Note to Moderator

Dear Moderator,

This is my A2 Media Blog where i kept record of my progress throughout the year, i hope you enjoy your visit as much as i enjoyed putting it together throughout the year.

Kind Regards,
Neil.

Music Video

Final Ancillary Products

I wanted to stick to three main colours; Black, White and The brownish colour.
I tried to keep it simple, with just one picture on each slide (except front cover) because i believe the simplicity is affective and works well.
I Kept the same font style all the way through (Hobo) reason for the font is that the artist is a kid (Teenager) and i believe the font appeals to the age of the artist.

I did come across trouble when finding a disc tray to put in, so in the end i attempted to make on and i inserted that instead. (google was no help, nor was the downloaded templates)

Overall i am pleased with my Ancillary Products.

Evaluation Question 1.

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

(before reading i would like to add i had a issue with TubeChop, most of the time it works, sometimes i didnt play, you may need to refresh.)

Camera angle element.



In this TubeChop i show the camera angle i was looking for in my final product, a disoriented look, but staying concentrated on the main character in the shot. I believe the disoriented look went well with the lyrics and the original music video of the artist Kid Cudi, shown below.



I believe i managed to pull off the disorient look in my final product.



In fact my music video got comments from classmates asking if i did it with green screen, how i kept the camera still the whole time and the background moving. I copied the camera angle throughout the bloc party video onto my music video, however they would have used professional equipment to keep the camera steady whereas I used a tripod and made each person hold it. I wanted to keep this element throughout to keep a linear continuity to the music video.



Clothing & Representation of my Character.

As the lyrics of the song is in the genre of hip-hop i wanted to incorporate the clothing style and representation of hip-hop into my cast, however Kid Cudi's style is Urban hip-hop clothes such as hoodies and jeans, and seeing as you only see above the shoulders in my music video it was hard to try incorporate clothing into the music video.



Above is what i believe Kid Cudi's style is and below is how i have linked from kid cudi's style into my characters.

 

For myself (above) i went for the urban/indie look that Kid Cudi wears with a chequered shirt.

For Chris (above) i went for the leather that Kid Cudi wears with a grungy urban top underneath to link with the urban wear that Kid Cudi wears.

 As Lotte (above) & Hannah (below) are both female it was hard to think how they could dress representing hip hop and urban clothing styles. Lotte went with a blue puff body warmer, which has became very popular in fashion, it would be wrong to say that only hip-hop/urban styles wear them because they have became mainstream again.

For Hannah, i tried to go with a chequered style again that Kid Cudi wears.

With George (above)  i asked him to wear a polo shirt inside a plain hoodie preferably dark, luckily he had a black hoodie with white roped tassels around the hood, this links well with the type of hoodie Kid Cudi wears mostly. Similar to the attached image.

Ancillary Products.

When it came to my digipak i researched and analysed a few current digipaks available already. Evidence of this shown below.

I chose the above albums to research because they are personal favourites of mine. In addition i believe that its good to have good knowledge of Kid Cudi's previous albums and albums of the same genre.

I then went on to analyse three of the above albums. They are shown below.

I then picked from the three analysed albums which i liked the most and would fit my artist and genre or music, in result i chose to favour Example's cover 'Won't Go Quietly', i really liked the multiple pictures window pane look and wanted to use this element on my album cover. I believe my album cover challenges Examples convention of that.

Below, to the left is my album cover, and to the right is Example's professionally made album cover.

When it came to looking at a poster for my digipak i research Kid Cudi posters and other hip-hop posters.

And from those three above that i liked, i decided i only wanted to take some elements from them; such as, how its only the artist in the poster and the name of the artist, so i decided i wanted those elements in my poster. In addition i also liked the simplicity of the posters, not a huge variety of colours and simple text. I believe that simplicity works better and stands out more, plus i think it works with the music video and digipak well.

Evaluation Question 2

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

Click Image to Enlarge

This video links with the change of faces, noted in the bottom right of the image above.

Evaluation Question 3

3. What have you learned from your Audience feedback?

Click Images to Enlarge

My Audience profile

Some screen grabs as evidence of feedback.

Draft Video Feedback.

I thought about doing stop motion to start my music video. However i gave myself some thought and  received some feedback on the idea and decided not to, i didn't think it fitted with the action within the music video. I also asked my family and friends whether i should include it or not and they agreed that it wouldn't go well. The friends feedback was reliable because they are at the ages between my target audience.

From receiving constructive feedback i chose to change the whole concept of my first music video idea. Reason for this is that the action and narrative storyline was not going along with the music and not working.

From my numberous amount of feedback i have recieved a variety of positives and negatives.

Even though i did and do not expect views from Germany i thought i would show that some viewers were restricted access to my music video.

Above is the comments i got on my video on youtube. I believe the viewer who comments "You deserve more views" is saying that the video is good. I also got three thumbs up which is better than zero thumbs up. So from the little feedback i got via YouTube, i believe it is positive feedback.

The Image above is my statistics on YouTube of my music video views.

From that image we can see that the video was most popular within the UK, USA and Canada, which is understandable as the lyrics are english. In addition, from the image we can see that Male viewers aged 13-17 viewed the video, which is close to my target market, just shy of three more years.

Evaluation Question 4.

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

With technology advancing daily, media is given the opportunity to spread across the world even more. I used a variety of media technology to construct, research, plan and evaluate my music video.

In the Research and Planning stages i gathered most information via the Internet.

Google has helped me with my research and planning by getting  background information on such things as Kid Cudi, Hip hop, lyrics to the song of my choice, representation of kid cudi and hip hop and most importantly current media surrounding music videos, digipaks and posters.

Blogger allowed be to store information such as my blog, posts and videos etc. After using Blogger in my AS media year i was fairly comfortable using it so i came across no issues during my time, however i learnt a lot more this year.

I used TubeChop to chop scenes out of media videos that i found useful, such as elements from a music video i may like to use. In addition i also used TubeChop to cut my own music video down and post it on my Blog.

I used Wikipedia to research my artist Kid Cudi and his style and genre of music. Wikipedia was very helpful in that task as a good reliable way of reseach.

I used Facebook to communicate with my characters involved in my music video, i was able to message them to try and make and keep to a schedule of filming. I also used Facebook to tell the characters what they will need to be wearing when filming.

I used Twitter as a sort of 'Artist Profile' for my created Artist. On Twitter i kept fans up to date with what was happening such as, when i was filming the music video and when it was going to be released.

I also used Twitter to contact the record label of Kid Cudi to ask permission to use his song. (attached)

I was fairly new to Twitter at this point so i was unsure how it worked, however as the year progressed i have became very familiar with its service.

Animoto became very popular with myself and my classmates this year, it was a online service that allowed us to put images, text and audio into a video that you could then embed to my blog which became useful to show text in a different concept. Animoto was fairly simple of upload and drag and drop, which made the process quick and easy. 

I used Microsoft Word to type up draft copies of work i was going to post onto my Blog, i found this helpful as i could see a clear view of what i was saying before posting. In addition i also used Microsoft Word for a copy and paste structure, similar to Paint. I could take the research i retrieved online and copy it onto work and modify it and then copy it and paste to Paint where i then saved it and uploaded it.

Sony Vegas Movie Studio was my editing software, i chose to use this software because i can became familiar with it in the past, however i did still come across obstacles, for example when the software crashed i would have to go back and re-edit some bits, which was very time consuming.

This Toshiba laptop was the facility to be able to complete such things as blogging, editing, research and planning etc. I found it useful to use my own hardware and software because i was familiar with them and meant i could use them out of school time. I had no issues when using my own hardware.

I used this Sony HD camera to film my music video and draft music video, i found them very reliable this time in comparison to my AS work last year, perhaps this was because i tried to keep to the same camera throughout because i gotten used to it and knew how it worked and its weakness. Last year on my AS work i edited on the school Apple Macs, which i had trouble with, i found them simple and unreliable hence why i chose to edit on my own Toshiba Laptop, this came with some difficulties because it meant i needed more wires to be able to get the video footage from the video camera onto my laptop, after the first three or so times it became second nature.

I used my brothers Lumix HD Camera to do the task of taking pictures in my photo shoot. This camera is possibly my favourite media technology i used, reason for this is because i learnt so much during the experience and believe the qaulity of the iamges to be outstanding. I did ask my brother for some help at the start for some settings but after that i was able to take pictures for myself with the settings i wanted. It was only after i had filmed my music video i noticed i could of filmed the music video with this camera which would have benefited me even more because its hardware within my household and is HD with a variety of settings.

I used the school Tripod to complete filming and photo shooting tasks, i used the tripod to keep stability within the picture/motion picture. I found the tripod useful because i could adjust the height and angle of the camera shot, which became more useful during the draft music video and the photo shoot for my digipak and poster.

My iPod Touche at the time was very helpful to get the lyrics and song rememberd, it allowed me and the characters listen to the song whilst filming via the portable speakers (attached image). I was also able to use Apps from the iTunes App Store to access Twitter and Facebook to keep in contact with people.

When i got my iPhone 4, similar to the iPod Touch i was able to used the iTunes App store to access Twitter and Facebook to keep in touch with characters, fans and record labels. I also got a slim opportunity to contact people via text, however i got my iPhone late to the ancillary products so by the time i got my iPhone i was basically finished.

I used my Blackberry Curve to keep in contact with people to schedule filming and keep the knowing what was happening. The Blackberry also had access to the internet so i was able to access Twitter and Facebook which became and advantage for the Blackberry. I also used one of Blackberry's own feature called 'Blackberry Messenger', this allowed be to communicate with people/characters via the messenger which is similar to instant messaging.
I also used my Blackberry to text people about my ancillary products.

I used the common program 'Paint' as a copy and paste surface to store or resize images whilst i did other activities. I used Paint to save images and put them onto evaluation question three, of the characters. I have been using paint most of my life so i did not come across any issue whilst using it.

Photoshop was possibly my biggest fear of the stage for my ancillary products, reason being that i have little expereince with Adobe Photoshop and was not a confident user, however this soon changed after trial and improvement with my Digipak and Posters, i believe i am still a novice user but with more knowledge about how it works than before.