CANDIDATE INFORMATION

CANDIDATE NAME 
 JESSICA CHURCH

CANDIDATE NUMBER 
 6015

CENTRE NAME 
WILMINGTON GRAMMAR SCHOOL FOR GIRLS

CENTRE NUMBER 
61119

FINAL MAGAZINE ADVERT

MAGAZINE ADVERT:

FINAL DIGI PAK

CD DIGI-PAK

FRONT COVER:

INSIDE COVER:

 BACK COVER:

CD DISK:

BEHIND CD COVER:

SPINE OF ALBUM:

FINAL CUT

This is our finished music video:

Evaluation Question 4

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

Using new technologies throughout my work in media has been quite difficult to understand at some points as I have had to teach myself how to use many of the tools and ask other members of my class with programs such as Photo Shop and In Design - during the construction stages. I realized that by experimenting with my work and using different effects regularly I have been able to develop my understanding of the programs whilst helping other people in my class and group.

When filming our video as a group we had to use a video camera provided by the school which none of us had ever used before. At first we found it difficult as when we thought we were filming we were not and vice versa, however, after realizing this we quickly discovered that we needed to check after each few shots to make sure that we were actually recording. We also used a digital DSLR camera whilst filming to take photo evidence of our work which we found easy as we had all experienced using a digital camera when creating our coursework last year.

 During my coursework it has become exceedingly difficult at some points to use Blogger, as the videos and pictures take a while to upload and sometimes I found that my work was not being saved properly. I over came this problem by double checking continuously that my work was properly saved and that I had a back up of all of the videos and pictures on a memory stick to be sure that no work was lost during the blogging and posting of my coursework.

 During my evaluations I found it difficult to come to a quick understanding of how to use new media presenting products in such a short space of time. I would have liked to use a bigger variety in my work however, the tools and presentation methods I wanted to use required a signing up fee which I did not feel was necessary when completing my work. Overall, I feel that I have learnt how to use many different technologies whilst producing my coursework and I feel that as a group we have created good products which could be comparable to those in real media marketing.

Evaluation Question 2

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

In the presentation above I conveyed how we have compared our main product and ancillary texts. In my opinion I feel that the combination is very effective and in our feed back from our target audience the main thing commented on to do with the ancillary and main tasks being comparable was the colour scheme and the way in which Alice looks exactly the same in all of the products. We researched specifically the links between real media product video's, their album covers and the magazine adverts promoting them. We focused specifically on the colour schemes, layout and posing of the artist by looking at artists such as Adele and Rihanna we were able to base our own ideas around the one's from real media products.

We kept the font the same throughout both ancillary products all except from the 'A' on the front cover of the album which we did separate font research for and each decided that it was most suitable in our opinions for the final cover. It has been commented on that this was not to some people's favour, however as a group we have looked back at our research and decided that this was the best way to portray the layout and font that we wanted, the colour also is the only bright colour used on the album which we felt was effective as it is eye-catching to our target audience and stands out on the cover.

Overall, I feel that all of our main products link together as our main focus throughout the whole project was to keep strong continuity as we thought this was the most important factor when creating and promoting a product which could be sold in real media marketing.

Evaluation Question 3

What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

Before I could answer this question I needed to obtain some feedback from our final products.

Magazine Advert:

I have uploaded a picture of our magazine advert onto twitter and tagged the other members of my group in the post to allow our followers to comment on our work. Lauren re-tweeted my message to allow her followers to comment on my post as well. The comments we received were useful and encouraging as they liked the product and felt that having a picture of our other ancillary task on the advert helped continuity with the song. They also liked the colours used which was a success.

CD Cover:

I have used an instant message app on my phone called 'WhatsApp' to ask my friends opinions on the CD cover and disk. The comments were good and they liked the overall product. The majority of the comments were focused on the colour scheme which we based around our research and so this was very rewarding knowing that we had made the right decisions during our planning stages.

I also used text messaging to send a photograph of the final CD cover and disk to my friends to get their opinions on our work. This was really useful and I received some good comments on the work we have produced. 

From this feed back I have been told that the covers work well together and the colours are useful within the presentation. The consistency of our products was something that we focused on intensely as we wanted our products to have strong continuity, as then they would look professional and link to real media products. By only having one photo shoot we were aware that we needed Alice to do as many facial expressions and movements as possible so that we had a wide variety of images to choose from. This has allowed us to have continuity throughout our work again. 

Music Video:

We will be posting our final video onto YouTube so that it is accessible for anybody to watch. I have recently asked family members and close friends to watch the music video and give us some feedback. These were the main points I received from the feed back:

                                                        

I have also recorded some opinions of our music video, I made sure that the people I videoed were in our target audience:

Ashleigh Cusack:

Louisa Hurrell:

From this feedback I have become more aware of how our actresses acting was impacting our video. We were aware of this problem throughout filming as Alice kept looking into the camera during filming, however we tried to over come this by using short shots to focus more on her facial expressions and emotions rather than her acting skills.

Our video was successful from the point that viewers also noticed that Alice had the same clothing on in both ancillary tasks and the music video as this promotes strong continuity. I have also noticed that our products, the music video especially, links more towards females in our target audience of young people rather than males, this has worked to our advantage however as we attend an all girls school we were able to ask girls for their feedback as they were more understanding of the problems Alice faced during the video.

One individual also commented on the way in which in the ancillary tasks we used the same styles of shots however with different make up. I was glad that somebody noticed this as we planned before the photo shoot to have Alice in the same poses however after the initial few shots we changed her make up and during the video her make up changes and we wanted this effect in our ancillary tasks to reflect this as the music video we created was the main single song on the whole album.

As a group we discussed during the production of the video whether or not to put some scenes in black and white as it would link to some of our specific research, however we felt that this was not necessary because the video was set over one day rather than when we first planned it to be over a few days and so we did not have a long time ellipses in our video and we did not need to use the effect of black and white to portray the change in time to our target audience. We also felt after the production that the quality of the camera was not as good as it could have been, however due to our limitations with time and money we were unable to change this. In my own opinion I feel that the video could have been perceived better by our target audience if the camera quality was better, it would also be easier to compare to real media products as we would not have this factor in the way - we could just focus on different angles and shots. 

To conclude, I feel that we have had mostly positive feedback from our target audience and that we as a group are content with our final products despite some technical issues to do with camera quality which we could not control.

Evaluation Question 1

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

Editing the music video

The editing of our music video was the most crucial aspect to our coursework and so we needed to be sure that it went accordingly and linked back directly to our planning. The first thing to that needed to be edited was the actual music itself as we did not need to use the whole file. This was done by using a 'Fading' technique. We used this to build tension in our music video and this also gave us continuity as we used this effect at the beginning and the end of our music video. By using a pan and establishing shot at the beginning of our music video it allows the situation to be introduced to the audience and our main character is evident from the outset.

To make our work load more manageable we decided to name each individual shot we achieved to ensure that we did not miss any important shots.

As we were planning to put a separate music file behind our edited shots it was important that each shot we placed in Serif Movie X3 had the sound behind it removed. This meant that the music file we chose to use would be the only file heard.

Becoming familiar with using Serif Movie X3 allowed us to play around and experiment with the shots we have gained in order to improve our overall video. By slowing down the pace of some of the shots we were able to focus more attention on certain aspects of our video. We did this with the close up shots mostly as this focused attention on Alice's movements and decisions, such as having a slowed pace close up of the pills which Alice swallows, as this is a climaxing part of out music video. Slowing down the pace of some shots also improved the quality of our filming as the occasional shakes from us holding the camera were diminished which allowed the video the appear more professional. We used this effect throughout the video to gain suspense and tension.

Throughout the video we used either sharp cuts or cross fades as these are quick paced which link to the beat of our chosen song. The most successful cross fades are those which go from the starting shot to black and then to the following shot and this improves our overall continuity. We used this transition shot during the video between Alice being in the bathroom to her sitting on the bench waiting for her friend; continuity is clear here as the transitions link to the transitions in our locations.

As well as enabling us to change from scene to scene, using the cross fade technique allows us to create successful transitions from shot to shot in the same scene, such as when Alice is looking at her reflection in the mirror we wanted to allow the audience to see this in many different angles. We also used this when Alice steps into the bath as at first the audience can see a side shot of Alice and this cross fades to a mid shot and birds eye view.

These are some more screen shots which convey our use of the cross fade technique:

As our song choice focuses highly on Alice's fast paced decision making based on her turbulent emotions we felt it was necessary to produce a music video with fast paced cuts to different shots of Alice's face which convey her emotions. By allowing our shots to move quickly we can create tension within our music video and link it directly to the lyrics in our video. Quick cutting shots presents Alice as frustrated and a build up of urgency links well with our video and we felt that this would work well in our final product. 

One of our main problems during filming was the effect of using natural light within our video. As we did not have enough lightening equipment to produce a completely professional video we had to rely on the natural light entering the bathroom and re shoot thoroughly to make sure that the shots conveyed continuity. The screen shot below portrays a shot which was far too bright compared to the rest of our video:

In order to overcome this issue without re shooting the shot again we decided to experiment with some lighting effects on the shot to match them to the rest of the  video. By using a 'half an half grey scale effect' we were able to dim the lighting in this shot which allowed the shot to look similar to the rest we had previously filmed. 

This effect was extremely successful as by using 'half and half' we were able to match the shot to the rest of the scene and the use of effects was not obvious to the audience.

This effect has allowed us to convert the majority of our scenes to the same colour as external factors such as the sun going behind the clouds in our bench scene meant that it was near impossible for all of our shots to be exactly the same brightness. Due to the colours outside being varied compared to the bathroom we had to use another effect called 'brightness and control' on these shots to allow them to all look the same.

Instead of decreasing the brightness we decided to increase the contrast function which worked better. This can be seen in the shot below when Alice tries to hold Jessie's hand, this is a focal point in our video and so this shot needed to be good. By increasing the contrast to 20 we were able to adjust the natural lighting to one which worked best for our video, giving us a successful result. 

By linking all of our shots together it enabled us to create a good quality video, as if one section of our video did not flow with the rest it would evoke confusion from our target audience. By cutting from scene to scene in different locations such as the class room and bathroom scene we asked Alice to do the same movements with her hands in her hair to allow the audience to become aware of her distress and the actions conveyed continuity throughout our work.

By using quick cutting towards the end of the video we were able to focus the attention of the video on Alice's face and her inner emotions. By linking all of the scenes together at the end of the video we are conveying the story in a fast paced way to show how Alice's emotions has stayed the same throughout the whole of the video, we did this by cross fading and cutting each shot quickly.

Learning to use Serif Movie X3 has allowed us to create a successful, in our opinion, music video. Using several editing techniques which have been displayed in the above post has allowed us to understand the production element to real media products and appreciate the dedication it takes to create music videos.

Detailed Timeline of Music Video

After changing our final idea we decided to make a more detailed story board / time line so that we were sure of which shots to use in our overall video. We did this by naming each shot and planning where we wanted it to be in the overall video. This will guide us into making the best music video possible with our shots:

This was our first rough plan of timing:

We then went on to create an in detail timeline of each minute of our music video, including which angle shots we should use and in what order.

 this is the first minute:

The second minute: 

The third minute / ending:

This in depth planning has allowed the production of our final music video to run smoothly as we were already aware of which shots to use. We feel this was a good step in making sure that our video explained the story line as best as it could.

Filming New Ideas 3

This was our final filming slot in which we gained all of the shots we needed to create the music video to the best of our ability. We re-shot the basis of the whole video again however focused intensely on some problem areas which were affected by natural lighting, such as the bathroom and bench scene. 

bathroom scene:

Close up of Alice looking in the mirror:

Mirror shot of Alice putting on make up:

Tilted angle of Alice putting on make up:

Close up shot of tablets and Alice picking them up:

Close up of Alice putting on make up:

Worms eye view of Alice at the sink:

Pan shot of bathroom:

Close ups of Alice's face:

Behind shot of Alice at the mirror:

Alice's perception:

Experimenting with lighting:

Side mirror shot:

worms eye view of Alice about to take pills:

We then went on to film the friend/bench scene again as previously during filming the natural lighting from the sun was not continuous and so this caused us to have to re shoot:

These three shots are of Jessie comforting Alice:

These two shots are close ups and mid shots of Alice waiting:

These three shots convey Alice's perception as Jessie turns up:

These are two birds eye view shots of Alice touching Jessie's hand:

This is a close up shot of Alice's face when she tells Jessie she loves her:

This shot conveys Alice waiting for Jessie:

These two shots convey Jessie's perception:

We used different angles of Alice holding Jessie's hand, so that we were sure of which one we wanted to use:

We have now finished filming and will go on to edit the whole music video with these new shots which will hopefully be more successful. By re-shooting the majority of the video again we as a group feel more confident when deciding which shots we need to use in order for our product to look professional and comparable to real media products. By having the same shot in a variety of angles we are able to convey the story thoroughly whilst portraying our skills of how to use media technologies when making a product.