G324 Evaluation questions - Peter Harris

Q1. In What way does your media product use, develop or challenge conventions of real media products?

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 1. Our Magazine advert follows the conventions of adverts for this genre as most will have the name of the artist as the most predominate thing on the advert, we have done this by having it in the largest text and having the album title underline it in smaller text. we also have the best ratings clearly on the advert to sell the artist and tell the audience how good the product is. The advert also features a QR code which is becoming a convention of adverts to get a more technologically aware audience interested.

2. We stuck to the convention of voyeurism by having the artist on 3 of the 6 panels including the front and back cover, so that is what the audience will see first when they get the digipak. we also used the same fonts as the magazine poster so they are clearly linked by the audience. similar editing styles are also used through out all 3 products such as the black and white filters and use of transparent layers for the ghost effect.

3.We followed the convention of pop artists showing wealth by using costumes such as a 3 piece suit, and smart shoes. we thought it would be best to follow this convention as it is a easy way to represent and sell the artist.
 

4. This shot was used to break conventions because it is contrapuntal to the rest of the video where the artist is dressed up smart which follows conventions. this is effective as it shows him as a normal and down to earth person.




5.The camera work we used followed conventions of framing the artist and voyerism of the artist. as this shot clearly shows it frames him between the two doors drawing more attention to the artist and makes him stand out, therefor being recognisable and easy to sell.

6. Close ups were used to sell the artist. this is often a convention used in media as it is a form of voyeurism and this a convention used in music videos to show of the artist in ways that would make them appealing to the audience.

7. This shot is used the convention of showing of wealth with the costume and the of a city could imply that he has the money to own a flat with a view like such.

8.This shot uses intertextuality to the film singing in the rain. it is often a convention of pop music videos to make references to pop culture.

9. once again this shot was used to imply wealth as it is a main convention of popular music and hip hops like Justin Timberlake's music. it conveys wealth by showing him in a shopping center which looks very upmarket and there by suggesting that he is wealthy.

10. We used a shot of the artist drinking in a coffee shop as it would challenges the convention of pop artists standing out and often not doing everyday tasks. this however makes it possible for them to relate to the audience.



Q2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?



Q3. What have you learned from you audience feed back?




Q4. how did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

G324 Evaluation Tasks - Michael Broadbent

1

Task 1 -

My Groups media product Uses, Develops, and Challenges forms and conventions of real media products. Many media products contain various shots, this shot on the Right displays one of our many uses of shot variety, in which we cut to Peter's left in order to keep the audience from getting board from front shots and to mix things up a little.

2

Another example of use would be in Still 2, this shot displays that we have a strong focus on the singer - This can be seen throughout the video and
in many media products nowadays e.g. Kylie Minogue's
video time-bomb has a large focus on her.

3

We developed a form of media product in the shape of a black and white filter, as black and white filter is used in music video's today so we can hardly say that we innovated, however only a minority use the filter in their music video's and we used it as it fitted our artists image well, thus we developed the filter to match our artists image.

4

I'am rather proud of how my group used intertextuality in this shot to make our video more interesting, as the heel kick has been used in cinema throughout the ages and has become a type of cliché and from this we show that we use film media conventions and not only music.

5

This shot displays the artist in a negative light, which is not used in music videos/ media of which is trying to sell the artist, thus we are challenging typical music video conventions in presenting the artist in such a way.

6

This shot is obvious intertextuality as it references 'Singin in the Rain', it uses this reference similarly to how we used our other inter-textual feature - to make our video more entertaining and to integrate ourselves into media through the use of iconography.

7

Commonly in modern music videos the artist can be seen dancing to their music, we used this convention to our advantage in order to match the beat and provide appropriate cuts at certain intervals in our video.

8

One blatant feature that we took from music video's/ media that they all seem to have nowadays is cinemascope (the black bars at the top and bottom of the screen), this simple editing technique really makes our music video look that much more professional.

In terms of our posted ancillary tasks, one that can mirror existing media products almost entirely would be the magazine advert. It just looks professional in all honesty as it has the features of a real world product, which includes: where to buy(Amazon, iTunes), ratings, songs included etc.

Another ancillary task that can imitate an existing media product is our Digipak box art, we include image of artist, various singles, appropriate images for the rest of the album, and a front cover of its own - some media products such as music albums may contain a hit single or two and yet may not be the cover track, an example of this would be Gorrilaz - Demon Days.


Task 2 -




Task 3 -

Task 4 -

G324 Evaluation Tasks - Ben Crisp

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

 

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

Question 3: What have you learned from your audience feedback?

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

Voice over script

• Introduction

T1-07, Ben, Peter, Michael and we chose Justin Timberlake's song Last Night

• filming shots alone (P)

These opening shots where filmed by me on my own due to transport issues and we believe that the shots came out well.

•  Spilt screen to "Suit and Tie" and comparisons and representation

This shot here shows a good representation we where trying to achieve, here we have a clip from Justin's other song "Suit and Tie" we can see that we successfully represented the artist through the use of a suit as it's common in Justin's other work.

• Opening shot, walking, shaking and stabilising- split screen to rough cut (B) 

When we first filmed our rough cut we had this sequence here where Peter was walking towards the camera how ever we had to replace this shot as it was very shacking and not very interesting.

• Split screen to "Take Back the Night"

Here we also have a good comparison to another one of Justin's music videos "Take Back the Night", these two sequences are very similar.

• Camera angles and how they worked

The response we received from camera angles was quite positive, we empathised this during filming because it is easy to say one angle is fine then move on to something else. We ended up filming several takes of the same thing in different angles to make sure we have a lot of variety.

• Black and white filter

As you can see we used a black and white filter in our video, this was a very back and forth thing for use as we weren't sure whether we where going to have the filter throughout the video or just for certain bits. We ended up deciding at the last minuet as we thought it might be confusing to the audience and it makes it fit in with the style.

• Editing on the beat and feed back

From the feed back we where able to take a good look at our work and we saw a few bits where we could edit to the beat and it would be effect for example.

• looking away from camera at 1:50

Peter did this throughout the day, i'm sure he was unaware of this, it does provide some inconsistencies but overall not many responses contained this so we believe that it wasn't as big a deal as say, the lip-syncing.

• lip syncing- Rough cut not many people liked, Final cut 50/50 split from feedback

• Locations and variety of it at 3:40

We tried to have a lots of different locations in our video and one of the most common prices if feedback we got was that we had a good variety of shot locations throughout our video.

• Digipak and poster

Final Music Video

Digi-pak

Magazine Advert

Ideas for Digi-pak

Initial ideas for out Digipak:

• Going on the theme of the artist silhouetted out in various street settings eg. Street lights, Street corner.
• Using images of the artist looking into the distance
• Umbrellas
• Lots of mid-shots showing off the artist.
• Keeping themes of our music video
• Black and white

Digi-pak Features

Digi-paks are a form off packaging for CD's DVD's and Blue-ray Discs. The are most commonly used for CD's and what makes them special are that they contain content which is not available on the regular CD for example a live recording of a concert, bonus songs which aren't available any where else, behind the scenes information/documentary on the creation of the CD, ect.

This is the list of songs that will be displayed on the digi-pak:

1. Last Night
2. The Subject
3. Feel The Beat
4. I’ll Hang Around
5. My Girl
6. In The beginning
7. Ghosts
8. All I have are my faults

Special features which we will list on our Digi-pak: 

• Live recording DVD from a concert
• Behind the scenes documentary on any collaborations
• A bonus song
• A behind the scenes booklet with images from the recording studio and images of any contributing artists.

Digi-pak front and back cover prototype.

This is a prototype of what the front cover of the Digi-Pak will look like:

We took multiple images of the same background with Peter in different positions around the frame, we did this because we thought it would link well with the name of the album.

These are the before images below:

This is a prototype of the back of the album:

To improve this we will move the song list up a little bit, add a bar code and add the copyright information.

Before:

Magazine Advert Initial Prototype/Template

We have been working on a prototype/ template of what out album cover would look like, this is what we have come up with without photo shoot photos.

We looked at other magazine adverts and took features from them for our advert, these include:

• Featured songs list.
• Name of the artist.
• Name of the album usually with a picture of the album.
• The release date for the album.
• Reviews of the album.
• Picture of the band or artist.

Star Development over time

Justin Timberlake started out his musical career in the boy band N Sync in 1995 where he was stylized to be in a boy band using

Feed from class mates + brief evaluation

Feed back summary

• Majority of the feedback we thought would be criticising about lip-syncing which was correct however there was a 50/50 split on this, some thought it was good others said it could have been improved and been more precise.
• Another comment was that we could have used a woman in the video which we agree because the song is about a woman, however we where unable to find a woman that would of been available when we where planing to film.
• Most comments on the costume were positive and said that we successfully represented the artist, this was good to hear as we intentionally based our star persona on Justin Timberlake.
• So people said we have a lot of varied locations however one comment was that we had a little too much of one location, which was the brick wall.
• Everyone said that they liked the use of black and white, we where glad that people liked the black and white as up until the deadline we where still debating whether we should make the whole video black and white or not.
• Lots of comments praised the camera angles which we where pleased about.
• Another comment we got a lot was that the editing was smooth which we where pleased about as we tried very hard to make the editing good which we seem to have achieved.
• We got a comment once or twice about the fact our artists kept loosing eye contact with the camera.
• Last comment we got was that there should have been more casual shots.

Ariel Levy; Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture

The Mainstream music video artist that I have chosen is Katy Perry and in particular her “California Gurls” video. In this video levy’s claim can be applied to many scenes such as when Katy Perry is naked on top of a cloud or when she is dancing with several other women in candy style underwear, so it can be said that this video is conforming to “Raunch Culture”, but I have to stretch that given the style and theme of the video that it also in a way challenges “Raunch culture” – e.g. the make-up that miss Perry utilizes is similar to how a cartoon character would have (significant cheeks and bright lipstick) this gives a slight counter to elements of “Raunch Culture”. Despite this, Levi’s ideas are dominantly applicable to the video because the video itself is still full of raunchy aspects/ parody’s of, e.g. when Katy Perry is opening fire on the audience with her Milk Guns, or when she is dancing on snoop lion.

-          I believe that “Raunch Culture” is not equally true of male artists today because male artists do not themselves apply to “Raunch culture” as much as female artists do and it is in most ways seen as strange or de-masculinising for men to do the same/ similar things as women (this can be seen in the “feminist” parody of Blurred Lines). We don’t expect males to apply to “Raunch Culture” because we are so used to seeing females do it that it is normal for westernised society.

Music Video Analysis (Bruno Mars)

Bruno Mars- Locked Out Of Heaven

In this video a majority of the shots are close ups of Bruno Mars this is to sell the artist and to show that this is his music

This shot makes it so he clearly stands out in the group who I think is the band by having him in big sunglasses and a hat. once again making him the center of attention as he is the main artist. and this is what music videos are for to sell the artist 

This shot tries to make him seem street wise and show that he can have a good time with friends, this is to make him more relatable to a younger and male audience. 

Feedback From Peers

Common Opinions Were:
- Lip-synch was good but needs improvement in select areas
- Black and White Filter added a nice effect and was used in the right places
- We represented the artist very similarly to the way JT would be represented
- Some think that the locations need more variety, and others think that the variety of shot types makes up for this.
- Occasional shot was Blurry/ Shaken

Digi-pak fonts styles examples

We believe that the font used should reflect the artists style and personality and thus we have looked at a variety of fonts to find the type that we were looking for. Specifically we wanted a type of font that gave a similar image to modern JT, this being a smooth classy font.

The four fonts at the top from left to right in descending order are:
- Onyx
- Vijaya
- Kozuka Gothic Pro
- Broadway

The two that we decided to choose between included Broadway and Onyx, but in the end we decided to use broadway as it gave that feel that we wanted for our artist.

Digi-pak examples

6 Panel Digi-pak Template 

We group 7 did not know much about digi-paks before we needed to research them for our coursework. From the simple shown template we understood that we needed to fill 6 columns with content - this including pictures relevant to the album (same color patterns etc), and various text e.g. Track names and their details (producer, writer, performer etc). We have also learned that the spine of the Diki-Pak also needs art/ detail, thus we will give that attention as well.

Final cut filming

On Wednesday the 6th of november we filmed the final amount of footage we needed for our music video to Last Night by Justin Timberlake. we started out filming the first verse on Eden Street Backway, these shots were of the performer standing still looking into the camera. We did this shot as the shot for our rough cut was to shaky as we moved so being stationary got rid of this problem.

We then moved on to film the first chorus on the same street but further down and leaning against the wall.

these shots were very successful and got many angles and takes of this part of the song. we then moved on to Elm Street to film the second verse as there was a lack of variety in shots and needed to film more to keep our audiences entertained. 

This led on to Parkers Piece where we filmed a couple of shots to fill the none lyrical parts of the video such as the performer swinging round a lamp post to make reference to singing in the rain. 

we then finished off filming on Regents Terrace for the bridge to the end of the song, We filmed this as we had not filmed any footage for this part of the song

Feed back from peers

• The most common criticism was of the lip syncing, we agree with this and to address this we will reshoot a lot of the lip syncing parts.
• Another was that the camera was shaky while tracking Peter we also agree and this shot will be re filmed.
• Some clips are out of focus so to adress with again we will reshoot some shots.
• Peter not looking at the camera and to fix this again we need to reshoot more footage. 
• The narrative was confusing to some people, the decision about the narrative in the group is split and only one group brought up this criticism so me might replace the narrative if we can think on something better to replace it.
• Most people think that the effects used where effective but there was a split decision on whether the whole video should be in black and white or whether the video should stay how its is with a mixture of black and white and colour shots.

Level 4

• The candiate is expected to have excellent knowledge of technical skills such as shooting appropriate material to the set task, controlled use of camera, attention to framing, a variety of shots and close attention to mise en scene.
• Also editing so that meaning is apparent to the viewer and making selective and appropriate use of shot transitions, captions and other effects.
• Finally recording and editing sound with images appropriately.

Target Audience of Music Video

From general observation of the music video it can be said that our audience can range from one type to another – e.g. in the video the main attire worn is that of a suit, which is stereotypically seen as high class but can be worn by any class to give the high status look.

In terms of age it can easily be assumed that the video is for the ages of teen – adult because of the lyrics and the singer (the singer is young and the lyrics talk of romantic love which is a subject that all experience but is highlighted in the young age range), however there is no specific audience that this is aimed at so all audiences can enjoy the video for different aspects – e.g. photographers could enjoy it for the contrast between the suit and urban society.

Similar artist taste that the audience may have would be along the lines of R&B such as Michael Jackson, connoting that the audience likes a smooth beat and a strong lead to make an enjoyable video.

Nowadays most music is accessed on video websites (youtube) or specialist websites (spotify) so these are options as to where potential audience members could find out about our artist and watch/ listen to them.  Of course music magazines are still a good source to advertisement and renown so an article could mention our video or be about it. 

Rough Cut Questionnaire

1. Is there a good variety of shots throughout the video or is there a need for more shots?
2. What do you think of the black and white filter used in the video
3. Are there enough cuts in the video or do you think some shots drag out too long?
4. At what points in the video do you think are good/need to be improved?
5. Do you have any improvements you can think of which you haven't already said?

• 1. Very good variety of shots. (Perhaps too many mid shots)
• 2. The tint/filter was well used, seemed to only be tinted when needed.
• 3. Shots start and end in a well fitting place, perhaps some do last longer than needed.
• 4. The parts of the video where the main character is singing (lip syncing) could have been done with a lot more enthusiasm. Other than that it was all good.
• 5. Not that I can think of

• 1. Good variety of shots, however, some seemed varied.
• 2. I think it was affective, gave the video some classic feeling.
• 3. Some dragged on, however, some shots seemed pointless.
• 4. I liked the outcome of the character getting dressed in the beginning however, I didn't know what was the point in walking around, there was no story.
• 5. Lip-syncing

• 1. There was a decent variety of shots however they don't seem to be connected and a bit random
• 2. The black and white filter is good however it's not really clear why certain shots are in black and white while others are.
• 3. Some of the clips didn't drag on a bit too much I think more cuts between shots is needed
• 4. The opening verse I think could be improved as it's drags a lot but the chorus bit (when he's singing up against the wall) looked very professional.
• 5. None that I could think of.

• 1. Good variety.
• 2. The black and white filter was used effectively.
• 3. Most clips are edited well but some clips do drag on a bit (the first lip-syncing part).
• 4. The lip-syncing in the video needs to be improved slightly.
• 5. A few more interesting camera angles.

• 1. I think there could have been more of a variety of shots used
• 2. The black and white filter was used well but seemed a bit random in what clips where actually black and white.
• 3. Some clips do drag out a bit too long
• 4. Some of the lip-syncing needs to be improved and maybe the performance could be improved a bit more.
• 5. none that I can really think of other than maybe more continuity between scenes as they seem to jump around a bit.

Target Audience of our music video

The target audience of our product in terms of gender could be either male or female however the audience would mainly be female as the contents of the video may not typically interest the male audience as the main content of the video is a classy male character signing and that may be more of a female interest. In terms of age roughly late teens to middle aged people because of the simplistic and colourless look of the video wouldn't interest younger audiences also the fashion sense of the character is quite grown up and that age range could possible relate to the characters fashion. 

Justin Timberlake is in the pop/r&b genre so any people which like that sort of music will be interested in the product. Most music is accessed through YouTube so any audiences with access to YouTube will be able to view the video, also iTunes is another way which most people access music.

Rough Cut Feedback Questionnaire

Rough Cut Feedback Questionnaire

Thank you for taking your time to help my group with our Rough cut – Emphases on the Roughness as we need to gather more footage and experiment with a more editing ( you can see that we needed to re-use footage to meet the deadline) but regardless enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xszjdA6SCGg

1 – What do you think of the black and white filter used?

2 – What/ which shot(s) do you think are good/ need improvement?

3 – Does Lip-synching need to be improved?

4 – In terms of location, do we need more variety or are the locations satisfactory?

5 – Did we represent Justin Timberlake in the light that would be expected of him? (assuming you know a thing or two about JT)

T1 07 Last Night Music Video (Rough Cut)

Cinemascope crop lines

We have noticed that a lot of moden profession music videos us cinemascope crop lines

We are using it as it will make our video look a lot more professional and industry standard.

Before:

After: