Codes and Conventions

The codes and conventions in media can be separated into 3 distinct groups -
- Technical (camera techniques & shots),
- Symbolic (ie clothing, colours)
- Written and audio (music etc).
These give the text meaning and determine the response of the viewer. They can be used as a basis for simple text analysis.
In movie openings you will always have the production logos and distribution logos
Of the main companies that work on the movie.

 

Generally the opening shot of a film will be either an establishing shot or a blankscreen with titles on. These title screens can also be a way of building up suspense and also giving away the genre of the movie to the audience.
The opening of the movie scream has codes and conventions because the title is in red to enphasis blood also sirens ring and a heartbeat plays over the film opening, because of this you can automatically see that it is a horror film. Finally the purpose of film openings is to set the seen to tell you what genre the film is and give a clue what its about.