Contemporary American Television Drama - Essay Example

Running Head: CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN TELEVISION DRAMA Contemporary American Television Drama: Textual Analysis of CSI Miami By course nameProfessor’s nameUniversity nameCity, StateDate Contemporary American Television Drama: Textual Analysis of CSI Miami Lighting in CSI Miami interprets the contrast between inside and outside artificial settings (Campaiola, 2008, p. 13). Interior settings usually have very low lighting and are consequently dark to make viewers feel as if the investigation is occurring at night and privately.

Dark blue and green make up the key colours used for interior settings (Byers and Johnson, 2009, p. 125). In contrast, scenes set outside have adequate lighting while some episodes have more than sufficient lighting. Such episodes are characterised by bright orange or yellow colours from natural light (Allen, 2007, p. 215). For instance, the CSI Miami production team show the season three episode “Lost Son” under unfavorable weather (SPEIER, M., 2002, p. 33). However, photography heads managed to integrate rain in the episode’s narration and embarked on new measures to capture as much natural light as possible (Gray and Lotz, 2011, p. 31). The set design of CSI Miami organizes and personifies space to differentiate between scenes shot inside artificial set designs and those shot outdoors (Campaiola, 2008, p. 2). For instance, the “Lost Son” shows a precinct within a stunning glass building where CSI investigators collect scientific proof and brainstorm to solve a crime.

Here, every specialist is allotted his or her own special, calculated space for work (Fiske, 2010, p. 87). For instance, a coroner gets the freezing room because he deals with mostly dead organic matter that needs preservation, the detective gets a computer area or desk, and the DNA expert gets a lab (OWEN, 2003). Such set designs weave into the show’s narration almost perfectly since they organize character roles and facilitate their effectiveness (MCNUTT, 2011, p. 60). The outdoors set design for the same episode entails Miami city, a metropolitan that harbors many criminals and potential suspects (GELINEAU, K., 2005).ReferencesAllen, M 2007, Reading CSI: Crime TV Under the Microscope, Los Angeles, CA: I.B.Tauris.

Byers, M and Johnson, VM 2009, The CSI Effect: Television, Crime, and Governance, Los Angeles, CA: Rowman & Littlefield.Campaiola, JG 2008, “Why French Television Drama Lags Behind: A Multiperspectival Approach,” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Communication Association, TBA, Montreal, Quebec, Canada Online . 2014-11- 10 http://citation.allacademic.com/meta/p230567_index.htmlFiske, J 2010, Television Culture, New York, NY: Routledge.GELINEAU, K., 2005, May 01.

Students Learn How CSI Differs From CSI. The Washington Post, D01. ISSN 01908286.Gray, J and Lotz, AD 2011, Television Studies, New York, NY: Polity.MCNUTT, M., 2011. CSI. Velvet Light Trap, (68), pp. 60-61.OWEN, R 2003, Jul 06. SCIENCE IS THE STAR ON ‘CSI: MIAMI.’ Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, TV-5. ISSN 1068624X.SPEIER, M., 2002. CSI: Miami. Variety, 388(7), pp. 33.