Evaluation Question 1

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

Thinking and creating ideas was very time consuming, as our initial ideas kept changing, due to the changes in music we made. We eventually all came to an agreement of producing a fully narrative based music video, as there’s not many videos that follow this convention. After struggling to find a song that was more of an instrumental, that fitted our genre. We decided to use our own produced song, as it fitted our genre. This allowed us to incorporate all our ideas that we came up with and have very little chance of copyright issues and also fitted our target audience.
Ryan Leslie being one of our biggest influences, inspired us to create a documentary feel to our music video as it tends to create a sense of social realism.
(video of ryan leslie addiction below)

As you can see from this video, it is documentary based, and you feel as if you are there with them. This was the same feeling and look we wanted to create.
Here are another Two videos that use the doucumentry convention, that we wer also influenced by.
( 'Beast Mode'and 'The show Goes On' below )


After studying music videos that have a documentary feels, to understand the conventions. We noticed that ‘Hand Held’ and ‘Tracking’ shots were used in every video. The video theorist Jonas Mekas suggested that using ‘Hand Held’ cameras, captured and created a sense of escapism for the audience, and as stated before this was the feeling and look we wanted to create.
For further inspiration we analysised some of our favourite music videos to see weather there were any handhelp shots that we would like to incorporate into our music video.





The short clip above is from ‘Game Over Remix’ By Tinchy Styrder, as you can see the camera shots are hand help which creates a sense of social realism. A Blurr effect is also used which is visually pleasing, which inspired us to also use the ‘Blurr’ transaction throughtout our video.
Examples from ‘I Can’t Figure It’ (below )

Evaluation Question 2

How Effective is the Combination of Your Main Product and Ancillary Texts?

My initial idea for my digipak was to show Chanan after he was signed to show the start of success. I would of created this feeling of success through simplicity throughout the digipak as i believed this may connote that he’s in a world of his own, as everything would be so clear and simple, with Chanan being the main focus of the digipak. Another way to show success would have been by the use of costume worn by Chanan. Most of my inspiration for this idea came from Ryan Leslie

For further inspiration and ideas and started researching into digipaks from my favourite artist such as, T.i. and The Game, when I came across.. ‘T.I vs. T.I.P’ (picture below) ;. The album was based to show his split personality of T.I.P when he was heavily involved in the drug and gang scenes in Atlanta America and T.I for when he became a huge successful artist and globally know. This inspired me to Incorporated this idea of split personality into my digipak, but using the narrative in our music video of Chanan on his ‘hustle’ before he was successful, to when he got signed to ‘Platinum Records’ which was the start to his success instead.







As you can see, the split personality from mise-en-scene used in both of these pictures.

Using this concept of chanan during and before his success, I started drawing ideas of how I could present this. As I dint want to use the idea of having a split album cover, because I felt that I’ve just copied and not created this myself. I again started looking into more digipaks of albums I personally own, when I came across ‘Recovery’ by Eminem. For the front cover he had a booklet with an image on both sides of two different, but similar album covers. (Picture below)



This inspired me to create a small booklet also with two album covers, one side with Chanan when he was successful and the other with him before he was successful.
I then started thinking of possible camera shots and poses I could do, and decided to have a mid-range shot of Chanan like the one used on ‘Ryan Leslie’ album cover. However I came across T.I.’s latest album ‘No Mercy’ which had a close up of T.I. looking down which I thought connoted a sense of failure. When I thought I could use such as a pose, to create the same feeling. After debating which idea to use, I decided to go for ‘No Mercy’ for inspiration, as I could use a close up of Chanan looking down to create a sense of failure before he was successful and a close up Chanan, with his head held up, to create a sense of power and success.

As I decide to go with the idea of a booklet with two different album covers, inspired by Eminem ‘Recovery’ I needed something to fill the booklet with. So I decided to have a few images of Chanan before he was successful in colour and the same amount of images of Chanan after he had been signed, in black and white, to link my digipak to the narrative of our music video.
In conclusion I used elements of every album cover that inspired me, from the simplicity in ‘Ryan Leslie’, the split personality from ‘T.I. vs. T.I.P’, the booklet with two different album covers from ‘Recovery’ and the pose from ‘No Mercy’ to create my own. I believe doing this allowed me to incorporate my idea of representing the narrative from our music video of Chanan through to my digipak.
As we designed a company ident for ‘Platinum Records’ as shown in our music video, I wanted to carry this out through to my didgipak as it would create a sense of branding. So I started looking into more album digipaks to see where the majority of company logos and sponsors are placed.
After researching, I found that most albums would have the company logo and sponsors on the back jus under the track list, so this influenced me to do this too. I also placed the company logo onto the poster, to show a sense of branding and continuity.
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Example of Nas album track list, with company logo on back.


Example of use of ident on my track list and poster.

I wanted incorporate the street look from our video into my poster. I did this through the mise-en0scen. For costume I had Chanan wearing a plain white t-shirt and a black hood jacket. I felt that this would help create a sense of ‘street’ as this is the sort of style and dress code, used by the sense of ‘street’.
For my location I had Chanan in a vandalised area which had graffiti all over the walls. I used this as this also created a sense of street, to relate it back to the narrative in my music video. As the street scene, before Chanan was singed is used a flashback and is under the ‘day into Night’ affect to give a Black and white look. I incorporated this idea into my poster as I was trying to create street look. I believed this made a big link to my music video.

Evaluation Question 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?


Gaining audience feedback played a big role in our production, as it informed us on, what worked, weather it suited our target audience, weather it fitted our genre and weather the narrative made sense.

Our first idea of showing Chanans success by filming in a modern apartment was the biggest change we made. By showing our first draft to friends, family and students in our class, we were constantly told that the film was ’Beautiful, but nothing else’ meaning, it was visually pleasing and looked very good, but didn’t really make any sense, as the narrative wasn’t as strong as we needed it to be, due to the fact our video was purely narrative based this was something we need to amend.

First draft ( below)
http://vimeo.com/16565340

As we had a major struggle in getting hold of an apartment for re-filming, so that we could make the narrative stronger, for a clearer understanding for our audience. We were forced to change our original idea of showing success through the luxuries Chanan had, such as a brand new modern apartment.

We then decided to have Chanan go out for a meal with and Record Company Owner, for a drink. This will then lead to Chanan getting handed over a contract, which he will sign to show that he had been signed. We believed that this would make it clear to audience that, this was the start to Chanans success.


After filming all the scenes needed, we then started editing and came up with our potential final piece. We again showed family, friends and students in our class our video and asked them fill out a questionnaire (below) for some constructive feedback.

Which genre would you categories this video to be?
Could you explain the story line from what you have seen?
If you was to remake our video, what would you change?

After receiving all the answers, 100% said that the can explain the story line, 80% said that they would categorize the video as R&B/ Hip Hop genre and 85% said that they wouldn’t change anything. Receiving this feedback gave us great relief as it showed that the music video we had made, fitted our genre, would suit our target audience, visually pleasing and that the narrative was really strong which was our main target as our music video was based purely on narrative.

However, from the 15% that said that they would change a part of the video, meaning there was an aspect that we could improve and make clearer. It was stated that, they did not understand why the whole video was under a ’Day into Night’ affect. So If they were to change it, they would keep the video in colour. This then inspired us to have the studio scene and the ending in colour, and the street scene in black and white. We believed that this made it clear that the colour was to show present day and the black and white affect was to show a flashback of Chanan before he was successful. We believed that changing this, helped made a narrative stronger, clear of why we have used the black and white through some scenes and that it was also visually pleasing.

For further feedback we posted our music video on to Facebook as it is a great way to promote anything and we would be able to receive feedback from a wider audience. The response was very positive, which suggest we achieved our target!
(Below a print screen of video being posted on Facebook)

Ancerially Product

For my Ancerilly product, I was told that the booklet with the two album covers, would be too complicated and would be hard for me to make, so that I should make a simpler digital. However as there are not many albums that have a feature like this, inspired and encouraged me to stick to my initial idea and to carry on producing it.

After I had created my Digipak I again showed my friends, that’s initially disagreed with my idea and received 100% positive feedback that the booklet I had made really worked and that they like how I incorporated the narrative from the music video into my Digipak.

Evaluation Question 4

Evaluation question 4

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

During the planning and research stage I used many technologies to widen my knowledge on music videos, production and ancillary products. The most useful tool was Web 2.0 which allowed me to gather as much information needed from many different mediums. These included photgrapghy, album artwork and music video. I also looked at blogs from artists such as T.Magic for inspiration on how to present on my blog
For the production stage of our music video, we used technology equipment such as Panasonic HDC-SD10 . This allowed us to capture our footage to a high quality, which help give a professional finish to our music video.
Picture of panansoic camera

To ensure that shots were a steadiy as possible, when needed, we used a tripod so that the shot was in focus and stable. This also helpd contribute to the quality of our end product.

The footage was filmed onto a 8gb SD card so that we could easily import our footage on to various equipment such as the MacBook and external hard drive to ensure that we had enough back up , in case footage was lost. We purposely used a 8gb Sd card as from the research we have done on industry, we learnt that it is very important to film more footage than ever needed, so that we could pick and chooses scenes, to give the best finish to the product as possible.
Pic of sd card

Once we inported the footage onto an Apple MacBook. We used the software iMovie to edit our footage together. As we had trouble with iMovie as it kept crashing, we were forced to re-install the programme. After we got the programme running we started the stage of editing, which we used our storyboard to help make the process easier. Using iMovie allowed us to cut and paste, cut clips, speed up , slow down and add effects such as ‘Day into Night’ ( shot below) which gave us the opportunity to create our music video exactly as we needed.

During the stage of editing, continuity was an important factor to consider. From our storyboard we kept this in mind, which helped us position the shots within the editing process. After we had cut the video into the correct order, we then imported
It to iMovie Hd, the was done to give the video a higher quality finish to our video.

After the video was complete, with exported it to iTunes which was used for storage to ensure we have enough back up, in case in footage was lost. We then used Web 2.0 to upload our final product on to Vimeo which is known for holding higher quality videos rather than Youtube. We did this so that it was easier to embed our video on to our blogs and other popular sites such as Facebook, to gather audience feedback, as it can be used to show to a wider audience.

ANCEILLARY
For my ancerially product , I used technology such as Lumix G1 so that I could caputure an image to its higest quality, which helps give a professional edge.
All the images wer captured and stored onto an 6gb sd card which allowed m eto easily carry and store the images onto as much storage devices as possible to ensure i have enough backup.
After norrowing down to 10 pictuire from 331 tooken. I started editing them on Adobe Photoshop. This allowed me to manipulate images to present the look I was going for, in the best way possible. I done this by using tools such as,’magnetic tool’ which allowed me to cut out aspects of the image that I needed to create the look I was aiming for. It also allowed me to change the contrast and brightness o fthe image, this made the quality alot stronger with andmade certain aspects of the images stand out, making it the main focus point, when needed.

Front Cover Problem

As from my previous post, I've stated that I have been inspired by the artwork for T.I.'s latest album, 'No Mercy' and am going for a similar look. The problem I am facing is that the font that I think fits best, is hard to read and may look pixelated once printed. To overcome this I would need to choose another font, preferably something similar, or try and make the font I'm using clearer and easier for the audience to read, which I may be able to do on Adobe Photo shop.

Last night, we had the photo shoot of Chanan, after he has been signed. As my sister was able to book an apartment 'West bridge Wharf' room 405 (one we have tried booking before) we were able to do the photo shoot there. This meant that the mise-en-scene would be perfect for the look I was going for, eg/ the rich and fabulous life. Again i took a total of 235 pictures, and would be only using roughly 2-3 . this will allow me to choose the best picture which will illustrate and connote the feeling of rich and fabulous to the greatest extent.

We were lucky enough to take pictures with an Aston Martin, Nissan 350z, Bmw 3 series coupe and a Mercedes S Class , as these were all in the car park, this will help represent the look I'm a trying to create.

Pictures will be up soon.

Front Cover Insperation