Toby Barnswarda as website evaluation
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Like real media products my web design features many of the conventions that would be recognized in a media standard website, I have used images to portray meaning, video and audio to describe that meaning. Alongside this legality conventions like the copyright information seen at the bottom of all website pages, conventional technical aspects of web design have been applied to my site as well, logic has gone behind the positioning of certain aspects of the website. For instance the navigation bar, this can be easily found and come to terms with how it works in regards to finding your way around the site, logos placed in the top left corner of the site where logos are expected to be seen.
The creative decisions I made can be found in color schemes where simple colors can bee seen, not too offending to the eye but not too bland to make the site dull and lifeless. Simple media connotations have been used in the colour scheme to represent certain meanings. For instance most if not all of the things we wish to represent as bad in the site have been mixed in with the colour of red, this meaning is then paired with that color in the users mind.
How does your media product represent particular social groups?
Obviously my media product is aimed at resolving the problem of substance abuse, all types of substances that can be abused not just drugs. The argument my website represents is that anyone can be affected substance abuse no matter who you are and how you are related to the problem at hand be it directly or indirectly, friends or relatives of people who are abusing substances often get worn down or feel bad about what is happening to the people they care about. My website demands the support we need to help these people in any way shape or form we can be that someone to talk to, helping an abuser get back on track or preventing your loved ones from falling of the long straight and narrow.
I went about locating the site visitor by splitting my website into the three main categories of substance abuse drugs, smoking and alcohol. Convincing them that trusting in us would provide for the best outcome was done in a way that made the website in a way relate to them, experiences that the user can relate to in order to better understand how and why we want to help sufferers of substance abuse. Information on what these substances can do to you and the help we provide to stop people from falling onto the wrong path and help them back onto the right one.
Versions of the reality are shown in the description of what the substances can do to you explained on the site, the problem is clear, the fact that a user is on the website looking for help proves that help is needed and a problem needs to be solved. Then come the solution, the website and the help it can offer if the user works alongside the help we offer. A video was also been used to show what our help can to for you and better your life.
What kind of media institution might describe your media product and why?
Web design is a unique platform in relation to film or radio because you can combine both of those media formats into a website, the limits are endless on a website whereas you are limited as to what you can do on video and radio.
The research made behind the making of this site and the institutions involved were web hosting, advertising agencies and domain name registration. In my research behind web hosting I found that it allows an individual to make a website and allows it to be accessed via the World Wide Web, this allows my website to be accessible nearly anywhere in the world (but is aimed at uk). Looking at advertising agencies I discovered that in working with an ad agency their aim is to simply give and outside point of view to the effort of what you want your media product to do. I also found that typical ad agency clients tend to be non profit organizations which is what my media product is and also government agencies which relates to my product because in working with my site I discovered a government based campaign that is highly regarded in the field of my media product ‘talk to frank’.
Who would be the audience for your media product?
Obviously the audience for a campaign website is of the up most importance without an audience a campaign site would be nothing, they would be offering a service/help to no one which would make the campaign pointless. In order to make my campaign as useful as possible the correct audience would need to be addressed. The demographics of my audience would be age group 13 and upwards because solving the problem of substance abuse is most effective when the subject candidate is younger, solving the problem early on in life leads to a better future later on in life and they are less likely to fall down into that path later on in life. We are not gender specific in my website campaign because both genders can be affected in substance abuse, income level again is not of an issue because we are generally looking at younger people who don’t have an income, the only income we would expect to worry about is the people who donate into the campaign. In a modern world with many races and ethnic backgrounds and especially the U.K. being a multi cultural country our efforts are not spread to one specific race but split equally between all racial backgrounds that seek our help. So in conclusion to target audience we would ideally be looking to aim our campaign at young people/teenagers of the uk of low income regardless of their background, race and ethnicity.
How did you attract/address your audience?
At the beginning I did a questionnaire to help with the finding and pin pointing of my target audience, the results proved the research found in the targeting of my target audience. Results from the questionnaire showed that young teens of Britain would be the ones looking to use this kind of website/the internet to look for help if they had a substance abuse related problem.
The navigation and design of the site was specifically designed to cater for this target audience, the layout being simple but effective, and the navigation bar easily found and identified at the top center of the page. The logo found at the top left hand corner of the page, these are conventional positions of these technical aspects of a website. The colour scheme as mentioned before uses simple connotations to outline what is good and bad and easy on the eyes.
Video, audio and imaging on the site has been used to create emotion. There is no harsh/displeasing video, audio or imaging used on the site. This is because our site has been aimed at young teens. It has also been done like this because we do no wish to shock our users with harsh graphic/gory video, audio and photography. This has been done to keep users calm and to not lead them into that false sense of security that everything is horribly wrong and that there is no help for them. My campaign site was created to calmly help and ease the target audience through their progression of getting better. This I believe will create a meaningful experience for the user and make for a better recovery.
What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
In the making of this media product I have learnt invaluable skills in website creation software, image, video and audio editing, website uploading. In each of these areas digital software did limit me as to what I wanted to do but I made the best of what I could out of the facilities I had at hand and the help I was given in order to work around these difficulties.
Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
Looking back at the school site I created the decisions I made back then in the creation of that site, those decisions were a lot more un informed and technical edits were made for the sake of them not to create meaning but now however decisions and edits made have been done to better the connotations and deeper meaning of the site and to cater for my target audience. Overall my skills have developed and developed in ways to better my judgment in the creation of media products in the future.
