When conducting my focus group I knew I needed to figure out the strengths and weaknesses, to ensure I knew what needed to be improved for my final edit and what needed to be kept.
Strengths of my first edit:
When my focus group was watching my first edit, they have given me my strengths which I needed to keep for my final edit:
- Intro and outro sound
When the students listened to my radio drama they liked the fact that there was intro music and the same music used for the outro. This allowed my radio drama to be rememberable with a hook at the start and the end. They understood that, that was going to pull in the audience straight away and keep their attention on the radio drama.
- Brief was met well
My students who conducted my focus group discussed how I met the brief successfully. When looking at the brief it states that my radio drama must "inform, educate and entertains" however it must be suitable for a family audience which is both younger and older generations. When successfully meeting with the brief I made sure to include the advantages and disadvantages of social media whilst informing, educating and entertaining the audience. One student discussed how my radio show did all three of the key terms in which the brief has stated.
- The voice actors sounded clear
A strength that my students conducted when listening to my focus group is that all the voices were clear and not muffled in which they knew what was going on. This allowed them to pay attention throughout watching my radio drama. This let me know that I used the perfect suitable microphone for my radio drama.
Weakness of my first edit:
When my focus group was watching my first edit they have given me improvements to improve on to ensure that my radio drama would reach its full potential. The improvements were:
- High dynamic range throughout when actors talking
They have stated that there is a high dynamic range in which that means all the sounds which the actors are speaking in are in different levels in which I need to edit. This has made the audience find it hard to listen to my radio drama since the sound volume constantly changes.
- Ambient sounds are loud
When my students were watching my radio drama they have told me the ambient sounds restaurant sounds/hallway school sounds were loud in which I needed to turn down. Therefore my focus group had trouble listening to it.
- Add music/sound track
My audience told me that I should add a sound track since It'll help improve my radio drama which will allow the audience to pay attention.
- A part where Faz discovers social medias bad side
My audience discussed how it'll be suitable to add a part in where faz finds the bad comments on social media and expresses how he feels.
Improvements and how I made the improvements:
Here is how I conducted the weaknesses and improved them in my final edit:
- High dynamic range throughout when actors talking
Here is me changing the volumes which fits each of the actors volumes to match one volume:
- Ambient sounds are loud
Here is me in the recording below turning down the ambient sounds:
- Add music/sound track
Here is a picture of me adding music throughout my radio drama:
- A part where Faz discovers social medias bad side
Here is a picture of the added part where faz discovers social media in which the comments are read out by an AI:
The technical and auditory qualities:
When creating my radio drama I must keep in mind the auditory qualities which leads to how good the quality will be for my ending product of the radio drama. The two main things I needed to keep an eye on is the sample rate which is a number of samples per seconds in which creates a waveform (how smooth the waveform will be) and the bit rate which is how much data is transmitted at a time.
Advantages of technical and auditory qualities:
When producing my radio drama I have decided it'll be suitable to use MP3 format for my radio drama. The reason for this is because the bit rate is 8Kbits and no higher than 160 Kbits and the sample rate is 16,000 , 22,050 and 24,000. This allowed my quality to not also be clear but be a small file.
Disadvantages of technical auditory qualities:
When producing I realised that all the equipment was old and damaged which may not have made my radio drama as good quality as needed. When filming my radio drama, I'll ensure ill get the best equipment which will produce the highest quality work.
When overall using technical and auditory quailties I was able to ensure that the brief was met to "inform, educate and entertain" the audience. This ensures good quality and make sure the audience pays attention throughout my radio drama.
