Rough Cut 4

In this rough cut there is only one change to the edit which i made. The change is quite a big one however and does change the tone of the video. The edit i made was to put the whole video in black and white. The video does still look good in black and white however i do not prefer it to the coloured version. The reason for this is i think there are many nice shots which include nice colours which aren't shown in this version and it feels like it is missing something when watching it. You watch the video thinking that some of the shots would look good in colour which isn't the effect you want to give off with a black and white video. If i chose to use my black and white magazine poster and digipak then maybe it would have been a good idea to use this version of the video for the final one. But i decided to choose the other designs for the ancillary products which means that this video wouldn't have any strong links to them making it feel a bit out of place. I am happy that i tried out this version so i could make a clear decision on it and rule it out of my options.

Evaluation Question 3

'What have you learnt from your audience feedback'

It was important for me to get feedback on my main video and ancillary products because this helped me develop and create better products because i learnt what worked well and what could be done better and changed through feedback from my target audience. I created a questionnaire which i sent to people i know who fit into my target audience. By doing this it resulted in me gaining 13 responses which i am able to analyse.

 The first question that i asked was 'What is your gender?' I asked this question to understand the demographics of the people who answered my questionnaire and to see if they fit my target audience. When i was researching into a similar artist to my own (Ben Howard) i looked at their target audience and what type of people listened to his music. I found that the people who listen to his type of music (acoustic) were female. Looking at my results which is 53% male and 46% female my results are not an accurate reflection of the target audience of the artist, however i still have managed to gain a fair amount of female responses.  The research said that 25% men listen to him this means that the responses can still be used properly and still give a representative response. If i was to carry out my questionnaire again i would aim to get more female responses so that the overall responses were more similar to my research.

 The second question which i asked was 'What is your age?' again this is another question to understand the demographics of the people who i asked and to see if they fit my target audience. When i researched Ben Howard i found that his audiences age was young and the majority is based in the 18-24 bracket. This is why i put the 18-24 bracket in my questionnaire to get a clear indicator of the age rathe than it being a larger bracket which wouldn't be as clear. My results found that everyone who answered was in this age bracket which means my results do directly represent the target audience for the artist. This is good because the answers i will receive in the rest of the questions will be valid and important rather than if someone in the age bracket of 65-74 answering which wouldn't have been as important because this isn't close to the primary target audience.




 This question is asking how well they thought all the products worked together. I wanted to see if the audience felt like they all matched and could see them as a whole package rather then seeing themas separate products which don't have any correlation. It was very important that they all the products matched together because if they didnt this would make the all of them feel unprofessional and sloppy. As you can see with the results i got 100% of responses believed that the products had a strong continuity or above meaning that none of them thought the products didn't work well together, i am happy with the results i got from this question. It wasn't too difficult making all the products match.  The reason for this was because while i was filming for the video i was also focused on what would look good for my ancillary products, this is why as i was filming i was also taking lots of photos. Doing this meant i had lots of photos which were taken at the same time and place as the video therefore the video would definitely match my other products and the digipak and magazine advert would also directly match. As i can see form my audience feedback this tactic worked and they believed that all my products link together well.

For my video i was aiming to follow the conventions of the acoustic music videos, so asking this question it was important that i got the responses which i wished for because otherwise i wouldn't have been successful. 76% of my responses agreed fully that the video follows the conventions ann the rest said in parts, none of my responses said no which i believe is successful. I was hoping if i got any no responses this would point out any parts of they video that completely went against conventions which i didn't notice but there are none meaning that there was nothing i missed out or didn't spot in my video.

 Another quick question i asked was if the audience thought that the video fit the song. This question was asked simply to find out if the video actually worked and that it didn't look out of place or that it should be a video for a different song. The response was 100% positive therefore everyone thought that the video was good for the song and worked well with it which means that the overall video is successful in my opinion. Because a music video is made to work well together with the song and if this doesn't work then it doesn't matter about any of the other aspects because it didn't complete the main one. I am happy with the results of this question because it mean that the video was successful overall.

 I asked the question how professional does digipak and magazine cover look. I asked this because throughout the process of creating my digipak and magazine cover i was aiming to make them look as professional as possible rather them obviously looking like they were an A-level media product created by and A-level student. 66% of the responses said that they thought the products looked professional and the other 33% were halfway between not at all and very. I am happy with this outcome because it shows that some people believed we did a good job with out products. I can understand the other responses for them not thinking the score deserved to be higher. When shooting the photographs for the ancillary products i was doing this at the same time as the filming so i was switching between the different modes and i was focused more on getting the good shots rather than the photographs. I think this was a mistake of mine. If i had done the filming and then took photographs separately i would have got more professional photos because my concentration would have solely been focused on them. I could have also allocated a completely separate day to shoot for the ancillary products which again would have resulted all my attention being on making the photos look as professional as possible, so if i was to do this again i would have chosen one of these options which would have hopefully make the other 33% tick the higher categories.

I asked this question so i could see what people liked about the video and if there was anything i could improve about what they liked and also what i didn't have to alter and what else to focus on. 5 responses just said that they liked it without leaving a response which is good because it is all positive feedback.
The other 8 responses left a comment. The two of the comments were about how they liked that the video and song fit together and felt connected. Because i didn't have a narrative in my video i though it would be quite difficult to get the video and song to feel like they worked together. I used a number of different ways to do this such as transitions, making the shots change at the same time as the beat. I am happy that this worked to make the viewer think that they felt connected. Another response was that they liked how i included the artist performing, i did this because it follows conventions to include the artist in the video especially playing an instrument, its good that the response was that they liked a feature i included to follow conventions.

 This question was to counter the previous one, it was to see if the audience had any recommendations or if they wanted any changes to be made in the video which they would think would add to it and make it better. The responses which i got from the questionnaire were at different times so some of the things which were said have already been fixed or added when i got to analysing the data. An example of this is two people said the thought the video needed colour correcting, these respondents must have seen an older rough cut rather than one of the recent ones when they answered. One other response was that they thought when there is a shot of the artist and you can hear him singing it isn't clear if you can see him singing, i tried to avoid this by shooting behind the artist so you cant see his mouth, this was successful in the second part of the video but not too much in first half. This is something i would find quite difficult to fit because it means reshooting and after getting this response everything has been finalised, but they mentioned that you can only notice this error if you are trying to look out for mistakes so it isn't that much of a big deal.

Altogether i am very happy with the audience feedback that i received for my music video and my ancillary products. I have learned that is important to get audience feedback throughout the process constantly so you can keep changing and adapting while in the process rather than at the end when it is finalised. If i was to complete my research again i would focus on getting more female responses to match my target audience more but this wasn't much of a problem because of the age bracket of the responses i got. I would also try to get the responses form my secondary target audience to see what they thought

Evaluation Question 1

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

Transcript

For my A2 media coursework i have had to create a main products which is a music video. This video is made for a song which i also had a hand in creating, this meant that i did not have to face any copyright issues or have to struggle when trying to get permission to use the song because i am also close friends with the artist. The song which the video was made for is called 'Hiding' by Josh Beattie and it is an acoustic singer songwriter track. I then also had to create a two side ancillary products which matched and linked with the music video so that they look like they come as a complete package which could be sold together. These two products were a digipak which is a type of packaging for CDs or DVDs and a magazine poster. The video fits into the genre conventions of 'Acoustic' and 'singer songwriter' as seen through the specific shot types and editing of the video using Premier Pro.

To create a group of products which look professional and work together well i had to carry out some external research into the forms and conventions of each individual product, music video, digipak and magazine advert. Iv studied multiple music videos which are categorised in the same genre as mine to analyse and understand the conventions which are used and to help me get a better understanding of what is done when creating acoustic music videos. When looking into the acoustic music videos i have noticed a couple of themes and styles which follow across them. One style is the slow editing and longer shots, rather than the video being cut a lot and the shots changing dramatically and quickly constantly throughout the video, the clips are edited more so that they last longer on the screen and the audience has time to study and appreciate the shot. The reason for this is that it matches the music a lot better than if there was fast editing and a heavy change in shots it wouldn't fit well with the songs because they are all much slower and peaceful rather than hectic.  As well as following the forms and conventions of slow editing i also followed some other conventions which involved the editing. What i am focusing on is the transitions between shots. One video which i studied which was Lewis Watsons Hello Hello not all the shots were straight cuts but they used a cross fade to fade between them gradually, this would help link to the previous point with the slow editing. In another music video which i studied called Holocene by Bon Iver when some of the clips change they change on the beat or match part of the song was they change. This isnt done for every shot but is done when appropriate, i noticed this in my research and took from it in my own video. However I challenged conventions in my music video by including the artist performing with their instrument in the video. In most acoustic music videos the artist is usually included which i have done however they are very rarely seen actually playing any instrument instead they are just lip syncing. I decided to challenge this by featuring the artist performing the song with the instrument but no vocal lip syncing

To expand and further my knowledge with the conventions of Digipaks and magazine adverts i researched into similar products to find out what would help me to create the most professional and appropriate products. I continued to look at the typical conventions for digipaks throughout the design process for example, including the artists name in a appropriate size and font being easy to notice and read, a reasonable tracklist which is also clear for someone to understand and also publishing and copyright information, the logo of the record label which the artist is signed to. The artist which i used isnt signed to a label so to fill this gap i researched another artist which is similar to him and found out which label they are signed to and used their logo. As well as following the conventions i also had to make sure that the products matched, one way in which i did this was with a similar colour scheme which was used in all the products, this colour scheme links the products simply but with a strong effect.

Similarly to my digipak research i also looked into the codes and conventions which are included in magazine adverts. I created my magazine advert and tried to follow the conventions for the genre i was following throughout the process. These conventions include the appropriate titles and font sizes, relevant images which are clear and bold, in the image i also included the artist, reviews from reliable and relevant sources for this i used NME magazine and Fader magazine, information of where to get additional information, link to official website. As well as this i also looked at other magazine posters from different genres to widen my knowledge about magazine adverts and see what was done in different genres to see if anything crosses over.

In conclusion i believe that my products conform, challenge and develop the conventions of real media products but are also fitting to what i believed was appropriate based off external research.

Evaluation Question 4

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

http://slides.com/alexhey6/deck

Evaluation Question 2

Evaluation Question 2:  How effective is the combination of your main products and ancillary texts?

For my A2 media coursework i have had to create a group of three products one main and two side products. The products which i made have been a music video which is the main product and then a digipak and magazine advert. One main focus when i was making these products was how they would link together and what was the best way for them to all look like a complete package. I individually researched each products to find out more about each products in more detail such as the conventions and the codes of each product. When i was planning the main product i was constantly thinking about how i was going to link this to two other products, the other products were always on my mind when shooting for the video because it was important that i got them to match.  The combination of the different products can be described as synergy.

Synergy is: 'the interaction or cooporation of two or more organizations, substances, or other agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects'

I had two ideas for how i would combine the products in a successful way. I am happy with how both the ideas turned out but there was one i preferred. Here is a quick look at my second design and how they link together.

Magazine Advert

Digipak Design

Music video Screenshot 1

Screenshot 2

As you can see all the products link, they link with different aspects such as the pictures that are used for the digipak link directly to shots which are part of the video. The dark grey gloomy colour scheme also brings all the products together to look like a complete package. The reasons i didn't use this design was that i wasn't a fan of the dark colours because it made the whole theme feel sad which wasn't the vibe i was aiming to get off my products. Also the products combined didn't follow the conventions i was aiming to follow, in this design there isnt a lot of emphasis on the artist, this design docent focus heavily on showing the artist which i didn't like too much.  

I decided to pick my second design as my final design for a few reasons but mainly because it worked together as a synergy. The way in which i applied the idea of synergy was through a few different ways such as font, colour, theme, subject. Below is my three final design products.

Digipak Design

Magazine Advert

Music Video Screenshot 1

Screenshot 2

One way in which i connected my products was with font. I used the same font for my titles in the music video as i did with the text on the magazine poster and the text on the digipak. The font which i decided to use was the serif 'Athelas Regular' font, the reason i picked this font was that it isn't a modern style font which is what i was wanting, i wanted a font to look more classic and old because i thought that it fits the style of the video much better, with a classic feeling. A modern looking font would have looked too childish for the video and wouldn't have worked together with the other products. Also a more childish looking font would have given people who look at the magazine poster without knowing anything about it the wrong idea and thought of what the music and artist was actually like. I chose for my text on all products to be white, i think white is the best option for my text because it makes it stand out the most rather than it blending in with the background making it difficult to read, it is also not too in your face or harsh to look at. Even though the i believe that the consistency of the fonts would probably go unnoticed to many it is important because people are more likely to notice if your fonts do not match up and are completely different. Below is an example of the font use across my media products.

Magazine Advert

Digipak

 

Music Video

Colouring is also another aspect of the products which remains consistent throughout all the products. Colour was an important part of combining all the products to me because colour can say and describe a lot and can create a heavy opinion. This is why i didn't choose the other designs because the colours used with them were too dark and sad which wasn't the theme i wanted to get out of the products, instead with the other design i used bright more happy colours such as orange. This colour would also catch the eye of someone looking at posters or digipaks making them look further into the product more than the grey style of the other design which wouldn't attract people into looking further into and engage them. The images which i used for my digipak and magazine cover were taken at the same time as one of the shoots for the video, this meant that there was no need to edit any images to make the colours match because they already did as i was also focusing on my ancillary product ideas while shooting the video. You can clearly see the use of the consistent colouring in all three products portrayed above.

Another way in which i have created synergy between all my products is by including repeated images and subject. I used images of the artist because the artist is important because he is a solo artist so all the attention is on him. This is why the image is dynamic striking shot with the artist directly central being the centre attention of the image. This continues within the video as the images are matched with many different shots of the same scenario. This measn that if somebody looks at the full package of products they will see the same artist throughout, this is creating a brand image and making the artist an icon and making him an important part of the brand image.

I wanted to keep my two ancillary products fairly simple but at the same time engaging with dramatic and bold imagery. I did this by not adding too much information and only the necessary stuff which is needed. This meant that the image stood out more and had greater effect, rather than the image being covered. I kept his style of simplicity consistent throughout the products. 

Overall i think that all my products work perfectly together and when they are put together they look professional and realistic making them look like a successful package

Final Digipak

This is a picture of my final digipak design. I have used two bold dynamic pictures for the front and back of the digipak. Instead of putting two pictures on the inside of the digipak i carried on the colour scheme of the outside and used that in the inside. This makes the outside and inside connect together well. I wanted the inside to be plain without a detailed image because i like the simplicity of the design and it looks aesthetically pleasing which i was hoping to achieve from my digipak.

I have included all the information needed such as the labels logo and a barcode and additional information needed on a digipak. i didn't over fill the sides with information because i wanted the design to remain simplistic so it is more dramatic and makes the audience interested and want to look further into the artist and explore them.

I am really happy with how my digipak turned out and how well it links to the rest of the products, the design was exactly what i was hoping to achieve when i started out making it and i am happy it was successful.

Questionnaire

This my questionnaire which i made on the site survey monkey. The questionnaire is done so i can get audience feedback from my main product the music video and the ancillary products, using the information i will get from the questionnaire i can analyse the feedback to see what an audience thinks about my products.Below is a link to my questionnaire.

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/Z8D28VY

Magazine Poster Feedback

I made two final digipaks which also came with two different magazine posters. Both were different designs which were taken from two different parts of my music video, so the posters both link well to the video. I asked a couple of people about each poster for their opinion on which they preferred and what they liked and disliked about each poster, this was so i could get an understanding of which poster to use as my final design. 

This was the first poster i showed them. The overall response i got from it was that they really liked it. It was a very positive response. Everyone said that they really liked the image which was used, a few mentioned that they colours were really nice and that they catch your eye instantly drawing you into the image straight away. Others also said that they like the image because it is quite dramatic with the one man standing alone, they said it also gives them an idea of what the type of music it is, solo singer-songwriter. Most people said that the text placement was good and done well, they liked how the text wasn't taking up all the image and that you can clearly see the image and what it is rather than it being covered up by loads of text. A few mentioned how they thought the colour of the text was good and appropriate because it makes it easy to read and stand out clearly which is good rather than them struggling to see what it says because if it was like that they may just not bother. I am happy with the response i got from this poster, saying that it looks professional and that you can easily tell what type of genre of music it is because it fits well within the genres conventions.

I then showed the same people the poster below directly after. The response i got from this poster was different from the previous one, the reason for this was because i got a lot more criticism from it with people not liking some parts more than liking the poster. The first criticism i got was that it didn't feel very professional and like a real poster compared to previous poster. They didn't like the placement of the texts and thought that the reviews were too big which took the attention away from the rest of the image. They also said that they much preferred the colourful design rather than the black and white design. Overall in my feedback for my magazine posters the majority of people who i asked said that they preferred the first design as it looked more professional and like a real poster rather than the other option and they would be more inclined to research further into the artist after seeing the first poster design rather than the second.

Final Magazine Poster

This is my final magazine poster, i have added all the necessary aspects to the poster which follow the conventions of other magazine posters i have studied and i have also included my own aspects to the poster. I have added two reviews at the bottom of the poster in the corner to add to the realism of the poster and make it more realistic. These reviews are both by real music magazines which review albums. I chose to keep the text white because this makes the text moe bold and stand out making it catch the eye of a viewer more easily than if it was black, if the text was black it would blend more into the background and also be a lot harder to see in the bottom text in the lower half of the image. 

The text placement has been inspired by other magazine posters which i have studied especially the Ben Howard poster for his album Every Kingdom.  This poster has all the necessary aspects of a normal poster in this genre it fits all the needs of what i customer would want out of a poster e.g. the date it comes out and who it is. There is not irrelevant information on the poster, this is so that the attention isn't drawn away from the main subject of the poster. Most posters in this genre aren't filled with too much information, one reason for this is so that the image isn't covered up and almost all of it can be seen.

I am happy with how my final magazine poster turned out. The poster works very well with the final digipak and they both work together well and look like a professional complete package.