Sunday 15 May 2011

Group Evaluation



This is the analysis of our promotional package.
Which was done by Joshua Featherstone.

Wednesday 11 May 2011

Individual Evaluation

In what ways does you media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

After having done research to find good music videos that are out there looked at a number of them including Fell In Love With Girl- White Stripes. We then learnt they codes and conventions of got the band who we were working with we had to look at how they wanted to be represented in the music video and make sure it fit the genre of music it was.
We wanted to make all of our music video in split screen and have lots of different angles from the same image by using more that one camera. but we were unable to due to lack of resources, we had to scratch that idea and make our music video without it.. Meese- Next in Line

For the music video we wanted to make something that fit the genre, so we looked at the song we had and decided to come up with something up lifting, and we looked at similar bands like Alien Ant Farm, and we also looked at the original New Found Glory music video.


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



During our research and planning stage we look at different promotional packages, like for example, Mika’s album The Boy Who Knew Too Much >, they all shared a theme and had the same colour patterns and are related to each other.
What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

We got quite positive feedback from our audience, we were told that the music video fit the song and the genre well, and that we managed to capture the band’s energy well with a good variety of shots , and that the had made good creative choices and they also like our shots of people kissing and hugging, they especially like our shot in Caffe Nero in town. The band also was glad and like the way in which they were represented in the music video.
We made an audience profile with two characters Sarah and Ollie and we kept them in mind as we produced to promotional package.
We quite liked the font and color as well as how everything was placed in both the magazine advert and the CD cover, and I think that they are both attractive partially because of the blur of the image but also because of the color scheme we used,

We originally were told that we needed more kissing scenes and the some of the shots were too long, so we went out and shot some more also reedited the music video to make sure it looked as professional as we could possible make it.



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


For the research and planning stage of our pop promo we used the internet a lot because it is kind of like and endless source of information and good for communication, we used goggle, Wikipedia, YouTube, Xtranormal.com and prezie.com.
We used a Canon scanner for out pre production sheets and all our work has been posted on blogger.com.


We shot our music video using Sony HVR-Z5E on a Libec Pedestal P110 tripod which gave us very high quality, and it was very professional. We also used a Panasonic HDC-SD700 camera on a Velbon tripod for the music video, we also used a Canon HDV camera, which was small and handy, we taped on to a guitar for the music vido but also had the vocalist hold it and sing into it..
We shot the CD cover and magazine advert photo with a Nikon D£100 SLR , which again was very professional and very good quality.
Our evaluation video was shot used a Kingston Card Camera, we used a Yoga- Super Cardioid Directional microphone and Ianiro Gulliver 30 lights we used for the music video, video evaluation and shooting of the still for magazine advert and CD cover.
We edited using Final Cut pro, which we already knew how to use from last year and got the opportunity to expand our knowledge of it.
Photoshop was used to produce the CD cover and magazine advert, it was difficult to us at first but it eventually became easier.

Friday 6 May 2011

Band Feedback

Of course, those opinions who's matter most is our clients - the band HOUSE. If we were to make a music video as a real job and were getting paid for it, its the most important thing to make sure the client is happy with the final product because they are the ones on screen who will ultimatly want to make money off it, promote themselves and impress followers, fans or potential buyers.

My group and I were fairly nervous on the way to meeting our band, hoping they are happy with the work we have created - plus we havnt seem them since filming them a few months back! The whole band apart from the lead singer turned up to view our video, which was unfortunate because the singer was the main focus throughout. Our band, plus a few members of another band crowed round our sceen in excitement to see their very first music video, when the video ended the first thing I heard was 'Wow! that was really good, I'm really happy with that!' - Lead guitarist.
We then needed to get some feedback - hopefully with complete honesty, it was evident the band seemed genuine throughout the discussion, but we needed to bare in mind that the band did not have the same knowledge of media terms as we do

1. Are you happy with how you are portrayed?
"Yes, it was awesome! I honestly didn't think it would be like that - I really liked it." (Lead guitarist)
"Yeh I've never made a video before so that's really cool, we look like a proper band - Do you have this on Youtube? I wanna show people (laughs)" (Drummer)

2. What did you like best about it?
"Well I really liked the shot with the camera tied on the end of the guitar with the close up of my fingers playing it, it's such a cool shot - I've never seen that before! It looks like I'm actually playing it...but honestly, I liked all of it" - (Lead guitarist)
"Yeh I liked that shot, I also like how you have so many different shots - there was loads" (Guitarist)
"To be honest I cant even remember making that video (laughs) but yeh it's quite good isn't it!" (Alex - Guitarist)
"I like the shots of all the people kissing, the narrative bit. I didn't realise you were going to do it but it works well, it would of just been boring if it was us playing the whole time" (Drummer)
"Oh, and that end bit - where you zoom into my hand after the last strum of the guitar, that's pretty cool" - (Lead guitarist)
"I really wasn't expecting the quality of the cameras to be like that either" - (Guitarist)

3. Is there anything your unhappy with?
"Hmm I'm not sure really, I think there was too many close up shots of the singer James if im honest - there's too much of that" - (Lead Guitarist) (All agree)
"I'm not too keen on that hand held shot of James either really" - (Alex - Guitarist)
"I can't really think of anything, but as a musician, I could tell we wern't really playing live - you can tell I wasn't hitting the symbol" - (Drummer)
"Yeh I noticed that too - the same with the guitars that wern't plugged in. You notice these things and it didn't look proffessional. I guess thats not your fault though!" (Guitarist)

4. What do you think of the pace and rythm?
"Yeh it worked really well with the song, it was quite fast and there were loads of shots so there was so much to look at. How did you do that?" - (Guitarist)
"Well I wish we could have chose our own song because I'm sure we could make a better rythm! - but yeh, I like what you've done with it" - (Drummer)

5. What would you have done differently?
"I'm not sure really, I would probably use more props, make the set more interesting I rekon" - (Guitarist)
"Yeh I probably wouldn't want to do it in that same set, It would of been good to have a proper location" - (Alex - Guitarist)
What about outside?
"Yeh, yeh outside! that would have been good" - (Alex - Guitarist)
"Yeh outside would be good, but I suppose it would be hard to take all the equipment out wont it, plus it was winter!" (Lead guitarist)

6. Would you make a music video again?
"Yeh deffinatly! it was quite tedious at the time having to do it over and over - but now I've seen how it turns out, yeh!" (Lead guitarist)
"Yeh I would, it was fun - I feel like a proper musician now, I wish I could do more! (Alex - Guitarist)
"I wish we could do it again, I wasn't feeling well at all that day so I wish I could have put more energy into it" - (Drummer)

7. Would you hire us if you become famous and need a music video? (laughs)
"Haha, yeh I dont see why not - you done a good job!" - (Alex - Guitarist)





(written by Emily Stansfield)

Pop Promo







Individual Pop Promo Ideas



This was my individual idea for the album cover and magazine advert, the idea I had was to make interesting by making it Robotic.
We ended up not using it because it didn't fit in with the genre of our band very well and it didn't fit in with the music video and we wanted our pro promo to be coherent with they way in which our band wanted to be represented.

Thursday 5 May 2011

Audience Feedback

Feedback.
This presentation was put together by Emily Stanfield.

Friday 15 April 2011

Pre Production






Sunday 6 March 2011

Synopsis

The final idea for our music video would involve a band performance in the college studio, we would have prefferd to locate them somewhere more adventurous and perhaps outdoors but we had to think about practicalities and budget, not to mention we were filming in the middle of winter! Although we have a basic set to work with, our knowledge of lighting and mes-en-scene would help create a professional, interesting 'stage' for the band to perform on.

Soft and hard lights would be used in a way to A/ focus on important areas (mainly meaning the lead singer) and B/ To create depth from the black curtains surrounding them, making the band step out from the back ground instead of blending in. The band would be dressed in casual, yet a little more dressed up than everyday clothing - like they effortlessly look 'cool' which would be part of their star construction. Their set-up would be the typical band set up, with the lead singer at center front, drummer at center back, lead guitarist one side and the other two guitarist on the opposite side.
We would get as many shots as possible - using different angles, depths and camera movement in order to make sure our video is exciting and fast and also to make sure each band member gets camera time to do their thing and get recognition. Like many similar bands to House, we would like band members to be fun and energetic in performance, with hopefully some sort of interaction with each other to show their closeness, again which wold help their star construction.

Our music video would not only involve a band performance, and like other videos, we would need a narrative. Not straying too far from our first idea of a young couple growing old together with shots of kissing throughout, we decided to get a large variety of kissing and hugging shots from the general public or family members. What we wanted to portray through this idea was a general feel of love and affection, from all age groups and all different reasons to love, it would be quite a personal, emotional and light hearted montage throughout the video which would suit the music and topic of 'Kiss Me'.

When regarding mes-en-scene and props, we must consider that our band would only be in a small college studio and not many props would be needed - just having the band stand infront of a black background with spot lights and stage lights surrounding them would be enough, and would also bring all attention to the band - the idea of our video is quite simple and 'home made' as it is, so I think the simple set fits into this theme. We would not really be able control the set, location or props of our narrative montage because we are just going to be asking the general public if they would be happy to quickly kiss for the camera (of course after explaining the reason why we are filming!) - but we're not anticipating a certain location because again, we are after a natural, home-made sequence.

Written by Emily Stansfield.

Thursday 3 March 2011

Audience Profile

Sarah



Sarah is one of three siblings, she is the youngest, and she is 17 years old.
She really likes alternative rock bands, including Cage in Elephant, Cobra Starship, Death Cab for a Cutie and Paramore.
She goes to sixth form and likes hanging out with her fellow scene kids. She loves her big group of friends and her family. She enjoys drawing and being creative, she can play the guitar a little bit.
Sarah watches CSI, Twillight, Vampire Diaries, Jersey Shore and Tim Burton Stuff.




Ollie


Ollie, is a only child and he like art, and animals.
He listens to mainly Melodic Death metal bands like Dead by April and Sonic Syndicate, but he also likes alternative rock bands such as Green Day and Killdozer.
Likes hanging out with his mates in the park, getting drunk and going to house parties.
And Ollie absolutely loves the Inbetweeners.

Band Research

We asked our band HOUSE, who we are making a music video for, some individual/group questions and here are their answers.
Taking in mind this is a formed band involving a diverse group of people.
The band consists of 5 students
James- vocalist
Alex- guitar
Fagan- bass guitar
Steven- guitar
Tom- drums


How is it that house became?
Fagan: we all new each other from in and around college. To be fair, it wasn’t until college that we formed.
Steven: to gain our qualifications in music, we must record varieties of songs within a band so long story short…HOUSE was formed.
Alex: obviously outside of college we are either rehearsing in our other bands or just rocking out in our rooms. We are musicians, that’s what we do but the fact I get to do it and receive a qualification at the end of it…cant say I’m upset about it.


So what drives you to continue to make music, to play your chosen instrument day in day out?
Tom: Its hard to comment on what it is that drives me. Personally for me its ingrained…innate. As if I was born to do this for the rest of my life. That playing is what keeps me from going over the edge. It keeps me sane man. Growing up I would listen to Queens of the stoneage and would listen to Dave Grohl over and over again and try and imitate him on the drum kit. Loved those guys.
Steven: So deep is our Tom (laughter) I was a huge beetles fan due to my dads repeated playing of them during my years of growing up. Eleanor Rigby may possibly be my favourite song.
James: Michael Jackson is what made me want to sing. My mum and dad bought me his earlier stuff first and then just continued to buy me anything that was M.J orientated. Such a shame I never got to see him live and never will.

How do you want to be portrayed in the pop promotion?

Simultaneously they all exclaimed that being themselves is what is wanted.
Alex: Because we are all so different, one person may dress in a Megadeth t-shirts whilst the other will be wearing Nike air max trainers . If we were all to have to wear the same piece of clothing then it wouldn’t express who we are or what we as individuals try to present….It would just feel uncomfortable.

What do you all aspire to achieve?
The overall agreement was firstly to receive a good overall pop promotional package to be produced. One that portrayed the band well and promoted them to the fullest.
James: it would be great to see HOUSE become something more than just a regular pop punk band. that’s where hopefully you guys (a2 media group) can start more than just ‘word of mouth’ advertising.
Tom: Would be amazing to see our names in magazine advertisements or on the back pages of Q magazine promoting up and coming gigs of popular bands.
They all agreed to this.

If for any reason HOUSE couldn’t make things work, might you all still persist and try things solo or work with other musicians?
Very controversial question I know but you are all still students and young. Is this something you all have thought about at all?

Fagan: If there comes points where you are unable to continue forward then I shall detour until I can get back on to that path.
Things in life aren’t easy but for those that it is then they are just lucky. I am determined to make things work because I could not see myself doing anything else. If HOUSE didn’t work out then there are always possibilities to do instrumentals for other peoples tracks/ live performances etc.
Steven: I want to go to university and study a bit more in depth the history of music. How it has evolved through the ages. The revolutionaries that have set the ground work for the music that we hear today. Through university I want to divulge with different instruments also. As much as I love guitar there is definitely more out there, maybe the triangle will take to me better (laughter)But I will definitely continue to play and possibly come back at the weekends to play with HOUSE as long as I am still wanted.
Tom: Once your gone, your gone……only kidding. Well I think I can speak for everyone when I say that music is our life, I know its very cliché but its true. We will continue to work and strive forwards to achieve what is necessary to either be signed to a label or to do our own individual work with others but somehow we will integrate music into our careers, even if I do have to work in an office to make ends meet.
Alex: Outside of HOUSE I already play with a band which I have been doing so since very early adolescence which is great. I get to play a lot throughout the week which suits me brilliantly as I can continue to better my instrumental skills.
If HOUSE weren’t to make it ‘god forbid’ then I hope my other band and I can but if its not meant to be then it isn’t. Maybe there are other paths I am meant to follow. Who knows?

Research conducted by Joshua Featherstone.

Wednesday 2 March 2011

Treatment.

In cinematography we will used a wide variety of shots, these will include long shots of the band and the couple, which will be good establishing shots as well as close ups of the band members, instruments and actors, we will do this at different angles.
We will also have varying shots for th narrative, which will include close ups and medium shots and over the shoulder shots, we will also have panning shots of the band.

As for Editing we will use slip screen which will be between the narrating, the performance and the montage of people kissing. We might add some slow motion effects of speed it up a little and use a fade at the end.
We will cut between shots and it will be non continuous. Because it is a love song we aim to wave warm colors and make it slow paced.

The Mise-En-Scene we have chosen will be the band wearing their casual clothing, and the couples too.
We plan to film the couples at the park where they will have been for a day out.
And the band we will find in the studio, with black curtains and 300w lights as well as others, we want to make it so that the black curtain is not visible, we will also have the instruments and amplifiers.