Tuesday 10 May 2011

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

Q 4. How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?
Throughout the process of my media project I used a variety of new media technologies that helped me create, develop and research my ideas.
For my research I found the internet highly useful when exploring the music industry and theorists such as Goodwin and Dyer to ensure I had enough understanding on the music video industry as a whole, before planning my own project. Websites such as Wikipedia and Google enabled me the correct information and allowed me to research artists, find images of certain bands and also YouTube for official music videos of existing artists/bands.
What’s more, in the process of filming my media video I used a Samsung video camera with a tripod, this, although was successful in creating a low budget “gritty” video- a typical conventional of indie rock videos, could however have been improved if I could of used a HD camera.
The most significant was of course Google Blogger, this enabled me to plan record and develop all of my ideas, research and plans throughout my project.
IMovie on the Apple Macs was simple to use (from previous experience last year) therefore editing process was not time consuming, what’s more this year, through the help centre on the apple website I was able to discover new techniques on IMovie such as fast paced editing and using various transitions, this enabled a quirky individual music video that reflected the Indie rock genre successfully.
I also used my own SLR camera for the band photo shoot as this created professional photographs that I later edited for my ancillary texts which were a magazine advertisement and digipak.
I further developed these texts in Picasa editor a soft ware in which enabled me to edit the photographs by changing the contrast, adding effects and also different text fonts to create my final product.
For my final music video I was able to use imovie to create useful transitions such as cross blur to show passage of time, what's more I used many other transitions such as fade to black etc to create an interesting video, keeping to the conventions of a typical Indie Rock musi video. Furthermore, I used a black and white effect on the band performance shots of the video, this challenging typical conventions of a indie video, what's more creating a gritty band persona, alongside shots that link to the lyrics in a film grain effect representing authenticy and memories.

Evaluation Question 3: What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

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

My Main product was the music video which consisted of both narrative and band performance along with my ancillary texts which were the Digipak and Magazine advertisement. Overall I receieved positive feedback from the three products that I produced, I felt that they had a link between each other therefore to present a brand image for the band.

I tried to keep continiuty with the colour scheme of all 3 products, mainly in the magazine advert and digipak I kept a simple black, white and red scheme thus to create a band persona and a striking and prominent image- so it would stand out in magazines and also in cd stores such as Fopp and HMV. What's more the use of the striking colour red reflected the band title of "RedManRed" to have a band style and striking logo/title. The image of the band that appears on the magazine advertisement and digipak is the same setting in which the music video was filmed- again to try and link each one togther- the image of the band looking down and hiding their faces I thought created a brand image that is quite individual and, from reseach, hasn't been done before. However, in the insert I created a page that had a photograph of each of the band members individually to show the band personality to the audience and used their names to give a persona touch to the digipak. What's more the use of black and white is threaded throughout all 3 products, the balck and white was used for ther band performance part in my music video to enable an edgy style to the video which I think worked effectively. However, improvements I considered was the use of the band name in the music video, whether have the title at either the end or beginning or perhaps on the drum kit, again to promote their name and the band themselves.
In my research I found that Blondie used the same colour theme as my chosen digipak, what's more in her video "hanging on the telephone" it is set in the same background styles as her album "Parallel lines"- this very effective and linked effectively toegther.
What's more the target audience of 16-25 year old (males and females) had to be considered in the creation and construction of my products, therefore certain elements of my products had to show this particular style. For example the continiuity and style of the costumes you would most likely see in stores such as Topshop/Topman or H&M - these stores in which my target audience would most liekly shop in- therefore cross marketing products.
Overall, the combination of all three products, from feedback, worked quite effectively, the use of the continuity helped with the overall style of the band. The style of the band I also tried to show through different elements such as effects (black and white), style and costume, settings and photography, this overall created a edgy indie rock style through all three products.

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