Structure of briefs

Contractual

A contractual brief involves a company signing a contract with a client, this contract includes the tasks they have to complete, in what time frame it needs to be done by and the payment, the contract should also include extra information about the parties involves that is needed to carry out the task. If either party breaches the contract they could fact legal action. Advantages of a contractual brief are both the client and company know exactly what needs doing and it’s legally binding. A disadvantage is that there may be disagreements between the company and the client about what exactly should go in the contract.

Negotiated

A negotiated brief is similar to a contractual brief but there’s lot more room for adjustment, both parties are involved with the creation of their product. This is usually used when the client doesn’t know what they want exactly. Advantages of using this brief are that you get ideas from both sides, it’s usually more creative and you get the expert opinion from both sides however there may be conflicting ideas that will need to be resolved which will take up time.

Formal

A formal involves a contract being with the necessities but there can be extra information added throughout the process, the process is usually a lot more relaxed and this leads to the product been made easier and quicker, but if there’s arguments the contract is not always legally binding.

Informal

This involves no written contract simply a verbal agreement between the two parties, it allows for the companies to meet before hand discuss what they want and let each other work, this allows for a lot les stress when working as there’s no contract of deadlines but this can lead to problems with the work taking too long and payments after it’s completed.

Commission

This is when a large company will hire an independent company to produce a product for them. The brief is only negotiated between the large company and the independent and not the external client.  The independent company will then be paid for the production they have made and get a % of the revenue made after sales. This type of brief isn’t the best type of brief for larger companies as they’ll be losing out on a lot of money whereas it’s better for the smaller independent company.

Tender

A client will publish a product that they want made, then production companies will go to the client with a proposal trying to secure the project for themselves. The client will then choose which company is best for them by reviewing their proposals. Advantages of this method is the client gets to look through all the proposals and choose which ones best for them and there’s competition between those who apply so they want to try the best they can, however the best people for may not go to the client with a proposal and the client may have been better off going to see them to negotiate it.

Co-operative

This is when two of more production companies are hired to work together in order to create a product, this means that the work is shared between two or more companies and that there’s more ideas. However the two or more companies ideas may clash and that will have to be resolved in order for the best product.

Competition

This type of brief is open to all production companies, they will all complete the brief and then hand in their work, the client will then review and judge all the work that’s sent in and from this choose who’s work they want to use, advantages of this brief are that it creates competition and with competition becomes better quality products, they also get a number of submissions and can compare work with only paying for what they want but from the production companies point of view it’s a massive risk as if their work isn’t chosen they will have wasted a lot of time and money for nothing.

Negotiating the brief

It is important that the client and company discuss the brief before they meet as it’s important that the company knows exactly what they need to do and to what standards and either party can ask any questions they may have. It’s vital that both the company and the client have good communication with one another throughout the process.  If they fail to negotiate the brief the company may not be sure exactly what they have to do and may make errors that will take time to fix and delay things.

Degree of discretion

This is where the company doing the work has the freedom of interpreting the brief how they think it should be done. Advantages of this method is that it gives the company freedom to do what they think should be done which could lead to creativity and better than what the client imagined.

Constraints

When making something for a client there may be legal, ethical and regulatory constraints. For example for our brief for the police about ASBO’s it would be both illegal and unethical for us to show a underage child drinking so instead we would show someone of age appearing underage to get the same effect, also even with acting of anti social behavior it all needs to be controlled and regulated. Other laws companies need to take into account are the laws copyright, they need to make sure they imagery or context from other companies/brands.

Amendments

The product

Companies need to take into account that they may need to make changes to the final product in order to make for it ideal for the brief, amendments may be due to laws being broken and needing to be changed in order for it to be legal or the product not turning out how imagined.

The budget

Any changes made to the budget have to be declared, usually a company will run out of money and will need more so the original budget will need to be increased or on the other hand the quality may be affected and the company will have to purchase lower quality items for cheaper price in order to complete the tasks.

The conditions

The original brief will state how much the company will be paid for their work. However depending on the final product this fee may change, if the work is of low quality and took too long to do the company may have a decreased wage and if it’s of excellent quality in good time their pay may be increased.

Opportunities

A brief may give someone opportunities to develop skills

Self-development

Briefs allow people to improve and develop new skills and these can be manual or technical. For example with our brief involving ASBO’s we will have to do research into troubled teens and the police and I could develop understanding of both types of people. It will also help us improve on our production skills such as filming, editing and pre production.

Learning new skills

During this process we are given the opportunity to learn new skills we haven’t done before, this could be done by working in a role we don’t usually for example I may usually be the camera man but I may have the opportunity to be the director and learn new skills I haven’t had the opportunity to do before, I could also have the chance to develop my editing skills use new technology in order to develop our production.

Contributions

When carrying out our brief I contribute as much as possible where it’s needed. I will achieve this by making sure all tasks that are set for my role and me are completed on time and in high quality. I will also contribute in the ideas stage suggesting ideas, what can be improved and why while listening to others’ opinions.