January Activities Plan

 

Feedback and improvements classroom task

Our class members looked through our products (music video,digipak and advert) and decided to give us feedback in what has worked well and what we could possibly improve.

The class members thought that our strengths os far were the ratings on our poster, showing relevance to the band's genre, and the creation of our record label. They liked how the colours from the record label consistently matched our products by the use of colour and was always visibly clear in all of our products.

When they chose what we could possibly improve on, they suggested that the continuity of the images was not shown on the digipak and poster and thought it would be best if they matched in some way. They also thought that the colour co-ordination between the ties should be changed as it would help give the ancillary texts a more professional finish.

When asked how effective the brand identity was throughout all of our products, they agreed that the use of the same font in the digipak and advert worked really well and the use of the record label appearing at the end of the music video helped bring all of our products together. The name of the band has been shown also on the digipak and advert, therefore making the name of the band very clear.

Once we got our feedback back, we didn't agree with the colour co-ordination as we kept the colours red,black and white consistantly throughout although we did take into consideration the colour of the ties and will therefore change this little error. We agreed also that the images may not have been placed in the best place appropriate and will also make changes to that.

In conclusion to our feedback we have took criticism on board and applied their decision into our work, making the finished products more professional and more fluent within the combination with one another.

Evaluation Question 4

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


For this evaluation we will show most of the technologies used throughout the production of our project. 


Construction

• Final Cut
• QR Codes
• Photoshop
• Camera Information
• Vista Print
• Filming on Location

Research 

• Blogger
• Google Questionnaires
• Slideshare

Planning

• iMovie

Evaluation

• Facebook
• Youtube
• Filming Audience Responses

Evaluation Question 3

Q.3. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Video Responses

Youtube Responses

Facebook Responses

....

Evaluation Question 2

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

Our music video challenges Laura Mulvey’s theory of ‘The Male Gaze’, as in our main products and ancillary texts, the males are the subject of focus. Although the gender challenges her theory, the actually theory that the person is being seen in a pleasurable way is still accurate. The guitarist in our music video is shown close up while playing the guitar. As his shirt is rolled up to his elbows, his muscles here are present. Whereas on the advert poster, we have shown all of the band members which are males. This occurs through the digipak however one of the images in the digipak show the band looking more relaxed as one of the members has undone his tie. This has been created to make the band seem more seductive to their audience.

Throughout our music video we have also attempted to make the jump shots quick and sharp. This can be seen by the use of colour in the digipak and advert as no colour blends to one another as we wanted our work to make a bold statement. The colours (red, black and white) are consistent throughout all of our tasks also however the colour blue on the discs is irrelevant. As we used these colours in the music video we have decided to incorporate them onto the record label as well as on the ancillary texts. The colours we have chosen, we think fits the genre of Indie music. Our music video is called ‘Apply Some Pressure’ and when we researched the original version, we realised that they had went to some extremes to show pressure (nosebleed). We therefore decided to use the connotations of pressure and ended up with the colour red. We felt that the black would also work as they both complement each other and the colours combined could show anger and frustration as well as the emotion we were going for, (pressure). The song titles therefore represent these type of emotions.

We have taken images with the band were they were wearing the same clothing from the main product and used them on both of the ancillary texts. This gives the audience some shared knowledge of the product and will be able to identify what is being advertised. During the creation of the ancillary texts, we made sure that the font was the same as we wanted to make sure that both of these texts were consistent throughout.

Evaluation Question 1

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

Our music video which we have produced shows many conventions in which our product can be related to real music videos. The genre of the music we used was indie, therefore we researched the genre making sure that our music video looked to the best standard possible as a real music video. As we had found out that most indie bands show the artists performing their song, we realised that this relates to Andrew Goodwin’s theory of performance and narrative. We asked people on a survey which they preferred (narrative or performance) with the majority liking either performance or both. We therefore thought it would be best to show a narrative and performance in our music video. This would show the audience that we had acknowledged the survey as well as using Goodwin’s beliefs in what should be in a music video.

Andrew Goodwin also identified how thought beats, help the audience see the sound. We have attempted this in our music video as we felt that it would be challenging for us to create as the song we chose (‘apply some pressure’ by Maximo Park) had a fast tempo, however we understood that the effect would be rewarding as it would look more similar to a professional music video. We feel that the thought beats compliment the lyrics as throughout the pressure is built up as the thought beats become more stronger.

The star image that Andrew Goodwin believes that every music video should have, is shown through the singer’s performance. As the song is about pressure we decided to make the singer look like he is fidgeting. This happens in the original music video of ‘Apply Some Pressure’ by Maximo Park. Once we had looked into this we tried to make the fidgeting seem more out of control. We then found a mutual artist, Jake Morley, who used a technique that involved playing the music video in double speed. We then added this type of effect by speeding the video up in certain areas in which the artist was singing on his own. We feel that by doing this technique as well as fidgeting would give the impression of the artist under pressure and that he has reached the limit. Richard Dyer’s theory helps support our music video as we have constructed the lead singer to perform in a certain way. We also feel that as looking at White’s theory, we think that we are the gatekeepers within this production.

According to Goodwin’s research of the visuals of a music video. We feel that our music video seems to show signs of illustrated visuals as at the beginning the lyrics mention ‘inside my head, were things I’d never thought about’. This is then shown through the video as the singer points to his head and gives the impression that it is out of control.Theorist Carol Vernallis also thinks that the visuals within the video should illustrate the lyrics. Our music video also shows signs of disconjunctured visuals. As the artist performs with his band, the lyrics say, ‘you know that I, would like to see you undress’. Vernallis mentions that the music video may bring questions to the end of the video, however they may not be answered. Our music video supports this theory as our music videos triggers a lot of questions such as, ‘Why is the lead singer feeling under pressure?’ ‘Why are the pan and match related in this way?’.

We agree with Goodwin’s theory that the technical aspects hold the music video together and help the fluent course of the video. We have added jump cuts and have used different shots (ie.meat shot) during a short and fast period of time, giving our music video more tension and pressure towards the end.

Making of Final Digipak

Making of Final Advert

Futher Merchandise Ideas

Final Digipak Design

( click to enlarge )

Final Advert Design

Mock up Digipak and Advert

Final Music Video Analysis (unfinished)

Holding a shot steady, where appropriate:

Before filming our actual video, Sean and I decided to film all shots using a tripod rather than using free-hand shots. The tripod ensured that all shots will be steady and that no shaking will occur, unless later added using editing tools in Final Cut. I can therefore verify that all shots used are steady and fulfill this marking aspect.

Framing a shot, including and excluding elements as appropriate:

Framing a shot is all about capturing the correct footage you need inside the lens, and excluding all the aspects that you don't need. Background factors which can spoil footage is the inclusion of dead space in the background or the lighting rig. We tried our hardest to make the center of the shot the main focus, however some shots vary which is all deliberate.

Using a variety of shot distances as appropriate:

Using the same shot distance throughout the whole video would make the video seem tedious and boring for the viewer to watch. With a little bit of creativity, Sean and I used a variety of shots to draw the audience closer and to capture the main focus points, for example a part of the video includes an extreme close-up of the males feet as he dances, and if we used a long shot to capture that dancing, we wouldn't be emphasizing his talent as much.

Shooting material appropriate to the task set:

Upon scheduling and planning our time for the music video, Sean and I performed background research in which we looked into genre conventions from other music videos of the same type, such as Jason Derulo and Ne-yo, as well as audience research into what fans of this genre expected from the music videos.

Selecting mise-en-scene including colour, figure, lighting, objects and setting:

Looking at other artists such as Usher, Ne-yo and Chris Brown, we realized that a lot of these artists wear casual/formal attire consisting of blazers and trilbies. The digipak and advert was promoted in black and white, in order to give a feel of nostalgia, however the females lips are spilled with red, showing lust and love, hence showing that we thought about this factor. The females lips are also spilled red in the actual video at certain points. The setting of part of the video was in a nightclub called The Showroom which is situated in Hartlepool. We chose to film in a nightclub because of the popular culture that Usher falls into in the current day, and his music would be played in a club. The exposure of the female also gives the feeling of a "night out" as she is dressed to impress the male. The other film location, which was the studio, was used to capture intimate shots, as well as take advantage of the lighting rig provided, as well as the green screen behind and highly technological camera software.

Using varied shot transitions, captions and other effects selectively and appropriately:

Not all of our shots linked in with each other, due to filming and other disturbances, therefore in order for it to flow correctly in certain places, we inputted certain transitions such as fades, dissolves and blends accordingly. We selected the location of these transitions so that they made an impact, instead of making the video just look like it was badly organized.

Using sound with images and editing appropriately for the task:

We didn't use sound and still images combined much throughout our video, but we did use it for the completion of our animatic before we actually constructed the final video. Another instance where we used this combination was on most of the evaluation questions in which stills from other music videos, as well as our own, where included for evidence purposes, along with bits from the song and also a commentary from both Sean and I.