Understanding
the requirements of working to a brief
When creating a product for a media company you will first be
presented with a brief, this gives you all of the relevant information you need
when creating the product. There are many different structures in which a brief
can be given to you: below.
Contractual:
A contractual brief is one that an employer has written,
specifying the details of the production. For example our media teacher handed
us a brief in which we were obliged to stick to outlining the specifications
that we as a class must stick to.
Another brilliant example of a contractual brief in the media
industry itself would be that the contract is a result of Channel 4 commissioning
Derren Brown for his different television series that air on the channel; they
would give him specifications in which he must stick to. These specifications
would include the length of the show, what is not allowed to be included in the
show and also what must be included.
Negotiated:
A negotiated brief is when the employer and employee work
closely together to create a brief that they are both happy with and agree that
the aims and objectives are fair and feasible. They are most commonly used after there has been
an argument between the employers and the employees. For example when creating
the 2007 Spiderman 3 film, there was much controversy between the writers of
the script and the creators of the characters. A negotiated brief had to be
made so that both parties were happy.
Formal:
A formal contract is one where it would be organised and
outlined through a face to face meeting between both parties and the employer
would outline the requirements for the employee.
Informal:
An informal brief is when the employer emails you, phones you
or via any other informal means discusses with you the outlines and
requirements of the brief. For example meeting in an informal environment like
a bar or a coffee shop to sit and talk through the plans and the aims of the
project.
Commission:
Commission is when an employer hires a specific person or
company to carry out the project. They will then be handed a brief to be
carried out much like the contractual brief.
Tender:
A tender is a brief sent to many different companies or
people to then hear their responses regarding the project then choosing the
most appropriate idea. They can be sent to companies via post, email, placed
online or even advertised in newspapers.
Competition
A competition brief is one where a company advertise for
anyone to create a product. The brief is outlined in the competitions rules and
objectives. The best entry would be chosen by the company and a prize is
usually given out to the winner. The E4 esting brief we were given was a
competition that anyone could enter from the E4 website. The brief was to
create a 10 second ident to be played in between content. The winner would have
their esting aired on television. http://www.e4.com/estings/
Reading a brief
Above in the link is the brief that we were given, partly by
our teacher the other half by E4. The main and most important part was the
brief advertised by E4. This brief was rather vague to help bring out a variety
of creative ideas and styles, though at the same time it did have some
objectives that were required to meet if you were to stand a chance at winning
the prize of having your Esting used on air. These objectives were very
straight forward; the esting could be no longer than 10 seconds long, you’re
advised to research the channels target audience to allow your Esting to be
suitable and appeal to that audience and the final was that you could not
submit more than 3 Estings a year. This was a very relaxed way of delivering a
brief and I think that this is to encourage everyone to have a go and not be
put off by a heavy worded brief with complex and detailed requirements.
Though these seemed small details they were all important
factors to take into account, the time limit was important due to the fact that
a televisions time schedule must be specific and running on time, specifying
the time limit means that all entries are the same length and will not
interrupt the schedule. It needs to be suitable for the channels audience so
that it fits in with the rest of the content on the channel, it won’t look out
of place and it will appeal to the audience more making their viewing
experience more enjoyable. They restrict the amount of entries that you can
submit to make sure that the is a wider variety of entries and to give more
people a better chance at their work standing out, they stress that they would
prefer “one totally awesome entry than three that are so-so”, meaning that they
would rather quality over quantity, to encourage people to create a better
quality product. Obviously the deadline is to stop entries coming in after they
have made their decisions and to prevent receiving too many entries.
The section of the brief set by our tutor, had elements of
both a contractual brief and a negotiated brief, for example the creation of
our animations and themes were our own choices, whereas the time restraints
were decided at the start and we had to stick to them. This brief was also
important and was used to ensure we met the grading criteria of our course.
Negotiating the brief
At the beginning, there were very few moments in which I had
to negotiate with my client. However as the process continued there was one
point in the esting that was needed to be amended, and that was the movement of
the characters face. It was brought up that in the original version of the
animation that the movements of the mouth were unclear; my client said that I
had to correct this to achieve the requirements of the brief, something I
quickly amended. The brief over all was a bit vague in the content and what
happened within the esting, which did allow creativity to flow. Other parts
were stricter, for example the medium and style were restricted in our brief,
stating that it had to be an animation and deadlines that had to be kept were
all strict factors in this brief with no room for negotiation. There were other
factors to consider when devising the animation for example, legal and ethical
issues that might arise, there for I had to ensure that I used no copyrighted
material within my work and also be causes that none of my content could offend
anyone.
I researched the legal and ethical issues on the Ofcom and
Channel 4 websites :
My feedback for my Esting was mostly very positive and the
majority of people asked enjoyed the animation and thought that was fitting
with the brief. However, as previously mentioned, there were a few amendments
in which I had to make, the previously mentioned facial motion of the character
and the other correction was that of the sound, in places in cut out and had no
sound. I soon amended these issues by re editing the audio for the video; after
which both the client and others that were asked were happy with the overall
end result.
Opportunities
In this unit I learnt a lot about animation, I learnt the
history behind it and the different filmmakers that contributed to the style of
film and television. I learnt the different methods of animation, like the
frame rate in which an animation is shot and tried out some of these methods
for myself, as well as the different styles, the two most enjoyable for me being
stop motion and Claymation. Learning about these methods was a lot of fun and I
am very pleased with the word I produced for both. My end project was using
Claymation and I feel that, though it was testing at times I found the end
result to be very rewarding and I am pleased with my Esting.
I learnt that I am capable of creating an animation and have
the creative abilities to put it all together. Through this unit I also learnt
how to uses new editing software and I am now comfortable and capable when using
it. I feel that now over all I can work to a brief comfortably and efficiently
and produce work in keeping with my objectives set out in the brief.
I hope to carry all these newly learnt skills into the future
and to hopefully explore animation further and keep it as a hobby at home to
post videos on YouTube, however I do really enjoy animation so a career in that
side of filmmaking is possibly something I would consider.
I feel that I extended my creative abilities when creating my
characters and set, and was surprised at my abilities to do so in an efficient
way.
Overall, I think I kept to the brief well and contributed well
with multiskilling when keeping to a budget and working to a deadline as well
as creating my own conceptual ideas and bringing them to life, with the end
result of an animation that I am pleased with; I feel that it fits in well with
previous E4 Estings, having a funny and quirky idea that is suitable for the
target audience; this is backed up by my findings when others gave me feedback
on my animation.
