Evaluation

In what ways does your Media Product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real Media Products?

We wanted our band to seem different and stand out from other bands; we did this by being quite random and bizarre. We incorporated different styles in our music video, so that many different audiences would find it appealing. we done this as being noticed as a band that appeals to many audiences something that many bands aspire to do. We thought by giving our characters different personalities in the video we would therefore appeal to many different groups of society.

We decided that it would be a good idea to make a video where the visuals and lyrics contradicted each other; this idea came from theorist Andrew Goodwin. We opted to do this as we felt as a small low budget project it would look much more professional than trying to link the lyrics and visuals. I felt that this would have a rather cheesy and tacky outcome.

Indie/rock music is one of the most popular types of music in the world today so we thought it would be a good idea to use this genre of music as it would appeal to a wide range of people.As the tempo of this song is very quick we decided to edit the video so that it cut from shots quickly to keep up with the pace of the song and make it flow, an example of this can seen in the scene below.

We wanted to make our video repeatable so people didn't get bored if they watched it for a second time we done this by making it entertaining and adding in things that may be missed if you were viewing it for the first time, we also made it so each character was different and exciting

The song that we used was in the traditional form of intro/verse/chorus/verse/chorus, its very clear when the chorus of the song is about to start and this gave us a better chance of getting good lip sync in our final video, there is a guitar solo in the song that fits in perfect with the main chase scene in our video. There is also a prolonged note right at the end of the song which fits perfect with the pool scene at the end.

I think that our video would appeal to mainly to teenagers as all of the characters in our video are teenagers, although because our video is quite funny and entertaining i feel it could be watched by a wide range of audiences. The song would appeal to people from about 15 onwards as it is much like material from bands such as Arctic Monkeys or vampire weekend who appeal to a wide range of age groups.

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

We Showed our final video and digi pack to a number of students and teachers mainly around the age of our target audience, overall we got very positive feedback which pleased us as a group, we then created a questionnaire for people who had viewed the video so that they could answer questions about our video, they agreed to answer truthfully and this helped us understand points where we may have gone wrong.They all agreed that our band gave of strong connotations of being indie, which made us very pleased, as we wanted the look of the video to resemble our music’s genre.

There were parts of the video where the audience were slightly confused as to what was actually going on, many people did not actually know why all the characters were running and they also found it hard to understand the narrative.In a way this wasn’t such a bad thing, as we wanted to create an enigma so people had to work out what was actually going on. Although I think it was a slight flaw in our video as we could have shown the bag in the pool a few times in the video as some people did not even notice it in the final scene.

After we had finished asking the audience questions we then explained what was actually happening in the video to those who were still confused and couldn’t make any sense of it, we then let them watch it again and they seemed to appreciate it a lot more than the first time viewing, we took this as very positive feedback as we wanted or video to be repeatable, this made it seem more professional.

We then asked the audience some more questions such as whether they would want to watch the video again and learn more about the band, we were very pleased with the response as they said that they would definitely want to watch the video a second time to so that they could understand it more clearly.

Once we had finished showing our audience the video we asked them what they thought of our digipack, they were very positive about our digipack too, they were very impressed by the way we had made the front cover of the CD look professional and not tacky and cheesy. They like the way we had just kept the digipack quite simple and original the whole way through and not trying to make it look over the top, they agreed that the filter added a nice touch to it and made it look more like a real product.

One thing that audience picked up on that we were very pleased about was the comedic factor our video, they thought we had done this in a very good way by not necessarily trying to be funny but just adding certain points in the video that were random and bizarre that would make the audience laugh, such as when Charlie and goughy run out of the barn with a television and a table, and when tom gets in the go-cart. They said that making the video funny as well as gripping made it very appealing andthoroughly enjoying.

Overall I think the audience viewing went extremely well and I am very pleased with the feedback that we got.

How did you use Media Technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

One of the first things we decided as a group was that it we definitely wanted to film the video using a HD camera, we felt this was essential as we were going to have mainly chase scenes and action shots so we wanted it to be as clear as possible for the audience. We had some difficulty finding the best settings to export our video to, but in the end it turned out fine and we were happy with the quality.

Once we had filmed our whole video we then moved onto the editing side of the project, for the editing we used a program on the Mac’s called final cut express. This was the same program we used to edit our films last year so we were all comfortable with editing the video ourselves, One of the main things we were trying to achieve in our video was very good editing that went in time with the music, in the clip below you can see that we achieved this.

Once the video was more or less finished, we created the CD cover using a program called Adobe Photoshop. We spent quite a lot of time deciding on what colours and fonts etc to use, as there was a very thin line between it looking tacky and professional. We took the pictures for our CD cover in one of our favourite locations in our video, we used a camera that would take high quality pictures and we didn’t leave the location until we were happy with the shots. We also made the poster look quite similar by adding a filter to it and making it seem quite cool and well made. The way in which we made the whole digi pack really pleased me as we didn’t try to make it overtop at all which I think can only be done if you have a big budget and huge experience in editing software. We stuck with plain ideas that were quite simple yet effective and I think this turned out very well, we got inspiration from big bands such as Coldplay as they had a very simple album cover yet it was very effective.

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

Our music video had many different purposes, promote the song, to show off the personalities of the different characters in the video. We also aimed to show our audience that our band matched the typical stereotypes of ‘indie’ and each member of the band had a different personality and style. Overall though, I believe that our main purpose was to entertain.

I believe that we achieved all of these purposes very well, through our audience feedback we learned that all of our characters gave off different feelings and styles and this made us very pleased. One point in our video when the lead singer is singing into the mirror while cleaning his teeth conforms to Steve Archer’s theory as he is performing while in the narrative of the video.

We took our song from an indie/rock band, I don’t think that this had a huge effect on our video as we had decided we wanted to do a chase video before we had even chosen our song. Although I felt that the way our characters were dressed in the video conformed to the typical indie look.

To accompany the video we also made a digipack, this included a CD cover, inlay booklet and a poster. When it came to our digipack, we wanted to prove to the audience that we are an artistically literate band with substantial intellect. We did this by making our digipack simple and cool without trying to make it to over the top.

The target audience for our video would be anyone who enjoys listening to indie music or just anyone who likes to be entertained, i think the scene below seemed to make people laugh and i felt that it helped build the tension for the final scene.

I decided to show our video to a range of different age groups with different views on music. I got positive feedback from everyone who watched the video, some said they didn’t like the song that much although they thought the video was very well made. I feel that we would be the sort of band that became famous through posters and appearing in magazines etc.

The narrative of both the product and our ancillary texts is to show of the different personalities within the band, we carried this on through our CD cover and poster, which show off our simple yet entertaining ideas which we wanted put across to the audience. I feel that our product does connect to the purpose as we are trying to get an up and coming band out there and showing the different personalities within the band. I feel this is a good way to get your band noticed as it shows you want them to know what kind of people you are as well as the music you play. I would like to see our music video on a well respected channel such as MTV2 or kerrang I feel once a band has a chance to have their song played on one of these channels it is vital that the video is well made and shows what the band are about as the video is often how people remember songs.

The Current Situation

At the moment we are just steadily working through our evaluations. Before we put each individual evaluation up we are uploading some sections, bit-by-bit. 

Whilst we are doing this, we are rendering and exporting the video to put onto a DVD. We are having some trouble as the final versions seem to be quite blurry, so we are just troubleshooting at the moment.

The Bag

Unfortunately due to none of us actually owning a briefcase that we wanted to put in a swimming pool, we had to use a different, and less smart, recyclable holdel bag.

Even though we had to make this change, the new bag does actually add to the comedic aspects of the film as the audience may be expecting a smart briefcase full of money, when actually it's a 'Tesco Bag for Life".

Obviously nobody knows what is actually in the bag, and we intend for nobody to find out.

What we did in the lesson

In yesterdays lesson Richard and Emiel took charge of the editing and came up with some good ideas and ended up with 36 seconds of our video fully edited to how we wanted it. Our video so far is running very smoothly and our ideas that we have had from the start have not been interrupted in any way so we are all very pleased.

What we achieved while filming

We filmed the full film on Sunday 18th, apart from the swimming pool scene. 

The filming went very well and and we managed to film on a sunny day which made the shots look a lot better, and the scenery around the villages in which we filmed were suitable for how we wanted it to look. As we started the filming during the morning and throughout the day, it looked very realistic because as we filmed the daylight slowly went which rapped the video up nicely.

Overall we think that the filming went very well and we are happy with what we have got so far, unfortunately we were unable to transfer our footage onto the macs this lesson, however once we acquire the correct CD we will be able to start editing our footage.

Final Plot

3 characters meet in location (to be decided) all receive texts . As they all take their separate routes. There are cuts back and forth from the singer, who, differently to the other members of the band, is waking up, and taking it slow. This is what happens until the guitar solo, when the singer then sees the briefcase in the swimming pool in his back garden and starts to become more suspicious. He goes outside to see it, and turns around, then to see the other 3 members hurtling down the road towards his house. The cuts between the 3 members and the singer will become more and more frequent the nearer they all get to each other. Eventually, the singer breaks away from his "chilled" exterior and gets in on the action by turning round and storming towards to swimming pool. All 4 members of the band then throw themselves, mid-air into the pool, and the video just cuts out before they all hit the water.

We feel that the contrast between the fast paced action from the instrumentalists and the slow, step-by-step morning routine from the singer will be effective and also not to difficult to capture. When it comes to editing, we can really bring the pace to a halt when it cuts to the singer through quick transitions and different lighting techniques in the filming.

More Costume designs

For our different characters in the band we need to have different costumes to identify our different personalities.

Firstly, the lead singer ; Tom Abraham

- As he is the lead singer we have made him the 'cool' one, therefore how he acts. As he is waking up in his home he will be wearing pyjamas, but he will be acting cool and doing everything in a slick style and lip-syncing the words into the mirror.

Second Character, the Drummer ; Charlie Potter.

As he is the drummer he will be the wacky character, so therefore charlie will be wearing ripped jeans, with maybe some tweed to go with his country boy esque transport. This will make it funny to watch him, also his facial expressions will be very 'crazy.' This will all add to the comedic effect of the video.

Our Bassist is Emiel Pronk ; His character will be the 'cool' one, therefore his clothes will be smart casual. He will be wearing a cool suit that will end up getting wrecked as he tries to find the money.

The last character is Richard Gough who is the Guitarist ; He is the rebel of the band therefore he will be wearing a hoodie and some baggy/scruffy trousers. The transport will be a 'stolen car.'

This will add many dimensions to the band and help achieve the 'random' video idea and make the video repeatable to the audience.

In our music video i am going to be one of the characters who is running for the briefcase, i think it will be a good idea if my my characters actions contrast with the way he looks, as i am going to be wearing a suit i think it will be very effective if my character does things like jumping over fences, sliding down hills etc i also think it will be a good idea if my character uses a push bike as his main method of transport, i feel the scene where charlie is in his tractor going along a field will be very entertaining if i cycle past him in my suit looking very rough and determined to get the briefcase. i think that a my character should see someone on a bike then steal it from him, this will be very effective.

i think that Toms character should be very down to earth and smart looking as he will be the one who ends up with the contents of the briefcase.

i think that charlies character should be quite funny and crazy as he is going to be driving through a field on his tractor i think this will be very entertaining.

i think that richards character could be cool and stylish as he is going to be using everyday transport such as trains and cars to get to the briefcase.

Ideas for Storyboarding

This lesson we have looked at many different videos to get ideas for our storyboard;

- Vampire Weekend, Oxford Comma: From this video we gained ideas about what to have going on in the video, from the video we have been been influenced to have many things going on in the background, we feel this will add to the video and make it repeatable.

- Beck, Odelay: This video was used as a preference because it is very much the style that we want to achieve; for example having very random goings on in the background and the video seemed very clever and cutting edge.

- Blink 182, All the Small Things: This video works on the basis of intertextuality making it very humorous - we like this video because it brought comedy into the music and we would like to add comedy into our video. We also liked the weirdness of the very random 'What's my age again' video by blink 182 which also showed signs of intertextuality.  With this music video we alo learned techniques of camera angles, for example the running round the corner shot shown at the top of the post.

The last video we looked at was by Chikinki, Assassinator 13; We like this video very much as it uses a range of weird clips and many different costumes on one person. Watching the video you realise how long it would have taken to make therefore you watch the video and appreciate it.

The lyrics

Money, I got it, I got it

Money, I got, I got and it's in my head

I've got to keep myself from drinking on the streets

I'll never find myself again in ways I can't believe

Money, I got it, I got it

Money, I got, I got and it's in my head

I've got to keep myself from drinking on the streets

I'll never find myself again in ways I can't believe

You better watch yourself when I meet your boyfriend

Don't get in my way cos I'll beat you down

It's alright baby cos I'll find my ways

to catch you up in the night, yeah

Money, I got it, I got it

Money, I got, I got and it's in my head

My mind is somewhere else away from what it seems

Get down on the floor bitch, bow and pray for peace now

Money, I got it, I got it

Money, I got, I got and it's in my head

I've got my head but not my heart set on the BLAH

The rest you said BLAH BLAH BLAH

You better watch yourself when I meet your boyfriend

Don't get in my way cos I'll beat you down

It's okay baby cos I'll find my ways

to catch you up in the night, yeah

Yellow garage

Today i listened to the song 'money' which we will be using for our video, i think this will go very well with our video as our first song had no lyrics therefore it was very hard to link the video to the song, i think now that we have an indie song instead it will be a lot easier to link the song and the video and it will also be much more effective. their are many ways that i think the song could be linked with our video, i feel the lyrics could be linked as they are about money and all four of us are chasing after a briefcase, it could be that it is full of money. also the ending of the song will be perfect for our pool scene at the end, as there is a sustained note that carries on for about 15 seconds, this will be perfect for when the four of us meet at the end of the video, it will add a lot of tension to the end of the video which will entertain the audience.

Costumes

Our original idea for the video was for us to all be wearing suits, we watched the vampire weekends video for 'Oxford comma' and we noticed that two of the band members are wearing suits in the video which we thought looked very effective. i have managed to find an old suit that i can use in the video, i think this will be very effective for the end of the video with the swimming pool scene. this also means that not all of us will have to have a suit, as each person will be wearing something that goes with their style in the video.

Learning the song

Today the three of listened carefully to the song that we are going to use (Money by Yellow Garage). We took notice of key lyrics, timing within the rhythm and also the use of instrumentation. There are some sections where the drum beat is off-beat and unexpected, these would be great times for quick cuts and modern transitions to maintain the variety and franticness within the video.

We were also thinking of maybe incorporating split screens and tone editing such as having some of the shots in black and white. 

What we need to do as soon as possible is post a copy of the lyrics onto the blog and then also a detailed analysis of where we could change shots and how we would. We also need to finally decide the routes being taken by each member of the band to get to the destination that they are racing for.

Indie Music: The genre

The genre we are going to work with will be Indie. We have already researched into the various songs we could use for the final piece and have found a suitable track, from an unsigned band called 'Yellow Garage.' The track is called 'Money', the reason we picked this song was because we think it will work best with the video we had in mind as the tempo is reasonably fast. The song also includes a clever riff which will go well with the whole 'pursuit' idea.

I think we have made the right choice choosing an indie song to make a video for, as it will include lyrics therefore adding an extra dimension to the video. Also, with the video having four people all chasing an object, and the lyrics being about money, this gives us an idea of what they could all be chasing.

Video research

We were researching various videos on YouTube as we thought we would like to take some techniques out of them to use on ours. The two videos that we looked at were ; 'The Prodigy - Voodoo People' and 'Vampire Weekend - Oxford Comma.' We like the style of these videos as they have very random scenes in, this made us want to make our video very unique by having events in the video that nobody will expect.

Developing our own stars

Our stars will be male icons for the indie/rock music of the early millennium. They will conform to the dress sense linking to that genre at this time, yet will slowly start to make it their own. At the moment when performing, indie performers normally wear casual clothes, as it is more about the quality of the music, rather than the performance given from the band. Here's what indie/rock musicians would normally state as their attire:

- Smart shoes or pointy boots, normally black or brown leather.

- Smart, yet tight fitting trousers. Usually black but white is appearing more and more.

- Often a small, slightly worn-out t-shirt, with a loose long sleeved shirt on top, almost always with the sleeves rolled up. The shirt has a sort of 'dusty' look to it.

- Miscellaneously, they would wear sunglasses, rings, they would have badges pinned to their shirts or their guitar straps, loose belts, rags hanging out their pockets. Recently, there has been a surge in the number of Trilby hats being worn.

Audience Profile theory

Obviously we will find out the Audience Profile for real once we have carried out the actual research on audiences with Indie music, but this is a good idea of what we think the audience will be:

Gender: The majority of the audience will be male but there will definitely be some female appreciators.

Age: The indie/rock age range is those around 15-30. Some of the older generation don't enjoy the music yet those younger than 15's music taste may not have matured yet.

Interests: The average person within this age range would probably enjoy going out with their friends to parties and dancing. They probably feel that music plays a big part in their life as they listen to it a lot, whether it's at home on their computer on on their MP3 players, when they're on the move.

What they expect to see: Indie/rock music videos can normally contain anything. If you look at say, the Arctic Monkeys, there are no definitive plots in the video, quite often it's them in picture-esque locations and then there are cuts to the band performing.

How we will appeal to them: Animal House want to incorporate some sort of pursuit within the video, we think it would be quite interesting if the audience didn't necessarily see what the members of the band were chasing for, as it would add a sense of mystery and would also conform to the general rule or randomness within Indie videos.

How we are going to research our audience

There are many possible ways to research our audience and get a very good idea of what the audience will be like, demographically and psychographically. We can carry out questionnaires and also look at download records and comments on video steaming websites such as Youtube or Google Video. Looking at the comments and also the Youtube usernames of the people who have commented.

These are the set-in-stone methods of research that we will undertake:

- Questionnaires

- Looking at Video Streaming website comments

- Looking at the most common fan age ranges from the popular music genres of today

- Play the song that we will use to people that feel it would appeal to, and also play it to people that we know it wouldn't appeal to, and get them to note down their reactions/opinions of the song.

Album Covers we looked at...

Promotion Packs

We researched albums on Play.com and we discovered that quite often, bands will release promotional packs of their albums. Take for instance, the band Pendulum. Their latest album In Silico has a distinguishable cover. On Play.com you can buy a dvd of a live performance of them at the Brixton Academy, playing all the popular songs from each of their albums. The cover for this dvd is remarkably similar to the album cover of In Silico.

We think that this is used as when glancing over the albums quickly, it will seem like the normal version of the new album, but actually, on closer inspection of the CD cover, you will notice that it is actually the live dvd. One of the main differences of the dvd to the CD is that the background in the dvd is black, making the cover seeming quite bold. This is similar to the promotional package of the new Coldplay album. The old album called Viva La Vida had a recognisable logo, of the text against a colourful background. The new promotional package of the most recent album Prospekts March is the Viva La Vida album cover, only with a bold black background. The songs of the new album appear in a second CD, with the songs from Viva La Vida on the main one.

This research has allowed us to realise that if we want to make a promotional poster or package, then the background colour should definitely be black, as it stands out yet at the same time it isn't too shocking to look at, therefore not looking out of place in a line of normal CD covers, allowing the buyer to be more surprised when they see that it's a promotional one off, therefore making them more inclined to buy the product.