Convergence Media Teamwork

Todays session was all about transmedia activism what it is and types of companies that use transmedia activism! An area looked at in the session was why do people join social networks; 

• Maybe to socialize
• To work together
• To have topical discussions 
• Or to share interests 

Using social media shares a range of things; participation - openness - conversation - community - connectedness. An example of social media who used transmedia activism we looked at was the Green Peace campaign about Barbie & Ken

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/forests/asia-pacific/barbie/

Digital Media Cultures

In todays session was about research strategies and methods for dissertations. The session consisted of tips we could use when writing any essays, research resources we can use; books, journals, audio, visual archives, official websites e.g. BBC or Ofcom. The session also went into detail about using journals, the internet and readings for essays. At the end we had an example of a plan for an essay/dissertation about TV formats.

Applied Media Research

So this weeks session was our presentation. For most of the week and also the session we prepared for the presentation, making sure we all knew what we were doing. While preparing we notice that a couple of times when we went to save the prezi, we had problems. But in the end we fixed it, until we walked into present our presentation. When we tried to put our presentation up in a different room the prezi wouldn’t load, which meant that we had to swap our presentation time with the final group so we could fix the problem. Finally after a long wait we did our presentation with no more problems, it was such a relief to have it over and done with! Check our prezi with the link below! 

http://prezi.com/ual2vxk468qw/cross-platform-television/

Convergence Media Teamwork

So in this session we had a presentation about narrative structure. After the presentation were then asked to get into groups of three, myself, phoebe and lois made up our group, as we knew we work well as a group and we would get on with the task asked. Once in our group we were then given an image of a persons face, to which we had to put objects or images next to the image. So that other people could make up their own story from the objects. Check out our image story board and see what story you come up with from the images and objects!

Digital Media Cultures

So todays blog post is only short as we only really focused on one area, which was writing techniques which we should use in our reports. And also when we come to writing our dissertation, in our third year. I can’t believe how far but how close it actually is to our third year.

Applied Media Research

This blog post is only short  as we only had another group meeting about out presentations, discussing any problems we may have or any help we need with certain research. After the meeting myself and Michael decided to collect all our research we had at this point and to start building our prezi presentation. We have decided that a couple of days next week we will complete our prezi, and will also practice the presentation before we have to do it in front of our tutors. 

Convergence Media Teamwork

So I have decided from now on in this blog i’m shortening convergence media teamwork down to CMT, its too long to write all the time!

So in our second session of CMT we had a recap of what we had spoken about in the last session e.g trans media. Once we had a re-cap we been set a task which was to pick a fairytale and create a back story to one of the characters within the story, which hadn’t been spoken about in the original story. To do this we were placed into groups with three or four members in, our group decided we would pick ‘The Elves and The Shoe Maker’. 

• We decided to use Buddy the elf, from the movie ELF, and explain that he had decided to stay and live in New York with his elf friends.
• But they would become addicted to gambling and would owe money to loan sharks. So they decided to look for jobs and see a shoe maker advertising one. They decided they would help him, without him knowing. 
• They would make fabulous shoes of a night so no one would see them. 
• The fairy god mother from the fairytale Cinderella would come into the shop and buy a pair of the shoes from the shoemaker. 
• The elves get caught by the shoemaker, so they decide to rob the money from the shoemaker, so they can pay the loan sharks off.
• And the rest of the story is down to the viewers/audience. 

After coming up with the story we had to come up with media platforms that users could use to be part of the story. Some ideas I thought of where; 

• They could fill in an application form for the job offer for the elves. This could be done through a website or a blog.
• They could play a game for the part of the story where the elves become addicted to gambling etc.

As you can probably tell I was in a group with three lads, their ideas for the story rubbed off on me. Check out the picture below of our storyboard, which tells our story. 

Digital Media Cultures

So for our second day of the semester was short, which I didn’t mind. Like the first session we had we had another introduction into the new assignment we will be doing over the next couple of weeks. After the introduction we were asked to pick an area within the media, which we had covered last semester, something different from the area we discussed in our essays. We had to do this for our new assignment we are going to be writing a report within groups. We were asked to pick an area that we are interested in so I chose TV Formats. Now I’m just looking forward to see what group I will be placed into and what area I will be writing part of the report on. 

Convergence Media Teamwork & Applied Media Research

So this is my first blog post of the new year, Happy New Year everyone! 

So our first day back for our second semester was weird and long. It started off with an introduction into this new module, what we would be covering over the next couple of weeks for example trans-media. This session for convergence media teamwork was more about the introduction so we finished slightly earlier than we normally would. 

Because we finished slightly earlier myself and a couple of my friends decided we would go to the library to finish off our essays for our other modules TV Studio Production and Beyond The Camera. Once I had finished adding the finishing touches to my essays, I thought my best option was to do some work for our applied media research module. I decided to type up our results from our questionnaires and also our focus group. As this would make it easier for myself and my group when coming to edit our presentation together which is due in soon. 

So our afternoon session was Applied Media Research, for this session we had a group meeting for our presentations, within the meeting we discussed the research we have done for the presentation. Before the meeting I was slightly nervous, but once it was under way I realised there wasn’t anything to worry about. I ended up finding the meeting really useful because I got a lot of notes and points to focus on for answering our question, I think these points will help us a great deal!

As promised in one of my previous blogs here are a few of the pictures, from our focus group which took place just before the christmas break. Check them out!