Codes and Conventions

Codes are things you apply to Genres.
E.g. Horror: Knives, Blood and Masks. Hospital: Surgical, uniforms, hospitals.
Coventions are scenes you expect to see in Genres.
E.g. Horror: chase scenes, montage shots to build suspense, good vs evil. Tv dramas: realistic locations and parallel naratives, use of shot reverse shot and realistic narrative.

Conventions of Tv dramas:
Characters
Stories use dialogue to tell the stories.
Familiar back drops e.g. home, police stations and hospitals.
Camerawork: establishing shots to set scene, mid shots of characters, close ups to show characters emotions and shot reverse shots to show character interaction.
Music is used to punctuate the action, create effects and underline emotion.
Particular subgenres tend to have items which make them imediateltly identifiable, e.g. police cars blue lights etc in hospital dramas.