The way language used in adverts to attract the target audience is the vital piece, because if this wasn’t there then nobody will listen to the advert. If the advert is for kids then this is where diegetic sound comes in. diegetic sound is used in every advert that I have heard. Take “The Simpson’s” advert for example, we can tell that it is for Simpson lovers and kids because the use of diegetic sounds. In the advert they put the Simpson’s theme tune in, sounds of a fight scene. Nearly quotes of the video that they are selling. That is how they attract the target audience, by using diegetic sound.
RSPCA broadcasts a group of 3 adverts. I will be looking at the second advert “SWIM”. This advert gets increasingly shocking, because the first advert is a drive, which is when a dog gets run over by a car. The second advert is swim, when a dog gets put in a sack and then thrown in the canal by it’s owner. The third is injection, when the owner takes the dog to the vets to put the dog down.
The advert grabs the audience’s attention by just using one voice, which is the dog. There is no diegetic sound, because without it the advert is powerful. The advert grabs the attention of the audience by using pathos.
Pathos means, sympathy to the dog due to their greater understanding of the event. This comes in when the dog gets put in the sack. It is here where the audience knows that the dog is going to die.
At the end of the advert there is a woman voice over, it is well known that when a women does a voice over most people tend to listen. The advert has got no fancy sound track, that’s what makes it more appealing. When there is an advert on the radio, most people just tend to listen to the soundtrack that is being played, and at the end they try to think what the advert was trying to say, but the RSPCA advert “SWIM” only has one voice, the dog. This is done so that people just listen to what the dog is saying, and trying to concentrate on what the dog is trying to mean. After the dog it is followed by the female voice over, which makes it a strong issue.
We feel sympathy for the dog in the advert because of the way the narrator for the dog uses language.
In the advert the dog is all happy because he is going for a walk with his owner and his brother, but things slightly go wrong, as the dogs are forced in the sack and then ready to be chucked in the river by their owner, “our best puts us in a sack”.
The character of the dog is revealed to us by the use of language. It is hard to believe that a dog is talking, because it is the voice of a man, but when you keep on listening you figure out that it is a dog. It would’ve been hard to figure out that it was a dog if they didn’t think like one, because dogs in cartoons call their owners “best friend”.
We re made to feel that the owner is powerful through the dogs use of language, because in the advert the dog say’s “we are going for a swim”, which means that the owner is taking them for a swim; this assumes that the owner is powerful.
There are many devices used to make the audience have an emotional response. One of the devices is to put the dogs in danger. When the dogs are in danger the audience will feel pity and anger.
The length of the advert does affect our reaction, because it is kind of long which makes it boring, then people just switch off, but if this advert got the target audience then it doesn’t really matter.
In this advert there is direct appeal. This appeal is at the end of the advert where the lady says the slogan. “If you give a DAMN, don’t give a pet”.
This is direct because in the slogan the RSPCA use the word DAMN. If they didn’t care then they would use some other word then they would use some other word instead of damn. The advert would sound something like this; if you care don’t, don’t give pet. That sounds like it isn’t that big of deal, but the fact that they used damn makes it more direct and appealing.
There are many languages used in the advert, but the ones that I thought of straight away are shocking, aggressive and factual.
I found it shocking, because the dog is happy as if the owner hasn’t taken the dog for a walk. Now the dog says he’s going for a swim, but then he changes his mind, because the river looks cold and dirty plus the owner didn’t bring a towel, instead he bought a sack. When the dog says the owner a sack you can assume that he is going to put the dogs in the sack and throw them in the canal. You see this through pathos.
I found it aggressive at the end, when the slogan came up, because I have already explained, it is direct appeal. It is aggressive because they use the word DAMN. That is an unusual word to use in adverts, but then again it is important. That is why I found it factual just before the slogan. The woman voice over says that “every year the RSPCA has to rescue thousands of unwanted pets”, and it is true, that is why I think it is factual.
Using camera angles, diegetic sound and an aggressive slogan at the end put the RSPCA’s television campaign together.
The use of camera angles in the advert makes the advert more important. There are many camera angles used in the RSPCA’s broadcast, there are, medium shots, low angle and the god shot (birds eye view).
The purpose of the medium shot is to set the atmosphere. Medium shots are sort of like flash backs, but they’re just still shots. We see this shot in the advert, when the dog changes his mind about swimming, because the river is cold and dirty. After the dog says that, the camera goes back to show us how dirty the river is and the camera stays there for five seconds.
The other shot is when the owner takes the dogs to put them in the sack, there is a wall with graffiti on it, and bin bags in front. Already that shop makes the atmosphere seem dangerous.
Low angle shots make the owner seem powerful. This is because this angle is through the dog’s eyes. This camera angle is the dog, because the camera is shaking. This angle is good because it shows us what the dog sees, and how we would feel if we were in the dog’s position. This is a sort of persuasive shot, because if you were a dog then you wouldn’t want that happening to you.
This angle makes the owner seem powerful, because in the advert when it comes up to the graffiti on the walls, the owner puts a rope around the camera to make it a leash.
The bird’s eye shot is the most important shot. There is only one of these shots, which makes it special. This shot is probably the biggest shot in the advert, because this proves you are right about the owner, if he is really going to kill the dogs.
This shot shows the owner putting the dog in the sack and walking towards the river.
The diegetic sounds in the advert give us an affect of isolation and fear.
The diegetic sounds in this advert are; footsteps, river flowing, cars and trees moving in the wind.
The fear factor is when the owner crosses the road with his dogs, but doesn’t have them on a leash. This makes us think he deliberately wants them to get run over by a car.
When they are walking or running through the grass, the dog looks at the river and thinks again about going for a swim, but still the owner takes him. This is isolation.
What gives this advert a big affects that the dogs voice is young and Scottish, which makes the audience think the dog is care free and happy and is more vulnerable.
Without the owners diegetic sound, then we wouldn’t have suspected that the owner was going to do this, because he started off happy, but then gradually gets angry, stressed and inpatient.
No voice-overs make the audience think back on images.
The slogan at the end is really aggressive, but it still is persuasive. This is because the slogan is presented on a blank screen, followed by the bird’s eye view shot of the dog being thrown in the river.
My opinion is that the television advert is more persuasive than the radio advert. The radio advert you have to think and listen to the advert and work out that it is a dog, but in the television advertise you already know it is a dog because another dog is running in front of the camera that is speaking. Radio adverts are some how good, because the people that don’t have time can’t watch it on television, so they just listen to it on the radio. If you were a blind person then you would prefer the television advertise because it has diegetic sounds, which make you imagine what is going on. Some people prefer radio adverts, because the television takes up a lot of electricity, plus radio is cheaper than television.
