Evaluation Question 4 Draft

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

Blogger

Blogger was my most used media technology as I used it to present my coursework as well as so I could locate my progression and work. I learnt how to import images and videos to Blogger so I could have references alongside my work. Blogger is reliable as it ran my google so it is accessible by the internet and it is free to use.

Adobe Premiere Pro

I used this media technology that I used frequently during editing process of my official music video and my mock music video. I used the effects it offers to edit the lighting, contrast, colour correction, duration, and the speed of my shots. All the editing made my music video look extremely more professional than without it. What attracted me to Adobe Premier Pro was that it was easy to use and it is a popular editing application so I could find online tutorials if I needed help. 

Adobe Photoshop CS6

I used Photoshop for the creation and editing for my digipak and my magazine advert. I did this because I was familiar with it as I used it for my media coursework last year and I know that it is easy to use and there are a lot of online tutorials I could what to further my knowledge. I also used Photoshop to create the song title and artist name at the start of my music video, I did this because in Photoshop I can save it as a PNG so that the background was clear and import it to Premier Pro to layer over the video footage.

Google Drive

I used this technology regularly throughout my coursework as it is a reliable way to transfer and save data from one computer to another. I mostly stored video clips and images from my camera on Google Drive as it is easily assessable on the internet as it ran by Google. 

YouTube

I used YouTube to upload my draft and final music video, as it’s a simple platform for sharing videos and easy to imbed the links of my videos from YouTube onto blogger. I also used it for market research and inspirational videos as I watched many professional existing music videos to see what types of music videos real artists generate and the quality of the professionalism.

Evaluation Question 3 Draft

Evaluation Question 3 What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Music Video 

I pitched my music video to my class by a power point with a verbal presentation explaining my concept and my vision for my music video. After this my class and my teacher gave me feedback, this was extremely helpful as the people in my class are in the age range my target audience is for my video, so their feedback was reverent to improving my concept. A lot of the feedback was making sure I filmed enough clips whilst I was in the ‘summer holiday’ location as I would be going abroad with my actors for a week-long holiday so I wouldn’t get a second chance to go back and refilm shots if I needed to when we arrived back to England. This was helpful as when I was filming abroad, I had a list of specific shots that I wanted to film and this was useful as it meant I wouldn’t miss an important shot in the ‘holiday’ location. I also filmed extra shots just in case I needed them during the editing process of my mock video or for the final video, this was extremely successful as I used some of the extra shots in my final music video to replace others. 

During the editing of my draft music video, I received feedback from my teacher to improve the quality of the editing, I was told to shorten the length of the shots and that the ‘bedroom’ location for the video didn’t ‘fit’ with the vide. Due to this, I made the creative decision to replace the ‘bedroom’ shots with more performance shots. The performance shots that would replace the ‘bedroom’ shots would be filmed in a white studio which my school offers to the media department. I would then add an overlay of colourful visual effects to the shots in the editing process to add an interesting a pleasing visual. 

During the editing for my final music video, my teacher gave me verbal feedback to add more performance shots to the video as my artist should have a more focal point in the video as well as making some shots have a tighter framing and some shots shorter. This was helpful as It would make my video look more professional.

Ancillary Texts: 

From the feedback my teacher gave me on my mock digipack I was advised to make the barcode smaller, add legal text, add a cereal code and the logo of the music company my artist is signed to, and to replace one of the artist images with an image that doesn’t feature my artist in it as I had to many images that featured my artist. The feedback was very vital as it improved the quality of the digipack as a whole. 

The feedback that I obtained from my teacher on my mock magazine advert was to move the ‘CD. Vinyl. Download’ to the bottom left of the advert, and that NME give /10 ratings instead of star. This feedback made my magazine advert look more professional.

Evaluation Question 2 Draft

Evaluation Question 2 How effective is the Combination of Your Main Product and Ancillary Texts?

The end results of my music video, digipak and magazine advert are very effective because they all flow together successfully in terms of branding of my artist. I have demonstrated this clearly as my artist’s performance in the music video is the main focus in the video, she is also on the digipack cover as well as on the back and inside of the digipack and she is also the main feature on my magazine advert. This is to give my artist identity so the audience can pair her name with her face. I wanted to make my artist relatable to the audience as this will make her appeal to them more over a unrelatable artist. I successfully did this by how I had my artist dress as I had her in fashionable clothing but also keeping a relatable fashion sense that the audience could relate to. Some examples of existing female artists that currently achieve this are Dua Lipa and Arianna Grande, who are unlike other existing female artists such as Lady Gaga and Katy Perry who dress in unrelatable artistic styles, I want my artist to be seen as the opposite of Lady Gaga and Katy Perry just like how Dua Lipa and Arianna Grande are. Another way that I successfully executed the relation of my Ancillary Texts for the branding of my artist is the woodland theme I created across them, on the cover of my Digipack and Magazine Advert my artist is pitured leaning against a tree, this is successful in how I want to brand my artist as relatable to the audience as she isn’t pictured with an artificial background which the audience can’t associate themselves with so by having a woodland background, my artist is seen as relatable and more appealing so the audience is more likely to buy the album.

Evaluation Question 1 Draft

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

Music Video  

The music video to ‘Alone No More’ by producer Philip George that is sang by Anton Powers inspired my narrative for my music video. The narrative in the video features a happy young couple enjoying their time on holiday in a hot country. The narrative fits with the genera of ‘Alone no More’ as it is in the House music genera and the majority of music videos for House songs share the location of a hot county. This is because House music is associated with dancing in clubs and beaches and the up-beat tempo represents the excitement of going on holiday to a warm foreign country. This relates to my choice of song for my music video, ‘Love In Ruins’ by producer Griffin sang by Sinead Harnett as this song is also apart of the House music genera. I liked the storyline of the couple on holiday so I incorporated it into my video for the up-beat parts of the song. This means my video conforms to the convention of having a ‘holiday’ location for the narrative because of the genera of the video. However, the song ‘Love In Ruins’ does have verses with a slow tempo so I wanted to incorporate some lip-synching with my generated artist. The identity of my artist challenges the convention of the majority of house music artists as they are mostly producers that get featuring artists to sing the lyrics of the song, however my artist is purely a singer whose songs are in the House music genre. This is successful as my artist stands out in a positive way and could be seen as ‘trendy’ and modern which every artist aspires to be. Because the verses in the song ‘Love In Ruins’ have a slow tempo compared to the fast up-beat tempo in the chorus, I wanted the location of the narrative and lip-synching to contrast against the ‘happy’ bright holiday location in the chorus. The song ‘Last Dance’ by Dua Lipa gave me the idea to have the contrasting location in a autumnal woodland area, I would have lip-synching in the woodland area and also incorporate it into my narrative so it fits in with the video. The woodland location in my video challenges the convention of having a House music song with a summer holiday location throughout the video. 

Digipack

Dua Lipa’s cover art for the single ‘New Love’ inspired the background cover for my digipack by having a single photo of the artist against a detailed background as the background for the cover. I liked it as it is simple but effective as the photo has lots of detail in it so It looks very visually pleasing. During more market research I found a lot of album covers for female artists follow this convention of having a photo of the female artist as the main feature of the cover. This is to add identity to the artist and in a more visually stimulating way rather than the artist photoshopped onto a blank background, because of this I followed this convention. Famous photographer Arnaud Pyyvka inspired my photo for my artist as I really like how he uses nature as a background in his photography which is similar to the cover photo for Dua Lipa’s single album cover art. H
e also uses muted filters on his photos which I think looks really effective with the detail in his photography so I wanted to use his photography style and editing for all the images of my digipack. This challenge the convention of most album covers and digipack design for female artists as they most likely always feature bright bold colours or pure black and white, so my digipack stands out against them. I challenged the convention of having the artist look towards the camera with direct mode of address on the cover as I had my artist look to the side. This is because it makes my artist intriguing and mysterious so it would attract the audience as she stands out against the covers with the artist look towards the camera on the cover. I followed the convention of having a barcode, legal print, record label and catalogue number. I didn’t develop or challenge this because they are essential parts of a digipack and by keeping them makes my digipack look more professional as a whole.

Magazine Advert

The magazine advert for ‘Rated R’ by Rihanna inspired my magazine advert as it has the image of the album cover as the main focus of the poster, I think this is successful as it is clear what it is advertising at first glance. This is a common convention of magazine adverts as when I did more research into other magazine adverts, the vast majority of them had the image of the album cover so I followed this convention. I also liked the black text box with white writing on the magazine advert for ‘Rated R’ as it makes the text extremely eye catching which is what I want for my magazine advert. However, I developed this as I also added white textboxes as well as the black text box. This is successful as it creates a contrast and makes the text stand out more. I followed the convention of Rule of Thirds and this is successful as my design looks very satisfying to the eye, the ‘Aela’ text is one third, the image of the Artist is another third and the date when the album is realised is another third. During more research into other existing magazine adverts, I found that a lot of them had positive reviews about the album on the advert. This is a successful convention as it promotes the album as the sources that reviewed the albums are creditable and reliable sources. I used these real-life sources for my magazine advert as it makes the magazine advert more realistic, professional and effective with marketing the album.