Jon Whyte Evaulation
Question 1.
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our media product uses various different forms of communication. Our media language is conveyed to our target audience by use of dramatic effects. For example, we used black and white imagery extensively to create an atmosphere of depression associated with the loneliness and despair often felt by disadvantaged teenagers in today’s society. The raw nature of the music, and the violence expressed in the soundtrack (see our blog where “violent” and “mind” are the two most used words in the song) was expressively conveyed by our imagery. This included hand-held camerawork to impart a dynamic scenario similar to the style made famous by such artists as Andy Warhol. In a way, we wanted to revert to the raw impact of such “underground” classic films, the genre of which is evocative and forceful. We contrasted the black-and-white images with coloured text (the choice of blood-red colour was deliberate) in the dig pack for added emphasis. Our mise-en-scene had different elements. The setting was anonymous: parkland, garages, and a brick wall. This was to establish a sense of isolation from society. Our characters wore non descript hoodies to emphasise their anonymity and their isolation from society because we wanted to convey anger and frustration. The sound track is harsh and grating, and we tried to reinforce it by our use of harsh video, i.e. somewhat disjointed footage with random effects. In this regard, we used a mixture of shots, some close-up and others at a greater distance. We did this to create a sense of energy in the video. A fast pace is what we wanted to achieve. Our agenda was played on three levels, as is the usual case. This enabled us to deconstruct how both visual and text communicate – a sort of “science of signs”. As already stated, we used black and white imagery, together with coloured text, to convey a real purpose to the project. At a representational level, we used basic editing skills to try to convey to the audience the meaning of the soundtrack. Finally, symbolically, we wanted to convey the frustration, exasperation and indeed anger felt by many young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, which is manifest in the sound track. One inspiration was the YouTube video by Justice called “Stress”. However, my group felt that this was too violent and we felt somewhat uncomfortable with that. The video “Stress” reflects on anger felt by disadvantaged young people in poor ghettoes of Paris: the banlieue, which erupted in violence in 2005. Another influence was the video on YouTube “La Haine”. Our product compares with others on the market in terms of its impact. We felt this was best achieved by making our presentation non-complicated, contrasting with the stereotypes of many of today’s “slick” productions with much video and audio editing. We wanted to challenge the “X-factor” concept and provide something to which young people could relate to in their lives. This was our ideology and, although apparently simplistic, it required a lot of work to make it successful. In addition, we wanted to convey a raw energy in our product, which helped us feel that we were successful. On a lighter note, we included a postcard to help develop a “fan club”, something which is missing from many bands today, unlike many years ago when every band or singer had a fan club. In addition, we included a competition in this postcard to attract more replies because we believed that such a gimmick might help market our product. Finally, we believed that the construction of the digipack was important to help promote sales of our product. It was intentionally uncomplicated for this reason, but resulted in a high impact value, which was evidenced by feedback [see Question (3)].
Question 2.
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
All of our ancillary texts were produced in black and white to maintain the continuity of our music video being produced in greyscale. All texts included something related to the band itself rather than unrelated artistic designs. We took influence from the French independent film “La Haine”. The film translates to “the hate” and is set in the suburbs of Paris. It aims to show a more gritty side of the city which is often neglected from the media’s attention. As well as “La Haine” we were also strongly influenced by the music video “Stress” by the French pop duo “Justice”. The video follows the antics of a day in the life of a group of young working class afro-Caribbean boy’s. We attempted to maintain all of the codes and conventions that would be expected in an indie-rock music video. We included performance-based footage, as this is commonplace with most indie rock bands, we also thought that this would provide some diversity in our music video and help to break up the narrative. We included many close up shots in the performance as well as an establishing shot and various other shots panning from left to right.
We received a large amount of constructive feedback on not only our music video but on all of our other ancillary texts (Magazine Adverts, Competition leaflets, digi-pack cover etc. They were almost all positive, praising our work on the digi-pack cover and competition leaflet and how well they fit in with the convention of the music video itself. We did however receive one criticism about our music video claiming that shots 1 and 2 were too “shaky”. However, we did explain in a response afterwards that this was a deliberate strategy in order to obtain an aggressive tone about the video. Whatever the criticism, positive or negative we took it all on board and used it to better our final project.
The digi-pack contained photos of a variety of angles of the band members standing in isolated settings such as a field. Our inspiration for the digipack was derived from the cover from the Arctic Monkey’s debut album “whatever people say I am that’s what I’m not”, which also contains very minimalistic photograph of a young man smoking a cigarette and smiling as if he was making a statement to one and all!
The competition leaflet and the magazine advert both contained photos of the band members. We made sure that no stone was left unturned and even included the official “HMV” logo together with the “parental advisory” label. We copied the layout of the completion leaflet from a DVD of an unknown band and in the competition leaflets we included a subscription to our monthly music newsletter together with all the backstage gossip from the band and inside view of our band.
When we came to edit our music video, we did not need to add any specific effects on Final Cut. We did however use greyscale, to add an aggressive feel. Some of the performance-based footage was filmed under a Flood light; this gave quite a nice natural effect which radiated on the face of our lead singer. We used the internet for much of the research process. We used Google to get some initial inspiration and then we other websites such as YouTube to post videos on the blog. We collected all our ideas and posted them on the website “blogger.com”. As part our evaluation we had to produce a DVD commentary explaining the codes and conventions of music video and why we did certain things in certain ways. This was beneficial as not only is does to add realism to our project, but it also allowed us to gather all of our thoughts collectively and analyse our music video properly.
Question 3.
What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Although we did not receive a huge amount of audience feedback, the advice we did receive was helpful and constructive. Mostly the feedback was positive, and the only criticism was of one of our misspellings! It was very beneficial to receive audience feedback as it allowed us to gather a set of fresh set of ideas and perspectives on our music video project. We are especially grateful to Groups 14 and 17 for their comments (thanks guys!). The black and white imagery was highly praised, with one comment even stating “beautiful photography”. The use of panels on the inside of the digipack was described as a “great idea” to create an image of a wide shot. Someone even thought our whole package was reminiscent of the Arctic Monkey’s first album. All comments agreed on the effective impact of the package, including the novel idea of including a postcard with a competition.
Below are examples of some of the feedback concerning the music video itself.
“Good camera shots and mise en scene. Excellent performance, enthusiastic”.
“Gritty in its tone and its presentation so suits the music you've chosen.
The switch between narrative and performance is solid, but it would have been better to see the singer with the band during the performance to build up the idea of being gang.
It's odd that the band are the hooligans so that could break with conventions.
The depiction of youth is good Daily Mail baiting content so you could get publicity from the controversy”.
In the first comment, the audience commented on the shots being too “shaky”. However, we deliberately wanted to achieve this effect, to give the video an aggressive edge, but I can understand how this might have been construed as looking a little amateurism. It was also criticised, as we did not include the singer with the band as a whole group. Whilst this was true, we did not have any good enough shots to include in our music video. The media project proved a learning experience for all of us.
As well as receiving feedback from our official music video we also were given feedback on the other ancillary texts which we produced. We had to produce a CD cover, DVD cover and magazine advert as basic requirements. However, instead of producing a CD cover we produced a digipack. We included such features in the digipack as a postcard to send off for a monthly newsletter, a competition leaflet to win a chance to meet the band, and finally a magazine advert. We included these items as we believed it would add more realism to the digipack as bands do occasionally offer competition leaflets.
Below are a few examples on the feedback of those ancillary texts.
“Beautiful photography that's consistent with the mood, quality and tone of the video. Again there's a focus on the band and an attempt to develop their image as edgy and dark (ish).
The use of the panels on the inside to created a 'wide shot' is a great idea.
It's a very appropriate style for the music and band type and reminds us a little of the arctic monkeys first album”
“Really nice idea with the postcard, simple and basic design but effective. Consistent colours look good, nice contrast between orange of band name and black and white image”.
Question 4.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
“New” media technologies primarily involve a digital format, rather than the older analogue technology characterised by use of tapes. It is hard to believe that it is not yet 30 years since the PC (Personal Computer) was launched by IBM in 1981. The rapid advance in technology since that date have led to the development of the internet, rapid (broadband) downloads, and digital technology. The last has allowed storage and transmission of huge amounts of data in high-quality audio and video formats. Video cameras today do not use magnetic tapes as used as recently as 10 years ago, but record either directly onto DVD (Digital Versatile Disc), or more recently, SD (Secure Digital) cards. The latest SD cards, SDXC (Secure Digital, eXtended Capacity) will allow storage of up to 2 TB (2000 MB) of information. This is impressive, as CDs typically can “only” hold 650 MB of data, and even multi-layered DVDs can only achieve this amount of data storage.
We used new media technologies extensively in our project. Our target audience (young adults) would be highly IT (Information Technology)-literate, and would download music directly from the internet (World-Wide Web, hence the WWW abbreviation) onto iPods (using iTunes) or onto mobile phones (using Bluetooth or wireless technology). They would want the product to be high quality but easily downloadable (i.e. not too large).
We used a Sony video camera with an MB SD disc to record our video. We recorded in colour and edited it to black-and-white using the video-editing software. For the digipack we used a Sony SLR (Single Lens Reflex) Digital Camera. Again, this uses a digital format on SD cards. A few years ago, SLR cameras used photographic film, which is now almost obsolete; such is the pace of advance of modern technology. For the audio track, we used a drum kit and a Gibson electric guitar. We wanted to advertise our album through modern technology such as downloadable formats (such as high quality MP3 files on iTunes) and MPEG-4 on a dedicated website (www.standardmeeting.com). Digital technology allows easy image manipulation using Adobe Photoshop and similar software. Recently, such image manipulation was performed in darkrooms by technicians who were highly skilled in such arts. Nowadays people who are more adept at electronic manipulation tackle such artistic interpretation differently. This is what all modern audiences, including our target audience of young adults, have now come to expect.
Blogs, twitters, Facebook etc. These are the modern means of communication. Even politicians, now renowned for their “techno-saviness”, use PDAs and Blueberries to keep in contact. Media has technology provides a high-impact presentation which imparts its effect much more efficiently than text alone.advanced in huge leaps in recent years, largely as a result of advances in technology, rather than any increase in sophistication of journalists or their skills.
We made extensive use of new software packages to help present our product and our blog. Adobe Photoshop and the free package Irfanview were used for manipulation and adjustment of the still images, whereas Final Cut Express was used for the video editing. Microsoft Word 2007 was also used for text, as were sites such as www.wordle.net to create word clouds for our blog.
Jonathon Whyte
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
Our media product uses various different forms of communication. Our media language is conveyed to our target audience by use of dramatic effects. For example, we used black and white imagery extensively to create an atmosphere of depression associated with the loneliness and despair often felt by disadvantaged teenagers in today’s society. The raw nature of the music, and the violence expressed in the soundtrack (see our blog where “violent” and “mind” are the two most used words in the song) was expressively conveyed by our imagery. This included hand-held camerawork to impart a dynamic scenario similar to the style made famous by such artists as Andy Warhol. In a way, we wanted to revert to the raw impact of such “underground” classic films, the genre of which is evocative and forceful. We contrasted the black-and-white images with coloured text (the choice of blood-red colour was deliberate) in the dig pack for added emphasis. Our mise-en-scene had different elements. The setting was anonymous: parkland, garages, and a brick wall. This was to establish a sense of isolation from society. Our characters wore non descript hoodies to emphasise their anonymity and their isolation from society because we wanted to convey anger and frustration. The sound track is harsh and grating, and we tried to reinforce it by our use of harsh video, i.e. somewhat disjointed footage with random effects. In this regard, we used a mixture of shots, some close-up and others at a greater distance. We did this to create a sense of energy in the video. A fast pace is what we wanted to achieve. Our agenda was played on three levels, as is the usual case. This enabled us to deconstruct how both visual and text communicate – a sort of “science of signs”. As already stated, we used black and white imagery, together with coloured text, to convey a real purpose to the project. At a representational level, we used basic editing skills to try to convey to the audience the meaning of the soundtrack. Finally, symbolically, we wanted to convey the frustration, exasperation and indeed anger felt by many young people from disadvantaged backgrounds, which is manifest in the sound track. One inspiration was the YouTube video by Justice called “Stress”. However, my group felt that this was too violent and we felt somewhat uncomfortable with that. The video “Stress” reflects on anger felt by disadvantaged young people in poor ghettoes of Paris: the banlieue, which erupted in violence in 2005. Another influence was the video on YouTube “La Haine”. Our product compares with others on the market in terms of its impact. We felt this was best achieved by making our presentation non-complicated, contrasting with the stereotypes of many of today’s “slick” productions with much video and audio editing. We wanted to challenge the “X-factor” concept and provide something to which young people could relate to in their lives. This was our ideology and, although apparently simplistic, it required a lot of work to make it successful. In addition, we wanted to convey a raw energy in our product, which helped us feel that we were successful. On a lighter note, we included a postcard to help develop a “fan club”, something which is missing from many bands today, unlike many years ago when every band or singer had a fan club. In addition, we included a competition in this postcard to attract more replies because we believed that such a gimmick might help market our product. Finally, we believed that the construction of the digipack was important to help promote sales of our product. It was intentionally uncomplicated for this reason, but resulted in a high impact value, which was evidenced by feedback [see Question (3)].
Question 2.
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
All of our ancillary texts were produced in black and white to maintain the continuity of our music video being produced in greyscale. All texts included something related to the band itself rather than unrelated artistic designs. We took influence from the French independent film “La Haine”. The film translates to “the hate” and is set in the suburbs of Paris. It aims to show a more gritty side of the city which is often neglected from the media’s attention. As well as “La Haine” we were also strongly influenced by the music video “Stress” by the French pop duo “Justice”. The video follows the antics of a day in the life of a group of young working class afro-Caribbean boy’s. We attempted to maintain all of the codes and conventions that would be expected in an indie-rock music video. We included performance-based footage, as this is commonplace with most indie rock bands, we also thought that this would provide some diversity in our music video and help to break up the narrative. We included many close up shots in the performance as well as an establishing shot and various other shots panning from left to right.
We received a large amount of constructive feedback on not only our music video but on all of our other ancillary texts (Magazine Adverts, Competition leaflets, digi-pack cover etc. They were almost all positive, praising our work on the digi-pack cover and competition leaflet and how well they fit in with the convention of the music video itself. We did however receive one criticism about our music video claiming that shots 1 and 2 were too “shaky”. However, we did explain in a response afterwards that this was a deliberate strategy in order to obtain an aggressive tone about the video. Whatever the criticism, positive or negative we took it all on board and used it to better our final project.
The digi-pack contained photos of a variety of angles of the band members standing in isolated settings such as a field. Our inspiration for the digipack was derived from the cover from the Arctic Monkey’s debut album “whatever people say I am that’s what I’m not”, which also contains very minimalistic photograph of a young man smoking a cigarette and smiling as if he was making a statement to one and all!
The competition leaflet and the magazine advert both contained photos of the band members. We made sure that no stone was left unturned and even included the official “HMV” logo together with the “parental advisory” label. We copied the layout of the completion leaflet from a DVD of an unknown band and in the competition leaflets we included a subscription to our monthly music newsletter together with all the backstage gossip from the band and inside view of our band.
When we came to edit our music video, we did not need to add any specific effects on Final Cut. We did however use greyscale, to add an aggressive feel. Some of the performance-based footage was filmed under a Flood light; this gave quite a nice natural effect which radiated on the face of our lead singer. We used the internet for much of the research process. We used Google to get some initial inspiration and then we other websites such as YouTube to post videos on the blog. We collected all our ideas and posted them on the website “blogger.com”. As part our evaluation we had to produce a DVD commentary explaining the codes and conventions of music video and why we did certain things in certain ways. This was beneficial as not only is does to add realism to our project, but it also allowed us to gather all of our thoughts collectively and analyse our music video properly.
Question 3.
What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Although we did not receive a huge amount of audience feedback, the advice we did receive was helpful and constructive. Mostly the feedback was positive, and the only criticism was of one of our misspellings! It was very beneficial to receive audience feedback as it allowed us to gather a set of fresh set of ideas and perspectives on our music video project. We are especially grateful to Groups 14 and 17 for their comments (thanks guys!). The black and white imagery was highly praised, with one comment even stating “beautiful photography”. The use of panels on the inside of the digipack was described as a “great idea” to create an image of a wide shot. Someone even thought our whole package was reminiscent of the Arctic Monkey’s first album. All comments agreed on the effective impact of the package, including the novel idea of including a postcard with a competition.
Below are examples of some of the feedback concerning the music video itself.
“Good camera shots and mise en scene. Excellent performance, enthusiastic”.
“Gritty in its tone and its presentation so suits the music you've chosen.
The switch between narrative and performance is solid, but it would have been better to see the singer with the band during the performance to build up the idea of being gang.
It's odd that the band are the hooligans so that could break with conventions.
The depiction of youth is good Daily Mail baiting content so you could get publicity from the controversy”.
In the first comment, the audience commented on the shots being too “shaky”. However, we deliberately wanted to achieve this effect, to give the video an aggressive edge, but I can understand how this might have been construed as looking a little amateurism. It was also criticised, as we did not include the singer with the band as a whole group. Whilst this was true, we did not have any good enough shots to include in our music video. The media project proved a learning experience for all of us.
As well as receiving feedback from our official music video we also were given feedback on the other ancillary texts which we produced. We had to produce a CD cover, DVD cover and magazine advert as basic requirements. However, instead of producing a CD cover we produced a digipack. We included such features in the digipack as a postcard to send off for a monthly newsletter, a competition leaflet to win a chance to meet the band, and finally a magazine advert. We included these items as we believed it would add more realism to the digipack as bands do occasionally offer competition leaflets.
Below are a few examples on the feedback of those ancillary texts.
“Beautiful photography that's consistent with the mood, quality and tone of the video. Again there's a focus on the band and an attempt to develop their image as edgy and dark (ish).
The use of the panels on the inside to created a 'wide shot' is a great idea.
It's a very appropriate style for the music and band type and reminds us a little of the arctic monkeys first album”
“Really nice idea with the postcard, simple and basic design but effective. Consistent colours look good, nice contrast between orange of band name and black and white image”.
Question 4.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
“New” media technologies primarily involve a digital format, rather than the older analogue technology characterised by use of tapes. It is hard to believe that it is not yet 30 years since the PC (Personal Computer) was launched by IBM in 1981. The rapid advance in technology since that date have led to the development of the internet, rapid (broadband) downloads, and digital technology. The last has allowed storage and transmission of huge amounts of data in high-quality audio and video formats. Video cameras today do not use magnetic tapes as used as recently as 10 years ago, but record either directly onto DVD (Digital Versatile Disc), or more recently, SD (Secure Digital) cards. The latest SD cards, SDXC (Secure Digital, eXtended Capacity) will allow storage of up to 2 TB (2000 MB) of information. This is impressive, as CDs typically can “only” hold 650 MB of data, and even multi-layered DVDs can only achieve this amount of data storage.
We used new media technologies extensively in our project. Our target audience (young adults) would be highly IT (Information Technology)-literate, and would download music directly from the internet (World-Wide Web, hence the WWW abbreviation) onto iPods (using iTunes) or onto mobile phones (using Bluetooth or wireless technology). They would want the product to be high quality but easily downloadable (i.e. not too large).
We used a Sony video camera with an MB SD disc to record our video. We recorded in colour and edited it to black-and-white using the video-editing software. For the digipack we used a Sony SLR (Single Lens Reflex) Digital Camera. Again, this uses a digital format on SD cards. A few years ago, SLR cameras used photographic film, which is now almost obsolete; such is the pace of advance of modern technology. For the audio track, we used a drum kit and a Gibson electric guitar. We wanted to advertise our album through modern technology such as downloadable formats (such as high quality MP3 files on iTunes) and MPEG-4 on a dedicated website (www.standardmeeting.com). Digital technology allows easy image manipulation using Adobe Photoshop and similar software. Recently, such image manipulation was performed in darkrooms by technicians who were highly skilled in such arts. Nowadays people who are more adept at electronic manipulation tackle such artistic interpretation differently. This is what all modern audiences, including our target audience of young adults, have now come to expect.
Blogs, twitters, Facebook etc. These are the modern means of communication. Even politicians, now renowned for their “techno-saviness”, use PDAs and Blueberries to keep in contact. Media has technology provides a high-impact presentation which imparts its effect much more efficiently than text alone.advanced in huge leaps in recent years, largely as a result of advances in technology, rather than any increase in sophistication of journalists or their skills.
We made extensive use of new software packages to help present our product and our blog. Adobe Photoshop and the free package Irfanview were used for manipulation and adjustment of the still images, whereas Final Cut Express was used for the video editing. Microsoft Word 2007 was also used for text, as were sites such as www.wordle.net to create word clouds for our blog.
Jonathon Whyte
Rob Cooper Evaluation
Evaluation of our music video for Ash's 'Shark'.
At the start of the planning process, we took into consideration that we need to, in some way, think about conventions; whether we used them at all, developed them or challenged them entirely. The process began by researching similar style videos from music of the same genre and taking notes of the conventions they displayed, and how they should be put to effect. We selected a particularly lively rock song – Ash’s ‘Shark’. We then looked at some of their work and found an underlying theme – they balanced performance-based footage and narrative-based footage extremely well in their products. From this, and with help from other existing media products, we gained an insight into understanding conventions of classic rock videos. We found that the majority of rock videos include a large performance-based part; either in front of a crowd, or depicted in a ‘jamming session’, the look that we agreed that we would do our best to portray. Our main inspiration was the video for the song ‘Stress’ by the French Electro House and Disco House group, Justice. So when filming began we tried our best to convey the feelings that we thought should be felt upon viewing the final product; anticipation, excitement, vulnerability and an element of fear.
As well as using other music videos as inspiration and concentrating all of our attention on this, it was suggested to us that we watch the dark French film ‘La Haine’, directed by Mathieu Kassovitz in 1995. This too decided for us the direction we would take. The main conventions that we noticed were from all elements of mise-en-scene; editing – we noticed that more impact could be felt it, after shooting, we converted our decent footage into black and white (we in fact ended up converted all of our final footage). This effect also adds drama and creates a somewhat sinister feel. The length of scenes and cutting style help massively to change the pace; either quick or slow – for us it was quick. The main advantage was that the cutting added an element of suspicion. For example, in our product we used very fast cuts throughout, mainly to increase the pace, but also to add that element of tension. We noticed that, in the direction and target audience we were aiming for, there were two main groups of people; antagonists – the younger generation who, as we stereotype or label in society as ‘rebels’, we built upon. The other group was victims – the vulnerable including the elderly.
I feel that, on the whole, we developed rock video conventions successfully in our product, therefore giving us somewhat of an advantage to create a, hopefully, professional-looking final product. Saying this, there were certain drawbacks that did not allow us to create a perfect mise-en-scene. These included props and actors. We had just enough props to film the narrative-based part of the video, but we struggled somewhat on the performance-based part. We only had a drum kit and electric guitar, along with the vocalist, but we ultimately needed a bass guitar but this was not feasible, so we persevered the best we could. We were even able to find a fairly decent venue for the shooting, so we had nearly enough ingredients for the performance. Another non-material aspect we lacked in slightly was confidence in the performances. The singer found it difficult to appear genuine, and along with having no accompanying soundtrack, very difficult to produce.
Along with our music video are ancillary texts so that the buyer doesn’t get only a CD; they get more which assures them that their money has gone further than they initially thought. These comprise of a postcard, which is used to the band’s advantage as further promotion, a competition offer with an added incentive to win tickets to see Standard Meeting live, and a magazine advert; again, extra promotion with information on the band and where to locate the product.
In my opinion the main product, along with these extras work very effectively together for a number of reasons. Appearance; text, colours and format matched, thus maintaining continuity and ultimately allowing the audience to familiarise themselves with the band. This too ties in with the images used, which were taken by myself. They have an element of exclusivity to them and display the style of the band – almost like a trademark of Standard Meeting – a black and white contrasty appearance. Choice is another appealing aspect. We offered as a band, a postcard and a competition offer which appeal to potential buyers as the band are giving something back to them. I think all in all, a decent package that a prospective buyer would think twice about putting back on the shelf.
We chose these texts as the majority of bands use them, and we were familiar with how they worked, and how to create them.
We were given very helpful constructive feedback on our blog through comments made on our planning, final product and ancillary texts. The majority of feedback we got was positive and focused on how fitting the video was to the song, the quality and content of the photographs and finally the effectiveness of accompanying ancillary texts. One comment, though constructive, I did not agree with in a way. It was said that a fair few shots were shaky; this was deliberate. We could easily have captured all still, sharp shots as we had access to a tripod at all times, but this was not the aim. We felt it appropriate to include shaky handheld shots as this creates a point-of-view effect, thus allowing the audience to feel more involved, and heightening the feelings of vulnerability and suspense. As a group we learnt from this and plan to improve upon a few points, to make our intentions clear in future projects. We also plan to, if appropriate to our next project, find better actors to make the production feel more sincere, and more realistic.
We also used new media technologies in every stage of the process; construction, research, planning and evaluation. When planning we used websites such as Vimeo and YouTube, to watch videos to gather an insight into how to attain what we wanted. YouTube is extremely useful, as it is updated constantly, and allowed us to watch specific and up to date videos. Using this, we watched existing media products including Ash’s earliest to latest videos, and other band’s music videos for inspiration. We also used other websites to research previous singles and albums, which in effect allowed us to create certain ancillary texts. This meant planning and research was combined altogether, and the use of these media technologies halved the time it would have taken to do it separately. Furthermore, this was effective in creating a schedule for creating all parts of the product; it broke up time into planning, filming and editing. Equally, other software aided us to get the product finalised. ‘Final Cut Express’ was very instrumental as this is where all of the editing was done. Final Cut uploads both the audio and visual properties of footage, and allowed us to edit them separately, making it extremely easy to completely change the mood and feel of our product. Cutting up our footage to re-order and such was hugely useful, and yet again easy. The best part of Final Cut, is that it is extremely easy to use, and anyone can use it.
Not only did we use technologies for construction of our music video and planning process, we took advantage of it to use it for our ancillary texts; the postcard, magazine advert and competition offer. I created the DigiPak, which I created using a number of my photographs. Using Adobe Photoshop CS3, I was able to import the images and rearrange and edit them to create the effect we were going for. I encountered a problem with arranging these images, as I wanted them to create quite a contemporary look along the length of the inside of the DigiPak. This was not due to the technology itself, but because of the properties of the image, and a slight lack of knowledge of how to attain certain effects using CS3. The software also allowed me to work in layers, which made it easy to correct mistakes without starting from scratch and lose as little time as possible. The other most important technology we used was the video camera. The simplicity of the controls made it easy to shoot the exact footage we wanted, and along with the tripod, was practical.
Overall, we found these media technologies highly instrumental for our project, and helped us create a half-decent product. We couldn’t have done any of the project without using any form of technology.
Matt Flack Evaluation
Music video evaluation, ‘Shark’ performed by ‘Ash’.
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
For our music video we have used the aggressive tone and styling of `shark` by ‘Ash’ to come up with the final product. We took most of our inspiration from Justice’s `stress` video, as this too used the same aggressive approach we decided on using. In our video we conformed to a stereotypical look at youth society in Britain, for example most of the characters in shot either lead singer or other members of the band are wearing dark cloths typically with ‘hoodys’. This tells the audience they don’t want to be recognised for the activities they are taking part in because they know what they’re doing is not perceived as the right thing to do. We enhanced the dark nature of the video by editing the video to be black and white as we thought this was pleasing visually and our audience is able to see the depressing, restricted and rebellious view the band members have making it easier to identify with them and discover the type of characters they are. This was also done by conforming to stereotypes as this makes it quicker and easier to identify type of music involved with this particular band.
By looking at previous ‘Ash’ videos we were able to research how they view their own music and genre. Videos such as ‘Polaris’ and ‘Burn baby burn’ showed us they concentrated more on instruments rather than themselves and had a mix of narrative and performance based scenarios, so we incorporated this in our product. This is us conforming to previous rock videos but developing the ideas behind them. ‘Blur’ ‘Song 2’ also has the aggressive alternative rock genre and we tired to emulate their use of lighting in to the new video we created. ‘Just a day’-‘Feeder’ was another video we looked at but decided it wasn’t the forceful intimidating video we had in mind, so we decided not to use any aspects involved in shooting this video but proceeded with the editing, through the fast paced action they have executed. Other inspirations came from ‘Linkin parks’ ‘What I’ve done’ we hoped to recreate the dynamic angles used through out the fast action in this video also scene in the ‘District 9’ film trailer. We could not however recreate a riot scene which we could have used in a way that would work with our product. We also researched the lyrics of the song by Ash and found the line ‘Violent Mind’ repeated several times this added to the strong hostile video we wanted to create, conforming to lyrics and other conventions already set in place by the music. All these factors would point us in the direction of our target audience of mainly males in their late teens to early twenties and others interested in other rock/alternative groups such as ‘Feeder’ or ‘Linkin Park’.
The editing phase was used to design short fast clips that fit with the music adding to the rushed effect and begin the build up to the main chorus and verses of the song, these types of shot are meant to build tension and in our music video it makes it feel faster and more energetic. We feel we have addressed the audience and have captured a music video they will enjoy strengthened by our conventions used in the making a rock music video in the aggressive high tempo manner, set in an average working class scene.
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
We have set up our band to be an Indie rock alternative genre this allows it to be open to a wide market audience with different aspects of the music. The video contains younger people making it easier for that part of the audience to identify with the band. This will also be helped by the distribution of the record through ‘Hmv’ a well known music institution making it accessible to most people and ‘iTune’s allows for global selling of the album through at least two recognisable distributors. We have incorporated a competition to attract a new audience to the band and genre this gives them more of an incentive to by the album and hopefully enjoy the music and continue coming back for further albums through this unique selling point. Again we have used black and white on the cover and advertising goods but I feel we have used it in a different way instead of having aggression it’s softer with more meaning and brings out the ‘indie’ side of the band. It could also become their trade mark of having the black and white effect in certain videos or just one song from every album to remind people of how they started and could become the bands unique selling point. The bold orange colour for text stands out really well on this background making the words eye catching and unmissable. The images themselves are also very different, more of a rural setting which makes you feel relaxed apposed to the working class urban background depicted in the video playing on more stereotypes and changing the entire mood of the album. The name ‘standard meeting’ is random much like the music on the album by using it as the first album name its making sure people know who we are through this simple act.
What have you learnt from audience feedback?
As a group we have received feedback both for our ancillary texts and our actual music video. Firstly the feedback was all positive and constructive to help further development in the production and post production areas. Our magazine advert, competition and CD cover received comments fro our peers suggesting we should take more time, as we have made simple spelling areas but also informed us that they were impressed by the photos and also they colour combination that is seen through out the promotion of the band. Another aspect was the postcard competition leading to members joining the fan club. This was well received and peers seemed to like and enjoy the simplistic but affective strategy of enticing people towards the artists. As for the CD cover/ digipak its self observations again suggested an overall positive review with comments touching on the impact of the shots, the professional look and visual hierarchy of the photos drawing your eye towards this product. ‘Beautiful photography that's consistent with the mood, quality and tone of the video. Again there's a focus on the band and an attempt to develop their image as edgey and dark (ish)’. This was one comment posted on our blog which really shows what we were aiming to convey to the audience and how it has been interpreted. I feel this phase of the project went really well and this is backed up by the feedback collected. Continuing on to the main product (the music video) the responses were mixed on the negative side we were told some scenes were to shaky due to the hand held effect we used through out the video. On the plus side however opinions state the quality of camera angles, enthusiasm and good use of real media conventions applied during the filming process, allow the true aggressive nature to come to life through these visual aids.
Gritty in tone and presentation is what we wanted to get through to the audience and this again supports the ideas we wanted to put across to any potential market. The feedback acquired is useful in the sense that we are able to understand our work from an outsiders point of view taking away any bias opinions or self gloating we may feel towards the project. In conclusion we can use this evaluation to adapt and hopefully raise the quality of any future projects we may under take. This will give the viewer more enjoyment and raise our own feeling of achievement furthering our development in the media industry.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
With out ‘youtube’ this would have been a very difficult task as it allowed us to research the band, find ideas, show our ideas and present our work in a way that could give us feedback from anyone at any time. We were also able to find pictures that served as inspiration through out the research phase on various internet sites and in magazines and other albums. Google Earth eas another technology used to find locations as it gave us the geographical position but also enabled us to view the setting and background to any potential sets. We used final cut express to edit the video allowing us to create the desired effect and flowing sequence we aimed for. This is the building block for the rest of the project knowing and understanding it gives us the control to do what we want with our footage. To create the Album design and format we used a ‘digipak’ and ‘photoshop’ to edit and change the photos we had taken allowing us to insert the track names build the competition entry from and advertising to make our product sellable. We have also used a blog to keep track of everything we have done which has made it easier to put everything together and look at how we wanted to create our video and other aspects of the project. Altogether I think we have created a solid piece of work by all means it is not the greatest video we have could have created, but it covers all conventions it needs to. With all the stereotypical codes you would associate with this genre and form of music video and advertising goods.
Some things we could have improved on are; better preparation and planning such as learning the lyrics of the song so we could have used more performance based shots and just spending more time on shots making sure we have enough of what we need. I feel we done a brilliant job on designing the ‘digipak’ and made a product that looks professional and eye catching to an audience, through technologies I have already addressed.
Matt Flack
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
For our music video we have used the aggressive tone and styling of `shark` by ‘Ash’ to come up with the final product. We took most of our inspiration from Justice’s `stress` video, as this too used the same aggressive approach we decided on using. In our video we conformed to a stereotypical look at youth society in Britain, for example most of the characters in shot either lead singer or other members of the band are wearing dark cloths typically with ‘hoodys’. This tells the audience they don’t want to be recognised for the activities they are taking part in because they know what they’re doing is not perceived as the right thing to do. We enhanced the dark nature of the video by editing the video to be black and white as we thought this was pleasing visually and our audience is able to see the depressing, restricted and rebellious view the band members have making it easier to identify with them and discover the type of characters they are. This was also done by conforming to stereotypes as this makes it quicker and easier to identify type of music involved with this particular band.
By looking at previous ‘Ash’ videos we were able to research how they view their own music and genre. Videos such as ‘Polaris’ and ‘Burn baby burn’ showed us they concentrated more on instruments rather than themselves and had a mix of narrative and performance based scenarios, so we incorporated this in our product. This is us conforming to previous rock videos but developing the ideas behind them. ‘Blur’ ‘Song 2’ also has the aggressive alternative rock genre and we tired to emulate their use of lighting in to the new video we created. ‘Just a day’-‘Feeder’ was another video we looked at but decided it wasn’t the forceful intimidating video we had in mind, so we decided not to use any aspects involved in shooting this video but proceeded with the editing, through the fast paced action they have executed. Other inspirations came from ‘Linkin parks’ ‘What I’ve done’ we hoped to recreate the dynamic angles used through out the fast action in this video also scene in the ‘District 9’ film trailer. We could not however recreate a riot scene which we could have used in a way that would work with our product. We also researched the lyrics of the song by Ash and found the line ‘Violent Mind’ repeated several times this added to the strong hostile video we wanted to create, conforming to lyrics and other conventions already set in place by the music. All these factors would point us in the direction of our target audience of mainly males in their late teens to early twenties and others interested in other rock/alternative groups such as ‘Feeder’ or ‘Linkin Park’.
The editing phase was used to design short fast clips that fit with the music adding to the rushed effect and begin the build up to the main chorus and verses of the song, these types of shot are meant to build tension and in our music video it makes it feel faster and more energetic. We feel we have addressed the audience and have captured a music video they will enjoy strengthened by our conventions used in the making a rock music video in the aggressive high tempo manner, set in an average working class scene.
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
We have set up our band to be an Indie rock alternative genre this allows it to be open to a wide market audience with different aspects of the music. The video contains younger people making it easier for that part of the audience to identify with the band. This will also be helped by the distribution of the record through ‘Hmv’ a well known music institution making it accessible to most people and ‘iTune’s allows for global selling of the album through at least two recognisable distributors. We have incorporated a competition to attract a new audience to the band and genre this gives them more of an incentive to by the album and hopefully enjoy the music and continue coming back for further albums through this unique selling point. Again we have used black and white on the cover and advertising goods but I feel we have used it in a different way instead of having aggression it’s softer with more meaning and brings out the ‘indie’ side of the band. It could also become their trade mark of having the black and white effect in certain videos or just one song from every album to remind people of how they started and could become the bands unique selling point. The bold orange colour for text stands out really well on this background making the words eye catching and unmissable. The images themselves are also very different, more of a rural setting which makes you feel relaxed apposed to the working class urban background depicted in the video playing on more stereotypes and changing the entire mood of the album. The name ‘standard meeting’ is random much like the music on the album by using it as the first album name its making sure people know who we are through this simple act.
What have you learnt from audience feedback?
As a group we have received feedback both for our ancillary texts and our actual music video. Firstly the feedback was all positive and constructive to help further development in the production and post production areas. Our magazine advert, competition and CD cover received comments fro our peers suggesting we should take more time, as we have made simple spelling areas but also informed us that they were impressed by the photos and also they colour combination that is seen through out the promotion of the band. Another aspect was the postcard competition leading to members joining the fan club. This was well received and peers seemed to like and enjoy the simplistic but affective strategy of enticing people towards the artists. As for the CD cover/ digipak its self observations again suggested an overall positive review with comments touching on the impact of the shots, the professional look and visual hierarchy of the photos drawing your eye towards this product. ‘Beautiful photography that's consistent with the mood, quality and tone of the video. Again there's a focus on the band and an attempt to develop their image as edgey and dark (ish)’. This was one comment posted on our blog which really shows what we were aiming to convey to the audience and how it has been interpreted. I feel this phase of the project went really well and this is backed up by the feedback collected. Continuing on to the main product (the music video) the responses were mixed on the negative side we were told some scenes were to shaky due to the hand held effect we used through out the video. On the plus side however opinions state the quality of camera angles, enthusiasm and good use of real media conventions applied during the filming process, allow the true aggressive nature to come to life through these visual aids.
Gritty in tone and presentation is what we wanted to get through to the audience and this again supports the ideas we wanted to put across to any potential market. The feedback acquired is useful in the sense that we are able to understand our work from an outsiders point of view taking away any bias opinions or self gloating we may feel towards the project. In conclusion we can use this evaluation to adapt and hopefully raise the quality of any future projects we may under take. This will give the viewer more enjoyment and raise our own feeling of achievement furthering our development in the media industry.
How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
With out ‘youtube’ this would have been a very difficult task as it allowed us to research the band, find ideas, show our ideas and present our work in a way that could give us feedback from anyone at any time. We were also able to find pictures that served as inspiration through out the research phase on various internet sites and in magazines and other albums. Google Earth eas another technology used to find locations as it gave us the geographical position but also enabled us to view the setting and background to any potential sets. We used final cut express to edit the video allowing us to create the desired effect and flowing sequence we aimed for. This is the building block for the rest of the project knowing and understanding it gives us the control to do what we want with our footage. To create the Album design and format we used a ‘digipak’ and ‘photoshop’ to edit and change the photos we had taken allowing us to insert the track names build the competition entry from and advertising to make our product sellable. We have also used a blog to keep track of everything we have done which has made it easier to put everything together and look at how we wanted to create our video and other aspects of the project. Altogether I think we have created a solid piece of work by all means it is not the greatest video we have could have created, but it covers all conventions it needs to. With all the stereotypical codes you would associate with this genre and form of music video and advertising goods.
Some things we could have improved on are; better preparation and planning such as learning the lyrics of the song so we could have used more performance based shots and just spending more time on shots making sure we have enough of what we need. I feel we done a brilliant job on designing the ‘digipak’ and made a product that looks professional and eye catching to an audience, through technologies I have already addressed.
Matt Flack
Ali Hunter Evaluation
1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
My media product (a music video for the single ‘Shark’ by Indie-rockers Ash) used and developed forms of real media products but struggled to challenge conventions of music videos and short films within its genre. But before we even started the researching and planning phase of our project, we asked ourselves if we would make a video that would be alternate to the mainstream videos, in other words, challenging conventions. We didn’t hesitate in deciding that our video would use and emulate ideas that we gathered from researching existing videos. From then onwards we set about gathering research in the form of similar media products to the one we had planned. This ranged from similar music videos to just similar music, films on the theme, still images, short YouTube clips and even album covers and lyrics that accompany the song. After listening to the song a couple of times the group acknowledged the tone of the song as to be very aggressive and quite a tough gritty rock song. We also acknowledged that the target audience for our song and band would be mainly male rock fans aged between 15 and 30.
It was this that made us start researching the rock genre and looking into gritty songs that we felt were similar. The lyrics of ‘Shark’ (particularly the words ‘Violent Mind’ and ‘I Go Where I Want To’) suggested to us that the music we were making a video for was quite rebellious and rough. Particularly instrumental throughout the planning and researching process, Justice’s video for the song ‘Stress’ jumped out at us as inspiration. The group knew of it before we even came up with the idea for a rebellious youth narrative, and when we viewed it together we knew that the original idea of having a performance and narrative based story of young boys causing trouble was the idea we were going to stick with. Although the music of Justice’s song was pretty dissimilar to that of Ash’s it still gave us a chance to base ideas around conventions in the video. For instance, we planned to keep the gritty tone in our music video by making the whole video black and white, which developed the form of the ‘Stress’ video as that was shot and edited to look dull and grey monotonous. The work we started on the ‘Stress’ video propelled the research process and it helped us onto our second set of research, the film ‘La Haine’. ‘La Haine’ and Justice are both French so we could work out the link between the two styles. ‘La Haine’ is a film about a French estate in which 3 young lads find themselves in the grip of a gun war. The film was very similar to the ‘Stress’ video and we gained valuable camerawork and mise-en-scene techniques that we emulated later in the shoot.
It is evident in our music video that the tone and the vibe of our final product used and developed the conventions of the music videos and the films we looked at. Secondly we looked at the mise-en-scene of our research. We gathered that the youths wore ‘hoodies’ and jeans a lot, generally dour attire, so we matched that in our video too. Finally we decided to develop the people in the video and the way the people in our music video acted. We decided that it was going to involve ourselves as we were the sort of age group we were targeting. We also planned to match the way they walked and reacted to others and even the way they sat and hung about. Overall, we developed and used conventions of real media products but struggled to find a way to challenge the conventions of our research.
2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
On review of our final ancillary texts (A magazine advert, a membership postcard and a competition leaflet) I am very pleased that they match with our music video. We were concerned after shooting the music video that we wouldn’t be able to match the gritty and rough tone of the video, with ancillary texts that could provide our audience with the same sort of quality. The music video, in its entirety, was shot in black and white and was fairly aggressive. Scene upon scene and location upon location we planned to give our video an edge, and an underlying social commentary. We planned to make a competition leaflet, a membership postcard and a magazine advert. This wasn’t a hard choice to male as we wanted to stick with the conventions of normal rock bands, not challenge them by making stickers etc. This is because we felt we needed to connect with our target audience as much as possible to ensure that the final product spoke to our fans. So after looking at some more existing ancillary texts, 3 of the group headed out for a photo shoot. When we uploaded the images from the shoot, we were all delighted to find a set of professional shots. With the DigiPak in mind, Rob took images of Jon and Matt (two of the band members in the music video) and strategically made the final shots black and white. However, there is some confusion as to whether our images are in contrast to our video, as the photographs are set in a rural location and the video is shot entirely in an urban location. This maybe the only downside to our photographs. But on the other hand, the images combined well with each other, and when we overlaid text the images really stood out.
Our main product involved ourselves as the band members and as a group we decided it was only usual for the band to front their own advert and DVD DigiPak. From this we decided we’d have a competition leaflet and a membership postcard to go with the DVD case. We landed on this after studying several DVD Digipaks and seeing that a constant for Indie-Rock bands (who targeted the same target audience as ourselves) was chances for buyers of the product to see them live or get involved in the band in some way. We also gathered that every band had a signature font or logo, so we set about making our own for the name Standard Meeting. We finished producing our logo just before we set about taking our shots and we realised that the bright orange font we used to create our logo would stand out very well against the dull black and white images, so that was a major plus for us. And when we produced the ancillary texts the orange did stand out extremely well. After this we started to plan what we’d say on each of the DigiPak products.
We planned every little detail to make it more professional, this meant choosing the correct form of language (informal), how we’d set out asking the question for our competition and even the price for joining the band’s members club. We chose to ask a question anyone could answer correctly, making it multiple choice, and making 2 of the 3 answers seem ridiculous. This would allow the competition to seem easy to win, therefore attracting as many fans. We also decided that the prize for winning the competition would be to win tickets to see the band (only proxy to existing ancillary texts). When we chose a suitable photograph for the background of the competition leaflet, we moved onto making a membership postcard. We felt the postcard should be devoid of a photograph, making white and stylish. It was also choice to make the logo of the band orange, every time it was mentioned in large print, to make it clear who it was for. I feel in general the ancillary texts partner the music video extremely well, and keep a constant check on who the target audience is and what the tone of the video is as well.
3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Fellow Media Studies students took the time out to comment on our music video and partnering DigiPak and gave us numerous feedback on what they thought of the products. Given that the video was aimed at males aged between 15 and 30, we were happy to hear what some in that bracket thought of the video. We were happy to hear that most of the feedback was positive and that we were praised for keeping within the tone of the music, picking our narrative and performance well, a task we had thought of as a tough one before we started to plan. One set of individuals had this to say; “Good camera shots and mise-en-scene. Excellent performance, [it was] enthusiastic. [We feel] 1 or 2 shots are a tad too shaky.” The group were happy to hear that we got some good camera shots and that the mise-en-scene was good because we worked hard researching these things and we were also pleased to learn that they liked the performance side to our music video. However we were displeased to hear that they thought some of the shots were ‘a tad to shaky’. Although we agreed with them that this was the case, we felt the handy cam type approach to the video was in keeping with the video and we learnt that although it may look adequate we should have checked every shot for how shaky it was and what was on shot, to provide a strong form of continuity.
Another group had this to say about our music video: “Gritty in its tone… so suits the music you've chosen. …It would have been better to see the singer with the band during the performance to build up the idea of being gang. It's odd that the band are the hooligans so that could break with conventions…” From this reaction to our video we learnt that although we felt we cast who was in our video appropriately, we should have asked more people to be in the video, so band members from the performance didn’t have to double up as gang members later on. We were glad to hear from this individual that we had got the tone correct as we tried our hardest to match the music and the video appropriately, which according to this comment, we did.
We were also given comments on our ancillary texts, which partnered the music video. Rob was highly praised for his photographs as many groups commented that the shots looked “professional” and was “effective”. One group even commented “Beautiful photography”. It was extremely satisfying to hear that our photographs and the accompanying text looked professional and that it was in keeping with the tone of the video. For our DigiPak, we didn’t really receive any negative feedback which was nice, but we also felt we could improve and no one could put their finger on what was not quite right. However in general, we felt our ancillary texts, as a whole partnered the music video we made really well, and the combination was perfect in making a gritty, rough, urban product.
4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
We couldn’t have made our music video and its partnering DigiPak without the use of new media technologies. Our video wouldn’t have been half as good as it is without the use of Youtube and Last.fm websites that helped us research our chosen genre and gain helpful advice to ignite our planning. Without the use of Final Cut Express and Photoshop we wouldn’t have been able to finish our project.
Particularly instrumental throughout the research phase we learnt the importance of the search engine Google, as without it we wouldn’t have found similar videos to that of Ash’s and also similar clips on the video sharing web page Youtube. We were lacking ideas before we used the Internet and it helped us with our planning majorly. Google Earth was useful to us as we used it to scout for locations and give ourselves a chance to pre plan where we’d go with the camera that we rented. Google Earth allowed us to scout for locations, with clear satellite images of the areas we had chosen. A subsidiary of Google Earth, Google Street View also gave us an idea of how busy the streets were and how easy it would be to shoot a video in the areas we had chosen.
Along with the Google Street View and Google Earth, we also used Last.fm and other music websites to locate similar music styles, of which we found and then typed into Youtube to see the partnering music videos. From there we found ‘Stress’ and gained valuable camerawork, editing and mise-en-scene advice, which was so helpful during the shoot for the video. After finding the ‘Stress’ video we moved onto the aforementioned ‘La Haine’ film. Without this research we definitely wouldn’t have got the ideas we had before the shoot.
When we acquired the shots we needed we moved onto using Final Cut Express. Final Cut allowed us to grey scale the shots and gives it its gritty tone and vibe. We also slowed down and sped up some shots, including the shot of the bridge, which opens the music video. Also we cut and pasted some shots to combine with others either to keep continuity or to give it a fast pace. The Final Cut software also helped us edit our video evaluation, making it smooth and interlinking with clips from our research.
Finally I have learnt that new media technologies are vital in the planning and research process. As we would never have known where to go to shoot our video and of course what we would have shot. Although we would have had a vague idea, we wouldn’t of had the developed ideas that we had, with the use of Youtube and Last.fm
My media product (a music video for the single ‘Shark’ by Indie-rockers Ash) used and developed forms of real media products but struggled to challenge conventions of music videos and short films within its genre. But before we even started the researching and planning phase of our project, we asked ourselves if we would make a video that would be alternate to the mainstream videos, in other words, challenging conventions. We didn’t hesitate in deciding that our video would use and emulate ideas that we gathered from researching existing videos. From then onwards we set about gathering research in the form of similar media products to the one we had planned. This ranged from similar music videos to just similar music, films on the theme, still images, short YouTube clips and even album covers and lyrics that accompany the song. After listening to the song a couple of times the group acknowledged the tone of the song as to be very aggressive and quite a tough gritty rock song. We also acknowledged that the target audience for our song and band would be mainly male rock fans aged between 15 and 30.
It was this that made us start researching the rock genre and looking into gritty songs that we felt were similar. The lyrics of ‘Shark’ (particularly the words ‘Violent Mind’ and ‘I Go Where I Want To’) suggested to us that the music we were making a video for was quite rebellious and rough. Particularly instrumental throughout the planning and researching process, Justice’s video for the song ‘Stress’ jumped out at us as inspiration. The group knew of it before we even came up with the idea for a rebellious youth narrative, and when we viewed it together we knew that the original idea of having a performance and narrative based story of young boys causing trouble was the idea we were going to stick with. Although the music of Justice’s song was pretty dissimilar to that of Ash’s it still gave us a chance to base ideas around conventions in the video. For instance, we planned to keep the gritty tone in our music video by making the whole video black and white, which developed the form of the ‘Stress’ video as that was shot and edited to look dull and grey monotonous. The work we started on the ‘Stress’ video propelled the research process and it helped us onto our second set of research, the film ‘La Haine’. ‘La Haine’ and Justice are both French so we could work out the link between the two styles. ‘La Haine’ is a film about a French estate in which 3 young lads find themselves in the grip of a gun war. The film was very similar to the ‘Stress’ video and we gained valuable camerawork and mise-en-scene techniques that we emulated later in the shoot.
It is evident in our music video that the tone and the vibe of our final product used and developed the conventions of the music videos and the films we looked at. Secondly we looked at the mise-en-scene of our research. We gathered that the youths wore ‘hoodies’ and jeans a lot, generally dour attire, so we matched that in our video too. Finally we decided to develop the people in the video and the way the people in our music video acted. We decided that it was going to involve ourselves as we were the sort of age group we were targeting. We also planned to match the way they walked and reacted to others and even the way they sat and hung about. Overall, we developed and used conventions of real media products but struggled to find a way to challenge the conventions of our research.
2. How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
On review of our final ancillary texts (A magazine advert, a membership postcard and a competition leaflet) I am very pleased that they match with our music video. We were concerned after shooting the music video that we wouldn’t be able to match the gritty and rough tone of the video, with ancillary texts that could provide our audience with the same sort of quality. The music video, in its entirety, was shot in black and white and was fairly aggressive. Scene upon scene and location upon location we planned to give our video an edge, and an underlying social commentary. We planned to make a competition leaflet, a membership postcard and a magazine advert. This wasn’t a hard choice to male as we wanted to stick with the conventions of normal rock bands, not challenge them by making stickers etc. This is because we felt we needed to connect with our target audience as much as possible to ensure that the final product spoke to our fans. So after looking at some more existing ancillary texts, 3 of the group headed out for a photo shoot. When we uploaded the images from the shoot, we were all delighted to find a set of professional shots. With the DigiPak in mind, Rob took images of Jon and Matt (two of the band members in the music video) and strategically made the final shots black and white. However, there is some confusion as to whether our images are in contrast to our video, as the photographs are set in a rural location and the video is shot entirely in an urban location. This maybe the only downside to our photographs. But on the other hand, the images combined well with each other, and when we overlaid text the images really stood out.
Our main product involved ourselves as the band members and as a group we decided it was only usual for the band to front their own advert and DVD DigiPak. From this we decided we’d have a competition leaflet and a membership postcard to go with the DVD case. We landed on this after studying several DVD Digipaks and seeing that a constant for Indie-Rock bands (who targeted the same target audience as ourselves) was chances for buyers of the product to see them live or get involved in the band in some way. We also gathered that every band had a signature font or logo, so we set about making our own for the name Standard Meeting. We finished producing our logo just before we set about taking our shots and we realised that the bright orange font we used to create our logo would stand out very well against the dull black and white images, so that was a major plus for us. And when we produced the ancillary texts the orange did stand out extremely well. After this we started to plan what we’d say on each of the DigiPak products.
We planned every little detail to make it more professional, this meant choosing the correct form of language (informal), how we’d set out asking the question for our competition and even the price for joining the band’s members club. We chose to ask a question anyone could answer correctly, making it multiple choice, and making 2 of the 3 answers seem ridiculous. This would allow the competition to seem easy to win, therefore attracting as many fans. We also decided that the prize for winning the competition would be to win tickets to see the band (only proxy to existing ancillary texts). When we chose a suitable photograph for the background of the competition leaflet, we moved onto making a membership postcard. We felt the postcard should be devoid of a photograph, making white and stylish. It was also choice to make the logo of the band orange, every time it was mentioned in large print, to make it clear who it was for. I feel in general the ancillary texts partner the music video extremely well, and keep a constant check on who the target audience is and what the tone of the video is as well.
3. What have you learnt from your audience feedback?
Fellow Media Studies students took the time out to comment on our music video and partnering DigiPak and gave us numerous feedback on what they thought of the products. Given that the video was aimed at males aged between 15 and 30, we were happy to hear what some in that bracket thought of the video. We were happy to hear that most of the feedback was positive and that we were praised for keeping within the tone of the music, picking our narrative and performance well, a task we had thought of as a tough one before we started to plan. One set of individuals had this to say; “Good camera shots and mise-en-scene. Excellent performance, [it was] enthusiastic. [We feel] 1 or 2 shots are a tad too shaky.” The group were happy to hear that we got some good camera shots and that the mise-en-scene was good because we worked hard researching these things and we were also pleased to learn that they liked the performance side to our music video. However we were displeased to hear that they thought some of the shots were ‘a tad to shaky’. Although we agreed with them that this was the case, we felt the handy cam type approach to the video was in keeping with the video and we learnt that although it may look adequate we should have checked every shot for how shaky it was and what was on shot, to provide a strong form of continuity.
Another group had this to say about our music video: “Gritty in its tone… so suits the music you've chosen. …It would have been better to see the singer with the band during the performance to build up the idea of being gang. It's odd that the band are the hooligans so that could break with conventions…” From this reaction to our video we learnt that although we felt we cast who was in our video appropriately, we should have asked more people to be in the video, so band members from the performance didn’t have to double up as gang members later on. We were glad to hear from this individual that we had got the tone correct as we tried our hardest to match the music and the video appropriately, which according to this comment, we did.
We were also given comments on our ancillary texts, which partnered the music video. Rob was highly praised for his photographs as many groups commented that the shots looked “professional” and was “effective”. One group even commented “Beautiful photography”. It was extremely satisfying to hear that our photographs and the accompanying text looked professional and that it was in keeping with the tone of the video. For our DigiPak, we didn’t really receive any negative feedback which was nice, but we also felt we could improve and no one could put their finger on what was not quite right. However in general, we felt our ancillary texts, as a whole partnered the music video we made really well, and the combination was perfect in making a gritty, rough, urban product.
4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
We couldn’t have made our music video and its partnering DigiPak without the use of new media technologies. Our video wouldn’t have been half as good as it is without the use of Youtube and Last.fm websites that helped us research our chosen genre and gain helpful advice to ignite our planning. Without the use of Final Cut Express and Photoshop we wouldn’t have been able to finish our project.
Particularly instrumental throughout the research phase we learnt the importance of the search engine Google, as without it we wouldn’t have found similar videos to that of Ash’s and also similar clips on the video sharing web page Youtube. We were lacking ideas before we used the Internet and it helped us with our planning majorly. Google Earth was useful to us as we used it to scout for locations and give ourselves a chance to pre plan where we’d go with the camera that we rented. Google Earth allowed us to scout for locations, with clear satellite images of the areas we had chosen. A subsidiary of Google Earth, Google Street View also gave us an idea of how busy the streets were and how easy it would be to shoot a video in the areas we had chosen.
Along with the Google Street View and Google Earth, we also used Last.fm and other music websites to locate similar music styles, of which we found and then typed into Youtube to see the partnering music videos. From there we found ‘Stress’ and gained valuable camerawork, editing and mise-en-scene advice, which was so helpful during the shoot for the video. After finding the ‘Stress’ video we moved onto the aforementioned ‘La Haine’ film. Without this research we definitely wouldn’t have got the ideas we had before the shoot.
When we acquired the shots we needed we moved onto using Final Cut Express. Final Cut allowed us to grey scale the shots and gives it its gritty tone and vibe. We also slowed down and sped up some shots, including the shot of the bridge, which opens the music video. Also we cut and pasted some shots to combine with others either to keep continuity or to give it a fast pace. The Final Cut software also helped us edit our video evaluation, making it smooth and interlinking with clips from our research.
Finally I have learnt that new media technologies are vital in the planning and research process. As we would never have known where to go to shoot our video and of course what we would have shot. Although we would have had a vague idea, we wouldn’t of had the developed ideas that we had, with the use of Youtube and Last.fm
Monday, 30 November 2009
And finally...
To complete the DigiPak and offer something else to the listeners, not 'just' a CD, we have decided to include a postcard and a competition. Below are finals of each;
Postcard back; 
and the Competition leaflet...
Postcard front;
Postcard back;
and the Competition leaflet...
DigiPak Final
So, over the weekend the final touches were made to our DigiPak design.
Below is the final product.
Outside (front cover, back cover, and outside of the flap for the middle section;
Inside (inside of front cover containing sleeve for competition leaflets etc, middle section for the CD, and flap also containing a sleeve;
Below is the final product.
Outside (front cover, back cover, and outside of the flap for the middle section;
Inside (inside of front cover containing sleeve for competition leaflets etc, middle section for the CD, and flap also containing a sleeve;
Sunday, 29 November 2009
Digipak Cover
In our last lesson on friday we had to tricky task of creating the cover of our digipak. Rob had taken some photos in black and white the day before and had the idea of creating a collage of photos for the cover. But Jon and Ali thought that this would look somewhat unprofessional and decided that as the digipak has six sides it would contain too many photos. So instead they suggested that the inside cover should contain the same photo and be split up into three parts and the remaining three sides should contain a single photo for each.
Final touches of the editing process will take place over the course of the weekend.
Final touches of the editing process will take place over the course of the weekend.
Friday, 27 November 2009
Band Name and Album Name
Dave strongly advised everyone to come up with their own band names so that we could all create a new identity and logo.
Our group could not come to a unanimous descion so, Ali decided that whilst on a band name genrator web page, we had to take a certain name on the following page, whatever it was.
The result was 'Standard Meeting', which we all agreed wasn't too bad. And so Standard Meeting will be the name of our band and will be branded on our DVD DigiPack and our magazine advert.
We also decided that the album would be self titled.
Our group could not come to a unanimous descion so, Ali decided that whilst on a band name genrator web page, we had to take a certain name on the following page, whatever it was.
The result was 'Standard Meeting', which we all agreed wasn't too bad. And so Standard Meeting will be the name of our band and will be branded on our DVD DigiPack and our magazine advert.
We also decided that the album would be self titled.
Magazine Advert
After a short while composing an image and a band name, Ali produced a magazine advert which includes the band name (Standard Meeting) and the album title (self titled- Standard Meeting) and when and where you can purchase the album. The shot was taken by Rob, in black and white and shows Jon with his guitar. The font used for the advert is the band's logo and can be seen wherever the Standard Meeting name is branded.
Thursday, 26 November 2009
Black and White
Rob and Jon felt that the photos for the digi-pack should be shot in black and white to continue with the black and white ideology from the music video. Rob took some photos in colour but we felt that it was much more edgy and aggressive to shoot in black and white. We took a range of photos including some of Jon holding his guitar from various different camera angles, including a shot from below to give the impression that Jon was arching over Rob and looked more dominant. We then took various shots of Matt (the lead singer)
Below is an example of our influence:
The Next Step
Our work is not done once we have shot and edited our footage to create a music video; we have chosen to design a digipack. This will consist of a DVD, of which we have to design the cover. A CD is obviously the main focus so we will be designing a case for the product, using conventions used by other records/artists, aswell as adding our own touches to make it our own.
Initial Ideas
- Rob had an idea of taking a couple of decent photographs, for putting on the DVD and CD cases. Jon will assist during free periods to do this.
Our idea for this is to capture the feel of the track, and to maintain the look we created in our version of the music video. Therefore, Rob will capture the antisocial feel with an element of music, within each photograph.
Initial Ideas
- Rob had an idea of taking a couple of decent photographs, for putting on the DVD and CD cases. Jon will assist during free periods to do this.
Our idea for this is to capture the feel of the track, and to maintain the look we created in our version of the music video. Therefore, Rob will capture the antisocial feel with an element of music, within each photograph.
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
Final Music Video Notes
Now that we have uploaded our final version for our music video, the editing stage is over and we can begin to start thinking of names for the band and DVD cover ideas.
However before we do so, the group think it would be nice to note down what we liked and disliked about our video.
However before we do so, the group think it would be nice to note down what we liked and disliked about our video.
Saturday, 14 November 2009
Editing Our New Footage
When we had completed the filming on the 11th November we started further editing on the 13th. To incorporate our new footage into the existing edited material posed some problems as the latter was narrative-based and we had to rearrange the clips to make it look fluid and polished.
Not only did we include clips of us singing, but we had to include clips of Matt lip-syncing to the music. We filmed the lip-syncing in several venues across the college to provide variety and more material for editing. However, as we had started after college, it soon got too dark to film. Luckily, we found a flood-lit area which allowed us to continue filming and had the bonus of giving a nice golden effect to our footage. - Jon.
Not only did we include clips of us singing, but we had to include clips of Matt lip-syncing to the music. We filmed the lip-syncing in several venues across the college to provide variety and more material for editing. However, as we had started after college, it soon got too dark to film. Luckily, we found a flood-lit area which allowed us to continue filming and had the bonus of giving a nice golden effect to our footage. - Jon.
Friday, 13 November 2009
Shooting Finished
Finally, we have finished shooting what we need to complete the project and as a group we feel extremely satisfied with what we have come up with. The performance based shooting, which admittedly got off to a shaky start, produced some amazing shots near the end and the photography on some of the final shoots was, quite stunning.
Now we rely on the editing to make the video as good as it can be. All members of the group, have at some point said "we'll leave that to editing" so it should be a major turning point in the eventual end product.
Sunday, 8 November 2009
Further Word Clouds
One of the things that struck me about the lyrics of "Shark" by Ash was their repetition of certain words. It was disturbing that these were aggressive and forceful words, so I (Jon) decided to try the same technique I used earlier in this blog to look at the lyrics in Wordle.net. As can be seen above the lyrics are disturbing. "Violent" and "mind" are the two most used words in this song. I think we have to convey the despair of this song, the need or the wish to resort to violence as frustration. That doesn't mean that they like violence, but we can understand it as an expression in some young people. It is the only way they feel they can get noticed. Does it mean that they are saying their minds are led by violence, or reacting to it? "Wanna" and "know" are the next most common words. Are they asking why society rejects them and makes them violent? Or are they saying they don't understand the violence accepted by society? We have heard a lot recently about young people dying in Afghanistan...they are our age. Perhaps young people just want to have a right to say in how they live and die?
Feedback
As a group, Jon thinks we should ask other groups and individuals for feedback about our blogs. Although we have asked for comment, we have not yet received any. Some groups appear to have received a lot of feedback. We should all ask them for their opinions - they must have some, even if they think our efforts are rubbish! It is possible to even design our feedback using tools (http://www.google.com/support/blogger/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=143413) which may make it more interesting. We could also offer to swap feedback with other groups which have not yet received any either.
CCTV Footage
Jon thinks that there are ways we can put CCTV footage in our video. Although much of it is not high quality, CCTV can be found on the internet and therefore is already in the public domain. Provided our sources are credited, perhaps at the end of the video, he doesn't think usage of CCTV will be a problem.
Examples can be got from sites such as this:
Another site is: http://www.cctvfootage.com/watch/
We could decide what subset of footage we want e.g. football violence, car crime, burglary etc and search for that.
Examples can be got from sites such as this:
Another site is: http://www.cctvfootage.com/watch/
We could decide what subset of footage we want e.g. football violence, car crime, burglary etc and search for that.
Word Cloud
Blogger does label clouds as standard, but this is not very informative about the contents of the blogs. So Jon decided to copy and paste the entire text blog into Word, then select all the text and copy into Wordle.net. The image was altered before being captured and imported (using printscreen) into Irfanview where it was edited to provide only the word cloud and saved as a jpeg and inserted above. The major words are music, video and editing, which at least shows that our blogs appear to focus on a relevant theme!
Saturday, 7 November 2009
Weekend Update
We have used black and white for some of the filming because we thought this more evocative and created a seedy and depressive mood. Next Tuesday, we will film our live performance in the music block studio using a green screen background. We will try a dynamically projected background initially but this may not work as it would conflict with the moving images of ourselves as a group. We could therefore aim to project our live performance against a static backdrop, perhaps of the album cover if it can be designed in time. (Jon).
Friday, 6 November 2009
Video Idea/Justification\Self-evaluation
Our video has taken into account the genre of music, and pace at which it is performed. We took inspiration from the Justice video for 'Stress' and have attempted to show a powerful music video depicting British youths in a stereotypical way and adapted and enhance this image of adolescent society. The video has been designed to be powerful and explosive to relate to our target audience, with the feeling art is supposed to be new and different giving people new and mixed feelings.
We have concentrated on the music rather than a a true narrative story as to keep the focus on the music. By doing this the video is open to peoples unique perspective and opinion, however if taken to literally by the news and other media outlets it could create a wider fan base and more units to be sold through the rebellious nature of the target audience. We believe this justifies the content of our music video and can leave the audience to decide why this is happening and the back story of the scenario.
We have concentrated on the music rather than a a true narrative story as to keep the focus on the music. By doing this the video is open to peoples unique perspective and opinion, however if taken to literally by the news and other media outlets it could create a wider fan base and more units to be sold through the rebellious nature of the target audience. We believe this justifies the content of our music video and can leave the audience to decide why this is happening and the back story of the scenario.
Thursday, 5 November 2009
Marking
In todays session we were given the aspect of our video on which we will be marked on. We will do our best, if even through the means of editing, to make sure we meet this requirements;
- Ability to hold a shot steady, where appropriate
- Framing a shot including and excluding elements as appropriate
- Using a variety of shot distances as appropriate
- Shooting material appropriate to task set
- Selecting mise-en-scene including colour, figure, lighting objects and setting
- Editing so that meaning is apparent to the viewer
- Using varied shot transitions, captions and other effects selectively and appropriately
- Using sound with images and editing appropriately for the task
Sunday, 25 October 2009
Ideas for our CD cover
Jon has discovered a couple of sites which show how Adobe Photoshop can be used to create stunning images for the CD cover. He thinks that one of the best is an image of the words as a "meteor shower" as this is dramatic and stands out from many other CD covers due to its 3D effect. The trailing shower of sparks give the impression of words entering the Earth's atmosphere and burning up there. Our text would use the words "Ash Shark" in reverse order with the word "Ash" burning up first and disintegrating into dust. Above is the image from: http://psdtuts.com/text-effects-tutorials/create-a-spectacular-flaming-meteor-effect-on-text/ showing the final version, created using Adobe Illustrator to create the text and Adobe Photoshop to create the effects.
Saturday, 24 October 2009
Roughcut Editing
Jon's thoughts about editing our roughcut:
1. we had problems uploading the track into final cut express. as a result we had trouble editing in time to the music
2. we had a temporary "work around" which was to play the music on iTunes at the same time as we did the editing
3. we managed to synchronise the narrative footage to the music using a variety of transitions e.g. by using fade ins/fade outs and slowing or speeding up certain clips of film
4. because we had to allow gaps in the video where performance-based clips will be inserted, the rough cut at certain points appears to be disjointed.
1. we had problems uploading the track into final cut express. as a result we had trouble editing in time to the music
2. we had a temporary "work around" which was to play the music on iTunes at the same time as we did the editing
3. we managed to synchronise the narrative footage to the music using a variety of transitions e.g. by using fade ins/fade outs and slowing or speeding up certain clips of film
4. because we had to allow gaps in the video where performance-based clips will be inserted, the rough cut at certain points appears to be disjointed.
Digipack
Whilst researching for designs I (Jon) came across this site (http://psdlearning.com/2008/07/cd-cover-design/) which describes in detail how to use Photoshop to design a CD cover.
As they say on the site:
This is an interesting site which asks some ppl to "visualise" music in colours and shapes. These may produce interesting graphics for the CD cover:
http://justcreativedesign.com/2008/05/10/how-to-design-a-cd-cover-by-listening-to-music/
It also linked to this site which used Photoshop again for design:
http://justcreativedesign.com/2008/05/10/how-to-design-a-cd-cover-by-listening-to-music/
Some of these tutorials are very interesting and we could make use of their suggestions to improve our graphical design for the digipack.
As they say on the site:
Some useful methods of enhancing workflow and efficiency are shown like using smart objects. The image we are creating will be in the style of some of the Ministry of Sound CD’s. We will explore a creative use of the displace filter in order to distort some of the image.
This is an interesting site which asks some ppl to "visualise" music in colours and shapes. These may produce interesting graphics for the CD cover:
http://justcreativedesign.com/2008/05/10/how-to-design-a-cd-cover-by-listening-to-music/
It also linked to this site which used Photoshop again for design:
http://justcreativedesign.com/2008/05/10/how-to-design-a-cd-cover-by-listening-to-music/
Some of these tutorials are very interesting and we could make use of their suggestions to improve our graphical design for the digipack.
Digipak
A ROUGH SKETCH BY JON OF THE A4 ADVERTISEMENT
Digipak is a trade name. Digipack is a better use. What is a digipack?
Digipacks are a type of CD packaging made out of card stock or other heavy paper/cardboard material. Digipacks can flip open like a book, or it can have three parts, so that one portion of the packaging opens to the right and one to the left, with the CD in the center portion. Usually, the portion of the digipack that hold the CD is made of plastic like a traditional jewel case CD - the plastic part is simply attached to the paper background.
Digipacks were first created by MeadWestvaco, and their product, called Digi-Pak, is trademarked. However, as the format became more popular and began to be used by more manufacturers, the generic "digipack" came to be used to describe all soft CD packaging.
Digipacks have pros and cons:
*
They look nice, and many bands and labels like to use them for aesthetic reasons. The three section digipack sleeves opens up more design options because there is more room. However, they're more expensive than traditional liner notes and jewel cases.
*
Digipacks don't crack like jewel cases do, but they will rip and eventually the paper begins to peel apart and separate.
*
The trays in digipacks break much more often then in jewel cases. There's not as much protection since the outer portion of made of paper, so the teeth that hold the CD in place crack and fall out easily.
*
When the teeth of the tray does break in a digipack, the CD falls out of the bottom of the digipack, because unlike jewel cases, there is nothing to hold it in.
*
Digipacks can be more environmentally friendly than jewel cases because they can be made of recycled paper - however, they aren't always in fact made in this way.
From:http://musicians.about.com/od/ah/g/digipacksleeve.htm
So, the design will be important to attract our target audience. We also need to think about the A4 advertisement.
Jon recalls Ed Lovelace's visit to Long Road and two of his videos that show that budget does matter.
For example, with a budget of £100, you get:
But with a budget of £40,000 you can have:
So, we must be realistic about what we can achieve.
For example, with a budget of £100, you get:
But with a budget of £40,000 you can have:
So, we must be realistic about what we can achieve.
Friday, 23 October 2009
Video of "Arcade Fire"
Jon thinks it would be a good idea to follow something along the lines of the Youtube videos "Wake Up" by The Arcade Fire:
These videos have features we might want to include:
1. part of our video will be a live performance, so the Glastonbury video may be relevant
2. we could be influenced by these videos in our style of filming, such as using different camera angles (perhaps using more than one camera, or editing to give that impression). I think we could use pan and zoom features of the camera to give us material to link together such as wide angle and close-up shots
3. the transitions also need to be obvious as they are in these videos where band members change instruments e.g. the front drummer/tambourine switching to the accordion.
These videos have features we might want to include:
1. part of our video will be a live performance, so the Glastonbury video may be relevant
2. we could be influenced by these videos in our style of filming, such as using different camera angles (perhaps using more than one camera, or editing to give that impression). I think we could use pan and zoom features of the camera to give us material to link together such as wide angle and close-up shots
3. the transitions also need to be obvious as they are in these videos where band members change instruments e.g. the front drummer/tambourine switching to the accordion.
Sunday, 18 October 2009
Rough Cut Analysis
Sadly we didn't get filming finished in one day, so we shall make a start on the editing process. Because some of the shots were badly executed eg. in one the camera bag is visible, we may have to rerun some of the shots. The editing may take some time, especially if we want to include some stills and CCTV footage. We will need to investigate if we can use CCTV footage due to (a) privacy laws and (b) copyright.
Thoughts on filming
Jon thinks that the following were problems:
1. As shots were from similar angles, there may be a lack of variation;
2. The camera batteries ran out, so we could not finish filming that day;
3. Location (CP) was quiet, so it may appear unrealistic as we wanted a busier setting;
4. As it was a bright day, we may not have created the ambiance we wished.
On the other hand:
1. Our planning worked well on the day;
2. Even though CP was quiet, this was an advantage in that we were not distracted too much by the public.
1. As shots were from similar angles, there may be a lack of variation;
2. The camera batteries ran out, so we could not finish filming that day;
3. Location (CP) was quiet, so it may appear unrealistic as we wanted a busier setting;
4. As it was a bright day, we may not have created the ambiance we wished.
On the other hand:
1. Our planning worked well on the day;
2. Even though CP was quiet, this was an advantage in that we were not distracted too much by the public.
Wednesday, 14 October 2009
The Initial Shoot
We feel we'll only need one shoot for the narrative, but after the rough cut we'll decide on whether we'll need some more shots. The group ended up choosing Thursday 15th October as the day for the initial shoot of the narrative base for the music video. This was convenient as all of the group have a large gap in timetabled lessons and can spend time at Coleridge Park doing the shoot.
We hope the day will be clear and there will be no precipitation, to help with the limitations of our shooting. We have also agreed that three of the group will wear hoodies, as discussed in the 'Props' post. Using the story board that Rob composed and the ideas and influence we have gained over our research period, we hope we can gain a variety of shots that we can use for the video. We have also been advised to take a large amount of shots to help with editing later on. In this particular bit of the video, there will be no lip syncing, so no music playing devices will be needed.
Locations- The Final Choice
After looking at both possible locations (Coleridge Park & Midsummer Common) the group decided that Coleridge Park (or CP for short) was the best available option as a location for the narrative based side of our music video. We weighed out the pros and cons of the two and saw that CP was;
1. Closer- easier to access at short notice and easier to get to on a college day.
2. Quieter- Midsummer Common (MSC) would be more busy as it is a walkway into the centre of Cambridge and a busier area would be harder to film in.
3. More suited to our needs- CP is an area more suited to the conventions and ideas behind our video.
4. More Intimate- A more intimate enviroment adds to the whole tone of the narrative.
Sunday, 11 October 2009
CCTV Idea
Jon thought that we should incorporate CCTV style clips into our music video, which would be in keeping with the tone of the video and, in a sense, the social comments we are trying to make. As a group, we decided that this would be a great idea and that it would be an interesting feature of the video.
However CCTV is, understandably, hard to obtain and hard to imitate, but we'll try to get around this using the college's camera, or, if there is any at Coleridge Park, obtain the footage from the local council.
There aren't many music video which use CCTV clips of youths in their music videos but here are some that use the idea of CCTV as a whole;
The Get Out Clause- 'Paper'
The Frames- 'Revelate'
Target Audience
It is important that the target audience is identified correctly, otherwise the video may become irrelevant to the fans of the music. Our key demographic would be;
-Mainly males,
-Late teens to early twenties,
-Rock/Alternative fans (Groups such as Feeder etc.)
-Mainly males,
-Late teens to early twenties,
-Rock/Alternative fans (Groups such as Feeder etc.)
Friday, 9 October 2009
Props
For our music video we'll need certain props of which include;
Performance Based
-Electric guitar
-Microphone
-Drums
Narrative Based
-Hoodies
-Pens for vandalism
-Lighters.
Performance Based
-Electric guitar
-Drums
Narrative Based
-Hoodies
-Pens for vandalism
-Lighters.
Thursday, 8 October 2009
Stills
As well as including performance based and narrative based footage, Jon thought that it may be possible to include still images. The song "Shark" by Ash is a fast-paced song which was why it was chosen to accompany the car racing simulation game, 'Gran Turismo 3'; the most successful car racing program to date. Therefore, to accompany our video we thought it might be useful to include stills of incidents involving cars. One of the most dynamic events in car racing indeed on our roads, is car crashes. To use their images successfully would video short video clips which may have caused copyright or plagiarism problems. However stills of the consequences of car crashes are usually in the public domain and therefore we felt that we would be able to use them with appropriate web references to their sources.
Developed Ideas
After making an attempt at a story board, the group came up with some more, developed ideas which helped get the ball rolling a bit more and give us more inspirational.
Still thinking of the Justice video and the La Haine movie, we thought of the narrative based side of the video. We began to imagine ourselves dressed up in darkish hoodies and intimidating people. Furthermore, we could actually show us surrounding and pushing a member of the public in order to match the aggressive tone of the song. This idea in particular, reminds me of the lyric in the song 'violent mind, violent mind, violent mind'.
Rob also thought that at the very start of the video we would cut from the performance to the narrative showing the three hooded lads lined up in the shot. Firstly the shot would be fairly dimmed, but within seconds it would brighten until totally white. That's when the main guitar riff will begin
He also began to envisage the cuts. He realised that the video would look a lot more professional if we cut to the narrative at a different angle each time. We also thought that it would be good if we could match the cuts to the beat of the song. But we'll decide this during the rough cut.
For more information see the 'Story Board' post.
Still thinking of the Justice video and the La Haine movie, we thought of the narrative based side of the video. We began to imagine ourselves dressed up in darkish hoodies and intimidating people. Furthermore, we could actually show us surrounding and pushing a member of the public in order to match the aggressive tone of the song. This idea in particular, reminds me of the lyric in the song 'violent mind, violent mind, violent mind'.
Rob also thought that at the very start of the video we would cut from the performance to the narrative showing the three hooded lads lined up in the shot. Firstly the shot would be fairly dimmed, but within seconds it would brighten until totally white. That's when the main guitar riff will begin
He also began to envisage the cuts. He realised that the video would look a lot more professional if we cut to the narrative at a different angle each time. We also thought that it would be good if we could match the cuts to the beat of the song. But we'll decide this during the rough cut.
For more information see the 'Story Board' post.
Location Scouting
It is important that the location for our music video is spot on. So we have gone into precise detail to get the correct locations.
We already know that we are going to use the college stage for the performance based side of our video. However the narrative based side is more complex. This is because we have to choose a location that is both going to look good in the video, stick to the conventions of the genre (i.e. locations seen in videos below) and within reach of all of the group members.
We already know that we are going to use the college stage for the performance based side of our video. However the narrative based side is more complex. This is because we have to choose a location that is both going to look good in the video, stick to the conventions of the genre (i.e. locations seen in videos below) and within reach of all of the group members.
Here are the choices;
1. Midsummer Common, Cambridge.
Midsummer Common looks as though it could be quite good in the evening time. As we learnt from a previous project, we don't have the equipment to shoot late in the day, as most of the shot was too dark and viewers couldn't make out the action. But, Midsummer Common will be well lit as there are many street lamps. This place looks like it fits to our ideas. Its within close-range of the college and will be relatively busy with people who we can ask to be in our film (to intimidate).
Influence- La Haine
Jon decided to take influence from the french feature film "La Haine". Produced in 1995 by award winning director Matthieu Kassovitz. The film shows a part of Paris which is often forgotten about- Life on the estates.
Below are a couple of clips he feels encapsulate the movie's link to the group's video;
Below are a couple of clips he feels encapsulate the movie's link to the group's video;
Friday, 2 October 2009
Mood Board
We decided that it would be good to create a mood board of all the pictures and videos and sounds related to our own ideas;
The Lyrics to Shark by Ash
Head is pounding in a daze
Bruised wrists and your body aches
If you be mine I'll be your mirror
Glide inside pull your trigger
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
I know what you wanna do
We're on the line
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
I know where you're going to
Eyes black and wide
I know where you're going to
Got a violent mind
Hedonistic, narcissistic
Erotic, nihilistic
Pupils wide gonna slide inside
Gonna blow your mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
I know what you wanna do
We're on the line
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
I know where you're going to
Eyes black and wide
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
I know what you wanna do
We're on the line
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
I know where you're going to
Eyes black and wide
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
I know where you're going to
Eyes black and wide
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
Bruised wrists and your body aches
If you be mine I'll be your mirror
Glide inside pull your trigger
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
I know what you wanna do
We're on the line
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
I know where you're going to
Eyes black and wide
I know where you're going to
Got a violent mind
Hedonistic, narcissistic
Erotic, nihilistic
Pupils wide gonna slide inside
Gonna blow your mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
I know what you wanna do
We're on the line
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
I know where you're going to
Eyes black and wide
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
Violent mind, violent mind, violent mind
I know what you wanna do
We're on the line
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
I know where you're going to
Eyes black and wide
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
I know where you're going to
Eyes black and wide
I know what you wanna do
Got a violent mind
Thursday, 1 October 2009
Related Music Videos
Post-pitch we thought of some more videos that we could look at in order to gain some more ideas. Below is a culmination of videos which mirror both the ideas we have generated so far and the style of the music and genre. We won't steal overall ideas off these videos, more aim to emulate the conventions of the genre and the pace of the cuts etc.
The first video is;
Feeder- 'Just A Day'
Blur- 'Song 2'
Our Pitch
We had to create a pitch, as a group, our ideas for what our video would portray.
We decided that our video would include;
We decided that our video would include;
- mix of performance and narrative-based footage
- performance will include close ups of instruments, dipping out of focus at times
- narrative will include a trio of intimidating male youths in hoodies, walking the streets
- whole performance in black and white
- narrative areas in colour
Inspiration
As a group we tried to think of similar videos that would match the the style of our chosen song.
Ali thought of 'Stress' by Justice;
Ali thought of 'Stress' by Justice;
He also had the ingenious idea of when on YouTube, playing our song over Justice's video. We realised that the aggression within both forms of media matched, and that this is what we would work towards.