Genre - Murder Mystery

· *** Please note I’m not planning a murder, this is for a “Creating Atmosphere” public relations assessment.

A brief intro: For a group assessment, we were given genres to choose from in which we would develop a “Creating Atmosphere” presentation. My group chose murder mystery. Why you may ask? Well why not, who doesn’t love a creepy murder mystery...

Ok so there is some method to our madness. Our presentation is going to have a Cluedo theme and feel to it. As we are public relations students, we are working for the United States toys and game company Hasbro, which published the game of Cluedo. The presentation will revolve around creating publicity for the launch of the 60^th Anniversary special edition board game. We intend to do this by incorporating all three mediums of text, vision and sound into our presentation, ultimately creating atmosphere, and a creepy one at that.

So a little background information on Cluedo:

The object of the game is for players to strategically move around the game board (a mansion), in the guise of one of the game's six characters, collecting clues from which to deduce which suspect murdered the game's perpetual victim, Dr. Black (Mr. Boddy in North American versions), and with which weapon and in what room. The game was originally invented as a new game to play during sometimes lengthy air raid drills in underground bunkers.

Along with the presentation, the assessment requires us to have a written piece. After a few brainstorming sessions, we decided to each write an alibi for our designated character, outlining possible motives and relationship to the victim, and of course, our alibi for the time of the murder. Unlike my group members, Cluedo didn’t have a significant place in my childhood; I was more of a monopoly and scrabble player, so therefore I wasn’t able to draw upon prior cluedo experiences while writing my alibi.

At the moment we are still in the early drafting and brainstorming stage. We have some great ideas for our presentation, so I will list them below:

• For the vision element of the presentation we are creating a visually stimulating video consisting of all things creepy; shadows, crows, mansions, candles, knives, with a centralised theme of “who dunnit’.
•  As well as creepy and spine chilling music in the video, there will be quiet creepy music playing constantly throughout the entire presentation.
• We are going to deliver our written pieces (the alibis) for the verbal aspect of the presentation. This will be done in typical murder mystery detective interrogation style. We will all be dressed as our designated Cluedo characters, and the room will be pitch black except for a torchlight shining on the person who is being interrogated by the detective.  

·         All of the above will create a murder mystery atmosphere. This will then set the scene for us to shine the limelight on the limited edition 60^th anniversary Cluedo board game. A poster about the 60^th anniversary limited edition board game will aid the presentation, providing the audience with something visual to refer to. 

So to finish off with, I’ll leave you with a little taster of what cluedo is all about

A murder. Six suspects. Six weapons. Nine rooms. Was it Miss Scarlet with the candlestick in the dining room? Or Professor Plum with the rope in the hall? Or Colonel Mustard with the revolver in the kitchen? It’s up to you to find out “who done it”?

Infographics

When you think of the term 'infographic', the image of normally boring, jazzed up information such as scientific reports or maps probably springs to mind. These days, the infographic has evolved to become a powerful communication tool that is increasing in popularity throughout multiple content platforms. Throughout my journalism degree, our lecturers have focused our attention towards this revolutionary method of communication. In their opinion, the future of journalism lies in the hands of infographics. As the readers become lazier, journalists must become smarter with regards to the presentation of facts. Here's a few examples:

If Twitter were the news...

Now I don't know about you, but I actually read through each of these infographics and was interested in the message behind them. If these sets of data were presented in the old fashioned text editorial style, it's highly likely that I would would have lost interest after the first 40 seconds of reading. I'm no expert, but I'm predicting that infographics will very soon become a vital communication medium utilised by not only journalists, but also communication professionals in the corporate world. 

If you want to see more interesting infographics click here 

Dr Peter Milne

You know when you look at an image, photograph, painting, billboard, meme, advertisement and you make that awkward noise that’s half way between a grunt and a giggle because you realise you’ve stumbled across something that’s been altered to challenge the norms of society in a clever yet humorous way? Well fellow citizen journalists, the term ‘Cultural Jamming’ is what you are experiencing.

Dr Milne, The University of Queensland’s photojournalism expert defines cultural jamming as the “engagement with existing media for the purpose of social critique, very often using subversive humour.” In most cases, culture jamming involves inverting/subverting an existing form of media to challenge social norms. So where does all this cultural jamming business begin? How did it come about? Well, like any phenomenon that sweeps the globe, it must have something that people can recognise or relate too. In this instance, it’s iCons. (See what I did there...?)

Way back in the day, icons were a form of religious paintings. These paintings developed shared visual messages that influenced a large audience. This same idea applies to modern times, for example the iPod advertisements (my computer just corrected me when I typed ipod with a lower case p, even the computer recognizes icons...) or even iconic photos, such as the famous Abu Ghraib image. I chose the two examples because the image below demonstrates how once there is an icon, it is open for alteration, ultimately sending out a social statement. 

Here's a few more examples of cultural jamming

As this lesson on cultural jamming was presented to us within a 'media conference' I will reflect on the presentation. This is a bit off topic, but as we are constantly getting reminded by our lecturer, in the media world, appearance is everything. People will judge you by how you look, what your wearing and how you present yourself. I'm going to use a bit of ironic humour here myself; I find it ironic that an expert in visual communication is willing to present a conference about visual communication to public relations students while dressed like an escaped prisoner cross banana in pyjamas. Seriously, could it hurt to tuck your shirt in? 

Anyway, besides lack of dress sense, Dr Milne enlightened me on what the term cultural jamming involved. Although I had previously sat through this exact 'presentation' in a previously completed course, a little bit of a refresher served me well. So, to sum up, cultural jamming; altering existing media in a way that challenges social norms, usually through the use of subversive humour. Hooray!

Fashion 34

A night of champagne, diamonds, gorgeous men in suits, Ferraris and up and coming boutique fashion brands, could it get any better? Well yes, as ticket sales went to the Childrens Health Foundation! 


Fashion 34 is a fashion extravaganza, the first in Australia to involve "online fashionistas" and their virtual fan clubs with a real, live show streamed by web video & on digital TV. 
The unforgettable and impressionable styles of Gail Sorronda, Wil Valor, Threadbare, George Wu, Apartment, Arthur Galan, Calexico were showcased with the help of Queensland's exquisite Dally's Models.

I was invited to this exclusive fashion show as my brother in law’s clothing label was being showcased. As I’m constantly being told in my journalism/communication degree, networking is just as much, maybe even more important than knowledge.  As I entered the event, I was feeling way out of my league. A first year uni student who can't afford to splurge on orange juice let alone a designer dress, trying to rub shoulders with people who were dripping in diamonds and ate caviar on a regular basis. However, as the old saying goes, you have to fake it until you make it. So with the help of my older sister’s elaborate and fashion forward wardrobe, along with the free alcohol on offer, I managed to ignore my low socio economic status and mingle with the big fish. I met so many people that I would never encounter in everyday life, to mention a few I met people from fashion publications, media companies, and modeling agencies. It made me realise even more that it’s definitely who you know, not what you know, especially in the media world.  Networking aside, the fashion was absolutely divine! 

George Wu

Calexico

George Wu

Wil Valor

Culture Shock

For one of my courses this semester, I’ve been learning about intercultural communication. I must admit, prior to doing this course I was quite oblivious and naïve to the whole idea of intercultural communication. This may have something to do with the fact that up until now, my entire life was spent in Noosa on the Sunshine Coast, and while it’s beautiful, lets just say it’s not the most culturally diverse place you can live.

In the 2011 census, 71% of people living in Noosa were born in Australia. This is equivalent to approximately 95 university lecture theatres at full capacity.

Coinciding to this statistic, the census also revealed that 90% of people in Noosa only spoke English.  This is equivalent to the entire population of Bundaberg (44,025) in Queensland, Australia.

So it was no surprise that when I moved to Brisbane to begin university, I was exposed to cultures I had never come across before. The course I’m currently studying: Identity, Culture & Communication, has proved to be a valuable and interesting course. One day, I intend to travel the globe, so this small migration from Noosa to Brisbane was definitely a starting point! 

I do miss waking up to this every morning though....

This data was obtained from the Australian Bureau of Statistics from 

http://www.censusdata.abs.gov.au/census_services/getproduct/census/2011/quickstat/SED30065?opendocument&navpos=220