Codes And Conventions

         The Second Factual Programme that I am analysing is a documentary called 9/11. The documentary was originally set out to follow a new rookie fireman in New York City, following him through all of his training, all the way to the day he signs on at a particular firehouse, and his first 6 months on the job. The way the documentary is set out to the viewers, it is as if you are a fireman just like the rest of them in the firehouse. When the September 11th attacks were taking place during the filming of the documentary, and when they were inside of the 2 buildings, or running from the debris falling around them as the towers collapsed, it was as if it was the viewer running from the scene because there are no clean shots at all, they were all shaky, and quickly moving around, just like you would do when you are running away from something, and rushing around everywhere. They had 2 cameramen so you had 2 views of what was going on that day. There was one at the towers, and one at the firehouse, so you were able to see both places and the emotions within the area. This piece of factual programming was a really good way of showing real life events, and how people felt on the morning of September 11th and it gave you the sense that you were there and part of the ordeal and that because there were no “perfect shots” like there would be if the camera was on a tripod or flat surface, it tells you the obvious statement that these weren’t shots they had planned when they began shooting.

The 3rd piece im going to analyse is an archive program called Only Fools and Horses Greatest moments. The show was dedicated to the 50 greatest only fools moments over the 25 years it has been on. What happened with it was instead of a panel deciding, the only fools and horses fans got to choose which one they thought was the best moment. Archive programmes have the majority of the time a lot of video clips or music clips (in the Only Fools case it was video clips) and normally they play the clips first then either have a freeze frame of part of the clip or a plain background with either one of the actors in the show, or another actor, or a TV critic talking about that particular clip, and because they are looking at the camera it looks like they are chatting to the viewers about it, and gets the viewers more involved in the show. Because they have got the actors from the show, it makes it look much more professional and more believable when it comes to telling them about that moment, because they were on the set at the time, or maybe in one of the moments that got voted for.  Sometimes in the show they had the actors, and critics talking about the moment before it was shown, to give the viewers a chance to think about what the moment is, so it keeps them all guessing as to what they are talking about.

     In conclusion to my research I have found that factual programmes use a lot of graphics to make the differences between similar shows, and get the viewers more involved with the shows. Te shots they use tend to determine what type of show it is, whether it’s a real life event, with the camera shaking, and moving quickly. Or with the tidy shots, when its purely focused on the object the program is all about. I have also found out that all programmes have, most of the time, a presenter that talks directly to the camera, to get the viewers more involved in that way, or that they have a voice over when clips of a subject is playing, and the voice over is explaining what exactly is going on.