Evaluation

The brief for my product was to create a promotion package for the release of an album to include a music promo video together with two of the following three options; a website homepage for the band, a cover for its release on DVD/ CD digi pack, a magazine advertisement for the DVD/ CD digi pack. From the above three options I chose to create the digi pack cover and a poster. My reason for choosing these is I thought that the website homepage would be very similar to the poster and I wanted to do something different. When creating the music video I wanted the idea of the importance of materials to come across. The narrative for the music video is that no matter what lifestyle you live materials are still important to you. I also wanted to show the music artists in different lifestyles rather than just the rich and famous lifestyles which celebrities are seen in.

When first planning the products I wanted to make them different from typical pop music videos. Although I had chosen to use a ‘typical’ pop song and still had the same target audience as other people I decided to challenge the conventions when creating the ancillary texts in hope that this would make my final product different and have a twist to it rather than the expected. The poster for the album doesn’t show the artist in an obvious way, it relates to the music video as it is a screenshot from the video however by looking at the poster you don’t know the artist and the song straight away and you don’t know what is being advertised this challenges the conventions of a typical poster. The poster has a mysterious feel about it however it grabs the attention of the audience immediately. My reason for choosing this particular screen shot is because the music artists look like they are travelling away from the camera however they are the main focus of the shot being the first thing the audience look at. I then edited the poster to make the surroundings of the artist’s black and white and making them stand out even more to the audience. I wanted the artist to still be shown in the poster however not in an obvious way again making the poster mysterious and drawing the audience in. In a typical poster to advertise an album there would be a picture of the album or the artist with the release date. I chose not to show a picture of the album as I wanted to do something more creative instead of just putting a copy of the album cover I had already created on a poster with a release date. I think that having both ancillary texts being very different works well as they appeal to a wider audience. The CD cover also challenges conventions as again it doesn’t show the artist. A particular person could be attracted to the CD cover however may not be a fan of the artist I think that not having a picture of the artist appeals to a wider audience as it stops people ‘judging a book by its cover’. The music video uses the conventions as the artist is shown in the music video although the artists are not shown performing so this could be seen as challenging the conventions. When researching music videos I found that most girl band/ female music artist had a stereotypical music video in which they were all dressed in glamorous clothing and wore a lot of makeup I have challenged this convention in the music video as the whole idea of my music video was to show different lifestyles and to show that materials are important to everyone no matter how much money you have or what lifestyle you live.

At the planning stages I created questionnaires to give out to different age groups to decide who my target audience would be. I chose to do these in paper form this way I could get more information as they people I gave the questionnaires to could write as much information as they wanted and could write in more detail helping me to understand the target audience. The questionnaires asked about music interests what you like to do in your spare time and how often you go to music concerts. I looked in detail at the answers my chosen target audience had given and worked the planning stages around the audience (there interests e.g. shopping, clothes, material items). I got audience feedback throughout the production by showing people from my target audience what they thought of the product so far this helped me when editing the music video. Towards the end of the project I collected more audience feedback this time through an online questionnaire. After the first edit of my music video I wanted to check that the audience understood the narrative of the video so I asked several questions such as ‘do you understand the narrative?’ and ‘do you think the song fits well with the video?’ I wanted to get audience feedback again before the end of the project so I had time to edit the video again before the end of the deadline. As most of my audience feedback was positive I just added to parts of the music video and extended it to fit to the length of the track. After gaining research from both forms of questionnaire I found that the paper form worked best for me as it gave more detail however this was harder to put into pie charts. My focus group is aged 16-25 with an interest of pop music. After my audience research I also found that most people I asked had an interest in shopping this relates well to the song ‘material girls’. My music video shows 2 female characters stereotypical of a girl band. I chose to cast these actresses as they are an iconic representation of beauty. They both have blonde hair and look glamorous. The actresses that I casted are twins my reason for choosing twins is so it gives the effect of a mirror image on one character. I provided the costumes for the actresses I chose for them both to wear pink dresses as the dresses have a princess/cinderella style. I wanted the actresses to wear pink dresses as the colour pink connotes innocence, romance and happiness. Pink is also seen as a 'girly' colour and I followed the use of the colour into the other shots to give them a 'girly' feel e.g. pink wellington boots, pink blankets.

I have displayed all of my work on a blog throughout the project this was an easier way of showing the work to my teachers aswell as the examiners it meant that all of the work was displayed neatly and stopped problems like pieces of work going missing. I used a blog last year for my AS media studies coursework and think that it is the best way to display work. At the first stages of the project I researched other music videos to see how different genres have different conventions to research the videos I used YouTube. I have used the internet throughout the project researching the artist and the song which I was going to use and finding the lyrics for the song online. I also had to find the right location for my filming. I used the internet to find the contact details of the manager for the old peoples accommodation in my area. I wrote a letter to the manager explaining what was involved in my media production and asking permission to film on the premises. Actually filming the music video was proven difficult as all of the students wanted to hire the cameras out at a similar time as I wanted to film when the weather was bright/sunny there were only certain days during winter which I could film. I got a camera from elsewhere so I was free to film whenever it suited me. Before filming the music video I assessed the health and safety issues at each location. All of the locations had health and safety issues however they were all just things to be aware of and there wasn’t anything that stopped us filming there. At the production stages I used a digital camera for filming. I also used adobe Photoshop to create both the poster and the digi pack. My music video was edited on the colleges editing suites I filmed over 20 minutes of footage however only used around 3 minutes I filmed extra as I wanted to ensure that I had enough footage to fit the track. I also had to re-film as I wasn’t happy with how part of the footage looked when I first started to edit it.

When creating the ancillary texts I decided that I would make them both different as I wanted to create a different feel to all of the products in the hope that they would appeal to a wider audience. My plans for the poster were to make it mysterious and to grab the attention of the audience making them want to know more about the product I created this by taking a screenshot from the music video in which the artists are running away from the camera the screenshot on the poster suggests the narrative of a fairytale and the audience can tell by the photograph that there is a story behind the picture. When creating the digi pack I chose not to show the artist on the front cover to challenge the conventions of a CD cover I thought that the cover should have a girly/feminine feel about it to fit with the narrative of the music video and the title of the song. I think that although all of the 3 texts are very different they work well together as they all follow the same narrative and are of the same genre.

In comparison to the AS product I have used a lot more technologies during the A2 project. I used both Adobe Photoshop and the editing suite during A2 which I didn’t use in AS. I learnt to research a lot whilst creating the AS project which helped when I was creating the music video.

I am happy with my 3 final products and think that they work well together. If I was to create the music video again I would use different actors for each different lifestyle as I think this would make it easier for the audience to understand the narrative. I am happy with all 3 locations that I used for filming and think that location is an important part of planning. I am glad that I took time to find the right places to film. I also changed the film from my beginning plans on the storyboard my reason for this being the location. It was hard to find the right location for all of the shots without the film looking like it was in someone’s house and looking unprofessional so I chose to have less locations and make the filming simple to make the music video look better.