Thursday 2 February 2017

Evaluation- Q4

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

Evaluation- Q3

What have you learned from your audience feedback? 

Audience feedback is very important when creating a media product. Its essential to know the strengths and weaknesses of your product from an outer perspective so your product can be the best it can be. 

The major ways I carried out audience feedback:


- Video Questions 


For our music video we got a media students and a psychology student to give us feedback on our piece. This helped us make any last changes to our piece before submitting it. 

- Picture Responses 

















- Verbal Feedback

During the editing process we got our teachers and peers to respond to our music video and help us out with any questions we had. A lot of the questions consisted of 'does this look ok?' or 'Which way should this video go'. Asking these questions pushed us to become more confident in making decisions on our own and produce a well planned piece. 



All comments either negative or positive were helpful when producing my music video. The negative ones allowed me to improve some aspects and look at my work from a different perspective. It was important for me to have an understanding of these improvements so I could gain a higher mark.

What Audience Feedback has taught me: 
It gave me another perspective to the production and editing stages. Getting feedback on the day from the performers helped as it gave us a chance to re-shoot some parts and get a more variety of shots which were helpful when it came to the editing process. Editing process was advanced by people showing us different ways of using the video. For example we found out how to change to colour of our shots so they matched with the natural theme. 

Evaluation- Q2



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






My Three Products:



Evaluation- Q1

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


 Conventions of real music videos
I looked into these conventions by watching professional music videos on youtube. I looked at a wide range of videos from Rihanna to Birdy. Although these are different genres they all follow typical conventions. I put together a Prezi at the start of my research to show what I found. 




We aimed to follow most conventions of real music videos.

- Closeup shots engage the audience and allow them feel connected to the performer. We used a variety of close up shots within our video to gain the audiences empathy with the main character and feel involved with the narrative.

The first shot in our video is a close up introducing the main character to the audience. Having a close up, birds eye view allows the audience to look over the character acting as her protector which will help them sympathise in the rest of the video.

Later in the video we see a closeup, two-shot of the two characters. This is conventional in real music videos to allow the audience to feel involved with the characters. We choose to use this shot to show the raw emotion of the characters faces which convey the theme of love and romance.
While using closeups of the characters I also used them to portray the artist. This is conventional in music videos as it ensures the audience know who the star is. Being able to recognise the artist is important so using close ups give the audience this insight.



As well as close ups of the characters I also shot closeups of the props in the location. This is unconventional in music videos as closeups tend to be just of the artists. I've chosen to break this convention because it has a strong focus of the background as well as the character showing the audience the scene from the characters eyes as is they wee involved within the narrative.


- Cross Dissolves are the main editing technique used in music videos. It helps show emotions and meaning within the video as well as making it flow with the music.

We added cross dissolves in between most of our shots to help them flow with the music. Having them flow together allows the audience to have an easy watch helping them focus on the characters. An example of it is pasted below:

via GIPHY

- Having a variety of locations was one convention we didn't follow. We wanted audience to become familiar with the 2 locations so they could focus on watching the video and find the real meaning instead of having to become familiar with different ones.











Genre conventions 
INDIE FOLK Conventions
Establishing shots 
They allow the audience to familiarise with the location so the story line will flow naturally to them. 
In my research I've found its the first shot in a music video but I decided to have it be the 3rd shot. Although its still one of the first things to be seen the audience start asking questions creating enigma codes before this shot. For example ' Where is she?' or 'Why is she there?'. This is then answered in the establishing shot which shows Chrissy sitting alone in a green open space. Although it doesn't fully answer questions it allows the audience to familiarise with the location. 

Features of nature
Green open spaces, with minimal action, helps the audience feel the emotion and create a connection with the artist.


















Our main location was a green open field with the background of forest. Being alone with no background action helps the audience focus on the performers and not be distracted. 

Panning shot
It helps the audience follow the characters adding to the connection they will feel to the artist. 
We chose not to use a panning shot as we felt it speeded the scene up. We practised one when Chrissy was running up to George but decided not to use it as it made the movement feel rushed. This was not the scene we wanted to portray with our music. 

 View of sky
This shot is normally used to show passing time or action allowing the audience to keep up to date with the narrative of the story. Its also calming and therapeutic way of relaxing the audience making them feel comfortable.
No shot of the sky was used because we thought it would move the audiences attention away from the characters. 

Natural lighting 
Minimal artificial lighting makes the audience feel connected with the artist as its more relevant and      familiar with them. 
No lighting kit was used in the field scene to really portray the natural theme. We used a lighting kit in the singers scene to expose her emotions to the audience. Having her exposed helped the audience really understand and connect to the lyrics of the song.



Real Digipak conventions 



My Digipak followed all conventions of a real digipak. I did his to keep it original and not confuse the audiences when coming to buy it. 


Link to Indie Folk Genre
While conducting my research I found the conventions of a digipak for the ‘indie-folk’ genre follow an ‘old-style' theme with a vintage look which adds an element of ‘folk’. The front of both album covers only usually include one relaxed image and the title of the album. The production company logo and bar code are included and the the usual colours are dull, they are not bright and eye catching like the colours of a digipak from the ‘pop’ genre would be.
I followed most conventions to the indie folk genre. Having the nature theme run through with the forest background helped along with the effects I used on pixelmaotr. 


Real Advert conventions 



My Advert Cover:

While constructing my advert I tried to incorporate all conventional aspects to allow the audience to receive the message of the album coming out. Although usually advert covers are Portrait I researched into simple landscape ones to create my own different one to catch the audience eye. The simple information of the album title, Artists name and the date the album comes out is places onto the advert along with a QR code to find out some more information. This allows the audience to choose to find out more information if they want to and not bombard everyone looking at it.