Evaluation 4 - Melissa preston

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

The construction of my music video was based around using the Canon DSLR EOS 650D. The DSLR enabled me to use different settings on the camera such as using the focus lenses in order for me to have high quality footage. Furthermore, the skills I learnt from using the Canon meant that I could use a variation of shots such as panning and extreme close ups.

make action GIFs like this at MakeaGif

Using the rule of thrids in my music video enabled me to to position the object or person in a different place on the image. An example of this is is when the artist is singing by red metal railings.

When I was putting together the two print products, I used the same camera as I did for the music video. The DSLR enabled me to have high quality and focused stills, which I went on to editing in the post production process.

These are the two final print products

For the research part of this process,  I used the software Quicktime and photobooth in order to capture footage for my audience research, focus groups and also the editing process of the two print products.

  I also used the software Final Cut Pro X to edit the videos i took on the different software in order for me to post them onto YouTube.

 


I used FinalCutPro X to also edit my main music video. With this software i was able to add in different effects and transitions such as fade away to make my music video 'Don't worry About me' look professional. Using different tools on this software like the blade tool and making the footages faster slower also made my music video  and the visuals look effective.

To edit my magazine advert and digpak, i used adobe photoshop. This software allowed me to explore different tools which would change the gradient of my image, the brightness and other features. I was also able to add in different images which i got from the internet such as the iTunes sign and barcode which would ultimately make my magazine advert look professional.

make action GIFs like this at MakeaGif

As you can see, this picture in the gif is different to my final magazine advert and this is because i experimented with different images but i couldn't  get a good gradient on this specific image. But it shows an idea f how i edited the final one.





Moreover, the final digipak and the original image used for the digipak are different.

I changed the colour of the picture from coloured to black and white, edited in a brick wall which i got from goole and cropped out the red bar and metal shutter.

In this process of creating my music video and two print products i created a mood board on a word document and an animatic.

For my evaluations, i used a multiple of softwares. i used powerpoint, Blogger, a GIF website, Youtube, and Soundcloud.

Blogger was used often during the whole process, i noted all the steps i made. Blogger was the main platform i used in order to produce and share my power points and voice notes to my group. I was able to easily produce posts with my group and also on my own.

Evaluation 3 - Melissa Preston

What have you leant from your audience feedback?

Focus Group:
My group and i started of with showing different songs to our focus group of ideas for the music video.

We then went onto to getting feedback on our rough cut.



... then the first cut for our final music video product.




This was feedback we got from our magazine advert.



... and our digipak

Evaluation 2 - Melissa Preston

Evaluation 2 from melissapreston

Typography:
 I used the same font style for all of my three products. Using the Arial font for all the text in all three products meant that the products could easily be linked together, also known as creating synergy. The reason for this, which was decided during the planning stage, was so that the combination of my main product and ancillary texts worked effectively well. moreover, the need for synergy is vital in order to create a realistic product/products. In order to catch the audiences attention, it was key to have the main text, in this case was the artist 'Arkitect' in bold or in a bigger sized font. This was done throughout all the texts and this promotes the artist, as well as distinguishing him/them.

How does each product develop each other?
 The lyric 'Don't worry about me' is the song title of the music video I produced. however, it appears on all print products too. the lyric appears frequently just like it does in the chorus of the song. 'Don't worry about me' recognisable to the audience because it is not only very catchy but it is on the ancillary texts. this therefore is a great selling point and advertising campaign. Using social media as a platform also helps in distinguishing and collecting together all media products and how they develop on to the next.

Evaluation 1 - Melissa Preston

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

Goodwin's theories:

-Include close up shots of artists as it will allow them to be established and shown to the audience/viewers.

-There should be a relationship between the song and visuals.

- the music video should include characteristics of the specific genre, for example our genre is Grime so there would be a focus on boys, cigarettes and props such as hats and side bags.

Coventions of the grime genre:

Mise-en-scene

costume and props-

Artists in the Grime genre usually dress casual, whether it is artists dressed in tracksuits or jeans, trainers and neutral colours such as black and white with side bags or hats, Examples of artists which develop the forms and conventions of costume within the grime genre are:

Chipmunk-

He is a grime/rapper artist and in the pictures below he is wearing a grey jumper with a hat and side bag.

Another example of chipmunk dressing casually is this picture.

                                              

Teenagers wear the brand Adidas a lot, and other brands such as Nike and North Face, we got inspiration from chip for our music video, mainly for the costume.

Skeptais another artist, in the picture below it shows him wearing a side bag and hat.

Focusing on the picture above of the costumes and props, our music video has similarities and they are shown below.

This Gif show the characters in our music video conforming to the costume and props within the Grime genre as the gif shows black clothing, side bags and branded clothing of North Face which teenagers wear and this links in with our target audience.

The gif below shows a car, this is a main prop in many grime genre music videos, like Lethal Bizzle Rari WorkOut ft. JME & Tempa T

...this gave us the idea of using a car to create a more realistic video.

Lighting:
we filmed in both day and night time, and because of this the lighting changed the quality of the shots.

This gif shows some footage of our music video that was filmed in the light compared to the gift below where it was filmed in the dark. we used LED lights so that the quality was better and also so that you could see the characters.

Location:

The locations our group used to film our music video conform to the generic conventions of a grime music video. we got inspiration and ideas from many artists, but also the artist of the song we used, Arkitect - Don't Worry About Me ft. T Dollars & Yung Zedz.

We filmed in carpark in Ealing and we got inspiration from this part of 'Don't worry
about me' by Architect.
The locations we chose to shoot at use the conventions of the grime genre in our music video.

we also filmed down an alley way and little street nearby and on a high street. These are all typical locations used in a grime music video.

Ancillary Texts:

This is our final digipak.

Digipak examples:

          

Digipak from melissapreston100

Our final magazine advert.

Before we chose our final digipak, we had two options. this was the other magazine advert we were thinking about using.

The reason why we didn't use this advert was because of the lighting. we created the magazine adverts in PhotoShop but couldn't find the right edit for the lighting. In addition, the colour of the text didn't fit the advert.

Magazine advert examples:

                                                                      

Magazine advert from melissapreston100

Evaluation Question 4 (Pio George)

Raw footage from the Canon DSLR EOS 650d camera:



Editing Music video using - Final Cut Pro:




Editing Magazine advert using - Final Cut Pro:

Evaluation Question 3 - (Pio George)

Initial Ideas Focus group video:





Audience Feedback for rough cut:





Audience Feedback for Final cut:







Audience Feedback for Magazine Advert:








Audience Feedback for Digipak:

Evaluation Question 2 - (Pio George)

Evaluation Question 1 - (Pio George)

Music Video  

Costume

For our groups music video, we adhered to the conventions of grime. As most grime music videos artists wear hoodies, jackets, trainers and jeans, and the colours of these clothes are usually in darker colours such as black or dark blue. I though our group should adhere this principle, examples of these costumes are in the music video by Stromzy called 'SCARY.'

          Dark green hoodie:                                                                                                                  

            Black jacket:


In my groups music video, we used mainstream and casual clothing that sticks to the conventions of grime. Types of clothing we used are hoodies, jackets, jeans and trainers.

Examples in my music video:

Trainers: normal foot-ware worn by artists in grime music videos


Character is wearing a black hoodie, this is seen in most grime videos


Jacket is a North Face jacket, trendy and casual.



Props
My initial ideas for props were watches, cars, headsets, pouches, bags and mainstream and casual clothing etc. These prop ideas conforms to the conventions of the grime genre. In the music video my group and I able to put some of these ideas into place, we could have included more items but due to our groups time restriction our options were limited.

Phones

The phone is used to show Goodwin’s factor on the relationship between the lyrics and the visuals, as the main characters lyric “got ‘em on the phone n I said T wuss hapinin,” after this it switches to another character on the phone answering the main character. The phone allows the audience to see that this is a youth who is fully engrossed in the technological age, allowing most audiences to relate as many people have mobile phones.  It is shown to be the main and most important form of communication in today’s time. An example of phones used in grime music video is ‘Pick Up The Phone’ by Belly Squad x Abra Cadabra and another example is Krept & Konan’s ‘My Story’ music video.

Example of phones in our groups music video:

 

Example from real media texts:              Example from real media texts:            
Krept & Konan -‘My Story’                     Belly Squad x Abra Cadabra - Pick Up The Phone

          

Cars and Police cars/vans

My group and I for some scenes used a car, as most grime music videos features cars. The car was not an important prop, but I felt that the use of a car ensures our music video conforms to grime conventions and it was the perfect prop to use in a carpark. The car used in the video creates a sense of realism as the audience sees that the car belongs to the characters, audiences with cars are able to relate with the characters. Furthermore, the car used is a normal and affordable car instead of an expensive car like a Lamborghini, adding more realism to our music video. 

The police car and police van were used in the music video for the audience to get a feel that there is potential criminal activity in this area. It also has the effect of making the audience think that the characters in the music video may be involved in criminal activity, even if the video does not show the characters undertaking criminal acts.

Cigarettes

My group and I decided to include a scene with a character smoking a cigarette to create more realism. As it shows it is normal for the characters to smoke in their lives. Real grime media texts do show smoking scenes and by using this in our groups music video it shows that our work is the same as a professionally made media texts. 

Pouches and bags

The pouches and bags used in the music video are seen in most grime music videos. Grime artists use pouches as a display or to ‘show off’ but it is also used to carry small handheld possessions such as headphones. In today’s society, it is seen as a very convenient tool among today’s young adults and as it is used by artists in grime music videos, pouches are even more appealing for young adults to be able to mimic their favourite artist. Also, the bags used in most grime music videos are trendy and mainstream type bags. These bags are also designer bags with logos such as Nike or Adidas, which young adults are also able to mimic. Uses of bags is seen in Wiley Ft Devlin’s – ‘Bring Them All’ and a pouch is used in Stormzys song - ‘SHUT UP’

Pouches and bags in me and my groups music video:
 

Examples of pouches and bags in real media texts:
Stormzy - 'SHUT            Wiley Ft Devlin – ‘Bring Them All’ :
UP': (Pouch used)            (Bag used)
 

Gun

My group and I decided we would use the gun at the end of the music video to portray the main character being killed. The usage of the gun emphasis the danger that lurks around the lives of most grime artists, this type of danger and violence is seen with rap artists. The sound of a gunshot is in the track as a gunshot can be heard at the end of the audio footage, which was very convenient for me and my group. As my group and I felt that it was appropriate to show a visual of the gun being pointed at the main character and then the scene cuts to black with the sound of a gunshot following shortly after, rather than showing visual footage of the character being shot which would be considered as too explicit for some audiences. This makes the ending less explicit and adds mystery and ambiguity which I feel the audience will find interesting.  Most grime music videos do not use guns, but it effectively shows the danger and violence in the music video and the gun contradicts a line of the lyric which is, ‘Don’t worry about me.’ The gun contradicts it as the character says ‘Don’t worry about me’ repeatedly throughout the video but at the end the character is killed. Examples of violence with guns is shown in Krept & Konan – Dunya. 

Example of a gun used in the music video:


Example of guns used in Krept & Konan – Dunya:


Location

Using previous research, me and my group knew that we needed to use an urban location for our music video. We believe it would give the music video more realism and our product is the same as real grime music videos. Furthermore, I felt that it would give the audience a sense of realism as audiences will be able to relate to the similar environment in our music video. 

The location my group and I decided to film at is Ealing. Ealing was the perfect location to film as it as an urban area filled with locations that fits in with the conventions of grime. A few locations we filmed at are Ealing Car Park, block of flats for domestic scenes, Ealing Council building and alleyways.

1) Ealing Car Park 

Location shot:

Examples of car park scenes in the music video:

2) Block of flats - for domestic scene

Examples of domestic scenes in the music video:





3) Ealing Council Building

Location shot:

Examples of scenes taken outside Ealing Council building:





4) Alleyways

Examples of alleyway scenes:






Narrative

In most grime music videos, the artists show experiences of their past. These experiences could be about friends, family, childhood events or even traumatic events. Personally, I wanted our groups music video to lean towards a story type narrative so that the music video would have a bigger impact on the audience. The music video begins with the main character and his friends have a brief altercation with two characters, then it has numerous scenes in a variety of locations, this was done to show a depiction of the characters day and how it progresses into the main character death at the hands of the two characters seen before.

Beginning of the music video:



End of the music video:



The main source of inspiration for the story narrative is from the grime music video Krept & Konan - 'Dunya.' In 'Dunya' the music video starts of with an introduction scene with the characters talking to each other, next there is an altercation with the police and then the music starts. Our music video is similar to a real media product and this will attract more audiences, as our product is similar to a professionally made music video.

Krept & Konan - 'Dunya.' :
Opening:


Altercation:




Camera Work

1) Tracking shot:




2) Close up shots




3) Low angle shots




4) Eye level shot:





5) Mid-shot:




6) Long Shot:





7) Group Shot:



8) Pan:




9) Two Shot:



Editing

During the editing stage, I used the editing software 'Final Cut Pro' on the apple iMacs to edit my groups music video.

    

1) Slow-motion effect:
The slow motion effect is used to slow down a particular scene to highlight its importance.
E.g. The phone call scene


2) Reverse Clip effect:
The reverse clip is something that is unique and we thought it would work well in out music video


3) Fast motion effect:
The fast motion effect was used near to the end of the music video



4) Image Stabilization:
Image stabilization was used to stabilize a shaky scenes so that the scene will be less shaky and is clear.

5) Flash:
The flash is used to indicate a change to another scene/location.




Ancillary texts

Magazine advert:

Digipak: