Evaluation, written form

Question one: In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

General stuff about video

Our video was based around conceptual ideas, having large amounts of symbolism which either related directly to the song lyric in verbatim (for example, walking past the fatburger, playing the song on the phone) or to what the lyric means.  Having symbolism in the video allowed for the viewer to piece together the story and emotions that the song was trying to convey.

My case study of Paradise by Coldplay is a heavy influence on the overall aesthetic of this video, using a costume to mask who the protagonist of the video is and adding the underlying theme of isolation and being out of place. This case study is mostly a narration, not having too many signs of overt symbolism which, while it is effective, is not the type of video my team and I wanted to produce. Having conceptual and surreal elements which tell a story allows the viewer to interpret different things in a way which they see fit, rather than the video having one set meaning. A further inspiration to the video concept was the film Donnie Darko in which there are heavy themes of obscurity and the main character sees a bunny. This had a clear relation and influence on our music video.

Narratively speaking, the structure of our music video is non-linear. The scenes show the protagonist in different places with no real indication of how or when he got there. This works to add to the theme of the video. However, a clear storyline is not necessarily needed as the viewer focuses more on the protagonist and how much he stands out rather than the scenery. 

Postmodernism

Our video was very experimental and this matched the genre of the song as it is quite an alternative genre that features many different aspects of music rather than simply falling under the category of ‘rap’. This links with Goodwin’s idea of genre related style and also shows continuity between our video and chosen song. 

Camera

There are a variety of shots used in our music video. In the opening chorus there is a mix of shots ranging from medium shots to cutaways. Using this range of shots allows for the viewer to be immersed in what is going on and to also straight away have questions for what is happening.

The camera is kept stationary throughout the whole video. Having the camera move in a shot to either track the artist or show surroundings would break the storyline.This challenges conventions of the genre of our chosen song as usually in rap the camera moves to track the artist, either as they're lip syncing or moving through their surroundings in the shot.

Editing

During the editing process we made sure to line the lyrics up with the different shots and visuals we had filmed. The first chorus of the song is accompanied with shots that are edited to match the beat of the song. It's edited to create a flipped version that you first see, this is done to give the viewer something more to look at rather than just a plain shot that lasted 4/5 seconds each. 

We made sure that the each shot was cut to match up with the lyrics said. For example, at 0:33 the shot is edited to match up with the sound of a door closing which is included in the song.

Print Products

For my print products I wanted to create something that was equally as confusing and experimental as our video. This is because of the fact that the products such as posters are the first thing that most people will see when first coming across our video. Having a sense of confusion in the print products makes the viewer feel curious and they will want to go search the video and find out more about the bunny costume and the video.

The majority of case studies and research done while looking at CD cases and posters was done within the rock genre. This is due to the fact that rock music generally has a darker aesthetic and meaning behind what you see. This related directly to our video and print products so it made sense to look through rock albums. This will also allow it to appeal to a wider audience rather than just people that listen to rap/hip hop.

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

Altogether, our video and print products are consistent in the style and overall aesthetic. Our video features the scenery that I have used on the inside of my CD case and the bunny is featured on the cover and on the poster of my print products. This gives a sense of unity that ties it all together and flows well. Particularly in the themes and imagery of my products

In my poster, I have chosen to feature the bunny as it will give the person looking at it a glimpse of the video and they will want to know more. Furthermore, my poster features some reviews of the song. This will catch the viewer's attention and, as it has positive reviews, they'll be more inclined to look up the video and form their own opinion of it. This shows that the poster and video both work to give the video more attention.

When thinking about how I would extend my products if they were operating in the real world, I would use various social media sites to further promote the video to a wider audience. Websites such as Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr and Facebook would allow for the video to be noticed more frequently through people being able to easily share it to their own followers. The use of social media among the general population has greatly increased in the past years and this is an advantage.

Question Three: What have you learned from your audience feedback?

With the use of audience feedback, we have been able to further develop our idea and understand what it is that makes our video appealing.

In our initial pitch, our ideas were very vague and we knew that we wanted our video to be very conceptual and abstract compared to the majority of our peers who wanted a more performance based video. This allowed our video to stand out amongst the other pitches and our classmates had a very positive reception to our ideas. However, once we were asked some questions about the meaning of certain things such as the bunny suit, my team and I came to the realization that we need to add in heavier symbolism and some context which relates to the song as well as our idea.

Once showing a rough edit of our video to our peers we had gotten very positive feedback. This gave my team and I the confidence that our video was going in the right direction and motivated us to continue with our idea. The audience reaction to the final scene of the video was the most impactful. As they hadn’t been expecting the video to lead to such a dramatic scene it created a visual and audible reaction throughout the class, which is what we intended to do while filming that particular scene. The audience also weren’t expecting this scene as in most cases, videos tend to have a relatively happy ending to the narrative but our final scene was quite the opposite.

In the final screening of our video we decided to gather friends and have them watch the music video. They all commented on the editing at the start of the video and how it went well with the beat of the song and the scenery. Much like with the rough cut screening, our friends were very much entranced by the final scene and the majority of them had commented on the fact that it left them thinking about the video as they didn’t know what happened to the bunny after he walked into the water. One shot they also liked was the one near the beginning of the first chorus of the bunny laying in the bathtub with Christmas lights.

When pitching our ideas for our print products, our class seemed to have a positive view that our products would fit with our overall theme of our video. This is what we were aiming for as we wanted to make sure all of our individual products went well together.

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

Many of my skills had developed in the process of both making the video and digi packs. While filming the video, I had learned to become more comfortable with both the camera and tripod, learning to maneuver with them in busy places without inconveniencing anyone that is trying to pass by. Furthermore, my team and I have greatly improved our editing skills. Neither of us had ever used the editing software provided by the college and so when we first started it was quite hard to get to grips with everything. However, as time went on we both became much more confident with what we were doing and we even attempted to add more experimental styles of editing rather than just keeping it at a regular cutting rate. The filming and editing was split up evenly throughout our team, ensuring that we both got a chance to film and edit and that we were both happy with the finished results. Working in a group further allowed me to develop my skills in communication and organisation.

For my print products, my main case studies were The Black by Asking Alexandria, Chasing Ghosts by The Amity Affliction and Camp by Childish Gambino. These case studies were a big inspiration in the aesthetic of my final print products. The first two case studies fall into the rock genre as the meaning behind them fit well with the overall theme of our video and the appearance of these album covers also align with our video idea. Using websites such as YouTube and Google to further research these albums and other rock music albums is what helped to give me a wider understanding of what I could possibly do with my own album and poster. Using another genre to inspire the look of my CD case gives it a unique style as usually, hip hop or rap albums follow a similar style. This means that my CD and poster will stand out against them.

Prior to making the final print products, I had used software such as Photoshop to plan my layout and give me a clearer idea of how I wanted it to look. This caused me to grow more confident when creating things in Photoshop, rather than simply editing.

When planning the filming for our video, we used pre production documents that have been made accessible to us through Moodle. These documents (recces, storyboards, risk assessments etc.) are what allowed us to carefully plan our time and make sure everything ran smoothly during the filming process and we didn’t waste any time.