Throughout the day i have been trying to upload the cd design and the final video but it doesnt seem to be working, the images and video dont show up and a box outline just shows up. To try and resolve this problem I will contact the blogger website and keep trying to upload the files every hour.

  

Magazine Advert

Here is our magazine advert where we took inspiration from Example's previous work by using the background picture as shadows to relate to Example's album name ''Playing In The Shadows'', and the actual CD cover we used our initiative and decided to use the song name as a guideline of how to make the CD cover as shown there is someone asleep on a bench.

Our Plan finished

This is our plan that we produced at the start of this course. We created this so that we keep on track of this course and we didnt fall behind and if we did we knew we had to put extra hours of our own time to get back on track. This was very useful because this had always been a guidence to us and kept us on track.


























Posted by Jubil

Question 1: In what way does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

Our music video is about having a good time and enjoying life which is portrayed by the performers in our video. We did not want to copy the exact video of Example- Stay Awake because during our initial planning meeting we has lots of creative idea’s that we wanted to do in the video. This pushed us to making a complete different video from Examples but we used his video as an guidance. However this was not to say Example had not influenced our video at all but infact it was he himself that was our biggest influence in the music video. The video was about enjoying life and having a good time and because the music was very high tempo we went with the party theme just as Examples video. We looked deep into shots used and locations from Examples video and used this in our video’s and added some of our locations and shots as well. For Example in the video Stay Awake, one of the main location at the high tempo part of the song is at a party in the woods whereas in our video our high tempo location is at a concert at the Apollo Arena. This is similar because both of the location is at a sort of party but with the difference of the location. We used the Green screen room to film parts of the video and put the exact same background that example uses in most of his video which is a white background with the letter ‘E’ on the side foe Example. We used this to make the video look professional and give the element so that it looks like Examples video and song. Also by watching Example we used similar actions that he did such as body movement and arm movements for example he never stays still when lip syncing but always moves with a lot of hand and arm movements.

We also used many of our ideas for our video. For example we used the flicking of the I phone images in the video because we thought the idea was very clever and entertaining for the audience. In our video we didn’t have a story within the music video because most of Examples videos don’t have a story and so decided not to have a specific story to this. Most music videos of this genre would have narrative parts, although we didn’t include direct narrative, we added scenes of the performers where they weren’t lip synching and paying no attention to the camera, these for example include when the performer is dancing and when he is looking at the scenery.

I think with the with the time given to produce this video we did well to produce the music video, as it is shows many conventions of a real media product. We shot the video in various locations and had a lot of lip syncing in this. Also we edited the video just as any other video to give it that professional look. We did continuity editing in our music video so that the audience is not distracted by the transaction and used various transactions to make the video look professional.

I would say our music video uses the same principals and techniques as Examples but what we did was use our ideas and our creative sense to make a video of our own using our ideas.

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

The video, magazine advert and CD case all compliment each other in ways that they're all similar, they all fall into the dub step, party themed genre and also link into way the artist has previously made CD covers, magazine adverts and videos. The artist example appeals to the teenage audience, because of the party themed music, genre and to even the type of clothing example wears. We used same type of design and style for everything, the CD cover, magazine and video. We used example’s previous work as a template to give us a rough guide of how he relates to his audience, the costumes used and the types of designs he has decided to use in the older/current work.

Here is a snapshot of Example in the video ‘Kickstarts’ wearing a standard red hoodie and checkered shirt something casual, but also something that mainly (16 - 24 year olds) would wear. Everything he wear usually would link into his audience.

Above is Example again wearing a standard t-shirt and chino pants in the video ‘change the way you kiss me’. We got an idea of the way Example dressed and the costumes we should wear from Example’s previous videos. Shown below is Jubil wearing similar clothes to Example a standard white tshirt, with chino pants and converse. All these clothes are shown in various Example videos such as 'change the way you kiss me', 'kicksarts' and in the original video for the song we decided to use 'stay awake'.

The way the videos both represent each other in similar ways are that we decided to use a party theme when the song actually kicked in, we decided to film at a concert because there we had a high mass of people similar to the big concert scene show in the 'change then way you kiss me' video. Shown below is the party scene in Example's video.

Shown below is a party scene that we shot at a concert similar to the shot shown above.

Evaluation Question 3 - Audience feedback

The audience feedback showed we had some mixed reviews, some people where fans of our video others were not.

The reviews ranged from people saying the liked how the video managed to tell the story behind the music, the song by Example has some dance elements telling a story of youth and freedom and some people thought that our video managed to portray that through our use of different shots and locations. The reviews also told of how people liked the link between the up tempo parts of the song with a more up tempo feel to the video.

Other positive reviews where that, the editing was fast paced and was in time to the song and reviews praised the lip syncing as it was in time to the music which gave the video a feel to it. However there were also negative reviews and these ranged from people who said that our editing was slightly random and didn’t have an order to it , they carried on to say to improve our shots should have been more ordered to suit the song and at times should have been slower.

People also said they would have liked to have seen some more different camera angles and different shot ranges during the video showing the main characters. And some of the people disliked the use of green screen while others liked it.

Over all we had some mixed reviews from the people who viewed. We however see this as a positive thing because it allows us to do what we did well and what we would need to improve on if we where to embark on a project like this in future.

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

Technology was used throughout our project from the research to planning to the evaluation. Media technology has benefited us very much making many tasks much easier to do and made many of our tasks completed more professional.

During the research stage the Internet (YouTube), when analyzing other music videos was very beneficial as it gave us the chance to see other professional videos, which gave us ideas on what to include in our music video. Because of the internet, we were able to access global music videos from various countries giving us a wider knowledge on music videos. This allowed us to understand fully how to target a specific audience. We found out that different music videos used different styles and context when targeting a different audience. During our research, we also used Google maps to look at potential locations for our music video. This was very useful because we could see and discuss the location sat in class than going to these various locations saving time and money.

The technology used in the planning stage was very useful. First of all the software PowerPoint on the computer was ideal to make notes on ideas for our music video, which could be sent by e-mail home so that we could make full use of our time even at home. This was useful because if we were not able to finish a task at home, we could easily send the work home so that we could complete the work there. The Internet came in handy again during the planning when we had to get the lyrics of our chosen song. The lyrics where very easy to get hold off and so we were able to annotate them easily and decide what we were doing for each stanza. After annotating our music scripts we were able to use a scanner to scan the paper and get four copies of the same notes which saved us time.

During the actual construction, mobile phones where used to communicate with all team members. This was very useful because it made communication among us so much easier and we could plan our filming day and tell each other new idea’s through the phone not wasting time. Also we communicated through Facebook as everyone in the group used Facebook and so we could also discuss idea’s and set tasks for one another through this. In addition teachers kept in touch by sending us email updating the blog if teachers had urgent notices or tasks that had to be completed. This is a fast, easy and effective method to communicate.

When making our digipack, the internet came in handy to look at other professional digipack, we could analyse them and get ideas from them to put onto our digipack. We looked at the positives and negatives of the digipack to know what was good to put on an album cover and what not to put on an album cover. To make the actual digipack we used Photoshop on the computer. This was very useful because we could edit pictures and edit them making them professional.

Constructing the actual video required using a video camera to shoot the actual footage and a memory card to within the video camera to save the footage. The memory card was then inserted into the computer where we could edit the footage using Final cut Pro. By having a memory card it made it easy to transfer the footage from the camera to the computer saving time and effort. Using Final cut Pro took much of our time because we had over 2 hours footage on our memory card of various shots and scenes for just a 4 minute music video and so we had to watch all the clips, many of which were at the same location and deleted all the unwanted footage. Even though we deleted lots of footage we still had lots of clip and footages and so we had to edit them and put it on the timeline of the song.

We also used the green screen in our music video. We used specialized green screen camera to record the footage and put a relevant background or scenery which we wouldn’t be able to in real life. Lighting was also used and managed to reduce shadow of ourselves when filming. After getting all the footage onto the timeline we had to readjust all of them again to make sure they lip synced with the music to make it professional. It was when doing this some of our video footage did not fit in with the music and so we had to redo the shots. After this Final cut Pro was also used when adding effects and transactions to the music video to make it more professional.

When making the Digipack we went to the woods to take the picture on a digital stills camera. This was very handy because we could take up to 1000 shots on the camera and so we clicked away on the camera. It was once we reviewed the shots on the camera using the preview on the camera we were able to understand what we liked about the pictures and how it could be improved. Because we could look at the pictures we were able to save time by not having o come back to college and reviewing the pictures on the computer and then going back to the location to shoot the image again because we were able to preview the picture at the location which saved all of us much time.

During the evaluation stage we produced questionnaires to fill about the music video and the digipack which was all produced on Microsoft Word. This was useful because it was easy to produce giving it a professional look and was easy to make copies of to hand out to reviewers. Also completing blog work regularly about what we did and tasks was done mostly on computer which was quick and easy to do and also to upload the work onto the blog. The tasks done on paper was easily scanned using a scanner to the blog.

In conclusion, media technology has helped us very much to complete our project successfully. If it wasn’t for media technology, our work produced would have been no where of the standard it is now and would of took more time. Media technology has helped us a lot and gave use a beeper understanding of media and this project through this.

Softwares and websites that we used

Final Cut Pro

Final cut Pro was used when editing our music video. This was the most important piece of software that we used because the whole music video was edited on this software. After filming we had over 2 hours footage on our memory card of various shots and scenes for just a 4 minute music video and so we had to watch all the clips, many of which were at the same location and deleted all the unwanted footage. Even though we deleted most of our footage we still had excess footages and so we had to edit them and put it on the timeline of the song. We edited the clips using final cut pro and inserted them onto the time line matching the beat of the song. After this we put transactions and effects onto the music video using Final cut Pro.

Photoshop

To create our album cover and magazine cover, we used software called ‘Photoshop’. We used this software because we could edit images easily by cropping pictures, changing colors and tones, adding layers, resizing images, having a variety of fonts and by rearranging images and effects to this. The program was very easy to use and gave the products that we produced that professional look to it.

YouTube

During the research stage the YouTube, when analyzing other music videos was very beneficial as it gave us the chance to see other professional videos, which gave us ideas on what to include in our music video. Because of the YouTube, we were able to access global music videos from various countries giving us a wider knowledge on music videos. This allowed us to understand fully how to target a specific audience. We found out that different music videos used different styles and context when targeting a different audience

PowerPoint

This software was used when we took note when we had our initial meeting plan. This was used because it is very easy to use and easy to take notes. Also it was very easy to edit your work if you have made a mistake.

Microsoft word

Microsoft word was also used to produce documents such as the evaluation and other documents. Microsoft was easy to use and made the documents produced very professional. This was also useful when we had to send our idea’s to other members by saving the document and sending it through email.

Facebook

Facebook was used throughout this project helping with the production and the evaluation. First of all we used Facebook to organize filming days and keep in contact with all of our group members. Because all members in our group where active users of the social networking Facebook we were able to stay in contact. For example, if I (Jubil) were to send a message to Gasim he would receive this not only to his computer but to his phone as well helping us to stay contact where ever we are.

In addition to this, we all posted our music video on our Facebook pages. With over 3000 friends between us on just Facebook we were able to show our video to them and ask for feedback. We received good feedback from our friends, which helped increase our confidence in the video. Facebook I would say I faster than ‘word of mouth’ because one post you put on Facebook is seen my hundreds of views helping to increase publicity of the video.

Posted by Jubil

Audience feedback video

Compare the challenges of AS production work & A2 production work.

First off the main difference between AS production work and
A2 production work is the obvious increased amount of work, A2 is an all round
harder year, therefore more work is expected and the quality of it also should
be of a high level so the things we learned in last year media, we had to do
but of a much better standard.


Other differences that were different were the
nature of the task, style of filming, style of editing and like mentioned
before the amount of work. Our AS production work consisted of making a
3-4minute opening of a movie, we had to target an audience and make it to
appeal to that audience as much as possible and also think of ways that it can
be advertised as if it were a real movie.


That year we learnt how to use the
cameras, final cut pro (editing software on the Macs) and how to use green
screen which was optional for us to use. This year since we already have a
knowledge of these software’s and items we had to use a better and also wider
variety of camera shots such as establishing shots, medium shots, close ups
etc…


We also had to better our editing skills by using transitions that cut to
the next shot, effects and a storyline which was also optional for us to have
in our video. In our A2 production work we had to pick any song we wanted, and
create our own video for it. It was more challenging because there was much
more to it than just acting as shown in the AS production work. There were
other tasks such as remembering lyrics for the song, finding good unique
locations (which were hard to find because many groups used similar locations).


Also the amateur level of editing and filming had to improve from last year. No
shaky camera shots and editing had to much of a much higher standard. Also this
year the blog work load was higher a minimum of 50 posts to be on the blog
before the 9th of December deadline compared to last year its a lot
more posts, we had to post magazine analysis’, make a completely new CD cover
for our song, and analysis for it, and just post everything we did from the
good to the bad.

Please note: Myself and Jubil did the same work but we did this because we thought it would be helpful because you can see how my views and his views are similar and different.

Compare As production work and A2 production work nature of the task, style of filming, style of editing, amount of work?

During the start of A2 media, I thought this would be very similar to AS Media because we were told we had to make a music video which I thought it would be very similar to a film which we did for AS and do a blog with this which we also did in AS. However it was only when we got more and more into the course we realised AS and A2 media are very different from each other. Firstly by completing AS Media and almost finishing A2 Media I can say A2 is much more complexed than AS. This is due to the increased workload, the increased editing/filming and the increased levels of organisation and meeting deadlines.

In regards to filming, last year we had to make the opening scene of a film. Because it was a film we didn’t have to use several shots or different angles for the same shot and so it was fairly easy to do as there where a limit to the different shots and angles you had to use. However when doing a music video, just for a single shot there could be several shots from different angles making the music video harder to film and edit making it harder to plan what shots we were going to do. This resulted in us setting an outline of our music video and using our creative ideas on filming scene. Also in a film a location is rarely repeated whereas in a music video locations switch quickly and locations are revisited continually throughout the music video making it harder to film. Because of this, we had to revisit the same locations many times which was time consuming. In addition, the film made in AS media was completely our idea as in we decided what to put in the film and how it is edited and filmed. However when doing a music video, we already have a rough outline to the music video and we have to have many idea’s to put into the music video to make the music video entertaining such as the I-phone sequence in our video to engage the audience into the music video.

In terms of editing, when doing a music video the amount of editing is considerably more that when making a film. When editing a music video the shot changes every few seconds to keep the audience interested and to keep up with our high beat and up-tempo beat. Compared to the film editing, editing was only used to show emotion and establish the atmosphere of the scene. Apart from this editing was used but not nearly as much as the music video. Editing the film in AS helped us to edit the music video because we were more used to the program ‘Final Cut Pro’ however the editing we did for the music video was so much more than what we did for the film.

In terms of performance, in the opening scene of the film you had a very specific script and a storyboard that you stick to making the whole production easier. However when doing a music video, to make an exact story board was very hard because of the quick switch in location and the different shots we had to do. Because of this we went to the location with a rough idea what we wanted and did the scene at the location at the location after which we went to the editing suit to edit the music video. We would revisit the location 2 or 3 times to improve our shots and film better shots at the location.

Looking at the blog, there was much more posts we had to do because we did more planning, meeting and editing which took alot of time and effort. In conclusion we thought A2 media was very much harder than AS due to workload, the planning and organising we had to do.

New album cover feedback

Feedback is crucial for us because it tells us if the costumers view of the product, what they think about it and how it could be improved. When we gave our album cover out to our target audience (teenagers and young adults) the first time we received not so encouraging feedback and so by listening to the critics and looking at how we could have improved our Album cover we have now produced a new album cover.

We asked them 5 questions which were:

1) What did you think of our album cover?

2) Does the image relate to the song and explain?

3) What do you think of the colour tine of the album cover?

4) Do you think the album has sufficient information about the song?

5) On a scale of 1 to 10 what would you give our album cover?

6) How can it be improved?

We gave same target audience the same feedback form and this it what they said:

We were very pleased that our efforts paid off. Making a new Album cover took time and effort but we are pleased that our target auidence likes it and so the album cover will be more effective when put on sale as it is now more appealing and attractive.

Our new album cover analysis

Feedback of our album cover

Feedback is crucial for us because it tells us if the costumers view of the product, what they think about it and how it could be improved. When we gave our album cover out to our target audience (teenagers and young adults), the overall feedback was that it could have been improved.

Even though the feedback was disappointing, we were determined to listen to the feedback and improve our product. Looking at our feedback sheets it said that the main picture of the teenager sitting down on the sofa drinking alcohol was not a good portrayal of teenagers and the overall color of the album cover was dull and depressing making it not noticeable. Also they said it had very little information such as what time song was coming out.

We were happy that the people we asked were honest and decided to change our album cover into something, which relates to the song ‘Stay Awake’. We had a group meeting, which we decided to make a complete new album cover without any alcohol references and make the album cover much brighter with more relevant information such as, date of release.

We asked them 5 questions which were:

1) What did you think of our album cover?

2) Does the image relate to the song and explain?

3) What do you think of the colour tine of the album cover?

4) Do you think the album has sufficient information about the song?

5) On a scale of 1 to 10 what would you give our album cover?

6) How can it be improved?


These are some of our feedback that we recieved.

Our Alum Cover Alalysis

This is our analysis of our album Cover. In this I have analyzed the album cover and the reasons for why we have done the album cover this way.

Production progress December 1st

Today our group was in the computer room doing blog work. Our teacher very generously created a checklist, which showed all the tasks that had to be completed in the blog. We held a group meeting in which we used the checklist and went through the list ticking all the tasks that we have done and marking all the tasks we haven’t don so far. The tasks we did not complete was shared between all four members of our group and worked on them individually. Each task that wasn’t complete was assigned equally to our group members to be done. At the computer we were doing our separate assigned tasks.

Wretch 32 Magazine advert

Picture not up!!!

This is a magazine advert for the artist “wretch 32” selling tickets for a live performance. The artist is a “rapper”

We discovered from the advert that magazine adverts should clearly show the artist show what they are doing and show prices for the event clearly. The advert clearly also shows the time and place very clearly. This is done in this advert as we can see date and time clearly the date is presented in red to clearly stand out.

The advert follows the theme of his album which is called black and white and the picture is predominantly in black and white, but has other colours for the date so its clear and appealing to the intended audience.

This is a magazine advert for the artist “wretch 32” selling tickets for a live performance. The artist is a “rapper”

Our Inspirations

Our inspirations for the video varied. Mainly the idea of performing the video was one that we got from watching other music videos. We realised this was good as it kept the viewer entertained and perhaps re-iterated the lyrics being sung. For choice of locations we decided to keep it simple as we didn’t want locations that would take away too much attention from the message the music was conveying. Our costume ideas came from a range of sources ,ranging from what we saw as being popular fashion and what we saw on TV shows and music videos we also had to ensure that our costumes kept in line with the genre of music we were doing e.g. in "hip hop" or "r&b" the costumes tend to be ones that convey a lifestyle of wealth and tend to show jewellery and other material possessions this would look out of place in a video like ours . To make sure we didn’t get this wrong we studied artists such as "rizzle kicks" and "Tinie tempah"