During Movement Control Order (MCO) of COVID-19, many information has been disseminated through both traditional and social media. Some of that information was credible and came from reliable sources while other information was fake and included misinformation, disinformation, and infodemic. The people needed credible information rather than fake one in this critical time. This study aimed to explore the credibility of media, information sources, the main issues, and preferred communication patterns and method of works perceived by Malaysians during MCO. A total of 300 questionnaires were distributed, and 210 were returned. The results of this study showed that the majority of respondents 69% relied on new media as their main source of information compared to 30.9% who relied on traditional media. However, a total of 64.8% of respondents considered traditional media as more credible and accurate compared to 35.2% for new media. Additionally, the main concerns and issues followed by respondents on media were health, economic, social, education and others. Finally, a total of 55.7% preferred face to face communication compared to 44.3% who preferred online communication. A total of 51% of respondents preferred to work from the workplace or office compared to 49% who preferred to work from home. Television played a significant role during the pandemic period due to its high credibility as perceived by Malaysians. The main intriguing implication of this study is considering the traditional media as more credible than social media by the Malaysians although the social media was their main source of information.

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News patterns on health information have an effect on social cognition and public attitudes as the pandemic progresses. Online news agencies have used a range of tools to engage with social media users in order to compete with others. The main and essential point of this study is analysing the frequency and form of online news coverage about the pandemic by the online news agencies in Malaysia. Quantitative content analysis was used in this study to analyse the news patterns such as news slants, dimensions of news, and news values on the coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Facebook fan page of MalaysiaKini during Movement Control Order 1.0 and 2.0. The research result shown that, there has been a major drop in the frequency of COVID-19 related news stories between MCO 1.0 and 2.0, with 73.5% versus 26.5%, respectively. Covid-19 news in news slants during MCO 1.0 was more neutral in nature, whereas in MCO 2.0, these are more alarming in nature. News with a social problem dimension had the highest volume in MC0 1.0. However, a majority of the news in MCO 2.0 has a health risk dimension. This research also shows that news with a political dimension receives more engagement than others in the MalaysiaKini Facebook pages, from the social media users, where the engagement can be seen in the form of comments and shares. MalaysiaKini frames the news with various news patterns in general, but news audiences are more interested in serious and political news.

Documentary films are so-called non-fiction films that have the elements of persuasion, objective content and candid cinematic techniques. It is an important propaganda tool for assisting the government in the development of the country and changing people's attitudes. The Freedom Film Fest, held annually since 2003 by the Community Communications Center, provides indie documentaries an alternative and more freedom for indie documentary filmmakers to represent social, economic and political issues. However, this genre of media has not received much attention especially from the youth or film industry as it is considered a less attractive medium. Most indie documentary filmmakers no longer produce documentaries as they are not well received. The objective of this study is to identify the problems faced by documentary filmmakers, especially those called indie filmmakers in Malaysia. Interviews with five indie documentary film makers and filmmakers were conducted in this research to examine the problems they faced in producing documentary films. The results have shown that the lack of distribution and broadcasting platforms, finance, promotions, legal restrictions, production techniques and flawed production plans are the main problems faced by indie documentary filmmakers in the Malaysian industry. Keywords: Indie documentary film, documentary filmmaker, Malaysia film industry, broadcasting and distribution, Critical thinking.