Location

The places where we film indoors doesn't necessarily have to be in the same building that we film in front of when we are outdoors. For inside locations we could just use simple rooms (such as living rooms in our houses or classrooms at colleges) and place props around (such as fake cobwebs to give the idea that the building is a lot older and creepier than it actually is). For the outside location I was thinking of outside of a Church seeing as they are old and big and at night time we can make it look really creepy, and by adding non-diegetic sounds that are associated with horror or tension, we can really give off the illusion that this building is somewhat haunted which will help set the genre for this show.

The connotations of a Church are a holy calming place of worship however using media representation we will turn the idea of a Church being a happy place to a Church being a scary place. The media has a way of turning things around (for example when nursery rhymes are adjusted to sound scary in horror movies such as in Dark Water to get a new perspective) as the media is always a representation.

There will be three main locations/rooms. The first will be outside the building (church). The second will be in the "living room" and the the third will be in the "diary room" (a room which appears constantly in reality tv productions). Of course if we were to make a full length episode then there would be rooms such as a kitchen, bathroom and bedrooms however those three rooms are the only ones that we will be showing in this short clip of our show.

These are images of the Church that we will be filming in front of.

Reality TV Pitch Presentation

 The presentation to pitch our idea for our Reality TV Show.

The basic idea is that this is a game show called 'After Dark' where contestants are made to live with each other for a week and complete a number of tasks to earn luxuries such as hot running water or soft duvets. Each day a contestant gets voted off by the audience which shows that our show contains audience participation. The winning contestant left at the end of the week wins a cash prize of £13000. I chose this number seeing as 13 is an unlucky number so it fits in with the theme and genre of the show which is thriller.

I have tried to show stereotypes in our show especially with the character Ashley Jenson who is a typical blonde girl who wears short clothes and lots of make up, who makes a big fuss and doesn't like to do challenges. I will be applying the uses and gratification theory by causing conflict between Ashley Jenson and Sienna Parnell (a character who likes to judge others and feels that she is better than most). This will bring satisfaction to an audience as seeing others argue tends to entertain them as they can watch it and get involved by taking sides without the people even knowing.

Feedback: When we got reviews back for our pitch we never scored any lower than 3 out of 5 and it was all usually 4s and 5s. Most people enjoyed our concept and said they would watch our show. Some people said that we need to work on theories to improve.

Shooting In The Dark

One of the issues that has arisen with this reality TV project is how am I suppose to film in the dark? I have researched into some ways and obviously the best way is with night vision cameras but unfortunately they are quite costly. Some cheaper ways are by using low lighting or artificial lighting when filming or to film in the day time and then use a filter to make it look as if it was dark.  There is also the option of filming in black and white. Other options include the 'day for night' technique where you film early in the morning or just before night where it is dark but still light enough to see everything clearly through the camera.

Print Advertisement : Whiskas

This is a successful print advert for Whiskas cat food.

I think that this advert is very clever and the slogan 'feeding your cat's instincts' goes with the theme of the advert. Cats are decedents from lions and tigers (i.e. big cats) therefore the advert suggests that by having this product, cats will enjoy it as it is what they're 'ancestors' used to have, and this product can potentially make them stronger or fearless. The product can also make them more speedy as the cat is able to catch up to a wild animal, much bigger than the cat, who is running away.
This advert is successful as it is memorable and clever therefore it will be able to draw cat lovers in which is the potential audience as they will trust the product as Whiskas must know what they're on about as they are able to make a connection between cats and lions.
This print advertisment suggests that a cat can turn into a more fearless animal when being given this food and we will be using this in our reality tv show. Obviously not by giving them food but some characters will go from scared to fearless when attempting to face a challange which we will show in our opening title sequence as some people will switch from a relaxed to a scared picture whereas others may switch from a relaxed to a fearless picture.

Tool Academy. E4 TV Show Title Music

This is the opening title to a reality tv game show called Tool Academy.
I really like the way that the contestants switch from one picture to another as they go from "regular guy" to "school boy". I would like to have the concept of this in my opening sequence however the contestants will go from regular people to scared or scary contestants and the background will change from bright colours to dark colours.

Reality TV Show Idea: After Dark

I got the idea to do a reality game show where contestants take part in tasks in the dark from the concept of reality through the film 'The Task' (in my opinion it is not a very good film however it has a really good story line).
Throughout the film contestants where asked to take part in challenges that may scare them which is what I would like to base my reality program on - pushing people and challenges to the extreme.
My reality show could be called 'After Dark' therefore during the day the contestants are just living their lives, sleeping, eating, doing whatever they want, however at night is when the challenges begin. The lighting will get darker when it comes to doing the tasks and they will wear darker clothes with connotes horror as opposed to maybe brighter clothes that they could be wearing earlier on before the challenges begin.

Big Brother (UK) Research

Pre-production work

Big Brother (UK)

Introduction:

Overtime reality TV has become more popular as more reality based programmes are being produced (for example; I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here, Keeping Up With The Kardashians, Young Dumb And Living Off Mum, Americas Next Top Model etc…). I am going to be researching one of the world’s most well-known TV programmes; Big Brother (UK).

Plot:

                The plot of Big Brother is where a number of contestants live together in a house, isolated from anyone or anything on the outside, and they may have to complete a number of tasks or challenges as well as having to put up with other peoples “home life” habits, these may be conditions that other people are not necessarily used too.  The house consists of a kitchen and eating area, a bathroom, a living room, a sleeping area, a garden and arguably the most important room; the diary room. The diary room was a place where contestants could talk about their own feelings or emotions to the world without input from anyone else or it was a place where the Big Brother House could decide “secret tasks” for the contestants to complete without anyone else in the house knowing. The program has audience participation as they watch the contestants in the Big Brother house and chose who stays and who gets evicted. This keeps happening until there is one winner left who wins a large cash prize.

Hosts:

                A host is an important part of reality TV as it is someone who always appears on every show therefore must be someone the audience can enjoy watching and even connect with. Davina McCall was the host for the duration of the program when it was hosted on Channel 4 and Brian Dowling has hosted it since Big Brother was moved to Channel 5. A good reality TV show must also have a strong voice over which most of the time was Marcus Bentley.

               

 Background information:

                Big Brother was first broadcast on Channel 4 (and E4) on the 18^th of July 2000 and stopped running on that TV channel on the 10^th of September 2010. Since the 18^th of August 2011, Big Brother has been hosted on Channel 5 (and 5*) and is still going on now.

Examples Of Contestants:

                On spin-off series’ such as Celebrity Big Brother there have been contestants such as Jedward, Kerry Katona, Mark Owen, Shilpa Shetty, Amy Childs etc… and on Big Brother there have been contestants such as Craig Phillps, Anna Nolan, Darren Ramsay etc…

Media Interest:

                Big Brother has a big impact on the UK as most tabloids and magazines cover the stories that happen within the Big Brother House. After leaving the house housemates usually remain newsworthy for only a short time. However there are some contestants (such as Jade Goody who was known as ‘the ultimate housemate’) who remain in the public eye long after they leave the house due to issues or arguments that happened on the program while they were there. A number of books have also been released such as Big Brother: The Inside Story by Narinder Kaur, Big Brother: The Official Unseen Story by Jean Ritchie, The Psychology of Big Brother by Dan Jones.