ANIMAL EARTH: March 2010

When constructing the research for my website, I looked at five different types of TV channel and the structure they used for their own websites. I decided that if I used a controversial structure, people would not know what it is for and would defeat the object of having the website. I used the advantage of that everybody knows what a TV channel website is and looks like through their cultural experiences. At the end of my research I came to the conclusion that to produce a successful piece of work, I need to incorporate material that already works well for other websites. I found that everything needs to be centred and in a square structure as it needs to be viewed on every size of computer monitor. Furthermore my researched showed me that it should have a distinct colour theme which would be sustained throughout. The best example of this was from the BBC3 website. I found that its logo and colour excelled all the way through the website; giving it character. That was the main idea I took away for my own project. I wanted to give it a character of its own but it needed to still look like a website. The fact that the BBC3 website also was centred and square gave me motivation to use a similar structure but not copy it. When researching schedule pages for my website, I also went back to the BBC3 website to look for ideas. Unfortunately it wasn’t the style I was looking for. The style I did find however that suited my website perfectly is the Discovery channel website. The way it was laid out and the structure and titles used were a good example to as what people would like to see on my particular themed website. Out of pure memory I remember that the Eastenders website has a full image in the header. I know that my channel isn’t anything to do with a soap however I think that the picture in the header was effective and would look good on mine if I used the right type of picture. I decided that I would do a similar thing and put the picture of the monkey up that I took from London zoo and made it look like it has been taken from a documentary. This is also a good marketing feature that would attract people to the program.

When I started off creating my website, I found that I couldn’t make it look professional; it lacked a shine. I re-visited the websites that I had analysed and found out why my website looked dull. This was because the navigation bar at the top was just a filled table with links. The UK food website gave me the best idea to brighten up my work. I took the green navigation bar and used it to produce my own similar one in Adobe Fireworks. I drew a long rectangle and filled it in with a metallic two-colour combination to give it a shiny effect. This then transformed my whole website into looking professional. There wasn’t much else from that website that I wanted to use for mine.

I now had to come up with a few original ideas in order to make my website look unique and not somebody else’s creation. This was to challenge other types of animal website like animal planet and to make it known for being its own channel so people do not make the assumptions that it is just like the other TV channels. For this, I used the idea of having a robin cam page where I have hosted a camera inside a bird box in my garden with my dad. Hopefully by the spring/ summer a bird will have nested and will attract a lot of positive attention to boost the ratings of my TV channel.

With my TV listings double page spread, I looked at other examples such as “What’s on TV” and “TV guide”. I saw that they were presented in the traditional format of ‘about the TV programs‘ on a few pages and then the TV listings on its own page; perhaps with a couple of programs being talked about again but not in detail. As my TV listings magazine double page spread is there to promote the new TV channel, I needed it to have some conventional material in there but also my own so I changed this by doing a whole page on ‘about the TV programs’ and a whole page on the listings. This came together very nicely. Furthermore I have used a picture of David Attenborough as the main picture to attract animal lovers from afar. My research showed me that this works well so I didn’t feel a need to do anything different.

With my newspaper advert, I didn’t find anything like I expected a newspaper advert to be. I used this along with my ideas to come up with what I have now. This was mainly of an activist approach because people would not normally find the animals I have included portrayed in such a dark way. I wanted to portray it like this as I wanted to again show that Animal Earth is not like all TV channels, it has shock and amazement for all the family.

My media package / products represent examples of life in the animal kingdom. I have used various animal pictures, colours, descriptive text and a simple structure in order to attact a social group of animal lovers. This social group will therefore be exposed to a new approach of animal footage. This will expand the market for TV channels like this one.

Out of all the TV channels I have researched, I think that the DIscovery Channel would take on Animal Earth. This is because it deals and is specialist in the animal/wildlife area and so my TV channel would benefit them. In addition, I feel that all of the TV provoiders would choose to host my channel as it expands the market for this topic. This would bring in new respectable customers and would increase viewing figures fore the providers.

My TV channel website uses video, audio, flash and images in order to communicate to my target audience, being the family in an exciting way. This addressed my audience by using familiar medium in order for the audience to make sense of what I wanted to communicate.

I have mainly learnt how to use Adobe Dreamweaver in a particular way in order to achieve a professional looking website. Furthermore, I have learnt how to use JavaScript and Flash in an effective way to bring my website a sense of profesionalism. The other two tasks I was set didn't require so much technical knowledge in that I was already familliar with certain programs such as Adobe Fireworks, Adobe Photoshop and Microsoft Publisher. Therefore I have come to a conclusion that the Adobe suite is a very good set of programs to use for this type of work.

In conclusion, I think that my website, newspaper advert and TV listings double page spread have come out well and all sustain the same theme linking them all to each other. This will help to associate my pieces of work with the TV channel Animal Earth. If I was to improve anything at all, I would manage my time better in completing my writeup.