Final Music Video

Final Ancillary Task

Final Digipack Design

Photoshop

To create the various posters and digipack Adobe Photoshop CS4 was used as well as Adobe Illustrator both these programmes are well known pieces of software which meant lots of people could help as I had little knowledge of either. The software allowed me to manipulate the images and mix graphics such as the band name “synergy” with the JPEG images. The use of layers in Photoshop allows individual aspects of the product to be adjusted and fine tuned, the background consists of light leaks through the colour which creates a good effect it also reflects the set design with the hanging bulbs, at AS level I doubt I would have thought about the design on the same level, I would have just tried to create something that looks cool and not have a deeper meaning. Also the image of the band was edited slightly after I used the lasso tool to crop them out of the original white background, a black and white effect was applied to the layer they were on. The photo shoot helped me to greatly improve my Photoshop skills and also setting up the shoot with the digital technologies in order to create a high quality final product.

 

Feedback on Director's Commentary

Stay With Me

Alli, Hannah, Sophie and James

Excellent considerate understanding of the technologies used in production of the video, for example in terms of set design quality and the use of FCP to create effective set design and mise en scene.

There are evident links between creative decision making and use of technology on both productions of the video using professional digital cameras and in the post production editing process – in discussion of match of action, lip syncing and graphic matching’. This is sustained and thorough and accurate in discussion of the branded themes of a broken relationship for example in discussion of the beat of the song and pacing of the cuts used in the editing process.

The commentary shows a discrete awareness of the use of new media technology and uses discriminating examples really well, particularly to selection and construction of narrative, editing techniques, such as FCP Tools. Excellent command of terminology and understands and discusses convergence really well.

There is sustained justified decision making links between the technologies used the product and audience reception in terms of the creativity that the group used.. Recognises the need to account for errors in the post production stage and the importance of converge technologies.

This is a well considered documentary – you may want to re-edit in terms of the presentation I think this is a provisional draft of the commentary.

Evaluation Task 4 - How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Task 4 Technology in pre production

New media technology was a significant process in our pre-production and planning of our music video


The Technology's I used in pre production were.



For research we heavily relied on the use of web 2.0 and website like Google and YouTube, We used Youtube to research bands of a similar genre in order to look at there videos and try to pick out the code and conventions they employed to create an understanding and build a star image with their audience, through the use of mise en scene, camera work and editing. e.g we used YouTube to research the Christina perri jar of hearts video to develop the dance element of our video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8v_4O44sfjM.
We also mainly used google images to research digipack designs of similar artists. to get design ideas being able to embed the url code and send the link of the video helped us to share ideas easily making being creative more easily.

We also did a animatic of the different shots we wanted to use in our video we used a Sony NX5 camera to film this which films straight onto a memory card which mad it very easy to transfer to the macs for editing. We put the A1 size piece of card with our arranged storyboard on and put it onto the wall, we then put the camera onto a tripod and shot each individual shot for 10 seconds.

 The use of the digital camera speeded up the editing process as the convergent technology makes the transfer of the footage from camera to computer far easier, also the quality was not effected when we transferd the footage over and the technology alowed when we had finished to finally upscale to HD quality. The editing of the animatic was done on final cut pro, this editing software allowed the rough cut of the shots of the music video in real time it helped errors to be seen before the final shoot day. the use of new media digital technologies helped slicken the pre production process and the vast resources it gave us at our finger tips helped us to be more creative.

Blogger has also been a technological part of our pre production due to the fact that I have posted all of my ideas, and the stages to the process of making our music video has enabled me to organise my work and access it from any work station. We have posted all of our research in an organised fashion on the program allowing us to use the page as a log ot on line folder almost of the process of creating the music video and package of the band.




Also to give  the digipack a more profesional look we did a photo shoot with a high quality digital slr camera Nikon D500 camera this gave us lots of options  so we could fine tune the camera and take the best photos we could for the front cover of the digipack and the poster.

Feedback -evaluation Task Three

This task appears incomplete.  Can you load comments from You Tube and perhaps be able to post your questionnaire results and address the evaluation task set over the weekend?  Thank you.

Task 3 What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Task 3 required me to get audience feedback using Halls reception theory of audiences can decode the media message in intelligent and engaging ways, the decoding of the message by the audience relies upon oppositional, negotiated and preferred readings. In the production of my music video I wanted to get a preferred reading from the audience in evaluation of achieving this the feedback is key in deciding whether the video was success or failure.

Feed back from the youtube post. 

QUESTIONNAIRE FOR MUSIC VIDEO	STAY WITH ME –YOU ME AT SIX
How old are you?
GENDER	MALE FEMALE
WHAT ARE BRACKET DO YOU THINK OUR VIDEO IS AIMED AT?	YES NO
HOW DO WE AIM THE VIDEO AT THIS TARGET AUDIENCE/AGE BRACKET	·       ·       ·
DO LIKE THE VIDEO?	YES NO
WHAT DID YOU LIKE/DISLIKE ABOUT IT? (e.g. set, narrative etc.)	·       ·       ·
WHAT DO YOU THINK COULD BE IMPROVED?	·       ·       ·
WHAT DO YOU THINK IS THE STAR IMAGE WE HAVE CREATED? (e.g. rock/pop star, mainstream, niche etc.)	·       ·       ·
Do you think the narrative in the piece is clear/unclear?	YES NO
What do you think is most clear/unclear?	·       ·       ·
Would this video influence you to/make you want to buy the track?	YES NO
Do you like this song by You Me At Six?	YES NO
What attitudes do the band represent? (idol/role model, rebellion etc.)	·       ·       ·
How have we represented this? (Costume, lighting, set, etc)	·       ·       ·
Have you seen any videos with a similar context/narrative, if so what are these?	·       ·       ·
Do you think the digipak represents the bands star image and does it link to the video?	YES NO
If so how does it do this?	·       ·       ·
Do you think the Poster represents the bands star image and does it link to the video ?	YES NO
If so how does it do this?	·       ·       ·
Would the poster make you want to buy the track or watch the video?	YES NO
Why?	·       ·       ·
Would the poster make you want to buy the track or watch the video?	YES NO
Why?	·       ·       ·
Is the poster eye catching and does it have enough information?	YES NO
How could we improve this?	·       ·       ·
Is the digipak eye catching and does it have enough information?	YES NO
How could we improve this?	·       ·       ·
Finally, is the overall concept of our video, digipak and poster clear?	YES NO

This is the questionnaire we are using to collect our audience feedback to establish if created the right star image and persona for our band and if we reached out to our target audience and if the audience got the concept of the video clearly enough. We also did a focus group which was an open ended discussion on the video and used the comments from the YouTube page as well.

How old are you? 18-4 people
                              16- 1 person
                              17- 2 people
                              20- 1 person

GENDER: Female-3
                   Male-4

WHAT ARE BRACKET DO YOU THINK OUR VIDEO IS AIMED AT? Everyone voted 15-25

HOW DO WE AIM THE VIDEO AT THIS TARGET AUDIENCE/AGE BRACKET?
(comments people made)

• Use of relationship between dancers 
• Age of band 
• Genre
• Sexual Meaning
• Dark lighting 
• Fast pace 

DO YOU LIKE THE VIDEO? 

YES-6 people

NO- 1 person 

WHAT DID YOU LIKE/DISLIKE ABOUT IT? 

• Liked the use of mirrors
• Liked the song we chose 
• Thought the lead girl was good looking which appealed to the audience 
• People liked the use of the set 
• A few people claimed to not like the dancers

WHAT DO YOU THINK COULD BE IMPROVED? 

• More shots of the band
• No dancing
• More use of close ups 
• Bands performance 

WHAT DO YOU THINK IS THE STAR IMAGE WE HAVE CREATED? 

• Rebellion
• Niche 
• Rockstar
• Alternative 

DO YOU THINK THE NARRATIVE IN THE VIDEO IS CLEAR/UNCLEAR?

YES-5 people

NO- 2 people

WHAT DO YOU THINK IS MOST CLEAR/UNCLEAR? 

• Clear relationship
• Clear that their is issues between them 
• Clear linking to the lyrics 
• Dance was unclear

WOULD THIS VIDEO INFLUENCE YOU TO/MAKE YOU WANT TO BUY THE TRACK? 

YES- 6 people

NO- 1 person 

DO YOU LIKE THIS SONG BY YOU ME AT SIX? 

YES- 5 people

NO- 6 people 

WHAT ATTITUDES DO THE BAND REPRESENT? 

• Chilled
• Rebellion
• Youth 
• Passion 
• Presents rebellion but ultimately conformity 

HOW HAVE WE REPRESENTED THIS? 

• Derivative set design 
• Great costumes
• Representation of lead singer
• Lighting 
• Mirrors 
• Darkness of set 
• Flashing lights
• Set
• Lyrics

HAVE YOU SEEN ANY VIDEOS WITH A SIMILAR CONTEXT/NARRATIVE, IF SO WHAT ARE THESE? 

• Nickleback
• Jar of Hearts-Christina Perrie 
• Ignorance-Paramore

DO YOU THINK THE DIGIPAK REPRESENTS THE BANDS STAR IMAGE AND DOES IT LINK TO THE VIDEO? 

YES- 6 people

NO- 1 person

IF SO HOW DOES IT DO THIS? 

• Linking of cracked frame
• Darkness 
• Use of colours from set design 
• Lyrics

DO YOU THINK THE POSTER REPRESENTS THE BANDS STAR IMAGE AND DOES IT LINK TO THE VIDEO? 

YES- 5 people

NO- 2 people 

IF SO HOW DOES IT DO THIS? 

• Nothing to do with the band 
• Set above 
• Band line up 

WOULD THE POSTER MAKE YOU WANT TO BUY THE TRACK OR WATCH THE VIDEO? 

YES- 5 people

NO- 2 people 

WHY?

• Not the target audience
• Its detailed 
• Didn't particularly like the music 
• Like the artwork, style and font

WOULD THE POSTER MAKE YOU WANT TO BUY THE TRACK? 

YES- 5 people

NO- 2 people

WHY? 

• Virgin records is reliable 
• Don't like the song

IS THE POSTER EYE CATCHING AND DOES IT HAVE ENOUGH INFORMATION?

YES- 5 people

NO- 2 people

HOW COULD WE IMPROVE THIS? 

• Background with catching colours
• Dates
• Site information 

IS THE DIGIPAK EYE CATCHING AND DOES IT HAVE ENOUGH INFORMATION? 

YES-6 people

NO- 1 Person

HOW COULD WE IMPROVE THIS? 

• Could be made more exciting- bit boring
• Less dark

FINALLY, IS THE OVERALL CONCEPT OF OUR VIDEO, DIGIPAK AND POSTER CLEAR?YES- 6 people

NO- 1 person 

Evaluation


From the YouTube page it can be derived that the audience enjoyed both the performance aspect and the narrative dance aspect, which is good as it will create good publicity for the band as it has two significant parts to it and we were effective at showing this. The set design and the digipack also proved to be a success with audience comments saying that the broken mirrors on the set were good direct link to the break up in the song, and also the digipack reminded the audience of the set so this links into the narrative. The narrative conflict of love hate was also talked about by the comenting audience.






For the questionnaire the questions we chose to ask would help us analyse how well we targeted the target audience, and whether we got a preferred reading of what we intended to signify.






We were targeting our target audience in order to get precise and concise feedback

The feedback from our questionnaire, most of the people we asked could correctly identify the target audience of the product of 15-25 this probably is due to the age of the band members. Everyone identified this due to the age of the band, the set and the narrative. Our video was popular among this age group as was intended but it was unclear and disliked by an older generation as we received feedback from a 40 year old who said he didn't like the dancing as he thought it had no relevance and he disliked the song. this is unsurprising due to the style and genre of the song and the band he is 15 years older than the target audience.



We received a few negative comments on the dancing but this is to be expected as some people just don’t like the style of dance that we chose to use in the performance, however the audience that gave us the negative comments on the dancing could still see the relevance it had to the narrative of the music video. 



We only had enough time to interview 7 people, we would be able to improve our feedback if we got more audience feedback, perhaps we should have shortened the questionnaire slightly to improve the number of people we asked to fill it in.


In conclusion the feedback we received helps us to deduce we appealed to the target audience of the video, the criticism was constructive on how we could improve the overall package e.g. the poster could have more information on it about future releases or gigs.

Feedback

Good presentation considers the use of the music video and ancilliary tasks well - particualrly in relation to star image and branding throughout the campaign.  The area for development is sutaining the use of real examples and considering more the marketing mix you have tried to create.  Please try to insert more example intto your work in order to meet level four criteria.

Good effort well done.

Task 2 How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?

Task 2

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At the last moment we decided to change the poster to these ones.

The new poster designs allow far more information to be given to the audience than the posters before this is important as they are a new and up and coming band so the teaser poster we used before wouldn't be very appropriate as the fan base isn't large enough to generate the promotion needed. We chose to keep certain aspects of the original poster we liked e.g. the picture of the band lined up together or the similar font of the band name "synergy".

Task 2

Task 2

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Teacher Feedback

Excellent evaluation of the use of conventions in your promotional music campaign.  Very good use of presentation tool which is succinct and makes some really good points, backed by academic argument.

There are a couple of points about the presentation that needs to be developed:

1. Provide consistency in your presentation with style - for example consider where you have or have not used capitals.
2. It was Negus who argued that the MV was a promotional tool not Dyer (he discussed star image).
3. Provide a broader evaluation of where you have used, developed or challenged conventions.

Task 1 In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Task 1

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Music Video

Feedback

Very good feedback on the shoot day especially in consideration of the shoot day and the set design.  There is good reflection supported by images in the slideshow, although there is some improvement needed here in terms of how it is presented.  You show very good knowledge and understanding of the production process.

Evaluation of shoot day

We started the day by letting the band rehearse a few times whilst we set the lights and worked out where they would stand we then got the band members in to position them and make any adjustments to the set if we had to as we had hot bulbs and sharp bits of perspex hanging from the ceiling so we had to make sure everyone was safe. The first shot we did was an establishing wide shot to get all of the band members in also it helped us to see what the lights looked like on the monitor as it will look different on the monitor to what we could see with the naked eye.
The mirrors were only hung by a piece of string so they kept spinning round this meant we had to constantly adjust them and try to hide as much of the camera behind curtains as we didn't want it to be seen in the reflections, the spinning mirrors really were what we wanted as we wanted to create a distorted effect and use different reflections of the band. For some of the shots we held the mirrors out of shot for example we did a box of mirrors round the lead singers head we used a laser pen to make sure all the mirrors were positioned properly but it created a really good effect. One down side of the mirrors is we had to constantly watch out of reflections and the mirrors were only one sided so in order to keep good continuity we were constantly twisting them and repositioning them to their original place, the band members had to constantly keep playing also otherwise we may catch a glimpse of them just standing in in one of the spinning mirrors.

In pre production we decided we wanted to shoot each of the shoots individually but on the day it became apparent that this would take to long and be hard to replicate the effect we wanted in after effects, so we decided to shoot the band by panning the camera and focus pulling to different parts of the band and doing close ups of instruments and singers all one take, this created a really rock music effect as the jumpy camera work and quick movements almost makes it look like it was filmed live at a festival, the use of dry Ice in terms of mise en scene also added to the dark rock feel of the video as it associated with grave yards Michael Jackson thriller video.

The second part of the shoot consisted of the dancers for this we had to slightly re-arrange our set moving some of the mirrors back and putting them higher as we didn't want the dancers to get injured in the filming process. We gave the dancers time to rehearse and familiarize them selves with the track, we then got them to perform it and we tried to work out the best position for the first shoots for the camera as the used the entire studio space , we then began to do close up shots of their faces and body parts we decided to shoot this in a similar way to how we shot the band with moving the camera around and focusing on different points when we were filming, we also tried to reflect of the mirrors in the same way we did with the band, we then went onto use the Ginni lift for some high angle shots of the dancers, we then had a costume change and they then did the dance again. We then filmed specific bits of the dance we liked like the kiss and the lifts. Also we used a tissue to smudge Sophie's make up in order to make it look as if she was crying.

Our shoot overall went smoothly and better than expected with other groups saying how stressful theirs were I think the pre-production planning really helped us to have a smooth and well structured shoot.  It also helped that our band members could play the song on their instruments and they new the lyrics, especially the drums as it held the song together as the playback of the track wasn't as loud as we had hoped, the heavy black curtains muffled the sound which we had not anticipated.

Photos from shoot day

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Set build for our video

We started the build of our set by smashing the perspex mirrors we originally wanted to use glass but it was ton dangerous and expensive to do. We then started to hang the pieces from the ceiling at about head height we also hung light bulbs from the ceiling and connected them to the light controls in the studio she would program a sequence for the video we used different colored bulbs to make it more interesting these were also hung at different heights.

After setting up the set we then started to move the instruments into position for the band for the shoot the next day. 

Feedback

This is a good account of the process, but your evaluation needs more detail.  I would like to see a more academic reflection on the design, in terms of conventions, institutional practice and audience recognition feedback.  You could have for example explained how you were marketing a star image and why this is branded in your group design.  Also need a clearer account of what you achieved in this production process.

Poster Evaluation

As well as creating a digipack for the band, I also created posters the one above, I wanted it to be included as an extra in the CD cover, it has the song lyrics on in a similar text style to the bands name on the CD cover. This use of synergy will help to promote the band as it will be more recognisable. I used photoshop to create the poster above.

These are designs for a magazine advert for the band once again we used the bands name "synergy" in the red font in order to strengthen the bands branding through the use of synergy. In Our magazine advert we need to include a copyright logo and information on the record label.


The CD digipack, the magazine poster and the extra pull out poster are all tools to help the selling of our bands music to the consumer, also brandded items will help create a stronger fan base as people will start to collect them. The pull out poster has been used by artist before e.g. Madonna by Andy Warhol.

Evaluation of CD digipack and music poster

 For our digipack we all came up with initial ideas for the pack and the main front cover design, these were deigned by hand and didn't include any images of the band. 

When we moved onto designing the digipack once we had a final idea template drawn up we had some images of the band but they weren't at the desired quality level as the had been taken on a phone camera in order for our poster and digipack to look more professional we decided we had to use a good quality camera and a white background in order to get the crisp images we needed. We then went on too create the digipack design using Lightroom and Photoshop. 

One of the main tools that were used in creating the front cover was lasso tool to cut the individual photos out and also the main over all effect was created by using light leeks and the blur tool. 

This is the finished product for the Digipack design ^. 

The photo shot was the first time I had seen the band members together, this was good as we could work out who was going to play what instrument and role in the band we originally had ideas but we made a change to the band we swapped the original singer to guitar and the guitarist to singer. 

We took this photo like this in order to create a boy band star persona with the front man the singer at the front of the photo and the rest of the band behind him. 

The text font we used on our digipack is very recognisable and effectively could be a logo for the band it is called bleeding cowboys, also the red text color is very bold and stands out well this will help us to build a brand image for our band. All though we mixed our band up we still kept the boy band stereotype adding to our bands brand and saleability.