Monday 25 March 2013

Dear Moderator...

Dear Moderator

I am writing to inform you that as of this post, I have concluding my recording of my progress of my blog. I thank you in advance for looking through this.

Daniel Wilson

Evaluation Question 4

Pre Production
 
 
Blogger - Blogger was the website used to record everything that we did during this project through Research, Construction and Evaluation.



Youtube - Youtube was a source of research on how music videos are made and how they look. We also looked at some videos titled "Urban Tribes" to help select our Target Market

 


Wikipedia - Wikipedia was also a source of research used to look at the band whose music we are making the music video for, as well as research into the genre of music it is. A Positive of using Wikipedia is that there is a huge wealth of information available. The downside, however, is that the information may or may not be accurate. This is because the information is free to be edited by almost anyone, which isn't the most reliable of systems.



Facebook - Facebook is a social networking site which we used to discuss as a group on what we are doing.



Skype - Skype is a program which allows you to call people over your computer and contact each other through microphones. We also used this to discuss with each other when talking through text was too time consuming.



HD Digital Camera - We used a HD Digital Camera as a form of Multimedia used to record our Pre-Production.

Production



HD Digital Camera x2 - We used two Digital Cameras during the filming of the Performance section of the music video. We used two at the same time so we could get a variety of camera angles and shots.


Tripod - We used a Tripod for one of the cameras. We did this so that while one the cameras moves smoothly and fluid like a professional music video, the camera without the tripod can swiftly move between band members and other sorts of shots.



Studio Lighting - Because we filmed in a studio for the Performance Section, we had access to the studio lighting above where the band members were performing. This allowed for creative use of lighting, so we can light the band members and not the background. That way the can stand out more from the background.



Headsets - We had to use headsets to communicate with each other while filming in the TV Studio as the person working the Studio lights was in a sound proof room.



GoPro Camera - The GoPro Camera is a small camera that can be mounted in a variety of places. For the music video, we mounted it on the cameraman's head to create a "P.O.V" Shot. We used the P.O.V Shot for most of the Narrative section of the Music Video.

Post Production



Final Cut Pro - Final Cut Pro was the editing software used to cut and edit the footage of our music video in order to create our final product. The program has been a bit of a mixed bag. While it was certainly useful and effective at editing our video, it was difficult to use as nothing was very clear about what did what in the program and we needed to look up several tutorials on how to use it.



Photoshop - Photoshop is a photo editing program which used to create our Digipak and other advertising material. While Photoshop is a difficult program to use, previous experience with it has helped me get to grips with it. As a result, it was easy to use for me and was very useful in creating our products


Audio Hijack Pro - Audio Hijack Pro is an audio capturing program which was used to get a hold of the song we wanted to use in out music video. We played a Youtube video with the song in it and the program ripped the audio from the video.

Sunday 24 March 2013

Evaluation Question 3

What have you learned from Audience feedback?

For our Final Cut of out music video, I asked some viewers to let us know what went well as well as what went wrong. The people we asked were within our target market so that we could have more reliable answers as well as so we can be properly criticized by the people the video was aimed for.

Our Primary Audience is are Young males, around ages 13-20. This is because that is typically the age group who like to listen to the Rock/Alternative Rock genre. They would also be the outgoing type due to the "Go out and Party" nature of the songs lyrics

One of the things the audience feels we have done well on is the use of lighting. They feel that the studio lights were used effectively in creating a professional, studio like atmosphere that we were aiming for in out music video. Another point they felt that we did well on is the use of Mise-en-scene. Yet again they felt that they were convinced that the performance section of the music video was filmed in a performance studio that most bands could have access to. Futhermore, they agreed that even without the music playing out loud, they feel they could correctly guess the genre of music video it is by simply watching the videos visuals i.e. Use of Guitars/drums.

However there are some aspects that they feel we fell flat on. The most glaring is being that most of them could not seem to understand what the narrative was about. They couldn't tell what was going in between the performance sections and often had to be told what exactly was going on. This was a big problem we had as if the audience can't understand the narrative section, they will effectively be cut off from half of the music video. We feel that if we had included some sort of prompt at the beginning or was a little less subtle in what the narrative was about then we may have avoided this problem.

Another glaring problem was that the audience indicated that there were times where the audio would go out of sync with the video. However this could be due in part to the import process from the original file into the Youtube copy and that during that process the video de-Synced in places, However it could simply be that we edited the video wrong in places and is still an issue.

Overall I feel that I agree with the audience feedback that was given and have taken it on board as constructive criticism.









Saturday 23 March 2013

Evaluation Question 2

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

In the making of our music video, we wanted to create a sense of Brand Identity in order to make our product look more professional and legitimate. To do this, we created a advertisement in the form of a Magazine Poster and a Digipak (Album Artwork).

In order to to successfully create a visually appealing Digipak/Poster, we looked at a variety of posters and Album artworks in order to find the popularly used conventions of each form of Media. After researching into these products, we found several examples of Albums/Posters that helped us find different conventions that are required in these products. For example...

- Copyright Information such as the Record Label/Producers (Typically in small text and shoved into the corner somewhere)
- Band Title followed by the Album Title (Usually the same typography is used)
- A general Colour Scheme (So that the Album can stand out)
- Song names on the back panel (Sometimes including length of Song)
- Recommendations by popular Magazines/Music Channels
- Relating Websites

 Examples of Magazine Adverts

 Examples of Album Artwork



Final Digipak and Magazine Advert



We showed examples of these conventions in both our Digipak and our Poster, although some of these our exclusive to one form of media (I.e. Track Listing for Digipak). For example, both forms of product has all the legal copyright info at the bottom, as well as a link to a website.

To further secure Brand Identity, we had to have some sort of a recurring theme between the music video, the Digipak and the Poster. The one thing that joins the three products together is the use of Warm Colours (Specifically Orange/Yellow). The lighting of the performance section of the video is a warm orange/red, the Digipak Artwork is mostly comprised of Red/Orange/Yellow gradients and the Poster is a simple Orange/Black Colour Scheme. The reason we went with this colour scheme is that warm colours typically connote high energy and happiness that is typically found in the Rock genre and is a prevalent theme in out music video.

Another thing that connects the Digipak and the Music video together is the use of a Guitar Amp. The Guitar amp is an iconic part of the Rock genre and is featured in the opening scene of the video and the back panel of the Digipak. We chose to feature the Guitar Amp this way to further emphasize what genre of music we are working with, allowing our target market to correctly identify what genre music the album is.

Friday 22 March 2013

Evaluation Question 1

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

Conventions are specific ideas that can be seen and categorized into different forms and genres of medias. Music videos is a form of media that can have conventions that can be attributed to Music videos in general, as well as different genres that reside in music videos such a Pop, Indie, Rock etc.

Andrew Goodwin theory is that Music videos can be split into 3 categories...
- Performance
- Narrative
- Conceptual

Performance is simply the band playing along with the music, often cutting between each band member and close ups of them and their instruments. Narrative is where a story is interwoven into the video. The story is told through the visuals that play alongside the music. Conceptual is a little more hard to define. It can be said Conceptual is showing visuals that don't create a story, but can still somehow keep the viewers attention. The  Rock/Alternative Rock almost always has the Performance part covered in their music videos as they use music videos as a way to advertise themselves as being able to play their own instruments and such. They also quite often use Narrative in music videos in order to show variety and experiment with different ways to get the audiences attention. They also have a narrative in order to accentuation the meaning of the lyrics to try and make them more powerful.

Karlsson has a similar theory in that he splits Music videos into...
-Commercial Exhibitionist
-Televised Bard
-Electric Shaman

Essentially it means the same thing as the above definitions, only in more defined terms.

Our music video contains the use of both Performance and Narrative. The Performance takes place in a music studio with professional lighting equipment and instruments. The narrative takes place in a first person point of view of someone trying to get to band practice, which is later revealed to be what the band performance is, connecting the two together.

Typical conventions of Rock music includes...
- A Large amount of close ups on the lead singer of the band
- Quick cuts
- Wide angle shots of the whole band playing
- Close up of instruments being played
- Studio Lighting
- Casual costume of the Band Members

As such, we've made it a point to include many of these conventions into our final product of our music video in order to make it look more like a legitimate music video.




Wednesday 20 March 2013

Letter of Permission for use of Song


Above is the email I sent to ask permission for the use of Orson - No Tomorrow. I screenshotted this to evidence myself asking permission for use of this song

Construction - Magazine Advert