Final Edit

Digipak (Final edit)

This is my final edit of my Digipak. Overall I am pleased with the final product as it creates the style that I intended during the planning stage. I feel this links well especially with the music video in terms of colour tone, creative ideas and the message of the song. I focused on the idea of loneliness as this was central to my interpretation of the lyrics of the song and applied this to how the images in my digipak were presented  and the editing method through which they were manipulated to maximise their full potential.

Magazine Advert (Final Edit)

Evaluation Question 4 - How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

During my research I used a lot of media technologies to research existing products, theories and techniques to use in my own product. I used the internet for the majority of my research as it is easy, interactive, quick and versatile. I could go on a search engine such as google and find more than I was looking for. This method was very helpful in terms of gathering information on theories and conventions for a music video. I also used audience feedback on existing products to find out what is popular and why, and also a wide range of existing products allowing me to evaluate and access them with ease. This was a massive benefit in my research stages and I felt gave me a greater advantage during the planning stage, as I was wasting no time finding websites and therefore giving me enough time to research every aspect I needed to produce my own product with success. I used 'Blogger' to record my research and planning in order to not lose/forget anything I learnt. This was a huge aspect of my production and was able to refer back to my research to develop new ideas. It was an efficient way to keep everything together, making it easy to search between all my findings quickly. The use of social media really helped me. It allowed me to get honest opinions on products quicker than youtube. I could type in an album name and get thousands of results in seconds, these were honest reviews and I learnt little tricks that viewers don't like within a music video. For planning my video I used Youtube as another method of gathering information. This was a huge help in order for me to learn techniques based on things like camera movement, camera settings and editing techniques. I used blogger again to record my findings and so I could easily refer back to the information. During my planning stages, specifically during the preliminary task, I experimented a lot with my DLSR Canon 700D camera in order to perfect the right shot I wanted. This meant I wasn't wasting time on the day. This gave me more time for actual shooting and allowed for a greater development of new ideas when filming.

During the construction of my music video I used my Canon 700D to capture my shots. I found that this camera gave me a really cinematic feel to the video which is exactly what I wanted. This piece of technology helped massively toward the cinematic look I wanted. Whilst planning the video, I knew it was going to involve a short narrative and I had to make it as realistic as possible. So I decided I needed some handheld shots to make it look realistic. From experimenting before my video I found that handheld shots can end up being overly shaky and didn't look professional what so ever. I knew therefore I had to be as careful as possible in order to give the product a professional look. I also used the Canon camera to get the right shots I wanted. I found out that higher the ISO on the camera the more the quality was lost. So in order to keep a low ISO I knew the shots had to be nicely lit, therefor I decided that I should shoot in the daytime. Without knowing this setting, I would have lost a lot of quality and would have hindered the final finish. In addition to this, I also used the effects on the focus of the camera. The standard setting has the camera on auto focus but this hindered some of the effects I wanted to include in my production. Therefore I decided to change to manual focus in order to create these wanted shots. There are multiple examples of this shot like in the narrative, when the actor enters the house the railings on the stairs are in focus compared to the actor entering in the background.

In pre production I learnt a lot about using ‘iMovie ' through the practice and internet, more specifically through youtube tutorials. I used this software in my post production as I had got used to the programme. I used all its features to get the best image I could. This Involved me exploring the colour correction and colour grading effects. This really helped to express the characters mood on the screen and was also used to try and manipulate the viewers emotion by the colour of the image. I also used this software to create a certain mood by the cuts and length of shots. I slowed down these cuts and transitions to match the theme of the song and I felt this was essential in making it a good edit. Overall I feel all the edits worked very well and the way I used the technology, I believe, was at the best of my ability.

My digipak and magazine advert used the same technologies and techniques as my video and I researched in the same way as my video. This consistent method I carried out worked very well. I used an apple equivalent of the windows software ‘Photoshop' in these texts to manipulate taken photos into commercialised images seen on digipaks and magazine adverts of real artists. I used a various tools within this  technology to create the feel & style I was going for. I lowered the saturation, boosted the contrast and also added 'film grain' and 'blur' effects on to the edit. This was very successful and manipulated my images beautifully, exactly how I planned.

I used directors commentary in my evaluation, so the viewers could get a sense of personal meaning instead of text. I used a prezi to present another question, this was used for a fun way to read and ensure the viewer wouldn't get bored, yet still read/heard why I did what I did and what I learnt from it.  

All the technologies I used were very helpful in order for me to create the best products I could. I used the technologies to the best of my ability and I believe they were a massive aspect in my final products.

Evaluation Q3 - What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Evaluation Q3 (DRAFT) - What have you learned from your audience feedback?

I used many different forms of audience feedback to evaluate my music videos and ancillary texts. These included using a questionnaire/survey where I got the participants who were mostly within my target audience to rate each of the ancillary tasks as well as the final product. I also carried out an interview with a selected few within my target audience. The aim of this was to identify areas of improvement in my products that I didn't see.

From the questionnaire I carried out the majority of participants, around 50% gave my music video a rating of 5 out of 5, with 30% giving a rating out of 4 out of 5, and finally the final 20% giving it a rating of 3 out of 5. I agree with my interviewees and am happy with my final production. I feel the video meets the standard conventions of a music video within the ‘soft’ rock genre, though there are always still ways of making improvements. During the interview I asked my audience to identify how they feel my final video could have been improved. Some of these flaws include some attention to the level of performance in my video. In many ways I can see the meaning of these comments and maybe I could have tried to push the actors out of their comfort zone. The lead singer from the band knew all the words to the song but during performance didn't feel confident singing in front of a small audience. I have learned from this as in the future I would look to either choose an actor who would be more comfortable performing to an audience or try and make the current actor feel more at home and relaxed. Other responses from the survey to improve the video included reducing the length of some of the shots, however my response to this particular criticism is that the song is slow for the genre it’s in and that to edit on the beat some particular shots needed to be extended in length.

In addition to this, in the questionnaire I also asked questions based on my two ancillary products. Firstly my magazine advert, For this I also used an overall rating system. The results were that 30% of the participants gave it a rating of 5 out of 5, whilst 40% gave it a rating of 4 out of 5. Leaving the final 30% of the participants giving it an overall rating of 3 out of 5. Although it was not as strong as my final music video I’m still happy with the feedback I received from this product. I would have to say I agree with the feedback received and have learnt a lot of ideas as to how it could be improved in the future. Some areas that were frequently mentioned from my audience was the scrappiness of the edging around the social media icons in the bottom right corner. I agree with these comments that were made and have learnt that I needed to pay a closer attention to detail when editing the images. I also learnt that little details & mistakes can have a huge difference on the final appearance. Another point that was brought to my attention was that the image given off by the lead singer in the band. Some people I interview weren't persuaded that my lead singer was a so called ‘rock star’. I have learnt from this and if I was to improve in the future I would take into greater consideration the costume of my actors in order for them to fit the roll they are trying to portray.

Next, I also recorded the opinions regarding my digipak and again decided to use an overall rating system to gain a fair reflection on whether it went well and how in the future it could have been improved. The results were that a majority of 40% gave it an overall rating of 3 out of 5, whilst 30% gave it a rating of 4 out of 5 leaving the last 30% of voters scoring it 5 out of 5. I agree with the overall verdict and admit that my digipak has the biggest room for improvement out of the two ancillary tasks. During an interview, I asked my audience how they feel my digipak could be improved in the future. The main concern from the viewers was that there was minimal writing on the digipak and no information on the digipak other than their name and the tracks that were included on the album. I agree with the origin of these comments and have learnt that in the future I need to include more details about the band. I can know see looking back on it that I missed an opportunity to apply Dyers theory of ‘star image’ by not including information about the band in order to sell it to the target audience.

Evaluation Question 2 - Transcript Of Video

When completing research into other artists of a similar genre to that of my chosen song, I found that there was a pattern that artists released a package including their album, digipak and advert.  Examples of this are other alternative rock bands such as ‘The Killers’, ‘The Red Hot Chilli Peppers’, ‘Foo Fighters’ and ‘Coldplay’.

For the digipak and magazine adverts, the main trend for similar artists consisted of images mainly of the lead singer but sometimes also with the rest of the band in the picture as well. This was to give the ‘star image’ appeal that the theorist Richard Dyer believed in. His theory suggested that making one person the main focal point on a digipak or magazine advert increased their reputation as they grow to become the face of a band. It can also be seen in my main product, the music video itself, that there is a particular focus on the lead singer.

Dyer’s theory was foremost in my thinking when creating my own magazine advert as part of the package. I made the lead singer the biggest aspect of the advert as I wanted him to be the focal point of it and what fans associate with the band. Therefore the camerawork was vital. I decided to use a mid-shot of the main singer appearing in a natural surrounding environment. However, I made sure that the majority of the screen was taken up by the singer and specifically his face. Rural settings run through all of the products - both ancillary tasks and my music video. My filming in a local nature reserve is a central setting. The top two panels in my digipak are a wide shot of a landscape scene at the same nature reserve. Rural settings are often used by Indie bands. Examples include The Killers in the album ’Here with me’ and ‘The Strokes’ with the music video for their song ‘One Way Trigger’.

When it came to the editing stages for my advert, I made some critical changes in order to emphasise the star image impact of the lead singer. First of all, I decided to crop the image to make the lead singer appear bigger and give more of a close up of his face.This links closely with my final video where I used close-ups on the main singer at key moments. I then decided to add a cross dissolve effect to the image so that the lead singer’s face was not affected but the surroundings appeared blurry. The tool I used for blurring the background on the advert was ‘fast blur’. I felt this effect worked well as by blurring the surround it made the lead singer stand out in the image. 

Next, I toned down the colours on specific aspects of the image to give a black and white affect to the surround. I then decided to add a red secondary colour tone to the whole image to match the band’s style. I chose the colour ‘red’ for its symbolic connotations of love and the fact that love is often represented through this colour. For example, love hearts and the red roses seen in my final production. 

Another successful method used was the striking font and text on the magazine advert. When deciding on a font I wanted something bold and clear for the viewer. I decided the font colour should be black so that it stands out on the advert to give a clear message of the band’s name alongside the artist. I decided to place the title of the advert at the top of the page as I feel it will be therefore be one of the first aspects the viewer sees when viewing the advert. Another reason for its placement here was as a result of my research. I noticed a similarity in magazine adverts for similar artists and that was they were placed at the top of the page and did not cover up any of the artist’s face. 

I also decided to add a rating image, 4*, from a music magazines, the NME, and a national newspaper, the Daily Telegraph to give it status. This then matched the convention of a music advert and give it a more professional look. I avoided covering the face of the singer to make sure I wasn’t going to hinder the ‘star image’ appeal I was trying to create. The final point I would like to make regarding my magazine advert was the addition I made of the social media images and a URL for the band’s website. This was effective as I noticed during the research stage that a lot of bands promote their website and social media accounts and therefore to make mine more professional and naturalistic I decided to include one as well. I felt it did work well but I could have maybe smoothened up the edges of the icons to give a sharper final finish. 

As well as this, I tried to match the style of my products and so therefore when creating my digipak, I again decided to tone down the images I used. I took the pictures at a nature reserve as I knew that I would be able to get high quality photos with a high level of cinematography. The reason I chose to use natural imagery was to link the image with the lyrics of the main song ‘With Or Without You’. When analysing the lyrics during the research phase I noticed that there were multiple references to the weather and natural imagery. In addition to this the most obvious factor I noticed from the lyrics was the impact of loneliness. Therefore in the photos I took, I tried to emphasise these factors. However for contrast purposes I still wanted to apply Richard Dyer’s theory of a ‘Star image’ and so In some of the photos I have applied this with an image of the lead singer to promote the artists to their fans. Similar to the magazine advert, the same font was used throughout both the ancillary tasks. This was again another method of linking the visuals seen on the screen. 

The final point I would make was that during the research phase I analysed multiple digipaks from artists in the same genre as U2. The common theme was to have the logo for their record company, a barcode for when it was purchased and various copyright details. I included all these aspects in my digipak to give a professional look to the product and give it an image that you could see on the shop shelves. The icon for Island Records is used on both ancillary tasks.

Overall I feel that my ancillary tasks did link well with my final media product as when I was designing them I wanted to develop a certain style across them all and through various forms. For example the colour tone of the images and the colour of the text seen on the ancillary products, In the final analysis I believe I have achieved this.

Evaluation Question 2 - How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

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

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

Overview:

My final edit for my my music video is heavily based on the same principles that were used in other music videos within my genre. This is mainly artists such as Coldplay, Muse, Red hot chilli peppers and Arctic Monkeys. From this research I gained an insight into the forms and conventions of what makes this particular genre unique to the rest. This allowed me to incorporate there ideas into my own media product in order to give it a professional look and appeal to it.

Forms and Conventions:

During my research stage I looked at the conventions of what makes a music video successful within it’s genre. I looked in greater detail at Andrew Goodwin's theory of music videos. I feel I have successfully attempted in including what he felt made an excellent music video into my own media product. 

Firstly, he suggested that there could be a relationship between the songs lyrics and the visuals seen in the video. This was seen in my music video as the lyrics of the song talk about a relationship that has fallen apart and the struggle that one half of this relationship can endure. This is linked with the visuals seen in the video as we can see a narrative of someone who is put in a similar situation where their partner leaves them and we see his reaction of emotions to the events as they unfold in front of the viewer.

Next, he suggested there could be a relationship between the music of the song and the visuals seen by the viewer. I again tried to include this aspect in my own music video by adding an element of performance into the video. We see close up shots during the song where there is no singing and the sound of the guitar is more noticeable. 

In addition to this, he also suggested that the video needs to be relevant to the genre of the song. I felt that although I did portray this in some ways for example using music equipment that you would typically find in a rock music video, I felt I could have used other methods to add to this effect. For example, the costume worn by the band when seen in the video at final edit, I felt didn't really reflect that of a proper rock band.

Another point Goodwin made was based on the idea that a music video should contain a narrative or storyline. I also felt this was important when making my music video and felt that the idea within my media product was relevant to that of the lyrics of the song.

Editing:

Other decisions I made were during the editing stage of production. I felt the most important aspect of the video was that the shot length needed to be small and transitions from one shot to the next needed to be smooth and flow as if it were professional. This was achieved by the use of the fade transition on iMovie which allowed me to both slow down and speed up the transition. The speed of the transition was crucial to the editing stage as my aim was to edit on the beat of the song so that I could meet Goodwin’s theory of linking the image with the music of the song. Another choice I made was to do with the colouring of the image. I decided that using a black and white effect on the footage of the singer and the band would match the idea that the singer is sad about loosing someone they cared about. However I left the footage of the narrative in colour to allow the viewer to get a clear distinction between the storyline and the performance of the song. I felt this worked well when viewing at the final edit and allowed the viewer to get a greater understanding the message of the narrative.

Costume:

Costume was an area I felt I could have improved on. To meet Andrew Goodwin’s theory of music videos where by the visuals seen need to match the genre that the song is in. ‘U2’ are seen as a very stylist rock group who fit the stereotype of a rock band wearing leather jackets, sun glasses and black boots. However when viewing my music video we can see that the band performing don't match the common stereotype of a rock group. This in effect meant that the mies-en-scene of the video was effected and hindered the professional feel I was trying to create for the final product.

Camerawork:

Camerawork was also an important factor when it came to the final product and it was important to get a variety of shots to be able to work with in the final edit. During the research stage I found that current music videos that were also within my music genre of rock had a lot of cuts with a variety of angles and shot lengths. I feel that during my production at the start of production I didn't incorporate this into my work but after viewing audience feedback I decided that I needed a greater variety of angles in my video and that I also needed more footage in order to reduce the shot length when it came to the editing stage. This I feel made a huge impact in the quality of the final product and gave it a more professional finish to the video.