Debrouillard LTD case study

Debrouillard LTD

Debrouillard LTD is a small freelance TV company only employing two people. It was set up in 1996 by Jonathon Young who runs the company. He is the camera man for the company, he got a practical media diploma from Norton College in Sheffield in 1990 and several other qualifications including a Steadicam training course and a city and guilds TV and video competences course. Debrouillard does many arias of TV including sports and event coverage, factual, commercials and corporate but mainly focuses on documentary and international current affairs.

Debrouillard has filmed 135 BBC ‘Panorama’ documentaries, 7 Louis Theroux documentaries, 12 Ross Kemp documentaries and many other programs for companies such as: ABC, NBC, BBC, ITV, SKY and many more, including 30 day coverage for the 2012 Olympics. He was nominated for 6 documentaries and the winner of 2 awards for Ross Kemp documentaries and one for ‘Indian Ocean with Simon Reeve’ (all awards for excellence GTC awards). He has filmed in over 100 countries, from the US to Pakistan to Tanzania.

Debrouillard updates there equipment as the technology advances, they have gone from SD to HD then to full HD and now to 4K resolution with their Sony F5 35mm sensor camera.

One of their competitors is John Waters wildlife and documentary cameraman, A highly regarded freelance cameraman. Another competitor is Rich Peart who has worked for the likes of The BBC, ITV and channel 5.

Evaluation of research techniques that I chose

I conducted research into the types of people that would visit the National Emergency Services Museum. The point of conduction the research is to find out the type of people and the age range of people that would visit the museum so that I can tailor the promotional video to the target market of the museum, making the video more appealing to those people. The research is also used for other bits of information that will help in the production of the video. I used three different research methods, first a voxpop then I published an internet questionnaire and finally I did secondary research from the internet. From my research I found that the target market for the museum is parents taking young children. The most useful research method for finding out the target market for the museum was the on-line questionnaire. I think this because I could reach a wider range of people and it takes a lot less time to do. The voxpop didn’t go very well, this is because I conducted it in collage so I didn’t reach a wide range of people and the range of people I did interview (16-21) were the wrong age range for going to the museum, all I found out from it was that 16-21 year old aren’t interested in the museum. The questionnaire did go well, I got responses from a wide range of people and found out that people will go to take there children to the museum. What didn’t go well with the questionnaire is that allot of people skipped questions and not as many people took the questionnaire as I’d hoped meaning I didn’t get answers from the range of people I’d hoped. The third research method (secondary internet research) was very successful, I found out lots of information that will help with the production of the promotional video, information like travel arrangements, weather and information about the museum itself like a floor plan map. The secondary research was also useful for finding out the target market of the museum, the museums website had pictures of children at the museum and arrangements for parties and school visits.

The Voxpop interviews are the most reliable source of information because your doing a face to face interview and its harder to lie to someone’s face, especially about things like age which really matter in some types of research. Questionnaires and secondary internet research aren’t as reliable as a source for information, this is because its done on the internet so there’s nothing to stop someone making up fake answers or publishing fake information.

I found the most useful research technique was the secondary internet research. I found this to be the most useful because I could find out the target market of the museum from the museums website and lost of other information like travel arrangements and weather from other websites and I could find it all out very quickly and easily.

Methods of communication to convey meaning

This is an evaluation of the soap, The Big Bang Theory.

On the first episode of a new series the introduction of the show is a brief look back at the following on story lines. This is so that the viewers will remember what happened and will understand the storyline in the new episode. The opening credits and the theme tune are fairly short but this s required as the episodes are only between 20.5 minutes and 22.5 minutes so the introduction is only 23 seconds long. The theme song is upbeat which is used because the show is a comedy and the upbeat music will make the viewer happy and ready for the show. In the theme song the lyrics are about science and this fits well because the show is about a group of nerdy scientists. The setting is pretty much the same in all episodes. They use the living room as the main setting for most of the episodes. They d occasionally use other settings but there regular every day to day settings like friend’s apartments, a car, bedrooms or workplaces. The cast is very small and started of with only 5 main characters but has grown to 7 main characters and several other commonly occurring characters. There is a variety of characters with different backgrounds and ethnicities, one Indian, a Jewish man (Howard) person, a Catholic woman (Bernadette) and several white atheists. One of the characters (penny) is a lower working class to the others who are highly regarded scientists, but one of them (Raj) is from a very rich family. Tis gives a good contrast in classes, a majority middle class with minority upper and lower class. The lighting is fairly neutral and not meant to be very cinematic, the use for the lighting is to draw attention to locations, characters and props in a scene. This makes it representative of real life. The main shot types used are wide shots for group conversation, medium shots for a closer viewing of someone and occasionally shot/reverse shot for conversations with characters sat opposite each other. These shots are used because the show isn’t meant to be cinematic or dramatic its just meant to show the characters play out the comedy which it does well. The editing mainly uses simple cuts but in a sad ending it sometimes fades to black and in a jump between locations a flip transition is used to make it clear the location has changed. The editing is used to build up comedic tension for example a characters face wont be revealed so its unclear who another character is speaking too but when they’re revealed its usually someone unexpected. The episodes towards the end of a season always end on a cliffhanger. This is so that viewers will watch the program the following week of even when the new season comes back the following year.

This is an analysis of the news program ‘news at 10’ by the BBC.

The program does not show what happened in the previous episode at the beginning of the program, instead a news reader and a short compilation of clips about the news that’s coming up later in the program. This is so viewers will stay watching the program to see the bit the wanted to. The opening credits use dramatic music which fits well because often the news read is dramatic and important. The video for the opening credits is clips of the BBC news office and cg abstract images of the earth and words of capital city names which are all interlinked by lines. This shows that they read news from all over the world. the setting is the same in every episode. Its the news reader(s) in the news room which is a bright modernist circular room with backlit red and white glass walls and floors and a desk in the centre. The cast is usually only 1,2 or sometimes 3 newsreaders and then other newsreaders who go to do interviews with people away from the studio. The newsreader are always smart and look there best, this shows formality and almost always upper middle and upper class. The lighting doesn’t change during the program, its well lit and not meant to be cinematic, its meant to look formal and uniform. The main shot types used in the program are long shots for establishing shots, these are usually of the studio or for interviewing several people and the other shot type is medium close up, this is the most used shot in the news, usually a newsreader sitting at a desk.

 

 

Critically compare a range of research tools methods and skills

I’m going to compare a range of research tools, methods and skills to find the most effective and reliable way of conducting research to find out information that will help me with the filming of the promotional video for the national emergency services museum. I will discuss the methods, reliability, relevance and similarities between primary research methods like formal interviews, vox pops and questioners.

Primary research

Primary research is research conducted by yourself with no work by anyone else contributing to your end results. I will conduct some form of primary research before filming the video for the museum. Conducting primary research onto of secondary is a good idea as it will give me information and views given by the general public who have been or may go to museums and I can use their feedback to help make the video more successful.

Vox Pop

A Vox Pop is where you approach a member of the public in a public aria like a park or a street whilst usually filming and recording audio, if they consent to being part of the research you continue by asking them questions tailored to the information you need. If I do a Vox Pop, I will ask questions like “when was the last time you went to a museum?”, “what did you like the most about the museum?”, “how old are you?”. The answers to these questions will be useful to me because the question “how old are you?” will tell me the age of the target market so I can tailor my video to the target market to make the museum more appealing to its target market so more people will visit. The pros of Vox Pops are that you can get allot of information out of someone in a short amount of time and the answers will be long expanded answers rather than closed yes/no questions. Another pro about Vox Pops is that there a very reliable source of information because it’s a face to face conversation so its harder for the person being interviewed to lie. The cons of Vox Pops are that allot of people don’t like to be filmed and/or are busy in public places so don’t have time to stop and be questioned.

Formal interview

A formal interview is where you arrange an interview with a person to discuss their views and experiences with a certain topic. They usually take allot more time because they have to be organised then the lighting, cameras, audio and seating arrangements have to be set up. They have some positives though, as they take longer to conduct than a Vox Pop the interviewer tends to be able to get more and better quality information because they have more time to carefully plan the question that they’re going to ask the person. Also the person being interviewed arranged to be there so they will have more time for the interview so they will usually answer the questions in more depth. whereas with a Vox Pop the questions and answers tend to be more rushed because the person being interviewed will have been stopped on there way to go somewhere so they will be more keen to leave. This is probably the most reliable form of research as it’s a face to face interview with someone who wants to be there to give their views and experiences so they wont lie and will give more accurate information.

survey

A survey is a list of questions usually either on paper or an internet survey. They tend to be more closed of yes/no questions. They are good for getting allot of information very quickly because they don’t require an interviewer to go to a person to get them to fill out the questions, the questionnaire can be emailed or shared on social media and can reach a very wide audience allot quicker than other methods.  They are also good for getting quantitative data, its one of the easiest ways of getting quantitative primary data. As good as questioners are, there not the most reliable source for research due to the fact that there not face to face and anyone can do it if they want to its very easy and common for someone to lie about there answers they put.

similarities

Formal interviews and vox pops are virtually the same. They ask the same questions and answers but there more time has been spent over the question and answer resulting in more accurate data. Questionnaires aren’t so similar as there not usually face to face nor do they share similar questions, they accumulate quantitative data.

Secondary research

Secondary research is data and information collected from souses such as books and primarily the internet, its research conducted and published by someone else. It’s a very quick way to get information as you just look up a previous study or set of information.

Comparing research

Secondary research is useful for getting quantitative data very quickly as you can look it up on the internet and find usually find what you need. It has downsides though, you cant always find what you want and sometimes when you do its not exactly tailored to your needs. Also, data collected from sites of the internet cant be trusted fully because you weren’t there to oversea the study so therefore cant guarantee the legitimacy of the data. Primary research is a very effective way of getting reliable, relevant information but it can take a while to get the information. Its generally more reliable because you conducted the study yourself so know that the results are true, the data collected is also usually more relevant because you can tailor the questions to your needs to get the most useful results.

Conclusion

I think that the best way to conduct research is to use some secondary research from more reliable and trusted internet sites but mostly rely on primary research as its more reliable and relevant. The best ways to collect primary research is by conducting vox pops and questionnaires, this is because questionnaires can collect allot of quantitative data quickly because it can go to a wider audience and vox pops can get reliable information from face to face interviews with people and they’re quicker than setting up a formal interview with someone meaning you can do more vox pops and get more data.

My secondary research

I will need to get information before filming the video for the museum. For some of the information the best way is through secondary research on the internet. I will get the map of the building from the museums website http://www.emergencymuseum.org.uk/map.html. Ill get the route to the museum from google maps https://www.google.co.uk/maps and the tram times from the south Yorkshire travel website https://www.travelsouthyorkshire.com/. Because I’m going to need to get some exterior shots of the building ill need to make sure that’s its not raining on the day of the shoot and ill check the weather on the BBC weathers website http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/. The last thing I’ll need to know is the opening times of the museum which i will also get from the museums website http://www.emergencymuseum.org.uk/map.html.

Primary research

How to conduct an effective VoxPop?

• Smile and look welcoming so more people will be comfortable with you approaching them
• Learn to accept rejections, some people just wont be comfortable with you approaching them]
• Ask a large amount of a large variety of people, a large amount of people will mean you find more people willing to be interviewed and a large variety of people will get a better array of answers.
• Use open ended questions to get more detailed responses then yes/no but don’t just use open ended questions, get quantitative data as well.
• Make the questions relevant
• Make the questions simple and to the point

How to produce an effective questionnaire?

• For questions like age where people don’t like to answer, use boxes with several options to leave their information confidential while you still get the data you need. For example, 0-5, 6-12, 13-18, 19-30, 31-40, 41-55, 56-70, 71+ for age options.
• Not too long, people are more reluctant to turn down an interview of a questionnaire if it will take up allot of there time.
• A mix of quantitative and qualitative data
• Keep the questions simple, easy to understand and too the point
• Ask screening questions at the beginning to find out if there right for the survey e.g. have you ever been to a museum for a questionnaire about what you did at a museum)

Questionnaire planning

The aim for my questionnaire is to gain information that will influence the production of my promotional video to help bring more people to the museum that the video is for. The museum is an emergency services museum and is aimed at children between the ages of around 5-10 (junior and primary school level). My target audience is parents and primary school teaches who take those children to the museum.

Question ideas- I’m going to start the questionnaire with asking the age group of the person then ask if they have ever visited a museum and if so when and where was the last place they visited. Ill ask what kind of museum they last visited; art, automotive, science, general, natural history, other? Ill ask some quantitative questions like how many times per year do you visit a museum? or how much would you pay for a museum? Ill also ask qualitative questions like; did you enjoy your last museum visit?

survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/6WHPVLF

My vox pop video:

Introduction to Research Techniques

I did research into the preferred genre of film for 16-20 year old’s. My results showed that action/adventure and comedy was voted the top two genres. All 15 people in the study said that either action or adventure was in there top three favourite genres. Horror was the next favourite with four people saying it was in there top three favourite genres and then drama was the third most popular with three people saying it was in there top three favourite genres. I did some secondary research into this and found that the web company IMDb did a survey into the most popular genres and the results are fairly comparable to my survey. The IMDb survey asked 9214 people there favourite genre and of that 1506 (16.345%) of people said action/adventure was there favourite which is similar to my study where 3 out of 15 people said that was there favourite genre which is 20%. The next most popular genre in IMDb’s study showed that drama was the next most popular with 1041 (11.298%) of people voting it there favourite whereas in my study no one voted it there number one favourite but 3 out of the 15 people asked (20%) voted it in there top 3. IMDb’s third favourite was fantasy with 840 people voting it there favourite genre whereas in my study only one person voted it in there top 3.

Research is useful because it gives you information about the general public opinions, likes, dislikes and views which can be used to influence the making of a product or a piece of work to tailor it to the likes of the general public who are the consumer of audience for the product or piece of work. This is necessary because this will make the product or piece of work more popular with the audience or consumer.

There are different types of research; primary, secondary, qualitative and quantitative. Primary research is research conducted yourself to gather data or information, this can be in the form of a questionnaire or survey. Secondary research is research using primarily other peoples work such as internet pages or books. Quantitative data is data that isn’t numerical but usually information like location or a favourite something. Qualitative data is numerical data like age hight or a distance or weight.