Evaluation part 4

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

Final Cut Pro

In order to edit footage for my music video; I used the program Final Cut pro, a professional level editing software that is made by Apple. I first started using it at the beginning of the project, when I was practicing lip syncing, this task was useful, as it also familiarised me with the software, as I previously had only used iMovie, which is entry level software. I also used final cut to put together the animatic for the music video.  Some of final cuts features were very useful when making the actual music video. These included, having multiple sound tracks, being able to lock particular sound tracks, cutting part of a clip before adding it to video, having the ability the zoom in to cut at a very specific point in time. Final cuts preset effects also proved useful, as in the music video, we used both a fade and one of the preset colour correct called “Threshold”.

Camera

The camera that we used for filming was an entry level camera that was primarily designed to take photographs. This presented some obstacles when filming the music video, as it did not mit many of the tripod in our media department and we had to look for aspecific piece to fit. The fact that it was entry level also meant that the picture quality was not that good, and when you tried to zoom in, the picture would become very pixelated. This restricted our video from using close up shots, otherwise the picture quality would be extremely bad.

Tripod

We used a tripod while filming in order to create a steady shot by placing the camera on it to prevent shaking from a person holding the camera. This wasn’t used as much as most texts use them, as we wanted quite a lot of our shots to be shaky in order to keep the audience on edge.  This was mainly used for shots of the landscape and the shots of the main character walking through the streets.

Blogger

For the research and written aspects of the project, I created a blog using blogger to post on. This website was very appropriate for the project, as it meant that I could keep a running profile of the project that was updated regularly rather than having one long document of the entire project. Blogger also has some features that were very convenient for the nature of the project. It allows you to upload pictures and embed videos into posts, this feature worked very well for the three tasks, as it meant that I could post drafts, real media examples, and the final products on the blog. Blogger also allows design layouts, so I could choose my own colour scheme, and organise my posts into categories. It also meant that I could provide links to Joseph Richardson’s and my media department’s blogs.  Another big advantage of using Blogger was that all my work was very portable and accessible. The fact that it is stored on the internet meant that I could work on my blog almost anywhere without having to carry around a storage device. This proved very useful for the research, planning and evaluation stages.

Youtube

Youtube came into good use during the research and evaluation stages of the project. It is a video-sharing website owned by Google. For the research stage, it allowed me to look up existing music videos in order to look at conventions and apply them to the theories which I looked at. It allowed me to upload my animatic and finished music video, which I could then put onto my blog. Youtube also provided a potential for audience feedback for the evaluation stage. Uploading my music video onto Youtube meant that anyone could view the video and then comment what they thought about it.

Photoshop

Photoshop is an image editing software developed by Adobe that is used during the construction stages of the digipack and print advert. It contains all the features that were required to create the two ancillary texts. These included being able to put text over images, altering size, shape and colour, magic wand tool and the magnetic lasso tool.

 

Evaluation part 3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

 

Here is the summary of the audience feedback I received from my focus group of 6 people.

Music Video

The main issue with the Music video from the audience feedback, was that the narrative was not obvious enough. A lot of those who I received feedback from didn't notice that there was a narrative in the video. The narrative was always meant to be subtle, but the fact that not many people noticed it could show that it need to be made a bit more obvious. This could have been done focusing more on the main character when he checks if he is being followed, or giving a sense that he is being watched throughout the whole video rather than just towards the end of the video.

Digipack

The digipack received one complaint from the focus group. This was that on the inside panel, the artist information did not stand out as a separate piece of text from the lyrics. This came about, as the artist information was too close to the lyrics and did not differ much in size or strength so it might not be read unless the viewer reads all of the lyrics first. A question was raised about why not all of the tracks on the tracklist were not featured on the inside cover. This confusion could have been avoided by adding just the song names in the correct place to explicitly show that there aren't any lyrics for those songs. Other than that, the digipack received good comments, and it looks like the research was useful, as there were multiple people in the focus group who said that the digipack looked professional

Print advert

The print advert received good feedback from that audience, and they said it included everything that a print advert should include. This has taught me that the conventions that I discovered through my research are very effective in making the advert complete its aim. The main criticism of the advert was that the release date of the album did not stand out enough from the other text surrounding it.  This feedback taught me that all information that is vital for the viewer to see such as the name and release date need to be extremely visible so that the viewer is guaranteed not to overlook them.

Evaluation part 2

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

Combining elements of the main product and the ancillary tasks was something that we wanted to do as soon as we finished making the music video. We were very impressed with some of the shots that we filmed for the music video, and we had a few that we thought would be good to use as the front cover image for a digipack. This is why we chose to create a digipack for one of the ancillary tasks. We also chose to create the poster advert, as that could also use one of the shots, and it would most likely feature colour schemes and other attributes of the digipack.

In terms of combination between the music video and the ancillary texts, we used the shot of the satellite tower that appears as the first and last shots of the music video.

 
As you can see, this picture was used as the front cover of the digipack as well as the poster. This is an effective way of combining the three pieces, as after looking at the picture, the viewer will associate it with the other pieces.

The picture of the satellite tower also set the colour scheme for the other two pieces. The grey sky in the background helped create the dull and dark colour scheme that suits the locations on industrial estates that we filmed on. This is why the digipack has such a simple design, and why it features alot of grey. It is also why the advert has a black background.

Another combination that is used was the font used in the digipack and the advert. The font, called "My Underwood", which was made using a slightly dysfunctional Underwood typewriter that smudges some of the characters. Here are some samples of the font, and it being used on the advert and the digipack front cover:

This font was ideal for us, as it has a vintage look that we wanted to use on the ancillary texts to suit the song that we used in the music video, as it was released in 1979. The other good thing about the font was that some of the characters are smudged, and we thought this would work very well for our artist, as it suits the fuzzy and distorted sound of the guitar in the song used for the music video. This was a very effective method of combining the three tasks, as it linked the two ancillary texts as they both used the font, but more surprisingly, the font managed to combine the music video with the ancillary texts, as it reflects the song used in the music video.

Overall I think the combination of the the three pieces is very effective, as they all have a similar feel and you can easily see how they are all linked. This combination is very good for building up an image for the artist, as it gives the audience a clear view of common features that the artist uses, so that when a future piece is released, the audience will immediately know who the artist is.