Friday 9 March 2012

Closing Post

Here is my coursework blog with research and planning, production work, and evaluation of my production. This blog is now complete and ready for assessment.
Thank you.

Evaluation Question 4

Research
During my research stages I used several media technologies. The most popular one I used was Youtube. This is because I needed to look at other videos to get an idea of the type of thing I'd want to put into my video. I also looked at different shots done according to what type of genre it is and how the stars being portrayed.
I also used Blogger a lot as this is how I recorded all my findings whilst researching. Google also played a big part of my researching as I used this to look at other artists digipaks and adverts to again see which would be the best style according to genre.
This already shows that I've been using media 2.0 a lot. This goes to show just how important it is and how much it effects people. For example as an artists Media 2.0's allowing people to view there work and they're music. 

Planning
The most useful technology I used was Facebook. This is because this is how I got in contact with the artist and in contact with my performers. Also once I got further into planning my print work and my music video I started a focus group where I posted pictures of my performer to see what the audience thought about her and I posted images of my story board on there too. This was useful as I got to see what the potential target audience thought and whether I needed to adapt my ideas. 
Another media technology I used was my phone. I used this the most as whenever I needed to get in contact with my performers or the artist it was the quickest and easiest way. Also whenever I had a fresh idea it was useful as I could quickly type it down ready to add into my plan. This potentially widened my creativity as I could add in original ideas that if I didn't have my phone with my at the time I possibly wouldn't of remembered. 
Again with the planning I used google. I used this to look at the artist Banksy. Banksy was my inspiration for the orginal ideas i had for my print work. 
I used a nicki d60 DSLR camera whilst researching and planning a it more with my print work. I also used Prezi for my pitch. I really enjoy using prezi as i find it simple to use and find it look good and more interesting when needing to present something.
Creatation

during the creation of my music video and print work i used many other media technologies. Such as a Panasonic HD DV camera. This is obviously the most important tool as it's what i used to film my whole music video. I feel that the camera itself was very good, but it took me a while to get used to it. I had a few instances which effected the creation of my music, for example a few times i thought i pressed record when i didn't therefore recorded the wrong things and didn't record the things i wanted. Another extremely important media technology that i used was Adobe Premiere Pro, this was the editing suite i used to edit my music video. I find Premiere Pro easy to use and really enjoy using it. For my print work i used the Nikon D60 DSLR camera again and to edit the photos and create the digipak and advert i use Adobe Photoshop. I found photoshop very confusing and i didn't like using it. But I'm sure if i managed to get much more practice in i would find it much easier and actually not mind using it more often.
I again used youtube during my creation. I put my final music video on youtube and this is how people have managed to watch it so far. To get audience feedback i used Facebook a lot, this was useful as it meant i managed to get quick and easy feedback."Technological determinsin presumes that a society's technology drives the development of its social structures and cultural views" I feel that with the presence of media 2.0 peoples opinions are altered. I think that media 2.0 makes people more self obsessed and has made society less secretive. and It's this that alters peoples true opinions. 

Evaluation Question 3

From my audience feedback, i can tell that people were shocked when they saw the narrative. I feel that this is a good thing. This shows they all understood what was going on and they also managed to link it to other media text. A few people managed to link it back to the media text i was inspired by and others by text i didn't think of before.
I think some members of my audience could relate to this text and therefore had more pleasure from it than others. I also found this was mostly girls, which is what i originally intended during the planning period. I think my text does offer girls more pleasure than boys, this is because in my video the females are being made victims and the male is being made the bad guy. Therefore females are more likely to have a direct effect from the text. I feel that my text gave off preferred readings as the audience has taken away the message i intended.

Wednesday 7 March 2012

Evaluation Question 2



I asked a few people to answer some question about there thought on whether or not my digipak, advert and music video where coherent....

I feel this feedback is good as i can see my audience can tell they're coherent. And also because they seem to agree with the same techniques as me when it comes to promoting the artist.

Wednesday 29 February 2012

Evaluation Question 1

For my initial ideas I was influenced by the band "the pretty reckless" i very much wanted to use a similar idea to her costume and make up. For the video itself i was influenced strongly by an artist called Gabriella Cilmi and her song "Sweet about me".  I really liked the idea of girls getting revenge on there ex's. 
"john tucker must die"
But when things went wrong with the first actress i planned on using i had to change the location of my print work at the last minute. I then decided that my print work didn't match my song and had to change that and therefore my initial ideas were changed too. This wasn't a problem in itself as I liked the new song and had a lot of good ideas for the video.
my video
My inspiration for my original print work was by an artist called Banksy. I love how his work challenges conventions. It's very "hipster" and I felt fit my song well. But again this all changed when i found my actress wasn't as reliable as i thought she was.
Once I'd chosen my new song i found i had inspiration from a film called "John Tucker Must die" There's a scene in the film where the main guy cheats on his girlfriend in an obvious way. He bounces from girl to girl and when the girls find out they take revenge. Although I haven't had the girls in my video seek revenge they do all break up with him.


As I had to change my ideas I had to pitch a few smaller ideas to people from my target audience. the feedback they gave me said the idea wasn't very original or something that stands out as it mostly consists of performance. They also said the story line was weak. This is how I came up with the idea for adapting the "John Tucker must die" theme. Was I suggested this to people from my target audience they found that that was slightly more interesting than the one before which was very simple and seemed very boring. When I suggested filming and taking some photos for the digipak and the advert in woods they did like this idea as its quite original for this genre of music. They said Woods are usually linked to the idea of horror films and they liked how I decided to go against this and use it for a love song. But for my original pitch with my original ideas, the responses I got was that they thought my idea was again unoriginal, but they liked how I had so many costume changes and location changes. So when I came up with my new idea I did in-corporate that advice into it. 
The advert I researched
My advert
In comparison to professional media products I feel mine aren't far off from looking too professional themselves. I think my advert especially looks reasonable professional as there aren't any blemishes and it's edited well. While I was making it I was also constantly referring back to other adverts that I researched to make sure there were some similarities to make sure all important information was on there. 
I feel that my digipak itself doesn't emphasis the band name as much as real media products would. Although the photos looking professional, I very much focus on the main girl and not the band and the name unlike real digipak's would. With my music video, some of it was meant to look low budget (the part when the guy and girl are together)to look creative and original, and the rest is meant to look professional. I feel it's down to my budget and technology available. 
I think the most original thing about my video is the amount of costume changes that are involved. I also feel because I've been inspired by so many other artists, whether its there music video or there costumes and make-up I managed to get such a mix it became almost individual. I don't think there's anything different in my music video from a conventional music video.
Steve Neale says "Audiences take pleasure from genre because of #instances of repetition and difference' "
I think in my music video entropy hasn't been used. There's nothing exceptionally unexpected in my video. I think something that may make the audience slightly uncomfortable is the fact the actress I used barely looks into the camera. Redundancy has been used a lot in my video. But I feel this is better than the use of entropy as it'll mean the audience feel more comfortable watching it and will be able to understand what's going on easy.

Thursday 12 January 2012

Research and Planning - Audience Theory

My intended effect for my audience after watching my music video is for them to feel sympathic towards the artist.  I've done this by creating a narrative that makes her the victim. I feel my audience could potentially be either be a niche audience, very specific or could be very wide. This is because my Genre's pop-rock. The particular song I've chosen edges towards more pop and therefore the audiences age could range between 13-18. I think I could also generalise my audience to mostly girls. 
McQuail says that audiences watch media texts to fulfil particular needs. These need are Surveillance, finding out what's happening in the world, Identity, finding something out about themselves and seeing their own experience reflected from watching this text, Personal Relationships, feeling like part of a group, Diversion/ Escapism, feeling emotions created through this text. 
Media 2.0 is the internet as it is now, meaning people can consume and interact. Flew argues that in comparison to other media products the internet appeals most the audience. This is because its a two way communication, it enables them to both consume media text but also become a producer of it themselves.
Morley suggests that audiences have different feelings and thought towards texts depending or the values expressed within the media texts. These standpoint are; Preferred reading (or dominant) This is where the audience recognise the values being expressed in the text and accept them as natural. Negotiated reading, This is where the audience recognise the text and except in on a general level but adapt their reading of this text to fit in with their own personal experiences. Oppositional reading, this is where the audience disagrees with the text and chooses the reject the idea of it. 
"Audience-hood is becoming an even more multifaceted, fragments and diversified repertoire of practices and experiences." -Ang. This means because of new technology we all we different things and different times. 

Wednesday 4 January 2012

Research and Planning- Audience Research

 I made a focus group, unfortunately this wasn't too successful but I did get some feedback from a few photos I added...
The questions I asked were-
"would you like to be friends with this person? and why?"
"What sort of character do you think this picture portrays?"