Evaluation 4

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

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My Progress Since AS level

Since doing my AS i have learnt and developed on so many new things. For example in my AS there
I did not know how to split clips and layer different clips.

In our AS task I do not think that our lighting was very effective. We all use lighting that was in the house and did not use any extra lighting. Although we wanted to have natural lighting I think that we could have created this in a more effective. As you can see in our music video we have made full use of the lighting and have been very inventive and come up with different ways to create lighting that fits the song and fits the genre although we have challenged so conventions.

In our AS we used text at the start of the video this however was appropriate we have learnt that text is not always need and is not always effective for example we were going to use text in the beginning of our video however when we tried it, it did not look effective.

 In our A2 work we used a lot more effects then we did in AS this is because we did not know about them however in our A2 we were able to experiment a lot more and challenge conventions. However I do think that using certain effects would have made our AS work better for example in the scene we could have used hard light which I think would of really made this scene and setting a lot more interesting.

Since out AS coursework we have upgraded our cameras as the quality the cameras produce was quite poor and I think that does effect the perception of our video. This year we were able to use better quality cameras which had more settings on them which were better for filming in different types of lighting it also had a stabilizer on it which makes our shots less shaky.




I feel like this year overall that we had a lot more opportunity to break conventions and be more creative. I also feel like we were able to play around with different effects, transition and different functions available on iMovie. I feel like I enjoyed the music video process more because we were able to be creative with costumes and also was able to use more cast members and it could be any gender and any amount as it did not have to fit a specific convention.

Over this past two projects i believe my media knowledge has vastly improved and i am now more competent in what goes in to the process of making a music video of a thriller. I am also more capable in using media platforms such as iMovie, Photoshop and Prezi and I have a wider knowledge of media terms and techniques.

Evaluation 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

As seen in previous blogs we made questionnaires to give out to people who have viewed our music video and digi pack and also to people who were in our target audience age range. This meant that we got information back from viewers who our music video was actually made for which makes the feedback more relevant.




















































The general feedback we received abut our video was quite positive and m,pst people liked it with only a few critiques some of the things that they liked were. They really liked the use of cuts. throughout our video we have 123 cuts which is about average for a fast pace music video which means we have followed this convention. The good use of a lot of cuts makes the video faster pace and a lot more interesting for the viewer this is because instead of watching one setting form the same angle they can see it from lots of different angles with lots of different footage in-between a lot of cuts insures that the audience will not get bored. Another thing that they liked about the use of cuts is the pace of the cuts matched the speed of the song which made the song and the video fit together. Most people really enjoyed our use of props and said that they was a suffient amount and they really added another aspect to the video which made it more interesting and made it look professional. They also liked how we had linked the props to the lyres of the video and said that this helped to connect the song to the video.  In terms of shots and angles most people like the different types of angle that we had as they said it showed different aspects of the same scene which helped them feel like they were more involed and present within the video. They also like the use of individual shots that we used of the grow they stated that this made them feel like they knew more about the individuals and their personal style which help them relate to the individual and a group as a whole.


From the feedback the main critique that we received was about the quality for this however we could not do anything for it as it was due to the quality of equipment that we had available to us. Some other feedback that we received is that we could have used lighter lighting to fit in with the conventions of a music video. However we did want to go against this convention to and make the lighting of our video darker as we thought that this would fit better with our song. However I do agree that in some place we could have used lighter lighting which would make some places of our        video better.  From our original feedback some people suggested that we needed to improve our lip syncing as some places were out of time we listened to this feedback decided to change it and now I think that it is a lot better and we are now very please with the lip syncing out come. Some people thought that we could add some more transitions into our video however we disagreed with this feedback because in most music videos there is not normally any transition and if there are there only a few and they are really subtle this is because in music videos it is mainly made up of cuts.






























The General feedback about our ancillary task was that most people really like the images that we had used and thought they were very good quality and also liked how we incorporated the name of the album within the image that we had used. They also liked that the images that we had used included all of the group as this is what they would expect when buying a groups album. They also liked the uniqueness of using an image on the back of the album cover as well and said that they think that this also make the back of the album more interested and reinforced that it is a group album. They also commented how they like the titles throughout our digi we used the same font which created synergy throughout our products. We also created synergy by using the same colour theme throughout our digi pack which help the viewer connect all three together and realise that it was for the same artist and also they all belonged together. however we did make it more interesting by using the colours in different compositions.

However for constructive criticism the feed back that we got was that we needed to the editing on our images because some parts of them looked distorted from where we had to cut them. however this is very hard to do and needs a lot of Photoshop skills. we did this to the best of our ability and we take the feedback and have tried to improve it. This was one of the only criticism that we received.

Video of feedback

We also decided to show three girls who fit our target audience our video this is their first time seeing it. this means that their reaction and comments are real which also makes the feedback more accurate as they haven't had time to think about what they want to say as this is their natural instincts.

Throughout this video we learned that they really liked the use of the hand which is clicking near the start of the video that like it back it is in time with the music and is something you don't often seen those in a pop music. it also adds variety to ours which they really liked. They also liked the transitions that we had used as they made it more entertaining other then just having cuts all the time however they did like the fact we didn't use to many of them. They did however suggests that we could improve the quality of our music video but as i have explained before this was due to the quality of cameras we had access to. They also suggested we could improve on some of the lighting as sometimes it was too dark in their opinion.

Feedback from social media

We put our video onto YouTube. On YouTube people are able to comment and anyone is able to see it which means the comments are not just from our target audience. The feedback that we received is very similar to the feedback that we got from our questionnaires with a lot of people liking the use of costumes and props.

We also shared our video to the group that did the perform for us we did this through a Facebook chat and we sent them the link to the video that also had very positive feedback for us. They was also our main target audience so this feed back is very important.







Overall I think that our feedback was very positive however we were able to improve our video with some of the negative feedback which made it very constructive. I think that having feedback is very important as it helps us develop our video and our overall media skills. Overall I am very thankful for all of this feedback  as it has been very helpful in making our video better.

Evaluation 2

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary tasks?

Throughout our an ancillary product and music video we wanted to make sure that we had synergy across our rodents to make sure that when someone looked at them they would be able to see how they link and what specify things make them link. The synergy that we have created makes our product identifiable for our audience for example our colour scheme.

We this picture of the group holding the letters to spell out confident. We also used the same letter in the music video. This shows how we have used the same prop in our CD cover and also our music video this is one way that will help the audience to be able to identify similarities between the music video and our  CD cover. I think this is very successful as it also reinforces in the video the name of the album and also when people seen this in the video it may remind them of the album or visa versa. I think that this use of prop meets the audiences expectations and we found in their feedback that this was one of their favourite parts. The Prop meets the conventions in the music however it is unusual to have a prop with writing on it on the album cover as this can sometimes be seen as a way of distracting from the main image however I do not feel in this case that it does.

The image on the back if the album is the same as the image on the tour poster. However it may look slightly different as the picture on the back of the album has been edited to look like a silhouette of the original image. Although these images may look slightly different I still do however feel like this synergy is still very recognisable to the audience. I also believe that they will be able to identify with the shape of the image as it is quite unique and this will be what they are able to identify between the two.  I do think that this is successful as I think that it can be a clear like between the two however it would be made clearer if the image was on the front of the album as well because the audience are likely to look at the front first and more often then the back and also when it is in a shop it would be the front that is displayed. I think that this fits the conventions as they usually use similar if no the same image on the album and tour poster.

 This is the Title on our tour poster we have used synergy here to link the name of our group to the colour theme of our ancillary task and music video. We chose the colour blue of our colour theme to be the colour of our group name on our tour poster because the colour also links to the second part of the name. I think this is very successful because it is another way of the audience to remember the name of the group especially as they are an up and coming group.  

We have created synergy by using the same clothing in the video as we have used on the front of the album cover. This is another way of the audience being able to identify between the music video and the CD cover. Using the same outfit can also reinforce the style of the group as a whole and as this outfit is seen regularly throughout the video the image of the CD cover could spark different moments of the video back to them as they watch it. this could then make them wan to watch the video again which means the video will get more views which may lead to it being seen by a larger number of people as it gets more popular. This is very helpful as this is an upcoming group. We could however of used outfits which may look more interesting and are very over the top which is a convention of pop music groups however I think that the simplicity really works for our CD cover and music video.

To create more synergy we created this silhouette image for the back of our album cover which looks similar to shadows. We got the inspiration for this from the shadows in the music video that we created by layering different footage and adding effects. This synergy is very subtle and this may not be the initial thing that the audience identify with to connect the two. However I do believe that  they may connect the dark images without realizing which is a very beneficial technique when creating synergy as you do not always want your audience to no why they have connected it.

Throughout our ancillary task and music video we create synergy by using the American theme. We did this by using American colours, American coloured outfits or outfits with American symbols on them such as the flag. We also used American dollars and finally a movement to represent America such as a salute. This is one of the most obvious parts of synergy throughout out ancillary task and music video this is because the clothing is very obvious in some scenes that it is American and I also think the colours we have used in our digi pack are quite bold and obvious that it is supposed to be the American colours. The song also reinforces this by singing about important people in American culture such as Michelle Obama it also talks about dollars which is the American currency which also helps to link to the synergy of the American theme. I think the synergy that we have created has been very successful I think that all the links are clear and are very identifiable for the audience to perceive. I think that this link of the American theme fits the conventions of a pop music video and ancillary task because usually pop groups have a theme for there album tour and the single for their album music video.

This is the signatures of the individuals in the group this creates synergy because the audience can link the artist to there signatures and is a way of the audience finding out more about the individuals in the group it also gives them a link to the individual shots in the music video to what that individuals name is and it will remind them of the album cover. However this does not follow the conventions of a CD cover we liked how it created synergy and we thought it was appropriate as they are a up and coming group.

Evaluation 1

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

To present our music video we used iMovie. We used this because it is very straight forward to use but has lots useful effects and transitions to make our music video the best it could be. However in the start we were going to use Final cut but this was very complicated to use as we had an old version and we found whilst using it, it would not be as effective as iMovie. For our ancillary product we used Photoshop to do all of our edits.

In our video we wanted to use conventions of pop video however at the same time we wanted to try and challenge some of these conventions and develop them to work for our video. some typical genre conventions of a pop video are:
a link between the lyrics and visual images
close ups
references to sexuality/nudity
long shots
bright colours
light lighting
Hair and makeup is fancy

Location



When we researched pop music videos we noticed that most music videos had at least 3 or more locations in them. In out music video we have filmed in 3 different locations so this is fitting with the location conventions. When we researched what type of locations that they filmed in we found that for most up beat pop music videos they were generally in studios using artificial lighting however they would have some scenes that would be outside that would mostly be using natural lighting. However we had to break the convention of using natural lighting when outside as we were filming in the dark and this meant you could not see anything through the camera. This led to us having to find ways of lighting up the setting we solved this problem by using torches and also we found whilst filming that the sparklers lit the setting up a lot more then we imagined so in scenes with the sparklers we did not need any other lighting. We have followed Andrew Goodwin's theory as he states that a girl group will often have a dance sequence and this is the reason why we have used big studio spaces.

Lighting 

For the lighting in our video we used many different techniques to try and achieve different effects to make the video more interesting. We managed to create a shadow effect by using a white light from a projector we got the inspiration for this from the silhouette for example in the video FourFiveSeconds. We found that this silhouette shot which is create by a certain lighting was used in many videos that we looked at however we developed and turned it into a shadow. The sparklers that we used created a lot of light especially when we used three together we decided not to use any other lighting with this and just have the light coming from the sparkler. When we were researching we found another video that used a sparkler however they used artificial lighting as well heir for we have broke this convention of always using extra lighting. however if we had used extra artificial lighting it would have made the whole setting lighter which would then fit in with the convention that is that most scenes are bright and do not using dark settings. We followed the convention of a music video by using a coloured background when doing my researched I noticed that this was used quite a lot that would use block colours such as pink, blue and green as a backdrop and lights it up to make it very bright. However as we did not have any coloured walls we used a projector and created a power point slide with lots of different colours on it and played this through the projector which lighted up the wall a particular colour which created the artificial lighting for that particular setting. We also used torches to create some artificial lighting for example when we were filming in the dark in the outside setting we placed to torches in the background of where the individual who was performing at the time was standing and made the torches flash. this meant that it lit up the background but also gave a really professional looking effect in the background. This fitted in with the conventions of a music video as although we were using a dark background the individual stood at and was the main focus. The last convention we challenged in terms of lighting was when we were in the editing stages and we wanted to try and lighten some clips but in a unique way as we did not just want to change the colour filters. To do this we layered a clip of a sparkler over the clip of the person who is miming this is challenging the convention because usually to make the clip lighter they would use filters and also if thy were to layer clips they would usually use other people in the group or a dance scene they would not however use a prop.

Angles

This two angles were both inspired by Fifth harmony Bo$$ video we used a mid shot with a black back ground with one person in the group this is a convention and is seen quite often throughout music video it is used to show an individual or artist up close. This follows Andrew Goodwin's theory of having a lot of close ups of the artists throughout the video. We also used a 5 person shot to promote and show the whole group united together which is also very often seen throughout music videos which are performed by group artists. This is because most audiences like to see the group all together.











These two shots are breaking the conventions of a pop music video. We have used a high angle group shot for the last few shots of our video we have not seen this in any other music videos that we have researched because they usually end with a low angle shot of the group which makes them look more powerful or they use a mid shot of the whole group to see all there faces. We however choose this high angle shots because it shows the whole group together and also shows the money floating with is mainly what the song is about it is about earning money and respect so we believe this was a very symbolic ending to our music video. Although we have had feedback which disagrees with us we have also have feedback from people who really like this so we have decided not to change it. We have also used a long shot of an individual which does not break a convention of a pop music video however the setting we have used it in does. This is because usually when a long shot is used it is because there is other things going on around the individual. however in our shot we have placed her in a setting with a plain grey background and bright flooring although this may look boring she is doing part of a dance routine which makes it more interesting and she is moving which covers the blank background.

 This shot is a two person shot which breaks the conventions of a group pop music video as the would usually have the whole group of as individuals. However it fits the conventions as it is a low angle shot which makes them look dominant and important which is part of the message of the song.

This breaks the conventions of a pop music video as it is an extreme close up of lips. this is not often used as it is not representing the group and would maybe be hard to edit to get the lip syncing correcting so some people may stay away from this.

Lastly we used a focus pull which is also breaking a convention of a music video and would normally be found in a film or TV show when focusing the camera from one character/object to another character/object. However we decided to use a focus pull because we liked the look of having a blurry image which is often used in music videos however we developed it in to a focus pull so the blurry image would then focus on the individual who would start lip syncing. I think that this shot is very effective and I think it makes the video more interesting.

Props

All of the props that we used within our music video followed the conventions. For example we used money which represented lyrics within the song that are video is too this therefore follows one of Andrew Goodwin conventions that the visual will often link to the lyrics in the song. I believe that we used all of our props very effectively and without them the video may not have been as successful for example at the start of the video we use some balloons that lay on the floor these add colour to the scene and without these balloons there it would look very empty and would not look as effective. I also think that the sparklers add a unique twist to the video as they are not often seen in music video for the reason of this I am not to sure however when doing my research I only saw one other video that used sparklers. However if I was going to do this again I would make better use of the glow sticks as I do not think that they look very effective however they do fit the narrative and continues on the theme of the neon paint and also the bright colours used as backgrounds.

Costume/Make up

We did not follow the convention of having lots of heavy and dark make up which is often found in pop music video this represents feminism the point of trying to look pretty. During the research we did think that we wanted to follow this convention however we did change our mind closer to filming day this is because we wanted t represent girls which are naturally pretty and feminine without having to wear lots of make up we did this because we thought out target audience would prefer this and it is also something unique and isn't done in a lot of music videos. However we did still use some make up such as neon paint on the faces we thought this looked really effective on them and made them stand out and we have only seen neon paint used in a few videos and we also thought it fit our genre really well. We kept our costumes within the conventions of a music video we had them all wear the same colour outfits for some of the shots and we also had them wear bright colour clothing which is used a lot in pop music videos and we also had them wear red white and blue which are the colours of the American flag and also the theme of our music video this meant that what they were wearing went with the narrative of the song.

Editing

This editing technique is the use of two different angles of the same shot which have been placed together the continuity of this shot in my opinion s very good. This fits in with the conventions of a music video because they often use different angles of the same scene and edit them together this makes the video more interesting and adds more view points instead of having one continuous shot.

This editing technique is similar to the one above however to create this effect we used the same image and then in editing e split the clip and on the second half of the clip we zoomed it in which makes it look like we have used to different clips. This was very easy and quick to do but is also very effect and made the video more interesting. However to make this better i could of used more cuts and zoomed in at different lengths.

To create the technique of the clip of the flashing lights we used a long clip of them standing with the flashing light and the made it faster by the maximum which is 20x. this made the clip alot shorter however the flashing became very fast we then layered this on top of the other clip but did not allow for any shadow so it looks like another cut we also placed this so it goes in with the beat with the music which is another convention of music videos.

To create this effect we used a split screen and then had it swipe in and out. This is a common convention of a music video as it it makes it very interesting and means you can show more then one clip at a time. We also did this when we had a individual lip syncing at the start however we did not use the swipe we only used the split screen. If I was to do this again I would use completely different clips which could make it more interesting.

The layering effecting with fading is another convention of a music video. this is used to merge clips and have them over lap each other. we layered one clip over two different clips. this was challenging the convention as the would only usually layer over one clip at a time however I like how ours has turned out as I think it creates an interesting effect and link the three clips together the flashing lights also look very effect going through all the clips.



Slow motion is another effect which is commonly used in music videos however it is usually used in slower songs to exaggerate or to show emotion. However we have used with a fast song which goes against the convention. However I do feel like the way we have used it has turned out to be very effective and it provides a break from all the fast movement which can be quite relaxing to a viewer.

Digi pack

These were our main inspiration for our album cover and the back of our album. Most of them follow the conventions of pop album covers however a few do break them for example Beyonce back album cover breaks conventions by having a picture of her and also by using her name on the back this is not often seen that much however we do think that it look quite effective. 

This is the pictures that we have decided to use for our digi pack this follow the conventions for a group digi pack as in features everyone in the group together it also follows the conventions because they are all wearing similar or the same coloured clothing which represents them as being united and like they belong together. However we have broke conventions by using a picture where the group is holding a prop which is covering them. This is often not used because as it can been seen as taking away focus from the artist however in our case we think it will add to the successfulness of our album cover.

This is our final tour poster. We have stuck to the conventions by keeping the same colour theme throughout our digi pack and music video. We have also used the whole group as I explained earlier. We have also included tour dates which is a convention of a tour however when doing my research I noticed that less artists are putting tour date and are now only putting social media contacts and a website. I think this is because social media is becoming more used and for younger artist who have a younger target audience are more likely to be in contact with there friends through social media. We have also followed conventions by making the name of our group large which is a common convention used by many up and coming groups. In this tour poster we did not go against any conventions.

For our album cover we followed conventions such as having a picture of the entire group they are also wearing similar colours of clothing. We also followed the convention of having the same colour theme throughout our music video and digi pack. However we challenged conventions such as having the artists autographs on the from of the album i did not see any other artist that did this throughout our research. However we really like this idea because we thought as it is an up and coming group this would be a way of viewers to learn more about the individual artists. We also challenged common conventions such as making the group hold props however this was vital and was a way of promoting the album name as the group is the main focus of the album cove so when the viewer looks at the group they will also see the album name.



We also followed some conventions for our back album cover such as we followed the same colour theme. We have also included a barcode and record label logo and fine print which is all commonly found on the back of CD covers. We have also included the titles of the songs and we were inspired of the layout of this from Marina's album. However we have gone against conventions like Beyoncé and included a picture of our group on the back however we have developed this and make it so lit looks like a silhouette.