Final CD Digipak

Final Website

http://gennyjblewis.wixsite.com/posse

Final Music Video

Evaluation Task 4 - How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Evaluation Task 4 - How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Our Script – research, planning and evaluation stages.

Genny:

During our shoot day, we used a diverse amount of technology to film out music video. Starting from the beginning we used an iPad, which was linked to the sound system in the studio, this made it easier to sync the music to the lip-syncing later on in the editing.

Megs:

We held up the screen with the song time right up to the camera lens, until a bleep signalled us to move it out the way, as the music was about to begin. This also helped the girls (artists) know they had 4 seconds until they had to start lip-syncing, it also made it a lot easier for us to edit, as it helped us know where to set the graphics so it matched the song.

Leo:

We did the majority of filming using Black Magic cameras, which are 4K professional pristine and a high quality. It has convertible lenses, so this helped us when it came to our POV shots and changed lens when it came to a static shot.

Genny:

We used digital playback, which is a convergent technology, which was connected the to TV.

Megs:

The TV that was placed right out of the way from the set was connected to the camera so the group could view what was getting filmed. Having the TV made things a lot easier due to the fact that we would not have enough time on the shoot day to re-watch our footage, so by having the TV it allowed us to see whether whatever we were shooting worked (angles etc.) and if they were going to be proficient enough to use in the final edit.

Leo:

All this digital technology used on the shoot day enabled us to make a quick transfer onto a mac computer of all our footage, so we could get editing the next day.

Megs:

We used the iPad for playback at the start of each shot to support the editing process. As we said before this made the editing a lot easier for us as we were then able to sync the clips to the audio that had been downloaded onto the mac, which was imported onto the timeline, which was made of different layers of footage.

Leo:

We then went through each clip renaming them, identifying the clip by the angle, the girl and camera style e.g. POV, this made the editing process a lot faster as we knew exactly where to look for each shot we wanted.

Genny:

We then used a razor tool, which helped us cut and shape each shot so they could match and fit with the pace and tempo of the track. Once the footage was organised onto the timeline by looking at the playback times and syncing the lip syncing of our band with the lyrics in the track, this helped the video becomes more realistic and have a good connection with most pop videos in the music industry (adheres to the conventions of a pop music video).

Genny:

Using the arrows on the keyboard to gradually move down our footage did this, and then we would find the point at, which the frequency was highest on the playback clip, at this point we would cut the footage, which was done using the blade tool, dragging the clip back along the timeline in order to get it well synced.

Leo:

Once we had finalised our final cut for our video we concentrated on colour grading. This helped us to bring out the colour and clarity of our video and match the graphics of the video to the colouring, creating a contrast.

Megs:

We used a blue LED rod for the first girl and increased the contrast, to the lighter parts on Georgia’s body so she really stood out and looked powerful. This made the video look more edgy and appealing to the audience.

Genny:

For the second girl (Eloise) we chose to have a beauty light on set whilst filming, which is a powerful bright light so her features were accentuated. This allowed us to spend less time on the editing for that section as the lighting and beauty side was already managed.

Megs:

For the illusion room (third girl Sana) we decided as a group that we should add a blue/green hint/undertone to the colouring as the original black and white colouring from the shoot day looked a bit too artificial.

Leo:

Lastly the red room (Hannah) we did not edit the colour grading, as we thought it would be too over powering and we liked the colouring from the original footage.

Genny:

Our track is a very upbeat, fast paced piece, so we decided as a group to make the shots done at a rapid pace, this makes it interesting for the audience to watch.We exported our finished cut version into a MOV file, which means it can be seen in a higher quality once uploaded to YouTube. The advantage of accessing the video via YouTube is you can see who has seen it, when, where and why people are watching our music video. We can also look at the age of our audience and this will hopefully enable us to see if we were successful and correct about our chosen target audience.

Megs:

By using the program; Adobe Premier Pro we were able to complete the online and offline process of editing in a quicker approach. During the offline process of editing we reviewed all our footage to decide, which ones could work in our final cut of our video. After separating the footage we put them into a folder we created called ‘rushes’.

Genny:

Thank you for listening and keep checking out our new posts on blogger.

Evaluation Task 4 - How did you use new media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

 As a group we discussed all the individual online technologies that we focused on/tried in our A2 year. I think the most important technology that we used in A2 was Adobe Premier Pro (editing software), as this allowed us to final combine on the shots together in a fast cut upbeat version. I have tried to used and experiment with new and more complex technologies, which may improve my campaign. More of these examples are listed on the spider diagram below:

I have then defined some of these points on the following sheets:


As this work continues will help me develop my skills of using more styles of technology and I will continue this onto my campaign so it looks more visually pleasing. Using all these different technologies has helped me link together the 3 elements in my campaign some how. 

Audience feedback - YouTube Statistics

This screenshot lets me know that our music video has been viewed 105 times between the 9th Jan - 5th Feb, however this number has increased rapidly, which will be shown in another screenshot. A large number of people viewed our video in the first couple days it was released (18th-19th December) but it is still ongoing.

This next image allows me to see where the views have come from (location). The majority of views have been from the UK, which is something that did not come as a surprise to me at all as the production of the video was in english and was uploaded by the school onto the Hurtwood account, also the girls in our video were all from the UK. 

This screenshot helps me see the 'average view duration', which is shown as 1:01, this means at this time the average viewer turns it off, this did not come as a surprise as you get moved onto this music video after seeing the previous one, which means people turn it off within the first couple seconds. Our video has been watched all the way through, which means we are successful however i get worried that people may have got bored after a while, which is why the average watching duration is 1:01. 

This statistic shows me that the ratio from female to male that have watched this music video is very close to almost exactly equal. This shocked our group because we thought the views for our video would me dominated by females, as it symbolises girl power and empowered women, so we did not ever thing the reading would show the two genders being equal. 

The music video's shown target market is 18-24 years as that is the majority of people who have viewed according to the YouTube statistics.

Evaluation Task 3 - What have I learnt from my audience feedback?

Evaluation Task 3 - audience feedback (focus group)

This is a video from our audience feedback session. From this focus group we were able to collect information, positive and negative comments on our whole campaign (music video, website and digipak). We decided to choose this selection of people as they fitted into our target audience, which we found out after looking at our YouTube statistics. 

Evaluation Task 3 - previous feedback.

Marketing has a huge impact on your campaign and part of getting your marketing on the right track is knowing who your target audience is. You want to know who your selling the products to and how to attract this type of audience so they will invest money into watching the artist/band. We have done a couple audience feedback videos to help us discover our target audience as we needed to know who to aim our campaign at and what appeals that specific audience. Overall we were trying to create something that the ages 16-30 would enjoy and mainly girls as it is a very girl powering group.


This whole discussion began when we started by pitching our ideas to the creative director Luke at Hurtwood. He helped us with our concept and gave us feedback on what aspects of our idea could work and what wouldn't work. After this meeting our views on things changed and we changed our idea completely but keeping the same song. So when we came up with our final pitch idea we ran it past Luke and he gave us very helpful feedback and ideas to make our idea even better, which we took on board and are aspects in our final video. So we pushed through with this final idea and started to think about everything we needed in preparation and who are target audience would be, which helped shape our music video and know how to attract the wanted audience.





Once we had the whole concept of our video we made an animatic and to take our research one step further we asked our peers to help us with some feedback on the animatic, also this helped us get a specific reaction from our age target audience as our peers are age ranging from 16-19.



Overall i think by collecting all this information and people giving us feedback etc. it has really helped us develop our idea and help us work out our target audience. I think we chose a good range of different people to comment on our idea and video to help us and by talking/pitching to Luke help us get to grips with everything and making sure we reached our target audience. So in conclusion all the feedback has been very useful and allowed us to know exactly what to do to appeal to the bands target audience.

Evaluation Task 2 - Voice over showing how well our music video links with our campaign

This video is showing a how effective our product (music video) was and how it works with our website and CD Digipack. We had to think about how these three products related to the star image we were going for and how well the unique selling point was getting portrayed to the audience.

During my research I looked into Philip Kotler's definition of marketing "Human activity directed at satisfying needs and wants through exchange processes". As i say in the video this means thats the selling of products and services to the audience and enabling them to buy into the star image and this consists of the four variables (the 4 P's) price, place, product and promotion.

Evaluation task 1 - (part 4)

Looking at our website for POSSE it adheres to the conventions of a noise pop style website. The website we produce reaches out to 15-30 year olds and is directed more at females rather than males however it does appeal to male demographic. We decided to use bright colours so the name was memorable to the audience, which helps promote the bands name and builds the girl power vibe. We decided to use a lion for the image for the home page because it represents 'king' (king of the jungle). As a group we looked at similar websites that are of the same style and has similar conventions, so we found Autolux. 

Me and Genny found a music artists website 'Sara and Tegan' and it had similar uses of colour in our website and theirs, they focus on the dark blue colour. The font in also very similar, they are both bold and clear, which we need for a new upcoming band where their name is not as circulated/global. Both pictures have images of the artist/artists for part of the websites backgrounds. These similarities show that our website adheres to a pop music websites conventions.

In contrast to this there are some websites that have the same genre that have a completely different style of websites. An example that we found was Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber are in the same genre of music styles however they have completely different styles. Miley's website has conformed to the conventions of pop by using bright colours/childish, bold and clear writing. However Miley has created her own unique image to fit her controversial look, so the images she uses for her website connect well with her style. Normally websites contain beauty shots where the artists looking high fashion and pose, so fans can aspire to be like them (gaining more fans). An example of this would be Little Mix seen below compared to Miley's website home page.

Evaluation task 1 (part 3) - In what ways does your media product use,develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

I have been searching the conventions of CD digipaks and how they are used as a way to promote the artist/band, i have particularly picked up on that most of the media use techniques and expectable forms to communicate a specific impression. Digipaks add some sort of value to the artist/band and it also inspires fans to buy something that has a bit more information on it about that artist/band and it is seen as a modern take on CD packaging.

For our bands CD digipak I wanted it to mirror their star image of 'girl power', being creative and 'out there', which is why as a group we decided not to go for an image of the girls as we wanted to keep it alternative and different, we think this might intrigue the audience not knowing exactly what they will get, but for the fans they will be excited to see the new piece of artwork created each time. I think this will really excel their USP as a all girl women powered group and this is what i really wanted to focus on. Some people might say that this is unconventional as we are not selling their physical image, although i think this works well for our group and i think this idea will entice the audience.

Although looking at our artwork it is unconventional as it does not have the band represented on the front of the album cover, there are a lot of artists/bands who have followed the same idea, making ours not as unconventional as expected. Comparing our digipak with the Rolling Stones CD cover, they are very similar in the artwork as that is where we took inspiration, however we made it a lot more feminine to fit the conventions of our artists.


Our front cover for the digipak:

Our group wanted something that was eye-catching and bold for the inside cover, so went for something original, having zebra print overlaid with a female body on top, which was created by Genny on Photoshop. The body promotes girl power and femininity however the zebra shows a more edgy/punk side of the music. I think this adheres to the conventions of pop/edgy album artwork.

The inside left side:






















The inside right side:

The right side also follows the theme of girl power having the girl sign in the right hand corner, this adheres to a pop video by using bright colours and female features, for example the use of stars and the pink girl power sign, this is so it will appeal to a female audience.














As a group we decided to keep the back page simple and get right back to the point and getting the man of the band out their and making it memorable, again it fits into the conventions of a pop music digipak, by using bright colours and bold text.

Back side:

Evaluation task 1 (part 1) - Introduction

For my music video we followed the conventions of 'girl power' 4 strong women who dominate a man, this would not be classified as a stereotypical pop video. A convention is a way that something is already done 'the normal'. Our video adhered to a pop video in the sense that there was a lot of lip syncing and and quirky shots and ideas. For our website we wanted to portray a alternative vibe, as the four girls are very different from other artists so we wanted to represent this on the website and this will also reflect onto the CD digipak, so we have had to work on artwork that shows of the band whilst not showing their faces. The overall performance of this video was the four girls trying to allure the man into their own different worlds, which is very unconventional. For this evaluation question i am going to compare my music video, website and CD digipak to other professional music videos, websites and digipaks and look at how they adhere to similar conventions or are completely different.

Evaluation Task 1 (part 2) - In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

The editing process

What is editing?

Editing is part of the creative post-production process of making a digital video. Normally a digital video editor works with raw material/footage, choosing shots and cutting them into sequences to create a well put together music video (pop promo).

Process:

Our initial result for the video was for it to be fast cut and frantic involving the use of PVO shots as possible and going through/changing rooms. This process should confidently allow for good group work and to produce something that looks professional. I think with the shots we have chosen we have created something very eye grabbing and interesting to watch. 

The first week of editing was slow getting together all the shots in the correct order and sorting them into sections. Me and Genny did all the editing throughout this process and Mingyu worked on assets for the website. Editing is quite frustrating at times when you are not sure what shot to use next, however it is always good when i had Genny there as it was easy to confer with her and decide on shots. Having each other to jump off each other made our music video better as we kept coming up with new ideas how to edit. 

Editing consisted of looking back through our footage and separating them into different files, collecting all the different girls shots into different folders. While we picked out the best shots we started to rename them as we went through, so it was easier to identify the footage, so we were to try and find a piece of footage we would know which one to cut from. There were two factors to renaming the file: Primarily it is the characters name (E for Eloise). Secondly the camera angle (wide, mid, close up or POV).The timeline in used to lay out all the chosen shots and help the producer to connect shots together syncing them with the music. This is done by looking at the playback video shot on the footage and matching it with the time on the timeline.

During our editing and filming we have used different conventions for example the lip syncing also the performance of our actors, which helps the audience identify the story line easier. As usual we used the program Adobe Premier Pro, which was helpful as we already knew how to habit the software already due to the making of our thrillers last year. We didn't want to rush this process so we concentrated on the quality of each cut as we wanted to develop the detail of the video and this method worked really well. We used the cutting tool so we were able to cut footage into smaller parts making editing a lot easier, helping us choosing the perfect shot we wanted to use, if it only be a second worth. 

We had to really think about the sequence and order of the shots as the continuity of each setting leading into the next had to be perfect. We knew the order from the shoot day as we had to get footage form one room leading into another. Because our music video revolved a lot around lip syncing of the four girls this means there was an added weight on our shoulders because of the level of attention we had to give when editing that it was all in sync with the music. When editing i made sure i made a duplicate of the first ever cut i made, so if anything happened of if something needed to be changed it was easier to access and it also means that nothing could be lost throughout the whole process.

By the end of the editing process me and Genny decided that we could add some more beauty moments in from each girl, i think this just added another element of girl power etc. Then right at the end we looked at the width of the screen and narrowed it taking some off the bottom and top, I think this just added the finishing touch to the video.