. It is about unequal battles you see from time to time. It is not about staid games between clubs, such as Manchester United's walkover against Fulham.
Audio
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/21224952
Facts and figures
The magic of the cup
At least nine of the last 16 teams in the FA Cup will be from outside the Premier League. It will be 10 if Brentford win at Chelsea.In an article you would expect the topic to be up to date and have relevent infomation in it. Also you might have a bit of audio e.g. an interview. The language of the article depends on the topic of discussion. You may also see facts and figures
TV Documentary
An example of a TV documentary is Wonders Of Life by Professor Brian Cox where he goes out to find the different wonders of life arouund the world.
The codes and convections of a TV Documntary are:
The music in a TV documentary will be the intro and outro.
The audio in a documentary would be the sounds of animals or traffic depending on the type of documentary.
Lighting
A TV documentery uses natural lighting for animal documenteries because there is no need for artificial lighting but if a documentary is filming inside they may use artificial lighting.
Real footage of surrondings
They use real footage because it is shot on location and not in a studio
Voice Over
A TV documentary will use voice over because they will film the animals then they will break it down in editing to tell a story of what goes on and then the voiceover will match the footage.
Single camera
A single camera will be used in a wildlife documentary when the presenter gets up close to an animal.
Use of text, labels, dates and locations
In a wildlife documentary they will show a world map first then it will zoom in to the continent they are in and then it will zoom in further to the country the filming takes place. Finally they wil zoom in to the general area of filming.
Video
In a TV documentry you might see archive footage along with a voice over who is done by Brian Cox in his documentaries. In addition you might get uses of text, labels, dates and locations to show data of whern they filmed it, where the creatures are found and to label what they have found. There would have been one camaras with him so someone could film him while he is up close to a creature
