Evaluation

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

Music videos can be experimental in creative genres as they are used as a promotional tool for the band. By looking in to the punk rock, hardcore and metal music, I wanted to explore the conventions of this genre as it is what I know best within the music media.

In mainstream media, the conventions of a music video often amplify the lyrics of the song through a narrative.  The narrative can sometimes be ambiguous which is often present in the conventions of hardcore and metal music videos.  Narrative is less common in this genre as there tends to be an emphasis on spectacle and performance instead. Similar to mainstream videos, my genre of music contains scenes and shots of the artists’ performance at a concert/gig.  For the bands that I have based my video on, it is significant to mention that they do not have lots of money from either not being a signed band, or new to the signed industry with a company that isn’t very well known. This emphasises the fact that the quality of their music videos aren’t necessarily good due to old cameras and low budget.  This subverts to the conventions of the mainstream media as many mainstream videos often have high budgets allowing them to have non naturalistic settings with effects such as CGI.  They are able to have more of a variation of mise en scene and setting by simply able to fund it.  This has connotations of wealthy artists as mainstream music is funded better due to a wider target audience.  The punk rock and metal genres aren’t as well known as they used to be, therefore funding is lower unless they are a well established band due to clever promotional tools and hard work.

There has always been a ‘do it yourself’ ethic about the genre established in the 1970’s which is in contrast to the slick, alike look that had been common and popular at the time.  Punk rock promotes the ideology of rebellion and individualism and freedom of this manufactured pop feeling. Ironically, by having this genre developing in the 21^st century, this rebellious and ‘individual’ look is becoming more and more common, therefore not having the same effect as it once did.

With the mise en scene in my video, it conforms to the conventions of the genre due to shots of the band practicing and performing which is common in most punk rock music.  Their priority and focus is the music that they create, therefore this is the best promotional tool to rely on as most of their money is made from the many gigs and concerts that they perform at.  This is different to mainstream media as artists bring out other products to sell their name or band with books, perfumes etc.  The colours used in my video conform to conventions of punk rock music as it includes many bright colours and edits emphasising the idea of punk rock which is colourful and upbeat.  This is also reflected in the editing of the video with transitions that correspond to the music beat itself.  The pace of the video runs with the video if there are slow parts as the video itself will slow down in motion.  Also, I have used dissolves which are used for the transition of slower parts of the song. I have kept to the conventions of my genre by including more jump cuts as the speed of the music increases.  I believe that my genre of music that I have used takes elements from all music genres and embraces them to create their own unique videos and music.  In my video, I have included a range two main different settings to do both of the following things: meet the conventions of a low-budget punk rock video and to conform to mainstream music by including different settings.

I have been careful in my selection of characters so that I can portray the image of a rock band.  The clothes that they wear exemplify this as two members wear different band t-shirts, jeans and vans which is the common look of hardcore music.  Some members also have longer hair which also conforms to the conventions of this genre. The persona of the characters allows the audience to identify the band and have a connection with them.  This is because they have a similar look in clothing showing resemblance and unity between the two.

In my feedback that I received from non-Media students, some found it hard to understand the concept of not having a strong and direct narrative in the music video.  These feedback students were in year 8 and most listened to mainstream music.  They are used to watching videos with strong narratives which contrasts to my video. I have not created a narrative that has to be understood as this is not common in low budget videos.  The film is simply of a band practicing and performing on tour and having fun in-between. I wanted to create a humourous video as I believe that this is important for upcoming bands to promote their personalities in the video which I think I have established as I got lots of positive feedback on the comedy element to the video.  I emphasised these ideas by using a variety of camera angles such as long, mid and close up shots.  I used a tripod for a few pan and tracking shots which I think is important in any music video to establish a different impact and effect on the audience. I was unable to conform to some conventions such as creating an arc due to unable being to obviously fund a crane to create an extremely high shot looking down on the band.  However, I challenged this convention by doing a small tilt underneath one of the members from below as I did a close up of his face looking down at the camera.

However, I did receive some feedback from people that had the same taste in music to my genre that I created a video for.  They believed that the video did well to conform to the conventions of not having a narrative.  In addition to this, they felt that the mise en scene and the ‘rough and ready’ feel was appropriate and deliberate.

I believed that I have developed the conventions of real media products through my ancillary tasks in particular.  These promotional tools are media texts in themselves which create and develop the personal image of the band. I have conformed to the conventions of both mainstream media and the punk rock genre in my ancillary tasks by including both of the name of the artist and album.  I have particularly made sure that I created the name of the band larger on both ancillary tasks to make sure that it would advertise the band more so that the target audience would be familiar with a new upcoming band.  The images in the ancillary tasks themselves conform to the genre as it includes a graphic image of a person rather than the band itself.  I have challenged and developed the conventions of the ancillary tasks by using different colours for both of the images.  I have been careful to select my images to make sure that they still relate to the video.

I have used bright colours to conform to the conventions of punk rock music. This is because I think that it is important for the band to establish their genre to their target audience so that is recognisable to their audience as they would be familiar with this type of promotion.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?For the relation between my main product and ancillary texts, I wanted to emphasise the dissonance and unconventional connections within genres outside of mainstream music. It is important to promote an artist across a range of media platforms. I have done this by using two different images for my CD cover and advertisement that may not be as recognisable in the video itself.  At a first glance, it appears to seem that there is no continuity. However, when looking in depth in to all three texts, you can see how they do relate. The ancillary texts have a direct relation by having the same character in both of the images; however, this isn’t as noticeable.  In both images, it is clear to see that the same shoe is featured in them.  This shows how the mise en scene for the ancillary tasks is the same as the clothing is used.  The difference is that the advertisement is in bold colour whilst the CD cover is in black and white.  I have done this deliberately to connote the different personalities that the band can denote which is common in this genre.

The idea of having the same mise en scene in all three of my products was important to show visual continuity and intertextuality. In the advertisement, there are images of shoes, a guitar, an amp and a person in clothing similar to what is used on the band members in the video.  I included these elements to the ancillary tasks to denote a direct relationship between the music video and the album in which it is released on as well as the advertisement that promotes it.

I believe that continuity of the font of the advertisement and CD cover can be used to show an effective combination of my products.  I have used the same font for both of these products to show a relationship between them.  In addition to this, I was specific in choosing certain  colours for the text as I thought that this was a key element that I could use to relate ancillary tasks with my video in another way.  In my music video, there is a use of bright colours and flashing lights.  This is reflected in my ancillary tasks by having bright and bold fonts and colours.

I think that it is important that I chose this music genre as I was able to subvert the conventions of mainstream media to research and show how music videos and promotional tools can be viewed in a different way. I kept to punk rock conventions so that it was successful in promotion amongst the target audience by creating products that this audience would understand and relate to.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?My audience feedback has allowed me to believe that I have met the requirements of the brief.  The feedback from both the target audience and other people of different ages has shown that I have done well to create media products within the expectations and means of a punk rock genre.

To look at the specifics of my feedback, the students of year 8 gave general feedback of how my video was ‘funny’ and ‘made the whole class laugh’. This is what I intended as I didn’t have a specific narrative.  However, the younger audience did not understand this concept of not having a narrative.  This is because usually they are the target audience for mainstream media as this is publicised more than the genre that I had chosen.  I have learnt that it may have been effective if I had included a slight narrative so that I would have been able to broaden by target audience.  This would help with promoting music of this genre if it appealed to people that it is not originally intended for.

Another key thing mentioned by in my audience feedback is that they liked the transitions between the different scenes as there were 'good effects' and it was 'creative'.  I learnt from this that I did well to develop the technical aspect to the video transition and camera angles.  Another feedback writer said how it was 'original' what I had created and that it 'fitted well with the music' due to the jump cuts that were linked to the upbeat points of the song.

After I showed my audience the video, I then showed them the ancillary tasks. The general message I got from the feedback was that it 'linked well' due to the 'colours used in both the video and the ancillary tasks'.  One person mentioned in specific the link they noticed between the colour of the font  on the ancillary tasks and 'the changing colour flash' at the beginning of the video.  I learnt that the colour of the ancillary tasks that I had created was significant as this was the key thing mentioned by the audience when they looked for the relationship between them and the video.

One key thing I have learnt from my feedback is that the ancillary tasks are an effective promotional tool as it was clear for the audience to realise that the pieces linked together due to the colours, text and mise en scene.

How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?Using new media technologies allowed me to develop all elements of my coursework for A2 like researching, planning, construction and evaluation.  Like my AS Media coursework, I used the basic media technologies such as the computer and a DSLR camera which then allowed me to develop my skills on photo editing software such as Photoshop.  I developed these skills further in my A2 coursework as I had learnt how to use this software due to experimenting with effects. Within the space of a year, I have developed my photo taking skills with my DSLR by experimenting with different scenery. Another basic media technology I used was the scanner so I was able to scan in images of the storyboard that I had created in the planning element to my coursework.

However, for this A2 coursework there were many different technologies that I used that I didn't use last year.  I spent a lot more time this year on the internet researching different music videos along with what other people's opinions were of different genres and what were the expectations of these. The use of the internet was key in all four elements to my coursework as I developed my research skills which allowed me to find out more information to include in my evaluation. It also helped with more ideas with the actual construction of my music video and ancillary tasks. The online video site 'YouTube' helped me specifically with ideas for the construction of my video, planning and research.  This was due to being able to see different ideas which allowed me to incorporate them with my own.

There are two key media technologies that I used this year which I didn't last year which were necessities with my coursework this year. I used a video camera which I hadn't used much in the past.  I used a friend's 'FlipCam' which I had previously used to film short, quick clips.  It was easy to use as I was able to zoom at a pace that I wanted and it was easy to hold which didn't give the effect of a shaky hand in my video itself. It helped with being able to store  a lot of short clips as I was then able to incorporate them together to create the video.  There is a FlipCam editing software built in to the camera which helped me greatly with the construction side to my video as I was able to edit and delete any unwanted footage.

To construct the video as a final piece I used Windows Movie Maker.  As I had problems with using the Apple Mac software when I was planning ideas with my video, I thought that it would be better to use Movie Maker as it was straight forward and I was used to this operating software. 

My final video

My final ancillary tasks

Below are images of my final ancillary tasks after analysing and recieving feedback from my prior designs.

At a first glance, it would appear that there isn't a direct continuity between these ancillary pieces. However, this is not the case.  Bands of the punk rock genre tend to create CD covers and advertisements that do not show a direct corellation. Despite this, if the target audience look in to the media texts, they will be able to see that there is a link. For example, in both of the album cover and advertisement, there is a 'Vans' shoe featured in them, but one is not the main element to the picture whereas it is in another.  There is still this relationship in all of the pictures.  On the front cover of the album and the advertisement, there is a link with the colour of the font.
The back image has a link to the front cover and advertisement again due to the image of the shoe.  In addition to this, it features the letters 'LTA' in the image which relates to the text in both the advertisement and front cover.

The images below show the inside of the album cover. I have included lyrics to the first song on one of the images that I had taken.  I wanted to include the rest of the images below for the inside of the album cover so that the target audience were able to see what sort of things this band would get up to on tour.

Designing my ancillary tasks

I designed and edited the ancillary tasks at the same time as I believed that it would help in ensuring that there is continuity in the two products. I created many different versions of both the CD front cover, back cover and advertisement.  I think that it is important in experimenting with ideas which will help establish the best products that can be made.  I edited my products on Adobe Flash, Photoshop, Word and http://www.picnik.com/.  These different softwares allowed me to edit the products in various ways.  For example, the Picnik photo editing website allowed me to include different fonts of text. I used the Photoshop software to edit the colours and texture of the pictures to emphasise the look that I have wanted to create for the artist and the video. Microsoft Word allowed me to touch up the picturs in contrast and exposure.  Also, it helped me with my creating the spine and back cover of m album as I was able to position the pictures and text to a specfic resolution for the actual size of an album.

Below are the designs that I created before my final piece. I did many edits of designs as I wanted to have a choice of what I could use. I played around with the software that I was using to ensure that I had created the best ancillary products that I could which would relate to my video the most. It was important to show continuity.

Taking pictures for my CD cover and advertisement

After analysing different media, I then went out to take many different shots for my advertisement and CD cover. In all, I took around 250 pictures to ensure that I got the right shot and to look through them all to decide on the best images.  I went through each one to delete ones that I wouldn't be able to use such as blurry ones and ones with either too high exposure or contrast.

Here are a few examples of these types of images:

I did not use this image because it is slightly out of focus. It is unclear of what is on top of the amp which doesn't add to the full effect of the picture:

I thought that this second image was extremely blurry and decided that I shouldn't use it. Even though I did like the effect as it is orignal and different and looks as if the image has been taken through the eyes of one of the band members. I think that it would be hard for the target audience to understand this concept at a quick glance of an advertisement.



I used a few different locations to decide where the best pictures would be for the two ancillary tasks.  The locations I used were two alleyways, the bed in my room, a road and a car park.

After I went through the images, I started to edit a few of them to start creating ideas of what I could use.

Here is the original of the photo against the edited version.  I used various ways of editing my pictures through Photoshop, Word and a photo editing website 'Picnik'.

For this image, I decided not to use the original as I didn't like the general colour that was made.  Luckily, I saw a car with the numberplate 'LTA' which would be perfect to use for my images as it would symbolise the band. I thought that the picture was quite unclear as it was very dark despite my intentions for dark colours.  Therefore I edited a similar picture in many different ways to experiment and see what I could create.

I like the effect on the last image in particular as it looks as if it is a photo that has had substances spilled on it such as tea, beer of coffee which donnotes the 'Lads On Tour' image I am portraying for my work.

The next type of images I used were of my character on the road. I have edited the picture so that is clearer to see what is in the image.  I like the use of the grainy effect as it portrays an old-looking effect which I believe relates to the rock image that I have created for my band.

I took further pictures of my character on the road to emphasise the general idea of the band being on tour.  The picture shows the person sitting on the side of the street with the effect of street and car lights passing quickly by as the character remains still on the pavement. Despite these images being blurry, I like the effect that this has for its purpose.  It signifies the unknown of what is to come for a band being on tour.  Here is the original picture and a few edits of the picture.  I decided to add black and white to the image to symbolise the darker or more poignant songs on the album as they would not all be upbeat like a new audience member may expect.

Another image that I edited that I think I should use in my ancillary products is this one of my character in an alleyway again.  I like that this image dennotes the darkness that comes along with 'Lads on Tour'. The mise en scene in this picture is strong, as I have been careful in selecting what to include in the picture itself.  I have used a small guitar amp on purpose as it connotes the idea that a small band on tour can't afford the extravagant things that people may expect whilst a band is on tour, contrasting to a mainstream band on tour. I enchanced the colours of the image so that it was bold and stood out.

Analysing CD covers

In this first CD cover, I can see from researching the album that the exact same picture is used on the magazine advertisement.  This dennotes continuity and relationship between the two media products.  This is done usually to show the correspondence so that the target audience can easily recognise what product is being sold and advertised.  I like the simplicity of this album cover as it is not clutted with different text apart from the artist and album name itself.  This picture used is of the artist so that the target audience can easily recognise the artist and that the album was created by him.  I particularly like the colours used as they make the character stand out from the background and the text.  The simple clear and white font makes it easy for the audience to read.  Out of the artist name and the album name, the creators of this design have chosen to make the name of the artist have a larger font than the album name.  This is usually done for new artists as they want to advertise their name first over the name of the album so that they gain recognition.  The image of the artist itself relates to the title of the album which I think is important in establishing continuity and relationship when designing media products.  The word 'chaser' in the album can be shown in the picture due to the blurred edit of another picture of the artist behind another fixed picture, connoting the 'straight' part to the title of the album. It is significant that both the text and the artist are centralised on the cover to make it stand out to the audience.

This second picture has used a similar approach to the first cover that I have analysed.  The text of the artist is larger than the name of the album title.  As this is a debut album for the artist, this could support the idea that it has been done due to wanting to advertise the new artist in to the music industry.  Again, an image of the artist has been use an takes up the majority of the album artwork showing who the artist his. The colour used for the artist text uses a similar colour to the image of the background which connotes a relationship between the image and the artist.The positioning of the album and artist name together is usually a convention of a CD cover so that the audience will fixate on looking at that part of the album cover. Having the text on the upper part of the cover is significant as it is next to a mid shot of the artist which draws the eye of the audience to both of these elements.

This final album cover is somewhat different in the type of images used.  The picture for the album cover is of a baby which does not connote a direct relation to the album itself.  However, it could dennote the idea of what the music of the album includes. Like the previous analysed CD cover, the text of the artist and album name are positioned together and in the corner of the album.  However, it differs from the previous album as it does not have a direct correlation to the image itself.



Analysing new album/single advertisements

I decided to look at three different advertisements for new albums/singles.  I thought that this would be beneficial so that it would broaden my ideas and to see what features are key to include e.g. release date.

The first advertisement that I looked at was for the release of The Progidy's new album titled 'Invaders Must Die'.  At a first glance, I can see that the designer has made a direct relationship between the title of the album and what is graphically present. The text used  connotes aggression and reflects the type of music that The Progidy create and release.  The colours are simple which allows the text to stand out from the graphic image in the background.  The image is black and white aside from the bottom part which links with the same colour of the text.  This is significant, dennoting the comparison to the image and text.  The main image is of warcraft which relates to the title 'invaders must die'.  This can suggest what type of music will be involved in the album.  The designer has been careful in creating this advertisement as they have used a different font for the smaller text so that it is easier to read.  This will allow the target audience to capture all of the information needed in order to persuade them to buy the album.  Overall, I believe this advertisement is successful as it states clearly that it is a no.1 album which will encourage people to buy it.

I decided to look at this second advertisement of Kids In Glass Houses as it is displayed on the internet which is different to the layout of a magazine advertisement.  In the background image is a faint edited coloured shot of the band itself.  This allows the target audience to connect to the band itself as well as to establish a relation between the people and the album.  The dominant part of the advertisement is the title of the album, 'DIRT'.  Cleverly, the creators of the album artwork have juxtoposed the title to the image and way it is presented.  The word is written out in bright, colourful flowers which is not what is expected of 'dirt'.  In this advertisement a release date is included at the bottom, the same way The Progidy have advertised the release date.  It is clear and easy to read.  The majority of the text used is in captials with large, bold fonts making it stand out and easily capture the audience that it is being advertised to.

Personally I like this third design for Mr Hudson's new album the most as I like the use of graphic effects.  I think that it is an interesting design which many other people of the artists' target audience may think.  The image of the artist looking at the camera is significant as it looks as if he is looking in to the eyes of the audience.  This will make the audience want to read the rest of the advertisement as it is a capturing technique.  The colour used is futuristic which is also interesting. This advert differs from the advert of Kids In Glass Houses as the name of the artist is bigger than the album name.  I think that it is better for artists that aren't as well known to have their name bigger than the album name so that the audience that will see it will remember the name of the upcoming artist.

Analysing punk rock advertisements/CD covers

I think that it is important to look at current promotional aspects for bands that are similar to the image I am trying to portray. This is so that I am able to create a design that both conforms and subverts to the norms of punk rock advertisements.  Looking back at these images, I can see that a lot of colour is associated with punk rock bands and advertisements.  Bold colours are used here as they stand out from other music genres. Interestingly,  the bands tend to have a lot of black and white images also of the members themselves which contrast to the advertisements that they create.  This is significant as it connotes the variety in the band and the music itself.  I think that I must take this into consideration when designing the CD cover and the magazine advertisement.  Even though I believe that there must be some consistency, I think that there should be a variety of different elements in colour. Here are a few images of the band members and album covers along with other band logo’s and images.

Conventions of CD covers

I noted down all of the conventions of CD covers so that I would easily be able to establish what I would and should include to fit the expectations of a CD cover.  However, I noted them so I could also challenge these conventions to make my designs unique.

• People
• Band
• Photo
• Art design
• Album name
• Artist name
• Spine has the album name and artist
• The back contains the names of all the songs
• Variety in position of titles
• Size changes
• Photography of others
• Extra stickers for advertising
• Spine contains music company's label
• Extra cover
• Variety of whether the artist or album name is larger (artist name bigger for LTA - not as well known band, therefore they need to promote their name)
• Contains small print of company name
• Info of artist/album story
• Barcode - bottom of album
• Album name shares name with track
• Style of visuals connotes the artist's persona and the genre

Deciding on which ancillary tasks to choose

I must pick two of the three options below to create in order to gain marks for the ancillary task of the coursework:

• A website homepage for the band
• A cover for its release as part of a digipack (DVD/CD package)
• A magazine advertisement for the digipack (DVD/CD package)

I have decided to create a magazine advertisement for the digipack as well as the CD cover. I am going to look at the current advertisements and CD covers that bands of my music genre have created and analyse them. I will compare them to other CD covers of different genres as well as magazine advertisements. This will ensure that I know how to both challenge and conform to the conventions of media products.

Changing the characters in the video and editing my video

I have decided that I am going to change the characters in my video as I believe that I will be able to develop my mise en scene.  With an already formed band in the media, it can be hard to change their personna in order to fit in with my own ideas for the video.  I think that with these new characters I have chosen will allow a better variety for the mise en scene as I will be able to shoot in more locations for longer. There is more accessibility with these members in that I am able to use a car. I am able to portray the image I am looking for in the video to demonstrate the general feeling of 'lads on tour'.  With these characters, I am able to vary my types of camera shots better as they are not afraid to put themselves in to situations to fit my camera angles!

From creating a preliminary video to help me learn about the skills that could be used in my video making, I started to create my final video.  I was restricted with the amount of footage I had due to problems with arranging times for the characters to be filmed.  However, I embraced this problem due to the fact that in this genre of music, the videos the bands create tend to have a limited amount of scenes in them.  This is because of the low budgets they have to film the videos.  In my video, I wanted to stress the fact that I wanted to portray the band I had created as new and upcoming, therefore there wouldn't be much of a variety in setting.  Also, I purposely used a camera in the scenes of the band playing at a gig that wasn't of high quality to emphasise the idea that the band weren't of a high status that could afford high quality cameras. This is similar to the first music videos created by bands such as Enter Shikari and Deaf Havana which are in this music genre.

Below shows print screens of editing the video itself and including different transitions along with the clips.  I wanted to include these transitions as they helped compliment the meaning of the video.  At the upbeat points in the song, the transition would be quick and would include jump cuts. When the music slowed down, I used transitions such as fade.

Editing

First of all I imported the different videos that I had filmed to start a preliminary idea for the video so that I could get to grips with the windows program.  Here you can see that I have inserted clips in to the video time line and have edited them so that different shots appear at different times. One challenge that I had with learning about how to make the video was how to time the different shots of the video with the beat of the music.  Trial and error was key in developing the creation of the video.  I imported the song as the overall music of the video. This meant that I had to mute each video with its original sound so that there wasn’t any background noise.

After I understood the ways of putting basic clips together, I started to add in different effects for transition, colour, etc. In the screen shot below, you can see that I have added in titles to the video to introduce what the film is.  I used a greyscale theme as I would like to show variety as in the video itself it is mostly bright colours.  For my ancillary task, I am going to use bold colours, so I think it would be interesting to show a contrast as I believe it would capture the audience as it is effective in having the audience questioning why the video may be different to the advertisement.  I also added a clip of a slow motion greyscale edited scene for the end part of the small movie that I had created to show continuity from the beginning credits. I added the effect of slow motion as it links with the end of the song itself as the pace slows down.

Pictures of scenes for shooting the music video

I think that for this video, I will film quite an amount of the video at different gig venues to portray the image of 'Lads on Tour'.  I will be able to film the band itself as well as fans.  There will be large groups of people in these places which will help emphasise my ideas. I will check before filming if they're okay with being featured in my video which I'm sure many will be. The mise en scene is key for these scenes.  The shots allow the mise en scene to vary due to bright, flashing lights which means that one moment the scene could be dark and dull; the next, the shot can be lit up in an instance showing the people, band and setting itself.  I wanted to use these settings as it will help portray my ideas that fit in with the music and song itself of fast and slow pace music.

Here are some picutres of the places where I filmed the clips for the video: