Before diving straight into planning our actual coursework, plenty of research was done to discover what was initally expected when looking at our chosen music genre, which was Indie Rock.
I analysed multiple music videos, advert posters and digi packs of successful Indie Rock bands, such as Noah and The Whale, The Wombats, The Ordinary Boys and Phoenix. When analysing these texts I thought deeply about the codes and conventions used which defined it's genre to the audience. From looking at elements such as mise en scene, costume, props, body language etc.
When looking at Noah and The Whale, as well as other Indie bands, we noticed that the genre appeared to be dominated by white middle class males, which dressed quite formally and were quite unusual. There use of props were quite interesting also...
This type of vintage feel came across in other videos that I analysed such as The Vaccines
We used this vintage-like feel in our own video, however, we developed it so that the change of effect in the shot made it clear to the audience that it was a moment from the past tense.
When looking at the positioning of the band members, we looked into ways in which we could position our own band members, and looked also into the positioning of the characters featured in the music video.
Here we used the ideas proposed by other indie bands and placed our band so that our audience had a clear understanding and recognition of the band members, similar to the view in The Vaccines. Also the views of our characters featured in our music video were similar to those of the shots used in The Vaccines.
However, the lighting used in our video was brighter compared to The Vaccines due to our music being slightly more upbeat, connoting realism.
From researching multiple music videos, we realised that in one particular video, the band members were individually shot with their instrument, communicating their passion for music.
We chose to do the same for our music video.
And also for our Digi Pack.
This helps to express the feelings that the band members have towards music and how they have a passion for it.
Music Video Planning and Research
Storyboarding
By storyboarding the storyline of our music video it made it easier to picture how the video would come together, what props we would need, and the kind of camera shots we were aiming for. After recording multiple sections of raw footage we got the shots we wanted when looking back on the storyboard.
Poster
When looking at poster adverts, I analysed ones from indie bands such as The Wombats,
When looking into the construction of our music poster, we firstly looked into the codes and conventions used in bands' posters of the same genre. We noticed that they were quite quirky and unusual. This gave us inspiration for our own music poster.
We spent a lot of time drafting our advert before we came to the final product.
When designing our music poster, took into account the 'quirkiness' which was communicated trough many examples which we looked at such as The Wombats.
We used the same font from the digi pack, therefore maintaining continuity, and the album cover is presented also, so that there is clear distinction of the band being advertised.
The cubes were used to make the poster look playful and quirky, much like our audience (which we discovered from our audience research).
Digi Pack
When designing our digi pack, we looked into multiple artists designs for inspiration.
When looked at other bands such as The Ordinary Boys and The Vaccines although they are similar genres, the codes and conventions of their media texts are quite different.
The Vaccines are quite abstract and would be deemed rather 'Indie' whereas The Ordinary Boys is rather simple yet refreshing. This gave us options for our own digi pack design.
It look a lot of planning fro us to come to our final idea for our digipack.
when looking at the album cover of our digi pack compared to album covers of other artists, we decided to have a washing line theme because we thought that this unusual image would attract our target audience, due to some other artists of the same genre using unusual images due to this creating an enigma.
Looking through the rest of our digi pack, we displayed the band equally, unlike The Ordinary Boys, due to the way Preston, the lead singer of the band being brought to the front showing authority over the other band members. We decided to make the band all equally and representing them as the same.
HOW DID YOU USE MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES IN THE CONSTRUCTION AND RESEARCH, PLANNING AND EVALUATION STAGES?
Use of Technology
In research
Microsoft Word was extremely helpful in the planning stages of our coursework. We used this program when pulling together the shooting schedule, so that everyone was up to date in the planning.
You Tube was highly useful due to it enabled me to access music videos of other artist of the same genre and compare codes and conventions and indicate ideas for our own coursework.
Google also enabled me to analyse the print products of bands of the same genre, also helping create ideas from their products which helped influence mine.
Unsigned.com was where we found our unsigned band. This website was definately helpful due to us having to use a band which were unsigned, we did have to filter the artists to find a band which we believed fitted the genre we were aiming for.
In construction
iMovie was used religiously throughout the construction of our coursework, multiple techniques were useful in the making of our coursework.
When we needed to speed up certain clips of our raw footage, iMovie gave us the oppurtunity to do this with ease, and the edited footage was still of high quality. We decided to speed up some clips of our raw footage because we believed it kept to the upbeat pace of the song we chose in our music video and it helped the target audience in understanding the relationships between characters featured in our video.
Placing our chosen song was quite easy and straight forward, we were even able to edit the music clip ourselves, enabling us to remove long intros etc, making it fit our footage easier. The way in which iMovie links with iTunes was definitely beneficial due to us being capable of transferring music from different programs.
(clip of Brad)
It can be quite difficult choosing the exact shots that we wanted to use in our coursework however, iMovie made it possible by simply selecting the shots we wanted and were able to view it in detail.
(clip of James drumming)
The cropping tool in iMovie made it easy for us to convert a long shot into a close up with minimal changes to the quality of the shot, therefore rather than having to record the same shot again at a closer angle we were able to simply crop the shot which definitely saved us a lot of time.
We were capable of changing the video effect using iMovie, this was extremely helpful due to us being able to connote the preferred meaning to some of our shots, by using a slightly dated video effect, this immediately showed the audience that this specific shot was in the past tense, therefore making the video more understandable to the audience.
In production
Throughout the whole planning, research and consturuction processes, one program helped immensley and that was Blogger.
Blogger was extremely useful throughout our coursework because we were able to display our work electronically, meaning that it was almost impossible to misplace any work. It was also very useful within our group because it helped us compare which pieces of work went in what order.
We were capable of displaying our Pie Charts of analysis of our questionnaire easily.
And our drafts of our Digi Pack.
The internet was also useful in helping us to find the right institution for our music video.
WHAT HAVE YOU LEARNED FROM YOUR AUDIENCE FEEDBACK?
Evaluation of Music Video
Positive Comments:
· The band setting up is effective.
· The fast cuts of Leah on the blocks are effective as it keeps up with the tempo.
· Singer in front of screen makes it clear there is a narrative.
· Change from singer to Amy is clear.
· Really good job, easy to understand genre, great narrative.
· Great concept, music video was engaging.
· Profiling shots of the band at the beginning help audience.
Negative comments:
· In some ways, the narrative is confusing; some audience members found it difficult to establish the relationship between Amy and Leah.
· Possible change to the order of the ending. Maybe consider not showing the band at the end, because they feel that the video is more effective finishing on Leah.
· Dinner scene is unclear- again what is the connection between Leah and Amy.
Overall, positive comments, with a few criticisms that we have tried to address, in order to create a successful video.
From our audience feedback we realised that the link between the band member Leah and the character of the storyline Amy was not clear to the audience and created confusion.
Therefore we decided to look back on our editing and realised that we could have put in transitions between shots of Amy and Leah, this therefore connoted a relationship to the audience making a clearer understanding for our audience.
(video example of transitions)
From our audience feedback we realised that the link between the band member Leah and the character of the storyline Amy was not clear to the audience and created confusion.
Therefore we decided to look back on our editing and realised that we could have put in transitions between shots of Amy and Leah, this therefore connoted a relationship to the audience making a clearer understanding for our audience.
(video example of transitions)
HOW EFFECTIVE IS THE COMBINATION OF YOUR MAIN PRODUCT AND ANCILLARY TEXTS?
We have attempted to maintain continuity throughout our three products by keeping certain features of mise en scene similar. For example, our lead singer is dressed in an outfit of a woolly jumper, a printed t-shirt and a skirt, we have done this to help the audience make useful connections between all three media products.
Another example of this is where we have used setting to connect all three products, for example we have used outside backgrounds to reinforce the ideology of freedom and freewill. We have kept the band members in the poster and the album cover without introducing the narrative characters so that we have a well rounded package which minimalises confusion. However the design of our poster is quite original by using the cube design, this is not used in any of our other products because it is quite quirky and unusual.
Overall from looking at other real media products of the same genre, we have used some codes and conventions which we thought were useful in communicating our genre, from looking into real media products it helped us to identify what main elements our coursework would be dependent on, such as costume, props and setting. By looking at real media products for our planning we were capable of combining what we believed to be the strongest codes and conventions in order to give a full interpretation of our belief of the Indie Rock genre.
Leah, you have some good ideas here but it does need reworking. Your discusion of technology is not a list of what you used rather it's what you used, how you used it, what you found and the impact it has had on your process and final product. You need to go through all stages starting with research, planning and production. It feels a little brief. It also is a little chaotic and it's hard to work out which section is linked to which question. I like your discussion of genre and the comparison you make between your products and the ones fro you research. I need to see a more focused discussion of what you LEARNED from audience feedback it shouldn't be 'here is our audience feedback. You have the basics here Leah spend a little time tidying it up and adding the detail you need to secure a level 4.
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