Blog task 4

The draft of our commentry


Pre production and planning

We are commenting on how we used technology, why we used it and how we made it creative, moreover we are reflecting on the change and advancements from last year’s use of technology to this years a2 product.

Starting with the pre production and panning of our music video. We used search engines such as youtubes official websites and fan pages to get an idea of how to generally construct a successful music video and to inspire our own music video through the use of web 2.0 technologies. Furthermore we used my space, facebook and even twitter to research and develop our bands institutional context. We also used web 2.0 to contact the record company of the song we used by Calexico to ensure that the copyright and legal matters were all sorted out, this ensured we could put our music video onto you tube and blogger after we constructed it.

We looked at other music videos to not only enhance our creativity but also to get a feel for the country and western genre, moreover we used feedback from fans as we didn’t want to make the same mistakes as other music videos that we looked at did. We looked at some of dolly partons work and that also enhanced our creativity as we did not want our music video to be that stereotypical of the country and western genre where as Keith urbans work was much more diverse and took the modern outlook on country and western, his videos on youtube and his fan pages inspired our unique and slightly edgy take on the country and western genre.

We also purchased all our props online including the second hand guitar from ebay and a cowboy hat that we decided not to use as we thought it would be conforming to the stereotypes of a country and western singer, as you can see we have moved away from this dressing our star in casual, very young and up to date clothing.

Our blogs this year are very much like a creative filter, last year our research on the internet was much broader, there was no limit set to us which led to us this year summarising what was significant and useful. We now use the internet much more precicesly and carefully and we have a defined idea on what information is helpful. This year we have used our blogs as a filter, last year was much less selective as to what exactly was needed on our blogs. Therefore we use technology in a much more mature way and we are learning how to be much more selective.

Another form of technology we used in the pre production was Photoshop, we used this programme on the computers to anticipate the image of what we wanted our star to look like, we looked at how we could manipulate images in preparation for the after affects.

Final cut pro is a programme that we used when we constructed our story boards and turned it into an animatic, we transferred rushes into final cut pro onto a time line this helped us cut our final product and the track helped us revise and fintune our story board ideas.
Construction promo digi pack

First of all, in constructing our promo, digi pack and poster we used final cut pro, we captured images from the shoot for our digi pack and then put these images through Photoshop to edit and improve them, we used took stills and used one of the cameras from the shoot day.

During the shoot day we were lucky enough to use a sony hd camera this camera enables us to shoot 3times more material then we could have done last year, moreover this camera was digital and in the editing stage the shots where in order and much easier to organise in comparison to last year as we used a tape. The fact that there was more film available meant that we could be more creative with our shots and be a bit more experimental, the camera has allowed us to be more free with what we want to shoot as we simply have the space and time, this enhanced our creativity as we had so much choice, from side angles to low angles to high angles we could capture and develop our star from the availability and advancement of our technologies.

Post production

In final cut pro we used markers when we were editing our music video this helped us make significant changes to the beat of our song and rhythm instrumentation, it helped create pace in our edits.

In after effects we used desaturation of colour to create a more sinister atmosphere. Moreover we used jump cuts throughout our music video to emphasise the fact that we our breaking the country and western stereotypes and the jump cuts are used to connote fast pace modern times and a urban take that we used in the country and western genre. Moreover the cuts highlight his star image, they symbolise his issues and troubled mind, the jumps relate to his unstable disturbed sociological state, for an example , Shots of our star stroking his chin further stresses the idea that he is constantly in deep thought.

We used a juxtaposition in saturating our star to make him remain glowing and warm through the use of lighting, whereas the back ground is saturated to be cold and dark , this was done to ensure our star image remained positive and dazzling.

Another media effect we used was montage, this was heavily influenced by one of Russia’s most prominent filmmakers, sergie eisenstein, he was essentially the father of montage and our mode of address.

Our artist in many ways was singing about emotional tragedy we used the same stylistic ideas as eisenstein that convey the same ideas of tragedy. The constant dramatic flashes of lights were also copied by the infamous Russian film maker in our music video, the light creates a disconcerting or unsettling atmosphere that relates back to the idea of pain, nightmares and tragedy. All these after effects add texture to the viewing experience, which is engaging and therefore interesting to watch.

The final copy of commentry


We are commenting on how we used technology, why we used it and how we made it creative, moreover we are reflecting on the change and advancements from last year’s use of technology to this years a2 product.

Starting with the pre production and panning of our music video. We used search engines such as youtubes official websites and fan pages to get an idea of how to generally construct a successful music video and to inspire our own music video through the use of web 2.0 technologies. Furthermore we used my space, facebook and even twitter to research and develop our bands institutional context. We also used web 2.0 to contact the record company of the song we used by Calexico to ensure that the copyright and legal matters were all sorted out, this ensured we could put our music video onto you tube and blogger after we constructed it.

We looked at other music videos to not only enhance our creativity but also to get a feel for the country and western genre, moreover we used feedback from fans as we didn’t want to make the same mistakes as other music videos that we looked at did.


In after effects we used desaturation of colour to create a more sinister atmosphere. Moreover we used jump cuts throughout our music video to emphasise the fact that we our breaking the country and western stereotypes and the jump cuts are used to connote his emotional disturbance and supports the star image of a man in touch with his dark side, this is also shown by the discolouration of his eyes suggesting that he is exhausted from the emotional strain. It also represents the fast pace of modern times and a urban take that we used in the country and western genre. Moreover the cuts highlight his star image, they symbolise his issues and troubled mind, the jumps relate to his unstable disturbed sociological state, for an example , Shots of our star stroking his chin further stresses the idea that he is constantly in deep thought.

We used a juxtaposition in saturating our star to make him remain glowing and warm through the use of lighting, whereas the back ground is saturated to be cold and dark , this was done to ensure our star image remained positive and dazzling.

Another media effect we used was montage, this was heavily influenced by one of Russia’s most prominent filmmakers, sergie eisenstein, he was essentially the father of montage and our mode of address.

In final cut pro we used markers when we were editing our music video this helped us make significant changes to the beat of our song and rhythm instrumentation, it helped create pace in our edits.
We also purchased all our props online including the second hand guitar from ebay and a cowboy hat that we decided not to use as we thought it would be conforming to the stereotypes of a country and western singer, as you can see we have moved away from this dressing our star in casual, very young and up to date clothing. This desaturated guitar is used to display his emotional turmoil.

During the shoot day we were lucky enough to use a sony hd camera this camera enables us to shoot 3times more material then we could have done last year, moreover this camera was digital and in the editing stage the shots where in order and much easier to organise in comparison to last year as we used a tape. The fact that there more film available meant that we could be more creative with our shots and be a bit more experimental, the camera has allowed us to be more free with what we want to shoot as we simply have the space and time, this enhanced our creativity as we had so much choice, allowing us to cut and cross cut our footage.

Blog task 3

In this essay I am going to Discuss how my feedback back our audience relates to my own view of the strengths and weaknesses of my product and use it to demonstrate hall’s concepts of preferred, negotiated and oppositional readings.
We gathered a variety of feedback for our pop promo video and our ancillary texts, the Digipak and the poster. We collected the feedback from the target audience and from other audience demographics according to the JICTAR model. Further we used quantitative and qualitative data from a focus group, questionnaire and our Youtube/Facebook comments. After this data was then collected we analyzed it.

With our pop video we were hoping to target a specificj audience to buy into our brand image of our artist. We decided that we were targeting men and woman up to university level, this means that they are educated to understand the apocalyptic feel to our video and how it then related to the world around them. Furthermore to how there relationship with our artist was similar to his or her own lives and relationships and how they could relate to him. Due to our artist sexual attractiveness this attracts woman, as they want to watch, buy and consume his music to feel closer to him. However, men also can relate to him as the song is about his heartbreak and how they can relate to him as a man and the troubles in their own relationships. Furthermore our audience may also sympathise or feel sorry for him creating a level of empathy to keep them watching, as he is sad and alone.

However, we were unable to put our video onto the public youtube site, as although we applied for copyright Calexico has a licencing agreement with copyright. This limited our youtube comments and reaction from our audiences

We featured 3 theorists in our questionnaire to help structure the responses we received so that we could anaylise them appropriately. The 3 theorists are Roland Barthes, Kats and blumner and Stewart Hall.
1. Roland Barthes audience expectations and foreknowledge and be able to pick or sample foreknowledge need to reinforce who target audience is
• Who is target audience: age (up to university level), gender, social group
• What other media they consume i.e. what mags they read (look up country western audiences)
• Can go back to institutional context
• Take stills from video or digi pack and ask the question “from looking at this image what type of music do you think he she makes”
• What is your favourite type of music
• Look at the objects in this picture and tell me what you think about it, it what type of genre this represents – what mood (organic, generic)

Kats and Blumner
This is the audience identify with the characters on the screen. Personal Identity, the ability to compare one’s life with the characters and situations within programmes and hence explore personal problems and perspectives. No matter from where or what class any audience member we have can also compare their life to the lives of the characters on screen. We can even identify with the pain and heartache or even confusion as many people go through thee emotions in life.

2) Diversion
Blumler and Katz say that Diversion is the ability to get away or escape mentally from everyday realities. Blumler and Katz say that in order for a media text to be diverting it has to occupy the viewer for more than 70% of the time. Our target audience could defiantly see our video as something they could relate to therefore watching it takes them away from pressures of school, university, home, emotional stress and even the pains of heartache.

3) Personal Relationship
Blumler and Katz say that personal relationship is about the ability to be able to identify themselves with the characters within the media text.
4) Surveillance: Surveillance, a supply of information about “whats going on” in the world.

And stewart hall. Stuart Hall’s is another theorist that can apply to the pop video and its audience. His theory states that a media producer communicated a preferred meaning through a media text.
Audience then has one of three reading, preferred reading, oppositional reading or a negotiated reading. This can be applied to our pop video, we as producers communicated a preferred meaning through our media text (the pop promo video). Our target audience then had one of three of the readings, meaning they accept the message, negotiated meaning they partially accept the message and oppositional, meaning they oppose the meaning and reject it. We saw this same theory apply to our pop video during our focus group. Around 3 out of the 4 members said they accepted the message that they understood it was quite apocalyptic and or understood his unset mood . However, different age groups may see this is different ways.

Through this feedback we wanted to discover whether our target audience enjoyed and understood the message we were trying to put across, the narrative, the representation of the character and if they could identify with them, how our video could be improved and even if they liked the song we had chosen.

These were the questions used which helped us establish these factors

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/YFYT56X

The comments we got back was positive such as “I enjoyed the story that progressed through out as he went walked around Battersea, resprenting the journey through life and how it does not always end well i.e with the heart break at the end”
We also got some more general answers such as “good editing” “Great” “very well done”

Blog task 2-How effective is the combination of your main product and your ancillary texts

Richard Dyers star image helps us to represent how the elements of our star image our sold through the our A2 product which includes our pop video, digi pack and poster.  I have looked at the conventions of our genre and how 3 products have worked to sell our product.

Richard Dyer states that “a star is an image and not a real person” he also says that “stars are commodities produced and consumed on the strength of their meanings.” We have created a very strong meaning of heart break which is a common convention is the creation of a star and their image represented In their lyrics but we have also incorporated an apocalyptic feel.  We have done this by subverting the conventions of a country and western genre being smooth cut, we have used jump cuts and Saturation of colour to create this feel.

However, our star does share the values of stardom as our male is relatable by being young but also by having a sexual attraction felt by many women.  Although, we do conform to some conventions of the genre by people alone and upset about love, although instead of being consoled of finding solitude he is alone and in a abandoned place, the location further emphasises this.  This gives our pop video a sense of realism as it is not conformist by being fake and glossy, it shows someones real life struggle.  This is how our USP was created as he is very organic.  This will also attract a broader audience as people will be able to relate to many of the conventions of the video such as heart break, isolation or the struggle that comes with following a path in life.

Stars depend upon a range of subsidiary media- magazine, TV, radio, the internet – in order to construct an image is made up of a range of meanings which are attractive to the target audiences. Fundamentally, the star image is incoherent, that is incomplete and ‘open’. Dyer says that this is because it is based upon two key paradoxes.

Paradox 1

The star must be simultaneously ordinary and extraordinary for the consumer

Paradox 2

The star must be simultaneously present and absent for the consumer.

We have achieved Paradox 1 by creating a very assessable feeling by him walking around an isolated but assessable place as it is not in a theatre or stage he is doing something that all people do.  However, is extraordinary has by using an interdiagetic gaze he is teasing the consumers of his music by making them feel as if they could be a part of his world, but not fully letting them in by not giving them a direct address, emphasised by how front cover as although you have a very personal look onto him, he is not looking on him it is very personal but you are not getting a full look at him.  This feeling of being close to him but not quite being with him gives the consumers a sense of wanting more which will be beneficial for the future of our artist. We have followed dyers ideology and have effectively made sure that the fans of our star will go away determined to continue consuming the star in order to carry on attempting to complete their image.

The image including the artists tour dates is a poster. We used this to promote our star image. Although one can see we have tried to break away from the country and western genre we still used the typical prop of country music, the guitar. We convey a western style font and de saturation of color to ensure that we follow the country and western stereotypes. However the background of urban decay and the general atmosphere of modern day city life once again challenge the audience’s expectations, thus making our star more diverse and interesting, this gives him an edge and differentiates him from other artists.

Blog task 1

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

Richard Dyer states that star image Is created from a range of materials.

We constructed aour star image from a pop promo, a digi-pack and an poster for a magazine.

Key unique qualities of our star image were constructed using various technical codes and conventions of the genre. We chose country and western genre and we sought to construct a star who symbolized some aspects of a traditional country and western star.

The term ‘star’ refers to the semi-mythological set of meaning constructed around music performers in order to sell the performer to a large and loyal audience.  Furthermore, Some common values of Music stardom are Originality, Creativity/talent and Youthfulness.  We have created an audience by using these common values. Through the use of the five technical areas of Camera, Editing, Mise en scene, sound and SPFX we have establish a star image.

In our pop video we shot our artist often from low to high establishing a ‘hero’ shot making him important and creating an audiences aspiration to be like him.   In addition through the use of diegetic gaze the audience can see and understand our artist without fully ever knowing him, making the audience want more from him but never fully getting him, drawing the audience into his world.

Fundamentally, the star image is incoherent, that is incomplete and ‘open’.  Dyer says that this is because it is based upon two key paradoxes; star must be simultaneously ordinary and extraordinary for the consumer. Secondly the star must be simultaneously present and absent for the consumer.

The incoherence of the star image ensures that audiences continually strive to ‘complete’ or to ‘make sense’ of the image. This is achieved by continued consumption of the star through their products. In the music industry, performance seems to promise the completion of the image, but it is always ultimately unsatisfying. This means that fans will go away determined to continue consuming the star in order to carry on attempting to complete their image.

Our star image is furthermore created through the use of mise en scene, including prop, location, costume and lighting.  Our Pop Video was shot as the location of Battersea Power Station which is derelict and without hope, due to the fact that it used to be used and important but is now alone and rotting.  This is reflected in our Artists performance he was once full of life which is represented by the natural sunlight surrounding him in the video however, but is now alone due to the loss of his girlfriend, which essentially has left him without hope for the his life and therefore music, as she was his muse.  This is furthermore shown by how when he finds her lying there dead the lighting is very dark and subdued.

This complies with the normal country and western star image as is often involves love and despair.  We have furthermore followed the star image of a country western star by using a leather jacket and a guitar on our artist.  However, we have modernised this star image but not using a straw hat and having him on the back of a horse with a toothpick in his mouth.  Creating a new star image which country and western audience and others can relate to and enjoy. 

In order to follow and subvert these conventions we need to establish and understanding and to learn them to be able to use them within the narrative. Negus explains them…

•      The explicit and unashamed promotion of the artist’s “image” as a specific product with a brand identity, ready for mass consumption.

•      The featuring of the artist

•      A wide and extensive use of shot types, camera angles and movement.
Repetition of reoccurring thematic elements and generically specific iconography.

•      
A possible narrative structure.

•      A possible performance element

•      Use of special effects

•      A carefully constructed Mise en Scene appropriate to the content and tone of the track

We have used many real life example to promote our star's image, and have complied with the new subverting country and western image in oder to establish a different yet still within the genre, brand image for our artist.  However, we have not conformed to the mass audience as our target audience is a smaller well educated specific set of people.  This will lead brand consumption and future following of the artists progression. 

The generic conventions that signify and genre and signal to audiences that their expectations will be met or reinforces their knowledge or different genres and products so that they can make a purchasing choice. 

Another element with are the ingredients which form a promise of expectation for the audience.  The audiences expect a direct address to become closer with the singer and establish a relationship between the two.  However, by having a unique direct address our audience are being drawn into his world but the USP is the fact that the world they are being drawn into is lonely and depressing.  Showing that the star is promising to understand his audiences pain and therefore meeting their expectations to a certain extent. 

Furthermore, our extensive use of shots and jump cuts with our editing technique gives the audience a sense of excitement and keeps them entertained and watching.  In addition the feel of a country and western Video is quite subverted as it is often quite straight forward and filled with a clear story of love or heartbreak.  Our video does not conform to this convention.  Our star is walking around battersea power station without a clear reason to, other than the fact that it represents is uncertainty of life and it is symbolic for the path around life and how it can be repetitive.  This is shown by the editing technique of recurring shots coming back and furthermore clouds going forwards and backwards showing the uncertainty of time, and how lost he is.  The reason for his walking and wonderment is then comes apparent at the end as his lover or love interest is dead.  This theme of love and death if conforming to the normal country and western conventions as this is often a theme is this genre of music.

our Digipack allows audiences to understand the brand of the bans.  it is a way of attracting those targeted audience (16- 25, up to university level so that they are well educated and can understand the themes and subverted conventions portrayed in the video and the artwork)

This back cover represents his Black Heart and how love and music is such a large part of his life and how that his heart is broken due to the passing of his love his music is also dying with her.  This conforms to the country stereotype of music, especially country music being interlinked with love and passion.  However, this stereotype is then subverted with the Poster, as although we are trying to convey the Country and Western feel with a very stereotypical leather jacket and guitar over the shoulder, it is subverted as in the background is then a derelict abandoned power station representing his dark soul filled with loneliness.

Pop Promo Digi Pack

Our Digi pack is a representation of our star. The poster does this through using a typical country and western font, which shows the genre of our star. This is furthermore shown through the use of his clothing. Our artist is shown to be in this genre through the guitar on his shoulder, which is typical country and in addition through the leather jacket he wears. this shows him to be masculine but still attractive so attention would be drawn to him and the poster when someone is flicking through a magazine. This will increase the revenue grossed from our album sales and help the reproduction of our artists music.

As member of the group i was able to share my photos from shoot day,  this photo of the guitar i took my self in order to represen the conventions of video and of the song as it is solely based around his music and his love. This photo shows that Both of these factors are a large part of his life.  The guitar symbolises the country and western genre as they are stereotypical country and western.  The heart however, made of rocks, represents his broken relationship and "Black heart".  When in the editing process we gave the guitar a golden glow to go against the ard and rock exterior of his heart.  To show how is music is pure and original but his heart is broken and shattered with then takes affect on his music.

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An album cover shows in a snap shot how the artist is represented.  By having such an organic and un touched cover is portrays the organic artist that he is.  This is also shown by how he is give the audience and inter-diagic gaze showing that although he is the artist the attention is not on him it is on his music, he is not solely attracting an audience from his sex appeal like many mass produced commercial artists.  

The ace of spades could have many interpretations.  I interpret it as a represent the game that is life an how are star has not "played along" and has gone down another path of loneliness and isolation.  This is further represented by how the Ace of spades is popular in myth and folk law as the "death card" which reflects the death which relates to the Video.  It is also traditionally the best card in the pack, giving our artist a star image of being the above the rest of the "players in the game" that is the country and western genre.

Final cut of our Pop Video

Account of Editing

“Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible  and film medium used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications in various media, performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete output.”

To start our editing process we loaded our footage onto final cut pro which allows us to store this and edit it.  The first thing I did was to break down the footage into useable shots and place them into bins.  I labeled these categories i.e. Sky shots, Derelict shots, and direct and indirect.  However, the footage was already in order and broken into sections from the camera tape.  This was a lot easier than AS and allowed us too shoot for footage and more effectively.

After the ground work was in place we then laid the track down so that when placing shots on the timeline we could be sure to sync them with the music so that the lip syncing was in time.  However, I did have some difficulty when editing to make it as excited as possible as due our act being very organic we kept the script simple, but didn’t want to make the video boring.  This lead to us incorporating jump cuts, blurs and saturation of colour, we did this by using Final cut pro with adobe after effects.  However, I ran into issues with this as it was finding the boundaries where we added enough special effects to add to the cinematic effect without making it look over the top.  Furthermore, it was also a very long process as each individual from had to be edited to achieve the desired effect you cannot just apple the effects to the role video.

The saturation of colour shows what he sees in the world as as opposed to what it is really like as although it is sunny, in his eyes it is tainted with darkness from the loss of his love.

Furthermore, when moving onto the more elaborate editing style we researched into the editing technique of montage.  For inspiration we used one of Russia’s most prominent filmmakers, Sergie Eisenstein, he was essentially the father of montage and our mode of address as inspiration.  He was a huge help in shaping the theme of our video and helped us establish the apocalyptic feel.  This was furthermore exaggerating by the use of intercutting footage of the rubble and decay of urban London with shots of our artist.

In addition, by reversing footage i.e. the clouds this represents how our artist wishing that time could go back and he could change things emphasizes his heartbreak about the death of his love.  This could also emphasize how the world is decaying and blackening and how we wish we could reverse and change the worlds perishing.

Moreover, we subverted the commonly used convention of continuity editing by incorporating the montage technique which is less classical., and tries to shows the symbolic association of ideas between shots rather than simple psychical action for its continuity.  This style of editing worked in our favor as this broken up and jiggered style of editing representing our artists and how he is broken, torn and unstable, not the classical type of country and western he is subverting the genre like we are doing in our editing technique.  It also shows how his life is not smooth cut as it is normally portrayed in the media.  It is more realistic that things aren’t always perfect and he is a perfect representation of how one thing can interrupt your life in such a grand way.

In conclusion I feel through the use of montage, jump cuts and saturation of colour we have achieved an apocalyptic feel and a look into how our artist sees the world, which is very intimate.