Evaluation

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

The first aspect I will look at is the representation of the artist and the way that I dressed him to suit the genre of the music. The second aspect is the links between the visual and the track. I achieved this by using the narrative to link in with the lyrics of the song so I included the beach scenery and the bucket and spade as these are within the lyrics. The setting and location was quite straight forward because the lyrics are about Mr. Thomas by the sea, on holiday so I choose the beach to go with the song. In the camera work aspect I tried to use a range of shots so my video doesn't get boring and drag with the same style shots. I used a variety of Long shots, mid shots, high shots, low shots, pans, zooms and close ups. My narrative is indicated by using the beach scenery and the fact that it represents holidays and also that there is a holiday camp in the lyrics and I used an arcade centre with a fair ground to represent this. My musical genre is suggested in the video mainly by the representation my artist gives off with his hair style as well as the clothes he wears. This shows the indie genre and the music shows this too. I didn't use any special effects in my video as it wasn't appropriate within my narrative however in the editing of my video I used some straight cuts where appropriate and some fades when the clip changes.

My representation of the artists are shown through the clothes they were and how they represent the indie genre. My mis-en-scene of the images show the beach theme throughout and the props within them like the bucket and spade. I didn't have to use any lighting as it was daylight and would not have been necessary. The costumes represent the genre and show young men with dress shorts and T-Shirts with long hair. This works well as if they were dressed in black clothes with make up on and piercings this wouldn't represent the indie genre as it would show Gothic. My props follow the conventions of my music video and I show these in my ancillary tasks to continue that flow of the beach theme. I made the font size large so it stands out to draw the readers attention and a font that is easy to read. The written content itself is short and straight to the point so it doesn't make the readers get bored and they understand the key facts such as release dates. My advert suggests the music genre through the picture of my band members looking out to sea, this shows their style through their clothes. My digipack also suggests the music genre through my artists clothing and style. The overall layout of both my magazine advert and my digipack is clear and aesthetically pleasing to readers and my target audience. I had to take into account the positioning on the back of my digipack as the bucket and spade are positioned to the right of the picture to allow space for my song names on the left side. Lastly for special effects in my ancillary tasks I used a drop shadow effect to make my titles and other important writing stand out.

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

Throughout my project I have made sure that I kept a theme that continued throughout all three of my tasks. This was mainly to show people that they were all of the same product. In my products I have used a beach theme as the lyrics of the song I chose are about Mr. Thomas on holiday and when you think of holidays you think of the seaside on the beach. I came up with plans showing my artists at the beach looking out see as well as using props such as a bucket and spade. In my magazine advert I used a picture of my band standing on the beach, this links in with my Digipack as I have used photos on the beach as well as shooting my video on the beach.
My products meet the conventions of the music video through the colour. The colours used are the sand colours of brown and yellow this is shown through all three of my products. I have used pictures inside my Digipack with again the background colour being a light brown. Using the pictures inside the Digipack follows the conventions that I researched. All of my texts and layout of my products are simple and easy to read and I think they work well.
I have used the same image in my magazine advert and inside my Digipack, this shows they are of the same product and represents the genre of the band that I was looking for from the clothes they wear.
Throughout my products I followed the conventions of real magazine adverts and Digipacks that I researched and this was to include things such as record labels, a bar code, date of release and 5 star ratings.
I found it quite easy to link my products together as the lyrics of the song gave me a good base to work around. such as using the beach theme and colours as well as the bucket and spade. this shows a strong cohesion between my products.
In conclusion there are many different elements that link my music video to my ancillary tasks. The colour in the video, shot type, costume and layout. The feedback i have received helped me to complete the video with useful and constructive points.


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

With out a camcorder I couldn't have made a video as i needed this to record my clips. I had never used one properly for my own use and had to learn how to use it as well as thinking about the mis en scene of the shots and what type of shots to use. I also used a Tri-pod with this to keep my shots steady throughout.

 I used a camera to take still shots of my artists and props used for my magazine adverts and Digipack.

The card reader was used to transfer my photos from the camera to the computer in order for me to upload them onto my blog and use them in photo shop.

Without the use of a computer I wouldn't have been able to complete any of my work as i needed this to use all of the programmes and to upload my clips and photos.

This is a photo of pinnacle studio which is the programme I used to edit my video clips to produce my rough cut and then go onto produce my final video.

Blogger is the website I used to produce all of my work so it can be viewed online.

Photoshop is the programme I used to create my magazine advert and Digipack. It is useful for editing images and is a much more advanced way rather than paint which is where I created my mock magazine advert. At the beginning of this assignment I didn't understand how to use Photoshop however now  am confident and will use it in future tasks with ease.

Flickr was a website i used to show my photos that i researched on the Hard Fi Digipack. Prezi was another website I used and this was used for my planning where I created a storyboard of my music video.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Gaining feedback has been extremely important as it has allowed people to express their views on my products and allowed different opinions other than my own. This has been effective as feedback has identified better suggestions or even pointed out mistakes that I had made and therefore allowed my to produce them to the best I can.

For my Digipack I created a first draft with two possibilities for my front cover and asked for feedback. The feedback showed the favourite image for the front cover and was the one I went on to use of Mr. Thomas wrote in the sand with some seaweed and rocks around it. 

My magazine advert I created and then asked for feedback and there was only one main thing that stood out and it was to include some ratings from nespaprwers so I include three 5 star ratings.

For my Music Video I produced a rough cut and showed it firstly to my classmates and their main reaction was that it was a good video with a few improvments that could be made.

Improvemnts where:

• Smooth cuts between clips
• Dont have clips with my shadow in
• Dont use clips where my actor looks at the camera
• Include a close up of actor eating ice cream

I then took the advice and included their suggestions as well as taking out mistakes in some clips and overall it helped me to produce a final video that looked professional.