Final Post

I have now completed my A2 coursework project and so this is my last post.

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

This project relies a lot on technology and so the technology we used determined some thing's for us, removing our choice. The biggest limitation was when we were shooting our video. We only had a simple camcorder and a tripod, therefore we couldn't have the variety of shots and the dynamic style of professional videos. When filming an onstage performance directors often move the camera a lot, panning around the artist, showing the location and then tracking in to focus on the performers. These shots make videos exciting and work very well when matched to the pace of the music. We were unable to do this however as we didn't have the equipment such as camera dollys, tracks and cranes.
When it came to design the print work and edit the video we used professional programs and so weren't limited by the constraints of the technology available.


Media 2.0 technology was massively important in this project. The idea's of media 2.0 are that everyone should be able to create, rather than just the large production companies and that is what has lead to Photoshop, Final Cut and pro-am cameras being available. Web 2.0 is another part of this idea, encouraging the audience to interact with producers and to share ideas. Facebook and YouTube are both Web 2.0 sites and we used them often throughout the planning, creation and feedback of our video. Using Facebook during the creation of my print products mean that I could get instant feedback from my target audience rather than organising a lot of meetings and groups that would take up a lot more time. Youtube not only allowed us to post our video and share it, it was were almost all of my research into music videos took place. I could see a wide range of videos from all genres and what people said about them in the comments and ratings.

Question Three - What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Throughout this project audience feedback has been vital in keeping our products focussed at the target audience as well as providing creative idea's. We received feedback in several different ways at each stage of this task.


Once our group decided on a clear initial concept and audience we presented a pitch to media peers so that they could assess our ideas. They told us wether they thought our audience profile was specific and clear, wether our idea matched that group and any concerns they had with the creation of our video. It was good to get opinions from other media students as they understood the timescale, constraints and technology available for this project. The feedback we got was overall very positive. They said that our audience was well chosen and that the idea suited them. They did say that parts of our concept were ambitious, in particular the clown performance scenes, and asked about actors, locations and costumes we planned to use so that it looked authentic an professional. 


We then took our idea to the audience. We planned a focus group consisting of people we considered a part of our target audience. We played them our song and then outlined our concept. Again the response was very good. They commented that our idea was very interesting, taking an original spin on a traditional narrative. They all though it sounded like an appealing music video and were excited to eventually see our finished product. Their concerns were again that we would have to make it look realistic, though they thought the theatre we chose was a perfect set. They also raised the issue that our main character was a man though the song was mainly performed by a woman. Our group discussed this and decided that this should not be an problem, though we needed to make it clear who viewers should empathise with.

One of the main things we needed to address was how we would ensure our video did not end up looking amateurish or silly. We finalised our plan to film in the theatre and organised an actor who we were confident would give a good performance. We also discussed costume, deciding to base it on pictures we found of the 'tramp clown' as this was a costume we could create.


We then storyboarded and filmed our video and started editing. When we got to the editing stage and had pieced together a good portion of the video we started to feel that the video was not working as well as it could. We didn't know if the video was working as a whole and we were going in circles. To get some fresh eyes on the material and generate some idea's we held two focus groups, showing them a rough cut of our work and asking what they though of the video, what was missing and if they had any suggestions.

These groups both thought that although what we had shot was good there were some problems. They said the footage of the clown looked grainy and low quality. We didn't have the time to re-shoot but viewers suggested trying adding a colour filter. They also said that the lack of performance in the video was a problem as it wasn't clearly a music video. Adding a performance aspect was necessary.


We made these changes to the video, using a sepia effect on the problematic footage and filming an artist performance. These changes made all the difference. Our video came together really well and we finished editing.

Whilst creating my print products I got feedback as I was designing. I created a Facebook group so that I could get almost instant feedback on what I was doing and the choices I was making. I posted colour palettes, fonts and design ideas then got comments on them from members of my audience. These comments meant that I had to make very few changes to my digipak and advert as I had been getting feedback as I went along.


When we had a final cut of our video I got feedback to asses how well I had created it. I used a site called 'Survey Monkey' and created a series of questions. The program allowed people to leave text answers discussing the questions rather than simply quantitative yes or no feedback. Qualitative feedback is far more useful for this project as it gives understanding of thoughts and emotions rather than generating statistics. I asked a range of questions trying to find out how viewers responded to the video and wether it worked as we had planned it to. The feedback I got suggests that our video was well made and viewers took the preferred reading. When asked about their understanding of the narrative and who they empathised with all participants said that it was clear the clown had been betrayed and therefore they felt sad for him. This was the way we wanted the narrative to be viewed and the female vocalist obviously didn't hinder this. Viewers said that the video was entertaining and though some had seen similar narrative ours had very original ideas. They also said they would definitely share the video with friends. This passing on of videos online is a kind of free marketing.


An important aspect of the video is how the artist is viewed. We want people to find them aspirational and approachable, someone that they could be friends with. This view creates a bond with the artist and means people will support them by buying the album. 


The only negative comments received were about the performance of the band, the comments were split as some people said it was "very realistic" and some thought it "could be improved". The quality of the video was something we worried about, but it seems to not be a problem as all those asked thought it looked professional.


If we could make alter our video after this feedback I would make two changes. I would re-shoot the footage that was poor quality. Although this didn't seem a problem on the final cut I think it would make the video more professional looking. As we had little time to organise the band performance filming we had to use non-musicians. This meant that there is room for improvement as some of this could be made more exciting and realistic.

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

 

After creating my print products I posted them onto a Facebook group of my audience. I then asked them questions about the overall finished designs. The feedback I received was very positive. People said that my designs looked very professional and that it was clear from the overall style that the genre was punk. They also commented that the products were all linked to each other as they used similar colours, photographs and fonts. The use of house style has meant that to observers the advert and digipak are clearly related and also relate well to the music video. I think that if my print work was used to sell the album that it would fulfil it's purpose of creating a strong brand as well as appealing to the artist's target audience.

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

When creating a music video the starting point needs to be the song and artist that it will be based around. So the first thing our group did was to find a band and then decide on one of their songs. We spent some time doing this as we wanted to find a song that we thought had enough depth and inspired us creatively. We decided on All About Flux's song Just Don't Care.




After deciding on this song I researched, watched and analysed a variety of professional videos. This was an important step in the creative process. Here I generated ideas about what we might use in our video, what would not be appropriate and what characteristics made up the music video form.


The video which were the most interesting and engaging were those that had a storyline and were original. The most original videos had a lot of entropic elements, especially in the punk genre where individuality is important. It was clear that making a really good music video would mean doing something different and unexpected.


To get a good idea of what would appeal to our target audience I looked at videos that were popular with them. This was where the majority of our inspiration came from. I researched Paramore, one of the most successful pop-punk bands, and found that most of their videos had very interesting narratives. The songs and videos often revolved around relationships, this applies to almost all genres, and because our song was about a relationship the best choice was to continue that idea in our video. When studying videos I found that most of them had some link between the lyrics and the visuals and this was a convention we followed.


When researching music videos generally I also found common features that would not fit into our video. In many videos, mainly of other genres such as rap, there is a very voyeuristic approach to women. Women in these videos are treated as 'eye-candy' and are sexualised, the camera focusses on their body. This would be inappropriate for our video as the target audience are female and would likely see looks and vanity as unimportant. In many punk videos there are anti-establishment themes and representations of psychological disturbance. These have become quite common for the punk genre, seen in videos such as White Lies' Bigger Than Us and Paramore's Brick By Boring Brick. These ideas would not work in our video as they would clash with the emotional narrative.

Bigger Than Us                                                                        Brick By Boring Brick

The narrative we created was inspired first by Panic! at the Disco's video I Write Sins Not Tragedies. They took a redundant wedding scene and invaded it with clowns and circus performers. This idea interested us and we wanted to try and use a clown as one of our characters. The circus was a theme that suited music as it is another performance style and also the circus celebrates individuality and being extraordinary, something our target audience would associate with. 

We searched for any similar videos and found Take That's "Said It All". This video showed clowns getting ready and then performing on stage, this worked really well with the music and was something we wanted in our video. The clowns were emotionally represented and romantic issues were hinted at in the video, but this was not explored to any depth. We decided to create a video around these themes, using a clown's failing relationship as our narrative.

The Take That video was what we based the look of sections of our video on. Their clown makeup was our model and also we likes the way the video was shot. It used close ups on the clown so the audience would connect with him, then longer shots to show his performing.


Watching and analysing existing music videos was important as it forms a mould of what videos are like generally. It showed what features almost all videos included, such as performance by the artist which promoted them and created a star image. When creating a media product it is most often best to balance redundant and entropic features. This is an idea that Steve Neale has presented, talking about how audiences enjoy both repetition and difference. We want the audience to enjoy our video and so it needs to be familiar to them and fit in with the other things they enjoy; it needs to meet some of their expectations. To do this creators use redundant idea's that will signal the the viewer that this product fits into their preferred genre. In our video we styled the artist in black and white clothes and had them act with an attitude, thus fitting into the punk genre. But viewers do not want to see exactly the same thing repeated over and over, to make an interesting product something new is needed. Our narrative about a failing relationship is fairly standard for music videos, but by making the man a clown it added another layer. Now he was trying to decide between his performing and his girlfriend, as well as living on a small amount of money. This is a story that hasn't been used in music videos before and so would make our video stand out to viewer as interesting and be memorable.


When trying to do something different you can also go too far. There are many videos that 
have no structure to them or which are very experimental. Sometimes these videos work and are a massive success. But they can also be so radical that many viewers don't understand the concept and feel alienated or think the video is ridiculous. 


Getting audience feedback heavily influenced our video, showing wether we were working too far from the conventions or if it was all redundant. Before starting to plan the creation of our video the group created a detailed mood-board, this meant we had a clear idea of our audience and what their interests were etc. We pitched our concept and had an initial audience focus group. These highlighted some concerns from the audience. Although they thought the idea was original and appealing, they thought that the setting and clown performance might not look realistic. When they heard the song they commented that because the lead singer was female but the main characters was male it could be confusing who viewers are supposed to empathise with. This was something we made sure to address when planning and filming.


After editing together a rough cut of our video we performed more focus groups to see it what we had done was working. The biggest change this prompted was the addition of artist performance to the video. We had at first didn't want to have performance, this was a challenge to music video conventions and was clearly a step too far as it didn't work. The audience thought seeing the artist perform the song was a necessary feature and so we incorporated it. By following the form more closely and adding performance our video looked a lot more professional and came together as a whole, an example of when conforming to convention can improve the product.


Our video is quite similar to a professional music video in many ways. The narrative, editing and use of conventions are all very similar. There are of course some things which do not look as professional, due to restraints such as time, technology and expertise. Over the course of filming we used different camera's and this meant our video quality was inconsistent. Some of the scenes looks professional quality and some do not look as good. We also realised after filming one set of scenes that the lighting in the location did not work well when recorded. We learnt from these mistakes but did not have enough time to reshoot, as we would have liked too.

Creating My Digipak Advert

I have already finished my digipak and so creating an accompanying advert is fairly simple. The two should look very similar so that once people have seen the advert they can recognise the CD cover. They will use the same fonts and colour palette, though I would like to use a different photograph so that each product is new and interesting to fans.

I chose to use this photograph, that would not fit into the digipak. It follows the overall theme I am going for with my print products, displays the band well and has room to the right where I can place the necessary text.

Adverts need to be very bold and eye catching, but I thought the original image was too busy and text would be unclear on the background. Because of this I decided to darken the image except for the area with the artists.

This has made the band stand out a lot more and will mean the text can be read easily by passers by. When I asked for comments on my advert people said the chair number plates were distracting and so I have blacked them out. To complete the advert I added the relevant information, such as the band name and cd title etc. I have tried to keep all my print products simple and professional looking, so I didn't use too much text or graphics on the advert.

Final Digipak Advert

Final Digipak Design

Below is my final design for my digipak. I have added in the necessary conventions of the product, such as copyright information and the website. I also put the signatures of the two band members, to give it a personal touch that fans would appreciate.

External Panels 

Internal Panels

Digipak Feedback and Changes

I created my first digipak draft and then got feedback from my peers about its design, asking wether they thought it was appropriate and what they would change. Overall the feedback was very positive, here are some of the comments and changes suggested:

I made the background on this panel darker so that the pattern was more subtle. I also made the track list white. This makes it stand out a lot more, as well as making the bonus video look like a special extra.

I still wanted to use some more band pictures inside the digipak, as the products need to sell the artist and build up their image. I added in a photograph from backstage underneath the disk tray. This ties in well with the video and overall performance ideas.

I liked using pictures from the video as all the products need to work together. To reinforce this I added some stills taken from the video and placed them on top of the other photograph. This gives a kind of preview of the narrative as we see the woman both with the clown and having the affair; this is also the narrative of the title track.

I now just have to add the finishing touches to the digipak, such as copyright information and the barcode. 

Creating My Digipak

I have had some more feedback from my audience and they agreed that the image below is a good cover design for my digipak. They did suggest that the song title did not stand out enough in previous versions and so I changed it's colour. 

The cover is now completed and I can move onto the rest of the digipak. Due to the feedback I had on the cover I have a clear idea of how the rest of the product should be designed as it will all be in the same style.

Digipak Cover Mockup

I have chosen this picture for my digipak cover. It shows the band members well and is quite simple. I have used several of the fonts my target audience liked so that they can see which they think would work well with the photograph.

Font Choices

I have looked for several different fonts that I can use for my Digipak. I have chosen several different styles that I think our target audience will like. They are all quite individual and are the style of fonts often seen on punk products. I want them to be very bold, I have also looked at some distressed style fonts that are a bit more grungy. I am going to ask for some feedback from our audience about which they would choose and then make a decision.

Digipak Photographs

I have chosen several of the photographs we took to use in my digipak. I thought these were the most interesting pictures and they suited the target audience well as they are quite unusual. I have decided on an black, white and red colour palette for my print products. This is a colour scheme often used in the punk genre and will be instantly recognisable to punk fans. Because of this i have put my photographs in black and white, though I might also edit them further for my final product. I have included some picture from the theatre as this fits in with the performance of the band and the video theme.

Music Video Final Cut

We have now finished our music video! Although we ended up behind schedule I am really happy with how the final product has come out.

Planning for March

In march we planned to edit our video. We first did a rough cut to get feedback from audiences, this checks we are moving in the right direction for our video and that everything we have filmed works as a whole.

Unfortunately we are behind our original schedule on the completion of our music video. In response to the audience feedback we got on our rough cut, we went back to our location and filmed some performance of the song to add into our video. We have edited this in and it has improved the video, making it look more professional and tying the whole thing together. The audience also commented that in some parts of the video the colour looked grainy and too bright, so we have sepia toned the clips of the clown performing. This has also worked well, it separates the two time periods of our video as well as making the clown scenes look more emotional.

We had underestimated how long our editing would take, and on top of this we had extra filming to do. This is what has lead us to being behind our schedule. To try and catch up we came in to do an extra day of editing. This means that we are now putting the finishing touches to our video and hope to post a final video today.

When we have finished the video I will move on to creating the ancillary print products. This shouldn't take too much time and I hope to have these done by the 29th March so that I can spend the rest of that week doing my evaluation.

Performance Shooting

We have returned to the Assembly Rooms and shot the new performance section of our video. We made the room a lot brighter than when we filmed previously and this made the footage look really clear. We made sure to get a variety of angles and shot types, focussing on making the band aspirational. We have started to edit some of the footage into our video and it has made a massive improvement. The whole video is coming together a lot better with this added and it looks much more like a professional music video.


While we were on location and in costume we decided to take some photographs of the band. We can use these pictures for our print products when we come to make them, rather than having to plan another session to do a photo shoot.


Most digipaks, especially ones for new artists, have a photograph of the band on the cover and possibly more inside. We decided to take the photographs in the same location, but sat in the seats of the auditorium. This links in with our video theme and style as well as being more entropic than having the band stood on the stage.

Performance Actors and Costume

We have decided to film some performance to add into our video after our audience suggested it. We need to do this quite quickly, so we needed people we could organise to come in easily and who were familiar with our song and video style. Because of this we decided to use people from within our group, so myself and Emma Guest will be performing as the band in our video. We think this is a suitable and practical choice, that will work for the genre of our video. 


To tie this performance into the rest of the video we have decided to film it in the Assembly Rooms where we filmed the clowns performance. Music videos often use locations for both the performance and narrative, this works especially well for us as the location is a theatre with a stage where the band can perform. We have decided to continue the clown theme, though also making it suit our audience and look stylish rather than like a costume. We chose to model the outfits on mime artists, as the clothes are similar in style to the way our audience dresses.

We are using some props too, a guitar and microphone, to make the video look more authentic. This also means we can film some instrument performance, another important convention of music videos.


We have filmed in the Assembly Rooms before and the footage we got was darker than we thought when filming, This time we intend to get much more light so that this section of our video will be clearer

Rough Cut and Feedback

We have completed a rough cut that we can show to our target audience. This will give us important feedback so that we are sure our final product will appeal to our audience. The rough cut is a simplified version of our video, with the clips in roughly the right place but without perfect editing.





We asked a group of people what they thought of this video, wether they understood the narrative and what changes they suggested we make. To record what the viewers reaction was we filmed their answers.





The viewers thought that although the performance element of our video was very good and made sense, the video needed some performance. Performance is obviously a big convention in music videos and will help to clearly define this as a music video. 


They also thought the quality of the clown performing clips was not great, these shots were very low light and so came out very grainy, the colours also looked quite cheap and tacky. It was suggested we try altering the colours. This will also help to separate the two sides of our narrative, the present and flashbacks.


Getting this feedback has been very useful as people who have not seen the video before can give us a fresh perspective and first impressions. We intend to make the changes our audience has suggested.

Updates

We have now finished our filming and are moving on to editing our video. We plan to do this in the next two weeks, hopefully finishing by the 5th March. We may not have filmed all the shots we want in our video and so we may need to re-film some shots or think of additional scenes.


We have looked over our footage and I think overall our filming went very well. Our actors worked out very well as they felt comfortable acting with each other and understood what we wanted in our video.


As we were filming we have adapted our ideas depending on the locations, actors and our audience. For example Luke, who played the clown, had a lot of good ideas about what he could do to perform onstage, and we added these in. When filming scenes between the other two characters we decided that a scene involving them messing around in the toilet didn't suit their characters or the tone of the video, and so cut it. 


Whilst filming we focussed on the emotions and the relationship problems of our characters, as these are the aspects of our narrative that our audience will identify with. They are stories that the target audience is interested in, similar to shows such as Hollyoaks and Skins.

Audience Theory

David Morley theorises that audiences read media texts actively and so can react in different ways to what you present - either Preferred, Negotiated or Oppositional.

• A preferred reading of our video would be that the audience see's the clown as honourable, and side with him. They disagree with the woman cheating on her boyfriend, as well as her valuing money above anything else. They should have a negative view of the rich man also, as he uses money to buy the woman's affections and encourages the affair.
• Negotiated reading's take into account the above points, but people have their own personal reading. They may expand the narrative by imagining things which they have witnessed in their own life. People may also recognise that the video presents a limited view of the situation, from mainly the clowns perspective.
• Viewers may oppose completely the idea's presented in our video. They could think that the clown should have found a 'real' job to support his relationship, and that the woman left him for legitimate reasons. They may also think the video is so limited and biased that it portrays the characters too negatively.

The people who would take an oppositional view could have been in the woman or rich man's place themselves and therefore might agree with their choices. People outside of our artistic target audience may think the clown is deluded pursuing this career, and they might not value his persistence.

I think that most people who watch our video will follow our preferred reading, though we need to ensure they do. We will do this by focussing on the emotions of the clown, showing how badly he is affected. The rich man will be dressed in black and will represent people our audience think are dull and conformist. The woman is dressed provocatively, which our female demographic will see as untrustworthy.

Filming Photographs

More Filming Updates

On Monday 6th we were unable to film any more of our video, as one of our actors couldn't make it into town due to the weather. We have postponed filming that section of the video until after the half term holidays.


We plan to film the rest of Luke's scenes as the clown on Friday 10th. These will take place in the Auditorium of the Ludlow Assembly Rooms, we have permission to film whenever the room is free.

Filming Update

Our main actor Luke was unavailable to film on Thursday and so we re-scheduled to Friday morning. We managed to film all the backstage and external scenes with Luke. We will then shoot his on stage scenes on Thursday 9th. During this time we will also have our photo-shoot for print work, as Luke will be in costume and in a suitable location.


Our next shoot is Monday 6th, when we expect to film all the scenes with Joe and Rosie. We have again made a call sheet of necessary shots and props etc.

Narrative Theorys

This week I have looked at several Narrative Theorys, thinking about how we use these in our music video.

Levi Strauss Theory

Strauss says that in every kind of media text there will be some use of binary opposites. These are two things which are comletely opposite to one another and so create conflict. The audience should be aware of who they are supporting within your narrative. We will be using several of these binary oppositions in our video:

• Rich and Poor - This is the main reason for conflict in our video, as the woman wants money and so chooses a richer man over her current boyfriend.
• The main character is betrayed because of the womans greed, and so we also see Good and Bad - The clown who is trying to make the relationship work and the woman, who cheats and lies.

We use these opposites to clearly show whose side the audience is on and who they are empathising with. The audience sides with the poor performer, as he is the underdog and is more honest. They also represent the ideology of the video, that it is important to be faithful and honest in relationships. The opposites are very clear in our video because we crosscut between shots of the clown, whose struggle we empathise with, and the other couple being unfaithful.

Todorov's Theory

Todorov states that there are five stages to each media text, these stages are included in our narrative.

• Original Equilibrium/Normality - This stage is included in our narrative, though you don't actually see it in the video, the audience assumes the relationship was at once stable.
• Disruption - This is the conflict in the video between the clown and his girlfriend, and her being unfaithful.
• Recognition - The clown recognises that he is being cheated on, during his performance.
• Attempt to Restore the Equilibrium - This is one part of the theory that isn't included in our video, as the clown has no chance to try and repair the relationship.
• New Equilibrium - This new state is also not really seen in our video, though the audience can deduce that the couple split up.

Music videos are very short and so the narrative we use has to be quite clear to the audience. Our video also has to engage the audience, the most interesting part of our narrative is the disruption, and so we will focus on this part in our video. Our story follows  Todorov's traditional structure and so we don't need to include the very beginning and end, as the audience can work those parts out for themselves.

Planning the Creation of Our Video

We have created another calendar to organise when we are shooting sections of our video, and when he hope to be editing by. These dates may change, depending on how much we film on each day, as we might end up behind or ahead of schedule. We have also given ourselves deadlines for certain posts, as there are somethings, such as risk assessment, that have to be finished and posted on our blogs before we can start filming. These calendars have been very useful and keep us on track, if we follow our plan we will be able to finish our video in time to move on to print work etc.




We have also planned out our first filming session, on Thursday 2nd February. 


Actors needed: Rosie and Luke

Props/Costumes needed: 

• Rosie and Luke's costumes, 
• props for the clown and facepaint
• Ring and Box

Shots of Luke and Rosie (clown and girlfriend):

• Backstage shot of talking and hugging
• Putting on the makeup in the mirror 
• Point of view shot from the clown and from the audience
• Action shots of clown (Spinning plates, diablo, bunting)
• Clown dropping everything
• Scrabbling around to pick everything up
• Sad audience with some people leaving
• Happy face when the clown throws the bunting up
• As bunting comes down the clowns face is sad
• Crying shots gradually getting worse
• Backstage shot of the mirror and ring shot
• Separate shot of Rosie and Luke walking by the river

Equipment:

• Video Camera
• Tripod and Gorilla-pod
• Laptop - with song and storyboard

Costumes

Storyboard

To make a good music video we need to plan out what we are going to film so that we end up with a well produced and considered music video, rather than a messy jumble. To do this we have created a storyboard, we know what we are going to film and in what order we are going to edit it. This means we will be able to get on quickly when we are shooting and we can plan our time effectively. We have then photographed our images and put them to our music, so that we can roughly visualise our final product. This has been very useful as now we are clear on all aspects of our final video.