1) In what ways does your media product use,
develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
The first point of Goodwin’s theory is a great basis for evaluating
whether my product uses, develops and challenges the conventions of real media
products as examples of how I have challenged and used conventions of my genre
will be interwoven.
- Music videos demonstrate genre characteristics (e.g. stage performance in metal video, dance routine for boy/girl band).
The genre of my media product is
Pop. The following characteristics are typical of
the pop music genre:
- an aim of appealing to a general audience, rather than to a particular sub-culture or ideology
- an emphasis on craftsmanship rather than formal "artistic" qualities
- an emphasis on recording, production, and technology, over live performance
- a tendency to reflect existing trends rather than progressive trends and developments
- much pop music is intended to encourage dancing, or it uses dance- oriented beats or rhythms
Although not a typical dance pop song, Rumour Has It does appeal to
a general audience as it has a universal message of not letting a break up get
you down. Being about a universal subject (relationships) it automatically eliminates the chance of only attracting a niche or sub-culture therefore appealing to a general audience.
The second convention I have used in quite a substantial way as I
have employed a lot of difficult and impressive techniques that can be seen as
an emphasis on craftsmanship over formal qualities. Techniques such as green
screen and picture-in-picture tools I believe qualify as advanced
craftsmanship.
As you can see in my final video there is no evidence of live performance.
The reason I decided on this is that although it is a convention for some older
forms of pop videos (such as Beatles, Queen, Prince) and some rocker genres,
the story and plot of the song was more important so by showing the audience
the ex boyfriend, the new girlfriend and the relationship between all of them.
I felt that had priority over the element of live performance as it detracts
from the plot.
The message of female empowerment is an existing trend that has
been emphasized heavily over the past 10 years in music from artist such as
Beyonc, Madonna and Britney so reflecting that trend conformed to the
conventions that there is tendency to reflect existing trends over progressive
trends and developments.
2)
How effective is the combination
of your main product and ancillary texts?
Creating a music video, cd pack and magazine advertisement/poster
allowed for me to create a strong identity or brand for my artist. All three of
these aspects have equal weighting in and they all support each other in
creating the image I wanted for my artist- Amy.
In creating a brand and identity it was important to be consistent
throughout all three areas (main project, CD pack and poster). So to keep this
consistency I decided on a colour scheme (mainly reds) on all three projects as
you can see from the examples shown.
The reason I chose red with black font is because it is vibrant
enough to show that my lead is independent and strong but still shows a sensual
and “sexy” image therefore appealing to the female and male audiences. I
believe it goes perfectly with Amy's playful image, yet is also quite bold and
easy to read.
This continuity also has the effect of making anything Amy Watkins-related
is instantly identifiable through the font and colour scheme alone, thus
strengthening her identity further.
I used specific lyrics from the song Rumour Has It on the
digi-pack to continue this idea of female empowerment. The lyrics say “Rumour
has it he’s the one I’m leaving you for” promoting the major message, the name
of the song and showing a flirty and fun image of Amy that I wanted to portray.
3) What have you learned from your audience
feedback?
The audience feedback that I have collected regarding my video,
cd-pack and poster have all been very helpful when coming to this stage of
evaluation.
My artist Amy Watkins is aimed at a general audience but two
demographics in particular:
1. Females between 16-35 years old. The younger generation would
see amy as an aspirational figure as they are of similar age to my artist and
the older generation would see her as inspirational taking the message “if she
can do it at her age, I can do it at mine” idea to next level.
2. Males (mainly teenage) around 15-25years old. These boys
would be the right age to have an aspirational crush on Amy, but also to
realistically want to be with her when they get a bit older. This is audience
is captured by the flirtatious cd-pack and poster shots which show Amy in full
make up and with the title Rumour Has It, it entices the audience to want to
know more. What is the rumour?
I targeted this demographic mainly because it was the age range
that I had most accessibility to. Therefore I was able to really focus on our
target market and gets lots of valuable feedback.
I organized screenings for small focus groups of people to see
their reaction and specifically what parts of the video they liked the most as
this will hint as to what that demographic is most interested in seeing.
Here are a few examples from each demographic of feedback I
received:
From a female teenager (aged 15):
"Amy's Rumour Has It video is really great as not only is the song really great to relate to but I could see my self in Amy's shoes. The green screen effects and when the moving pictures of Amy in different colours was really effective and looked a lot like recent professional videos where artists are using new and wacky effects to make the video more interesting. However my favourite aspect of the video was how the cuts worked so well with the video. The way James edited the video shows his knowledge of every beat of the song is spot on and to have that musical understanding of the song I think was key to making the video look so good!"
From a male adult (aged 21):
"This video is great for numerous reasons. Firstly, Amy is a great actress and really understood the message and portrayed the image of a independent woman really well. The use of her face worked so well and allowed some shots to be simple but her acting allowed the shot to be interesting. Although some of the lip syncing could have sharper the cuts in time with drum beat were epic and the visual effects such as green screen and layering Amy over the other girl and the guy worked really well. The only real negative I have is that there were some repetitive shots of Amy like in the chorus. However the song itself is repetitive and Amy's looks and acting ability kept me interested!"
Main things I learned
from audience feedback:
- technical aspects such as green screen and picture-in-picture are impressive shots but anything too repetitive may overwhelm or bore the viewer.
- with a great actress simple shots can work really well. For example a shot that many viewers loved was the shot of just Amy in black and white as they thought it was a nice contrast to the quick jump cuts previously.
- Lip syncing needs to be sharper and shouldn't be sacrificed just for a "good looking shot". The vocals and lyrics are the most important thing.
4) How did
you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and
evaluation stages?
Over this course I have been exposed to a lot of new technology and I have been taught skills that have resulted in me creating a music video that I believe is impressive and would have been impossible if I hadn't got to grips with technology that was completely foreign to me at the start of this 2 year course. Having not done GCSE media editing was something I had never done before however there was some technologies that i was familiar with but I was able to expand my knowledge of those forms and explore them in greater details.
Of course, filming a music video would be impossible without a camera but the camera I used to shoot my video with had technologies that could match professional standards in the industry.
Tripod:
Even though the camera that we used had great free-hand control, a tripod was required for some shots as it allowed me to shoot some ultrastable shots that would have been impossible without it. Also having a few stationary shots allowed me to cary the pace of the video as some of the cuts (with the music) are quite quick so to having fast moving footage on top of that would have been overwhelming so the tripod was essential.
Editing Suite:
All of my editing was done using an Apple Mac computer with the programs iMovie and Final Cut Express. I used this technology for my AS work as well however this project required a lot more complex techniques and tools as the demand for shots and edits was greater than for a thriller opening sequence.
I only used green screen very briefly in my AS project but for this project I wanted to use it a lot more but not in a typically conventional way. The most conventional use of the green screen in my video is the shot of Amy on a black background as that it is just an moving image of Amy over-layed on to a still black image as shown below.
However I also used the green screen in more inventive and original ways such as using an moving image of Amy and Jason but removing all the red and green pigment in the shot allowing purely there dark outlines to be projected onto a moving image of Amy lip-syncing in the background as shown below.
However I also used the green screen in more inventive and original ways such as using an moving image of Amy and Jason but removing all the red and green pigment in the shot allowing purely there dark outlines to be projected onto a moving image of Amy lip-syncing in the background as shown below.
Blogger:
Blogger has been a vital piece of technology throughout all phases of this course as it is where I have documented all my research, planning and also where my final presentation of my work will be viewed. Its a piece of technology that is familiar but my knowledge of this technology has been expanded vastly.
Youtube:
Finally, Youtube has provided an easy and most importantly free platform upon which to present my music video. It allowed me to show the video not only to a potentially unlimited audience but also use it is as very quick and easy link from pretty much any social networking site which my demographic is very familiar with. It was also very useful when researching other music videos in the early stages of the project and see what techniques (green screen) I could incorporate into my video.
