Video

Evaluation Q4

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

To create my video, I used different technologies and software to make my video, magazine cover and digipak cover.

First I began with the researching stage, which was finding what consumers/audience like and what they want/ look for in an media product, so I could try and incoperate some of those ideas into my work.
I already had my idea of what my product was, however I searched and analysed music videos from Youtube, to see how I would go about creating.
I also analyse magazine covers to get an idea of the layout and appeal it has to it's intended target audience, so for me this was the alternative rock scene.
To gather more information from a consumers point of view and devised a questionnaire to find out what they expect to find in my products.

Once I has as much information I needed I bagan planning and creating my production work.
For the magazine cover this meants using the internet to search for already established/ well known magazines.
For the video, this meant using technology such as a camcorder, digital camera, tripod etc, to shoot my video and take pictures for my magazine cover.

SAMSUNG Camcorder









Olympus m840 8.0 megapixel camera.

After filming I started editing my footage,which from this point on was computer based work, and to do this I used VideoPad Video Editor. This is a software that allowed me upload my video footage, music to enable me to cut and trim videos to shorten for an specific shot. Add effects, for example black and white, and also transitions, like fade, dissolve etc.



VideoPad Video Editor






As my track for the video was to long I had to shorten it, so to this I used a programme called WavePad Sound Editor.
This allowed me to split the track at specif points then I could merge them together.


WavePad Sound Editor








For editing photos to create my magazine and digipak cover, I used Photoshop CS3.

Finally...

Evaluation Q3

What have you learned from your audience feedback?

After I completed my Video I posted it on YouTube and gathered opinion my mouth from others.

Most have commented on my video by saying:

1) Length of the video was abit short
2) The transition into clips were too quick
3) Some shots could have been longer, for example prolonged skating sequence.
4) The quality of some shots not clear enough.

Evaluation Q2

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

As the main focus of my work is skateboarding and BMX, I would say that the combination of my main product and ancillary text was very effective.
The video is used to present skateboarders and bmx riders in London, so to make the video promotion more effective, the front cover of the magazine features a BMX ridr, which will appeal to those who enjoys these sports, aswell as those who enjoys the alternative/rock genre and art ie graffiti.






Printscreen from video






Magazine Cover












The foreground of the magazine cover, you can see that the location of the picture was captured at Southbank Skatepark in Waterloo. This is mainly where my video footage was shot, so you can further see how my main product and ancillary text compliment each other perfectly.



Finally, as my magazine is combination music, sport but also art, there are a lot of shots in my main product which feature graffiti in the background. I decided to use this location of Southbank for my Digipak cover.

.

Evaluation Q1

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

Many Alternative/indie magazines are presented quite similar and simple in regards to layout and amount of text used on the cover. The main purpose of this is to bring focus onto the cover artists, by the use of images and bold font.
Most Rock/Alternative rock magazines are quite simple in terms of text, so the cover is not to over crowded and the pictures are the main focus. This is to attract their targeted demographic by focusing on their interest.
Below are examples of magazines of this genre.


Kerrang magazine features many subgenres of rock, for example metal, punk etc, so tend to use more of a darker colour like black, with white and yellow font. The magazines cover artist, which is Fall Out Boy's ,ost popular members, takes up the majority of the cover space, with the intent to draw in consumers.








Taped Magazine











Every magazine has a theme to their covers that it associated with their cover artist, which is presented in the form of background colouring and font, basic design layout.


NME Magazine uses:

- Bold Lettering
- Mostly neutral colours like white
- Central positioning of cover artist
- Light background image of building landscape - Used as relation to the bands latest destination

For my magazine cover i've used similar techniques and conventions for this type of music genre.
* I started off with the use of bold font.
* Red, Black and White for font colour.
* Image associated with product - picture of skateboarder and BMX riders
- Placed in foreground
- Overlapped with minimum text
Since my magazine is a combination of music, sport and art, i've included:
* smaller pictures similar to product like: Graffiti, more skaters etc
* also added an Exclusive interview with the band - Silver Sun Pickups.

My Magazine Cover

DigiPak Cover

For the DigiPak Covers I took a picture of Southbank skate park to use as the background for each foldered cover.
The front cover shows the name of the artist i'm using, which is Silversun Pickups, plus the album title Swoon and the video soundtrack "Sort Of".
To add text to the picture i uploaded the image on to photoshop and then used the 'Horizontal Typing' tool, clicking onto the picture and then dragging across.
After typing in the text I manipulated it by changing the angle, by bending the words.
i did this with the artist name, album title and so the song title.

After adding text to the picture this is what it looked like, with the bright red font to standout. This picture will be used as the front cover of the digipak.

Filming

As my video is based on an outdoor sport like skateboarding, I was faced with problems like the weather, being a lot of rainfall, that my chances of filming were on occasion limited.
I have also have troubles with the resolution and the overall appearance of some of the footage i've edited because of where i've had to convert the files.

Photoshop - Magazine Cover

When creating the magazine cover for my production, I used Photoshop to edit various photos, by extracting from the image and changing the overall appearance.


Here is a picture I took of an BMX rider, which will be the main cover. Before I began editing on Photoshop I resized the image.




















I then began adding text the the cover.

First was the title of the magazine, Alternative Press, which was made to stand out. I clicked the 'Horizontal Type Tool' in the tool box to the left, wrote in the title, then increased and coloured the text.


I continued doing this to add in more text onto the cover, changing the font size and colour. As the genre of music i'm doing is Alternative Rock, i've chosen dark colours like black and red for the font, with a few text in white.



I've decided that my magazine is a combination of music, sport and art so i've decided to include small pictures on the cover as features of the magazine. This includes graffiti art and pictures of the skateboarders, as a free poster.

To do this I uploaded the picture of the skateboarder onto Photoshop, and extracted the actually skateboarder from its original picture and placed it on my magazine cover.
On the middle of the cover I added more text by introducing the band name of my video, as an exclusive interview, with a picture of the band beside it.

To finish off the cover I included text of offers like free tickets to concerts, upcoming extreme sporting events and news on other Alternative Rock bands also a feature on 'Girls Who Skate' as a way to broaden the audience.




















The idea of a magazine cover is to have as much information on it as possible to attract the attention of consumers, with what they would find interesting to them.

Photoshop Test

To familiarise ,myself with photoshop I took images relating to my production work, like skateboarding stances, so I could practice editing manipulating photos by cropping, cutting, changing colour schemes etc.

This is an original picture which I took.

I then decided to play around with different colours to change the effect of the photo, like for this photo I turned it pink.

This was a test before I started on the real photos.

Filming Locations

I have indentified two of the locations I will be filming at, being in Clapham Common and South bank Skateparks.

Clapham Common Skatepark



SouthBank



Here I will be filming specific shots like tricks performed by the skaters, done in a variety of close- ups and long shots.

Final Brief

So I knew beforehand that I was making a Alternative Rock Music Video, plus a CD/DVD Cover and a Poster for a music magazine.
Now that my audience and product research is complete, I know the specifics to what my A2 Media Production will include and who i'm targeting for.

Target Audience

Demographic: Aimed at Male and Females, and at a narrowed down age of 15 - 23 years old.
Psychographic are those interested in the rock genre and enjoy skateboarding.

I will be advertising m poster in both 'NME' and 'Alternative Press' Magazine, which are top magazines in Europe and America, and the poster will be of a skateboarder, in front of a graffiti background.
My product will be distributed via internet, through sites like YouTube, that allow you to share videos, and also on websites belonging to the record label and magazine.

Representation - I will not be using the streotypical representations of the rock genre, instead i'll have a range of different age, gender and ethnicities to draw the audience in.

Narrative - I'll be sort if using a linear narrative that will be evident alongside the skateboarding, which will tell of a journey of a group of skateboarders, coming together against everything.

Product Research - Magazine Ad (Poster)

To advertise and distribute my music video I will be also creating a magazines poster to promote my product. Having looked at a range of magazines to determine where I will distribute and who the magazine appeals to, I have narrowed it down to two possible magazines to advertise in.


One of the magazines I will advertising the poster in is NME Magazine.
NME is one of the most popular magazines in the United Kingdom as well as the best-selling British magazines.
Being a popular music magazine, essential to the rock genre, it would be perfect to advertise to my target audience.
Another reason for advertising in NME is because the magazine is circulated mainly in Europe , which is a huge market, expanding the audience. NME also have an online magazine which brings you the latest music news and music videos.







For my American and Canadian audience, advertising in Alternative Press magazine would be the perfect option.
This issue of Alternative Press, which is in a poster form, has made me think of ideas of how to create and position certain features, when it comes to producing my poster. Things like the layout and size of the font, making it stand out and finally the image I would use and how it relates to my product.








As my video is predominantly about skateboarding, I will working around that idea, plus adding a bit more about how the skaters will be represented.

Product Research - CD Cover

For the CD Cover I have researched a couple of album covers from rock bands to see how they are represented or present themselves. This will give me ideas for my CD Cover.

This is the album cover from the band Fu Manchu and their 1997 album 'The Action is Go'.

The themes surrounding Fu Manchu's music are primarily Skateboarding, Women and Cars, which is refected in their lyrics.

The second album cover is Fall Out Boy - From Under The Cork Tree

The bands thought process and vision for album covers come from their lyrical sound, which hails from use of irony and other literary devices to narrate personal experience and stories. This album cover for 'Under The Cork Tree', which features a van with a trailer in a slump of snow, is a reference to a car accident the band was in.

Audience Research

For statistical data of what genre of music my intended target audience listens to and what their preferences are, I have devised an questionnaire.

1)This pie chart clearly shows that I have recieved more responses from Males then Females, however not by a large margin.

2)

From the results of the second question of my questionnaire, I have narrowed down the age of my target audience with the majority being aged 15-18 years old. However, I will take a slight focus on those aged 19-23 years old to expand the audience.

3)

The responses for the ethnicity question is not as wide as I intended, but show that the majority of the responses are from the white and black respondants. The results from this question would have been different if I had asked a more satifying number of respondants.

4)

Of the participants I asked, most of them listened to Rock, closely followed by RnB. This helps as Alternative Rock is genre that I am focusing on for my media prooduct.

5)

For this magazine question I could have put more thought into it and widen the options. Instead of using existing magazines in shops I could have included online magazines aswell. This might have made a difference in the results. However there are a few who don't read magazines at all.

6)

When it comes to distributing my music video, I know exactly where to do it. It isn't a surprise that a large majority of people watch music videos on TV and on YouTube, so this allows me to reach out to a larger audience.

7)

You could say that 1 or 2 of these options, maybe all, attract consumers to a music video, the storyline being one of the main option. With the right combination in my music video I intend to use most of these conventions to satisfy my target audience.

8)

For this last question I got varied responses, for example those who have never been to live concert or only go once every few years. This is down to the fact of not having time or money.

Now that I have completed my questionnaire I know what directions i'll be taking when creating my media product. For example what audience I am targeting and what conventions to use.

Institutional Research

For the institutional research I will be looking at different record companies that would be suitable for distributing my media product.
I'll will be looking at how they distribute their music products, the success of their artists/bands signed to them and what they stand for.


The first institution I am looking at is Fueled By Ramen Records. Fueled by Ramen is a record label based in New York City, whos primary genre is Pop Punk and Alternative Rock.
One of the record labels strengths is the number of successful albums they have released. For example a self-titled EP from the band Jimmy Eat World, which proved to be a breakthrough for them and label. This lead to increased disribution demands and a rise in radio play.

More success came to the label when Panic! at the Disco's debut album 'A Fever You Can't Sweat Out' , and Paramore's second album 'Riot!' gained platinum certified status for the amount of sales.

Fueled by Ramen also have a video streaming site for all bands signed to them ,called FBR+, which is way of distributing my music video.


Dangerbird Records is an independant record label, with a small roster of artists, located in Los Angeles, California, where they deal with music in the Alternative Rock and Indie Rock genre.

Dangerbird gained recognition when they released Silversun Pickups debut album Carnavas in 2006 with sales of over 300,000, and as the rocord label has only been around for 5 years, already they have helped the artists signed to them acheive international success.

On their website Dangerbirld make it a big priority to advertise their bands by posting new videos and live performances from the bands, which is an effective way of distributing new products to consumers.


EMI is one of the leading music companies in the world with the best known and successful recording artists, from a range of genres. EMI poses as an umbrella for a number of record labels including Virgin Records.

Virgin Records is a British records label founded by British entrepreneur Richard Branson in 1972, to then be bought by EMI in 1992.

The record label has a whole of artists from up and coming to the successfully established bands like 30 Seconds to Mars, Gorillaz and The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, just to name a few. Virgin's site also enables users to view music videos by the artists, mostly via Youtube, which is an example of web 2.0 that allows video sharing universally.

Another way in which Virgin Records advertise for their artists is through music festivals like the popularly known 'V Festival', which is a predominantly rock music festival.

Product Research

This video here is a promo video from the Dew Tour in Portland 07: Vans International.
This theme street skateboarding is the kind of idea I want to be using for my music video, as it gives me a chance to work with various camera angles, which will help develop my technique.
As i'm doing a skateboard music video the type of shot i'll be using are long shots, close-ups, high angle shots and low. Also a convention of this type of video is the speed in which the shots change, I would say depending on the music to make it more effective. As well as using skateboarding i want to show a narrative within the video.



Product Research The Kooks - Naive

This music video demonstrates genre characteristics by setting the video in a crowded club with a brief shot of a band performing on stage. This type of characteristic is typical of the alternative/indie genre.
Also in this video you notice a relationship between the lyrics and visual. The lyrics tell of a story of a man who is having trouble with his girlfriend and how she behaves, and so the visul aspect of the video amplifies this with the actors.
Also there are a lot of close-up shots of members of the band which shows the recurrence of conventions like clothing.

The Kooks - Naive

Product Research - Sum 41 - Fat Lip

This music video demonstrates the genre characteristics by showing a rock band performing at a skate park.
There is an obvious relation between the lyrical and visual aspects of the video. Firstly lyrics like "I don't wanna waste my time, become another victim of society". This is amplified by showing a qroup of people whose actions are not of the typical social norms.
A notable motif of this band are the crowds of followers that appear in their videos and disorderly behaviour.



As there is that stereotypical representation of skateboarders being of white ethnicity and listen to rock music, I have decided to explore different ethnicities who are into skateboarding, compared to those that are seen in rock videos.

Print screens from American recording artist Pharrell Williams.

Aswell as the Rap and Hip-Hop genre, Pharrell is also in a rock band called N.E.R.D.

Product Research - Music Video Analysis

Editors - Papillon



My interpretation of the video is its a journey of life, friends joining you along the way then disappear, and its then you make your own way.
This music video from the Editors demonstrates genre characteristics by presenting a low key , fairly low production value video that shows the artists' vision and individuality.
The video shows a relationship between the lyrics and video, as the song title 'Papillon' is french for Butterfly, which after it breaks out from it's cacoon becomes free. This is similar to the video as it shows a runner/runners free to roam around the streets.

Initial Brief

For my A2 Media Studies Advanced portfolio I will be doing music promotion.

The main products I will be creating is a Music Video , a CD cover of my product and a Music Magazine ad.

The genre of my main product will be Alternative Rock. The reason I have chosen this genre of music is because I wanted to choose a genre that is popular and listened to by a huge number of consumers, but also shows of how up and coming artists/bands go from independent to mainstream in the music industry.

Target Audience

Demographic: Aimed at male and females, and the age is aimed at roughly between 13 to 29 years old.

Psychographic: Followers of the rock genre, up and coming artists/bands (independant to mainstream)

Lifestyle: Skateboarding, garage bands

Similar Media Products: Artic Monkey, Jack's Mannequin, Sum 41

Justification for choice of brief

I have decided to choose this brief because I would like to target consumers who are more into this independant genre of music and how their influence can help progress it to a more mainstream audience.