Evaluation Question 1

Main contribution by Ella
1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Here we can see how our music video uses, develops or challenges the conventions of real media products.

- PERFORMANCE SHOTS
In your typical music video you would see performance shots which would have sole focus on the star. The lighting and backdrop should all be there to emphasise the star in the performance. For example in ours, we used a simple white back drop which let the artist stand out clearly. It also has a good contrast compared to the rest of the music video which is seen to be quite dark. One of the lights were shining on the backdrop which meant that the star stood out and didn't blend in, whilst the other light was shining to the side of the star to create a silhouette on one half of his face. We also created a shot which meant that the light box was behind the star which showed his features and created a desirable image.

- RHYTHMIC CUTTING
The rhythmic cutting is used in all music videos to fit with the emotion and theme. In ours we used rhythmic cutting to build up suspense before the chorus and then to slow it back down before it hit the bridge part of the song. We switched from this idea throughout the video so that we could show more shots that fit to the narrative. The narrative shots were a lot longer and showed more emotion on the character's faces and their actions.

- RED CUP PARTY
A 'red cup party' is typically an American party which features the classic red cup. This can be seen in the Afrojack music video, Summer, where the actors are seen dancing with red cups and with each other. This is why we decided to link the club scene with red cups as we thought it would show how realistic the club was. We have been told many times that the red cups actually made the clip work, that it completed the idea.

- REBELLION
The scenes of smoking and the bedroom a scenes are not typical of your pop music video as it would have to reach out to a wide age bracket. This meant that we were challenging conventions when we decided to link in clips from Cambridge and the Hotel Room which were particularly rebellious. We thought the rebellion was important in this video as the lyrics write a lot about rebellious activities and we wanted to have a strong lyric to video cohesion.

- NOT TYPICAL LOVE STORY
In a pop music video, you almost always have a love story that features throughout. This was an important aspect of our own music video, however our love story wasn't particularly conventional. In a pop music video you will see a love story that shows the beginnings of a relationship or the endings. In ours you see a relationship that isn't normally excepted by wider society but because of the nature of the song, it fit perfectly with our narrative.

- SOLD OUT STICKERS
Moving onto the digipak, we used images that we took when filming at our different locations to create a cohesion between our media products. We created a tour poster and a CD case which meant that we were able to use many different images and ideas to see what fit with our theme best. The tour poster had a number of locations and dates on which we then covered with 'sold out' stickers. This is used on many different tour poster to not only offer information, but to ensure the audience know that the audience is desirable.

- PROMOTION OF OWN ALBUM
We also made sure that our album and poster were cohesive, alongside the video. We made sure that when we created the poster, that we included the image of our own CD cover so to promote the CD. This combo is seen a lot on other tour posters as it is a simple and cheap way of selling two products at once.



(This will be a split screen video with myself and other clips.)

Evaluation Question 2

Main contribution by Esther

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

During the developmental process of producing our music video, we decided to produce a survey monkey to gather various information to develop our knowledge of the type of audience we were presenting it too. Questions asked were some such as "Whats your favourite band?" "what age are you?" What genre of music do enjoy?" and these questions really helped us find us the best way to get to our target audience. In terms of the type of people that would watch our music video, we found that they were of an age range between 18-30, meaning that we were able to make it more mature for that audience. We also found that the people watching were pretty 50/50 male an female meaning that we had too consider both a song male and female star image. 

Survey Monkey itself is a free website in which you can produce multiple questions to a survey with personalised answers. We were then able to post it on social media so we were able to reach a large platform of people and get a multitude of answers. 

- This would be a development from our previous market research but we would still use SurveyMonkey to collect responses from our audience. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Once we had completed our rough cut we presented to it to the class to get feed back from other media students. Our feedback included comments such as a few timing issues when we didn't cut exactly to the beat and a few colour corrections but other than that everyone seemed impressed with the brief outcome. Survey monkey was also the website of choice because they were able to provide us with graphs and pre formatted meaning we were able to get a clear indication of our target audience. 



Survey monkey provides us with emails saying when we have new audience feedback meaning we were able to constantly improve our audience feedback constantly.

We really liked this approach and I feel like this is an application we will use in the future. 

Evaluation Question 4

DONE BY ALL
4.How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?


Ella-Survey Monkey
Est-Final Cut 10
Anna-Photoshop
Ella-Equipment
Est-Blogger
Anna-YouTube

Me: 

To edit our Digipak and Advert we used Adobe Photoshop. This allowed us to use a wide range of effects and techniques to make our Advert and Digipak seem very professional. We mainly used Photoshop one we had planned and researched both of the products, so we mainly used it in the production stage of our video. If we didn't use photoshop to create the Digipak and Advert we think that the outcomes would not of been as strong and may have lacked a professional, finished look. 

We used YouTube to research music videos to influence our ideas. So it was an essential technology to use in the initial research and planning stage. Then after we had created our first rough cut, we then uploaded it to YouTube. This therefore allowed us to show our class easily and then get feedback from them.

Ella:

Survey Monkey allowed us to gather information on what our video should include, for example how much narrative there should be in comparison to performance. We were able to share the survey to a wide target audience from being able to share the link on a social media website which was Facebook. 

We used a range of equipment to achieve the highest quality music video and product. We used a DSLR which enabled us to create high quality shots with strong depths of field. This also allowed us to have high quality images for our digipak. The tripod was used in the performance shots to create shots that conformed to pop music video conventions. At other times we didn't use a tripod to create a non static image that fitted with the flow of the music. 

Esther:

Final Cut 10 was the software that we used to edit and produce our final music video including the rough cut. It allowed us to explore various features such as slo motion which we used throughout the music video. It also allowed us to colour correct any shots which matched the indie/pop convention, it helped us also continue the effective continuity. As apposed to when we edited last year, editing was a lot easier with using the updated software. 

Blogger has allowed us to document our progress and development of our music video and digipak. We have been able to show the progression of our work through posts about editing  research and planning. It has also allowed us to incorporate YouTube videos, powerpoint presentations and surveys which enabled us to have all of the technologies in one place. 


(This script will be a voiceover on our video)

Evaluation Question 3

Main contribution by myself. 
3. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

(Transcript from presentation)
Our video and the genre:
Overall:
Overall we felt that we comined all of our skills and resources together to create a strong video and ancillary pieces. We used the genre as our main reference point when making decisions on whether it will 
'What Would You Do'-By Bastille (Final video)
Genre-Indie/Pop
After researching what genre Bastille class themselves as, we gather that they fall under the Indie/Pop genre. We decided to follow a lot of the conventions associated with this genre. After looking at some of their videos and knowledge of the genre, we gathered some conventions that are in the Indie/Pop genre. For example the videos are lit a lot darker in comparison to a Pop music video and we wanted to continue this through both our Video and Ancillary texts. A few of their videos have a narrative theme instead of performance, but there is a quirky theme that runs throughout most of their videos. For example, the video for 'Oblivion' is mainly performance, but instead of the main singer lip syncing, they have a actress singing. This continues the convention that artists in the Indie/Pop genre will have quirky music videos.
Relations between the video and poster:
We decided that Miles would be the main focus on the poster, even though he is part of the band we felt that the main singer should be the only person on the cover. He is also the star image in the video, so we felt that we could create that link between them. We took the photo that is on the poster when we were filming on location, so this links to the 'What Would You Do' video. As we did in the video, we continued the theme to de-saturate the image to give it a raw effect. I think this is really effective and makes the male actor have the star image. We didn't want the girl to feature on the poster because she isn't the main focus of the album, only the song 'What Would You Do'. 
Relations between the video and digipak:
Similarly to the relationship between the video and the poster, we wanted the main singer to be the focus of the digipak. We looked at Bastilles album 'Bad Blood' and this album cover only had the main singer on it, so we felt that it was acceptable to only have the main singer on our digipak. We also wanted there to be some light painting in the digipak to differ from the shots of the actor/actress. Even though there isn't anything like this in the video, we felt as a group that it still worked in the Indie/Pop genre. We also took photos for the digipak when we filmed the performance section to the video, so there is a link between those two shots. 
'Miles' (Final Digipak)
'Miles' Tour poster
Final product and Ancillary Texts:
'Pompeii'-Bastille
'Things we lost in the fire'-Bastille
'Oblivion'-Bastille
We continued the typical characteristics of a Indie/Pop genre video. Keeping the theme running throughout it quite different and serious. We really wanted to have both performance and narrative shots to tell the story but then also link the two together so it didn't seem too divided. The girl in the video represents the sad part to the story and I think it works really well with the main singer acting as her support. I think that this would be something that Bastille would do. We also de-saturated the colour of a lot of the shots as we felt that this followed conventions of the Indie/Pop genre. As well as following this convention I think it has given a rawness to the video, making the girl seem even more vulnerable.

FINAL VIDEO-'What Would You Do' By Bastille

CREATED, EDITED AND PRODUCED BY ANNA CURRAN, ESTHER GRIMWOOD AND ELLA SANDERS 
MYSELF:MISE-EN-SCÉNE/LIGHTING
ESTHER GRIMWOOD:CINEMATOGRAPHY
ELLA SANDERS:EDITING

This is our final music video. To ensure that weren't subject to copyright infringement, we had to make sure that in the bio of the video on YouTube that we stated that the music used was not ours. (See photo)

Editing-Final touches

To complete our video we had to add titles, these would be on the name of the song and who edited, produced and directed the video. We felt that they should be at different times in the music video, with the name of the song coming first. This has been staggered in with the beat of the music to carry on the themes of following to the beat of the music. It also made it a lot more interesting to look at. We added the other title at the end of the film when the camera goes out of focus. 

Editing-Jump cuts

After our audience feedback we were able to add in our final clips and edit them. We decided to go with what the audience said and edit the clips to the beat of the music and create the jump cuts. I think that this has been really effective because it has linked the video together and made it a lot smoother. The original change between the faster and slower shots just didn't work, so the audience feedback was really helpful. 

Rough cut feedback

This is our rough cut of our music video. After finishing the rough cut we decided to show our class to then have constructive criticism on the video. Our rough copy didn't have all of the clips in, so there were still some big gaps in the middle of it. The only comment that was made was regarding the editing towards the end of the video. At the beginning we added in jump cuts to the beat of the music. This rhythm comes back towards the end of the video an it was suggested that we should go back to cutting the clips like that. I think this would work really well and would tie the whole video together. So now we will go back to editing the final parts to our video and add in the last clips, then we will have finished our video. 

FINAL Digipak and Poster

These are our final Digipak and Poster designs. To finalise the poster we added the sold out signs and also the final album front cover to the bottom of the poster. This links together the two products and typically a band will go on tour to promote a product. Below shows the final layout to the album cover. We are really pleased with how it has turned out and it is good to see all of the different elements work together. 

Roles within our Digipak and Poster:

-Photography: Esther and Anna

-Typography: Ella

-Design work: All three of us

-Editing: Ella

Digipak editing-CD case

This is going to be the front cover to our album. We felt that the cover should show the star, so when we were filming the performance section we took some photos that we could use for the cover. We used a lightbox that was in the studio to carefully light Miles face. 

These four screen shots show the use of light painting for our album cover. The two on this row will be inside the album and the two screenshots below are of the spines of the case. I think that the light painting works really well as a background because it is quite simple yet effective, so it doesn't distract any attention away from the star.

These two screen shots are of both of the CDs for the album. We wanted to keep the CDs really simple because we felt that colours and photos should be used in the covers. 

This is the back cover for the CD album. We took this photo when we were filming the performance section to the music video. The writing seemed to luckily fit perfectly between their faces this is just a list of the songs. 

Digipak editing-Poster

For our poster we chose a image that we shot when we were filming our music video. The lighting worked really well as it wasn't too bright, the lighting really helped us with reinforcing our genre. We didn't want the font on the poster to be too  complex because we didn't want there to be any attention taken away from the star image. We added the dates around the face as this is a normal convention of a tour poster. The poster looked a lot more professional after we added the bands names and a image if the CD cover as this relates to the music video. 

Editing-High speed clip

There is one part in the song where the music seems to slow down ever so slightly. It is a transition into the chorus, and we felt that we should place something effective in the gap. To match this weirdly paced section, we felt that we could group a set of shots together and then speed them up. The duration of this transition is about 3 seconds, so the clips would have to be quick and equal. We chose the clips that we used at the beginning of the video, this therefore acts as a flashback to what had previously happened to the girl. After speeding the first 5 clips up, then having the last one at a normal speed, the overall effect was really good. It fits with the music really well and leads into the next performance section effortlessly. 

Editing-Slo-mo and Colour Correction

These are some screen shots from our editing on Final Cut 10. We have decided to add some slo-mo into the video because it fits a lot better with the beat of the music. The slo-mo also makes the clips seem more dramatic as it puts more emphasis on them. We wanted the clips to match the colour theme that we have running through the whole video, we had to desaturate the colour. 

Planning for Evaluation Questions

Digital Storyboard

Editing-opening sequence

After filming the opening sequence yesterday, we were able to piece together the beginning of the video. Each clip will be cut 2 times to give 3 separate clips, this gives a disjointed effect. It also gives the effect that we are looking in on flashbacks that have happened in her life. 

Hotel room filming

We filmed the hotel room a day after than planned due to our actors not having the correct costumes with them. These costumes are essential, so we had to push back filming a day. Due to only being able to film at lunch time we are limited for time, so we were only able to film the shots of them in the bedroom together. We also made it a high priority that we filmed the jump cuts that are used at the beginning of the video. So we still need to film the bathroom scene. We are planning on filming these shots on Friday in our lunchtime. 

Hotel room notes

This will be filmed on the 17/11/15 at our friends house. We chose this bedroom because we felt that it looks extremely like a hotel room with the decor etc chosen. 

LIGHTING
- Quite low key lighting to match theme

EQUIPMENT
- Tripod
- DSLR
- Set lighting

SHOT LIST
- Close ups
- Reverse shots into the mirror
- Mid shots to cut out faces

HEALTH & SAFETY
- Lighting and wires
- Valuables in the room

COSTUME
MILES
- Jeans
- Shirt
- Tie

HONOR
- Fishnet tights
- Heels
- Short skirt
- Fur coat

PROPS
- Bed
- Posh bedding
- Mirror

Editing/Filming-Light box

When we were filming Esther thought that we should see what the effect would be like if we place the light box behind our actors head. It gave a really clean-cut silhouette of the head and it worked really well for the lip sync. We corrected the colour of the shot to ensure that we could only see the outline of his face.

Editing-Continutity

Due to matching certain lyrics and visuals together, we had to ensure that there wasn't a lack of continuity. For example sequences when Miles was walking out of the club with honor. These shots in the wrong order would confuse the audience and make the video seem messy. We decided on a close up of their hands, which then moves onto them walking out of the club. We were going to use a shot of them together by the wall of the club. But after putting it in the sequence, we realised that is looked too jumpy and didn't really make sense. 

Another example was when honor is smoking. We had 2 clips that worked well together but they were from different angles. After changing the order we felt that the clip that focuses on her lips works a lot better and the transition was a lot smoother.  

The second picture highlights how we made a strobe effect on the clips that we filmed in the pit. We cut the clip up into lots of smaller clips then deleted every other one. Even though we tried to manipulate the lighting when we filmed to have a strobe effect, it still didn't give us the desired look. We feel that this effect works a lot better and we have a lot more control over it. 

Editing-Lip Sync

It was a lot easier to match the lip sync that we filmed in the studio to the music because we had already had experience with how to match the two together. When we filmed some of the performance in Cambridge we didn't have the sound on the camera to save the battery, so it was very hard to work out where to fit in the music. We learnt from the mistake in Cambridge and remembered to put the sound on to make the process a lot easier. 
After placing the clip in the right position, we were then able to colour correct it. We felt that the white backdrop was too bright in comparison to the rest of the video, so we de-saturated it. 

Studio filming-evidence

11.11.15

Today we filmed the performance element to our music video in the studio. We spent a lot of time ensuring that the lip sync was accurate because we wouldn't be able to use the studio space again, so we did a lot of takes. Our shots varied between close ups and mid shots of the male actor on his own and of both of them together. I think that the outcomes of our filming today have been very positive and I think they are going to work well in our music video. 

Editing 2-thoughts on filters and lip sync

9.11.15
After our first couple of days of simply adding in the shots that we took in Cambridge into the video, we decided to add in the shots from the club scene. We are going to cut to the beat of the music, this is popular in these type of music videos. 

We have been discussing whether to use a black and white filter on the shots of the girl in Cambridge. I have added a example of what it looks like and personally I think that it looks really good. It makes her seem a lot more vulnerable because the colour is so raw, We are going to see what it looks like with the rest of the video before we decide for definite on the colour.

Video editing-opening sequence

9.11.15
We have began editing our music video, but we still need to get some other shots from our other locations. So at the moment we are limited as to what we can put in the video. We began editing by de-sataurating the shot, this follows a indie/pop genre characteristic. We are planning on having this shot cut within the music video at different points. We will also have this same sequence of him singing filmed in the studio, mainly because this shot isn't as good as we thought. 

Lighting Plans

14.10.15

Studio Lighting Plan:

We have decided that the lighting for these shots will be quite soft, there will be a light to the right and left of the actor. We want to make sure that the lighting used when filming this will make the backdrop separate to the actor. Equal amounts of light or the same light on both of them will not give us the desired effect. The shot type throughout these clips will be a mid shot, and we may move the camera slightly to get some softer movement. 

Bathroom Lighting Plan: 
When we film the girl in the 'Hotel' bathroom, we really want to expose her. So there will be a light on her face to really illuminate her face. We will need to place the camera carefully because we do not want the camera to be seen in the reflection in the mirror. 

Cambridge Lighting Plan:
We have planned to take photos to our location when we film, but realistically this may not be possible only because we may not be able to find any lights. If we do use the lights, we will want to illuminate her and create some shadows on her face. 

Club Lighting Plan:
We will use a variety of lighting when filming the club scene because we are doing a variety of shots. The close up shots will have flashing white/yellow lights, this will illuminate peoples faces whilst they are dancing. When we do the mid/long shots we will change where the light will hit the actress, but we will have to do that when we get in the Pit. 


'Hotel' room lighting plan:
We will have to ensure that the curtains are closed for these shots because we will be filming in daylight. So we will have to make sure that the room is lit well to give it a night time effect. 
We want the lighting to be quite soft on the actor/actress, but we also want them to be the main focus of the shot. That is why we will have two sets of lights. 

Time lapse

As soon as we got at our location, we decided to do the time-lapse whilst the lighting was still good. We ended up filming for about 7 minutes because our actress began to get cold, but this ended up being enough time for us to get the right effect. To create the time-lapse effect on the clip, we used Final Cut 10 to sped up the clip to 1000% this gave us the desired look. As well as speeding up the clip, we de-saturated the colour to create a duller colour. We will carry this same filter through the clips to keep the continuity accurate

Evidence from shooting

These are some photos that ella took when we were shooting the Cambridge shots. We decided to shoot some of the performance element because we found some well lit areas. 

Possible filming problems

26.10.15

SD cards: One problem that we may have is that we fill up a SD card, or that we forget one. To ensure that this doesn't have a knock on effect to our filming we have decided that Esther will bring 3 empty SD cards and Ella will bring one too. I will also bring one but it is nearly full. 

Bad weather: If the weather is bad the day that we film then we will have a problem. We will all bring a umbrella to ensure that the actor/actress and equipment does not get wet when filming. We will also bring blankets to ensure that they do not get too cold. 

Lack of continuity: To avoid this problem we will ensure that Miles and Honor both wear the same clothes that they did when we filmed the party scene. 

Equipment: Their is a possibility that equipment can break, so we will all check our cameras before we leave for Cambridge. If we get their and the equipment is broken then we will have to re-organise the trip, so checking is essential. 

Copyright email

We decided that because Bastille are a well known band, that we should email their record label to ask for permission. We did the email off Ella's account but it was from our whole group. It is essential to email because of the copyright law.

Cambridge Filming planning

28.10.15

Equipment:

Tripod
Camera(s) X2
SD cards
Spare battery's for cameras
Possibly some torches to aid the lighting because we will be filming from 4.00pm until about 7.00pm, so it will be getting dark. 

Honor (Costume):

Black skirt
Black top
Fur coat
Fishnet tights
Heels

Miles (Costume):

Grey jumper
Black jeans
Leather jacket
Casual shoes

Props:

Blankets
Cigarettes 

We will take the storyboard so we know the exact shots that we need to take. But in general we know that we need to take a variety of close ups of honors face and also mid/long shots. 

Mock Digipack