Evaluation Questions

Evaluation Question 1- In what ways does your music video and digipak use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?

It can be said that our Music video for Blake & the Boy challenges usual conventions for a Indie/pop video with the use of narrative. Most videos are found to act like a film, where the equilibrium is broken, but results in being fixed.  As our video ends on a saddening note, it is considered to challenge these usual ideas and leaves the audience shocked with the ending result. By not only this; but we also aimed to challenge usual conventions but by focusing on the girls point of view, and allowing the video to show the girl in control. This was an idea which was adapted from 'Rihanna - We Found Love' video, as we felt that it came across more powerful showing a relationship where a girl was in charge. This is something most videos do not conform to as it believed that Men are shown to be the more dominant figure. DOMINANCE THEORIST?

It can be argued that the beginning of our music video will conform to real media products because of romance portrayed within the narrative. We decided to portray the girl as a stereotypical 'women in love', allowing the change in the narrative to appear sharper and leave more impact on the audience.

Digipak

The digipak that i created is shown to challenge real media products are it does not show any direct link towards the artist. This can be said as it is to appear mysterious and quirky to fit alongside with the band. As Blake and the Boys genre would not need to carry a straightforward digipak which shows the artist' faces. This type of style is popular with other similar bands and can be considered to conform with the conventions. 

Camera Angles

The camera angles used for the music video generally conformed to the typical conventions of a Indie/pop music video. As the video contains many still shots to capture the objects and the lip syncing, and also panning shots of buildings. The majority of the shots used are mid length, for example the lip syncing shots, only carry the artist's chest and upwards.  This was done so that the artist appear to framed within the white background. It also allowed for us to capture 

her shadow which makes her appear dominant as it shows her emphasis of her standing there. 

As well, the music video carries a 'hand held shot' which allows the audience to see things through 'the artists eyes', this is a very current and modern way of filming and has 
been used to in many music videos of our genre. For example, Lana Del Rey - Video games.

Voyeurism

Rizzle Kicks - Down with the trumpets was one of the main influences we had when we came to deciding our voyeurism, as we understood that the beginning of our song contained a noise which was similar to the static of a TV, we decided to use footage of TV static as our video opening. 

It was then afterwards we decided to use the opening of TV footage as a place to use for our title so that the audience could then tell from the beginning 5Seconds, who the song is written and performed by. 

As seen this technique been done by other artists, it is obvious that this does not challenge any conventions but yet conforms to  the idea as it is likely to be seen in other similar music videos.

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Evaluation Question 2 - How effective is the combination of your music video, advert and your digipak?

I felt that as we tried to make our video appear quirky that it was important that my digipak and and advert was follow through on this quirky theme. Making sure my advert and Digipak contain the same colours so that the audience could begin to recognise/class the selection of colours with Blake and the Boy, I felt that this would be a good technique to do as it would then allow that the audience would attach the connotation of B&TB with the colours used on my advertising. These colours then could become a branding for the band and would be an easy way to remind the audience of the band. Repeating a striking image of the two characters kissing on top of the colours from the digipak helps place the selection of colours together with the artists. It moulds the two images together forming a combination of the both, which reinforces emphasis of the band onto the audience. 

Downloading different fonts from www.dafont.co.uk allowed me to reach a certain font to which would fit and compliment the genre and advertisement. 


The music video links together with the digipak and advertisement as images from the video has been used. This allows the audience to recognise the image and can then locate it in the video, and vice versa. 

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Evaluation Question 3- What have you learnt from your audience feedback?

After completing the audience feedback, It is interesting to see that the video has gained many positive points and has been well excepted by our preferred audience. 

The change in roles, allowing the girl to be the more dominant character was greatly accepted and was said to be an interesting contrast to usual music videos, however it was quoted that 'it wasn't clear that you repeated some of the same shots but filmed to show her falling out of love'.  This was something we tried to do as we aimed to repeat some of the shots, (shown in picture) however it was said that it was only realised that the shots were repeated when notified. 

The use of nature and architecture was liked within the video as it can an urban feel to the video and made it appear rural giving an extra  personality to the characters as you can tell what type of life they lived. It was liked by the audience we asked as they said it was places they could relate to as they weren't unrealistic and posh. 

It was easy to locate audience feedback due to the use of social networking sites,such like Twitter and Facebook as now B&TB can use their time to message people, gaining a idea of what their desired audience felt about the video. 

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Evaluation Question 4- How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?


Using search engines such like google, gave me a vast amount of websites to begin my research. As once I decided the genre for B&TB, it simple to research similar artists with help from youtube, allowing me to have access to previous videos that have been before, allowing me to see what is popular and current for 2012. As youtube allows audiences to comment on the video, i was allowed to collect access to what people were enjoying and what they disliked. 


Music channels such like NME, which focus on the style genre that i was aiming for, were helpful as it allowed me to see which videos are popular due to recent downloads etc.
By building storyboards I was then able to draft an idea of what the video will look like, this let me ask a audience whether it would seem like a successful video. Letting myself get audience feedback at the planning stage, allowed me to save time on filming as it then meant when my storyboard was finished, i knew exactly what i needed to film. 

Using websites such like Prezi to create a presentation, i was then able to present my ideas to a group of 17-18 year olds.

Media pitch on Prezi

siging up to websites such like Twitter and Facebook allowed me to communicate with my group, and let us discuss about our progress and decide on times for us to meet up. This usually was held in conversations via Facebook messages as it was a instant way for us to keep in touch. 

As well as facebook, I set up a B&TB twitter page which then allowed us to gain followers and keep them updated with the progress of our video.

Audience Feedback

Having shown our finished film to 20 Media students, I have now been able to gain an sense of feedback from an audience of our desired target audience. As the audience thats been approached are all girls, it is possible that some of the answers may be biased when questioned about gender.

Q1- Do you think our music video promotes Female Empowerment?

Q2- What genre would you place Blake and the Boy's Music video with?

q3) Which media outlet would you most likely watch our music video on?

After asking the audience, it was concluded that the majority of students would watch the video on youtube, as it is now a quick way to find certain videos and is a strong platform to find newly created music videos. This is because it is quick for the viewer to search what they want to watch where as other outlets usually have a shedule to which they play. However, a minority of the students were in debate agaisnt this, saying that they generally find new videos on chart channels as they previously have found new likings for bands due to being shown their new video on a channel.
Therefore, the general conclusion was that most students who are already fans of the band would watch the video on youtube, whereas some students who might not have been introduced to the band would see the video via music channels.

q4)Did you like our narrative? if yes, what did you like and if no, what did you dislike?
It was found most people that we asked commented positively about the narrative of our music video. They found that it was interesting  that the girl was had the control in the relationship, as this was a theme was recognised as a rare theme within music videos. They commented on the clear change of the relationship breaking. However. Some people were confused to as why there wasnt a happy ending as they expect a certain realness to become at the ending, this conforms to todorov's 5 stages of the equalibrium where it is anticipated that storyline is corrected.

q5)Was our most prominent theme of pairs of objects aparrent and apprioriate for our narrative?

Final Version

Since filming the lipsyncing, we have now been able to finish Blake & the boy's music video. Having to do a little extra filming of objects and certain places to allow us to get different shots and avoid us from having to repeat shots. We are now keen to present our finished version:

BLAKE AND THE BOY - ISLANDS

to the beat

One of the first stages of the our film, where we have cut and cropped bits and placed them to the beat. The song changes beat after this video so that this is the fastest part of the song, meaning from then on our clips can be a lot longer, allowing them to carry more detail as they will be on show for longer.
(Some of the clips have not been muted just yet, and unfortunately add unwanted to sounds the video)

lipsyncing

Update: All lipsyncing is filmed therefore meaning the B&TB's filming has been finished!

This is a video we created which shows some of the out-takes throughout our day of filming. 

Outtakes

a short video which we created to show the outtakes of our filming and a little insight to behind the scenes of our filming sessions!

Advertisement for B&TB

Using colours which i felt compliment my digipaks colour scheme, which is merged into the two members of the band. I decided to merge the two images together as it created a new illusion and only allowed the audience to see a shadow which then acts as a way to hide both of the members. 
The pink which is used for the title has been has not be repeated as it helps emphasise the bands name and allows the name to stand out. 


Adding a quote to the advertisement gives praise to the band and allows them to appeal to the audience further as it may be a quote by a magazine which they read. 


Placing the advertisement on a white background will make the advert stand out as it will not be absorbed by any other distracting images. It also allows the advertisement to be built up by words and the photo of the album cover. This makes it appear simplistic and easy for the audience to read, as they may be in a rush when spotting the advert.

Remaining with the same style as before, this advertisement appears more urban and would be suitable to placed in and around central London. This would be a target audience for the band so it is important that the advertisement is thought about where it will be placed. This design doesn't carry any quotes from other music organisations as it is to appear as simple as possible, due to the writing having a slight graffiti slant to it, it was thought that a quote would be unreadable in the desired font. In this design, the photo is used as the main background, and portrays only Tasha, as she is standing in the middle shows her emphasis on the band and implies her role to an audience who may not be familiar. However, as the image again is one from the video, It will instantly attract fans of B&TB as it will be a recognisable image and will let them be reminded of the recent music video. 
The background has been shown to be distorted allowing the image to be slightly different to the videos shot as this then creates a fresh connotation to the video and also allows to conform to the urban styling which has been aimed for.

Advertisement Anaylsis

This advert is very informative and tells the audience all the correct information quickly. By writing in capitals it means that the writing is clear for the audience to read quickly and not complicated.

The artist is found sitting on a beach which ties in with the quote from the observer annoucing that Friendly Fires is the band of the 'summer'. This means that the audience can put the two images together making it appear more visual for the audience.

Showing the album has won awards makes the album more impressive and pushes the audience into wanting to buy the album.

The colour scheme of this advert are very faded colours allowing for the main image of Mr Hudson holding more emphasis as it is the darkest image. Showing an image of the artist face, allows the audience to become familiar of the artist. This means that they can be reminded of the artist if they have seen him or her previously on other media outlets. Printing Mr Hudson in a bold font makes the name stand out letting the audience to first locate his name and gives emphasis.

Showing the date of when the album is out gives the audience something to look forward too.

Showing other artists that Mr Hudson has collabarated with can interest the audience as it they be a fan of the bands meantioned.

This advert appears to be more simpler and abstract, as it does not show the audience who the members of the band are. Instead it carries artwork which can be linked with the band or have rellevance to its singles.

Giving the website on the advertisement means that audience can reserch more into the band and gain extra information.

Filming

Last time filming with Sam today! Finished gathering all shots needed to document the relationship. Now focusing on getting the last bits of lip syncing and considering whether we need to plan to do some more object filming. Making sure that we have enough footage so that we can now move onto focusing on the editing. 

Voyeurism

After filming the TV screen allowed us to create the voyeurism of our filming which is what we are using for the beginning of our film. The music creates an illusion of the TV noise.

Today's filming

After we constructed a plan for todays filming session, we then went to Forty Hall to do some more filming of the couple. These shots were held in forty hall as we needed to have the couple show to be on location, which helps ties in some of our filming of the fields. This connects the shots as it now shows the couple walking on the same grounds. So that the still shots of the fields can help be used as establishing shots allowing to build up the storyline and create a setting for the two characters. 

Today was a perfect day for filming as the sun was shining and allowed us to gather shots in which were perfectly lighted.

Recent Filming

Recently done some filming of our two characters, Tasha & Sam. This allowed us to finally put together some footage of the two characters allowing our narrative of their relationship to unfold. This filming took place at Katrina's house, and we are soon to be filming later this week to continue with gathering shots of them two. 

Domino Filming

This is a print screen of us putting together the domino shots. We decided to film use moving the dominoes rather pausing and moving the dominoes then proceed to filming. This is why you can see a group members hands in the shot of filming. After quick cutting and editing, we created our stop animation and we are thinking about using the ending shot as our finish for our video. 

Object Shots

Here is a new video that we've put together to show some of the new shots that we have recently filmed. Currently there is no music with this video however we are focusing on getting the basis of our film shot.
This is 37 seconds worth of filming, and we are due to be filming more of Tasha and Sam sometime this week.

36

From this advert in which I came accross quite recently has sparked off ideas which would be suitable for our media video.
The use of the splitscreen helps to convey the idea of the two characters relationship as it is trying to put forward the idea of 'finding your other half'. This is an idea that i thought we could explore in our video as it would give us the chance to show splitscreen and make our video look more stylish and contemporary.
My favorite shot is the shot where the two characters are seen putting on their trousers. This is the shot that i felt would fit to our video the most, as it can be seen simular to some of the certain shots we were already planning on filming.

Recent Filimg

More filming has taken part at our 'Mini studio' at Katrina's house. This involved us filming some more still shots such like Dominoes and Wine glasses. We again used our white and black backgrounds to carry on with our continuity.
During our filming, we decided to take some shots of Tasha, however as they were not planned they do not involve any lip syncing - a task that we are going to be tackling sometime next week.
Majority of our still shots have been worked on however we need to now focus on editing he shots creating our stop animation as that how we will be presenting the dominoes as well as the wine glass

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( a photo taken from an iPhone, showing the filming of the domino box)

NEW digipak idea

After much needed audience feedback, it was questioned that my digipak was originally lacking in substance and that left the audience clueless to what the 'pak' was advertising. Since then, I have focused on adding my newly created Tracklist. Whilst adding the track list to fit on of the digipak, it was difficult to make such words become clear to the reader. (This was another point brought up during the session of audience feedback). This lead me to questioning my colour scheme and although it had been compliment I was still eager to play around with the colours.
Using Photoshop, i inverted the colours which then resulted in the colours changing from purples and blues, to browns and greens.

This was the idea that i was left with, however, I am still left within two minds of the colour scheme as I am still drawn to the idea which I presented to start with. However, I understand that with this digipak the title is much clear to the audience, and can be read much easier.

Blake's joined Twitter

Deciding to join twitter has allowed the advertising of our band to be expanded. This has then allowed us to contact such fans and update them with recent activities. From the tweets shown, we have used the website to hint to the followers to when our music video will be ready. This is something most bands tend to be found doing as it is a good way to keep their audience keen and eager. Twitter has become a main way for people to feel that they are in touch with celebrities and music artists. Which due to the popularity of twitter is why we have resorted in making account, and not with other websites such like 'Facebook.'

Tracklisting

I came up with my tracklist by reading the lyrics of certain The XX and related artists lyrics. I focused on how The XX tend to name their songs with short titles, so i aimed to keep my tracklist with short yet obscure titles.

I felt that the titles would need to keep an abstract feel to match with the digipak and the image of the band.

Saltwater

Flicking Fire

I'm Lashing Out

Islands

Boredom's Getting Higher

Suicide pact Ft. Nina Sky

Stay in Fashion

Waterfall in Slow Motion

Rhyming Slang

86' Charlie 

I have created a song in which features another artist because the style of music they create tends to be remixed. This also is a good way to advertise the band as it can create a wider audience due to the public liking the Artist they have featured with.
This is also a good way to help advertise the album and tease people to buy their merchandise as it can be displayed on the front of the digipak.

Blake & The Boy, Digipak

Following the previous research, i have made my digipak to conform to look abstract. Doing so meant that i used image that have little to none relevance towards the band. In future this can help build up a brand for the band, allowing the public to recognise a band by a simple image. For example, The Weeknd are recognised by

This 'XO' is a symbol that they use to advertise their band. The use of the two letters helps create connotations towards the band meaning that the audience can remind them.

This digipak holds a simple font used for the title, which covers the whole of the front of the CD.

Digipak Research

Atlas - (While we sleep) Digipak is shown to be simple which is similar to The XX. Within this genre of music, Digipaks appear quite obscure and abstract.

"Radio head-Bloom(Jamie XX remix)"

 The Weeknd – Lonely Star (Cralias Remix)

Christmas Holidays

Over the Christmas Holidays, we started to film some of the shots of items which will be played in-between the shots of Tasha & Sam.
Our group is debating whether the brightness has been over used as I am worrying that the clips may look a little over exposed.

Paint

We decided to create our own black boards to use for backgrounds. As we felt that our video would appear a little too repetitive using a white background continuously. We originally set out to buy our own black outs, however whilst on set we decided a shot would look better with a black background, leading us to creating our own. Due to the group being of three people, we found that painting the new backgrounds did not waste anytime.

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The technique of Snorri-Cam has been used throughout this whole video. This is a technique that would be interesting to use as it is a quirky way to film the characters within our music video. It helps portray a shaky/handheld feel to the video but yet still remains to capture a clear shot.