As Live Production Unit - RESEARCH Fashion Trends

As the show has a big focus on trends I decided to carry out some of my own research into the trends that will be appearing. Since the show will be transmission mid April, the content will be focusing on what people can wear for spring and then leading into summer so these were the key areas I looked at. 

The first thing I did was go down to my local supermarket and buy a selection of magazines that revolved around fashion. These were Vanity Fair, Vogue and Cosmopolitan. The producers also mentioned that we will be including male fashion in the show as well so I purchased GQ that is very vocal on mens clothes and what to wear. 

After flicking through each one of them I found a variety of articles that explained the trends that will be coming in through the spring and summer seasons. In Vogue, Cosmopolitan and Vanity Fair, they included lots of images and check lists of what to buy. For spring it included boots, satin tops and trousers, leather and suede. They also mention that the rodeo look is going to be very in this spring for when its a little bit cold but warm enough not to wear a coat. 

For summer, There were lots of articles explaining the use of bright colours and pastels. The idea is to pair these colours to create a trend known as colour blocking creating bright bold statements of colour to everyones outfits. Vertical stripes and plaid were also mentioned to be a high priority and will be seen a lot through both seasons. 

There was a trend that was mentioned in every magazine aimed at both females and males and this was denim. This material is going to be huge through spring and summer, so much so that they are recommending to revive the 80's trend of double denim. This is where a person will wear a variety of two or more pieces of clothing at the same time that show a denim look. This could include wearing denim jeans with a white t-shirt and a denim jacket. 

Although these magazines are aimed at the high end price tag I felt it was important to look at as usually high street and more affordable clothing is trickled down from the high end looks that begin with it. It starts at the catwalk and then eventually filters down into places like H&M, Primark and Topman. 

After I had researched some trends in magazine, I went on to look at some high street websites to see what clothing ranges they had coming out. I first went to River Island which had a section all about clothes that are aimed for the summer season. A lot of the clothes resembled pastel colours and floral pattens. 

RIVER ISLAND:

For men it was a very similar story with pastel hues and floral, silky, satin, slim fit shirts. 

I then looked at Topshop which also had a lot of pastel in the clothes they are selling for spring/ summer but they were more focused on double denim rather than floral and they had a number of off the shoulder dresses and tops. 

TOPSHOP:

With Topman, the sister company that focuses on predominantly male fashion had a variety of trends. The main attention was on shirts. This included two trends that they say will be big this spring summer. These are bold stripes and floral. They also focused on double denim pairing lots of garments made out of denim together. 

TOPMAN: 

Overall I have come across a lot of trends for both men and women through researching in magazines and online. I will make sure that in our second progress meeting I will relay what I have found to the group in terms of floral, pastel, strips, plaid, satin and denim so that the producers and other team members will be able to decide what to incorporate into the show. 

As Live Production Unit - RESEARCH An Introduction To Fashion

As I am going to be directing a fashion show and have influence on the programme as a whole, I wanted to make sure I had knowledge and a good background about fashion in general. Although I know fashion and keep up with trends myself, I thought it would be a good idea to take interest on the history to modern day as well as the different areas fashion is a part of.



A Brief History

Fashion has been present in society for centuries and you can see the evolution of clothes throughout time. If you call a time period, you can distinctly envision the type of style people would be wearing in that era. For example in Egyptian times, We have great pictures to show bright coloured clothes, the thick flicked eye make up, the head dresses and the gold of the pharaohs. To compare, we can look at the Georgian period (15 - 1600's). These were times where elegant floor gown dresses were worn by women and suits with cravats and double breasted button jackets with grey wigs were worn by the men.

EGYPTIAN PERIOD:

GEORGIAN PERIOD: 

Fashion has been around for 1000's of years and originally was only reflected by the rich and affluent members of the current society. Fashion as we know it today has changed in many ways. We don't just have the rich that carry the taste of clothes, in modern society, anyone can reflect their own expression through the clothes they wear and follow fashion at a diverse range of all costs.

Todays Fashion usually starts with a designer that will draw a design of the clothes he or she would like to make. They will then gather the materials and make the garment which is then fitted to a model. Once all the fittings have been made, the designer will arrange a show where models walk down a runway to show the world what type of clothes that designer has made. This is then sold to customers for a high end price. Trends will be picked up on where common themes are appearing in a variety of clothes for example plaid (a check style patten) or skinny jeans (a tight style denim trouser that is made to tightly fit the persons leg). This its then usually seen by other shops and designers and similar clothes are copied to reflect the outfits that were seen. The person who started this process was a seamster in the 19th century called Charles Frederick Worth. He had his name put on a label and was sewn into all of his clothes. 

In the 20th century fashion magazines became available for people to admire the top designers that had emulated their own work. This branched into fashion houses which still exist today and have a number of people working for the one designer. A number of houses that are recognisable are ones like 'Chanel',  'Givenchy', 'Prada', 'McQueen', and 'Burberry'. 

Since then, fashion has continued to develop and grow over the years all over the world and is accessible to everyone rather than the people who could only afford it. High Street shops and independent vintage markets all host a variety of fashion that can allow a person to express their style with a variety of garments that can express those on the catwalk.

The Modern Eras: 60's, 80's & 00's

60's: 

In the 1960's fashion was a huge statement when looking back on the decade. It introduced skinny jeans in which would prompt more and more women to start wearing trousers. It was also the era for PVC where instead of cottons, women would wear shinny rubber looking material that had hardly been done before. Their hair cuts were all about the Beehive with backcombed big hair. With men, this was the era of the Mods (abbreviated from modernists) and Rockers. The Mods would consist of short cropped hair cuts, buttoned up shirts/ polo shirts and long parka jackets. With the rockers they were more leather jackets, pompadour haircuts and leather trousers. The fashion created rivalry as the looks were so strikingly different from one another. 

This was also a big era for music influencing a lot of the fashion worn from bands like 'The Beatles', 'The Rolling Stones', 'Elvis' and 'Aretha Franklin'.

80's:

The decade of the 1980's saw a dramatic change. This was the year of bright colours and fitness clothes for both women and men. Both genders would be seen wearing fitness clothes as every day wear including tracksuits, exercise shorts and leotards. Aside from this there was also flared mini skirts, jumpsuits and fishnet gloves for women. With men they wore doc martens (also worn by women), neon make up and slim fitted clothes like suits. This era is known for its uni sex style as men and women were often seen wearing similar clothing. 

This was another decade that was hugely influenced by music created with the likes of Michael Jackson, Madonna, Prince, David Bowie and George Michael. 

00's:

The 2000's had a change in fashion once again. Its the era that has a lot of similarities to what we wear today. Big designers really made a name for themselves in the likes of Christian Louboutin, Karl Lagerfeld and Alexander McQueen. It also was the era that saw fashion becoming quick and cheap with the rise of high street stores. Women genrerally wore mesh type tops, concert headliner T - Shirts and sequins. Men wore mainly black coloured clothing in the form of full matching tracksuits, dress shirts and trousers. There was also a lot of lumber jack style check shirts and ribbed jeans. Another big statement was denim either worn as a top/ bottom piece or both together to create double denim.

As Live Production Unit - Production Meeting One: The Commissioned Show

The show that was commissioned for this unit was an idea thought up by Katie Joslin and Mellisa Moore on the course. We had a production meeting with the whole class where they displayed there powerpoint that they used in their original pitch and explained to us what the show is about.

The show is called 'Steal The Style' and focuses on a live presenter lead show exploring the different elements of fashion which is often overlooked by the mainstream media. The show has four segments and will introduce guests throughout that are relevant to each topic.



These segments are:

Trends Of The Week - Discussing the most popular trends
Not On The High Street - A section focusing on independent stores
Very Vintage - Focuses on vintage clothes and markets with facts and tips
Digging Through The Wardrobe - Going through a guests wardrobe to find clothes and key pieces


They explained that the shows target audience will be E4 and will target ages 16 to working age. The shows format will be a live chat show style with 4 VT's that will be incorporated to give expert knowledge and interesting information at different locations.

There was also a rough set design they produced giving an overall vibe and tone of the show.

Set design:

Overall the meeting was very informative and I feel excited to see what I can bring to what has already been established. The task was set at the end of the meeting to do more research into fashion, research our own roles and to brainstorm some ideas on adding to it.

As Live Production Unit - Job Roles

As we were not picked for our idea we then had to go for a job to be part of the production. These ranged from vision mixer to camera operator and VT operators. I went for the role of director to be directing the show when its live. Although this is a very important role I feel I will be able to do a good job with this as I am calm under pressure and through previous projects I have shown I can direct a crew and a production well.

I researched what it involves to be a director on a live TV production and looked at all the things that I would have to do. I decided that this is the role I will be going for in my interview and have production manager as my second choice. 

I went for the interview which went really well and explained all my reasons for why I feel I would be good at this role mentioning my past history with projects and where I wanted to go in the future. It was eventually revealed that I was chosen to be the director on the first half of the show as well as Gavin directing the second half. I am very pleased I got this role and will continue to research and attend work shops to make sure I am as prepared as I can be for the day we transmission live. 

As Live Production Unit - The Pitch

Today we pitched our idea to a panel of 5 about our idea. Unfortunately we was not picked to go into production but we got some brilliant feedback that I will definitely take forward in the future. Everyone said our pitch was very strong and confident with clear delivery and great content produced. We were able to go into detail about all elements of the show overall and we all knew our idea in great detail inside and out. They recognised a lot of effort and thought had been put into the idea and it was shown from the booklets that were handed out and throughout the pitch.

There were a few issues with the idea itself. They all felt that it contrasted as the subject was a bit taboo although it was meant for a family audience and they couldn't quite see how that was going to tie in together. I explained that it was more of an underlying issue and the show was more about routing for your gender and should be seen more like a battle of the sexes which they said made more sense. There was also some problems with the channel we were trying to get it commissioned for as they felt it was more itv than ITV 2. You can see a copy of the presentation below.

Overall, although there were things we could improve on, we felt we all delivered a great pitch with a workable idea that, when adapted, could prove to be a success in the future.

As Live Production Unit - Final Idea

We have really struggled to come up with an idea that we are all happy with and would be excited to pitch but over the last couple of days we have settled on something that we all feel has its uniqueness and is interesting for viewers. We have come up with the working title 'Prove them wrong' which explores gender stereotype issues. We broke it down into 5 rounds that would all be based upon a well known stereotype and give the contestants a chance to "prove them wrong".

Once we had got our idea we thought it was important to develop the rounds and how they would all work. The rounds were:

Girls Cant Throw

Boys Cant Apply Make-up

Boys Are Better at Maths

Girls Are Better at Multi-tasking

Final General Knowledge Round


The rounds are a mixture of physical and mental to give variety for the viewers but to also give participation. Girls Cant Throw, Boys Cant Apply Make-up and Girls Are Better at Multi-tasking are all physical rounds for the viewers enjoyment of watching and Boys Are Better at Maths and the final round are both mental challenges that viewers can have a go with themselves.

Once the rounds were sorted we could then develop the show as a whole exploring structure, camera plans, lighting plans, set design, zoning and running orders. We created a booklet of all the paperwork we produced as a group which you can view below.

Title Page

Structure

 Set Design

Zone Running Order

Show Running Order

VT Description

Camera Plan

Lighting Plan

As Live Production Unit - RESEARCH Entertainment Programme - Blind Date

Introduction

Blind date is a popular entertainment programme that originally aired in 1985 and was hosted by Cilla Black. The show ran for 18 years and was hugely popular hitting its highest rating of 18.2 million viewers. The show was so popular it featured celebrity special episodes and a sketch for comic relief in 1993. Due to the show becoming very familiar and repetitive, the viewing ratings slowly declined over the years and the last show aired in 2003 with 2.9 million viewers.

Format

The show contains 3 contestants who are behind a screen either male or female. A person who is looking for a date then sits on the other side of the screen and asks questions to the contestants on the other side finding out facts about them. The single contestant cannot see the other 3 contestants hence the name of the show 'Blind Date'. Once all 3 questions had been asked and answers. The single contestant can finally choose whether he /she wants contestant 1, 2 or 3 to go on a date with. When picked he or she sees who she could of had before the remaining contestant stands behind the screen and they are revealed. The contestants leave the studio together and go on a date that is seen on the following weeks show. This is repeated several times in one episode usually changing the genders. 

In 2017 the show was commissioned to re air from ITV to Channel 5. After Cilla's passing, Paul O' Grady was to host the new show in her place and the show would go through the same format as the original. The set was revamped for a more modern look and the logo and branding was also changed to fit in with the current times.

Set Layout

The set is formed into 3 zones. This consists of an area where the single contestant sits and the presenter stands as well an area behind the screen where the other 3 contestants are sitting. The third zone is a hard area with stairs where the presenter walks out and can stand to do pieces to camera. I like the idea of having different zones that can be used at different points of the show. Rather than being all in one area, it gives more variety and adds more excitement into the way the show is viewed. The show received mainly positive reviews and is commissioned for a second series.

As Live Production Unit - Further Ideas

Since Helens feedback our group decided to sit down and brainstorm some further ideas. We still felt that a dating show would be a strong contender for us and we went down a similar concept but formated it differently in order to make it simpler. After further discussion between ourselves over the next few days we really struggled to pull it all together without it being complicated and realised that we was not getting our potential to its best whilst working on an idea that we are not keen on so we then decided to move away from dating shows all together.



We next talked about the possibility of a talk show but felt we didnt have anything that would make this show unique and different to anything that viewers would have seen before. We decided that we really wanted to push the boat out and make this show as exiting and different as we possibly could so we have ruled out this idea completely. We decided on looking at peoples fears and phobias that we could put live to a studio audience. The VT's would be animal fears as we can't have them in the studio and the more physical fears such as clowns and the unknown would be in the studio. After having a long discussion we eventually said that the idea was not viable enough and we would need to take a more simple approach.

Logo/ Branding Ideas:

As Live Production Unit - Feedback From Our Initial Idea

Over the past couple of days we have had further information from Helen to establish the brief in greater detail. We then gave a rough idea of what we had thought of to the course group to which helen said needed further development. After this we had an induvidual tutorial with Helen to discuss our idea in greater detail with her. We explained the rounds and how the gameshow would work whilst showing her the document that we had wrote up with the diagrams to help explain. The main point Helen gave us was that it was very complicated and needed to be stripped back to a rawer form. Although this game show could work, getting it commitioned would prove a challenege as its not that easy to explain.

Our group have decided to come away from the meeting feeling fresh minded and we all agree we need to come up with a more simple and easier concept.

As Live Production Unit - Our First Initial Idea

After reading the brief, Me and Andreya decided to work on some thoughts that we were having. We both felt that a dating show would be interesting as they are currently relevant to TV and we could factor some great entertainment from it contributing our own style and structure to making it unique.

Our first thought was a show we named 'At First Sight'. This idea played on the ideology of falling in love with appearance over personality. 2 contestants would individually pick between 6 people of the opposite sex based on the number they chose. The chamber with the equivalent number would be shown with a man facing away. The contestant would have to choose whether to select him or eliminate him moving on to the next man. Round 1 would end by the contestant finally selecting one man.

Round 2 consists of the final couple entering a large perspex cube with two chairs. They will be asked questions about eachother led by the presenter and the contestants will have to guess about eachother i.e. job title, age etc. The real answers would eventually be revealed and they would decided if they still wanted to date eachother or not.

After we had got this idea we met with Jemma who is now in the local area and she loved the idea and helped us to develop it further. We wrote a document explaining all the details in it which you can view below:

As you can see we went into a lot of detail with the document as we wanted to make sure we had a viable idea. We included a title page, an overview of the idea, the format of how it works, the channel of who its aimed for and the schedule showing us the timings and how it would all work with the half an hour slot. 

We then went on to designing the set as well as making a model to bring it to life so we could consider all the practical issues we may have and where we would put the cameras, extra lighting etc. 

As Live Production Unit - Initial Preparation

In preparation for this unit, myself and Andreya Decided to meet over the christmas break to discuss what this unit entailed and how we was going to approach it. We first off decided to look at what was required from the brief and break it down. As the first thing was the pitch, we focused on breaking the elements down to what was needed. I produced a document that explained the details more clearly so we will have a better idea of what was expected. This can be viewed below:

As you can see it gives the deadline for the pitch following with the main areas that the pitch should involve. I then typed up the boundaries in which the idea should follow moving on to spliting the musts and the must nots of what it can have. I feel looking at this sheet, our group can easilly refer to it whilst preparing for our pitch making sure it has all the right and relevent details needed.