Blog 21 - Final evaluation

In relation to finishing my music video and the rest of the coursework, I will now evaluate all that I have produced. In what ways does your video use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

In a way our video doesn't challenge the forms or conventions of real media products as we chose to keep a similar style to Kesha, where she had bold, different make-up and the 'party lifestyle' that she has in her other video's such as; 'Tik Tok'. However we did challenge certian forms of a normal music video, we did this by using an effect on the software Final Cut Express called 'layering', which meant we had two of the same character instead of having a house filled with different actors/actresses. We chose to do this to create a diverse idea that drugs had been taken and in the actress's head, she believed she was at a 'wild' house party where there was lots of people around her, however due to her taking the drugs she was hallucinating and really it was only her dancing and drinking on her own and felt that this effect worked really well.

How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts? To promote our video we had to create a digipack which included a front cover, back cover and the inside design's to which we believe would help sell the CD, we had to include all the information necessary. We also had to create an advert which would also help promote the CD, to make sure that both products represented Kesha, I made them similar to her previous albums and adverts, in style and layout. The feedback I gained from my advert was really positive, people had noticed that I opted for a 'Kesha layout' and said it was effective. I used an effect which made the image brighter and bolder to make sure the advert was eye catching to viewers, I continued certain colours through from the Digipack onto the advert so that they were clearly linked. However I made the advert more eyecatching as that product would be representing the Digipack itself. I felt using a close up of the face as the background worked well and the layering of the text on top didn't take anway any attention from the background which is usually what happens with adverts. Therefore I felt the combination of my products if put into real practice would create really good promotion of my music video. What have you learned from your audience feedback?

Using Facebook to recieve feedback was one of the most simplistic and easiest ways possible as its available for people to view immediately and also comment on immediately rather than me asking them to say what they think when I show them my products face to face. It was also easy distribution to my target audience and also the artist's audience as they are the age that would be using Facebook reguarly therefore I recieved feedback from the audience I am aiming to for my products, which would help if I were to repeat this experience and to improve my video to fit their opinions. As people have stated in the feedback, my products are attractive and good, but I would change the size of the writing in my advert as it may not be clear to see if it was put in a Newspaper or on a bus stop.

How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages of all your products?

Majority of the work to produce our video and products was IT based, using software such as Photoshop to create the Digipack and advert, Final Cut Express to create the music video, and also the internet to research for all these products and gain feedback. I really enjoyed using Photoshop as it is very straight forward and easy to use, but creates really effective products compared to a software such as Paint, also having used photoshop to create my last coursework product, I was able to use knowledge I already gained and develop skills to reach a even more advanced standard. This software is really good in producing effects that are eye catching and different, this helped me make my products look individual and really genuine. An example of an effect I used is to change the background from looking dull, to looking different, I used the brush tool to create this effect, and chose a shape of brush that created a sketchy look around the edges of the digipack.

This is a before and after shot of using this effect;

Blog 20 - Evaluation and feedback of the video

The response from our video turned out to be very positive and we were grateful that people had taken the time to watch it, and also noticed and liked the effects we had created.

Here are some of the feedback from our final video;

As you can see the people that viewed the video really liked that we sped the footage up as they commented that it went well with the song. They have also noticed that we used various editing techniques such as layering, and that we slowed the footage down at the end to fit in with the music coming to an end. This makes me feel proud of my video and that all the hard work paid off.

By creating this music video, I have learnt how to use Final Cut Express, and how to use certain tools such as the cropping tool and also effects such as brightness and contrast which helped make shots in the video look brighter and clearer to see.

However if we were to do our music video again, we would have chosen to film later in the day so the lighting represented the theme of the music video better (house party). Also, we would start filming earlier, and given ourselves more time to film this would enable us to have more of a selection of shots and also create a bit of diversity in the video. Other than these changes, we were very proud and happy with our video and the feedback we recieved.

Blog 19 - Finished video

This is the finished music video we finished on the 5th April 2011, we uploaded it onto a social networking site (Facebook) to get feedback from the target audience. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U90ClLCqDCU

Blog 18 - Creative camera use

This shot was filmed by a hand held camera in the point of view of the actress, this was different from the rest of the video. We chose to do this so we can emphasise how the drugs were affecting her and making her feel (unsteady on her feet). In this shot we used the effect of layering which we produced during the editing stages of filming. We had to film different shots of the actress in different postitions, then we layered the two pieces of footage and created a shot that had 2 of the same character. We liked this shot as we created a different form of lighting, although the video is based around a music video, the natural background lighting made the 2 characters sillouettes stand out and create a different shot compared to the others in the video.

In this shot we didn't intentionally mean to create a 'blurry' effect, but it worked in our favour as it represents the drugs effecting her sight.

Blog 17 - Rejected footage

These are still shots of footage that we chose not to use in the video;

We chose not to use this footage as, although we wanted to create a 'blurred' reflection to resemble the drug making an effect, it was too blurry that it was hard to see her face and as we were filming her putting on make up in her reflection this was a big problem.

We didn't use this footage as we felt the lighting was too bright. This is because parties are known to be in the night time, therefore her getting ready in a bright room didn't make it clear she was getting ready for a party.

We didn't use this piece of footage as the actress started speaking too early before we finished filming the shot and also it is again too bright.

We didn't use this footage because we felt the actress was too close to the camera so you couldn't really get the full effect of what we wanted, you couldn't see her body language or anything which is what we wanted.

Its fairly obvious why we didn't use this footage, the dog ran into

the frame whilst we were filming, this meant we had to re-shoot this shot.

We didn't use this footage as it was too dark, although it represented a house party, it was too dark to establish what was happening in the shot.

This shot was again far too bright to be used in the video as it is very unclear and doesn't give the impression that she is at a house party.

For our music video, we wanted to use the effect of layering but this shot meant that it was difficult to do this as parts of her arm were cut out in the process, and this would ruin the effect. We decided it was much more effective to use 2 characters either end of the sofa than 3 characters on the sofa.

Blog 16 - Advert

As part of the digipack task, I had to create an advert in the form of a poster or advertisment that may be found in a newspaper or magazine. I have viewed and analysed some other artist's adverts;

Katy Perry's advert isn't a traditional advert, its background is the whole image and shows Katy Perry's, when looking at Kesha's cd covers she doesn't show her whole body, only a fragment of her face or her top half. This is why I chose against the layout of this advert. However the colour scheme is something that drawed me to it.

This advert attracted me as it was simple but with the bold colours and attractive picture it still caught my eye. It provided all the information needed but still didn't look too much. I started to base my advert around this layout but then added my own style by having my image as the background as Kesha only uses some of her face in most of her CD covers, so its easy to relate the album to the artist. Below are the flatplans of my advert and why I did or did not chose them; I based this design around

Nelly's advert layout, I would use the same colours for writing and decor that I used in my digipak so that people who see the advert would know that it was related to Kesha. I decided against this idea because it doesn't fit in with Kesha's traditional layout and style as she's more simple yet different in her look, this is what catches attention.

I wanted to produce a design that was a little different to what Kesha may normally use for advertising. This idea of Kesha being 'wanted' was intended as a pun so that it had a humour side to the advert as well as selling Kesha's produce. However I decided against this design as I wanted to stay safe with the design of the advert so that it definitely fit in with Kesha's usual style and I thought this would be a little 'too' different and may also be confusing as the big bold letters of 'wanted' may cause confusion that thats the albums name.

This is the design I wish to use as in majority of Kesha's cd covers she uses close ups or only part of her face showing for example; This is the front cover of her single Tik Tok where she uses a simple close up of her face.

Therefore I chose to design my advert in the same layout that only half her face would be showing, this would look quite simple on an advert and may be misleading as its not eye catching, but due to the fact its similar to what Kesha has done previously, it will prove likely that it would do the same job as an eye catching advert. I would use the samecolours; gold white and black as I have used in the digipack and also use similar pictures of Kesha wearing the same clothes and make up etc, this is to prevent confusion and to make sure all adverts and digipacks relate to each other. I have made sure it is at the size of A4 so that it can be seen when simply 'flicking' through a magazine or newspaper and all information on the advert can be seen clearly.

Here is my final advert;

I chose to stick to the same colours I used in the digipack so it relates to it and Kesha too.

I chose to use white and black traditional colours as the image I used was colour so I didn't want colours to clash or for it to look 'too much' and therefore for readers to by pass it. I also wanted it to look quite simple for this reason too.

During this task I managed to work on my skills from my previous projects such as the magazine cover and article, but within this advert task, I used Photoshop to edit the image by using different effects to make it look a bit more original rather then a plain image.

I asked for some feedback from some of my target audience (who are teenage girls between the ages of 16-20).

Change of plan

Since we produced and presented our pitch, we have asked people from our target audience to fill in a quick questionnaire on our idea, so we can evaluate and if need be change our plan in the early stages. After doing these questionnaires and finding that majority of the results showed that our idea wasn't catchy enough for a music video and people may struggle to keep interest as it was similar to video's they've seen before and those done by Kesha herself. Therefore we decided to change our idea to something that would relate to our target audience, which is a girl holding a house party at her house but really its only herself and her hallucinations which will be another her; we will produce this in editing by shooting the cast member on her own and changing the shot angle slightly, then we can layer the images in editing to produce a picture that includes 2 or 3 of her in the same shot. This idea will interest the audience and may impress our target audience due to their age, they may wonder about the technology and how it was done, as well as this we decided we would include the aspect of drug taking into the video. Not showing the girl taking the drugs, but editing and using the camera to our advantage in hinting towards this is why she is hallucinating. We chose to show it this way so we are still anti drug taking and not promoting the wrong behaviours, as at the end of the video we will show the girl disappointed that her night was ruined due to taking the drugs. Below is the Recce of the video, a couple of photos that show where our video will be shot, although the mise en scene will be different to these photos.