Pre Production Planning AOS 3 – Unit 3

How do students refine their ideas and concepts to create media products?

Pre-production involves the development of written and visual planning documents for a proposed product. These documents reflect both creative vision and thorough planning. The media industry has specific methodologies, conventions and workflows for documenting media production in different media forms. These methods vary from form to form and within forms according to the style and/or genre of the proposed product.

Audience engagement, consumption and reception is at the heart of media production. A feature common to pre-production across media forms is a clear understanding of the proposed audiences. Audiences may be delineated by demographic or social factors, identified by their interests and experience in media products, forms, genres or styles, or created by media institutions or individual producers for a particular purpose. Detailed articulation of audiences and how they will be engaged underpins all aspects of pre-production planning.

Informed by their learning in Area of Study 2, students use industry specific planning, using both written and visual documentation, to complete a pre-production plan. The plan incorporates a clear fictional, non-fictional or fictional/non-fictional narrative for a specified audience in a selected media form as outlined below. Students consider the relevant media codes and conventions of the selected media form. The pre-production plan is developed for one of the following media forms:

  • a video or film production of 3–10 minutes in length, including title and credit sequences
  • an animated production of no more than 10 minutes in length, including title and credit sequences
  • a radio or audio production of a minimum of 8 minutes in length, including title and credit sequences
  • a digital or analogue photographic presentation, sequence or series of a minimum of 10 original sourced images shot, processed and edited by the student
  • a digital or traditional print production of a minimum of 8 pages, produced and edited by the student
  • a digital and/or an online production that demonstrates comparable complexity consistent with the other media forms
  • a convergent or hybridised media production that incorporates aspects of a range of media forms and is consistent with product durations and the descriptors listed.

Key Knowledge

  • the intention and audiences for a proposed production
  • methods for documenting the narrative of a proposed production
  • methods for producing visual planning documents for a proposed production
  • codes and conventions, technologies and processes relevant to the selected media form, proposed audience, narrative and production
  • methods for documenting production and post-production roles, tasks and timelines
  • media language relevant to the planning and production of a media product in a selected media form.

Key Skills

  • document the intention and audiences for a proposed production
  • document the narrative of a proposed production
  • produce visual planning documents for a proposed production
  • apply codes and conventions, technologies and production processes appropriate to the selected media form, proposed audience, narrative and product
  • document production and post-production roles, tasks and timelines
  • use media language appropriate to the planning and production of a media product in a selected media form.

Folio Design Plan

By now you should be developing your Folio which started in Outcome 2. On completion of this unit the student should be able to develop and document a media production design in a selected media form for a specified audience.

I have included the folio booklet to the right, however upon beginning Outcome 2 you should have this document already.