Evaluation

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

The music video which has been done for My Kind Of Love is the main product. We focused on things that would be considered when making a video or film, things such as lighting, costume, Mise-en-scene, camera angles etc. We thought of going for natural lighting because it would make the video more realistic, however, the day that we filmed on, the weather was very bright and it did rain a couple of times. I think we should have used some sort of artificial lighting so that we could get the perfect shots. 

The locations that we went for were in the local area. Waverly Abbey Ruins and Gostrey Meadows were the 2 locations that we used. Most of the video was shot in Waverly Abbey. We did a couple of takes of the whole song whilst we were there, so that we would have a wide variety of shots that we could use to include into our music video. 

When considering all things for Mise-en-Scene, we looked at using more than just one person. This was shown in the storyboard that I illustrated. I thought we could have used 4 more people so that there would be more of a story behind the song. In the end, we only used 1 other person who is featured in the last 10 seconds of the video. 

We wanted to keep the costume basic and used normal, everyday clothing. This was to try and relate to the target audience who is teenagers, to see if they could understand what our artist was 'going through' to find love. The make-up was also natural, again linking to the same reasons for keeping the costumes basic. 

The poster that we designed for this project included an image of our artist and text which included the artists name, the title of the song and the date that it was released. The photo was taken also at Waverly Abbey, so that it would always relate back to the song. 

The way the poster is edited is bright so that it is eye-catching and 

will stand out. We chose the writing to be in big, bold, red font so that it would be noticeable on the background image. I don't think the red works very well and would choose to go for another colour. I would also spread the text out more because I feel that the top of the page is a bit cramped. Maybe the release date could be at the bottom of the page, with the other two bits of the text staying where they are.

Our artist is wearing the same clothes as she does when in the music video. This is another thing that could be changed. We could have had her wear something else just to make it less similar to all of our other bits that we have done. 

The use of images on our poster is very limited because we didn't want to overdo it. As a poster usually only contains one image, we went for a straight design that is similar to all of this type of media. 

For our CD design, we wanted to make it look like a professional design. We went for a pinky-red background for the actual disc colour. I took the photo that is featured on the disc and then edited it so that the only thing that was included was the hand heart. 

We wanted to put the image in the middle of the disc so that it stood out from the background. We went for white text with a black outline for the artists name, and just white writing and curly font for the song title. The small print at the bottom of the disc is the copyright © information of the disc. We have also included the 'Compact Disc' official logo, to show that it is a real product and isn't copyrighted.

The front cover of the CD is also a very simple design. The photo was taken by Katie at Waverly Abbey. I then edited the photograph so that it looked a bit darker and merkier. The text is simply the name of our artist and the name of the song. we have used the same coloured writing as we have done for our poster. 

The image is simple and I really like that she isn't actually looking at the camera for this shot. It is also really nice that that location is in the background. 

The back of the inside slide is simply just a photograph of Susanna. It has just been brightened up. Again, I think we could have used more clothing so that it is different from the rest of the project. 

The back of the CD is also quite basic. The barcode is situated in the bottom right hand corner, with the small print which is also featured on the bottom of the CD being the Copyright © information. The image has been brightened and edited on photoshop. 

The text is in the same white curly writing as on the CD. It is simply the track listing. 

I would have again, changed what she was wearing, simply because all of our images are exactly the same.

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

There are a few similarities with our project, most of them being related to the mise-en-scene. All of the photographs that we got from the shoot that we did, Susanna is wearing the same clothes in each of them. I think we should of had her wear a variety of clothes so that we had a wider range for our subsidary tasks. 

Another similarity was the poses that were done. We only managed to get a couple of pictures with her smiling, she tended to go for the 'pouty' type of photos, which look good, but are all to similar. 

The test that we have used is all quite similar. We decided that it would look better if we used the same style for each of our products. This was so that it could all be linked back together. The small print on the back cover of of the CD and on the actual CD is exactly the same. 

We have related our products altogether by using the same style of photos throughout all of our subsidiary tasks and our main task which was the music video. All of the clothes are the same in the photos which isn't always a good things because it makes the links between each product too similar. 

There aren't many differences between each task because it was all done on the same day. We didn't really discuss costumes, so our artist only had two sets of clothing to change into. 

We wanted to go for a straight forward language which was aimed at our target audience. This was so that our audience could relate to the video and the subsidary tasks. We felt that if we could relate to the audience then more people would be interested. I think that this worked well because without anything our audience could relate to, they wouldn't be interested at all. 


What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Our target audience was set to be teenagers to young adults in their early 20's. We studied music videos and other forms of media which was targeted at the same audience to analyse. This is how we developed our tasks. 

Our strongest elements of the task would probably be the long shots that we used for the music video. We thought that it would be too long for an audience, but when receiving our feedback, we found out that this type of shot was fairly popular. Another strong point about our project was the CD design. The people that analysed the CD said that they liked the photo that was used which was the hand-heart.

The weaknesses which we would agree on, would be the lip synching for the music video. As our artist had a different version of the instrumental that we did, her singing didn't fit well with our version. When recording her voice, unfortunately she was ill, therefore she was unable to hit the high notes. This wouldn't have worked with our video. We found out that a few people would have preferred us to use an image for the background for the CD placing. We used a colour which was exactly the same as what our CD colour was. 

These are the results from the questionnaire that I did after they looked at our products. Most of the answers are split half and half which is nice because it means we can keep  the bits that were liked by the half that mostly went for 'yes' and we can change the bits that the half that was opposite didn't like and suggested that we could change. 


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

To film our music video we used the video cameras and to do the photo shoot we used digital cameras to get high quality photographs. We used a different range of software for the majority of our project. For the research and planning we used YouTube to watch and edit music videos to see how we could make ours look professional like theirs. 

To edit the footage that we had, we used FinalCutPro. We had used this type of software before to do practice media, however when editing our video, we found that trying to get the lip synching to match the footage was harder. I learnt how to put transitions into the footage and how to fix the timings to it so that it could speed up, slow down etc. 

To edit the photos that we had and were using, we used PhotoShop, to change the exposure, saturation, colour, brightness etc. Doing this made our photos look more professional and usable for our project. We put our photos on Facebook to see if we had any feed back. Susanna used the album cover as her Profile Picture making it more advertisable. We received many comments on the photo as well as 'likes'. 

   

These comments showed that this photo was popular with people around our age group, who, were our target audience. This helped us clarify whether we had the right target audience and if we were using the right photos for our project. 

Receiving these comments meant that we could see which bits people of our age group liked and what they thought would work and what they thought didn't. These photos worked really well and the people that commented said that it looks very professional, we also got a lot of 'likes' for these photos and we have explained that these were for our media coursework. The first comment on the top photo really thought that this was a proper album cover. 

This video is a focus group who are analysing our music video. They have said things that we could improve on and bits about it that they liked. I chose to use people from our target audience to talk about it. This would mean that we had evidence of things that people from our age range liked and didn't like and they gave us ideas of what we could do to make it better.

Music Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R26cj7-DBiw

The above link is to our music video. Now that it is on youtube, we can actually get more comments on our production and see what the feedback is. Depending on the number of views and likes or dislikes we get, we can discuss how we think it went and whether or not more needs to be done and if we need to edit anymore.

The Production and the Final DigiPak

Most of the footage was edited by Katie, I included the transitions and added any effect which I thought would look good and make the video better. I think the shots are still too long, but unfortunately, due to the time, we couldn't film anymore as the continuity of the day light and the weather would have been awful.

The majority of photos that we used were Katie's. One of them were mine. This was due to lighting situations and the type of cameras that we were using. I did the majority of the editing of the photos, make them lighter or darker, changing the exposure of them. Katie did most of the text and font for the posters, CD, and digipak. 

The image of the CD is a 'hand-heart' This was my idea, and it links back to the song. Another advantage is that our target audience is teenage girls, and this seems to be a popular symbol for that age range.  Once I had taken the photo, I edited it by deleting the background, adding a black line around the hands to add emphasis on them. We put the edited version onto a template of the CD. We put it onto a maroon coloured background which looks quite good. 

This is the unedited version of the heart. We wanted some light on it so that it was clear and visible. The background is messy, but we wanted it on a white background to start with anyway, this soon changed.

This is the half edited version of the heart. There is a thin line outlining the hands, and I got rid of part of the hand to make the shape more round. I also made it darker and tinged the skin orange slightly. This looks good because it stands out but it would fit in with the theme of the music video.

We eventually decided on a maroon background. Using the Template that was provided we made the hands fill across the CD. We used the same writing as on the poster, so that it is always obvious that they are supposed to be together. The small print at the bottom of the CD is the same on the back cover of the case. The CD 'logo' was also included onto the template so we used that on there as well to make it look real.

The photo for the poster was taken by Katie. the lighting was good because we placed her in a beam of light... Literally. The sun came through one of the Ruin 'windows' as we were doing the shoot.

The greenery looks good behind her because its all a similar colour, making her stand out in here darker clothes and bright hair.

The colour of the font is redish, but it could link back to the colour of the CD. I think we should have spread the writing a bit more because it looks a bit crowded at the top.

The CD cover is of Susanna sitting on a stone wall looking 'whistfully' into the distance. Using PhotoShop I made the photo brighter before Katie added more colour onto it. She added orange making the sky look darker and the photo mirky. The Font is the same as pretty much everything but the CD deisign. It is also a redish, maroon colour.

We used a normal photo for the back of the CD insert. Nothing was done to this Photo as it felt like it would have been too much.

The back of the CD cover includes the small print which is also on the CD, the songs of which the Single includes. The barcode is placed in the bottom right hand corner where most of them are usually found in media. I think the text on the right hand side should be bolder so it is clearer to see. The image is the main focus and because its quite a dark photo, white writing works well, however,  a fair amount of the photo is a white-ish grey colour so I think we could have found a better colour. 

The Music Video

The footage was filmed during half term when both of us were available to film with our artist. We shot several time at Waverly Abbey Ruins and then headed to Gostrey Meadows in Farnham. We both directed Susanna in what she was doing, some of it was left for her to use the area how she wanted, this  didn't always work well as we weren't always aware of what was happening and couldn't prepare the camera for the shot to look how we would have wanted it. We still managed to incorporate this into our footage and work around these issues.

Farnham Castle

After e-mailing Farnham Castle for permission to use the grounds to film part of our music video we received a message saying that they could not provide this facility any longer. Katie soon came up with the idea of shooting at Waverly Abbey. As it is public grounds we would not have to get permission to film in this area.

Lorna Brown

Animatic Storyboard

The animatic storyboard is a sketched music video, using photo cut outs of the drawn storyboard. Me and Katie, split this job between and I had to draw the pictures and work out all the timings, she got to find the music and edit them together.

We found that some of the frames were a bit too long for the music we had, so we did have to cut them down a bit. This didn't take very long as we just wanted to get a fair idea of what it would be like.

The storyboard might not be the final official outcome and may change during the filming process.



Storyboard by Lorna Brown and Editing by Katie Lapworth.

Updated ideas

As it is now impossible for us to travel to Brighton in the time that we have, we are sticking with using the local town. As we will be shooting during half term, we decided that if we shot on the night of Farnham Fireworks, we could use the candle light procession tradition and have her singing there. It would be a pretty part to what we are doing and it would look amazing with our chosen song.

We also need to have a part of our storyline