Planning Stage - Character Profiles

Character Profiles (Representation)


Female protagonist character –

This is the main character in our narrative that experiences a change in persona as the narrative progresses. She will be shown as a stereotypical female character who is portrayed as vulnerable at the beginning of the narrative, but as the plot develops she will become more dominant and reverse the roles of dominant ideology.

We will encode this female character within the text as a character who challenges dominant ideology in terms of gender, in order to make our audience active, as it is not a text that is a pastiche of a typical dance genre, music video. We will represent this female character and the characterisation of the character through semiotics and technical codes. She will be framed using high angle shots at the beginning, whilst wearing ordinary, non-glamorous clothing, representing her as a vulnerable, innocent character, whom the audience will pity and empathise in.

However, as the narrative develops, this character’s change will be represented through costume, iconography and camera shots. Her occupation as a DJ will give her a new lease for life, which in turn changes her costume to a more stereotypically passionate and powerful type and changes her general demeanour to a more positive one.

Youth will be represented stereotypically throughout the start of the narrative, as this female character will reinforce the dominant ideology that teenagers are vulnerable and pity themselves. However, as the change occurs in the female character, it challenges representation of youth, as she now possesses self-confidence and strength.

A feminist view of this character after she experiences a change could include Laura Mulvey’s theory that the female body is displayed for the male gaze in order to create voyeurism for a male audience. However, as this female character becomes dominant, this will also engage a female audience, as it is not conventional and challenges what the female gender see as societies gender norms.


Male character –

This is the main male character in our narrative. He is classed as a stereotypical ‘action/hero’ male character who is portrayed as dominant from the beginning of the text, but in a negative manner. His attempts to bully and undermine the female protagonist reinforce gender dominance, but as his actions are unethical his relationship with the audience will be a negative one. However, this ‘powerful’ male character will experience a downfall in dominance, as he will see the female character succeed in her occupation of DJing, which makes him turn away and leave the setting, with a facial expression suggesting defeat.

We will encode this male character in an attempt to conform to dominant ideology when speaking of gender. His rash thinking and actions throughout the narrative reinforce the male stereotype. He will dominate the frame when he is shown as the ‘bully’ but as gender dominance roles reverse he will be captured in low angle point of view shots that express his sudden lack of dominance in comparison to the female character.

This male character will stand in the crowd and will show clear signs of envy towards the female character. This character will wear black clothing to reinforce his dominance as a male character, and will be a stereotypical ‘cocky’ character. Youth will be represented for this male character as stereotypical, as he is shown as having lack of intelligence due to his bullying of the female character. But his targeting of the female character and his confrontational behaviour stereotypically allow him to gain friends of the same type, who laugh at his ‘achievements’ and destroy the confidence of the female character.

Planning Stage 1

Pyschographic Questionnaire Summary

Using the Values, Attitudes and Lifestyles audience theory, along with the LifeMatrix theory, we could identify who are target audience were in more detail.

• We found that the majority are driven by money, suggesting our audience are fulfillers and strivers in life.
  
  
• They all Show interest in designer clothes showing our audience could also be aspirers.
  
  
• They don't do charity work, suggesting they are the opposite of Young and Rubicam's audience type: 'reformers', as they do not define themselves by their self-fulfillment.
  
  
• Many of the results we got suggested that their usual hobbies are socialisation and sport, showing an aspect of the typical 'mainstreamer' within our audience.
  
  
• They also feel they live fulfilling life to an extent; which also illustrates that they are fulfillers.
  
  
• All feel they are successful to a certain extent; portraying that they are experiencers, who have experienced success through showing success in work and activities and can deal with different situations which allow them to be successful. They may also be classed as Believers, as they attempt to succeed in life personally.
  
  
• They all strive to do well in life, which therefore suggests they are stivers in life, according to the Values, Attitudes and Lifestyle audience theory.
  
  
• There is a general mass audience of mixed classes with the majority belonging to the working and middle classes.
  
  
• Our audience occasionally watch the news but not on a regular basis, showing that our target audience are the opposite of actualisers, and do not take life too seriously.
  
  
• Our audience are all classed as sociable; suggesting that they are experiencers and makers, according to the VAL audience theory.
  
  
• All of our audience consume alcohol on a regular basis, illustrating that they fit well into the 'Fun/Antics' LifeMatrix audience theory types.
  
  
• Provocative dress code was the leading chosen preferred dress code for a night out; showing that they are Makers, as well as fitting into the stereotypical view of dress code that the dance genre depicts.

Pyschographic Questionnaire

1. Do you think you are driven by money?
Yes___ No___

2. Are you interested in designer clothes?
Yes___ No___ Sometimes___

3. What do you do in your spare time?
____________________________________________________________

4. Do you do any charity work?
Yes___ No___

5. Would you say you live a fulfilling life?
Definitely__ Maybe__ No__

6. Would you class yourself as successful?
Yes__ No__ Maybe__

If yes Why?
_____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________

7. Do you strive to do well in life?
Yes___ Sometimes___ No___

8. What class do you consider yourself to be?
Upper ___ Middle___ Working___ Lower___ Other___

9. Do you watch the news?
Yes___ No___ Sometimes___

10. Are you a social person?
Yes__ No__ Sometimes___

11. Do you consume alcohol on a regular basis?
Always___ Occasionally___ Sometimes___ Never___

12. What is your preferred dress code on a night out?
Casual___ Smart___ Provocative___ Comfort___ Other___ N/A___

Questionnaire Summary

From this questionnaire we will be able to tell who our target demographic is and what attracts them to buying dance music.

• We found that mainly females who are aged 16 to 24 tend to listen and buy dance music, possibly because they can easily relate to the music when they goout to nightclubs etc.
  
  
• The target audience tend to listen to the dance music on the television on channels such as MTV dance but also listen to there music on there ipod which they have downloaded from the internet.
  
  
• Many of the people surveyed said they find out and hear upcoming music via the television and the internet, showing this is the main way of distributing our dance music video.
  
  
• The results showed that the audience expect to see the stock settings of nightclubs and bedrooms which relate to the genre of music and also the stock characters they expect to see are female dancers within the videos, possibly relating to the gender of the target audience.
  
  
• Many results showed that the expected colours within a dance video would be a dark blue/black background within colourful red, yellow and orange spotlights to highlight the artists and dancers.
  
• The target audience see a music video as just to entertain but if there was a narrative they would expect the narrative to be based around love and relationship problems, possibly with the use of Todorov's theory.
  
  
• They expect to see a female artist associated with the dance genre, along with being able to relate themselves to the dominant characters within the music video.
  
  
• The audience we are targeting feel that the album cover of a dance video is considerably important when buying an album and the album cover appeal to them in the way of attractive models, the gesture of the models and the layout of the album cover.
  
  
• When asking the audience of the questionnaire which album covers they are most likely to purchase Clubland 15, Clubland 17 and David Guetta came out on top.

• There reasons for choosing these album covers were because of the layout and model used. The ideology that the success to selling dance albums is to have a provocative woman placed on the cover, however the David Guetta challenges this as it a was very popular choice with the target audience because of its uniqueness and differentially.