Thursday, 23 April 2015

Final Magazine Advert




I have kept the same advert as my draft expect by making a few changes. I wanted to add 'pre-order 'static' album now' which I thought would link my digipak, poster and music video to create synergy. 
I also added a 'available on iTunes' symbol as this is presented on other adverts I have looked at as well as it being linked to the music rather than solely the tour. 

Monday, 20 April 2015

Stuart Hall - Audience Positioning Theory

Encoding and Decoding

Hall says that there are three different positions audiences (receivers) take in order to decode the meanings within cultural texts, particularly televisual discourses. They are the dominant-hegemonic position, the negotiated position and the oppositional position. (Hall 1993, 101)

The Dominant Theory- the reader fully accepts the preferred reading which means they will read the read/view a text the way the 'creator' wanted them to so that the code seems natural.

The Negotiated Theory - The reader partly believes the code and broadly accepts the preferred reading, but sometimes modifies it in a way which reflects their own position, experience or interests.

The Oppositional Theory - the readers social position places them in opposition to the dominant code therefore they reject the preferred reading.


Hall believes that texts have the power to be polysemy (having multiple meanings) allowing readers/audiences to decode it how they like.


Saturday, 18 April 2015

Intertextuality



Iggy Azalea uses the film 'Clueless' as the basis of her music video. The clothing worn in this video is the main intertextual reference in the video to the film. The films acts as a modern remake of the film, almost. The iconic yellow tartan two-piece from the film is a key element in the video and the mise-en-scene in general conveys the 90's style of the film.
Furthermore, the music video opens with a title screen that mirrors that from Clueless and also establishes the theme of the video. Additionally, the video star Iggy choosing her clothing from a tablet which is a modern version of what Cher does in the film, as well as the school location. 




Taylor Swift's music video contains intertextuality of the Shakespeare play Romeo and Juliet. The music video has a twist of the stereotypical tale of a girl wanting a boy that doesn't reciprocate the feelings. It plays on the inter textual reference of a girl that can't get the boy because of the way she looks. 'Jock' goes with the 'head cheerleader' rather than the unpopular nerd.
The story has a twist as they end up being together reflecting the Disney story Cinderella as at the end of the video she's dressed in a white dress as she has found her prince charming.
The video, like Cinderella shows that dreams do come true no matter how obscure they seem.

Our Video 
In our music video we used intertexuality of the biography of Virginia Woolf we thought this would be effective as like these examples creates a connection with a well known story that people may have been previously interested in. However, upon reflection, this may not have been a good option because it requires a literary background and many people from our audience feedback were unaware of why the stones were there.


Laura Mulvey - Male Gaze

Male Gaze Theory- 1975

How an audience view people presented
Feminist think of it in three ways
1) How men look at women
2) How women look at themselves
3) How women look at other women

Mulvey believes that in film, audiences have to view characters from the perspective of a heterosexual male.
Females only exist in relation to the male (LINK to bechdel test)

Mulvey states 2 functions of the female role
1) Erotic object for characters in narrative view
2) Erotic object for audience view

This is shown in the indie music video Bad Habit by The Kooks



The female character is dancing around seductively along with the cut away shots of her body which function is to please the characters watching her online through the webcam (also showing voyeurism) and also for the audience both male and women because according to this theory women view people in the perspective of the heterosexual male.

She says 'females act as an inspiration for males to act'
Male = active role (the looker)
Female = passive role (being looked at)

Scopophilia - the love of watching which derives from Freuds study of the 'Phyche'

Female objectification
'person gazed at - seen as an object to be enjoyed. Objectified characters are devalued.


Monday, 13 April 2015

Feedback about the Ending

After choosing what we wanted our video to end on we showed some of our peers to gather some audience feedback. They all said that they didn't like the way our protaganist looked at the camera at the end therefore we took this out and had a more ambiguous and dramatic ending.





Record Labels

How do record labels distribute music? 
Distribution is how albums get into shops. Distribution companies sign deals with record labels that gives them the right to sell that label's products to record stores that have an account with that distributor. The distributor takes a cut of income from each album sold and then pays the label the remaining balance label to provide them with finished product but sometimes a distrbtor will do an M&D (manufacturing and distribution) deal with a label. With this set up, the distributor will pay for all of the manufacturing costs of an album up front, and then keep all of the income from the album until that initial investment is paid off.


Why is social networking important? 
Music fans turn to social media to keep updated about their favourite bands, whilst new tracks or videos will 99% of the time ger their launch on social channels. 
Furthermore, social media is where music audiences naturally congregate, forming their own launch on social channels. A social media monitoring platform like Brandwatch has multiple use cases for the music industry. The sheer volume of conversation, coupled with the agnostic nature of social media results in a vast body of opinion that can be mined for insight into trends, tastes and purchasing behavior. This is really useful for audience feedback at low costs. It is also useful to measure the 'buzz' around a specific release which will enable labels and distribution to estimate costs and profits etc. 

RISE RECORDS 
 I think this music company would be best suited to our band as many of the artists signed to them are of the same genre; PVRIS, Monsters of Men, In Hearts Wake etc.
Rise was founded in 1991 by Craig Ericson in Nevada City, California, USA. He released a small number of 7" records before putting the label on hiatus to attend college.[2] Ericson didn't release anything further until 1999, after moving toPortland, Oregon.[2] He began issuing small-print 7" records, and his first CD release came in 2000, from the group One Last Thing. The label gave a strong foundation to bands Anatomy of a GhostEver We Fall (who later signed withHopeless) and Fear Before the March of Flames (who signed to Equal Vision). Later signees (e.g. Drop Dead, GorgeousBreathe Carolina and The Devil Wears Prada), gained considerable popularity while with Rise, and moved on to what were larger labels at the time (InterscopeFearless and Ferret, respectively). Rise has also signed some veteran bands, including: Hot Water MusicBouncing SoulsThe BledBleeding Through and From First To Last.
Rise Records' releases are currently distributed nationwide by Alternative Distribution Alliance,[3] by Warner Music Group in many European countries as Germany and Italy, and comprises bands and solo artists. In July 2013, the company moved from Portland to neighboring Beaverton, Oregon.[4]
On September 9, Australian label UNFD announced a distribution partnership with Rise.[5]    

TAKEN FROM THIS SITE




Music Industry

MTV and Fuse are the two main TV channels that show music videos. These two channels are mostly dedicated to music. They also feature original series and specials as well as exclusive interviews, live concerts and blocks of music videos. They accommodate a variety of musical tastes which allows for their audiences to be much wider while still targeting at a demographic of young adults between 18-34. However MTV have recently been targeting a more teenage audience, too
















Now there is a range of ways to watch and access music videos. From the audience feedback i have gathered it is clear that most young people watch music videos online, specifically on YouTube. This is the most easily accessible and it is free. Furthermore, others watch it on music television channel such as the afore mentioned. iTunes is also a place where you can buy music videos to put on smart devices such as phones or tablets etc.


The main purpose of a music video is to sell the song.
However, there are others such as to entertain and give the listener a better understanding of the song (if the video is narrative). It is also to give a better insight to the band/artist themselves which creates more intimacy and therefore will help selling.
Music videos create a memorable visual for the song which will increase the songs chances of selling.
More over music videos are a form of marketing which exposes and expands the artists profile.
The overall purpose is to promote the music so it will increase the sales.


I found an interesting article from the guardian which discusses the rise in vinyl record sales because of the younger generation. Click here for link.



Thursday, 9 April 2015

Evaluation Questions

Question One - 





Question Two - How effective are your ancillary tasks?



Question Three- What have you learnt from your audience feedback? 




Question Four 

Saturday, 4 April 2015

Magazine Advert Draft



 This is my finished magazine tour advert. I decided to use this image as it was favored by our audience feeback. Also as i used it on my digipak i wanted to keep with the consistency of the three products to create a parallel while still making them all easily distinguishable.

I decided to use the conventional black and white colour pallette as our video was in this pallette as well. Furthermore during the research process i found that many adverts of the indie genre were in black and white too.

By using photo shop i was able to make this already eye catching image more interesting. I added the image of the 'star' from our video and merged it into the eye adjusting the opacity etc to create quite a dark mood which corresponds with the darkness of our video. I also copied this and overlapped it on top of the star in the main/background image. I thought this would subtly create a more interesting and aesthetically pleasing advert. Also as we used a lot of voyeurism to show self reflection within our music video i thought i would extend this onto the advert and digipak as well.

For the font i used the same as the font at the beginning of the music video and on my digipak again to create consistency between the three products.

I included the date, venue and city for the information of tour dates as i thought this was the most important information and also took inspiration from the layout of the Arctic Monkeys tour advert.
I decided to do only a UK tour as we are a new band we wouldn't be able to fund a European tour let alone a World tour therefore I researched into small gig venues in the main cities in England and Scotland choosing only six in order to start small.





As I was unsure how Photoshop works I looked at various videos to self teach myself. As well as doing this,by playing around with the different tools allowed me to create the overlapping effect that I did. 

This website/blog was also useful Click here for link

Monday, 30 March 2015

Magazine Advert Research (2)


-Firstly, the most eye catching features of the advert is the image of Miles Kane and the name. I think it is important that these two things are the first things readers see as it will attract them to who is playing and therefore encourage them to read more. Furthermore, the artists name is in the biggest font which catches the readers attention straight away which will entice exisitng fans. The guest artist is placed just below this which will be the next thing audience/readers will read once their attention is caught. This will make for 'Eugene McGuinness' fans to also be interested in the tour as well. This will benefit both artists as they will be sharing fans creating mass publicity. 

-The artist himself appears on the poster which is common in most posters generally and especially in the indie genre. He is looking directly into the camera creating an intimacy between the image and the audience. 

-This poster uses the conventional black and white colour palette with the additional pink writing. This makes for a more interesting poster while still conforming to conventions. Pink usually connotes femininity which is interesting as this artist is male. This may show his individuality and differences to other artists making him stand out and therefore be more attractive to audiences. Indie audiences like new and different music therefore him trying to be different with the way he presents himself will also attract them.

The album is also mentioned on the poster which will make audiences aware of the name of the album so they can easily find and download it. This will make them more interested in the tour especially if they enjoy the album. 

The tour dates are smaller than the locations which suggests importance. They want readers to see if he is performing in a place near them rather than when it is. Furthermore the venues are quite small which is common for indie bands/artists as bigger concert venues are usually for more mainstream artists.
The tour dates are presented in vertically in chronological order. The tour happens over a month travelling through the major cities in the UK. He gives the date, the telephone number and the venue. 

Saturday, 21 March 2015

Digipak


Front Cover 

I chose the isolated tree as i thought it would fit in with the themes of our EP music video, such as isolation and loneliness, without being something from the video directly as it has to also reflect the rest of the songs on the album. However the subtle elements such as the black and white filter and the font type links in well with our video. The theme of nature also comes across which was used throughout our music video and is a convention of the indie genre. 


Inside Cover


I chose this image for the inside as from our audience feedback many people said this was their favorite shot and therefore must have impacted them in some way which i thought would translate well on the digipak. I wanted to use colour on the inside as the whole group loved the green colour of the graffiti. I also thought as we probably wouldn't have every video on the album in black and white it would be nice to have some colour on the digipak as well. Having this on the inside will also give a nice effect for when the digipak is opened it will be more inviting. 



Back



I choose this for the back cover as it links with the narrative of our video as it is by the lake. Also, it is in black and white which goes well with the front cover giving the digipak and all around consistency of the outside. 
Furthermore, it has the star on it which makes up for not having her on the front still showing that star quality theory. 
I have also added a code which is a popular and easy way to access websites etc through smartphones and therefore would be accessible to our audience making it more likely that they'd go and look. This will give more publicity to the star gaining her a bigger fan base and viewing. 

Friday, 20 March 2015

Magazine Advert Research

I have been researching into magazine advertisements from the indie genre and have found that they follow the same conventions has music video such as the theme of black and white.



Thursday, 19 March 2015

Ideas for Digipak

I'm struggling with what to put on the back of my digipak and therefore have made a few drafts to have a better idea of what they look like visually and compare side by side. These are the two I have. I think I prefer the second one as it sticks to the black and white theme and as the front cover doesn't have the star on it i thought i should put her on the rest of the digipak to make up for it. 



Wednesday, 18 March 2015

Final Music Video

It's finished!


Static by Dysphoria is finished! It has changed a lot since our initial idea or ideas but I'm happy with the end result. 

Showcase Evening

Yesterday, after school we showcased our media products to our friends and family. It was nice to see everyone's products and our own as we have worked so hard on it. It was also useful to gather audience feedback especially because we had a mixture of age and gender present. We made feedback sheets which we put out on each chair in hope of getting some nice comments as well as some criticism as we knew our film was far from perfect.





We got many nice comments which was nice to hear as we put so much effort into the making of our video. Majority of people understood the narrative element of our video which was reassuring. Furthermore, many people said they liked the mirror shots and the graffiti and in terms of editing most people said they enjoyed the overlaps and variety of the fast pace and slow pace in contrast with the song.




More Audience Feedback

Tuesday, 17 March 2015

Font Type



When picking a font we wanted our band name font to create a brand. Thinking about this we looked at other indie brands and they mostly had quite bold fonts however we wanted to create something more original while still keeping with the conventions found from my digipak research.

However we stuck with the conventional bold, blocked font with the font of our song name 'Static'.

Therefore we ended up using 'SimHei' for 'Static and 'Humana Serif' for Dysphoria.

DigiPak Ideas

I was thinking about what i want my digipak to look like and whether or not i wanted the 'star' to be on the cover.

I was thinking to maybe not have her on the front solely because she is in majority of shots in the music video. However i still wanted the two to have a strong link therefore i thought having it in black and white might be a nice idea to link them.

I found this image


As it is in black and white it fits with the filter of our video and it also continues the theme of nature we also including in our video. As it stands out and ignores the rule of thirds it makes for a more dramatic and eye catching image. Along with the band name and album/song name overlapped. 

For the inside I wanted one image to stretch across the middle the two that i think would work well is either. 

The mirror shot or the graffiti shot. 



Also i thought it might be nice to have colour in the inside covers as it will open to a pop of colour. 
I thought of this idea after looking at Adele's '21' album as she also as a black and white album however the CD itself is green. 



The front cover of this CD cover demonstrates the melancholic tone that is highlighted throughout the majority of her songs which keeps the consistency. However, i think that the decision to use this pop of colour is really effective especially as it is on the inside of the digipak. 
The target audience will be expecting a melencholic vibe to the digipak thereofore the black and white colour pallete and the positioning of Adele on the cover fits the expectations of the audience. I think this will make them want to buy it more as it will be what they except therefore what they like. I would want to do the same with my digipak in order for a good marketing campaign. 



Friday, 13 March 2015

Evaluation

The Questions 

1)      In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
2)      How effective is the combinations of your main product and ancillary texts?
3)      What have you learned from your audience feedback?
4)      How did you use media technologies in the construction and research, planning and evaluation stages?

Monday, 9 March 2015

Adele - Someone Like You

This music video gave us the inspiration to have our protagonist walking as her whole video is her walking and we thought that, although simplistic, it still made for an effective/ watchable music video.
The pan at the beginning of the video allows the audience to take in the mise-en-scene of the river Seine before she begins to sing.
The majority of video is shot by a backwards and front dolly of her walking and singing from the front and back. However this is done at different b distances away to still add dimension to the video. There is also panning shots of the city which creates a sense of where she is.



 The whole video is all in black and white which is a feature we wanted to include in our own video. As the song is a ballade and carries quite a melancholic tone and message this filter works well as it represents both the sound and lyrics through to the visual.

Thursday, 5 March 2015

Fish Eye Lens

During our last day of filming at the lake we decided to use a fish eye lens attachment. We liked this effect to emphasise the point of view shots that we used. We also thought it would add more dimension to our video as it creates a contrast to the convention style and shows the turning point in the video more clearly. Furthermore, as we played on the theme of water I thought the lens worked quite well with this theme.


Wednesday, 4 March 2015

Grey Scale/ Black and White

We decided to go with the black and white filter on our music video as after looking at many music videos from out genre we found that it was a recurring theme/convention of the indie genre.




The Arabella video stood out to me particularly as it includes both performance and narrative elements which is what we have decided to do with our music video. We also liked the ambiguity of the beginning of the video with the flashes which is what we took inspiration from for our ending.


Here are some more music videos that inspired us to use the black and white filter.







I think the black and white filter adds to the melancholic feel to the video that many indie artist try to create and i think we have followed this convention therefore the filter fits well.

Friday, 27 February 2015

Audience Feedback (2)

After adding in our narrative we wanted to collect some feedback to make sure the message came across well enough and if the ending was powerful enough. The ending is what we wanted to make really dramatic and slightly ambiguous in order to  leave the audience shocked and slightly confused to encourage them to re watch the video. 
As the lake was very shallow we didn't like the effect of actually showing the protagonist in the lake therefore thought it may work well to have the jump in slow motion and then sped up to an empty lake. We got some feedback from the AS class as they have an informed idea of media elements but have not seen the struggles along the way therefore we thought they'd be able to give a non bias opinion. 

Many of them understood the ending and liked the concept which was a relief. They also mentioned many of our editing techniques that they liked and the mixture between performance and narrative. However many said that the ending may be a bit too abrupt and should be faded out a little bit which is easily fixed and that is what we will be working on fixing up until the deadline.

Band Name

We chose 'static' as our song name however when Tara and I were adding the credits to our final video we were unsure about the name. We looked at the lyrics to see if anything stood out to us but nothing did. We then thought, because our video has a lot of sadness and loneliness in the narrative I put 'sadness' into thesaurus to see if anything cool came up. I found 'dysphoria' which i thought sounded appealing and fits with our genre well. 




However, we liked this name for our band name and decided to keep 'static' as the song name and album name. So, we are now Dysphoria.


Wednesday, 25 February 2015

Editing

ITara and I edited all of this morning and again after school when Emily joined us. We have been sticking to the schedule as much as possible which i feel has motivated us to get it done. The new footage has fitted in nicely to our video and I think a narrative was definitely needed as it just adds that something extra to the video and makes it more interesting for the audience as it gives them something to think about.


Tuesday, 24 February 2015

Target Audience

Understanding the target audience is crucial when creating media texts. As our song fits into the indie rock genre i looked into what the audience for this genre is.
The occupational grouping of my audience is that the majority are males between 15-24. However as we have a female singer this will be extended to females too.
Our target audience are most likely to be students as the age range of 15-24 are the peak studying period.

Our target audience will like indie rock, alternative music genres as our song is part of this genre. However they also have a interest in more intense rock music as the music video has similar conventions to these music video conventions.

 Indie rock music is usually dark and troubled which in some cases may be related to.

I think our video fits this well as we have added a suicidal element to it conforming to the darkness that usually reflects the indie music genre.
Horror/thriller films may also be favoured by our target audience because of the dark tone of our video. This is the social grouping of our video.








Filming Schedule

As it's a week until the deadline organising our time wisely is essential for hitting that A grade.
We've set out a filming schedule to know exactly who and where we will be during all of our free lessons.

So, today we stuck to the schedule and Ciara, Tara and I went out and filmed in Forty Hall as Emily couldn't make it. We had a successful (very cold) trip. We went straight back to school to upload and edit for the rest of the afternoon and until we got kicked out of school. We all thought there was a big transformation to the video even after adding a few of the shots from the new footage. We are all feeling much more positive and eager to stick to the schedule and meet the deadline with something we are proud of. 
Here are some photos from the day... 



Audience Feedback

We asked our media class to give feedback on our video so far as we felt they had an informed idea of the criteria and would be able to give constructive criticism.



Looking at our audience feedback we saw a recurring issue that it was 'repetetive' and 'needed something extra' which we decideed to add in after so many people suggesting it. 
We sat down as a group and decided what the extra something could be.

We wanted to portray our protaganist as being trapped as this is what our lyrics presented to us. 
We came up with the idea to show her committing suicide by jumping/walking into a lake. We were inspired when we heard about how author Virginia Woolf killed herself by putting stones in her pockets and walking into a lake.  




Here are the shots that we filmed today.