coursework ideas

We came to the idea pretty quickly that we wanted to focus on drink driving. The reason for this is that we can relate to it straight away as we are just starting driving ourselves, therefore will be able to produce an advert in a way we know would have a massive impact on us. We are also part of the target audience age range, so believe we have a good chance at creating unique, high impact adverts.

After the group decided on this topic (drink driving) I began thinking of my individual idea, what could really grab the attention of the audience and have great impact on them leaving it in their minds even after the advert has finished. Therefore I came to the conclusion that there are not many adverts out there broadcasted often about living with the consequences of drink driving and so I wanted to target this area of fatal drink driving accidents. How could I do this.. I researched many drink driving adverts such as, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtJqw--DGl8, DOE drink driving advert. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsY_Co-p8Bw THINK! Drink driving advert, and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQtTREndJKk UK drink driving advert. Out of all the ones I viewed, personally I found that the ones involving children or the effects left on children have a much greater impact. I asked many students what they thought and the large majority agreed due to them being far more venerable, innocent and still have their whole lives ahead of them. This is how I came to the idea that the main focus of my advert will be that of a young girl, during school life and the effects her death has had on everyone around her and the man who killed her. (man because it is proven by statistics that male’s cause the majority of fatal car accidents, and also because a grown man is the complete opposite to a venerable small child.

There is an advert that is currently being broadcast that involves a man seeing the child he killed everywhere he turns, in his sleep, in the bathroom mirror, in the corner of his rooms etc. I think this advert has a massive impact on audiences as the repetition of seeing the child really makes you realise the hugeness of what this man now has to live with due to careless driving. Furthermore I want to add this type of repetition into my advert and have the camera constantly showing her in different situations such as school, class’s and with her friends. In addition she will fade from the end of each scene to give the audience the idea that she has passed away, and what is left behind now she has gone is devastating. Unlike this advert though I don’t want the man who killed her to appear until the very end, where you will then see his facial expression and it will suddenly hit you what has happened. The slow pace of the advert that I want to create will hopefully draw the audiences in so much that when that scene of the man suddenly appears it will create a massive impact.

Although it is proven that fast upbeat music will stimulate your brain and grab your attention quicker it will not fit with the mood of my advert. Therefore the non diagetic music I want to use will be a slow paced, non lyrical instrumental, something that adverts don’t often use and therefore will draw attention from that aspect. It will also cause the audience to feel the emotion that needs to be felt when viewing these types of scenes and will therefore interact better with the audience that an upbeat song would. A sudden break in music will add to this which is why I want to have a sudden cut in the instrumental where a crash scene will evolve and a loud crash and cry sound will be produced, which will hopefully have the power to shock the viewer.

It shows on various websites such as http://www.drinkdriving.org/drink_driving_information.php and http://www.drinkdrivingfacts.com/drinkdriving/drink_driving_facts.aspx, that statistically men ages 17-29 are the main causers of drink driving road incidents. Therefore we want to take this age range into consideration and aim our adverts at this age group but for both genders as fatal incidents are far too important to ignore. More than these two websites suggest this fact therefore it is reliable and the use of statistics makes it more believable and realistic and most importantly taken seriously.

 I then presented my idea to my group which went down very well and is one of the chosen two we are going to produce into a 30 second public service broadcast advert. Since the selection of my idea I have thought deeper into things such as camera angles and what will have the most effect, working well with the music and emotion I want to create. Therefore for each repetition scene I would like to begin with the camera in a close up on the main girl, slowly panning out in order to reveal her friends and their emotion. As it continues to pan out she will then begin to fade from the scene as the rest of the scenery is revealed. When I picture this with the slow saddened instrumental I believe it will really cause the audience to interact and feel so sorry for the girl and her friends and family who are now suffering the consequences. Then finally for the last scene where the drink driver is revealed, there is no longer any sound, just an image on a grieving guilty man. 

When considering where and when my advert would be broadcast, I questioned many people about which channels they watch the most. (asked 16-20 years of age people) and E4 and E4+1 followed closely by VIVA where the most frequently watched programmes. Therefore this channel slot would be most effective for my PBS as it is aimed at this demographic, furthermore it would be shown after 9 (watershed) as the scenes may be too stressfull and upsetting for younger viewers.