Thursday 26 March 2015
Tuesday 24 March 2015
Evaluation - Part 2
How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?
To make this part of my evaluation more visually pleasing, I decided to record my answer and use a green screen to show my main product and ancillary texts as I discuss them. This is something new we learnt to do this year, which I find interesting to use for analysing texts.
Green Screen Recording:
Script:
I wanted to have consistency between my
main product of the music video and ancillary texts of the digipak and poster,
with the main focus to be the artist and her distinctive style. To do
this I used the same setting of the drama studio, costume of the black lace
flowy dress, and make-up with bold red lips for the three different pieces.
I used bright white lights to create a spotlight against the black
background and framed my artist in the centre to make her the focus of the
pieces, almost acting as a halo around her.
I emphasised the vintage costume and
make-up further by editing the products, using the 'interview' filter on Bullet
Looks for my main product, and using a tutorial I found on YouTube to create a
vintage effect on Photoshop for my ancillary texts. This costume, make-up
and editing conveys the unique elements of my artist, which is a convention of
the indie/pop genre.
To continue with this vintage image of my
artist, I initially chose fonts similar to a typewriter for my ancillary texts.
However, they looked out of place against the bold images of my artist,
and I decided to change this and use a simpler font. I chose a serif font
and spaced out the letters, which seemed more professional and added to the
unique aspects of my artist. I made the font white to contrast against
the black background, which meant it was more legible.
I originally intended to have various
images such as Polaroid photos and a map and images of London for the inside
panels of my digipak, yet changed this to single images of my artist. I
did this as she is intended to be a new emerging artist and the focus should be
on her to promote and sell her image, relating to Goodwin's theory.
For my CD designs, I edited the CDs to
look like vinyls to link with the vintage elements of my artist's image.
I placed an image of my artist in the middle of both of these CDs,
similar to vinyls I had researched, which was the same image placed on the
panels behind the CDs. The fact I included two CDs instead of just one
also gave my digipak extra content, emphasising the special collector's item
idea of this ancillary text as well as the individuality of my artist, which
would mean more sales for my artist.
Posters advertising albums often feature
the front cover of the album as the main image, or an image of the artist with
a smaller image of the album cover. I
opted for the second of these choices, continuing with the bold single image of
my artist and placing an image of the album cover in the bottom right hand
corner, as people tend to read left to right.
I also used the same font, attempting again to link the ancillary texts. To further promote the artist, I included
social media logos of Facebook, Twitter and Instagram like on the digipak. This makes her accessible on more than one
platform, particularly with younger people in their teens and twenties who are
familiar with this technology, which are my target audience.
Overall, I think my main product and
ancillary texts link together well. They all convey clear conventions of
my indie/pop genre, mainly due to the setting, costume and make-up. There is also significant focus on the artist
and her image, which reinforces Goodwin’s theory. I think they communicate key aspects of
conventions of the type of ancillary texts they are, such as the digipak with
different panels that link and extra material to make it more of a collector’s
item. Due to all of these factors, I
think my media product and ancillary texts would be very successful with my
target audience.
Evaluation - Part 1
In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
When creating my music artist, I
wanted them to be a female pop artist, as they are well received within
mainstream music and I thought having a solo artist would make production
easier due to having to rely on less people.
After researching into the pop genre, I realised that it was very broad
and included sub-genres, such as indie/pop and pop/rock. I wanted my artist to appear more unique and
artistic than most pop artists do, therefore researched into artists such as
Florence and the Machine, Lana Del Rey and Kyla La Grange. These three artists fit into the indie/pop
sub-genre and are similar to what I had originally wanted my artist to be like,
therefore I chose to focus on this sub-genre.
After this initial research, I looked
further into the indie/pop genre and style.
I found, like mainstream pop, that the main focus is on the artist’s
image, particularly their costume and make-up.
However, unlike mainstream pop, indie/pop artists appear to be more
artistic and quirky. This is conveyed
through their clothing, which tends to be vintage inspired or quite eccentric,
such as wearing long flowy dresses like Florence Welch from Florence and the
Machine. This is a huge contrast to the
mainstream pop conventions, which has a focus on fashion of a different
type. This tends to include brighter and
more colourful clothing, which can also be quite revealing at times. For these reasons, I chose costumes from
stores that are associated with these indie/pop conventions and are considered quirkier
and more ‘indie’, such as Urban Outfitters.
Taking these conventions into
consideration, I began to create my own music artist. At first I struggled with naming my artist,
as the existing artists I researched all had unique and artistic names, such as
Lana Del Rey and Kyla La Grange. I
eventually decided on ‘Deedee & The Darkside’, as I thought this was
similar to the style of existing artist names like Florence + The Machine and
Marina and the Diamonds, but also sounded original and quite unusual,
particularly with the spelling of ‘Deedee’.
I decided my primary target audience would be females aged 15-25 to fit
with the young image of my artist, making her music more relatable.
I conveyed this sense further
through the narrative within my main product of the music video, which featured
the storyline of love, specifically a relationship ending, which is
stereotypically associated with females and the pop genre.
I cast a girl the same age as my artist to again fit with this target audience
age. However, a significant part of the
music video is performance based, featuring my artist. The main product of the music video and
ancillary texts of the digipak and poster focus on the artist and her style, making
her a selling point, therefore I included shots of her from various angles and
photographs in different poses. This
relates to Goodwin’s theory of promoting and selling the artist’s image.
I intended to match the visuals
of my music video to the pace of my song.
The song I chose was ‘Dog Days Are Over’ by Florence + The Machine,
which changes pace frequently but is overall quite energetic. I chose to shoot stylized long takes of my
artist’s performance for the slow beginning and bridge. I shot this in a studio with bright lighting,
a typical indie/pop music video setting for performance pieces. However, this studio was black in comparison
to white studios usually used, which suited the artistic look of my artist
better. The title and lyrics of my song
are quite obscure, allowing for many interpretations of the meaning, therefore
giving me creative freedom when drafting ideas.
However, I kept to the indie/pop conventions of the setting of a park
for my narrative. This also meant it was
easier during production as it was a public place and I was not restricted with
obtaining permission to film. Despite
this, shooting was sometimes difficult due to unsuitable weather conditions and
trying to avoid having people in the background of shots.
My idea was to show a girl
reminiscing over and then moving forward from a past relationship. I included shots of her holding and looking
at items relating to romance, such as flowers, a heart teddy and heart balloon,
as well as photos of her and a boy on her phone. I filmed these shots on overcast days in the
park and I filmed the rest of the footage of her throwing and dropping the
items while she ran on sunny days, using pathetic fallacy to convey the sense
of her moving forward. These brighter
shots were shown when the song appears to pick up pace slightly, after a
dramatic pause in which I included no footage. I also featured the notion of looking, an element of Goodwin's theory, during some of my narrative as the girl looks through photographs on her phone.
Fashion is a key part of an
artist’s image and they often have more than one outfit in music videos,
therefore I tried to follow this idea.
My artist had a few different costumes to show this convention, each
with a different purpose. My first
costume, used for my music video, digipak and poster, was a black full length
sheer lace dress. I used this as I felt
it was the most striking and conveyed her unique style well. I shot the beginning half of the performance
using this, as I felt this half was more dramatic and heartfelt, and the
boldness of the outfit helped show this.
I also included slow motion shots of the artist spinning and dancing in
this outfit as an intertextual reference to the original music video for the
song, which worked well due to the flowy and eccentric look of the dress. The second costume was a black top with a
floral maxi skirt, as florals are often associated with the indie/pop
genre. I kept this costume solely for
the footage of my artist clapping in time with the song, linking with Goodwin’s
theory of relating the music and visuals.
I tried to emphasise the change within the song when it seems to pick up
pace by including shots of my artist wearing yet another costume, clothes that
were much lighter such as a kimono, which is again quite quirky. My artist also moved and danced more when
miming this second half of the song to convey the cathartic feeling of it. In addition, during the final energetic
chorus I overlaid the footage of my artist in the lighter costume with the
footage of the floral maxi skirt costume as she clapped to further convey this
powerful mood.
Overall, I definitely feel my
media products use forms and conventions of real media products, as I have
drawn a lot of inspiration for my music video, digipak and poster from
researching existing examples of these pieces.
I have also attempted to include theorists within my work, such as
Goodwin’s analysis of music videos, as well as common conventions of my
indie/pop genre, such as costume and setting.
Monday 23 March 2015
Evaluation Planning
I decided to plan my evaluation by breaking down the questions into simpler versions and adding notes for what to include when answering each one.
Sunday 22 March 2015
Saturday 21 March 2015
Filming/Editing #7
To finalise my music video, I tidied up any cuts, made sure everything was in sync, and corrected any colouring or filters.
I also laid over footage of the end part of my performance in the lighter costume with footage of me clapping while framed in various positions. I think it was successful in the build up to the end of the song and the final energetic chorus as there is a lot happening visually.
I also laid over footage of the end part of my performance in the lighter costume with footage of me clapping while framed in various positions. I think it was successful in the build up to the end of the song and the final energetic chorus as there is a lot happening visually.
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