Final Blog Post

I quite enjoyed this coursework, a lot more than I thought I would. Even though I'm still not taken to the idea of being in my music video and being the face of the main products, it was a good and fun experience. Thank you to all the teachers who helped out during this coursework (especially Rebecca and Mary) and I would like to thank Micky and Trevor also. I happy this is over, so I get to relax a little bit and No more Blogging!!

Final review post

In comparison to my AS blog I have done a lot more work and in a lot more detail. I was more laid back in AS and that meant I missed out a lot of blogs and it wasn't to a good standard and not all that I had to do was on the blog. This year I took on a new attitude towards my work as I saw the error in my ways. One thing I have done well is used more and a wider range of technology as I didn't know much in AS about good sites to use to present my work and how to properly use technology. My research, planning and production blogs are quite detailed. There are a few gaps in my work but i think I have the most important blogs that I need up and in terms of individual blogs, i have a few not too many but that's just down to me and my POOR time management.If I had another chance to do this, I'd spend a little more time blogging and plan my time better so that my blogs were better and also more detailed planning and I'd take more advantage at the research stage.

Evaluation Question 3

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

Music Video

Research

At this stage the main sites that I used were Youtube, Vimeo, Google. I used the Google search engine to gain greater understanding and more information about the theories than what I learnt in class. Youtube was use to look at videos which linked to the theories and to gain ideas from existing music videos to use in my own. I also used Vimeo to look at previous student work in the same way.
Planning

Animatic: The animatic was a good way to structure the music video so we'd know which type of shots would be used at a certain point of the song and also the mise en scene and camerawork.We didn't use actual images for the animatic but hand drawn images (courtesy of Anthony).
Digital Storyboard (Quark): We used images to create a storyboard with details of the types of shots, location and camerawork.

 










Construction
Camera (+ memory cards): We had the opportunity of working with professional, state of the art JVC camera's provided by the media department. This piece of technology was very important in the construction of our music video as if we did not have them we wouldn't have been able to make our music video. We used them to film our footage for our music video at the Barbican. At first, most of our footage were normal shots and cutaways instead of base tracks but after we realised we shot quite a few base tracks. All of this footage saved onto the memory cards and later transferred and saved onto our hard drives.

Sony still camera and Flip Cam: These 2 technologies were used mainly for behind the scenes to provide visual evidence of our filming sessions and how they went and what we actually did on the days we went out to film.

Final cut pro: We used Final Cut pro during the editing process of the music video. The footage that we shot using the cameras was transferred onto final cut and we went through and chose the shots we wanted and that looked the best. We had base tracks as well as cutaways and they were both used to create a sequence and cut accordingly to add structure to the music video and put the right shots in the right place.  When placed onto the sequence they were layered in the style of base track editing.We also used final cut for colour correction to bring out our make up and jewellery and we added slow motion to some sections of our music video.

Ancillary products

Research
Google search engine: This is the main way I researched digipaks and advertisements to gain ideas for my own and to be analytic of others.
Planning: Looking at pre-existing digipaks by previous media students through the blog and looking at actual digipaks by searching on google images to look at typical pop digipaks and advertisements so that I can use that in the construction of my own.. Also using external websites like dafont.com to try and find a font for my digipak. We also did a photo shop exercise in class recreating a digipak for photoshop practice and to be familiar with the conventions and the do's and don'ts of digipak and advertisements.
Construction
Canon: We used a professional canon camera to take pictures for our digipak and advertisement.
Photoshop:For my digipak I used a template to create a four panel digipak. I added the colour I wanted for my background (black) and then my font (fonts from photoshop).All the images that I used I didn't add any effects as I thought I didn't need to add any. The cd was created using the shape took and adjusted the opacity so that the image on the back would be visible and the hole in the cd was created (with the help of Trevor) cut out tool in photoshop.

Blogger (research, planning and evaluation)
Blogger was a good way for us to keep track of our work, for the teachers too and also a way to present my work in a more creative way. Using blogger I was able to create detailed posts on research, planning and evaluation, not only written posts but using external sites like: prezi (powerpoint), animoto, slide.ly and gifs (to present images rather than just posting them) go animate (animation). Also added video's filmed using the flip cam, especially at evaluation stages when we're getting feedback from others.

Social Networking (Twitter & Instagram)
We used twitter so that our teachers can keep track of us while filming and also as a way to engage with possible fans/ to gain fans by talking about what the Candi hearts are doing and getting into character of being a girl band. We also used instagram to put up pictures of our prodction

Evaluation Question 4

We have received quite a bit of feedback from our peers, teachers and target audience members throughout the process planning, production and final products. It really helped to get the opinions of others to see what worked well, what didn't and what could be further developed/improved.

The reaction to my music video at the cinema wasn't what I expected. The response was very good, there were a lot of cheering (which got weirdly louder when I was on screen) and clapping to the beat of the song so from that it seemed like people enjoyed the music video - even though I found it quite embarrassing)- but I was happy with the response. After the screening of all the music video's I asked a few people what they thought of my video

Youtube links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFrxAfFgQ6o&feature=youtube_gdata_player
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDe323sq93w&feature=youtube_gdata_player
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wE2laH5kBfE&feature=youtube_gdata_player

What would I change after hearing what people thought?

One of the things that I picked up which was quite interesting was  a comment on our performance. we need to be more confident with our performance. I understand where this person was coming from with this comment and it did seem like we weren't as comfortable and confident with what we were doing so I think this is one thing I would change. I think if we got more comfortable with the performance aspect it'll look more realistic and not amateur.

Digipak and Advertisement Feedback

What have I learned from this feedback?

The one comment that they both made as a way to improve my work is the image on the inside of the digipak, as it covers both panels the cd covers my face and it takes away the group aspect as you can't see me. It is something I wouldn't have noticed myself and it's definitely something I would change so that all members of the group are visible as that is  really important.

Evaluation Question 2

How effective is the combination of your main products (video) and ancillary texts (digipak and advertisement)?

The plans for synergy included: monochrome theme, gold rings, bright lipstick and one of our costumes incorporated into the digipak. Although we did not use one of our costumes because we changed some of our ideas regarding the video and it resulted in us only having one costume so we wanted to have a different costume for the digipak.The aspects of the video that link with my ancillary work are the jewellery, red lipstick and monochrome costumes. The moncochrome costumes and red lipstick are evident but the jewellry not as much as there was an emphasis on the gold jewellery which is not clearly evident in the images used even though we did use them, plus some colourful jewellry, which may have stood out more.

How can your audience recognise them as linked products?

What will be most recognised as a link in my products is the black and white theme (monochrome) which has been used throughout, in the music video (costumes), digipak and advertisement. In the music video colour correction was used to bring out the jewellery and the make up and they are also evident in my digipak and advertisement - red lipstick and gold and coloured jewellry. The coloured jewellery was added when doing the photo shoot, it is not an aspect of synergy but it was used to add colour and be a signifier of the pop genre that The Candi Hearts belong to. They stand out more than the gold jewellry in the images I used on my advertisement and digipak so the gold jewellery may not be as clearly linked to the video. My advertisement and digipak are very clearly linked as the same colour scheme, fonts and images were used in each product. 

colour correction

distinct colour scheme, same image used and same fonts used.

How successful do you think your main and ancillary texts are?
I think my music video and ancillary products are successful as I have gained a good response from my audience and I think I've done a good job in making a music video, digipak and advertisement which look quite professional. Although I do favour my ancillary products over the music video because I had more control over the design ideas and how I will do things. I think my target audience will be attracted to my music video and ancillary work as it's not very conventional to the pop genre and that will make it stand out more and may act as a unique selling point and I also think it has a distinct colour scheme which works well and will be easily recognisable .

Comparison with existing products

These two digipak & advertisements are quite similar to mine.

 

Evaluation Question 1

Advertisement

I decided to do an A4 advertisement as most pop artists did an a4 instead of a5 landscape, so I decided to be conventional. Making my digipak was quite easy as I planned to use the same image, fonts and colours as on my digipak. Although, for the other text I did use a different font but I chose one that was similar so it looks cohesive.

At this stage I hadn't yet added my ratings on the logo's of where this album was available I was just getting the layout right and the colours as I was still researching the right magazines and newspapers to put on my advertisement

On this I added the logo's of the places that this album was available but I still hadn't added the ratings.

Digipak construction

For the inside panel I wanted to use a group shot on one said of the panel and have the background of the other side just black/white but the image I picked did not look good just on one said and didn't fit well in the panel so I stretched it over two panels. My cd will be black and I wanted to add a white border but I used the wrong shape to to create the cd and the right one didn't have the white border so I axed that idea.

 creating the cd

draft inside panel

The cd was created using the shape too in photoshop and it's meant to be black. I changed the opacity so that the image on the back can be seen and so that it is clear that there are 3 people in the group and not two. Trevor helped my create the hole in my cd.

Research into Magazines and Record Labels

On my advertisement I'm going to include ratings from magazines and newspapers. On my mock-up I didn't quite get it right and Rebecca pointed out that the ones I did use wouldn't really rate this type of music and it has to be appropriate to the genre so I did a bit of research into magazines that promote pop artists/bands.
Some of the ones I came across were:

• Bilboard
• we love pop 
• vibe 
• the sun
• Top of the pops

I was going to put bilboard and we love pop on my advertisement but I asked Rebecca whether it would be suitable and she said it wouldn't be appropriate for a new band and that it was also an american magazine and she said it would be good to go with a mainstream newspaper like the sun as they're more likely to comment of give ratings to a band like ours so I took this into account and put, The Sun and We love pop.

Existing Ancillary work

Design Ideas for my digipak came from my research into British pop girlbands, Little Mix, The Saturday's and the Sugababes.

The idea that I like and want to use on my own digipak is the lines and the single shots used, it's like a way of giving each individual in the group a way to bring out their personality but it brings them together at the same time.

I thought it would be good to add some colour to the digipak as we have stuck to the monochrome theme throughout which is good but the addition of colour will make it look more interesting and also it's a convention of the pop genre.

I liked the fonts used in this digipak, the bold and handwriting type font and I intend to use similar fonts in my digipaks but I'd prefer that the artist name be in the handwriting font and the alum title be in bold font just because the candi hearts are younger and need to appeal to younger audiences.

Reasons for choice of Location

When looking at other digipaks especially ones for girl pop groups all of them were set in a studio and not outside so we decided to mimic that and do it in a similar way. We did ours in front of the green screen (so we'd be able to cut out images if we wanted a different background) and a black curtain to go with the black and white theme and it's a good background as black goes with most colours.

Function of digipak's

Costumes

For the photoshoot we will be wearing black and white clothes and colourful jewellery. We did say that we wanted to use costumes from the video in our digipak but because we didn't have a change of costume we decided against that as we wanted to wear something different. We kept the monochrome theme just like in our music video but we didn't wear anything that was the same. The link that we have to our genre is the aspect of colour with the jewellery because we didn't want to be too colourful and neither did we want to be bland and the aspect of synergy is the red lipstick.

Dionne: White Top, Black and leather Jacket, Purple necklace. Black and multicoloured earrings

Larah: Black white and leather top, gold necklace, gold studs 

Anca: Black and white striped top, black belt

Shortlist of photos

Shortlist of Photo's by Slidely Slideshow

Digipak font

I had trouble finding a font that I wanted because the cursive fonts didn't look good and didn't fit well. I found one on a website but I had trouble getting it on photoshop and I was also worried whether it was a good decision to use a downloaded font as the macs get deleted at the end of the day.  I found a font that looked good and worked well from the website dafont.com and I found a similar font on photoshop if I wasn't able to use the font I downloaded.

I few fonts that I considered using that are in photoshop ()

I settled with this font as it had a similar look to what I wanted

There was another font that I really liked and that was similar to the font I found on dafont.com and it was little black dress,

Digipak colours

Initially we said the colours we all should use was, black, white and gold but when we were deciding on what costumes we were going to wear we wanted to add colour and decided to wear colourful jewellery, so there is a signifier of us being a pop group so when I started making my digipak I carried this out.

I decided that the gold wouldn't work on the Digipak after looking at it so I decided to use an idea I saw on the Saturdays digipak. Their one was mainly black and white but their track list was multi coloured. In my pitch in the lift Rebecca had some reservations about that idea because having more than one colour on the digipak doesn't look good but after I explained she understood.I carried it out when producing my digipak and it did not look as good and I saw why she wasn't sure about the idea so I decided not to go forward with that idea and I changed it to red to go with our red lipstick we used in the video. The colours I've decided on and hopefully do not change are, red black and white.

Draft Digipak and Advertisement

Final Video

Merry christmas, folks! As a surprise we've decided to to upload our final piece onto Blogger. Enjoy it and don't forget to leave us a comment below - peace

18. Anca, Anthony, Larah, Dionne from 283goswell on Vimeo.

Do's and Don'ts of Design work

Do's

• Minimum of 2 fonts that must work well with each other and your genre
• The colour used must compliment each other, the genre and suit the colours in the photos - Maximum of 3
• Clear photos that are in focus should be used and the size must be appropriate
• Follow the rule of thirds
• Barcode, date, copyright info, title of album, artists name, record company logo, website and artist website must be included

Don'ts

• Effects used must be appropriate to the genre
• Images should not be stretched to fit panels. This could result in loss of marks
• Text should not go across the artists face
• Follow conventions of your genre by looking at similar artists. You do not need too much photo's

Mock up of Digipak and Advertisement

Digipak

Notes:

1. 2 fonts: Cursive and bold 
2. Main colours: Black and white
3. Tracklist multicoloured (Inspired by The Saturdays back cover)
4. Line separating each member of the group (Inspired by Little Mix album cover)
5. Single shots used

Notes:

1. Group shot
2. Black and White background
3. Black cd
4. 'The Candi Hearts' multicoloured and It aint easy' in white

Advertisemment

 Notes:

1. Same image used and image layout used as the album front cover
2. Album front cover included
3. Ratings from Magazines
4. Places it is available: Amazon, Itunes, HMV

Pitch in the lift
I had to explain my ideas for my digipak and advertisement to Rebecca. Her feedback was I had some good ideas but she wasn't sure about my idea to have a multicoloured tracklist because have more than 2/3 colours usually doesn't look good but I explained where I got my ideas from (The Saturday's) and she understood. I had forgotten to do my spine and the release date of album.  Rebecca also said I should think about the magazines/newspapers I had out down and be a bit more realistic in terms of the genre and the fact that they're a new group.