Evaluation

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our music video that we have created and used a number of different forms and conventions of real media products. After looking into a number of different music videos, digi-paks and magazine advertisments we were able to distinguish between what was neccessary and what wasn't. Studying 'Goodwin's Theory Of Analysis' helped us to identify key features from other music videos from the genre that we have been looking at, and help to place them into our music video such as; key relationships, lip syncing, and also to identify how we could get a relationship between the lyrics, visuals and the music. Also looking through a number of different videos from the genre that we have been looking at (alternative-rock/folk), especially looking into a number of videos from the script, we were able to identify other convention that we would be able to use in our music video such as camera angles and transitions which would enhance the emotion and also sexualisation of our main character (Ally).

One convetion that we have worked especially hard upon is to keep the genre clear through-out. Helping us to maintain this through our music video, we have had a lot of inspiration from musicians such as 'The Script' 'The Fray' and also 'James Morrison'. The idea for the use of the guitar came from 'The Scripts' video 'Before The Worst', after analysing this and a number of others from themselves we saw that the use of instruments was a convention of this genre from this we decided that we would use a guitar to show our character expressing his emotion at the beginning of the video.

 Another way that we have tried to keep the genre clear is through the use of costume, we have used costume that would be common to see in alternative-rock videos including; jeans, chino's and shirts. We felt the genre of alternative-rock/ folk would be correct for our song choice of song 'Erick Baker - When Will I Be Loved' because the majority of their songs are about heartbreak and sad emotions therefore we continued to get our inspiration from these artists.

Lip syncing was also very important to us whilst creating our music video, as it is one of the most, if not the most important convention. We filmed Ally from a number of different angles lip syncing the song the whole way through, and chose the sections that we wanted to use. The amount of editing was phenomenon, and before hand i think we had overly underestimaded the amout of time and effort it takes to make the lip syncing perfectly in time. Whilst Ally is lip syncing, in the background we decided to play images from the past whilst the two are happy, contrasting the words of the song. We created a video on iMovie and played that off a projector to create the images reflecting onto ally and onto the back screen similar to The Scripts video 'Breakeven'.

Camera Angles and Mise en Scene were also kept as realistic and genre like through-out the video as possible also. After planning and research we had found that they use a majority of close-up's and extreme close up's. We have tried to implicate this as much as possible using this to help create an interest into our proganonist and a sense of sexualisation. We have also used the close-up's to show the emotion created in his face, and the strain and heartbreak the situation has put upon him (Ally).  We have also used a number of long shots, these shots allow us to create a sense of lonliness and seperation (in this case from Shannon, myself) and also seperation from the audience watching so he will feel very alone, this is also another convention of alternative-rock/folk genre music videos.

^ Above is an example of a close up shot.

^ Above is a example of a long shot used.

With the use of 'Auteur Theory' and looking at Jonas Akerlunds work through a number of different music video's he has created the use of 'Pink - Sober' helped us to concentrate on idea's and conventions that we could incorporate into our music video. The video used alot of very dark colours including black, white and browns and also shows a lot of different emotions through-out the video including hostility and heartbreak. The video includes a number close-up's and mid/long shots. Our video, the same to those created by Jonas Akerlund include the same structure which nearly all music video's follow; exposition, development, complication, climax and resoloution. This narrative structuring is shown clearly through our video with the heartache you can see clearly at the beginning, the introduction of the second character and how this effects our protagonist, the reject he once again suffers, and the reseloution of him trying to teach himself to move on.

2. How effective is the combination of your main product and your ancillary task?

Our ancillary task's also uses conventions of the same media text's. the digi-pak uses the same colour scheme of black and white through-out, and uses a four way fold and also includes a spinal image. On the tracklistings on the back we have also included an instrumental version of the song and also a live version which you would also find on typical single digi-pak's you would find on same in shops such as HMV. We have also choosen to include lyrics which is another typical  convention of digi-pak's. The magazine advertisment also uses a number of typical conventions such as including 'who' the single is by, in this case Erick Baker, 'when' the single will be released, 'where' the single will be available from and 'what' the single is called.

Both ancillary task's (both the magazine and digi-pak) follow the same style as the video, using black and white imagery throught-out keeping in line with the emotions of heartbreak, lonliness and hurt. We have decided to keep all three the same as so the audience are able to recognise that all three are linked together. When we made the first draft of our ancillary task, there was no similarities between the magazine and the video and digi-pak, after looking into this we decided that it was necessary to completley change it to find in with the image that we was after. The images we have choosen to use reflect the emotions show in the video such as that on the magazine advertisment. We have also used images that are taken in the same locations as the video was shot to create a sense of realism.

We believe we have created a brand between all three of the products that we have created. Becuase we have choosen to use the same themes through-out including the same black and white imagery throught all three, we have also choosen to use the same text font, this can be seen on work by artists such as Adele and The Script. Location has also played an important role on keep the brand of Erick Baker clear through-out, we have made use of the autumn scenery and played upon this for the single between the magazine advertisment, music video and digi-pak. We also believe that we have worked hard to create a brand that could be seen in 'NME', 'Q' or 'Kerrang' magazine, believing that it could also be seen on the 'NME' website under featured artists with the level of video that we believe we have created.

^ relavent to the website which we would wish our video

We believe that both ancillary tasks are direct and understanable to our choosen audience. We have not tried to over complicate neither the magazine advertisment nor the digi-pak as we want it to be available for everyone to see, use and buy. Both elements involve the protagonist, the same black and white editing and location to keep them entwined and relevant to one another.

3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

Audience feedback has played an important role on the creation of our media products. We have gained the majority of feedback from the questionnaire that we have created but also through feedback from posting our rough cut video onto facebook (a social media site). From our questionnaire we gained feedback that the song should be aimed at an age range of 16 - 30 and mainly women, although we didnt want to not allow anyone out of this category not to be able to watch and enjoy what we have produced.

Creating the questionnaire allowed us to ask people what they believed the song was about, and what emotions and feelings it made people think about. It also allowed us to change and make improvements to our rough cut. We gained back information that we should base our video around the emotions of; heartache, lonliness, rejection and reminiscence and tried to incorporate actions that this could reflect this feelings. you can see this during the final cut between 0.59 and 1.11. This is a clear example of including the sense of rejection that we had gained through the feedback. Below is an example of a moving shot, of Shannon (myself) rejecting Ally's call and throwing the phone away.

After the feedback we also wanted to bring in some lighter parts to the music video rather than it being dark and miserable through-out the majority of it. We wanted to include more than we had done originally done and so decided to this, and also made the lighting in the background brighter, to make them more uplifting.

From posting the video onto the social networking site facebook, it helped us to establish a number of elements that we should correct and fix that we had no previously noticed whilst looking at it as a group of four. We established that the lip syncing was out of time, we fixed this by sitting down and taking some more time editing in the scenes, we also re-filmed a section of the song to the lip-syncing looked clearer. We also felt that there wasn't a clear enough narrative structuring through-out the video and therefore decided that it would be beneficial to change some of the order of the video around making it more clear, and also making the sense of rejection a lot more clearer to the audience.

Feedback to our ancillary tasks was less than we had of hoped, although we still managed to keep the brand we had hoped for. We gained the majority of feedback from our own perspective, although we did show a number of people both the drafts of the magazine advertisment and the digi-pak. The feedback that we gained from the original advert was that there was no resembalance between that and the other two media products. We therefore decided that we wold change the image from the artist Erick Baker to our own actor, to be able to keep the imagery the same. The feedback that we gained from the digi-pak was espeically about the red writing on the lyric page, and the placement of the back cover. To fix the red lyrics we decicded that it would be best to change the colour and size of the font to make it easier for everyone to be able to read, by doing this we were also taking away the feeling of love and seductivness as that it what red symbalises, as this is a lost part of our video. We also changed the backcover, by adding a barcode to make it see more realistic.

4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction, research and planning and evaluation stages?  

How did you use new media technologies in

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Final Video - Erick Baker 'When Will I Be Loved'

Ancillary - Magazine - Final

This is our final magazine advertisment product, compared to the first draft that we have made there has been a number of changes we have decided to make to improve our advert. We have decided to use the same font that was used on the digi-pak but just making it bolder, and also capitalised. As described in the evaluation of our first draft we have decided to use a picture of our own main character (Ally), we believed with the side on shot of him it enables you to see the emotion that you would be able to see in the video. We also decided to keep to the same costume for the photos as to the video as to again keep the resemblance between the final product and the ancillary tasks.

We kept the same advertising statements the same that was on the first draft as we believed it was neccisary for them to know 'who' the artist is, 'when' they are able to get the new single, 'what' the single is and 'where' they are able to easily and quickly be able to get it from. Using these four techniques it tells the audience all they need to know about the new single and they are also able to see what the artist looks like, with the close up picture of the artist we are again using the technique of sexualisation similar to the first draft with Erick Baker. 

Ancillary- Digi-Pak - Final

This is our final draft of our digi-pak for part of our ancillary task. After changing a number of different elements from our original draft we came up with our final product.

This is the front cover to our digi-pak, we have tried to create a sense of loneliness for our main character, and believed with him leaning against the tree it created a sense of being outcast from the people around him, and a feeling of watching the world just pass him by. We have tried to keep the locations the same through-out both the video and ancillary products, as it is a single digi-pak that we are releasing and not a album so we are keeping the theme of the genre strong in all the products. We have decided to keep this the same from the original draft as we felt the colour scheme fitted well with the video and also the images. We also kept the red writing as we believed it stood out from the black and white background, and was what we wanted the audience to see the title of the song.

In the original digi-pak draft we had this section (the CD) red to reflect the lyrics page and also the colour on the front cover. We decided that this would no longer be the case and wanted to change it to being black and white to again fit in with the colour scheme. As you can see though the CD is actually brighter than the background and so this allowed us to use two tones of the black and whtie to create more of an effect although the image is all as one. The decision was made to keep in with the feeling of lonlieness and isolation, as using the red would create a more seductive, loving feeling which we dont want to come across.

This is the lyrics section, which we believed should go into the single diig-pak as it is a convention of all singles that are released. In the first draft we had the red lyrics against the wall, after looking at it a number of different times we decided that the lyrics were to difficult to read off of the wall. Firstly we changed the size of the lyrics to see if we would be able to keep the red writing, but this was unsuccessfull and decided to keep the large font but still change it too black. We did also try and change the writing to white but this had the same effect as the red writing. We decided to take this picture because we knew that with the wall we would be able to put the lyrics on it whilst still having the artist in it. Again also we have kept with the same emotions through-out, creating a sense of isolation.

 

This is the back cover to our digi-pak. We decided to have a picture of the main character (Ally) walking away from the camera as we believed that this kept in theme with the back cover. Also it shows a sense of emotion that he is walking away from the troubles that have been hurting him through-out the video. Also we have choosen to include both a instrumental version and live version which are usual conventions off singles that are released. We have also choosen to add a barcode which is different from the first draft that we did as we believe the barcode creates a more sense of realism, and that this is something that you could picture on a shelf of a music store such as HMV.

This is the spine to the CD case, we choose to create on after our first draft because we felt that this would add more detail to our digi-pak. Again we have kept this in theme with the genre and the rest of the the digi-pak, and believed that we should include the spine because if the CD was to stocked on a shelf not facing forward, you would still be able to identify the artist and song.

Ancillary - Magazine - First Draft

This was our first attempt at the ancillary tast for the magazine advertisment for our music video. We decided that we would use a full scale picture of Erick Baker close up as a technique of sexualisation of the artsist so that it would be able to draw in people that did not neccesarily know the song or the artist. We also decide to use huge size writing with the artists name (left hand side) as so straight away when you open up the magazine you know exactly who is being advertised.

Once finishing off the music video, we decided that we wanted to make a number of changes to the magazine advertisment. Firstly we decided that we wanted to change the main image from a picture of the artist Erick Baker to a picture of our main character (Ally). We believed with the black and white theme that we have during the video should be implicated into the advertisment, and should also have our own actor in it as it is easier for people to be able to resemble from the video to both of the ancillary tasks. Also the black writing against the the coloured background we believed was very hard to see, so changing to the darker background, we have decided that we should use a brighter writing for it to be able to stand out. 

Ancillary - Digi-Pak - First Draft

Editing Techniques

Editing techniques that we have tried to incorporate into our music video include a number from The Script. We have tried to base a majority of our work upon their's, we have used them as an important influence on our work and here are a number of editing techniques we have tried to use.

We tried to recreate this picture this image from The Scripts video Breakeven, we took a video and played it in the background via a projector. The background images were placed there with the intention to create emotions of heartache by seeing previous memories, the ideo of reminicing and pondering on previous happier times.

Again from The Scripts video Breakeven, we wanted to be able to recreate the scene above. After watching the video numerous times we decided that we felt this justified the feeling of walking away, leaving what troubles you have and trying to forget about them. Although the backgrounds of the street and then sea are completley different, i believe the body language both speak clearly that something is wronng as backs are slumped and arms are in their pockets.

We also decided to put in a mobile phone, people now use this digital technology in everyday life and see it as an essential to being able to contact friends and the ones that they love. Mobile phones are shown in a number of different music videos and as a group we decided to play on this and use it as another way that the girl (myself) is able to reject speaking or getting back into contact with the main character.