How are sound, camera and mise-en-scene used to effect in this scene from Hollyoaks?

The scene is taken place in the woods. In the opening shot is mid shot of Max and the camera is shaking which is like hand held shot which gives the feeling to the audience that he is walking. Then they show a long shot of the small bridge and the lake which shows a clear point of view shot. The colours used are really dull and washed out. As the character Max is holding his hand close to his chest and from his facial expressions the audience gets an idea that he is ill. The sound used in the shots is Diegetic sound. It includes the sound of the leaves moving when he is walking and also the sound of him breathing which again shows that he is ill and is feeling difficult to breathe. He is also wearing grey and black clothes.

As the camera tilts from the lake to Max’s face, they show a close up shot of his face calling Tom. The close up shot of his face shows the tension. When they show the lake and a mid shot of Max, they show the red jacket in the lack which makes everyone thinks that Tom has fallen into the water. The red colour represents danger.
When he jumps into the water the shots shows the scenes underneath the water which is again really dark. The incidental music adds more atmosphere to the action. The sound creates tension to the audience. At this point they have also diegetic sound of the water moving which makes is more realistic.

The second character in the scene is Claire. She is wearing a black long jacket and a purple top which indicates that she is cold and is also evil. When Max comes out of water and asks Claire that where he (Tom) is his sound shows that he is really struggling to breathe. Then they show a cut away and point of view shot of Tom safely sitting in the car and is hitting on the glass and calling for help. When Max is drowning in the water his face and lips turns into the same colour as her top which shows that there might be a link between them two.

They also show a high angle and low angle shot of Claire which shows her power. The close-up shot of Clare’s face shows her expressions and shows how evil she is and is giving a bad devilish smile when Max is drowning. This again shows her evilness as she is trying to kill him and she is standing there looking at him drowning. Another point which shows the power of Claire is when she actually succeeded in making Max believe that Tom is drowned in the water as she put Tom’s jacket in the lake which will make anyone think that he is drowned but that was actually her plan to kill Max.

Then they show another character who is OB who acts as a savior to Max who saves his life. He is wearing casual but very light clothes, which are blue and green. When he comes there, there is a point of view shot of Claire from the back when she is looking at Max drowning. Then they show a long shot of OB jumping into the water to save Max. They have again showed some shots underneath the water which will show the audience how he gets to Max and rescued him. There are some two shots when OB is trying to bring Max back to the ground. They have shown some high angle shots of Max an OB, when OB brings him to the ground and trying to bring back to his life. There is also a low angle shots which shows his power as the savior. The scene ends with an aerial shot of OB and Max in the woods.
The sound given at the end is very soft and represents the sadness.

How has the representation of youth has changed over time?

To compare the change in the representations of youth over time, I am going to compare the drama Skins with Blooming youth. Skins show the teenager’s life in the 2000s and the Blooming youth shows the teenager’s life in the 1970s. In the Blooming youth the main character is Jeffery who is a college student who is ambitious. He wants to get the first grade. Jeffery and his friends use good language most of the time. This character is a bit similar to the character Tony in the Skins. He is also a good guy who gets good marks and also well behaved. Both in the Skins and the Blooming youth one of the story lines is sex and virginity. They also talk about sex, smoke and drinks alcohol. In the both dramas they use slang. The settings used are the bedrooms. Jeffery shares a room with his friend. Their room is so messy. Everything is here and there. In the scenes of the bedroom we can see papers here and there in the ground, the unarranged bed etc. this shows that both Jeffery and his friend are muddled and unorganised. Whereas in Skins Tony has his own bedroom which is so clean, neat and tidy. His room even doesn’t look like it’s a teenage boy’s room. There are fewer posters in his room which is unlike from Jeffery’s. His clothes and bed are all well arranged and everything has its own place in his room. The main characters have a close relationship with music. Tony sings in a choir and Jeffery plays guitar. The characters Tony and Syd are similar to the characters Jeffery and his friend. As Tony tell things Syd to do and he does as he says in Blooming youth Jeffery orders to his friend and he does how he says. This shows that Tony and Jeffery have a leader role. One of the female roles in Blooming youth is Gerniea and Effie in Skins. Gerniea is a character who is silent, interested to learn things from her friend whereas Effie is a character who goes to wild night parties and comes back home in the morning. She wears really revealing dress i.e. a V neck top which shows her cleavage and a mini skirt. Gerniea wears a long sleeve red top which is not revealing and a skirt which is up to her knee length. She is not wearing any makeup, wears a blue hat and grey coat. Effie wears a lot of make up and when she came back home after the party her makeups were faded which shows that she had a long night.

Another drama which in am going to compare Skins with is 3 minute heroes, which is a drama from 1982. As the same as Skins and Blooming youths the teenagers in this drama also talk about sex and virginity. They try to attract girls. The characters have entirely different style of dressing and hairstyle from both the dramas in the Blooming youth and in skins, this shows the change in the dressing, hair and the life style of the teenagers over the years. In these 3 dramas there are 2 characters which they are mainly focusing on. In the 3 minute heroes the two main characters are Billy and his friend. They show the close relationship between the characters. One of the female characters in this drama is Debo who is similar to the character Effie. Both of them wears lots of makeups and loves going to night parties. The characters in this drama are fun, loving, caring and immature. They also show their interest to music as they have the ‘New era’ song. The main setting is the streets that they walk through. One of the storylines is also sex and virginity. There is a scene in which one guy smashes a drink can with his feet and some other guy comes and picks it up and puts it in the bin. This shows that not every teenagers are the same. Even though some teenagers do some wrong things there are some teenagers who are not like them. It’s the same case of Tony in Skins in which he is very good guy who respects others, keeps his room neat and tidy, organised etc. In conclusion I think that there are some similarities between the teenage representations over the past but at the same time it shows how the teenagers styles have changed.

How are the teenagers represented in the episode of skins?

In this episode of skins the teenagers are represented in many contrasting ways. One of the characters I have chosen to focus on is Tony who is the main character in this episode. Tony is a guy from a middle class family. He is clean, neat and tidy. In the stating scenes of the episode they show the bedroom of Tony which is really neat and tidy. His shirts are all folded and kept it in a particular order in the wardrobe. In the beginning of the episode there are some shots in which he is just wearing under wares. When he wakes up he does some exercises and after that he looks at the naked lady who lives in the opposite house. He also plays the ipod in the loudspeaker in a high volume to distract his dad so that his sister can get into the house without his dad noticing. His sister shows the media’s representation of teenagers who goes to late night parties and doesn’t come back home. He uses swearing words when he is talking to his friends. When he is on his way to college he gives call to every one of his friends which shows the close relationship between him and his friends. When he calls his girlfriend he talks dirty. He is wearing clean and casual clothes and the colours are black and red. When he met his girlfriend he kisses her. When he is with his friends he smokes, drinks, takes drugs, goes to wild parties, immoral. He behaves like the leader of the group. In the beginning he is shown as a bad teenage guy but at the same time he is a good guy who gets good grades, sings in the choir and shows respect to others. He is different from other characters in the episode. In the show it shows how Tony behaves when he is not around his friends as he is a calm and well behaved boy and when he is with them he shows his other face.

The second character I have chosen is Syd. He is the second main character in this episode. He is entirely different from Tony. He is really lazy and untidy. His room is all disorganized. Everything in his room is here and there. When Tony calls him in the morning on the way to school, Syd is still sleeping on his bed and also shows all his clothes are on the floor and chair and his mobile phone was vibrating on the plate on which he had the dinner yesterday, which clearly shows that he is not organised. He doesn’t have any close relationship with anyone. He is the one who goes to get the drugs. He always does what Tony says, which again shows that Tony is the leader. Syd seems a bit nervous when Tony’s girlfriend is around. He also looks like he fancy her. He also drinks, smokes, takes drugs, looking at porn magazine, uses bad language. He is wearing over sized jogging bottoms and jumper which is green and black and also he wear a black beanie hat. He wears glasses which is not very fashionable.

The first story line is about sex. Syd is crazy about sex and Tony is helping him to lose his virginity. The second story line is about buying drugs so that they can go to a wild party. In this episode both the characters are involved in storylines about smoking, drinking, drugs, fights, sex, virginity and sexuality. The storyline shows the lifestyle of the teenagers and also about their behaviour. Even though all of the characters are shown in a negative way, they have shown a different character who also have the same bad habits as others who is Tony. He is shown as a good, clam, neat and responsible guy who gets good marks. This shows that not all teenagers are the same and not everyone adopts the bad behaviour of their friends. The drama shows the typical stereotype of teenagers who dresses scruffy and also their way of life.

The settings used in this episode of the drama are parks, bedrooms, the roads, cafe, house, dance studio, bus, classroom, church and school grounds. When they are in the school they looks like the normal teenagers. These locations are seen as the typical place to hangout for the teenagers. They also talk about sex and drugs openly without showing any confidentiality or disgrace. We can see and entire different face of all of them when they go to the wild party at night. All of them seems having a quite close relationship with each other. Even though they are in the same group and hang around with each other, not everyone has the same hobbies or area of interest. For e.g. Tony is interested in singing, someone else is interested in dancing etc. They behave and talks like adults.

Although Syd and Tony are good friends they don’t act the same. Tony uses good and proper language to use, he doesn’t use swearing words all the time, whereas Syd always uses slangs and uses just common words and phrases. Through the way Tony is dressed and behaved he looks like he is from a middle class family where as Syd is from a working class family. I think they have represented different class through these different characters. Throughout the episode they (not only Tony and Syd) have used slangs, swearing and bad language. Tony’s and Syd’s dad seems using swearing words and really aggressive so there is no surprise if the children behave the same as they learn and adopts from the parents.

Skins Poster Analysis 2

Skins Poster Analysis 1

Analysis of the title sequence of the drama ‘Skins’

Analysis of the title sequence of the drama ‘Skins’

This is the title sequence of the drama ‘Skins’. In this opening sequence they include the images and the actions that the actors who lead the main role in the drama. The sequence starts with a long shot which shows the blue sky and the river with the reflection on the sky in it. the camera movement is pan and the setting is in an open place which shows the river, sky and the flying birds. The second image shows the upside down images of houses which shows that this is an urban area. The shots are kaleidoscopic and also the graphics looks stylish. The colours used are green, blue, yellow and red. There are also lots of graphics used in this scene. From the opening scene shows trains, high flats, modern semi attached houses which make the audience get the idea that the story is taking place in a city. The first shot which shows the characters in this drama is a mid shot of the two boys which is also a two shot. In this shot the boys looks so close and it shows the close relationship between them. There are few mid shots which show the different characters in the drama. This scene includes some close-up shots of couples kissing and also there is a mid-shot of a guy standing near the window which shows that there are some adult scenes in the drama. There is shot which shows an arrow symbol which represents that it is a city. The settings of some shots are green landscape. There are some mid shots which show some of them sitting and lying down on the landscape. The different shots of them show the close relationship between each other. In the mise en scene the clothes that all of them wearing are casual which show that they all are middle class college going students. There is a high angle shot which shows two girls jumping on a trampling which again shows that they are middle class students. One of the props used by the characters throughout the sequence is cigarette. There are so many shots in which it shows that they are smoking and this shows that smoking is a big part of their lives. There is a low angle shot of a clock which shows that the time is passing by. One of the main part in this sequence is that it gives the audience an idea that this drama in multicultural as they include people from different ethnicity. The characters are seen as more responsible students during the day time but worse during the night time. There is also a long shot which shows all of the friends walking on the street which again shows their close relationship. There are some shots in which they show different images on the same scene. The editing throughout the scene is very fast. The sound of the scene starts low and it goes higher and then again it goes lower.