Note to Moderator

Dear Moderator,

The initial brief for my A2 media coursework was to create a music video and a choice of two different ancillary products. The pieces that I decided to produce were a music video, digipak and digipak advert. Each ancillary linked together to create a promotional package.

I chose to use a song by an alternative rock band because this is my favourite genre of music to listen to and the song I chose gave me many ideas for what I could create for a music video.

The target audience of my products was aimed towards people aged between 18-25 and like alternative music/culture. I have received positive feedback from peers and teachers to help my progress with my products and to help aim them towards the alternative genre.

You can use the labels at the top of the page to navigate to each section of my blog. These labels cover the different products I've worked on and the research and planning I did, also my evaluation of my promotional package.

Yours Sincerely,
Alex Rolls

Candidate Number: 0215
Centre Number: 51111

Question 1

Here is a Prezi I made to answer question 1 of the evaluation.

Question 2

Here is question 2 of my evaluation where I spoke about how effective my music video and ancillary tasks were as a promotional package.

Question 2: How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts? from Alex Rolls

Question 3

From the focus group's responses, I have learned that the pace of editing for my music video was very well suited to the genre of the song, especially with the drum parts to emphasise the heaviness of the music. I think that from this I have successfully made a music video which links to the conventions of alternative and grunge rock music videos due to the positive comments from the focus group. However, some of the comments made by the focus group suggested that some of the lip syncing could have been a better by being closer in time to the music and I could have used transitions in the video to add some more effect to the overall finish.

These comments made in the focus group have been very useful for me in finding out what I have done well in my video, but also what to do to improve for the future. For example, by using better transitions and lip syncing it would have made the video have an overall polished feel which is something I will take note of for future projects.

Here is a Google Slides presentation I made about my teachers comments on my music video and ancillary tasks.

Question 4

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

During the construction stage of creating my music video, I used Final Cut Pro on an Apple Mac computer which had many benefits but also drawbacks. I chose to use the Final Cut Pro to edit my music video together because I found that it had a lot of features and tools which I could use to make my music video effective. For example, there were many tools at my disposal that I could use to change the appearance of the video which I found was beneficial. I felt that it was a more professional choice of software as well due to the amount of feature available and was much better than any other type of video editing software such as Windows Movie Maker which I felt was more inferior.  However, some of the drawbacks with the software were that I had a complete lack of experience using it before  and  such as experience as I had not used one professionally to create a music video. This made progress slow at the beginning when I was inserting clips that I had filmed and editing them, however I eventually got to grips with the software after I used it for a while. From using the software I learned a lot about how to edit video clips together and add effects to make the video effective. I think that I definitely benefited from using the cut tool as it allowed me to edit long shots to become shorter which fit the song I chose much better. 

Final Cut Pro

The screenshot on the left shows a clip from one of the narrative moments in the music video. I edited this shot quite a lot by changing the brightness and contrast and by adding a vignette to the frame which made the corners slightly darker whcih helps focus in more on the content in the video. I did this for all the narrative clips in my video as I thought it helped draw more attention and focus to the story in the video and also adds adds to the grungy genre of music.









This screenshot shows the edits I have made to this clip and other narrative clips in the video. For example, we can see edits I have made to the brightness/contrast, adding a vingette and adjusting the settings on that and also adjusting the colour balance as the woods appeared to be quite vibrant and colourful.





Cameras

During the planning stages of my music video, I used my Canon 700d DSLR camera to take pictures of the locations for where I would be shooting my music video. I also used the camera to take pictures for my ancillary tasks such as my digipak and advert. Due to the camera being quite mid ranged in price, the quality of pictures taken were very good which led to a good looking digipak and advert. To record my music video I used a Sony HDV camera filming footage onto tape. I chose to use these cameras as I did not own any cameras that would be able to produce the same quality as these cameras. Although I had no previous experience using this type of camera for recording a music video I quickly got used to it through practice. Using this camera, I was also able to attach a tripod to it to create different types of shots such as panning. This camera was very easily accessible for me as I would be able to borrow the camera from the school to use for filming whenever I wanted.


Serif software

The software I used to create my digipak and poster was Serif PagePlus X9. I decided to use this software and not any other because it contained the essential tools and editing functions that I needed in order to create both ancillaries. By using PagePlus I was able to insert a template digipak layout which I could use to place the images I would use onto. I was also able to edit the photos I inserted onto the different panes through the colour, swatches and transparency. I also use SerifPhotoPlus to edit my photos for my digipak as it had more options for editing and manipulating images.

For example, the image of the trees on the front cover and disc side I changed the colour so the text was more easily noticeable. PagePlus also allowed me to add text onto the images I inserted such as the band name and album name, also the track list and some other text. Once I had finished editing the images I was easily able to export the image to Blogger.

Here we can see my digipak advert created in Serif PagePlus. I decided to use PagePlus to create my poster because it gave me many tools and options to help construct a professional looking advert for the album. I was able to add images and adjust their colours and transparency. I was also able to add text and manipulate the text.







Presentation software

I used Google Slides to present my digipak advert analysis. I decided to use this because it was different to any other type of presentation software I had used before but I was able to present the different adverts I was researching. I used this and not PowerPoint because I had not used this software as much as PowerPoint which also shows that i'm using a broader range of ICT to present my research.

I also used Prezi to present my research on band homepages and other tasks in my planning and evaluation stages. This free, online software allows me to create a more interactive type of presentation with a variety of different designs to choose from. I think it is a more creative way of presenting research than just a standard PowerPoint. I was also able to embed these Prezi presentations into my Blogger to receive feedback from my teachers about them.



YouTube

I used YouTube in my research and planning stages to find videos for my research on music video conventions. This helped me eventually plan out my music video. I have also used YouTube to upload different versions of my music video to my Blogger which enabled me to receive feedback from my teachers and other people on how to improve the video each time.

Blogger

I used blogger to present my research and planning and my ancillary tasks such as the digpak and the digipak advert. Blogger enabled me to post and embed different links to research I had done or to rough drafts of my music video which could then be viewed by my teacher who could then respond with constructive criticism and helpful feedback. This feedback was very useful for me improving my video and ancillaries to ensure I achieve my target grade. Using blogger I was able to also write progress reports on what improvements I had made each lesson whether it was editing my music video or conducting more research or working on my ancillary tasks.

Plumtree

Alex, the ancillaries are coming together now and I like the continuity of using the same image on both. The interior panel on the digipak has a lot of 'dead' space and looks a little simplistic. Have a look at maybe changing the image or including a bit more text to help with this. Your poster also needs a little more information. Could you add brief comments to go with the magazine star rating? Could you add that it is their new album and contains the hit single/s.......Have a look and see how these changes might work.

Evaluation Plan

For question 1, I will be talking about how my music video uses, develops or challenges forms and conventions of real media products.

• Music video conventions and what i've included in my video/not included.
• Genre conventions and what i've included/not included in my video.
• Digipak conventions and what i've included/not included in my digipak.
• Advert conventions and what i've included/not included in my advert.
• How my conventions will attract an audience. 
• How have I adapted conventions onto my 3 different products.
• I will be using Prezi to present this question for my evaluation.

For question 2, I will be saying how effective I think my music video and ancillary tasks were.

• Brand identity and house style importance when creating media products e.g. digipak
• How did I create a brand identity across my music video, digipak and advert e.g. similar colours, images, wording, style.
• How will my digipak design sell the song/album to audience.
• How will my advert sell the digipak to the audience. 
• What elements of my digipak and advert communicate the genre of the music video/ style of band.
• I will present this question using Slideshare. 

For question 3, I will be talking through what I have learnt from my audience feedback.

• What were the positive comments received by peers, teachers, focus groups about the video? (screenshots)
• What were the negative comments received by peers, teachers, focus groups about the video? (screenshots)
• How the comments would change the way I work in the future.
• Which comments taught me about the process of producing and editing a music video?
• I will present this question by making a focus group and using Google Slides.

For question 4, I will talk through how I used media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages.

• Discussing the benefits and difficulties of using certain technologies when creating my music video, digipak, advert and other ancillaries. Include screenshots and images of the technologies I used. e.g. Macs, Blogger, Final Cut Pro, Digital camera (Sony HDV), photo editing software (Serif PhotoPlus editing my digipak photos), (Serif PagePlus creating advert and digipak designs) Include screenshots of the softwares used.
• Blogger - 
• How have they helped me to produce better work?
• I will present this question in a Blogger post where I can go into further detail on the points I will make.

SUMMING UP - Finally, I will sum up all my answers to all my questions using Prezi. This will include images to illustrate what i'm talking about. 

Finished Music Video

Digipak and Poster

Digipak

Poster

Feedback Plan

For Research and Planning I will need to expand my research into digipaks more and also include more detail for the research into band homepages. Also, I need to label and order my posts as they appear to be in a confusing order on the blog.

The layout of my digipak will need to be rethought about as some of the images do not work so well and are hard to relate to the band/genre (try to get a band shot or use a shot from the video). Also, the colour choice is a little bland and the font is too hard to read for the song list. Don't label the digipak as "finished".

The album name on my poster will need to be adjusted to be smaller than the band name. Also, maybe include more shots to represent the band and genre to promote them.

The pacing of my music video will need to improved to help represent the song and genre of music better (loud and heavy sound), needs to have more impact with the shots coming in on the beat. Editing needs to be improved (include a superimposition) to show the narrative and to ensure it makes sense. Include more lip synching.