Chapter 7 - Evaluation, Reflection, Authentication & Bibliography
Project Evaluation & Reflection
Authentication Document
Final Product
Chapter 5 - Pre-Production Planning & Production
Target Audience
Skills & Techniques
Pre-Production
Script
Text Message Correspondence Between Me & Damien Moore MP’s Campaign Manager “Adam Rawlinson”
Before writing my scrip out, I met Adam down in the parliamentary office to discuss next steps for the campaign video. We went through things such as the party visual identity documents which is a guide to show you what kind of text font to use and even down to the right colour it should be. There is also different types of logos and watermarks which relate heavily to the different situations.As you can also see below, we went through how to create a campaign video in a script format. I’ve ran campaigns before, but not on a scale which is political in any way shape or form. To make things easier for me, he bullet pointed down each section for example, 1. issue outline, 2. break down for residents, 3. who’s involved - who’s proposing this, 4. why do I oppose this and lastly 5. why does this impact the local elections. This gives us a good outline on how to set out the video for the way I write the script. Adam also given me some examples which he has written up before which would help me in the planning process for the campaign video.
I am only allowed to show you certain elements of text message, but I have shown you the most important parts which relate to this final major project.
Production
Chapter 4 - Problem Solving
Problem Solving
How is election spending regulated in the UK?
As I had to slightly change my idea due to candidate expenditure and electoral law, I’d like to take this opportunity to talk about how the election spending is regulated in the UK and try and relate it back for the educational purposes as it actually doesn’t matter if you say you’ll do it for free because it goes against the budget anyway as they ask you how much did it cost to create as they ask about anything related to the campaign.
Regulated spending can cover a wide range of things, such as party political broadcasts to campaign leaflets. There is also a wide variety of costs involved. There are some notable spends which are excluded but however the parties must count how many rallies they have done, but don’t need to include the actual cost of annual conferences. Candidates and non-party campaigns have to include money spent on staff in their returns, but the actual party does not.
Image from: Institute For Government
Limits only apply to party spending during the 365 days before the day you go the polling station and vote; this is known as the “regulated period”. Each party can spend around £54,010 for each constituency that they contest. For the people wondering a constituency is, the full name is a “Parliamentary Constituency” is a geographical area that is represented in the House of Commons by an elected Member of Parliament. There are 650 constituencies across Britain which also have the same amount of people in each area to fill the House of Commons.
At the next General Election they have reduced the amounts of seats represented in the Commons, so now there will be 632 seats and will be able to spend just over £34millon collectively. The limits were increased by rising them to 80% to account for inflation since they were instituted in 2000; they changed these in November 2023. Since 2010 the government had a statutory duty to either raise these limits in line with inflation once the a parliament has lasted two years or to make a statement explaining the reasons why it is not doing what they said they were going to do.
Previously political parties were able to spent under £19millon at previous contested elections under the old limits. For parties that are only contesting a small number of constituencies, there is some flexibility involved; for example each party is allowed to spent just over £1.4million in England, regardless of the number of seats they contest. This simply allowed “The Women’s Equality Party” to spend just over £100,000 at the 2019 General Election, but only standing three candidates; even though the constituency limit was only £30,000 per seat. Even the similar flexibility is applied to the limits in Scotland and Wales, but not in Northern Ireland.
Retrospectively spending restrictions apply, even in the case of a quick snappy general election. This also means that the regulated period has already began before the date of the election is announced. At the last general election the period has already began on the 12th December 2018; but the next elections this period would have already began.
Image from: Institute For Government
How much can candidates spend while parliament is still sitting?
Individual candidates do spent money at elections, There are two periods of restrictions for candidate spending. One is known as a “long campaign” and the other is a “short campaign”. Candidates during these two periods is in addition to the party spending, but doesn’t actually count towards the party spending limits. The long campaign refers to the final few months of a full-length parliament; this period only begins once parliament has sat for about 55 months. Sometimes when a general election has been called before the 55 month point, this would be there is no long campaign, this was the case in both 2017 and 2019. For the next general election before January 2025, the long campaign would be starting before 18th July 2024, that is if parliament has not been dissolved already.
A limit on the candidate expenditure is usually introduced at the beginning of the long campaign, but does increase proportionately for each additional month that parliament sits. The maximum limit could be calculated as a proportion but that is only if parliament sat for a full 60 month period. The maximum limit is fixed sum of £40,220 plus an allowance per registered voter. It is about 8 pence in a borough (town/city) and 12 pence in county council seat.
This is means that in the current climate, parliament only would last a full five years; until the 17th December 2024 and then candidates would have spent around £46,000 in a borough seat and about £49,000 in the county council seat before parliament is dissolved. These limits are quite high for by-elections, where they fix the price at £180,050; this applies to the candidate spending.
Weekly Progress Tracker
I will be writing a diary entry every week and I will talk about what I have done each week and how it is going to relate to my Final Major Project.
Week Commencing ...
Monday 18th March 2024:
On the first week of Final Major Project I focused writing up my proposal and action plan for the eight weeks ahead. I took the time to think about what I am going to create which is a campaign video for the local Southport Conservatives and I want to be able to do it for the local elections on the 2nd May. To reiterate from my proposal is that I want to gather all of priority candidates together to talk about about their plan and of course there pledges that are going to set for the community. I want to be able to bring in my special guest which is the local Member of Parliament for Southport Damien Moore.
There is candidate expenditure and Electoral Law rules behind bringing candidates and the MP into filming for a college project even though it is for educational purposes only, I will need to look into the cost implications with the party and see what the best decision is for the party and of course me as I am filming, planning and directing everything. In the problem solving section I have looked into Electoral Law and candidate expenditure as it will link heavily back to my project.
Monday 25th March 2024:
On the second week, I focused on smashing out Chapter Two which is context; Talked about my project background and how I related it back to my project, I also written up an about me section which includes my history in the spotlight and of course I put on my personal statement which sums up a lot in a few paragraphs. I also completed a research plan which looks into what I am going look into which is relating to my project. I will look into the history of political broadcasts and then I will analyse 3 videos with one being which a opposition video the controversy of WhatsApp group chats and even how political parties sensor what you put on the internet.
Monday 1st April to Monday 8th April 2024
The third and forth week, I went through the research process and typing up my findings in accordance to relating it back to my project proposal.
I have also been in talks about with the Southport Conservatives over getting the video approved and having permission to actually film. We had to chance the to discuss further steps on who was going to be filmed it and we decided it would hinder other peoples expenditure, so we have decided to do a campaign video on me as I am the selected Conservative Candidate in Kew Ward. As I came in really late to the political scene, we realised that it wouldn’t matter that we took a bit of money out of my pot. As candidate we are given about £1200.00 for our campaigns.
Monday 15th April to Monday 22nd April 2024
The sixth week I planned out my final major project by writing out a script which shows what I am going to say and gives me the information of any sort of shot types, angles and even movements. I also had to send the script off to the association and read through and approve such project as it is going to be a real one, so they had to read through and make sure there was no errors or any kind of problems with the script.
From planning and sending it off, it took them another week to approve it; so I can go ahead with the film making aspect and then editing it.
Monday 29th April 2024:
In the seventh week I focused on getting Chapter 4 done which is the problem solving section for the project. I am also writing up about the Electoral Law and candidate expenditure rules as that has slightly changed my plans from my original proposal, I have mentioned this above in my diary entry a few weeks ago.
I went out filming on the Wednesday to mainly experiment with the shot types and angles and of course if there is anything that needs changing from the planning elements of the script. I realised that the main problem I encountered was that the clip on microphones were not the right thing for the job for the campaign video. They seem to be sound really noisy and loud even if you moved the microphone more away from yourself. The shot types and angles I experimented with worked really well, I think if we used a “ “ lens it might also minimize the wide angle look and it also will help us frame the image a little bit better and get rid of all the bits which are not needed. I also used a tripod which helped us out massively and I think using the gimbal wasn’t very good either as I thought framing up and shooting was way better then walking around and doing walking shots.
Chapter 3 - Research
Inspiration
I’ve always had a huge interest in the local area and the history of it, Even right down to the rise and fall of Southport. This has what has got be interested in local politics and to get me more involved in it to help support the town as much as I can. I never intended to get into it as a career or to work my way up the ladder into Westminster politics. I have a keen interest in film making and website design and being able to incorporate this into my local politics especially with the experience I have with gained from campaigning when I was part of the Southport Town Deal for the state of the art Events Centre on the Promenade. I gained over 8,000 consultations alone from the public and school/college students. Being able to direct and create videos is what I am good at down to even knowing how to encourage the younger generation is what primarily what my job was as I know exactly how they think and what they want which is what would encourage them. It even comes down to being offered jobs in the Conservative Campaign Headquarters because their crying out for people to run campaigns in different constituencies in the country.
Identify requirements for your media project and discuss how your project would be different to comparable products and justify the need for it.
As I am standing in the next local elections in Kew Ward for Southport, something like an election campaign video would help out my campaign a lot and would boost up support. As this is a real election campaign video; I have external deadlines to meet, in other words my deadline has been moved forward so that I can create the video and have it approved by the association.
For this video I will be identifying issues/problems with the new Eastern Access Scheme which is being put across in Southport and in my area, the main requirements I would say for this video is to make a really compelling and persuasive argument which puts across to residents that something like this would increase congestion, increased level in pollution, cause more side roads to become rat runs and damage the local independent businesses who are running in front of these schemes.
This project would be different in so far as that I am highlighting an issue which doesn’t seem to be talking about by anyone and I feel like people are dismissing such scheme out of hand thinking it won’t happen even when it probably will happen.
Refer to industry examples throughout your portfolio. Comparing and contrasting a range of work to similar type of products / industry examples.
With it being a Conservative Party Local Election Campaign video featuring me representing Kew Ward in Southport, I will need to be able to keep everything brand driven based on party image etc. Comparing with industry examples from my portfolio, I will be looking back at my existing clothing campaign video to see if I can add a little bit of artistic creation to this campaign video as I feel like it will give off that a lot of thought has gone into creating it. Comparing with other existing videos I have analysed and placed below in the research finds, The Pier campaign update video; I think that the concept and script worked well, but the way the video were shot in terms of colour contrast was poorly made and I don’t think it was properly filmed on anything other then a mobile phone. It gives off the illusion that the video was green screened when it wasn’t. I want to be able to create something using my Panasonic GH5 so that everything comes out in the best possible colour grade and nothing looks really peachy and blurry, paired with the gimbal so that the movement shots are really smooth and works well with the campaign video. It’s alright having a good compelling argument but without an enticing video, this will deter people away.
Different Media Products
Opposition Campaigns Which Aren’t Governed by Anyone
Led By Donkeys is prime example of an opposition campaign where they were established in 2018 as an Anti-Brexit organisation, but also criticised the actions of the Conservative Government. The original campaign consisted of past tweets from pro-Brexit politicians and quoted them in there’re own tweets. They started off as a guerrilla campaign which in other words mean independent and not controlled by any media outlet or political party; they plastered over existing adverts and then expanding into a crowdfunded campaign that actually legitimately purchased hundreds of billboards across Britain. They later started projecting messages on buildings such as the Houses of Parliament and even the White Cliffs of Dover. They even went as far as drawing messages on beaches and fields. They won an award for The Best Social Media Campaign in 2019 at the Social Purpose Awards.
Campaigns’ Led By Donkeys
The main and biggest campaign which was Led By Donkeys was to hold the Brexiteers to account and which is still ongoing and their strategy is to research into the achieves of other pro-Brexit politicians and displayed them for public show and which seems to be at the odds with reality when displayed in 2019. Over 300 billboards started to be displayed in areas of pro-Brexit areas and it was established to reached about 30 million people.
There was a few billboards that has some tweaked in late 2019 which featured Jacob Rees-Mogg’s 2011 statement in the Commons that it made sense to have a second referendum and of course this billboard was really dishonest because he actually wasn’t on twitter yet and he said this was based on different circumstances. From then on, they added footnotes to their billboards rather then a statement from somebody else’s Twitter. In that case Jacob never never tweeted anything, he said his speech in the House of Commons. They have collaborated with a music artist called Coldwar Steve with a more detailed billboard shown at the headlining show Glastonbury in 2019.
One of the most famous campaigns the European Union was considering extending the deadline of Brexit from the 29th March 2019, Led By Donkeys used a giant projector to display a video on the White Cliffs of Dover; which displayed a message of asking the EU leaders for much more time to deicide as they think there should have been a second referendum. The video footage actually showed an SOS sign with the O made up of yellow starts; to replicate the EU flag. The leader of the EU at the time Guy Verhofstaf endorsed this by tweeting out that it was “quite something to see the White Cliffs of Dover turn blue”. They also projected messages onto Buckingham Palace asking if the former Prime Minister Boris Johnson is a criminal after they thought he unlawfully suspended Parliament.
The point I am trying to make here is that as it is a democracy, you are able to say what you like without being governed by somebody else and as this is an independent organisation, where as other political parties sensor what you say and it is a lot more controlled and governed. This campaign group are not governed by anyone and can say what they like without fear of being censored or the modern term of Cancel Culture.
Controversy of WhatsApp Group Chats
I am going to start off with the famous British controversy story over Boris Johnson and his WhatsApp group chat called “Number 10 Action Group” Corresponding from what The Guardian Newspaper said about this and rewording it the best I can.
The former boss of the GCHQ has asked for the end of handling sensitive and important decision making over WhatsApp. Sir David Omand, who ran the UK intelligence service has expressed his concern of the way the Government handled the pandemic and said they didn’t handle it with the proper process. He spoken by giving in evidence at the parliamentary inquiry as they are heading into General Election year. “The complexities and nuances of any decent strategic analysis; cannot be conveyed in a WhatsApp exchange”
These kind of interventions are supposed to put pressure on the government to make sure that decision making is properly written down and recorded for the future, as all this seem to be strengthening the demands for Labour as they are leading the polls.
Omand has also said that the evidence he has gathered shows that Ministers and officials often engaged in Gossip and informal exchanges as they gather cabinet meetings, by which he believes that has “helped let off steam when pressure has built up”. He also said that “It is understandable that WhatsApp messages might fulfil a comparable function during lockdowns that limit much face-to-face contact”
This leads me back to when Boris Johnson used WhatsApp group chats to discuss decision making and critical national importance in the pandemic. The extend it went was when there was tens of thousands of messages to and from the former health secretary as well messages to do with the Covid inquiry. A message from Johnsons former chief advisor Dominic Cummings has said that the Prime Minister was “careering around on WhatsApp as usual creating chaos and undermining everybody”.
As from reading and writing this out here, You can see the scrutiny over WhatsApp messages and group chats because it seems there’re all having these conversations without thinking about the consequences which are coming with them. High profile people who are using these platforms for sensitive decision making seems really wrong and also when it comes to holding them to account over these matters it works well because they think that this data is end to end encrypted when it actually isn’t, it is protected in the middle not when it finally reaches the receiver.
Activities, Strategies & Questions
I created a Google Forums survey which received a total of 6 responses. I asked questions based on my research which was on political broadcasts and controversy over decision making over WhatsApp group chats. The responses were very mixed between each question and looking at the statistics 80% out of 20% said that political broadcasts haven’t influenced any decisions and 60% out of 40% said that there isn’t massive controversy over decision making for WhatsApp group chats. A lot of people also thought that it was down to the type of person who wins landslide victories in elections because they think it if the person is well liked then they will win irrelevant of anything else. With this being sent around to class friends generally and this demographic is between 18 - 20 year olds, they have said they haven’t actually watched any sort of campaign videos, but if they have done they think some are actually quite well produced.
Research Findings
The History of The Political Broadcasting
With my final major project being a local election campaign video, what relates heavily to this is party/political broadcasts.
The first broadcast was aired by the BBC for the 1924 General Election Campaign with the three main leaders. Stanley Baldwin of the Conservative Party, Herbert Asquith of the Liberal Party and Ramsey MacDonald of the Labour Party. They made a public speech to the public which lasted twenty minutes. By 1947 they had to regulate the number of slots for broadcasting, The BBC created a committee which comprised representatives from the three main parties to help establish a regulation system.
Following the rise of television broadcasting, for the 1951 General Election Campaign, the first televised one was made by the Liberal Party’s representative Lord Viscount Samuel. At the time this television broadcast was seen as farse because it was seen as he was reading from a prepared script like if he was on the radio. On the same evening, the Conservatives produced a more professional broadcast with Anthony Eden who was interviewed by Leslie Mitchel who was a pre-war television veteran. On the same evening the Labour Party’s broadcast followed the same rhythm with the interviews where Christopher Mayhew asked Sir Hartley Shawcross “Why a man so well educated, well off as he should support the Labour Party”. Back in the 50s, fifteen minutes for each broadcast was very normal. Presumably would get boring afterwards if it was longer and due to the fact of slot allocation for political broadcasts.
The first televised political broadcast was on the 15th October 1951 by Viscount Samuel.
A new type of political broadcasting started in the 1970s were advertising started featuring with more formal public addresses. Producers and Directors from Hollywood offered and showed their support to help their favoured party and at the same time the involvement of celebrities were support was taken out by all the main parties as I would presume it got really controversial. Today - A lot of broadcasts featuring political parties are now usually lasting around 5 minutes; some are even around 2 minutes. Apart from party political broadcasts which usually take place around when a General Election happens, these usually happen on a seasonal basis i.e. autumn, Party conferences usually happen around winter or spring.
What Makes a Video Campaign Successful?
In the world of campaign videos, it is a powerful marketing tool which can be used to capture attention, create emotion and motivate action. Video is one unique way because you are incorporating sound and motion together and can be much more productive way in the terms of gathering an audiences attention. This is included with the increased level of engagement, there is a handful of things which should take place in order for a campaign video to be seen successful.
Having a content strategy is the main part because the video needs to be able to stand out with companies or people needing to invest any sort of time into what they want their video to say or show before they start to create it. Not even making an attempt to create such video shows a lack of promotion that will not catch anyone’s attention as it was intended. This is where the content strategy comes into the video as it will end up helping us pick out the main message and the story which is being told so it fits with the brand’s aim and budget.
Another way which helps with a campaign video being really successful is that knowing who you are targeting with the promotional efforts. You should not assume one type of person will respond well to it, having different demographics may react differently is based on several different things such as age, gender, culture etc. It is also a good thing to understand what people expect out of campaign videos from different groups so that you can create a video meeting those criteria’s. This could become really difficult if you start looking at smaller audiences; such as people who engage with a specific YouTube channel. It is also very important understand probably from the beginning that not everyone is going to respond positively, but it is the matter of finding the right people who are using these strategies above to engage them.
It is also very easy to get overwhelmed by every kind of possibility that a campaign video can bring. Firstly you need to set realistic goals, which then need to be broken down into bite size chunks to secure success. These also should align with the goals set for any ongoing campaign video if there is any. After these have been rectified for each stage, then this should move on from the planning and to start creating content for the promotional efforts.
Analyse x3 Campaign Videos
Southport Pier Campaign Update W/ Damien Moore MP
Adobe Stock Graphic - The Beginning
To start with from the right beginning, this campaign video starts off with a a graphic at the start of the video which gets people enticed and interested in to see the latest progress of Save the Pier campaign. It looks as if they have used Adobe Stock to create the intro graphic. The text which is being used for Damien’s name is in bold letters with a border around it and then at the top the border breaks off with the lettering which says “Member of Parliament for Southport” which shows it is an update from the local MP, this text is set to the bottom left. To title the campaign video, in the top it still uses bold letters to make it really easy to read; with Southport Pier being blue which contrasts well with the graphic behind and then Campaign Update is in white. Another artistic creation which is basically part of the graphic, all the text flickers and transitions with the audio used and then transitions into the actual video.
Video Footage - The Middle
The video footage which is used is very generic, the shot type which is being used is a mid shot as it is only showing from the waist up, the shot angle used is a mixture between eye level and over the shoulder because it is showing the subject as if the any other person would have a conversation with that person and also it is slightly elevated above the subject so you can see the Pier which is leading off into the distance which is showing leading of lines; the camera movement is stationary. There are bold captions being displayed on the bottom which are really easy to read and are set in line with when the subject is talking. The aspect ratio which is being used is a 1:1 which is a square mainly because this is a targeted advert for Facebook and Instagram.
The Drone Shot - The Ending
For the last scene of the video uses a wide shot with a birds eye view shot paired with a panning camera movement to capture the Pier and the landscape surrounding it. As the camera pans around, a blue see through square is put in the centre of the screen which white bold text has been placed in the centre of it; the text changes three times as the camera pans around from “Save Our Pier” - “Sign Our Petition” - “Join The Campaign”. Lastly, their is an imprint on the infographic which you have to compulsory put somewhere in the video to show who actually promotes and runs the social media pages etc. So for this, it uses simple white bold lettering which says “Promoted By: Thomas de Freitas on behalf of Damien Moore MP” etc.
I think the colour grading of the footage itself was really poor and it creates the illusion that the video was filmed on a green screen, when really it wasn’t; it makes things look really peachy and blurry.
Boris Johnson’s 12 Questions General Election Advert
To start with the the video fades in to a blurred camera and as the subject walks out of the door and the video becomes unblurred. As the video plays we can see the shot type which is being used is a medium shot type with the camera angle being at eye level and the camera movement is called a follow. This shot list stays constant through out and hardly changes. The context behind this advert was to create something which was funny and witty as this seemed to fit with the subject’s personality, creating something like this twelve questions was to try and entice viewer into see what he does in his daily life, favourite bands and among other things questions about why he should be the next Prime Minister; There is no captions through out the video showing you the questions, all the questions are being asked by the cameraman himself. To create videos like this is supposed to show a different side and make people believe that he is not what people thought he was; all this is down to a funny personality and it worked well hence why he won a landslide majority. At the same time as he is walking through his office building, their is small little posters on the wall dotted around the office which were manifesto promises, they were trying to keep you on your toes as the subject spoken so that you looked and listened. The most artistic thing I can see which was created was at the end of the video was where the video blurred and then the famous words came up which said Get Brexit Done - Unleash Britain’s Potential and then the background changed to white with the colour changes on the for the slogan.
Opposition Campaign Video
Led By Donkeys - A Historic Failure
After watching this video irrelevant of the politics behind it, we can see from the get go that this video has been produced in such a high quality compared to the Conservative Party videos I have analysed before. What also makes the production value also 10x better is that they managed to record the projection onto the building and then overlay the crystal clear sound over the top and even kept a little bit of background noise in for bit of ambient noise.
To start with the background of this video is a protest against Liz Truss and her leadership of the country. Led By Donkeys are exposing Truss and her friends for the way they have ran the country and they believe that the country was ran from Tufton Street in London rather then 10 Downing Street. As the video plays out you can see that they have three activists who are propping up a ladder against the office building and then one person is climbing up the ladder with the sign while two other people are holding it. They are putting a sign up which says “55 Tufton Street - The UK economy was crashed here - 23rd September 2022 - mini budget day” As I can see from the footage it was recorded using a good DSLR video camera and the footage is pretty raw meaning it wasn’t edited. There was a few position changes and angles but like I said pretty raw, not edited. An artistic decision which I would say which was made by the makers was to have the aspect ratio being 1:1 and I think the reason why it was done like this because it was specifically designed for mobile phone viewing. They would of posted this on for example social media sites such as Facebook or Tik Tok to name a few.
Later on in the video, they took us back to earlier in the night we’re they were dragging a few carts along the road back roads of London full of presumably a projector and a white background to Tufton Street which is where they projected a video outside of the office building exposing all kinds of people who they think were under Liz Truss’s wing when she was in office. To start with used a simple slightly slanted easy to read font type which read “A little earlier…” which enticed the viewer in to see what happened the night before they stuck up a banner on the building. They used a medium shot and followed the subjects and then it moves onto a wide angle shot of them dragging the carts along the back streets. The text overlapped onto two of those footages.
After that section the video shows them move onto setting up the peaceful protest and the a narration starts and starts talking about how “This is 55 Tufton Street in London, you may have heard of it, you may not have, but this isn’t your average address” etc.
The protest moves onto talking about how Liz Truss teamed up with what they believe to been pushing a “Extreme economic ideology - Free market fundamentalism”, as they go on talking about all that, As this is a eight minute video I will dissect the projection as much as I can without talking about anything random which isn’t necessary.
They are using a lot of stock videos being used, for example a handshake, ice glaciers, a brick layer, birds eye view of London, stock market figures and even a hospital corridor. They also use a lot of footage from out of Downing Street showing the subject in question and many other government buildings. There is a close up shot of the projector. They also doing a overlays with text, “ideology = government policy”, and even changing the footage from colour to black and white. Another artistic decision which was made is they are putting subtitles underneath so people can read as they go along. Putting in bar graphs in the videos is showing the evidence they have gathered so prove and persuade the the audience. The one thing that has stuck out to be is as it seems to be a flagship thing of Led By Donkeys, they are also featuring tweets in the video footage and of course underlining them for quotes of what other people have said too.
As I have said on many occasions all this is an artistic creation/decision by the creator of the video and whoever creates it does put across a good argument and has a really good goal and the target audience is also shown to persuade their opposition their ideology then believing what other people say.
Viewing/Comments/Reaction Figures
As you can see above I have piled together all the viewing and feedback figures for each video I have analysed in depth.
To begun I am going to start off with Damien Moore’s Save Our Pier campaign figures, as this is a Facebook/Meta boosted advert this video hasn’t done very well. Since the 12th January when it was posted, it has only gained 12k views in 3 months which doesn’t strike me as successful. Neither when you look at the 32 shares it has shows how badly performing the video is. I think this is mainly down to how poor quality it was made and it didn’t seem to entice people in very well; Recorded on an iPhone, what do you expect? This video also has 69 likes and 5 laughing reactions, this also shows how under performed it is and of course how little people seem to be interested in it. The kickback in the comments has been shown because it has more comments then reactions, which again shows people want to comment more about it then like or share it. I think this is mainly down to what party he represents and because of who he is.
Moving onto Boris Johnson’s campaign video, for a start the video has done miles better then his former colleague Damien Moore has done with it gaining 451k views; I think this is mainly down to who the subject was in the video and at the time how popular the guy was before he eventually got kicked out of office. When I analysed this video originally I did say that everything to do with this video was very generic and nothing really special as it was the cameraman being the narrator and of course asking him questions. On this video the like and dislike ratio has been switched off so I can’t actually tell how tell it really did based on that and it did receive 1.7k comments and mainly from what I read from it; they quoted him on the kind things he said and then took the micky out of it for saying it. The comments only go back about 3 years, so you can really see how well it aged from that perspective.
Lastly we are moving onto the opposition video Led By Donkeys which talks about how Liz Truss and her friends ran the country from 55 Tufton Street in London for a short while. In my opinion this video was produced in such a higher quality then the two other counterparts which by the way were really dreadful to watch and listen to, it is something I think that the Conservative Party haven’t understood yet is the usefulness of social media and how things need to be produced at such a high quality otherwise people keep on scrolling. I don’t think it’s necessarily down to peoples attention span, I think if people see garbage they keep scrolling and that’s the mentality and I agree with them.
Now then, as this video has been out for about a year it has gained about 128k views and to be fair they are only a small organisation pushing for their voices to be heard and if I am contrasting this back with Damien Moore’s video with 12k and he is “supposed” to be a well-respected government official and to carry round lots of clout then this shows how unsuccessful his video was compared to Led By Donkeys who produced a higher quality film with a lot less following and still gained more views then Moore. I would also like to touch on how many likes they received as this is a very good indicator to how well the video did in retrospect, it got 6.5k likes and this also shows that again for a small campaigning organisation, they are actually reaching to a wider audience on wider scale. Only having 644 comments in total seems very small but when you have a quick cycle through, you can see many are really positive and I think this mainly down to how many people are viewing it rather then it hitting a wider audience. Slowly it is, but for such videos to take off you need to put the money behind it and I am not sure if they are a non funded organisation or not and if they aren’t then they are doing really well with allocating resources in the right places and pushing hard to have their voice heard.
What strategies did you use to analyse your data?
What did you find out?
What did you learn from your research and how it informed your project?
To reiterate from what I said before that I think the production value of the campaign videos that I have seen were very poor. For example the colour contrast which was used in the Pier campaign update, was dreadful; things looked really peachy and even mention it all out of focus. So I think I can do a better job combining a good script with brilliant production quality. I’m sure we can do better then a mobile phone recording; I also think the market is also lacking in a good quality campaign video as it only seems that small organisations like Led By Donkeys are actually creating good quality campaign videos. If I use the gimbal in my campaign video, I want to be able to create nice smooth moving shots and I think being able to do that might entice the viewer into watching the video and investing their time into watching the video.
Did the research support your idea, or did you have to change your idea because of your research?
Give specific examples to support this question.
In so far as the ideas and scripting behind other practitioners campaign video, I think there is nothing wrong with that side of things; But what I do think is that the production quality could be drastically improved because when I analysed the two Conservative videos above, I felt as if things were not in focus or too peachy and not very visually appealing. What I am trying to say is I think that having a very enticing video paired with a good script which is very compelling, I think that will go along way as people will deicide to view such video because it is enticing people in. An opposition campaign group like Led By Donkeys prove this very well with pairing a good quality video and a good enticing video.
How have similar media products influenced and shaped your research ideas?
As this will be a real campaign video, this will be going out on Facebook advertising and will be helping towards my local election campaign video. Using such medium for this video will help it get out to people across Southport and Kew Ward. This has shaped my research ideas because helping it get out their and to be viewed by a few thousand is the key to success in this case.
Chapter 2 - Context
Project Background
What is it that makes me do my project?
To reiterate From My Proposal: The concept might change through out the whole Final Major Project, but I am going to create a campaign video for the local elections in the 2nd May for the Southport Conservatives. I will be filming each candidate from each ward with some local residents queries and concerns and what the candidates plans are going to be for each ward. I will also be bringing up on-going campaigns; for example, Save the Pier campaign and reinstating the Children’s A&E at Southport Hospital.
The main reason why I am doing a campaign video is because I feel as if their is a gap in the local political scene for this sort of thing, So I think creating something like this would be an election boost for the candidates and would be something different that nobody has seen before on a local scale. With the new real life deadline set for before the 2nd May 2024, and of course the permissions granted from the local association I am very certain I can produce something compelling and persuasive video for the locals of Southport who want to see change.
A disclaimer, my project proposal might change due to candidate expenditure and electoral law. I will be looking into all of the possibilities and if things change I will be writing it all done in Chapter 6 of Problem Solving.
What are your first hand experiences that influence your choices (idea for the project, my role in the project, how it relates to my future career)
My role in the project will be the director, meaning I will be coming up with the plans for the project, I will also be filming the project too. For me it has always been hard to answer the question of how it is going to relate to my future career because at this stage I don’t know; All I can say is that I am going to University in September because I want to further my education as much as I can and the end goal is a degree in my chosen field which will be Film Making & Television Production. As of currently I am being offered jobs at the Conservative Campaign Headquarters because of my campaigning and consultation process for the Southport Town Deal and that has shown volumes in how much feedback I got from that which was 8,000 responses. So you could say that creating this campaign video is opening doors into a future employment with CCHQ.
What do I Seek to achieve?
As this is going to be a real campaign video which the public of Southport is going to see, I want to be able to make a good compelling video which will get people talking and I want to see if I am able to persuade people to see if they would possibly vote for the Local Southport Conservatives at the next local elections on the 2nd May.
Who Am I
A Little Bit About My Me!
Hi My name is Owen. Born 22nd January 2005. I currently study Creative Media Production & Photography at Level 3 at Southport College.
I have achieved many things over the past few years or more. My Southport article that was published on Stand Up For Southport by Andrew Brown, reached many people across Southport and got recognition. I was named the role model for my generation to encourage young people to give ideas for the Southport Town Deal.
Southport teenager reveals his vision for the future of resort - Stand Up For Southport
The Member of Parliament for Southport - Damien Moore has congratulated me on success with a letter. I also got recognition for building Southport in a game called Minecraft.
I got a prime spot in a video funded by Sefton Council for Schools. I was encouraging school children of all ages to put forward ideas for the Town Deal. I was also asked to be included in another video funded by the council and it was called "Sandgrounders Help Launch The Town Deal". Same as the last video I was asked to showcase my build of Southport in Minecraft and inspire young people to submit ideas for the Southport Town Deal.
More then six months later I was approached by Andrew Brown again to interview me over my Minecraft build of Southport. He interviewed me and had it published in the Southport Visiter local newspaper and on Stand Up For Southport.
Personal Statement
From a young age I have always been into creating films and videos, this started off in high school when I got my first gaming computer with a capture card to record gameplay off an Xbox. Then, I would use Windows Movie Maker to drag and cut clips together to make a simple video which would gather probably about 40 to 50 views per video, at the time I thought that was amazing. This was where I first found my passion in the creative media process.
During my time in high school, I dipped my toe into many things but most notably local politics. At the age of 15, I wrote an article for Stand Up for Southport talking about what the town could spend the £25 million government grant on. This sparked huge debate in Sefton Council, Southport Town Deal, and the Southport BID. As a result, this put me front and centre of the Town Deal with some help from my Headmaster at Meols Cop High School. During this time, I had to utilise and develop my leadership skills in order to create change within my community.
To promote the Town Deal the Council funded a video to introduce the Town Deal and during the creation of the video; this made me fall back in love with video editing and filming. There was a video that was sent around local schools with me at the forefront encouraging younger people to submit ideas into the Town Deal. All the campaigning and promoting caused a landslide of ideas, and this also gave me the opportunity to influence the younger generations which was inspiring.
As a result of falling back in love with Creative Media, I enrolled on a course at Southport College to start studying whether it was photography or film making in 2021. My interests tailored towards film making and this became apparent when working on other projects. As I started to focus more on filmmaking, I’d always push myself to improve every time whether it was on the editing side using Premier Pro or using a dedicated DSLR video camera with a gimbal. I would also self-reflect on my work and talk about the mistakes and having good time management for hitting deadlines is very important as there will be many in the future and adapting to this early on is very vital and important to me.
I feel as though going to university would be massively beneficial decision for myself since realising that I could extend my educational career and I can develop as a person as well as my knowledge. I also want to learn a lot more things part of the film making world but on a bigger scale. There are many units I have enjoyed at college, but the one I mostly enjoyed was the TV Commercial Production where I photographed my car from different angles and then put it together in a moving image format using post-production lighting techniques.
Throughout the past couple of years whether it is at college studying Creative Media or local politics; the passion for each of these things have been high, the willingness to learn is always a key factor.
What Inspired me to do my Project?
I’ve always had a huge interest in the local area and the history of it, Even right down to the rise and fall of Southport. This has what has got be interested in local politics and to get me more involved in it to help support the town as much as I can. I never intended to get into it as a career or to work my way up the ladder into Westminster politics. I have a keen interest in film making and website design and being able to incorporate this into my local politics especially with the experience I have with gained from campaigning when I was part of the Southport Town Deal for the state of the art Events Centre on the Promenade. I gained over 8,000 consultations alone from the public and school/college students. Being able to direct and create videos is what I am good at down to even knowing how to encourage the younger generation is what primarily what my job was as I know exactly how they think and what they want which is what would encourage them. It even comes down to being offered jobs in the Conservative Campaign Headquarters because their crying out for people to run campaigns in different constituencies in the country.
My Portfolio:
Photography
Film Making
Interactive Website Development
My Research Plan
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FMP - RESEARCH PLAN (OUTLINE) |
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Interest/Topic/Theme |
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My theme for my Final Major Project
is going to be a campaign video for the Local Southport Conservatives for the
local elections in the 2nd May. As campaign videos is a too narrow
field to research into, I will be researching into the history of party-political
broadcasts and how this relates to how campaign videos are made. This will be
secondary research. I will also be writing up about Local and National
campaigns and the local campaign is really close to
my heart as it is Save Southport Pier campaign. |
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Why is it
important? |
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To reiterate from the project background
section of Chapter 2, I’ve always
had a huge interest in the local area and its history. Even right down to the
rise and fall of Southport. This is what has got my interest in local politics
and get more involved in it to help and support my town as much as I can. To
be able to incorporate my keen interest in filmography and local politics especially
with the experience I have gained from campaigning when I was part of the
Southport Town Deal. I gained over 8,000 consultations alone from the public
and college/school students. And for this to be as important as it is, this
is going to be the younger generations future and to be able to encourage
that will be what I really want to be able to do. |
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My research
question(s) |
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What am I trying to find out? I want to be able to engage and
persuade the audience with a good campaign video. With it being a real one
meaning it will be used for the existing campaign, the stakes are high
because it needs to be really good. |
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Research
Design (methodology) |
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Subject I am going to research
is party political broadcasts and examples of local and national campaigns.
Campaign videos generally specifically look at compelling and persuasive material
and of course I want to be able to link this with my interest with my keen
interest of filmography; meaning I will link this with producing good camera
angles and shot types in the process. Target audience – 18 – 65 years
old. Skills and techniques to be
used – practice and watching and analysing existing campaign videos. Production research – Looking into
how to produce a compelling and persuasive videos. |
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Literature
(Proposed Sources – Harvard Format) |
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/broadcastersliaisongroup/political-broadcast-history/ https://www.southportconservatives.org/campaigns/save-southport-pier |
Chapter 1 - Project Proposal, Action Plan & Timetable
Proposal
Level 3 Extended
Diploma in Creative Media Production & Photography
Unit
13 -
Project
Proposal
Proforma
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Centre
Name |
Southport College |
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Candidate Name |
Owen Phillips |
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Pathway |
UAL L3 Extended
Diploma in Creative Media Production (Film Making) |
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Project title |
Southport
Conservative Local Election Campaign Video |
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Section 1: Rationale (approx. 150 words) This section provides you with an
opportunity to reflect on, review and summarize your progress and
achievements through the first 12 units of the qualification. You should
outline the knowledge, skills and understanding you have acquired. What you
know now, and what it means to you, compared with what you knew and could do
before you started the course, and how this has influenced your choice of
discipline or disciplines and your project proposal. It also provides an
opportunity for you to explain your reasons for choosing a particular
discipline and to outline both your immediate and longer-term aspirations. |
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Over the past 3 years of being at
Southport College I have acquired so many different skills from learning how
to use a dedicated film camera with a gimbal to even teaching myself to learn
more in depth with the editing process. The skills I have shown from the past
5 units is perseverance like when I was doing my Television Production, I
showed that even when my initial plan didn’t go how I’d like it, I would
still go with what I’d got and still experiment with it even if it was
frustrating when I wasn’t getting it right. I also learnt how to get more
involved in the directing role, for example when I was doing my clothing
promotional video; I had to direct my model for the video and direct a pose
for the photography. Compared with what I knew back in 2021
when I started Level 2 and even right through to when I started Level 3 back
in 2022, my knowledge has exponentialized over the past 3 years, with all
that practice and experimenting I think I can safely say that whatever video
I desire to make I can do it combining all the knowledge that I have
acquired. After being in the Youth Board for the
Southport Town Deal helping instigate the Events Centre on the Promenade, I
have always been asked because of the passion and my intense feelings towards
Southport, why have I not helped campaign or stand in a local election and
the answer simply is I don’t know. But what does this mean to me? Well, if I
create a campaign video, I feel as if I am doing my part to help Southport and
I feel like I am doing the right thing even if nobody agrees and has a
different opinion to me about it. The next reason why I want to create a
Local Election Campaign video is that I want to be able to support the Town
as much as possible and be part of its future as I am 19 years old, on the
topic of age, the Southport Conservative Association champions young people
at its heart, I have experienced this first hand through the candidates
standing and of course the behind the scenes. |
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Section 2: Project concept (approx. 250 words) This section provides an
opportunity for you to clearly explain the concept and aims of your project,
production or performance and the research and ideas that will support its
development. What you anticipate producing, the levels and types of resources
that you will need and an indication of the form in which you will complete
and present your final realization within the allocated timescale. This might
include an indication of when and how you will use studios, equipment, and
other resources, how you will make use of tutorial and peer feedback and
where you will incorporate independent study. |
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The concept for the project might change
through the production stage; but to give you a rough idea, I will be filming
each Conservative candidate who is standing in each ward throughout Southport;
(Birkdale, Cambridge, Dukes, Kew, Meols &
Norwood) and then I will also film some local people talking about their concerns
and queries which they would want the candidates to do in their local area.
This video will also bring up some on-going campaigns such as “Save the Pier”
& “Reinstating the Child’s A&E at Southport Hospital.” There will be a special guest appearance
from the local Member of Parliament Damien Moore who will be bringing up
issues that he is campaigning for down in Westminster, (The reinstatement of
the Burscough Curves Rail Link) The is a huge gap in the local political
scene in Southport for doing this type of thing, So I think creating
something like this will be a big election boost and I think it will be
something different that nobody has seen before on a local scale. With the
allocated timescale and with permissions granted from the local association I
am very certain I can create a compelling and persuasive campaign video for
the locals of Southport who want massive change in the local area. On the topic of equipment, I will be
using my personal items which are the Panasonic GH5, the film making gimbal
and a tripod. I will be using a lot of my research to influence my own
practice and I will be taking in a lot of peer feedback and advice to help form
my campaign video. |
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Section 3: Reflective Practice (approx. 100 words) This section provides an
opportunity for you to explain how you will reflect on and evaluate your
work, as both an ongoing activity and at the conclusion of your project. You
should describe how you intend to record your decision-making and how you
will document changes to your ideas as your work progresses. The evaluation
should be referenced to your stated aims and be reflective and analytical
rather than a description of actions completed. |
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I will create a journal/diary everyday
based on what I am doing that day whether it is planning day, production or
editing. I will document my changes and any unforeseen activities which delay
and slow down production. As I will be relaying on the association for dates
and times up until the deadline; I will work closely with them to make sure
that we don’t leave anything out from the original proposal and if we do, I
will document this down as I am very aware of the deadline will be Fastly
approaching for this Final Major Project. |
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Project Action Plan & Timetable
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Project Action Plan and Timetable (FMP 2024) |
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Week |
Date week beginning |
Activity/what you intend to do -
including independent study |
Resources / what you will need
to do - including access to resources |
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1 |
18 March |
Introduction to THE FINAL PROJECT |
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2 |
25 March |
Final Proposal |
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01 April |
EASTER HOLIDAYS (Monday 1st April - Friday 12th April) |
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3 |
15 April |
Pre-Production
Planning |
Storyboard,
Script & Shot List. |
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4 |
22 April |
Production Filming |
Panasonic GH5 –
Gimbal – Planning Materials |
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5 |
29April |
Post-Production
Editing Ready For Local
Elections on 2nd May |
Premier Pro &
Adobe Stock |
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6 |
06 May |
Ironing up blog
work right up until the deadline. |
On the Computer
on Squarespace. |
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7 |
13 May |
Ironing up blog
work right up until the deadline. |
On the Computer
on Squarespace. |
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8 |
20 May |
Ironing up blog
work right up until the deadline. |
On the Computer
on Squarespace. |
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½ term week (x1 week) (Monday 27th May – Friday 31st
May) |
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09 |
03 June |
Ironing up blog
work right up until the deadline. |
On the Computer
on Squarespace. |
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10 |
10 June |
PREPARING OUTCOMES FOR THE END OF YEAR EXHIBITION HAND IN ALL WORK BY FRIDAY 12th JUNE 2024 |
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11 |
17June |
GRADING WEEK END OF YEAR EXHIBITION PRIVATE VIEW (TBC) |
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