Preliminary Task : Adobe Illustrator

The illustration i have made is of a British Model Elizabeth Jane Bishop. I started my illustration by firstly making her face and hair using the Pen Tool. I used different layers and shades to make the shadows which i then blended with the Blend tool to give the illustration a more realistic look. After the hair and face were completed, I moved onto her facial features. I used different layers to make the eyes, eyebrows, lips, nose and forehead. Later on I made her neck and background and combined all the images to see the final result.

Codes & Conventions

What are codes?
Codes are systems of signs, which create meaning. Codes can be divided into two categories – technical and symbolic.

Technical codes are all the ways in which equipment is used to tell the story in a media text, for example the camera work in a film.

Symbolic codes show what is beneath the surface of what we see. For example, a character's actions show you how the character is feeling.

Some codes fit both categories – music for example, is both technical and symbolic.

What are conventions?
Conventions are the generally accepted ways of doing something. There are general conventions in any medium, such as the use of interviewee quotes in a print article, but conventions are also genre specific.

How codes and conventions apply in media studies
Codes and conventions are used together in any study of genre – it is not enough to discuss a technical code used such as camera work, without saying how it is conventionally used in a genre.

Media Terms

Codes: are the rules or conventions by which signs are put together to give meaning;codes are socially constructed and are accepted by society as a whole.These include:


Dress code

Colour code

Non-verbal code

Technical code


Conventions: are the unwritten laws, which are held acceptable at the expense of individuality or sincerity! They construct meaning and are usually genre specific.


Semiotics:–theory of signs that underlies all forms of communication or anything that is used for human communication is a sign.Examples could be; gestures,expressions,poetry,ritual,food,music,Morse code etc.


Media saturation: This term is used to describe the way in which the media today saturate all aspects of our lives and the extent to which our experience of the world is dominated by media.


Verisimilitude: Using micro elements to create a believable world.


Inter-textuality: This is the shaping of a text's meaning by another text.