1. Unit 12 Specialist study in creative media production
Week 2: 7th of March 2017
Choosing a Research topic

2. Objective of this week:
In week 1 you should have identified the subject matter that has influenced you and shaped you as a person/student.
This week the main focus is to identify the research topic and the research question and what methods of research you will need to apply to help you with the answer.

3. Selecting research topic
Ask yourself these questions before choosing a specific topic:
What interest you the most about particular subject?
For example in case of writing it could be the specific genre of writing, writers, novels, poems etc.
Make sure that your topic can be supported by the research
Will you be able to support your ideas with research from appropriate resources.
Focus on the limited aspect of the research not too broad not too narrow.
You want to be able to manage your research.
Is there anything you wonder about or you are puzzled about with regard to the subject?
What is it that you want to find out?
Why? The purpose of the research? (Because of my own interest in the topic, identified gap in the similar media products, client needs, to aid further research etc. )

4. What do I know about my favourite media product. LO1
What do I know about my favourite media product? LO1.1 – Critically describe range of contextual perspectives influencing a chosen discipline in creative media production
Chose three media products related to you research topic ( for example music videos, TV programmes, magazines / magazine articles, photographs, books, radio programmes, etc. )
Critically analyse and describe chosen media products answering the following questions?
Who produced it?
What do I know about the producer/s (artist/creatives/writers)?
What do I know about historical / political context of the product? (What art movement, period ideas, political or world view the chosen media product belongs to?
What are their influences?
What skills, production techniques, practises and knowledge has been used in the production of the chosen product? (identify skills, crafting, production techniques, practices and knowledge, critically analyse and compare with similar products).

5. What technologies have been used for the production and distribution and how they influenced the product?
Define the audience ( audience profile: age, gender, sexual orientation, socio – economic status, geodemographic, psychographics, what sort of category they fit into; mainstream, alterative or niche).
Who owns the media production and how it influences the product you are analysing?
Identify codes specific for each chosen media product and conventions common for all products, analyse and compare.
How is the world represented through each chosen media product? (groups, individuals, situations, stories etc. ) Look at stereotyping, genres, representation of genres, race, social classes, positive and negative images etc.

6. How the findings on my favourite media product/s inform my topic research question? LO1.2 – Critically describe range of contextual perspectives influencing a chosen discipline in creative media production
Write a report on what you found out from analysing three chosen media products.
Analyse what the chosen products have in common and what is different or specific for each product.
How the analysis of each product will help you and aid you in developing your research further? Be specific and refer to questions asked previously about your chosen media products.
Has your initial research topic been affected ( change of idea) as a result of the task you were doing? If yes or no explain why? What makes you convinced in your research topic idea?

7. Research plan What. and How. LO2
Research plan What? and How? LO2.1 – identify a rage of relevant academic and cultural sources for a personal research project.
Once you have identified the research topic and question you need to produce the research plan.
1. Create a ‘Spidergram’ of possible research activities that you can take to inform your project idea.
2. Identify research methods and research instruments that you can use to get the best possible findings.
3. Analyse strengths and weaknesses of each research activity. Decide which ideas to keep and which to reject or keep as an option.
4. Be realistic: getting an interview with the Prime Minister is unlikely to happen.